‘Well get her hooked up, then. Intercept the bitch’s calls.’ Hardie was terse and dismissive in his tone, as if this was the easiest task.
‘My man can’t. He doesn’t have the right access and it needs at least an ACC to make it happen.’
‘That’s bollocks. With what I pay, you need to work harder. Leave it with me, I’ll make a call, but we need to have a chat after this situation is sorted as to how useful you actually are. I’m not as forgiving as my old man. Now stay with Ferguson and tell me when he’s dead.’ The beeps in his ear told him that Hardie had gone.
Slattery sighed, as he floored the Renault once more. This was heavy stuff now. He was being pulled in much further than he would like. He was committed, though. Hardie would have him killed just as easily as he would kill anyone else.
42
Will Harding kissed his mother and jogged out of the front door, wearing his running shorts and Enfield Harriers running vest.
‘Be careful out there, honey; roads are busy,’ his mum had said, as she stroked his short, braided hair, that sat in cornrows across his scalp.
‘I’ll be fine. I know to look both ways now,’ he had joked. She was a worrier, his mum, but he loved her dearly. It was tough being a parent to a sixteen-year-old boy at the moment, especially in an area like Enfield with its street gangs, but Will stayed clear of them. He wasn’t interested in anything but his athletics and couldn’t see the attraction in hanging round with the roadmen. It just wasn’t his thing. He kept himself to himself, got along just fine. Some of his friends at school had fallen into the gangs, and were always about, with their jewellery, new phones and designer gear, but Will didn’t care about any of that stuff, either. He was friendly with them, and mostly they left him alone.
He had competed yesterday, hitting personal bests for eight hundred and fifteen hundred metres and his legs ached a little. He always found that a slow and gentle jog was the best way to ease the kinks out of his muscles before a big stretching session. He then had a mountain of homework to do.
He entered his usual Zen-like state as he picked the pace up before turning into Trent Park. A quick circuit of the park at a fastish pace and he was feeling his breathing begin to labour. Already his legs felt better.
After about twenty minutes in the park, he decided that he’d had enough and began to head home. That was when he saw the boy on the mountain bike. He was clearly a roadman, about his own age, but he hadn’t noticed him before in Enfield. Enfield was pretty sewn up by the Get Money Gang or GMG, who sold weed and coke. A few of Will’s friends had joined them and one or two had ended up in jail, another getting badly stabbed. Will saw the guy on the bike give him a look and put a phone to his ear.
Speeding up a little, Will left the park on his way back home. A slight tingle running down his back at the thought of the look the boy had given him. If he’d returned the screw-face, it wouldn’t have ended well.
He felt the prickle of anxiety build as he turned towards home. It only got worse when he glanced back to see the boy on the bike a hundred yards behind him. He was still cycling steadily in the middle of the road, his phone clamped to his ear. Will picked up his pace even more and decided against turning straight into his home road. He didn’t want the boy to learn where he lived. He thought back, tried to remember if there had been anything, however slight, that may have made him an enemy. He didn’t make enemies, was known for being everyone’s friend and keeping out of beefs.
He was running just below his race speed now, and a quick glance over his shoulder revealed that his follower had fallen off, was a good way back and wasn’t showing any signs of pursuit. Will breathed a sigh of relief. He was probably imagining it, in any case. All the stories of beefs and postcode wars making him scared, even if he kept well away from them.
He maintained his speed, keen to get back home.
As he rounded the bend on Corby Crescent, he was shocked to see three boys he didn’t recognise, blocking the pavement, all dressed in street clothes, on bikes, hooded and sneering. Will stumbled to a halt and almost fell. Glancing over his shoulder he saw the first boy on the pavement cycling towards him at speed. He froze on the spot and time seemed to slow down. Then he felt a vicious shove from behind him and he flew into the low wall in front of the line of terrace houses, falling over it into the garden. Then they were on him, like jackals, kicking and punching as he lay helpless on the rough concrete. Will screamed in terror as he saw the flash of steel. A huge-bladed Rambo-knife was produced from the waistband of one of the boys and was thrust at him, smashing into his abdomen. Strangely, there was no pain, just an impact as the steel passed into his body.
