Nemesis
Page 26
“That’s only an opener, bit like a tin opener,” Moxley said, before he sniggered and continued. “These knives with retractable blades are amazing and I can make up for lost fun with Quasi here. It’s not like he doesn’t owe me …”
Vinnie cut the call. He had no wish to hear Dawson’s suffering, or to let Moxley grandstand further. He caught his breath for a couple of minutes and was aware of Christine looking at him as he tried to clear the sounds of Dawson from his mind. He put a quick call into Harry to see if the cell-siting on Moxley’s phone was up and running yet. He was told it wasn’t, though it shouldn’t be long. He ended the call and was sorely tempted to turn his work phone off. But he knew he couldn’t.
He quickly briefed Christine and sat in quiet contemplation. After all the events of the last few days he felt exhausted. And, as close as he had come to catching Moxley, he had failed. He had no idea where he was. Wherever Moxley had Dawson for that final twisted torment; Vinnie could do nothing about it.
“What’s up?” Christine asked.
Vinnie told her.
“Don’t let him get into your head; you’ll only feed his mania.”
“You sound like Harry,” Vinnie said.
“Come on, let’s get out of here. We may get inspiration on the way back to Manchester,” Christine said.
Vinnie nodded as he restarted the car’s engine and pulled away from the kerb. As corrupt as Dawson was, he didn’t deserve what was happening now.
Vinnie looked up ahead and saw a council worker putting up diversion signs forcing him to turn left rather than go straight on to the city centre. Damn, a minute sooner, he thought. Even the sat-nav was of no help now.
Christine broke the impasse, “I never realised how shitty your job was until now.”
Vinnie turned to face Christine as he made the left turn.
She continued, “Reporting on events – no matter how horrible – in the past tense is one thing, but to be in the middle of it as it’s happening…” She let her words trail off.
Vinnie looked beyond her, down a small street to their left and slammed on the brakes. “Look,” he said, as the Volvo came to a halt across the side junction. He watched Christine turn her head as he stared at the rear of a black cab parked at the end of the road about thirty metres away.
“You nearly gave me a heart attack,” said Christine. “We are in the city centre Vinnie; there are black cabs everywhere.”
“Yeah, but look at the hackney carriage plates,” said Vinnie.
“Aren’t they all the same?”
“I guess so, but that one has the Scottish saltire above it.”
Chapter Sixty-three
Having abandoned his car past the junction, Vinnie and Christine ran the short distance to where the taxi was parked. As they approached it was obvious to Vinnie that it was empty. He quickly confirmed this as he slid to a halt. He tried the doors, they were unlocked. “This had to be it,” he thought.
“Look.” Christine pointed to a large hedge in front of the cab. The street was a dead end, but in the centre of the hedge was a turnstile.
Vinnie realised that this was a side entrance to the park they had just left. He stared at Christine and could see the look of understanding on her face. He quickly rang Harry. He knew from the awful sounds he had heard during the phone call from Moxley a few minutes ago that they didn’t have long. He spat the park’s location down the phone prefixed by the words, “assistance required,” before ending the call. It was a time-honoured phrase in police communications, which also meant ‘don’t question, just send help, no time for pleasantries’.
Vinnie sprang over the stile and heard Christine close behind him. Up ahead, he could see the rear of the pavilion. It was downhill and only a hundred metres away. Moxley had chosen his approach well. Probably one he had used more than the once Vinnie knew about. The thought made him shudder as he ran.
Twenty metres away and he could hear a muffled scream. Dawson. It sounded as if he’d been gagged. It had probably only been removed for Vinnie’s benefit when Moxley made his call. The memory of the sounds made him cringe. He couldn’t help feeling glad that the screams had become stifled. He immediately felt a dreadful guilt at feeling such relief while someone else still suffered. An involuntary thought.
He rushed around the building’s side and heard the sound of feet spinning around with grit underfoot.
Vinnie came to a halt at the side of the concrete steps a few feet from the main central arch. He jumped over a low wall and stood three steps from the entrance. In the far left-hand corner stood Moxley staring defiantly at him. By his side on the floor was the crumpled and bound wretch that was Dawson, hands behind his back and silver tape across his mouth. Blood had run from his nose and the man’s chest was all red. His shirt was heavy with fresh blood.
“You just don’t know when to quit, do you?” Moxley snarled.
