‘Get me the details of that account and send them through to my phone, will you?’ said Mercy. ‘I want to get forensics in here too.’
‘What … now?’
‘Tomorrow morning. Can you be here to let them in?’
She walked around the rooms, put in another call to Boxer, still no answer. Came across Amy’s bag, knelt down and went through it. Nothing unusual. She looked up and saw from her vantage point that Amy’s mobile was slightly tilted. She went back to the table, flipped the mobile, found the screwed-up, flattened piece of paper that Amy had left and teased it open. A UK mobile phone number. She called the operations room at the kidnap unit HQ in Vauxhall, asked them to check the number for her, do a trace on it and call her back. She stared into the table trying to stem a rush of thoughts and emotions about the last time Amy had gone missing, the terrible sense of loss even after years of not getting on. But now … she winced at the memory of that hug Amy had given her in the coffee shop, her new grown up girl.
Jess called Boxer, told him she was outside with the car. Boxer took the Ukrainian down. As they drove to the rendezvous point, Jess handed over the chain from her neck. They parked outside some seventies blocks of flats down a side street, crossed the Cally Road and went down the steps to the Regent’s Canal towpath to perform the recce. They looked towards King’s Cross and decided that there were too many buildings overlooking that stretch. They went under the bridge formed by the Caledonian Road and walked along the canal, past the ramp up to Muriel Street and as far as the western portal of the Islington tunnel.
On this side there were no overlooking buildings and the narrow boats moored on either side of the canal were silent, unsmoking, uninhabited. The nearest one was twenty metres away from the bridge and had a canvas cover over the rear deck and entrance; its centre was weighed down by a tarn of leafy water. On the way back to the bridge, Boxer unclipped the canvas, making sure he didn’t tip any of the water over the side. He told Jess to go back to the car and wait for his text, be ready to mobilise.
‘If it’s Todd coming to this meet, I want to be here,’ she said. ‘We’ve got things to discuss.’
‘That’s not how it’s going to work. There’ll be no confrontations. We want to find out where he’s going. You wait in the car,’ said Boxer. ‘You know this area?’
‘Lived around here all my life.’
‘We don’t know where he’s going to come from or his mode of transport, so we have to be prepared for everything. I want you to park the car where you can see both access points down to the towpath. If you see Bone arrive or leave, you text me the word Bone.’
‘What about me?’ asked the Ukrainian.
‘You’re going to go back up on to the Caledonian Road to send the coded text message that will bring Todd Bone here. I’ll be watching you from across the road. You come back down here, stand in the light and wait. When Bone arrives, you hand over the chain and ring, take your money and split,’ said Boxer, taking a shot of the Ukrainian with his phone. ‘Make it quick. If you tell him anything about us, I’ll find you.’
‘I want the chain and ring back,’ said Jess, stepping forward.
‘Don’t complicate the issue,’ said Boxer. ‘Let’s just get it done. I’ll be under the canvas of the narrowboat. Take your positions and let’s keep it relaxed.’
Jess and the Ukrainian trotted up the steps to the Cally Road while Boxer slipped under the canvas at the stern of the boat, careful to maintain the puddle of leafy water. He took up a position with a view of the towpath, making sure his back didn’t make contact with the canvas.
Minutes later, the Ukrainian walked slowly out of the deeper darkness under the Caledonian Road and held up his phone. He retreated back under the bridge. Traffic heading into King’s Cross crashed overhead.
They waited. Boxer changed position after ten minutes. Too uncomfortable. He lay on his back, listening with the Walther P99 on his chest. He tried to keep his mind blank, but the images of the night kept streaming through his brain. He saw himself stuck on the threshold of the hospital room, not wanting to go in, knowing that what he would see would change him forever. He toyed with the words: Isabel has passed away. Isabel is no longer with us. Isabel is dead. Isabel has died. He said them to himself over and over until the words achieved a wonderful meaninglessness, one that released him from their terrible reality. His mind drifted to the struggling infant in the incubator. That tight, purposeful frown. He tried to think what he should do with this little life that had been left to him, and that was when he heard footsteps on the towpath coming from the direction of the Islington tunnel.
