Bad Tidings hc-19 Page 14

  The clubs and other drinking establishments didn’t help matters.

  Most were well run, but a core of them were managed by individuals whose names should never have appeared on a licence, or were fronts for more organized crime, thriving on the weakness of others.

  Sitting behind the wheel of the Audi, Henry exhaled a long breath, then inhaled an equally lengthy one in the hope of replenishing the oxygen in his system, which felt very depleted. He knew he was running on fumes.

  His fingers gripped the steering wheel as he focused his mind. His intention now was to visit the club and see if Runcie had gone there. Hopefully, he wouldn’t be there. That would mean Henry could execute a graceful retreat, brief a few people then dash home — to his house in Blackpool, tantalizingly close, but oh so far away — sleep for four hours, then get back to work, and write off any possibility of seeing Alison.

  He considered calling her, decided not to, and started the engine, having arranged to meet the night-duty detective at the club. Henry had decided his approach to finding Runcie would be blunt. He would simply knock on the door and take it from there.

  He weaved through streets he knew intimately and emerged on the sea front. He drove north, turning into Withnell Street which ran at ninety degrees to the promenade. He drove past the club, did a three-point turn, then pulled in about fifty metres away, just as the night detective came and parked behind him in an unmarked Astra. The jack’s name was Brighouse, a youngish DC Henry knew vaguely and had heard good reports about. He had been busy with a prisoner in the cells when Shoreside was kicking off.

  ‘Some rockin’ tonight,’ he said to Henry as they walked up to the club.

  ‘One of those nights that make it all worthwhile,’ Henry said, with a mouth full of irony.

  It was well over ten years since Henry had set foot in the club. Standing in front of the big, solid, ornately carved double doors that were the entrance, he paused and his heart upped a beat for a moment as a palpitation shimmied through him, head to toe. He swallowed.

  Brighouse noted his hesitation. ‘You OK, boss?’

  Henry nodded. ‘Yeah — someone’s just tangoed over my grave, that’s all.’

  ‘Don’t you just hate it when that happens?’

  Henry shook himself free from the terrible memories and ghosts of the past. He had not thought about John Rider for years, a fact that slightly baffled him. Rider had been a top-rate Manchester gangster who had tried to break free from the shackles of his past, but his ex-buddies wouldn’t let go. They had muscled in on Rider’s Blackpool dream with fatal consequences for too many people, almost including Henry. Henry was amazed that he had the ability to move on from such life-changing events and still function as a cop. He knew that had to be the nature of the cop mentality, to be able to compartmentalize, to box off sections of the brain, file away the shit and carry on.

  Not that he was completely immune to leakage between those inner walls. On occasions, they had disintegrated — big style — and the plumber had to be called in.

  But not tonight. Tonight he had accidentally stepped into a violent set of circumstances that needed to be dealt with firmly and swiftly and forcefully, and a tenuous link to the past wasn’t going to throw him off the scent.

  ‘I’ve had dealings here in the past,’ Henry said.

  ‘I know,’ Brighouse said. ‘Bit of a legend.’

  Henry shot him a glance, seeing if he was taking the piss. He wasn’t, but a concurrent thought struck him: did becoming a legend mean you were over the hill? Was it time to retire? he asked himself again. ‘This place hasn’t been used in a long time, by the looks.’

  ‘Not that I know of,’ Brighouse said. ‘So why are we here?’

  ‘Runcie Costain owns it.’

  ‘Shit — does he? I wonder if the licensing lads know about that.’

  ‘He’ll have got in under the radar. Probably using a clean front man.’

  Brighouse nodded.

  Henry put his weight to the substantial door. It didn’t move. And there was no way of booting it down. It wasn’t some flimsy plywood or MDF door to a bedsit. It was thick oak and properly secured. Henry surveyed it from top to bottom and saw a bell on the wall which had the look of being disconnected. Not that he would have rung it anyway. Runcie wasn’t likely to open up and let the boys in, if he was here.

  ‘Round the back,’ Henry said.

  Brighouse gave him a wary look. ‘Boss, I don’t want to shit my suit up.’

