by M A Comley
“I know. Look, ordinarily, I would dig my heels in just like you are, but we’re talking about an innocent girl’s life being on the line here. I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night knowing that I could have possibly prevented that girl’s death, could you?”
The silence rippled back to her.
When the inspector didn’t respond, Lorne asked, “Inspector, are you still there?”
“I am. Look, if you can think of a possible solution, then I’d be willing to help in any way I can. I’ve had enough blood on my hands over the years. Anything I can do to avoid the same thing occurring is fine by me.”
“That’s brilliant. What about if we set some kind of trap? Would you be willing to work with me on that?”
“Let the guys go and then pick them up again after the girl is safe, you mean?”
“Exactly. We’ll need to work out the finer details later, but as long as you’re up for it, I can get the ball rolling. The Lynx is expecting his men to be released by nine o’clock this morning.”
“Bloody hell. That doesn’t give us much time to organise things.”
“I know. I’m sorry. The Lynx is going to ring me at nine-o-five to let me know about the girl.”
“Can you trust him to let her go?”
“It’s a difficult one. I opted for an exchange at first, but he refused to go for that. I fear he has us by the short and curlies.”
“Okay, I’ll leave the finer details for you to sort out. Get back to me in an hour or so. How’s that?”
“Wonderful. I’m truly thankful for your help. Sorry again for disrupting your beauty sleep.”
The inspector grunted and hung up.
Lorne began jotting down notes on how to go about forcing the Lynx into a trap. The problem was, she had no idea what he intended to do about the girl after his men were released.
CHAPTER FIVE
Lorne phoned Pete, asking him to come into work early, only to receive a barrage of abuse before he reluctantly agreed. Then she called Inspector Grant back.
“Hello, Inspector, it’s DI Simpkins again. Any news for me?”
“Right, here’s where we stand. Obviously, I had to run things past my DCI first. Luckily, he agreed to release the men on the proviso they were put under immediate surveillance and picked up the second the girl is safe.”
“Bloody marvellous. That’s a weight off my mind. I need to sort out the nitty-gritty details now, but won’t be able to do that until the bastard rings me. What time will the men be released, Inspector?”
“I’ll organise that when I arrive. I’m on the way into work now.”
“Brilliant. Can you ring me once they’re released?”
“I will. We’ll keep in contact throughout the morning, Inspector. I hope this strategy has a happy outcome.”
“Me, too. I’ll be in touch soon.”
Lorne hung up, and hearing movement in the outer office, she shot out of her chair to see who it was. “Pete, hey, it’s so good of you to come in early.”
“Yeah, I know. You owe me big time, getting me out of bed at dawn like that.”
Lorne tutted and shook her head. “A slight exaggeration on your part, matey. Coffee?”
“Yeah, I’ll have it in intravenous form, thanks. Hey, have you been here all night?”
Lorne looked down at the creases in her suit. “That obvious, eh? Damn, I haven’t got a change of clothes, either.”
“Not worried about your change of clothes. I’m more concerned about what Tom is going to bloody say?”
“I rang him last night. He ended up putting the phone down on me.”
“I’m not surprised. You get too involved in your cases, Lorne.”
“Granted, but this girl is relying on us to help her, Pete. What am I supposed to do? Just throw my hands up in the air and say, ‘Hey, I can’t hang around here, folks, I’m expected at home for my dinner?’”
He shrugged. “Don’t ask me. That’s why I ain’t married and why I ain’t bothered climbing the promotional ladder. I can come and go as I please.”
“Wise words. I wish someone had pointed that out to me years ago.”
“Yeah, right. It’s just a phase you guys are going through. Mind you, if you keep spending the night at your desk, you’re hardly going to heal the rift between you.”
“All right. Enough of the lecture, Chunky. This is a one-off. I hope Tom knows that.”
Pete slumped into his chair and accepted the cup of coffee from Lorne. “So, where do we stand with things?”
