Val McDermid - Crack Down

There were only a couple of dozen people in the fun pool at Gorton, so Davy and I made the most of the slides and the waves, treating the place as our personal pleasure dome. Although my shoulders screamed in complaint at first, the water therapy seemed to help. Afterwards, both ravenous, we scoffed huge pizzas and enough salad to keep Watership Down’s bunnies going for a week. Then we hit the video shop and chose more movies than we’d have time to watch. I didn’t care. Part of me felt a holiday sense of release. I’d done everything I could to get Richard freed. Now all I could do was wait, and I owed it to Davy to do that as cheerfully as possible.

As we drove across Upper Brook Street and into Brunswick Street, the traffic slowed to a crawl. I couldn’t see what the problem was, only that there was no traffic heading past us in the opposite direction. Eventually, craning my neck, I could see that the road ahead was cordoned off, and that traffic was being diverted down Kincardine Road by a uniformed policeman. Curious, I swung the car out of the queue, and indicated to the policeman that I wanted to turn right, heading back home. He gave me the nod, and I pulled round the corner and parked. I couldn’t help myself. There’s no way I could ignore something looking that interesting on my own doorstep. At the very least, it looked like someone had raided the local post office. I sometimes wonder whether I chose the career or it chose me. I turned to Davy and said, ‘Wait here a minute. I just want to see what’s going on.’ He flicked a glance heavenwards, sighed and pulled a comic out of his backpack.

I got out of the car and locked it up, then cut through the council estate so that I’d emerge at the mouth of a narrow alley off Brunswick Street, but further down than the road block. I was almost opposite the pelican crossing, and I could see that there was a second road block a little further down in the other direction. On the pedestrianized little shopping precinct on the other side of the street, two police cars and an ambulance were standing, doors open, just outside the post office. Around them milled a bewildered looking knot of people, police officers trying to keep them away from the person the ambulance crew were crouched over. The wailing cries of a child rose and fell like a siren. While I watched, another pair of police cars arrived.

One of the ambulance crew stood up and shook his head while his colleague continued to crouch on the ground. There was a commotion at the heart of the crowd, then a stretcher was loaded into the ambulance. The spectators parted, and the ambulance reversed on to the road and sped off. The crowd stayed back long enough for me to see a policewoman ushering two young boys into the back of a police car, which shot off in the wake of the ambulance, blue light flashing. It was hard to be certain from that distance, but they looked disturbingly like Wayne and Daniel.

By this time, I was a question mark on legs. I’d also spotted a familiar mane of black hair bobbing around on the fringes of the crowd, tapping people on the shoulders and thrusting a tape recorder in their faces. I checked that none of the cops were looking my way, then I nonchalantly nipped out of the alley, crossed the street and headed for Alexis. If anyone had tried to stop me, I’d have insisted I was on my way to a dental appointment in the precinct. If the police were suspicious enough to check it out, Howard’s receptionist knew me well enough to back me up.

As I drifted closer, I could see the police officers were working their way through the crowd, taking names and addresses rather than attempting statements. I could hear odd snatches of shocked conversation: ‘all over in seconds…’; ‘…balaclava over his head…’; ‘thought it was a car backfiring…’; ‘police should do something about them druggies…’ Alexis was over on the far side, tape recorder shoved under the nose of a uniformed inspector. I took my notebook and tape recorder out of my handbag and rushed round the fringe of the crowd to Alexis’s side. I arrived in time to hear him say in harassed tones, ‘Look, I can’t tell you any more now, you’ll have to wait till we have a clearer idea ourselves.’ Then, seeing me and falling for my instant disguise, he added, ‘And I haven’t got time to go through it all again. Get the details from her,’ he said, gesturing towards Alexis with his thumb. She turned and clocked me. Her face, already paler than usual, seemed to go even whiter.

‘For Chrissake, what are you doing here?’ she hissed.

‘I could say the same to you. What’s happened? Somebody taken a pot at the post office? And where’s the rest of the pack?’

‘Still on their way, if they even know about it. I just happened to be driving back to your house when it all came on top. Kate, you’ve got to get out of here! Now! Move it!’ Alexis started hustling me away, back towards the side street where I’d left my car.

‘Why?’ I protested. ‘What’s it got to do with me?’

‘Where’s Davy?’ she demanded, still shooing me away from the crowd and back across the street.

‘He’s in the car.’ We’d reached the opening of the alley and I stepped in, then stopped in my tracks. I wasn’t going another pace further until she enlightened me. ‘What is going on, Alexis? What happened back there?’

She ran a hand through her unruly hair and pulled a crushed packet of cigarettes out of her bag. She lit up and took a deep drag before she spoke. ‘I’m sorry, but there is not a gentle way of saying this. Cherie Roberts just got killed,’ she said.

I felt like I’d been punched in the chest. The air emptied out of me like a burst balloon. ‘A robbery? She got in the way?’ I asked.

My face must have betrayed my hope that this had been no more than a horrific accident, a tragic and malignant twist of fate, for Alexis turned her face away and shook her head, smoke streaming down her nostrils in twin plumes. ‘No. It was a hit.’

I squeezed the bridge of my nose between my fingers. I didn’t want to believe what Alexis was saying. ‘That can’t be right,’ I said half-heartedly. ‘For fuck’s sake, she was no big deal. She was just another single mum, trying to get through the days and keep her kids out of trouble.’

‘I’ve covered too many stories like this over the last couple of years in the Moss and Cheetham Hill,’ Alexis said bleakly, referring to the violent drug wars that have practically doubled Manchester’s homicide figures. ‘According to the eyewitnesses, Cherie was coming out of the post office after cashing her child benefit. There was a car parked on the other side of the road. When she came out, the car revved up, shot across the road, mounted the pavement and drove towards her. When they were a few feet away from her, she got blasted from the rear window with both barrels of the shotgun. It was, variously, a metallic blue Sierra, a silver Toyota, a grey Cavalier, and nobody’s admitting to getting the registration number.’

I closed my eyes and leaned against the wall. I could feel the brick rough against my fingertips. ‘Dear God,’ I breathed. I’d asked her to find out who had given her kids drug-laced transfers. And two days later, Cherie Roberts was on her way to the mortuary, stamped with the familiar hallmarks of a drug-related murder. Suddenly, my eyes snapped open. ‘Davy!’ I gasped. I turned on my heel and ran down the alley, panic pumping the blood till my ears pounded with the drum of my heartbeat.

I rounded the corner, imagination painting scenes of bloodshed and violence that even Sam Peckinpah would draw the line at, making all sorts of ridiculous bargains with a god I don’t believe in. I skidded to a halt by the car, feeling deeply foolish as Davy waved at me and mouthed. ‘Hi,’ through the glass. Alexis rushed up behind me, slightly breathless. ‘We need to talk,’ she said. ‘What did you ask Cherie on Sunday?’