Green For Danger - Volume II of the Operation Jigsaw Trilogy

by Hayden, Mark

  It had been a late night for James King. Queen Victoria had played a session in Manchester at a private club, and they had lingered afterwards to talk to the movers and shakers who were organising the promotional tour for Vicci’s forthcoming album. Everyone who might have wanted to call him was at the club, so James hadn’t even taken his phone with him.

  There was a burger van outside the club, and the band enjoyed an early breakfast at six am before taking a taxi back to their hotel and crashing out. James was getting too old for this.

  When he finally surfaced in the afternoon, it was to answer the room phone.

  ‘Is that Mr James King?’ said a male voice.

  ‘Yes. Who wants to know?’

  ‘This is Police Sergeant Chandler from South Lancs Constabulary. I’m in reception and I’d like to come up and see you in ten minutes, if that’s okay.’

  This was worrying. He could have handled a raid because he was always clean when they were on the road. A policeman who was being nice and giving him a chance to dispose of his stash obviously had something serious to discuss.

  ‘Can you make it fifteen minutes? Then I can have a shower. You woke me up.’

  ‘Sorry, sir. Just call reception when you’re ready, but don’t be too long.’

  Sir? They called him sir? This was getting worse. James headed for the bathroom.

  He threw on some clean clothes after the shower, but didn’t attempt to dry his hair. When the policeman came up to the room, he was in uniform, but had a woman trailing behind in plain clothes. This was getting serious and it got worse when they insisted that he sat down in the armchair. The sergeant introduced his woman as Detective Constable Smith and they both sat down on the bed, moving apart when the sergeant’s weight nearly pitched them together.

  ‘I’m sorry to say this, Mr King, but I’ve got some bad news. A body was found this morning which we have reason to believe may be your brother. Have you heard from him since Wednesday?’

  ‘Wednesday? It’s Friday now. Anyway, how did you find me and what do you mean by We believe it may be your brother?’

  James rocked back and forward in the chair. The woman was about to speak when James remembered his phone. He made a grab for it but the sergeant, a big man, took hold of his wrist. James flinched but the man wasn’t hurting him, just trying to slow him down.

  ‘It’s switched off, isn’t it?’

  James nodded, and the man let go of his wrist. They all sat down again. This time the sergeant took the chair by the dressing table instead of risking another go at the bed.

  ‘That’s why it’s taken so long,’ said Chandler. ‘Your mother’s been trying to get hold of you, and she told Midland Counties police to try Queen Victoria’s management company. They pointed MCPS in this direction and MCPS asked us – me – to come and see you. DC Smith can answer some of your questions, and I’ll leave you with her if that’s okay.’

  ‘Yeah, thanks,’ said James, and the sergeant let himself out.

  DC Smith was young and chubby and pale. James was surprised they hadn’t found a token black officer for this job. With PS Chandler gone, she gave him a diffident smile.

  ‘Tell me what you know,’ he said. She lost the smile and looked at her notebook.

  ‘Your mother reported your brother as missing this morning. She was especially concerned in light of the events on Wednesday and the fire.’

  ‘What you talking about? I’ve been on the road for three days, and we don’t get newspapers.’

  Smith flicked back another page. ‘On Wednesday evening there was a shooting in Earlsbury, and two police officers were injured. One of them died at the scene and the other is in a critical condition. On Thursday afternoon a serious fire was started in a warehouse. When Fire & Rescue gained access, they discovered two bodies. No one has heard from your brother since Wednesday. We’re conducting tests to determine whether one of the bodies is Robert.’

  James’s foot started tapping maniacally on its own. He looked down and wondered what the noise was. He put his hand on his knee to try and stop it, but his other foot started tapping instead. He leaned forward and wrapped his arms round his knees.

  ‘Robbie, Robbie, Robbie. What have you done, man? What’s happened to you?’

  He shot a look at DC Smith. ‘He was murdered, right?’

  ‘Almost certainly.’

  ‘And who’s the other one? The other one found with him?’

  ‘Midland Counties police have reason to believe it may be a Mr Dermot Lynch. Do you know him?’

