Storms

by Menon, David

  ‘How long are you going to keep me here?’

  ‘As long as is necessary for us to complete our enquiries and I ask again, Mrs. Patterson, did you know Alan Chaplin and Reggie Clayton?’

  ‘And I’ll tell you again that their names mean nothing to me’.

  Rebecca took photographs of Chaplin and Clayton that had been taken soon after their bodies had been found and placed them on the table in front of Melanie Patterson. She could see that Melanie tried not to look at them at first but then couldn’t help herself and her eyes flickered when she saw the extent of the horror.

  ‘Doesn’t make for a very pretty picture, does it?’

  ‘What doesn’t?’ said Melanie, defiantly.

  Rebecca sighed with irritation. ‘These young men had rubber tyres placed round their necks which were doused in petrol and then set alight. But then you’d know that wouldn’t you Melanie? Because you were there’.

  ‘What kind of nonsense are you talking now?’ Melanie demanded. If she’d been nervous before she was especially so now. She’d spent so long cultivating her position as head of the Gorton boys and maintaining it by fear. That’s why Chaplin and Clayton had been dealt with. Because they’d attempted to betray her and they needed to be shown as a lesson to those others who might be tempted to do the same. But what was happening now? It felt like everything was falling apart. And where had her nephew Jackson gone?

  ‘You ordered the murders of Chaplin and Clayton because they threatened your position of power’.

  ‘Rubbish!’

  ‘Where does all the money come from, Melanie?’

  ‘What money?’

  ‘The money you use to furnish your house and pay for your twice yearly trips back to the Caribbean? You’ve never done a day’s work in your life. Everything you’ve done has been by illegal means’.

  ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about’ Melanie scoffed. ‘You’re flying on half baked theories that don’t add up to anything significant’.

  ‘You ordered their murder’.

  ‘I ordered nothing’.

  ‘You were afraid they were going to pull the rug from under you and you had them murdered’.

  ‘I want to go home’.

  ‘That won’t be until we’ve decided we’re done with you’.

  ‘I’m a citizen and I have rights!’

  ‘So do the residents of the Gorton estate but you didn’t seem to respect them’.

  ‘I don’t know what you mean!’

  ‘I mean the death of Evelyn Squires that could’ve been prevented’.

  ‘And how on God’s earth are you trying to connect me with that?’

  ‘Oh we don’t have to try, Mrs. Patterson’ said Rebecca. ‘You see we have names, addresses, times, dates, places. We have all the information we need to make a solid case against you. A case that we can successfully prosecute’.

  ‘I need to speak to my lawyer’.

  ‘I’m glad you’ve finally decided to take these matters seriously, Mrs. Patterson’ said Rebecca. ‘It can only help you in the long run’.

  Rebecca brought the interview to a close and then she and Ollie joined Jeff Barton outside in the corridor. Jeff had been watching the interview through the two-way mirror.

  ‘She’s on the brink in my opinion, sir’ said Ollie. ‘She’s looking decidedly uncomfortable. I don’t think it would take much to push her over the edge’.

  ‘DI Stockton?’ said Jeff. ‘Is that your assessment too?’

  ‘Yes, sir’ Rebecca agreed. ‘I think Ollie is absolutely right’.

  They were about to discuss further what approach Rebecca and Ollie would take when they went back in to continue the interview when Chief Superintendent Geraldine Chambers walked up and said she needed a word with Jeff.

  ‘What is it, ma’am?’ asked Jeff after he’d gone with Chambers back to her office. DCI Mike Phillips was there too. ‘Mike?’

  ‘Jeff, we’ve received a DVD. It’s rather disturbing I’m afraid’.

  ‘Disturbing? Is this to do with PC Tyler Moore, ma’am?’

  ‘I think you’d better watch the DVD, Jeff’ said Chambers.

  Chambers played the video on her desktop computer. It was of PC Tyler Moore being ‘executed’ by guillotine. It caught all the terror and fear and blood and savagery. There was so much blood that some of it splattered against the camera lens adding to the extreme horror of the scene.

  ‘It’s gut wrenching’ said Geraldine.

