by AD Davies
Alicia said, “You gloated, Omar. CCTV on the motorway shows you staring at the wreckage. At what you did.”
She slid a fuzzy photograph across the table: the van, Omar beside it, leaning over the railing to get a better view.
Omar shook his head. “It wasn’t like that.”
“If your parents were here, good ol’ mum and dad, how would you explain the murder of innocent people?”
A pause. Then Omar replied, “If they are innocent, they ascend to Heaven. If not, they will burn in Hell. Whether they die today, yesterday, or fifty years from now.”
“You really believe that?”
“Yes.”
Silence. A shuffle of paper as Alicia referred to a note she made when skimming the transcript fifteen minutes earlier. She did not look up.
Omar said, “Do you know what true Muslims like me, like my parents and my friends, have in common with your average terrorist?”
“Implying you’re not average,” Murphy said.
Omar clenched both fists, his mouth tight, as if shoring up a dam to prevent his anger from cascading out. “We all believe this world is a test. The next life is the true world. Where we are right now, it lasts an average of, what, eighty years if we’re lucky? When we leave here, we live forever. Either at God’s side, or the Devil’s. So when a life is taken from this world, it is a sin, as proscribed by Allah, but life goes on in the next. Those children who died yesterday, they live forever. That absolute belief, that knowledge, is what we have in common.” He laid his hands flat on the table. “Want to know the difference between true Muslims and the average terrorist?”
Alicia shifted uncomfortably on the chair. “Can’t wait.”
“The difference is a terrorist sees it as a divine act. We, the good Muslims, we know taking an innocent life means eternity in Hell.”
“So why do it?”
“I told you already.”
She made a show of scanning back through her other notes, which usually looked like shorthand but she confessed to Murphy were meaningless. Alicia treated her brain like a mini-computer, able to store and process serious amounts of data without overheating. Today, though, she appeared to be concentrating on what she’d jotted. When the pause lasted longer than usual, Murphy glanced at the pad: regular writing, only much scruffier.
Alicia looked up sharply. “You said to strike a blow for jihad. To prove average Muslims could inflict damage anytime, but they do not. And now you say you’re prepared to go to hell for your vision.”
“Correct.”
Earlier, before they commenced, Murphy fed her a line to use, the one that either meant he really deserved this promotion to detective chief inspector, or showed him as having a cracking imagination after all and confirm Omar was as insane as his logic.
Alicia said, “Why you, specifically? Why no one else?”
Omar fixed her with an earnest stare. The sort of stare Murphy saw on intelligent criminals throughout his career. The stare that meant they were concentrating on their words, formulating them with the care of a watchmaker fitting the final cog. They had to get it right, or all was lost.
The Breezeblock Jihadi said, “Because only true courage can defeat fear.”
Alicia nodded sagely. Rearranged her papers. Then panted as if the baby somersaulted unexpectedly. She gathered herself, mimicking Omar’s body language with her own palm flat to the surface.
And her big, big smile that Murphy had been hoping to see returned.
She said, “You, my little jihadi munchkin, are a big dirty liar. Let’s try all this again, shall we?”
CHAPTER TWO
Having been an open faucet before, Omar now refused to talk. For Alicia, it was as good as a confession. No matter how forcefully she insisted Omar was not being completely truthful about the massacre, he refused to budge.
Outside, she told Murphy he was a very sneaky DCI for doing that to her.
He said, “I didn’t want to taint your opinion without hearing it for yourself.”
She waddled at pace, a technique she figured out over the past ten weeks—knees akimbo, hips low, shoulders back—which would never count as “striding purposefully” as she hoped to exude, but it transported her from A to B efficiently, meaning she’d settle on looking bloody ridiculous.
“That line,” she said. “The ‘Why you, specifically?’ one. That was the feeder.”
“And he replied with the payoff.”
They passed a middle-aged female uniformed sergeant escorting a younger male police community support officer—PCSO—and both nodded to her and called her “ma’am” and Murphy “sir.”
