No Middle Ground

by Jack Slater

  ‘Yes. But what I meant was, is it going to stay our case?’

  ‘You mean as opposed to the NCA’s?’

  The National Crime Agency, based in London, had been set up with the express purpose of dealing with crimes that crossed multiple jurisdictions, as this one clearly did. But their specialities were in complex and organised crimes like drug dealing, paedophile rings and so on.

  ‘Exactly.’

  Colin tipped his head. ‘I don’t know. That’ll be up to his lordship. I’ll make the case if you want me to but, right now, I’d have thought something like this was the last thing you need.’

  Pete grimaced. ‘It is. But there’s a responsibility, isn’t there? It was brought specifically to us. And it was found on our patch. I’d have thought Fast-track would enjoy the kudos.’ And need it, he thought. The DCI’s reputation was spreading beyond the station – beyond the force, even. And it was not a good one.

  Colin pursed his lips. ‘You know how thin these bloody walls are, don’t you?’

  ‘Slip of the tongue, guv. Sorry.’

  Colin sighed. ‘You also know he’s looking for any excuse to nail your arse to the wall.’

  Pete raised an eyebrow. Such frankness in the face of superior ranks wasn’t like Colin. ‘Another reason for keeping this case. I need the kudos from it, too.’ He winced. ‘That sounded arrogant, but you know what I mean.’

  ‘Hmm. I’ll see what I can do. But you’d better solve it. Or your team had. He won’t be a happy camper if he sticks his neck out and you don’t deliver.’

  An image of the DCI clad in black feathers, with his neck sticking out waiting for the fall of an axe popped into Pete’s mind and he couldn’t stop the beginnings of a grin creeping onto his face. ‘Oh, for the opportunity, guv.’

  Colin frowned.

  ‘To chop it off.’

  ‘Get out of here before you get something chopped off.’

  Pete hesitated. The older man’s support meant a lot to him and he knew it would to his son, too, as they faced the court proceedings the next day. It felt almost like it was Pete and Tommy who were on trial, as opposed to former teacher Malcolm Burton. Pete wouldn’t feel comfortable explaining all that, any more than Colin would, hearing it. ‘Thanks, guv,’ he said simply.

  Colin didn’t ask for an explanation. Pete had known he wouldn’t. Instead, he just nodded. ‘Brief your team and clear off.’

  ‘What about the writer’s cramp and cauliflower ear?’

  ‘I’m sure they’ll cope.’

  ‘I’ll see you in court, then.’ Pete turned to leave. He gave the doorframe a double tap as he went through to express his appreciation.

  As he got back to his desk five pairs of eyes were fixed expectantly on him.

  ‘For now, at least, the case is ours,’ he told them. ‘But you know I’ve got court tomorrow and probably beyond and so’s Colin. So, fingers out of orifices, caffeine on drip-feed and don’t let me down. Right?’

  ‘Thanks, boss,’ Ben said from beyond Dick Feeney to his left.

  ‘Don’t thank me, Ben. You’ll be doing the work. And there’ll be a hell of a lot of it. We need case notes for every victim to start with. Times and locations. Then we need to try and put Hanson there evidentially or get the relevant forces to. And in the meantime, we need to find him.’

  ‘I put an all-ports out on him,’ the spiky-haired PC said.

  ‘Nothing yet on ANPR, though,’ Jane added.

  Hanson’s car would be flagged up as soon as it passed one of the countless automatic number plate recognition cameras positioned in towns and cities throughout the country as well as on the major highways and in many of the police cars that covered them. But ANPR was a present and future system. It didn’t look at where he’d been in the past so the fact that they’d got no hits so far could mean anything or nothing.

  ‘Did Graham get anything?’

  ‘Not a peep, boss.’

  Pete took a second to absorb that. ‘OK. Well, at least that limits which directions he could have taken initially. He’s self-employed. He’s got to keep seven years’ worth of papers related to that. It’s the law and, whatever else you do, you don’t mess with the tax-man. So, where are they? Spare bedroom? Bottom of his wardrobe? Sitting room sideboard? We need to find them, seize them and go through them. They’ll give dates and locations. The other major question is why he stopped – or at least stopped collecting trophies – four years ago. It’s highly unusual for someone like him. So, what happened in his life four years ago that was significant enough to put urges as strong as these on hold?’ His gaze travelled around his team members.

