‘It’s not like you to be so sullen. Not after you nailed Jake Munroe. Two for one deal, eh? Good for you. Always knew you had it in you.’
Brady didn’t reply. He didn’t like the tone of Madley’s voice or where the conversation seemed to be heading.
‘I didn’t realise what kind of bloke I had working for me. You can’t get the staff these days. No matter how much you vet, something always comes up and bites you in the arse,’ Madley mused.
Again, Brady remained silent. Whatever Madley was dangling, Brady was not biting.
‘I thought we could have a chat like the good old days.’
‘I haven’t got time for this,’ Brady replied.
‘What? My company not good enough for you now, Jack? Is that it?’
Brady had no idea why Madley was goading him. It was out of character. At least where he was concerned. However, he had seen Madley in action before. He could be as cruel and ruthless as a cat playing with a trapped mouse.
‘You can’t hold me responsible for Jake Munroe’s actions.’
Brady was about to speak. But Madley beat him to it.
‘Anyway, you should be more interested in Ronnie Macmillan than Munroe. He’s dead. Stabbed repeatedly in the neck,’ Madley stated. It was chillingly clinical.
‘What the—’
But before Brady could finish, the line had been cut.
His head was spinning.
Why the fuck had Madley called to tell him that? But he knew why.
Brady took a deep intake of breath as he steadied himself.
He felt nothing but relief. The bastard deserved everything he got – and more.
Brady suddenly thought of Ronnie’s estranged brother, Mayor Macmillan. He wondered whether he knew and if so, what he had made of the news? Brady imagined that there would be an element of relief for him as well. After all, Ronnie Macmillan had the potential to damage a lot of people. From the day he had been arrested he hadn’t talked. Brady thought about the obvious. Had someone silenced him before he found his voice?
Brady didn’t even question how Madley knew such a fact. He had contacts everywhere; both on the inside and out. And he knew Madley was telling the truth. He wasn’t a liar – never had been.
It didn’t take long before Brady came crashing down. Madley’s news took on a new dimension when Jimmy Matthews rang him. It had taken Brady by surprise, since Matthews was inside Durham prison.
‘What took you so long?’ Matthews hissed.
Brady realised from the heavy breathing that Matthews had his hand cupped around the mouthpiece. It was a survival strategy. If the other inmates knew he was talking to a copper, he would be dead. The fact that he wasn’t already dead was a feat in itself. Most bent coppers who end up on the inside rarely come out the other end. Matthews had even had an attempt made on his life six months ago – a good old-fashioned biro in the neck.
‘I was in the shower. How did I know you were going to call?’ Brady answered.
Since Matthews’s life-threatening injury, Brady had made a point of visiting him every two or three weeks. They shared a friendship that spanned twenty years. Most of that time had been served in the force together. All that had evaporated when Brady had been forced to arrest him. That was over a year ago and it had taken Matthews nearly dying for Brady to lose some of his anger and sense of betrayal.
‘Jack, I need to see you. Now.’
‘Come on, Jimmy. You’re having a laugh. How would I get a visiting pass for today? It’s too short notice.’
‘I’ve already sorted it,’ Matthews said, refusing to take ‘no’ for an answer.
Brady didn’t need to ask exactly how Matthews had sorted it. Matthews had always been involved in various shenanigans, which is how he ended up as a bent copper. He just never knew when to stop.
‘Bloody hell! I don’t know . . .’
‘Ronnie Macmillan’s dead.’
‘I know.’
‘How the fuck would you know that? The place is in turmoil. It’s in lock-down mode.’
Brady realised then that Matthews wouldn’t be on the inmates’ payphone. The inmates would all be locked in their cells. After all, Macmillan had shared the same wing as Matthews. Both of them had been segregated from the main prison population for their own safety. Macmillan, like Matthews, had enemies. It didn’t matter that one was a copper and the other a gangster; both had pissed enough people off to warrant being attacked.
No. Matthews must be on a mobile phone. The guards wouldn’t have known about it. Otherwise it would have been confiscated. Inmates had various ways of smuggling banned substances and objects into prison. Most of them came in through the back passage.
