Crossing the Line (Kerry Wilkinson) (18 page)

18

‘Who’s that?’ Jessica asked.

Josh paused, peering from the photo to Jessica and back again. ‘Do you know him?’

‘Not personally.’

‘Lucky you. That’s Scott Dewhurst – a real piece of work. His dad died a couple of years back but

drug-dealing has always been in the family.’

‘What else is he into?’

Josh began to reply but stopped himself, seeming more hesitant. ‘Why do you want to know?’

‘My friend.’

Josh sighed, biting on his lip, sucking his teeth. He straightened his shirt and took the photo back.

‘If your friend has anything to do with Scott Dewhurst then he’s either involved in something serious

that he shouldn’t be – or he’s managed to stumble his way into a situation he almost certainly won’t

get out of. Either way, he might as well be dead. Is he someone I should be interested in?’

‘No.’

‘You sure?’

Jessica remembered how pathetic Tony had been the previous evening; the way she had stripped

and washed him, then put him to bed. She’d known him on and off for years – a pest but nothing more.

When she’d spoken to him in his flat she saw in his eyes that he wanted to be free of his past – but

she’d also seen how scared he had been, hurrying down the street when he noticed Scott opposite the

flat. There was something there.

What had he got himself into?

‘I’m not sure,’ Jessica said.

Scott packed the photographs back into the folder, shaking his head. ‘You know we can’t go through

this. I’m here as a favour to Esther – but I can’t give you details if I don’t know why you need them.’

‘I’m not dirty.’

Scott shrugged, tossing the folder onto the back seat. ‘It’s not like you’d say anything different

whether you were or you weren’t.’

‘But Esther—’

‘Look, Esther’s great – we went out and I’d trust her if
she
was asking but
she
isn’t. I don’t know you and if our roles were reversed, I doubt you’d say anything different.’

Jessica knew he was right – but so was she. ‘All right, come with me.’ Josh moved reluctantly at

first but she led him across the car park steadily, opening up the passenger side of her car and holding the door open. ‘Go on then, get in.’ As soon as he was inside, Jessica slammed the door and pressed

the button on her keyfob to lock the vehicle. At first Josh stared at her, confused, but then she saw his nose twitch. Within a second, he was hammering on the window and scrabbling on the door itself to

find the lock, not knowing it could only be unlocked from the driver’s side.

Jessica let him stew for thirty more seconds, his face turning greyer until he eventually clamped a

hand over his mouth and nose. When she eventually unlocked the door, Josh fell out of the side,

landing on all fours on the frozen tarmac of the car park, gasping for breath.

After a long stream of expletives, he finally managed to get a sentence out. ‘What’s that smell?’

Jessica had her hands on her hips. ‘Last night I found my friend in an alleyway on his way down.

His pupils were tiny dots and he was sick everywhere. EV-ERY-WHERE. Mainly on me. If you really

think I’m dirty, then fine. Fuck you. But if you think I welcome puke-covered junkies into my car for a

laugh, then you’re very, very wrong.’

Josh clambered to his feet, still gasping for air. ‘You could have just bloody told me.’

‘Yeah and you could’ve not been a knobhead. Now are you going to tell me about Scott Dewhurst

or do I have to go hunting myself?’

Josh began walking back to his car rubbing at his face, trying to remove an invisible spot. His

voice was croaky. ‘Esther said you were sound – she didn’t say you were mental.’

‘It’s my middle name, now get a move on – you bloody stink.’ Back in Josh’s car he took the photo

out again, clicking his tongue against the top of his mouth, trying to get rid of the taste. ‘It’s not that bad, stop being a baby,’ she added.

‘I can still smell it. How did you drive here in that?’

‘I had the window open and a massive coat, now stop whingeing and tell me about Scott’s dad.’

‘Oliver Dewhurst – he was sent down a decade ago for various things, mainly involving drugs. He

died in prison a couple of years back, no suspicious circumstances.’

Jessica peered at the photograph again. ‘What about Scott?’