  ‘Together? They were found murdered together?’

  ‘I can’t give you any more details, I’m afraid. I just don’t know.’

  James picked up his jungle jacket, the one his father had left him, and took out some cigarettes. He didn’t care whether or not the hotel fined him. DC Smith pulled open a window and gave him a saucer from the tea tray, then she picked up the hotel phone and muttered something to someone.

  ‘I’ve ordered some tea and coffee,’ she said, and opened her notebook again. ‘So you do know Mr Lynch, then?’

  ‘Of course I know him. The Earlsbury filth – sorry, the Earlsbury police, know that I know him, too. Look, DC Smith, you’ve been very kind, but I’m going to go home as soon as you’ve left, and I’ll present myself at the station if they don’t get me first. Is there anything you really need to know?’

  She looked at the list of questions and snapped her notebook closed. ‘Not really.’

  There was a knock at the door, and she let in the room service porter with the tray. Before she finally left, she gave him a card. James smiled and thanked her.

  He had been desperate to get rid of them ever since Chandler had grabbed his wrist. He knew that Robbie was dead, but he had just remembered the last text his brother had sent on Wednesday. It had said simply this:

  Payback time, Bro.

  Now he wanted answers. Payback for what? James had always suspected that Dermot Lynch had played a part in his brother’s arrest for dealing, and if Dermot had been found dead, it would have been a disappointment rather than a surprise. But both of them? Together? All he had thought when the text arrived on Wednesday was that Robbie’s English teacher would have been pleased to see him using a comma in the right place.

  Chapter 6

  Earlsbury

  Saturday Morning

  23 October

  There was no leaving do at the MLIU, no presentations of single malt, or hastily arranged parties. At three o’clock on Friday afternoon, DI Fulton had gathered the team together, and the chief superintendent had come downstairs and hovered at the back. Fulton began by announcing who would be acting DS, and then looked over at Tom’s desk where a police issue cardboard box was sitting with his personal possessions.

  ‘This is gonna be brief,’ said Fulton. ‘I just wanted to have it said, on the record, that Tom Morton is a good copper. More than that, he’s been one of the best sergeants I’ve ever had. Mortgage fraudsters across Europe will sleep easier in their beds tonight. Yes, my children, the Force is strong with this one. It’s just a shame he’s going to join the Dark Side. Thanks, Tom, and good luck. You’ll need it.’

  Tom didn’t know what to say. He hadn’t expected anything to be said, but to be so publicly praised and damned in the same speech had wrong-footed him completely. He stood up and cleared his throat to give himself thinking time.

  ‘Thank you, Yoda,’ he said, and got a small laugh. ‘This is either the best thing I’ve ever done or the most stupid. Either way, it was the only thing I could do, given the circumstances. The guv’nor will tell you why, if you’re interested. If I’ve done good work here, it was only because I had a good boss and a great team. I’ll miss you.’

  The chief superintendent led a round of applause, and by the time it had died away, Fulton was back in his office. Tom shook hands with his replacement and picked up his box. Fulton had taken his warrant card off him at five to three, and that left one more duty to perform.<
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  Elspeth Brown looked very put out. She folded her arms and refused to accept his security pass and locker key.

  ‘I can’t believe it, Tom. You’re going to Professional Standards?’ She shook her head. ‘All my dreams are shattered and my heart is broken.’

  ‘But we were star-crossed lovers from the start. It could never happen.’ He put the pass and key on the ledge in front of her. ‘Besides, you haven’t heard who my replacement is. It’s Maxwell.’

  She snatched the pass from under his nose. ‘Ooh, good. I do like a challenge. If the lottery syndicate wins anything, I’ll donate your share to the benevolent fund: it’ll make up for what you’re doing to us.’

  Tom left the building and hailed a taxi. On their way to the off-street garage where he kept his BMW, Tom stared at his new warrant card, hand delivered from Samuel Cohen. The cover showed the generic Metropolitan Police crest, and the interior identified him as a detective inspector. If he held his fingers over the designation Central Inspectorate of Professional Policing Standards, some people might think he was an ordinary copper. Who was he trying to kid?

