The faces around the room don’t register much in the way of expectation.
‘Look,’ says Blunt, ‘I know this isn’t much to go on, but it’s something. I’m getting the voice analysed. Perhaps the experts can pick up something we can’t hear. In the meantime, I want each of you to listen to all the calls. You might spot something.’
‘And the next time he calls?’ says Cody.
Blunt looks down at him. ‘We’ll be ready. We’re making everyone aware of this voice. If he calls again we’ll initiate an immediate trace.’
‘That’s if we recognise it,’ says Ferguson. ‘Next time he could be Irish. Or Welsh. Or Pakistani. He could even use one of those voice changer devices.’
‘Yes, he could, Neil. He could do any of those things. We’ll worry about that when it happens. What we need to worry about right now is that he’s still after us. He’s still out there and still trying to lure us into one of his traps. That means none of us is safe until we catch him. Please bear that in mind.’
With that she is gone. Back to her office.
She leaves Cody deep in thought. Even when Webley and Ferguson amble over to his desk, he finds it difficult to engage with them.
Says Ferguson, ‘How’s your Scottish accent then, Wibbly?’
Webley clears her throat and says, ‘You’ll nae get any haggis on Balamory.’
Ferguson looks askance at her. ‘Who’s that meant to be? Jimmy Krankie?’ He shifts his gaze to Cody. ‘Whaddya think, mate? Reckon she’s our prime suspect?’
‘Yeah,’ says Cody, distractedly. He’s not sure what they’re talking about, but he suspects it’s bollocks. Slowly, he gets out of his chair.
‘You all right?’ Webley asks him.
He nods. ‘Right as rain. Back in a minute.’
He moves off. Behind him, he hears Ferguson saying something about Jimmy Krankie always having that effect on him.
Cody heads over to Blunt’s office. Knocks on her door and enters.
Blunt has some paperwork in her hands. She peers at Cody over the top of her reading glasses.
‘Cody?’
‘Got five minutes?’ he asks.
She waves him into a seat. Takes off her glasses and tosses them onto her desk. ‘Don’t really need them,’ she says, as if to protest against the ravages of age.
‘What’s on your mind?’ she asks.
‘This guy,’ he says. ‘He’s not giving up. Like you said, he hasn’t finished with us. Three’s not enough for him. He’s going to keep killing and killing. Dead coppers piling up around him for as long as he can keep going. Those calls from him last night show how determined he is.’
Blunt nods. ‘That’s my feeling too. I don’t know what this man’s issue is, but I don’t see it as a thirst he’s ever going to quench.’
‘Only now he’s got a problem. And so do we.’
‘Care to elaborate?’
‘We know he’s out there, and we know what his tactics are. His first two victims – Latham and Garnett – were different. Somehow he found out where they lived, and so he was able to kill them in their own homes. For whatever reason, his well ran dry after that, and he had to find a way of making us come to him. So he started calling in fake crimes. We didn’t know he was going to do that, of course, and so that’s how he managed to get to Andrea Whitland. But now we know what he’s up to, and we’re ready.’
‘Which is a good thing. We have to be ready. We have to protect ourselves.’
‘Yes, I know. We’re making life difficult for him. There isn’t a copper out on the streets now who hasn’t got another copper watching their back. No single response at all. And if we get a sniff of one of his traps, we respond in force. We don’t give him the slightest opportunity to claim one of us as his prize.’
Blunt clasps her hands together, burying them deep beneath her mountainous chest. ‘You say that almost as if you disapprove.’
‘No, not that. It’s just . . . what we’ve got here is a Mexican stand-off. One slip from either side is the end. Our killer can’t do what he wants to do, because we’re not giving him a chance. All he can do is keep calling us out and hope we balls it up. And one of these days we probably will. We can’t keep operating like this. We can’t treat every suspicious call as if it’s leading us to an unexploded bomb. We haven’t got the resources, and pretty soon the public is going to start wondering why we’re taking so long to deal with minor crimes.’