He eased over on to his front, peeked out from under the canvas awning. Nothing. No one. Silence. The footsteps started up again. They were coming up alongside the narrowboat and stopped again at the stern, right next to where he was hidden. He heard the man breathing through his nose. Still couldn’t see him. The Ukrainian appeared in the low light shed from the Caledonian Road on to the towpath and made a signal with his hands. The footsteps started up again more confidently and the man finally eased into view, walking slowly but decisively towards the Ukrainian. He was wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a calf-length coat with his hands in the pockets. He was medium height, stocky, with powerful shoulders, which fitted Jess’s description of Todd Bone. Boxer reckoned he’d spent some time assessing the scenario from a distance.
Bone cruised up to the bridge, shook hands with the Ukrainian and they squared off in the dim light. The Ukrainian produced the chain and ring from his pocket. Bone took out a small flashlight, checked it, nodded. He reached into his inside pocket for what Boxer assumed would be the money and produced a
SIG
Sauer with suppressor attached. No words preceded the four sharp clicks that were the shots that put the Ukrainian down on the towpath. Bone finished him off with a head shot before disappearing into the darkness under the bridge. He came back into the light with weights in his hands, which he must have stowed earlier. He pushed them down the Ukrainian’s jacket, rolled him over the edge and into the canal. He straightened his coat and hat and walked back under the bridge. Boxer saw him turn right and go up the steps to the west side of the Caledonian Road. It had taken no longer than ninety seconds.
Boxer sent a pre-prepared text to Jess and got out from under the canvas, clipped it back into place. He ran up the steps, but took the path to the east side of the Cally Road much more slowly, holding back in the darkness of the trees. Bone was already heading south, hands in pockets, relaxed pace. Boxer waited, let him get a good fifty metres ahead before he stepped out on to the pavement and followed him on the opposite side of the busy road.
After a few hundred metres Bone crossed at a zebra crossing and disappeared down a side street. Boxer waited again, watched him, certain that he was trained and would feel a tail at a hundred metres. He called Jess, told her to turn her car around and ease down towards Muriel Street, park, turn the engine off and see if Bone came past on foot. Bone turned left down Muriel Street. Boxer hung back still on the Cally Road, checking the map of the area on his phone and what the options were. The street ahead of him was empty of people; he didn’t want to risk going down there. Nothing from Jess. He crossed the road, took the first turning on the right and waited by a concrete pillar in front of an ugly block of flats opposite the Thornhill Arms. He texted a question mark to Jess. She came back with a zero.
Just as Boxer felt his nerve stretched to snapping point, Bone came out of Muriel Street, glanced down towards him and carried straight on. Boxer turned and ran down a parallel street, took a left turn and crossed the road, hid behind a brick pillar by the gate of a kids’ playground, which had a view of the street Bone had taken. He sent a text to Jess telling her where Bone had gone, but not to move. He looked at the map again; saw his problem. Bone had all the options, and Boxer realised he was going to need some luck.
Bone appeared at the end of the street, turned into it and started heading towards Boxer, but on the other side of the road. Boxer crossed over, veered away from some steps to a blue-tiled building and the Café Niko; Bone passed in front of him, slowed and got into a blue Ford Focus parked on the corner. Boxer took the registration number, carried on walking, called Jess, told her to pick him up.
Jess pulled up alongside him forty seconds later. They cruised along Bone’s route with Boxer looking right and left trying to find the blue Ford Focus. Nothing. They came to a T junction, where they saw the Ford Focus turning left on to the Pentonville Road. They followed. By the time they got to the main road, there were five cars between them and the Focus.
‘Keep your distance,’ said Boxer.
‘Bone taught me how to follow in a car,’ said Jess. ‘How about that?’
‘Useful,’ said Boxer. ‘Let’s hope he doesn’t spot his own distinctive style.’
At the traffic lights with Penton Street, the Ford Focus stalled. There was some honking from behind. Then the lights changed to red and it pulled away, turning left.
‘That was one of his tricks,’ said Jess.
‘The old ones are the best,’ said Boxer, and switched his mobile phone on.
23.30, 16 January 2014
Lofting Road, Islington, London
‘
T
hat phone, Mercy, it’s a disposable but it’s turned on and we’ve done a trace on it to an address in Tower Hamlets. Corner of Duff and Grundy Street. Do you want us to send someone round there?’
‘No, leave it with me. Too sensitive for that.’
