Mark Sennen - BAD BLOOD - A DI Charlotte Savage Novel

Poor quality video played on the screen. Black and grey chunks of pixels swirling. Static on the audio track. That, and the sound of heavy breathing. Jackman was about to ask the man what the hell he was playing at when a bloom of light grew and danced in the centre of the picture as the camera zoomed and struggled to focus. Then the image steadied and Jackman was able to resolve the jumble of light and shadow. As the film ran on he realised this was dynamite, and a minute or so later when the clip finished he had to struggle to contain his excitement.

‘Good, eh?’ A finger touched the screen and the man pocketed the phone. ‘Five thousand.’

‘How the hell did you get that?’ Jackman felt his heart beating, but tried to remain calm. ‘I mean, were you waiting there or what?’

‘I was in the area on business. There’s a holiday home, couple from London. They’re down here every weekend and they’ve got careless. They started to leave a few things around the place and I spied them through the window. There’s a key under the flowerpot for the cleaner. They’ve got the brains to earn all that money but really they’re as thick as they come. I—’

‘Alright, I understand. Get on with it.’

‘I heard an almighty smash as I was going through their stuff. When I rush out I see the car upside down. I recognised her immediately. I was about to make a run back into the woods when something made me stop. I whipped out the phone and started to film. Twenty minutes later the place was crawling with police, the fire brigade, ambos, everything. That’s when I legged it.’

‘Give me the phone.’ Jackman reached into his back pocket and extracted his wallet. Pulled out all the cash he had. Two fifties and a bunch of tens. ‘Here.’

‘A couple of long’uns? You must be fucking joking.’

‘I don’t carry five K around. You’ll get the rest once Kenny’s seen it.’

‘But I need my phone. Anyway, how do I know I can trust you?’

‘It’s not me, it’s Kenny. He plays fair. And when he doesn’t play fair he sends someone round to kick your head in. You don’t have a choice. You’ll get your phone back tomorrow.’

‘Alright.’ The man grunted, retrieved his phone and dumped it in Jackman’s hand, in exchange for the money. ‘Five thousand. Remember?’

‘Sure,’ Jackman said pushing the door open and gulping fresh air. ‘I’ll be in touch.’

The engine started up as Jackman slammed the door and the car jerked forwards and then slewed out of the car park.

Jackman stood still for a moment. Let out a breath. Felt in his pocket for the phone. The smooth surface tingled the ends of his fingers, almost as if there was something magical about the object. He smiled, glanced up to the doggers at the top of the hill and then thought of the girl waiting for him back at his flat.

‘You lucky, lucky boy,’ he said to himself as he climbed back into his car.

Nr Bovisand, Plymouth. Tuesday 15th January. 6.45 a.m.

Tuesday morning, Savage was roused early by Jamie snuggling into the bed and wanting to know when Father Christmas was coming again. Pete muttered something along the lines of ‘never, if you don’t let him get some more shut-eye’, but by then Savage was wide awake, all chance of further sleep gone.

Down in the kitchen for breakfast Pete stifled a yawn, let it slip into a smile and then put his arm around her when she came over. He was finding it difficult, she knew. Adapting to a permanent life ashore was always going to be tricky after the routine of his previous existence. He loved Samantha and Jamie as much as she did, but often he’d only seen them at their best. Day-to-day was a totally different experience for him.

As Savage drove in to the Stonehouse area of the city to catch up with the inquiry teams, she let her thoughts mill around. Concluded that although things could be better, they could be a whole lot worse too.

By the time she arrived the sun had crawled up over the horizon into a clear sky, a smudge of cloud off to the south-west and a change in the wind direction hinting at an end to the cold conditions of the last couple of days. A call to DCI Garrett informed her that yesterday’s door-to-door trawl hadn’t produced anything fresh, so she made her way back to Owers’ flat at one twenty-one Durnford Street. John Layton’s Volvo stood alongside a resident’s parking sign, an ‘On Police Business’ sticker on the inside of the windscreen. Layton sat in the front passenger seat, spooning something from a pot into his mouth.

‘Yogurt and muesli,’ he said as the window slipped down. ‘A bit nineteen eighties but still as good for you now as it was back then.’

‘Sorry,’ said Savage. ‘I messed up. Too eager I suppose.’

‘And I apologise for getting angry,’ Layton said, finishing the last of the yogurt and stuffing the plastic pot and spoon in a paper evidence bag. He took his Tilley from the dashboard, got out of the car and plonked the hat on his head. ‘I blame it on my daughter. Ever since she was born … well, you know, don’t you?’

Savage did know. When her own daughters, the twins, Samantha and Clarissa, had been born, something had changed in the way she approached police work. Cases involving violence towards the innocent or powerless became magnified in their importance. The crimes became personal, as if they had been committed against her own family, and the anger and despair could only be ameliorated by catching the perpetrators. Or, as in the case of the man who’d tried to abduct her daughter Samantha – the serial killer Matthew Harrison – seeing that he received a fiery retribution.

‘Can I go in?’ Savage asked, swallowing a lump of emotion.

‘Yes, of course. I’ve nearly finished so there’s no need to worry about suiting up this time. Just about to check the U-bends in the bathroom and then I’m done.’

‘U-bends?’ Savage said. ‘As in plumbing?’

‘Yes. You get hair and nail clippings and all sorts in them. You should have a gander at yours sometime, you’d be surprised how much gets stuck down in amongst the sludge and gunge.’

‘Yuck,’ Savage wrinkled her nose. ‘I don’t want to think about it. If I want to get them cleaned I’ll call a plumber.’

‘If you can find one.’

They went down the steps and into the basement flat where Layton disappeared to his plumbing duties. Savage went into the living room, where a set of floodlights on a stand illuminated several boxes of papers and files stacked ready for dispatch to the station.

She wandered out of the living room and down the corridor. Floorboards had been pulled up in places and a section of plasterboard cut away from a wall where a patch of paint appeared fresher than the rest of the flat. In the bathroom the white floor tiles gleamed under the glare of another set of lights. Layton’s legs sprawled across the tiles, scrabbling for purchase on the shiny surface. His body was wedged under the bath where he’d removed a panel from the side. Banging, huffing and the occasional swear word came floating out. Savage left him to it and moved onto the bedroom. The bed had been stripped of the Barbie cover and sheets and the tea chest Owers used as a linen bin contained nothing but air. Savage wasn’t sure what she was looking for; Layton and his team usually went through a crime scene like locusts through a field of crops and it was unlikely they would miss anything.

She stood in the centre of the bare room, thinking how Owers’ life was being taken apart. He’d probably killed Simza Ellis so he deserved all that was coming to him, but it looked as if he had been living a bleak, empty existence for years. He may have gained some perverse pleasure from his paedophilia, but was the pleasure so great it was worth sacrificing everything for?