Javelin - the gripping new thriller from the former commander of Special Branch (John Kerr Book 3)

by Roger Pearce

  Retreating without a word, Melanie padded down the stairs into the street.

  ‘Anything?’ said Langton as she rejoined him in the car.

  Melanie shook her head, reaching into the glove compartment for an iPhone. ‘No-one home, but the place looks pretty standard,’ she said, then checked the video and uploaded the file to 1830. Turning around at the end of the mews, she frowned. ‘Alan says the net worth is over £3 million. That’s a lot of equity for a tinpot outfit showing two directors.’

  Langton was the first to spot Dodge. Tieless, unbuttoned suit jacket flapping around his stomach, he emerged from Piccadilly Circus Underground while they were held in traffic on the way back to the Yard. ‘Look who’s here,’ he said, flipping their sun visors as the lights changed to green and Dodge veered across the street two cars ahead. He looked grey and sweaty, breaking into a trot as he hurried across Regent Street and headed up Shaftesbury Avenue.

  ‘Slow down, Dodge,’ murmured Melanie as she changed course after him. ‘You’ll give yourself a heart attack.’

  ‘What do you think?’ said Langton, his free hand already on the door.

  ‘About what? John wants us back at the Yard,’ said Melanie, held behind a double-decker outside the Apollo Theatre.

  ‘No,’ said Langton. ‘He asked us to keep an eye on Dodge.’

  They watched him rush down the pavement just in front of them, barrelling through a group of French students as he crossed Great Windmill Street.

  ‘And I told him I’m not happy about it.’

  ‘Yeah. I heard,’ said Langton. ‘Why do you think Dodge took the wrong exit from the tube? Cock-up or counter-surveillance?’

  ‘Spying on Finch is one thing. But this? Snooping on our friend? No way. God, he looks terrible.’

  With a sharp look behind him, Dodge made a left into Wardour Street.

  ‘Soho,’ said Langton, simply.

  ‘He’s probably meeting an agent.’

  ‘So it’ll be in the source unit log, won’t it? Except he isn’t, and it won’t. Something’s wrong.’ Langton’s seat belt clicked for the second time, then the door. ‘I’ll cover him on foot.’

  Before Langton could move, Melanie reached across and pulled the door shut, knocking against his injured arm. ‘No, Jack,’ she said, ‘and he’ll spot you in a heartbeat looking like that.’

  ‘You go then,’ he said as they reached the junction and caught a flash of Dodge swerving right into Old Compton Street, on the way to Soho’s heart.

  ‘You can’t drive, either,’ she said, forcing a U-turn at Dean Street and accelerating back towards the Circus. ‘And I’m boss today.’

  ‘Who says?’

  ‘John Kerr. It’s the upside of you getting shot.’

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Monday, 17 October, 16.07, Room 1830, New Scotland Yard

  Checking his BlackBerry as he swiped into Room 1830, Kerr almost collided with a wall of large black plastic crates piled between the door and the reading room. New Scotland Yard was on the move. Within weeks its key personnel would be uprooted to a new building on Victoria Embankment, close to the original Scotland Yard that now provided office space for MPs.

  Commander Bill Ritchie had different plans for his intelligence unit. Alarmed by press leaks, corruption and other integrity breaches swirling around the Met, he had tasked John Kerr to look for a secret base south of the Thames, within easy reach of the Secret Intelligence Service headquarters at Vauxhall Cross. Before its dissolution in 2006, Special Branch had been sole occupants of the top three floors at New Scotland Yard; now, Ritchie was determined to a rebuild the Chinese wall between usable evidence and secret intelligence, saving his highly vetted officers from the clutches of Derek Finch.

  Kerr looked around for the displaced cybercrime team and found them doubling up in the overheated space behind Mercury. ‘When are we escaping?’ he said, pulling a chair alongside Fargo’s desk.

  ‘It’s in the pipeline,’ said Fargo, ‘if you believe the intranet.’

  Kerr scanned the files and readouts from Mercury. ‘So what have we got?’

  ‘First pictures of the crime scene and the flat,’ said Fargo, handing Kerr an A4 plastic wallet.

  Exactly a week after the murder of his mother and sister Fargo sounded upbeat but looked tired, his eyes red and watery behind the contact lenses. Kerr had kept tabs on his state of mind indirectly through Gemma, though anyone in 1830 could have told him Fargo was using work to hold grief at bay. He sifted through the colour stills. ‘Does Finch have any suspects yet?’

  ‘No,’ said Fargo, nodding at the wall TV. ‘But that lot have already made up their minds.’