Vinnie didn’t reply but walked forward and stopped in the doorway of the main arch. He heard Christine come to a halt next to him. He kept his eyes fixed on Moxley and noted the short bladed knife in his right hand.
“And the Scottish bitch, too. A bonus,” said Moxley.
“It’s over, Moxley, drop the blade. This place will be crawling with cops any minute.”
“Well, I’d better hurry up then Traffic Warden, hadn’t I?”
Vinnie saw Moxley stand behind a terrified Dawson and grab the hair at the back of his head with his free hand, yanking the man’s head backwards. At the same moment, he moved his bladed hand towards Dawson’s throat.
“Stop,” Vinnie yelled. He stepped forward and at the same time became aware of the pungent smell of faeces coming from Dawson.
Moxley did stop but with the blade right against Dawson’s throat, already cutting in by a millimetre or two.
“You stop, too, or he’s dead,” snarled Moxley.
Vinnie stood still, twelve or more feet away. He’d never make it. It would only take Moxley a second to end Dawson’s life. Vinnie would try to stall him until back-up arrived.
He heard the distant blare of sirens approaching and wished he hadn’t as he saw Moxley look up too. A decision influenced by the sound registered in the man’s eyes.
In the split second that followed, Vinnie saw Moxley turn his attention back to Dawson’s throat and start to cut. He saw the blood start to spurt out as Moxley moved the blade from the side of Dawson’s neck towards his windpipe.
Then Vinnie remembered the escort’s handgun in his jacket outer pocket. It was a Glock 17 pistol. He quickly drew it out and saw its presence register in Moxley’s eyes. He saw something else, too; as the man seemed to speed up his cutting motion. Even now his arrogant self-belief refused to accept the odds.
Vinnie aimed and fired three rounds in quick succession.
The noise echoed around the pavilion in a deafening fashion. Vinnie watched Moxley’s head disintegrate against the white wall behind it. His body bounced off into a heap on the floor. The reverberation of the gunfire rang loud in Vinnie’s ears. Time seemed to slow, giving the whole incident a surreal, almost cinematic feel.
He stood stock still and watched Dawson fall forward on to the floor.
Vinnie stared and, as time caught up, he realised Dawson was making noises. Christine rushed past him to the fallen man and quickly shouted, “He’s still alive, the wound only goes so far, I don’t think Moxley got as far as his windpipe.”
Vinnie saw Dawson nod as Christine removed the tape. Relief started to flood through him. Then he heard a loud voice behind him say, “armed police – drop your weapon. Do it now.”
Epilogue
It had taken Vinnie a little while after he dropped his gun to convince the armed response unit that he was really a cop. Then Christine and he were taken to a local police station where their clothes were taken away and the long process of investigation began. An hour later, Harry Delany turned up to liaise with the locals and give the on-call SIO all the background he could. Accord
ing to Harry, the local SIO had muttered something about wishing Moxley had driven a further twenty miles into the Manchester police area before stopping. Harry had apparently ignored this and also held back the true nature of Dawson’s involvement.
It was fortunate for Dawson that Vinnie had fired his gun “in the nick of time” as Harry had put it. Vinnie was sure he had meant no pun, but couldn’t help smiling to himself every time he heard Harry say it.
Two weeks later, Dawson had been fixed up and was deemed fit to be detained. Which he was, along with George Piper, who had been true to his word, leaving Dawson nowhere to go but to tell the truth. According to Harry, the interviewing officers had reported back that Dawson kept saying how he had still put the right man behind bars. He clearly didn’t get it that, by doing it corruptly, it might have had a slight bearing on the various outcomes that followed. Though, granted, through the logic of a damaged mind.
Johnson had also been arrested and all three were now charged with various offences from malfeasant in public office to perjury or conspiracy to commit either, and they were on remand awaiting trial. Not a nice place for a retired police officer, prison officer and an informant to be.
Vinnie hadn’t seen too much of Christine as she had been busy putting together her documentary, but had voiced her frustration at having to wait until after the trial of Dawson and the others. Vinnie had reassured her that it wouldn’t be sub-judice for long, as all three had indicated they would plead guilty in a hope for some reduction in sentence.