  The Friday afternoon traffic was foul, all the way from central London to Earlsbury. After handing over his active caseload in the morning, he had scoured the Internet for a decent hotel. The best deal he could get was just to the west of the town at the Earlsbury Park Golf and Country Club. That would make a change, he supposed.

  The room was okay, and had a decent-sized desk with a view of the golf course. The food was less appealing but at least he was fed. He took a glass of wine back to his room and started up his laptop. Tom wasn’t as good with computers as his cousin Kate (who was?), but he knew his way round most of the standard programs. He logged into his new CIPPS email address and found three messages. One was a standard message from the IT manager, one was a Welcome aboard email from Samuel Cohen, and the third was from the Assistant Chief Constable of Midland Counties Police Service. Well, he wasn’t hanging about, was he?

  I understand that CIPPS have assigned you to conduct the investigation into DS Griffin.

  Please see me in the Station Commander’s office, Black Country South Station at 0800 tomorrow (Saturday).

  Malik Khan

  ACC Operations

  MCPS

  Tom had once visited the old Dudley police station, opposite the Courthouse pub. He didn’t know whether it was still there or not, but much of the work was now done from the new Black Country South Station (BCSS), next to the M5 motorway. Tom had read about it in the newspapers – it was a Private Finance Initiative project. The taxpayer would be forking out millions of pounds every year to pay for a police station without any cells. That was a design error, apparently.

  The PFI contractor had been asked to quote for providing a custody suite and had quoted a figure so high that the police authority had decided to build its own cells at the back of Earlsbury division. When the cuts came in next year, there were going to be several officers facing redundancy because of this extravagance.

  Tom shook his head and consulted the hotel guide. They didn’t start serving breakfast until eight o’clock on Saturdays. Tom shut down his computer and went to bed.

  The BCSS building looked good, all right. It was brick faced and solid without being brutal. Tom was issued with a pass at reception and shown up to the Station Commander’s office.

  ACC Khan was standing by the window, talking on his mobile. The station commander himself was absent, but a second officer, an Afro-Caribbean woman in plain clothes, was seated in the corner, on her own and far from the desk. Khan waved him in and pointed to a chair much closer to the seat of power. Tom smiled at the woman, but she barely flicked her eyes up and didn’t acknowledge him. She appeared to be sending a text message and was hunched over her phone.

  Khan finished his call and welcomed Tom to the Black Country.

  ‘Sorry to drag you in so early, but I needed to see you before the main briefing at 0930, and I’ve got my own session with the Senior Investigating Officer in half an hour.’

  ‘No problem, sir. I came up last night so I’m ready to go.’

  ‘Good. Now let’s get things straight, shall we? The Chief Constable asked for CIPPS participation in this enquiry because he wants to know if we’ve got one rotten apple or a whole barrel. That’s all. Your role is to investigate DS Griffin’s professional conduct and what connections he may have had with criminal elements. Okay?’

  Tom nodded and glanced at the woman in the corner. She still hadn’t looked up from her phone.

  Khan continued. ‘Was Griffin acting alone within MCPS, or are there other officers who need to be investigated? That’s the question you have to answer while we concentrate on finding who shot him, who shot DC Hooper, and who killed those two in the van.’

  ‘So, in other words, I’m not part of enquiry team.’

  Khan tapped the desk. ‘Consider it this way: you’re conducting a specific part of the enquiry, with clearly defined elements and boundaries. It would be difficult for you to operate without having access to the main enquiry’s resources and discoveries.’

  It would be ruddy impossible, thought Tom. To Khan, he said, ‘So I’m okay to join the briefing. Who do I report to?’

  ‘You plough your own furrow, Tom. If you need anything or discover anything relevant to the main enquiry, hand it over to the SIO. Everything else you discover comes to me. Routine reports by email, but if you discover anything that needs further investigation, give me a call.’

  Khan handed over a business card, and Tom slipped it into his pocket.

