Rough Justice (41 page)

‘All quiet,’ he said. ‘How’s Razor getting along?’

‘Ticking over,’ said Button. ‘One thing for sure, Gary Dawson’s going to be out of a job when this is all over.’

‘For his political beliefs?’ asked Shepherd.

‘For being a member of a racist organisation,’ said Button.

‘From what I’ve seen, Dawson’s more concerned about upholding the law than he is about race.’

‘We’ll let the CPS sort that out,’ said Button.

‘Any news of your successor?’ asked Shepherd.

‘Not yet,’ said Button. ‘Soon as I know, you’ll know. I promise.’ She ended the call. Shepherd went upstairs to get dressed.

Working on the Commissioner’s Reserve was more varied than being attached to the borough. The team could be sent anywhere in the capital and generally they went in larger groups, with up to fifteen vans turning up to some of the bigger incidents. On Wednesday they were on duty at Chelsea’s Stamford Bridge stadium in west London, keeping the visiting Liverpool fans out of trouble. Despite football intelligence to the effect that a major fight between the rival fans was on the cards, the match went ahead peacefully and Shepherd and the team spent the best part of three hours sitting in the van in full riot gear, waiting for a call that never came. Not that anyone seemed upset at not seeing action – they were all happy enough to take the overtime. Shepherd’s mobile rang three times while he was in the van. It was Katra, but he couldn’t risk taking the call while surrounded by his colleagues so he switched off the mobile and didn’t call her back until just after eleven o’clock at night.

She answered immediately and he could tell she had been crying. She sniffed and told him that someone had just thrown a brick through the sitting-room window. ‘Are yo—’

‘We’re both fine but there was a mess and I didn’t know what to do,’ she said.

‘A brick, you said?’

‘Half a brick. Dan, do you think it was that man? The man who punctured the tyre?’

‘I don’t know, Katra. Did you see or hear anybody?’

‘Liam and I were in the kitchen. He was doing his homework and I was ironing and helping him.’

‘Did you call the police?’

‘I wanted to talk to you first. I called you but you didn’t answer. I didn’t know what to do, Dan – I’m sorry.’ She started crying again.

‘No, I’m sorry, Katra, I was working, I couldn’t answer the phone. Is Liam okay?’

She didn’t answer and Shepherd pleaded with her to stop crying.

‘He’s asleep,’ she said eventually.

‘Okay. What have you done about the window? It’s not raining, is it?’

‘No, the weather’s fine. I picked up the glass and I’ve put a piece of cardboard over the hole.’

‘How big is the hole?’

‘It went through the window that opens, on the left, and it’s all smashed.’

‘Okay, here’s what you do,’ he said. ‘In the left-hand drawer in the kitchen, where I keep all the receipts and handbooks and stuff, there’s the business card of a glazier. They have a twenty-four-hour service so they’ll come out tonight. If there’s any problem call me.’

‘Do you want me to phone the police?’

‘I don’t think it’s worth it, Katra. It’s only vandalism so it’ll be pretty low down their list of priorities.’

‘But it must be that man again,’ said Katra.

‘We don’t know that for sure,’ said Shepherd. ‘Did you see him?’

‘No,’ she said.

‘Then you’re just guessing,’ said Shepherd. ‘The punctured tyre could have been kids messing around and so could the brick.’

‘I don’t think so, Dan,’ she said.

Shepherd rubbed his face. Katra was almost certainly right: one act of vandalism might have been an unlucky break but two was almost certainly personal – and Shepherd didn’t have any enemies in Hereford other than Talovic. And if it was someone he’d crossed in his undercover work they wouldn’t be slashing tyres or throwing bricks through windows. But he didn’t want Katra any more worried than she already was, and even if they did tell the police he doubted they would do much. ‘Let me deal with it when I come home, okay?’

‘Okay,’ she said quietly.

‘Katra, I’ll take care of it, don’t worry. Just get the window fixed tonight so that the house is secure.’

‘I will, Dan,’ she said, and ended the call.

Shepherd hadn’t eaten since lunchtime but his stomach was churning and he didn’t feel hungry. He made himself a cup of coffee, added a slug of Jameson’s and sat in front of the television half watching Sky News until he fell asleep.

