Relentless (35 page)

'I don't know,' she answered, which wasn't quite what I was
hoping for.
'Well, I want to try,' I said, leaning forward like a kid on a
first date. I went for the full-on lips kiss, and saw with a heavy
heart that she was inclining her head slightly and I was being
presented with the old platonic cheek.
As I gave it a peck and she squeezed my hand once again, the
phone rang a few feet away. It was the first time I'd heard it
ring since Jack's fateful call the previous afternoon. That call
seemed like a lifetime ago now. Slowly, I got to my feet, feeling
inexplicably nervous. I knew it was all over, but if nothing else,
my experience had taught me that life is never predictable. It
can throw up plenty of surprises, many of them extremely unwelcome.
'Hello?'
I could hear the nerves in my voice.
'Tom, how are you?' came a loud, confident voice with
artificial American inflections that made it sound like the person
it belonged to was stuck somewhere out in the mid-Atlantic.
Wesley O'Shea had always wanted to be American, and it was a
source, I suspect, of everlasting shame to him that his place of
birth was actually Leamington Spa. 'Are you OK, bro? I've just
heard all about what's happened to you. The cops just called me,
and frankly I'm speechless.' Wesley then showed me exactly how
speechless by launching into a long series of questions about
my ordeal, and when my answers were deemed too brief and
evasive, he responded by telling me about a supposedly similar
incident that had happened to a cousin of his in New Jersey back
in the early 1990s.
'Wesley, thanks a million for your call,' I said, interrupting
him as he got to the bit where the SWAT teams were just about
to go in, 'but I'm extremely tired, as you can imagine. Do you

mind if we talk about this later?' I turned to Kathy and made the
universal jerk-off gesture, and she smiled.
'Sure, Tom. I understand. Listen, take the day off tomorrow.
Maybe even Tuesday as well. Ezyrite Software wants you back
on the job fit and well.'
'That's very kind of you, Wesley.'
'Please, Tom, we're friends. Call me Wes.'
'Well, that's very kind of you, Wes. I appreciate it.'
'Er, also, Tom . . .' His voice suddenly sounded uncharacteristically
shaky.
'Yes, Wes?'
'Er, is it true what I'm hearing? That, you know, you actually
shot someone?'
'Twice,' I said, and hung up.
When I put the phone down, I looked at Kathy, knew that one
way or another we'd make it, and for the first time in as long as I
can remember, actually laughed out loud.

57

When DC Ben Sullivan got out of the car, he looked nervously
both ways down the deserted night street before running up the steps that led to safety. He opened the front door to the
flats and stepped inside, waiting for the click of the automatic
lock as the door shut behind him. He was in trouble, big trouble.
He Mjas sure that after Caplin's death they would be looking

for him; they might also have him down as Vanessa Blake's
killer. He knew the evidence against him was flimsy, but he
wanted some time to think before he answered any of their
questions, and that meant getting out of the country for a
while.
A part of him knew this was a foolish move, an obvious
declaration of guilt, but he wasn't in the right frame of mind
for an interrogation. Yesterday afternoon he had killed for the
very first time, stabbing to death a woman for money. They'd
promised him 20,000 pounds in cash for the job, and he'd received ten
grand already. It was a lot of money. But there was no way he
was going to be getting the other ten, because Vanessa Blake,
his actual victim, was the wrong person. He'd been sent to the
university to intercept a woman he'd never met before called
Kathy Meron, having been told that she was possibly in possession
of a key to a safety deposit box. If she was there, he was to
get the key off her, get the box's location, and then kill her; if
she didn't have it, he was to find out who did, then despatch her.
He was told that he'd be supplied with a pair of her husband's
gloves which had been taken from the family home, and which
could then be used to frame him.
But everything had gone wrong when he'd been disturbed by
Vanessa Blake and, in the ensuing struggle, had killed her with
her own kitchen knife.
And now the guilt was kicking in. He wished he'd never got
involved. He blamed his former colleague and mentor, Rory
Caplin, for tempting him with talk of earning large amounts of
money on the side, and he also blamed his girlfriend, Janet, for
her expensive tastes. If she hadn't wanted all those clothes and
furniture and exotic foreign holidays, he would have been able
to get by. In fact, Ben Sullivan blamed everyone other than

