Stephen Leather - Nightshade

‘I’m serious, Bella. Your breath smells terrible.’

Bella folded her arms. ‘Mum, please …’

‘Do you floss?’

‘Yes.’

‘Every night?’

‘Yes.’

‘Okay. I’ll buy some mouthwash. And it’s about time you saw the dentist.’ Sandra heard a car pull up outside. ‘Daddy’s home!’ she said, but Bella didn’t react. She continued to stare at the television, her eyes wide.

Nightingale climbed out of the taxi, paid the driver, and turned up the collar of his raincoat. It was just starting to rain and he jogged towards Robbie Hoyle’s neat semi-detached house, keeping a tight grip on the bottle of burgundy that he’d brought with him. Anna Hoyle opened the front door and air-kissed him. Anna was gorgeous, slim with shoulder-length blonde hair and amused green eyes. She looked a good decade younger than her true age and it was hard to believe that she was the mother of three daughters.

‘He’s in the front room playing with his Wii,’ said Anna.

‘I thought he’d grown out of that,’ said Nightingale.

‘I’m cooking, I’ll be with you in a minute.’ She took the bottle of wine from him and nodded appreciatively at the label. ‘Fancy a glass of this?’

‘I wouldn’t mind a beer first.’

‘I got a pack of Corona in just for you,’ she said. ‘Though I’ve never understood why you drink Mexican beer.’

‘A girlfriend got me into it years ago,’ he said. ‘There was something sexy about the way she used her tongue to shove the lime down the neck of the bottle.’

‘More information than I needed,’ she laughed and headed off to the kitchen.

Robbie was playing virtual tennis against his eight-year-old daughter Sarah and she was trouncing him. ‘Fancy a game?’ asked Robbie, as he tried and failed to return one of his daughter’s serves.

‘Tennis was never my game,’ said Nightingale, dropping down onto the sofa.

‘Hello, Uncle Jack,’ said Sarah as she pounded another serve past her dad.

‘Who’s winning?’

Sarah laughed. ‘Who do you think?’

Anna brought Nightingale his lager, complete with slice of lemon in the neck. She grinned as he used his finger to push it down. ‘Dinner’ll be ready in five minutes,’ she said.

Anna had cooked her signature beef and beer casserole with garlic mashed potatoes, and as always it was delicious. Robbie opened the bottle of wine that Nightingale had brought, and then a second bottle of red. Afterwards Anna took Sarah up to bed while Nightingale went out into the garden for a cigarette. Robbie kept him company and the two men stood looking up at the stars. High overhead an airliner headed towards Gatwick airport.

‘You remember that Berwick thing?’

‘The killings. Sure.’

‘It’s all going to blow up soon. Big time.’ He reached into his pocket and took out the thumb drive that contained the pictures and videos Morris had taken from Stevenson’s laptop. He handed it to Robbie. ‘Have a look at that. You’ll see some faces that you’ll recognise.’

Robbie frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

‘McBride was part of a paedophile ring up in Berwick. They were abusing kids at his farmhouse. Serious abuse, Robbie. I don’t know if they were drugging the kids or what, but they looked out of it.’

‘McBride was a paedophile?’

‘I haven’t seen him on any of the videos or pictures yet, but there are thousands of them. It’s definitely his farmhouse, though. I recognise the rooms.’

‘And what am I supposed to do with this?’ asked Robbie, holding up the thumb drive.

‘It’s a fallback position. I’ve sent the stuff to the Met’s paedophile unit already, but I wanted another copy out there, just in case.’

‘Where did you get it from?’

‘The computer of a cop up in Berwick.’

‘A cop? There’s a cop involved in this?’

‘Robbie, the cop’s the least of it. There are some very, very important people involved. Showbiz, TV, politics. It’s huge, mate. It’s big and it’s organised and I think Berwick is a very small part of it. It makes the Savile thing look like a tea party. In fact the Savile thing might even be part of it.’

‘Bloody hell, Jack. Are you sure about this?’

‘Take a look at what’s on that thumb drive. You’ll see why I’m sure. Some of the names on the list are cops. I think that’s why there was no real investigation of the school killings. No one up there seemed interested in why McBride killed the kids that he did, and now I know why.’

‘What about going to the papers?’

‘The London cops need to move before the papers get involved. I don’t want trial by media, I want the bastards behind bars. Once it’s in the papers people are going to run.’

Robbie put the thumb drive into his pocket. ‘So why did McBride shoot the kids?’

‘Somehow the paedophiles found out that there was an investigation on the way, out of London. The London cops were going to talk to the teacher that was killed, the deputy headmaster. That was why McBride killed him. Then he shot the kids that were being abused. That’s why he was moving from classroom to classroom. He was killing witnesses, Robbie. All those kids he killed were the ones that were being abused. He was covering his tracks. And then he killed himself.’

‘Are you sure about this?’

‘I’m fairly sure. But the cops handling the investigation will find the proof, I’m sure of that.’

‘Why would he do that? Kill himself?’

‘Maybe he knew that whatever happened he was finished. Maybe the others persuaded him to do it. Maybe they threatened him. Hypnotised him. I don’t know, Robbie.’

‘And the Satanic stuff?’

‘To throw the cops off the trail. If they thought it was the work of a lone madman then they wouldn’t be looking for anyone else. It was sexual abuse, pure and simple. But organised and on a scale you can only imagine.’

‘And tell me again why you’re giving this to me?’

‘Insurance, I guess. Just in case the paedophile unit drops the ball.’

‘Why do you think that might happen?’

‘Because this is big, Robbie. It’s bloody huge. There are some bloody big names on that thumb drive. And some of them are in the photographs and video. I don’t know who else is involved. There’s already at least one cop in on it, but for all I know there could be senior officers in the Met involved. I need you to keep your ear to the ground and if nothing happens over the next few days then at least you’ve got the information there. You’ve got all the pictures, videos and the list of email addresses that were getting the doctored pictures.’

‘Doctored? What do you mean?’

‘The guy who had them on his hard drive was taking the pictures and blurring the faces of the men involved and then emailing them. I’ve got the before and after pictures. Those pictures alone will send dozens of men to prison for a long, long time.’

‘And how did you get them?’

‘Best you don’t know, mate. But they’re one hundred per cent kosher.’

‘Well, I hope you covered your tracks.’

‘I’m pretty sure I did.’ Nightingale tried to blow a smoke ring but the wind ripped it apart. ‘Can you sniff around, see if you can confirm that the Met was about to investigate the Berwick paedophile ring?’

‘I’ll give it a go.’

‘And I need you to do me a favour, Robbie.’

‘That’s a first,’ said his friend sarcastically. He sipped his red wine.

‘Have you heard of a lawyer by the name of Marcus Fairchild?’

‘The QC?’

‘Yeah. He’s Jenny’s godfather.’

‘Is he now? He’s a big swinging dick, that much I know.’

‘I need you to check him out.’