No Time to Die_a thrilling CSI mystery Read online

‘What was all that about?’

  ‘Fucked if I know. Where’s Monty?’

  ‘Dunno. He left about an hour ago. Bookies, I expect.’

  Slade made it to his feet, grabbed his stick and said, ‘Go get twenty grand from the safe.’

  Slade was in the car park of The Magic Carousel in fifteen minutes. He’d already completed two circuits of the surrounding lanes, and he made sure Tyler parked facing the exit, and when Lisa’s car pulled up alongside, he made Tyler get out and check her boot, her back seat and then go stand at the roadside, thirty yards away. He was cautious under all circumstances, was Slade, but this kind of thing was verging on extreme. And though he would have liked another six men taking care of security right now, he had no one. They were out collecting, or out pissing it up, or like Monty, at the bookies.

  He looked at Lisa through the side windows of both their cars, and when Tyler nodded, he beckoned her to sit next to him.

  ‘What’s so urgent?’

  ‘Did you bring the money?’

  He studied her face and could see real anxiety on it. Her eyes flicked around like she was on speed, never still, never trusting. Whatever was bothering her, it was real, not a trick. Slade pressed the glove box button and took out an Asda bag. ‘Twenty grand,’ he said, handing it over.

  ‘Thank you.’ She had tears in her eyes.

  ‘Okay, what the fuck is going on?’

  ‘They’re on to me–’

  ‘You said that already. How do you know they’re onto you?’

  ‘The red-eye. The photo your man took of Eddie Collins?’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘Apparently, dead people don’t have red-eye.’ She looked at him, square on.

  Slade studied her for a moment before reaching inside his jacket for his gun.

  Lisa immediately raised her hands and began crying. ‘I’m not lying,’ she sobbed, ‘it’s true; that’s how I found out they knew about me. They kept it from me, they said he was dead, that they’d found his car and two graves. But he’s alive!’

  Slade was quiet for a moment, and then he put the gun away. ‘That means Jagger’s in on it. That means he’s a fucking copper.’

  She nodded.

  ‘And you didn’t know?’

  ‘No! No one knows who they are, except Crime Division. I swear, Slade. When I checked him out for you, he was kosher.’

  ‘Bastard!’ He smashed a fist into the dashboard and glared at her. ‘If you’re fucking me about, I swear, I’ll mutilate you.’

  The tear fell, and she mumbled, ‘I’m not. Honest.’

  ‘So that’s why you’re not bothered about the Sophie woman?’

  ‘I’ll be long gone before she calls for her money.’

  Slade sat still in thought for a moment, cheeks throbbing as he ground his teeth, eyes like slits as he planned Jagger’s execution. ‘Go. Leave me alone.’

  She opened the door wide and then hesitantly took a folded sheet of paper from her jacket.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘This is the news I have for you.’ She looked worried. ‘I have nothing to gain from this, so it’s up to you if you believe it or not.’

  He snatched the paper, then turned to her. ‘What is it?’

  ‘It’s a lab report from a blood stain.’

  Slade shook his head. ‘I have no idea what you’re–’

  ‘This is the name I promised you; the one responsible for Blake’s death. He was killed by a rock thrown from a tree.’

  ‘What?’ And then he half-laughed, like a snort. ‘That’s like a kid’s way of killing. I always thought he woulda been shot.’

  ‘We found blood on the branch where the murderer sat.’

  Slade unfolded the piece of paper and squinted, trying to make sense of all the numbers, and the names, and the processes it mentioned.

  Tentatively, Lisa reached over and pointed to the line that said, ‘No nuclear DNA detected. That’s the results from the swab of Tyler’s blood on Lambert’s bedroom carpet. Remember, I said I’d fix it?’

  ‘Yeah, so you fixed it. So, what else am I looking at?’

  ‘I just wanted you to know that you can trust me; that I did my bit.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I see that!’

  ‘Below it is Exhibit EC8, the blood Collins swabbed from the tree branch…’

  Slade’s eyes followed the row that began with Exhibit EC8, followed by the date, the time, the place. Then came the lab process used to extract DNA. Then came the result as a number. That number was converted to a Nominal index number. The Nominal index number equated to ‘CROSBY, Tyler Michael’. He read it through again, and then he read it through one last time before looking at Lisa with a mixture of confusion and disbelief.