Mercy and the landlady left the flat. Mercy headed east around the City, down the Commercial Road, which was brutal with traffic even at this time of night, to Poplar. She found a big Victorian house at the address she’d been given, drove past it, looking it over. Must have been a pub and a survivor of some Blitz bombing, as all around were terraced houses built in the seventies. There was an empty lot next to it, fenced off, with a beaten-up car in the undergrowth. Mercy did a circuit and parked outside one of the terraces just down the street from the house. Now she saw in the orange glow of the street light an old sign on the side of the building, paint well faded:
The African Queen
. Her phone vibrated. Boxer. Finally.
‘What happened to you?’ she asked.
‘Just tell me where you are.’
‘You know they’ve got Amy now.’
Silence.
‘Did you hear me?’
‘I heard you,’ said Boxer. ‘She must have gone with Siobhan. I told her not to, but she’s let her get into her head somehow.’
‘That’s Conrad Jensen’s daughter,’ said Mercy. ‘Now that I know who the Siobhan is you were talking about before.’
‘And how’s that?’
‘One of those kidnaps I was telling you about. The Kinderman girl. The mother, Emma Railton-Bass, is the ex-wife of the
CEO
. Her boyfriend is Conrad Jensen. I wanted to talk to him to exclude him from our inquiries, but he couldn’t be found. And now the kidnappers holding Amy have just told me that
you’re
looking for him as well. And that they want you to back off too.’
‘I’ve been set up,’ said Boxer. ‘I just don’t understand why. Tell me where you are.’
Mercy gave him the address.
‘Are you armed?’ she asked.
‘I could be.’
‘Well bring it with you and don’t drag your feet,’ said Mercy. ‘I’m … I need you here.’
‘Amy’ll be all right,’ said Boxer. ‘She’s learnt some stuff since she’s been at
LOST
.’
‘We don’t know what we’re dealing with here,’ said Mercy. ‘It feels big and … just come, will you?’
‘I’m on my way.’
‘And come alone. Nobody else should know about this.’
Jess turned off the Pentonville Road, trying to pick up the trail of the blue Ford Focus.
‘We’ve lost him,’ she said.
‘Pull in over here,’ said Boxer.
He wrote the registration number he’d memorised on a piece of paper, gave it to her.
‘Drive around for half an hour or so,’ he said. ‘See if you get lucky. If you do, follow him. Don’t try to confront him. He’s armed. He shot the Ukrainian. And he’s expecting you to be dead, which is what will happen to you if you get anywhere near him. Just get the address where he ends up, call me. Nothing else.’
‘You wonder why he didn’t kill me himself ?’
‘Maybe he liked you too much.’
‘Are all men that weird?’
‘Would you have been interested if he wasn’t?’
Jess stared out of the windscreen.
‘Don’t get excited,’ said Boxer. ‘But he’s just gone past us on the other side of the road. So turn round. Follow him. Try and get through the lights with him this time.’
Boxer got out of the car, walked to the Angel and got a cab to the East India Dock Road. He walked up Duff Street, saw Mercy’s car, got in the back, sitting low in the seat.
‘That was quick.’
‘You made it sound urgent,’ said Boxer. ‘So what are we doing here?’
‘We’re waiting. In this house is a mobile phone whose number was written on a piece of paper, not in Amy’s handwriting, but it was left screwed up under her phone in the flat Siobhan was renting. I gave the number to the trace guys in Vauxhall and here we are.’
‘What do you want to do?’
‘I want to go in there, take a look.’
‘How long have you been watching?’
‘About forty minutes. Nothing’s happened. No traffic whatsoever. Just that crack of light in the upstairs window on the first floor. Nothing on in the top or ground floors. No cameras that I can see.’
‘It’s an old pub.’
‘And?’
‘It’ll have a basement with a trap for the beer barrels.’
‘You think you’re clever.’
‘Sometimes.’
They walked round the house, found where the trap had been. It was concreted over.
‘Not so clever,’ said Mercy. ‘Now what?’
‘Front door by way of a change?’ said Boxer. ‘Gun in hand?’
‘I can’t believe I’m doing this.’
They rang the doorbell, which surprisingly worked. Waited.
