Snow Storm

by Robert Parker

  He phoned home. Any day now he was due to become a father. There was a suitcase packed, a route planned, even a playlist composed on Rachel’s Ipod. She was so very organised, quite the opposite of her husband, who spent his life craving order and even now could not wholeheartedly concentrate because of the awkward angle Edwards had placed his laptop at on his desk, but who did not know where to start. He knew it was a fault; the need to have the coffee table in the living room cleared of all debris or disruptions to his field of vision, the overpowering urge to move that coke bottle on the basis that it would obscure his view of the TV should he choose to lie down, even when he wasn’t planning on it, and he knew that even when it was all done there would be no peace and he still wouldn’t settle. Something always had to be wrong and if he didn’t know what it was, it was just waiting to ambush him.

  “When are you coming home?” she asked.

  “Don’t know darlin,” he replied, for some reason resenting the question like it was just another demand being made on him. He knew deep down it was an invitation. It was her way of telling him she missed him and loved him and that even after all these years he was still the person she always wanted to spend more time with. He knew it was far more than just a nag. “Maybe another hour or two.”

  “That’s not really what I meant,” she said, almost absent minded.

  “Then what did you mean?” he asked, eyeing a takeaway menu. Perhaps he could make it up to her, swing by the Guru Balti on the way home.

  Home. It seemed a long time since he’d been there. He pushed the thought to the back of his mind. He mustn’t go there.

  “Nothing,” she replied, meaning anything but.

  “Ok,” was all he could come up with in response, not really wanting to get into an argument right then.

  “No,” she replied, as if it had been a question, before telling him she would see him when she saw him.

  Might take more than a Guru Balti, he thought as the phone clicked back on the receiver. He leaned back again, looking for a distraction once more.

  Edwards woke him from his trance as he stumbled sweating and snuffling through the door, closely followed by Black and Wilson, whom he’d heard Campbell had renamed Decker, partly because of the obvious fit with her partner’s name but partly because she looked like she could throw a mean right hook.

  “Team run,” Edwards declared, forcing Burke to conclude that he didn’t rate his detection skills highly as he surveyed them all with their lycra compression gear, MP3 player arm bands and red faces.

  Burke nodded to this all the same, unable or unwilling to say anything in return. They were on his turf, in his man cave and he resented the interruption.

  “Thought we’d get some cardio in before heading to the billet,” Edwards added, seemingly feeling this wasn’t obvious either.

  Burke felt the unmistakeable sensation of a penny dropping inside his head.

  Edwards jumped as a phone rang on his arm, deafening him through the adjoining headphones. He tapped the microphone attached, barked his name at whoever was on the other end and fell into a silence for the next few seconds. His face sank as though someone had let the air out of it and then, when all the animation had left it, his lower lip slowly began to curl. “Ok,” was all he said in the end, leaving the other three in the room wondering awkwardly if the call was over.

  “Everything ok?” Burke finally asked, hoping on some level that everything was far from ok and knowing deep down that it was childish.

  “We’re having to let him go,” he answered in a monotone.

  His two minions made a great show of being disappointed, mass outpourings of breath being their initial method of communicating this, followed by the old shake your head and look at the floor when you don’t want to look someone in the eye technique. He particularly loved that old chestnut.

  “How?” Burke asked, somewhat perplexed himself, wondering at the greatest effort at escape since Houdini or possibly The Scarlett Pimpernel.

  Edwards rubbed his eyes and let out a big sigh. “It seems none of the witnesses saw anything. All of them have checked out of hospital and the CCTV in the bar seems to have been corrupted in some way. There’s nothing on the disk it’s stored on.”

  “Magnet?” Burke suggested automatically.

  “Cold hard currency more like,” Edwards snapped. “And now we’re going to have to let him go due to a lack of any evidence whatsoever. I don’t suppose we’ve got anything to link him to the murders?”

  “Nothing so far,” Burke replied, wanting to add “sir,” bristling somewhat at the fact that Edwards had used the word “we,” implying that this was somehow his investigation, which, all things being equal, it probably was but he was damned if he was going to have it underlined to him by a man wearing tights, even if they did have a Nike swoosh on them. “We were going to check the CCTV in town and cross reference it with the drop off zone at the airport, see if we could find out what kind of vehicle he left in and attempt to track it, see where he was dropped off, assuming he didn’t hire a car. It seems unlikely he’d be involved in a revenge execution personally, although we don’t fully know the depth of his connection to Petrovsky. Would he have got his hands dirty?”

  “He might have, if it was an act of revenge,” Black suggested. “Obviously we were letting you run with the whole getting him to reveal his deepest darkest secrets by using an attempted murder rap as leverage plan.”

  Burke resisted the urge to point out that this was neither his plan nor something he personally attempted. This must be how it worked around Edwards, palm the blame off onto someone else if results were not forthcoming. Interesting department culture. No matter. The interview tapes confirmed the contrary.

