A Time For Justice (13 page)

Kovaks’ weary but sharp eyes gazed at the wounds. There were
at least twelve punctures in the chest around the heart and
innumerable ones in his face and neck. One of his eyes had been
gouged out, an ear sliced off and his cheek carved open. Kovaks
could see Whisper’s teeth through that particular wound.

Blood was everywhere. The bed was soaked, his body was
drenched in it. Crimson was splashed ten feet up the wall behind
the bed and’ across the floor. It had started to congeal in
tar-like clods on the tiles. There were many footprints in it. It
had been a frenzied attack. Kovaks was puzzled.

He looked quickly from the body to the blood splashes and back
to the body. A police photographer asked him to step aside while he
took more shots from a different angle. Another photographer was
videoing the scene for evidential purposes.

The stills man bent down on the far side of the bed. His
camera flashed. He stood upright and said, ‘Have you seen this?’ He
pointed down to the corner of the room.

Kovaks walked over carefully.

A piece of thick, pink, blood-oozing meat lay on the floor
skewered by a knife. The knife was thin, as long as a stiletto but
with one jagged cutting edge. Kovaks had no doubt he was looking at
the murder weapon.

He had no doubt, either, that he was looking at Whisper’s
tongue.

The message it conveyed was not lost on him.

He turned to the local sheriff who was standing at the door.
‘I assumed he’d been killed out on the ward and his body moved here
after. ‘

‘
Apparently not.’ The man shrugged. His thumbs were tucked
into his gun belt. He seemed slow-witted, but Kovaks knew not to
underestimate such people.

‘
I’ll be moving a team in here,’ Kovaks informed him, ‘but
we’d sure appreciate your cooperation. I think that together - our
skills and your local knowledge - we’ll crack this.’

The sheriff smiled. ‘Us and the FBI
,
working together? Sure thing,’ he
said, pleased.

‘
And obviously we’d like to set up an incident room to run
from your office, if that meets with your approval?’

‘
Yeah, sure. From my office. No problem.’ His smile widened
even further.

‘
But first can you tell me where I can locate the nurse who
found him?’

The sheriff cocked a thumb. ‘Down there. She’s pretty shook
up.’

Kovaks strolled down the ward, muttering, ‘Keep ‘em sweet,
keep, em sweet.’

The eyes of the patients were on him. Some sneered at the
sight of the badge pinned to his lapel. None spoke. He doubted if
any ever would.

The nurse was a middle-aged lady whom he’d seen earlier. She
was sitting in an office, her head buried in her hands, being
comforted by the bored-looking doctor whom Kovaks had also met
before. As Kovaks came to the door the doctor immediately ushered
him back out.

‘
She is in no condition to be interviewed yet,’ he said. ‘I’ve
given her a tranquilliser to get her this calm. Her husband should
be here soon to take her home.’

‘
When will I be able to speak to her?’

‘
Tomorrow at the earliest.’

Kovaks nodded. ‘OK. Can you tell me why Whisper was
transferred to that side ward, doc?’

‘
To aid speedy recovery. He needed complete isolation, in my
opinion.’

‘
Did you see anything that might be of use to us?’

‘
Such as?’

‘
Such as who stuck a knife into him a million
times.’

‘
No, I didn’t and frankly, I don’t have the time to talk to
you just now. I need to care for this nurse, then I need to get the
hospital back to normal.’

‘
When can I see you then?’

‘
Ask my secretary. Make an appointment.’

Jack Crosby was still alive when he was slid on a stretcher
into the back of the ambulance some fifteen minutes later, but only
just. His heart and breathing had stopped at one point, but FB’s
half-remembered first-aid training had saved him. For the time
being at least.

Karen watched the ambulance race away, blue light flashing.
She was standing at a first-floor window.

The small crowd of people who had gathered outside dispersed
slowly, leaving only two standing there: a pale, shaken FB and a
worried-looking Chief Constable. FB began talking animatedly, arms
waving, fingers pointing, voice obviously raised.

Karen’s mouth twisted sardonically. ‘I wonder who he’s talking
about,’ she said under her breath.

She watched them turn and walk into the HQ building, FB not
letting up for a second.

Karen made her way to the Chief Constable’s secretary’s office
and sat down to wait. A wave of tiredness enveloped her. This was
the longest single uninterrupted period she had ever worked in her
life. It was all she could do to prevent herself falling
asleep.

Jean, the secretary, glanced up at her.

‘
I do hope he’s all right,’ she said.

‘
I do too,’ said Karen. She meant it.

‘
Is there anything I can get you? You look
exhausted.’

Just a warm bed and a stiff drink. Karen shook her head, too
tired even to speak.

‘
Don’t blame yourself,’ Jean said softly. ‘He’s been warned
about his condition often enough. It was only a matter of
time.’

Karen managed a wan smile.

FB and Dave August entered and the Chief went straight into
his office without acknowledging Karen. ‘I’m not to be disturbed,’
he announced. ‘I’m going to call Mrs Crosby.’

‘
Boss. . .’ Karen began, getting to her feet.

‘
Disturbed by no one,’ he reiterated and slammed the
door.

FB turned to Karen, ‘This is your doing,’ he said with
vehemence.

‘
None of this would’ve happened without your incessant
ambition.’

‘
Don’t become a bigger fool than you already are, FB. I wasn’t
to know he had a dodgy heart.’

‘
It was common knowledge.’

‘
Common to whom, dickhead?’ she challenged. She sat back down
and folded her arms, determined not to enter a no-win, no-profit
argument.

The intercom buzzed on Jean’s desk. ‘Get a car to pick up Mrs
Crosby from home and take her to hospital. Then arrange for mine to
pick me up from the garage. I’m going to see him too.’

