Hard Place (9 page)

“I was comforting her. She and Neil have been close friends for years.”

“Is that what you call it. Com … forting.” His contempt was obvious as he withdrew his finger and inspected it carefully. “Emphasis on the come, I expect.” He seemed to be enjoying Holtom’s discomfort. “De-briefing her, were you?” He laughed again at his joke but this time it was Ratso who sat poker-faced before starting to ease himself out of the uncomfortable chair with the sagging bottom.

“I didn’t come here to listen to this crap. If I want smutty jokes, I’ll go to the Improv. Is that all, boss?”

“Sit down. I have questions.” Both hands jabbed downward before he turned a page on his pad and Ratso saw the familiar lazy scrawl in biro. “You went to identify the body yesterday?”

“Correction. We went to see who it was.”

“DCI Caldwell,” he studied his notes “said you did not recognise the deceased.” Ratso said nothing, raising Tennant’s blood pressure a notch or two. “Well? You’ve just admitted you knew Neil Shalford”

“No secret, boss.”

“Did you recognise him yesterday morning?”

“Yes.”

“So why did you deny recognition?”

Ratso thought any moron from SCD7 could see why denial had been the only option. “I didn’t deny recognition, sir.” He added the final word as a measure of defiance.

“Oh? So you’re challenging Caldwell, are you?”

“I’ve two witnesses. Yes.”

“You mean lie-my-arse-off–for-you Sergeants Strang and Watson?”

“I mean two reliable witnesses who will recall my precise words. As should a yellow-shirted DCI, even if he’s seeking promotion using shit-stirring garbage like this.”

“So? What did you say?”

“Beau Brummel asked me if I did or did not recognise him.” He pulled out his notebook written up after leaving the crime scene. “I replied, quote, ‘Very familiar but not the guy we were … I dunno whether to say … hoping or expecting. Not the guy we wanted to see on a slab.’” Even as he repeated the words used, Ratso admired the cunning way he had danced on the head of a pin. But it had still obstructed the course of Caldwell’s enquiries.

Tennant’s hands stilled. His little eyes looked upward as if seeking a cribsheet on the ceiling. Ratso took the chance to pile in.

“You think I should have said, Oh yes, Mr Brummel. We know this is Neil Shalford and we know who murdered him and why and where. Because he was working for SCD7 on an operation without backup that went pear-shaped.”

Tennant’s mouth dropped open as the facts clicked. Then a slight smile and look of relief took over, as he realised how bloody smart he had been passing the buck to the AC. “Well. Put like that.”

“Is there any other way?”

“I’ll have to say something to Caldwell.”

“Tell him to get lost and that if he pokes his nose into SCD7’s sensitive OPs again—or worse still, screws up thousands of hours of our work—I’ll personally stuff his highly polished loafers right up his arse.” Ratso stood up. “And warn him I shall enjoy it. As might he.” He pointed at Tennant for emphasis. “And if he thinks I murdered Neil to carry on an affair with his widow, tell him to charge me.” Ratso glared at Tennant. “And, sir, don’t go near the truth either, otherwise I’ll have Wensley Hughes after you from a great height. I wouldn’t give a fag paper for your career after that. The AC put his head on the block when you hadn’t the balls.”

Tennant did not like problems, never had. His arms waved helplessly as he anticipated the difficult phone call ahead. Ratso was almost out of the door when he let rip again.

“Tell the git to stop concentrating on me and work on the Hogans. A witness yesterday linked them to Neil. Keep him out of my hair.”

“But, er, er … you and what’s-her-name? I mean, I see where Caldwell’s coming from.”

“You reckon I’d pull off the fingernails of an old mate? Cut off his todger and stuff it in his mouth? Do me a favour, sir.” His voice had risen to a crescendo but now he turned quiet. “Me and Charlene? Yeah! She’s a right little raver. ’Cos she’s in mourning, she’d only let me give her one while wearing black stockings and suspenders. Trouble was I hadn’t got a black condom, so I was scuppered.”

In a trice, he was out of the door, leaving his boss to wonder where truth ended and fantasy began.

