Death Message (22 page)

It was a favour I owed the bloke, that was the thing.

Thing about it is, I know sometimes people have taken the piss, made me look like a right mug, whatever, but I've always tried to be as good as my word, to be reliable. You say you'll do something, you do it. You understand that, don't you, Ange?

Same as this business with Nicklin. Liking someone, not liking them's got fuck all to do with it. When someone does you a favour, you owe them and, whatever else, I've always settled my debts. Simple as that.

From what Nicklin told me inside, I reckon this bloke Thorne is pretty much the same. The sort who follows things through, you know? He'll feel as if he owes something to these fuckers, to their nearest and dearest at any rate. That's exactly what Nicklin wants, if you ask me. Thorne won't leave it alone, he'll get right deep into it. Once he's made a promise he'll keep it, or at least he'll try to keep it, and I've always respected that.

I've not learned much. I know, fuck all probably.

Except how important it is to know you're doing the right thing, even if it doesn't always feel like it.

Funny fucking pair, the two of us. Me and this copper. Sitting here, filling up these pages, trying to work things out in this poky shithole, I can't help wondering what he thinks about what I'm doing. I don't really care, but all the same, it's on my mind.

Which one of us is going to end up looking like a mug.

Maybe both of us...

The sun was just coming up, and Thorne scraped a thin crust of frost from his windscreen with the edge of a CD case. The trees on his road - he had no idea what sort they were - were completely bare, and all had been severely cut back for the winter. Looking along the pavement, there was an almost perfect line of them. Bleached and stumpy in the half-light.

The message had woken him half an hour before. The tone he'd set up on the prepay handset.

He'd stood there in his dressing-gown, the cat pushing at his shins, and watched the clip. If he hadn't recognised the man, he might have thought he'd been sent some random snippet of amateur porno. But dark and fuzzy as the image was, there was no mistaking the face; the punter being serviced by a woman who was almost certainly a hooker and was definitely not the man's wife.

Not Mrs Bin-bag.

Thorne had stared at his other phone, at the mobile that was being monitored, and waited anxiously to see if the message would be sent to that handset too. He had given it a couple of minutes: felt colder and more uncertain with every few seconds that passed.

Louise had staggered through, pulling on a robe and asking who his message had been from.

'Some fucking upgrade offer...'

'What?'

'Do I want an upgrade?'

She mumbled something, still half asleep, then turned and walked back into the bedroom.

Brigstocke had sounded only barely more awake when he'd answered the phone. 'Fucking hell, Tom...'

'How much surveillance have we got on Martin Cowans?'

'What? Er... there's an officer at his home address.'

'What about the clubhouse?'

'Can't we do this later?'

Thorne had heard a woman's voice; a muffled question as a hand was placed over the mouthpiece; children shouting somewhere. The Brigstockes had three kids to get ready for school every morning. 'Russell?'

'Yeah, there's someone at the clubhouse. And I think S &O have got people on the place as well.'

'How many?'

'Fucked if I know. Nobody's breaking into there though, are they? You said it was like Fort Knox.'

'We thought we'd got Skinner's place covered, remember?'

Brigstocke was wide awake now, and irritated. 'We'll talk about this at work, OK? I've got a meeting at nine...'

Thorne tossed the CD case back into the boot and climbed into the car. He had already started the engine, giving the BMW's ancient heating system a chance to take the chill off, but the steering wheel was still freezing to the touch and he couldn't be arsed to go back inside for his gloves. He looked at his watch; it was a good time to be driving. All being well he'd get in before seven-thirty.

Pulling the car round into a three-point turn, his eye was caught by movement above him, and he glanced at the tree opposite; at a fat, wet pigeon, perched awkwardly, halfway up. Its movements - the umbrella-shakes of its feathers - made it seem as if it were shivering.

Cold and pissed off; naked as the tree.

He didn't quite have the place to himself, but for half an hour or so he was able to sit in relative peace and quiet. To eat toast and drink tea, and worry about the health and safety of a drug dealing, heavily tattooed gangster. To reflect on a course of action that meant he was the only one who knew Martin Cowans was in immediate danger.

