Nameless Kill (13 page)

Brian heard commotion. He heard shouting and struggling. He moved around onto his side, his chest still stinging with the pain of what must’ve been Wayne thumping him to the ground. He rolled over, crunching plastic DVD cases, his hands pressing in something sticky, and he looked over at the door to the lounge.

Brad was there. He was standing there staring at the open door with his mouth wide open.

But Wayne wasn’t there.

The footsteps outside. They must’ve been Wayne. The little fucker. The sneaky little fucker.

“Quick!” Brian shouted, pulling himself back up with all his strength, fighting through the pain it caused in his knees and back and chest.

Brad turned to him. His eyes were wide. “He just‌—‌he just‌—‌”

“It doesn’t fucking matter,” Brian said, getting his balance, his head spinning. He walked over to the open door. “We need to get him. We need to get Wayne. Go!”

Chapter Twenty One

Brian soon overcame the aching pain riding through his body as he sprinted down the creaky steps of Wayne Jenkins’s upstairs flat and rushed out onto the street.

He looked to the left. Looked up Black Bull Lane, looked at the parked cars and the houses. No sign of Wayne on the pavement. He couldn’t have gone far. He’d only left the house a few seconds ago.

He looked to the right. Back towards the Spar and the busy roundabout. At the kids hanging out on their bikes on the other side of the street. No sign of Wayne. Absolutely no sign of him.

“We need to split,” Brian said, panting, already out of breath despite only having run down the stairs.

“I‌—‌I swear he just‌—‌” Brad started.

“It doesn’t fucking matter now,” Brian shouted. He’d seen the way Brad had stood there, like a pheasant caught in the crosshairs of a gun. He could’ve stopped Wayne. Or he could at least have chased him and stayed on his tail.

Instead, he’d frozen. Completely frozen. Great fucking work Detective Sergeant Richards.

Brian jogged a short way up the road, away from the Spar. He looked at the cars pulled up on the kerb despite the double yellow lines. He peered around the back of the silver Rover, the dinted black Corsa, the stark blue Renault Clio.

And then the cars ended and he still didn’t know where Wayne had got to.

Fuck. They’d been so close. The pot-smoking little fucker knew something about the murdered girl on Avenham Park and they’d let him slip out of their grip. He wouldn’t have run if he didn’t know something. No way. Within a fraction of a few minutes, Wayne Jenkins had gone from potential suspect to prime suspect.

And they didn’t know where the fuck he was.

“I’ll‌—‌I’ll put a search out,” Brian said, lifting his iPhone out of his pocket with his shaky hand. He gulped down a metallic taste of blood that he must’ve got from biting his tongue or busting his nose when he’d been knocked down to Wayne’s floor. “We need to set up a search for this wanker. If he knows something, then‌—‌”

“Wait,” Brad shouted.

Brian turned around. Turned around, phone still in his hand, and looked at Brad. “There’s no more time to wait. There’s‌—‌”

“Those kids,” Brad said. He had his back to Brian and was facing the opposite side of the road, where the kids in black hoodies were hanging out, just as they had when they’d first arrived at Wayne Jenkins’s place.

“Brad, they won’t give a shit about what we have to say. They’re little scrote kids. Wouldn’t surprise me if Jenkins paid them to‌—‌”

“Just look at them,” Brad snapped. “And then look at their bikes.”

Bubbling up inside with irritation, Brian actually took a few seconds to really observe the chavvy kids across the road.

And just as he was about to give Brad an earful about further delaying the search, he saw what it was Brad was referring to.

The kids were shouting at one another. Pushing each other around and whining in their high-pitched voices. Not in a playful, mischievous banter way either. One kid, who had a pale skinhead, was shouting really loud into the face of another kid, who had a black hood over his head.

And it looked like this skinhead was crying.

“The bikes,” Brad said, just as Brian was putting two and two together. “Count them.”

Brian did. There were four kids.

But there were only three bikes.

Three bikes, and one very pissed off little chav.

Brad turned to Brian and nodded. “I reckon they might be able to tell us which way that fucker went.”

Brian and Brad ran over to the side of the pavement. The traffic was busy, horns were honking. But over everything, the sound of the pissed-off chav whinging at one of his friends stole the scene.

“Fucking traffic,” Brian said, as he waited for a gap in the road. He looked down the road to the left and then to the right, trying to get sight of a stolen bike.

