A Matter Of Blood (The Dog-Faced Gods Trilogy)

by Sarah Pinborough

  He stopped for a bit, his head hanging, then added, ‘It was like talking to some kind of counsellor rather than a loan shark. I’ve met some powerful people in my time, but this man was different. He couldn’t have been much older than us, but there was something about him that was completely different - I just can’t put my finger on why. Sitting with him, I had every intention of doing what he asked me. I couldn’t imagine not doing what he asked me.’

  ‘And then?’

  A small shrug. ‘We went home. We didn’t talk about it, but I could see Paul was happy too. We cleared our debts and slowly started spending less time together. I broke away gradually so that Clara wouldn’t notice. I think he must have had the same instruction because he didn’t say anything about it.’

  ‘I’ve seen your bank accounts,’ Cass said. ‘It doesn’t look like you told your wife.’

  For the first time tears appeared in Isaac Jackson’s eyes. ‘I didn’t - I couldn’t. Paul obviously hadn’t told Eleanor, so how could I tell Clara? They’re best friends. It would have killed her’ - he stumbled a little over the phrase - ‘if Eleanor were able to maintain her lifestyle while Clara couldn’t. She’d have been humiliated.’

  Tests. It was all about tests, and these men had failed. Cass could see it unfolding so clearly. Paul, and Jackson too, probably, supposed to talk to their wives about their overspending, both watching and waiting for the other to do it first. An absolute classic case of having to keep up with the Joneses, and both wives blithely unaware of the cost - but at what cost?

  Jackson’s defeated voice intruded on Cass’s thoughts as he continued, ‘A month or so ago my phone rang. It was Solomon. He wanted us to meet.’

  ‘Back at the penthouse?’ Surely Solomon wouldn’t have met the men at the bedsit?

  ‘No, not this time, in a restaurant. An ordinary place, one of those steak chains. It was in Soho. Solomon looked different. He wasn’t so smartly dressed. He seemed less . . . contained. Maybe it had all been there the first time, but I hadn’t seen it. I’d been too worried about myself then to see the madness in him.’

  ‘You think he was crazy?’

  Jackson laughed for a full thirty seconds. The sound was at odds with the bleakness of their confines and his tale. Eventually, he continued, ‘Oh, he was crazy. And I think he made me crazy too. I’d gone in there knowing he was going to ask for something. He’d said at the first meeting there’d be a charge if I didn’t tell Clara we needed to cut back, but I’d allowed for that. Investing on my own I’d made some extra money - nothing major, I’m not as brave as Paul, so the choices I’d made were less risky. But I’d kept the money, put it aside for when this call came.’ That sour smile flashed again. ‘I thought I had it covered. How wrong can you be?’

  ‘Tell me.’ Cass had an awful feeling in his gut. Nothing is sacred. We’d been tested and found wanting. What did Isaac Jackson and Paul Miller do?

  ‘He said that my wife’s life was an illusion. I’d failed to be honest with her and allow her to share in reality as he’d told me to do.’ He paused and swallowed hard. ‘He said that he’d made that clear when he’d given me the money. He said that her life was the charge.’ His eyes met Cass’s, the horror of reliving those moments so clear that Cass felt he could almost see the film running in a loop deep in those chocolate-brown eyes.

  ‘I didn’t understand what he was saying at first. I kept babbling about the money I’d put aside for him. He waited until I’d finished. Then he just said, “I’m going to kill your wife.” As simple as that.’ Jackson ran his hands over his head and then rested his face in his palms, his long fingers pressing against his mouth and nose as if that could somehow stop him from finishing this story.

  ‘But your wife is still alive.’

  Jackson’s nod was almost imperceptible. ‘And sometimes, God help me, I wish she wasn’t,’ he whispered. ‘I begged and pleaded, and in the end, he gave me a choice.’ A whine crept into his deep voice, and Cass recognised it: it was the sound of someone who badly needed forgiveness of some kind. He’d heard it a thousand times before, in a thousand squalid police cells, and just like then, suddenly he was the Father Confessor. It was always the way, but he could offer no forgiveness; all he could do was to mete out justice. His face stayed impassive, but his stomach churned. He thought he could see where Isaac Jackson’s story was heading.

