Headhunter Read online

  ‘Yeah, OK,’ Gary said, a little flustered. He patted his pockets for the cell keys and found them actually dangling from the fob on his belt.

  ‘I’ll come with you.’

  ‘You need to put an entry on the custody record.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah.’

  Gary dived back through the door into the cell corridor, which was a low, oppressive place with an almost medieval pall to it. It was grubby and smelly in the way in which only a cell corridor can be, reeking of sweat and piss, a pungent odour. Gary led Hardiker to the cell at the far end of the complex.

  Bashkim – if that was his name – was a young, sour-faced man, tired looking with a very shiny, swollen left eye.

  He was alone in the cell, dressed in a white forensic suit, elasticated slippers and nothing else. All his possessions had been seized for evidential purposes. He scowled at the two men as the door opened, reminding Hardiker of a trapped rodent – back against the wall but still capable of inflicting a nasty bite.

  Hardiker beckoned with a crooked finger. ‘With me.’ The prisoner rose uncertainly. ‘Follow me.’

  With the prisoner between gaoler and cop, the trio trooped along the corridor and into the Fingerprint/Photographic/DNA suite, grandly titled but just a cramped, grimy room off the main custody office.

  Once the prisoner was seated, Hardiker gave Gary the nod to leave, then looked at Bashkim as the door closed behind the gaoler.

  ‘Now then, lad … there’s very little I can do for you personally,’ he said without any foreplay, ‘but we might still be able to assist each other. How does that sound?’

  Molly slept fitfully that morning after leaving Flynn and her contretemps with Hardiker, although the satisfying crunch of her knee up into her ex’s balls was quite pleasing.

  After about four hours of tossing and turning, she decided enough was enough, got out of bed and went for a run. She lived, following her divorce, in a one-bedroom flat on the first floor of a large house on the seafront in Bispham, just north of Blackpool, next stop Cleveleys. It was a slightly shabby place but in a great position and it belonged entirely to her. It was all she could afford at the time.

  Hardiker had half moved in but now she was back to being alone, which suited her for the moment.

  It was a great location to run from, along the seafront in either direction, and that day she chose to jog north, a four-mile round trip, ending up back under her shower, still unable to shake off the thought of Steve Flynn until she chided herself as the suds cascaded from her hair. Apart from anything else, he’s, like, twice your age, lass.

  Flynn had been glad to get back into bed from the excursion to the shower, but he did exaggerate his pain for the sake of his captive audience, PC Guthrie, complaining and whining about the handcuff which had gone back on as soon as he was on the bed, saying it was too tight, biting into his wrist, even though it wasn’t. As Guthrie wrestled with the ratchet to open it slightly, the officer’s Glock was tantalizingly close and Flynn was almost tempted to disarm him and snatch it.

  As if Guthrie had read his mind, he gave Flynn a knowing look as he adjusted the cuff, then backed away and said, ‘Yeah, right … love you to try that.’

  ‘I won’t be doing,’ Flynn had promised, settling back on to his pillows and closing his eyes.

  Hardiker was kept busy throughout the day with the normal workload of a DS, which in Blackpool was enormous. Even so, his mind continually drifted back to his conversation with the prisoner.

  If he could find the courage, the compensation could be considerable.

  Flynn dozed most of the day. He was visited by the surgeon, who had performed the operation on him and who was pleased the procedure had gone so well. He made Flynn grimace with pain as he prodded and squeezed around the sutures, then declared, ‘All good.’

  ‘When do I leave?’

  ‘Because of the nature of the wound, I want to keep you in another day for observation and, if everything is OK this time tomorrow, you can go.’

  Flynn thanked him for his handiwork.

  He ate between sleep, then, when his eyes flickered open after a longish snooze, his bodyguards had changed and Molly Cartwright had returned. She was sitting on her customary chair by the door, ready for Flynn to wake.

  He grinned at her but winced when he moved his wounded leg, which had tightened while he’d been asleep. Even so, it was feeling much better, as was his burst eardrum, now just a slight throb and hum.

