A Limited Justice (#1 - The Craig Modern Thriller Series) (32 page)

Annette knew that she’d never have made the leap, playing ‘follow that cab’ instead.

“Get onto the gendarmes, Spanish police, and Interpol and bring them up to date within the next twenty minutes please, Davy. Then we’re all going for a very well-earned lunch at The James.”

***

Craig put his feet up on John’s desk, and yawned.

“If you don’t mind sitting through it again, I’ll go with you tonight John, but I can’t promise to speak to her. And if I leave before the end I leave, and I don’t want any grief from you, please. And we’re sitting at the back.”

John Winter was focussing on a microscope slide, letting Craig talk. He said nothing until he’d finished.

“It’s a good play actually. I won’t tell you the end but the death’s pretty unexpected.”

“What?”

“It’s unexpected.”

“I thought it was ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’? Where’s the death in that?”

“Oh...no, that’s only on Saturday and Sunday. They’ve been doing a Stephen Maray play since Wednesday, ‘The Cold Stone’. Didn’t you see it in London?”

“No, I must be the only person who didn’t.”

Craig thought for a minute, and then spoke again, hesitantly. “What ...?”

“Yes?”

“What role does she play?” She...as if mentioning Camille’s name would suddenly make her appear.

“Camille plays the title role and she was very good. She ...”

Craig held his hand up to stop him.

“Thanks, but that comes under the heading of too much information. Any more and I may get the urge to work tonight instead. By the way, don’t ever mention to my folks that I went, and for God’s sake don’t say that you went with me; they’ll shoot you as a collaborator. Mum won’t even have her name mentioned; she nearly strangled Dad after one syllable.”

He lifted the dark-pine office chair and turned it around, slumping tiredly with his arms over its back. “This case is wearing everyone down.”

He brought John up to date with Annette and Davy’s latest findings.

“Of course, they’ll be long gone by now. I’ve said probably France or Spain, but they could be anywhere if they’ve got forged passports.”

“Have they?”

“Definitely, good forgeries too. Our Fina Morales doesn’t exist, and changing their names again won’t be a major effort.”

He was about to say something more but stopped himself. John knew exactly what it had been.

“You’re thinking that if Jessica Adams will be dead soon anyway, and the kids are innocent, then why pursue them at all.”

Craig nodded, as if actually saying it was a complete betrayal of his training. Then he remembered the families of the dead, and he knew again, why they couldn’t leave it.

“We can’t. It wouldn’t be justice for the victims.”

“I imagine that’s what the McNamee’s thought when Taylor got a five year sentence.”

Craig nodded, conceding that it was the truth.

“What if Fiona McNamee had nothing to do with this, Marc, and it’s just some woman Adams is paying to be nanny to the kids? They could easily argue that she’d flown a nanny over to care for the kids, all above board.”

“And exactly what did she use to pay this nanny? This nanny with a forged passport.”

But John was on a creative roll so he ignored the question.

“OK then. Say Fiona McNamee held back some of the insurance money, there’s no way she’d have spent two million pounds in four years, not unless she went to Vegas. Then, for all we know she could’ve found out about Adams’ situation, and just decided to gift her some money before she committed suicide. Then Adams decided to do this in return, in her memory?”

Craig looked at him, wryly. “When did you start writing fiction?” They both laughed.

“Fiona McNamee met Jessica Adams at the trial and liked her, that much we know. But to give her that amount of money for doing nothing, when she has two children of her own to provide for? No.

And no matter how much money Fiona McNamee left her, for Adams to kill and risk being caught, leaving her children at the mercy of the state when she died. When they’d almost certainly end up with her parents? No way, John. Fiona McNamee is alive, she’s up to her eyes in these murders and we need to catch them both.”

“Yes, but didn’t Annette say that the McNamee kids will already get half a million and the house? So they’re well provided for already. She could have just gifted the rest to Adams.”

Craig rubbed his eyes hard with his knuckles, too tired to keep arguing with him.

“You’re wrecked, Marc. Are you sure you’ll stay awake long enough to get to the theatre?”

Craig thought about it for a moment, sensing a way out, then shook his head and looked over at John with blood-shot eyes.

“Don’t tempt me...but if I fall asleep during the performance, don’t bother to wake me up either.”

“I will if you snore. It disturbs the thespians...”

***

The Italian Alps

Jessie felt more alive than she had done in years, ever since the farm had started to go downhill. She closed her eyes to erase the painful memories. This wasn’t a day for being sad; it was one of those special, perfect days that only came a few times in life.

She smiled and looked over the cafe wall into the deep gorge below. The view was breath-taking. The steep slopes fell gently away to form an emerald-green chevron between the valley’s walls, the grass dotted with white flowers, even in October. Tiny sheep grazed calmly miles below them, bored by the beauty of their surroundings, the business of eating much more important.

An open sandwich sat on the wall beside her, untouched. She had no time to waste eating, desperate to memorise everything around her. The fresh, cold air was quiet, broken only by the occasional clatter of plates and the loud whirr of camera-shutters, freezing the image to look back at in years ahead. But she didn’t need a camera, and there would be no years ahead for her, only now.

Fiona reached over, poised to tap her on the shoulder but reluctant to disturb her dream. Jessie sensed her and turned around, smiling, her newly swollen face distorted by the grin.

“Did you ever think we’d get here, Fi?”

Fiona shook her head hard, setting her newly styled bob swinging, “Never. Do you regret it?”

Jessie was emphatic in her reply. “No. You four are all that matter to me now.”

She looked towards the table where the girls were sitting, helpfully covering Pia’s face in food. The baby was laughing happily so she left them in peace. She ruffled her recently reddened hair playfully, fingering her newly full lips and laughing at Fiona’s enhanced cheekbones and Botox-ed brow.