  ‘A choice?’ Claire asked softly.

  ‘He said a life was forfeit.’ His breath was ragged, the calm of earlier fading. ‘He said that if it wasn’t Clara, it had to be someone else. At first I thought he meant Justin and that almost sent me over the edge . . .’ Now tears flowed unchecked down his face and he stopped for a while until Cass prompted him again. ‘He started talking about Paul, and how the mess I was in was as much his fault as mine. As if he knew what I’d been thinking, why I didn’t tell Clara. Then he gave me my choice. Clara or Paul’s John.’ He buried his head into his hands again, and Cass could barely hear him when he said, ‘God help me, I chose little John.’ Snot ran from his nose and the words dribbled out with it: ‘I chose John.’

  Cass stared. He was feeling so much he almost felt nothing at all. He was numb in the face of what had happened. Solomon had set them a test, and they’d failed. Pride, vanity, stupidity, and the craziness of one rich man: all these things had collided to create a tragedy, and two boys died. And even right at the end Jackson hadn’t offered up his own life to pay for his own weaknesses, no, he chose the life of someone else’s child over that of his wife. Did he even once say, “Don’t take either of them, take me”? Would things have been different if he had? Maybe that would have been Solomon’s Get Out of Jail Free card: offer the ultimate sacrifice and all will be well. Perhaps that was one high-risk bet that Jackson wasn’t ready to take.

  ‘And then when it happened, I knew.’ Jackson’s mournful gaze could have cracked ice. ‘Of course Paul and I both knew. We’d made the same choice. Our beautiful boys were gone, and now the devil is dancing with our souls. I can’t look at him any more. Nor he me.’

  Cass couldn’t help the disgust that rose up inside him. He wanted to show him the tape. Perhaps he would. Maybe both men should live with the sight of their boys, friends to the last, gunned down side by side. Maybe then they’d see the reality of what they’d done. He glared at the sobbing man.

  ‘If I could take it all back I would,’ he was repeating, ‘oh God, I would.’ He was a broken man.

  Black shoes. Crimson spots. There was one more thing Cass needed to know. ‘If you feel so bad, then why did you try and set me up?’

  ‘What?’ Jackson’s head slowly rose and revealed a face riven with guilt . . . and now confusion. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘My brother and his family. The evidence that was planted.’

  Jackson stared at him and then glanced at Claire before looking back at Cass. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he said.

  ‘This was the only case I was working. It had to be you or Miller.’ He leaned in and growled, ‘Things cannot get any worse for you. You and your good friend - your best friend - just killed each other’s children.’

  He enjoyed the visible recoil as the statement hit home. ‘Just tell me why. I need to know.’

  There was a long pause. Jackson looked helpless. ‘But I really don’t know what you’re talking about. I haven’t tried to set you up - Christ, I was relieved when you came for me. That’s the truth.’

  Seconds ticked past silently. The problem was that Cass believed him. Compared to killing his best friend’s kid, this was nothing - he had nothing left worth lying for.

  Miller didn’t take long to break after that. Cass saw the horror on his face when he realised Jackson had told him everything. It took less than thirty minutes of increasingly abject ‘no comment’, most of which Cass thought was the last vestiges of self-denial, before Paul Miller was in tears as well, blabbing out his version of events much less coherently than his former friend had. Cass wonde
red if there wasn’t something more honest in this loss of all self-control than there had been with the stoicism Isaac Jackson had displayed when he started his interview, his completely unjustified sense of ‘doing the right thing’.

  As he left his second sobbing man of the day behind he figured it didn’t much matter. There was no good way of accepting what they’d done. Cass felt sick, any brief moment of sympathy he’d had for these men and the mess they’d created long gone. They weren’t bad men, just weak, and somehow that made what they’d done more terrible, unforgivable. Their children had died for their weakness. Acid burned up his throat.