  Molly looked at him. ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘OK … All the better for seeing you,’ he said, and could have sworn she blushed. So he added, ‘That PC Guthrie isn’t my cup of tea.’ He paused. ‘How’s the boyfriend – the lovely Alan with the moustache?’

  A wicked grin came to her lips. ‘I was forced to take action,’ she said. ‘I’ll leave it at that.’

  ‘Good. He’s a shit,’ Flynn said.

  ‘You don’t know the half of it,’ she said, gently rubbing her neck. ‘Anyway, you get taken into custody tomorrow.’

  ‘This could be my last night of freedom.’ He rattled the handcuff. ‘If you let me go.’

  Hardiker finished his day at 6.30 p.m. almost a nervous wreck, but kept it together until he reached his car in the police car park. When he sat in it, he felt his body turn into a form of jelly, but then it became tense again when he spotted Molly’s Mini Cooper in the row opposite, about four cars down, and saw an opportunity.

  Other than for vehicles, the car park was deserted, and he knew he had a little chance for some very peevish revenge here.

  Slipping out of his seat, he went around to the back of his car and rooted out the tyre jack from his boot. He crept across to Molly’s car, crouched down behind it, waited to ensure he was definitely alone, then rose to his full height and, in one fluid moment, smashed the jack into the back window of the Mini. The window did not disintegrate but cracked like a spider’s web.

  That was enough. Point made.

  Hardiker knew enough about glass fragments from broken windows to realize he could put himself in an indefensible forensic position if he smashed the window completely. There would be minute particles of broken glass all over his clothing and in the soles of his shoes which he would not be able to see or brush off but which a scientist could find easily. He had convicted a lot of people that way.

  As much as he would have liked to go completely berserk and do all the windows, he left it at that, then ran back to his own car at a crouch.

  He had someone to meet.

  Flynn was getting impatient. He was a man of action, not reflection, and being shackled to the bed was starting to grate on him. He was achieving nothing in hospital and realized he might even be better off in the custody system, from which he could plan an escape. He knew there would be several chances, although he also knew that the best chance of all would be when he was being transferred between the hospital and the police station. From his own experience as a cop he knew that police officers were a bit slapdash when it came to escorting prisoners, even though it was a bread-and-butter part of their job.

  He looked at Molly.

  The problem was that an escape from police custody usually included violence and he did not want to hurt her if she ended up with the job of transferring him to the nick, although he didn’t have the same dilemma with her partner, Robbo, or preferably PC Guthrie if it happened to be him.

  She was still sat on the chair. They had been sitting in silence for a while, just occasionally letting their eyes catch.

  ‘I checked up on you,’ she said eventually.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Rumour is you left under a cloud because, apparently, you helped yourself to a million pounds in cash belonging to a drug dealer.’

  ‘I wish,’ Flynn said. He had no great desire to elaborate.

  ‘Then you went on to become the skipper of a sportfishing boat down in the Canary Islands. It all fits. A million quid. The lifestyle.’

  He guffawed. ‘I wo
rked for someone. It wasn’t my boat. I lived hand to mouth, still do. I crashed in other people’s flats and villas – still do, more or less …’

  She regarded him sceptically. ‘But you own a boat now,’ she accused him.

  ‘Yeah, I do … and if your enquiries take you anywhere, you’ll find I’ve been working hard in Ibiza all summer trying to make ends meet by helping a pal who owns a day charter business, taking tourists out on day trips around the island. Not really my preferred option, Molly. I work hard and don’t make much money. A sportfishing boat is an expensive mistress.’

  ‘It is a nice life, though?’ she inquired dreamily.

  ‘Up to the point where Albanian crime families come sticking their noses in and won’t take no for an answer, it can be.’ He looked at her and decided on a cheeky punt. ‘You know, I could do with finding out more about the Bashkims.’ He yawned, trying to make it sound inconsequential. ‘All I’ve done so far is react … I could do with a strategy.’

