Dead Heat

by Nick Oldham

  ‘I won’t.’

  ‘My history with you, a very long and tiresome one, means I supported you, but don’t expect that your return to work will be heralded with flags and celebrations. A lot of people in this force are putting a very big question mark over your head. You will have your work cut out to regain any credibility whatsoever.’

  ‘I know,’ Henry said glumly. ‘Thanks. But what’s the bad news? PACE inspector at Burnley? Best Value Inspector?’

  ‘Worse than that.’

  ‘Go on.’ Henry’s heart sank.

  ‘When you come back you’ll be working directly for me. You’ll be retaining your temporary rank of Chief Inspector.’ That same leering smile was on his face again. ‘I have a job for you. When you’ve finished it, then you might go to Burnley on shifts.’

  By 7.15 a.m. Henry was back in his car, too dithery to start the engine, elated but wary of FB’s motives. The future sounded slightly menacing. He tried a few deep-breathing exercises to bring him down from the roof.

  ‘Calm . . . keep calm . . . Phone Kate, tell her the news . . . Don’t gabble.’

  He reached for the mobile which he’d left on the top of the dashboard. As soon as he picked it up, it rang, making him jump. He could not really get used to the little sods.

  ‘Henry, it’s me, Karl.’

  ‘Early bird.’

  ‘Been up working all night. Called you at home, but Kate said you were seeing FB at HQ. Everything all right? Anything to tell me?’

  ‘No, everything’s OK and I’ve nothing to tell you.’ He wanted Kate to be first to hear his news.

  ‘I have news for you, but I’ll be brief. You asked me to make some checks with my source in Spain?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Henry had asked Donaldson if he could speak to his informant in Mendoza’s organization to check to see whether he knew anything about the Spaniard who had been operating in the north of England two years ago, who had met Andy Turner on the night he and two surveillance cops disappeared. Henry hadn’t held out much hope of any result. ‘Is this OK for a cellular line, Karl?’

  ‘I’ll keep it mysterious. The person you enquired about is actually my source. He says that he was working for the big man –’ Henry knew Donaldson was referring to Mendoza here – ‘at the time referred to. He was seeking new business for him and he had to deal harshly with your local criminal for stepping out of line, making threats.’

  ‘Harshly?’

  ‘He put our dead friend on to him.’ Henry knew that was a reference to Verner. ‘He dealt with the local man, but also with two officers of the law who stumbled across him in the act.’

  ‘Jesus,’ Henry said. ‘They found him doing the deed?’

  ‘Affirmative. He was forced to deal with them in the only way he could. All three are buried . . . somewhere . . . source doesn’t quite know where. He helped our friend to dispose of their car to a scrap dealer, as well as getting rid of our friend’s car, which was extremely wet.’

  ‘Wet’, Henry knew, referred to blood. He was slightly annoyed at Donaldson for talking about Verner as a friend. Henry was stunned by the news. It meant that Jo Coniston and her partner had been killed and buried by Verner. Henry thought about Jo’s mother, the distraught woman he had met in the White Café. Hard though it would be, there might be some possibility of closure for her now. Depending on how Donaldson allowed the information to be used, it could be that Greater Manchester Police would be able to re-open the investigation into the disappearance of their two officers properly. At least that is where Henry’s thoughts took him in those moments. When he was reinstated, he would push it, he decided, no matter what Donaldson said. The problem was that it could possibly compromise the source and Henry would have to think about the greater good. Was it more important to bring down Mendoza, or to bring to an end the suffering and agony of a mother? Discuss.

  Henry laughed shortly. Donaldson had described his informant in Mendoza’s organization as being quite high up but of limited value, if Henry’s memory served him correctly. From the information Donaldson had just passed, that was nowhere near true. The source had his finger on the pulse of Mendoza’s organization if he could come up with stuff like that, and also if he had the authority to order hits on people. That meant he was very high up in the pecking order, one of the players.

  Henry had a sudden, very dark thought. Could this informant, so high up in Mendoza’s firm, have also ordered the hit on Verner? Or did he at least know who had carried it out? Presumably he knew where and when Verner intended to waste John Lloyd Wickson.

  ‘Your source is very good,’ Henry commented. ‘Better than you let on.’

  ‘And getting better. He might put the big man on a plate for us yet.’

  ‘Maybe he could nail the guy who disposed of our friend?’

  Donaldson went quiet. ‘No, I believe not. I’ve asked him and he says he doesn’t know. Can’t say it’s something I’m going to push. Our pal was a guy who needed to be dealt with. Justice was done. He’s dead and won’t be killing any more of our people.’

  ‘I’ll lay odds he knows, though,’ Henry commented, but didn’t press further. Just for his information he asked if the informant had a code name.

  ‘Yes, he does. I call him Stingray.’

  ‘I won’t ask why,’ said Henry. ‘He wouldn’t be called Lopez, by any chance, would he?’

  Donaldson chose not to reply to that.

  Donaldson hung up his phone at the end of the conversation with Henry, feeling as though he had been rumbled. Henry was a suspicious son of a bitch and made the American feel just a teeny bit nervous.

  He stood up, crossed to the window and stared blankly down at Grosvenor Square, wondering if he could ever confide in his friend. He knew he could not. Apart from the fact that Henry was far too straight-down-the-line to allow anyone to get away with anything, no matter what their crime, he would also have some very disparaging things to say about Donaldson’s marksmanship. It was very, very rusty. He sniffed a laugh and returned to his desk. He logged on to his computer for the first time that day. It was 7.30 a.m., British time. That meant just after midnight on the eastern seaboard of the US. He knew that the Director of the FBI would still be at his desk. He never left until 1 a.m. at the earliest, always arrived no later than 6.30 a.m. Donaldson brought up his e-mail facility and typed a short note to the Director.

  It read: ‘Carried out instruction as requested.’

  He sent it direct and encrypted for the Director’s eyes only, a man Donaldson trusted with his life.

  He looked at the blank screen for a moment before going into his ‘Sent Items’ folder and deleting the message, then going into ‘Deleted Items’ and finally and irrevocably scrubbing the message. Then he locked his workstation.

  On the floor next to him was the padded case which contained the Accuracy International Police Sniper Rifle. He reached down, picked it up and carried the 6.2kg weapon down to the post room. He handed it over, together with the letter of authorization which would ensure it was sent in that day’s diplomatic bag back to the armoury at Quantico. Donaldson was given a receipt and watched the weapon disappear. Once it got to the other end of its journey, the weapon would be destroyed.

  All he could think of was how out of practice he was.

  In days gone by he could have picked off somebody from almost any distance, through almost any weather conditions, with one shot. In fact, he had once done so. The fact that it took him so many shots to bring down Verner annoyed him, niggled constantly. I need to get more practice, he thought. I’m getting very rusty indeed.

 

 

 
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