‘Paul Lancaster.’ I introduced myself and he smiled. ‘Bit of a drama, isn’t it? I think we’re going to need to clear the building in case things kick off when the armed units arrive.’
‘Shouldn’t be long now.’ I looked at my watch, trying to remember how long it had been since I’d called it in – a couple of minutes but it felt like twenty.
Lancaster turned to Derwent. ‘I’ll leave you to clear this floor. PC Snow will help. I’ll take DC Kerrigan up to the next floor so we can check for any other occupants. We’ll have to wait to deal with the top floor when the AFOs get here.’
‘I should go up with you. It’s too much of a risk to send DC Kerrigan. She’s not wearing body armour.’
‘And neither are you,’ I pointed out. ‘There’s absolutely no need to take my place.’
‘Still, I’d prefer to.’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘Want me to pull rank?’
‘Stop bickering and get on with it.’ Lancaster headed for the stairs and Derwent followed, giving me a last look as if to check I was staying where it was reasonably safe. With bad grace I went to the first flat and knocked on the door as softly as I could, while PC Snow did the same next door. It was something to do, anyway – something that might take my mind off what was happening two floors above.
We had cleared the ground floor (one occupant, an old lady who angrily refused any help from Snow and left the premises carrying her most precious possessions in a Tesco carrier bag) when a marked silver BMW pulled up, the yellow sticker in the window announcing that the first armed officers were on the scene. Lancaster and Derwent had seen them from the floor above and came down at speed for a briefing that lasted all of twenty seconds. In the meantime, another two teams had arrived along with their commander and the nine of them headed for the stairs, more like soldiers than police officers in their black helmets, blue fatigues and body armour. Six were armed with Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine guns that looked more or less like the most lethal things imaginable, while another two carried square-muzzled Glocks that weren’t far off the pace. The last was hefting an Enforcer, a mini battering ram that was known in police slang as the Big Red Key because it could open pretty much any door.
Lancaster and Derwent had taken cover on the opposite side of the road and I ran to join them, squatting behind a parked car that would be about as useful as tissue paper if the submachine guns started firing in our direction.
‘Not hanging about, are they?’ Lancaster turned to grin at me as the armed officers fanned out along the balcony, checking the other flats for signs of life. Satisfied, they moved into position around the door of Flat 9. I had the distinct impression Lancaster was enjoying himself. Derwent was chewing gum, his jaws moving rapidly, tension written on his face.
From our position down on the street, we only had a limited view, but it was easy enough to reconstruct what happened next. At a word from the commander, the officer with the Enforcer stepped forward and shouted ‘Police’ at almost the same moment he swung it into the door. I saw the timber frame splinter with the first blow, break with the second, and give way completely with the third impact. As the officer fell back, his colleagues pushed into the flat, shouting to disorientate anyone inside who might have considered putting up a fight. My heart was pounding as if I was in there with them. I had never wanted to be a firearms officer but I could see the attraction. There was something atavistic about charging into a confined space while armed to the teeth, backed up by eight equally well-equipped colleagues who were trained to respond to aggression with targeted, measured violence.
On this occasion, there was no aggression to respond to, it seemed. In a surprisingly short space of time, the commander came to lean over the edge of the balcony and gave us the thumbs-up before getting back on his radio. He was requesting paramedic assistance and my stomach twisted as I thought about why. Maybe this time the killer had left his victim to die alone. Maybe I should have tried to break into the flat myself instead of calling for back-up. I didn’t get long to consider the maybes; Derwent was out from behind the car before I had even straightened up, and disappeared through the main door at a sprint. Lancaster and I followed, running up the stairs as sirens whooped in the distance. We caught up with him at the door of the flat, where the commander was explaining what had happened.
‘We’ve got four males in the flat, three in custody and one awaiting paramedic assistance.’
‘Three?’ Derwent’s voice was sharp.
The commander nodded. ‘No names yet, but I’ll leave that up to you. No ID on any of them. Two older blokes, one young. They were in the kitchen at the back of the flat when we went in.’
‘Were they armed?’