  Henry treated him to his best superintendent’s caustic, visual dressing down, all eyes and disapproving mouth, and the young man got the message instantly. Henry refrained from saying patronizingly that he’d ruined more suits than Brighouse had had hot dinners. Probably wasn’t a good boast for a living legend to make. Instead he stalked away, turned into the next side road and found the alley that ran parallel to the rear of the club. Another location he knew well.

  It was a typical Blackpool South back alley. Empty beer cans, cider bottles, dog shit, discarded fast food packaging and, before he knew it, or could lift his foot up quickly enough, Henry had trodden on a hypodermic needle that crunched like a baked cockroach. His mouth turned into an ugly sneer of anger as he lifted his foot carefully from the broken glass.

  Up ahead in the darkness the alley was blocked by a parked car, which Henry assumed might belong to Runcie. He and Brighouse crept towards it, leaving fluorescent street lights behind, entering a dark world. Henry saw there were two cars in the alley, both parked facing the same direction, nose to tail.

  With some shock he realized that the nearer one was the Nissan he had seen on Shoreside. His mouth tasted bitter again as his system pumped the last dregs of adrenalin into him. Beyond the Nissan was an old-style Fiat Panda, one with a fold-back roof.

  ‘That Panda’s Runcie’s,’ Brighouse whispered behind Henry. ‘I think.’

  ‘And this one’s from the drive-by shooting,’ Henry said under his breath.

  ‘Oh.’ Brighouse sounded uncertain.

  Henry continued to creep down the alley, careful where he placed his feet. The driver and front passenger windows were wound down on the Nissan. Even feet away Henry could feel the heat of the engine rising on his face, hear the tick-tick of it cooling. A car with a little engine that had been screwed to the ground.

  And — not for the first time that night — he could smell the unmistakable odour of cordite from the discharge of a gun.

  ‘What we gonna do, boss?’ Brighouse said hoarsely. His adrenalin was flowing too, but he was probably having his first flush of it that night, so he had plenty remaining.

  ‘Investigate.’

  ‘Does that-?’

  Henry wasn’t completely sure what the next words were going to be, nor did he ever discover, as the sentence was stunted by the sound of gunfire from within the club. Dulled. Muted. Unmistakable.

  The young detective’s next words actually turned out to be, ‘Fuck-shit!’ and he ducked instinctively. Henry was sure they were not the words he’d originally planned to finish his sentence with.

  ‘C’mon.’ Henry sidestepped between the cars and went to the door set into the high wall at the back of the club. Highly illegal barbed wire was looped loosely along the top of the wall to deter burglars. Henry flicked the latch on the door and put his shoulder to it. This door, unlike its cousin at the front, was rickety and rotten and loose. It scraped open and he stepped into the rear yard. This was not a particularly large area, but it was a mess of tangled and broken pallets, a few beer kegs and a couple of mega-sized wheelie bins.

  When Henry had last been to the club, the back door had been sealed by a huge steel panel, pock-riveted to the brickwork. That had long since been peeled away, revealing the door which led into the kitchen area. Henry headed for this door, seeing it was ajar, his mouth now salty and dehydrated. It was a long time since he’d had a drink of anything.

  ‘Henry — is this wise?’

  Ahh, Henry thought. Maybe tha
t was what Brighouse was going to say.

  Henry ignored him and entered the club. A low wattage bulb lit the kitchen, hanging by a bare wire. Henry crossed to the next door. If he remembered correctly, it opened into a series of corridors at the rear of the premises, off which toilets, offices and storerooms were located. Beyond was the way through to the main part of the club.

  As he stepped into the first corridor he was instantly confronted by the charging figure of a hooded man, a machine pistol in his hands; behind him was another, similarly clad figure, this one carrying a revolver in his right hand. The two guys from the Nissan.

  The meeting was a surprise to all concerned. If it hadn’t been deadly it would have been farcical when Henry and the first man collided headlong into each other. They fell into a tangle of thick limbs and torsos, groans of expelled air rushing out of their lungs.

  And behind each man was a second man, of course.

