“Any news?”
“Go take a shower downstairs. Get yourself cleaned up. I’m sending out for breakfast.”
“Jeffery. Answer the fucking question.” She growled at him through clenched teeth.
He closed in, no hint of compliance in his eyes. “Go. Shower. Now.” And then he stood up and walked away.
— Three —
Lisa Westmoreland was in a state of near paralysis. Like the others in the office, she had snatched minutes of sleep in what turned out to be a very long night for her. She had a fitful slumber that consisted of a fairground ride where each segment of its journey passed through one nightmare after another, rotating slowly so she got the full experience each time. She got her money’s worth.
In one segment, Eddie would pop up and ask her if she was enjoying the ride, big smile on his face and a thorn pinning his top lip into his right nostril – looked like a permanent sneer, looked like an exaggerated impression of Elvis, and of course, he could blink in one eye only because the other was pinned open. Tears streamed down his face, and they’d mingled with blood to produce a water-smear like running red mascara after a crying fit. His eyes glared at her with a redness in their centres, a glow reserved for some kind of robot from those sci-fi films, like a Terminator. He was grotesque and she couldn’t shake the image no matter how hard she tried. Eddie would put his drunken arm around her and ask her why she’d fucked about with his evidence like that.
He’d stood next to her in Crosby’s kitchen, and watched one of his men use the liquid nitrogen from a van they’d pulled around the back. They took a tamper-proof evidence bag – the one bearing Eddie’s signature, the one with a swab inside it from Tony Lambert’s bedroom carpet – and they’d wafted it in and out of a metal container with liquid nitrogen pouring over the sides like an eerie spectral vision of the Niagara Falls.
Eventually, the bag had cracked open at the seal, the adhesive – super strong under normal temperatures, and of course, tamper-proof – had parted and the swab inside fell out onto the worktop. The bag now was super fragile, it would snap if touched too hard, had become brittle enough to shatter if subjected to extremes of temperature variation, and would remain so until it slowly came back up to room temperature again. So one guy had kept it hovering inside the container without actually immersing it, while another guy had slowly slid inside it another swab, pre-prepared by Lisa.
She could see Eddie in Slade’s lounge now; he was on the floor and had been kicked in the side, and he was slurring his words as though pissed. Then the door had opened further and Eddie saw her, and his eyes opened wide in recognition, and that’s when her heart had stepped up a notch. But by then it had been too late to step back out of the way – the damage was done. Eddie had just signed his own life away. And that’s when Slade invited her into the lounge.
But then, Eddie was right beside her again; he had nudged her, thumbs up, “Feckin good job,” he’d said. He spoke and a dribble of saliva splashed onto the floor because he couldn’t close his mouth properly. “You’ve really thought thith through,” he slurred.
And she had. But it was all Eddie’s fault. If he’d stayed away from Tony’s scene, none of this, none of it, need ever have happened.
And that’s when the carousel spun majestically around a little further and the nightmare had continued on to another scene. This one featured bright sunlight bouncing off the white walls of a pub called The Magic Carousel; bright enough for her to be squinting, shielding her eyes from the brightness with a hand like she was giving a permanent salute to the man she stood alone with. His name was Slade Crosby, and he was a fat bearded man like a Hell’s Angel, but he didn’t wear oil-stained denim and a scratched leather jacket with spikes all over it. He wore jeans, and boots, but with a shirt and cotton jacket. He wore aviator shades so she couldn’t read his eyes.
And she was speaking to him as though she trusted him. And she knew she couldn’t. He was a gangster, and you could never trust a gangster. Gangsters worked towards their own ends, and once those had been satisfied, there was little chance your own piece of the deal would be concluded correctly. But she’d had little choice.