‘We found a handgun on the floor by the cooker – a Beretta nine millimetre. Looks like one of them dropped it when they heard us coming. Better than being caught in possession, I suppose. They didn’t offer much in the way of resistance. We had officers blocking the fire escape at the back and enough of us at the front to give them a fair idea there was no point in trying to fight their way out. Don’t know who they are or why you want them, but I’d say they were pros from the way they reacted.’
I was desperate to find out if William Forgrave was okay. ‘You said there was one awaiting a paramedic?’
‘He’s going to need treatment for burns, by the looks of things. Nasty stuff. They used a steam iron.’
‘He was being tortured?’ Lancaster sounded shocked, and I recalled that he would have no idea why we had been at the address.
‘Looks like it. I don’t think he was having much fun, put it that way.’
Derwent moved restlessly. ‘Is the flat clear? Are we okay to go in?’
‘It’s all yours.’
I followed Derwent inside, past the shattered door that had been propped up against the wall. The living room on the right – the one I had peered into – was full of men: four of the armed officers and three suspects who were sitting down, hands cuffed in front of them. Two of them were sitting on the sofa while the third, a thin middle-aged man with a deep tan, was leaning back in an armchair with his eyes closed. Derwent barely paused and I only had time for a quick glance before we moved on past the flat’s one bedroom to the kitchen at the back. A couple of officers were in there, giving fairly rudimentary first aid to a man who lay on the floor, his limbs vibrating as if he was wired to the mains. William Forgrave, I presumed. He was short and paunchy, as if he rarely took any exercise beyond climbing the stairs to his flat. He was wearing a pair of jeans and nothing else, all the better to show off the angry triangular burns that patched his torso. The soles of his feet were dotted with tiny blisters. It would be a long time before he could walk without pain, and a long time before he looked into the mirror and recognised what he saw, because his face was a mess behind his heavy black beard. It had swollen badly already, but I could tell that his nose was broken. His front teeth were chipped and his mouth hung open as if his jaw might have been damaged too. The kitchen floor was spotted here and there with droplets of blood. A steam iron stood on the table, turned away from me. It was still plugged in, I noticed. The air in the kitchen was warm and humid, close to stifling when you thought about why that might be, and the windows had misted up.
Derwent had determined with a glance that the victim was in no state to talk to us, and had turned his attention to the kitchen counter.
‘Where did these come from?’
One of the officers stood up. ‘Personal effects from the gentlemen in the living room, sir. We thought we’d let you have a look. That was everything they had on them. Obviously, some of it is evidence.’
They had been arranged in three separate piles, one for each of them. My attention was caught by a brass knuckleduster, a wicked-looking thing with blood spattered across it. That would explain Forgrave’s facial injuries. Derwent sorted through the piles with the end of a pen, examining each item without touching them. There was one mobile phone between the three of them, a small, cheap Samsung model. I was willing to bet it was a pay-as-you-go one, probably bought that morning. It had taken a while to filter through to the criminal world that carrying a personal phone was as good as having a permanent location beacon – the phone companies could and would supply the police with information about where they had been and when, and who they had been calling. The professionals took steps to avoid it by using phones they could dump after each job. I was starting to see why the commander had thought he was dealing with proper criminals.
The knuckleduster’s owner was a smoker: a silver Zippo lighter stood beside it, along with a pack of Benson & Hedges cigarettes. He had also been carrying a sheaf of cable-ties held together with a rubber band.
‘That looks promising. Ivan Tremlett was restrained with ties like those.’
Derwent made a noise in his throat that was probably agreement. He was looking at the third pile, at a money-clip in the shape of a bear. It was in silvery metal with shiny clear stones for the eyes and claws, and its paws were clamped down on something approaching a thousand pounds from the thickness of the roll.
‘Are those diamonds?’
I was being flippant, but Derwent nodded. ‘Set in platinum. What would that set you back?’
‘More than I’ve got in my savings.’ Not that I would have wanted it anyway. ‘Flash, isn’t it?’
‘Oh yes. Like the man who owns it.’
My interest sharpened. ‘Do you know who that is?’
