“So, you’re happy with the plan then?”
“I am. Something tells me these three are important. It’s frustrating because I can’t quite pin down why that is, but it is there.” He looked intently at Hooley. “I know you’re going to ask but, at the moment, my Rainbow Spectrum doesn’t really help – we just don’t have enough information. But I do feel that, if I keep adding data in, I will start to get somewhere.”
Hooley powered off his terminal and rushed out of the door, before turning around and walking back in, nearly colliding with Roper who was rushing to catch up.
He looked at Brooker. “Sorry Susan, with just me and Jonathan I’ve got out of the habit of being a team player. Can you hold the fort here and we’ll stay in touch and let you know when we’ll be back? And please, don’t me call me ‘Sir’. Brian is fine.”
He stopped and stared into space. “I know this is going to make me sound like Jonathan, but I have the strongest sense that the clock is ticking, and we only have a small window to get the people behind these attacks.”
Chapter 19
The Diamonds and Pearls store in Sloane Street was no more. Huge white painted boards completely covered the extensive damage to the front of the building. Inside, engineers were carefully stabilising the building after an initial assessment had warned it was in danger of collapse.
Hooley and Roper had been directed to an office at Chelsea Harbour, an upmarket development of businesses, residential units and a five-star hotel, a couple of miles from Diamonds and Pearls. Their driver took them along Sloane Street, past the store, and into Sloane Square where he took the turn for the Kings Road, the most direct, if congested, route to their destination. Even with the morning rush hour they were on course to arrive at 8am.
They walked into a small reception area, identified themselves to the guard and watched as he picked up the phone.
“Police are ‘ere,” he mumbled.
Long minutes dragged by and a smiling woman, dressed in a severe black outfit, her blonde hair scraped back, arrived and asked to check their IDs. The DCI nodded at Roper.
After spending far too long studying their pictures, the woman finally handed them back. “I’m afraid security is very tight now. We can’t take risks.”
“Shame the security wasn’t so good for the bomb,” said Hooley, with his own smile. He was pleased to see the woman redden slightly.
She led them to an oblong shaped room dominated by a dark grey table with black leather chairs on either side. At one end of the room, floor to ceiling windows flooded the space with natural light and gave a distant view of the River Thames.
Waving them inside, the woman said, “The owners know you’re here. They’ll be with you shortly.”
A few minutes later, the three showed up. They were about Roper’s age but here the similarities ended. These people were toned and buffed, beautifully dressed – and the women had a perfection that came only with expertly applied make-up, lots of money and plenty of time.
They trooped in, making no attempt to shake hands, and simply sat down on one side of the table. Soon they were followed in by a couple of men wearing black suits who placed their phones on the table - clearly intended to record the interview - and then took seats behind the three.
Everything was done in total silence. Hooley studied them for a long moment and then carefully placed his phone on the table, gesturing with his head for Roper to do the same. He recognised power games when he saw them, and he knew exactly what to do.
After letting the silence grow a moment, he suddenly started talking – using what his children said was his “Sergeant Major’s” voice.
“Thank you for seeing us. At this stage you are merely assisting our inquiry.” His voice boomed out and the trio flinched. “You should keep in mind this is anti-terror investigation and, as such, the police have wide ranging powers to question anyone of interest.”
Now he had their attention. The threat of arrest, no matter how vague, tended to focus most people.
He studied them more closely. The brother and sister shared a strong familial look and wore carefully matched trousers and tops, him in neutral colours, her in pale pinks and blue. Emily Wong favoured a slightly more casual look which the DCI guessed cost thousands.
Games over, he nodded at Roper to start the questions. He wasted no time, speaking fast but cleanly. “Your shop was at the centre of a lot of controversy. Did you get threats or maybe hate mail?”
Mark Savage answered. “We get a pretty steady stream of hate mail. People saying what they’d like to do to us, to our customers and even to our staff. I used to throw it away – but for the last couple of years we’ve employed security people to go through it, just in case we need to take some of it more seriously. A couple of months ago, Emily became convinced that someone was stalking her. Our security team put people on it and believed they managed to frighten someone off.”
Hooley jumped in. “Did you inform the police?”
Savage shrugged helplessly.
Hooley tried a different tack. “Did your security people manage to get pictures, some sort of ID or even a description?”
Savage looked miserable. “Nothing beyond him being a white male, about five feet ten inches tall, wearing glasses and fit enough to outrun our people. To be honest, we thought it might have been someone trying to get Emily’s attention. Rich and beautiful women can attract unwelcome approaches.”
“We’re going to need to speak to your security team,” said Hooley. “We need every single detail, no matter how ‘unimportant’ you might think it is.”
Roper jumped in again. “But it would be right to say that a lot of people didn’t like you."
Throughout the session, Julie Savage had been staring at the floor – but this seemed to attract her attention.
“That’s rather direct of you, Mr. Roper. Most people are little more circumspect – but why not call a spade a spade? A lot of people like us and a lot don’t. Mark says we are like Marmite.”
