by LJ Ross
Dead eyes.
Curled fingers.
And his DNA all over her, and the bed.
There was a single message that came with the images, and it read:
YOUR WARNING CAME TOO LATE. NOW THERE IS A PRICE. DESTROY OR REPLACE ALL PHYSICAL EVIDENCE CONNECTING ROCHELLE TO THE DEMON BY TOMORROW NIGHT. DO IT, OR FACE CONSEQUENCES.
Unable to hold it in any longer, Lowerson threw up in the footwell of MacKenzie’s car.
CHAPTER 17
Simon Watson had spent a miserable day reading and re-reading the GCHQ paperwork he’d found inside his father’s envelope, still unwilling to believe yet unable to ignore the truth it contained in stark black and white. He kept it with him at all times, in case anybody should discover its contents, while he thought about what to do for the best.
His first inclination had been to go to the police. In general, he wasn’t a great fan of the boys in blue, but the two he’d met yesterday seemed decent enough.
Simon pulled the little white card DCI Ryan had given him out of his wallet and tapped it against the edge of his desk.
He sat there for a long time, staring at the usual stream coming in and out of the jobcentre and thought about all the different kinds of people in the world.
Good people, and bad people.
When he was young, it had seemed so simple; either you did good things or you did bad things, and that was the end of it. But growing older came at a price, and that price was disillusionment. The world was filled with people who occupied that murky grey area, somewhere in between. An uncomfortable purgatory filled with good intentions but no action. They sometimes did good for their fellow man but, mostly, people looked after Number One. They jogged merrily through life with very little care or understanding of what their misdeeds would cost the rest of the world, and slept soundly in their beds at night while others struggled to get through the day.
Simon thought of the jobcentre strike against Universal Credit he was organising, alongside all the other offices in the North East. Few of them agreed with the new benefits system the government had introduced, and even fewer enjoyed having to be the ones on the front lines implementing the complicated new rules that made it even harder for vulnerable people to get help from the state. The Department of Work and Pensions had chosen the North East to be the guinea pigs; the first area in the country to roll out the new system, as if its working poor didn’t have enough to contend with.
Well, he had his father’s blood in his veins, and Simon wasn’t going to stand for that.
Thinking of his father reminded him of the envelope tucked inside his desk drawer, and he reached across to lock it inside overnight.
He needed more time.
Unexpectedly, the old urge reared up and Simon broke out in a sweat as his mind waged a battle between Simon and the Addict, with the latter whispering to him about where and from whom he could buy what he craved.
Just a little bit, to pick you up a bit, the Addict whispered.
No!
NO!
It will make you feel better, the Addict told him. You won’t feel any of the hurt or the pain anymore.
You’re lying! It’ll make me sick, angry—my family will hate me.
I’m the only one who knows you, the only one you can trust, the Addict replied.
Simon made a grab for the phone and dialled a number he knew by heart.
* * *
While Ryan gave Chief Constable Morrison a progress report following the failed attempt to apprehend Paul Evershed, alias Ludo, Phillips busied himself in the kitchen making what he liked to call a ‘Kids Special’.
Namely, chicken nuggets, chips and peas, slathered in tomato sauce.
“How was school today?”
Samantha was sitting at the kitchen table with a homework book in front of her, looking crestfallen.
“It was fine,” she mumbled, pushing the book away. “The teacher will be happy when I tell her that you and Ryan can come in and give a talk at the assembly.”
Phillips shook the chips on their oven tray and then wiped his hands on a tea towel.
“Aye, well, there’s nothing we like more than giving school talks,” he said, with as much sincerity as he could muster. Truth be told, he’d take being locked inside a room with a raving axe-murderer over a roomful of expectant children, any day of the week.
“Will we get to try out a stun gun?” she asked.
“No, pet. We don’t tend to stun people, unless you count me stunning them with my dashing good looks.”
Samantha chuckled, as he’d hoped she would.
