James Craig - Shoot to Kill

‘Amongst other things,’ Carlyle mumbled.

Dino glanced at his watch. ‘Time’s up.’ Before Carlyle could utter a protest, he had reached the door. ‘Hope you enjoy the game,’ he said, before disappearing into the corridor.

Fuck the football , Carlyle thought, reaching for the Glenkinchie.

After enjoying a generous amount of Dino’s fine malt, Carlyle encountered some difficulty in finding his way out. He was just about to enlist the aid of a steward, when he felt a hand on his arm.

‘Inspector Carlyle! How’re you doing?’

Trying not to sway, Carlyle turned to see a fresh-faced man with thinning blond hair and the general air of an ageing roué. I know you , he thought rather groggily, but who the hell are you? ‘Hi.’

Shaking his hand, the man smiled. ‘It’s been a while,’ he said.

‘Yes, I suppose it has.’

The man finally picked up on Carlyle’s confusion. ‘Eddie Fitzsimmons.’

‘Eddie! Yes, yes, yes,’ Carlyle scratched his head, trying to clear it a bit. Eddie Fitzsimmons, the poor man’s Gavin Swann fifteen years ago; famous for taking three hookers and a bag of coke on an open-topped-bus celebration after he won the FA Cup single-handed with two goals in the final. Slightly less famous for beating up his then wife, a former Miss Bournemouth or Brighton or something, and being arrested by one John Carlyle. ‘What are you doing here? You never played for either of these clubs.’

‘I’m working for radio.’ Eddie pointed at a door down the corridor with PRESS stencilled above it in red paint. ‘I do the summaries.’

‘Nice job.’

‘Nah.’ Eddie yawned. ‘It’s boring as shit. The games are crap these days and the players are like robots.’

It was a familiar refrain; the kind of thing you heard in the media all the time.

‘It’s not like the old days,’ Eddie droned on.

‘Never is.’

‘There’s no fun in the game any more.’

Fun , Carlyle thought, as in getting banned from playing for England for a year, after punching the manager .

Or getting relegated twice on the bounce .

Or getting sent off before a game had even started for urinating on an opponent in the tunnel .

Selected highlights from the Eddie Fitzsimmons canon.

‘Not like in my day.’

That was the great thing about never having been ‘somebody’; you never had to worry about being a has-been. Carlyle smiled indulgently. ‘Why do you do it then?’

‘Need the money,’ Eddie shrugged. ‘Mrs F took me to the cleaners.’

Good for her .

I’m living in a one-bed flat in Kensal Green with the girlfriend and there’s not room to swing a cat.’

Aw .

Eddie glanced at his watch. ‘I’ve gotta go in a minute. You watching the game?’

‘This lot?’ Carlyle belched. ‘You’d have to pay me.’

‘Sooo,’ a little lightbulb started glowing weakly above Eddie’s head, ‘you’re here on business?’

Carlyle sighed. Anything that was said to Eddie would doubtless be round the press box before the first foul of the game; he had to stay schtum.

Something behind Carlyle caught Fitzsimmons’ eye. ‘If you’re sniffing around Dino Mottram, this is your man.’ Stepping away from Carlyle, he intercepted a tall Asian guy in a navy suit and white shirt, open at the neck, who was heading for the press box.

‘Baz?’

With a curt nod, the guy tried to sidestep Eddie and reach the press room. However, Eddie still had some of the old magic in his feet and wasn’t caught out by the feint.

A full-throated roar went up outside. On a monitor bolted to the wall, Carlyle saw the two teams take to the pitch.

‘Kick-off,’ the guy protested. Round his neck was a press pass with a passport photo of his mug and the legend Baseer Yazdani, Honeymann .

‘What are you worrying about?’ Eddie laughed. ‘It’s not like you have to file a match report. Anyway, with this lot there won’t be much worth writing about!’

‘Eddie!’

‘You want to talk to this guy,’ Eddie said, gesturing at Carlyle. ‘He’s a cop investigating Dino. You two should have a lot to talk about.’