Roper looked puzzled.
“You know, Marmite! People either love it or hate it. There’s no in-between. That’s how people seem to react to us.”
Hooley recognised the expression on Roper’s and decided to head him off before they got bogged down. “Let’s talk about the Marmite reference later. For now, I’d like to get back to any concerns you may have had, anything that was bothering or maybe really worrying you.”
Mark Savage, who was looking at Roper with an intent expression, managed to drag himself back into the conversation and switched his gaze to the older detective.
“I’ve been asking myself the same question and I don’t think there is. Yes, we get a lot of hate mail, but we knew we would get that when we opened our store. It was bound to polarise opinion, but we banked on that.”
“You mean you were using hatred as part of your business plan?” Hooley thought he had heard it all now.
Savage showed some genuine enthusiasm. “Exactly!” he said, waving a finger in their direction. “Right from the beginning, we knew it was going to be a great marketing tool. We were all over the internet in the months before we opened.”
“What about staff? Did you have any disgruntled employees?”
The brother and sister shared a look. Then, Mark spoke. “There was an issue, but I can’t believe it would have led to this.”
“Perhaps you’d better tell us and let us be the judge of that.”
Chapter 20
Josephine Taggert was interviewed by two senior intelligence operatives, nominally assigned to GCHQ. For this interview they’d opted to describe themselves as ‘working with Scotland Yard.” Because Taggert was no fool this made her assume they were members of the security services. Both sides left it unsaid. The relationship between big tech companies and domestic intelligence organisations was complex, to say the least.
As the door closed, she put her head in her hands, exhausted by the non-stop roller coaster she’d been on since the
attack on Ryder. Everyone she met had questions to which she had very few answers.
It wasn’t just the police and their “assistants” who wanted a piece of her. She needed to spend time reassuring anxious staff that the Ryder Corporation was worth sticking with. She knew rivals were already making approaches to her most valuable people.
Ryder had spent a lot of time in London, claiming it was his favourite location, but she knew he wasn’t above telling the other regional chiefs the same thing. Not that it bothered her. John Ryder was one of those people you always looked forward to meeting. His energy was contagious and, even though he was a genius, he had a way of involving people that made them feel that, on their very best day, they were on his level. She feared the reality was he might prove irreplaceable.
Despite the mountainous work to be done in London, she had to free up time to travel to California, and yesterday she had plucked up the courage to ask the detectives if she could leave the country, causing furrowed brows and muttering that it was much too soon.
But the two people who had just left had surprised her by arriving with a solution. She could leave so long as she consented to be available for questions at any time and made sure there was someone in the UK who could cover the bases.
It was a reasonable request but left her with a dilemma. She normally took her assistant, Mary Lou Healy, on any major trip. Healy had made herself indispensable over the last couple of years and had long outstripped her nominal role as a PA. She was Taggert’s right-hand woman.
That made her the obvious choice to liaise with the police teams and keep a careful eye on the UK operation. By the same token, she would be invaluable in America, especially as the launch was undoubtedly the most critical in the organisation’s history.
Josephine was in danger of arguing herself into a standstill and needed to make the call. As Ryder always said, “Leaders, lead.”
Decision made, she stood up and went into her outer office to find Healy. Seeing that her assistant was engrossed in preparing a report, she walked over to the coffee machine.
“Small black coffee, one sweetener?” she said, holding up a cup.
Healy laughed. “I’m wired enough as it is. One more shot of caffeine and my eyeballs will start revolving.”
“Well I’m going to risk it. I know what you mean – but, if I stop drinking coffee now, I won’t be held responsible for the consequences. I’d put the crazy in crazy lady. When you’re free, can you come in and we can talk about the launch?”
Five minutes later, she and Healy were sitting on the sofa. Even though her assistant was a few years younger, Taggert thought it was amazing how fresh she looked. By contrast, Taggert was sure that she was showing the first signs of bags under her eyes.
“The police are saying that I can probably head over to California, but they’d prefer it if someone senior stayed here to help with any immediate inquiries. To be honest, you should be first on the list to come with me, but it might be better to leave you here. You know everything I know, which makes you the right person to deal with the police. What do you think?”
Healy didn’t answer straight away but looked oddly embarrassed. “Normally I would bite your hand off to go on that trip, but I do have a problem…”
Taggert suddenly thought she knew why her assistant was embarrassed.
“Is there an issue with Miss Kitty?”
Miss Kitty was Healy’s much-loved cat who repaid her owner’s devotion with total disdain. This only seemed to make her love the cat more.
“Normally she stays with my neighbour – but she’s in hospital at the moment and won’t be up to looking after her for a couple of weeks. I’m not saying I can’t go – there’s a very good cattery I can use. But she’ll be grumpy with me for ages if I leave her there, so maybe this is serendipity.”
Taggert smiled at her. “Well, I would hate to upset Miss Kitty. I’ll talk to California today and explain that we’re thinking of leaving you behind to run things here.” She saw a horrified expression flit across her face. “Don’t worry. Miss Kitty is our guilty secret. I’ll explain what the police have said and that should be fine. But thanks for being willing to send her off to the cattery. I could ask no more of you.”