  She nodded. ‘It’s true.’

  Slade bit down hard on his lower lip. ‘You saying he killed his own brother?’

  She looked at him, not daring to speak.

  ‘Why would he kill his own brother?’ Slade’s eyes left her and they stared out of the windscreen into nothing at first, just drifted as though searching for an answer. And then they settled on Tyler standing by the entrance smoking a cigarette, keeping an eye on the traffic. ‘This is true?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘No way it could be falsified, like you did with the bedroom carpet blood?’

  ‘It hasn’t been tampered with. And I’ve nothing to gain by lying to you.’

  Slade closed his dampened eyes, and eventually, he said, ‘Go.’ The car rocked slightly as she got out, and there was a muffled thud as she gently closed the door. Then he heard her drive away. When he opened his eyes again, the tears fell.

  But the sorrow didn’t last long. The anger came pretty quickly.

  Sophie used her elbow to smash one of the small panes in the rear door. Most of the glass fell onto a bristle mat just inside the door, and the back garden was secluded, shielded from view by a six-foot fence, sounds well muffled by the shrubs and the trees that grew nearby. She waited for a minute or two just to make sure no one had overheard.

  No one had, it seemed, so she pulled the cuff of her woollen sweater from beneath the leather jacket and down over her fingers, then reached inside and unlatched the Yale lock.

  Five minutes after Slade left the house, Jagger opened the gates, and the police rolled in. They came in vans. Nine of them. Forty police officers, sniffer dogs, OSU search teams, CSIs and divisional detectives all commandeered by Crime Division to conduct a thorough and detailed search of The Grange, the staff quarters and the surrounding outbuildings, and any vehicles found on site. Armed officers gave initial protection to method of entry officers, and when the house was cleared, they took up position at the gates.

  X99 floated overhead, and spotters circulated the neighbourhood, keeping an eye out for erratic behaviour and signs of impending trouble.

  Jagger didn’t anticipate Slade being back any time soon. And that was good, because war would break out if he did. All this had begun with a hurried phone call to the Divisional Commander this morning at 0430 hours from Cooper – shortly after Eddie Collins woke up in a Harrogate hospital and began talking to Jagger. And then there was a face-to-face meeting at 0700 at Killingbeck Police Station.

  It had been hurriedly concocted, hastily brought together, and all those gathered under the operational name Domino had been on standby two miles away for the last three hours.

  Units had been placed at the ends of the road which ran past Slade’s house and at all junctions in between. Each unit had pictures of all nominals connected with the Crosbys, and all the units were allotted an operational channel to communicate with each other directly, or exclusively with a control room staffed by three, and watched over by a Silver Commander.

  From a shaded balcony across the street, a young woman took pictures of all the activity and made audio notes into a recorder. Her name was Kelly Moran, and a man called Eddie Collins had rung her earlier with an address that, he said, might be of very great interest to her, p
roviding she could secure a decent vantage point.

  Other units were also deployed to a café called Fat Sam’s, known to be owned by Crosby, and fourteen tenement flats in some of the newer apartment blocks in the city centre. Over the course of the day, eleven disused properties were raided; six of them turned out to be fully-fledged cannabis farms, two were crack houses producing methamphetamines, and a further two were inhabited by women and girls of all nationalities in makeshift brothels. Another address in south Leeds yielded Slade’s fraudulent passport business, complete with the 150 superbly forged passports that Jagger had collected from Scarborough.

  Further, smaller scale raids occurred simultaneously at sixteen addresses through Leeds and Bradford, but this was the biggy, this was the kingpin. When Slade Crosby fell – they would all fall.

  They hadn’t found them yet, but over the course of the next two days, search teams would find detailed records of his protection rackets, contacts at various ports around the UK; names and interests of junior and senior politicians, even references to police officers.

  ‘Can’t you drive any fucking faster?’

  Benson scowled at him. ‘I could, but what’s the point in rushing?’

