No Lovelier Death (6 page)

To Bazza’s delight, the contracts had come rolling in and by early summer Mackenzie Confidential had spawned Mackenzie Sunrise (‘buying your new life abroad’), Mackenzie Poolside (‘taking the risk out of foreign relocation’) and Mackenzie Courier (‘distance no object’). The latter was the love child of Bazza’s drug smuggling operations back in the nineties - importing vast quantities of cocaine from middlemen in the Dutch Antilles - and Winter found himself employing faces he’d last seen in court. This time, though, they were dealing with totally legitimate high-value items, hand-carried to any corner of the globe, and although some of the veterans complained of boredom on the longer flights, the profit margins - like the pay - made up for everything.

Sunrise and Poolside had naturally involved a lot of foreign travel on Winter’s part, and lately he’d begin to tire of the drive to Gatwick, but he’d discovered that his natural ruthlessness coupled with a seeming affability was the perfect combination if you fancied your prospects as a tyro businessman, and it pleased him a great deal when even Bazza himself had been surprised at his success. The Lexus had been one way of saying thank you. Rumours of an invite to Misty Gallagher’s, over on Hayling Island, might well turn out to be another. Either way, Winter was warmed by the prospect of the coming months.

Spooning sugar into his tea, he kept an eye on the TV through the open kitchen door. Already, Willard’s comments had sparked a modest studio debate on BBC News 24. A woman from a London-based charity for delinquent kids was talking about problem families. We reap what we sow, she was saying. We worship money, and power, and easy pickings. We live in a help-yourself society and we measure happiness by the thickness of our wallets. Too right, thought Winter, beaming at the set.

 

Faraday was late getting to the Bridewell for the first of the interviews. The conference calls had taken longer than he’d anticipated and the opening session with Bazza Mackenzie was well under way when he slipped into the monitoring room alongside the interview suite.

The Tactical Interview Adviser was sitting at the table, scribbling himself a note. Mackenzie’s battered image hung on the monitor set cabled to a camera next door. Beside him sat his lawyer, Nelly Tien.

Mackenzie had put on a little weight since Faraday had last seen him and he must have been somewhere hot because his face was heavily tanned under a night’s stubble. A crêpe bandage around the top of his head hid the worst of the damage but a bruise had virtually closed his left eye and there was more bruising on the side of his neck. He was on the small side, five seven, five eight, and Faraday wondered whether the overlarge tracksuit that hung from his shoulders was a deliberate act of malice by the Custody Sergeant. The clothes he’d been wearing at arrest, liberally splashed with blood, had already been bagged and tagged, awaiting dispatch for analysis by the Forensic Science Service.

‘How’s it going?’ Faraday took a seat beside the TIA.

‘It’s going nowhere, boss. He couldn’t be more helpful. Names, times, the whole nine yards.’

‘Names?’

‘Kids in the house next door. Turns out he knows half of them.’

‘And what’s he saying?’

‘He’s saying they were out of their heads. And he’s saying they were …’ he glanced down at his notes ‘“… a fucking disgrace”.’

Mackenzie, according to his own account, had arrived back at Sandown Road a bit past midnight. He’d been to a dinner party with his missus. He’d had a few to drink and she was driving. As soon as he got out of the Range Rover, he’d realised what had kicked off. He’d never fancied young Rachel’s party idea and now it had all turned to ratshit. Marie had told him to leave it but there was no way that was going to happen. He’d given his mate his word. The kids needed sorting.

‘His mate?’

‘Ault. Apparently they’re top buddies. Before Ault went on holiday, Baz promised he’d keep an eye on things. Like you do.’

Mackenzie had therefore waded in.

‘In his own words, the place was already a khazi. Apparently they’d liberated Ault’s cellar. He kept some really tasty reds. Half of them were over the carpets. The rest they’d had away or they were necking. Baz couldn’t believe it.’

‘So what happened?’

‘He set about finding some faces he knew. Like I said, he didn’t have to look far. The kids who did the real damage were out of Somerstown. One of them called him a silly old cunt. Apparently that did it.’

Bazza, in his own words, had totally lost it. He’d been a scrapper most of his life but he’d lost his edge recently and an evening’s drinking didn’t help. He’d whacked a couple of them before he took a bottle of single malt, full force, on the top of his head.