Blunt frowns. ‘First of all, Cody, resource allocation and operational strategy are not your problem. Let the powers that be worry about such things. Secondly, we’re not treating every call in the same way. You need to give our phone operators some credit. They know what we’re dealing with, and they’re pretty good at distinguishing between those calls that are genuine, those that are hoaxes and those that come from deranged individuals such as our killer. Trust them to do a good job on that front. And, thirdly, this situation isn’t going to last forever, because you and your colleagues out there are going to catch this lunatic very soon. That’s me trusting you to do a good job.’
Cody responds not with speech but silence, chewing his lip as if to hold back what he’d really like to say.
‘Why do I sense you’re not convinced?’ Blunt asks.
‘It’s not that. I know we’ll get him, but . . .’
‘Yes?’
‘I want to suggest a Plan B.’
‘A Plan B? You mean, something we try if all else fails?’
‘Not exactly. I was thinking more like something that we do in parallel with Plan A.’
Blunt brings out her hands again, now presumably very much warmer. ‘Something tells me I’m not going to like this. Go on.’
Cody takes a deep breath. ‘This guy likes to set traps. He’s hoping we fall into one of them. At the moment he’s just studying us, working out how to make his traps even better, or hoping that we make a mistake.’
‘Okay. So?’
‘What about setting a trap of our own? Instead of being reactive, let’s get proactive and create our own trap.’
‘And how do you suggest we do that?’
‘We let him think we’ve grown tired. That we’ve become sloppy. We give him the mistake he’s been waiting for.’
Blunt brings the forefinger and thumb of one hand to the bridge of her nose, as though applying them to a pressure point to ease a building headache.
‘I’m going to hate myself for asking this, but how do you propose we do that without him smelling a rat?’
‘We ease off on the response. Gradually, over the next few nights. We tone down the phone interrogation. We reduce the number of uniforms responding. We cut down on the searches taking place at the scenes. Baby steps, until we’re ready, and he thinks his wait has been worthwhile.’
‘And then?’
‘And then we give him what he wants. A single copper. Alone. No partner in sight. An irresistible target.’
Blunt listens. Thinks. Drums her fingers on the edge of her desk.
‘If you’re wondering why I didn’t say no immediately, it’s because I’m desperately trying to remember when I had a more ridiculous suggestion put to me. I can’t think of one, so congratulations – you win the Stupidest Idea of the Century award.’
‘It’s not so ridiculous, and you know it. The cop wouldn’t really be alone. We can put cameras and a mike on him, and we’d put unmarked cars in the vicinity. Plus, he’d have the advantage of being ready for whoever came at him.’
‘No, Cody. Absolutely not.’
‘Why not? Give me one good reason why.’
‘I’ll give you two. The first is that it would be putting a police officer’s life in unacceptable danger. The second is that I know how that brain of yours works. I know exactly what you haven’t told me yet, which is that the sacrificial goat you have in mind for this mind-numbingly stupid plan is you.’
‘Actually, I was going to suggest Footlong.’ He smiles, holds his hands up. ‘Okay, it�
��s me. I can do this.’
‘You say that like getting yourself killed is a laudable achievement. Well, actually, Cody, I don’t want to be congratulating you at your funeral. I don’t want to be nailing a medal to your coffin, thank you very much.’
Suddenly Cody is leaning forward, becoming more intense than he knows he should be with his superior.
‘Then who else do we sacrifice?’
Blunt appears stunned by the question. ‘Nobody. We don’t sacrifice anybody, because we’re not going along with your stupid plan.’
‘I’m not talking about the plan. I’m talking about the other officers who will die if we don’t catch this fucker soon. We can hold each other’s hands as much as you like, but sooner or later he’ll catch one of us alone. He’ll find out where one of us lives, or somebody will say the wrong thing in a bar. A mistake will be made, and he will be there, and he will take that person’s life.’