Suddenly there was a new shout that pierced the madness – stronger, older, and full of authority. ‘Armed police!’ And there were blue strobing lights everywhere and blue-clad police officers brandishing submachine guns. One of his attackers fell, stiff as a plank, with two thin wires embedded in his jacket connected to a baseball-clad cop armed with a bright yellow taser. There was another shout of, ‘Taser, taser, taser!’ as one of Will’s attackers fell to the ground like a felled oak.
Then it was over as quickly as it had begun. A cop came and squatted by Will. ‘You’re gonna be okay. Stay with me, mate,’ the officer said in a kind voice. He produced a white pad and clamped it against Will’s abdomen and pressed hard. Will’s vision became woozy and the cop’s voice indistinct as the coldness began to envelop him, from his feet upwards, seeping into his body.
‘I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die,’ repeated Will in no more than a whisper, feeling himself on the edge of sleep.
‘What’s your name, mate?’ the kind cop asked.
‘W … W … Will,’ he heard himself say, although it didn’t sound like his voice.
‘Will, mate, stay awake, stay awake. Keep talking to me, Will, ambulance is here.’
Will looked at the cop’s face, wide and meaty and split by a kind smile.
He realised that he had passed out when he woke in the back of an ambulance, a drip in his arm and a concerned-looking paramedic attaching sticky pads and wires to his chest. There was a range of competing beeps and tones in the back of the vehicle. Confusion fogged Will’s brain. Was he dying? Was this it? Tears brimmed in his eyes as he thought of his family. He so wanted to see them all again.
‘You’re okay, Will. We’re here now. You’re in good hands.’ She had a soft voice with a funny accent he hadn’t heard before.
Will didn’t feel very lucky, but managed to say, ‘Please can you tell my mum and dad?’ and he recited their address, his head swimming.
‘Sure, thing, love. The cops will do it now. Close your eyes and rest. We’ll be at hospital soon.’
Will did as he was told, and slipped into blackness, thinking about his mum’s kind, smiling face.
43
Tam Hardie and his brothers sat opposite Jack Slattery at the bar in their deserted Glasgow club just off Sauchiehall Street. A solitary cleaner was mopping the floor and all the house lights were up, casting harsh and raw shafts across the normally dark space. As always, what was a pulsating, buzzing club when open to the public, became a dank and depressing cave when it was closed. No better than a municipal hall, with scuffed walls, filthy windows and the rank smell of stale booze and sweat that permeated the very fabric of the building.
The club was a goldmine, though, and allowed Tam to launder vast quantities of dirty money through the tills during the busy nights. Whilst having the illicit drug trade sewn up in most of Scotland, Tam was also keen to develop legitimate, cash-heavy businesses alongside his irregular streams of income. It let him clean cash from the drugs, whilst pulling in serious bucks legitimately with the door fees and extortionate alcohol prices.
Slattery fidgeted nervously on one of the bar stools, cradling a large glass of whisky in one hand and a cigarette in the other, as Tam levelled him with a piercing stare. He had given a full account
of yesterday’s activities in Caithness and Hardie was not pleased.
‘Did you see Ferguson’s car at any time?’
‘Not after the funeral, no.’
‘So how do you know it was him?’
‘I stayed on the network, just never got close to him. It could be that the battery died, or it fell off. McGee isn’t experienced at this kind of thing. I needed to stay out of the picture, as you know,’ said Slattery, his voice trembling, slightly.
‘This is undesirable. Ferguson has been a bastard to find, and we still have no idea where he is. How did you lose him? There were two of you, one of whom was a uniformed copper with a police car, with blue lights and sirens.’
‘We had to split when Elizabeth Phillips’s phone came online. I thought we could take them both, and with my contacts monitoring her phone, it seemed too good an opportunity to—’
‘And because of that decision we lost them both.’ Hardie’s voice was laced with irritation. ‘Leitch’s bitch of a sister has disappeared, but we know she’s in the UK and we have a number for her. She’ll raise her head again, but Ferguson is gone, and no bastard knows the first thing about him. He’s like a ghost. None of your people can find him, and none of my contacts in Spain know anything either.’