‘What happened?’

‘The bottle smashed. It was full. He was lucky the cuts weren’t deeper and I guess the alcohol was a pretty effective antiseptic but you should read the Custody Sergeant’s notes. Even this morning he still stank.’

‘And that was it? Inside the house?’

‘Pretty much. He was on the carpet after they bottled him so he took a bit of a kicking but another lad lent him a hand.’

‘We’ve got a name?’

‘Yeah, boss.’ He flicked back through his pad. ‘Matt Berriman.’

‘Where is this kid?’

‘Newbury. Apparently Mackenzie knows him from way back.

Which might explain the intervention.’

‘And that’s when Mackenzie left the party?’

‘Yeah. He says his missus had treble-nined us by then. I checked with Charlie One. They logged her call at 12.39.’ Charlie One was the force control room at Netley.

‘What did she say?’

‘Basically she told us to get our arses down to Sandown Road. The house belonged to a Crown Court judge. She said we were looking at serious grief.’

‘She’s right. Probably righter than she knows.’

Faraday broke off to watch Mackenzie. One of the interviewing D/Cs was quizzing him about exactly what happened after Marie had sent him home.

‘I went to bed, didn’t I? Like you would …’

‘You didn’t clean up at all? Have a bit of a wash?’

‘Yeah, I must have done, but to tell you the truth I felt shit, totally knackered, plus I had a headache like you wouldn’t believe. Four Ibuprofens, couple of mouthfuls of Scotch, out like a light.’

Faraday was staring at the screen. There were implications here. And one of them was suddenly all too obvious. He turned to the TIA.

‘We arrested him in bed, am I right?’

‘Spot on, boss.’

‘And his wife we arrested outside?’

‘Yeah. In the street.’

‘So they never talked, never met, not after he got back from next door?’

‘Absolutely right.’

‘So he doesn’t know that one of the bodies was Rachel? Is that what we’re saying?’

‘No, boss. Not yet. He was arrested for sus homicide. No names.

No details.’

‘What about his brief?’ Faraday nodded at the screen. ‘The Chinese lady?’

‘She knows. We had to disclose it.’

‘And she hasn’t told him?’

‘As far as I can gather, no. I think she’s playing it long. We’re going to get to Rachel in the end, probably soon, and she wants Baz to react for real. He’s not going to be pleased. And that says there’s no way a killing like that is down to him. Good move on his brief’s part. Fucking smart.’

Faraday nodded. The TIA was right. Fucking smart.

Next door there seemed to be a problem with the audio cassettes. One of the D/Cs brought the interview to a formal pause while the other one tried to sort it out. Mackenzie went into a huddle with his lawyer. Seconds later, the door opened. D/C Dawn Ellis was holding an audio cassette. She asked the TIA to call for a techie.

Faraday looked up at her. He’d worked with her for more years than he cared to remember, trusted her judgement completely.

‘Mackenzie? What do you think?’

‘No chance, boss. The way he’s calling it is the way it happened.

I’d put my life on it.’

‘You’re going to tell him about Rachel?’

‘It’s next on our list.’ She nodded at the screen. ‘Stay tuned.’

The TIA returned with a technician. Within minutes the interview had restarted. The other interviewer was D/C Bev Yates. Another veteran.

‘Mr Mackenzie, we’re dealing with two bodies beside your swimming pool. Do you know how they got there?’

‘No.’

‘No idea at all?’

‘None.’

‘You didn’t see them when your wife sent you home?’

‘I couldn’t have done. I went in through the front door. The pool’s at the back of the house.’

‘Really?’ There was quickening in Yates’s voice. ‘So why didn’t your wife use the front door too? When she came back to check on you?’

‘Because I’d locked it. Probably chained it too. Tell you the truth, I wasn’t thinking straight. A night like that, you wouldn’t blame me.’ He leaned forward. ‘Check it out, son. Have a look for yourself.’

‘We will.’ Yates scribbled himself a note then sat back.

‘These bodies, Mr Mackenzie.’ It was Ellis.

‘Yeah?’

‘Would you have any idea who they might be?’

‘How could I?’

‘That’s not an answer. I’m asking you whether you might have any suspicions, any …’ she frowned ‘… clues.’

