Tall Order: The 15th Spider Shepherd Thriller

by Stephen Leather

  The man behind the wheel was the older of the two but only by a few years. Both were bald, though the older man’s bald skull was a choice rather than genetic. He nodded at his companion. ‘In you go,’ he said. ‘Any problems I’ll beep the horn twice. Three times means get the hell out and expect the worst.’

  Neither man was armed. They had documentation that showed they had been hired to carry out an inspection on the property so, even in the unlikely event that the cops turned up, there was a good chance they would be able to talk their way out of the situation.

  The passenger climbed out of the van and slammed the door shut. He walked over to the door and bent down at the drainpipe there. He found the key immediately and used it to open the door and slipped inside.

  He heard the buzzing of flies immediately and seconds later the smell of dead flesh assailed his nostrils. He put a hand over his mouth as he switched on a small Maglite torch. The beam found the body in seconds, the head covered in flies. He walked around to approach the corpse from the feet and knelt down. He took a mobile phone from his pocket and slipped it into the back pocket of the man’s jeans.

  The man’s wallet was in the left side pocket of the jeans and he fished it out. He took a folded piece of paper from the breast pocket of his overalls and placed it in the wallet. It was a receipt for a left luggage locker in the Bullring Shopping Centre, just a few miles away. Inside the locker was Farooqi’s laptop computer. The man put the wallet back into the dead man’s jeans pocket and then retraced his steps to the door.

  Chapter 48

  Present Day, London

  S hepherd spent all of Saturday afternoon and most of the evening staring at the CCTV footage from the camera closest to where Farooqi lived. He took a five-minute break every half an hour to rest his eyes, but at six o’clock he took a complete break and went up to the canteen, where he ordered fish and chips and coffee.

  Nick Hughes was sitting at a table tackling a chicken curry and Shepherd went over to join him.

  ‘How’s it going?’ asked the inspector. ‘George says you’re looking at footage from Birmingham.’

  ‘I’m checking on a Syrian refugee that Naveed phoned. Trying to see if he left with somebody, but it’s not easy. A needle in a haystack doesn’t come close.’ He poured a large dollop of ketchup on his plate but as he picked up his knife and fork his mobile rang. It was Katra.

  ‘Dan, where are you?’ she asked.

  It was clear from her tone that she wasn’t happy and he could understand why. Since the bombing he had been working pretty much non-stop and only went home to shower and grab a few hours’ sleep.

  ‘You said we’d go shopping at Portobello Market,’ she said.

  ‘I know, and I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m just working flat out.’

  ‘What are you doing at the moment?’

  ‘Right now, I’m eating. Then I have to get back to work.’

  ‘You could have come home to eat. I could have cooked for you.’

  ‘It would have taken too long, I’m sorry,’ he said.

  ‘I hardly see you at the moment. I thought the reason I moved down to London was so that I could spend more time with you.’

  ‘I know, and once this case is over we’ll spend lots of time together. But a lot of people died, Katra, and a lot more are still in hospital. They deserve justice for what happened to them.’

  She didn’t say anything but he could sense that she wasn’t mollified.

  ‘I’ll make it up to you, I promise,’ he said.

  Inspector Hughes tried to suppress a smile but didn’t do a very good job of it. Shepherd grimaced, stood up and went over to an empty part of the canteen. ‘I’m really sorry but sometimes the job is like this,’ he said. ‘You didn’t really see it when you were in Hereford and I was here or wherever, but believe me, there are many times when my job isn’t nine to five and there’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t stand up and say I want to pack up work and go to see my lovely girlfriend, no matter how much I want to.’

  ‘Lovely?’ she repeated.

  Shepherd laughed. ‘Yes, lovely. Listen, of course I’d rather be at home drinking wine with you and watching a movie than sitting in a room with a bunch of sweaty policemen, but this is important. We’re catching terrorists, Katra.’

  ‘I’m being stupid, aren’t I?’ she said in a soft voice that sounded close to tears.

  ‘No, it shows how much you love me,’ he said. ‘I’d be really worried if you didn’t care what time I got home.’

