“If we don’t come out after half an hour, you call the cops,” I said. “You’ve both got Karen’s number, haven’t you?”
They nodded.
“Why don’t we call them now?” Rog asked.
“Because Dave used the alert code for us,” I said. “And we know from our White Devil experiences that we’re the only people who can look after each other.” I saw their expressions change when I mentioned the monster’s name.
“Come on,” Andy said, adjusting his microphone. “We were trained by the best. We can handle this.” He glanced at each of us. “Let’s go and get the man.”
Trust Slash to look keen. The rest of us tried to match him, with varying degrees of success.
“Watches, guys,” I said. “I’ve got ten forty-two. Check?”
“Check,” the others replied, after some tweaking.
“Right, communications check in ten minutes,” I said. “Go, Pete.”
He had the farthest to walk and set off at a rapid pace, the bag with its lethal contents on his right shoulder. We gave him five minutes.
“Rog, go,” I said.
After two minutes, Andy and I moved off. There was no point in splitting up. If anyone asked what we were doing, I’d say we were friends of Dave’s from the army. At least we looked the part.
“Breathing steady,” I whispered, under my breath. “Concentration. Be aware of what’s happening around you. Control the adrenaline rush.” That was easier said than done. Andy looked relaxed enough. I pulled a balaclava down my forehead, covering the headset straps.
No one was out on the pavements. We turned rapidly onto the path that ran down the right side of Dave’s house. There were no cars in the drive and the garage doors were shut.
“In position?” I said quietly into my mike.
“Confirmed,” came Roger’s voice, then Pete’s.
“Take this as the comms check,” Andy said. “Confirmed.”
“Any sign of Dave from where you are?” I asked.
“Negative,” said Rog. “Curtains on the front are all open, except in the sitting room. No movement.”
“All the curtains at the rear of the house are open,” Bonehead said. “No sign of anyone.”
I looked at Andy. “Why are the sitting-room curtains closed?”
He raised his shoulders. “Let’s go and find out.” He squeezed my arm. “Steady, my man.”
I checked my Glock one last time and slipped it back under my belt. The silencer jutted out and I hoped the automatic’s trigger safety was as reliable as the manufacturers claimed.
Then I gave Andy a nervous smile. “Okay,” I said, taking a deep breath. “Here we go.”
I reached up toward the small window.
Karen Oaten drove to New Scotland Yard. There were only a few members of her team working the weekend shift. She sat down to clear the backlog of administration work, but found herself thinking about the latest spate of killings. One of the problems she had running a unit that pulled together violent crime from all over the city was keeping in check the tendency to link everything together. It was perfectly possible that the shooting of the Turk and the knife attack on the Kurd were unconnected, just as the overwhelming likelihood was that the murder of the crime writer had nothing to do with those in East London. But still, she found herself trying to make at least some connection between the deaths. That was the curse of the VCCT.
It didn’t help that there was very little to go on with the shooting of the Turk. Mehmet Saka, a twenty-three-year-old, was suspected of being a heroin deliveryman. He’d been gunned down in broad daylight outside a betting shop in Stepney, taking five bullets in his chest. Witnesses had been hard to find, and no one had noted the number of the car that carried the shooter. There were even varying reports of its color and make, ranging from a black Audi 6 to a dark green Citröen Xsara. The bottom line was that people developed very selective memories when it came to identifying gang members. They were swift to exact harsh retribution and there was no point in pulling in known gang members, as the gangs’ versions of omerta were just as tight as the original. Homicide East hadn’t even been able to tempt the Turks themselves to talk, which was hardly surprising if they’d been responsible for the subsequent murder of Nedim Zinar. Then again, maybe the Kurd had just slighted someone. That was one of the few characteristics shared by Turks, Kurds, Greek Cypriots, Albanians and Jamaican Yardies, as well as the long-standing local East End gangs—losing face was totally unacceptable.
Oaten moved on to the latest update from the Mary Malone murder. No other witnesses to a figure in a black cape and top hat had been found. DI Neville surmised that the killer either had a car parked farther down the street or had managed to change clothes somewhere nearby after the attack.
The chief inspector’s cell phone rang. It was her boss, the assistant commissioner.
“I’m in the office, sir.”
“Admirable, Chief Inspector,” he said drily. “I’m expected to play golf with the commander of the Flying Squad, would you believe?” The assistant commissioner resented every minute he had to spend away from his desk. “Update me, please.”
She gave him a rundown of the Saka and Zinar murders.
“And your recommendation?” the AC asked.
“To leave them with Homicide East. I’ll make sure we see the daily case-file updates. If there’s any link, I’ll take them over.”
“Very well. Now, what about the crime novelist?”
She told him where Homicide West had reached.
“That doesn’t sound very impressive,” he said. “Don’t you think we should intervene?”
“Do you mean because of the potential connection to the White Devil case?”
“I mean exactly that.”
Karen thought about it. If she took over the case, the spotlight would inevitably fall on Matt. He was already worried that Sara might be back, even though there was no direct evidence. Then again, she hadn’t heard from him today.
“Tell me honestly, Karen,” he said. “Do you think it’s the start of a series?”
