Hurt (DS Lucy Black) (8 page)

The house in question was detached, two storeys, with a faux Tudor facade. A silver 4 X 4 was parked in the driveway, and, behind it, a smaller Ford. Lucy had intended to drive past, but when she reached the house, she found herself parking up on the kerb a little down the street from it, then twisting in her seat to better examine the place.

Just then, the front door opened and a man stepped out, dressed in a suit, clutching a plastic shopping bag which looked to contain his lunch. He was perhaps mid-thirties, Lucy thought. His wife appeared at the doorway, dressed in jeans and a white T-shirt. In her arms, she held an infant. Lucy felt her throat constrict as Joe lifted a small fist and reached out to the man, looking to be held. Joe had only been a baby the last time Lucy had seen him. He’d grown in a year. The man moved quickly towards him and embraced him, then turned away and climbed into the 4 X 4 while Joe cried and the woman shushed him, bouncing him lightly in her embrace.

As Lucy watched the woman and child retreat back inside their house, the husband passed her in his 4 X 4, staring in at her, as if realizing that she’d been watching his home.

Tom Fleming wasn’t in his office when she arrived nor had he left a note to say where he was. However, the phone was ringing in the main office and Lucy went in and answered it.

‘Can I speak to Tom Fleming, please?’ a young, female, English voice asked.

‘I’m afraid not,’ Lucy said. ‘He’s not here.’

‘Do you know where he is?’

‘I’m afraid not,’ Lucy repeated. ‘Can I help?’

‘This is Euro Security. Mr Fleming’s burglar alarm has registered an intruder. Are you a key holder?’

‘I’ll check on it,’ Lucy said, hanging up.

She was already on the dual carriageway towards Fleming’s house in Kilfennan when she reflected that she should, perhaps, have asked someone to accompany her, in case there actually were intruders in the house. She comforted herself with the thought that, if Fleming himself had been there, he’d have used his panic button. She decided to get as far as his address. If it appeared that there was a need for backup, she’d call for it then.

As she pulled into the street, her stomach constricted. Fleming’s car, still owned from his disqualification for drink driving, sat in the driveway, as she’d expected. The curtains in the windows of the house, however, were closed. She pulled up outside and went up the drive. The alarm continued to blare, the blue light on the box attached to the front of the house winking, as if against the morning breeze.

None of the windows or door to the front seemed disturbed, though all were curtained, including one across the front door. Lucy skirted the side of the house, climbing the low gate into the back yard. Again, the windows were shut and the back door locked. She peered in through the kitchen window, using her gloved hand to shield her eyes from the glared reflection on the glass.

The kitchen gave way onto the hallway to the immediate right of which climbed an open staircase. As Lucy squinted to see better, she thought she could make out something, at the far end of the hall, at the foot of the stairway. Shifting her position slightly for a better view, she caught clearer sight of it. Someone was lying at the foot of the stairs.

Taking out her phone, she called for an ambulance immediately. She hammered on the back door a number of times, leaning against the window and calling Fleming’s name, but the body did not move.

Finally, she hunted through the overgrown flowerbeds bordering the garden until she found a rock. Using it, she smashed the pane of glass in the back door and, reaching in, grateful for the protection of her work gloves, she unbolted the door and ran into the kitchen.

Tom Fleming was lying face down in the hallway, the lower half of his body still stretched up the staircase from where he had fallen. A pool of vomit haloed his head, sticking to his hair and skin. Lucy pulled off her gloves and placed her hand against his cheek. His skin was pale and clammy, his breath rank with sickness and alcohol.

‘Inspector Fleming,’ she said, shaking him. ‘Tom.’

He moaned, but did not rouse from his torpor. The ringing bell of the outer alarm had been replaced in here by an intense electronic tone that was pitched at such a level it made Lucy wince.

She slapped Fleming’s face lightly, all the time calling his name. Eventually, unable to rouse him that way, she went into the kitchen, filled a kettle with cold water, brought it back to the hallway and poured it on his face.

The effect was instantaneous. He jerked awake, staring around him blindly. He caught sight of Lucy standing above him and seemed to struggle to focus on her or place her in the context of his own home. He smacked his lips together dryly and looked as if he might speak. Then he twisted and vomited again onto the carpet, his back arching with each retch.

