Penshaw: A DCI Ryan Mystery (The DCI Ryan Mysteries Book 13)

by LJ Ross

  Pinter’s explanation for the lack of blood spatter when Watson fell from the sofa to the coffee table—if he fell at all—was simple. Watson was already dead by that point, which meant the blood was not pumping through his veins in order to spill out following a blunt force trauma. This, alone, would not have been conclusive. After all, if Simon died following a drugs overdose, he would also have been dead before he fell, leading to the same clinical outcome.

  That’s where the first wound became significant.

  During the course of their sweep, Faulkner’s team isolated a large area of bleach on the wall and floor of the hallway beside the front door of Watson’s bungalow, which was a highly suspect but unexplained anomaly. Now that Pinter was of the firm belief that Simon Watson had suffered an earlier head wound, it was possible this occurred when he opened the front door and his assailant attacked him immediately, in order to disable him. If this assailant went to considerable trouble to stage Watson’s death as a drugs overdose, it was certainly possible they took the trouble to clean any blood from the wall or floor before they left.

  Finally, early toxicology results had come back to show that Simon Watson had died following a massive cardiac arrest occasioned by the noxious blend of heroin cut with fentanyl, which was widely agreed to be one of the most lethal drugs combinations available.

  No pouch had ever been found, and no fingerprints had been found on the syringe, either.

  Not even Simon’s.

  * * *

  At the service station in Washington, Lowerson watched Paul Evershed slip inside his green Nissan. Rather than moving at a snail’s pace, as was customary, the car pulled out of its space at high speed, taking Lowerson by surprise.

  He put his rental car into gear and hurried to follow, desperate not to lose the man they’d all been searching for, and surged out of his own parking space.

  It was obvious something had spooked Evershed, because he didn’t slow down. In a 10-mph zone, Ludo was pushing thirty or forty, taking the narrow, winding corners at dangerous speed as he prepared to join the A1 and accelerate into the rain.

  Lowerson was not far behind and had the advantage of some advanced driving training, albeit he’d seldom needed to use it.

  Now was one such time.

  The tyres squealed as he rounded the corner, following the bumper of the dark green Nissan. Up ahead, there was a short slip road to join the A1, which was by now filled with cars and lorries grappling with rush hour traffic.

  Lowerson saw the danger in the nick of time, but Ludo did not.

  With a fierce, tigerish smile, he watched the Corsa brake on the slip road behind him, sending a spray of rainwater up into the air. He assumed the pussy had lost his nerve, whoever he was, and accelerated wildly to celebrate. A lorry was taking up the slow lane, so Evershed reasoned that he could speed up and nip into the gap ahead of it, before moving across to the fast lane without so much as a pause.

  But he hadn’t seen the second lorry, which was filling the space in the fast lane, effectively blocking his path.

  Lowerson punched his hazard warning lights seconds before the collision happened, bringing his car to a standstill on the hard shoulder. He’d had a prescient notion of what was to come and, with detachment, he watched the dark green Nissan outrun the first lorry, then heard an ominous screeching of metal as it smacked into the second lorry in the fast lane.

  A small cloud of food produce rose up from where the first lorry had spun across the road, trying not to become embroiled in the collision.

  Traffic came to a standstill and, in the seconds that followed, Lowerson moved quickly.

  Wishing he had his blue light with him, he pulled across the front of the incident, forming a barrier with the side of his car. On the motorway, cars had come to a stop, and he held up his warrant card to reassure them somebody was in charge.

  He found a couple of tiny orange cones in the boot of the rental car and thought they were better than nothing, so he set them out to form a makeshift barrier.

  Having secured the traffic as best he could, Lowerson knew it wouldn’t be long before the local police arrived to deal with the pile-up, and he put an urgent call through to the emergency services.

  He ran around the edge of the fallen lorry to where the green Nissan now lay upside down, its windows completely shattered, and its metal frame squashed like a can of Coke. One of the lorry drivers was helping the other one, who had suffered injuries, and Lowerson understood immediately why he hadn’t wasted any time on the driver of the Nissan.

  Ludo’s head had been completely severed, the force of the impact having forced the upper metal sheet of the car’s bonnet to break through the windscreen and disconnect Evershed’s head from his body. It was a grotesque sight, something he had rarely seen before, but Lowerson told himself he’d deal with the image later.

  There wasn’t much time.

  He hurried across to the open window, with its jagged glass edges, and forced himself to reach inside Evershed’s pockets until he found what he’d been searching for.

  Wallet and phone.

  The phone was activated by a fingerprint, which acted as a passcode, and he gritted his teeth, took the dead man’s index finger, and used it to unlock the phone. In the seconds that followed, he went into the settings and changed the access mode, so he would no longer need to use Ludo’s fingerprint.

  He left the gun lying on the underside of the fallen roof—it had slipped from the passenger seat where Ludo had placed it when he’d pulled out of the car park.

  Just then, Lowerson heard the long wail of approaching sirens, and prepared himself to lie again.

  One last time.

  CHAPTER 33

  “Detective Lowerson? Thanks for making things safe until we got here.”

