A Need To Kill (DI Matt Barnes)

by Michael Kerr

  He towelled himself, went through to the bedroom and, without switching on the light, peeped out through a chink in the curtain.

  Saw a fleeting shadow move across the drive below him.

  He froze. What had made it? Maybe a deer, or badger, or fox. Or a man!

  Retrieving the knife, he crept naked down the stairs. Went into the kitchen, turned off the light and silently unlocked the door. He then helped Julie to her feet and took up position against the wall, with her directly in front of him. If someone was out there and planning to enter, then they would get a hell of a lot more than they bargained for.

  Fuck! Was he losing the plot? There was a shotgun on the floor of the lounge. It was sure to have one cartridge left in it. And there might be more ammunition in Marjory’s handbag.

  Too late to go for it now. There was a faint squeak, and he saw the doorknob begin to turn.

  Errol drew his gun and edged along the rear wall of the house with his back to it. Phil was a step behind him, holding his weapon two-handed with the safety off.

  Errol tried the obvious. Grasped the door knob and slowly turned it. It opened. This might be easier than he had thought it would be. If Downey was here, then it appeared he felt secure enough to leave the door unlocked. They might be able to walk in and arrest him without a drop of blood being spilt. Errol always opted for the easiest way to do anything. He had no intention of ending up a dead hero.

  Even as he eased the door back and made to push it all the way, to be certain that no one was behind it, the naked woman stumbled out in front of him.

  He almost discharged his weapon. Somehow stayed his trigger finger, then gasped as something feathered across his throat. The stinging sensation that followed was no more painful than a paper cut. So why couldn’t he breathe?

  Errol staggered back into Phil, dropped to his knees and let the gun fall to the ground as he put his hands to his throat and felt the hot rush of blood. He did not know what had happened. Just swayed like a cobra in the thrall of a moving flute as he noisily trying to suck in air, until starved of oxygen, his brain shut down and he toppled forward onto his face.

  Phil wondered why Errol had backed-up into him. At first the blood looked like shadow, black in the moonlight. When he realised that his colleague had been attacked, he brought his gun up to search for a target, and shouted for Matt.

  Matt paused and assessed the situation. Whatever was happening, it was taking place at the rear of the house. He took two steps back and threw himself at the front door, hurting his shoulder as it held firm and he bounced off it. Shit! He raised his good leg and drove his foot forward in a half-decent karate kick. The door exploded open to slam against the wall behind it.

  Matt dived to the left, tucked up and rolled, to come up on his knees, looking for something to sight in on and fire at.

  Pete followed Matt in, ducked low and ran to the right.

  “Clear,” Matt shouted. There was no one in the hallway.

  Phil’s voice: “Kitchen’s clear. Errol’s down.”

  Matt moved to the stairs and edged round the newel post. The butt and trigger of his Beretta was slick with sweat.

  “What now, Barnes?” Lucas called down to him. “Do you want me more than you want to save Julie?”

  Julie was sitting on the top step. Her hands were together in front of her, bound. In the semi-gloom she looked as though she was praying. Matt was sure that she was. The muzzles of a shotgun’s barrels were pressed up against her temple. Downey was out of sight, protected by the corner of the landing wall.

  “Without her alive, you’ve got nothing, Downey. I promise you, that if she doesn’t make it, then you won’t. This is a private party. And I don’t go by the rules.”

  “You’re bluffing, Barnes.”

  “Tell him, Sergeant,” Matt said to Pete, who was at his side.

  “I’m Detective Sergeant Deakin,” Pete shouted up. “Given that you’ve just wounded or murdered an officer, I want you to know that if my boss wasn’t here, I could guarantee you not making it.”

  “I don’t want to hear empty threats from your lackey, Barnes,” Lucas said. “What’s the deal?”

  “You drop the shotgun and walk out into view with your hands on your head. Do that and you get your day in court.”

  The silence that followed was nerve-racking. The tension seemed to charge the air.

  “Okay,” Lucas said. “You win, Barnes.”

  The barrels came away from Julie’s head and tipped towards the floor. Matt felt relief surge through him. Downey was not stupid. He had made the choice of life over death. Maybe he thought he could plead insanity, and after a few years be cured and released. It didn’t matter.

  Lucas moved with lightning speed. He darted out; kicked Julie in the back, raised the barrels of the shotgun and took a snap shot at the two men at the foot of the stairs, before ducking back behind the wall.

  As Pete was blown off his feet, Matt fired three shots, before being knocked to the floor by Julie, who had tippled and bounced her way down into him.

  Matt pushed the moaning woman off him and leapt to his feet. Heard a window smash upstairs, and headed outside. Almost ran into Phil at the side of the house. They both saw the running figure vanish into the trees.

  “Get help for Errol and Pete, Phil,” Matt said.

  “But―”

  “Do it,” Matt barked, and ran off in pursuit of Downey.

  Beth winced as the boom of a shotgun and three sharp cracks from a handgun being discharged assailed her ears through the clear night air. Her stomach clenched, and she was seized by a deep but far from irrational fear. She was certain that the shots signified someone’s life being terminated, and she had no way of knowing whether Matt was alive, dead, or badly wounded.