To wonder if it was the stupidest thing he'd ever done.

It was a tough chart to top...

From his window, he watched officer after officer coming through the Peel Centre gates. Some he knew well; some he didn't know from Adam; others he'd no more than smiled at when they'd passed on the stairs or in the canteen. Somewhere, there was a police officer who, in league with a friend or colleague, had killed a gang leader and sent an innocent man to prison for it. And who, six years later, according to Marcus Brooks, had battered his partner in crime to death rather than risk seeing their criminal history exposed.

Thorne wanted to find that man. Wanted him every bit as much as he wanted Marcus Brooks.

'Bright and early, Tom,' Karim said, marching straight across to the kettle. He held up the teabags, asking if Thorne was ready for another.

Thorne nodded. 'Plenty of fucking worms to catch.'

He wasn't the only one making an early start. Richard Rawlings was on the phone before Thorne had finished his second mug of tea.

'Any news?'

'The PM confirms that the cause of death was blunt trauma to the head, and puts the time of death somewhere between three and five on Saturday afternoon.'

'You know that's not what I meant.'

'I'm not sure what else I can tell you,' Thorne said.

'Any news about Brooks? Any progress...?'

Nobody had spoken officially to Rawlings about Marcus Brooks, but Thorne was not surprised that he knew the name of their prime suspect. He could have found out through any number of sources: jungle drums; friends or friends of friends on the squad. Or even Skinner himself, who had probably told him all about the video clip he'd been shown, and what it meant.

And there was another possibility: a simple explanation for Rawlings knowing all about Marcus Brooks; for knowing more about the case than anybody else.

'Is there anything
you
can tell
us?' Thorne said.

There was a pause. 'Such as?'

'Such as why Marcus Brooks, or anyone else, would want to smash your friend's head in with a hammer.'

'No fucking idea.'

'That's your first "fucking" of the conversation. I'm pleased you're making an effort.'

Thorne was surprised to hear Rawlings laughing. 'Well, I like to start off slowly, build up during the day, you know?'

Afterwards, Thorne failed to return several messages: one from Keith Bannard, the DCI from S &O: another from a CPS clerk, wanting to talk about a bloodstained training shoe that had 'gone walkabout' from an evidence locker; and a rambling message from his Auntie Eileen, who never got round to saying why she was calling. Thorne guessed she wanted to have the 'What are you doing at Christmas?' conversation.

He heard someone outside the door telling Kitson how good she'd been on TV the previous night. When she came in, Thorne added his own congratulations.

'Anything?'

'A few people ringing in to say they saw someone dropping something into the litter bin that could have been a knife, but I don't think that gets us very far. The woman hasn't called back.'

'There's time yet.'

Kitson was something of a closet football fan and they talked about the previous night's European results. Arsenal were now at the bottom of their group having lost at home to Hamburg. Thorne hadn't had a chance to talk to Hendricks yet, who he knew would be devastated.

'Did you see the highlights?' Kitson asked.

'Better things to do,' Thorne said.

He walked around to Colindale station; waited for Brigstocke to emerge from his meeting with the borough commander.

'Sorry I called so early.'

'Why the sudden urgency?' Brigstocke asked.

'No urgency. I just thought we should cover our arses.'

'Like I said on the phone, I think they're covered.'

'It's understandable that we're focusing on the Skinner killing,' Thorne said. 'But there's no reason to presume that Brooks has finished with the Black Dogs.'

'We're not presuming anything.'

'That he shouldn't want to hit them again.'

'No, you're right.'

'You said there are people on the home address and the clubhouse?'

They walked into the station's reception area, and out. Began to walk back across to Becke House. The sky was a grey wash, but here and there were glimpses of sun, like streaks of milky flesh seen through thin and frayed material.

Brigstocke smiled as he buttoned his overcoat. 'It's good to know you're taking the welfare of the city's biker gangs so seriously.'

'I understand some of them do a lot of work for charity,' Thorne said.