Chapter 21
Julie Savage sighed heavily and stared at the floor, unable to make eye contact. She remained this way for a long moment before she seemed to gather herself, puffing out her cheeks with an air of embarrassed resignation.
Addressing a point in the centre of the table, she said, “It’s down to me – so I might as well tell you. I had an affair with one of the floor managers. I thought it was just a bit of fun, but he seemed to take it a lot more seriously. In the end, Mark had to step in.”
On a personal level, Hooley hated this sort of thing, but as he often told Roper, “It’s our job to know everything that might be relevant, especially when people don’t want to tell us. We just have to treat it is as detail. It’s either useful or it’s not.”
“I’m afraid,” he said, “we’ll need you to give us a more detailed account. I know it’s not great, having to reveal personal information to people you don’t know, but if it helps, just remember that this is a line of inquiry. It might hold the answer, or it might not, but either way we will be discrete.”
She nodded, apparently resigned to having to come clean, and gathered her emotions enough to finally look up.
“Jasper and I were together for almost three months. At first, we had lots of fun and just enjoyed our time together. But he suddenly started getting intense and jealous. He hated me talking to other men – so I realised he had to go. I let him down as gently as I could. Told him he was a great guy and it was all my fault that we couldn’t develop the relationship. The truth is, I’m relationship phobic. I can’t stand it when people come over all needy. So… I told him over drinks, and he reacted badly. Told me I needed protection from other men, and he was the one to provide it. I’m afraid I made a bad mistake and laughed at him for that. He got very angry, threw a drink over me and stormed out.
“It was very embarrassing, and I do regret upsetting him, but he just disappeared after that, not even coming to work. I asked HR to send him a letter confirming he had now left our employ but, as a recognition of his work, we were giving him three months money.”
Hooley worked hard to keep a poker face – but some sense of his discomfort at her last remarks must have filtered through because Julie Savage looked defensive.
“He wasn’t actually entitled to anything, so three months was pretty generous. But it seemed to encourage him again because, after that, he started hanging around at my house. In the end he became such a nuisance I had to get Mark to talk to him.”
“And this went OK? It sounds like things got a little fraught for a while?”
“It was fine,” said her brother. “I found Jasper waiting near Julie’s flat and had a talk to him, man to man. There was no trouble at all. I thought he took it very well. After that, we never saw him again. The only reason we’re mentioning it now is that there really is no other member of staff who might have had some sort of beef with us. Even so, it would be a stretch to imagine that Jasper might have taken it a bit further. At worst, he’s guilty of a bit of stalking and he put his hands up when I confronted him. There’s no way he would have organised something like a bomb attack on the store. It just wasn’t in his nature. We probably shouldn’t have mentioned him.”
Roper had been silent during the latest exchanges but now interjected. “But you have raised him, and he is obviously a suspect. Do you happen to have an address, his full name and any personal details, like his parents for instance? Who did he name as his next of kin on the work contract? Oh, and any pictures?”
Mark Savage rewarded him with another stare, before crossing to a small desk where he picked up the phone and dialled. After issuing his request, he came back to his chair.
“I’ll have those details in just a moment, apart from the next of kin. Eve
ryone has a standard contract put together by HR, but most people don’t worry about the details. People are so keen to get working at Diamonds and Pearls on their CVs, I suspect most of them would turn up if we said they had to do it naked.”
The way the man smirked at this riled Hooley, who hated that sort of arrogance. “That would be a sort of zero-hours contract you offer people. No guarantees or other protection, I suppose,” he said, his tone showing he was becoming less and less impressed with the way the three did business.
Savage didn’t bother to reply, just shrugged his shoulders. Before the DCI could say anything else, the brother’s phone beeped with an incoming message. He checked his screen.
“I have those details and photo for you.”
As he pinged them to Roper’s phone, Hooley decided this was a good point to break off; he’d had more than enough of these three for now, and they could always come back. He also wanted to check something with Roper. The moment they were outside and safe from being overheard; Hooley spoke.
“I know we’ve got a suspect now, but I was expecting you to raise those theories you mentioned last night.”
Roper shrugged. “I thought it was a bit convenient that they offered up this guy, Jasper Fitzhenry, so I thought to get him out of the way first. His address isn’t that far away. I would be surprised if it was him, but he might know something that can help us.”
Hooley was frustrated but there was no point arguing. Their police driver had been waiting for them and they clambered into the back of the car. He asked the driver to head for Stockwell and then put a call into the main control room. He wanted back-up. While he shared Roper’s skepticism that this was the man, he had no option but to take it seriously.
The driver took them east, until they crossed the River at Lambeth and headed towards Stockwell, home to a large Portuguese population.
The address they were looking for was at the Lambeth end of Stockwell and was off the main drag. It turned out to be a small white fronted Victorian property in a short terrace of similar houses.
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