Soft Target ss-2

by Stephen Leather

  The files were split into three sections: MI5, Customs and Excise, and the Greater Manchester Police Drugs Squad. The MI5 file was the largest but contained little intelligence. It consisted mainly of copies of wire-tap authorisations and transcripts of conversations that Charlie Kerr had made over the previous eighteen months, none of which appeared to have had anything to do with drugs. Hargrove had been right: the Security Service had nothing more than a watching brief, and if all they were doing was monitoring his phone traffic then they didn’t stand a chance of getting anything on him. A criminal of Kerr’s calibre would hardly start organising cocaine shipments by phone, even using pay-as-you-go mobiles. MI5 had access to the Echelon eavesdropping system, a joint venture between the United States, Great Britain and New Zealand, which allowed for the world-wide monitoring of all phone and email conversations. It was also equipped with voice-recognition so accurate it could identify a target from among millions of conversations. But listening to Kerr and catching him in the act of setting up a major drugs deal were two different things. The only way to get him would be to use an undercover agent, or persuade a family member or associate to inform on him.

  The Customs and Excise file was a tenth the size of MI5’s, but it contained surveillance photographs of Charlie and Angie arriving at Heathrow airport and leaving Málaga airport. Kerr was balding, a big man with broad shoulders. He was a head taller than Angie and in several of the photographs he had an arm round her as if he wanted to establish ownership. There were also photographs of them at their villa in Spain, and at various restaurants with several Costa del Crime faces. There was nothing wrong with the Kerrs wining and dining with major criminals, of course, drinking Dom Pérignon and tipping with fifty-euro notes. It wasn’t a criminal offence to associate with villains. Yet. There were reports of Kerr’s trips to the United States, Drug Enforcement Administration and FBI reports on whom he had met in Miami. There was no information on any pending US investigations in the file, so either they weren’t telling the Church or the Church was playing Secret Squirrel with its overseas information.

  In theory, the intelligence services, Customs and the police were supposed to co-operate on major cases, but in practice they guarded their turf jealously. There was a lot of resentment on behalf of the police and Customs that MI5 had moved into anti-drugs work. The Security Service had shown little interest in catching drugs barons until their own jobs were on the line and now whenever they were involved in a major seizure their press-relations people went into overdrive, trumpeting every drugs bust as a major victory for MI5. Also the spies were able to operate in decidedly grey areas, while the police had to follow the Police and Criminal Evidence Act to the letter. And while Customs had to fight for every penny of its budget, it seemed that MI5 had a blank cheque book to play with.

  Customs had tried using an undercover agent to infiltrate Kerr’s circle in Marbella, but two weeks into the investigation he’d been sussed and had made a rapid withdrawal. He was only identified by his cover name in the reports he’d filed. There was nothing in them that would have resulted in charges: he had met with Kerr three times in various nightclubs but the only conversations they’d had were social chit-chat. According to the agent, Charlie Kerr was notoriously unfaithful to his wife, and on the nights he was out without her he usually ended up bedding one pretty girl or another, although he was always back in his villa by dawn. The agent had suggested sending in a pretty female undercover agent but the head of Drugs Operations had vetoed a honey trap. Charlie Kerr was too dangerous: a borderline psychopath.

  The Marbella operation had been aborted one night after the agent had been out in a group with two of Kerr’s associates, Ray Wates and Eddie Anderson – the men Angie had talked about. They’d sat on either side of the agent and plied him with drink. When Charlie had left with a young Spanish waitress they’d suggested they move on to another club. The agent had had a bad feeling about the way the men were smiling at him. He’d pretended to be more drunk than he was and said he had to go to the bathroom. He’d broken a window, climbed down a drainpipe and caught a plane back to London. Shepherd understood the man’s decision. Sometimes you had to go with your instincts. If a situation felt wrong it probably was.