‘We don’t know much about his mother but she was never really in the picture. His dad was on

Greater Manchester’s police radar a long time before either of us were around, building up from

thefts to drugs, plus plenty more they never pinned on him. Scott’s a little different, mainly keeping

himself out of trouble and generally learning from his old man’s mistakes.’

‘Does he have a record?’

‘Not much. He was arrested for a drugs offence four years ago but there was no evidence and the

charges were dropped. We had him nailed for a serious GBH a year ago when he attacked someone

outside a nightclub. We had witnesses, his blood at the scene – everything except CCTV. Two weeks

before the trial, the victim changed his story. He said he’d been the aggressor and attacked Dewhurst

and then slipped, smashing his own nose on the floor. Surprise, surprise, our witnesses suddenly had

a change of heart too. Obviously Dewhurst got to them but how are you supposed to prove it? If he

paid them off, we’ve not found the money. More likely, he sent someone round with a crowbar.

Anyway, Dewhurst’s solicitor said that explained why his blood was at the scene and with no

witnesses and no compliant victim, the CPS dropped the charges.’

‘What a surprise.’

‘Exactly. Since then, he’s kept himself cleaner than a wet wipe. We’ve been keeping an eye but he

lives in this smallish three-bed house and doesn’t spend much money. The only thing he does have that

would make you notice him is this flash soft-top sports car and a few suits. No expensive holidays, no

credit card bills, no huge parties – nothing to say he has much more money than me or you. And I’ll

bet his car doesn’t smell of sick.’

‘How do you know he’s still in drugs?’

‘Officially, we don’t. Unofficially, some of those who just happen to be visiting pubs and clubs at

the same time as him are people very much on our radar. You’ll never see them together but the

messages somehow get across. He’s got smart since we nearly nabbed him and he’s moving up too.

He’ll be in the big leagues soon.’

‘Can you send me anything else you have? I’ll give you a home email address.’

‘You know internal will get into your non-work emails if they really want to?’

‘So send it from somewhere secure that doesn’t have your name attached. It’s not like I’ll say

where I got it from if they ever come asking – which they won’t.’

‘You know we shouldn’t be talking about these things.’

‘Who’s talking? I’ve come to the supermarket to use the car wash next door. I didn’t meet anyone

here other than the valet attendant who will surely remember the girl whose car smells of sick if he’s

ever asked. Josh who? I don’t know a Josh.’

A smile crept across Josh’s face. ‘Esther said you were sharp.’

‘Like a Stanley knife. Now are you going to send me what I need?’

‘I’ll sort something.’

‘Good – then you should take a shower.’

Given the queasy look on the valet’s face after he had spent twenty-five minutes cleaning the inside of

her car for the princely sum of eight pounds, Jessica was pretty sure he would never forget her. The

poor guy looked about sixteen, although she had consoled herself in the knowledge that she had given

him a valuable life lesson: everyone starts with a rubbish job. By the time he was forty and running a

billion-pound multi-national technology company, he’d be giving after-dinner speeches about this

moment. Either way, she told him to keep the change from her ten-pound note and headed back across

Manchester, her car smelling ninety per cent less vomity.

As she passed the Printworks entertainment plaza, trying to imagine what Tony had got himself into,

Jessica noticed a small huddle of people standing by the traffic lights. Groups of tourists and

shoppers weren’t unusual but as she waited at the red light, more people spilled out of the glass-

fronted Arndale shopping centre, standing on the kerb and talking excitedly among themselves.

Jessica pulled her car onto the wide pavement, leaving her hazard lights flashing and offering a

terse ‘piss off’ to the know-it-all gobshite giving her the evil eye for parking on the path. A quick

flash of her ID and he soon went scuttling back to wherever he came from.

As she headed into the Arndale, more and more people were hurrying out, couples and groups,

until it was one large sea of shoppers chattering in a mixture of excitement and confusion. Overhead,

the alarm blared into life but Jessica knew this wasn’t just a fire. She rounded the corner, passing

W.H. Smith, to see a group of security guards at the other end standing in a small circle. One of them

was on a walkie-talkie, two others were on their mobile phones. Apart from a handful of shop

workers stumbling out of their stores, confused looks on their faces, the place was empty. Her

footsteps would have been echoing from the high ceilings but were instantly drowned out by the

unending blast of the alarm.