  ‘I do care,’ she said.

  ‘I know you do. And I will be home at some point, I just don’t know when. But I will make it up to you.’

  ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘You’ve nothing to apologise for. And I’ll try to get home before midnight.’

  She said goodbye and that she loved him but Shepherd could tell that she was close to tears. He put his phone in his pocket and went back to his fish and chips.

  ‘Plays havoc with the family life, doesn’t it?’ said Hughes.

  ‘When the shit hits the fan, sure. But it doesn’t happen that often, to be fair. My speciality was working undercover and that can be twenty-four-seven for days on end. And before that I was in the army and that really plays havoc with family life.’ He attacked his meal and suddenly realised how hungry he was.

  ‘You’ve been around,’ said Hughes. ‘I joined the police as a graduate and haven’t worked for anyone else.’

  ‘I was with a police undercover unit after the army, and that was good fun. I’m not sure I could do what you do for ever.’

  ‘It’s valuable work,’ said Hughes. ‘And I did my fair share of RTAs and break-ins when I was on the beat.’

  ‘I didn’t mean to denigrate what you guys do,’ said Shepherd. ‘I can see how you get results. It’s just not for me. I need …’ He shrugged as he tried to find the right word.

  ‘The adrenaline rush?’

  ‘Yes. Maybe. The knowledge that you could get hurt if things go awry. What’s the worst thing that could happen in the Super-Recogniser Unit? A bad back from sitting too long?’ He saw the inspector’s face fall and he quickly apologised. ‘That came out wrong. It’s a valuable job, I get it, and your arrest rate is way higher than mine ever was as an undercover agent. But it’s not how I want to spend my career. I want to put guys away, and I want to be there when it happens, not just see it on an internal email a few days after I’ve put in my report. Does that make sense?’

  ‘It makes perfect sense,’ said Hughes. ‘And I don’t take offence. Me, I prefer fighting crime at a computer terminal. I like the fact that no one is going to spit in my face or make a spurious racism complaint about me or accuse me of being part of a system designed to suppress the common man. I come in, I sit down and I catch criminals because I’m good at recognising. That’s good enough for me.’ He shrugged. ‘Mind you, it’s a pain not getting paid overtime.’

  ‘That’s right, ranks above sergeant don’t, do they? Same as my job. No overtime either.’

  ‘You can’t have everything,’ said Hughes. ‘But it’s a bugger, isn’t it? One of the PCs was saying he’s hoping to get a new kitchen out of his overtime from this case.’

  ‘Every cloud …’ said Shepherd. He finished up his meal and headed downstairs with Hughes, taking a fresh coffee with him. He sat down, sighed and clicked the mouse to restart his CCTV footage.

  Chapter 49

  Present Day, Birmingham

  J on Barnes lived in a semi-detached house about four miles from the lock-up where Israr Farooqi had been tortured and killed. It was late evening and the house seemed to be empty. The two men sat in their van and watched it for half an hour and saw no movement outside. A red and white flag of St George had been hung from one of the bedroom windows, the bottom weighed down so that it didn’t blow around.

  According to the information they’d been given, Barnes drove a four-year-old Jaguar XF and there was no sign of it out
side the house or parked in the road.

  The passenger climbed out of the van and opened the side door. He took out a metal toolbox with the insignia of the plumbing firm on the side. In the top pocket of his overalls he had a job note with the name and address of a house around the corner. In the unlikely event that he was asked to explain why he was at the house, producing the job note would make it look as if it was a simple mistake. He’d blame the GPS and all would be well.

  He closed the side door and walked across the road, swinging the toolbox casually. He walked up the side of the house to where two wheelie bins were backed against the wall. One green and one black. He put the toolbox down and opened it. Inside was a carrier bag containing a blood-spattered hammer and a can of red spray paint. He opened the lid of the black wheelie bin and moved the rubbish around to make a space at the side. He dropped the carrier bag in and pulled rubbish over it, then closed the lid and picked up the toolbox again. He looked around, satisfied that nobody had seen what he’d done, and walked jauntily back to the van.

