by LJ Ross
“What now, sir?” Gallagher asked, popping a Murray Mint into his mouth.
“We wait,” Coates said, checking the time on his watch.
Eight-thirty.
It wasn’t fully dark, yet.
“Keep your wits about you,” he muttered.
* * *
Lowerson checked the back door again to make sure it was securely locked, did the same at the front, and then paced between the kitchen and living room.
He’d given up trying to sit.
Singh’s message to Ludo played through his mind, again and again.
Terminate.
Instruct pack dogs to terminate.
Singh wanted him dead before he could clear his name, so the world would believe he’d died a murderer. The plan to intimidate him into submission had failed, and Lowerson was of no further use to him, except for one loose end.
Rochelle.
It was growing dark, now.
They’d be coming for him soon.
* * *
MacKenzie drove through the gathering darkness with steady hands and a clear head.
She did not think of Frank, or of Samantha. She thought only of the job she’d been tasked to do, and of the team that relied on her to execute it with the professionalism she was known for. The countryside passed by in a flash of green and blue, and she flipped down the sunscreen to protect her eyes against the last of the sun’s rays before it fell off the edge of the world.
Behind her, a cavalcade of marked and unmarked police cars followed; an army of specialist police staff drafted in from DCI Blackett’s own hand-picked and trusted team, some of them having travelled from as far afield as London.
It had taken less than fifteen minutes for Ryan to explain the position, and less than fifteen seconds for her and Frank to understand his predicament. Ryan had spoken to them when he was ready and able, and when he’d needed people he could trust without reservation.
That was all they ever needed to know.
* * *
As darkness fell, the shadows lengthened in Lowerson’s ground floor maisonette.
The streetlamps on the pavement outside flickered into life, shining their artificial glow through the panels in the front door like yellow fingers, stretching out along the hallway floor to where Jack stood, waiting.
He did not have to wait any longer.
He heard the distant squeak of metal as somebody opened the front gate, and then soft footsteps making their way to the front door.
A figure appeared.
Jack’s heart slammed against his chest in one hard motion and his stomach churned.
They’d come for him.
* * *
At the Port of Tyne, DCI Coates and DS Gallagher waited inside their parked car, eyes trained on The Starry Night, which was berthed directly ahead of where they had concealed themselves. Shipping containers were stacked in high walls around their heads, like miniature skyscrapers, and the water glistened like navy-blue ink against a backdrop of twinkling lights as the city came to life on the northern shore.
Coates checked his phone, then slid it back inside his breast pocket, growing impatient.
“Nothing here,” Gallagher muttered, and it was true. There had been no sign of any lorries arriving to take possession of the ship’s cargo.
Coates said nothing. He was getting too old for this, too long in the tooth to be gadding about the town late at night on a fool’s errand.
“D’you hear that?” Gallagher said, in an undertone.
There was a rumbling sound, distant at first but growing louder as it drew nearer.
It was a lorry.
* * *
Jack Lowerson stared at the figure beyond the door, wondering which of his fellow officers had answered the order; which of them had fallen so far as to take another life.
He watched their arm raise to the door knocker, and three loud taps rang out like a death knell in the silent hallway.
The blood rushed through his veins, pumping fast as he told himself to stay calm. To get the job done.
Lowerson walked slowly towards the front door, and reached out to unlock it.
“Jack?”
His arm froze, and he looked up sharply in confusion.
“Jack! I know you’re in there. I can see you through the glass!”
Melanie?
Lowerson swore softly, then unlocked the door with shaking fingers to find Yates framed in the doorway.
“You could at least let me in,” she said, her eyes shooting daggers at him.
Lowerson took a quick survey of the street and saw no other signs of life.
“Quickly,” he muttered, and tugged her inside the house.
“Hey!” She yanked her arm away and planted her feet in the hallway. “I want to know what the hell’s going on with you, and I’m not going to be fobbed off anymore.”
“Mel, please. This isn’t a good time.”
“When is it ever a good time?” she exploded. “I’m sick to death of all your long looks and sad smiles, Jack. I want some straight answers, and I want them now.”
“Look,” he said, casting another nervous glance towards the door. “This really isn’t a good time.”
“Oh, I see,” she said, in a dangerous tone. “Already moved on to the next victim, have we? What’s her name?”
It was an unfortunate choice of words, and he turned pale at the thought.
“No, it’s nothing like that,” he said urgently, and grabbed her arm again. “Look, I know you deserve some answers, and I want to give them to you. But not now.”
“Get your hands off me!” Melanie shouted, more upset than angry. “I don’t understand all this, Jack. I wish you’d explain…”
In that moment, Lowerson would have taken on fifty murderous bent coppers rather than have to see the hurt in Melanie’s eyes.
“You’re not going to be very happy about what I’m going to do next,” he warned her. “But you’ll understand why, very soon.”
She had no time to react before he plucked her off the floor and up into his arms.
“Jack! What the hell? Put me down!”
She began thrashing and kicking as he mounted the stairs, and Lowerson swore viciously as she almost toppled them backwards.
