A Need To Kill (DI Matt Barnes) (54 page)

Detective Superintendent Clive Adams took the lion
’s share of credit for wrapping up the case.  He faced the cameras and praised his team for their effort, but let it be assumed that he had been instrumental in bringing Downey’s reign of terror to an end.  The performance saved his career.  Everyone loves a winner, and especially when he looks like a middle-aged matinee idol, and has the same skin-deep smarm as a newly plastered wall.

The bar of the
Kenton Court Hotel was becoming a regular drinking hole for the team.  It was where they gathered after a high-profile case was put to bed, to celebrate in a low-key way.

Over a week passed before the impromptu piss-up took place.

Matt, Beth, Pete and Marci arrived first, followed shortly thereafter by Tom, Phil and the others.  Even Errol showed up.  The stitches were still in his throat, and he did not intend to drink alcohol, but wanted to be there.  Only ‘Grizzly’ Adams was conspicuous by his absence.  He was not invited, and had a lot to prove if he was to earn back any respect from the squad.

“
I came out of it smelling of roses,” Tom said to Matt at the bar, out of hearing of the others.  “I had to write it up as though I authorised the raid at Marjory Walters’ cottage.”

“
But?”  Matt said, knowing that there would be a punch line.

“
But, you’re an arsehole, Matt.  We could have lost men, and the hostage.  Then I would have been happy to gift wrap you and feed you to the ICC.”

“
What are you trying to say, Tom?  Don’t beat about the bush.”

“
That being right isn’t always enough.  You need to consider the bigger picture.  You aren’t a one-man army.  If Pete and Errol hadn’t made it, you’d be feeling sorry for yourself, and crying in your beer.  And if despite your best efforts, I hadn’t got there, then Beth...”

Matt
hadn’t needed the lecture.  He had given it to himself, almost word for word. He
was
too impetuous, and didn’t trust other people to not fuck up.  It was both strength and weakness all rolled into one.  He needed to modify it.  When his Beretta had jammed, he had yet again faced losing all that mattered.  The chances of Downey getting away from the cottage, then to almost run headlong into Beth, and for his gun to turn from a lethal weapon into a handful of scrap metal, were not something a sane person would place a bet on.  Tom had appeared like a guardian angel and saved Matt’s personal universe from being devoured by a black hole.  He would never be able to properly repay the debt he owed his friend.  But would not miss any opportunity to try.

“
You’re right, Tom.  Bollocking accepted and deserved.  I’ll get Beth to put me on the couch and hit me with some appropriate psychobabble.  Okay?”

Tom didn
’t hold out much hope of his DI being able to change tactics.  The bottom line was, he wanted Matt to include him, not infuriate him by continually going it alone.

“
You two want serving, or are you going to stand there and argue all night over who gets his wallet out?” Ron Quinn said.

“
My shout,” Matt said to Ron.

Tom smiled at Matt and said, “
Damn right, it is.”

# # # # #

If you enjoyed this book, then you will undoubtedly enjoy some of Michael Kerr’s
other books
.  There is a sample taken from one of Michael’s other character’s stories, Joe Logan, at the
back of this book
, to give you a taster.

Michael Kerr is the pseudonym of Mike Smail the author of several crime thrillers and two children’s novels.
  He lives and writes in the Yorkshire Wolds, and has won, been runner-up, and short listed on numerous occasions for short story competitions with Writing Magazine and Writers’ News.

After a career of more than twenty years in the Prison Service, Mike now uses his experience in that area to write original, hard-hitting crime novels.

Connect With Michael Kerr and discover other great titles.

www.michaelkerr.org

Michael Kerr’s official site

https://www.facebook.com/MichaelKerrAuthor

http://www.michaelkerr.org/amazon

1 - A Reason To Kill -
Link

2 - Lethal Intent -
Link

3 - A Need To Kill -
Link

1 - Aftermath -
Link
(Sample at
back of this book
)

2 - Atonement -
Link

Deadly Reprisal
-
Link

Deadly Requital -
Link

Black Rock Bay -
Link

A Hunger Within -
Link

The Snake Pit -
Link

Adventures in Otherworld – Part One – The Chalice of Hope -
Link

You
don’t always get value for money.  In fact you hardly ever do these days.  Maybe word of mouth from family or friends or work colleagues is the safest way to go if you need the services of a professional to satisfactorily undertake whatever job needs to be done.

But who do you go to if you want people killed?  No good looking in Yellow Pages, because there are no listings for hitmen.  It’s a problem.  You need to know someone with connections; a lowlife to put you in touch with a homicidal maniac, or with a crew that murder for money.

Where there’s a will, there’s usually a way.  The real problem was going to be the aftermath.  Making sure that an alibi was rock solid and that nothing could ever lead back to you was the key.  There was a lot to think about, and not a lot of time to sit around mulling it over.  Every minute was sixty seconds too long.