  They paused to watch the news rolling through the screen. Within minutes of the Cheapside attacks, standard BBC and Sky footage had been overtaken by shaky iPhone video of people fleeing the scene, streaming carnage to rival anything from Baghdad, Kabul or Bangkok. In the past hour, tape of Avril Knight on The Andrew Marr Show had been spliced into the loop to convey a single message: the Home Secretary had just become victim number thirty-two in a single terrorist campaign.

  ‘So they’re looking at serial killers,’ said Kerr. ‘What do you think, Al?’

  ‘It’s a similar MO to Mark Bannerman’s murder.’

  ‘The message round the neck, you mean, or the brutality?’

  ‘Both, plus the arrangement of the bodies. It’s the exhibitionism, John. Bannerman’s scapegoating, Knight’s betrayal.’

  ‘Drawing us back to the IRA.’

  ‘Knight was spouting anti-IRA rhetoric all her political life. It’s a pretty raw history,’ shrugged Fargo. ‘Then the “non-denial denial” about IRA guilt in her interviews yesterday.’

  ‘Which gets her murdered…executed, less than twenty-four hours later.’ Kerr looked again at the photographs of Knight’s body in the shed. ‘She spends the night with her secret lover. Who knew about that? The private office and her prot team, according to Karl Sergeyev. No-one else.’ He peered at the head wound. ‘So how did the killers get to her?’

  Suddenly there were two loud raps on the door, then Melanie swiped herself in, followed by Langton and a porter wheeling more crates. In search of privacy, Kerr edged past the trolley for the reading room, avoiding Langton’s shoulder as they squeezed together around the cramped table. ‘Good to see you, Jack.’

  ‘Nice to be here,’ said Langton, waggling the fingers of his injured arm.

  Kerr looked between Langton and Melanie as she shoved the ill-fitting door shut. ‘So how was Wymark? Anything to worry us?’

  Melanie shook her head. ‘Frugal offices in a posh location with loads of equity. I sent you the pictures, Al?’ Fargo nodded. ‘This has to be Derek Finch on job search. He’s greedy for a consultancy and they want a name to draw high roller clients.’

  ‘But why meet them the day after Victoria? What was so urgent?’ Kerr frowned. ‘I mean, London’s burning and the Bull’s out for brunch?’

  ‘It’s the celebrity terrorist catcher feeding his vanity,’ said Langton.

  ‘Yeah, right,’ murmured Fargo, squeezing his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. ‘All those victims must be sending his market value through the roof.’

  Melanie, squashed beside him, laid a hand over his.

  ‘Jesus, Al…’ said Langton.

  ‘I’m fine.’ Fargo slid Kerr the wallet of photographs. ‘Avril Knight?’

  ‘Tell us about the girlfriend,’ said Kerr.

  ‘It’s only a pen picture so far.’ Fargo produced a passport photograph from his bunch of papers. ‘This is Maria Benita Consuela, Spanish citizen, forty-three years, born in Barcelona. Married in 2003 to Maximo Leon Salvatella. Max. Second time round for both, and they moved to Madrid to set up an art dealership. Resettled in London three years ago with their two young daughters, but she divorced him and hooked up with Avril Knight around July last year. Max got custody and took the girls back to Spain.’

  ‘Registry?’

&nb
sp; ‘No adverse traces on either.’

  ‘So how did Consuela and Avril Knight get together?’

  ‘Benita. Everyone calls her Benita. Karl’s looking into it. The Spanish embassy says she worked with its office for cultural and scientific affairs, a mover and shaker on women’s projects in media development, audiovisual education and film festivals. Recently she’s been fundraising for international co-productions with Italy and Greece, and Anglo-Spanish projects for disadvantaged kids.’

  ‘So where is she now?’

  ‘Under doctor’s orders and heavily sedated, apparently. Distraught, like she and Avril were the real deal.’

  ‘Do you think they were?’

  ‘I’m working on it,’ said Fargo.

  ‘Who’s the doctor?’

  ‘Local GP. She’s staying with friends in Notting Hill while the murder team search her flat, but no-one’s in a rush to interview her. Unless something drastic turns up, Benita is definitely in the category of grieving lover.’

  ‘But central to the murder investigation,’ said Langton. ‘What if she was blackmailing Knight?’

  ‘We’ve got multiple traces of her phone number in Knight’s call log, obviously, but it’s almost entirely outgoing from Knight. The victim was making the running here.’

  ‘When was the last call?’ said Langton.

  ‘From the constituency house on Sunday afternoon, presumably to confirm she was coming.’

  ‘Anything from the flat while Knight was there?’

  ‘Did our Benita tip the killers off, you mean?’ Fargo shook his head. ‘Both phones were switched off.’