Brady realised in that moment Matthews must have been scared shitless to have risked ringing him on a mobile. Especially when every cell in his wing would no doubt be in the process of being searched. The guards would be looking for whatever weapon had been used to stab Ronnie Macmillan. That was, if they didn’t already have it in their possession. A Self Honed Implement of Violence, otherwise known as a shiv, could be made out of anything found in a prison. Matthews had been attacked with a sharpened biro but toothbrushes, spoons, any seemingly innocuous object could be deadly.
‘Who killed him, Jimmy?’ Brady asked.
Brady wasn’t an idiot. This was why Matthews wanted to talk to him. He was scared. There were two possibilities: either Matthews had killed Ronnie Macmillan; or the more plausible scenario was that he had witnessed another inmate kill him.
‘That’s why I need to talk to you.’
That was as far as Matthews got before the line went dead.
Brady listened to the dial tone.
Matthews had left him no option.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Brady kept his head down. He still wondered what the hell he was doing in Durham prison: a maximum security prison at that. He had gone through the humiliation of having a body search. Nothing intimate. Otherwise Brady’s reaction would have found him banged up alongside Matthews. But Brady could tell that the shit had most definitely hit the fan. The guards were on edge. No surprise. An inmate had been killed on their watch. Heads would roll – that was a given.
Brady had been taken through countless security gates until he reached the visitors’ room. It was a large, soulless space filled with an air of desperation that clung to the dented tables and chairs. But primarily it clung to the occupants.
He could see Matthews sitting on his own in the corner. He looked nervous. Agitated even. Brady caught his eye. Relief filled Matthews’s face.
Brady tried to hide his surprise when he sat down opposite Matthews. He looked like shit. He had dropped a lot of weight. His long hands drummed on the table nervously, while his eyes shone with a feverish madness as he surreptitiously looked around the large room. His brown hair was matted with a sheen of sweat covering his pale, clammy forehead. He looked like a man who was about to be shot.
‘Hey, Jimmy. How you doing?’
‘Cut the crap, Jack. I look like shit. I feel like shit,’ Matthews answered as he stared at Brady’s face. ‘What the fuck happened to you?’
Brady automatically touched the left side of his jaw. It still ached like hell but at least it wasn’t broken. And he could move it now without too much pain. The cut above his eye had started to heal. It was just the mottled bruising that made it look worse than it actually felt.
‘Ran head-on into someone’s fist. Repeatedly,’ Brady said with a lame grin.
‘Same old Jack Brady, eh?’ Matthews stated. ‘What is it about you not being able to keep out of trouble?’
Brady shrugged.
He waited for Matthews to tell him why he was here on his day off.
‘Macmillan—’ Matthews began in a low, conspiratorial voice.
Brady waited for him to finish.
Instead Matthews looked around the room.
‘Macmillan?’ Brady prompted.
‘Do you know who had him murdere
d?’ Matthews asked.
‘I’ve got some ideas,’ he answered.
Matthews looked at him as if he was an idiot. ‘You have no fucking idea!’
‘Do you know who did it then?’
Matthews nodded. ‘Martin Madley.’
‘Don’t take the piss,’ Brady hissed at him. ‘Fucking Madley’s not here is he?’
Brady sat back. He couldn’t believe that Matthews still had it in for Madley. He wondered if he would ever let it go. After all, it was Matthews who tried to stitch Madley up – not the other way around.
‘For fuck’s sake! No one knows better than me Madley’s not in here. But one of his men is!’
‘Who?’ Brady asked.
‘Bastard named Munroe. Jake Munroe. Arrived late last night. Evil fucker.’
Brady felt winded. He tried not to let it show. He failed.
Matthews nodded at Brady’s reaction.
‘Yeah? Police charged him yesterday for rape and murder. He’s inside for less than twelve hours and he’s already butchered Ronnie Macmillan.’
‘How do you know he did it?’ Brady asked.
‘Because I fucking witnessed it with my own eyes. That’s how!’
‘Did Munroe see you?’
Brady could understand Matthews’s jittery state. Munroe would take great delight in slicing a bent copper’s throat.