  The man with the revolver pointed it at Brighouse and fired. It was an ill-judged, unsupported shot, one handed. The recoil snapped the man’s hand high and sent the bullet into the wall above the detective’s head.

  Not that Brighouse would have been hit anyway. As soon as he had seen the weapon rising, self-preservation kicked in and he dived back into the kitchen like a synchronized swimmer launching into a swimming pool — but quicker and not so gracefully.

  Henry scrambled wildly and hit out.

  The man he was tangling with whipped the barrel of the machine pistol across Henry’s temple, a glancing blow, knocking him sideways. Then the man was up on his feet, and both gunmen hurdled over Henry through to the kitchen and fled out past the terrified Brighouse, who had somehow ended up on his knees in front of the gas cooker, hands held up in surrender.

  The man with the revolver pointed it at Brighouse, who clamped his hands together as if praying. ‘Don’t shoot,’ he pleaded. ‘I’ve got a fam. .’

  He did not fire, and they were gone.

  Moments later, Henry staggered through the door, holding his face, blood from the gash on the side of his head all over his hands.

  Brighouse dropped his praying hands hastily and looked shamefacedly at Henry, who gave him a glare, found his balance and ran out of the kitchen as he heard an engine starting up, a crunch of gears and a squeal of rubber.

  Henry sprinted into the alleyway to see the Nissan swerving backwards onto the street, rocking as the brakes were slammed on, first gear was engaged and the car sped away.

  By the time Henry made it to the street himself, the car had gone, leaving a trail of burned oil smoke hanging two feet above the road surface. He could hear the sound of the engine diminishing into the night.

  ‘You must think I’m a coward.’

  Henry had found some kitchen roll, folded it square twice and was holding it against the cut on his head. The blood had flowed onto his face, neck and collar, but the cut itself did not appear too severe. It just hurt.

  ‘Do I hell. You did exactly the right thing. All you did was get out of the way of someone who took a pot shot at you. Good thinking if you ask me. I’d’ve done the same if I hadn’t run headlong into one of the bastards.’

  ‘You’re saying I did right by not tackling them?’

  ‘Yeah, you did right,’ Henry said softly. ‘Don’t dwell on it,’ he advised, but he could see that the prospect of being labelled a chicken would haunt Brighouse for some time to come, if not for ever. It was in his eyes. Self-recrimination. ‘OK?’ Henry said, ending the conversation. ‘Let’s go see what damage they’ve done.’

  He and Brighouse had not been joined by any backup — mainly because all other available men were now up on Shoreside and there wasn’t another cop free within twenty miles. Henry, however, would lay odds that they would be safe now. Whatever had been going on in the club was over with. The job had been done.

  He jerked his head at Brighouse to tag along, and they started to make their way through the corridors until they entered the main dance floor and bar area. It had not been touched since Henry had last been there. He quickly scanned the floor for signs of old bloodstains, then glanced up at the ceiling and saw the large number of bullet holes that had been put there on his last visit by killers trying to murder him and John Rider. They had fired upwards, strafing the ceiling, knowing that the two men were hiding in the rafters. Henry shook his head at the memory. The bullets had obviously missed him. They had killed Rider.

  He blew out his cheeks, looked around. Brighouse had strolled over to the bar, which he peered over. ‘Oh Jeez. . here,’ he called, and looked at Henry, his face horrified.

  Henry walked across, dabbing his face. It was still bleeding and the kitchen towel did not seem to be as efficient at soaking up liquid as the manufacturers claimed. Not blood, anyway.

  He went to the open end of the bar and — without surprise — looked down at Runcie Costain’s bullet-riddled body. Alongside him was a sawn-off shotgun, a few scattered cartridges and a mangy-looking revolver. His little arsenal, stashed at the club, which he’d hurried down to retrieve and arm himself with after the drive-by, before he was ambushed.

  He was on his back, one leg drawn up, between the bar and the shelves. An arc of bullets from the right side of his chest ran up to his left shoulder, probably one burst of the machine pistol that had cracked Henry’s head. A curved line from his liver, across his sternum, shredding his lungs and heart, and into his left shoulder, most of which seemed to have been blown away. They must have caught him by surprise, because he had a half-smoked cheroot clamped at the corner of his mouth, still smouldering. He was lying in a steady growing pool of crimson, oxygenated blood.

