Authors: Peter Helton
Fishlock shook his head. ‘He never mentioned it. He said there was a shotgun inside the car, sawn-off, but he left it.’
McLusky took out his mobile. ‘Okay, you did well. What’s his full name?’
‘Ian Geary.’
‘Address?’ He called Albany Road and left a long message to be passed on to Fairfield.
Immediately
. The memory of seeing her in bed with Louise intruded and made him stumble
for a moment, but he swallowed it down. He listened to the DC reading some of the message back, then added: ‘I got an anonymous tip-off.’ He folded his mobile, pushed his empty cup
towards Fishlock and nodded at the enamelled coffee pot on the stove. ‘If there’s any left.’
At Gooseford Farm, McLusky left his car on the track, where it would cause the most obstruction. The Land Rover was in the yard, the tractor in the shed, and he could see the
quad bike in the lee of the house. He should, of course, have gone by the book and brought some backup, since there was a firearm involved, but Farmer Murry would have had ample time to get rid of
the gun if he felt like being difficult. McLusky didn’t expect violence, and when the front door opened and Murry stepped out, he knew from his expression that he wasn’t going to get
any.
‘Morning, Mr Murry. I’ve come for the gun.’
Murry just nodded, stuck his hands in his pockets and shrugged deeper into his jacket before leading the way across the yard. Inside a large storage shed full of plastic drums and sacks, he
reached behind a stack of wooden fence panels leaning against the back wall and produced a three-foot-long bundle. He unrolled the dirty piece of cloth and let it drop to the ground. ‘Look
what they’ve done to it.’
Even with twelve inches missing from the barrel, and despite McLusky’s loathing of all gun fetish, he could see why Murry had taken the thing. The over/under shotgun was the closest a
weapon could come to a work of art. Its stock was polished walnut, the side plates delicately engraved, depicting hills and game birds, surrounded by intricate scrollwork. The birds were
gold-plated, the trigger looked to be solid gold. ‘Thank you, Mr Murry.’ The farmer placed it into his outstretched hand. ‘It’s valuable, is it?’ McLusky asked.
‘Even needing the barrels replacing – about five grand. It’s Italian.’ He looked straight at the inspector, as though weighing him up. ‘It’s not as though he
needed it any more. And it looked as though he was up to no good with it.’
McLusky broke open the gun. It was loaded. He checked the safety was on and began to walk away. ‘We’ll be in touch, Mr Murry.’
Murry came after him but stopped at the door of the shed. ‘I know it was wrong, but … it was just so … Will I be charged, do you think?’ he called.
‘Almost certainly. I’m sure I’ll think of something.’ Theft, obstruction, wasting police time, greed and stupidity for starters. And selling red diesel to his neighbours.
More than likely it was a puddle of Murry’s diesel that had caused the crash in the first place.
McLusky stuck the gun under the driver’s seat, then turned the car around in the yard. The temperature in the MiTo was still quite acceptable. All the other places he inhabited seemed to
be cursed with heating problems: the Mazda, home …
Heating
. A crystal-clear image appeared in his mind: his kitchen stove and three gas rings burning on full, with the kettle left
sitting on top. He put his foot down and skidded away, wheels spinning in the snow, towards town.
‘Not our usual hour this, middle of the afternoon, not a good time at all,’ said the team leader. The drug-squad team had arrived at their assembly point near the
Bishopston address, not far off the Gloucester Road. Fairfield and the team leader were exchanging last-minute notes, standing in the snow behind one of the two vans. There weren’t many notes
to exchange; it was a rush job.
The leader of the heavily armed squad looked as unhappy as he sounded. Fairfield knew the responsibility for the arrest was his alone and he could still refuse to go ahead. ‘I knew you
wouldn’t be happy, but we can’t wait until the early hours so you can ruin his beauty sleep. Forensics have finally decided that the heroin in the crashed BMW is the source of the pure
heroin that’s been causing people to overdose, and the twit who’s flogging the stuff lives at this address. The target’s name is Ian Geary.’
‘But nothing definite on the gun.’
‘No. The crashed dealer had a shotgun in the car. That’s accounted for, but we found a magazine for a Beretta, and that gun is missing.’
‘I want my misgivings noted.’