  The traffic sergeant shook his hand, and then jerked a thumb over her shoulder, to where three ambulances and four police cars were now on the scene, as well as specialist road sweepers who were clearing a path so that standing traffic could move slowly around the edge.

  “What exactly happened here?”

  Lowerson had already prepared what he would say.

  “I saw the whole thing,” he said. “I happened to be coming out of the service station, right behind that green Nissan, and the driver flew out of the slip road like a maniac. He wanted to get ahead of that blue lorry, which was in the slow lane, and cross over two lanes to get to the overtaking lane. Unfortunately, he hadn’t seen the other lorry, that was already sitting in the overtaking lane. I think he hoped to get past the first one and go straight into the outer lane so he could be on his way, but ended up hitting it straight on.”

  “What kind of speed was he doing?” the woman asked.

  “At least sixty,” Lowerson replied, and that was true enough. “He was doing forty as he left the service station.”

  “I see,” she said, and tutted. “They never learn.”

  It was an odd thing to say, Lowerson thought, especially since the man was dead. However, he had no time to dwell on social niceties.

  “I set out a couple of cones, called it in, then checked the driver’s status. I’m afraid he was clearly dead.”

  The traffic cop nodded, looking a bit green around the gills.

  “Yes, I saw,” she muttered. “There’s nothing you could have done.”

  “I guess not,” Lowerson sighed. “I had a quick look for any ID, but couldn’t find anything, so I ran the number plates, in case it’s helpful. The bloke was called…Steven Marshall, D.O.B. 13th March 1961.”

  He wondered whether it should concern him, how easily he was able to lie.

  “Thanks, that saves us a job.”

  And will buy me twenty-four hours, Lowerson thought. Until some observant so-and-so at the mortuary realised who they were dealing with, he had some time to play with.

  “Look, I’m late getting into the office, but feel free to call me if you need a statement.”

  “Right, we’ll do that. Thank
s again.”

  Lowerson walked swiftly back to the rental car and re-joined the slow-moving traffic as it skirted around the edge of the crash site. Only when he was free and clear did he let out the pent-up breath in his lungs.

  Paul Evershed might be dead and gone, but he had left behind a gift—one Jack fully intended to use.

  * * *

  Sally Emerson shut the door to her office in City Hall, and made two phone calls.

  The first was to the hospital, to check how her mother was doing. She and Mike had taken all the time off work they reasonably could, but it was a wrench to leave her alone when she was still so frail. It was hardly surprising, since she’d lost her husband, her son and her home—all in the space of a week.

  The ward sister told her that her mother was doing very well, and had managed to eat a good bit of breakfast, which was a positive sign. She kept trying to talk, working desperately hard to make herself understood, and had been asking for a chalkboard or pen and paper to be able to write down her thoughts, since she could not speak them aloud.

  Sally agreed to stop into the hospital gift shop and pick something up, later on.

  The next phone call she made was to the family liaison officer at the police station, who had been their main point of contact during the investigation into Alan and Simon’s deaths. This time, though, she was transferred straight through to DCI Ryan.

  “Good morning, Mrs Emerson,” he said, in his smooth, southern voice. “I understand you had some queries about what progress had been made in the investigation?”

  “Yes, thank you for taking my call,” she said. “The last time I spoke to the family liaison officer, I was told that my brother’s death was being treated as an accidental overdose, and that the autopsy had been completed. However, when my husband rang the mortuary to request Simon’s body for cremation earlier this morning, he was told that they’re not quite ready to release his body. Naturally, I’m concerned. Is there some sort of problem?”

  Ryan shifted the phone to his other ear and wrote, ‘CREMATION’ on a pad of paper, which he then held up for Phillips to see.

  That was a tenner his sergeant owed him.

  “I see,” he said. “Well, I shouldn’t worry, Mrs Emerson. The mortuary often has a few last-minute checks to do, before they can release a body. I assure you, it’s completely normal.”

  “Oh, I see. Do you have any idea how long it’ll be, before we can hold our funeral service?”

  “I’m sure it’ll all be resolved in a day or two,” Ryan said.

  There was a slight pause, as Sally considered what her husband had said to her, after another blazing row about her wanting a divorce, the night before.

  “Chief inspector, do you think there’s any reason for us to worry about my mother’s safety? She was in the house both times, when my father and my brother died.”

  “Since both deaths have been determined ‘accidental’, there’s really no need to worry,” Ryan said. “Incidentally, I caught the news segment this morning, Mrs Emerson. I thought you gave a very nice interview.”

  Despite herself, Sally blushed at the other end of the line.

  “Thank you.”

  “It’s a great project you’re backing,” Ryan continued, once more setting his personal views to one side for the sake of the greater good. “Our part of the world is crying out for more affordable housing. Your father must have been proud to know the land was being put to good use.”

  “Ah, yes—yes he was. It was mostly Mike he spoke to about it…” she found herself saying, and instantly regretted it. As the head of planning, Mike’s name wasn’t to be associated with the development, or they’d both risk allegations of corruption.

  “Thanks again, chief inspector, I must be getting back to work.”