‘No, DS Cody. That’s not going to happen. And the reason it’s not going to happen is because of what I said to you all just a few minutes ago. You are going to catch this man. But you are going to do so through good old-fashioned detective work, and not through some hare-brained scheme that sounds like something straight out of a Hollywood movie. My God, haven’t you been through enough? And now you want to go undercover again, only this time as a uniformed officer?’
Cody smiles his disarming smile. ‘Undercover as a cop. I hadn’t thought of it like that.’
‘Well, don’t think about it any longer. It’s not on. End of discussion.’
Cody sits there quietly for a minute, wondering how to come back at her. But he knows her mind is made up. He gets out of his chair and heads for the door, but is stopped by Blunt.
‘You do understand, don’t you, Cody?’
He nods, but more to keep her happy.
He’s not done yet.
31
The roar comes later that afternoon. He’s been expecting it, but it’s still frightening in its intensity.
‘CODY!’
He looks across the room at Blunt. Everyone looks across the room at Blunt. She is the picture of a vengeful queen who has just learnt of treachery and betrayal in her court. She looks capable of breathing fire, turning everything here to crumbling, smoking charcoal.
‘My office,’ she says. ‘Now!’
She doesn’t wait for him. She just turns and storms off, expecting – knowing – that he will follow, on penalty of a fate worse than death.
‘Uh-oh,’ someone whispers. All eyes shift to Cody now. All questioning what he could possibly have done to merit a summons like this. There is a deathly silence in the room. They are expecting nothing less than a call to the gallows for this malefactor.
He attempts a smile, as if to say, It’s okay. Nothing to worry about. But it sits uncomfortably on his lips, and they see it for what it is. And when he trails after Blunt, he hears one of them humming the funeral march.
When he gets to the doorway of Blunt’s office, she is at the window rather than behind her desk. Not a good sign. She stares out through the open blinds, obviously troubled.
Cody announces his arrival with a light tap of his knuckle on the glass door panel. She doesn’t even turn around.
‘In,’ she commands, accompanying it with a brief flick of a finger to beckon him inside. ‘Close the door.’
He does as he is ordered, but knowing that a closed door will make it easier for her to let rip.
Brace yourself, Cody. Get ready for the hurricane coming your way.
She turns then. Her face is thunderous. Lightning could flash from those eyes.
‘What the hell did you think you were doing?’
He forces himself to straighten his spine. Showing her that he’s standing up for what he believes.
‘It’s a good plan,’ he says simply.
‘It’s a fucking stupid plan,’ she answers. ‘And just because you managed to convince Superintendent Warner to go along with it, that doesn’t make it any less stupid. He’s as gung-ho as you are. What the hell did you think you were doing by going over my head?’
He thinks about repeating that it’s a good plan, but decides against it. Life is too precious.
‘I needed a second opinion.’
‘Bullshit. You were being pig-headed. You think you know better than I do. You think you’re right and I’m wrong. I bet if Warner had turned it down you’d have gone to the Chief Super. You were determined to have your way, because you’re so damned sure of yourself.’
‘I . . . I just thought we should give it a try.’
‘Give it a try? You’re not testing out a new recipe, Cody. You’re not taking a different route to the pub. You do realise what you’re letting yourself in for, don’t you?’
He shrugs. ‘I’m okay about it. Honestly. It’s what I do.’
She shakes a finger at him. ‘No. It’s what you did. When you worked undercover. You don’t do stuff like that anymore because of what happened. You work at MIT now. You work for me. And the boys and girls who work for me don’t go running off to the headmaster when they don’t get their own way. What did Warner say, anyway?’
‘He . . . He said he thought it was an excellent idea. He said this is the kind of thing he’s looking for in his officers. Innovation, originality, fortitude—’
Blunt puts a hand to her mouth. ‘Stop, stop, I’m going to be sick. He said that? In a one-on-one chat? Jesus Christ, does he ever stop rehearsing for his next move up the ladder?’