I am not a “ma’am”, she thought. Not yet anyway.
She and Murphy ascended in the lift to the third floor.
Alicia asked, “Enjoying the high life?”
“I think the squad got a bit of a shock,” Murphy replied. “I’m a bit more hands-on than Streeter.”
Murphy’s old boss, DCI Streeter now held an administrative position within the Police and Crime Commissioner’s office, which promoted Murphy on secondment to chief of his own CID section pending a full review. Alicia clashed with Streeter during last winter’s investigation into a serial kidnapper and murderer, picturing him far more comfortable in a political position than commanding a squad of detectives.
She was happy for him. But happier for his detectives.
The lift opened and Murphy led her to the open plan office in which resided two detective inspectors, four detective sergeants, and two detective constables. Usually, anyway. Right now only Detective Sergeant Roger Cleaver and a female DC whom Alicia had never met occupied their desks. The name on the woman’s desk said, “Rebecca Ndlove.”
It was a big team, but around these parts the murmurs from the detective pool indicated Murphy’s promotion was well overdue. Alicia’s only worry was that politics made Murphy grumble uncontrollably, grind his teeth, and generally bulldoze through any decision that might have an outcome embarrassing to the top brass.
Alicia waved to Cleaver. “Hi, big boy!”
“DS Friend,” Cleaver replied.
He skirted the side of the desks to greet her with a limp handshake. In his late forties, Cleaver had not been in great shape when Alicia first met him last year. Tall—but not as tall as beanpole Murphy—with skinny limbs and a burgeoning belly brought on by the additional beer and takeaways divorced men often resort to. He’d lost some weight now, though.
She said, “Where’s beardy Ball today?”
“Demoted,” Cleaver answered.
“Not demoted,” Murphy said. “How many times do I have to tell you that?” Glanced at Alicia. “He got tenured back to uniform.”
Cleaver’s attitude was fairly typical in the modern world of US TV shows in which police were seen to earn their spurs on the street, a gateway to detective-grade, which then “promotes” them out of uniform. But when detectives in the UK remain at the same grade for ten years, they are rotated back into uniform for a period to ensure they don’t get complacent with their position. It is not a demotion. Still, despite a uniformed sergeant holding an equal grade to a detective sergeant, Alicia suspected DS Ball would still view it as a kick in the balls.
Murphy’s office door displayed his name and new rank on a brass rectangle, and Alicia resisted taking out a marker pen to underline “chief” on the plate. She sat at his desk in his high-backed chair, hands resting on her stomach. “You don’t mind do you?”
“Not at all.” He forced a grim smile as he lowered himself to the padded four legged chair opposite. “Make yourself at home.”
“I need a wee. Where’s your bathroom?”
“Down the corridor past the lift.”
“You don’t have your own bathroom? DCI Streeter had his own bathroom.”
“DCI Streeter had a minibar. And a lot of other things a DCI doesn’t need.”
The building saw a lot of renovation this year, and a number of squads amalgamated. They even had a D
I running missing persons here, answering to a DCI who also oversaw vice and street crime.
Alicia tapped the space bar to wake up Murphy’s computer and said, “I’m not going hiking again. I’ll have to hold it. What’s your password?”
Murphy spun the screen and keyboard, tapped out the password, and returned it to Alicia. She logged out of his account and back in with hers.
As her profile loaded, she said, “I’m working archives. Did you know? Me. Archives.” She accessed the internal cloud-based Box account where the Serious Crime Agency’s video interviews were stored. “Sure, they loan me out for the odd consulting job—”
“You’re welcome for the day out, by the way.”
“And I thank you most sincerely, oh benevolent one. But I’m assuming you saw the memo re Mitchell Vaughn.”
Murphy crossed his legs, his long limbs gangly on the smaller chair. “Correctamundo.”
“Hey,” Alicia said. “You stole my line.”
“You stole it first.”
