Just Another Day (20 page)

He was trying desperately to think of some way that he could let this poor terrified woman know that he was as much a victim as she was. He couldn’t let her believe that he was part of this evil unfolding before her.
He had to make Johnson believe that she was more of a liability by keeping her than by letting her go.

‘
Don’t you think it would be better if we dump her?’

Johnson was surprised by the venom in his drivers’ voice. The new captive was shocked and even more terrified than a few moments before. She shrank back in her seat clutching the blood stained handkerchief ever more tightly. The quietly spoken words of a few minutes before were now replaced by an anger and aggression that she heard when her terror first began; she couldn’t come to terms with the split personality. She was completely confused. She had started to think that the man alongside her might not be
as evil as the one behind.

‘What, do her and dump her?’ c
ame the voice from the back.

John didn’t want this to get out of hand as he sensed that Johnson, leaning forward to speak to him, was becoming interested in John’s thoughts.

‘
No. Just dump her at the side of the road. She’s going to be more of a pain in the arse the state she’s in.’

Johnson sat back in his seat once more as his initial excitement subsided. He thought quietly for a few minutes mulling over his thoughts and options.
He could keep her in the car as extra insurance but with the two coppers already, didn’t make much sense to keep her. Yeah, probably better to dump her but where?

‘What did you have in mind?’

They were now passing the Services again at Stafford, going back up North towards Liverpool.

John was grateful that his initial idea hadn’t been dismissed out of hand and might even have whetted Johnson’s appetite for getting shut of his latest hostage and continued.

‘
I was thinking that if we dumped her on the hard shoulder somewhere in between a couple of the emergency telephone boxes, it would take her at least half an hour to get to one of them and make any phone calls. We could even tape her mouth and tie her hands behind her back and that would give us even more time to get up the road.’

He couldn’t believe that he was talking in such a way. This was Jonson’s way of treating people not his. He had sworn on oath many years ago to carry out his duty without fear or favour and here he was now talking and acting like the scumbag sat behind him.
He knew he was playing out the part, but he still had a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach.

The woman sat next to him began to cry quietly. Her jaw was loosening and she was able to open her mouth slightly. Her chin was slumped forward on her chest as the tears fell onto the front of her skirt causing another wet patch to form. The words came in short sharp emotional bursts.

‘
Please don’t hurt me. My two children, my two kids,  are, are at, are at the nursery, ww, waiting for me. PP’Please let me see them again.’

John hated himself as he looked out of his drivers’ window to his right. He hated being the cause of such anguish and pain.

Johnson began to laugh in the back seat.

‘Shut the fuck up lady, you should be grateful that John boy here wants to let you live. The last woman he had in a car like this, he shagged senseless before stickin her didn’t you mate?’

John couldn’t look in the direction of the woman as she cringed and tried to squeeze further away from the monster in the driver’s seat.
Johnson was relishing the humiliation of both the front seat occupants as Dave groaned in semi consciousness alongside him.

‘
Yeah, fucked her brains out before slicing her like a kipper. One evil bastard he is. Don’t wanna mess with him love.’

As he looked out the side window, J
ohn fought hard to stop the bile rising in his throat. If I get the chance to do you Johnson, he thought to himself, I’ll fucking do it, oath or not.

‘Is this your car?’
john forced his head back to the front and spoke to his passenger.

‘
It’s our car, my husband and me.’

‘
Is there a toolkit or something in the boot?’

‘
I’m not sure, my husband has something in the back with stuff in, but I’m not sure what he keeps.’

‘
What d’you reckon, pull over and look for something to tie her with?

Johns eyes burned with hate as he looked in the mirror to see eyes filled with amusement and contempt staring back.

‘
Good idea Mr Walsh. Be gentle with her now, I know you’d like to hurt her but when alls said and done, we’re not savages are we?’

John quickly pulled onto the hard shoulder and opened the back of the car. He was raging within himself for allowing Johnson’s taunts to get the better of him.

He opened a plastic box that was typical of a handyman’s and rummaged about. He quickly found the cable ties and gaffer tape that would serve his purpose. He moved to the front passenger side of the car and opened the door. He pulled the woman out roughly to keep up the pretence.

‘Face the car’
he barked at her ‘and put your hands behind your back.’

She was trembling once more and John leaned close to her left ear as he was fastening her hands with the black plastic tie. He felt her revulsion and fear as he whispered in her ear.

‘
The other man in the back and me are police officers. We’ve been kidnapped.’

She began to push back and tried to turn round but he shoved her roughly forward again and said in a louder voice,

‘stop fucking struggling or you will get hurt.’ He whispered again, ‘I’m trying to save your life. Be quiet and listen. When you get found, tell them we’re heading back towards Liverpool. Okay?’