  He felt the cold fingers of the two boys tightening around his heart as Claire came outside and stood next to him. The truth might be out, but how could that ever be enough to satisfy the ghosts of those boys’ lost years? That haunted him.

  ‘You okay?’ Claire touched his arm. Her hand was hot, or his own skin had gone cold. He couldn’t tell which.

  ‘Yeah,’ he lied. ‘You?’

  She smiled wanly. ‘You got them. You were right.’

  He tried to smile back, but the victory was hollow. Children killed by their own fathers; unwittingly sacrificed. There was no pleasure to be gained from that. He wished Bowman had been right, that it had been a botched hit on a gangster. A terrible accident was something they could all live with. As it was, this would be one of those cases that stained everyone who came near it, even innocent Claire, with her touching faith in right and wrong and black and white. Once the thrill of closing the case had passed she’d find her sleep restless, and she wouldn’t be able to put her finger on why: a silent haunting down through the years until she finally came to realise - as she would, in this bloody job - that black and white are easy to live with; it’s the shades of grey that give you nightmares.

  ‘Get Blackmore to show them the film,’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’ve got to go out.’ Despite his calm voice, his hands were trembling at his sides. ‘Bowman can explain to Morgan exactly how he fucked up, and I want Blackmore to sit in each of those fucking cells and show those bastards what they did.’ God, he needed a cigarette. ‘They’ve fucking earned that right.’ The small, cold fingers slowly released their grip and slid away into the darkness inside him. The dead were vengeful; Cass thought perhaps he’d given them what they wanted. He’d given them everything he could, anyway.

  He couldn’t look at Claire; he didn’t want to see her looking at him as if she saw something bad below the surface of his skin: a man she didn’t understand at all.

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘I have to go and see their wives and tell them what their haircuts have cost them.’

  She flinched. ‘That’s not fair, Cass. They didn’t do this.’ So much pity in her voice. Was it for the families, or for him? ‘They’ve lost their children and their husbands in one fell swoop.’

  ‘I know. I’m sorry. You’re right, of course. Clara Jackson and Eleanor Miller are victims too.’ So why did he feel so angry at them? Was this his own resentment at Kate coming out to play? There were parallels between them, that was for sure. Kate had always pushed him to climb the ladder. She was desperate to fit in with the best people, to have the best things. She wanted him to be successful. Well, it hadn’t worked for him, and it hadn’t worked for Isaac Jackson or Paul Miller. He remembered Kate’s face when those dreams had been destroyed. He remembered the feel of the trigger as he squeezed it. They were all steeped in blood.

  ‘Just make sure they see that film.’

  Claire nodded. Even she wouldn’t argue with him in this mood. He walked away without looking back.

  He had one more thing to do before heading out to wreck what was left of the women’s lives. He went to the busy first floor, where people were too busy running around chasing reports of domestic violence and stolen cars to pay any attention to a phone call. He flipped open his mobile and called Artie Mullins. If Jackson and Miller hadn’t set him up, whoever had was still out there. Only one person appeared to have any idea about who that might be, and he was lying in a hospital bed.

  Artie was as straightforward as ever, and with no real questions asked. Cass knew that one day he was likely to call in a huge favour, and that he was going to have to oblige, but worrying about that could wait.

  ‘What’s this kid’s name?’

  ‘Josh Eagleton. He’s in a coma in the ICU.’

  ‘Not a problem,’ Artie said. ‘I’ll get some people over there.’

  ‘Nothing obvious, though. I don’t want anyone asking questions.’

  ‘Trust me, your lot won’t even know we’ve got anyone there - but your boy will be safe as houses.’ His strong London accent didn’t mask his genuine concern. ‘You getting all this shit sorted out, Jonesy?’

  ‘Let’s hope so, Artie. Let’s fucking hope so.’

  Ramsey was loitering outside the building. Cass saw him flick a cigarette aside before he turned to go back inside. He didn’t smile; his face was a mask of tight lines.

  ‘I didn’t know you smoked,’ Cass said.

  ‘I don’t. Just once in a blue moon, when I think my choices are that or punch someone more senior than me. The cigarette becomes the lesser of two evils.’