She pursed her lips. How the hell was she supposed to know that? “It could be, sir,” she replied, hedging her bets.
“How do you want to play it? The newspapers are having a field day. It would calm things down if they knew the VCCT was on it. We might scare the killer into backing off.”
Oaten raised her eyes to the ceiling. The AC had been in the alternative reality inhabited by senior ranks for far too long. “I doubt it, sir. How about we leave it with Homicide West for the time being? If there’s another murder, we’ll take over.”
Her boss considered that for a long time. “You’re not losing your appetite for messy cases, are you, DCI Oaten?”
Karen felt her cheeks redden. “Certainly not, sir. You have no reason to suppose that.”
The AC was taken aback by her tone. “No, of course not. I apologize. Very well, do it your way. Let’s hope it’s a one-off.” He cut the connection.
“Tosser!” Oaten yelled.
John Turner put his head around her door. “Not me, I hope, guv?”
She glared at him. “Why? Have you got something to be guilty about?”
The Welshman shrugged. He knew better than to cross swords with his boss when she was in a temper. “I just had Neville the Lip on the phone. He couldn’t get through to you.”
“Because I was talking to the idiot on the golf course,” Oaten said, shaking her head until curiosity got the better of her. “Have they got something?”
“It isn’t good news. Still nobody else in Ifield Road who saw the figure in the cape and top hat.”
“Oh, great.”
“That’s not all. The rubbish was collected early this morning.”
“What, Neville didn’t seal the street?”
“Apparently not well enough.”
“For pity’s sake.”
“So the killer could have dumped the fancy costume in any of the bins on the
street and walked off into the night. There’s no sign of anyone dressed like that on the recordings at Fulham Broadway Station. Homicide West is following up the owners of cars that showed on the local traffic-control cameras, but so far they all have cast-iron alibis.”
Karen Oaten leaned back in her chair. “What interests me is why the killer chose a novelist as the victim, Taff. Is Neville doing any work on that?”
“They’ve been checking her e-mails for signs of a stalker or the like. Nothing so far.” The Welshman caught his superior’s eye. “You should be getting background on her from your…from Matt Wells.” He failed to keep his disapproval of Oaten’s partner from his voice.
She gave him a sour look. “I’m working on that. What are you doing here, anyway? You should be at home with your kids.”
“I’m on my way, unless you’ve got anything for me.”
Karen Oaten shook her head. “Have a good one.”
“You too, guv.”
As soon as Turner had left her office, she called Matt. She got the messaging service on his landline and cell phone. She was about to call the ex-directory number that only she and his close circle had when she remembered that he was to have had Lucy today.
Karen settled back to the heap of files, and hoped that there were no more murders—at least until after the weekend.
I felt around for the security lock that Dave had fitted to the outside of the window for exactly this eventuality. The hole was concealed by a blob of putty the same shade of pale gray as the paint on the frame. Only Rog, Andy, Pete and I had extra keys. When I finally located and cleared it, I inserted the key and turned it until the window was loose. Then I pushed it inward, slowly and silently. I turned and nodded to Andy. He cupped his hands and, after I’d put one foot in them, lifted me smoothly upward. Moving carefully, I put my hands through the open window and dragged my stomach over the ledge with Andy’s help. For a moment I went into a partial dive, but I stopped the fall when my hands hit the floor. I stayed in that position until the muscles in my arms began to burn, listening. I heard nothing. I walked forward on my palms before bringing my legs in and letting my feet slide gradually to the floor. I was in. Then I felt a vibration in my pocket. I pulled my phone out and saw that it was Karen’s office number. I knew she’d call at some stage to arrange the evening, but this was hardly the best moment. I let it ring out.
I moved forward and stood at the pantry door for a full two minutes. I still couldn’t hear anything. That wasn’t good news. Either Dave had been taken away, or he was the bait in a trap. I stopped myself from thinking about the other possibilities.
“Okay,” I said to Andy.
He heaved himself up with ease and was soon standing beside me.
“There’s no noise,” I whispered.
He nodded, and then took the silenced Glock from his belt. I followed suit.
“Go for it,” Andy said, his eyes narrowed.
I opened the door slowly—it was always deliberately left an inch ajar by Dave and his family so we could get in without making undue noise. I looked around. There was no one in the kitchen. Holding the automatic in two hands, I walked very slowly down the carpeted hall. On my left was the dining room. Looking cautiously around the door frame, I quickly established that no one was inside. On my right was the sitting room. The door was a couple of inches open. Through the gap I could see no occupants, but most of the room was out of sight.
My heart began to pound and I took several deep breaths again. I turned to Andy. He pointed to his chest, meaning did I want him to go first? I shook my head. That was my job. I was the one who’d brought Dave into danger and I owed it to him to get him out of trouble now. I steeled myself and pushed the door hard and swung around it into the room, Glock raised.
I felt my mouth open as I took in the scene. I sank to my knees, unable to speak or scream and blinded by tears.