  ‘We know one thing that happened.’

  Pete focussed his gaze on Jane.

  She glanced at Ben then switched her green eyes back to Pete. ‘His daughter got pregnant.’

  ‘You mean…?’ Dave started.

  ‘Ew! That’s nasty,’ Jill protested. ‘Even for you, Dave Miles.’

  ‘And it doesn’t need to be true,’ Pete pointed out. ‘Ben?’

  The young PC’s expression began to shift.

  ‘When did she take up with her boyfriend? When did they meet and how? That leads you to the question of whether the boy’s his. It’s a question that needs an answer in the circumstances. Take Jill with you. You can put the lead-up questions; she can step in and ask the big one. Jane and Dick, you go to the house and do the search. Someone will need to get onto the PND in the morning and start downloading all those case files, then chase up anything you need to with missing persons or the SIO’s but I’m off. Colin’s orders. I’ve got a trial to prepare for. I’ll see you tomorrow, Dave.’

  As the actual arresting officer, Dave would be required to testify too.

  ‘Just like these bloody students,’ Dick said. ‘Cram everything in at the last possible minute.’

  ‘Good luck for tomorrow,’ Jane grinned.

  Pete’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He took it out and checked the screen. Annie. On the mobile he and Louise had bought her a few months ago when it became clear that her safety could be an issue. He tapped the green icon. ‘Button? What’s…’

  ‘Dad, its Tommy. He’s gone.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Pete forced himself not to swear. ‘What do you mean, gone?’

  ‘Gone. Walked out. I phoned to wish him well for tomorrow and Nanna said he wasn’t in his room, where she thought he was. She checked the bathroom, the back garden, everywhere. She’ll probably call you in a minute, herself. She’s probably onto the local station now, I expect.’

  ‘When…?’ Pete stopped himself. It was no use asking Annie questions that she wouldn’t have the answers to and, if she did, they’d be hearsay. ‘Never mind. Thanks for calling me, love. You did good. I’ll speak to your nan. I’m on the way now anyway. Are you at home?’

  If so, Louise would be there too. Otherwise, Annie was still under strict orders to only go home with someone whose parent was there. No exceptions.

  ‘Yes.’

  Relief washed over him like a tide. At least he wasn’t going to have to be the one to tell Louise. Then guilt followed just as quickly. Annie had obviously had to. ‘How’s your mum?’

  ‘Frantic, but OK.’

  That made sense. It was exactly how he felt.

  ‘He hasn’t…? You don’t think…?’

  ‘Right now, I don’t know what to think, love. But we’ll find him. I promise.’

  ‘But…’

  ‘Tell your mum I’m going there myself, right now. Love you.’

  As he ended the call he saw that his whole team were staring at him like a set of statues.

  ‘What’s up?’ Jane asked.

  ‘Tommy. It looks like he may have ducked out.’

  ‘Shit.’

  ‘I’d best tell Colin and then get moving.’

  ‘Go, boss. We can tell the guvnor.’

  Pete glanced at the door then over his shoulder at Colin’s office and back at the team. ‘You sure?’r />
  Dave pushed his chair back. ‘I’ll tell him. You need to go.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Pete didn’t need telling again. He dialled as he was going through the door from the big open-plan squad room and turning towards the stairs. Pushing through the door with its 1970’s wired safety glass.

  Beep, beep, beep.

  Engaged. Annie must have been right: they were talking to the Okehampton police station. There was supposed to have been an officer stationed outside the house for Tommy’s safety. Had there been?

  Pete thundered down the concrete stairs three at a time.

  If so, what the hell was he doing? Sleeping? And if not… Pete grimaced. Either way, he would create merry hell when he got there. There wouldn’t be an officer in the station that didn’t know exactly what Pete thought of their levels of efficiency and competence, regardless of their rank.

