Good Bait

55

The warrants were issued: Michael John Carter and Leslie Arthurs for the murder of Valentyn Horak and two others, identities as yet unknown; Carter also on three counts of inflicting grievous bodily harm with intent and for conspiracy to supply cocaine and cannabis; Kevin Martin, Douglas Freeman and Jason Richards for conspiracy to murder and inflicting grievous bodily harm. Gordon Dooley for the importation, repackaging and distribution of cocaine and cannabis and for conspiracy to inflict grievous bodily harm. Anton Kosach for money laundering, conspiracy to traffic human beings into the UK for the purposes of forced labour and conspiracy to traffic women for the purposes of sexual exploitation.

Officers from Serious and Organised Crime Command, Homicide and Serious Crime Command and SOCA were involved, along with others from SO 19, Armed Response, and Operation Support. Close on four hundred, all told.

An hour before sunrise.

Synchronised raids.

Two Metropolitan Police helicopters were on standby, their initial use denied by the noise involved, the necessity of surprise.

At the briefing, in a primary school just south of the river, Burcher had emphasised the importance of coordination, keeping all phone traffic and radio contact to a minimum, nothing that might constitute a warning.

‘And if I see some scumball reporter from the Sun or Sky News within spitting distance of any part of this before we’re through, I’ll track back the leak and when I find who was responsible, personally hang them by the balls off the middle of Westminster Bridge, am I clear?’

He was clear.

Warren Cormack went over the details a final time: timing, location. Six addresses in South London, two within a couple of streets of one another, which raised potential difficulties due to the number of officers necessarily present in a relatively small area. The most recent information had all targets in situ. Thanks to Google Earth, every targeted address had been theirs in glorious full colour; every side passage, back entry, dormer window, every crack in the masonry.

Charlie Frost put in a few words about SOCA’s involvement and made a case for Kosach being the most important single target, with Gordon Dooley a close second. Karen stood a little to one side, not called upon to address the troops and not minding; her place at the top table clear and reserved, her team crucially involved.

‘Not wetting your feet on this one?’ Ramsden said to her with a grin, the briefing over, personnel moving away.

‘Too senior. Leave the heroics to others. Sit back and garner praise.’

There was a brightness in Ramsden’s eyes, the expectation, the testosterone dripping off him like sweat. All geed up to go over the top, in with the milk, what he was born for or so it seemed.

Karen looked around the now almost empty hall. In what? An hour, two at most, they would know how successful they had been.

Les Arthurs was tucked up in bed, sleeping like a baby.

Dougie Freeman, alerted by sounds below, bolted up the stairs to the attic, thence through a narrow window and out on to the roof, bollock naked, his efforts loudly applauded by the officers who had taken up positions on the rooftops to either side.

Kevin Martin, reactions dulled by a considerable amount of wine and spirits the night before, to say nothing of some quite energetic sex with his half-brother’s wife, had barely time to swing his feet round towards the floor before two pairs of hands seized hold of him and pushed him the rest of the way, face squashed sideways against the carpet. Fay Martin, leaning back against the headboard as she reached for her cigarettes, seemed as much concerned that she had snagged one of her nails as anything else.

Jason Richards had been on his way back from the bathroom, woken as usual by the need to pee, when the first police vehicles arrived; minicab for the woman who lived opposite, he thought, early shift at the hospital, but then when he glanced out through the blinds he knew it was something else.

Trousers, shirt, jacket, shoes: Walther PPK from the wardrobe shelf.

‘Here,’ he said, tossing his mobile to the startled Italian waiter with whom he’d spent the night. ‘Gordon Dooley, the number’s in there. Dooley. Tell him to scarper.’

And he was gone.

Out through the side door of the kitchen into the adjoining garage, out again from there into the rear garden, two shapes ahead of him crouching, waiting; one foot up on the dustbin and he was over the side wall and running; only a weak trellis between the next pair of gardens and he crashed through it, vaulting a low brick wall to the rear and then past a garden shed and a greenhouse into a narrow passage between the backs of two houses and out on to the adjacent street.

Empty.

Cars parked close at either side.