  She rose to her feet from the hollow among the tree trunks where she had agreed to wait it out, to stand ankle deep in a bed of rotting leaves that were turning to mulch as the soil reclaimed the nutrients from them. The night was no longer a peaceful, sheltering ally, but a place of long and evil tree shadows, and drifting, pooling patches and ribbons of clinging grey fog. She wanted to run out from the trees towards the house to find Matt.

  The sound of whipping branches and breaking twigs concentrated her. She turned to face whoever was approaching, to see a naked man less than twenty feet from her.

  Lucas was in a state of near panic. Smashing the first-floor window out and jumping through it had been a drastic but necessary ploy to escape from the cottage. One of the shots fired at him had passed through the wood panel wall at the top of the stairs and hit him in the left shoulder. The pain of the slug ripping through muscle and shattering bone was almost too much for even him to ignore. Now, he was out in the night, unsure of his surroundings, naked, seriously injured, and with only a puny steak knife to defend himself with. He had discarded the empty shotgun, and was now at the mercy of Christ knows how many armed police, who he had no doubt would shoot to kill him on sight.

  Out of nowhere, he saw a woman rise up in front of him. She did not appear to be armed. He might yet make good his escape. He ran towards her, then stopped in his tracks at the sound of Barnes’s voice.

  “One more step and I’ll shoot you, Downey.”

  He stopped and slowly turned to face his pursuer.

  “How did you find me?” Lucas said.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Matt said, in some way fascinated by the sight of the naked man’s illustrated body. “You made the mistake of killing the cop, and we worked back through all the calls she had made that day. You shouldn’t have parked your van across the road from the tube. Everything else just fell into place. Going to your aunt’s was the next real dumb move you made.”

  “So finish it, Barnes. I’m not going to give you the satisfaction of taking me in.”

  “You don’t get a choice in the matter,” Matt said.

  Lucas sneered, turned, and rushed at Beth with the knife raised up above his head.

  Matt too
k careful aim at the back of Downey’s right knee. A nine millimetre slug through it would take his kneecap out and drop him on the spot.

  The mechanism jammed. He could not fire, and was too far away to cover the ground and stop his quarry before he reached Beth.

  Beth turned and tried to run, slipped on the damp, rotting vegetation and fell back onto the ground among knots of gnarled tree roots.

  He was above her, a broad, triumphant and crazed grin on his face. The blade gleamed silver, and began its descent. Beth closed her eyes. It ran through her mind that she had been fated to suffer a violent end, ever since meeting Matt. Death seemed to surround him. No one close to the man was safe.

  The first bullet hit Lucas before the explosive percussion reached his ears. The sensation was of how he imagined it would feel to be struck in the chest with a sledgehammer. He rocked on his feet, but did not fall or lose his grip on the knife.

  Beth opened her eyes and saw a dark trickle run down between the eyes of the wolf’s head tattoo on his chest.

  As a deep and crippling pain threatened to overcome him, Lucas took another step forward, to walk into a second bullet, which hit him in the left cheek, shattering bone and teeth and jerking his head sideways. A spray of blood issued from his mouth as he emitted a spine-tingling animal howl. And then he turned his head to look at Matt and smile, before once more raising the knife, determined to bury it in Beth.

  It was the third shot that brought the proceedings to an end. The bullet entered Lucas’s left ear, travelled through his brain and took out a large portion of tissue and fragments of skull as it erupted from his right temple. Dead on its feet, the body remained standing rock still for two long seconds before going limp and crumpling to the ground.

  Tom walked out from cover and approached the body. Put his foot on its wrist and stooped to prise the knife from the clenched fist and throw it clear. He then helped Beth to her feet.

  “Another fine mess Barnes nearly got you into,” Tom said.

  Matt stepped up to Tom and Beth looking extremely relieved and sheepish. His face was parchment white. He asked his friend and boss, “How?”

  “Easy, I put an APB out on your Discovery. And when Phil and Errol sneaked off, I had them tailed. In fact I was behind them all the way here.”

  “What about the raid on all the other addresses?”

  “Aborted. I knew you had him in your sights.”

  As they talked, other armed officers appeared from out of the trees like ghostly apparitions in the thickening fog.

  Matt patted Tom on the shoulder. “Thanks. I owe you one,” he said.

  “Yes, you do,” Tom replied. “And I’ll collect, believe me.”

  Matt squeezed Beth’s hand and then ran off, back along the route he had followed Downey, heart in his mouth, dreading to be faced with the scene he might find. He had made an unofficial play, again. This time, he might have the deaths of Pete and Errol to somehow come to terms with.

  EPILOGUE

  Harry Fletcher accepted their offer on Orchard Cottage. They signed all the necessary forms and set the wheels in motion. Went to see Harry again and took him for a meal in his – and what might become their – local pub in Woodford Wells.

  Matt was feeling fine. ‘All’s well that ends well’ was his new motto. It was more optimistic than ‘shit happens’. And everything had somehow, incredibly turned out okay.

  The Kevlar vest that Pete had worn undoubtedly saved his life. The impact of the lead shot had broken a couple of ribs. A lot of what goes down is pure luck. He could just as easily have had his face blown off.

