The Killer

by Susan Wilkins

  ‘Nope.’ He slipped his hands into his trouser pockets. ‘But I think that we can both agree that your brother has left you in a very tricky situation.’

  She fixed him with a hard, piercing stare. ‘Oh. So the fire wasn’t an accident.’

  ‘The fire investigators are examining the site now, but they’ve found accelerant vapours, so, yes, we’re probably looking at arson.’

  Even though she’d already come to that conclusion herself, hearing the official confirmation sent a jolt right through her. But there was no way she’d show it. She got up and faced him, back to the window, with folded arms.

  ‘Murder and arson, eh?’ The tone was mocking. ‘You crack this one and you’re gonna be up that greasy pole like a rat up a drain.’

  He smiled. ‘I need your help in this investigation, that’s true. But you also need mine, Karen. I’m not the enemy.’

  ‘What are you then? My new best friend? So let’s see you prove it. Put me back on witness protection with a new ID.’

  ‘I’m afraid that’s not my call.’

  ‘There’s a surprise. In that case, you got nothing to offer. I’ll take care of myself, thanks very much, and you can fuck off.’

  He tilted his head and, although his hair was dark and curly, the eyes were blue. For a split second his look put her in mind of Joey, whose ghost seemed to be everywhere, ganging up on her, taunting her for not trusting him. Rely on a cop? How her brother would’ve laughed. Kaz could feel a cold rage rising inside her. No, there was no way she’d let this tosser use her.

  Rivlin sighed. ‘Listen, why don’t we—’

  The anger gave her a surge of energy and she put her hands on her hips. ‘You deaf or something? I said fuck off!’ The voice was still croaky but loud enough to make all the other patients in the bay stop and turn to look. ‘If I’ve done something wrong, then nick me. If not, fuck off! I don’t wanna talk to you.’

  ‘Okay.’ He raised his palms in a placatory gesture. ‘Calm down—’

  Calm down? She was icily calm and, taking a deep breath, she found more volume. ‘Don’t patronize me. Just FUCK OFF!’

  The staff nurse appeared round the corner with a concerned look, having heard the rumpus. Rivlin turned to her apologetically. ‘It’s okay, I’m going.’

  Kaz took a step forward. ‘And don’t fucking come back.’

  All the women in the bay were glaring at him. He was some invading male on their territory and they instinctively took Kaz’s side because she was one of them. Rivlin could feel his colour and embarrassment rising. As he turned away, he couldn’t meet the staff nurse’s eye. His previous notion of seducing her had evaporated. He’d clearly misjudged Phelps’s reaction and he felt a fool. Now he wanted to get out as quickly as possible. But in his haste he walked straight into Nicci Armstrong, who was coming round the corner with a short, fat bloke in tow.

  For a frozen moment they stared at each other. Nicci smiled. Rivlin huffed. ‘Maybe you can talk some sense into her.’

  Standing at the end of her bed, holding her ground, Kaz’s glowering look turned to annoyance as she saw Nicci. ‘Oh, what the fuck!’

  Rivlin wagged his finger. ‘If you won’t listen to me, Karen, then listen to her. She definitely is your friend. My boss did want to lock you up. She’s the one who persuaded the probation service to give you the benefit of the doubt. You owe her.’

  23

  Asil Kemal was struggling to contain his annoyance. He was standing in his pleasant sitting room in Muswell Hill trying to talk sense into his beloved son, Tevfik. The boy was supposed to be revising for his resits. He’d completed the first year of a Business Administration course at London Metropolitan University, which he’d managed to fail. Still he didn’t seem at all bothered and Asil had caught him, lounging on the sofa, watching American football instead of working.

  Of his three daughters, two had already graduated and one was in her final year. But, if Asil was honest with himself, he had to admit that his youngest, the precious son he’d waited so long for, was a big disappointment to him. The boy was indolent, arrogant and, even though he’d been brought up bilingual, too lazy to speak Turkish. He also kept saying he wanted to be a DJ, which was clearly absurd.

  It had taken Kemal grit, ruthlessness and hard work to get from the poor mountain village where he was born to this affluent London suburb. The enterprises and assets he controlled with his brother, Sadik, were now 25 per cent legitimate and, if he managed to carry through his current five-year business plan, he hoped to raise that figure to 50 per cent. But what was the purpose of it all if his son couldn’t pick up the reins?