Lucy heard the wailing siren of the ambulance cut through the white noise of the alarm.

‘What’s the code for the alarm?’ she asked.

Fleming looked up at her, then turned to the floor once more as he dry-heaved. Finally he struggled to stand, seemingly not realizing that his feet were still on the stairs.

‘The alarm, sir,’ Lucy said. ‘What’s the code?’

‘One, two, three, four,’ he managed hoarsely.

So much for police officers being security conscious, Lucy thought.

Lucy had just managed to get the code entered and the alarm silenced when the blaring of the siren outside crescendoed, then stopped abruptly. She could see the flickering of the blue lights through the chink in the curtain over the front door. She pulled the curtain back, turned the key left in the lock and opened the door, flooding the stultifying atmosphere of the hallway both with light and fresh air.

‘Is there an officer down?’ the paramedic asked, stepping into the hallway and catching sight of Fleming at once.

‘I thought he was injured when I looked in from outside,’ Lucy explained. ‘I don’t think it’s quite as serious as I thought.’

The paramedic approached him. ‘Sir?’ he said. ‘Can you hear me?’

Fleming groaned and tried to shift himself again.

‘Is he pissed?’ the paramedic asked incredulously.

Lucy nodded, the gesture greeted by Fleming’s grumbles of disagreement.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I thought it was ... you know. I looked in and saw him lying there.’

‘We’ll give him a quick check over,’ the man said. ‘He might have injured himself in the fall.’ He shifted across to Fleming again. ‘We’re going to lift you, mate, all right?’

Fleming muttered something, but the man moved in and, gripping the drunk man under the armpits, hefted him to his feet.

‘Sit there a moment and I’ll get some help,’ he said as he helped Fleming to sit on the bottom step of the staircase.

Fleming slumped on the step, then leant sideways, against the wall. His face was pale, his stubble grey against his skin, flecked with his vomit.

‘Are you OK, Tom?’ Lucy said, stepping past the pool on the floor and laying one hand on his shoulder.

He stared at her accusingly. ‘What the hell did you call them for?’ he said.

She was making coffee for them both in Fleming’s kitchen when Tara Gallagher called. They’d had a hit on the metal thefts. Finn’s scrap metal yard had called to say that a team was offloading cabling at that moment. Finn, keen to avoid charges of handling stolen goods, had said that if the police were quick enough, they might catch them in the act.

Finn’s yard was on the outskirts of the city, past Ballyarnett, where Amelia Earhart had landed following her cross-Atlantic flight in 1932. The yard itself was a half-acre compound, enclosed on all sides by a metal palisade fence. A small portable unit from which the owner operated his business sat behind the front section of the fence, at the single gateway into the yard.

The PSNI teams had parked some distance away and were watching the gang as they moved to and fro, shifting metal from the rear of their white Transit van, which was parked on the roadway that bisected the yard.

To the left-hand side of the road, the skeletal remains of crushed cars sat atop each other, three high, six piles deep, against the palisade fence. The other half of the yard, to the right of the gang’s van, was comprised of piles of scrap metal and skips, some already filled, as best Lucy could tell. She could see four men moving backwards and forwards, removing scrap from the back of the van and depositing it in different piles and skips, perhaps in an attempt to mix the stolen metal more thoroughly with the legitimate scrap.

Lucy approached Tara. ‘What’s the plan?’

Tara smiled. ‘There’s only the one roadway, with the entrance, next to the Portakabin,’ she pointed out. ‘We’ll block it with the Land Rover and move in and arrest them. Simple.’

They climbed into the Land Rover, alongside the four Tactical Support Unit officers who had accompanied Tara and the driver down. They wore blue cargo pants and fleeces over their shirts. They all carried guns with them.

The Land Rover’s doors slammed shut and the vehicle’s engine roared into life as the driver accelerated it up the roadway towards where the van was parked. Leaning forward, Lucy could see through the reinforced windscreen over the driver’s shoulder. The four gang members outside heard their approach and instantly dropped what they were doing. One’s instinct was to run for the white van, possibly too shocked to realize that he was already blocked in by the police. The other three, however, scattered in different directions across the yard. One made for the area of scrap to the right, scrambling over the pile nearest to him, failing to find purchase on the metal, which slid away beneath his feet with each step he tried to take. The other two cut left towards the carcasses of the cars.