“Watch it!”
“What are you doing?” she said, with a touch of fear. “Where are you taking me, Jack?”
But she knew where he was going. He was taking her to his bedroom.
She began thrashing again, but Lowerson was saved from any further injury when the door to his bedroom opened to reveal a roomful of surveillance officers, DCI Blackett and DCI Ryan, all of whom were trying very hard not to laugh.
Lowerson marched through the lot of them and deposited Melanie in the centre of the bed, where she bounced a couple of times and then sat up, looking furious.
“See?” he said, gesturing to the people crowded around the room. “Now do you see why it’s not a good time?”
Yates looked around their faces and felt a flush work its way up her neck.
She needed to leave, before she could be humiliated any further. She scrambled off the bed and made to barge past them all, but Ryan put a gentle hand on her shoulder.
“Mel,” he said. “Stay here with us. We’re on the cusp of something very important, and we can’t risk scuppering the operation, not just now.”
Yates cast a final, fulminating glare in Lowerson’s direction.
“I’ll stay until it’s over.”
Ryan gave Lowerson a nod, and the door shut behind him. A moment later, they heard his footsteps retreating down the short flight of stairs.
Yates looked around the room at the men and women with microphones and headsets.
“I don’t understand what’s going on.”
“I know, Mel. I wanted to tell you, and so did Jack,” Ryan said. “All you need to know is, things aren’t as bad as you might think, and neither is Jack.”
He reached for another set of hea
dphones and handed them to her.
“Listen for yourself.”
CHAPTER 38
Coates and Gallagher watched the lorry pull up with a low rumble and a squeal of brakes in the loading area beside The Starry Night. Two men got out and walked around to the rear, where they let down the back of the lorry and made it ready for loading.
Gallagher spoke quietly into his radio, telling the local squad cars to move into position and set up roadblocks at every exit to the port.
Coates typed a quick text and then slid his phone back into his pocket.
“We should move,” he said.
“Sir? Surely it’s best to wait until they’ve loaded the goods onto the van?”
The bust would be meaningless, unless they’d handled and taken possession of the drugs.
Coates fell silent, but his fingers drummed an irritable rhythm against the side of the car door.
Soon enough, the two men emerged from the ship carrying what appeared to be large laundry bags along the gangway, which they hauled onto the back of the lorry. They watched them walk back and forth, until they were done.
“Now, sir?”
Coates felt for the phone inside his jacket pocket, but there had been no answering message.
“Now,” he agreed, and followed Gallagher as he jumped out of the car, shouting down his radio for all units to move in.
* * *
The interlude with Yates had served as a blessing in disguise, because Lowerson no longer felt fearful, but oddly…joyous.
She had come to find him, which meant there was still hope.
He was grinning like an idiot, when he heard the scrape of a knife jiggling the lock at the back door. Simultaneously, there came a similar sound at the front door, and he remained in the hallway, waiting for them to find him.
His mouth ran dry as he heard the lock give way on the back door, and a gust of air rushed through the flat as it swung open. A moment later, he heard footsteps moving through the kitchen, into his living room and then, before his eyes, the first of them appeared in the doorway.
Then, two more appeared at the front door, their faces cast in shadow.
* * *
“It’s nothing but laundry,” Gallagher exclaimed, from his position in the back of the lorry. “There’s nothing in here except dirty sheets. This one’s filthy!” he added, in disgust.
“I told you, we’re a laundry company,” one of the men protested. “We collect the cabin bedding and towels once a week, when The Starry Night docks. We do the laundry overnight and have it back with them first thing in the morning. We’ll be late, now!”
Coates stood a short distance away, holding back a smile.
“Guess our source must’ve made a mistake,” he said, and worked up a bit of anger about it. “Total waste of our time.”
“Are we free to go?” one of the men asked. “Only, we’ve got a few other pick-ups tonight.”
“Aye, bugger off,” Coates said, and waited for Gallagher to jump off the back of the lorry. “Can’t win ’em all, Tim.”
Gallagher raised his radio to his lips and gave the order for all officers to stand down.
“Could be another lorry coming in,” he suggested. “Maybe it hasn’t arrived yet.”
“It’s possible, but now they’ve seen all of us pouncing on that laundry van, they’re unlikely to want to risk it, are they?”
Gallagher nodded.
“I’m happy to keep watch here, sir.”
“Very diligent of you,” Coates said. “But I’m going home.”
He’d been a party to this farce for long enough.
* * *
Lowerson stared at the faces of the three police officers and, despite everything, found that he was disappointed.
“I didn’t think it would be you,” he said, to Detective Inspector Anika Salam. They’d worked together countless times on cases involving fraud.
“Don’t make this any harder than it needs to be,” she said.
“I’m not allowed a few last words?”
“Shut up, Jack.” This, from her partner, DS Harry Tomlinson. “You brought this on yourself.”
“Howay, man. Let’s get it over with.” DI Terry Prince stepped forward, from the Vice Squad.
Lowerson turned and hurried upstairs, in the direction of his bedroom.