‘Fuck no! Do you think I’d be sat here if he did?’
Brady nodded. ‘What are you going to do?’
‘What do you think? Keep my mouth shut.’
‘So, why tell me?’ Brady asked.
‘Two reasons. If something happens to me, then you know who’s responsible. And I wanted you to know that Madley was behind this.’
‘What the fuck does Madley get out of silencing Ronnie Macmillan? Macmillan had no information on Madley. Madley refused to go into business with him if I remember correctly.’
‘For a copper you’re not very bright,’ Matthews said, his voice thick with irritation.
Brady didn’t say anything.
‘Munroe turns up. Word is he’s one of Johnny Slaughter’s boys. He kills Ronnie Macmillan at the first opportunity that arises. No hesitation or deliberation. Stab! Stab! Stab! Macmillan’s dead before he even knows it. But crucially, it’s before Macmillan gets a chance to find out that Munroe worked for Madley. If Macmillan had known that, Munroe wouldn’t have lasted an hour inside.’
Brady sat for a moment. He needed to make sense of what Matthews had just said.
‘Why the fuck do you think Munroe let you lot catch him? He’s a nasty fucker and he’s clever. He could easily have eluded you. You should be asking yourself why didn’t he? Why didn’t he run? Why give it to you on a plate? The films on YouTube? The identifiable scar across his scalp? The black panther going down his right arm? Why give it to you by filming himself?’
Brady looked surprised that Matthews knew this level of detail about the case.
‘Fucking hell, Jack! This isn’t a Russian prison. We have TVs and computers in here. And I was a copper once, remember?’
Brady was silent for a moment. Matthews’s eyes burned as he waited for Brady to speak. He was desperate for Brady to believe him.
‘So you’re saying that he wanted to be arrested and charged?’
Matthews nodded. ‘Exactly.’
It made sense. Brady had already wondered why Munroe had left a bloody trail to his own back door. It smacked of stupidity. And Munroe was far from stupid.
‘So he gets arrested. But who’s to say he would end up in the same prison as Macmillan?’ Brady asked. The odds of that happening were extremely low. Durham prison was not the only maximum security prison in the country.
‘Given the severity of his crimes he had to be put in a prison with this level of security. And he’s in the segregated wing for his own safety. Most of the inmates in here have watched the YouTube film of him raping that woman. A lot of the men in here are thugs. But they’re not animals. Munroe wouldn’t last in the main prison.’
Brady nodded. It all made sense. Apart from the coincidence of it being the same prison that held Ronnie Macmillan.
‘I get it. But why Durham prison?’
‘Munroe’s charged but he’s still awaiting trial. His court case will be heard at Newcastle county courts. After all, his crimes took place here. So what prison is close to Newcastle but offers the maximum level of security for someone like Munroe? Durham.’
Brady sighed as he ran his hand back through his hair. It was a lot to take in. And he was not quite sure whether it was mainly wishful thinking on Matthews’s part.
‘So again, this all comes back to Madley? Yeah?’ Brady asked, still unclear as to why Madley would want Ronnie Macmillan dead.
‘You’re getting there. Yeah. Madley orchestrated this whole thing.’
‘Why?’
‘Remember DC Simone Henderson?’
Matthews didn’t wait for a response. The dark look in Brady’s eyes was enough.
‘She was dumped by Ronnie Macmillan in Madley’s nightclub as retribution for not going into business with him. With Macmillan it wasn’t a question of whether you wanted to do something. If he asked, you did it. Madley really had no choice. So when he refused, Macmillan set him up. Dumped a copper who had been gutted and fuck knows what and then made an anonymous call to the police.’
Matthews waited for Brady to absorb what he had just said. Time was running out and he wanted to make sure that Brady understood the full magnitude of what was going on.
Brady thought back to Friday when he had called in on Madley unannounced. He had two well-heeled businessmen in his office. Both had kept their backs to Brady. But he was sure when one of them stood up and walked over to Gibbs that he recognised him. Albeit from the back. The more Brady thought about it now the more he was certain it was Mayor Macmillan. But why would a politician be sitting in a well-known local gangster’s office? It hadn’t made any sense. Now though? Had Madley and Mayor Macmillan been in this together? Brady knew that Madley was cut-throat and that if he saw an opportunity he would take it. The same could be said of Mayor Macmillan.