Chiswick, West London

Despite Jock Strang’s confidence that he would locate Klodian Skela in an hour, it was another day before Ratso and Tosh Watson pulled up outside the apartment block just north of Chiswick High Road in West London. It had been Tosh who followed up a lead that several Albanian families lived as tenants in a rundown five-story at the western end of Chiswick.

Ratso’s check of the public records at the Land Registry had revealed that the landlord for the entire block was a Gibraltar company called Chewbeck Holdings Limited, registered in the offices of a Corporate Service Provider in Main Street, Gibraltar. The name of the lawyers involved was not a matter of public record but a phone call had revealed some unpublished information. The conveyancing when Chewbeck had purchased the block had been carried out by solicitors Ratso had never heard of called Arkwright, Fenwick and Stubbs, with offices in Lime Street in the heart of the City of London.

Ratso decided to start with Gibraltar. He knew that many respectable businesses operated from there for bona fide business reasons. In particular, large British bookmakers had taken the exit route to the Rock on accountants’ advice. But Gibraltar had also been a hotbed of sharp-end business and had laundered money for years. As he logged onto Gibraltar’s Companies House, he was immediately transported back to a wild night with the Gibraltar police a couple of years ago. Lifetime friendships had been formed during a raucous karaoke party followed by entertainment from some energetic lapdancers. With a wistful sigh, he returned to data mining and quickly found Chewbeck Holdings Limited.

The Gibraltar CSP was home to hundreds of companies and offshore trusts and was little more than a place to display a nameplate. The directors of Chewbeck were a couple of local professionals, no doubt officers of countless companies managed as part of their business. They didn’t own the asset; in reality, the shareholder owned the company. Unfortunately, the published data showed a meaningless nominee shareholder, which concealed the real owner of the block of flats.

Ratso had got Tosh to put a watch on the block and to photo everybody coming or going. Yesterday evening, Tosh produced a photo that pulled Ratso up short. No question—the man was part of the couple he had seen approaching Bardici’s Range Rover. Now there he was entering the block, after which a light had come on in a second-floor flat. Nobody had seen him leave.

Ratso glanced round the shabby concrete walls of the entrance. The faded green stair rail looked filthy and the walls were covered in spray-painted slogans written in what Ratso guessed was Albanian. A used condom lay discarded by the wall leading to the ground-floor flats. Ratso reminded himself to wash his hands when he returned to fresher air. Fastidious he was not but there were limits.

“Gotta be pretty desperate to have a knee-trembler here,” muttered Tosh. “No sweet music or soft lights. Just cat’s shit and a smell of urine.” Red and blue graffiti stained the communal letter box. Its door had been forced open and hung off one of its hinges, the results of typical mindless vandalism.

Ratso pointed to the meaningless Albanian words on one wall. “I think it says Sharon was shagged here.”

Tosh nodded agreement. “Yeah and isn’t that last word twice?” They chuckled all the way to the second-floor landing.

The bottle-green door to number five had been severely kicked at some time in its history and though now repaired, the door had also been forced with a screwdriver or chisel. The splintered wood was a dead giveaway. The bell had been pulled from the wall and the bare wires hung loose. Tosh gave Ratso a despairing look and then banged loudly. After a few moments of silence, the sound of movement came from inside. A light came on. “Po?” Ratso knew from his trip to Tirana that the word meant yes.

“Police. Open up.”

There was a longer pause and Ratso imagined the man’s brain struggling into top gear to work out what was wanted of him and what to say. Slowly the chain was unhitched and the door opened.

“Mr Skela? Mr Klodian Skela?”

The man nodded, albeit reluctantly. Klodian Skela was wearing a vest under a dressing gown with a pair of slippers that looked so worn and stained it was hard to believe they had ever been new. Ratso flashed his ID. “I’m DI Holtom. This is Sergeant Watson.” As he spoke, Ratso was already pushing inside, taking in the smell of stale air and last night’s garlic-flavored meal. “We have some questions for you.”