A guy in his late twenties answered, hair flicked up at the front, thick-rimmed glasses, a loose-necked jumper, black skinny jeans and yellow Converse trainers. He was smoking a roll-up. Geek. The threat level was so minimal, the idea of producing a Walther P99 seemed ridiculous.
‘Huh? I thought you were the pizza guys,’ he said. ‘Can I do for you?’
‘We’re in the area …’ said Boxer.
‘Seems like you are.’
‘… and we thought we’d drop by and say hi.’
‘Right,’ said the guy. ‘And you are?’
‘Friends,’ said Boxer.
‘Friends of … the Earth?’
‘Todd.’
Mercy looked perplexed.
‘Don’t know that I know any Todds.’
‘You’ll know this one,’ said Boxer, and produced the Walther P99 at waist height. The guy looked down.
‘Oh shit,’ he said. ‘I don’t have any money here, you know that?’
‘We’re not interested in money.’
‘The product’s not ready yet.’
‘Show it to me,’ said Boxer. ‘We’ll decide.’
The guy backed away down the hall as Boxer and Mercy came in. He put his hands on his head as instructed, told them his name, Leo, and kept going to a door on the right-hand side. He asked permission to open it, which Boxer granted. The door was thick with insulation. The light emanating from the basement was intensely white and there was the hum of extractor fans. Boxer made a gesture for Mercy to find the phone she was looking for while he and Leo walked down into a surgically lit environment with white plastic walls, an abundance of greenery, tubing, heat and humidity. From the powerful stench of hemp he realised they were looking at an urban cannabis farm.
‘That big tree at the end,’ said Boxer. ‘What’s that?’
‘That’s the mother plant. Provides all the seeds to grow these little guys,’ said Leo. ‘This is going to be the best crop of Super Lemon Haze grown in London, but it needs another couple of weeks.’
‘And the lights. What kind of lights are these?’
‘Metal halide,’ said Leo.
There was a gurgling sound and a gentle thump followed by hissing, and a mist rose up amongst the leaves.
‘I’m using hydroponic propagation with an advanced nutrient system.’
‘And the power to run it?’
‘I steal it from the grid.’
‘You have to keep an eye on something like this.’
‘That’s why I’m here twenty-four/seven.’
‘Got it,’ Mercy shouted down. ‘First floor.’
Boxer pointed Leo back up the stairs, told him to shut the door. Leo was confused. Not sure what this was about. The doorbell went. Boxer looked at Leo.
‘The pizza you were supposed to bring.’
‘You paid?’
Leo nodded.
Boxer opened the door. Domino’s. Took the carton, handed it to Leo. They went up to the first floor and a room that had everything in it: desk, computer, TV, bed, cooker, gas bottle, fridge. It was a tip, too, with every conceivable fast food horror represented in empty box form with leftovers.
‘Don’t get out much,’ said Boxer.
‘Not allowed.’
‘This place should stink with all this crap,’ said Mercy, disgusted.
‘I’d say that’s a tribute to the chemical preservatives used in fast food production,’ said Leo.
‘Whose phone is this?’ asked Mercy, pointing at the mobile on the desk behind the computer.
‘Reef ’s.’
‘Who’s Reef ?’ asked Mercy. ‘And is that a real name?’
‘It’s the only name he has,’ said Leo. ‘This is his farm. He’s got maybe ten of these in London. Moves them around all the time. He’s a specialist.’
‘What do you do when this phone rings?’
‘I answer it,’ said Leo.
‘Let’s keep this moving, Leo,’ said Mercy. ‘We haven’t got all night.’
‘I listen to the request and call Reef, give him the message.’
‘Who was the last person to call this number?’
‘No names are ever used.’
‘When did they last use this number?’
‘This evening around seven.’
‘What was the message?’
‘“She’s coming.”’
‘That was it?’ asked Mercy.
‘I can only tell you what was said.’
‘Male or female voice?’ asked Boxer.
‘I’d say female but deep, bit of a croak in it.’
‘She called before or was that the first time?’
‘She’s called a few times.’
‘How do you get in touch with Reef ?’ asked Mercy.
‘I call him.’
‘Sounds easy.’
‘Well, it is once you’ve got used to the protocol.’
‘Which is?’
‘He changes his number every day. I access it by running code through a website.’
‘What code?’
‘I have a program I run,’ said Leo. ‘The number changes every week as does that phone there on the desk. It’s security. That’s all.’