‘McGee got a photo,’ Slattery said, meekly.
‘Aye, a fat lot of good that’ll be. A shite mobile phone photo of him and nothing else. No phone, no address, no vehicles, no bank. His hire car was paid for by a pre-paid and untraceable card and his driving licence is a bullshit address in London. We have nothing, and I don’t like it. You need to find him; get onto Interpol, whatever. I don’t care, get him found.’
‘I’ll get the word out.’
‘Aye, you bloody better. My patience is running thin, man. What about the bitch?’
‘Not sure why she came up. Her phone was in Latheron, but no sight of her and nothing at Leitch’s place. She then headed off south and disappeared again. I don’t know if she’s back in Perth.’
‘She’s not been seen and my people have a camera on her place. Fucking idiots couldn’t even take a wee woman out. It looks like that Craigie bastard somehow got in the way.’
‘Are we sure it was him?’ asked Slattery.
‘Who else? He and some girl had a right bloody stramash and took out Jimmy Talgarth’s boys before they could get the job done. He had to rescue them, said the man was cool as a cucumber and even mentioned my name. Apparently, he almost dared Jimmy to shoot him.’
‘Christ,’ said Slattery, exhaling, his cheeks puffed out.
‘Christ indeed. How come you didn’t know he travelled to Perth?’
‘I’ve only a tracker on his bike. He obviously went by car.’
‘Not good enough. Get his phone hooked up. Who was he with?’
‘I don’t know. None of my people do either; didn’t even get reported. Craigie isn’t even supposed to be working.’
‘Right, I want you to tighten up on that bastard. Get his phone intercepted. He’s the key to this. We get his phone, we find out where the others are. I want his car tracked and get on his house, whatever it takes. One thing I do know is that when this is all over, that bastard Craigie is dead,’ Hardie growled with pure unadulterated hatred.
‘I can get cell sites and I can track his car, but I can’t intercept his phone. No way, man. It’s Home Secretary approval and you can’t go near it without the top brass being all over it. I just don’t have that reach.’
‘Then what use are you to me, then? Right, get him hooked up for cell sites and get a tracker on his car. I need to know where that bastard is twenty-four-seven, get it?’
‘Aye, Tam.’
‘Looks like I’ll have to sort the other thing. A liberty this is, like having a dog and barking myself.’
‘But even if you could get the phone added onto an existing intercept authority …’
‘Well luckily for us, my pa realised the value of having contacts in the police. He realised that by the early planting of an acorn, you may one day grow an oak tree. Now get out of my sight, and when we next speak, you better have some good news.’
Slattery shuffled out of the bar, disconsolately, his head bowed.
‘He’s a mess, that boy,’ Davie said, shaking his massive head in distaste. ‘Could be a liability, if he ends up getting dragged in, no telling what he’d do if his arse was on the line.’
‘Aye. It’s why I wanted him to take care of Ferguson. He shoots someone then he’s ours. He’s still useful for the moment, but I’m watching him closely – you can be sure of that.’
‘So, what you gonna do?’ said Frankie, who was smoking a large cigar.
‘If that wretch Slattery can’t get us intercepts, then I’m reaching out to one of Pa’s oak trees. I didn’t want to use them unless I had to, but I think it’s time I let the bastards know that they’re still ours,’ said Tam, reaching for his phone.
44
Max was working out in his garage, with Nutmeg staring at him as she normally did, when his phone rang. Looking at the display, surprise hit him. It was Jill Strother, an ex-Met colleague he had served with on the Flying Squad. Max wandered out into the bright, early morning sunlight to answer the call. ‘Jill, you old boot, how you doing?’ Max said, a smile across his face. Jill had been a good friend, known for her acerbic, and sometimes cutting wit.
‘Max, old son. How’s it going in Jockland?’ she almost shouted in her loud, sing-song cockney accent.