  “And it might have worked if he wasn’t so connected to everything,” Edwards snapped, bringing Black to heel.

  “I thought he was just an interloping drug dealer,” Burke replied.

  Edwards scoffed. “If only. This guy’s a one stop crime shop. He’s into things the rest of the criminal fraternity haven’t even thought of yet. He’s running drugs, arms, counterfeit fags and booze. He’s trafficking girls from most of Eastern Europe with the promise of the western life and the end result that they wind up working it off in one of his knocking shops. He’s got waiters and shop assistants, employees in airlines and banks, anyone with access to cards getting your details and feeding them back to his cyber bods. He’ll sell you anything you like at a knock down rate, which in this harsh economic climate goes down a storm. He’s got contacts in the mother country who get him access to IP addresses in deepest darkest Siberia so he can bring down whatever the hell he likes and the Ruskies just say nothing because he knows who to pay to turn a blind eye. You name it, he’s into it and that’s fine, but not on my turf. Not on my watch.”

  Burke was torn between rising irritation and confusion at the lack of communication regarding the size of Edwards’ operation and the hilarity of his last statement. It reminded him of Tony Blair trying to sound Churchillian. “Nice to be kept in the loop.”

  “Need to know basis,” Edwards replied, “but yes, there’s a lot more going on than you know.

  “I’m sure, but with all of this going on there can only be more opportunities to catch him at it.”

  “Of course, but we have a tight window of opportunity. How long before he leaves the country? He’s only here for a finite time. We’ve got to make something stick but I’m fucked if I know what.”

  “You must know something,” Burke probed.

  “I know dealers connected to him have got hold of a large amount of pure coke from somewhere, really pure stuff, but no one knows where the hell it’s coming from. You’d expect to see an increased volume stopped at border controls at least. The coastguard, or customs or the ports units should be expected to pick it up but everything’s been very quiet of late. Surprisingly so.”

  “And you haven’t picked up anything from the competition say, if as the theory goes, they’re i
nvolved in some kind of chemical arms race.”

  “No sign of that either.”

  “Could they be in this together, using the same supply chain maybe?”

  “Unlikely,” Edwards replied with a patronising grin, “but say that were the case, it’s too big an operation and there would conceivably be too many people involved to not have someone caught along the way. It only takes someone using a yacht too many times on the same route to cause suspicion.”

  “Maybe the competition are trying to corner the market with other things, if Andreyevich is spreading himself too thinly. Might create a gap in the market they might want to shoehorn themselves into.”

  “Perhaps.”

  Burke said nothing more, letting the thought hang in the air for a few seconds.

  “There was one episode, a few years back,” Edwards began, causing the beginnings of a smile to form at the corners of Burke’s lips. “Some yardies took it upon themselves to try and kick off a bit of a switch selling scheme.”

  29

  Giles was not used to being ordered around like this. His superiors at the firm had always been respectful, to the lawyers at any rate. Those in polite society at least regarded professionals as having some kind of social standing, even in this dire age of waning formality, where everyone was required to address one another by first name only, lest anyone be allowed to get on in the world and be respected for it.

  His client had said very little, made no attempt at thanking him for services rendered and the accompanying risk to the integrity of his bollocks which had been placed well and truly on the line. A substantial Christmas bonus was in order. He was being well rewarded for this, naturally. That was everything to these new money types. They hadn’t had time to acquire the necessary tastes or interests to spend it properly. He would concede that Andreyevich knew how to travel though. Not for him the driving three hours or catching the three trains and bus it would take to get to their final destination.

  He’d wanted to head back to the flat in Morningside, the place he was now starting to think of as a second home. He wanted to climb into the shower and wash away the scummy residue the day’s events seemed to have left on him and then down half a bottle of Remy Martin and fall into a comatose state.

  There had been no discussion on the subject. His presence was mandatory as far as the client was concerned. End of story. He’d been shown to the car outside the cop shop in Gayfield Square and driven to the airfield at high speed. He hadn’t felt the time to protest present itself. There was a time and a place to raise certain objections with clients, draw a line now and again but he was starting to doubt that was the case here. No one said no to Victor.

  They sat at some kind of a cruising height in the Cessna now, four of the six seats filled by himself, his client and two heavies who looked like they meant business but said very little, certainly nothing to contradict the vibe their collective demeanour gave off. For his part, Andreyevich seemed to stick with a similar theme. He may have been like this all the time. How would Giles know after all? He’d only just met the man. Perhaps all of this; the meting out of casual brutal violence to unsuspecting members of the public, followed by bribery of witnesses, the hacking into Lothian and Borders Police servers to tamper with evidence and locate those witnesses and the owners of the premises, finding an employee willing to assist in the destruction of all CCTV footage and then ensuring the correct pressure was exerted at the correct level to secure his timely release after due consideration of all these facts, then flying off with what could only realistically be described as mercenaries to some God forsaken outpost to do God knew what that required the services of a frankly inexperienced lawyer, maybe all this was just mundane to him. Maybe this was just another day at the office.

