by Alex Carver
“Who’s we?” Burke asked.
“Me, Jerry, and Ash.”
“Ash who?” Burke couldn’t remember an Ash being on the list of known associates for the Logans.
Ben glanced at his solicitor but answered without consulting him. “David Ashford.”
“Where can we find him?” Stone gave Ben a hard look when he didn’t answer. “You know how this works, Ben, this isn’t your first time here; if you want to use Mr Ashford as your alibi, we need to be able to speak to him. It’ll also help if you can tell us what takeaway you visited so we can see if anyone there remembers you.”
“Ash lives on Cutler Street, seventeen. I forget the name o’ the takeaway, it’s the kebab place on St Peter’s Road.”
“Does Mr Ashford have a criminal record?” Stone asked, drawing the first response of the interview from the duty solicitor tasked with representing Ben Logan.
“I fail to see what possible relevance Mr Ashford’s criminal record, if he has one, has to do with him providing an alibi for my client.”
“Well, firstly, Mr Valentine, if Mr Ashford has a criminal record then it calls into question any alibi he might provide for Ben here, and secondly, as previously mentioned, your client is out on license. One of the conditions of that license is that he avoids contacting or associating with known criminals, specifically anyone he has been convicted with at any time in the past; the only exception, of course, being his brother.” Ben couldn’t be kept from having contact with his family, but Stone would have preferred it if he was. “So, does Mr Ashford have a criminal record?” Stone asked for a second time.
This time Ben did consult with his solicitor. They spoke in hushed tones, their heads close together, for about a minute and a half before Valentine responded to the question. “To the best of my client’s knowledge, Mr Ashford was convicted of handling stolen goods when he was twenty-one, for which he served a short prison sentence, but hasn’t been in trouble since. Mr Logan’s parole officer is aware of the friendship, and has spoken to Mr Ashford, and is satisfied that the association does not breach Mr Logan’s license.”
“Fair enough,” Stone said. He would check on that, but left it for the moment. “You said your brother was with you at Mr Ashford’s place on Sunday night, can you explain how, if that’s the case, he came to be identified as one of the two people who robbed the Stag Inn’s pavilion at the Rock Radio Music Festival?”
Ben smiled. “You said yesterday the person seen had a tattoo similar to what my brother had done, that ain’t no positive identification. Why don’t you just admit it, you’re fishing; you ain’t got nothing, and you’re hoping I’ll say summat you can make your case with. Give up.”
There was a contemptuous look on Ben Logan’s face, and Stone enjoyed seeing it disappear as he said, “That may have been the case yesterday, but now we have fingerprints, confirmed as your brother’s, that place him in the pavilion.”
Before Ben could respond there was a knock on the door of the interview room.
“What is it?” Stone asked of Grey once he had suspended the interview and left the room.
“The DCI wants to see you, sir.”
“Does he know I’m in the middle of an interview?”
“Yes, sir; he said it’s urgent,” Grey told him. “He wanted to see you immediately. Mason’s already with him.”
Bemused, Stone re-entered the interview room. “Take Mr Logan back to his cell, Stephen; we’ll have to finish this interview later, something’s come up.” He closed the door on the protests from Valentine, leaving his partner to deal with the solicitor.
“You wanted to see me, sir,” he said when he entered the DCI’s office. He hoped there was a good reason for his interview being interrupted – he couldn’t imagine that Mason had come up with something to complain about that would be considered sufficient to disturb an interview, but he also couldn’t think why else the DCI would want to see both him and Mason.
“Yes, Nathan.” Collins waited until Stone had taken the seat next to Mason before he said anything more. “I’ve got to take you off the armed robbery and the hit-and-run. A situation has arisen,” he said quickly when he saw that Stone was about to protest. “Something important.”
“What kind of situation?” Stone asked, wondering what Mason could possibly have said that would have convinced Collins to take him off either case, let alone both.
