by Ted Tayler
A newspaper editor would gloss over another knifing in a street fight between rival gangs, in favour of the death of a pedestrian hit by a drunk driver. It’s the way of the world; the first doesn’t get much sympathy, while the second tugs at the heartstrings.
Easter Saturday, 19th April 2014
On Saturday morning, there were three newspaper reports, which individually might have appeared unremarkable, but one man was more vigilant than the rest of the country. Phil Hounsell was having breakfast at his home on the outskirts of Bath. Erica and the kids had gone shopping.
Phil was having a lazy day. He and Wayne went out for drinks last night. He was paying for it now. The hangover made him concentrate even harder to get the letters on the page to stay in focus.
The body of a teenager called Danny Simpkins had been discovered in the Whitehawk area of Brighton. He had been strangled. Phil thought that odd; so many youngsters carried knives today. There was no suggestion of his murder being personal. He buttered another slice of toast and turned over the page.
Chris Vince, of Lichfield, had died at the garage where he worked as a mechanic. Vince, thirty-one, was killed in an explosion late last evening when he was in the workshop alone. Several cars were destroyed, and the building cordoned off until fire investigators determine whether the structure is safe. Vince was a hardened criminal who appeared to have tried to put his past life behind him. Police appealed for anyone with information to come forward.
Phil stood up, walked over to boil the kettle. Another cup of black coffee was required. Something here didn’t smell right.
The third item received more prominence on an inside page. Greg Pitt, a farmer’s son, twenty-four, had been working in a trench yesterday evening when a wall collapsed. Pitt had been buried alive. Nobody heard a thing. His father went looking for him with a torch at eleven o’clock when Greg didn’t come back to the house. He had made the gruesome discovery and called the emergency services. Police found drugs in Greg Pitt’s Land Rover, and several hundred pounds in cash. The Pitt’s farm lay on the outskirts of Leicester.
Phil sipped his coffee. Those years as a DCI solving cases from scraps of evidence were brought to bear. This was TV drama territory. Normal criminals stuck to traditional methods. What were the odds against deaths by strangulation, explosion, and being buried under tonnes of dirt, happening the same day?
“Astronomical,” thought Phil, “and if you throw in a bloke called Pitt, dying in a trench, then this copper’s nose smells something rotten.”
*****
At Larcombe Manor, the invited guests gathered for the noon wedding.
Geoffrey and Grace Fox had been collected from the station.
Phoenix spent the night in a vacant room in the stable block. He showered and dressed in his suit, ready to walk to the tiny church by eleven. Rusty arrived to accompany him at just before half-past eleven.
Athena sat with Hope on her lap.
Maria Elena was taking her to church. Giles and the nanny were due at half-past to collect her. They were a few minutes late.
Artemis put the finishing touches on her hair, make-up and dress in her room. It was time to help the bride finish her preparations. When she reached Athena’s rooms, she could hear Grace Fox fussing over her daughter. She knocked and entered. Grace held Hope, and Athena stood in the middle of the room, in her gold wedding dress.
“How do I look?” asked Athena.
“Stunning,” replied Artemis.
“You both look wonderful,” Grace gushed. She was full to the brim with happiness.
Athena and Artemis complimented Grace on her outfit. There had been no expense spared. She only had one daughter, so Geoffrey was forced to dig deep.
Her husband sat in the lounge, reading the newspaper, He looked up as the three women walked through from Athena’s dressing room.
“My word, you look splendid,” he said to them.
Maria Elena and Giles finally arrived at the door. The small party could make its way across the grounds to the church. Hope was handed over to her nanny. Geoffrey took his daughter by the arm. Artemis walked with Grace. As they came outside into the warm sunshine, it was easy to believe everything was right with the world.
Ahead of them, at the gateway to St Michael’s, Grace and Geoffrey could see Minos and Alastor stood with Henry Case.
Phoenix and Rusty waited by the door with the Reverend Sarah Gough. Everyone invited to attend the wedding of Annabelle Grace Fox to Colin Bailey was present. All thirteen of them.
*****
In his penthouse office in the City, Hugo Hanigan was an angry man. The newspapers scattered across his desk suggested it was these that incensed him. He had engineered his response to the busybodies threatening to disrupt his plans for The Grid, so carefully. A steady succession of killings across the country; to get rid of inconsequential fools who didn’t agree with his plans for a super gang to cover the entire country.
The press didn’t see the connection. The fools. His unknown enemy hadn’t been roused from their slumber. They were resting, after eliminating a few soldiers in Chiswick, and Hackney, like a lion after a kill.
How dare they ignore him? He was Hugo Hanigan, the owner of the merchant bank that carried his name. An organisation that existed to facilitate the expansion of organised crime and had many billions at its disposal to help him achieve his aims.
As Ardal James Hannon, he had been just one of the hundreds of entrepreneurs who scraped and scrapped their way out of the gutter. His transformation into a financial superstar was now complete. The City knew who he was; in time, the country would know his name and fear it.
