Michael Fowler - Cold Death

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“Okay what have we got?” DCI Leggate demanded, pushing through the door of the CID office, fighting with her waterproof jacket as she wrestled with one sleeve to free an arm. She saw that the office was buzzing; every member of her team appeared to be in.

“I wouldn’t take your coat off yet boss,” replied Detective Sergeant John Reed, snatching up his own grey woollen top-coat from the back of his chair and grabbing a file from atop a mountain of paperwork strewn across his desk. “We’ve got a meeting with Glasgow A Division CID. I said we’d join them”- he paused and glanced at his wristwatch — “ten minutes ago.” He slipped past her and held the door back open whilst pointing down the corridor with an outstretched arm urging her to hurry up.

She fought to slot her arm back into her waterproof as she dodged sideways past the DS.

He slapped the folder he was holding into her free hand. “That’s the hand-over file of the job. I’ll fill you in on the way.”

In the rear yard of the station DS John Reed turned the engine over of the unmarked CID car and waited for the screen to demist.

Dawn gave him sideways glance. He was raking his fingers through his dark wavy collar length lanks of hair. He could do with a hair cut-she thought to herself. But as long as she’d known John his hair had always been like that; always looked unruly, and with his constant five-o’clock shadow around his jaw line and upper lip he always appeared untidy no matter how well he was dressed. She tried to think how long she had known him.

On and off it had been just over fifteen years. How time had flown.

John Reed had been her first DS when she had joined CID at Stirling and after three successful promotions she had returned first as his DI and now as his DCI. She trusted and respected him implicitly and had taken him into her confidence on many an occasion. He knew her innermost secrets and had never let her down. He was the best DS she had ever worked with and she had tried to persuade him on many an occasion to take his Inspector’s exams but he constantly replied that he was happy doing what he was doing and she had given up bugging him.

“You’re going to love this job Dawn,” he said driving out of the yard, leaning across and tapping the paperwork spread open on her lap.

John was the only person she allowed in her department to call her by her first name and only then outside the office doors.

“Traffic spotted a silver BMW in the early hours of this morning cruising around one of the Easterhouse estates. The car’s registration number pinged up on their ANPR.”

Dawn knew John was referring to the Traffic cars on-board computerised Automatic Number Plate Recognition system linked to the National Vehicle Centre.

“There were three recorded hits for various parts of the registered number. Firstly a hit-and-run accident in North Yorkshire where two people were rammed off the road and seriously injured, secondly it was clocked driving away from the scene of a murder on Sauchiehall Street in Glasgow, and finally as you know from our enquiry in Killin, a silver BMW vehicle’s registration number was noted by a local walking her dog after she was suspicious about its activities around the village. Anyway ‘traffic’ had a hell of a blues-and-two’s chase but they finally caught it when it crashed into a lamp post.” He tapped the paperwork again. “It was two up and unfortunately the little bastards didn’t get hurt — not even a scratch would you believe.” He turned and gave her a wry smile before quickly returning his gaze back to the road in front. “And look at the Intel sheet of the two they arrested.”

Dawn licked a forefinger and turned several pages until she found the section she was looking for. She started to read the typed sheet following the route of her steadying finger because of the erratic motion of the car; she guessed that John was trying to make up for lost time, but she wished he would just slow down a fraction; she was being bounced uncomfortably around in her seat.

“Driver was Sandie Aitkinson and front seat passenger Bruce McColl. Both are well known and have form for burglary and car crime and a bit of anti-social behaviour, but none for violence. It turns out the car is on cloned plates. We visited the address of the registered keeper according to the number plates on it and they still have their own silver BMW on the drive. Anyway after Traffic checked out the chassis and engine number of the car they discovered that it belongs to someone living at an address at Belshill near Glasgow. We asked uniform to do a visit there for us early this morning and they’ve found the house broken into and the guy who lived there battered to death.”

Dawn gave off a low whistle.

“Told you you’d love it.”

“Are the two prisoners saying anything?”

“No one’s interviewed them yet, we’re letting them stew in their cells.”

“Do we know any of the victims of the other two jobs — any links to our case at Killin?”

“The names are somewhere in the file, I can’t remember them off-hand. North Yorkshire faxed us a copy of the statements from the man and woman who were rammed off the road. They’re from South Yorkshire.”

Dawn began to search the folder.

“The murder on Sauchiehall Street happened just over a week ago — and get this it’s another retired cop — worked out of Shettlestone nick many years ago.”

“Just like our Ross McNab?”

“Exactly.”

Dawn pursed her lips and let out a low whistle. “Did they work together?”

“Don’t know much about the Sauchiehall Street murder at all, other than he was found dumped near a subway and had been given a real good hiding. His face apparently was barely recognisable — ID’d from his NARPO card. That’s why I’ve fixed up our meet with CID from Stuart Street nick. They are dealing with the job and they’re now at the scene of this latest killing in Belshill. It’s a DI McBride we’re liaising with there.”

She knew that name and she was trying to put a face to it. She continued picking through the file and found the faxed copies of the witness statements of the hit and run in North Yorkshire. She spotted that one of the witnesses was a DS in South Yorkshire — Hunter Kerr she read.

A Yorkshire man with a Scottish surname .

Then the alarm bells started ringing in her head. Kerr — she had heard that name recently.

Now where was it? Then the light switched on. It was the guy she had spoken with on the phone at the McNab’s bungalow. He was a Kerr — Jock Kerr. She recalled him telling her that before he had hung up on her.

She flicked through the faxed statements. And there it was. The driver injured when his car was rammed off the road by the silver BMW. He was also called Jock Kerr. “This is just too much of a coincidence,” she muttered to herself,

“What’s that Dawn?” asked DS reed, shooting her a sideways glance. “Didn’t grab what you were saying.”

“Just thinking out loud.” She recounted her thoughts to him.

John shook his head. “I know it’s a cliché but I have to say the plot thickens.”

Dawn nodded in agreement. Gazing through the windscreen she saw the sign for Belshill. She closed the file.

They entered the old part of the town, driving past row upon row of high-rise old pink sandstone tenements that had been refurbished. Within five minutes they were turning into a newer estate. The road they finally entered had already been cordoned off halfway along and looked to be busy and organised. They had to leave their unmarked car, some twenty yards from the scene because of the amount of police vehicles, which looked more abandoned than parked, and they made their way on foot towards the taped off area.