Sacrifice (7 page)

As if telepathically connected, Todd realised someone was there too. His eyes snapped open and he stared past Cheryl’s suddenly rigid shoulder, focusing on the figure about twenty yards in front. He couldn’t distinguish anything about it except that it was taut, as though twisted partly around. In the very same second Todd realised why this was. The figure was straining on some complex, hi-tech instrument; he appeared to have drawn a heavy cord back to his shoulder.

Todd gasped, choked …

It was a bow and arrow.

There was a muffled twang.

And the windscreen shattered.

When Detective Superintendent Gemma Piper gave you a bollocking, you knew you’d been bollocked. They didn’t call her ‘the Lioness’ for nothing. When Gemma roared, the corridors at New Scotland Yard shook. And she was articulate with it, so it wasn’t just uncontrolled rage you were exposed to; her choice of words could be so scathing that even if delivered in terms of friendly banter, they could make an eavesdropper wince.

And this wasn’t friendly banter.

Heck sat alone outside her office as he listened to the racket within. Because of his rank, Bob Hunter had been summoned in to see the superintendent first. That had been a good thirty minutes ago, and Gemma was still tearing strips off him, the whipcrack voice penetrating the closed door and ringing down the central corridor of the Serial Crimes Unit. By the sounds of it, she’d now moved from criticising Hunter’s handling of the enquiry, primarily the way he’d allowed it to ‘crash and burn’, to something more akin to common abuse. Phrases like ‘swaggering overconfidence’, ‘buffoonish disregard for protocol’, and ‘off-the-scale ineptitude’ sounded decidedly non-specific.

In one respect, it all seemed a little unfair, given that the M1 murders had officially been solved. The evidence found in the wrecked van, including the pistol used in all the killings, had strongly indicated that the Savage twins were the culprits. What was more, two days ago, the inquest into their deaths, which had delayed the team returning to base from Milton Keynes, had returned a verdict of death by misadventure, so there ought to be no further questions regarding the double fatality.

The problem was that even though the case of the M1 Maniac was now firmly closed, the press, who had fed on it for months in a shark-like frenzy, weren’t content to leave it there. With the inquest over, the finer details of the enquiry had been made public, and fascinated journalists had pored over them, determined to find mistakes. It almost seemed as if the actions of two cold-blooded serial killers had provided insufficient explanation for the deaths of eight teenage boys. Any errors made by those charged with catching the deranged duo had to be immediately and ruthlessly exposed, as though these constituted sins as reprehensible as the homicides themselves.

Heck wouldn’t ordinarily dispute that viewpoint – it was the job of the police to catch killers, and if they couldn’t do it, they ought to be asked why. But the hunt for the M1 Maniac had stirred widespread panic across southern England and put intolerable pressure on the investigating team. There’d been massive interference at all levels, both judicial and political; everyone from the Prime Minister down to the average petty criminal had stridently demanded a resolution. Exhaustion had set in, mental and physical, so it was no wonder errors were made by the team: failure to follow up leads, failure to update computer files, innocent suspects suffering heavy-handed treatment from overworked officers, and so forth.

Now, after the revelation that Jordan Savage had been spoken to at an early stage of the investigation but then disregarded, resulting in he and his brother going on to commit a further five murders – the press were having an absolute field day.

‘Keystone Cops,’ one headline proclaimed over a photograph of the Yard’s famous revolving signpost. ‘Police 2, Bad Guys 9,’ another said. Its strapline added: ‘So how dare they claim victory’. It was enough to make even Heck cringe with guilt, and he was the one who had broken the case.

He wasn’t sure where to look when the door to Gemma’s office opened and Bob Hunter came stiffly out. The DI winked, but the only colour registering in his chastened face were two dots of bright pink, one on either cheekbone. He stuck a thumb over his shoulder at the half-closed door, turned and perambulated down the corridor, his gait slow and delicate.

Heck stood up and brushed his hair with his hand, before knocking.

‘Yes?’ came an irritable voice.

Heck walked in, closing the door behind him.

‘Ah-hah … the arresting officer!’ Gemma said. ‘Or something to that effect.’

Her personal office was always fastidiously neat – and rather bare, in fact some would say ‘spartan’ – and yet surprisingly small, given her high rank. Of course, this made it all the easier for it to be filled by her towering personality.