  ‘You’re not kidding, ma’am’ said Jeff who’d had to put his hand across his mouth at one stage of watching the video. It truly was horrific.

  ‘Thank God that because he was undercover his parents have been spared being sent a copy because the killer wouldn’t have been aware of who they were’ said Chambers. ‘I have sent a team out to talk to them and give them our support’.

  DCI Mike Phillips had remained silent so far. Being the officer who sent Tyler Moore into that situation was proving to be a hard cross to bear this particular morning.

  ‘I imagine the press will be on to it, ma’am?’ said Jeff.

  ‘Yes, we’ll need to hold a press conference, Jeff. I’ve scheduled it for eleven this morning’.

  ‘We’re in the middle of questioning Melanie Patterson who thought she was giving a home to her nephew Jackson Williams’ said Jeff. ‘I say we tell her the truth. We expose the whole situation. It isn’t going to threaten Tyler Moore poor sod. But it could push her into an admission of guilt over the matters that Tyler was in there finding out about and smoke out some other members of the Gorton boys now that they know for sure that we’re dealing with a serial killer who is deliberately targeting the Gorton boys. Mike, is there anything in the intelligence that Tyler Moore gathered that could point to one individual or a group of individuals that could’ve carried out and had the motive to carry out this horrifying act?’

  ‘The short answer to that is no’ said Mike. ‘We’ve gone through everything a hundred times. Every encounter Tyler Moore had that he reported back to us. What he did tell us however is that Leroy Patterson had a girlfriend. She was a white girl and Melanie Patterson didn’t approve. In fact, after Leroy was found dead she seemed to blame this girlfriend in some twisted way but she’d gone to ground. Nobody knew where she was’.

  ‘And do we have an identity for this girlfriend?’ Jeff asked.

  ‘I’m afraid not’ Mike admitted. ‘There’d been some problem between them and they weren’t speaking at the time of his abduction and subsequent death. Tyler hadn’t been in there long enough to find out any more’.

  Jeff could understand Mike’s feelings over the horrendous fate of Tyler Moore but he was becoming more than a little exasperated by his drip feed of potentially useful information. Call it departmental competition? Christ when are the police in this country going to get past that load of bloody bollocks?

  ‘Then we’ll bring them all in’ said Jeff. ‘Every member of the Gorton boys will be brought in and I’m keeping Melanie Patterson for as long as I can’.

  ‘There is still a risk there though, Jeff’ said Chambers.

  ‘There’s a risk in everything to do with this, ma’am’ Jeff countered. ‘Tyler Moore paid the ultimate price of that risk’.

  ‘And finding Tyler’s killer?’ asked Mike.

  ‘That’s ongoing’ said Jeff.

  ‘And we have a potentially very useful piece of information that may carry that part of the investigation forward’ said Chambers. ‘A note came with the DVD’. She handed the piece of A4 paper to Jeff and he read it.

  ONE BY ONE UNTIL I DECIDE JUSTICE HAS FINALLY BEEN DONE. NICE TRY WITH THE POLICE OFFICER. HE LOST HIS HEAD IN THE LINE OF DUTY AND WAS SO VERY YOUNG. SUCH A SHAME.

  ‘So he’s rubbing our nose in it’ said Mike. ‘He’s laughing at us’.

  ‘Well maybe not for much longer’ said Jeff. ‘My instincts tell me that the answer to all of this will be found somewhere amongst the rest of the Gorton boys. And we’re
going to find it’.

  STORMS EIGHT

  A sombre mood had descended on the police station as might be expected after one of their own had been brutally murdered and his decapitated body had been dumped on a street on the Gorton estate. Police officers weren’t necessarily known for wearing their hearts on their sleeves. They’d seen so much that the rest of society were spared from that it made them immune from public showings of disgust and revulsion. But the killer of PC Tyler Moore had sent the Chief Constable a DVD of his ‘execution’ which most officers had now seen and even the most hardened amongst them couldn’t help but show their emotions. It brought home just how vulnerable they could sometimes be in the process of trying to protect the public from the twisted ambitions of a killer. Tyler Moore had paid the ultimate price after giving himself to an undercover operation. And he was only twenty-one which made his death even more untimely. The Chief Constable had been in contact with Tyler Moore’s family and told them that their son would be given full police honours at his funeral. A memorial fund had been set up covering the entire Greater Manchester force and it was already in the thousands.

