Find Them Dead

by Peter James

  Meg sat up with a start. She suddenly realized she had missed several minutes of what had been going on. She saw Gready looking at her – had he seen her eyes shut? Had anyone? Somehow, she had to stay awake – her daughter’s life was at stake.

  ‘A number of other ways?’ Cork prompted. ‘What other ways?’

  ‘I’ve seen this kind of set-up used for money laundering, for example. And by large-scale drug trafficking operations.’

  The defence QC was on her feet again. ‘Your Honour, this is casting aspersions on my client.’

  Jupp shook his head. ‘I disagree, the witness has given a straightforward answer to a question.’

  The prosecutor turned back to Emily Denyer. ‘You have told us you have been running an investigation into the defendant’s finances for the past eighteen months. That I’m sure is a major time and resource commitment. Could you tell us what made Sussex Police decide to instigate this?’

  ‘I was briefed as part of a confidential investigation that the name LH Classics had come up during an Interpol inquiry into a major international drugs supply chain, operating from Eastern Europe and also from Colombia and Ecuador in South America.’

  Emily Denyer spent some time giving her evidence, sharing the accounts and information she had accumulated against the defendant, Terence Gready. There were multiple spreadsheets she went through in detail, showing regular large transfers of money into bank accounts, a number linked to LH Classics. She had established that during the last five years there had been four separate payments of over £5 million passing through the LH Classics account. These transfers coincided with the approximate dates listed on the details of the offence. They also matched the evidence DS Alexander had given in relation to other large importations of drugs via Newhaven Port using classic cars destined for LH Classics.

  At the end of this evidence, the prosecutor briefly turned to the jury, to make them feel included, then back to his witness. ‘So, in your capacity as a Financial Investigator, you drilled deeply into the complex international chain of shell companies and nominee directors of LH Classics. Did you discover, as result, who the real beneficial owner is?’

  ‘I did,’ she said.

  ‘Could you tell us that person’s name?’

  She glanced almost disdainfully towards the dock and nodded. ‘It is the defendant.’ She hesitated, as if unsure whether to say what she wanted to next, but she did anyway. ‘We actually had a code name for him in the office.’

  ‘A code name for the defendant? Would you like to share it with the court?’

  Instantly Primrose Brown was on her feet. ‘Your Honour, this is not relevant.’

  ‘I believe it is material, Your Honour,’ Cork responded.

  Jupp smiled. ‘I’m curious. You may answer the question,’ he directed Emily Denyer.

  All eyes were on her and she played to the audience with gusto and a wry smile. ‘We called him The Iceberg, because he had so very little showing above the surface.’

  69

  Friday 17 May

  Despite the seriousness of the situation, of having a highly dangerous, clever and unpredictable serial killer at large, Roy Grace had to stop himself smiling as he sat in ACC Cassian Pewe’s office, watching his boss’s apoplectic face on the far side of his far-too-big desk.

  ‘Heads are going to roll, Roy,’ Pewe said.

  Yes, Grace thought. And the first one that should roll is yours!

  ‘This is unbelievable. U N B E L I E V A B L E.’ Pewe said the word again, slowly, as if spelling it out loud. ‘How on earth has this happened, can you tell me?’

  With pleasure, Grace thought. ‘A consultant surgeon went into Dr Crisp’s private room to check on the wound in his eye. It appears that Crisp took him by surprise, overpowered him, rendered him unconscious and switched clothing, putting him in the bed instead of himself. I understand the room was dark to ease the pain for Crisp’s eye – he was claiming that bright light hurt it. As a result, no one was aware of what had happened for several hours, until the consultant regained consciousness.’

  Pewe, with his tensions rising, opened and shut his mouth several times, looking like a cat trying to cough up a hairball, before speaking. ‘There was meant to be a police guard, twenty-four-seven, outside Crisp’s door – what were they doing – ordering their online shopping?’

  ‘Guarding,’ Grace said, and then waited for Pewe’s response.

  ‘I mean, honestly, Roy, how – how could they have let this happen?’