He had been forced to act in haste last night. He ordered a series of killings, each designed to provoke a reaction. The press pushed them from the front pages into obscurity. Why was there no one intelligent enough to see the hold he had over the country already? The Grid was growing; in size and strength.
*****
Inside St Michael’s church at Larcombe Manor, Colin Bailey and Annabelle Fox were joined in holy matrimony. Sarah Gough performed her duties without question. It was the first wedding at which she officiated where the names of the bride and groom were absent from every part but the required documentation. She wondered whether Henry knew the reasons. Perhaps she could ask him in the future?
Annabelle was a friend, and Sarah could think of no valid reason she should object to whispering their first names when going through those parts of the service. As Sarah looked over the heads of the happy couple kneeling in front of her as the service drew to a close, nobody else seemed it strange; so why be concerned?
The wedding party soon outside the tiny church. Alastor took a minimum of the required photographs. There was no need for anyone outside the small congregation to receive a copy.
A short walk to the main house and they were inside the dining room. The wedding reception could begin. An afternoon and evening of celebration stretched before them. The troubles that remained to be faced beyond the boundaries of the estate were put on hold.
Phoenix and Athena could relax, at last. They were now Mr and Mrs Fox-Bailey. As they mingled with their guests, they discussed plans for Hope’s baptism. Rusty and Artemis danced together as Phoenix watched, and he wondered whether his friend would soon follow him into marriage.
Phoenix spotted Giles and Maria Elena sat closely together. Surely, they realised by now everyone knew they were an item? He was pleased to see Henry with Sarah Gough. They made an interesting couple and seemed to get along like a house on fire. Would it last, though? The closer they became, the greater the chance she would discover his dark secret. Could love ever survive between a minister of the cloth and the man they knew at Larcombe as a tough interrogator and executioner?
His in-laws enjoyed themselves, Geoffrey and Grace weren’t returning to Belgravia until Monday; they were making the most of tonight. Hope slept upstairs. She wasn’t being abandoned. Kelly Dexter had volunteered to babysit. Hayden Vin
cent stayed in the stable block watching TV.
As Phoenix’s gaze continued around the room, he noticed Minos and Alastor hovering on the sidelines; together as always. They would be the first to make their excuses and leave. Phoenix walked across to talk to them. He made fun of them too often. It was time to thank them for their sacrifices to the cause. Olympus would be lost without them.
The party continued until past midnight. Not excessive, perhaps, but the majority understood that there was work to be done in the morning.
Easter Sunday, 20th April 2014
As the revellers surfaced mid-morning to join Phoenix and Athena for brunch on the patio, in Bath, Phil risked the wrath of his wife and made a phone call.
“Wayne, sorry to disturb you on a Sunday, mate, but could you spare me an hour?”
Wayne Sangster looked at the clock. He didn’t know why he bothered. He had nothing planned.
“Sure thing, boss, shall I come over to your house?”
“No, we’ll go into the office; there’s a puzzle I need your help with.”
After promising Erica he’d be back in time to take her and the kids out for the afternoon, Phil drove into the city.
“What’s the problem, boss?” asked Wayne when he strolled through the door of HSS thirty minutes later.
Phil explained his suspicions concerning the deaths reported yesterday in Brighton, Lichfield, and Leicester.
“I’ve been doing some digging,” he continued. “It meant fishing out old papers from the recycling box, but I found several more over the past week.”
Phil showed Wayne a list of over a dozen names.
“So, what?” said Wayne. “You’ll get an unexplained death every day somewhere in the country, won’t you? A high percentage of these will have been solved before long. That might make the news, it might not. It depends on how long it takes for the case to come to court, and whatever other news is pushed to the top of the pile.”
Phil knew Wayne was right, but he wanted to pursue this. His nose didn’t usually send him in the wrong direction.
“What if something links these together? Each of the ones I’ve selected was a criminal. They were involved in drugs, violent crime, you name it.”
“Are you suggesting these are connected? Yeah, well, no police force is going to come to that conclusion, are they?” said Wayne. “They’ve each got their own little patch, with their own targets. They wouldn’t be looking for similar deaths in Leicester if they worked in Brighton.
“Humour me,” said Phil, “check out this Gloucester one again. A bloke called Fry dies in a house fire. Someone’s extracting the urine.”
“OK, you’ve convinced me,” said Wayne. “Where did these deaths happen?”
He stood up and walked over to a filing cabinet.
“We’ve got a map here somewhere,” he muttered, “ah, here we are. Let’s get this up on the wall and stick pins in the locations. Shout the names out, boss.”
Phil called out the names. A few appeared in random towns, but Phil thought he could see a pattern. Bournemouth, Gloucester, Telford, Liverpool, and Blackpool. Surely not? Brighton, Watford, Leicester, Nottingham, and York.
“Draw a line between Bournemouth and Blackpool; then York to Brighton. It’s not dead straight, but tell me what you see.”
“Parallel lines, boss,” said Wayne, “give or take.”
“Look at Lichfield,” said Phil. “Is that a straight line between Telford and Leicester?”