She recounted what had happened over the last few hours and waited for his response.
He whistled. “Wow, the DCI and DI agreed to letting those frigging punks go! I find that hard to believe.”
“Believe it, matey. Hopefully, between us, we’ll be able to recapture the bastards swiftly. I have a bad feeling in my gut about this one, Pete.”
“So, what’s new? You’ve always got a gut ache about cases.”
She swiped his upper arm. “A really bad feeling. Still, let’s not dwell on the negatives. The positives are that we have other teams willing to work with us to get the girl back. I just hope the Lynx isn’t playing games with us.”
“He probably is. So, you’re waiting on a call from this Inspector Grant?”
“Yep, that should come through any minute now.”
They sat in silence for a few minutes until the phone rang in her office. Lorne bolted out of her seat to answer it. “Hello, DI Simpkins.”
“It’s DI Grant. We’ve released them, and I’ve put a tail on their car. Told my lads to keep their distance. Let me know when their boss contacts you.”
“Thanks. You’ll be the first person I call. He’s due to ring me in half an hour.”
“Speak soon.”
The inspector hung up, and Lorne returned to the incident room to find the other members of her team all gathered around Pete. “Good, I see Pete’s filled you in. The men have now been released, so it’s a waiting game. Let’s hope the bastard sticks to his side of the bargain.”
The team spent the next few minutes going back and forth with ideas on how they should proceed to try and trap the Lynx. Lorne watched the minutes tick painfully by as she waited for his call to come in.
At bang on 9:05, the phone rang.
“Hello, DI Simpkins.”
“Glad to see you’re prompt in answering the phone, Inspector,” the Lynx answered. “Okay, this is what’s going to happen next. My men have just reported in, in the nick of time. One more minute, and the deal would have been off.”
In the background, she heard the girl whimpering, then she yelped as if someone had kicked her, and started to sob. “Don’t hurt her, please? I’m prepared to do anything to get her back.”
“Good. Okay, I’m going to drop her off on the edge of Hyde Park.”
“That’s a pretty big area. You’re going to need to be clearer than that.”
“That’s enough for now. You have thirty minutes to get your arse over there. You better give me your mobile number. Oh, and she’ll be wearing a suicide vest.”
Lorne’s voice shook as she reeled off her number. He gave an evil laugh before ending the call.
Lorne was out of her chair and ran into the incident room so fast she would have given a racing greyhound a run for its money. “Right, team, we’ve got the drop-off. AJ, I need you to stay here and man the phones. Ring DI Grant for me. He’ll be expecting my call, but I need to get a shift on. Tell him to meet me at Hyde Park. I have no further details other than that. We have thirty minutes from now. Oh, and he told me the girl would be wearing a suicide vest. We need to ring the bomb squad and to arrange for the area to be cleared.”
AJ reached for his phone. “I’m on it, boss.”
“We can’t clear the area. That’ll spook him,” Pete announced.
“You’re right. Shit! Let me get the all-clear from DCI Roberts and then the rest of you can come with me. We’ll go in two cars.” She rang Roberts who agree
d to the strategy she’d put forward.
Seconds later, the room was filled with the sound of chairs scraping on the floor and the stampede of feet as the team raced towards the door.
The two cars headed out of the car park. Lorne looked in her rear-view mirror and saw a swarm of uniformed and plain-clothed colleagues running towards their vehicles. Relief flooded through her that Grant had stuck to his word and supplied several backup teams. The convoy drove through the traffic to the location. Lorne radioed AJ to order him to instruct the team to spread out and keep their distance for the moment.
Lorne pulled up, hunched forward over the steering wheel and observed people coming and going at the main entrance to the park. “Can you see anyone acting suspicious Pete?”
“Yeah, that guy over there, and that one.” He pointed to the two men in question.
Lorne shook her head. “Nope, don’t forget we have a witness putting this guy as black, twenty-six to twenty-eight, slim, with an athletic build.”