They looked nothing like the women who’d arrived in Paris two days before, one visit to a cosmetic doctor and hairdresser had ensured that. The only thing that had saddened her was cutting her daughters’ beautiful hair, shorn into crops to match their boy disguises. They would become girls again when they were safe in their new home.

Jessie was glad that they’d chosen Italy to settle, she and Michael had honeymooned there and she’d loved it instantly, their absolute love of ‘bambinos’ the final clincher. Fiona had started studying Italian as soon as they’d made the choice, and she was almost fluent now. It was essential for the next stage of their plan.

Fiona stared up at the winter sun, thinking the unthinkable; Lynsey Taylor would have been freed this week, and she could never have lived with that. They had to kill them. Then she corrected her thoughts quickly. Jessie killed them, Jessie; reminding and convincing herself again that her denial wasn’t cowardice, just her part of their bargain. If she ever confessed, the girls would be lost and it would all have been for nothing. All Jessie’s sacrifice would be in vain.

They stood for a moment longer watching the meandering sheep, and then they re-packed the bags and climbed into the car, ready for the final journey into the country that they both loved.

***

The ward Sister stood with her arms folded, looking at Liam disapprovingly.

“Are you really sure you want him home, Mrs Cullen? He can be very noisy you know.”

Liam squeezed himself into the too–small wheelchair that they’d insisted on, for his journey to the car, and gazed up at the three women balefully.

Annette was backing the Sister up, enjoying teasing him while she could.

“Yes, are you sure Danni? Because Jack Harris can find a cell for him at High Street. Just you say the word.”

Liam squinted up at Annette, making a mental note to get back at her somehow, when he was better. “Just you wait ‘til I’m back at work sergeant, you’ll be making tea for a month.”

Annette and Danni looked at each other and shook their heads. Then, without a word, they turned on their heels and walked off down the ward, waiting for the howl of indignation that would inevitably follow.

“Ah, come on, you know I was only kidding you. Take me home and...” Liam reached for some sacrifice that would convey the enormity of his gratitude. “I’ll cook you dinner.”

Danni turned around, astonished. “Hasn’t there’s been enough poisoning for one week?”

A student nurse who’d been watching them, laughed suddenly.

“Well, at least we’re entertaining the staff. Ah, come on now girls, take me home...please?”

***

Craig liked her, but did he like her enough to take the risk again? Dinner could get messy and then they’d both lose out, but then life was messy, wasn’t it? Except that he’d done a good job of keeping his life tidy for years. It was dull and it was lonely, but at least it was tidy, and tidy was good, wasn’t it?

Maybe lunch would be better. There was less chance of misbehaving when alcohol wasn’t involved, but then there was less chance of fun as well. He turned the number over repeatedly in his hand, and stared hard at the phone, as if the solution would magically appear. God, he was too old for this crap.

Nicky’s soft knock rescued him from the decision and he beckoned her in gratefully.

“What can I do for you?”

“Davy would like five minutes when you get time.”

He nodded, smiling. Davy was still too shy to knock his door directly, using Nicky like a big-sister intermediary.

“Where’s Annette?”

“Gone to help Danni get Liam home. She’s got Erin and a six-month bump to carry as well.”

Craig’s hand flew to his forehead in realisation. “Of course, he gets out today. I would have collected him if Danni had said.”

“She didn’t like to bother you, what with the case, and she wants this killer caught as much as we do. Anyway, don’t worry, the two of them can nag him into submission.”

He smiled. “OK, tell Davy I’ll be there in five. I just need to make a quick call.”

He picked up the receiver, suddenly decisive, and Nicky left, discreetly leaving the door open just a crack. Enough to hear his deep voice say hesitantly. “Hello...Julia, it’s Marc, Marc Craig.” Time for life to get messy again.

Chapter Twenty

Annette thumped in heavily, looking as if she’d suffered enough for ten women and Nicky laughed, knowing exactly why.

“How’s Liam?”

Annette rolled her eyes meaningfully. “A hell of a lot better than we are. It nearly killed us getting him to go to bed when he got home. I had to threaten him with the Armed Response Unit, and even then he said that he’d beaten most of them at weights and to ‘bring them on’.”

“I bet he has too.”

“God knows what he’ll be like when he’s an old man. He’s difficult enough now. Imagine trying to give him a bed-bath when he’s ninety.”

“Oh thanks a lot, Annette. That picture will be in my head for days now.”

Nicky laughed and shook her head, as if to remove the image. Just then, Craig emerged from his office, the smile on his face giving her all the information she needed.

He strolled over to Davy so casually that she could almost hear him whistle.

“Right Davy, what’ve you got for me?”

Davy was sitting in ‘Emo World’, a three-desk-horseshoe full of computers, each flashing with different colours and timings as if it had its own character. He pointed Craig to the screen on his left and clicked on a video file, opening it to show Jessica Adams and her baby emerging from the Eurostar terminal at Paris’ ‘Gare du Nord’ station. The time and date showed eight o’clock on Wednesday evening U.K. time.

He clicked again and she appeared two minutes later, exiting on the Rue de Dunkerque heading onto Rue La Fayette, until she disappeared into the Metro at Magenta. A third click showed her leaving the Metro thirty minutes later at Rambuteau in the fourth arrondisement, before disappearing completely into the busy Marais district.

“I’ve been on the phone all afternoon trying to find more images. S...Sarkozy announced that they’d be installing extra cameras in Paris in 2008 but most of them are in the eighteenth and nineteenth districts. My French is a bit rusty, but as far as I can make out they disappeared off the Rue Saint-Merri.”