  At least the weather wasn’t as extreme as it had been on the way up. Clear skies it seemed, and so far no turbulence. How often did you get to fly like this?

  He was just asking considering that when finally the client turned to him with a look of contemplation. “So maybe now you know quite a lot,” he said with a sigh.

  ********************

  Edwards had properly thrown the rattle out and made for the nearest exit. His two minions had hung around for a short time, seemingly none too sure what to do with themselves and probably more than a little embarrassed for their boss, like he was a slightly tipsy parent or a babbling older relative whose mental capacity they were starting to doubt. But then it seemed fitting, dressed as they were like overly preening teenagers most of the time.

  “Something funny sir?” Wilson asked, before looking down, probably realising again that she was admonishing a senior officer.

  “Nothing really,” he replied, enjoying her discomfort.

  Sarah Armstrong worked for “a very particular department in Whitehall” she had said, with a knowing grin.

  She could have been late forties, given her unhurried confidence, but he wouldn’t have put money on it. Burke considered himself a reasonable judge of character but all that went out the window when dealing with certain types of people, specifically the type that specialised in knowing all and telling nothing. This made her all the more intriguing.

  “What can I do for you?” he asked, with the sense of trepidation you got from dealing with someone you knew could have you in a body bag with a phone call, legally, without having to bury you in the woods or explain themselves to the likes of him.

  “I’d say in this case Detective Inspector, it’s more a case of what I can do for you.”

  “Really?” he asked, wondering if he looked like he needed put down.

  “Really,” she confirmed. “And don’t look so nervous. I’m not planning on having you fitted for concrete boots or anything.

  “The thought hadn’t entered my head.”

  She smiled her knowing smile once more and continued. “What do you know of Leon Williams?”

  He let this sink in for a second, taking time to respond. How did GCHQ, MI5 or whoever else know what they were investigating?

  “Not a great deal,” he said finally, deciding there wasn’t much to give away. “He is the subject of an ongoing murder investigation, given the fact he has a spot in our city morgue.”

  “Quite, but what do you actually know about him?”

  “I’m not sure where this is going. What is it you want to know? Is there a reason you’re investigating him?”

  “In a sense yes,” she replied. She was probably a good poker player, Burke decided.

  “In all honesty we don’t know a hell of a lot,” he admitted. “Ex-marine commando, injured in Afghanistan, seemingly got mixed up with the wrong people after he left the forces and wound up here. We’re not sure what he got mixed up in but it looks like some kind of drug war.”

  The spook nodded slowly as he spoke and Burke knew he wasn’t telling her anything new.

  “You’re right of course, in a sense. He did get mixed up with the wrong people,” she said with a sigh. “He was one of ours.”

  He eventually summoned the energy to take a trip out into the cold. He took a skulking DC Jones who had been hanging around his peripheral vision since this afternoons visitor had presented herself, presumably wanting to know the script. She managed to skirt around the subject, all the way from Gayfield Square to Karpov’s palatial home in Bruntsfield. He wasn’t biting. She’d have to try harder than that.

  The headlights shone on the dark hulk of a house now making it look as if it had been abandoned for years, aside from the scene of crime notices which were too bright to be anything but modern. They entered via the front door, disabling the alarm system and fumbling for the lights in the hallway. The place still reeked of carnage

  Something moved to his left. He turned to see a figure emerge from the gloom before it knocked him sideways. They burst through the front door as he turned trying to follow but lost his footing. A crashing sound behind told him there was a second intruder. He turned again to see another figure in black run towards
him. Jones tried to get in the way but only managed a glance blow to the side of the runner. The man let out a growl as he ran for Burke who stood his ground knowing he had a weight advantage. His heart lurched as he saw something glint in the black gloved hand. He held on for a second more before shifting his weight sideways as the man threw himself forwards, top heavy, swinging the blade. The knife caught his left hand as it moved outwards to counter the side-step and he let out a yelp as he swung the rest of his body back round, catching his assailant with a well-placed blow to the side of the head sending him staggering headfirst into the doorframe. The man’s head made a sickening thump before his body gave way beneath, collapsing into a tangled heap on the floor. He felt the sting in his hand and he was only prevented from aiming an angry kick at the slumped would be ninja by Jones, who got in the way in her efforts to get the bastard cuffed.

  Once he was suitably restrained, they removed the balaclava from his head to reveal the face of what could not have been more than a teenager.

  ********************

  Andy woke again, hearing the commotion outside. Had another plane landed? He’d heard trucks come and go; feed trucks, oil tankers, the kind of thing that wouldn’t normally cause him to bat an eyelid down here but now everything seemed to have a double meaning. Every movement, noise, flicker of disrupted light through the slatted wall, it all seemed like a sign of something, and all of it gave cause for alarm.

  His life was now an endless night punctuated by a succession of shocks and starts. He was no longer sure what he’d dreamt and what was real at points.