A trawl of the computer systems by professional standards had revealed that Harry’s sensitive material policy log had been accessed by someone using Vinnie’s password and, as he’d been incommunicado so to speak, they readily accepted that it wasn’t him. A clue however was that the terminal used to access George Piper’s address in Govan was done from a computer used by a civilian police employee – a certain Lesley Palmer.
Vinnie knew Lesley had his passwords. When he was out and about and wanted some database checks doing in a hurry, he would ask her if he couldn’t get an answer in the office, which was often. He had felt a mixture of pleasure and sorrow when she was arrested, then felt sorry for feeling the former when the explanation came flooding out. Apparently, Moxley had rung her and used his unique ability to threaten and terrify. He forced her to access the information by reminding her of Rob’s demise and what the boot of her Mini looked like.
Three weeks after the shooting Vinnie was called in to see Harry. He started by saying his shooting of Moxley was clearly a justifiable homicide and the coroner had indicated he foresaw no problems when the facts would be fully put before him. It was clear he’d saved Dawson’s life. Helped by the fact he had two witnesses.
“And the enquiry into my earlier discharge of a firearm?”
“Utterly reckless,” Harry answered, but in the light of what had taken place thereafter, he was to receive words of advice, which was the lowest of the potential discipline outcomes. He was happy with that.
“What about my ex?” asked Vinnie.
“As you can imagine, she had been scared half to death, but shouldn’t have been able to access sensitive systems anyway; so you and her are to receive a written warning for that.”
“Fair enough,” Vinnie thought again. He had expected as much.
“Is that everything, Harry?” Vinnie asked at what appeared to be the end of the meeting.
“Just two more things.”
“Yeah.”
“It looks as if Rob was straight after all. Johnson said he’d given him a phone as a sweetener to open him up about the bent cop, and to enable him to keep a check on him. Still shouldn’t have done it, but at least we can remember him in a better light.”
“I’m relieved to hear that, Harry. And the last thing?”
“Well, as the Dep has your career on hold for the next couple of years …” Harry started.
This was the first time he had heard a timescale put on his persona non grata with regards to any hope of advancement to the next rank. But he said nothing and let Harry continue.
“I’ve put a transfer request in to have you moved full time to the murder squad’s major investigation team. What do you reckon?”
“That’s brilliant, Harry. Thanks a lot and I promise I’ll not cause you as much drama in the future.”
Harry raised one eyebrow as Vinnie shook his hand and said his goodbyes. He walked back into the main incident room, which was in the process of being wound down, and pulled his mobile from his pocket. One thing he hadn’t had time to do yet, and that was to ask a certain reporter out for a meal.
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Acknowledgements
To my advance readers who kindly volunteered their time to plough through the early draft of this book to advise me on the basics of the story in order to get that right from the outset. It always amazes me what you see, so thank you with much appreciation to Chris, David, Chris and Nick.
You can find out more about me via my website: www.rogerapriceauthor.com (for which I thank Ivor for his continued support) and from there you can join me via my social media accounts if you wish, I'd love to connect with you. I can also be contacted direct via the email address: rapricereviews@aol.com
A word of thanks also to fans of my previous works 'By Their Rules' and 'A New Menace' I hope you like my new series starting with this book, I'm really excited about it and am quietly confident that you will. I fully intend to continue with both series in the future.
My thanks also goes to friends and family, some new, some old; some near, and some far for your continued support and interest in my work.
Much thanks also goes to all at Endeavour Press for all their professional work; from acquisition to editorial, to cover design, production and marketing; this book is simply in the best of hands possible.
And lastly to my long suffering wife Candace, who continues to encourage me and puts up with my daily blithering about all things literary.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Chapter Thirty-three
Chapter Thirty-four
Chapter Thirty-five
Chapter Thirty-six
Chapter Thirty-seven
Chapter Thirty-eight
Chapter Thirty-nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-one
Chapter Forty-two
Chapter Forty-three
Chapter Forty-four
Chapter Forty-five
Chapter Forty-six
Chapter Forty-seven
Chapter Forty-eight
Chapter Forty-nine
Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty-one
Chapter Fifty-two
Chapter Fifty-three
Chapter Fifty-four
Chapter Fifty-five
Chapter Fifty-six
Chapter Fifty-seven
Chapter Fifty-nine
Chapter Sixty
Chapter Sixty-one
Chapter Sixty-two
Chapter Sixty-three
Epilogue