“What about guns?” she asked. “Do we get to see any of those?”
Phillips shook his head.
“Bloodthirsty little thing, aren’t you?” he joked, as he pulled the nuggets out of the oven. “We don’t encourage the use of guns, especially not in schools. I don’t think your teacher would appreciate that, do you?”
“S’pose not,” she said, and thanked him when he set a heaped plate of food in front of her. “I know his face.”
Phillips was confused.
“What’s that, love? Whose face do you know?”
“His,” Samantha replied, pointing her fork towards the tiny television they’d fitted to the wall. Usually, they kept it on the news channel with the sound muted.
Phillips turned around and saw that the local news was running a bulletin report about the manhunt that was underway for Paul Evershed. It hadn’t stopped since he first went AWOL but, inevitably, the press preferred to sensationalise matters so that it appeared that a dangerous killer was suddenly on the loose…as if he hadn’t been missing for almost two years, and a danger to society throughout that time.
“You know that man?” he asked, pointing at the mug shot of Ludo.
“Yeah, he worked for my Dad’s circus when we were touring Wales,” she said. “I remember him, because he had a scary-looking face and my dad told him he had to keep indoors or keep his clown make-up on.”
“Ludo worked as a clown?” Phillips was agog.
“Who’s Ludo?” Samantha wondered. “Did he use a different name, or something? He told me he was called Paul, and he told me he had a granddaughter my age.”
“Oh, he did, eh?”
“Yeah, he said he hadn’t seen her in a long time.”
Phillips switched off the television set. He’d have a word with Ryan about what Samantha had disclosed, in the morning.
“Now then,” he said, after she’d cleared her plate. “What about that maths homework, you don’t seem too keen on? Anything I can do to help?”
When she showed him the lines of long division, Phillips wished he hadn’t opened his big mouth.
“Ah… you know, I don’t believe in giving kids all this homework. I reckon you’ve worked hard enough at school…”
But Samantha was determined.
“I don’t mind maths, but I don’t do it the way the teacher wants me to. I just do it my own way, but I want to be like everybody else.”
Phillips smiled.
“Dance to your own rhythm, Sam. That’ll be just fine with us.”
She gave him a beautiful smile and set about answering two pages of long division sums correctly, in her own way.
* * *
When Ryan came out of a progress meeting with the Chief Constable and heads of the Drugs and Firearms Units, Jack Lowerson was nowhere to be seen.
“He went home,” MacKenzie told him. “He was sick all over my car on the way back in, so I dropped him at home and told him under no circumstances to come back in to work tomorrow. He’s obviously not well.”
Ryan nodded, and told himself he’d give the man a call later on, after he’d answered a question that had been playing on his mind for hours.
“Mel? Can you send over a copy of that spreadsheet the Fraud Squad sent over—the list of Singh’s properties and vehicles?”
“Sure thing,” she said, and tapped a few keys while he settled himself at a com
puter.
A few moments later, he brought up the spreadsheet and ordered each of Singh’s suspected properties alphabetically, before running a search for ‘Biddles Farm’.
Nothing.
Next, Ryan brought up the spreadsheet containing the list of vehicles associated with Singh or his associates, and performed the same actions, this time running a search for ‘LAND ROVER’.
Nothing.
Ryan’s eyes turned a flinty shade of grey as he surveyed the people seated around him, every one a potential stranger.
“Have any changes been made to this spreadsheet since we came by it?” he asked.
“Not that I know of,” MacKenzie said.
“We haven’t had time to add in Biddles Farm,” Yates added. “We’re not even sure it’s associated with Bobby Singh, so it seems prudent not to add it to Tomlinson’s list.”
“This was compiled by DS Tomlinson?” Ryan asked.
“Far as I know,” Yates said. “Why? Is there something wrong with it?”
“No,” Ryan muttered. “Just curious.”