‘
Yes, sir.’

Karen came to an instant decision. ‘This is preposterous,’ she
said, striding across to the Chief’s door. Jean opened her mouth to
remonstrate, but Karen burst through the door before she could
utter a word and crashed it shut behind her.

Blackpool Tower came into view. In ten minutes they would be
at the central police station where the firearms team had been told
to assemble for the briefing.

Karen sighed heavily as she thought back to her head-on
confrontation with Dave August, Chief Constable and
lover.

‘
I said I was not to be disturbed.’

‘
I still need a firearms team,’ she said. ‘There’s no ACC on
duty now - only you can authorise it.’

‘
FB was right - you
are
a bitch. There’s a man lying near to death
and-’

‘
And there’s also a killer on the loose who needs catching,’
she cut in. ‘Life goes on, especially in this job. So does death by
murder. It doesn’t stop because someone’s ill. Now do I get the
team or not?’

‘
Yes ... now piss the hell off out of here.’

As she reached the door, August added: ‘And by the way, if
this murder isn’t bottomed in twenty-four hours, you’re off the
investigation and I’m handing it over to someone with more
experience.’

They were slowing down now as the motorway narrowed into a
two-lane road and they entered Blackpool.

Karen sat back and cleared her mind, concentrating on the task
ahead.

Pepe Paglia mooched, hands in pockets, down the street on
which his small hotel was located. He was still rather depressed at
having handed a thousand pounds in cash over to Hinksman the day
before. On the other hand he felt reassured that Corelli would
reimburse him handsomely in the not-too-distant future. That was
the good thing about family ties, however tenuous; a favour for a
favour.

He entered a newsagents and picked up a copy of that
day’s
Sun.
In the
back room of the shop a TV was switched on, showing a lunchtime
news bulletin. Paglia was not really paying it much attention. He
was too busy choosing goodies for his sweet tooth. He glanced up by
pure chance and saw the screen as he picked up a Mars bar. His
mouth dropped open.

Paglia almost sprinted back to the hotel, arriving breathless
and weak, in desperate need of a cigarette.

They commandeered the parade room at Blackpool Central police
station for the briefing. The firearms team was already assembled
when Karen, McClure and Donaldson arrived. There was one Sergeant
and twelve Constables, including two women. All were dressed in
lightweight blue overalls, ballistic vests and caps. Each wore a
pair of Reebok trainers. They were checking numerous weapons
between them as they waited: handguns, rifles, semi-automatic
pistols, MP5s, stun grenades, CS gas launchers. They were like a
small, well equipped army.

Karen stopped in her tracks and surveyed them. It was the
first time she had ever seen such a team. They exuded calm,
confidence and good humour. And efficiency. They were an efficient
killing machine.

Karen cleared her throat and moved to the front of the room,
aware for the first time of the magnitude of the chain of events
that she might be just about to unleash.

She introduced herself and her two colleagues.

The ceiling of Hinksman’s room had many cracks in it and some
dampness in one corner. He lay on the bed, hands clasped across his
chest, staring blankly up at it, when Paglia rushed in without
knocking.

Even though the door had been flung open, Hinksman had reacted
instinctively as soon as the handle had started to move downwards.
He rolled off the bed, grabbing the revolver which was on the
bedside cabinet, twisting himself onto his knees, using the bed as
cover; by the time Paglia actually stepped into the room he was
greeted by the sight of a black muzzle pointing directly at his
chest, the hammer on its deadly backwards journey.

Paglia froze. His jaw dropped.

Fortunately, Hinksman saw who it was and eased the hammer back
into place with his thumb. He stood up angrily.

‘
Jesus H Christ,’ he cursed through gritted teeth, ‘I told you
knock and wait. Next time I’ll kill you. That’s a
promise.’

Paglia gulped. ‘Sorry,’ he blabbered, ‘but I thought you
should watch this.’

He switched on the portable TV. The top story was being wound
up with an artist’s impression of the man police were after in
connection with the M6 bombing. The sketch was Hinksman, of that
there was no doubt. It captured his features exactly, right down to
the cruel, piercing eyes. Killer’s eyes.

Hinksman watched scornfully. ‘So?’ he spat. ‘It changes
nothing.’

‘
Oh,’ said Paglia, bemused by the calm reaction.

‘
Because they think they know what I look like means nothing.
They don’t know my name or where I am, do they?’

‘
Right, right,’ said the hotel-keeper. ‘I thought you should
know, that’s all.’

Hinksman nodded. ‘You did right.’

When Paglia had left, Hinksman switched the TV off and lay on
the bed again. The drawing had been a very good likeness - and that
was a niggling worry. There was no way it could have been drawn
from someone’s memory. It was a lift from a photograph, Hinksman
suddenly realised. But which one?

Maybe it was time to quit this Godforsaken little country
after all. Get the job done and get out. In the meantime, Hinksman
decided, he’d hole up somewhere else. In a city. Manchester or
Liverpool somewhere he could just fade into the
background.

The telephone rang in the reception area. Hinksman heard
Paglia answer and then the sound of footsteps running
upstairs.

This time Paglia knocked and announced himself nervously
through the closed door.

‘
Come in, you idiot.’

‘
Phone for you,’ said Paglia, out of breath again.

‘
Who is it?’ Hinksman asked sharply.

‘
Only one other person knows you’re here.’

Hinksman shouldered Paglia out of the way and sprinted down to
take the call.

Only a minute later he was back.

He started to pack. Quickly.

Paglia hovered at the bedroom door. ‘Problem?’

‘
Big problem,’ said Hinksman, stuffing his clothes into a
holdall.