A young woman had approached her several weeks prior to this meeting. The young woman though had grown wide, not fat yet, but wide. She’d become incredibly less beautiful than she’d remembered; now she was clad in black leather, black-painted nails, black lipstick and black eye-liner. A dozen years ago, about two years before the young woman went to jail, she’d been lithe, sensual and beautiful in every department. She could have been a model, she was fit, as the saying went, but she wasn’t a model, she was a copper, like Lisa. They’d gone through probation together and became lovers the night before they had graduated.
Of course, they didn’t graduate by themselves. Back then there’d been a healthy intake of new police officers. Fifty people in all, four waves of probationer officers. And during the twenty-six weeks they’d spent together, a good few of them had become close friends. Lisa and this one young lady called Sophie, in particular. But fringing them, good enough friends to be invited on nights out and parties at each other’s houses, were several others. In particular, there was a guy called Tony Lambert, distinctive because of the gap between his front teeth that was wide enough to park a bike in. He’d disappeared off the radar not long after graduation. He’d gone to work out of Stainbeck police station in Leeds, and then he disappeared, rumoured to have been picked up by Special Branch – and Christ knew what happened to people when they went into the secret squirrel world of plain-clothes.
But in the case of Tony Lambert, Lisa knew exactly what had become of him because over Slade’s shoulder she could see him right now. He was squinting against the sunlight too, drawing his lips back as he screwed up his eyes, showing the gap between his front teeth.
At first, she hadn’t really noticed him; she was involved in some rather fragile negotiations with Slade. But then she’d seen him, really seen, really paid him some attention, and she was utterly convinced it was him. She had problems bringing his name to mind at first. She got the Tony part immediately, but the surname evaded her.
“She’s into me for fifty grand,” she whispered to Slade. Of course, that wasn’t necessarily the truth – Sophie had said she was kidding. But the point of it all was the threat, at least that’s how Lisa perceived it: a threat. And that was good enough reason to be here right now, cutting a deal with a bastard. Didn’t matter what currency.
Slade’s eyebrows had risen at that. A handsome figure.
“I’ve no chance of raising it.”
“You shouldn’t anyway,” he said. “What’s to stop her coming back for more? You’d never be free of her.”
“That’s where you come in.”
“Why would I want a piece of that?”
“Because I’m going to get Blake off a charge of rape for you.”
Slade slid his aviators up his head, looked at her through deep brown eyes, shadowed crow-feet to the sides. “I’m listening.”
And she’d gone on to state how she’d risk her career to lose some evidence, namely semen, recovered from the scene. When it went to court and CPS couldn’t produce, they’d have to cancel the hearing or risk it being thrown out anyway.
Slade had warmed to the idea of course, and he’d agreed to take care of Sophie for her. But then, he’d surprised her by asking how he could trust her. A fair question when you actually stopped and thought about it.
“You want to know if you can trust me?” she’d asked. He nodded. “Okay,” she said, “Don’t look around, but the man who drove you here today. Do you know him?”
“Course I do. He’s one of my men. Why?”
“Last I heard he worked for Special Branch. Probably into Crime Division by now.”
“Bollocks.”
“Name’s Tony…” and there she paused for a moment, because it still wouldn’t come; it was still just out of reach, and then, like a penny dancing down the board, s
triking pins left and right at the fairground, it landed in her hand, and she said, “Lambert. Been on the force for twelve years. Same as me.”
“You sure?”
“Joined the same time as I did. He doesn’t know I’ve seen him, but I know he recognises me. You should ask him.”
Slade was quiet. Thinking. “Lambert?”
“It’s what I know him as, yes.”
Slade pulled the aviators back down over his eyes again.
“So you trust me now? We have a deal?”
It turned out they did indeed have a deal. And Tony had died as a result of it. Turns out his wife had too. And Lisa was sorry about that. No, really she was; she didn’t want this thing with Slade to get bigger than one simple job in return for one simple favour. But, as predicted – if she’d stopped and given it some serious thought – it had spiralled into favour after favour, and still Sophie waved the threat over her and still Sophie laughed at her, with her high morals and low self-esteem.