  ‘I’m afraid it’s very simple, sir. Shortly before the consultant visited on his rounds, the previous police guard went off shift and was replaced by another PC who had never seen Dr Crisp. The consultant was, apparently, wearing scrubs, with a cap and a mask hanging loose over his chin. The new PC hadn’t taken a close look at him. When Crisp came out, some minutes later, dressed in this kit, he had no reason to question him.’

  ‘I’m holding you personally responsible for Dr Crisp’s escape, Roy,’ Pewe said.

  Despite Pewe’s currently senior rank, Grace jabbed a finger at him. ‘No, sir, you’re the one responsible. I emailed you, after we’d learned his injury was self-inflicted, that this might be an escape plan and recommended that we should ask the Metropolitan Police to double up on his guard, which you rejected for cost reasons knowing that they would recharge Sussex Police.’

  Pewe narrowed his eyes. ‘Roy, you’ve been the SIO all along on the Crisp case. It’s your responsibility to make sure your prisoner is properly guarded until he is brought to justice and – if there is any justice – sentenced. You’ve failed abjectly. I suggest you buddy up with the Met Police PDQ and recapture the doctor. A man wandering the streets of London in surgical scrubs shouldn’t be too hard to find, even for an incompetent like you.’

  Grace bristled at the insult. ‘I’m sorry, sir, I’m not going to take that crap from you.’

  ‘No? Well, maybe you’ll take this, instead: get Crisp back under lock and key within the next forty-eight hours or I’m reassigning you from Major Crime. We could be looking at suspension here because of the way you are reacting to this.’

  Grace responded. ‘This is typical of you. You know you are wrong, so you pull rank, just like a bully.’

  Pewe hesitated a moment, mouth opening and closing again as if trying to find the right words. ‘Well, perhaps suspension isn’t appropriate here.’

  ‘That’s very generous of you,’ Grace retorted. ‘But if you take me off Major Crime – assuming you even have the authority to do that – I would go straight back to the Met in a Commander role, where I have the ear of the Deputy Assistant Commissioner. And my first recommendation to her would be that you are flushed down a fucking toilet into the Thames estuary. But before I do that, I will be sending a full report to the Chief Constable and to the Police and Crime Commissioner on my recommendations to you on how Dr Crisp should have been guarded. And how you rejected them. I wrote them in my Policy Book along with a note about your bullying conduct.’

  Pewe winced at Roy’s words, raising a conciliatory hand. ‘Perhaps we are both getting a little bit heated, Roy.’

  ‘Not me, sir. I’m a cucumber.’

  ‘Cucumber?’

  ‘Cool as.’

  ‘Very well. Look – let’s forget our differences, shall we?’

  Grace stared him in the eye, saying nothing.

  The ACC blinked first. ‘You and I, we go back a long way.’

  Unfortunately, Grace thought.

  ‘I’ve said it to you before and I’ll say it again now. We may never be best friends. But we have a common purpose, don’t we? To try to make this world a better place.’

  Yes, thought Grace, and it would be a much better place without assholes like you.

  70

  Friday 17 May

  In a small interview room in the cell corridor under the courts in Lewes’ Crown Court building, Nick Fox looked at his client. This was the first time the two men had been alone without Pri
mrose Brown or her junior present since Stuie’s death.

  Terence Gready sat opposite him, hunched and with a worried expression, looking small and vulnerable. Fox thought he already looked like a crushed man. Except, of course, as Fox well knew, the man was a consummate actor and even more consummate manipulator.

  ‘What the fuck went wrong with Stuie? I told you to have him roughed up a bit, not to kill him. You’ve lost the one hold we have over Starr, our best bargaining chip.’

  ‘We can’t turn the clock back now, Terry, what’s done is done. Let’s focus on the trial.’

  ‘How do you think it’s going then, Nick?’

  Both men kept their voices low, aware of the watchful eye of an officer standing a short distance away.

  ‘So far, Terry, if you want my honest opinion, you’re the filling in a triple-shit sandwich.’ He smiled. ‘But all we’ve been hearing so far is the prosecution. Cork’s good – but so is Primrose. Once she gets going it’s all going to swing your way – trust me. And, we have our Plan B!’

