Alec opened the front door of his house and stepped inside. He had hoped that the lights and central heating would be burning and the smell of cooking would greet him, but it didn’t. The house was dark and cold, and his heart sank. Gail hadn’t relented. He hadn’t thought that she would, but hope had kept him positive. All those years of marriage had to count for something. Alec switched on the light and kicked the door closed with the heel of his foot. “Hi, honey, I’m home,” he said to the empty hallway. “What’s for tea, oh, is it quorn sausages, my favourite?” he wasted his sarcasm on the hall carpet. “I miss you, but not the quorn sausage surprise,” he chuckled dryly. “What is the surprise anyway? Surprise! It’s not a sausage at all, it’s quorn!” he joked to himself, but if he had had the chance to sit down and eat his tea with his wife opposite him, he would have. Alec felt a terrible emptiness inside. He missed her already. The house felt alien to him without her there, but he thought about how much time she had spent there alone. Alone and waiting for her husband to come from work. Alone, wondering if he would take his days off this week. She had spent her married life alone. Alec realised it now. Now she had gone, it was obvious.
He was tired and needed to sleep. The adrenalin from the investigation had worn off, and his mind felt numb. Arresting Jack Howarth had felt like an anticlimax. He walked into the kitchen and flicked on the light. The kettle was full, so he switched it on and grabbed his favourite mug from the cupboard. He caught his reflection in the window, and the man he saw there was much older than he had expected. The job was aging him rapidly, but he couldn’t see the day that he would retire coming anytime soon. It was no wonder that Gail had left him. He lived for the job. Apart from a few stolen hours a day, she had lived her life alone, constantly waiting for him to come home.
His mobile rang, and he tutted as he took it from his coat. “Tell them you’ve only just arrived home, Alec,” he mimicked his estranged wife. “You haven’t even had a cup of tea yet and they are ringing you. Can’t they make any decisions themselves? Are you the only detective in Liverpool?”
“Hi, Will,” he answered the call just before it clicked over to answer service. “What’s up?”
“You okay, guv?” Will sounded concerned. “You seemed a bit down when we left.”
“I’m just tired, nothing a good night’s sleep won’t fix.” Alec put coffee into the mug and then added another spoonful for good measure. Gail wouldn’t have approved, but then she wasn’t here to complain. “I thought you’d be in the pub with the troops.”
“I was going to, but I can’t face putting on a smile and acting like nothing has happened. Smithy has gone with them, but he’s just putting on a brave face. He was close to Kisha.”
“A few pints with the team will do him good.” Alec wasn’t so sure it would, but it sounded like the right thing to say. “It will hit him sometime sooner or later. Anyway, what’s up? You’re not calling just for a chat, are you?” Alec opened the fridge, swearing under his breath when he saw that there was no milk.
“No, I thought you’d want to know that they have sectioned Howarth.”
“No big surprise there,” Alec said. He was relieved in a way. “The man is a raving lunatic.”
“The medical staff said that he was behaving normally one minute, and the next he was like a rabid animal,” Will explained. “He bit the solicitor we appointed to defend him.”
“Bloody hell!” Alec laughed. “Who was it?”
“Wilkins,” Will laughed with him. It wasn’t really funny, but sometimes they had to make light of the darkness that surrounded them. “It took six coppers to hold him down, and after they restrained him, he began to plead that he didn’t know why he had been arrested!”
“Poor old Wilkins.” Alec poured boiling water into the mug. “I never liked the man anyway.”
“They’re transferring him to the cat-A in Manchester tomorrow morning,” Will added.
“A bullet through the back of his head would do it for me, but that’s the way it goes.” Alec stared at his reflection in the window. He considered using an anti-wrinkle cream, but decided that it was probably too late. “Have you heard anymore about what happened at the docks?”
“It’s all a bit sketchy at the moment,” Will sighed. “Leon Tanner has been positively identified as one of the victims, and one of his boys, Gareth Bates, took a bullet through the head, but the other guy is still John Doe. Dr. Libby reckons he was shot at least thirteen times, but he can’t say for definite how Tanner died until he completes the autopsy. He thinks that he drowned.”
“Drowned?” Alec was shocked.
“Well he was found face down in a puddle so they assumed he’d been shot and he’d fallen down into it, but when they moved the body, there were no other injuries,” Will explained.
“How did they move his body, with a forklift truck? Tanner is a big man,” Alec commented. “Holding him down would be difficult. Could he have been knocked unconscious?”
“Guess we’ll find out when the doctor cuts him open. They found a Scorpion machinegun next to the body.”
“Sounds like a drug deal gone bad?” Alec asked, although he had a sneaking suspicion that it was linked to their investigation somehow.
“Sounds like Nate Bradley to me, guv,” Will spoke his mind. “I think the guy is on a mission. The drugs squad have been after Leon Tanner for as long as I can remember, and they reckon he supplied our dead friend Jackie Benjamin. If Bradley had a hand in killing Benjamin, then it makes sense that he’s moved up the chain.”
“Any sign of him yet?” Alec sipped the black coffee and winced. It was strong and bitter.