The man retreated a pace or two but blocked the way into the next room. He looked unshaven and his thinning hair hadn’t been combed today. His eyes looked bleary, as if he had not slept a great deal.

“We’ll need some time. We’ll need to sit down with you.” Ratso nodded in the direction of the open door to the main room. Skela burst into a torrent of Albanian spoken at a furious pace.

Watson tapped his toes impatiently as they heard him out. Then he thrust his face forward. “Cut out the Albanian crap, mate. You speak excellent English.”

The man shrugged.

“Stop pissing us about, Mr Skela. We listened to the recording of the call you made reporting a stolen vehicle. You spoke well and understood what was being said to you. Now. Take us in there.” He glanced at the almost closed door from which came a sliver of light.

Reluctantly Skela led them into what proved to be a bed-sitter with a table for four near the window and a double-bed against the far wall. The curtains were drawn but the bedside light was on and sitting in the bed, sheets pulled to her chin on seeing the three men enter, was a young woman certainly under twenty, with tousled long black hair and heavy pink lipstick. Ratso enjoyed taking a second look. She had high Slavic cheekbones, giving her a haughty look beyond her years. Ratso had expected to see the woman who had been on the jaunt to torch the Range Rover but this woman was too young by nearly twenty years.

He wondered how much Skela had paid this bint for the night and whether his assumption that Skela was married was correct. Ratso pointed to the young woman and motioned her to go next door to the bathroom. She looked uncertain, though Ratso was sure she understood English. Skela rattled off a few words and she swung her long limbs out of bed, dragging the sheet with her but not before Ratso had spotted an eyeful of tit and a flash of trimmed, jet-black pubic hair. He watched her wiggle into the bathroom and close the door. He drew up a chair at the table with Tosh beside him. After some hesitation, Skela took a third chair opposite them.

“Where’s your wife?” enquired Tosh.

“Manchester. No here till four day.”

Tosh cocked his head toward the bathroom and winked. “A secret, eh?”

Ratso watched for the Albanian’s reaction; he didn’t look too proud of his conquest, so she must have been paid for the night. That or he was worried about something. Maybe his wife had a good way with rolling pins.

Tosh leaned forward and looked at his notes. “You reported Mr Bardici’s vehicle stolen at 5:25 p.m. When did you first know it had been stolen?”

“Maybe morning, maybe a bit later. I not so for sure know. I went collect car. Not there.”

“You went to Mr Bardici’s home to collect the car? 22 Westbrook Drive. Right?”

Skela nodded.

“Alone? Nobody with you?”

“Me. Nobody else.”

Ratso marked the first blatant lies but let Tosh continue. “So why not report it, then?” Ratso noticed the man fidget, his fingers opening and closing on the tablecloth.

Skela shrugged. “I not know for sure. Maybe I make mistake. Wrong day. Maybe Mr. Bardici, he out in car.”

“So what made you sure at 5:25 p.m.? Had you spoken to Mr Bardici?”

“No. Not talk. Erlis Bardici away.”

“Oh, where?”

“Away. He not say. Back tomorrow.”

“Abroad, is he? Tirana, perhaps?”

Skela shrugged again but still looked composed.

“You work for him?”

“Like … bit this, bit that.”

“Such as?”

“Take car to garage. Work in garden. Paint wall. Buy things. B & Q. HomeBase. Maybe drive him.”

Ratso nodded. He always enjoyed questioning a witness when he had every ace in the deck. But he liked to build it up, let whichever sergeant was with him do the spadework, set the tempo before going for the jugular. “So when did Mr Bardici ask you to take his car to the garage?”

Skela seemed unperturbed, replying without hesitation that it had been the day before the theft. “The garage in Twickenham. Meltbys.”

“And how do you know Mr Bardici?”

“He my cousin.”

“Mr. Bardici? Who is he? What is his job?”

“Ask him.”

“I’m asking you. Now tell me.” The final three words were snapped out, causing Skela to flinch.

“Maybe he own one, no, maybe two stores. Like corner shops.”