Nelly Tien broke in to protest but Mackenzie shut her up with a look. There was something in his face that told Faraday he’d scented bad news. He wanted the names. Now.

There was a silence broken, in the end, by Yates.

‘One of them was a lad called Gareth.’

‘Gareth Hughes? I know him, met him round at the Aults’.’ Mackenzie’s head was cocked at an angle, his undamaged eye bright. ‘And the other?’

‘Rachel.’

‘Rachel Ault?’

‘Yes.’

He stared at Yates for a long moment, then shook his head. ‘Shit. Shit.
Shit.
’ He turned to Nelly Tien. ‘You knew this?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then why the fuck didn’t you tell me?’

‘Why do you think?’

‘I don’t know, love. I’m not paid to think.
You’re
paid to think. And you’re also fucking paid to keep me in the fucking loop. That girl’s my responsibility. She’s my neighbour’s daughter, for fuck’s sake, his
only
daughter, his only fucking
child.
She’s precious, she’s what it’s all about, and pretty soon he’s going to be back in Sandown fucking Road wondering just what’s happened to this wonderful life of his. Not just his house. Not just his fucking cellar full of posh wine, but his
daughter,
for fuck’s sake. Out there by
my
pool
.
What do you say to a man who’s just lost everything? What do you say when you were the one who promised to keep things cushty?’ He stood up, shaking his head, distraught. ‘I’m out of here.’ He turned on Yates, scarlet with rage. ‘Just fucking sort it, son, yeah?’

Next door, in the monitoring room, the TIA glanced sideways at Faraday. Then he reached forward and closed his notepad.

SUNDAY, 12 AUGUST, 2007.
11.31

Summoned to his video entryphone, Winter found himself looking at three tiny faces peering up at the camera guarding Blake House. Guy, Lucy and Kate, Bazza’s grandchildren, his pride and joy.

‘Ezzie? You there?’

The kids shuffled sideways and Esme appeared. Esme was Bazza’s daughter, a qualified lawyer who lived with her husband and three kids on a seven-acre spread in leafy Hampshire. She was wearing a halter top Winter recognised from her last expedition to the Maldives. The scowl on her face told him she’d been tuned in to BBC News 24.

He buzzed the door open. The kids loved banana smoothies. He kept a regular supply for just these occasions.

They were up in the lift seconds later. Winter could hear them laughing as they ran along the corridor towards his apartment. At three, four and six, he thought, they still lived in a world of their own. Winter was their favourite uncle. They’d told him so. Uncle Paulie. With the well-stocked fridge.

The moment they romped into the flat, Guy headed for the kitchen. Winter heard a
clunk
as he pulled the fridge open for the smoothies, and then the usual squabble over who was to clamber on the kitchen stool to grab the yellow plastic Lion King mugs.

He was right about Esme. She needed to talk about her dad. Badly.

‘What’s he done this time?’

Winter laughed. Things had been tricky between him and Esme to begin with. She hadn’t bothered to hide her misgivings about letting an ex-cop so close to the family business but they’d slowly fumbled their way towards some kind of truce. Esme was a girl who always spoke her mind, and Winter liked that.

‘From where I’m standing, I doubt he’s done anything.’

‘So why all the hassle?’ She nodded towards the TV. ‘Nelly phoned me first thing. Dad
and
Mum?’

‘It’s routine, Ez. We’re not talking subtle here. Show cops a crime scene and they grab what looks obvious. Baz? These days he might be pushing to join the Rotary Club but that’s not the first thing they’re going to remember.’

‘Nelly said he’d got into some kind of fight.’

‘More than likely.’

‘And ended up with two bodies beside his pool.’

‘Spot on.’

‘So how come that happened?’

‘Christ knows. You want coffee?’

They talked in the kitchen while the kids played in the lounge next door. In Winter’s view, unless he’d misread the situation, Ezzie had nothing to worry about. Bazza and Marie would doubtless remain in custody until Scenes of Crime had taken a good look at the house itself but that shouldn’t take long and he’d be surprised if they spent another night in the cells. As for the bodies beside the pool, Winter was as clueless as everyone else.

‘We’re dealing with kids on the piss,’ he said. ‘It could be they necked so much vodka it all just got silly.’