  ‘What about suspicious activity around the address ? Any signs they were being watched?’ said Kerr.

  ‘There’s no CCTV in that street, and house to house will take time,’ said Fargo. ‘On the face of it, nothing unusual here.’

  ‘Hold on,’ said Melanie, peering at the photographs. ‘Have you run Benita’s telephone log through Mercury?’

  ‘Next on the list.’

  Melanie pulled out a still of Benita’s flat, slid Fargo’s notes aside and laid it squarely on the table. ‘Did you watch my video from Wymark?’

  ‘Not personally, no,’ he said, nodding at his team through the glass.

  ‘Don’t bother.’ She rapidly scrolled through her iPhone, enlarged an image and laid it beside the photograph. ‘Philip Deering’s conference room, if you can call it that. Look at the picture above the fireplace.’ She paused as they all craned in, then picked up the photograph of Benita’s cluttered studio. ‘And then just here, leaning against the wall, next to the red snake thing.’

  ‘Same picture,’ said Kerr.

  ‘Benita’s original oil painting. Which tells me she’s linked to Wymark.’

  Langton leaned in for a closer comparison. ‘Or Deering’s an art lover?’

  ‘But he’s not. Look,’ she said, scrolling through the video, ‘the other walls are full of waiting room crap, prints of ships, fields and battles. Then he hangs this weird…I dunno, orange and green abstract…sunrise, sunset?…right there in pride of place.’ Melanie looked between them. ‘Derek Finch, Philip Deering, Maria Benita Consuela. All connected.’

  Fargo gave a low whistle. ‘That’s one hell of a triangle.’

  ‘With Finch sucking up to Deering and soft-pedalling on the girlfriend. Take it from me, guys,’ said Melanie. ‘Benita’s call history is going to be v interesting.’

  Fargo was already pushing his chair back. ‘I’ll go and run the numbers.’

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Monday, 17 October, 16.33, Paquito’s Tapas, Old Compton Street, Soho

  For his third shaming, Dodge arrived before Bobby Roscoe. Breathless from the race along Old Compton Street to arrive on the dot of four-thirty, as ordered, Dodge could find no sign of his nemesis. Perhaps it was as well. Since Saturday, overwhelmed by the near deaths of Langton and Peter Webb, he had been beside himself with anxiety, unsleeping and murderous.

  Paquito’s was an arty, stylish bar and eatery a few doors away from the Admiral Duncan pub, target of a homophobic nail bomb attack in 1999, and a short walk from the Groucho Club in Dean Street. Dodge wondered if Roscoe was hiding somewhere in the street, holding back and checking for surveillance. He lingered for a moment in the doorway, suddenly worried that he might be in the wrong location, though Paquito’s bright red and yellow striped awning lifted it from the neighbourhood’s older haunts. Alert to a trap against himself, Dodge snatched a final glance up and down the pavement before entering the crowded bar and easing his way to the toilet.

  Opened three years earlier, Paquito’s had quickly become the go-to place for writers and media types to network, pitch and play. Upstairs were rooms for the night and a quiet area for study and research, but the real action was on the ground floor, with hot staff in scarlet aprons serving rioja, tapas and bowl food. Drinkers socialised at the bar or worked their tablets at pine tables along the far walls, though Dodge could tell from the hubbub that the real movers and shakers occupied the brown leather sofas in the centre, scripts on knees, heads up close, hands doing the talking. The lunchtime crowd was still busy, big shots hearing out nobodies and hipsters coaxing chic women for an advance on royalties, every voice schmoozing, promoting or dealing. Searching for Bobby Roscoe, Dodge was thrown by a scattering of people he vaguely recognised, TV faces or tabloid fodder whose names he had never pinned down.

  Roscoe appeared as he was heading back through the bar. This time he was wearing an old black donkey jacket with jeans and work boots, and waved at Dodge as if he were a lifelong friend. In the far left corner, separated from the main bar by a slatted partition, was a carpeted area signed The Retreat, with a couple of armchairs and the day’s newspapers. Roscoe checked it was empty and led Dodge inside. They stood facing each other for a moment, Dodge suddenly feeling breathless. ‘Shall we talk here?’ said Roscoe, spreading his hands.

  ‘Not where we can’t be seen,’ said Dodge. ‘I’d probably kill you.’ He spotted a couple vacating one of the sofas in the bar and moved to stake his claim, glaring at a young man in round glasses shifting from one of the side tables.

  ‘Want some rioja?’ said Roscoe, sinking into the leather cushions. ‘Tapas?’