Six
The Soul Collector took off all her clothes—what an inspiration the disguise had been—and stood naked in the cheap hotel room. There was a mirror near the bathroom door and she studied herself in it. Some mornings she still didn’t recognize what she saw, but this wasn’t one of them. She glanced at the watch she had removed from her coat pocket. It was coming up to eleven o’clock. Matt and his idiot friends would be at the house in Dulwich. She wondered how he would take the work of art she had left him. Badly, she was sure of that. He had always been weak, for all his claims to understand the criminal mind. That book—he would regret what he’d written about her brother and her, as would all the people he loved. Not that the ex-SAS man had shown her the pain he was undoubtedly feeling. Eventually, after he’d finally agreed to make the call to alert Matt and even managed not to sound like a man in terrible agony, she put an end to it. She admired him for that, if nothing else.
Eyes still fixed on her perfect body, the unsupported breasts firm and the lines of her face even more striking than they had been, she took off the black leather outer gloves and put them in an opaque rubbish bag. Her hands were still covered with latex, the pale gray flecked with blood that hadn’t washed away in the target’s sink. She stripped them off and put them in a different bag. Then she stepped gracefully onto the uneven bathroom tiles and into the battered shower cabinet. The hot water cleansed her, but the cold she stood under for much longer was what she really enjoyed. It made her skin tingle and her nipples harden. She always felt like this after “a mission”—that was what the men who’d trained her had called killings. She knew they used the euphemism to distance themselves from what they did to their fellow human beings. She had no such scruples. She killed because she was good at it and because it brought her closer to her dead brother—the brother who had also been her lover. She put her fingers between her legs, then took them away. There would be time for that later. Now she wanted to glory in what she had achieved, doused in the cold that was her natural medium.
She was thinking about other SAS men. The ex-soldier she’d just worked on had known the three who’d dispatched her brother. Two years ago, she had stopped as she was fleeing from the wood yard in East London, long enough to hear one of them ask her victim of today what he was doing there. That had been all she’d needed. Matt Wells hadn’t said much about the three killers in his book, but he mentioned they had Special Forces experience and that they had pursued the White Devil because he’d killed a former comrade: Jimmy Tanner. She had heard that name before—Tanner was the drunk who’d trained her brother how to kill along with numerous other skills. He had also been one of the White Devil’s earlier victims. She had salted away those pieces of information, but after she’d moved her brother’s deposits into new accounts, finished her training and dispatched her early targets in Latin America and the U.S., she was ready to act.
The woman had slipped into Britain by ferry from Belgium a month ago. She had a new look, identity and passport, but she’d waited for a busy and rainy day to ensure she didn’t stick out from the crowd. Although every immigration officer in the country would have a photo and description of Sara Robbins in their laptops, she hadn’t been recognized under her new name and guise. That gave her confidence for the murders ahead; no point in wasting time calling them missions.
She’d passed a hundred pounds to a publican in Brighton and was given contact numbers. A homely woman with two squealing kids had provided her with a driving license that would stand computer scrutiny. A man with rat’s-tail hair had sold her a brand-new Heckler and Koch U.S.P., a silencer and a hundred 9 mm cartridges; he even threw in a Spyderco C36 military knife with a black blade for free. Then she’d paid cash for a common-as-dirt white van she’d seen in a dealer’s yard in Southampton. Her adoptive father had been a farmer and he had taught her about the workings of cars and tractors—she could tell in five minutes that the van was adequate. She’d taped over the rear windows and put a mattress and sleeping bag in the back with her bike, a red metallic XL650V Transalp.
Dave Cummings had been easy. She’
d been sure Matt and his friends would have alarms on their houses. They would also have set up alert codes to be used if any of them were under threat. From the van, she had studied the movements of the burly demolition expert and his family. She’d considered murdering them all and leaving pieces of the children about the house, but decided against that—not from any qualms of conscience, but because she didn’t want to risk the neighbors hearing the screams. Instead, when the wife and kids left, she’d struck.
All she needed to do now was snare the three men who had executed her brother. Her plan was already under way.
I felt Andy’s hand on my shoulder.
“Oh, sweet Jesus,” he said, then his grip tightened. “I’m going to check the rest of the house. The bastard who did this might still be here.”
I knew he was right. I wanted to go with him—maybe, when we came back, the atrocity wouldn’t be here any longer, maybe I’d imagined it, I’d always had a vivid imagination….
I dug my fingernails into my palms and forced myself to look up. Dave was wearing only jeans and shoes. They were soaked in blood, as was the sofa he lay sprawled across. His arms were outstretched and his legs wide apart. Something terrible had happened to his legs. There were bullet wounds across both thighs and in the kneecaps. But worst of all was his head. It had been broken open, his features unrecognizable beneath a carpet of blood and soft tissue. Dave was no longer there. What he had been—his spirit, his bighearted soul—had disappeared. I fell forward like a worshipper before the shrine of some ancient, blood-addicted god, my chest racked by sobs and my face soaked with tears.
“Matt?” I heard Pete say, in my earpiece. “Are you in? There’s someone moving around on the first floor.”
“This is Andy. Get in here, both of you. The house is clear.”
The American came thundering down the stairs, then unlocked the front and back doors. I felt his hand on my shoulder again.
“Come on, Wellsy,” he said, “let’s get you out of here.”
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