Shepherd’s team spent Thursday providing extra security for the state visit of the President of France. The van was one of six that shadowed the presidential motorcade from Stansted airport, in Essex, to Downing Street and Buckingham Palace, then to the French Embassy in Knightsbridge. They had no time to stop anywhere for lunch but Fogg arranged for sandwiches to be delivered to them when they were parked at the rear of the embassy.

As Shepherd bit into a beef sandwich his phone rang. The caller had blocked the number but he climbed out of the van and took the call. ‘Have you told the police yet?’ The caller was male, the voice gruff and aggressive.

‘Who is this?’ asked Shepherd. He turned to the van but no one was paying him any attention.

‘You know who I am. Have you told the police yet? Have you told them my son is nothing to do with the video?’

‘Mr Talovic?’ He kept walking away from the van, still holding his sandwich in his right hand and the phone in his left.

‘Have you told them?’

‘Did you burst the tyre on my car? Did you throw a brick through my window?’

‘Fuck you!’

‘It was you, wasn’t it?’

‘You think a brick is something? I’ll do worse than that – I’ll burn your house down, I’ll do whatever I have to do until you tell the police to back off.’

Talovic began to swear effusively and Shepherd ended the call. Within seconds the phone was ringing again. Shepherd answered: ‘Look, I know that you punctured the tyre of my car and I know that you threw a brick through my window, and if you do anything else I’ll report you to the police.’

‘I’m not scared of the police.’

‘That’s clearly not the case, Mr Talovic, because if you weren’t scared of them, you’d be talking to them instead of threatening me. There’s nothing I can say to them that will make them stop their investigation. They already know that your son filmed the attack. All he has to do is to tell the police everything he knows.’

‘They will send my son to prison.’

‘He’s under age,’ said Shepherd. ‘And he didn’t actually hurt the kid. It’s not your son they want, it’s the boys that were doing the attacking.’

‘And if my son betrays them, what will they do to him?’

‘He’s not betraying anyone. He’s just telling the truth.’

‘Your son has to tell the police that he got the video from someone else.’

‘I’ve already told you that he’s not going to lie to the police. And if you do one more thing to my property or my family, I’ll make sure that—’

‘Fuck you!’ shouted Talovic, and the line went dead.

Shepherd cursed and phoned Katra. He asked her where she was and she said she was at the supermarket. He asked her to make sure that the burglar alarm was set at night, and that all the windows and doors were locked.

‘Is something wrong, Dan?’ she asked.

‘The father of the boy who gave Liam the video has been calling me. I don’t think he’ll do anything but I need you to keep an eye out for him. If you see anybody hanging around the house, call me straight away.’

‘Do you think he might do something?’

‘He’s just angry. I think he’ll calm down eventually.’

‘So it was him that threw the brick at the window?’

‘I don’t know . . . maybe.’

‘Should I call the police?’ Shepherd could hear the apprehension in her voice.

‘Katra, it’s okay. Just keep your eyes open, that’s all. And when Liam’s not at school make sure that he’s in the house or the garden for the next few days. I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about but it’s better to be safe than sorry.’

Shepherd put his phone away and walked back to the van. ‘Problem, Three-amp?’ asked Kelly, as Shepherd climbed in.

‘Nah, just someone trying to sell me a magazine subscription,’ said Shepherd. ‘Dunno how he got my number.’

‘Not
Amateur Asian Slappers
, is it?’ said Kelly. ‘My subscription for that’s almost up.’

Shepherd faked a laugh. He continued to eat his sandwich but he couldn’t taste anything: all he could think about was Talovic and his threats.

Jason Brownlee didn’t hear the police van as it pulled up behind him, but he looked around as he heard the doors open. ‘We want a word with you, Jason,’ said a policeman, putting on his cap as he walked away from the Mercedes van. He was in his early thirties and wearing a fluorescent jacket over his uniform.

‘I ain’t done nuffink,’ said Brownlee, keeping his hands in the pockets of his khaki cargo pants.

‘If I had a penny for every time I’ve heard that,’ said the policeman, amiably. ‘Let’s see your ID.’

‘I don’t have any,’ said Brownlee.

A second policeman climbed out of the van. He was in his mid-twenties but already his hair was starting to grey and there were dark patches under his eyes as if he hadn’t slept well the previous night. ‘Not even a driving licence?’ he said.

