Vanished

Chapter 33

Jack and Ridley stood together in the darkened room. To their left, Anik stood with Josh, Mal, Moley, Mike Tulley, Edgar Matthews and Steve — his new team.

The blackout blinds were drawn and the seven screens showed the view from seven body-cameras. Seven officers, all dressed in black, carrying what looked like AR15 semi-automatic rifles crouched in a circle, each filming the others. There was no sound as six of the officers intently listened to the one in charge. On a specific instruction, each officer placed one hand on the back of the person to their left and ripped away a black velcro flap of material to reveal the word POLICIJA.

The seven officers moved quickly along the bare brick exterior wall of a block of flats. A gloved hand input a numbered sequence onto the main door’s keypad, and they crept inside. They immediately ran to the concrete spiral staircase and, without pausing, they slammed their backs against the wall, pointing their guns at the higher floors as they crept upwards. Once they’d passed the door marked 1 AUKŠTE, the officer at the rear turned for a moment to make certain that no one came through the first-floor door and ambushed them from behind.

He did the same again as they moved passed the second floor. At the third floor door, the team kept low as they snuck through and into the corridor. They crouched for a second, quickly scanning left and right before setting off again. Outside flat number 23, they split and crouched in two groups of three on either side of the door. The seventh officer took up his position directly opposite their target flat. Guns were raised to the shoulder and the door was silently opened with a copied key card.

A slender young woman with a small protruding baby-belly, sat on the sofa watching TV with her feet up on a footstool. Although no sound came from the screens, the speed with which she jumped up showed that she was being shouted at to comply. Two officers aimed their guns at her and she dropped to her knees and placed her trembling hands on her head. She laced her fingers, bowed her head, and sobbed.

Seconds later, a door from within the flat opened and a shirtless man stepped out. He was a handsome man in his sixties, with black stubble and thick, iron-grey hair. He seemed calm but was tight-lipped with anger. He shouted through the line of guns at the officers beyond as he inched forwards, pointing at the terrified woman on the ground. It was only when one of the officers lifted her to her feet and sat her back on the sofa, that their target appeared to relax. He then turned his back to the guns, knelt down and allowed his hands to be cuffed behind his back.

Steve Lewis high-fived his ‘A-Team’ before moving to Ridley and Jack. ‘That’s Michael Mahoney. Not sure who she is, ’cos his mistress is in protective custody after we found her in his three-acre Spanish hideaway last week. She’s pregnant, too, and wouldn’t give this scumbag up because he promised to leave his wife and marry her.’ Steve smirked. ‘I bet she talks when she sees his pregnant Lithuanian mistress.’

The lights flicked on, and Jack could feel the sting around his retinas as his pupils shrunk away from the sudden, fluorescent brightness.

‘Come into my office, guys, and I’ll get you bang up to speed,’ he said cockily.

Jack noted not only Steve’s disrespect for Ridley but also the fact that he was supposed to have been keeping them up to speed on a daily basis.

Steve’s office was as neat as a new pin and his shiny new coffee machine made every type of caffeinated beverage you could wish for. It was style over substance, Jack thought: Just like Steve.

‘When we brought in...’ Steve tutted at his own memory lapse. ‘I’ll get the name for you... his three-acre-Spanish-hideaway mistress, she gave us the Lithuanian steer. Their police force was already watching flights between Vilnius Airport and London, not knowing they could be observing anything as big as what we’ve got going on. We quickly identified flight patterns — Vilnius to London, sure, but also Vilnius to Leeds Bradford. Mahoney took a flight from Leeds to Vilnius the day after Avril Jenkins was murdered. He’s being extradited tomorrow. Then he’s ours. We’ll break him.’ Steve set his extravagant coffee machine going. ‘We may have just brought in the head honcho of an international drugs ring, and the man who ordered your double murder.’

The small hairs on the back of Jack’s neck bristled. If Ridley were his normal self, right now, Jack thought, he’d put you back in your sanctimonious cage.

‘One of the low-hanging fruit,’ Steve continued, ‘one we’ve been softening up for a couple of weeks, has a passport that goes nowhere other than Belgium. We combined forces, using Visser as our liaison and, two days ago, we seized a huge shipment destined for the UK: 34 kg of cocaine, 470 kg of cannabis and 15 kg of cutting agent, hidden inside metal rollers used to make industrial conveyor belts. Once we knew what we were looking for, we found evidence of eighteen similarly sized shipments, moving in exactly the same way over the past two years. That’s an estimated 68 million pounds’ worth on the streets. Once the shipments hit the UK, they got split and distributed across the country and on to Ireland.’ Jack made a mental note of yet another mention of Ireland. ‘As well as numerous small-fry, we arrested fourteen gang members from higher up the ladder. Some of them are already talking, passing the buck and doing deals for easier rides. It seems...’ Steve left a dramatic pause in order to build the tension, ‘amongst the arrests, we have one of your trio of killers.’

Jack and Ridley drove back to their own squad room, both silently churning over the idea of interviewing Avril Jenkins’ potential killer. They were both pissed off not to have been in on the arrest... or more to the point, not to have even known about the arrest. But none of that was worth agonising over now. Now they had to get justice for Avril.

Ridley broke the silence. ‘What the hell is the link between all of that and Avril Jenkins? Why did they choose her and why did they kill her? And Adam Border... how does he fit in?’ Ridley’s questions were the exact same ones that were swimming around in Jack’s head.

‘Sir, from what I understand, DCI Lewis has got Mahoney down as kingpin because someone told him that’s who he was. We should reserve judgement. Lewis moves far too quickly. He’s arrested dozens of people and has no actual clue who he’s got.’

Ridley nodded, and then took a deep breath. ‘Unless the top guy is our missing Adam Border — which I doubt, because I think he’s long dead. That’s the reason we’ve been unable to trace him.’

The whole of Ridley’s team — including key uniformed officers from early on in the investigation — were gathered in the squad room ready for the big update. Ridley didn’t say too much about the drugs angle, but instead focussed on one of the men suspected of Avril Jenkins’ murder who was being escorted across to their station in the next two hours.

‘Jack and I will interview. Anik, stay on top of whichever member of the Drug Squad you think will be the most forthcoming.’

‘That’ll be Moley, sir.’

‘Fine. Keep on him. Hour by hour if you have to. And if DCI Lewis feels the need to get involved, you let me know. Regardless of the lack of communication, we are where we need to be. Our job now is to find every existing connection between the new names — such as Mahoney — and the Jenkins house, including confirmation whether Adam Border is deceased. These are threads that the Drug Squad will have no interest in tying up. Anik, feed everything back to Laura and we’ll figure out the relevance from here. Thank you, everyone, for your patience and hard work. It’s been disjointed, but you’ve all stuck with it, aiming for the bigger picture. We’re nearly there.’

Ridley’s mobile pinged, telling him that their suspected killer had just arrived in the custody area.

‘Ready, Jack? I don’t know about you, but one out of three isn’t good enough for me.’