  Chapter 50

  Present Day, London

  S hepherd woke to the sound of his mobile phone ringing.

  ‘What time is it?’ asked Katra sleepily.

  He grabbed the phone and squinted at the screen. ‘Eight o’clock,’ he said. It was Don Margrave.

  ‘You’ve only been in bed four hours,’ she said.

  Shepherd sat up.

  ‘And it’s Sunday.’ Katra glared at him, then turned over and wrapped the quilt around herself.

  He slid off the bed and padded naked into the hallway to take the call. ‘Don, hey, how’s it going?’

  ‘The whole Israr Farooqi thing has kicked off and I thought you’d want a heads-up.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Crimestoppers got an email tip-off about a body in a lock-up garage south of Birmingham. Turns out to be Farooqi. Someone had chopped off a toe and smashed in his skull. That someone then sprayed anti-Islamic graffiti on the walls.’

  ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘It gets better. The Birmingham cops then get a phone tip-off from a call box saying that a guy called Jon Barnes was connected to a racist killing. Barnes is a nasty piece of work and the Brummie cops were chomping on the bit so they used the tip-off as an excuse to go through his house with a fine-tooth-comb. They found a hammer with blood on it and a can of spray paint in his rubbish.’

  ‘Oh, come on.’

  ‘I’m just telling you what the cops have told us. The blood on the hammer is Farooqi’s. They haven’t matched the paint yet but the paint in the lock-up is red and so is the spray can they found with the hammer.’

  ‘And what does this Jon Barnes say?’

  ‘He’s screaming fit-up. But then he always does. He runs the Anti-Muslim Brigade and they have a habit of burning out Asian families. There was one three months ago when a mother and a baby died. Barnes always has an alibi but his Facebook posts hint that his group deserves the credit.’

  ‘Okay, but this isn’t setting fire to a house, is it? Someone abducted Farooqi. How far is the lock-up from where he lived?’

  ‘Four miles. Five maybe.’

  ‘So someone takes him across town and what, chops off a toe before killing him? Why not kill him in his house? And why chop off a toe?’

  ‘Torture maybe?’

  ‘So why just one toe?’

  ‘What are you thinking?’

  ‘I’m thinking maybe someone was trying to get information out of Farooqi. And the fact that they only took off one toe suggests that he started talking pretty quickly. Why would the leader of a racist group be doing that?’

  ‘I’m just telling you what the Brummie cops told me,’ said the detective. ‘How was I to know you’d be looking the gift horse right down the throat.’

  ‘But you hear what I’m saying, Don? This is a guy who burns out Asians and boasts about it on social media. Why does he suddenly move into abduction, torture and bludgeoning to death? And who tipped off the cops in the first place?’

  Margrave laughed. ‘You understand how the anonymous tip process works, right?’

  ‘You know what I mean. Who could have known there was a body in the garage? The killer, obviously. And why would anyone leave a murder weapon out with his rubbish?’

  ‘I’m starting to regret phoning you now,’ said Margrave. ‘I guess you don’t want to hear the really good news.’

  ‘Go on, I’ll bite.’

  ‘His phone was there. And there was a left luggage receipt in his wallet. The cops checked the locker and you’ll never guess what they found inside.’

  ‘A suicide vest?’

  The detective chuckled. ‘Chance’d be a fine thing,’ he said. ‘No, it was Farooqi’s laptop.’

  ‘He kept his laptop in a left luggage locker?’

  ‘Seems like clever tradecraft to me. Anyway, the phone and the laptop are being rushed to your technical boys as we speak.’

  ‘So they realise it’s terrorism and not racist?’

  ‘I’m not sure that the Brummie cops had a change of heart. My understanding is that MI5 stepped in and asked for the laptop and the phone. They’ve also slapped a D Notice on the story so you won’t be seeing anything in the media. Hopefully you’ll be able to get the intel from the horse’s mouth.’

  ‘I’ll give it a go,’ said Shepherd. ‘Any news on Yussuf?’