‘What happens if you need to get in touch with Reef in an emergency?’
‘No different. I just call him.’
‘How often does he drop in?’
‘Once every few days.’
‘When did he last come?’
‘Hasn’t been since Tuesday, said he had something on.’
‘Does he warn you?’
‘Sends me a text.’
‘Does he have a key?’
‘Sure.’
‘Let’s have a look at your phone,’ said Mercy.
‘Are you going to tell me what this is about?’
‘We’re part of the Met’s Drugs Directorate,’ said Mercy, looking through the messages. ‘But we’re not interested in you.’
Leo looked at Boxer, then at the Walther P99, and scepticism was a mild form of the unease that passed across his face.
‘What do you know about Reef ?’ asked Boxer.
‘That he knows more about drugs than anybody else out there.’
‘Is he a dealer?’
‘More of a connoisseur, I’d say.’
‘But he’s not growing this for fun, is he?’
‘Mostly, yeah,’ said Leo. ‘He’s competing to produce the weed with the highest
THC
in the world. With some of his stuff he’s hit more than twenty-five per cent
THC
content.’
‘He still sells it, though.’
‘Sure, but that’s not the point,’ said Leo. ‘The point is to be the best—’
‘Will you two shut up,’ said Mercy. ‘There’s a message here, came through four hours ago from Reef. Says “Abt 12.00”. What does that mean?’
Leo was hesitant. Boxer levelled the Walther P99 at his left eye.
‘This isn’t my gun,’ he said. ‘But I looked at the ammo the guy was using in it, and I can tell you, this would not leave much of your head for posterity.’
‘You creep me out, you know that?’
‘Tell her.’
‘It means he’s coming round here in about twenty minutes.’
‘Well that’s convenient,’ said Mercy. ‘And it means you won’t implicate yourself.’
‘You mind if I smoke?’ asked Leo. ‘Need to mellow myself out a bit.’
‘You never had a gun pointed at you before?’ asked Boxer.
‘Sure, but not by someone like you.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ asked Mercy.
‘He looks as if he doesn’t care one way or the other.’
‘There must be plenty of people like that in your business.’
‘Not really. This isn’t a gangster business. We’re not looking for world domination. Just trying to grow a nice crop of weed is all. Now can I smoke?’
‘Let the poor bastard smoke,’ said Boxer.
Leo slowly opened a Tupperware box on the desk and removed a grey-green clump. He laid out a paper and sprinkled roll-up tobacco on it, then brushed some of the green clump on top. He rolled it up, lit it, inhaled deeply.
‘You want to try?’
‘No he doesn’t,’ said Mercy.
‘Just a toke, won’t do you no harm,’ said Leo, holding it out.
‘Don’t,’ said Mercy.
Boxer took the joint, drew on it, inhaled and held. Let out a small stream of smoke and a sigh.
‘You lie down on the floor now, Leo,’ said Mercy.
He sat down on the bare boards, lay back, crossed one leg over the other and smoked, yellow Converse nodding.
‘Good stuff ?’ he asked. ‘This is called OG Kush, won an award last year in the US, twenty-four-point-six per cent
THC
, medical-grade cannabis, earthy pine aroma, bit of citrus, very good for stress and anxiety. Perfect for your man, I’d say.’
Boxer pulled up a chair, sat astride it, gun resting on the back. Time passed.
‘You’re looking better already,’ said Leo, holding out the joint. ‘More human. And maybe, I don’t know, a little sad.’
Boxer took another drag, gave it back. Long silence. Just the computer hum and the fridge chuckling. Leo carried on smoking. Mercy paced the boards. More minutes passed.
‘I lost somebody tonight,’ said Boxer. ‘Somebody very important to me.’
Mercy stopped, turned, looked down on the back of his head, frowned.
‘What happened?’ asked Leo.
‘She died in hospital,’ said Boxer. ‘The first woman I’ve ever really loved.’
Leo came up on to his elbows.
Mercy eased round to look at Boxer’s face. Tears were falling silently down his cheeks. His body was still. She put a hand on his shoulder. He looked up at her.
‘Isabel died tonight,’ he said. ‘She had a pulmonary embolism, fell down the stairs. They gave her an emergency C-section, but she died. The baby survived. He’s this big.’