Dying Inside (DI Nick Dixon Crime)

by Damien Boyd

  ‘Those two just then?’

  ‘I didn’t recognise them, but an increased presence was put in place up here yesterday when you were found camping on your own.’

  ‘That was for me?’

  ‘Just for you.’

  ‘Got any more of those beers?’ asked Sam.

  Jane pulled another can from the plastic loop and handed it to her, watching her mulling something over; the vacant stare, her fingers fumbling for the ring pull. Sam was miles away. If only Jane knew where.

  ‘He’s really in danger?’

  ‘Four people are dead already.’

  ‘Five,’ whispered Dixon.

  ‘Make that five,’ said Jane.

  ‘The bloke listening.’ Sam’s brow furrowed. ‘Was it him here last night?’

  Jane nodded.

  ‘He seemed nice.’

  ‘He is.’

  Sam took a deep breath. ‘Further along, down by the Observatory, there’s a seating area and a chicken wire fence with concrete posts along the top of the cliff. There’s a gap in the fence this end and the path leads to the cliff top; only it doesn’t. You can scramble down to a grassy terrace that’s hidden from above. Plenty of room for a couple of tents. I went down there today, thought I might move and it seemed a quiet spot. Only there’s a tent already down there and he told me to eff off.’

  ‘Who did?’

  ‘Craig.’

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  ‘All right, nice and calm, everyone.’ Dixon glanced over his shoulder as Mark’s headlights came on behind him, the sound of his engine spluttering into life at the same time as Cole’s. ‘We don’t even know if he’s down there yet.’

  ‘What do we do then, Sir?’ asked Cole, frowning at him.

  ‘You and I will go down and see if he’s there. Mark, you pick up Jane and we’ll have those two PCSOs back up here to keep an eye on Sam.’ Dixon’s phone started buzzing on the dashboard. ‘Hang on, Dave’s on the phone.’

  ‘Gavin’s replacement pay-as-you-go phone’s just gone live, Sir,’ said Dave. ‘If Sims has got it then he’s the Bristol side of the suspension bridge, in the triangle between the zoo, the cricket ground and the Observatory.’

  ‘Oh, shit.’ Dixon sighed. ‘That makes it an immediate threat to life. Let’s get backup here now – Armed Response, dogs, and we’d better have the helicopter up as well. Give his position to the CCTV Hub too, Dave, get them looking for him in the right place.’

  ‘Blue lights?’

  ‘Nothing to lose now.’ He was watching Jane running across the grass towards Mark’s car behind them, Monty trotting along next to her. He rang off and tapped the dashboard. ‘Right, go.’

  Cole spun his wheels as he pulled out. ‘I’ll need to find somewhere to turn,’ he said, reaching out of the window and sticking a magnetic blue light on the roof of the car.

  ‘Bollocks, Nige. Go across the grass.’

  The car slewed from side to side, Cole wrestling with the steering wheel to control the slide as he accelerated across the grass, churning the perfectly manicured turf to mud. Then it bounced off the kerb, the tyres spinning on the road surface.

  Streetlights and the mass of bulbs on the suspension bridge lit up the trees in front of them as they accelerated off the roundabout and raced along Clifton Down. Dixon had forgotten Cole was traffic pursuit trained and made a conscious effort not to look across at the speedometer, not that there was much else to look at, apart from trees and startled pedestrians flashing by on the nearside.

  Bulbs on the cables and the supports; the bridge at night was a spectacular sight, stretching across the Avon Gorge, the river far below in the darkness, the twinkling lights of the Bristol suburbs visible beyond. The moon was out too; not quite full, but near enough.

  Right into Observatory Road.

  ‘Is it your car?’ asked Dixon.

  ‘Pool car, why?’

  ‘Go across the grass.’

  The car bounced up the kerb, Cole following the footpath that offered the only gap in the trees. Then they were in the clear, the round tower of the Observatory directly in front of them, the bridge beyond.

  ‘Over in that corner.’ Dixon was pointing off to their right. ‘And we can lose the blue light now.’

  Cole slid to a halt on the grass behind a line of trees, empty benches silhouetted against the moonlit sky. Beyond the benches a line of concrete posts marked the wire fence and the top of the cliff.