  On the plus side, if there was a man on duty there, it limited the options. Whether Tommy had run off or…

  Pete swallowed as he ran down the corridor towards the custody suite and the back door. No, the Southam brothers couldn’t have taken him. They hadn’t had time, surely? And yet, he’d just spent four hours locked up with Harold Pointer and Okehampton was only half an hour away. Of course they’d had time. Especially if they’d been planning it for several days – as they would have.

  ‘You’re not helping, Gayle. Get your head out of your arse.’

  ‘Been to see the chief, have you?’ Bob asked from the custody desk.

  Pete shook his head, not slowing in his flight towards the back door and the car park beyond. Had he really said that out loud? ‘Not this time.’

  He lifted his ID badge to the sensor, struck the door with the flat of his hand and fresh air hit him in the face like a slap. He shook his head. Was he losing it or what? Muttering to himself as he ran? Jesus! He swapped his ID badge for his car fob. Pressed the button when he was still several yards from the silver Ford. In seconds he was in the car, door slammed, engine running and on the way.

  Mid-afternoon, the roads were full of parents fetching kids home from school. He didn’t have time for this crap. He hit the blues and twos as he approached the road out front, checked for danger and pulled out, turning right towards the roundabout on Western Way. It might not be an official shout but there was a boy in imminent danger, he told himself as he accelerated past the queueing traffic. The fact it was his son was beside the point.

  And do we know he’s in danger? That little voice in his mind was back again. Or has he just buggered off, of his own accord?

  Pete’s parents still lived in the 1930’s bungalow he’d grown up in. The plot it sat on would make at least three of the one his own place occupied and even now it was right on the edge of the little market town, backing onto woods that were criss-crossed with a maze of footpaths and bridle ways. Three weeks ago, it would have been a mass of colour in there with the new fronds of ferns uncurling amongst the carpet of bluebells, stitchwort, wood anemones and yellow archangel. The bluebells would be pretty much over by now, but the leaves would be coming out on the trees above them, so it would still be a beautiful place to walk in. He’d spent many hours in there as a kid and he’d made sure to show it to Tommy and Annie when they were younger.

  He’d even shown them the old hollow where he and his mates had made a camp with the occasional fire for roasting spuds back in the day and the site of the old ruined cottage, now no more than a foundation pad and a couple of moss-covered stumps of tumble-down wall, where legend had it that an old woodsman had lived right up to the 1940’s with no electricity or running water.

  Of course, when Pete had first heard the story when he was five or six, his first question was, ‘Where did he go to the toilet then?’

  His dad had laughed. ‘What do you think all these flowers grow on?’

  Pete blinked, focussing on the road and the here-and-now. Never mind a five-year-old’s sensitivities – what about a fourteen-year-old’s? Would he have wandered out there on his own, despite being told specifically not to? Just for a break from being cooped up like a November turkey?

  Of course he would. Pete himself would and, after the past year, he didn’t doubt that Tommy would want to get out in the fresh air, on his own, just to think – or maybe not to think but just enjoy the outdoors. Specifically not to think, probably – especially about what he was about to be forced to relive in all its gory and perhaps embarrassing detail, under the close and inescapable scrutiny of a court.

  If he’d had time, Pete wouldn’t have minded doing exactly the same.

  As he headed for the edge of the city along a narrow, mostly residential street of old houses and small businesses, his phone rang.

  Annie? His dad? Had they found Tommy? He hit the button on the Bluetooth system without even looking at the screen. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Boss?’ It was Jane. ‘Have you got your radio on?’

  ‘No.’ The last thing he needed now was music. Then he realised: she meant his police radio. ‘Why? What’s happened?’

  ‘Mrs Turnbull’s been found.’

  ‘Jesus! Where? How is she?’

  ‘She was spotted by a passing motorist, half-in a ditch down the road that leads west out of Cheriton Bishop.’

  ‘And…?’ Pete asked when she paused.