A moment later, he shut down the monitor and scooped up his mobile phone to go in search of Blackett. He needed to check the metadata on that spreadsheet, to find out who was the last person to make an alteration—such as deleting a significant address—but he couldn’t use their own digital forensics team for that. Not without arousing suspicion.
“Any word on Rochelle White?” he asked, as he prepared to head off. “It’s not too late for you to go and interview Singh.”
He might have been inclined to go along to the interview with Yates, as a show of muscle, but that was his upbringing warring with the modern police officer inside him, who knew better. MacKenzie and Yates were more than capable of looking after themselves, and he had to let them.
The two women looked at one another and nodded.
“We’ll let you know how it goes.”
Ryan made it all the way to the door, before old-fashioned chivalry kicked in again.
“If you need me, just call. I’ll be there.”
“Thanks, Dad,” Yates called out, and laughed when the air turned blue in the corridor outside.
CHAPTER 18
Bobby Singh kept offices at a prestigious city-centre address. Ostensibly, they were held under the banner of Singh Properties Inc, an entity with legitimate tax returns dating back almost ten years, a robust Corporate Responsibility Programme and an even more successful PR machine, judging by the sponsorship deals and affiliations with local charities and much-beloved sports teams. Singh drew down his director’s salary and paid his employees at the end of every month, in line with all the proper employment laws.
MacKenzie and Yates arrived outside the large, former Victorian warehouse just after five o’clock. It had been converted into luxury offices sometime in the last three years, if memory served them, and it now boasted jet-washed brick exteriors enhanced by acres of polished glass and engineered wood floors. The result was one of urban chic; a place inhabited by men sporting designer beards oiled to within an inch of their lives, and women in crop tops so short they would put the Spice Girls to shame.
“Trendy in here, isn’t it?” Yates muttered, as they were buzzed inside the main foyer.
“Painfully so,” MacKenzie agreed.
They were in Ouseburn, a former industrial area to the east of Newcastle, very near the river. It had seen a lot of regeneration over the past thirty years or more, and now boasted rows of smart new apartment buildings and quirky conversions, edgy music venues and a building devoted entirely to promoting literacy and reading for children.
Unfortunately, it was also where the Victoria Tunnel ended. The tunnel was a subterranean wagonway built to transport coal, which began on the other side of the city and finished at Ouseburn for onward transportation by sea. It had seen many uses since the 1800s, and had served as an air-raid shelter in the Second World War, but it was known amongst the staff of CID chiefly for having been the location for an epic chase between Ryan and The Hacker.
MacKenzie shivered involuntarily. She had her own memories of that man, and her own scars to contend with.
It came as a timely interruption when a girl of no more than twenty tottered over to greet them, wearing the most improbable high heels either woman had ever seen.
“She’ll turn her ankle, on this shiny floor,” Yates muttered.
“I’m Vogue, Mr Singh’s personal assistant,” she said, flicking her long hair to reveal an equally improbable chest. “Do you have an appointment?”
“Yes,” Yates said, smiling politely. “I spoke with you on the phone earlier today? I’m Trainee Detective Constable Yates and this is Detective Inspector MacKenzie. We’re from Northumbria CID.”
The girl didn’t ask to see their identification, but they showed it to her anyway, for the sake of the many CCTV cameras dotted around the foyer.
“Oh, yes! I remember,” Vogue said, with a little laugh. “Mr Singh is on a conference call at the moment. Do you want to wait?”
“We’ll wait,” Yates told her.
“Great! Can I get you some water? Coffee?”
“No, thank you,” MacKenzie murmured. “Do you mind if we ask you a couple of questions, too?”
The girl looked nervous.
“Do I need a solicitor?” she asked.
MacKenzie gave her a motherly look, designed to put her at ease.
“Why would you need one, Vogue?”
“I dunno…That’s what they say, on all the cop shows, don’t they?”
She really was very young, they realised, and trod carefully.