They crossed the road in front of a Met minivan which had just turned out of the main gates. The driver leaned on his horn and, recognising him as someone he knew, Thorne gave him a friendly finger.

Brigstocke was taller, with a longer stride, but had to jog a step or two to match Thorne's pace. 'Slow down, for fuck's sake.'

'I'm too bloody cold to dawdle,' Thorne lied.

They showed their passes at the Driving School entrance as it was closer, and walked towards Becke House, which rose, less than majestically, brown and grey on the other side of the parade square. They passed the gym, and Brigstocke put a hand on Thorne's arm. 'Listen, I wanted to say sorry.'

'For what?'

'For being a twat.'

'Which particular time?'

Brigstocke looked at the floor as they walked. 'You know there's been something going on.'

'The Dark Side, you mean?'

'Right. I don't want to go into it, OK?'

Thorne had raised it three days before with Nunn. As they'd driven hell for leather towards Skinner's house, Thorne had asked the DPS man what he knew about an investigation into his own team; about the Regulation Nines that appeared to be flying about in Russell Brigstocke's Incident Room. Nunn had been as forthcoming as usual. He said that it was an Internal Investigation Command matter, that his was a separate department, that he couldn't comment in any case. Seeing no point in another 'couldn't' meaning 'don't want to' conversation, Thorne had let it drop.

But he still wanted to know; now more than ever.

'I told you before,' Thorne said. 'If you want to talk about it...'

'Cheers.'

'We can go and get hammered somewhere. Sit and slag the fuckers off.'

Brigstocke nodded. 'It's tempting, but I just wanted to explain why I've been walking around with a face like a smacked arse, that's all.'

'I couldn't tell the difference,' Thorne said.

They walked into Becke House and straight into a waiting lift. They rode up in silence, each staring ahead at his own reflection in the steel doors. Stepping out on the third floor, Thorne made straight for the Incident Room, watching Brigstocke head the other way along the corridor and close his office door.

He loitered for a minute, then went to find Holland. 'How busy are you?'

'Up to my tits in phone-company correspondence and CCTV requisition orders,' Holland said. 'Have you got a better offer?'

Ten minutes later they were arguing about which CD to listen to as Thorne drove towards Southall.

A quick glance at the Police National Computer had revealed not only a couple of fines for shoplifting and a suspended sentence for possession of a Class A drug, but the rather more surprising fact that Martin Cowans' 'old lady' was actually a nice posh girl called Philippa. That she'd been brought up in Guildford and privately educated.

'How the fuck should I know where he is?'

Standing on the doorstep of Martin Cowans' semi, Thorne couldn't help but admire the degree to which the young woman doing the shouting had reinvented herself. There was no hint of anything remotely genteel; not the slightest trace of a 'Pimm's and ponies' accent.

'And why would I tell you? Even if I did fucking know?'

Thorne wondered if her parents had ever met their prospective son-in-law. He imagined two jaws dropping and the hasty redrafting of wills.

'Have you called him on his mobile?' Holland asked.

Bin-bag's girlfriend almost smiled, but caught herself in time. She took the cigarette from her mouth and flicked it past Holland's shoulder on to the path. 'Call him your-fucking-selves,' she said. She tightened the dressing-gown across her black T-shirt. 'I'm going back to bed.'

'Thanks for your help, Pippa,' Thorne said.

Her eyes widened, furious for just a second before she slammed the door.

Holland left a beat, cleared his throat. 'Have we got his mobile number?'

Thorne shrugged. 'I haven't seen it listed anywhere. He didn't give us a business card, did he?'

'Maybe your mate at S &O's got it.'

Thorne owed Keith Bannard a call anyway. He fished out the number as they were walking back towards the patrol car parked opposite the house. He got Bannard's voicemail and left a message.

Coming off the back of twelve hours in the front seat of a Ford Focus, the uniformed officer on surveillance had been a tad surly when Thorne and Holland had first arrived. He seemed cheerier now, having obviously enjoyed watching them get Cowans' front door slammed in their faces.