It was almost a hundred degrees.  He had the AC in the stolen gray Taurus on full blast to keep him cool as a can of chilled Bud as he waited in the tree-shaded car lot near the junction of 37
th
and O streets in D.C. for the mark to appear.  He checked the SIG-Sauer again.  The solid, blocky, black 9 mm pistol was a P239 with a regular eight round magazine.  He didn’t know a lot about Switzerland, apart from the fact that it was famous for cuckoo clocks, the tennis player Roger Federer, and its beautiful guns.  No wonder a third of all police forces in the US carried SIGs as standard issue.  The weapon felt good in his hand, as if it was an extension of his limb.  He had shot dead a dozen people with it; seven men, three women, and two minors that were not paid hits but potential witnesses that had to be eliminated for peace of mind.

He knew what building she was in.  Had all the details, and a plan of
Georgetown University’s layout.  There was even info on the ‘net about how it followed the Jesuit tradition of educating the whole person, whatever the fuck that meant.

Claudia Duncan was in a hurry.  She needed to get home, hit the shower, decide what to wear and be back in the city at the
Kennedy Center to meet Jeff, the new love of her life.  But being an undergraduate meant that it would be a few years before she contemplated playing happy families.  She was living in the now, and loving every second of it.

He squinted through the windshield and watched as she jogged to her car.  She was quite a way off, but looked to be the slim brunette he was being paid a lot of money to kill.

Yes.  She got in the red Toyota and drove towards the barrier.  Hardly gave the bar time to rise as she accelerated out onto the street and headed west.

He kept a couple of cars between the Ford and the Toyota all the way out to Oakton, and drove past as she pulled to the curb, stopped, and dashed out and across the sidewalk to the small duplex that he knew she shared with two other female students.  It was going to be an easy job.  Just knock at the door, push his way inside and do the deed.  He would be back in the car and heading out to West Virginia very soon, stopping somewhere secluded on the way to change the plates on the car, and then again for a steak and a beer before he met up with Roy.

Claudia rushed into the kitchen to find Pam preparing a veggie meal for herself and Sharon.

“Slow down, Claudia,” Pam said.  “It’s too hot to hurry.  Do you want a glass of lemonade, or a Coke?”

Claudia glanced at her watch and took a deep breath.  She had plenty of time.  “Lemonade sounds good, she said.  What’re you cooking?”

“A whole-wheat spinach lasagna.  It’s one of
Sharon’s favorites.”

“Sounds yummy, but I’m a practicing carnivore,” Claudia said, grinning at her friend.

There was a knock at the door.

“I’ll get it,” Claudia said.  “You pour me that lemonade, with plenty of ice.”

It was broad daylight.  Claudia opened the door expecting the caller to be a neighbor, or maybe the FedEx man.  She was expecting a package.

Sal frowned.  The brunette was wearing a loose, cream-colored blouse and blue jeans, exactly the same as the broad that had driven the
Toyota.  But she was not his target.  Similar, yes, but not Sharon Jennings.

“Where’s
Sharon?”  Sal asked Claudia.

“Who’s asking?” Claudia came back as she studied the short, swarthy-looking man standing on the step.

He looked both ways along the street.  It was clear.  He stepped forward and hit her hard in the stomach with his clenched fist, and pushed her backwards as she folded at the waist.

Closing the door behind him, Sal drew the SIG from the calfskin shoulder holster and quickly screwed a suppressor to the end of the barrel.  There was a round in the chamber, ready to go.
He used his left hand to grab the moaning young woman by the hair and drag her along the hallway.

A plump bitch with red hair appeared in a doorway in front of him, almost filling its width.  She was staring back and forth at him and the girl he had hold of.  Her eyes were wide with shock, and the glass she was clutching was shaking in her hand.  He could hear the ice cubes clinking, and liquid sprayed out from the rim.  He shot her between the eyes and watched the spray of blood, bone and brains blow out from the back of her head.  It seemed to be in slo-mo as she stutter-stepped backwards before falling down as dead as you can get.  He took a couple of seconds to enjoy the spectacle.  Noted that he had immediately got a hard on.

Claudia threw up on the hall carpet.  Her mind could not properly comprehend the events of the past few seconds.

Sal hunkered down next to where she was sitting and stroked her tear-stained cheek gently with his thumb.  He gave her a warm smile.

Claudia thought that he looked Italian.  He had olive skin, dark-brown eyes, jet black hair, and his breath stank of garlic and nicotine.

“D’ya want to live?”  Sal asked her.

She nodded as she wiped the slime of her vomit from her lips with the back of her hand.

“Good.  Now listen to me very carefully,” Sal said.  “I need to know exactly where
Sharon is now, and why you were drivin’ her car.”

“I…I borrowed
Sharon’s car because I have a date this evening.  She’s still at the university.  She said she would get the Metro home.”

“When is she goin’ to be here?”

“I don’t know.  She said that she might go to the mall first.”

“What fuckin’ mall?”