  ‘Do you think we need to get a psychological profiler in here, sir?’ Rebecca suggested in a soft voice after watching the DVD. The images of Tyler Moore’s horrific death would stay in her head for a very long time. ‘They might be able to help us work out just who we might be up against here?’

  ‘I think we can work that out for ourselves, DI Stockton’ said Jeff who himself was emotional numb after having watched the video twice now. He had nothing against psychological profilers and had used them in the past but he didn’t think it was necessary in this instance, at least not yet anyway. They might have to bring one in later if they haven’t made any progress. ‘I still hold with the idea that this is someone with a grudge of some kind against the Gorton boys. But I also think he has a grudge against the police too because we haven’t done what he thinks we should’ve done in relation to the Gorton boys’.

  ‘John Squires, sir?’ Ollie suggested. ‘Evelyn Squires’ son?’

  ‘Well he certainly feels we haven’t got the Gorton boys under the kind of control he thinks we should have’ said Jeff.

  ‘But could he be capable of something like this?’ asked Rebecca. ‘You’ve met him, sir. What do you think?’

  ‘It’s hard to tell, DI Stockton’ said Jeff who wasn’t feeling entirely well disposed towards Rebecca at the moment. ‘But I suspect there’s something in his background that we might need to know about so let’s start with him. Ollie? I want you to look into his background. Start digging and keep on until something comes up’.

  ‘Sir, now that we know that Tyler Moore was undercover has that brought up anymore information on Melanie Patterson that could be useful to us?’ asked Rebecca.

  ‘Yes, it has’ Jeff answered and handed Rebecca a file that had been given to him by DCI Mike Phillips. ‘Have a read of that, DI Stockton. I think you’ll find it gives you a lot more meat to chew on than before. Has a warrant been issued with regard to Melanie Patterson’s house?’

  ‘Yes, sir’ said Ollie. ‘It’s ready and waiting just like the team of officers who are going to swoop on the remaining members of the Gorton boys and bring them in. They’re downstairs waiting for your briefing, sir’.

  ‘Good’ said Jeff. ‘Thanks, Ollie. Come down with me and fill in any details I might miss. Read that file carefully, DI Stockton. The press conference I’ve just done was a decidedly uncomfortable affair. I want some results here to shut them up if for no other reason’.

  Annabel was nervous at work that morning. Tim was due to take over from her on the afternoon shift after his days off and she’d been texting him for the last couple of days since her little excursion following him but he hadn’t replied. Had he seen her checking up on him? It would’ve been easy down that lonely country lane where the man in the sports car had taken him. If he did was he mad at her? She wouldn’t blame him if he was but she didn’t want to lose his friendship or for him to think that she was some kind of crazy stalker. She’d never done that sort of thing before.

  ‘I well wanted a little girl really’

  The last bloody thing Annabel needed was to be doing her shift with one of the summer seasonal recruits who was called Janette. She was only twenty and although Annabel sometimes found her okay there were other moments when she found her vacuous, shallow, immature, and just plain boring. She was pregnant but hadn’t told the hotel before she started so that she’d be entitled to the full maternity package. An example, Annabel thought, of women taking the piss out of the laws that were meant to make them equal and now she was disappointed that she was having a boy instead of a girl.

  But she also had a problem with the whole reason why Janette was pregnant. By her own admission she hadn’t even asked her good-looking but hapless boyfriend if he wanted to become a father at the age of twenty. Janette had just ‘decided’. Annabel wondered why she wanted to saddle herself with dirty nappies and sleepless nights when she could be out partying and enjoying herself? Why had she made that choice when she was paid peanuts at the hotel and her boyfriend was already doing two jobs to keep a roof over their heads? Annabel wouldn’t have missed having Kyle for the world. He was the best thing that had ever happened to her. But if she was honest he came along way before her ex-husband Clive was ready to be a father and Annabel had ‘decided’ that two should become three without having talked to Clive about it. She shook her head in disbelief at the way so many girls these days decide to get pregnant at the earliest opportunity. She wanted to scream at them. They had so many choices and yet they chose to act like they had no choice.