“Nothing yet,” Will scoffed. “He isn’t likely to go home, is he?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised, Will,” Alec said. “If he is behind all this, then is he likely to have anything incriminating at his house? I doubt it.”
“You might be right, guv.”
“Have we got a warrant to search the place yet?”
“First thing in the morning, guv.”
“Good.” Alec had a thought. “What happened to Oguzhan?”
“Drug squad swerved it and released him, guv.”
“How come?”
“They reckon that some big noise in the Met told them to back off. There is an undercover investigation going on, and they didn’t want it compromised.”
“That makes sense,” Alec said. “Did Libby release any of the bodies?”
“No, guv. When Oguzhan found out the little fella was still alive, he broke down in tears. Apparently, he went straight to the Royal to see him. His solicitor is filing a formal request for the early release of the bodies in light of the Howarth arrest. Oguzhan wasn’t happy with me, but fuck him!”
“We can’t please everybody all the time, Detective,” Alec said sourly. He turned off the kitchen light and walked into the living room. Everything was neat and tidy. Gail must have tidied up before she had packed her bags and left him. “What time are you going in tomorrow?”
“I’m thinking about seven, guv, if that’s alright with you?”
“Let’s make it nine, eh?” Alec said. “We both need some sleep, and the courts won’t process the search warrant until gone ten.”
“Nice one,” Will agreed. “See you in the morning. Say hello to the missus for me, guv.”
“Yes, will do.” Alec hung up and sat down. “Will says hello,” he said to the empty room.
Jack woke up with a banging headache, and it took him several seconds to remember where he was. ‘Locked up, stitched and fucked up, all because of Patrick Lloyd,’ Jack thought. He tried to move his arms, but thick straps fastened them to a restraint belt around his waist. It was early, half-light filtered through thickened security glass high above his urine-stained bunk, and it hurt his eyes. His right eye was swollen and bruised as a result of his arrest. Apart from the restraint, he was wearing white pants made from paper. The cell door rattled as the custody sergeant inserted the key to open it. Jack closed his eyes and clenched his bowels. He grunted and defecated. “You can clean this up later,” Jack laughed hysterically and grunted again as he emptied his rectum. “Poo! That stinks, doesn’t it?”
“Dirty bastard,” the sergeant grumbled. “He’s all yours, get him out of here.” The sergeant wrinkled his nose at the foul smell and retreated from the cell. Three uniformed officers entered the cell. They wore full protective helmets and body armour more suited to a full-scale riot than transporting a single prisoner. “Put the face bar on him first,” the sergeant ordered. “He’s a biter.” The officers threaded a leather strap behind Jack’s head and forced the bar over his face before fastening the buckles. “That’ll stop you biting, arsehole!” one of the officers said as he fixed the straps painfully tight. Once they had attached the face shield, they untied the straps which held Jack to the bed.
“What are you doing?” Jack’s face suddenly changed. His words were barely audible. “Can I go home now?”
“You won’t be going home at all, you sick bastard.” The officers pulled him to his feet and dragged him across the cell. “You’re going to a nice new cell in the nuthouse. Put the hobble straps on him.” They fastened leather shackles around his ankles, avoiding the faeces dribbling down his thighs.
“Why are you doing this to me?” Jack asked innocently. “Can I see the doctor? Because I don’t feel well.”
“Shut up,” one of the officers snarled. They marched him down the corridor and the custody sergeant opened the metal gates as they went. A thick steel door led them out to an underground car park where a prison van waited. The van was white with two blacked-out windows on the side. They bundled Jack up the steps and pushed him into a holding cage, where they secured him to a mesh seat.
“We’re all going on a summer holiday, a summer holiday, me and you, where the sky is blue,” Jack sung tunelessly as they closed the door and locked him in.
“He’s a fucking fruitcake,” an officer said. He cleared phlegm from the back of his throat with a guttural sound and spat through the mesh. The sticky blob trickled down Jack’s cheek.
“Are we there yet?” Jack looked around and ignored the globule that was tickling his skin. “Stop the bus, I want a wee wee, stop the bus, I want a wee wee, stop the bus, I want a wee, and the driver wants a poo!” He rocked his head back and laughed. The officers muttered and cursed him as they closed the rear doors. “Do they think we are mad?” Jack stopped laughing and asked himself the question. “I think we might be, you know,” he answered. Jack closed his eyes and went to the dark place in his mind where he often sought sanctuary in times of trouble. It was the place he had found when he had been a young boy. The place he had hidden when the priest at the care home had buggered him. He felt no pain there, no humiliation or embarrassment. As a boy, he had spent many hours there whilst the men tasked with his wellbeing had abused him.