‘I have a fair idea.’
‘Tell me.’
‘You’ll find out.’ He took out his own phone and dialled a number.
I shook my head, frustrated. ‘I don’t know what’s going on. Why would three professional criminals be engaged in a campaign of torture and murder? None of the victims had a connection with organised crime.’
‘Weird, isn’t it?’ Whoever Derwent was calling picked up then. I worked out it was Godley from listening to the DI’s end of the conversation. When he hung up, he said, ‘The boss’ll be here in a couple of minutes.’
‘By helicopter, presumably?’
‘He was out and about. At a meeting. He’s not far away and he was in the car already when I rang.’
‘Is he pleased?’
‘What do you think? Course he is.’
And are you?
I almost added, but didn’t quite dare. There was something I couldn’t read in Derwent’s manner, something he was suppressing that seemed to me to be excitement.
He had moved on to the second pile and was examining a small folding knife, dull black in colour, with a blade that couldn’t have been longer than three inches. It was wickedly sharp.
‘That’s one for forensics.’ He looked up and grinned at me. ‘Not bad. And I was going to let you walk away.’
‘You were out on the street. We almost missed it completely. We would have if I hadn’t gone back to drop in my card.’
‘Yeah, well, everyone gets lucky now and then.’
Including William Forgrave, though he probably didn’t see it like that. A couple of paramedics had arrived, competent in green overalls, and had taken over from the officers. They were preparing to transfer him to a stretcher and I nudged Derwent.
‘We should get out of the way. Besides, don’t you want to meet the three suspects?’
‘Yeah. Why not?’ He sounded as if he was trying not to laugh. ‘Wait until the boss gets here. He’s not going to believe this.’
I followed him down the hall feeling increasingly out of my depth. The DI stopped in the doorway of the living room and I almost collided with him. The three suspects looked up with varying degrees of interest. The two on the sofa were muscle, pure and simple: one was young with close-cropped fair hair and a sprinkling of spots on his chin and neck, while the other could have been his dad. He was twice the width and what remained of his hair was grey. He had the battered nose and cauliflower ears of the habitual fighter. He was wearing the uniform of a BT engineer, down to the ID swinging from a chain around his neck. The young lad had a purplish scar running up one arm that looked like a souvenir from a knife fight. Not the sort you want to tangle with. Neither looked particularly worried about their situation, as if being arrested was all in a day’s work.
I turned my attention to the man in the armchair just as Derwent said, ‘Well, look who we have here. Hello, John. Nice to see you again. What brings you back to these parts?’
‘None of your business.’ His heavy eyelids didn’t even flicker; he didn’t look surprised to be addressed by name. I stared at him, at the tan that spoke of life in a hot country, at the thick ash-coloured hair that curled over his collar, at the heavy ring he wore on one hand and the Rolex watch that didn’t quite go with the steel handcuffs he was sporting. He had a long nose, full lips and a square jaw, and his skin was so smooth that I found myself wondering if he’d had Botox. His white shirt had a smear of blood on the shoulder, drying to brown. The overall impression I got was of a coolness that bordered on the psychopathic, and I knew I had seen his face before, but I couldn’t place it.
‘What you do
is
my business, you know that. Must be something big, if you’re here yourself. I thought we’d seen the last of you.’ Derwent had his hands in his pockets and was rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. He had moved closer to the suspect, looming over the man he was addressing. I slipped into the room and stood beside one of the firearms officers who was cradling his MP5 like a baby.
‘No comment.’ The tanned man was having to lean back with his head at an awkward angle to maintain eye contact with Derwent. It seemed it was too much trouble. He pulled a face and looked away with an air of finality, as if he was bored with the conversation.
‘Come on, John. Talk to me.’ He lowered his voice so I could only just catch what he said. ‘You don’t want me to make you talk, do you? Only I’ve learned quite a bit from you and your lads, over the years. Very inventive, some of the things you come up with.’
‘But not legal.’
‘A couple of minutes is all I’d need, wouldn’t you say? I’m sure I can get a couple of minutes alone with you.’