Gone (24 page)

Caffery chewed his lip. He checked his watch. ‘I’ve got a job for you. You need to go and see someone.’

Prody turned his chair back. ‘Yeah? What?’

‘The bean-counters are whining about budgets – throwing their toys out of the pram about the staffing levels on the new safehouse. Go over there and give the PC the afternoon off. Speak to the Costellos and Nick. Give them an update on what’s going on – try to calm Janice down because she’s going to lose it when she hears about this. When you’ve done all that – and you can take your time about it, hang around if you have to – get the local shop to send someone back to cover you.’

Prody regarded him balefully. Go and explain to a woman who had nearly lost her daughter that they knew who the bastard was? That something could have been done about it a long time ago? Not exactly the soft option. A hidden punishment in there. Still, he pushed his chair back, got his raincoat off the hook and found his keys. He walked to the door without a word, not looking at anyone.

‘See you,’ Turner shouted to him. But he didn’t answer. He closed the door, leaving the two men standing in silence. Turner might have spoken to Caffery at that point, but his phone rang. He answered it. Listened. Finished the call, put the phone in his pocket, and looked sombrely at the DI.

‘They’re ready, I take it?’ Caffery asked.

Turner nodded. ‘They’re ready.’

They held each other’s eye. Each knew what the other was thinking. They had Richard Moon’s address, a witness who said Moon was at home right this second, and now a forced-entry team standing by. And no reason to think Moon knew they were coming. He might be at home, just sitting on the sofa in front of the TV with a cup of tea, not expecting anything to happen.

Of course it wouldn’t be like that. Both Turner and Caffery knew it. So far Moon had outsmarted them at every turn. He was cunning and deadly. There was no reason to think he was going to change now. But they had to make the effort. Really, there wasn’t anything else they could do.

‘Jasper doesn’t like it here. Jasper thinks that man’s going to come in those windows.’ In the flat DI Caffery had transferred the Costellos to, little Emily was sitting on the bed, toy rabbit clutched against her chest. They’d had lunch, spaghetti and meat sauce, and now they were making up the beds. Emily frowned at her mother. ‘You don’t like it here, do you, Mummy? You don’t really like it, do you?’

‘I don’t
love
it.’ Janice pulled Emily’s Barbie sleeping-bag out of the dustbin liner she’d used to transport it and gave it a shake. This bedroom was nicer than the last one. In fact, the whole flat was better than the police house. Cleaner and tidier with cream carpets and white woodwork. ‘I don’t
love
it, but I don’t hate it. And I do know
something
very special about it.’

‘What?’

‘I know it’s safe. I know no one is going to hurt you while we’re here. Those windows are special safe windows and Nick and the rest of the police have made sure of that. The nasty man can’t get you here. Can’t get Jasper either.’

‘Or you?’

‘Or me. Or Daddy, or Nanny. None of us.’

‘Nanny’s bed’s too far.’ Emily pointed out of the room, down the corridor, past the living room and bathroom to the door at the back of the flat. ‘Nanny’s bed’s all the way down there.’

‘Nanny likes her new room.’

‘And my bed’s too far from yours, Mummy. I won’t be able see you in the night. I was scared last night.’

Janice straightened and looked at the little trundle bed Nick had set up in the corner for Emily. Then she looked at the rickety pine bed she and Cory would sleep on. Last night at her mother’s Cory had fallen asleep easily. While he snored and grunted she’d lain awake, watching car headlights pass on the ceiling, waiting for one to stop, waiting for footsteps, straining her ears at the tiniest noise outside. ‘I tell you what.’ She went to the T-shirt and joggers Cory had worn last night. They were in an untidy tangle in his suitcase where he’d thrown them this morning. She picked them up and dropped them on to the trundle bed. Then she pulled Emily’s pyjamas out from the rucksack, crossed to the double bed and put them under Cory’s pillow. ‘How’s that?’

‘I sleep with
you
?’

‘That’s right.’

‘
Great
,’ said Emily, bouncing eagerly. ‘
Great
.’

‘Yeah – really great.’ Cory stood in the doorway. He was wearing a suit, his hair slicked back from his forehead. ‘I get the camp bed. Thanks a bunch.’