  He made this point yet again to Tevfik, as he had done on numerous previous occasions.

  In return, he got a surly look. ‘Baba, I don’t need to go to uni to take over the business.’

  ‘If I had had such a chance, a proper education, you think I would’ve done the things I’ve had to do? Taken the risks we take?’

  ‘I like risk.’

  ‘You wouldn’t like going to jail.’

  ‘You didn’t go to uni. Why should I?’

  ‘But I studied! Every spare moment. I studied and I worked.’

  The boy picked up the remote from the coffee table and began to channel-hop.

  ‘You listen to me when I speak to you, Tevfik.’ The tone of voice was resigned; it carried no real threat and the boy knew it.

  ‘I am listening.’ He gave his father an innocent look even though his attention was on a re-run of Jackass, which was making him giggle.

  The door to the sitting room opened and Sadik Kemal walked in. He scanned the all-too-familiar scene: father and son at loggerheads. Tevfik was a spoilt brat in his uncle’s view and Sadik had no patience with him. Asil had been in his late forties when his son was born; he’d overindulged the boy from day one and was now suffering the consequences. Sadik’s own sons were still small – eight and ten years old – but he guided them with a firm hand and had privately resolved that, in spite of his loyalty to Asil, they would inherit the firm, not Tevfik.

  Asil glanced across at his half-brother and shook his head wearily. There was a twenty-year age gap between the two men. Several inches shorter, Asil’s spare frame and glasses gave him the appearance of an accountant and rivals had often been fooled by his manner; he looked nothing like a gangster. But a combination of relentless ambition and strategic thinking had turned him into the dominant player in the web of Turkish gangs trafficking heroin and cocaine into the UK.

  With a sigh he abandoned the battle with his son and strolled out of the room and across the hall to his study. Sadik followed. He’d only been fourteen when he first joined his brother’s early forays from Istanbul across Europe, smuggling large consignments of drugs. Asil had started out as a foot soldier working for a Turkish-based cousin but he was too ambitious and way too smart to remain anyone’s subordinate. Competitors were dispatched with cold-blooded efficiency until Asil established a solid foothold in North London.

  As Sadik grew and filled out he became the new firm’s indispensable enforcer and together the brothers proved a lethal combination. Now, after twenty-five years in the business, they were serious players in the UK’s illegal drugs industry. Asil had fashioned a network of alliances that took in Turkish and Albanian gangs in the Netherlands and Germany, commanded the fealty of younger London street gangs and snaked back to Istanbul. He’d anticipated the surge of European-bound migrants and got into the people-smuggling business early on. Now, through his chain of kebab shops and a London-wide taxi business, he funnelled the illicit profits into a burgeoning commercial property portfolio.

  Sinking into his padded leather chair he drummed his fingers on the oak desk and glanced up at his brother.

  ‘Can we do anything?’ He had a hard look in his eye and he wasn’t talking about his son.

  ‘It’s not the Met. This is Essex cops. They’re running the investigation.’

  ‘It’s the fucking Met taking pictur
es of me every time I step outside my own door.’

  ‘Sure, they carry out the surveillance, but for Essex.’

  Asil gave him a baleful look.

  Sadik shrugged. ‘That’s what they tell me.’

  ‘How much we pay to keep these bastards off our backs? Too fucking much.’

  ‘I speak to some more people, see what can be done.’

  Asil’s gaze darted up towards the ceiling and the light fitting. ‘And get this place, the office, everything swept for bugs again.’

  ‘They got nothing. They sniff around. Make it look like they do something.’

  ‘How come the finger is pointing at us? That’s what I want to know?’

  Sadik shook his head. ‘No way it’s Bogdani. He’s so pissed they shot his daughter he refused payment. He done the fire job for free.’

  ‘And still made a mess of it. He’s a fucking gypsy. He’s got no control over his own people.’

  Sadik took a gold cigarette lighter from his pocket and started to turn it over rhythmically between thumb and forefinger. He waited. Asil was a worrier. It was a process he had to go through and Sadik was used to it. The more successful they’d become, the more he worried.