  The police file contained more hard intelligence than those of MI5 and the Church put together. In his mid-twenties Charlie Kerr had been charged with armed robbery three times. Each time the case had collapsed before it had got to court. Witnesses were intimidated or paid off; evidence mysteriously disappeared. In one case CCTV footage was wiped in police custody. Kerr was thought to have been responsible for more than two dozen building-society and bank robberies over a five-year period, netting, according to police estimates, close to a quarter of a million pounds. Sometimes he worked alone, sometimes with a partner, and he hadn’t served a day in prison. He had a criminal record, though, for an assault on his eighteenth birthday: he’d bitten the ear off a middle-aged man in a pub and had been given a year’s probation after three witnesses swore that he had been provoked. It was the only time he had been in court but it meant that his fingerprints, teeth impressions and DNA were in the system.

  Kerr had channelled the profits from the robberies into drugs but, because of his record, he took more care than most to cover his tracks. He was paranoid about phones and did virtually all his business outdoors, face to face. There were hundreds of surveillance photographs in his police file, but no hard evidence of drugs-dealing. The police had looked into Kerr’s nightclubs, and while they were sure he was using them to launder his drugs profits, they hadn’t been able to prove it. There were also rumours that his men were extorting money from other nightclubs in the Manchester area, but only one owner had ever complained officially – his club had burned down the next day and he left the city shortly afterwards.

  Shepherd read the file with a heavy heart. It was always the really nasty pieces of work who got away with it. Petty thieves, small-time pimps, street-corner drugs-dealers were rounded up, tried and packed off to prison. But the real villains were virtually untouchable. They surrounded themselves with physical and legal protection, intimidated or bought their way out of trouble, and caused untold misery to the population at large. Time and again, in police and Customs files he saw appeals for major investigations turned down because the resources weren’t available: it was too expensive to put together a case that was guaranteed to result in a conviction. And the powers-that-be couldn’t afford to move against the likes of Kerr without a guarantee of success. If the case collapsed they would look incompetent, so it was easier, and safer, not to try.

  The Drugs Squad had tried working its way up the chain, picking up dealers on the street with balloons of heroin in their mouths, then using the threat of a jail sentence to get them to roll over on their supplier. They’d had some success, putting two major wholesalers away, but they couldn’t get near Kerr or his associates. People were simply too scared to give evidence against him.

  Shepherd sat back and ran his hands through his hair. What about Angie? She, more than anyone, must know what her husband was capable of. Would she be prepared to go into the witness box and tell a court how he brought hundreds of kilos of heroin and cocaine into the country? And what about afterwards? If the Crown could find a non-corruptible jury and a judge who couldn’t be paid off or intimidated, and if Charlie Kerr was sent down for ten or fifteen years, what would happen to her? A lifetime in witness protection? Or a bullet in the head from the contract killer that Kerr would surely put on her trail to show the world that you never went up against Charlie Kerr?

  Angie Kerr’s life as she knew it was about to end. If she refused to help the police she’d go to prison on conspiracy to murder. If she co-operated, she’d be in hiding for the rest of her life. And Shepherd knew that anyone could be found eventually, providing you had time and money. And Charlie Kerr had plenty of both.

  Roger Sewell finished drying himself and tried to pull on the hotel robe. It would barely have fitt
ed a man half his size and he couldn’t get it across his shoulders. He swore and flung it away from him. The hotel room was eight paces from door to window, and six from the bed’s headboard to the TV cabinet. Sewell knew this because he had spent the best part of the day pacing up and down, cursing Larry Hendrickson for wanting him dead, and the police for keeping him locked in a room the size of a cell. He’d only agreed to co-operate in the first place because he wanted to see Hendrickson behind bars, but right now Hendrickson was probably wining and dining a couple of escort girls in one of Manchester’s top clubs.

  Sewell glared at the half-eaten cheeseburger and chips on the dressing-table. He hadn’t stayed in anything below four stars since his teenage years. The food was terrible and they didn’t have a bottle of wine for more than twenty pounds. Sewell wouldn’t ask a dog to live in the place, but the cops seemed to think it was acceptable to ask him to stay put for another two days. And Sewell hadn’t been fooled by the smooth-talking Superintendent Hargrove. Something had obviously gone wrong and they wanted to keep him on ice until they’d covered their arses. He didn’t believe Hargrove’s story about there being another contract. They’d screwed up their investigation and Sewell was paying the price.