  Her expression informed him how clearly unimpressed she was. ‘Any chance you could delve into the constabulary’s intel database for me? Was that going to be your next question?’ she probed, mimicking him. ‘No, I fucking can’t.’ She answered her own question.

  ‘OK … however, you could tell me who the biggest drug dealer is in town, couldn’t you?’ he asked hopefully. ‘That wouldn’t be breaching any confidences, would it?’

  ‘I could, yeah – but I’m not going to, so stop asking.’

  With some trepidation, Hardiker relived the tense, bladder-emptying moments spent earlier that day in the fingerprint room with the young prisoner. To make it as realistic as possible, just in case there was some comeback, he did take the lad’s fingerprints, a photo and a DNA swab from inside his mouth. Then he’d sat down opposite, pretending to take his antecedent history but instead had a very cagey conversation with him.

  Hardiker looked him in the eye.

  ‘I hear your family wants to kill Steve Flynn in retribution for the bad things Flynn has done to them.’

  The lad did not flinch. At that moment he only believed he was being tricked. He said nothing.

  ‘I know you’re saying you don’t understand much English, but I know that is a lie.’

  ‘Solicitor,’ the prisoner said.

  ‘You don’t need one, not with me.’

  The lad’s eyes remained blank and unreadable.

  After a pause, an intake of breath and a swallowing of something that tasted quite appalling, Hardiker whispered, ‘I can give you Steve Flynn.’

  Sitting in his car later, the engine ticking over, the heater keeping his toes warm, Hardiker shuddered at the memory of those words. The moment when he’d crossed the line. When he’d thought he was still in control but had, in reality, stepped off a precipice and was plummeting through space.

  He was parked behind an empty industrial unit now on Marton Moss Side, not far from the actual end of the M55 motorway, where it fizzled out from three lanes into one and became Yeadon Way, the old railway line, now a main road into Blackpool.

  His car was an old, four-door Micra – clear evidence of his financial decline as he’d had to trade in his treasured VW Golf GTi for the Nissan, which reminded him of a mobile biscuit tin. He claimed to his colleagues that he’d ordered a new GTi but there was a four-month waiting list for the spec he wanted and a large cash deposit was required.

  He had been instructed to leave all the doors of the car unlocked.

  The next moment in which he had almost peed himself in the fingerprint room had been when he’d handed his iPhone to the prisoner and then stood at the door with his back to the window, just in case anyone peered in and wondered what was going on – a prisoner using a mobile phone.

  ‘Shit,’ Hardiker breathed, sitting in his car, reminiscing.

  He had been watching, keeping an eye on the rear-view mirrors, but the man who yanked open the back offside door and dropped in behind the driver’s seat must have approached in a blind spot.

  Instantly Hardiker smelled the reek of body odour and strong cigarette smoke.

  Then he felt the barrel of an automatic pistol being screwed into his neck, and then the hot, garlic breath of the man leaning forwards and speaking into his ear.

  An exhausted Rik Dean appeared in Flynn’s hospital room at 6 a.m. the following morning.

  Flynn and Molly had spent the night in strained silence following his completely inappropriate requests for information.

  He had dozed sporadically but she had remained alert and awake, fuming about what Flynn had asked of her – to search the intel database to unearth as much information as possible about the Bashkims. Actually, she doubted she would have got very deep into it anyway as her access was fairly restricted. She also guessed there wouldn’t be much to find as still not much was known about organized gangs from Europe at her level, and most police investigations into them were carried out by specialist squads anyway.

  So she had taken a wary step back from Flynn.

  In turn, he realized he had offended her.

  He went through the night feeling the pain in his leg worsen again as the analgesics wore off, but he put off calling a nurse for some more pain relief, please, until the last possible moment.

  The nurse came in just behind Rik.

  She checked the patient over, then handed him a couple of very large tablets to swallow with water and began to dismantle the drips and strip the electrodes from his chest.

  Rik watched, unsmiling.

  ‘What’s happening?’ Flynn asked, a little groggy.