The others let out a cruel laugh.
“There’s nowhere to run,” Tomlinson called out, and their footsteps thudded on the stairs as they came to find him.
Salam turned the handle on the bedroom door, and came face to face with Ryan.
“Surprise,” he said, softly.
* * *
John McDougall guided the Annie-Mae around the pier and safely back into the harbour at Berwick-upon-Tweed. Nothing stirred on the water except the gulls, and he was glad to see the glittering lights of the town guiding his way back to shore. It had been an arduous journey—despite the rain having stopped over the mainland, the wind had whipped up a storm over the deeper waters out at sea. The Northumbrian coastline was infamous for its treacherous waters and hidden rock beds, and there were countless shipwrecks lining the ocean floor like a mariner’s graveyard.
The waves had crashed around the rickety old fishing boat as he’d reached the stronger currents of the shipping route, where larger vessels made their way to and from Scotland, or further afield. Even as an experienced sailor, he’d been afraid.
It had been a risky manoeuvre to run up alongside the larger vessel and collect the goods, without going under beneath the force of the waves.
Now that home was in sight, relief washed over his exhausted body.
* * *
His relief lasted right up until he laid anchor and set his feet back on the jetty.
“Mr McDougall?”
John spun around to see figures materialising from the arches, their torches shining on the slick wooden floor.
“Who’re you?”
An attractive, red-headed woman stepped beneath the single light at the end of the jetty and held up a warrant card.
His stomach performed a slow somersault.
“DI MacKenzie, Northumbria CID,” she said, nodding towards his boat. “Been out for a midnight jaunt?”
His eyes skittered over the scores of other police officers standing behind her, their faces little more than stony masks of contempt.
MacKenzie cut through the small talk and cautioned him, before producing a warrant giving her permission to search his boat.
John closed his eyes, and nodded.
MacKenzie gave the signal for a couple of officers to board the boat, and there was a short, awkward silence while they completed a preliminary search of the vessel.
“Looks like it’s clear, ma’am.”
John thought he had misheard.
“Check under the fish,” MacKenzie told them, her infallible nose for criminal behaviour never having failed her in the past. She’d have the whole boat dismantled if necessary, but her instincts told her that McDougall wouldn’t have bothered with any elaborate attempts at concealing his illicit cargo.
Sure enough, the two constables amended their earlier, hasty conclusion.
“Ma’am, you need to see this,” one of them said. “This is the biggest haul I’ve ever seen.”
MacKenzie boarded the boat and walked over to where they had lifted part of the wooden deck to reveal the ice storage unit, and were now shining their torches down into the crevice.
At first, she saw nothing but dozens of glazed, dead fish-eyes, staring up at her from their icy grave. But then, she saw the vacuum-packed bags, stacks and stacks of them concealed beneath the top layer of fish under the ice.
While officers held John McDougall on the jetty, MacKenzie took a pole from the floor of the wooden deck and used it to scrape away the top layer of fish and ice. What she found beneath made her breath catch in her throat, because there must have been nearly two hundred kilograms of cocaine or other substances piled in a heap, with a con
servative street value of over twenty million pounds.
MacKenzie looked across to where the fisherman held his head in his hands.
“Book him.”
CHAPTER 39
Officers surrounded Lowerson’s address, closing off any escape route from the front or back doors and leaving DI Anika Salam, DS Harry Tomlinson and DI Terry Prince cornered. Ryan marched them downstairs to the living room, where DCI Blackett stepped forward to perform the arrests on behalf of the Anti-Corruption Unit.
“Detective Inspector Anika Salam, I am arresting you on suspicion of conspiring to commit murder, and as an accessory to murder,” he said. “You do not have to say anything, but anything you do say—”
“Sir, you’ve got this all wrong,” she said quickly. “We were, in fact, on our way here to place Detective Constable Jack Lowerson under arrest.”
The other two smiled, bolstered by her ability to think on her feet.
“We received a series of anonymous text messages, containing photographs of DC Lowerson in a compromising situation with a woman we believe to be Rochelle White, the girlfriend of Bobby Singh who has recently been reported as missing. Even more harrowing, we received photographs of Ms White, clearly deceased, and apparently taken very soon after her liaison with DC Lowerson.”
Yates turned to Jack with uncomprehending eyes, and he simply reached down to take her hand.
“No, I didn’t,” he whispered, in answer to her unspoken question. “But Ludo staged it to look like I did.”
“We believe those photographs to be highly incriminating,” Salam continued. “Furthermore, we understand that evidence has either gone missing from the Evidence Store or been tampered with.”
She turned to Lowerson.
“Ask him if he denies it.”
“You should really be asking me, since I’m the one who switched the evidence bags,” Ryan said, and was gratified to see her face fall. “DCI Blackett and I have been aware, almost from the start, of an attempt by an organised criminal gang to impugn DC Lowerson’s character, in an order to place him under duress and to extort sensitive police information. This was in exchange for not sharing photographs which appeared to show him in a sexual assignation with Rochelle White, a woman who was in the process of becoming a police informant.