Vanished

Chapter 16

When Jack finally entered the squad room, ready with his rehearsed excuse about traffic jams, only Laura was at her desk. She knew he was there, but she refused to look up. ‘The DCI had to go. He said write up your interview with Hester and put it on his desk. He’ll read it when he gets back.’ Jack asked when that would be. ‘Well, I don’t know, Jack. I’m not his secretary.’

Jack hated the impersonal nature of handing over vital information via a written report. He was adamant that you couldn’t properly convey priority and importance in words on a piece of paper. Jack was far better at verbal handovers, which is why he decided straightaway that he would stick around until Ridley got back. After a good twenty minutes, Jack could still feel Laura’s eyes burning into the back of his neck.

‘Go on then,’ she snapped. ‘I mean, you’re writing one hell of a report over there, Jack, so, go on, tell me what she said to you that she didn’t say to me.’

‘Avril Jenkins was making and selling hemp oil.’

Laura leapt from her desk and rushed to Jack’s side, hands on hips. ‘What the hell! Avril Jenkins is our drug dealer?!’

‘No... well, the cannabis might be hers, but the other stuff’s in a different league.’ Laura asked how Hester knew about Avril’s drugs empire and why she didn’t mention it during her first interview. ‘Because you weren’t there asking about Avril, you were asking about Adam. And I expect she didn’t want to get her friend into trouble.’

‘Oh, but she mentioned it to you!’ Laura huffed.

Jack’s growing impatience with Laura’s petulance finally flared up. ‘Laura, Avril wasn’t dead when you spoke to Hester.’ He took a couple of seconds to regain his composure. ‘Nothing about my interview will reflect badly on you... so chill out and make us both a coffee.’

Laura spun on her heels and headed for the coffee machine. She wouldn’t have taken such a sexist comment from anyone but Jack: the impromptu demand for hot drinks was normal. It was what partners did. In fact, he made coffee for her far more frequently than she made it for him.

At 7.20 p.m., Ridley walked into the squad room and it was plain to Jack that he’d forgotten all about their planned catch-up. Jack figured that whatever Ridley had been doing must have been important, so he ignored his frustration and started their handover with the big bombshell that Adam Border was indeed the son of Avril Jenkins.

‘Yes, well, we knew that really, didn’t we?’ Ridley said dismissively. ‘Hester was just confirming it.’ Ridley walked straight past Jack and into his office. Jack couldn’t believe the blatant lack of interest. Nonetheless, he again gave Ridley the benefit of the doubt and followed him.

‘There’s a further connection to Amsterdam, sir. It’s where Adam’s dad lived, and he was perhaps dating a girl from there. And of course, Jessica Chi had an address in the Netherlands.’ Ridley listened in silence, without his usual questions and challenges. ‘Hester confirmed our theory about Avril producing hemp oil for sale. The bottle found in Jessica’s bag is with toxicology to determine its strength and if it could actually be made from the plants in Avril’s greenhouse. But there’s no reason to doubt Hester’s statement. And the hundreds of small bottles that SOCO found in the outbuildings make sense now.’

Ridley rubbed his brow as though he was fending off a headache. ‘I’ll hand all of this over to Steve in the morning. Can I have your report, so I don’t forget anything? How do we think the cannabis connects to the class A stuff we found?’

‘I was thinking this through on the drive back,’ Jack said, pulling up a chair. ‘This cannabis factory could have been a mother-and-son endeavour, with Avril and Adam making CBD oil for medicinal purposes to sell to a small group of people. They’d make a decent profit, but nothing life changing — not after the debts Avril was left with and with that huge house to run. Adam could have been selling it in Amsterdam, maybe with Jessica Chi, maybe with the as-yet-unidentified Dutch girl. It would have been far less risky to do it there than here. At some point, I think Adam must have attracted the attention of dealers who offered him the opportunity to think bigger. I mean, he had access to a mansion and extensive grounds, he already grew cannabis without detection, and his eccentric mother kept visitors at bay better than a Rottweiler. Then maybe Avril started to get scared. I’ve seen the guys who attacked her and — although there’s no footage of her murder — it has to have been them who did it. She had gang members taking over her home. Her life. Adam either left or was removed from the picture, so she was on her own. I think this is when she started calling us. She wanted our help but couldn’t tell us the whole truth for fear of arrest.’

‘Write it down. Add it to your report.’

Jack was stunned by Ridley’s lukewarm response. ‘None of it’s fact, sir. It’s just speculation. We need the evidence to back it up. We should bounce the theory round, ’cos it might have holes in it.’

Jack was getting worried about the integrity of the case. They were working closely with an exceptional team at the Drug Squad and if they presented ill-considered, half-arsed theories with nothing to support them, they’d be a laughing stock in no time.

‘Sir, are you OK?’

Ridley repeated his request for Jack to write up his report, including his theory about the movement and distribution of the cannabis oil. ‘We’ll use the experience of the Drug Squad and trust them to check out the suggestions we’re putting forward. That’s what they do. They won’t provide us with murder theories in their entirety — they’ll pose questions and expect us to find the solutions. That’s what we do.’ Ridley pressed his fingertips down on the desk, leant forwards and pushed himself to his feet. He was trying to look calm but Jack’s desire to work on when it was already so late was starting to piss him off. ‘I know working with outsiders isn’t your forte, Jack, but they are on the same team as you.’ Ridley pulled his raincoat off the coat rack in the corner of his office, bringing the conversation to an end.

Jack answered back before he’d given himself time to think.

‘It’s not the outsiders who are the problem, sir.’

Ridley froze with his back to Jack and waited for whatever was coming next. Jack replayed the words that had just emerged, unedited, out of his mouth. There was no taking them back, so he ploughed on. ‘Working with you on this case is like working with any other DCI in the nick — and that’s not good enough. You’re supposed to play devil’s advocate at every turn and make me work hard for every step forward in the case. You’re supposed to question me and doubt me, so that I double-check every detail and make certain that I never let you down. Since when do you just go through the motions? It’s like you’ve already retired.’

Ridley spun to face Jack. ‘Who do you think you’re talking to? You think we’re friends in here? I’m your boss! And if naming ceremonies and wedding invitations are confusing the issue, then it all stops. Right now!’ Ridley slid his hand into the inside pocket of his raincoat and spun his wedding invitation through the air towards Jack. ‘I’m not your partner, DS Warr, Laura is. You need a pat on the head, get it from her. Stop being so fucking needy.’

Ridley left his office without another word.

Jack was in shock. At first, he tried to make sense of what had just happened, then he realised that the far greater issue was how the hell they’d find their way back from the insults they’d just thrown. Jack stood in the middle of Ridley’s office for what seemed like an age and finally decided that there would be no way back for them.

He looked up to see Ridley standing in the doorway. His eyes were lowered, and they flicked around the worn grey carpet, searching for the words he needed.

‘I’m not retiring. I’ve got cancer.’