  ‘We’re also providing you with local support,’ said Khan. ‘Can I introduce Detective Constable Kristal Hayes? She’s between teams at the moment. She’ll show you where the canteen is. See you at half past nine, Tom.’

  Before Tom could stand up and offer his hand to the woman, she swept out of the office without acknowledging him or ACC Khan. By the time Tom had picked up his laptop bag and coat, she was disappearing through the doors of the Command Corridor.

  He found her waiting for him at the next turning. Now that he could look at her properly, he that realised she was younger than he thought – perhaps no more than twenty-four or twenty-five. Her hair was pulled back in cornrows and she was wearing a blue trouser suit with a white blouse: Caroline had referred to this style as plain clothes for women detectives 101. It didn’t suit DC Hayes. Tom approached and held out his hand. She gave him the fastest handshake ever and continued to block the door with her other arm.

  ‘You can tell who likes me round here very easily, sir,’ she said. ‘Anyone who calls me Kristal doesn’t like me. Anyone who does like me calls me Kris, okay?’

  ‘And what about people who’ve only just met you, and haven’t formed an opinion yet? People like me.’

  ‘Hayes is fine. What do I call you? Sir? Guv’nor? Boss?’

  ‘Boss implies a team of more than two, and we’re not in London now so that rules out Guv’nor. You can call me Sir. However, unless I eat some breakfast soon, you’ll be calling me an ambulance.’

  She didn’t smile, and Tom felt his heart sink. Humour was his leadership style of choice, but it looked like he might have to try a different approach – such as giving orders, perhaps. He followed her to the canteen.

  The family home where Francesca’s husband had finished growing up after the move from Ireland was on the Elijah estate, and his mother, ‘Ma’ Lynch still lived there in her eighty-third year. Even though Fran’s home was bigger, the family seemed to gather instinctively at Ma Lynch’s ex-council house in times of celebration or crisis.

  Ma was making her way slowly from the kitchen with another plate of bacon sandwiches as more relatives arrived, and Fran jumped up to give her a hand. Her mother-in-law waved her away and went over to the corner where Elizabeth was pretending to do some homework. Lizzie shook her head when offered a sandwich, and Ma put them on the table then returned to the kitchen to fetch the teapot. Ma’s daughter, Janet, h
ad already started on the washing-up. Daughters were allowed in there, but daughters-in-law were not. Fran picked up the plate of food and offered it to Maria, Dermot’s mother. She had just finished crying.

  ‘Come on, Maria. You’ve got to eat something,’ said Fran.

  ‘They were his favourite. Ma’s bacon sandwiches. He’d find any excuse to come here for them.’

  Fran smiled at her sister-in-law. Flaky. That was the word Pat had used to describe Maria. It summed her up perfectly.

  A car drew up, and Fran breathed a sigh of relief – it was her eldest daughter, Helen. She found it hard to comfort Maria and didn’t know how to comfort Lizzie (because Lizzie didn’t know she needed it yet), but Helen was a different story. Her husband had been on one of the fire tenders which had been called to Wrekin Road. He was back on duty now.

  As she went to open the door, she looked around Ma Lynch’s house at the four women. Ma, Janet and Maria were widows, and there was a good chance that she might join the club herself.

  She let Helen in and the first question was, ‘Any news on Dad?’

  ‘He’s still at the police station,’ said Fran.

  The walk to the canteen gave Tom a chance to ponder the woman who marched four paces ahead of him with a chunky-heeled clatter that announced her to the whole division. What were her parents thinking? Kristal Hayes? It could have been worse – they could have called her Purple. Black women don’t often have it easy, he thought, and to be saddled with a name like that must have been an extra handicap. In the horse racing sense, of course.

  Tom queued for hot bacon rolls and a mug of tea in the busy canteen. There were an awful lot of officers for a Saturday morning. Kris did the same and they found a distant corner.

  She sat as far away from him as she could while still being on the same table and took out her phone while she tucked into her food. She had also chosen to put her back to the room. Tom left her alone and savoured his breakfast, then wiped his hands as noisily as possible; she didn’t look up at him. He pushed back his chair and moved next to her.