“I couldn’t use a ruler to connect them, boss, but I suppose so, yes.”
Phil picked up the phone and dialled the number his Olympus contact left.
Hayden Vincent answered.
“Hello. What have you got for us?” he asked.
“I’m not certain,” said Phil, “but does the letter ‘H’ mean something to you?”
EPILOGUE
‘Loose Ends’
Les Biggar discharged himself from the hospital in Dublin after the Easter weekend. He was still in pain, but eager to fly back to Cardiff airport and get home.
Olympus ensured he was well paid for the trip that almost cost him his life. It wasn’t the need to work, to earn extra cash that drove him. He missed the flying. He missed the danger. A few days’ resting at home and he would call Larcombe Manor to say he was fit again for active duty.
In Kilburn, the ‘Wishing Well’ café continued to offer Guinness cake and other artery-clogging delicacies in the afternoons. Bridie Carragher watched the shop door more and more; to see who was there. She hadn’t forgotten the man-mountain who captured her heart.
Her evenings were spent dreaming up recipes for cakes that would entice him back to her. Bridie picked up the HSS business card at least once every day, trying to pluck up the courage to call.
Josie Dymond had attended Carrie Ditchburn’s funeral in Cheltenham. At the wake, afterwards, she met with friends from their school days. Nick Angell, who now worked as a tree surgeon, asked her for her phone number. She imagined there might be a future for them. A future tinged with regret that Carrie was no longer alive to witness it.
Wayne Sangster often thought of taking a trip to London; just to renew old acquaintances. His boss kept him too busy to give him the chance. Phil Hounsell could see the wistful look on his colleague’s face; as he stared into space.
Phil understood where his mind wandered and knew he had to save him from himself. He had only just got Wayne down to one doughnut per day. HSS wasn’t that flush with cash to afford a new uniform for a staff member with an expanding waistline.
Fintan O’Sullivan and Brendan Connery returned to their respective homes. The excitement had diminished for now. Olympus would come calling again for their help. They would be ready.
You have just finished reading ‘A New Dawn’
This was the sixth book in the series featuring ‘The Phoenix’; in the seventh book, ‘Something Wicked Draws Near’ the action continues.
• Can Olympus prevent The Grid from gaining a stranglehold on the UK?
• Will Athena find any ‘skeletons’ amongst the proposed new Olympians?
• Can relationships, old and new, survive the summer of 2014?
• Which scandal, or injustice, is next for Phoenix and Rusty to handle?
• Is it time for Orion, to be brought into the fold at Larcombe?
These are just a few of the unanswered questions. Many dangers must be faced by the Olympus agents. There are many criminals to be brought to justice. Several wrongs have to be put right and closure sought for victims… more tales remain to be told.
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The Final Straw
An only child, unloved and unwanted by his parents, Colin Bailey is a bitter, emotionally damaged young man. He’s hell-bent on exacting revenge on anyone who has stopped him becoming the person he believes he was destined to be. What sets Colin apart is his intellect and meticulous planning. Detective Phil Hounsell pursues his man relentlessly while trying to avoid the small town in which he works sliding further and further into the grip of two rival gangs.
A devastating event in Colin’s life provides the final straw that herald’s a bloodbath. Can Phil prevent it happening or will he too be a victim? This tale of revenge spans two decades, yet the police are chasing shadows; it builds in pace and tension to a thrilling climax against the backdrop of a quiet West Country town.
Unfinished Business
The sequel to the award-winning ‘The Final Straw’ sees Colin Bailey return to the UK after a decade abroad. With a new name and a new face, he still has scores to settle. His meticulous planning takes him ingeniously across Scotland and the North of England ticking names off his list with the police completely baffled.
DCI Phil Hounsell pitted his wits against Colin before and so he is sent to Durham where he teams up with super intelligent young DS
Zara Wheeler; together they track their man to Manchester and then eventually south to Bath. The final scenes take place on the streets of the Roman city; Phil Hounsell’s family is threatened. In a dramatic conclusion reminiscent of Holmes and Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls, the two men struggle above the foaming waters of the historic Pulteney Weir.
A Sting In The Tale
A collection of twelve short stories, each with an unexpected twist at the end. Love stories, ghost stories, and tales of revenge sprinkled with a touch of humour.
There is something for everyone, young or old; from the elderly bookshop owner with an unusual talent and his summer of love with a young schoolteacher. To the haunting account of the journey on the last bus back to town from the heart of the countryside. Each story has characters and situations you will recognise. But will you identify the 'sting in the tale' before you turn that final page?
The Olympus Project
Rescued by strangers from a watery grave and given a new identity.
The Phoenix is a stone-cold killer.
An ideal fit for the Olympus Project, a secret organisation fighting injustice.
With hard, fast action and a cast of characters you can reach out and touch, this is the thriller series for which you’ve been searching.
Gold, Silver, and Bombs
The eyes of the world are on London 2012.
British security services anticipate an organised terror attack.
Safety is paramount. What if the real danger comes from a lone wolf?
You won’t want to miss the page-turning intensity of the second story in this gripping series.