“And her?” Ratso pointed to the bathroom, where a shower was running. He saw Tosh change positions uncomfortably on his chair and he would have bet a pony that Tosh’s bladder was giving him hell with the sound of running water. Then his attention returned to the witness, who either shared Tosh’s problem or was uneasy. “This young woman. Her name?”

“Lindita.” The name was accompanied by a small bead of perspiration trickling down the man’s forehead to the black stubble on his cheek. A study of Skela’s heavy features showed that, given a good wash and brush-up, he would be quite attractive to some women; he had a strong jawline, a steady gaze and designer stubble that he had yet to trim this morning. His eyes were deep-set, suggesting a depth to his character but judging by the squalor in which he lived, perhaps he was less intelligent than his features suggested. His mouth looked smiley though at present he had little about which to smile.

Ratso was puzzled by the man’s unease. “How old is Lindita? Fifteen?”

Very quickly, too quickly, Skela retorted that she was eighteen but now his forehead was gleaming with a line of sweat from side to side. It started between the thinning strands on top of his head and was almost a stream now, so much so that the Albanian searched in his dressing gown pocket and mopped his brow with a grubby blue-spotted hankie.

The draught from the ill-fitting window whistled across the table, matched only by another from the hallway. The small gas fire was not lit. “Not hot in here, is it, Mr Skela?” Ratso was curious. In fact the place was bloody freezing and the best way Ratso could think of to keep warm in a dump like this was to be shagging Lindita twenty-four-seven. Short of that, thermals all year.

Ratso stood up, stretched and yawned loudly as if he were at home. He wanted time now—time to gather his thoughts as he pottered his way round the bedsit picking up ornaments, looking at the pictures on the walls. Who’s this woman Skela is bedding?

He paused at the end of the bed. Lindita had taken the top sheet but the bottom sheet was still there, rumpled and creased. Halfway down, there were a series of wet patches where Skela’s orgasm had dripped from the girl’s thighs or been shot into the bed. Elsewhere were other stains that he did not care to study too closely. On the far side of the bed, he saw the jumble of male and female clothes lying in a heap on the floor.

For a fleeting second the discarded underwear took his imagination to Wolsey Drive. His animal instincts toward Charlene had been heightened by a second overnight stop. Last night, they had even walked down to the pub by the Thames for bar food and a glass of wine. It had been one of those awkward events, sort of dating but not—their first public appearance. Yet he could almost feel her urging him to hold her hand in the dark side streets on the return journey. Though his sap was rising, he had somehow refrained. F’Gawd’s sake, Ratso, you can’t go walking through the streets hand in hand before the funeral. But at least there was no sign now of Caldwell’s lot, who had interviewed Charlene and left with nothing of value.

Ratso continued his tour of the bed-sitter, leaving Skela to worry about whatever was worrying him so much. Tosh knew better than to fire any questions now while Ratso was letting the witness stew. There was no kitchen as such, just a small area where you could stand on the lino by the sink or cooker rather than on the stained fawn carpet. The remains of takeaway for two and an empty bottle of Bulgarian red stood beside unwashed dishes. Ratso reached the sideboard, the place that had been his ultimate goal without making it obvious. There were almost a dozen family photos, including one of Klodian Skela’s wedding to the woman he had seen walking toward Bardici’s house in Westbrook Drive. The adjacent photo of husband and wife was quite recent and appeared to have been taken with Southend Pier in the background. Ratso picked it up. “Your wife?”

Skela nodded. “Rosafa.”

Ratso’s eyes moved along the line of snaps and portraits of the loving family—several were of a young boy at different ages. In the most recent, he was about nineteen and posing outside Old Trafford wearing United’s red top. But it was the photo of the other young child that made him look and then look again. No. Surely not? But yes. He said nothing as he turned away and pulled back the faded curtain to peer down at the wet pavements below. He felt slightly sick and wished he had tucked into a bacon buttie in the greasy on the High Street like Tosh. Empty stomachs were not good at times like this. He returned to stand, towering over the witness. “So where were you during the day? I mean, between when you saw the car was missing and when you phoned the police.”