“There’s been a kidnapping,” Collins said, surprising Stone.
“What sort of kidnapping?” Stone asked when he had recovered. “A snatch and grab on some kid on the way home from school?” It was the right time of day for that kind of thing.
“Early details are limited, but it looks more serious than that. I want you to go out to Pine Street and take charge of the investigation; I’m putting Justin in charge of the armed robbery case.”
Mason couldn’t conceal his pleasure at that news, though under that pleasure his demeanour suggested that he would have liked to be put in charge of the kidnapping, which was likely to be the more high-profile of the two investigations.
“So make sure he’s up to date with everything before you go.”
13
Lewis looked unhappily at the unconscious form in front of him. “Did you have to hit her?” he asked.
Jim looked up from where he was securing the schoolgirl’s wrists and ankles, and said simply, “Yes. It was either that or let her carry on yelling. Would you rather I left her to tell everyone we pass that we’ve got her back here?”
“She secure back there?” Crash asked from up front. He risked a glance over his shoulder, but quickly returned his attention to the road ahead – the last thing he wanted was to have an accident while they had a kidnapped teen in the back.
“She won’t be waking up anytime soon,” Jim assured his partner. “Even if she does, she won’t be getting free.”
“Good, cuz we’re coming up on the switch.”
Two streets later, Crash turned onto a side road and slowed the van. His eyes moved constantly between his mirrors and the road ahead, checking for potential witnesses to their moving an unconscious and tied up young girl about. The street was empty, thankfully, and he brought the van to a stop alongside an almost identical vehicle; the only difference between the two, other than the license number, was the name of a local plumbing firm emblazoned along the side of the parked van.
“We’re here.”
Immediately, Jim appeared from the back of the van. He leaned on the passenger seat as he peered out through the windscreen. “All clear?” he asked, his eyes darting up and down the street.
“Yeah, we’re clear.” Crash remained where he was, maintaining a watch, while his partners climbed from the van and quickly transferred the inert and trussed up Alice Keating to the new vehicle. It took barely thirty seconds to move the girl, and once it was done he drove off up the road to park the van.
14
Stone found a crowd at the crime scene when he got there, and among them was Louisa Orchard; it didn’t surprise him to see the journalist there, it was a rare occasion when he didn’t find her at a major crime scene - she often reached them before he did.
“I guess we’re not going to be able to keep this quiet,” he remarked to Burke as they climbed from their car.
“Did you really think we’d be able to?” Burke asked as he followed his partner up the road; they had been forced to park thirty yards from the scene because of the crowd, and the line of traffic stuck there by what had happened.
“Nate. Inspector Stone! Are you taking charge of the investigation here? I thought you were in charge of the robbery case at the music festival.”
Stone did his best to ignore Louisa, who had spotted him before he even made it through the crowd, let alone to the ambulance that was his destination. Just then he was more interested in finding out what was going on than in talking to the press, she was persistent, however.
“Is it true three men dragged a girl from the Bentley? It�
�s Owen Keating’s car, isn’t it? Was the girl his daughter? Does her kidnapping have anything to do with the attempted takeover of his company by Feliks International? The rumour is that Grigori Feliks has connections with the mafia back in Russia; could this be an attempt to convince Keating to sell his business to the Russian mafia?”
Reluctantly, Stone turned to face the journalist. “I’ve only just got here, Louisa; why don’t you give me a chance to find out what’s happened before you bombard me with questions.”
Louisa ignored the request. “Will you be investigating the possible mafia connection? How will you go about doing so? Will you be talking to the Russian authorities to get their help with investigation?”
“You have a vivid imagination, Louisa,” Stone told her. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to get started. If I find anything the press needs to know, I’ll speak to you.” With that he turned his back on the journalist and continued to the ambulance.
He was not happy that the press were there already, even if it was only in the form of Louisa Orchard currently, but consoled himself with the thought that as fanciful as Louisa’s suggestions might be, she would only print what she could confirm.