It was a laugh. But it wasn’t in the slightest bit funny, as The Magic Carousel revolved a bit further, still spinning even though she’d been awake and in her office for the last hour or so. There was so much happening inside her mind that Lisa shrieked when her phone rang.
— Four —
It was a large office and there were phones ringing all the damned time. Over at the admin desk in particular where Melanie worked, but also there were phones and conversations happening all around her, and yet Ros managed to pick up on just one out of the cacophony.
Jeffery was summoned into Lisa Westmoreland’s office and the door closed. This was becoming like a ritual. It was getting to the point of obsession on Ros’s part, and she climbed from her chair, about to walk across the carpet and let herself into the office. Through the window, Jeffery obviously saw her, and he put his hand up as though stopping traffic. She stopped, and then he waved her back, telling her to get back to her desk. There was pain in his eyes.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Northern England. A graveyard and a wind howling among the stones like a ghoul in a vampire movie. And of course the rain, incessant, pounding; umbrellas being ripped inside out, the vicar’s garments floating up around him like some weird occult version of a Marilyn Monroe scene. He finished his chat at the graveside, bowed his head in respect for the people standing there in the rain, and left them to it.
Among the dozen or so police officers who had arrived wearing pristine dress uniforms, and who now looked like a bedraggled fancy-dress party, were Cooper and Benson, heads down, praying silently for, or just contemplating, a man doing his duty, an officer of the law trying to bring order from chaos. Much missed. Sadly defeated by an evil that roamed freely among them like the vampire movie ghoul.
“So where did it all go wrong?”
Benson squinted through the rain at Cooper. “It went wrong,” he shouted over the wind, “with that stupid bitch, Westmoreland.”
Cooper nodded.
“And I have to say, boss, it went wrong when you didn’t take a firmer stand against them.”
“Slade Crosby?”
Benson shrugged. “All of them; all the crews in Leeds. You’ve got enough to bang them up, certainly the leaders. I don’t know why—”
“I was waiting,” he said. “I knew there was something big coming along—”
“There’s always something fucking big!”
Cooper looked at him.
“And look what happens when you wait,” he nodded at the mounds of mud before them. “I need a drink,” he said, and walked away, leaving Cooper feeling empty, betrayed, and worthless. But he wasn’t alone. Standing at the far side of the new grave was a young woman dressed in a black leather jacket. She wore black lipstick and black eye-make-up; looked like a fucking Goth, Cooper thought. For a moment he wondered who she was and why she was there. Then it didn’t matter anymore, and he walked away too, chasing a drink with Benson.
It was time to bring Domino to a close.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
— One —
Lisa’s nightmare vanished like smoke in a force nine. For the first time in days, she felt invincible again, like her plans were working, like they’d been positioned in the path of success by gods favourable to her. Eddie was dead, sunk into a muddy grave up north, and so surely it wouldn’t be too long before her final problem was out of the way. Slade would deal with Sophie soon, as soon as she’d given him the news that the swab from Tony Lambert’s bedroom carpet came back as horse blood. He would have to act then; it was her payment, her final payment to him to get on with the damned job of erasing Sophie and her malignant threat.
The nightmare carousel would be still tonight, she hoped.
The call she’d taken was from division, saying they had discovered two shallow graves up north not far from where they’d found Collins’s car. It seemed a little strange that division had called her, but Collins was her employee, after all. Anyway, the feeling of elation completely obliterated any reservations she’d had. The silly bastard was not going to come walking back through the office door. She could relax, breathe deeply and concentrate once more.
Out in the office though, things were not so smooth. Lisa peered through the glass at Ros, and couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for her.
— Two —
Since Kojak and Columbo were out of the office, it fell to Jeffery to pass on the news to Ros. He stepped out of Lisa’s office and felt like running away. He saw Ros’s eyes staring him down, and he was sure she could tell just how nervous he was. He looked not at her, but past her, out of the window just so he wouldn’t have to see the pain of expectation in her eyes, and then he looked at the carpet, unable to deal with it any longer.