  Both men smiled. Then Gready said, ‘You are confident in Plan B?’

  ‘Oh, yes.’ The dapper, unflappable Nick Fox smiled, then frowned. ‘But we have a potential fly in the ointment we need to sort.’

  ‘Who or what?’

  ‘Michael Starr.’

  ‘Mickey? Why do you say that, I trust him – despite him pleading guilty to get a softer sentence – I understood his reasons for doing that, his responsibility for his brother, Stuie. Fair play to him.’

  Fox shook his head. ‘Not any more.’

  Gready suddenly adjusted his position and sat more upright, leaning forward. ‘What do you mean?’

  His solicitor tapped the side of his own head. ‘It may just be the rumour mill, Terry, but I don’t think so. As a result of what happened to his brother, I’ve heard from a good source that Starr, through another solicitor – obviously – is exploring what kind of a deal he could cut for grassing you up.’

  In all the years Fox had worked for Terence Gready, he could never remember seeing the man angry – until now. Gready always took everything calmly, in his stride. But now he looked like the Devil himself was inside his head. ‘Grassing me up?’

  ‘That’s what I’ve heard.’

  ‘He’s exploring what kind of a deal he could get by doing that?’

  ‘Yes, Terry.’

  ‘I just can’t believe he’d do this.’

  ‘When people are desperate, they do things differently. He’s a very hurt and angry man because of Stuie.’

  Gready sat in silence for some while, thinking. Lucky Mickey had the ability to sink him. If he started giving evidence for the prosecution it was going to take more than the current tampering with the jurors, it was going to take a miracle. ‘Mickey doted on his brother. Has he forgotten how much I’ve helped him over the years? Everything I paid for? Now he’s looking to make a deal by grassing me up? What happened to loyalty, Nick?’

  ‘They say that when a Black Mamba bites you on the end of your dick, you find out who your true friends are.’

  Gready, absorbed in his thoughts, didn’t react. ‘I can’t believe Mickey could do this.’

  ‘Well, you’d better, and you’re going to have to move fast if you want to stop him. The way the prosecution case is going, they’ll finish next week so they’ll have to call him then.’

  ‘Witness for the prosecution? Fuck, he’s one of our key defence witnesses.’

  ‘Maybe not any more.’

  Gready was thinking hard. ‘Just let him try. I’ll tear his other sodding arm off and fuck his other eye up, and the only job he’ll ever be fit for again after I’m done with him will be as a fucking paperweight.’

  Fox stared across the little divide at him, expressionless.

  ‘Loyalty, right?’ Gready said, bitterly.

  ‘It is what it is.’

  ‘I hate that expression.’ Gready was silent for some moments then said, ‘No. I’m not having this. This isn’t what it is at all.’

  Fox nodded.

  Gready was perking up. ‘I’ve thought of a way we can get to him. Mickey needs to be given a reality check.’

  ‘What kind of reality check?’

  Looking around cautiously before he spoke, Gready replied, ‘A permanent fix. Know what I’m saying?’

  Fox nodded. ‘I know what you’re saying, Terry, but are you sure? It’s one thing threatening Mickey, but this is taking it to another level. I’m not sure I want to be involved.’

  ‘We all have to do things we don’t like sometimes.’ Gready stared at him. ‘That’s what I pay you for. Nothing’s easy, Nick, if it was, I wouldn’t need you. My wife and my kids are up in the public gallery watching every day. They’re expecting to see me acquitted because they know I’m an honest man. And that’s what you’re going to deliver. Is that clear enough?’

  Nick Fox shrugged then smiled. ‘The King of the Jungle’s always delivered, Terry, you know it. I just don’t think this is a clever thing.’

  Gready looked at him. ‘Perhaps the King of the Jungle’s going soft in his old age? Or perhaps the King of the Jungle is just too plain warm and cuddly? Maybe I need a wolf instead?’ His voice was hardening as he spoke and Fox frowned, uncomfortably.

  ‘Just remember this, Nick,’ Gready said. ‘A lion may be the king of the jungle, but a wolf doesn’t perform in a circus.’