“Well, constable, is she right?” Stone asked of the officer standing by the ambulance. “Is the kidnapped girl the daughter of Owen Keating?” He hoped not – it was bad enough that a girl had been kidnapped; if it should turn out that she was the daughter of one of the most prominent businessmen in the county, he was sure that an excess of pressure would be brought to bear on him to see her returned home safely as quickly as possible, and that would make an already difficult job more so.
“It’s not certain at the moment, sir,” the constable replied. “But it looks like it. The car is definitely registered to Owen Keating, and, according to the schoolbooks we found in the back, Alice Keating was in the car, and she isn’t now.”
Stone felt like swearing but resisted. “What do we know so far?”
“It looks as though Alice Keating was being driven home from school with a friend, Julia Harris. When they stopped at the lights a van pulled out from the line of traffic and drew up alongside the Bentley; two men got out and proceeded to drag a girl, Alice Keating, we assume, from the car. Brian Jacobs, who was driving the two girls, tried to stop them taking the girl. He was attacked by the driver of the van and badly hurt, he’s been taken to hospital already. After that the girl was put in the back of the van, and the kidnappers drove away in a hell of a hurry.”
“Okay, the driver can’t talk to us right now,” Stone said. “But why can’t the missing girl’s friend confirm whether it was Alice Keating that was kidnapped? Surely she can tell us who got taken – could she be Alice Keating, and the kidnapped girl the friend?”
“She’s can’t tell us anything at the moment. Oh, she’s alright physically, the sleeve of her blouse is torn, but that’s it, but she’s in shock. She’s in the ambulance, hasn’t said much so far – she’s practically a zombie. She’s done nothing but stare into space since I got here, hasn’t given the slightest sign that she’s aware of anything or anyone, not even when they’re right in front of her.
“We are pretty sure she’s Julia Harris, not Alice Keating, though.”
“Why’s that?”
“Sergeant Wells googled her when we found out who the car belonged to, and realised the girl we’ve got can’t tell us anything – she’s not Alice Keating, so we figure the kidnapped girl has got to be her.”
It was a long way from conclusive, but Stone accepted it for the moment. “Has anyone notified her family yet, or the Keatings?”
“Not yet, sir. Sergeant Wells thought it would be best to wait for you to do that.”
“Probably a good idea,” Stone admitted. He waited then for his partner, who had joined Sergeant Wells in his questioning of the witnesses, to finish; there was no point in him examining the car, not when doing so might damage any evidence forensics might find when they got there. “Anything useful?” he asked of Burke when he was done with the witnesses.
Burke flipped through his notepad, stopping when he reached the beginning of his scribbled notes. “We’ve got a few things,” he said. “We have seven witnesses who were on the scene at the time of the kidnapping, and eleven more who were in the vicinity. I don’t think those eleven are going to be much use to us, though; they were all either in the surrounding shops, or too far away to see any details that will help us.
“All of the seven main witnesses agree that the vehicle used by the kidnappers was a white Ford Transit, and that it was in need of a wash – bloody filthy in the words of one witness. One of them, fortunately, had the presence of mind to note the license number ‘Y715 CLH’. There were three kidnappers in total, all of them dressed in black; two of them wore hoods or balaclavas, the witnesses disagree on that point, while the face of the third, the driver, was hidden by a heavy black beard.
“Times for the duration of the kidnapping range from one minute to five minutes.” Burke was used to the lack of consistency between eyewitnesses, but that didn’t mean he liked it. “There are two recordings of the incident, or parts of it at least, made on phones, that put the time at between two and a half and three minutes.”
“We’ve got video of the kidnapping?” Stone asked, pleased by the news. Like his partner, he knew how unreliable eyewitnesses could be; they were good to have, but too easily confused or discredited by defence counsel – photographs or video that couldn’t be disputed were better.