“Jeffery?” Melanie beckoned him.
Jeffery stopped, pirouetted left, like some kind of ballet-dancing puppet, and said, “Please tell me it’s not more bad news,” he approached her desk, “I cannot take any more bad news today, my bad news bank is overflowing and if I have any more then—”
“Just look,” she said, cutting him dead. She slid a piece of paper across the desk.
He picked it up and read it. It was from the forensic science service – lab results for exhibit EC15, which was the swab from Tony Lambert’s bedroom carpet, and from EC8, which was the blood swab from the tree branch at Blake Crosby’s scene in Garforth. He perched on the edge of Melanie’s desk, absorbed by the news.
“This can’t be right,” he said.
“What?”
“This!” He flicked the page, and in a high voice said, “Get me Eddie’s scene report from the revisit at Tony Lambert’s house.”
“But—”
“Now!”
Melanie beat the keyboard up and then turned the screen so Jeffery could see the scanned report of Eddie’s second attendance at the scene.
Then Ros was by his side. “What is it?”
“It’s the lab results from Eddie’s exhibits.”
“Not that,” she said; “what were you coming to tell me?”
“Nothing,” Jeffery was distracted, scrolling through the report.
“Tell me.”
“It’ll wait, Ros, I’m just—”
“It won’t fucking wait! Tell me!”
Jeffery closed his eyes, sighed and turned to her. He took a moment, and then quietly said, “They found two shallow graves not far from Eddie’s car.”
Like a machine shutting down, spiralling downwards towards a complete halt, Ros’s eyes closed, and her breathing slowed, her tense posture relaxed and then she hit the floor going straight down like a building being demolished. Melanie shrieked and raced around the desk; Jeffery dropped the report and tried to catch her but got twisted up in his own feet and fell to the ground just beside her.
Lisa’s door banged against its stop as she rushed from her office, “Get her some water!”
— Three —
Benson and Cooper left the pub and climbed into the car. “Well, we shoul
d go see him,” Benson said.
“Okay, let’s do it.”
In twenty minutes they left the main road, circled around onto a quiet lane, and pulled up outside an old-fashioned cottage with a single streetlamp outside, and a tuft of crime scene tape tied at its base fluttering in the wind.
In the rain they stood by the new front door and knocked loudly.
Eventually it creaked open and he stood there with a blurry expression, swollen lip and badly bruised eye. Across his forehead was a gash an inch and a half long with glue and tape holding the two sides of the flap together.
“Fuck me, it’s Dempsey and Makepeace.” Eddie strolled back inside and headed for the kitchen.
* * *
They closed the door behind him and he sighed as he realised his peace and quiet had just gone straight to ratshit hell. He sprinkled some coffee into a swilled-out mug and looked up at them, “Want one?”
They looked at the mug and both shook their heads.
“Suit yourselves.” The kettle boiled and he poured the water. “You get anything useful from the bug?” And then he picked up a knife.
“What bug?” asked Cooper.
“Why are you stirring your coffee with the handle of a knife?”
Eddie looked at Benson as though he was stupid, “Because if you use the blade it sloshes everywhere.”
“What bug?” Cooper asked again.
“I meant to tell you about that, boss.”
“But you forgot, eh?”
“Gentlemen,” Eddie said, “no shouting, I have a headache, okay?”
“How are you feeling, Eddie?” Benson hovered around him as Cooper took a seat in the lounge.
“Concussion. A lip that stings, an eyelid that hurts like fuck and throbbing in my head like there’s a guy with a sledgehammer practising percussion for Motörhead. And the drugs they’ve given me… I can shit through the knee of an idol.”
“What. Fucking. Bug?”
“So you didn’t actually get shot at all?”
Eddie shook his head. “Nope. That prick Gillon was about to but Jagger got him first. He fired as he hit the floor fortunately.”
Black by Rose Page 29