Deadly Terror (Detective Zoe Finch Book 4)

by Rachel McLean

  “What about you two? You look like you’re good friends.”

  One of the boys nodded. “I’m Marius. He’s Florin. Where are we going?”

  “There was an explosion, on another plane. We got you away, safe.”

  “Where are we going?”

  Sofia looked at Adam, sitting in the front. He stared out of the windscreen, his feet up on the dashboard and ankles crossed. She swallowed.

  “We’ll find out soon,” she said.

  They were heading for the city centre. Titi had had a flat not far away, when she’d first come here. They’d moved out within days of her arrival, to the echoing, sparkly house in the countryside. She hadn’t met any of the neighbours, had never even glimpsed them. Adam and the other men took her shopping or to the hairdresser’s. And Titi, of course. He took her all sorts of places, when he was around. Restaurants with dishes that would have cost her a month’s salary. One time, a hotel suite. It was a luxurious lifestyle, but she longed for friends.

  It would be easier now Andreea was here. They could go places together, Sofia could show her the city. They’d escape her minders and find some freedom.

  The boy gave her a look as if it was all her fault. She couldn’t blame him. She’d grabbed him and his friends from the plane, bundled them onto this van and driven them away into the night. She was amazed they weren’t all crying.

  “Shit,” Adam said. Sofia perked up. She leaned forward.

  He slammed his phone into the dashboard and turned to the driver. “Bad news. Looks like it wasn’t as clean as we’d hoped.”

  “What, you mean he might have walked out of that?” the driver asked.

  Adam shrugged. “Who knows? Turns out even the so-called experts can’t get a fucking bomb right. But the problem now is us and where we’re going. They’ve cleared the place out. Too close to New Street.”

  “They’ve what?”

  “It’s not safe, apparently.”

  “So where are we going then?”

  Adam slapped a palm to his forehead. “Beats me.”

  The boy next to Sofia put a hand on her knee. “What’s happening?”

  “We’re just finding the best route,” she told him in Romanian. “Won’t be long now.” She tried to smile.

  “We’re lost,” the other boy, Florin, said.

  “No,” she reassured him. “See out there? That’s a mosque. Biggest one in the city. I know this area. I’ve eaten in a restaurant not far from here.”

  She hoped she wasn’t mistaken. Titi had driven her this way a week after her arrival, taken her to a fancy French restaurant. But she couldn’t remember where it was.

  She leaned forward.

  “Where do we take the children?”

  “Just keep them quiet, alright? We’ll worry about that.”

  “They’re tired. They’re scared. They need food.”

  “They’ll be fine.”

  “Did you say you cannot take them where you were planning?”

  “You listen too much.”

  She clenched her fists. “You don’t know where you going.”

  He jerked around in his seat, his eyes blazing. “Shut up, woman. Just cos the boss is shagging you doesn’t mean you’re immune.”

  She glared back at him, ignoring the trembling in her limbs. “They need to go somewhere safe. Where are parents?”

  “No parents. School exchange programme.”

  She looked back at the children, her body cold. These children had no one to stand up for them.

  “Where is the teacher?”

  “Buggered if I know.”

  Sofia slumped back. She hadn’t had time to ask questions when they’d arrived at the runway. She’d never asked why they were taking the kids, who they all were.

  “We take them home,” she said.

  “Don’t be daft.”

  “Not their home. My home.”

  Adam exchanged a look with the driver.

  “It is a big house. They will be safe there. Titi will look after them.”

  Adam laughed. “Oh, he’ll look after them alright, lady.”

  She wanted to hit him. The impulse made her think of Andreea, and her quick temper.

  “Take me home. I explain to him.”

  “You will explain, is what you mean.”

  She waved her hand, irritated with his correction of her English. She’d like to see him try to speak Romanian.

  “I’ll have to call the boss,” Adam said.