  Dixon had been there once before, finishing a climb on the buttress below the bridge with Jake, the fence posts offering sanctuary that time. He could picture the small terrace, too, and the two hundred foot drop below. Hardly a good place for a spice addict to camp.

  ‘Let’s go.’ He jumped out of the passenger seat, leaving the door open, and set off across the grass to the gap in the fence hidden in the bushes beyond the benches, Cole right behind him.

  Light certainly wouldn’t be a problem, the display on the bridge casting an eerie orange glow across the cliff top.

  He turned sideways and squeezed through the chicken wire fence, holding the metal links away from his jacket; snag that and the rattle would be enough to wake the dead. He looked at Cole and put his index finger across his lips. ‘Shhhh.’

  Tiptoeing down the path now, he stopped at the top where it took a sharp turn and dropped down into the void, two figures silhouetted out on the edge of the terrace ten feet below and maybe ten yards away at most. Sims was standing on the left, the unmistakeable outline of a crossbow in his hands, the red dot of the laser telescopic sight in the middle of Craig’s chest, the curved blades of the broadhead on the bolt glinting in the orange glow from the lights on the bridge. Three more bolts were mounted in a quiver underneath the arms of the bow, each with a broadhead.

  ‘John Sims!’ shouted Dixon, just as the helicopter appeared over the Observatory, the powerful light mounted underneath sweeping the top of the cliffs as it moved towards them.

  Blue lights raced across the bridge in the distance, more coming along the A4 far below, the sirens just carrying over the roar of the helicopter’s engine, the downdraft sending fallen leaves high into the air all around them.

  Then the helicopter was directly overhead, its beam lighting up the terrace.

  The green flysheet of Craig’s small pop-up tent was flapping violently in the rush of air from the rotor blades. It had been pitched at the back of the terrace, the guy ropes tied to large stone blocks and a sapling fighting for life in a crack in the rock.

  Craig himself was bleeding from a head wound, his hair dishevelled and matted.

  ‘How the hell?’ Sims kept the red dot squarely in the middle of Craig’s chest as he watched Dixon scrambling down the short section of cliff to the terrace.

  ‘Get the helicopter higher,’ Dixon said into his microphone. ‘I can’t hear myself think.’ Hands behind him, he kept his eyes fixed on Sims as he picked his way down the top section of cliff, jumping the last few feet on to the terrace.

  Cole followed, landing heavily beside him, the downdraft easing off as the helicopter climbed to a higher altitude.

  ‘Hello, Craig,’ shouted Dixon. ‘You’re not an easy fellow to find, are you?’

  Craig was standing on the cliff edge with his back to the void, his eyes fixed on the red dot bouncing around in the middle of his chest.

  ‘And as for you.’ Dixon turned to Sims. ‘Little Orphan Annie died in February, according to the Longleat bailiff.’

  Sims shook his head. ‘Is that it? Is that all it took?’

  ‘That and a hole in your fence post.’ Dixon took a step forward, Cole following without hesitation. ‘You’re not a very good shot, are you?’

  ‘Good enough,’ snarled Sims.

  The wire fence started rattling along the top of the cliff as more officers squeezed through the gap and ran along the path.

  ‘Stay back, all of you!’

  The footsteps stopped at the top of the cliff. ‘Armed Response are on scene
,’ said Jane, her voice in Dixon’s earpiece.

  He took another step forward, again matched by Cole to his left. ‘So, this was all about your pension, John?’

  ‘They took what was left of our lives, so we took what was left of theirs.’

  ‘What about Gavin?’ Another step forward.

  ‘Collateral damage.’

  ‘I’ll tell his mother,’ said Dixon, a sarcastic edge to his voice. ‘That will be a great comfort to her, I’m sure.’

  ‘It had to be done. And so does this.’

  ‘How d’you expect to get away? Look around you.’ Dixon craned his neck to look past Sims and over the cliff. ‘We’ve even got the boat out on the river.’

  ‘I’ve spent my entire working life inside and I’ll be fucked if I’m dying inside as well.’

  ‘Then you’ll die here and now.’

  ‘Not before I’ve taken this little shit with me.’