  The hotel manager Marilyn Kent walked up to reception with an apparent smile on her face. Annabel thought she must’ve run over a puppy on the way to work.

  ‘Good morning, Marilyn’ Annabel greeted just to make the effort. Being good at customer service meant you could put on a big smile and a happy face even when you wanted to call the person you were talking to a complete cunt. That’s how she was with Marilyn who was dressed in her usual striped trouser suit and low cut top that was struggling to accommodate her well heaving bosom. High heels completed the ensemble and she of course was carrying her radio so that she could be reached quickly if need be. Annabel rarely saw her actually talking into it. She thought it was more for effect than anything else.

  ‘Good morning each’ Marilyn responded.

  Annabel and Janette might’ve expected Marilyn to tell them something useful to do with their contracts now that the new owners, who still hadn’t revealed themselves, had taken over. But no. She instead treated them to a five-minute description of the row she’d had with her husband the previous evening and about how if her marriage suddenly ended she wouldn’t ever be interested in seeing other men. Annabel smiled at the way reptiles like Marilyn try to use personal experiences to make you think they were human like you but the fact remained that they were still reptiles.

  ‘I don’t suppose you’re much interested after your experience with Clive?’ Marilyn asked Annabel. ‘It must’ve made you wary at the very least’.

  Annabel was proud of herself that she hadn’t let her personal experience with her ex-husband Clive make her all bitter and twisted against the entire male gender. But she’d never been like that. Just because her step-father had been distant and remote from her all the way through her childhood didn’t mean that she could take that out on all men. The same applied to her own weak willed father who was completely unable to build an emotional bridge with her. And even though she’d never been unfaithful to Clive and had been devastated when she’d found out that he’d been unfaithful to her, she would still take a risk of being happy with someone else if someone else came along. Just because she was seeing her lover Dermot for sex and friendship didn’t mean to say that she wasn’t open to a single man coming along and sweeping her off her feet.

  ‘Not really, no’ said Annabel. ‘I don’t think you should let o
ne bad experience with one man affect your whole experience with men in the future. They’re not all like the one who did you wrong’.

  ‘No I suppose not and that’s a very intelligent way of looking at it’ said Marilyn.

  ‘I don’t think I’ve ever been accused of being intelligent before’ said Annabel, laughing.

  ‘Well make the most of it’ said Marilyn.

  ‘Have you heard from Tim in the last couple of days, Marilyn?’ Annabel asked as casually as she could.

  ‘No? Should I have done?’

  It was well known around the hotel that Tim wasn’t in favour with Marilyn. It was because he’d challenged the way she ran the place. Not in a particularly confrontational way but by making suggestions about changes to some working practices that would be more efficient and by opening his mouth when he didn’t think someone was being treated fairly. But Marilyn was one of those managers who was forever saying that she wanted people to use their initiative and that she was always open to suggestions but when people did either of those things she tended to slap them down. Annabel thought that Tim could probably run this place without any bother. He’d once confessed to having many years of managerial experience in a rare moment of candid disclosure. Marilyn had probably seen that herself which was another reason why she’d turned off him. She mustn’t have some receptionist making it look like he knew more than she did.

  ‘Oh I just wondered that was all’ said Annabel, lightly. ‘I haven’t been able to get hold of him the last couple of days’.

  ‘Well he’s in for a surprise when he comes for his afternoon shift later’ said Marilyn. ‘As are you all. The hotel’s new owners will be revealing themselves to us in a staff meeting at three o’clock. I’ll be sending round an email when I get back to my office. Exciting isn’t it?’

  Both Annabel and Janette stood there wondering why on earth she hadn’t told them that when she’d first walked up to the desk instead of boring them rigid with all the shit about the row with her husband. So they were all finally going to know who the new owners were. That would be a surprise for Tim when he came in later.