Say You're Sorry: A Gripping Crime Thriller (A DCI Campbell McKenzie Detective Conspiracy Thriller No 1)

by IAN C. P. IRVINE

  Anand was not without skills. In England, he had studied Computer Science and in his spare time between his studies, his hobby had been to hack into other people's computer networks. He knew a lot about computers and in England he would have been able to find a thousand jobs in IT, anywhere, but not here where his family lived. Here in the sprawling poverty stricken suburbs there was nothing. If he were to get a job in the city in IT, he would have to spend three hours travelling to work in the morning, and then another three home in the evening. There was nothing he wanted more than to find a job where his skills could be used, and he could continue to learn. But his family would not move and finding somewhere else to live in the centre of the city was not possible; they were poor, and Anand would never be able to save up enough money. He was shackled to a life without promise, and one which he hated, by his duty to his family.

  So, although it seemed to be of no use, he was an expert at networking and his hobby was exploring the cyber world. At night time, when the rest of the family was asleep, he would often pull out his laptop and spend hours surfing the web, and talking to others in chat rooms and user groups. They gave him a link to another world that he was no longer physically part of, but in which he was actually quite well respected.

  When Anand was growing up, when he was in his early teens, he had been precocious. He had taught himself everything he could about computers, and at night time, while others watched TV, he was playing with the websites of companies, trying to find a way to hack into them, and rewrite the words on their web pages. In the old days, kids in England who were having fun and rebelling against the older generation might have thrown stones through windows, or painted graffiti on walls. Anand always felt that he was doing nothing more than that: painting the modern equivalent of graffiti on the websites of large companies who should have known better than to have such poor network security that a spotty kid from India could hack his way in without being stopped. He never really felt guilty about it. He was just a kid.

  As he grew older, defacing websites started to get boring. In search of new kicks, he started hanging out online with groups of like-minded hackers who were taking a stance against the evil corporations of the world by hacking into their networks. At first, it was all about just belonging to the virtual group of hackers, virtual because they only ever met on line and knew each other only by their avatar nicknames. They would hack a site, then boast to the others in the group about what they had achieved. They encouraged and goaded each other on to new successes, each hacker jealous of the successes of the other, and determined to prove themselves just as good if not better than their online friends.

  At first, they did no real harm to anyone they targeted. They got their kicks from overcoming a company's network defences and finding out what they could see and do on a network, and what network privileges they could award themselves. They would pride themselves in hacking in, having a look around, and leaving before they were found out. However, as they got better at doing it, the rush they got from knowing themselves that they had been in a network and had left undetected began to diminish. They started to show off, the hackers leaving signs, pointing to their previous presence on a system and announcing their successes to the IT managers in a firm. Some began to steal information from networks and send it to others, or posting it in user forums, boasting of their successes. As the years passed, and their cyber skills increased, the attacks they launched got progressively more damaging to the companies they targeted. Some of the hackers began to affiliate themselves with political causes, while others realised that it was possible to use their cyber skills to make large amounts of money with practically no chance of ever being caught. According to the law, technically it was called fraud or theft, and it was wrong…but the problem was that for those who had the skills to do it, it was so simple! A new generation of high-tech criminals was born, skilfully hacking into bank accounts and ‘freeing’/redirecting money online from one bank account to another - theirs -, or stealing company or government secrets and selling or sharing them with anyone who might be interested, including those who may pose a threat to national security.

  For a while, Anand had been swept along with the tide. He found it exciting and loved the admiration and respect he got from other fellow hackers. However, perhaps unlike others in the hacking community, he came from a loving, caring and law-abiding family. Coupled with his faith, which taught him clearly the difference between right and wrong, Anand had started to become more and more uncomfortable with some of the acts that he and his peers were committing. Anand worried not only about breaking the law, but also about what his father would say to him if he found out.

  Anand loved computers. He loved to hack. But he didn’t want to cross that line that some other hackers had, and from which there seemed to be no simple return. Instead, he determined that he would become a cyber expert, and applied for and was granted a place at university to study Computer Science. Supported and encouraged by his family, he had moved to Birmingham and taken up his studies.

  For almost two years he had studied and learned everything he could about computing, computers and the cyber world. He had dreamed of going to live in London or California and to be a part of a start-up that built the first thinking robots.

  Anand was going to change the world!

  For a long time, it seemed that his plan might come true. He only had a year to go and he was one of the best on his course. Then one day, his father in India had dropped down dead.

  Almost overnight, his world was destroyed.

  Within a month, he was back in India, his second year exams not taken, and his dreams shattered.

  Every morning he now woke up to the reality of his new life: their tiny, squalid apartment and a family to feed that depended upon him for their existence. He longed to escape, to run back to Birmingham, to live the dream again. His mind told him to go, now, soon, while he still could; his heart however, said ‘no’.

  That same heart, which now said ‘no’ once again.

  No, to turning a blind eye while Swiss Insurance continued to destroy the lives of those who had paid for protection. No, to turning away from those who needed help. And no to allowing Mr Stuart to be their latest victim.