Cody isn’t sure Blunt should be saying these things about her boss in front of him, but right now she seems too upset to care.
She shakes her head in despair. ‘I thought we had a better working relationship than this, Cody. I thought we could trust each other. I know I give you a hard time sometimes, but only when you need a kick in the pants, for your own good. Of all the people in this team I would trust with my life, it’s you. You’re a damn good copper. I know my saying all this is embarrassing you, but you’re going to hear it anyway. I see great things in your future. You went through one of the most traumatic events an officer can possibly experience, but you fought back. You got back in the saddle. That takes guts. And now I’m starting to sound like Warner.’
Cody smiles at her to let her know how much he appreciates what she’s saying to him, even though a part of him is denying most of it. If he’s back in the saddle, then it’s on a stallion that’s galloping away with him.
‘What I’m trying to say,’ continues Blunt, ‘is that you have damaged something today. You could have come and spoken to me again about it. My door is always open, you know that.’
‘Would you have changed your mind?’ he asks.
‘The truth? No. Certainly not. I would have suspended you from duty rather than authorise this reckless action.’
‘And now?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Now that it’s got the green light. Will you run it for me? The operation?’
She stares at him, and for a brief moment he is convinced he sees the glint of wetness in her eye.
‘You want me to oversee the operation, the one in which you could possibly be killed?’
‘Yes. Only I won’t be killed. You won’t allow it.’
She stares some more. Nods. ‘Damn right I won’t allow it. And Warner will have to put me in a strait-jacket to keep me away from this one.’
Cody straightens his back again. Less standing up for himself this time; more a coming to attention. A gesture of respect.
‘Thank you, ma’am.’
A silence ensues. The two look into each other’s eyes. Unspoken messages pass between them. A pact to deny death and to affirm life. Two very different people, with different backgrounds and different experiences, but both acknowledging what they share.
‘Now get out,’ says Blunt. ‘And if you do get killed out there, don’t come running back to me.’
*
When he has left, DCI Stella Blunt l
ets out a long sigh. She grabs a tissue from the box on her desk. Dabs at the corner of her eye.
Stupid, she thinks. Not Cody. Me. I’m the stupid one for allowing my feelings to get the better of me.
He’s a copper. A brave one at that. One of the bravest I’ve ever known. He’s doing what he believes is right. I respect and admire that.
And I wish he weren’t going on this mission.
God help me, I wish it were somebody else putting their life on the line like this.
That’s wrong. I shouldn’t be showing any favouritism. But I can’t help it. Sometimes I just can’t stop myself.
Cody has noticed. Of course he has. Doesn’t say anything, though. Doesn’t ask for an explanation.
Best if he doesn’t know. Best if he just thinks I’m a menopausal old fool.
Stay safe, Cody.
*
Webley. Marching along the hallway. Thinking, I’m going to nail his balls to the ceiling.
She catches up with Cody as he comes out of the men’s toilets. In her fury, she doesn’t even notice that he’s wiping his hands down the sides of his trousers.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ she demands.
He shows her his palms. ‘It’s not what it looks like. They’re washed, honestly. The dryer wasn’t working.’
‘I’m not interested in your urination rituals, Cody. I’m talking about your fucking stupid plan.’
‘Not you, too. You know, I’m beginning to think I should call this Operation Fuckwit.’
‘Actually, I think that would be pretty apt. How the hell did you get a green light to go and throw yourself on a grenade?’
He shrugs. ‘Cutbacks. It’s cheaper than a redundancy package.’
She slaps his arm. ‘Stop being a dick. You need to call it off.’
‘Why?’
‘Why? Because turning yourself into an easy victim is not recommended in the police manuals as a way of catching murderers.’
A Tapping at My Door: A gripping crime thriller (The DS Nathan Cody series) Page 19