  Sofia squared her shoulders. Her boyfriend was a good man. He’d brought her here, and he was doing the same for her sister. So the kids couldn’t go to their intended hotel, so what? There was plenty of space in her house. Six bedrooms, two living rooms.

  “Call him,” she said.

  Adam gave her a thin smile as he raised his phone to his ear. He stared at her as he waited.

  “Fuck.” He put down the phone.

  “What is it?” Sofia asked.

  “No answer.”

  “Then I decide. We take the kids home. Now.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  “DI Finch, DS Osman. You’re back.”

  The ops base had filled up since Zoe had left it. Almost all the monitors were turned on and airport and police staff lined the desks. There was an air of hurried calm.

  “Sir. I’m not happy about the—”

  Randle raised a hand. “You got your answer, DI Finch. Just shut up and do as you’re told, eh?”

  It felt like he’d slapped her, and with Ian right next to her too.

  “Where’s Adi?” she asked.

  Randle jerked a thumb behind him. “Getting computers set up with the other techs. Waiting for you.”

  “Good.” She walked past Randle and made for the Forensics team. No way was she letting him see he’d rattled her.

  “Zoe,” said Adi. For once he didn’t smile. She’d known Adi Hanson for years, and he never failed to flirt with her when they came face to face at a crime scene. This one, it seemed, was the exception.

  “Adi.” Zoe turned to his colleague, Yala Cook. She was bent over a computer, setting up software. “Yala.”

  “DI Finch.” Yala turned and gave her a tight smile, then returned to her work. Another tech, a young man Zoe hadn’t met, worked with her.

  “So, what are we working with?” Adi asked.

  Zoe plunged herself into a chair. The techs had been allocated a row of desks in a corner of the room. They were setting up their own computers, not getting any help from the incident IT team. “Not much, right now,” she said. “The explosion was beneath the passenger compartment, in the hold, I imagine. We’ll need to get schematics of the aircraft.”

  “Leave that with me,” Adi said. “I’ve already spoken to the manufacturers. They’ll be sending their own investigative team. I’m just hoping they’ll work with us.”

  “Me too.” Zoe wasn’t holding out much hope, the way this day was going so far. “They’re still bringing people off. Bodies, mainly, but they seem to have found survivors.”

  “That’s something.”

  “Yeah.” Zoe wanted to speak to Ian. He was still with Randle.

  “Ian?” she called. “Get over here, will you?”

  He looked up from his conversation with the Super. “Sorry.” He nodded at Randle then hurried to join her.

  “What was all that about?” she asked.

  “He wanted more information about the crime scene,” he replied.

  “There are a range of possibilities,” Adi said. “If someone detonated that bomb from inside the plane, then whatever they used was probably destroyed. And I can’t see them getting it past security anyway. We’ll need to go through the hold contents, or what’s left of them.”

  “The plane came from Pakistan,” said Zoe. “We’ll need to find out what security checks would have taken place.”

  “If there was a detonator, there might be traces of it on the plane,” added Ian. “Even if it’s just fragments.”

  �
��You got an idea what kind of thing you might be looking for?” Zoe asked Adi.

  “Some. Not much. Most of the people on that thing will have been carrying electronic devices. Phones, laptops. They could have used a phone.”

  Zoe slumped in her chair. She checked her watch: 9:42pm. Almost six hours since it had happened.

  “OK,” she said. “Seeing as we can’t get access to the plane right now, what else can we be looking at?”

  “In terms of forensics?” asked Adi.

  “Course.”

  “The bodies,” he said. “If we can get access to them, we can check for devices, phones and the like. Take them in, look for any unusual apps. And we’ll need to take devices from survivors, too.”

  “That’ll be my job,” said Yala. “It could be a lot of phones to go through. Or it could be none. Depends what state they’re in.”

  “We always have to consider the possibility it was just a fault in the plane,” said Adi. “The airline investigator doesn’t like that idea.”

  “I bet not. What type of plane was it?” Zoe asked.

  “Airbus A320.”

  “What’s their safety record like?”