  ‘Still missing, believed to be on the run,’ said the detective. ‘Though after what’s happened to Farooqi I’m wondering if someone got to him, too.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘I really don’t know, Spider. Nothing about this case surprises me any more. Though there’s nothing to suggest that Yussuf was abducted. Like I said before, he’d taken clothes with him, and his toothbrush. People who are abducted don’t usually pack a bag first.’

  ‘Fingers crossed,’ said Shepherd. ‘Do me a favour and text me the address where the body was found.’

  He ended the call and went back into the bedroom. Katra was sleeping. Shepherd considered getting back into bed but he wasn’t tired; the adrenaline had kicked in again and all he really wanted to do was to get back to the office.

  Chapter 51

  Present Day, Salford

  ‘W hat do you think?’ asked the woman. She was in her early thirties, blonde with too much make-up and wearing a pink tracksuit with JUICY written across the bottoms.

  Sitting in the driving seat was a man who hadn’t shaved for several days. Like his companion he was wearing a tracksuit but his was blue and Adidas. He was also in his thirties and while he slouched in his seat, a closer look would have determined that he was in good physical condition. The woman was fitter than she looked, too, and was more than capable of holding her own against most men. She had a black belt in Shotokan karate, was expert at Krav Maga, the military self-defence system devised for the Israeli security forces, and was an expert shot with small arms and rifles.

  The car was an old Ford Escort with a couple of fluorescent orange dice hanging from the mirror and a back seat littered with fast-food wrappers and pizza boxes. They were in a run-down part of Salford and the car and the outfits helped them to blend in. They were looking across the road at a brand new BMW Five Series, black with tinted windows and gold wheels.

  ‘Personally, I’d rather put it in the boot, hide it in the spare tyre,’ said the man.

  ‘Yeah, and I’d like a date with Brad Pitt but I don’t see that happening in the foreseeable future. Look, he didn’t get back until four in the morning.’ She looked at her watch, a pink Casio. ‘It’s now ten-thirty. He could be sleeping all day for all we know. Then who knows where he’ll be tonight.’

  ‘What about getting inside the house?’

  The woman shook her head. ‘Way too risky while he’s in there.’ She folded her arms. ‘I say we put it in the car now, under the passenger seat. It makes sense to keep a gun there. Nobody would question it.’

  ‘You’ll be seen.’
/>   ‘Not if I’m lucky.’

  ‘That’s your plan? To depend on luck?’

  ‘If I time it right it’ll be fine. Walk alongside the car. Open the door. Gun under the seat. Close the door. Four seconds. Five at the most.’ She nodded at the upstairs bedroom window. The blinds were down. And the curtains were closed in the downstairs window. ‘He’s not going to see anything.’

  ‘No, but people in the street will.’ Further down the road a woman was pushing a stroller with a toddler in it. An old woman was walking slowly with two carrier bags and behind her was a shaven-headed bruiser of a man with a large brown pit bull on a lead.

  ‘The passenger door is on the road side. I’ll be covered. You can drive up and that’ll cover me from the other side. Four seconds, Pete. Tops.’

  Pete sighed. ‘I don’t like it.’

  ‘What are our options? We sit here on our arses all day doing nothing until we get a phone call and we’re asked what the fuck is the delay? Or we say that we’re sorry but the job is just too difficult. Either way our careers come to an abrupt end. We can’t even do a simple drop.’

  ‘Yeah, but it’s not simple, is it, Katy? And if we get caught, then what? You want to explain how you’ve got a murder weapon in your hand? Because I sure as fuck don’t.’

  ‘I’m just saying, we can’t sit here all day.’

  Katy had a key fob in her right hand. The previous night they had been following the BMW and had got close enough to clone the car’s keyless entry code. The driver had been going into a nightclub and Katy had asked him for a cigarette. The device – the size of a packet of cigarettes – had been in her pocket and it picked up the fob’s wireless code and recorded it. That code was now stored on the key fob Katy was holding, allowing her access to the BMW whenever they needed it.