  Lying on the floor on his apartment, he pulled back the cover from over his face, and smiled.

  Anand Mhasalkar had a plan.

  The path to atonement would be a long walk, but tomorrow Anand was going to take the first step.

  -------------------------

  St Leonards Police Station,

  Edinburgh

  Monday

  5.15 p.m. G.M.T.

  Operations Room, Basement

  There was a buzz in the air, which Campbell felt the moment he stepped foot in the operations room.

  Until further notice, the team assigned to Operation Queens were to meet twice a day for briefings, giving everyone the opportunity to learn and quickly respond to anything that any other member of the team found out.

  In murder cases like these, the first few weeks were critical. In the early stages of an investigation, when the tracks of any crime were still fresh, it was possible for those involved on a case to meet and pull together individual clues that quite rapidly built together to form a single intelligence picture.

  It was quite common for cases to be solved during a briefing when an operations team would share a 'Eureka' moment, which would be followed hours later by an arrest.

  McKenzie sensed, and hoped, that with luck, they were just about to experience one of those times.

  "Good evening everyone. Who wants to go first? I can see a few smiles on faces, so I'm hoping you've got some good news to share? Okay, DC Roberts, you can lead off..."

  A tall man with cauliflower ears and a broken nose, probably a forward in a rugby team somewhere, stood up and opened his notebook, although he spoke without reference to his notes.

  "I just had a very interesting conversation with one of the boys from the Digital Fo
rensics squad in Fettes Avenue. I'd previously asked them to look at the phone records of Keith Urqhart, and following yesterday morning's meeting, I asked them to check the phone records of Ivor Petrovsky and see if there was anything interesting that might be worth some attention. We obviously needed a warrant for Urqhart, which we got, but as you might expect, it turns out that Petrovsky is already a subject of interest under an existing warrant, which regularly gets renewed. At first pass, there was nothing particularly interesting about Urqhart's phone records. He has several phones, and he's made lots of calls, and we're busy calling the various numbers we have in his records covering the past few months to see if we can make any interesting connections, but that will take some more time yet. So far some of the numbers have turned out to belong to a few known names connected with the Edinburgh drug scene, but we can't tell yet if they were professional contacts, or private ones. My suspicion is that a few of the calls made on his private phone will turn out to be illegal activity, and we'll get some leads from them." DC Roberts took a deep breath, and looked around the room quickly, before delivering the rest of his news.

  "The good news is that the Digital Forensics guys have just called back to say that four days before the death of Urqhart, Petrovsky called one of Urqhart's private phones directly from his private mobile phone at twenty minutes after one in the morning. It only rang twice, then Petrovsky immediately hung up. However, the phone records on Urqhart's phone, the one that Petrovsky had just called, showed that two minutes after Petrovsky had dialled that number from his private phone, Urqhart received another call. It was late, so two phone calls in quick succession at that time to the same phone are of interest, particularly when the first came from Petrovsky. Incidentally, Urqhart's phone records from his service provider don't show the first missed call, because it was not answered. But Petrovsky's does, because it's part of the records the Fettes boys get from the Lawful Intercept warrant, where they record the data directly themselves using electronic probes on the phone network. However, the second call does show up on the same phone of Urqhart, and from that we can get the number which called him. And this is the good part... it's another of Petrovsky's phones, but one which he rarely uses."

  A few smiles appeared on the faces of those in the Operation's Room.

  "So, the scenario is likely this: it's late. Petrovsky is tired and he makes a mistake. He calls Urqhart directly on his own main private phone, quickly realises his mistake and then hangs up. He then picks up another phone, this time one which he only uses for making dodgy calls to people who are in some way involved with him in something probably illegal, and he calls Urqhart again. Urqhart picks up. They speak for ten minutes."

  "Do you know what they talked about?" Campbell asked, voicing the question everyone had on their lips.

  "No, not yet. But give me twenty-four hours and we will. Petrovsky is under an LI warrant signed by the Home Secretary. All his calls are being recorded. All the Fettes boys have to do now is to conduct a quick search of the archives, find the call that was made and listen to the recording. There's a bit of paperwork involved, but not much. With any luck we'll have the recording tomorrow."

  "Brilliant!" McKenzie clapped his hands together. "So, we now have a direct connection between Petrovsky and Urqhart, a serving police officer, recorded at a very unusual hour, and only days before he was murdered. I can't wait to hear the conversation. Excellent work, Roberts. Well done. You come see me the moment you have the voice print, okay?"

  "Yes, sir, I will." Roberts nodded.

  "Good. And that gives us a nice link into the next piece of news, which DI Wessex will tell us about. Wessex?"

  Wessex stood up, and immediately drew everyone's attention, not all of which was on a totally professional basis.

  "As discussed yesterday, we sent some hairs to the lab for analysis which we think came from Ivor Petrovsky's dog. Our hope was that they would match the DNA of the dog hair found stuck to Urqhart's skin by the adhesive from the duct tape that was used to bind his arms, legs and jaw. And..." her eyes twinkled in the light as she glanced around the room, perhaps dragging out the moment a little too theatrically, "... And we were right. There was a perfect match!"