  “Very good,” said Yala. “One crash per ten million flights.” She shrugged, catching Adi’s expression. “I did some googling on the way here.”

  “So that makes it more likely that this was human activity,” Zoe said.

  “I know,” said Adi. “We’ll be ready, when we can. We’ll secure the plane, make sure there’s nothing that’s going to degrade. I want to work fast, though. I’m worried that when the airline investigators turn up tomorrow, they’ll bring things to a halt.”

  Zoe sighed. “Ian? You’ve been very quiet.”

  He frowned. “There’s always pathology,” he said. “We might find evidence on the bodies.”

  “Luckily we have Adana working on that.”

  “She’s got access already?” asked Adi.

  “She’s out there now.” Zoe jerked her head in the vague direction of the runway. This room didn’t have windows and for all she knew, she was gesturing in the opposite direction.

  “Nice one, Adana,” said Adi. He shook his head. “Wish I could be as persuasive as her.”

  “You’ll get your chance,” said Zoe. “Meanwhile, what can you tell me about New Street?”

  The bomb in the city centre had been playing on her mind. She’d had to push it away since she’d arrived at the airport and focussed all her attention on the incident here. But she’d heard nothing since seeing the explosion on TV.

  “You haven’t heard?” said Adi.

  Zoe tensed. “What?”

  “DCI Clarke. She collapsed in the ops room.”

  “She did what? Why?” Lesley was made of steel.

  “She was right by the doors when the bomb went off,” said Adi. “That’s all I know, but it sounds like she was injured.”

  “Where is she now?”

  “City Hospital.”

  “Shit.” Zoe felt an urge to drive straight to the hospital, to find out how her boss was doing. To be there in the same way Lesley had been there for her over the years.

  “Who’s at Force CID?”

  Ian shrugged. “I haven’t been in, remember?”

  Zoe gave him an irritated look and grabbed her phone.

  “Zo.”

  “Mo, I just heard about Lesley. Is she OK?”

  “She’s in surgery.”

  “Surgery?”

  Adi and Yala exchanged glances.

  “She got shards of glass lodged in her brain stem,” Mo said. “Made her black out.”

  Zoe gripped her chair’s armrest. “Where are you?”

  “I’m at New Street. Working with Uniform, trying to compile a list of witnesses. It’s not easy.”

  “I can imagine.”

  “There were hundreds of people here at the time. Thousands. But no one says they saw anything. We’ve got CCTV of a woman talking to the bomber but no one knows who she is.”

  Zoe put her hand over the receiver. “Yala, do you know about this woman who spoke to the New Street bomber?”

  Yala shook her head.

  “I’m putting you onto Mo. Maybe you can work on that while you’re waiting for access to the plane.”

  “Let’s get out there,” said Adi.

  “No point yet,” Zoe said.

  “Like I say, I want as much time as I can before the airline guys arrive. If I’m on the runway, I’m ready. You coming, or not?”

  “I’ll join you when I can.” Zoe turned to Ian. “You go with Adi. Keep me informed.”

  “No problem, boss.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  The van turned into a driveway on a street lined with large, shabby houses. Andreea shivered and wrapped her arms around herself.

  Sofia had told her she was living in a large house in the countryside. This must be it. Andreea let herself relax for the first time since they’d led her off the plane.

  The side door to the van opened.

  “Out,” said the man.

  Andreea jumped down along with the other women. She had no idea why these women were coming with her. Maybe they were friends of the Sofia’s boyfriend.

  She grabbed the woman closest to her by the wrist. “Why have they brought us all here?”

  The woman pulled her arm away. “They told me I’d have a job waiting for me, a place to stay. Maybe this is it.”

  “Shut up, you two.” The man with the scarred cheek pushed them apart. Andreea stared back at him. She didn’t know who he was but he wasn’t pushing her around like that.

  “Let go of me,” she said. “Take me to Sofia.”