  ‘What’s up?’ Cass wasn’t sure he wanted to ask. He was weighed down with enough this afternoon.

  ‘It turns out no one’s in that much of a hurry to get me that search warrant for your brother’s computer. Not that there’ll be anything left on it by now.’ He grimaced with frustration. ‘I’ve just sorted out another CSU to go through the house again and see if there’s anything they missed that might give us a clue who tried to make you look dirty, and how. There must be something they didn’t pick up on.’ He sighed. ‘It looked so open and shut - sorry, Cass - that maybe the team didn’t hunt so hard first time round. You know how it is. Everyone wants it to be easy.’

  Cass lit a cigarette of his own and now Ramsey really looked at him.

  ‘You’re not in too great a mood yourself. What’s up?’

  ‘I’m just going to see Clara Jackson and Eleanor Miller, to tell them that their husbands are responsible for the deaths of their children.’ His fingers were still cold and trembling.

  ‘Jesus Christ! What the fuck happened?’

  Cass looked at the other DI . In the late afternoon sunlight it looked as if the slightest yellow wash was drifting into the air from the corners of Ramsey’s eyes. He didn’t want to look at it. It wasn’t there. He shook his head. It was all he could manage.

  ‘You know what,’ Ramsay said, ‘I’ve got an hour to kill before anyone even thinks about giving me any paperwork that’s any use. I’ll drive you.’

  ‘It’s okay. They’ve both got WPCs with them. I’ll be fine.’

  ‘This isn’t about you.’ Ramsey started down the stairs towards the car park. ‘I want to hear the story, and I’m fucking bored of just hanging around here doing fuck all - what a waste of a great police brain.’ He laughed drily as a car bleeped and flashed its lights in friendly greeting. ‘Get in.’

  Chapter Eighteen

  The late afternoon is warmer than he expected, as if the sun has come to pay its final respects. He looks around and sees the faded beauty of the earth, and he smiles. The flowers are dancing in the slight wind. The grass grows in the lawn that runs between the beds and the concrete. He wonders if perhaps this day is truly more wondrous than all the countless thousands that have gone before, and whether perhaps this is something that is felt by all who know their final hours have arrived. He finds he is glad to leave the world while there is still some beauty left amidst the rot.

  He breathes in, and fills his lungs with damp air so full of the scents of humanity that he can barely taste how it used to be. He feels strange. Not afraid, just disconnected. Over his sweater and cords he wears a long brown mackintosh, to keep out the damp. He checks its pockets: the bottle of blood and a paintbrush in one; in the other two syringes,
one large and one small. He says a silent goodbye to the gardens and the earth and the air and the citadels beyond and turns to go back inside the church. His bones ache with the movement and he wonders if they’re turning to dust inside him already.

  The heavy doors shut with a thud that vibrates through his long fingers. He looks at the old wood for a long second, surprised by the sudden wave of sadness. The world on the other side is gone for him now. He will look upon it no more. Although his sadness surprises him, he knows it doesn’t matter. Nothing is sacred. It is a rotting world. Nothing is good, nothing is bad. None of it should ever have been. Even its Gods are dying.

  The vicar is at the altar, arranging some flowers brought by someone who enjoyed the music. He is placing them carefully in a large vase of water, but there is no point. The stems are cut. They have only the scent of death. He wonders if that is what it means to be human. As soon as the cord is cut they start dying. He sighs. They really didn’t think it all through properly at the start. As he walks down the aisle his skin under his shirt itches. The flies can feel the end is coming and they’re fighting it, even though they’re dying within minutes now when he sets them free. But he is in charge, and he will not rage against the dying of the light.

  The vicar turns. He has a name, Brendan Carpenter, but he will always be ‘the good Reverend’. He sums up all the best of those who have dedicated their lives in service to a God who was only ever an illusion, a long-ago memory. He is goodness and kindness and weakness rolled in one. But still he does not glow. He is simply human. And they were only ever pawns in the game. They tagged along when there was nowhere left to go. The rejects. The ones who failed the first test.