He heard security guards climbing into the front of the vehicle, and he felt the vibration as the engine started. The seat was hard and uncomfortable, and his arms were aching in the restraints. He drifted away from the pain and discomfort, and the gentle rocking motion of the van made him doze. It was a quiet place where he went, peaceful and serene. Jack wasn’t sure how long they had been travelling when a violent shudder woke him. The cellular van tilted and then tipped over. He felt the world spin upside down, and the judder smashed him into the side of the cage with force. Blood rushed to his head as he dangled upside down from the seat. The thick straps held his bodyweight to the chair despite gravity trying to pull him down. He could hear yelling coming from the guards, and then it stopped suddenly. They were silent for a moment, and then there were other voices. Loud voices shouting things that he couldn’t understand. He could hardly breathe. The straps cut into his skin and the material dug into his neck as he hung upside down in the cage. The face shield cut into his mouth, and it was impossible to swallow. It occurred to him that the prison van had been in a collision, upended by another vehicle maybe. He felt his blood pounding in his head, and the fragile vessels in his face strained under the pressure. There was a scratching sound at the back of the van, and he heard keys rattling in the locks. Jack couldn’t breathe because his bodyweight forced him down against the restraints around his chest. His eyes bulged from his head as the blood pressure increased. He thought about Louise Parker hanging upside down, and her screams echoed around his mind as unconsciousness descended on him.
Developers had built number 16 Palace Mews at the end of a leafy lane in a suburb of Liverpool called Woolton. The predominantly Jewish community was secular and quiet, which suited Will. He wasn’t one for making friends out of neighbours, and the job devoured most of his waking hours, leaving his social time at a minimum. When he did socialise, it was usually with other law enforcement officers. He found talking to people outside of the job about how his day was going almost impossible, and his previous relationships hadn’t lasted long because of that. Katie Osborne was the only woman he had ever wanted to marry, but she was already married to another man. The affair had blown up in his face, damaged his career and broken his heart. When Katie’s husband had found out about them, he had said he would forgive her if she resigned from her job, and they had moved away from the city to begin again. Will had begged her to stay with him, but when the chips had been down, she had jilted him for her husband. All the promises she had made had been lies, all the plans they had made to be together had been nothing more than romantic dreams, shattered on the harsh rocks of reality. Katie’s husband was a senior executive with Shell Oil and the heir to a large family fortune. Her love for Will hadn’t been powerful enough for her to lose her life of privilege. She had resigned from work by telephone, and he had never heard from her again. When he had rung her mobile, the number had been out of service, and after five days of torment, he had driven to her house to find the building totally empty and a for sale sign outside. The loss had devastated him. Will would have walked over razor blades for Katie, and she had promised him that her marriage was a sham and that their future was together. Her husband’s money and the security it offered her had meant more than she had thought in the end.
Since then, Will concentrated on work. He still had an eye for a pretty woman, but his heart was somewhere else. It was months before he met a woman he was interested in, and in true Will Naylor style, it was the wrong woman, a married woman. She was older than he was, but still very attractive. They met at a charity function and hit it off immediately. He was vulnerable since Katie had jilted him, and she was in a sexless marriage with a man she didn’t love anymore. They went to a wine bar after the function and opened their hearts to each other. The sex they had was exactly what they both wanted and needed. They both knew the relationship was destined to go nowhere, but they enjoyed their time together whenever they could. She had called earlier that day and arranged to come to his house when he eventually finished work. He needed her touch and the warmth of her body to take his mind from the case. She was a generous lover, making up for all the intimate experiences she had lacked for years.
The Howarth case had taken its toll, and he was exhausted. After speaking to Alec, Will opened a bottle of Pinot. He poured a generous measure into a glass tumbler and swallowed it in one gulp. The doorbell rang and he switched off the television, grabbed the bottle and headed for the front door.
“Hello, Detective,” she cooed. He could smell her perfume, and the scent made him heady.
“Come here.” He pulled her inside and pushed her body against the wall. “You smell good enough to eat,” he whispered as he kissed her lips. She opened her mouth and welcomed his tongue into her mouth, tickling it with hers.
“Good, because I like it when you eat me,” she gasped into his ear. “Are we going to stand here all night or are you going to take me to bed and show me how hungry you are?”
Will picked her up in his arms, and they giggled as he carried her upstairs. Their lovemaking was frantic, almost desperate, and when they were spent, she slept soundly in his arms. Will reached for the wine. The liquid burned his throat, but it helped his mind to rest and allowed him to sleep soundly. He thought about replacing the top on the bottle, but decided to empty the remainder into the glass. Will downed the wine, and it made his eyes water. Two minutes later, he closed his eyes and turned on his side next to her. The wine numbed his senses. Sleep claimed him quickly, but his dreams were dark and haunted by the murder victims he had seen through his career. His mind kept asking him questions about the case whilst his body cried for rest. It took a long time before his breathing settled and he fell into a deep sleep, but when he did, the days of working constantly caught up with him.
Downstairs the front letterbox opened, and a length of green hosepipe poked through it. The pipe grew longer as a man dressed in black fed it through the gap, and it was four yards along the carpet when petrol began to pour from it. The fuel seeped into the thick carpet and soaked from the hallway into the lounge. Petrol saturated the area from the front door to the narrow staircase, and fumes filled the air. At the back of the house, another man dressed in similar fashion sprayed petrol from a pressure tank used for applying weed killer. He soaked the back door in the liquid and sprayed it through the keyhole into the kitchen. Fuel covered the linoleum floor before the man threw the tank into the bushes. As Will drifted deeper into an exhausted sleep, a single match turned the ground floor of 16 Palace Mews into a vision of hell.