“Christ, you’ve just described half the men in Brixton.”
“I know it isn’t much. Keep your eyes peeled.” Her mobile jingled that a message had arrived. She grabbed her phone and swiped at the screen to reveal an image of the girl, battered and wearing a vest full of explosives. “Shit, damn and blast.”
Pete pulled her arm to let him see. “Shit! What the fuck is this guy playing at?”
“He’s toying with us, Pete. We need to get to her before that vest goes off.”
The text jingle sounded again. This time the message read: Thought you’d lay a trap for me, Inspector? What kind of fool do you take me for? There’s an alley off Moore Street. The girl will be there. You have fifteen minutes before... BOOM!
Lorne threw her phone at Pete and slammed the car into first gear. “Get in touch with AJ. I think Moore Street is in this direction. Get out of my way, you morons!” She blasted her horn impatiently as the traffic was at a standstill ahead of her, then she turned on the siren. One or two of the cars shifted a little to make room for her to squeeze through the gap. “He’s got to be around here somewhere. Make the other teams aware of that, Pete. Let’s see if we can grab the bastard before he escapes us again.”
Pete got on the radio to AJ to relay the information, as Lorne turned into Moore Street. She spotted the entrance to the alley halfway down the road. She drew the car to a screeching halt at the end of it. “This looks like the right location.”
Pete nodded, distracted by the chatter on the radio.
“All right then, let’s see what we’ve got,” Lorne said. They exited the vehicle and walked into the mouth of the alley. Graffiti covered every inch of the brick walls of the buildings on either side, and the remains of takeaways littered the ground. “This place is a dumping ground. The council need to clean up their act.”
“They probably only cleaned it last week. This area is always a shithole.”
“We should split up. She has to be around here somewhere. Time’s running out,” Lorne said, her eyes darting around the long alley.
“No kidding,” Pete glanced at his watch. “Ten minutes. That’s all we have.”
The pair separated. Heart racing, Lorne searched the right-hand side of the alley, while Pete began to explore the left. She hated having a countdown to work by.
Lorne heard a distant cry for help. “Pete, did you hear that?”
He shook his head, and his mouth turned down at the sides. “Nope.”
She held out her hand, instructing her partner to stop and listen until she heard the muffled cry again. “Did you hear it this time?”
“I did. Sounds like it was coming from back there.”
“Put the call in, Pete. Get the bomb squad here. Tell them it’s urgent. We have ten minutes before that damn vest explodes.”
“AJ already has them on standby. I’ll just give them our location.”
Lorne left her partner and ran to the back of the alley.
“Help me, please...”
The girl’s cry for help was closer now. Lorne scanned the buildings to the left and the right.
Out of breath, Pete arrived at her side. He pointed at the basement of the building ahead of them. “There, I saw something move.”
They approached the building. He was right. Lorne saw a girl’s hand poking through the bars of a tiny window.
“It’s okay, Lisa. We’re going to save you,” Lorne shouted as Pete searched the perimeter of the building to find a way in.
“Over here, Lorne.”
He disappeared through the door before she arrived. “Idiot! Wait for me, Pete. Don’t go in there alone.”
She followed him, her eyes scanning the area high and low in case the Lynx had set up some kind of booby trap.
“She’s in here.” Pete motioned for her to join him.
“Shit, it’s locked. It’s a heavy-duty door by the looks of it. We need to come up with a plan, and swiftly.”
Pete rushed out of the building and returned with a crowbar. “Where there’s a will...”
“Quickly, Pete.”
A few minutes later, he’d pried the lock off the door and pulled it open.
Lisa sobbed. “Please, get this thing off me.”
“We will, love. Help is on its way. Let’s get you outside. Can you walk?”
“I think so,” she replied, struggling to her feet with the bulky vest strapped to her chest.
