Over two hundred years old, the prison housed around six hundred inmates, many of whom were sex offenders. A dark coloured Kentish ragstone brick wall surrounded the prison buildings, obscuring them from public view.
Despite the numerous awards the inmates had won for their gardening efforts, Kay felt repulsed at the undue attention it gave the prison. As far she was concerned, they were there as punishment, and not for recreation, and she didn’t believe any of them could be rehabilitated back into society.
She battened down her thoughts as the car drew to a standstill at the gatehouse, and checked the notes she’d printed out when she’d first suggested they speak with Bob Rogers.
The prison comprised four residential buildings for inmates, however for his own safety Bob Rogers had been sent to the segregation unit.
Kay snorted at the irony.
‘Did you say something?’
‘No, guv. Reading the notes, that’s all.’
Sharp grunted a reply, and wound down his window as a guard approached.
‘You’ll need to move your car over.’
‘What?’
The guard jerked a thumb over his shoulder. ‘Ambulance is on its way out. You’re blocking the way.’
Sharp swore under his breath, shoved the car into reverse and swung his arm over the back of Kay’s seat as he manoeuvred the vehicle back onto the narrow street that ran in a parallel line to the prison walls. Terraced houses faced the prison, and parked cars lined the road.
‘Can’t see a bloody thing,’ he muttered as he craned his neck.
Kay twisted in her seat. ‘Clear.’
Sharp reversed the car into the road, and then sat quietly fuming while he drummed his fingers on the steering wheel.
Kay straightened as an ambulance shot through the gates and tore down the street beyond their position, its siren blaring and lights ablaze.
‘That doesn’t look good,’ she said.
Sharp cranked the car into first gear. ‘I’ve got a bad feeling about this, too.’
Once through the gates, the guard now pacified that the ambulance had been able to leave swiftly, Sharp swung the car into a space and they made their way to the entrance to the prison.
A small crowd had convened at the next set of gates, and Kay recognised a mid-set man amongst them as the governor.
He didn’t look like he was having a good day.
He raised his eyes from the man he’d been deep in conversation with – a guard with blood down the front of his shirt – and waved them over.
‘Go and get cleaned up, Perkins. A job well done, by the way. You did all you could.’
Kay watched the prison guard disappear into a building off to the left, then turned her attention back to the governor.
‘Mr Bagley,’ she said, shaking his hand after Sharp.
‘Detectives.’ He ran a hand over his tie and smoothed it down, an almost unconscious movement as his eyes tracked the forecourt.
‘What happened?’ said Sharp.
‘Rogers was set upon by a man armed with a screwdriver. Stab wounds to the chest and abdomen.’ He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. ‘Perkins was first on scene with a colleague of his. They restrained the attacker, and then Perkins did his best to stabilise Rogers while we waited for the ambulance.’
‘How bad is it?’
The governor’s eyes looked troubled. ‘Bad, I’m afraid. The ambulance took over twenty minutes to get here – school traffic, you see. By the time they arrived, Rogers had already lost a lot of blood.’
‘What about his attacker?’ said Kay.
The man shook his head. ‘He’s refusing to talk. There’ll be a full investigation, obviously.’
Sharp pursed his lips. ‘A shame we couldn’t get an appointment to speak with him sooner.’
Bagley’s brow furrowed. ‘Detective Inspector, my team’s first priority is the wellbeing of our prisoners. We can’t upset the whole prison routine simply because you decide you want to speak to one of them. Arrangements have to be made, and the prisoner informed of your wishes.’
Sharp held up his hands. ‘Sorry. Frustrating, that’s all.’
Bagley nodded. ‘Understood.’
‘Who else knew we were planning to speak to Rogers?’ said Kay.
‘Myself and half a dozen members of staff,’ said Bagley. ‘Plus Rogers, of course, and whoever he might’ve told.’
Kay glanced down as her bag started to vibrate, a moment before her phone began to ring.
‘Excuse me,’ she said. ‘I need to take this.’
She took a few paces away from Sharp and Bagley, then answered. ‘What’s up, Barnes?’
‘We just received a call from the hospital,’ said the older detective, his voice resigned. ‘Bob Rogers didn’t make it. Dead on arrival.’
‘Shit,’ Kay murmured, then, ‘thanks.’
Ending the call, she made her way back to the two men and passed on the news.
‘I can’t say I’m surprised,’ said Bagley. ‘He wasn’t in a good way when he left here.’
Sharp sighed, and held out his hand to the governor. ‘Let us know what you manage to find out. I’ll keep in touch, and if our investigation throws any light on why this happened, I’ll let you know.’
‘Likewise,’ said Bagley.
Kay followed Sharp back to the car, both of them lost in thought until they reached the vehicle.
‘Demiri found out, didn’t he?’ she said.
‘Or, he pre-empted us.’
‘Tidying up loose ends, you think?’
Sharp placed his hands on the top of the car and turned his head to the prison entrance behind them. ‘That’s what worries me, Hunter. What if he takes this boatload of people and runs? Sets up somewhere else? We’ll have lost every advantage we had.’