  Errol had been even luckier, if that was possible. Phil had performed a tracheotomy. Used a pen knife to make an incision below the severed part of Errol’s windpipe, and found a plastic straw in a drawer to employ in lieu of a ball-point pen casing – that always seemed to be the preferred choice in movies – to insert and create an airway. Errol’s voice now sounded like Barry White with a chest cold. But he was on the mend.

  Julie Spencer was a changed person. Her prolonged suffering and constant fear of being murdered had in some way inspired her to reassess and make more of her life. The experience as a hostage and potential victim had opened doors for her. She had accepted a huge cheque from a tabloid for the exclusive rights of her ordeal at the Wolf’s hands; was doing a home study writing course, and planned to write a book from a victim’s viewpoint, and even had a title for it: IN THE LAIR OF THE WOLF. All of a sudden she was a minor celeb, had acquired an agent, and was doing talk shows worldwide. How many ex-laundry workers from Bethnal Green got to go on The Tonight Show in the Big Apple?

  Lucas Downey had in one way fulfilled an ambition. He had not lived and died in obscurity, and had become more than just the illegitimate son of a back street whore. His name would join the ranks of the ignominious in history, forever associated with the worst of humanity. Even the illegally obtained photographs of his tattooed corpse had appeared on web sites, courtesy of a mortuary attendant with vision, who was subsequently dismissed. Tattoos of wolves’ heads became de rigueur in certain quarters, and a movie was already planned. There was something in the psyche of the masses that was attracted to the lowest common denominator of behaviour. The lives and crimes of sociopaths were converted into marketable and highly lucrative packages. The name of Lucas ‘The Wolf’ Downey was destined to become synonymous with both real and fanciful human devils.

  Detective Superintendent Clive Adams took the lion’s share of credit for wrapping up the case. He faced the cameras and praised his team for their effort, but let it be assumed that he had been instrumental in bringing Downey’s reign of terror to an end. The performance saved his career. Everyone loves a winner, and especially when he looks like a middle-aged matinee idol, and has the same skin-deep smarm as a newly plastered wall.

  The bar of the Kenton Court Hotel was becoming a regular drinking hole for the team. It was where they gathered after a high-profile case was put to bed, to celebrate in a low-key way.

  Over a week passed before the impromptu piss-up took place.

  Matt, Beth, Pete and Marci arrived first, followed shortly thereafter by Tom, Phil and the others. Even Errol showed up. The stitches were still in his throat, and he did not intend to drink alcohol, but wanted to be there. Only ‘Grizzly’ Adams was conspicuous by his absence. He was not invited, and had a lot to prove if he was to earn back any respect from the squad.

  “I came out of it smelling of roses,” Tom said to Matt at the bar, out of hearing of the others. “I had to write it up as though I authorised the raid at Marjory Walters’ cottage.”

  “But?” Matt said, knowing that there would be a punch line.

  “But, you’re an arsehole, Matt. We could have lost men, and the hostage. Then I would have been happy to gift wrap you and feed you to the ICC.”

  “What are you trying to say, Tom? Don’t beat about the bush.”

  “That being right isn’t always enough. You need to consider the bigger picture. You aren’t a one-man army. If Pete and Errol hadn’t made it, you’d be feeling sorry for yourself, and crying in your beer. And if despite your best efforts, I hadn’t got there, then Beth...”

  Matt hadn’t needed the lecture. He had given it to himself, almost word for word. He was too impetuous, and didn’t trust other people to not fuck up. It was both strength and weakness all rolled into one. He needed to modify it. When his Beretta had jammed, he had yet again faced losing all that mattered. The chances of Downey getting away from the cottage, then to almost run headlong into Beth, and for his gun to turn from a lethal weapon into a handful of scrap metal, were not something a sane person would place a bet on. Tom had appeared like a guardian angel and saved Matt’s personal universe from being devoured by a black hole. He would never be able to properly repay the debt he owed his friend. But would not miss any opportunity to try.

  “You’re right, Tom. Bollocking accepted and deserved. I’ll get Beth to put me on the couch and hit me wit
h some appropriate psychobabble. Okay?”

  Tom didn’t hold out much hope of his DI being able to change tactics. The bottom line was, he wanted Matt to include him, not infuriate him by continually going it alone.

  “You two want serving, or are you going to stand there and argue all night over who gets his wallet out?” Ron Quinn said.

  “My shout,” Matt said to Ron.

  Tom smiled at Matt and said, “Damn right, it is.”

  # # # # #

  If you enjoyed this book, then you will undoubtedly enjoy some of Michael Kerr’s other books. There is a sample taken from one of Michael’s other character’s stories, Joe Logan, at the back of this book, to give you a taster.

  About The Author

  Michael Kerr is the pseudonym of Mike Smail the author of several crime thrillers and two children’s novels. He lives and writes in the Yorkshire Wolds, and has won, been runner-up, and short listed on numerous occasions for short story competitions with Writing Magazine and Writers’ News.

  After a career of more than twenty years in the Prison Service, Mike now uses his experience in that area to write original, hard-hitting crime novels.

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