Lorne studied the explosives. She’d never seen a suicide vest up close before, not a live one, anyway. Her heart was banging against her ribs. Damn, where the hell is that bomb squad?
As if they’d read her mind, two men in what appeared to be spacesuits arrived at the entrance of the building. They took charge of the proceedings, ushered the girl away, and instructed Lorne and Pete to keep back why they dealt with the vest.
Lorne watched one of the men reassuring Lisa while the other tinkered gently with the vest.
“What happens if the Lynx decides to detonate it before they can remove it?” Lorne asked her partner.
“Then it’s bye-bye world. We’ll go up, too, what with it being this close.”
“Shit! I didn’t even get the chance to kiss Charlie goodbye this morning.”
“You should have gone home. Hang on. I think they’ve got it.”
One of the suited men came towards them, holding the vest in his outstretched arms, and plodded his way towards his specially equipped vehicle, kitted out with a bomb containment chamber. Pete rushed to open the back door to the van. The suited man shouted at him to get back. Lorne rushed to the other end of the alley to comfort the girl. She heard the back of the van slam shut and the two suited men outside the back door, discussing what to do next. Then she saw the van rock from side to side on its wheels.
The men issued Lorne the thumbs-up that it was safe. Lisa flew into her arms. “That could have been me. I thought it was fake.”
“Hush now. We wouldn’t have let that happen, sweetheart. You’re safe. Are you up to answering some questions about the man who abducted you?”
“Of course. I want to see him caught and strung up after what he’s put me through.”
“You’re a brave girl. Let’s get you back to the station, or would you rather go home?”
The girl shook her head. “I’d rather help you first.”
“Good girl.” Lorne led the girl to the back seat of her vehicle, then she and Pete jumped in the front.
The radio sparked into life and AJ’s excited voice filled the car. “We’ve got him, boss. The Lynx has been arrested.”
Lorne looked at Pete and let out a relieved breath. “Thank God for that.”
Lisa began to sob in the back seat.
“Let’s get you back to the station, lovely.”
EPILOGUE
Lorne and Pete questioned the Lynx for ten hours straight. His wealthy solicitor had instructed his client to go down the “no comment” route, which had lasted a full two hours until the Lynx himself got bored with sp
outing the same two words over and over again.
During the interview, the backup teams had raided several addresses and rounded up the rest of the Lynx’s gang members. They would all be charged with the deaths of three girls and the kidnapping of Lisa Timmins. Lorne would ensure her team spent the next few weeks gathering every single piece of evidence they could find to put the gang away for life. They had disrupted London and terrorised Londoners for far too long.
At the end of another long shift, she stopped off at the pub for a celebratory drink with the team before she drove home.
Charlie ran into her arms. “We saw the TV, Mum. They’ve been hailing you as a modern-day heroine.”
Tom stood in the doorway to the lounge, staring at Lorne. Henry barged past his legs and sat in front of her. She bent down and cuddled her treasured dog. “Hello, boy, nice to see at least someone missed me.”
Tom tutted and walked into the lounge.
Oh, goody, another pleasant evening to look forward to in the Simpkins household. From heroine to villain in a matter of seconds!
THE END
Thank you for reading IRRATIONAL JUSTICE; I sincerely hope you enjoyed reading this short story as much as I loved writing it.
If you liked it, please consider posting a short review as genuine feedback is what makes all the lonely hours writers spend producing their work worthwhile.
Other books written by M A Comley you might also like to read.
CRUEL JUSTICE (Justice #1)
#1 Best-selling novel in two categories, Police procedurals and Women sleuths in both US and UK and Amazon top 20 novel.
The headless body of a wealthy widow is discovered
decomposing in Chelling Forest. Then a second victim is found. Detective
Inspector Lorne Simpkins and her partner, DS Pete Childs are assigned the case.
Before they can discover the identity of the killer they must make a connection between the two victims.
After a third murder, Lorne receives a grisly surprise. Clearly, a vicious