  Another step forward. Cole followed.

  ‘Frank kept his part of the bargain,’ said Dixon. ‘I’m guessing you planned it all between you?’

  ‘Two each, that was the deal.’

  ‘And if either of you got caught you’d confess to all the murders?’ Keep him talking, at least until Armed Response could get into position.

  ‘Neither of us are going to prison,’ said Sims, his eyes darting from Craig to Dixon, to Cole, the top of the cliff and back round again. ‘He knows what it’ll be like for a prison officer on the inside; he’ll never serve a single day. And neither will I.’

  Dixon moved slowly, bringing his right hand up to the microphone pinned to his jacket and lifting it towards the corner of his mouth. ‘Put Frank Allan on suicide watch now.’

  Sims laughed. ‘He’s a prison officer, for fuck’s sake. That won’t stop him.’

  ‘That’s for our benefit, John, not his.’ Dixon shrugged. ‘We’ve got to have a tick in all the right boxes for the inquest. You know how it is.’

  ‘I know how this is too. You keep me talking, edging ever closer until you can make a grab for the weapon. I’ve done it often enough inside to know the drill.’ Sims took a step towards Craig, still holding the crossbow in both hands. ‘Only that’s not how it works this time.’

  Two paces at most between Sims and Craig now; at that range the bolt would go clean through him. Dixon was losing control; things coming to a head before Armed Response had got their arses in gear.

  Too bloody soon, by half. Fuck it.

  He took two steps forward; Cole followed again – good lad.

  Sims swung the crossbow towards Dixon, holding it in his outstretched right hand, his index finger clenched around the trigger, the red beam of the laser sight now pointing squarely at him.

  ‘Oh, shit no, don’t!’ Jane’s voice in his ear and up on the cliff top behind him, safely out of the way.

  ‘That’s far enough,’ growled Sims. ‘It ends now.’

  Dixon looked down and watched the red dot hovering in the middle of his chest. He glanced at Cole. ‘Five seconds, Nige,’ he whispered, taking a deep breath.

  Then he stepped forward.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  A searing pain exploded across his chest. Then he was falling, a blood-curdling scream echoing in his earpiece. Dixon landed flat on his back, fighting for breath, gasping and sucking in gulps of air.

  ‘You fucking . . .’ A shout from near the cliff edge, the voice fading into the distance; the terrace plunged into darkness as the helicopter moved away, its light searching the void below.

  Cole was shouting into his phone. ‘We need an ambulance now. Officer down!’

  Watching too many American cop shows on the TV, thought Dixon.

  Odd, the things you think of at a time like this.

  Then the coughing started, each rasp sending a stabbing pain tearing across his ribcage. He looked down at the crossbow bolt buried in the middle of his chest and grimaced. It had seemed like a good idea at the time.

  Fighting for breath.

  Cole knelt beside him. ‘Breathe through your nose, Sir. Nice and easy.’

  ‘Shit, shit, shit.’ Jane’s voice.

  He felt hands clawing at his shirt, ripping at the buttons.

  ‘You’ve got your body armour on, you beauty!’ she screamed.

  He watched the tears streaming down her cheeks as she tore at the Velcro side strips, releasing the front plate. She thrust her hand up behind the Kevlar, smiling down at him. ‘It’s not gone through.’ Laughing and crying at the same time now, she leaned forward and planted a kiss on his forehead, holding his face in her hands. ‘Just breathe,’ she said, her voice soft and calm.

  His gasps slowed, breathing through his nose now, filling his lungs with air. ‘Where’s Sims?’ he spluttered.

  ‘Gone over the edge,’ replied Jane. ‘Don’t worry about him now. Craig’s safe, we’re all safe. That’s all that matters.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Don’t. Worry.’

  ‘Paramedics coming through!’ The scene was lit by torches and phones held aloft. ‘Let’s get this off him.’

  That was a decent shirt, Dixon thought, watching a pair of scissors working their way up the sleeves. Then the Velcro shoulder straps on the body armour were ripped apart and it was slid from underneath him, the bolt still sticking out of the front plate; an oxygen mask clamped across his face, the elastic snapping back behind his head.

  ‘What’s his name?’

  ‘Nick,’ replied Jane.