Detective Superintendent Gemma Piper was formidable; a force of nature. Her beauty helped her in this regard. It was fierce, leonine (hence the nickname) – she had wild, ash-blonde hair, blue eyes, red lips, flawless features – all the usual accoutrements of fine femininity, yet somehow it combined to create a warrior rather than a princess. In addition she was tall and athletically built, and she dressed to enhance this; men could be reduced to jelly in Gemma’s presence for all kinds of reasons. Heck knew this better than anyone, because at one time, many years ago now, he’d shared her life and her bed.

‘Morning, ma’am,’ he said.

She pointed to the chair in front of her desk. He sat.

‘You know why I want to see you?’ She leaned forward, fingers steepled. She was pale in the cheek, but her anger seemed to have abated a little, presumably because she’d vented most of it on Bob Hunter – though there was still a menacing snap in her tone.

‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘Because this …’ and she dropped a file related to the M1 enquiry on the desk; it landed like a paving stone, ‘… should have “Cowboys and Indians” written on it. Particularly the bit at the end. You know, the bit where the damage runs into hundreds of thousands of pounds … caused by a frantic car-chase, which
you
instigated. The bit where the two perpetrators suffered horrific, life-ending injuries. I mean, killing the two chief suspects, Heck … that kind of
faux pas
knocks everything else that went wrong on this enquiry into a cocked hat.’

‘Ma’am …’ Heck shrugged helplessly. ‘These guys had a lot to lose. They were never going to come quietly.’

‘I understand that, but we still have to be accountable for our actions.’

‘If we have to account to Joe Public, we’ve no worries. He’s fine with it.’

‘Joe Public is an arsehole!’ she replied, her voice sharpening again. ‘Joe Public will turn on us viciously the first time we do the slightest thing he doesn’t agree with. Don’t pretend Joe Public is our mate, Heck, because he isn’t.’

‘Ma’am …’ Heck tried his most earnest tone. ‘You can surely see I had no choice but to pursue the suspects?’

‘Even though they were armed and you weren’t?’

‘Well … yes. I knew it was a risk, but it was less of a risk for me than it would have been a risk for the general public if those two were allowed to remain at liberty. For what it’s worth, if I’d been going there to make an arrest, I’d have taken armed support with me, but it didn’t happen that way.’

Gemma pondered this. There was no doubt she was torn. If Heck’s actions leading to the fatal accident were reckless, he’d also showed exceptional bravery, which was something she valued in her officers.

‘Even if the suspects had got away, ma’am, I couldn’t afford to lose that van,’ he added. ‘It was chock full of physical evidence.’

‘Celebrating its capture hardly seemed appropriate, given that two men had died.’

‘I know that.’

She sat back. ‘It won’t surprise you to learn that Max Humphreys has distanced himself – by some margin – from the comments Bob Hunter made on the hospital steps.’

‘No, that doesn’t surprise me.’

Detective Chief Superintendent Max Humphreys of the Thames Valley Police, nominal SIO in the M1 Maniac enquiry, had struck Heck from the outset as an uninspiring leader; too old and tired, too disorganised, and alarmingly prone to avoiding responsibility. For all that, Bob Hunter’s triumphalist attitude in front of the press had been very ill-advised, given the errors that would later emerge.

‘Now in actual fact,’ Gemma said, ‘I’m not too concerned that
you
were involved in that extremely injudicious press conference. I know you were acting under Hunter’s orders, and I’ve already had it verbatim from DCs Quinnell and McCluskey that you were against the idea. But I’m very concerned at the way this investigation ended overall. What should have been a feather in our cap has brought ridicule on us. The press are ripping us a new one.’

Heck snorted. ‘To be fair, ma’am, the press did their own bit to turn the M1 Maniac into a monster.
They
created the name,
they
caused the anti-gay panic. In fact, the whole thing’s ended too quickly for them. They wanted more and more – a show-trial, exemplary sentences, maybe a protracted appeals process. And now they can’t have it, and they’re looking for scapegoats …’

‘Have you finished?’ she asked, eyebrows arched. ‘Because anyone would think
you
believe the investigation was handled well!’