  Asil opened a hand-carved ivory box, took out a Sobranie Black Russian and tamped it on the desk. He was a man of rituals and his brother knew them all. As he placed the gold filter between his lips, Sadik sparked the lighter and offered the flame.

  Asil Kemal sighed and leant forward to light his cigarette. ‘Okay, I want this matter concluded. And I don’t want no more fuck-ups.’

  Sadik bowed his head.

  ‘The Russian was business, but this bitch—’ Asil took a long pull on the cigarette and it seemed to calm him. ‘She held a fucking gun to my head, Sadik. This bitch I want dead.’

  ‘I told you. You should’ve left it to me in the first place.’

  Asil met his brother’s eye and the hint of criticism in the tone didn’t escape him. Since the incident, there had been a shift, barely discernible, but nevertheless a lessening in the deference his younger brother showed him. Did Sadik think he was past it?

  Kaz Phelps had come storming into his office looking for her whore of a friend and waving a gun. He’d fronted it out. A fighter his whole life, his nerve had never cracked. But then he’d found himself lying face down in that alley, volleys of automatic fire ricocheting off the walls, and suddenly it had felt like the end. Convinced he was about to die, he’d crapped himself. And that’s how Sadik had found him. It turned out that Phelps had backup, which was how she got away. But she’d humiliated him, robbed him of his self-esteem, his manhood and maybe even his brother’s respect. It had become a matter of honour. In spite of the police interest, there was no way he could let this go.

  A thin grey-blue coil of smoke curled up from the tip of his Sobranie. ‘I warned her. Make sure she knows I keep my promise.’

  ‘Oh she will know, brother. She will have plenty of time to regret what she’s done.’ Sadik was already relishing the prospect. ‘And when I’ve finished with her, she’ll be begging me to kill her.’

  24

  Kaz Phelps settled back against the pillows and frowned at her visitors. The staff nurse had insisted she put the nebulizer back on. It was an effective way of calming her down and shutting her up.

  Eddie Lunt found a couple of chairs, one of which he handed to Nicci.

  She sat down at the side of the bed. ‘Steve O’Connor. That’s the name of your probation officer, right?’

  Kaz thought back to the slip of paper she’d been given by the police when they’d released her. It seemed like an age ago. She simply nodded.

  ‘I went to see him yesterday morning first thing. Put it to him that you were not a danger to the public. He obviously believed me.’ Nicci smiled ruefully. ‘Though if you’d been in a police cell last night you probably wouldn’t have ended up here. So maybe it wasn’t such a favour after all.’

  Kaz slipped the nebulizer off. ‘I wouldn’t have been any safer back in the nick. They’d’ve got to me somehow.’ She hesitated; her earlier desperation in the police interview room after the shooting had left her embarrassed. Never show weakness was the motto she lived by. ‘Thanks anyway.’

  Acknowledging this with a nod, Nicci scanned the patient. Before, she’d looked scared. Now she seemed brooding and wary. Understandable. Her life had been threatened twice in as many days. She’d been through the mill. Nicci wanted to reach out, but the aura around Kaz made it clear that physical contact wouldn’t be welcome.

  ‘You still thinking this is Pudovkin?’

  The dark eyes met Nicci’s. ‘Don’t you? Joey tried to kill him and he knows why.’

  ‘What about the Kemals?’

  This produced a disdainful huff from Kaz, which caused her to cough. Eddie got up and poured her a beaker of water.

  Watching Kaz drink, Nicci shifted in her chair. ‘Thing is, Karen, the police can connect the shooter at Joey’s funeral to them.’ She waited for this to sink in.

  ‘Well, I’m not scared of the fucking Kemals.’ It sounded like bravado and Nicci took it as such.

  ‘Maybe you should be. When you went to rescue Yasmin you held a gun to Asil Kemal’s head. You think they’re the sort to let that go?’

  ‘Then why shoot Yevgeny?’ She took another sip of water.

  ‘Could be they were aiming at you and he got in the way?’

  Kaz’s memory of events was a jumble: the bullet lacerating her ear, Yevgeny shoving her sideways out of harm’s way. She hadn’t had time to process any of it. Could it really have been the Kemals? It had never occurred to her.

  ‘It was your fucking bug-up-his-arse mate Rory who shot at the Kemals. Not me.’