  ‘You’re going to be all right, Nick,’ said the paramedic kneeling next to him. ‘The body armour did its job and stopped the bolt, but you’ve been winded and you’ve got a blunt force injury to the chest. Just breathe normally. Can you taste blood?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘That’s a good sign. Are you in pain?’

  ‘Worse when I cough.’

  ‘We’re going to get you to the hospital as quick as we can. We need to get you checked over.’

  ‘Where’s Monty?’ Dixon asked, holding the oxygen mask away from his mouth, his eyes wide looking up at Jane.

  ‘Who’s Monty?’

  ‘His dog.’ Jane smiled down at him. ‘Lou’s got him in her car.’

  ‘Take him home.’

  ‘I will, Sir.’ Louise’s face appeared from behind one of the phones being held aloft. ‘Jane’s given me her keys. I’ll see to it.’

  ‘His food’s in the cupboard.’

  ‘She knows,’ said Jane, still smiling.

  ‘Oh, no, you don’t.’

  Dixon slumped back into the pillows and closed his eyes.

  ‘You’re staying right where you are,’ said Jane.

  The worst part of it all had been getting to the top of the cliff strapped to a stretcher; bloody terrifying, that. He’d offered to climb up and had felt perfectly capable of it, but the paramedics had been adamant. And so had Jane. There really had been no escape.

  Then had come the ride in the ambulance, various people poking and prodding his chest on arrival at the hospital, followed by an X-ray. Now he was lying in a private room, wired up to at least two machines. He turned his head on the pillow and watched the heart monitor, the line jumping at regular intervals, just as it should.

  ‘They’re wasting their time with that,’ he said, from behind his oxygen mask.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘My heart always skips a beat when you’re in the room.’

  ‘You soppy sod.’

  The cannula in the back of his left hand was a pain in the arse, if such a thing was possible. And there was something clamped to the tip of his right index finger; he’d found that out when he’d tried to scratch his nose. What’s more, it had hurt like the devil when the nurse had stuck the heart monitor patches on his chest – and getting them off would be even worse.

  The stabbing pain had gone at least, although he hadn’t felt the urge to cough for a while; a side effect of the morphine, probably.

  He was trying to focus on Jane sitting on the e
nd of his bed. ‘Have you got my insulin?’

  ‘I gave it to the doctor and they’ve got you on an insulin pump to keep your blood sugar levels stable. That’s the thing in the back of your hand.’

  He noticed the clipboard first, then the woman holding it; peering at him over a pair of reading glasses, she was. Most unnerving.

  ‘We’ve got the results of your X-ray,’ she said, with a reassuring smile. ‘You’ve fractured your sternum; or your breastbone, I should say.’ She was rubbing the tips of her fingers up and down in the middle of her chest. ‘Right here. It’s a nasty one, I’m afraid, and there’s not a lot we can do except give you pain relief. It’s not something we can put in plaster.’

  ‘Will he be all right?’

  ‘It’ll take a few weeks, but he should be fine.’ She held the X-ray up to the light and pointed at it. ‘You can see a nice clean crack here. And he’s also got an eggshell fracture on the outer surface. Imagine hitting the top of a boiled egg with a spoon. It must have been one hell of an impact.’

  ‘It was,’ mumbled Dixon. ‘Take it from me.’

  ‘We’ll be keeping you in overnight to monitor your heart and lungs.’

  ‘Overnight?’ He frowned. ‘It must be two in the morning already.’

  ‘Till later on today then. In rare cases we see soft tissue damage to the heart or lungs and sometimes both, so we need to check that before we let you go. Your heart is looking good.’ She was watching the screen behind his bed. ‘And your blood oxygen levels look fine too, so you may have got away with it.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘More often than not these types of injuries are caused by seatbelts, so you’re quite a novelty around here.’

  ‘He’s one of those everywhere he goes,’ muttered Jane.

  ‘It’s going to be pretty uncomfortable for a while, so we’ll let you go with some Tramadol. Have you had that before?’

  ‘When I got stabbed.’

  ‘Stabbed and shot? You have been a busy bunny.’

  ‘And burnt,’ offered Jane.

  ‘Don’t remind me.’