“Yes, one was made from about twenty feet away, while the other is from further away. We also have a series of photographs. I’ve taken a quick look at them, they appear to be good quality and should confirm the license number of the van. With one exception,” Burke continued, “the owners of the phones have agreed to surrender them as evidence.”
“Who’s the holdout?”
Burke nodded in the direction of a young man who was standing a little apart from the rest of the witnesses. “It’s a new phone, apparently, and he doesn’t want to give it up.”
“I’ll have a word with him,” Stone said. “Anything else?”
“The lady in the green top is the driver of the Peugeot 205 in front of the Keatings’ Bentley, she was closer to what happened than anyone else, and is of the opinion that the beard of the driver was a fake.”
15
Unlike his partner, Stone found it hard to sit and wait patiently; instead he paced up and down the lobby of Griffin Games, looking at the magazines, posters and other displays that made it clear Owen Keating’s company was a leader in the European computer games market.
After an interminable wait, a young woman approached from the lifts. “Inspector Stone?” she queried.
Stone nodded after turning away from a poster, which showed the company’s newest franchise – Luke Kane: Treasure Hunter.
“If you’ll follow me, inspector.” She turned on her heel and strode briskly back to the lifts.
“You are?” Stone asked as he, Burke and the mystery lady ascended.
“Sally Bryant, Mr Keating’s assistant.”
Stone filed the name away in case it should be important, and then followed Sally Bryant along the corridor after leaving the lift on the top floor. They entered a spacious outer office, where they were acknowledged by a middle-aged woman seated at a desk to one side of the double doors that led, Stone assumed, to Owen Keating’s office. “Mr Keating will see you momentarily,” she said the moment she saw them; her demeanour was professional, but there was a look in her eyes that made it all too plain she did not approve of her employer’s day being disrupted, especially by the police.
Stone only had time to look around quickly before a buzz sounded from the phone on the secretary’s desk.
The secretary listened for a moment, said, “Yes, sir,” and then hung up the phone.” Mr Keating will see you now,” she told the two detectives.
The first thing Stone noticed when he entered Owen Keating’s office was
the gigantic screen on the wall – he estimated it was about one hundred and fifty inches, far bigger than anything he had seen before. As he watched, a man, vaguely reminiscent of Indiana Jones in appearance, leaped across a crevasse, scrambled up a wall and dropped down to hide while an armed thug searched the darkness with a torch. The scene shifted then to show the ground collapse under the Indiana Jones figure, leaving him to fall a significant distance before hitting the ground. When he got to his feet and looked around, he was in a dimly lit chamber whose walls were decorated with intricate carvings.
“It’s going to be a huge hit.”
The statement drew Stone’s attention away from the screen. “It certainly looks good,” he remarked, though he wasn’t sure looking good was enough to make the game a success.
“I’ll be getting a copy,” Burke said, his eyes still on the screen, where he watched Luke Kane – presumably – burst into the middle of a group of thugs to rescue a young woman tied to an altar, over which loomed a multi-armed idol. “I’ve enjoyed everything you’ve produced so far, even Undead Evil 4, and it took me forever to figure out how to kill Carter Weyland.”
Owen Keating’s mouth lifted at the corners. “There’s a trick to it; if you shoot the environment instead of Carter, you bring it down on him, injuring him; killing him’s a lot easier then. Plus, there’s a few little bonuses to be found.”
Burke nodded. “I figured that out, but not until my fourth run through, when I already had all the achievements.”
“Wait till you play Legacy; if you think Undead Evil 4 is tough, you’re going to find 5 a nightmare,” Keating told him; he seemed amused by the idea of people struggling with his game. Pressing a button on the remote control on his desk he changed the images on the screen – they now showed a female, dressed in military style clothing, fighting a group of undead monsters.
“Is that Jasmine MacNally?” Burke asked as he watched the woman chop off an arm and then cave in the head of another monster. “I thought she died in UE2.”