The tallest security guard held his hand up as he saw her approaching, bellowing something

impossible to hear over the din. Jessica took out her ID, her walk becoming a run until she was at the

far end of the rank close to the toilets.

Jessica shouted into the ear of the security guard who had tried to stop her, asking what was going

on. One of the others was still on his walkie-talkie, although Jessica couldn’t imagine how he could

ever be heard. He pointed towards the toilet and leant in to yell back into Jessica’s ear. ‘Someone’s

been stabbed.’

‘Dead?’ Jessica mouthed.

He shook his head and angled in to shout again. ‘Not a knife.’

Jessica dashed forwards, heading into the men’s toilet where the smell was only marginally better

than in her car an hour ago. Another security guard tried to stop her but Jessica showed him her ID

and continued past. Slumped inside a cubicle was a youngish man, somewhere in his mid-twenties,

his hair dark and patchy, eyes wide in terror. As Jessica approached, he held up his hands, shouting

‘stay back’, even though she could only lip-read.

Jessica edged closer but he pointed towards a spot on the floor next to him where a needle lay, the

plunger thrust all the way in, droplets of blood clinging to the pointed tip. She didn’t have to be a

world-class lip-reader to work out the next thing he said: ‘H-I-V.’

19

Jessica sat in the makeshift incident room shivering as the pilfered heater failed to make much impact

on the wintry temperature. The operation to steal the small convection device from the basement room

given over to solicitors had been as ruthless in the planning as anything Jessica had been involved in.

A three-man team created the distraction, with a further two-woman party doing the actual thieving.

Getting it up the first set of stairs was simple enough but negotiating past Pat on reception had

involved a Holland’s meat and potato pie, plus a Bakewell tart. Jessica had made sure Cole was

otherwise engaged and in less time than it would take for a drug-dealing scroat to get bail, an eight-

person team had taken thievery to a new level. Execution: A+. Effectiveness: D. The bloody thing

was useless, producing more cold air than hot.

Izzy blew into her hands, wisps of breath spiralling through her fingers into the air. ‘For all your

military operation to nick this fan, we could’ve chipped in a fiver each and bought something that

actually worked.’

Jessica checked her watch, glancing at the door. ‘Where’s the fun in that?’

Izzy stretched out her foot, nudging the heater. ‘Blowing into my hands creates more hot air than that

does.’

‘Yeah, but for every minute the solicitors are distracted by freezing their balls off downstairs, that’s one minute they’re not trying to get some thieving shite off the hook.’

As Jessica finished complaining, the door clicked open and Detective Constable David Rowlands

walked in, hands in pockets, turning from Izzy to Jessica. ‘Did you miss me?’

Jessica stood and began slow-clapping. ‘Well, well, well, look who it is. The adventurer returns:

Marco Polo Rowlands.’

Rowlands sat next to Izzy, blowing into his hands. ‘When I flew out yesterday, it was thirty

degrees, blue skies, no breeze, beautiful pool. I got back here and it was so foggy we couldn’t see the

ground, the roads are frozen, there’s still snow on my road and it’s about minus ten out.’

Izzy reached forwards and rubbed his cheek. ‘I thought it was fake tan. You make me sick.’

Dave leant back in his chair, hands behind his head. His skin was bronzed, his hair tall and spiky.

Jessica would never tell him but he looked more relaxed than she’d seen him in a long time. He

nodded towards her, grinning. ‘Your glasses look ridiculous, by the way.’

‘At least I can take them off, you’re stuck with that face.’

‘Blah, blah, blah. Same old jokes.’

‘Where did you go again?’

‘Majorca.’

‘Broadening your horizons then? It’s not quite Scott of the Antarctic or Columbus finding America,

is it?’

Rowlands dismissed her with a ‘pfft’ as the doors reopened and a stream of PCs and DCs entered,

with a weary-looking sergeant at the back who had been sent out to round them up. Jessica waited