  71

  Friday 17 May

  Roy Grace finally left his office at Sussex Police HQ at 7.30 p.m. He’d spent the past hour on the phone with Detective Superintendent Ross Shepherd at the Met, who was coordinating the lockdown of the hospital, in case Edward Crisp was hiding in there, as well as a manhunt across London. They both well knew, with Crisp’s past form, their chance of a result was slim. He could be anywhere, including out of the country, by now.

  Grace had suggested – and not in jest – they focus on sewers. The seemingly mild-mannered family GP had used sewers as an escape route previously. Did he have a particular reason for wounding himself in the eye – was it to end up at Moorfields Hospital, either because of its location in the east of London, or because of its relatively low security?

  As he drove his Alfa out of the car park, he was reflecting on his difficult day, especially with Pewe, as well as the knowledge that he would be spending much of the weekend ahead back at his office. But with Cleo pregnant again, there was at least something to be really positive about.

  Turning into the residential street outside the HQ, he drove home in a slightly better mood, but his mind still churning with all that had happened today. And, mostly, his fury at Cassian Pewe. He tried to calm his anger by thinking of a Buddhist saying Cleo loved: Everyone you meet is fighting a battle of their own you know nothing about. Be kind to everyone.

  Even to Pewe?

  72

  Friday 17 May

  Twenty-five minutes later, Roy Grace drove along the track and pulled up outside his cottage. As he climbed out of his car into bright daylight, the sun still high in the sky, he heard the familiar bleating of sheep on the hill behind their house, but was surprised he couldn’t hear Humphrey. Normally the dog would be at the front door, barking his head off in greeting. Cleo was at home today. She was using the time to finish off her final modules and dissertation in order to complete her OU philosophy degree course.

  He lifted his laptop bag off the rear seat and walked up the path, past the riot of flowers in their front garden, unlocked the front door and went in. No sign of the dog. ‘Hi!’ he called out, across the open-plan living-dining area. Cleo’s course papers were spread out across one of the sofas and the coffee table. Noah’s playthings were strewn around the floor.

  ‘Hi, darling!’ she replied, coming down the stairs, wearing a loose dress over her small baby bump.

  He went over and kissed her as she reached the bottom, then asked, ‘Where’s Humphrey?’

  As if in response, he heard the dog barking from somewhere at the rear of t
he house. ‘I’ve put him in the utility room.’

  He frowned. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘He started growling at Noah, again.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Earlier this afternoon, Noah was playing in here quite happily. Then he stood up and toddled over to Humphrey, and as he tried to stroke him, Humphrey snarled at him. Like, a really menacing keep away snarl.’

  ‘Shit. He loves Noah.’

  She nodded. ‘I thought so, too. They often rough and tumble together and I’ve always felt we could completely trust him with Noah. But this afternoon I was really scared he was going to go for him.’

  ‘Did Noah try to take his food or something?’

  ‘No. It was really weird. I put him straight into the utility room and left him there. It’s odd, Roy. It’s just so out of character. And he’s still got that limp, but I can’t work out which leg it is. I don’t want him near the kids when he’s like this. This is all we need right now, a problem dog.’

  Grace frowned. ‘He’s not a problem dog, come on, there might be something up with him. I’ll get him to the vet and see what she says about the limp.’

  ‘Monday is the earliest appointment. Can you take him for 5.30 p.m.?’

  ‘You’re two steps ahead! I’ll happily take him, but we can’t keep them separated until then.’

  ‘We have to, Roy, I’m not risking it. Once we find out what is up then we can help him. Or . . .’

  ‘Or what? What were you going to say?’ Roy said, guardedly.

  ‘Well, I am just saying that we can’t have a dog who keeps growling and scaring our kids.’ She looked down and took a deep breath before carrying on. ‘Kaitlynn and Jack have just adopted Buster, that Yorkshire terrier who belonged to that poor lady found murdered in her home in Hove – Suzy Driver?’

  ‘Yes, what’s your point?’

  ‘Well, maybe they want a friend for Buster too?’

  Roy stood, aghast. ‘No, no, no! Whatever’s up with Humphrey, we will sort it. We are not rehoming him. I thought you loved him?’