‘I share your misgivings, but we can’t allow the bastard to go out on the street tonight and sell more of the stuff. He also told a friend he was going to lie low, so he might change
addresses.’
‘Right. In we go, then. Same routine as ever: you and your DS stay close behind and take instructions from me. Any gunfire – you don’t wait to be told, just get to cover. And
please remember that a car doesn’t constitute cover. I had to point this out to one of your CID friends before: cars are made of tin foil, bullets go right through them, okay? Think brick
wall, not garden fence.’
Yeah, yeah. Fairfield hooked her thumbs into her bulletproof vest and nodded sincerely, and sincerely wished they’d get on with it. When the call that ruined her Sunday afternoon came, she
had been a couple of worlds away from this dump, and from testosterone-flooded blokes toting MP5s and Glock 17s. The team leader thumped on the back of the van and Fairfield nodded to Sorbie, who
had stayed in his car. Sorbie looked bored, but Fairfield knew that was for the benefit of the drug squad. The target lived at the third house on the left side of the street.
They charged around the corner in single file, holding on to each other, the man with the heavy ram near the front. The wooden front door offered little resistance and caved in after two hits,
and the man with the ram was nearly trampled by his colleagues rushing inside. ‘Armed police! Listen to my voice!’ bellowed the leader while thundering up the stairs, as other officers
shouted, ‘Clear! Clear!’ from the downstairs rooms. ‘Show yourself! Keep your hands where we can see them! Armed police!’
Fairfield was third behind the leader as they reached the upper floor of the little house. MP5 levelled, the second man booted open a bedroom door. ‘Police … ah, shit.’ He
turned around and poked his gun around a couple more door jambs, but the search was over. There was no one else, and they’d found Ian Geary.
Someone else had found him first. Even the team leader looked uncomfortable; he probably didn’t know he was grim acing. ‘I think that probably comes under the category of
he
suffered a sustained attack
. Jesus, he must have pissed someone off.’
For Fairfield, the sight confirmed that the first day off she had had in weeks was now irredeemable.
Sorbie looked over her shoulder in the narrow doorway. ‘I’m glad he’s still wearing his underpants. Not sure I want to see what’s left under there.’
‘Is that the bloke you saw at the back of the squat in Easton?’
‘No, that bloke had a face.’
‘DS Sorbie …’
‘I really can’t tell, honest, Kat.’
‘Looks like they tied him to a chair but the chair collapsed,’ Fairfield said.
The body lying in a large pool of blood and the splintered remains of a kitchen chair was naked apart from one sock and a pair of boxer shorts. Both had probably been white but were now
saturated with darkening blood. Blood seemed to be everywhere: on the floor, the double bed, the walls, the flimsy curtains drawn across the window. Somewhere in the mess where his face had been,
she could make out a blood-soaked gag among the exploded skin tissue and shattered teeth.
‘I’m not going further in there, obviously,’ said the drug-squad leader, ‘but I can see the handle of a cricket bat poking out from that mess on the floor. Bet
that’s what did it.’
‘We can safely leave all that to SOCO.’
‘But it looks like McLusky got
something
right at last,’ Sorbie said.
Fairfield whisked around and pushed past him towards the stairs. ‘Shut up, DS Sorbie, and get on with something.’
Unaccustomed warmth greeted McLusky when he pushed through the door into his flat. The temperature in the kitchen would have been pleasant, even, had it not been for the fact
that there seemed to be no air left. There was an unpleasant smell, too. The kettle, which had boiled dry a long time ago, sat above the flames, blackened, buckled and pulsing with red heat. He
turned off the gas and, armed with oven gloves, carried the kettle to the sink. He managed to free the lid and opened the tap, and even while doing it knew it was a stupid idea. Superheated steam
shot upwards and temporarily blinded him. He dropped the kettle; it jumped and banged and crackled and sent acrid fumes his way. ‘Marvellous.’
His phone rang; it was Austin. ‘We have an ID for the flyover guy. We traced the serial number on the wheelchair, easy-peasy; it’s a Darren Rutts.’
‘Good job.’
‘And he lived not far from your place. Another council flat; Deedee already picked up the keys.’
‘All right, what’s the address? I’ll meet you there.’
Despite the proximity, McLusky took the car. He passed the scorched community centre on the way. The burnt-out floor had boarded-up windows, and scaffolding had gone up
outside. Austin and Dearlove had arrived before him. Dearlove handed over the keys and they entered the building in order of seniority. At the flat, McLusky rang the bell and knocked.