“Fine, you win this round.” She concentrated on finding the appropriate file. “If I remember correctly, Mitchell Vaughn was a waiter in a Leeds restaurant called The Dove of Portugal. No history of violence, no priors. For some reason, two weeks ago, he brought a firearm to work. When two all-male couples were tucking in to their desserts, Mitchell brought the gun out from his locker, and unloaded into them. What’s that noise?”
“Noise?”
One of the perks of this office was a window, although it did not open. More health and safety brilliance.
Alicia scooted over on the wheeled chair while Murphy walked.
Down in the public parking lot, an angry crowd of people gathered, currently around fifty, but with more streaming in from outside. They carried banners and placards, most denouncing Islam as a disease, a violent ideology, or simply “un-British.” At least two carried effigies hanged on ropes, alongside demands for reinstatement of the death penalty. Photos of the M1 victims abound.
Chanting: “Muslims OUT! Muslims OUT!”
Neither Alicia nor Murphy commented. No need. Groups like this always took advantage of tragedy and outrage, became noisy for a while, then scuttled away until the next time.
Back at Murphy’s desk, Alicia fired up the video of Mitchell Vaughn’s interview led by a female detective inspector called Cupinder Rowe, DS Peter Marston alongside.
Alicia said, “One of my scintillating desk duties is transcribing interviews for input into the SCA database.”
“I know.” Murphy dragged the chair to Alicia’s side. “Figured you’d spot the same thing as me.”
“Clever you.”
As she wound through the preliminaries and searched for the correct section, Murphy said, “About seven minutes before pulling the trigger, Vaughn sent a text message via a web application to someone we haven’t identified yet. End-to-end encryption, meaning even the phone company can’t see what it was.”
“Meaning … he was either working with someone else, or tying up a last bit of personal business before killing himself.”
“Or would have killed himself,” Murphy said, “if he wasn’t wrestled to the ground and disarmed by other customers.”
Alicia found the spot. Hit play.
On screen, DI Rowe said, “And what gives you the right to play God? Why do you decide who lives and who dies? Why can’t gay people live out their lives how they want?”
Mitchell chuckled. “Filth. They’ll live in fear now. All of ’em.” He spat on the table.
“Fear?” Rowe said, mimicking his chuckle. Not going so far as to mock him, but Mitchell’s darkening expression indicated she got to him. “Sounds to me like you’re protesting too much. Like you’re the one who’s afraid. What of, I wonder? Of being gay yourself? Of becoming what you hate?”
Mitchell no longer laughed. Instead, he calmly replied, “I am courage, you sick bitch. And I will defeat the fear.”
* * *
Alicia burst back into Omar’s interview room. She considered performing a pirouette, but figured the paperwork might get messy if she had an accident. Murphy strode in behind her. She settled for a sweep of her arm, as if presenting a stage play.
“You weren’t gloating,” she said to Omar.
The young killer stared blankly at her.
She said, “On the bridge. The CCTV. You, leaning over, watching people die … you said it wasn’t like that. And it wasn’t, was it?”
Omar continued to stare.
“You were supposed to kill yourself,” Alicia said. “Murder those people, then kill yourself. But you couldn’t. The Breezeblock Jihadi is now the Cowardly Custard. Or a pawn. The Sad Little Jihadi Pawn.”
Omar’s teeth gritted together. “Shut up.”
“No, Omar. You’re part of a bigger cell. And I’m going to find out before anyone else dies.”
Omar frowned.
“Oh dear,” Murphy said. “You didn’t know? You weren’t the only one, Omar. Whoever persuaded you to accept eternity in Hell … he has other pawns. Now why don’t we talk about this some more?”
CHAPTER THREE
Omar said nothing else, but Alicia’s bladder spoke loudly and clearly enough for her to give up on the notion of prying any more secrets from the kid who’d condemned himself to hell in order to help his brothers find a voice.
“Deluded idiot,” Murphy called him.