  Nicci glanced at Eddie. ‘Probably best not to mention that to Simon.’

  ‘Wasn’t going to, boss.’ He’d already surmised that the connection between her and their erstwhile colleague was decidedly dodgy. That’s why they were here. The former cop wasn’t as squeaky clean as she made out. He grinned. ‘In my experience, these ex-army hard cases often do turn out to be nutters.’

  It sounded supportive but Nicci suspected he was taking the piss.

  Kaz’s gaze had drifted towards the window as she mulled it over. ‘Eddie’s right. He was the nutter. Once I’d got Yasmin I just wanted to get out of there. It wasn’t me that tried to kill Kemal.’

  ‘What if they don’t see it that way?’

  Kaz let the nebulizer settle back on her face. Viktor Pudovkin was a Russian billionaire that the law couldn’t touch. But the Kemals were grubby little gangsters and she’d dealt with their sort her whole life. Maybe Nicci was right. As the thought percolated she began to feel slightly less beleaguered.

  Nicci watched her. Edgy with impatience, she was forcing herself to wait. Kaz needed time but, in a fast-moving investigation like this, it was the one thing they didn’t have. And Nicci did feel part of the investigation. Her default mode was still that of a police officer. She couldn’t help it. Rivlin slipped into her mind; was she doing this to impress him? She dismissed the thought.

  Having taken a couple of cleansing breaths, Kaz pulled the nebulizer off again. ‘What’s-his-face, your slimy cop mate—’

  ‘Rivlin? He’s not my mate.’

  ‘Well, he reckons the fire was arson.’

  Nicci tossed her head and sighed. She’d guessed as much, but this compounded her guilt. ‘Then there’s only one way you’ll be safe: when the police nick the Kemals.’

  ‘Well, yeah.’ Kaz kicked back the sheets, her growing anger and frustration palpable.

  ‘You’ve got to cooperate, Karen. Tell them everything you know.’

  ‘Like what? What do I fucking know? What do you think I know?’

  Nicci hesitated, but only for a moment. She wanted to be gentle but she didn’t have that luxury.

  ‘The police have surveillance photos of your recently deceased Russian friend entering premises in North London, an old cloth
ing factory, now being used to grow cannabis.’

  ‘So?’ It sounded to Kaz like the place she’d visited with Joey, but she couldn’t be sure. The thunk of the low oscillating fans over a vast sea of luscious plants skipped briefly into her mind. Joey had been so proud when he’d showed off the place to her.

  ‘What was he doing there?’

  ‘How should I know?’

  ‘He was Joey’s enforcer, wasn’t he?’

  ‘That’s crap.’ Kaz folded her arms defensively. ‘Yev was just a friend.’

  ‘Don’t bullshit me, Karen. He was helping Joey evade the law. And the police think he was trying to get Joey’s assets back from the Kemals. Wasn’t it his brother that was killed with Joey?’

  ‘So this is still about Joey? I testified against him. Sent my own fucking brother down. Now he’s dead. Isn’t that enough?’

  Sunk in the mound of pillows, dark hair a straggly mess, Kaz clenched her jaw to resist the tears. Observing this, Nicci sighed.

  ‘Rivlin’s not stupid and he’s not going to go away.’

  Kaz glared at her. ‘Is this why those bastards won’t put me back on witness protection? Because they want the Kemals and I’m the bait?’

  In spite of being hurt and over-emotional she’d cut through to the heart of the matter and Nicci felt a stab of conscience. Let her run and see what happens. It was the argument Nicci herself had used to put pressure on Rivlin.

  The ex-cop shook her head. ‘You’ve got to offer them something.’

  ‘That’s a two-way street. Look around. You see any uniforms here to keep an eye on me?’

  ‘I’ll talk to Stoneham. She’s the DCI in charge.’

  Kaz turned away and the tone was bitter. ‘Yeah, right. You’ll have a word, ’cause you’re all in the same club. Why should I trust any of you?’

  Why indeed? That was Nicci’s immediate thought and she was summoning up the energy to defend herself when Eddie Lunt leaned forward in his chair. ‘You should trust her because she doesn’t need to be here. Doesn’t need to be doing any of this. You’re in a hole, mate. She’s trying to help you.’