Kay grimaced. She didn’t say it out loud, but right now she couldn’t recall one single advantage they’d had in the first place.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Kay adjusted the volume on her headphones before hitting the “play” button on the video once more.
On her computer screen the recorded video of Paul Robinson, the last council worker to visit the smallholding at Thurnham, was playing; Gavin and Carys sat opposite the man in an interview room as he told them about his last visit.
‘It was nothing, really,’ he said, his voice sounding reedy over the recording equipment. ‘One of the property owners further up the lane made a complaint about the number of rubbish bags left outside the property – worried about rats, she said.’
‘What happened when you got there?’ said Carys.
‘There was no-one in, so I made arrangements for the bags to be picked up on the next rubbish collection the following Monday, and issued a notice to the tenant to be sure to keep the place tidy and free from vermin.’
‘Isn’t it unusual to have properties like this on your books?’
The man shrugged. ‘Not really. Some of the buildings like this used to belong to different departments for different reasons over the years. That house used to belong to the environmental department, for instance. As the council has had to reduce its budgets in different areas over the years, the buildings have been rented out. Brings in an income, you see.’
‘What about references for the tenants of this one, or forwarding addresses?’ said Gavin.
Robinson leaned back in his chair, and held up his hands. ‘For some reason, the last record we’ve got for that place is for an older woman by the name of Mrs Boyston. I did some checking before I came here. It seems that, ah, she died fourteen months ago.’
‘Fourteen months ago?’ said Carys.
‘We’re understaffed, like I said. Budget cuts. Look, the rent kept being paid on time, so the council had no reason to question the tenancy.’
‘But surely the death certificate would have been sent to you?’
‘It seems to have been mislaid.’
Kay groaned, and pulled her headphones from her ears, then reac
hed out and stopped the recording.
She logged out of the system, switched off her computer and swung her bag over her shoulder.
The incident room had emptied half an hour ago, a subdued air hanging amongst the team as the news of Bob Rogers’ death had reached them.
Despite the temptation to grab a takeaway on the way home for convenience, she changed her mind when she realised the guinea pigs had been eating a healthier diet than her in Adam’s absence from the house.
Twenty minutes later, she pulled into her driveway, determined to use up the bag of salad in the refrigerator before it started to sprout a whole new species, and consoled herself with the fact that at least she had at least two glasses of white burgundy left in a bottle to wash it down with.
After feeding Bonnie and Clyde and then herself, she sat at the kitchen worktop, a manila file open at her elbow filled with her own notes about the investigation while she drew a series of linking circles, all connected to one name.
Jozef Demiri.
She dropped the pen and took a sip of wine. Everything pointed to Demiri retreating from his business ventures, perhaps even from the southern coast of England, and she simply couldn’t afford to let him escape.
Her thoughts returned to Harrison and O’Reilly.
Would Harrison let her have a chance to be the one to arrest Demiri when the time came, or would he seize the opportunity for himself? Would he ensure O’Reilly was the one to accompany him rather than see anyone from Sharp’s team take the credit?
She set down her wine glass, determined that whatever happened politically between her two senior officers, she’d be present to see the Albanian people smuggler’s face when he was charged with the murder of Katya and the other victims.
Her mobile vibrated on the worktop a second before it started to ring, and she reached across for it, recognising her sister’s phone number.
‘Hi, Abby.’
‘Hang on.’
Kay rolled her eyes as her sister attempted to cover the phone before her muffled voice reached her ears, berating the eldest of her two toddlers and then returning, breathless.
‘Honestly, those two. I swear I’m going to get an egg timer set up when they’re playing so they share the toys fairly.’
‘Like Mum did with us, you mean?’
‘Worked, didn’t it?’
They both laughed at the memory.
‘I hadn’t heard from you for a while. Everything okay?’ said Abby.
After months of silence, Kay had finally confided in her family about the miscarriage triggered by the Professional Standards investigation she’d been subjected to.
Her work colleagues had found out by accident; a rumour spread around the police station thanks to a series of listening devices placed in her house. Kay suspected Jozef Demiri – or at least one of his lackeys – of the handiwork and subsequent tip-off to try to fracture the team around her, but she still had no proof and, rather than have them find out by other means like her colleagues, she’d taken the decision to tell her family one summer afternoon she and Adam had been at her parents’ house for a barbeque.
It hadn’t gone down well.
‘You there?’
‘Sorry.’ Kay took another sip of wine. ‘I’m fine. Busy at work, as usual. Adam’s up in Aberdeen at a conference all week. How are things with you?’
She smiled as her sister carried on about Emily’s antics at her daily play group, and then tuned out as the topic turned to the baby, Charlotte, and the perils of potty training.
‘Aren’t you going to ask how Mum is?’
‘Did she ask after me?’
Kay’s mother had been furious when she’d finally been told about Kay’s miscarriage – both at being kept in the dark about the news, but also at Kay for taking her career so seriously that she’d endangered the life of her grandchild.
Shocked at her mother’s selfishness, and disappointed at herself for not realising that her mother’s reaction had been predictable given her previous lack of support for whatever Kay did with her life, Kay had stormed from the house leaving Adam to make their excuses for leaving while she fumed in the car.