  He wrapped a towel around his waist, picked up the remote control and flicked through the TV channels. Nothing but soap operas and quiz shows. There were at least three policemen downstairs so there was no way he could leave the hotel. When they’d first told him about Hendrickson’s plan, they’d asked him not to tell anyone else, not even his family. Not that Sewell had much in the way of family. A mother in a nursing-home in North Wales, a sister who’d got halfway round the world during her gap year, married an Australian and never come home, and a couple of elderly aunts. If Sewell died, the only people at his funeral would be business acquaintances – he had fewer friends than he had relatives. He had followed instructions and no one knew where he was. But that meant he didn’t know what Hendrickson was doing with the company, or its money. If Hendrickson was sure he’d got away with murdering Sewell, he wouldn’t hurry to take over the company. He would probably wait a few days before he reported him missing, then bring in his own man as cosignatory on the bank accounts and sell the company. He had been pestering Sewell to sell for the past three years but he had always refused. Sewell owned seventy per cent of the shares so there was no way Hendrickson could sell without his agreement. Or death.

  Everything depended on Hendrickson being convinced that no one suspected he had murdered his partner. If Hendrickson knew the police were closing in on him, he’d probably empty the bank accounts and make a run for it. Some offshore accounts could be accessed 24/7, and it wouldn’t take more than a few phone calls to transfer around half a million pounds out of the business. If Hendrickson realised the police were on to him, that would be more than enough running-away money.

  Sewell picked up the hotel phone and pressed nine for an outside line. He smiled as he got a dial tone. He was fed up to the back teeth of following instructions. He could call his lawyer, John Garden, and at least check up on the bank accounts to see if Hendrickson had been making unexpected withdrawals. A few minutes on the phone would either put his mind at rest or confirm his worst fears. Garden had been on Sewell’s payroll for almost ten years and he trusted him as much as he trusted anyone.

  Sewell tapped out the number of his lawyer, but before he’d hit the fifth digit a brusque voice was on the line: ‘Sir, who are you trying to call?’

  ‘That’s none of your business,’ said Sewell.

  ‘I’ve been instructed not to let you make any phone calls,’ said the man.

  Sewell recognised the voice of the sergeant who’d brought him to the hotel in the first place. ‘I want my laptop brought in, and I need cash.’

  ‘No visitors, sir. Those are my orders.’

  ‘You tell me I can order food to be brought in, but I have to use cash and I’m down to my last twenty quid.’

  ‘I’ll speak to the superintendent,’ said the sergeant.

  ‘I’ve had enough of this,’ said Sewell. ‘I’m cooperating, I’m doing everything you ask – all I want is my laptop and some cash.’

  ‘Like I said, sir, I’ll speak to the superintendent.’

  ‘I want to talk to my lawyer,’ said Sewell, forcefully.

  ‘I can’t allow that, sir,’ said the sergeant, ‘without the superintendent’s say-so.’

  ‘Isn’t there something called habeas corpus?’ said Sewell. ‘A lawyer has the right of access to his client?’

  ‘That applies to people in custody, sir,’ said the sergeant.

  ‘Well what do you call this?’ asked Sewell. ‘It’s worse than prison.’

  ‘I think that’s an exaggeration, sir,’ said the sergeant. ‘I’ve visited a few in my time and I don’t remember one with room service.’

  ‘Listen, you sarcastic piece of shit, either I talk to my lawyer tonight or I set fire to my room. There’s no way you’ll be able to keep me here if the place burns down.’

  ‘That would be a very foolish thing to do, sir.’

  ‘Tell Hargrove I want to talk to my lawyer or I start lighting matches.’ Sewell slammed down the phone. He picked up his room-service tray and threw it against the wall.

  It was just after nine o’clock when Keith Rose got home. As he pulled into the drive he saw his wife at the sitting-room window. She waved and disappeared. He drove into the garage and went through the internal door to the kitchen. Tracey was in her pink dressing-gown, pouring boiling water into two mugs. ‘Sorry I’m late, love,’ he said, putting his hands on her hips and nuzzling her neck.