  Ryan returned the polite farewell, and replaced the desktop receiver. Across the bank of desks, Phillips sent a paper aeroplane across to him made from a ten-pound note, which he caught one-handed.

  “D’you know? Sally Emerson rang to query why her brother’s body hadn’t been released, but didn’t ask about her father. That’s rather strange, isn’t it?”

  “Perhaps they weren’t close,” MacKenzie said. “Or, it could be the grief. It can make people disorganised.”

  Ryan said nothing.

  “I know Pinter seems to think it’s all cut and dry,” MacKenzie remarked, having only seen the ‘official’ pathology report into Simon Watson’s death. “But I can’t help thinking about the surrounding circumstances. Something doesn’t sit right.”

  Again, Ryan said nothing, trapped between his duty not to divulge the undercover elements of an operation, and his duty to be open and honest with his colleagues.

  “I had a look at the CCTV footage that came through from some of the businesses around Penshaw,” Phillips said. “The funny thing is, Jack seems to have beaten me to it. He must’ve had a late one, last night.”

  Ryan set the little aeroplane down on his desk, with exaggerated care.

  “Really?”

  “The system says the CCTV files were downloaded around ten o’clock, last night. Must be why he’s slept in, this morning,” Phillips joked.

  Ryan immediately concerned about Lowerson’s whereabouts.

  “Was there anything on the footage?” he asked. “Anything to help us?”

  “I haven’t had a chance to go through all of it, yet, but there’s clear footage of Paul Evershed buying cigarettes and chocolate from the convenience shop in Penshaw, around quarter past eleven on the night Simon Watson died.”

  Ryan was faced with a decision. He could no longer pretend to his friends and colleagues that Watson’s death was an accident, when the evidence was stacking up to suggest pre-meditated murder. However, DCI Blackett had issued a clear warning about the consequences he would face if he was responsible for jeopardising the undercover anti-corruption investigation.

  Before he was forced to decide, his mobile phone began to ring.

  Lowerson.

  Rising from his desk, Ryan hurried from the room to take the call, leaving Phillips and MacKenzie to look at one another in confusion.

  “Here, I hope he’s not having an affair, or ‘owt like that,” Phillips muttered. “I’ll have a few words to say to him, if he is…”

  “Don’t be daft, Frank. He’s probably dealing with some sort of top-secret, undercover operation that he can’t share with us, and it’s making him act out of character.”

  Phillips considered that possibility, then pulled a disbelieving face.

  “Nah. Maybe he’s just got the runs.”

  CHAPTER 34

  “What do you mean, they’re holding on to the body?”

  Bobby Singh’s tone never wavered, even in anger. It was a point of pride for him to know that nothing and nobody ever affected him to the degree that he lost his temper. Controlled anger was healthy, but rage was indulgent.

  “That’s what I heard. And now they’re looking into Priory Developments.”

  He could hear the note of panic at the other end of the line, and smiled.

  “What’s the party line?”

  “They’re calling it an accidental overdose, just like we planned.”

  “You’re probably worrying about nothing, then. Our little helper in the Major Crimes Team has been given very clear instructions about what to do, and he knows the consequences if he fails to comply.”

  “But…if it was ruled accidental, Ryan would have handed it over to another team. Wouldn’t he?”

  Singh was quiet for so long, they thought the connection had been lost.

  “Hello?”

  “I’m still here,” he said.

  “Well? Don’t you think he would have passed it over to another team, if he thought it wasn’t murder?”

  Now that he thought about it, Singh had to admit it was true. Ryan was, in many ways, as single-minded as he was, himself.

  “We’re being deceived, it would seem,” he said, after another long pause
. “Our little helper hasn’t been so helpful, after all.”

  “What do we do now?”

  More panic.

  “You do nothing,” he said. “Your past dealings have caused enough trouble as it is. The deal will be going ahead, without delay. In the meantime, I have some more of your mess to clean up.”

  “I’m sorry, I had no idea he would ever find out—”

  The conversation over, Singh disconnected the call and then walked to the bedroom window to look out at his brand-new swimming pool in the garden below. The rain continued to fall in fat droplets against the surface of the water and he watched it for a few minutes, before turning away again to issue the next order.

  He sent a short message to Ludo, which read:

  JL NOT COMPLYING. INSTRUCT PACK DOGS TO TERMINATE.

  After the message was sent, Singh walked through to the dressing room he’d shared with Rochelle for two years. Now, half of the shelves were empty of her clothing and shoes, her make-up and underwear. Anything she’d ever touched had been destroyed, as if she had never existed.

  First thing Monday, a crew would be coming in to remodel the entire house, so he would no longer see her fingers touching the worktops, or smell her scent lingering in the carpets and curtains. The company he’d started in her name would be liquidated, and the women she’d worked with would find themselves out of a job.

  Then, he’d start looking for her replacement.

  * * *

  Jack Lowerson pulled into the staff car park at Northumbria CID and heard a message ping onto Ludo’s burner phone. He turned off the engine and reached for it, shoving aside the distasteful memory of how he’d gained access to the device in the first place.

  He opened the message and, when he read what it contained, it was as though somebody had walked over his grave.

  JL not complying…instruct pack dogs to terminate…