Janice put her hands on her hips and gave him a long look, up and down. The suit was the most expensive one he owned – YSL – and had cost them a small fortune. Last night, in the time she’d been grabbing toys, food, sleeping-bags and clothes for Emily, he’d been getting this suit out of the cupboard. Now he was busily fitting the tiny Paul Smith cufflinks she’d bought him for Easter last year. ‘You look nice,’ she said coldly. ‘Where are you off to? Hot date?’

‘Yeah – really hot. I’m going to work. Why?’

‘
Work?
Jesus, Cory.’

‘What’s the matter with that?’

‘Well,
Emily
to start with. She’s terrified – you can’t just go.’

‘There are four of you – Nick’s not going anywhere and there’s an officer sitting outside. You are being looked after. Watertight –
watertight
. In the meantime, my job is not quite as secure. In the meantime,
Janice
, our livelihood, our house,
your
car – everything
is not quite
as
watertight. So forgive me for applying myself to the problem.’

He headed back down the hallway. Janice leaped up, closed the door behind her so Emily wouldn’t hear and hurried down the corridor to where Cory was standing at a little smeared mirror next to the front door, checking his tie was straight. ‘Cory.’

‘What?’

‘Cory, I—’ She took a deep breath. Closed her eyes and counted to ten. Emily had had enough to put up with. She didn’t need to hear her parents tearing each other’s heads off. ‘I am very grateful to you for how hard you work,’ she said tightly. She opened her eyes and smiled. Bright. Patted his lapel. ‘That’s all. Just very grateful. Now, you have a lovely time at work.’

The high street was typical of a thousand others in England, with a Superdrug and a Boots interspersed with a couple of local retailers. The shop lights battled with the rain and the beginnings of dusk. Eight men were waiting for Caffery when he arrived at the RV point in a supermarket car park two hundred yards down the street from Richard Moon’s flat. They were dressed in protective gear: Kevlar vests, shields, helmets in their hands. He recognized some of them: the Underwater Search Unit, out on the regular support-group duties they did from time to time.

‘Where’s your sergeant?’ Their van’s lights were still on, the doors open. ‘She on board, is she?’

‘Afternoon, sir.’ A shortish man with cropped blond hair stepped forward, his hand out. ‘Acting Sergeant Wellard. I spoke to you on the phone.’

‘You’re acting? Where’s Sergeant Marley, then?’

‘She’s back on tomorrow. You can get her on her mobile if you need her.’ Wellard positioned himself with his back to the rest of the men so he couldn’t be heard. He lowered his voice. ‘Sir? I don’t know who’s been talking but some of the lads’ve got it into their head that this is the carjacker we’re doing today. Are they right?’

Caffery raised his gaze past Wellard, down to where the little street they stood on met the big thoroughfare and the entrance to the flat. ‘Tell them I don’t want excitement. I want them to keep their respect for this job. Make sure they’re ready for the
unexpected. This guy is clever, clever, clever. Even if he’s in there it’s not going to be fairy dust.’

The house with Moon’s flat in it was a two-storey plain Victorian terrace with a Chinese takeaway – ‘The Happy Wok’ – on the ground floor. The stairs from the flat, as with most buildings like this, ran down the side of the takeaway and opened straight out on to the pavement, where pedestrians were passing, hurrying home from work, heads down, fighting the cold. The back of the flat overlooked a small car park where the takeaway owner dumped his empty containers and probably sold off his used cooking oil to the local boy-racers. The curtains were drawn tightly at all the windows. But they’d already made enquiries with the takeaway owner, who said Richard Moon did live upstairs and that there had been movements up there all afternoon. Already members of another unit were assembling at the back of the building. More cops still were discreetly diverting the pedestrians. A rash of sweat prickled on Caffery’s upper lip.

‘How do you want us to work it?’ Wellard stood in typical support-group stance: arms folded at chest height, feet planted wide. ‘Do you want us to knock on the door or do you want to handle that part with us backing you up?’

‘I’ll do the knock. You back me up.’

‘You want to do the caution, do you?’

‘Yes.’

‘And if he doesn’t answer?’

‘Then it’s the big red key.’ He nodded to where two men were unstrapping the red battering ram. ‘Whatever way, I’m going in with you. I want to see it first hand.’

‘If you do, sir, please come in behind us. Stay back, give us space. When we’ve found the target, I’ll assess it and give you a shout. I’ll tell you one of three things: compliant, non-compliant or deranged. We’ll cuff him if it’s a non-compliant—’

‘No. You’ll cuff him even if it’s a compliant. I don’t trust this guy.’