‘Couldn’t be better, mate,’ he found himself saying, despite the desperate situation he currently was in. ‘How’s London life?’
‘Shit, mate. Too much crime, not enough cops. Listen, can I bend your ear? Something’s come up at work. I’m a DS on a proactive syndicate at Hendon, now,’ she said.
‘Sure, but how the hell did you get promoted? Thought you have to be politically correct to climb the ranks,’ Max said.
‘My talents are finally being recognised, geezer, and about bloody time too. Listen, we had an attack on a young lad yesterday in Enfield. A definite full-on attempted hit. We were following a team of youngers who run for the head of the MDK in Tottenham, when they jumped on this young lad out running. Literally, jumped on the poor bugger and horribly stabbed him in the gut. Fortunately, we were running with a firearms team and we took all five of them out across the pavement. Lad is in a really bad way, though, and it’s touch and go. He’s a proper innocent, as well. A decent kid, top-level athlete and a good student.’
‘Isn’t that always the case?’ said Max.
‘Well, I grant you, normally it’s bullshit, but in this case it’s genuine. Really lovely family as well; poor buggers are devastated.’
Suddenly the gang name “MDK” flashed in Max’s mind. ‘MDK, as in Eustace Fielding’s crew?’ he said, quickly.
‘Bingo. Glad to see that the hills and glens haven’t pissed your memory up,’ Jill boomed down the line.
‘That’s a big coincidence. I saw him at a gangland funeral just the other day. He was offering condolences to the family of Tam Hardie, head of the Hardie crime family.’
‘Blimey, mate, don’t you Jocks share anything anymore? Would’ve been nice if you’d told us.’ She sounded a little put out at this piece of information.
‘Well, I shared it with the intel unit up here. They were supposed to disseminate. I take it they didn’t?’ Max made a mental note to check up on this. He had definitely submitted the video footage to the intelligence unit and he wondered how its dissemination had been neglected.
‘Nope, not a sausage. Anyway, to get to the point, one of the gang had a message on his phone from Fielding with a photo of this kid and an address in Enfield. Looks like he set it up, but we can’t see why. We thought mistaken identity at first, but the message put paid to that. For some reason, Eustace Fielding wanted this poor lad, William Harding, dead, and we can’t work out why.’
‘So why do you think I can help?’
‘Well, as it goe
s, Max, it turns out that William Harding is adopted. He was taken into care when he was six months old and adopted by a real nice family when he was eighteen months old. His birth mum died a few years later after a heroin overdose.’
‘Okay, and?’
‘Well, as I say, FLO turned out all his adoption paperwork, and it seems that his dad was a rat who wanted nothing to do with the lad. He made no opposition to adoption, apparently, said that there was no way he could raise a black kid on his own in the wilds of Scotland. I was going to ask you to look into your intelligence systems for us, rather than going through all the rigmarole of force intelligence.’
Max’s insides suddenly felt like they were being gripped by an icy fist.
‘What was the birth father’s name, Jill?’
‘Hold up, it’s here somewhere.’ Max heard the rustling of papers as Jill searched her paperwork, but he knew. Before she even spoke, Max knew.
‘Here, you go. Dad’s name is William Leitch from Caithness.’
Max took in a deep gulp of air and held it for a moment. His thoughts whirled as he exhaled slowly and evenly. He knew what he had to do.
‘Max, have you buggered off already?’ Jill’s cockney tone tore him back to the present. He looked at his watch. It was still early.
‘I’m going to come down to London. I think we need to chat.’
45
Max sat in the lounge at Glasgow airport, deep in thought, a glass of cranberry juice on the table in front of him. He needed to get to London and meet with the team. He had a feeling that the key to this whole situation lay in the stabbing of this innocent young man.
Will Harding was the blood relative of Willie Leitch, and it seemed his death had been ordered by Eustace Fielding, an associate of Hardie. That was no coincidence, and it couldn’t be ignored, but he knew that if he reported it into the murder team in Inverness, it would get straight to Hardie and then the opportunity would be lost.
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