‘I don’t have a licence,’ mumbled Brownlee. ‘Failed my test, didn’t I?’

‘Doesn’t stop you stealing cars, does it?’ said the younger cop. ‘Three TWOCs last year, right?’

‘No comment,’ said Brownlee. He had the hood of his sweatshirt pulled low over his face and he kept his head down.

‘Let’s have a look at your wallet, Jason,’ said Fluorescent Jacket.

Brownlee sniffed and handed it over. Fluorescent Jacket flicked through the thin wad of notes and pulled out a credit card. ‘This isn’t yours,’ he said.

‘Borrowed it from a friend,’ said Brownlee.

‘I just bet you did,’ said the officer. He gave him the wallet back. ‘Date of birth, Jason?’

Brownlee mumbled it.

‘Get in, Jason.’

‘Why? I ain’t done nuffink,’ said Brownlee, shoving his hands back into his pockets. ‘You can’t take me in if I ain’t done nuffink.’

‘You’ve been taken in enough times to know that’s not true,’ said Fluorescent Jacket, spinning Brownlee around. He pulled the man’s hands from his pockets and handcuffed his wrists behind his back. Then the two policemen grabbed an arm each and marched him towards the van.

‘I’m going to the doctor’s,’ said Brownlee. ‘I’m on the sick.’

The policemen ignored his protests and took him to the rear doors. They opened them. There were two uniformed constables in the back of the van and they moved to the front to allow Brownlee inside. The second policeman followed him in and pulled the doors shut while Fluorescent Jacket opened the front passenger door and sat next to the driver.

‘Why are you mob-handed?’ asked Brownlee. ‘Scared, yeah?’

‘That’s right,’ said the officer on his right. ‘Scared shitless.’

The driver pulled away from the kerb. The officer on Brownlee’s right pulled a black bag from under the seat in front of him. ‘What’s that?’ asked Brownlee.

‘Trick or treat,’ said the officer. He grinned and pulled the bag down over Brownlee’s head.

Brownlee began to protest but the officer on his right seized him by the throat with a gloved hand and hissed in his ear, ‘Keep your mouth shut or I’ll Taser you, scumbag.’

Brownlee went quiet. In his four-year career as a housebreaker and car-stealer he’d been arrested more than two dozen times, but he’d never been hooded. He wanted to ask them what was going on but he didn’t think the Taser threat was an empty one.

The policemen started talking about the forthcoming Liverpool–Fulham match, joking and swearing like a group of guys down at the pub, but they weren’t regular guys, they were policemen, and Brownlee didn’t understand why they had hooded him or why they had turned up mob-handed. The van he was in wasn’t the sort of van they used to hoover up drunks on a Saturday night – they always had a cage in the back with two bench seats. The van they were using was full of seats, and it didn’t make sense to use it to pick up one person. Being mob-handed didn’t make sense either because Brownlee never carried a weapon, not even a knife. But nothing about what had happened made sense to him so he sat with his head down and waited for it to end. The van made a series of turns and he soon lost all track of where he was. He tried counting off the seconds but he gave up after two hundred.

The policemen continued to laugh and joke as if they were alone in the van, though at one point one of them tapped Brownlee on the shoulder and asked him if he could breathe. Brownlee swore at him and was rewarded with a slap to the back of his head.

Eventually the van came to a halt. He heard doors open and shut and then the sound of a metal gate being pulled back. The van moved forward again, edged over a bump and came to a halt. Brownlee’s heart was racing and his face was bathed in sweat. He had no idea where they had brought him, but he was sure of one thing: they weren’t in a police station.

He heard the side door slide open, then hands grabbed him and he was hauled out. He was half dragged, half carried across a concrete floor and thrust onto a chair. The hood was ripped off his head. Brownlee looked around, panting. He was in an empty industrial unit with bare brick walls and metal girders overhead. Bare fluorescent tubes lit the interior and at the far end was a large air-conditioning unit.

The cop who had handcuffed him appeared in front of him, holding a sledgehammer. He had taken off his fluorescent jacket and rolled up his shirtsleeves. He grinned at Brownlee. ‘So, let me tell you exactly what’s going to happen, Jason,’ he said. ‘We are bringing your career to a halt, here and now.’