himself. It was a long-standing trait of his that did little to
endear him to people.
He flicked on the hall light and walked down the corridor past
the staircase to the door to Flat One, Janet's pad. They didn't
live together - Sullivan preferred his independence - but he paid
the rent on the place, and had done ever since she'd lost her job
in the hotel months earlier. Stupid cow, he thought irritably.
How the hell do you lose a job as a receptionist in a hotel? It was
hardly a challenging role. All you had to do was answer the
fucking phone. And this place wasn't cheap either. Seven fifty a
month, even though it was only one bedroom, and in one of the
cheaper areas of Hendon. The cost of living in London was
extortionate. No wonder he'd had to do other, more lucrative,
work.
Janet was out tonight, meeting friends in the West End, a
situation that suited him fine. The ten grand was in a holdall in
the top of her bedroom wardrobe, underneath a pile of blankets,
along with a further four thousand in cash he'd made for other
tasks he'd performed on behalf of his unofficial employers.
More than enough to get him out of the country and somewhere
warm, where he could plan his next move. She'd be getting a
shock, though, when rent day came round. From now on, he
wasn't paying it. Fuck her. Let her get off her arse and find
another job giving out room keys. Consider this goodbye, love,
he thought.
But as soon as he'd shut the do'or to Flat One and flicked on
the lights, he knew something was badly wrong. The living-room
carpet had been covered by a thick sheet of black tarpaulin that
crinkled underfoot. More tarpaulin had been taped to the back
of the door and the adjacent wall. It even covered the sofa in the
middle of the room. A man was standing behind the sofa, facing

him. As their eyes met, the man let slip a thin, humourless smile
and raised a gun with silencer attached, pointing it at Sullivan.
Eight feet separated the end of the barrel from its target.
'You,' said Sullivan, recognizing his killer straight away, even
though his hair was now a different colour and he'd taken to
wearing thick-rimmed glasses.
'It's always me,' said the killer, and shot Sullivan once in the
leg, just above the kneecap, the bullet making barely a sound.
Sullivan fell backwards against the door, grabbing at his
injured leg as it went from under him. He ended up in a sitting
position, his teeth clenched against the pain.
'You've got something I want,' said the killer calmly. 'Two
things, actually. A tape and a laptop. Where are they?'
'I don't know what you're talking about,' hissed Sullivan.
'Yes, you do.' The killer shot him in the other leg, and
Sullivan gasped painfully.
'They're in my car. I was going to bring them back.'
'Sure you were,' said the killer, and pulled the trigger for a
third time, sending a bullet into Sullivan's forehead. The dead
police officer slumped forward with his head bowed, the blood
splash from the bullet's exit wound caught by the tarpaulin on
the door.
The man Tom Meron had known only as Daniels unscrewed
the silencer and placed it and the gun in the pocket of his jacket.
He knew the value of the tape and laptop that Sullivan had
liberated from the deposit box at King's Cross station, and
knew too that they implicated his employer, multi-millionaire
businessman Paul Wise. It was why from the start he'd wanted them for himself. It was why he'd risked his life to get hold of
them. Because he knew they represented the biggest potential
pay day of his career.

Things had very nearly gone disastrously wrong at the
Merons' cottage, when they'd been ambushed by Lench and his
men, and he had to admit that Lench had proved a worthy and
resilient foe who'd almost hit him with the shot he'd fired in
the cottage driveway. But now he, Mantani and the rest of the
employer's people were dead, and Paul Wise no longer had any
protection.
Which made him rich pickings.
When Daniels had finished wrapping Sullivan's corpse in the
tarpaulin, he tied it up at both ends and with some effort carried
it out to Sullivan's own car, depositing it in the boot. He had a
contact in Essex who disposed of bodies with no questions
asked, and who would also get rid of the car. Daniels had called
ahead and told him to expect a delivery.
The laptop and tape were under the front passenger seat. He
started the engine and placed the tape in the car's player. Five
minutes later, and two miles away, he was convinced he had all
he needed. He parked up at the side of the road and dialled a
number on his mobile.
If Paul Wise thought his problems were over, he was in for a
major shock.
They were just beginning.

Epilogue

THREE WEEKS LATER
Bolt had done a lot of thinking since his suspension. It was
difficult to avoid it when you had so much time on your hands.
You get the full understanding of what it's like to be lonely
when you're at home all day, and most evenings too. He'd made
it across to Cork for some fishing, which had taken his mind off
things a little, and he'd spent more time in the Feathers than he
was used to, putting on close to half a stone in the meantime,
even though he'd doubled his visits to the gym. And all the
time he'd been thinking. Thinking about the man he'd killed,
thinking about the case he'd been involved in, thinking about
the individual alleged to be behind it all: Paul Wise. The man
who'd got away.
More details had emerged about Wise's operations over the
past three weeks. There had actually been an NCS investigation
into his business dealings some months earlier which had
inexplicably been wound up, even though Mo had said that he
was suspected of involvement in as many as five murders - and
this before the events of three weeks ago - as well as extortion,
fraud, even non-payment of tax. It was amazing that someone so