Fuck, Eddie , Carlyle groaned to himself. Tell everybody my business, why don’t you?

From outside came another roar. This time it really was kick-off.

‘Shit!’ Eddie turned and bolted for the door. The Honeymann hack started after him, then hesitated. Turning, he offered a hand to Carlyle, without quite managing to smile. ‘Baseer Yazdani, Honeymann Newswire Services.’

‘So I can see,’ Carlyle frowned, shaking his hand.

The men exchanged cards.

‘Why aren’t you investigating Gavin Swann?’ Baseer asked.

Carlyle waved the guy’s business card in the air. ‘What’s a reporter from Chicago doing at a football game?’

Baseer stroked the stubble on his chin. He was a good-looking guy – a poor man’s Umar Sligo, if you will – but with the air of someone who hadn’t slept for a week. ‘I cover leisure industries.’

Carlyle nodded sadly. Sport was now big business and his enjoyment of the game was dying, day-by-day, as a result.

‘I have been working on a special investigation into the sports interests of Dino Mottram and Entomophagous Industries.’

‘Why?’ Carlyle asked a bit too eagerly.

‘The rumour is,’ Baseer said, effortlessly returning to his own agenda, ‘that Gavin Swann was in the hotel room when that girl was killed.’

‘No one has written that.’

‘That’s hardly a surprise,’ Baseer scoffed, ‘given that Clifford Blitz got a super injunction within twelve hours of the body being found.’

How on earth had that one passed him by? A flash of intense frustration shot through the inspector’s core, passing in an instant. Then again , he thought, keeping the press out of it – if you can – is never a bad thing .

‘What you’ve got to appreciate,’ Baseer continued, ‘is that you can’t hide behind the courts forever. The injunction will get lifted in the end.’

‘Or someone will run the story anyway,’ Carlyle said wryly. ‘Sooner or later.’

Baseer gave a small nod. ‘Quite.’

‘Not you, though.’ Carlyle knew that Honeymann, being American-owned, had far more rigorous editorial checks and balances than most of its British media rivals. That meant Baseer had to reach much higher standards of accuracy than his rivals. It also meant that he was someone that the inspector could probably do business with.

‘No.’

‘Look,’ Carlyle said, ‘there’s not a lot I can tell you at the moment but let’s keep talking. If I can give you a heads-up on anything, I will.’ An empty but friendly promise.

Baseer smiled. ‘Okay.’

‘You can call me at any time, but I can never be quoted.’

‘That’s fine.’

‘And you can never write anything that can be traced back to me. No fingerprints.’

Baseer nodded and they shook again.

‘One final thing,’ the journalist said as Carlyle moved away.

‘Yeah?’

‘The other rumour that I don’t expect you to comment on is that Swann is paying Paul Groom to take the fall for Sandy Carroll’s death.’

Carlyle stopped and turned to face the journalist. ‘Good luck getting that past your editor,’ he said pleasantly.

‘The gossip is that Groom’s agent agreed a deal so that Groom gets a million pounds for every year he has to spend in prison.’

Carlyle resumed walking towards the stairs. ‘Nice work if you can get it,’ he commented drily. ‘I’ll be in touch.’

Shivering under his official team blanket – a bargain £29.99 in the club shop – Christian Holyrod gazed sullenly at the electronic scoreboard in the far corner of the ground. There were still more than ten minutes to go to half-time and the prospect of a nice double measure of Highland Park that would ease the pain of watching this rubbish. The crowd groaned as another simple ten-yard pass went astray. At least Abigail, sitting to his left in her replica shirt, seemed to be reasonably enthralled by it all. He was amazed by the way his girlfriend could develop new passions at the drop of a hat. He was fairly sure that Abigail had never been to a football match in her life before he had taken up this job. Now she behaved as if she’d been a season-ticket holder in the main stand for thirty years. The Mayor couldn’t work out if it was really quite impressive or just rather sad.