But Alicia wasn’t entirely convinced. The few times Omar uttered anything it was to insist he worked alone, that he was not going to kill himself, and no one knew in advance what he was planning. That final line, that no one else knew, was a common refrain in jihadi circles, especially those based here in the west, and when MI5 or Counter Terrorism Command took over his interrogation, they would surely use the threat of imprisoning his loved ones to loosen those nuggets of intel to which he clutched so vehemently. She and Murphy could have gone for it, but IT forensics hadn’t returned anything solid, except to confirm a laptop computer was missing from his property. Online activity from his IP address was being forensically examined but because surveillance techniques were now so well-known, people were getting better at hiding their technology use. Such as disposing of the hardware.
Once rescued from wet-pants-mageddon, Murphy drove Alicia’s unmarked car from west Leeds toward Wakefield where the SCA was based just off the M1, fifteen miles south of Omar Jafari’s murderous act. Although they paired up in America earlier this year, the two detectives had not partnered officially since the previous winter, so on the way Alicia explained the changes to date.
“When I returned from America, Chief Superintendent Rhapshaw was already running for the top job,” she said. “Now he’s happily putting his feet up as police and crime commissioner, I’ve got a new boss. Janine Paulson. She doesn’t like that I jumped up to see you today, worries I might go ‘off the rails’ again.”
Off the rails.
Like risking jail to chase a serial killer who was out of control.
Like taking a knife to the gut whilst pregnant.
Like showing off the scar to the squad room upon her first day back in the fold.
“You?” Murphy said. “Off the rails? Never.”
“Hey, I’m all better now. Went to counselling and everything.”
“They made you?”
“I had a choice, but it was a lot of death and nastiness for a four-month period.”
“So now you’re desk bound.”
“Well, my ‘erratic behaviour’ is part of it, but don’t forget you-know-who.” She pointed at her belly, sensing the three-inch scar against her blouse at the top of the bulge. “Can’t risk me experiencing the tiniest bit of stress.”
“What’s she like? Chief Superintendent Paulson?”
“Efficient,” Alicia said.
“Oh, say it ain’t so. Alicia Friend has finally found someone she doesn’t like?”
“I dislike plenty of people, thank you. But I hear rumours she was only appointed to the Serious
Crime Agency to disband it. She has political friends and contacts in MI5 who want to take us back under their umbrella.”
“Why?”
“So we can concentrate on terrorism and OC gangs bringing in illegals, activity funding terrorism, that sort of thing.”
“Because regular organised crime isn’t important.”
“Not this election cycle, no. That’ll be up to you regular plod to handle. No extra budget, though, so hey. Think of it as a challenge. An opportunity.”
They fell silent as they passed the point of Omar’s attack. Twisted lumps of metal still littered the hard shoulder, and the overpass was literally coated with flowers and notes. Dozens of people milled around up top, tying more flowers, a couple praying. Then it was behind them.
Alicia said, “My temporary replacement is getting a bit comfy at my desk, too. Chap called Robert Stevenson.” She leaned in to Murphy, whispering as if someone might hear. “Don’t call him Louis. He doesn’t like it.”
“Why would I call him Louis?”
“Like the writer. You know, Treasure Island? Robert Louis Stephenson?”
“I’ll try to resist calling him Louis.”
Alicia winced as the little bugger inside her kicked again. When it subsided, she asked, “Are we nearly there yet, Uncle Don?”
They pulled off the motorway and Murphy updated her with his moans and grumbles about being in charge, but she cut him off.
“You love it really, Don. Pretend to yourself if you like, but not me.”
His moustache ruffled up at the ends, a smile breaking. “Feels good getting stuff done.”
In the car park, Murphy tempered his usual long strides to compensate for Alicia’s duck-walk to the reception desk.
“I think I got boring,” Alicia said as she signed Murphy into the visitor log.
“How so?”
“I watch the news now.”
Murphy frowned down at her. “I watch the news.”
“Exactly.” She didn’t wait for his faux-insulted expression; took it as read. “It annoys my flatmate. Says it’s pointless on the telly. We get it all first on our phones, so why bother?”