Ronnie Macmillan’s his fucking brother though . . .
Brady took a moment to try and accept that someone could want his own brother dead. But then again, this was Mayor Macmillan. He was a rising politician who would do anything to protect his political career. Perhaps Ronnie Macmillan’s death was damage limitation? Who knows if Macmillan was preparing to strike a deal to have his sentence shortened if he talked? He had already been inside for six months. In all likelihood he would have been refused parole every time he’d applied for it. An indefinite life in prison could be a bitter pill to swallow – even for the resolute.
‘So? Convinced?’ Matthews asked with a gleam in his eye.
‘Maybe . . . Or maybe someone else paid Munroe to kill Ronnie Macmillan. Madley wasn’t his only enemy.’
‘For fuck’s sake. What more do you want?’
Brady stood up to leave.
‘Watch your back, Jimmy. And keep that mouth of yours shut. OK?’
‘Fuck you!’
Brady nodded at him. There was nothing he could do for Matthews. He was stuck in this hellhole with too much time on his hands.
‘See you in three weeks,’ Brady said before he turned to leave.
Matthews didn’t respond.
As Brady walked across the room towards the guarded exit something, or to be precise, someone, caught his eye: Jake Munroe. Then he saw who Munroe was talking to. It was Weasel Face. Madley’s right-hand man.
What the fuck? Why would that bastard be here?
Then it hit Brady. They were both from the East End of London. Surely they must have known one another? After all, the criminal world was not that big. There was a high probability that Weasel Face had also worked for Johnny Slaughter. At the time Weasel Face came up to the North-East, Madley had needed protecting, which was why the hired gun was here. Had Johnny Slaughter
sent him up to help Madley out? Both gangsters went back together. Slaughter looked out for Madley and vice versa.
But maybe it’s nothing to do with that. Maybe Weasel Face is here on business – Madley’s business. Was he here to make sure Munroe had followed Madley’s instructions and silenced Ronnie Macmillan? At what price? How much had Madley paid Munroe? It must have been a significant figure for a hit man to be prepared to spend time inside.
Brady put his head down and kept walking. He couldn’t be sure if they had seen him. If they had, they hadn’t shown it. The last thing Brady wanted was Munroe knowing that Jimmy Matthews had been talking to him. If he found out, this might be the last time Brady would ever visit Matthews.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Brady had driven around for a couple of hours after his visit with Matthews. He didn’t feel like going home. Nor did he want to go to the station. So he drove. In no particular direction, with no destination in mind. All he could think about was what Matthews had told him. That Madley had set this whole thing up, from Munroe’s attack and rape of Trina McGuire to Eddie Jones’ brutal murder. Munroe had even played the police when he copied details about the serial rapist printed in the Northern Echo. But he had tortured Trina for information on Nick. And then for his own sadistic pleasure he had raped her after removing her tattoo of Nick’s name.
It was clever. Brady would give Munroe that.
Then there was Eddie Jones’ attack. Both attacks were filmed by the assailant’s own hand and then uploaded onto YouTube for the world to see. But more significantly, the police. Brady still wondered how much Munroe had been paid. The savage rape and murder were incidental, merely a cruel means to an end. The ultimate plan was to get inside Durham prison so he could kill Ronnie Macmillan. It was so crazy it was almost believable.
Apart from Nick. Why go after Trina for Nick?
This was Brady’s and Nick’s childhood friend. This was Madley. Would Madley really pay someone to torture Trina for information on Nick? Madley had made it very clear that Nick had stitched him up. After all, Ronnie Macmillan may have been behind setting Madley up with the police, but Nick had also played a part in it. So much so, Madley had made it very clear that if Nick ever returned to the North-East he would have him killed. Madley knew that it was nothing personal where Nick was concerned. That he was just doing a job. But it was a moot point. He had betrayed Madley. The reason why didn’t matter.
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