crooked could not only rise so high within the establishment,
but also remain there unmolested. Not quite a pillar of the
community, but not far off it either. But then, Wise had some
powerful friends, people who did him some big favours. Bolt
wondered how many more there were like Parnham-Jones,
people right at the top of the pile who shared his perverted
tastes. It was a thought that pissed him off, because he suspected
there were a few.
There was something personal about all this too. It was Paul
Wise who'd given Bolt sleepless nights by putting him in a
position where he'd had to shoot dead an unarmed man, and
where he'd had to break the very law he'd spent so much of his
adult life upholding. He wanted to make the bastard pay for
that. But it looked like he was going to have to wait. Wise was
clever, and he kept his hands scrupulously clean. What evidence
there was against him was still so patchy as to be unusable. For
the moment, at least, he was safe, although, as Mo had said,
now that he was suspected of a whole new raft of killings it
meant that the investigation into his affairs was going to be
reopened, and with significantly more resources. One day, like most criminals, he would pay a price for his crimes. It was just
that it might not be any time soon.
Three weeks into his suspension, on a warm summer's afternoon
in June, Bolt walked into a cafe on Camden High Street.
The interior was quiet, and once again she had arrived before
him, and was sitting at a corner table at the back. Bolt gave her a
nod, ordered a regular filter coffee from a young eastern European
girl behind the counter, and made his way over.
'You're looking well,' he said as they shook hands.
And she was too. Her skin was tanned and healthy-looking,
her black hair a little longer and a lot more lustrous, and the eye

shadow she was wearing seemed to accentuate the brightness in
her eyes. She was dressed in a white lace top with short sleeves
that showed off the tan, a simple silver chain with one of the
smaller Tiffany hearts around her neck.
'Thanks,' said Tina Boyd, and sat back down. 'You're not
looking so bad yourself.'
'So, where have you been?'
'Holiday. Two weeks in Mexico. I felt like I needed the
break.'
'I think you did. It seems to have done you a lot of good.'
'I heard what happened to you. I'm sorry.'
'The suspension is a formality. I've done my interviews with the
PCC, and it doesn't look like they've found anything untoward,
so I'm starting back on the job next week.'
'Same rank?'
'Exact same rank.'
She smiled. 'Good. The Brass spend too much time hanging
good officers out to dry. It's a wonder they've got any left.'
'You thought any more about coming back?'
She considered that one for a moment. 'Part of me has. But
I'm still not sure.' There was a pause. 'So tell me,' she said,
changing the subject, 'Parnham-Jones. Was it suicide or was it
murder? I've fallen behind on everything.'
'No-one knows for sure,' answered Bolt truthfully as the
coffee arrived.
He then told her what he Ihiew of the story, but didn't
mention Paul Wise by name. As he spoke, she listened raptly,
occasionally shaking her head at some of the grimmer details.
'So John was right. There was a paedophile ring involving
Parnham-Jones and others.'
'It certainly looks that way.'

'And one of them's still out there evading justice. And you
know who he is.'
Bolt nodded. 'We've got a suspect who could have been
behind John's murder,' he said carefully, 'but we've got no
proof.'
'And you also think he had Parnham-Jones killed. Is that
right?'
Once again, Bolt nodded. 'I think the Lord Chief Justice was
the weak link. He had to go. Let's assume he had been involved
in the murder of that child years before. He thought he'd got
away with it, then a few months ago it becomes clear that the
secret's out, and that there's a detective sniffing around, asking
questions. He calls on one of his associates, someone who was
also involved in the murder - let's call him Mr W - and asks him
to sort it out. A few weeks later, the detective ends up dead.
Now the judge can breathe a sigh of relief, but not for long.
Because word gets out that there's a tape recording of him
confessing to the crime, or at least to being involved with child
abuse, and then, to top it all, he gets an anonymous email from
someone telling him they know the details of his crime. We
found it on his desktop PC. So, more sleepless nights. My guess
is he was beginning to panic as his murky past finally caught up
with him, and his associate finally decided that it was simply too
dangerous to keep him alive. They use the same people who
killed John, and rather than vary their modus operandi, the
perpetrators stick with a formula that's worked before and kill
Parnham-Jones in exactly the same way, trying to make it look
like suicide.'
'And someone's got away with it,' said Tina, taking a pack of
Silk Cut from her pocket. 'Your Mr W.'
'The people who actually carried out John's murder are