  ‘What’s the point? The point is, dipshit, Lisa Westmoreland ruined evidence against the son of a Leeds gang lord. Until you have that evidence, you can’t charge him with killing one of your men! Oh, and his wife. But if you’re–’

  ‘I know that, but the lab’ll be closing soon, and he ain’t going anywhere, is he?’

  ‘–not interested, then just drop me at the nearest bingo hall.’

  ‘Very fucking funny.’

  ‘I put my neck on the line for you lot; I was inches away from being dead, and you’re worried about a speeding ticket. And would you rather he was charged just for killing his brother, or for killing a police officer?’

  ‘Okay, okay.’

  ‘Pity we can’t hang him twice, really.’

  Eddie said, ‘And there’s something more important, too.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You buried the poor bastard with everyone still thinking he killed his wife and topped himself. You need to put that right urgently. Think of his family.’

  The car went quiet for a few minutes following that little revelation. Of course it was something that each of them knew, but it was good to have it refreshed and said out loud.

  From the back seat, Cooper said, ‘He’s right, Tom, get your foot down. If Eddie can get anything from Tony’s scene, I want it dealt with now, the lab techs and scientists can work overnight, if needs be. Domino is running, and the last thing I want is loose ends flapping in the breeze. I should be in the control room now, not fucking about with you.’

  ‘Boss,’ sighed Benson.

  ‘And when we get to MCU, I want you to find Westmoreland.’

  ‘I thought you lot always swabbed everything anyway. You said there was only one spot of blood.’

  Eddie ignored him, took out his phone and searched for Ros’s number, then pressed “dial”. All he got was five rings and then a recorded message. He searched for her house number and tried that. All he got was constant ringing, not even an answerphone.

  ‘Who you ringing?’

  ‘Trying to get hold of Ros. She still thinks I’m dead, remember?’

  ‘I’ll let her know,’ Benson said. ‘She’ll be in the office.’

  They arrived at MCU, and the gate rolled slowly, achingly slowly, back. Eddie noticed a wing mirror near the gatepost and chuckled to himself. No sooner had Benson stopped the car than Eddie climbed out, wincing at the pain in his ribs from the kicking Crosby’s crew had given him.

  He limped to his van and was back at the gate before it had time to begin closing. Cooper followed in his car.

  39

  — One —

  ‘Where to?’

  Slade stared across at Tyler as the car moved along. He said nothing for a long time, he just stared. He was thinking about his son as a boy. Not so long ago, really. And what tugged at his mind in the way an often-used memory will, was a time when Slade and Maureen, Tyler and Blake were in Cornwall on one of the very few family holidays they’d ever had – Rachel had elected to stay at a friend’s house.

  Part of the reason it stuck in his mind was because it was the first time Tyler had ever sworn at him. He’d be about twelve or thirteen years old. Maureen wouldn’t permit the kids to swear, not until they were sixteen, she said – and even then, never in front of her. It was a stupid rule, because he and Maureen frequently swore. They can know the words, she’d said, but while ever they’re under my roof or under my care, or in my company, they will not use them.

  But Tyler had. And this was his first time.

  Slade had bought Blake and Tyler a mobile phone each. Funny how when you go on holiday you have to browse the same shops as you would back home. And even funnier is the mentality that you can spend more while on holiday. Anyway, he’d bought them a phone each. Nokias, he thought they were. Except Tyler’s didn’t work. Blake’s was fine, but Tyler’s wouldn’t even switch on.

  They had a fight, and Slade had got between them and given them both a good clout around the ear. Blake had cried, as he always did – and really, he hadn’t deserved it – but Tyler had flown into a rage and screamed at Blake and his dad, called him a bastard and one or two other choice words. So, Slade thumped him on the chin, nothing too hard, just a reminder of who was boss. That had made Tyler cry. And it made him furious too, shouting and screaming that he always got worse treatment than Blake, that Blake was the favourite, that he could do no wrong, while Tyler always had the shit kicked out of him. Soon after that, Tyler called his brother Blake-the-Snake. And that name stuck for months.

  ‘What you grinning at?’