Lucy felt the Land Rover brake suddenly then one of the uniforms flung open the back doors and the four men jumped out and set off in pursuit of the gang members. Lucy and Tara followed, Tara heading straight for the man struggling through the piles of scrap, accompanied by a TSU officer.

The other three TSU men made for the piled cars, in pursuit of the two who had run, leaving Lucy to approach the white Transit van. She pulled her own gun from its holster and, holding it in front of her, both hands to steady it, banged on the side of the van three times in quick succession.

‘PSNI,’ she shouted. ‘Show me your hands.’

Behind her, she heard the thud of the police Land Rover door as the driver got out to support her.

She could see the face of the man in the white van reflected in the side mirror as he tried to gauge the likelihood of his escape. Then, incrementally, she saw the side window begin to lower. Instinctively she pressed herself against the side of the van, gun ready.

‘Show me your hands,’ she shouted again. ‘Now.’

The window cranked down faster now and, slowly, the man’s two hands appeared through the gap.

With the PSNI driver approaching from the passenger side of the van, Lucy stepped up and pointed her gun into the van cabin. A single man, in his late teens at most, sat in the driver seat. His face was swarthy, a raw black beard on his chin. His eyes focused on the tip of Lucy’s gun and did not waver. Then he heard the passenger door of the van open behind him and turned to face a second PSNI gun.

‘Please,’ he whimpered, turning to look at the other officer.

Lucy pulled the cable ties from her belt and quickly looped them around his hands, then pulled the plastic tight, cuffing him. Then she opened the door and gripping the man by his shirt front, pulled him out of his seat and onto the ground.

He lay on his face while she sat astride his back, frisking him quickly to check for any weapons. Satisfied that he had none, she twisted him round, onto his back. The PSNI driver had approached them now and stood above them.

‘What’s your name?’ he asked.

‘Marcus,’ the man said, wide eyed.

As the officer cautioned the man, Lucy moved to the back of the van and climbed inside to see what the men had been shifting. Coils of copper wiring were stacked to one side of the van, while against the back wall wads of folded lead flashing were piled to the height of the seats in the cab beyond. To the left-hand side were various bits of scrap metal, among which Lucy spotted one section of the cast metal fencing she’d had placed on Mary Quigg’s grave.

She climbed back down from the van, just as Tara approached with the second man in cuffs.

‘Well?’

‘It’s the right team for the churches and graveyards anyway,’ Lucy said. Over to her left, Lucy could see the other three uniforms tracking their way through the rows of piled cars, still searching for the two men who were presumably hiding inside some of the wrecks.

Lucy grabbed Marcus and, pulling him to his feet, brought him round to the rear of the van.

‘Is this cabling from the train line?’

The boy nodded. ‘It wasn’t us,’ he said.

‘This wasn’t you?’

‘No. The girl. She was there when we arrived. We’d only cut a bit and we came round the bend and saw her. She was just lying there. She was dead already.’

The boy was clearly terrified, perhaps believing that the police suspected the gang of Karen’s killing.

‘So you say,’ Lucy snapped.

‘I swear,’ the boy managed. ‘We saw someone leaving when we arrived. An old guy, grey hair. He was getting into a car. It was red, I think. I didn’t see what make. But it was small. Like a Fiesta or something.’

‘What about the stuff from the graveyard?’ she demanded. ‘Did you take that?’

Marcus glanced at the officers standing around and nodded.

‘We’d best leave this till we get to the station,’ Tara cautioned.

Ignoring the comments, Lucy pointed to the fencing from Mary’s grave. ‘This was taken from a child’s grave. Who stole it?’

The man shook his head. ‘Not me. That was Shaun. In the red T-shirt. He did the graveyard while we did the church roof.’

He nodded towards the piled cars. Shaun was evidently one of the two men still hiding there.

As they glanced across towards where the man had indicated, they suddenly saw that one of the columns of cars, close to the fencing, was beginning to sway. Below it, in the small pathway between the carcasses, they could see the uniforms moving, searching for the two missing men.