  “Will you shut up about your fucking sister.” The man turned to his friend and laughed. Their eyes were hard. She’d known men like that, back at home. She’d learned to avoid them. Was this the kind of man Sofia was befriending now she was in the UK? Or were they all like this?

  “You don’t push me around.”

  “Don’t I?” The man flashed his eyes at her. He gave her a shove in the chest. “I think I do.”

  She lunged at him, her fists clenched. He smirked.

  “You’re priceless, you are. They’re gonna love you.”

  “Stop it, Cal,” the man who’d been angry with her said. Andreea could see his face now. He was older than the others, old enough to be her father. “Just let’s get them inside before someone hears us.”

  The younger man backed away, his eyes not leaving Andreea’s face. She glared at him, her chest heaving.

  The men shepherded the women along a pockmarked gravel driveway that reminded her of her parents’ farmhouse.

  “Here we are,” grinned the older man. “Home.”

  The building wasn’t the mansion Sofia had described. It was big enough, sure. But that was where the similarity ended.

  “There has been mistake,” Andreea said. “You leave others here, take me to Sofia.”

  “There has been mistake,” the older man repeated. “Are you all like this?” He grabbed her arm and shoved her towards the building. She tried to free herself, but his fingers dug in.

  The building had been grand once. It was broad and imposing, with tall windows and a roof that disappeared up into the night sky. But almost half of the windows were boarded up and weeds grew around the steps leading up to the front door. The place looked like it would fall down if Andreea gave it a sharp kick.

  The man banged on the door with his fist. Flakes of paint fell to the ground. Andreea coughed.

  The door opened and a thin woman wearing a black fleece and torn blue jeans confronted them.

  “You’re late.”

  “We had to take a detour. Too many pigs.”

  The woman spat. “Get them in ‘ere then.” She had dyed red hair and her roots were showing.

  The man pushed Andreea forward. The woman stood back to let her pass. Her eyes were sharp, like a crow’s. She peered into Andreea’s face, sizing her up. In return, An
dreea shot her a look of disdain.

  “You’re going to be trouble,” the woman said. “We’ll tame you.”

  Andreea felt her skin bristle as she passed the woman and entered a broad hallway. Wide stairs with carved wooden railings rose to one side and the walls were partly covered in wood panelling. Patches of it were missing, crumbling plaster showing through from underneath.

  “This is not Sofia’s boyfriend’s house,” she said.

  “Hah! That’s a good one,” the woman said. “No, you can certainly say this is not his house. Although he did pay for it.”

  “You have brought me to wrong place.”

  “No idea what you’re talkin’ about, hen.” Her accent was different from the men, sharper.

  Andreea stared back at the woman. For the first time, fear threatened. “Take me to Sofia,” she said, struggling to keep her cool.

  “We’ll find you a nice comfy bed,” the woman said. “And give you some food. If you’re good.” She prodded Andreea’s stomach. “You could do with fattening up.”

  Andreea swiped at the woman’s hand but she was too fast. The woman leaned in, her breath stinking of cigarettes.

  “You’ll learn to behave yourself, lass. If you know what’s good for you.”

  Andreea blinked back at her. Behaving herself wasn’t something she did.

  The other women had gathered behind her. Andreea turned to see them huddling together. Who were these mice? There were twelve of them, three men, and this scrawny woman. They could overpower them, no problem. But none of them looked like they had the guts to do so.

  She blew out a breath. She’d have to get away under her own steam. Find Sofia. Wait for her boyfriend to arrive: this was his house, after all.

  She’d watch, and she’d wait. And then she’d act.

  Chapter Eighteen

  At last Zoe had been given the all-clear to enter the plane. Adi was already there, directing his team as they pushed a set of steps up to the hold doors.

  “How helpful will the hold be now they’ve cleared it out?” she asked him. Luggage, mostly burnt, lay jumbled on the tarmac not far from where they stood. Apparently it was standard procedure to clear out the hold in case anyone was hiding inside.