  ‘You need a bath,’ she said, stirring sugar into one of the mugs of coffee.

  ‘How was she today?’ he asked, stroking his wife’s long auburn hair.

  ‘Not good,’ said Tracey. She turned and linked her arms round his neck, kissing him hard on the lips.

  Rose broke away first. ‘Is she asleep?’

  ‘Just dropped off.’

  ‘I’ll go up and see her.’

  Tracey released him. ‘Was it bad?’ she asked.

  Rose frowned, not understanding what she meant.

  ‘Gatwick. The surveillance.’

  ‘Waste of a weekend,’ he said. ‘All foreplay and no orgasm.’

  Tracey smiled coyly. ‘I’ll see if I can remedy that,’ she said. ‘Go and see your little girl, then come to bed.’

  Rose went upstairs. Kelly’s bedroom door was ajar and a nightlight cast shadows from the toys scattered around the room. He sat down on the bed, taking care not to disturb the drip line that ran across the sheet and into her left forearm. He ran his hand down the side of her face. There were dark patches under her eyes and her chest barely moved as she breathed.

  ‘It’s going to be okay, sweetheart,’ Rose whispered. ‘Daddy’s going to do whatever it takes to make you better.’

  The phone rang. Sewell slid off the bed and padded over to answer it.

  It was Superintendent Hargrove. ‘I gather you’re not happy, Mr Sewell.’

  ‘Damn right I’m not,’ said Sewell. ‘Your Rottweilers won’t even let me talk to my lawyer.’

  ‘What do you intend to talk to him about?’ asked Hargrove.

  ‘No one knows where I am and I need someone on my side.’ Sewell thought it best not to mention that he wanted Garden to check up on his firm’s financial status.

  ‘As we prevented your murder, you can assume we’re on your side, Mr Sewell. Your partner was looking for a hitman. If we hadn’t presented him with our man, you’d be lying in a shallow grave in the New Forest with a bullet in your skull.’

  Sewell sighed. Every conversation he had with the superintendent went around in circles. ‘Fine. I’m grateful. But I need to know my legal position.’

  ‘You’re helping us put a criminal behind bars.’

  ‘But I’m the one who’s being held at the moment.’

  ‘It won’t be for long, Mr Sewell.’

/>   ‘Two days, you said. Which means one more day to go.’ Sewell sensed hesitation in the superintendent. ‘One more day to go, right?’ he pressed. ‘I’m out tomorrow?’

  ‘I hope so,’ said Hargrove.

  ‘You’d better do more than hope,’ said Sewell. ‘Look, I can go at any time, can I?’

  ‘I’d rather you didn’t, but I can’t stop you. You don’t need a lawyer to tell you that.’

  ‘You’re saying I can go home now?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Sewell, but I’d rather you didn’t. As soon as Hendrickson sees you he’ll know he’s been set up.’

  ‘So you’ll have to arrest him?’

  ‘Probably. Which means that our secondary investigation gets blown out of the water.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Another potential murderer will get away with it.’

  ‘Like I said, so?’

  ‘What if you were the potential victim, Mr Sewell? What if we needed someone else to stay hidden for a few days so that we could catch Hendrickson in the act? Wouldn’t you want that person to co-operate?’

  ‘There you go again,’ said Sewell. ‘Now it’s a few days. You said two before.’

  The superintendent sighed. ‘I’m as unhappy about this as you are,’ he said, ‘but we now have a second ongoing investigation. Another contract has come to light, and we want the same man who nailed your partner to go after this person. If you surface, Hendrickson will tip off the other person and all hell will break loose. And you will put my man at risk.’

  ‘Have you got Hendrickson under surveillance?’

  ‘We know where he is.’

  Sewell pounced on the evasion. ‘Do you have men watching him?’

  ‘We don’t have a car outside his house, but we have him red-flagged at all ports and airports. If he was going to run, we’d know. We’re watching his credit-card activity so we’ll know if he buys a ticket to go anywhere. He doesn’t suspect anything so there’s no reason for him to run. He thinks he got away with murdering you. Provided you stay where you are, that won’t change.’