  Everyone exhaled at once. Two officers banged their hands on the desks they were sitting at.

  So, Campbell had been right. This was one of those special meetings.

  The rest of the briefing didn't yield anything quite so interesting, and soon the meeting was ending.

  "Okay, listen up," Campbell dived in. "It's all good work. Thank you! So, in summary, so far today we've just established a direct link between Petrovsky and Urqhart days before he was murdered. In addition, we've just recorded evidence that links Petrovsky's dog directly to the deceased. Obviously, it is now highly likely that Urqhart was tied up and bound in the presence of the dog, or somewhere where the dog frequents. We also have large amounts of cash going into Urqhart's bank accounts, probably with a drugs connection of some sort. And we all know Petrovsky is one of the biggest drug dealers this side of Moscow. We also have independent reports that Petrovsky was buying drugs from Urqhart, which links them as in business together."

  "Is it enough?" Wessex asked.

  "It's certainly enough for us to make an arrest. But I suggest we hold off for now. I think we need to talk to the Procurator Fiscal and get his opinion. Also, this time tomorrow we'll hopefully have the content of the voice conversation. Odds are that it will be something good."

  "In the meantime, do we arrest the dog?" Wessex asked.

  Several people laughed, and Campbell smiled.

  "Not yet. But I've already got a warrant to have it taken into custody, and tonight I'm going to prepare an arrest warrant for Petrovsky. With any luck, by this time tomorrow, we'll have him locked up. Not quite job done, because we still need a motive, and as many more details as possible. But it's looking good. Very good indeed."

  As the police officers began to file out of the operations room, Wessex caught McKenzie staring at the white board and the notes that now covered it. She recognised the look on his face.

  "Everything okay? It's been a good day, hasn't it?"

  "Yes. Absolutely."

  "So, what's up?" she asked.

  "I don't know. Something, but I don't know what. Yet."

  "You really thought it was McNunn, didn't you?"

  Campbell turned to her and looked her straight in the eye, his expression quite serious.

  "Yes, I did." Then his face softened, "But, hey, you can't be right all the time, can you?" he joked, very unconvincingly as he shrugged and eased himself out of the room before her, leaving her to examine the white-board alone in his absence.

  She knew McKenzie very well.

  The problem was, that she knew that McKenzie was seldom, if ever wrong.

  She knew then that if McKenzie was going to be convinced of Petrovsky's guilt, she needed to produce some more evidence.

  What evidence, she didn't know.

  But she would find it.

  With a little help.

  Chapter 18

  Andheri

  Near Mumbai, Maharashtra

  India

  Monday

  8.00 a.m. India Standard Time (IST)

  Anand had slept very little the night before. When he did manage to finally fall asleep, his dreams were vivid, and disturbing. He dreamt he was in Scotland, in a football stadium, surrounded by thousands of fellow co-workers from Swiss Insurance. They were all working on their computers and laughing loudly at the misery of those they were talking to on their phones.

  A man walked on to the football pitch, - a man whom Anand immediately recognised to be Jonathan Stuart even though he had never met him - and a deathly silence fell on the stadium. Then one by one, just as the man reached the centre of the pitch, all the Swiss Insurance employees rose to their feet, and started humming the same note loudly.

  The man fell to the ground, clutching his chest, and rolled onto his back.


  Crying out in pain, the man shouted loudly 'Say you're sorry! Just say you're sorry!'

  All the employees in the stands then started throwing stones at Jonathan, which piled up on top of him, and quickly buried him.

  Anand heard the voice of his manager shouting, "Well done, everyone, ... now get back to the phones!"

  Anand had woken in a cold sweat.

  Shaking.

  It had taken a while for the remnants of the dream to disperse from his head, and even when he had washed, dressed and set off for work, he could still experience the dream.

  The feeling it left with him pervaded his thoughts for the rest of the day, a living nightmare that went on and on.

  Anand struggled to concentrate throughout the day.

  He worked shifts, sometimes coming in the morning to support other English speaking countries in other time zones, many of which were east of India, and were ahead of their time zone.

  Other days, he started only when the UK came online, and worked until the early evening. On those days, he would rely upon his siblings making their own evening meal and getting themselves ready for bed. He would arrive home late, check on the family and then spend several hours surfing the web or hacking his way around networks or websites around the world.

  Today was one of the early shifts, and he spent the whole day wondering about one thing, and one thing only: was Jonathan Stuart dead?

  How would he find out?

  He tried calling his home number numerous times, and even looked up the names of several hospitals in the Edinburgh area, and was contemplating calling them and pretending to be a relative. Ultimately however, he didn't.

  Hopefully one day soon, Jonathan would answer the phone at home, and everything would be okay.

  It was only thanks to the rigorous training that Anand had previously mastered that he managed to get through the day, answering the phones and talking to customers on auto-pilot. Although today, unlike ever before, he genuinely did try to be friendly, and also tried his best to be useful, giving advice and words of wisdom to the callers whenever he could.