“You can have a solicitor, if you like,” MacKenzie told her. “But you’re not in any trouble, and we’re not arresting you for any crime, either. We just want to ask a couple of informal questions that might help our investigation, that’s all. Would that be alright?”
“Yeah, I suppose so,” the girl muttered, and noticed that the receptionist was putting a hasty call through to the boss.
“Great. I was just wondering how long you’ve been working for Mr Singh?”
“Um, about six months,” Vogue replied, crossing her legs as she stood on six-inch heels, creating the impression of a flamingo balancing in a lagoon of marble.
“Working directly with Mr Singh, I guess you’ll have met his girlfriend, Rochelle?”
Vogue’s heavily made-up face turned a painful shade of red.
“Mm-hmm,” she nodded. “She’s…she’s nice.”
“When was the last time you saw her?”
“Um, Rochelle didn’t really come into the office all that much,” she replied. “I think it was a couple of weeks ago. She came in to meet Mr Singh for lunch.”
“Right, thanks. And, how long have you and Mr Singh been seeing one another?”
Vogue went red, then white…and back to red again.
“What? Um, no…no, we’re not. I don’t know what you mean. You can’t say we are!”
“Can’t I? I thought we were just chatting, woman to woman,” MacKenzie shrugged, while Yates watched this masterclass in witness handling with open admiration.
Vogue flapped her hands, which had been manicured with long, sharpened nails painted a deep burgundy shade.
“It was only a few times,” she whispered. “Is it illegal?”
The two women looked at one another.
“No, it isn’t illegal,” Yates sighed, wondering if the woman could be any more of a walking cliché of their sex.
“Why are you here, then? He doesn’t have a disease, does he?”
MacKenzie was almost relieved when any further conversation was forestalled by the arrival of the man himself.
* * *
“Thanks, Vogue. You can go home, now.”
The girl nodded profusely, and mumbled a ‘goodbye’ to MacKenzie and Yates before hurrying across the lobby with a clatter of high heels.
“To what do I owe this pleasure?”
Singh wasn’t hard to look at
, they’d give him that much. He reminded them of one of those male models from a perfume ad in the nineties; all shiny-smooth skin and bright white teeth, with a pair of long-lashed eyes that seemed to peel away their skin.
They disliked him on sight.
It was hard to tell whether it was a basic, instinctive reaction to a predator, or whether it came from knowing—or, at least, suspecting—the things he had done.
“Mr Singh? My name is DI MacKenzie, this is my partner, Trainee DC Yates. Thank you for making time for us in your busy day.”
“Anything to help,” he said. “Why don’t you come into my office, where we can talk more comfortably?”
Without waiting for an answer, he turned and made his way back to one of the lifts, which had a glass front and skeleton sides, so they could see the inner mechanism. As they moved across the lobby area, several security guards followed their progress and spoke softly into mics attached to their lapels.
One of the guards stepped inside the lift with them and operated the buttons. A moment later, the doors opened with a silent whoosh of glass to reveal Singh’s office area, which consisted of the entire top floor to the building. It was an architectural dream, where wooden beams fused with concrete and glass, old and new working together in perfect harmony.
“Please, have a seat,” he said, indicating a plush lounge area. “Can I offer you a drink?”
He was certainly the most affable criminal underboss, MacKenzie thought.
“No, thank you, Mr Singh. If it’s alright with you, we’ll come straight to the point.”
Something flickered in his eyes, a warning that told her this man did not accept orders from anyone, especially not a woman and particularly not a police woman.
“As you wish,” he said, sinking into one of the easy chairs. “Well, this all sounds very serious,” he murmured. “Luckily, I happen to keep a legal department on site. Roger?”
A weaselly-looking man of around forty materialised from another part of the office, responding to his master’s call like a whipped dog.
“These ladies are from CID—”
“Detectives, Mr Singh,” MacKenzie put in, very sweetly. “We’re only ladies when we’re off duty.”