He shook his head. ‘Ma’am, Chief Superintendent Humphreys …’

‘I’m well aware of Max Humphreys’ shortcomings. He’ll be getting exactly the same bollocking up at Thames Valley that you lot are getting now. But Max Humphreys is a carrot cruncher, whereas
we’re
supposed to be experts. We were advising him, leading the enquiry, and by the looks of it, missing stuff that was right under our noses.’

Heck nodded, unable to disagree. ‘That’s why I spent three days going back through the files. I’d never known any case before where we just weren’t getting anywhere.’

‘And it was good initiative. So congratulations. And I mean that, Heck.’ She sighed, the annoyance finally sapped out of her. ‘If you hadn’t done what you did, God alone knows how this thing would have ended. But … and I appreciate it may not seem very important after how close you came to getting killed, this is not the way the brass want the Serial Crimes Unit portrayed. Like some redneck posse charging around. Especially not after the investigation was botched. Needless to say, the Savage family is pushing for a public enquiry. The coroner exonerated us of any wrongdoing, the case is officially closed and it’s in no one’s interest to rake over it again, so I’m sure we’ll be spared
that
… thank God. But at the end of the day it’s about professionalism. We need to keep the mayhem to a minimum.’

‘Has anyone told the criminals that?’

She arched an eyebrow again. ‘Are you trying to be clever?’

‘No, ma’am … but, it’s not an irrelevant point.’

‘One way or another, the criminals will go down. My concern is that SCU may go down with them.’

‘How so? We stopped the M1 killers …’

‘We also stopped the Nice Guys Club, and look at the bad publicity that caused.’

‘That was Laycock.’

‘And he paid the price,’ she said. ‘Which should be a salutary lesson to all of us.’

Heck pursed his lips, nodding. There was no question that she was right on that score. The Nice Guys enquiry, in which he had played an integral role, had led to several deaths on both sides of the law, and an embarrassing internal investigation, which eventually saw National Crime Group Commander Jim Laycock demoted in rank and removed from his post for gross negligence. If Heck had got his own way, Laycock would have been investigated for criminal activity, but there hadn’t been sufficient evidence of that.

‘The point is that attention is now focused on
us
,’ Gemma said. ‘On SCU. We’re a key facet of the National Crime Group. We’re part of the bright new future for British law enforcement. Or at least we were, until we started initiating cock-ups on a regular basis.’

‘I wouldn’t call it regular …’

‘One is too many, Heck! Two is a total clusterfuck.’

That was a sure proof of how upset she was: Gemma almost never swore. She took another moment to compose herself. ‘So the first thing I’m going to do is appoint a full-time Media Liaison Officer.’ He raised a quizzical eyebrow. ‘Just for us,’ she added. ‘A civvie … a real pro. Someone who can give us a far more professional face.’

‘Does the budget extend to that?’

‘It wouldn’t do normally, but as you know, Des Palliser’s retiring at the end of next month. If I don’t replace him we can manage it.’

‘You’re going to replace an operational DI with a civvie?’

‘He’s hardly operational. He’s been acting duty-officer for the last eighteen months, which means filing paperwork and manning phones. I’m sure we can live without him.’

‘Someone’ll have to do that job.’

She eyed him carefully. ‘Bob Hunter.’

Heck thought he’d misheard. ‘You’re taking Hunter off the streets?’

Gemma shuffled the paperwork on her desk. ‘Bob’s better days are behind him. Milton Keynes wasn’t the first time he’s shown a lack of judgment recently.’

‘But we’re already under-strength, ma’am.’

‘Bob Hunter’s grounded for the foreseeable, and that’s all there is to it. We
are
under-strength, I agree … but the last thing I need at present is a loose cannon out in the field. Now let’s get back to work. We’re all busy.’ Heck stood up. Gemma was already engrossed in checking another report. He headed for the door. ‘Well done on the case,’ she said to his back. He glanced around, but she didn’t look up. ‘I said I meant that, and I do. But none of us smell of roses right now. And I have to take any action necessary to put that right.’

Heck nodded and left.

If nothing else, Kate was glad it was spring.

Okay, some parts of Liverpool didn’t look great at any time of year, and Toxteth was undoubtedly one of them, especially when rainy as today. But just standing outside the front of the shop this evening and not having to wrap up like an Eskimo was a boon.