  ‘You’ve got to be fucking joking.’ Dodge dragged over a matching armchair, sat forward and leaned in, his voice a growl. ‘Two of my friends nearly died because of you.’

  Roscoe wiped a trace of spittle from his cheek. ‘You think none of the blame lies with you?’ Dead calm, he shuffled out of his heavy jacket and laid it beside him on the sofa. ‘How about a carajillo, then? With whiskey?’

  ‘Cut the crap. Why am I here?’

  Roscoe gave the slow, taunting smile Dodge remembered from before. ‘We’ve known each other nearly a week. It’s time to confess, Mr Dodge.’

  ‘What the hell are you talking about?’

  ‘Frankie. I want to know what happened,’ said Roscoe, maintaining the smile. ‘Who gave the order?’

  ‘There was no fucking order. I already told you,’ said Dodge angrily, then the chair rocked noisily on the wooden floor as he lunged forward. ‘Stop laying that shit on me.’

  Roscoe looked down, unflinching, as Dodge’s fingers turned white on his forearm. ‘You gonna move your fat pig’s trotter? You want everyone staring, like you’re some hissy old queen?’

  Dodge released his hold and slumped back. ‘You’ve got this wrong.’

  ‘I’ve brought you some more info.’ He stood up and slid a twenty pound note from his back pocket. ‘Let’s order a couple of long blacks and talk about it.’

  ‘No,’ said Dodge, pulling him back. ‘Tell me now.’

  Roscoe shot his eyebrows at an inquisitive couple nearby, then perched on the arm of the sofa, his splayed thigh touching Dodge’s arm. ‘You go first.’

  ‘There’s nothing to say.’

  Roscoe shrugged. ‘Okay, here’s what I heard.’ He bent in, so close that Dodge could feel h
is lips brush against his earlobe. ‘If you see a truck parked up with its hazards flashing, run the other way.’

  ‘An IED? You’re handing me a fucking lorry bomb?’ Dodge threw himself back in the chair, struggling to make eye contact. He wiped his brow with the back of his hand. Sweat was soaking into his shirt, but his mouth felt dry as the desert. ‘Jesus Christ. How do you live with yourself?’

  ‘It’s you should be taking a look in the mirror,’ said Roscoe, harshly. ‘I’m giving you an early warning, big man. You should be thanking me.’

  Dodge sat forward again. ‘What else?’

  ‘When, you mean? Who?’ Roscoe gave a short laugh, like before, and Dodge felt a powerful arm encircle his shoulder. ‘You know the drill, my friend.’

  ‘So you’re doing it…passing me this…this fucking nightmare that’s a little bit true, three parts shit, just so you can destroy me,’ said Dodge, flatly.

  Roscoe slowly shook his head, like a chiding parent. ‘This is about Frankie, not you or me.’

  Dodge wanted to shift again, but Roscoe’s hold was too strong. To the people nearby they must have appeared as friends comforting one another, Dodge speaking quietly into Roscoe’s lap. ‘Do you have any idea…I can’t just let this…’

  ‘Yes. Until you come clean, the pain goes on.’

  ‘Bobby, I’m asking you,’ murmured Dodge, the first name wrapping everything else in a plea.

  ‘No. You’re begging,’ said Roscoe, then leant into his ear again. ‘How’s your daughter by the way? Still out all night, sleeping with that boy? And the missus? Nicola, right? She has a secret, too, doesn’t she? Two legal eagles in one family, and both misbehaving.’

  ‘Bastard,’ croaked Dodge, his voice full of sand.

  ‘This is about us both doing the right thing.’ Roscoe clapped Dodge on the back and stood again, suddenly looking expansive. ‘A deal, like everything else in here. Think about it while I get the coffee.’

  Dodge acted quickly as Roscoe threaded his way to the bar. Heaving his bulk across to the sofa he checked no-one was watching, grabbed Roscoe’s heavy jacket and searched the side pockets. Roscoe was left-handed, so he checked there first. It was heavy with a ring of three Yale keys and a couple of Banhams, plus the usual work detritus of chewing gum, screws, allen keys and a small clasp knife. No phone or car key. At the bar, Roscoe drifted out of sight behind a clutch of drinkers. The right pocket was empty, with a hole in the fabric. Dodge forced his hand inside the lining and widened the tear, exploring the space below the pocket. He pricked his finger on a sharp piece of metal and pulled out a receipt stamped FOR CASH, badly stapled to an old fashioned invoice headed ‘Thomas Roache and Sons, Building Supplies,’ in block print. Blood was seeping onto the paper, so Dodge slipped it into his pocket, straightened Roscoe’s jacket and made for the bar.