Nick Oldham - Hidden Witness

In some ways, Cleveley House would be a blessing. Just the two of them, no interruptions. On the other hand, as comfortable as he would be, the night would be a lonely one for Mark once he was in bed.

However, under the circumstances, nothing could ever be perfect for someone who’d just lost their mother in horrific circumstances, as well as a friend, and had witnessed others being murdered. But Philips still relished the possibility of helping Mark to deal with these things… if only Mark would allow it to happen and would not clam up.

At least he had got Mark as far as the home, then into it, then up to the bedroom. Philips had had kids jump out of his car at the first set of traffic lights before now. But Mark was obviously shell-shocked, Philips had thought as he left him in the bedroom and went back to the kitchen.

The house had been well renovated and was due to be opened properly for business the week after. Philips had only managed to get Mark into it because everywhere else in the area was full to bursting. There was an overnight space in a home in Rossendale, but Philips had argued with his boss that a forty-mile journey was out of the question. His boss had relented when Philips had volunteered to stay over with Mark, and had let him use Cleveley House.

The kitchen was big enough to fit a small dining table and Philips sat at it, and opened his laptop and diary and placed his mobile phone on the table next to him. He needed to catch up on his notes before doing anything else. He was conscientious like that. There was a lot to write about Mark and he wanted to do it whilst it was still fresh in his mind.

He was so engrossed in it, working hard with his head resting on his left hand as he wrote, that the next time he glanced up, the three men had already entered the kitchen from the back door.

Each was wearing a balaclava ski mask, all dressed in black, two carrying handguns and one a large hunting knife. It was this one who, even before Philips could rise or even utter a gasp, moved behind the social worker with a roar of warning, dragged his head back to expose his neck and had laid the blade of the knife across the windpipe, the kitchen chair scraping the floor as it moved.

‘Where’s the boy?’ one of the others shouted, stepped forwards and held the muzzle of his gun against Philips’s temple.

Philips swallowed, his eyes wide in terror, feeling his throat ripple across the knife blade. Yet in spite of the predicament and his own personal danger, Philips still believed his first duty was to protect the life of the boy he had been put in charge of.

‘What boy?’

The man with the gun bent to his face. ‘Don’t be a dick, I know he’s here,’ he said savagely. ‘I’ve just followed you from the police station. Where is he? Tell us, save time, save anguish.’

‘This place is empty except for me,’ Philips said bravely.

The man stood upright. His eyes flicked sideways to the man who had the knife at the social worker’s throat.

‘Kill him.’

There was a moment of hesitation, a millisecond that Philips took advantage of and he screamed, ‘Mark — run!’

Then the man behind him pushed his head forwards and at the same time drew the knife across his throat. Not tidily, not a nice slice, but roughly gouging and riving the blade into the larynx, pulling hard, pushing the head down, sawing, grinding, finding the carotid, then swiping the knife free as Philips, clutching desperately at his torn throat, fell off the chair. Everything twitched. He gagged horribly, gurgled, spat blood, which also pumped out of his neck via the severed artery. Then he no longer clutched at his neck, but for something above him. His fingers tensed and contracted as they seemed to reach for the light above. Then the gushing eased, his hands relaxed with no strength left in them, and flopped to the floor. The jerking of his feet slowed, became less urgent, gentler as though he was walking in his sleep, then ceased altogether.

‘Find him, quickly,’ said the only man who had spoken, ripping the telephone off the wall as it began to ring, then scooping Philips’s mobile off the table and stamping on it.

‘You know where we’re going?’

Bill Robbins nodded, and as he did a quick shoulder check, accelerating away from the kerb, said, ‘Used to be a bail hostel, as I recall.’

‘What firearms have you got?’

‘Glock on the waist, H amp;K, baton launcher and Taser in the safe. The usual.’

Henry nodded, then used his PR to call in, interrupting a two-way conversation between two other patrols. ‘Detective Superintendent Christie to Blackpool, urgent, repeat, urgent.’

‘Patrols stand by,’ the operator came in who was the one running the mobile phone location incident. ‘Go ahead, sir.’

‘Carrying on from the previous job, please send all available patrols to Cleveley House in Little Bispham. No one to enter the premises and I want everyone to RV at a point of your choosing, comms. I want the ARV down there… suspect armed individuals could be at the address intending to cause harm to a boy called Mark Carter. I’m en-route with one armed officer — don’t ask — ETA maybe one minute.’

‘Affirmative… RV point to be Little Bispham tram stop on the promenade opposite Wilvere Drive — received?’

‘Received,’ Henry said. ‘Know it?’ he asked Robbins, who nodded.

‘Only two patrols available to attend at present, though, sir, both in South.’

‘Send them,’ Henry ordered. ‘What about the ARV?’

‘On refs.’

‘Turn them out immediately, get back to me when you have and I’ll give you more instructions and details.’ Henry squirmed to look over his shoulder at Donaldson. ‘I was half-hoping that if the bad guys are monitoring us, the massive response we deployed would be enough to make them think twice. As it happens, it’s pathetic. Two patrols miles away and the ARV stuffing butties down their necks.’

‘Not sure anything would make much difference,’ Donaldson said. ‘They’re ahead of us anyway, they move fast and there’s every likelihood they’ve already dealt with him and gone.’ He clicked his fingers as though this was all a waste of time.

‘Come on, Bill, get this tug moving.’ Henry smacked the dashboard.

‘I am, but this is a police owned Ford Galaxy, not a Maserati — and where did you get an ETA of one minute from?’

‘Bit of an exaggeration?’

‘By about four minutes, not counting traffic,’ Bill said as he careened on to the roundabout at Gynn Square and gunned the vehicle sluggishly around it, blue lights on and a weary two-tone horn sounding as they hit the promenade northwards in the direction of Bispham.

‘Blackpool — Superintendent Christie.’

‘Receiving.’

‘ARV en-route.’

‘Thanks for that… now call Cleveley House and see if you can contact a social worker called Barry Philips. He should be there. Also contact the custody office. This man’s mobile phone number should be in Mark Carter’s custody record. If you can’t get a response from Cleveley House, call the mobile. It’s imperative we contact this guy, as he’s the one with Carter.’

Mark heard Barry Philips scream out the warning and for an instant he could not move. He could not even begin to imagine what had happened in the kitchen, around the corner, probably less than a dozen feet away from where he was standing. He’d heard the shout, then what? Maybe the sounds of a struggle, the thump of something heavy — a body? — hitting the floor and a horrible gurgling, gagging sound.

Then he moved. He spun away from the wall, taking two long paces, pivoted into the TV lounge, his eyes searching for a hiding place. There wasn’t much choice. The furniture consisted of one L-shaped sofa pushed up into one corner of the room, then a couple of mismatched armchairs and, of course, the 42-inch TV that Barry Philips had boasted about, which was screwed to the wall.