“We just have to speak to them. Find out which way he went,” Brad said. “Then we can follow him. Or at least, try to.”

Brian nodded. He looked across the street at the four kids. Were they too far away to shout at? Shout at them and ask which way Wayne had gone?

Fuck. If that’s what had even happened. Knowing Brian’s luck on this case, Wayne wouldn’t even have a clue how to cycle.

“Fuck this shit,” Brian said. He took a deep breath of the polluted air then stepped out onto the tarmac. Traffic was coming from both directions, but the longer they waited, the longer they delayed, the better chance Wayne Jenkins had to get away.

And that couldn’t happen. Not now. Not with what Wayne must know. Not after his spunk and fingerprints were found on the girl.

“Fuckin’ hell, Brian!” Brad shouted, following Brian across the road like he was attached to him with glue. Cars honked from either side. Brakes squealed as Brian scuttled across the road towards the kids, congregated outside the Plungington Pub. He was focused. He had to be. They couldn’t let this slip, not now.

Brian made the final few steps across the road, cars still pipping and honking, and within seconds he was opposite this group of young chavs. The chavs were so engaged in scrapping and shouting at one another that they still didn’t seem to have noticed Brian or Brad.

Which was a good thing. It gave them a better chance.

Brian cleared his throat. Tried to force the friendliest smile he could, although this was a struggle. “Kids,” he said. Fuck.
Kids.
Worst way to address them. Patronising, condescending old fart, that’s what they’d think.

But they all turned. All of them turned and looked, wide-eyed, startled. A couple of them pressed their feet on their bike pedals slightly, edging away.

But the tearful kid. The angry kid. He looked at Brian with his shaky, furious face and he didn’t look like he was going to budge.

“What‌—‌what happened here?” Brian asked.

“These wankers are pigs,” one of the kids at the back of the group said. His voice was high and he hadn’t even started growing bumfluff above his upper lip yet. About as intimidating as a sloth in a boxing ring. “Seen um. This fat’un arrested Kyle. Need to shoot, lads.”

“Wait,” Brian said. He reached his hand out, which made the kids twitch some more. “We just…‌Your bike. Have you lost your bike?”

The upset kid’s lips shook. He looked like he was refraining from exploding in Brian’s face.

“Don’t tell ‘im, Birfy,” a hooded ginger kid said. “He’s trickin’ you. Am goin’ if we don’t‌—‌”

“I din’t nick the bike, I swear,” the upset kid said. His eyes were watery, full of tears. From the road, Brian could hear the car horns honking even louder. Evidently his and Brad’s run across the busy road was still causing some discontent with the locals.

“I don’t care whether you nicked the bike or not,” Brian said to this “Birfy” kid. “All I need to know is whether somebody took that bike from you. A man with short dark hair. Wearing a‌—‌a white G-Star top and grey joggers. Head like a melon. And if he did, which way did he go?”

A couple of the kids snickered at Brian’s “melon” comment.

Which was positive. They knew who he was on about. But fuck, he wished they’d hurry up and just tell him.

The upset kid sniffed. He brought his black-trackie-bottom-covered legs close together and lifted an arm to his left, pointing down towards the bridge, where car horns honked. His head lowered when he pointed that way, as if he’d just given up the location of buried treasure.

“Good lads,” Brad said. He flicked a ten pound note in the direction of the kids.

Just seeing that tenner fast wiped the upset off the pissed-off kid’s face.

Brian and Brad turned to the road. They had to cross. Get to the car. But fuck‌—‌the traffic was choc-a from here right down to the bridge. They’d be better on foot. Or on bikes.

No. Forget that idea. Last time Brian rode a bike, he’d fallen into a ditch in the Lake District. Broken rib. Damaged ego. Never again.

“The fuck’s causing all this?” Brad asked, as he and Brian jogged up towards the dark, narrow railway bridge that stretched over Lytham Road. “It’s a Tuesday afternoon. What happens on a Tuesday aftern…”

Brad stopped. He stopped just as Brian stopped running. Which meant he must’ve seen what Brian had seen.

Seen the blood.

Seen the body, sprawled out in the middle of Lytham Road just under the bridge.

A woman with blonde hair and panic on her face waved at Brian and Brad. “An ambulance! Ring an ambulance! One of you‌—‌all of you‌—‌ring an ambulance!”

She turned back to the rigid body in the middle of the road, blood dripping out of the side of its melon-shaped head, left arm twisting out of the white G-Star t-shirt at a right-angle in the wrong direction, a sharp bone poking through the grey jogging bottoms and out of their lower leg.