  ‘I’ve spoken to the surgeon and you’ve been discharged,’ Rik told him. ‘As of now you are very much in custody and, just so we’re clear, you are under arrest on suspicion of murder. You do not have to say anything unless you wish to do so, but it may harm your defence if you do not say anything now which you later rely on in court. Understand?’

  Flynn’s insides did a tricky somersault.

  He said nothing. It wasn’t the first time he’d been cautioned, but he didn’t like it.

  Unless he escaped, this was now the beginning of what was likely to be a long process and his options were starting to disappear. Once in the justice system, as he was sure he would be, because bail is never given by the police to someone on a murder charge, he would more than likely end up on remand, incarcerated until his trial, unless a court allowed him bail, which was pretty unlikely. Flynn also knew that he would be vulnerable in this period, too. People like the Bashkims had a lot of influence and, although Flynn was hard and mean enough to stand the rigours of prison life, he would also have to be on guard every minute of every day, because not even he could survive a blade between the ribs. If a contract was put out for him, inmates would be queuing up to skewer him. He assumed he would be a good payday for any shit-head wannabe desperate to make his mark. So his earlier musing that he might be better off on remand didn’t seem such a good idea when properly analysed.

  The nurse finished her tasks and left the room.

  Rik dropped a square package on the over-bed tray. ‘You need to put these on.’

  Flynn looked at the package. It was the promised forensic – zoot – suit and slippers. His mouth twisted.

  ‘Just so you know, I’ve spent a lot of time talking to the Spanish cops and the FBI, who have suddenly shown an interest in events …’

  ‘Karl Donaldson?’ Flynn asked.

  Rik shrugged with a gesture that told Flynn he had no great desire to say too much. Then he sighed. ‘Look, let’s get you to the nick, get you booked in and then you can start telling me your story …’

  ‘You know my fucking story,’ Flynn blurted.

  ‘Finished?’ Rik said crossly like a primary school teacher. Flynn nodded. ‘Good. Let’s get it all on tape and paper – I mean everything – and I promise you I’ll get the CPS to speak to your brief and put your side of it fully and without too much of a challenge from us.’

  ‘I don’t have a brie
f,’ Flynn said.

  ‘Well, you’re going to need one. You know we’ll provide a duty solicitor for you.’

  Flynn nodded. It was one of his rights as a defendant – free legal representation.

  ‘It’s a big operation, all this, and I’ve got to pull it all together,’ Rik went on.

  Flynn couldn’t help but chuckle mirthlessly.

  ‘What’s so funny?’

  ‘And the result will be?’ he asked, stone-faced. ‘I’ll tell you. Those two Bashkims you have in custody, if they are Bashkims, will be as far as you’ll get. They’ll go down for murder and that’s where it’ll stop, Rik.’

  ‘I … I …’ he stammered. ‘It might take time but I vow to dismantle the whole of the Bashkim Empire, at least in the UK, and also bring to justice those who ordered the killings.’

  Flynn closed his eyes and sighed irritably. ‘Not going to happen. You’ll hit a brick wall, but if you do, by some freak of fate, get close to the top of the tree, get ready for a bullet in the back of your head, mate, because that’s how they roll.’

  ‘Whatever,’ he said uselessly.

  ‘And in the meantime, I’ll be sent to prison for life. Now that’s real justice.’ Flynn leaned forwards earnestly. ‘What you need is a headhunter, Rik. Someone who’ll give them what they deserve. Someone who’ll cut the head off the snake and see the rest of it wither and die.’

  ‘Someone like you?’

  ‘If you insist.’

  ‘Don’t be an arse.’

  ‘OK, I won’t.’ Flynn rattled his handcuffs. ‘If you want me to put that zoot suit on, you’re going to have to let me go.’

  Rik turned to Molly, who had listened silently to the exchange. ‘You got the key?’

  She crossed the room, digging into her uniform trouser pocket, and stepped in front of Rik, putting herself between the detective and prisoner. Her eyes caught Flynn’s as he watched her insert the key and release the cuff firstly on his wrist, then the one around the bed frame. Although the cuff had not been on tight around his wrist, it was a relief to be free. He kneaded his skin gratefully.