There was a children’s playground at the far end and beyond that a high-rise that was a warren of stairwells and walkways, a good quarter of the places squatted or empty.

He was running, keeping low, close alongside one of the lines of parked cars, when the first officer appeared suddenly ahead of him, just three car lengths away, arms spread, blocking his path.

No time to change direction, Richards decided to go through him, straight-arming him in the chest, following up with his shoulder, the officer — young, Asian — grabbing hold of Richards by the back of his jacket, the momentum sending them both sprawling across the pavement, stumbling up by way of some garden railings, a privet hedge, the officer with his arm now around Richards’ neck and squeezing hard, Richards choking, reaching into his pocket for the Walther and swinging it round into the policeman’s face — once, twice — hard enough to open the skin above the cheek, below the eye, the grip loosening but not failing; one more blow with the pistol against the side of the head behind the ear and the officer’s legs gave beneath him, his fingers closing nonetheless on Richards’ collar and dragging him down, the pair of them on their knees — all of this happening in moments, seconds, sounds of pursuit ever closer, gaining — ‘Leggo, you stupid fuck!’ — no let-up in the officer’s grip, Richards pressed the muzzle of the gun against his shoulder and fired.

Shock lancing across the policeman’s eyes.

Richards scrambling to his feet and running.

Ahead, a police vehicle swerved broadside across the road, cannoned against two parked cars and swung to a halt, doors opening, armed officers in helmets, full protective clothing, jumping out, the wheels still spinning.

The first of them dropped into a firing position at the pavement’s edge, shouted a warning.

Headlong towards him, Richards raised his weapon, pointing.

The marksman called a second warning, then dropped him with a single shot to the chest that seemed — surely an illusion? — to lift him off the ground, legs bicycling in the air, before he dropped down, seconds from dying if not already dead, blood beginning to trickle slowly from beneath the body, filigreeing its way along the cracks between the paving stones and down towards the gutter.

It was to Mike Ramsden’s great disappointment that his own involvement was less dramatic. Having pulled strings in order to nab his target, Mad Mike Carter, he was disappointed to find Carter in shorts and singlet, sitting cross-legged on the mat in the basement he’d adapted into a home gymnasium, sweaty and smiling after the first half-hour of his regular early-morning workout.

‘Didn’t have to come through the front door like a fuckin’ train, you know? Could’ve rung the fuckin’ bell.’ Rising, he threw the towel from round his neck towards Ramsden. ‘Here. Put in a bit of time, why don’t you? Looks like you could fuckin’ use it.’

He was still laughing as, arms pulled sharply back, the cuffs were snapped shut behind him.

Alerted by the phone call, Gordon Dooley made his getaway minutes before the police arrived; avoiding a roadblock by driving across two suburban gardens, scattering shrubs and rose bushes like some profligate guerrilla gardener, before accelerating over the centre of a roundabout and away, leaving two pursuing vehicles in his wake. One of the police helicopters picked him out, fifteen minutes later, his distinctive Porsche Cayenne SUV heading east along the M26 at upwards of one hundred miles an hour.

Time, just, to close the motorway at exit 4 and channel him south along the A228 towards Leybourne and West Malling, where, this time, the roadblock was more comprehensive, helicopter hovering low now overhead.

No fool, Dooley slowed, stopped, stepped carefully from the car, hands raised, and began to walk towards a phalanx of armed officers. Following instructions, he lay face down in the centre of the road, arms stretched wide, legs apart.

Almost a full sweep.

Almost.

When the SOCA officers, supported by others from SO 19 and the Major Crime Investigation team of the local Surrey force, arrived at Anton Kosach’s residence, the bird, as the saying goes, had flown.

All that awaited Charlie Frost and his team, alone in that sprawl of a house and grounds, were Letitia and her son; Danya still in his bed, surrounded by stuffed animals and posters of animated superheroes, Letitia in a white towelling dressing gown, sitting at the breakfast bar in the kitchen with a cup of lemon and ginger tea.

When asked about her husband’s whereabouts, she shrugged. ‘How the fuck should I know? Maybe he went out for a pint of milk.’

It was all Frost, normally the most self-contained of men, could do to stop himself slapping her round the face.