‘OK – I’ll cuff him for either of the first two and you can come in to do the caution. If it’s a deranged, you know the routine. It’ll be Armageddon in there. He’ll be up against the wall, two shields
on him, squashed. We’ll take him down by the back of his knees if we have to. That’ll be the point you might want to think about letting me do the caution.’

‘No. I’ll do it.’

‘Whatever. But stand clear till we’ve got him completely cuffed. Shout it at him from the doorway if you have to.’

As they walked down the street – Caffery, Turner and the Underwater Search Unit – the mood was superficially calm. Casual, even. The USU guys chatted among themselves, fiddling with gear, checking the channels on their radios so the only communication they’d get would be from officers on this operation. One or two squinted up at the curtained windows, assessing the flat. Only Caffery was silent. He was thinking of what the Walking Man had said:
This man is cleverer than any of the others you’ve brought to me before. He’s laughing at you
.

It wasn’t going to be straightforward. He just knew it. It couldn’t be this simple.

They stopped at the shabby little front door. The support officers fell instantly into time-tested formation around Caffery, who stood, hand poised, ready to press the bell. To his left three men grouped together as a shield entry team, riot shields rigid in front of them. To his right Wellard spearheaded the rest, batons and CS gas at the ready. Caffery turned his eyes to Wellard. They exchanged a small nod. Caffery took a breath, and rang the bell.

Silence. Five seconds of nothing.

The men held each other’s eyes, expecting at any moment the familiar crackle of the radio to tell them their target had jumped from a back window. But nothing happened. Caffery licked his lips. Rang again.

This time there was a noise. A footfall on the steps. From the other side of the door came the sound of bolts being pulled back, a Yale lock turning. The men around Caffery stiffened. He took a step back, feeling in his pocket for his warrant card. He flipped it open, held it up in front of his face.

‘Yeah?’

Caffery lowered his card. He realized he’d been squinting, half
expecting something to explode in his face. But standing in the doorway was a small man in his sixties. He wore a filthy vest, trousers held up with braces. His head was completely bald. You’d have mistaken him for someone at a BNP meeting if it wasn’t for the slippers.

‘Mr Moon?’

‘Yeah?’

‘I’m DI Caffery.’

‘Yeah?’

‘You’re not Richard Moon?’

‘Richard? No, I’m Peter. Richard’s my boy.’

‘We’d like to speak to Richard. Do you know where he is?’

‘Yes.’

There was a pause. The team exchanged glances. It never went this smoothly. There’d be a pay-off. ‘Then would you like to tell me where he is?’

‘Yeah – he’s upstairs in bed.’ Peter Moon stood back from the door and Caffery peered past him into the hallway and up the stairs. The carpet was shabby and covered with mud. The walls were marked with years of use and nicotine, lines of brown at waist height where hands had scuffed and trailed over the years. ‘Do you want to come in? I’ll go and get him.’

‘No. I want you to step outside, sir, if you don’t mind. You can wait here with my colleagues.’

Peter Moon stepped out into the street, shivering at the cold. ‘Jesus. What’s going on?’

‘Any questions, Sergeant Wellard?’ said Caffery. ‘Got any queries for him?’

‘Yes. Mr Moon, there aren’t any firearms on the premises as far as you know?’

‘Not in a million years.’

‘And your son’s not armed?’

‘Armed?’

‘Yes. Is he armed?’

Peter Moon looked carefully at Wellard. His eyes were dead. ‘Give me a break.’

‘Yes or no?’

‘No. And you’re going to frighten the crap out of him. He doesn’t like unexpected visitors. That’s just Richard’s way.’

‘I’m sure he’ll understand. Under the circumstances. He’s in bed, then? So how many bedrooms are there?’

‘Two. You go through the living room down the corridor – there’s one on the left, then a bathroom and the door at the back is his bedroom. Mind you, I wouldn’t go too near the bathroom at the moment. Richard’s just been in it. Smells like something crawled up inside him and died. Don’t know how he does it.’

‘End of the corridor.’ Caffery jerked his head at the door. ‘Wellard? You got it? We good to go?’

Wellard nodded. On a count of three they went: the three-man shield team first, running up the stairs, shouting at the top of their voices: ‘
Police, police, police!
’ The hallway filled with noise and the smell of sweat. Wellard followed with three of his men, and Caffery brought up the rear, taking the steps two at a time.