‘He lived alone, apparently,’ Dearlove said.
‘That doesn’t mean he can’t have his auntie staying over.’ McLusky used the keys and threw open the door. ‘Yup, they’ve been. Same scenario; place is a
tip.’
‘Could be he lived like that?’ Dearlove suggested.
‘Not in a wheelchair, you nit,’ Austin said. ‘How was he going to get through that lot?’
‘That lot’ was a mess of papers and books tumbled off the waist-high shelves that ran around the sitting room. There was a desk that looked plundered, its door and drawer open, the
contents of its tabletop swept to the floor. There was no computer. McLusky looked around for a telltale charger that would point to a missing laptop, but saw nothing.
‘Deedee, go to the kitchen and open the bin.’
‘That’s what I joined for: the glamour.’
‘See if there’s house keys in there.’
Dearlove obliged. Half a minute later he reappeared, holding the keys aloft. ‘Well, what do you know?’
‘Not a lot,’ Austin said, and snatched the keys off him. ‘Definitely the same bastards, then.’
While waiting for the SOCO team to arrive, McLusky gingerly sifted through the papers strewn on the floor: bills, bank statements – no luxuries there – and correspondence with the
hospital; no personal letters. A name caught his eye and he snatched up the dog-eared letter. ‘Well, we were looking for something to connect our victims – how about Mike Oatley and
Darren Rutts having the same social worker? I just found an appointment letter from Mr Justin Hedges.’
‘They lived in the same area, stands to reason. I take it you want me to check if he had dealings with Deborah Glynn as well?’
‘Discreetly. I don’t want him prepared. In the meantime, I’ll try and meet up with him and see how he reacts when the name comes up.’
‘Stuff’s melting everywhere. I hate slush,’ Sorbie said as he got into the passenger seat beside Fairfield.
‘It might be melting, but it’s hardly balmy. It was
freezing
in that place with all the doors open all day.’ What Fairfield craved was to sit by the fire in a warm,
spacious room lined with books – and she had an open invitation to do just that – but the day wasn’t over yet and their destination was Albany Road station for a lot of desk work.
There could be a connection between Ian Geary’s murder and the series of killings McLusky’s team were investigating, but until there was any evidence of it, Geary was her case. It
wasn’t much, but it was better than scooping up dead junkies. The lack of sleep was taking its toll: several times she had called the dead man
Dreary
by mistake. It was exactly how the
day had felt, and the dirty melting snow squelching under the tyres just rounded it off.
Fairfield instinctively avoided the Gloucester Road, forgetting it would be quite driveable on a Sunday night, and dropped south towards Albany through a network of familiar streets that took
them close to her own neighbourhood. When she saw the lights of a large newsagent’s at a street corner, she stopped opposite and jumped out. ‘Won’t be a tick,’ she told
Sorbie, leaving him no time to get in a request for a chocolate bar before she slammed the car door.
Five minutes later she emerged on to the street with a box of matches and a tin of small cigars. She paused by the side of the road to unwrap and light one and sent a blue cloud of smoke towards
the sky.
‘When did you start smoking? And cigars at that?’ Sorbie asked when she slid back into the driver’s seat.
She ignored the question. ‘Open the window if it bothers you.’
‘It’s not that it bothers, me; actually, I quite like—’ His airwave radio coming to life interrupted.
It was control, with a rare request. ‘It’s a burglary in progress, reported by the neighbour. Intruders still on the premises. We’ve no units near, but I can see you’re
only about a minute away. Montrose Avenue.’ Control gave the house number and the name of the neighbour.
Fairfield was already pulling away from the kerb, her cigar clamped into the corner of her mouth. ‘Bloody GPS, there’s nowhere to hide. It’s the bloody perpetrators that should
be fitted with it, every sodding one of them.’
Montrose Avenue was a quiet residential street of large Victorian semi-detached houses, many of which had had their front gardens turned into off-street parking. There were no spaces left on the
street, and Fairfield left her Renault double-parked several doors down from the address. The couple who had made the call lived in the next semi along. ‘I saw them going round the back and I
heard glass breaking too,’ the husband told them.
‘How many?’ Fairfield asked.