  ‘Holy. .’ Brighouse uttered as it truly sank in what he was seeing. It had taken his mind a few seconds to completely assimilate it. Then he started to gag. He pitched away from the bar and ran across the dance floor to its far edge, where he dropped to his hands and knees and heaved up copious amounts of half-digested Christmas dinner. It reminded Henry he hadn’t yet been lucky enough to have his.

  But at least the crime scene remained sterile thanks to Brighouse’s thoughtfulness in spewing up as far away from it as he could manage.

  Henry walked over to him and gave him a fatherly pat on the back.

  The Force Major Investigation Team maintained a pokey office at Blackpool nick, tucked away in a corridor few people ever seemed to venture down. Nominally it was Henry’s office, but he let any of the FMIT team use it as necessary. The department only had a toehold because that was all they needed. When anything major happened in a division which called for FMIT involvement, such as a murder or other serious crime, it was up to the division to provide most of the staffing, resources, space and money. The team, which had such a grand-sounding name, was actually a very tiny department based at headquarters, headed by four detective superintendents (though only three at the moment because of Joe Speakman’s sudden departure) with a couple of DCIs and DIs, some support staff — and that was about it.

  Divisional commanders — the chief superintendents who ran the geographical divisions — were supposed to find the staff and funding for major investigations from their own budgets, but it wasn’t always so clear cut, and they could be awkward about it. The FMIT supers had to be skilled in negotiating and prising cash out of tight-fisted commanders whose budgets were already stretched in a force that had recently been compelled to save over?20 million by a cost-cutting central government.

  For a force the size of Lancashire’s, such cuts were excruciating. Posts were slashed, people lost jobs, were made redundant. HQ departments were pared to the bone or abolished. Police stations were closed, or opening hours reduced. Communications rooms were going to be closed and centralized, as were custody suites. Front-line cop numbers were reduced, Police Community Support Officers were sacked, and, as Henry discovered (although he already knew it), the number of officers actually working on public holidays, where pay entitlement doubled, were shaved to a minimum. In other words, there was hard
ly anyone on duty on Christmas or Boxing Day. The knock-on effect was that, if there was a big incident — and there had been two — it was a struggle to police them.

  Which was why, at 6 a.m. on Boxing Day, Henry was sitting in that dank FMIT office in a disintegrating police station, still dabbing his endlessly bleeding cut and rubbing his half-strangled throat, trying to get the county’s act together.

  At least he was being assisted by a much-needed mug of good filter coffee.

  He had just finished a dispiriting phone call to the divisional commander at Blackburn, scene of the first shootings at the hospital — which included, of course, a fatal police shooting. Prior to that he had also spoken to the Blackpool divisional commander, on whose patch there had been a drive-by shooting and a murder.

  The crime scene in Blackburn was easier to contain, being in the hospital; those in Blackpool not so, mainly because of the outdoor nature of the drive-by. That was skewed because the more criminally minded inhabitants of Shoreside were bubbling with mischief fuelled by the rumour that the police were behind it all. There was no logic to it, they simply wanted a confrontation, and the likelihood was that Shoreside would become a battleground later in the day.

  The chief superintendent’s perspective was that he wanted to keep the streets safe; neither Runcie’s death nor the wounding of one of the partygoers (a completely innocent lad, incidentally) really mattered very much. His priority was maintaining short-term public order, and if extra staff had to be brought on duty, that’s what they would be doing, not investigating the death of a toerag. He didn’t actually say the ‘welcome death’ of Runcie Costain, but Henry caught the insinuation — which riled him: no one’s death was welcome in Henry’s book. The commander suggested that as the whole thing had kicked off in Blackburn, then any investigation should be run from there. . with their money, not his.

  Henry thought he had a point. Although the commander at Blackburn saw the logic, he wasn’t impressed by starting a murder investigation on Boxing Day, because even a very basic Major Investigation Room would need a lot of staff. ‘And I don’t have the freakin’ money,’ he bellyached.