  Slade looked at his son. And he found that he was indeed smiling. Memories did that to you too. ‘Head out to Garforth.’

  ‘Garforth? What’s in Garforth?’

  ‘I was remembering Blake-the-Snake,’ he said. ‘You remember that?’

  Tyler nodded, saw the beam on his dad’s face and smiled too. ‘Yeah, he was, though,’ and he laughed.

  ‘And then–’ Slade’s phone rang, spoiling the moment, and it brought him back to now. Not a pleasant place to be, especially after the memories he’d allowed himself to see. First time in a long time. He took out the phone. ‘Where the fuck have you been?’

  ‘Chief, it’s me.’

  Slade sighed. ‘I know it’s you, Monty. Where are you?’

  ‘I’m with Shack, chief. Remember the names we got off that copper fella, Pearson; the undercover coppers? They’re here! We found ’em, chief!’

  ‘What, all three of them?’

  ‘Nah. Two of ’em, though.’

  Slade thought about this. They have two of them; I can make that a flush. ‘Where are you now?’

  ‘Woodhead’s scrapyard. Off Pontefract Lane in Hunslet.’

  ‘Right. Gimme an hour.’ Slade pressed end and put the phone away. And then he said to Tyler, ‘Take a left here, here now!’

  ‘Okay!’ Tyler swung the car off the road, and it bounced onto a rutted track, still slick from the earlier rain. The track appeared to go nowhere, disappeared around a bend. ‘What we doing here?’

  ‘Just drive. Slowly!’ And then he was back in Cornwall, being called a bastard by Tyler. Good days. But they got worse. Tyler had swapped phones with Blake, and World War Three had broken out. Slade took his belt off and gave Tyler’s bare legs three of the finest wallops he’d ever handed out. They’d left marks so vivid, you’d have thought he’d sat on a freshly painted bench. The boy had screamed for hours, and then the screaming died down a bit and the ranting began, the pleading of innocence, the blame, the finger pointing at Blake and then the tears. ‘Why won’t you believe me?’ It went on for hours.

  ‘Here,’ Slade said, ‘Pull up here.’

  Tyler rolled the car to a gentle stop. They were half a mile away, maybe more, from the ro
ad. The place was immersed in silence; only an occasional bubble of birdsong interrupted it. Perhaps it didn’t interrupt it, merely added to it, an enhancement, Maureen would have said.

  ‘Dad, what the hell are we doing here?’

  ‘Turn the engine off and get out. I want to show you something.’

  Once outside the car, Slade said, ‘You ever been told you never had time to stop and smell the roses?’

  ‘I’ve heard it before. But I’m not interested in flowers.’

  Slade looked at him for a moment, and then it dawned on him; Tyler hadn’t a fucking clue what he was talking about. ‘We’re having five minutes,’ he said. ‘Five minutes of father-son time; five minutes out of the rat race just to…chill out.’

  ‘Cool.’

  ‘Come on, wanna show you the stream.’

  It took them almost ten minutes to walk the 200 yards away from the car. They stood at the top of the banking, Slade favouring his bad leg and breathing heavily. The stream ran, heavy with recent rainfall, twenty-five yards away. Its sound was hypnotic enough to induce a trance-like state, and Slade allowed himself a moment of clear meditation. That’s what he called it, anyway. He closed his eyes, and the rippling water reminded him of Cornwall again. Absently, he wondered why he couldn’t get Cornwall out of his damned mind. And that brought his trance to an abrupt end.

  To the right, another thirty or forty yards away, was a great old oak tree. ‘Recognise this place?’

  Tyler shrugged. ‘Nope.’

  ‘Not even that tree?’

  ‘Should I?’

  ‘I thought you would, yes. This is where Blake brings hi…used to bring his “girlfriends”.’

  ‘Where he raped women, you mean?’

  ‘Precisely. To my knowledge, he brought two of them here. The first he managed to walk away from; we even got him off the charge when she got the police involved.’

  ‘Yeah, the copper woman.’

  ‘That’s right. The copper woman.’ Slade shifted his stick to his other hand and reached inside his jacket for a folded sheet of paper. ‘The second one, though, he didn’t walk away from.’