  ‘She’s alive, but only just. Evidence at the scene suggests they just kicked her out and kept going. We’re talking cracked vertebrae, three broken ribs, broken humerus on one side, ulna on the other, cracked hip. She was unconscious when they found her. She’s been taken to the RDE.’

  ‘And no sign of the other victim? Cathy Webber?’

  ‘Nothing, boss.’

  ‘So, they dump the old lady and keep the young attractive one. We know one of them’s a paedophile. Do we know about the other one? Adrian?’

  ‘There’s nothing in his record. Apart from violence and murder.’

  ‘And a jail sentence that ended abruptly, not that long ago.’

  ‘Yeah, I was trying not to think of that, boss.’

  ‘Well, do, Jane. We need all the incentive we can muster. Because whatever she’s going through, the sooner we can put an end to it, the better.’

  ‘That much, I was sure of.’

  ‘Is there anything to be gained from me stopping off at the scene?’

  ‘I shouldn’t think so, boss. Traffic have got it covered.’

  ‘I’ll go straight through to Okehampton, then. Keep me updated.’ He switched on his police radio and ended the call with Jane, focussing on the road ahead as he turned onto the main trunk road towards west Devon and Cornwall.

  Seconds later, he saw an ambulance speeding past in the opposite direction, lights and sirens blaring. Mrs Turnbull? He hoped to God she’d make it. If not, he knew the guilt would eat him up, rightly or wrongly. He had been in charge of the Southams’ pursuit when they’d gone into her home.

  In the meantime, though, there was one thing he knew now that he hadn’t five minutes ago. The Southam brothers were heading in the same direction he was. Why, he wasn’t certain of, but he didn’t like the coincidence - not one bit. The question was, how far ahead of him were they? There was no way of knowing how long Mrs Turnbull had lain on that verge before she was found. It could have been seconds, minutes or hours.

  In which case, it was entirely possible that they had taken Tommy, after all, to stop him testifying in Malcolm Burton’s trial.

  You don’t know that, he told himself firmly. You can’t know that. He needed evidence. He needed to be at the scene.

  *

  His parents lived at the top of a T-shaped cul-de-sac. As he reached the head of the road and glanced right, towards their house, he could see a black BMW and three patrol cars parked around the property. He pulled up several doors down and set off on foot. Had barely got to within thirty yards of the place when the door of one of the patrol cars opened and a huge figure in an over-stuffed uniform emerged, one meaty hand raised to bloc
k his path.

  ‘Sorry, sir, you can’t…Pete!’

  ‘Dazzer. What’s going on?’

  Darren “Dazzer” Perkins had been on the force a year longer than Pete. They had worked together when Pete was in uniform, here in Okehampton.

  ‘I thought… Sorry, mate, what are you…? Scratch that – stupid question.’

  Pete shook his powerful hand. ‘So, which numpty was supposed to be keeping an eye on the place – keeping it safe and secure?’

  ‘Unfair, mate. And no, it wasn’t me. But he was on his own out here. You know what staffing levels are like. And you didn’t help, buggering off to the big city. They still haven’t replaced you, you know.’

  ‘Yeah. Not helpful or relevant when there’s a pair of known killers on the loose, wanting to stop my lad from testifying tomorrow.’

  ‘Eh? Bloody hell. Since when? We weren’t told that.’

  ‘I spent this morning trying to get them back into custody. And their last known direction of travel was this way. They nearly killed an innocent old lady in the process, back at Cheriton Bishop. So, what’s the story here?’

  ‘Scott’s been out here since half past eight. All was well at that stage. No unusual activity on the street since.’

  ‘Scott Bishop? How much of that time has he spent awake?’ Pete hadn’t seen or spoken to Bishop since he transferred to Exeter, but he did remember his inclination to burn the candle at both ends and catch up on his sleep in the middle.

  ‘Needs must, mate. We hadn’t got anyone else and we weren’t expecting trouble.’

  ‘W…’ Pete was incredulous as well as furious. ‘What the hell did you think this was all about? If it was just a matter of protocol there wouldn’t have been any need to get you lot involved at all, would there? Jesus! Tell me you’ve searched the woods, at least.’