Her father had been devastated.
He’d phoned the following Tuesday morning, their usual time to chat while her mother was out of the house, and both of them had ended the call in tears.
She hadn’t spoken to her mother since the barbeque.
‘No, she didn’t ask after you.’
Kay sighed. ‘Sorry you got dragged into this. I didn’t mean for it to happen.’
She could almost hear the shrug at the end of the phone.
‘S’okay. She’ll come around.’
‘Eventually.’
They both said the word at the same time, and Abby managed a small laugh.
‘I’ve got to go, sis. Big day tomorrow,’ said Kay.
‘Okay. Love you.’
‘Love you, too.’
Kay ended the call, slid the phone across the worktop, and picked up the photograph showing her quarry leaving his offices some six months before.
‘I’d rather take on you any day compared to my family, Demiri.’
Chapter Thirty-Five
‘Settle down.’
Harrison stalked to the front of the incident room, and paced in front of the whiteboard while Kay and her colleagues stopped talking and faced the detective chief inspector.
Sharp leaned against a desk to one side of the room, his eyes sweeping over the assembled uniformed officers and detectives as they found seats or somewhere else to perch and a silence descended, save for the scratch of pens on paper.
‘Right. First of all, thanks to you all for the early start. I appreciate it’s no fun being at work at sparrow’s fart, but I’m sure you appreciate the importance of striking Demiri now.’
Harrison held up two documents in his right hand. ‘These are the warrants we were seeking to search both his offices in Ashford and his house. Debbie, love, can you dim the lights?’
Kay caught Gavin’s expression at the term of endearment and gave him a slight shake of her head.
Harrison’s management techniques belonged in the Dark Ages, but now wasn’t the time to debate it.
As she turned back, she saw O’Reilly bend down from his position on the corner of Carys’s desk and whisper something to the detective constable. Carys covered her mouth with her hand and responded, her eyes never leaving Harrison, but Kay saw the wink that O’Reilly gave her before turning his attention to the front of the room.
‘At this rate, we’ll be losing even more people to SOCU,’ she grumbled under her breath. ‘Including the Jake O’Reilly fan club.’
‘What was that?’ Gavin hissed next to her.
‘Nothing.’
‘Right.’ Harrison’s voice cut across the room, and tapped the image on the whiteboard. ‘Floor plans for Demiri’s offices.’
Kay turned her attention to the DCI as he extolled Carys’s attempts to get copies of the building’s layout from the council’s planning department, and wondered why he hadn’t sought assistance from their colleagues in Ashford.
She nibbled at the end of her pen as she listened, and then realised Harrison was so determined that Demiri be arrested by his investigation team, he was likely leaving as many people out of the loop as possible to protect his position.
It worried her, and despite his assertions as the briefing continued that they’d have support from a local uniform contingent when conducting the raid, she wondered what the ramifications might be when the detectives there found out they’d been snubbed.
She scribbled a note to herself as the image flickered and a new one appeared, that of an aerial photograph of a large sprawling house surrounded by woodland.
Harrison grinned, his face illuminated in a grotesque mask in the light from the overhead projector.
‘We haven’t been as lucky with Demiri’s house,’ he said. ‘For those of you joining us today and who aren’t aware, this
property is on the outskirts of Pluckley.’
He flicked the switch and another image appeared. ‘This photograph was taken this morning by SOCU officers monitoring the property some distance away. You can see here that there appears to be three entrances – front door, back door next to what we believe to be a kitchen, and these double doors onto the paved patio that leads into the garden. I want officers at all entrances prior to us going in. Currently intelligence from previous reports by Gareth Jenkins suggests that Demiri has at least four live-in staff, and a number of people visiting his house on a day-to-day basis, so we need to make sure we restrain anyone trying to leave in a hurry. D’you want to get your team up to speed, Sharp?’
The DI nodded, and made his way to the front of the room. ‘I want two teams accompanying uniform, so Piper and Miles – you’re leading the search of Demiri’s offices. Barnes – I want you at the house. That way, we can have a high level debrief the moment you’re back here rather than wait for reports to be updated onto the system.’
He held up his hand for silence as a murmur swept the room, the team’s impatience palpable. ‘I don’t need to tell you how dangerous Demiri and his men are, or how important these searches are to our investigation, so watch out for each other, and get the job done properly.’
He handed the meeting back to Harrison who concluded by echoing Sharp’s order for restraint before dismissing the team.
Kay turned at O’Reilly’s voice as he passed her desk.
‘Miles? Be careful, yeah?’
Carys’s eyes opened wide at O’Reilly’s words, but she nodded. ‘Of course, Sarge. Always.’
‘Obviously hasn’t heard about you taking on a moving train,’ mumbled Gavin as he followed her out the room.
Kay could hear them still bickering as the door swung shut behind them, and smiled to herself.
At least Gavin could be trusted to keep Carys’s mind on the job and not the detective sergeant during the raid.
‘O’Reilly?’
‘Guv?’
‘A word in Sharp’s office. Got a special task for you.’ Harrison beamed, and gestured towards the open door.
Hell to Pay Page 13