Beside Wayne Jenkins’s body, a dented bike rested on its side.

Chapter Twenty Two

Brian and Brad sat opposite one another. Much to Brian’s disapproval, Brad had insisted the pair go into the Plungington pub for a pint. Brian resisted and resisted, but just seeing the washed out look on Brad’s face after they’d discovered Wayne Jenkins’s body under the railway bridge convinced him otherwise. He didn’t want to go into a pub for a pint, especially not the Plungington. But he’d rather that than leave Brad on his own.

“I could’ve stopped this,” Brad said. He lifted his half-drunk pint of Fosters to his lips, gulping it down fast, something Brian had never been able to perfect. Brian had a half-pint of Coke in front of him, something that earned him a few raised eyebrows from the tattoo-laden, skinhead fellow pub goers. He’d be sure to remember those looks when they were in their deathbed with liver failure.

“Don’t think like that,” Brian said, his cheeks heating up and his throat freezing as he tried to find the words to reassure Brad. Truth was, he was a little pissed off at Brad for letting Wayne slip by so easily. If he’d stopped Wayne, then he’d never have run across the road to take that bike from those kids. He’d never have cycled away in a panic. He’d never have tried to speed through the narrow railway bridge, unaware of the yellow and green City Link postal van coming from the other direction.

“It’s true though,” Brad said, burping out a little bubble of gas. His eyes were drifting already. Just over half a pint and he looked gone. “If‌—‌if I’d just stopped him, we could‌—‌we could know something. Something about‌—‌about the girl at Avenham. We could know who she was. What‌—‌what had happened to her. We could…” He sighed. Took another gulp of his pint.

Brian didn’t say anything. He looked around the pub. Looked at the eyes of the bartender watching him closely. Looked at the two punters with wife-beater vests on and discoloured tattoos. He took a sip of his Coke. It tasted flat, stodgy. And the smell of the booze in the air, too. That wasn’t helping. He stuffed his finger down his tight collar. Took a few gulps of the boozy air, trying to avoid focusing on that smell. It’d be okay. Wayne Jenkins, he’d pull through. He’d make it. He wasn’t a dead end.

He couldn’t be. Brian couldn’t afford another dead end. Nobody could.

“Now he’s gonna end up a fuckin’ vegetable,” Brad said, twirling his pint glass around on the table. He hunched forward. His voice was slipping into more of a Northern twang as more alcohol entered his system, his walls and inhibitions dropping. “Wayne Jenkins is gonna end up a fuckin’ braindead. Then that’ll be it. Nothing.”

He sighed. Took another large gulp of the beer, almost finishing it before Brian had had the chance to really indulge in his Coke.

“We don’t know that,” Brian said, doing his best not to look around the pub, ignoring the grumbling and the muttering that he swore must’ve been directed at him and Brad. “We…‌Wayne. We did what we could. And now we know he was involved in some way, we can start speaking to his friends. Getting alibis, things like that. Besides, there’s still the other stuff. The missing persons could come good. The links with‌—‌with Yemi Moya. Y’know, the others that were involved with him that Price said about‌—‌”

“D’you really fuckin’ believe that, Brian?” Brad said.

There was a sheer nonchalance in Brad’s voice that rubbed Brian up the wrong way. It reminded him of some of the crims he’d arrested over the years. That cockiness they had when they knew they’d been caught and had nothing left in the arsenal but to be an utter cunt. And Brad had that in his voice now. Had it in his eyes, in his face, his judgement clouding with the alcohol.

“I’ve worked enough cases to know‌—‌”

“Oh yeah,” Brad said, his voice raising. “Brian‌—‌fucking‌—‌McDone. Master of all the cases. We all know how good you are, don’t we?”

Brian bit his lip. Kept his eyes on Brad, who took another sip of his beer. “Are you really gonna go down this road?”

“Brian‌—‌fucking‌—‌McDone,” Brad said, louder this time. A smile crept across his face. “Shoulda known what always happens when‌—‌when someone teams up with you. Shoulda known.”

Brian felt the skin on his neck prickling. Usually, he’d let this go. Remember all the things he’d been taught and trained in the various bullshit therapy sessions he’d had since his depression set in. Not now. Brad was being a dick. Brian’s chest tightened. His head pulsated. “And what always happens, genius? What always happens?”