He roughly twisted her round so her face was looking towards him. She looked at him with bewilderment as he placed a large piece of tape over her mouth.

‘There, that will keep you quiet’
he said for the benefit of Johnson.

He took her by the arm and walked her several feet away from the car as Johnson watched intently from the back seat. The knee length skirt was a hindrance as he half lifted her and told her to climb over the Armco barrier to the relative safety of the grass verge beyond.

‘I’m so sorry I’ve had to treat you like this but believe me, it’s for your own good. You probably couldn’t see, but he’s holding a shotgun to my colleagues’ neck. Sit down on the grass and wait till we’ve gone okay?’

She couldn’t speak with the tape in place but she nodded and John thought he had gotten through to her that, although she was still completely shocked and frightened, he wasn’t such a bastard after all.
He shoved her once more for the benefit of the watching psycho and moved quickly to the drivers’ seat and closed the door. He was trembling somewhat himself at the thought of how he had treated the woman and even though it was for her own good, it didn’t make him feel any better. He gripped the steering wheel hard to try and prevent his hands from shaking.

Their eyes met once more in the mirror as Johnson said,
‘Okay Mr Walsh, no point in hanging around.’

John’s foot was on the accelerator even before he had finished speaking
. The wheels screeched and spun on the tarmac as he gathered speed and eased back into the traffic flow.

It was completely dark now as John glanced at the clock on the dash. 7pm.

He saw the overhead signs as they approached the signs for Garston and the silence of the last 30 minutes was interrupted by the voice from the back.

‘
Follow the Garston signs till I tell you different okay? Pass me back the two bags on the seat.’

John did as he was ordered, the plastic bag contained the sandwiches and drinks; the expensive leather handbag with the designer logo obviously contained the woman’s worldly goods.

Johnson put the knife alongside his right thigh. He could easily get to it if needed if his driver decided to piss about. He didn’t think there was much danger of that as he would have to pull up first and stop, then turn around, by which time he would have the knife back in his hand and plunging through the seat. True, this car was much more plush than the police car and the foam padding was a lot thicker, but the knife would still go through the fabric easy enough into the body sat in front.
He put the plastic bag on the floor after taking out a bottle of coke. He still had hold of the shotgun in his left hand but his captive hadn’t stirred for the last half hour or so. He wasn’t dead, but there wasn’t much life left in him so he had no problem in putting the bottle between his knees and twisting the top off with his right hand. The sugar in the drink gave him a quick burst of energy as he swigged it down greedily. He emptied the contents of the handbag out on his knee and his eyes lit up like a Christmas tree. The black shiny mobile phone almost winked at him.

John heard the tell tale ping, ping, ping as Johnson hit the keypad quickly.

‘
Is that you Tony?’

‘
Luke, where the fuck have you been all day. I thought you’d been locked up or dead or something. I’ve been watching the news every hour all day long trying to see if there was anything about a police incident anywhere. When the copper stopped the wagon going out of the gate this morning, I thought you’d do him. Next thing I know, he’s in the fuckin wagon
with
you goin up the road.’

‘
It’s a long story little brother and I’ll have to knock the shite out of you when I see you. Who’s the soft bastard who didn’t charge the phones up last night like I told you to you fucking arsehole. When I needed to get you earlier, no fucking battery, twat!’

Tony knew better than to argue and just accepted the bollocking over the phone.

‘Where are you now Luke?’

‘We’re on the M6 just coming off at Garston.’

‘
What d’you mean we? Who’s with you?’

‘
We’ve got a couple of guests for dinner our Tony so you need to put the kettle on and make them a nice welcome cup of tea when we get there.’ The menace in the voice wasn’t lost on John as their eyes met in the mirror.

‘
What do you mean a couple of guests, who are they?’

‘
One’s the copper from this morning, the others a copper from this afternoon.’

‘
Fuckin hell Luke, two coppers. Are you out of your skull, are you fuckin mad?’

Tony had said the words without thinking and instantly cursed himself as the volcano in the back seat erupted
. He screamed down the phone at his younger brother, even Dave was brought out of his semi comatose condition and jumped in his seat.

‘
Don’t you ever call me fuckin mad you little bastard, d’you hear me. I’ll take this fuckin shotgun and shove it up your arse you fuckin little shitbag.’

His face was contorted with rage. John hadn’t seen him this angry at any time during the day. Dave was all to well aware of the violence that bubbled below the surface as he saw the speckles of saliva spatter all over the back of John’s head.

‘
Get your arse to the fuckin yard now. We’ll be there in fifteen minutes.’

Tony stammered down the phone.

‘Sorry, sorry Luke, I didn’t mean it like it sounded. I’m at the yard already. Just sound the horn when you’re outside and I’ll open the gates and you can drive straight in OK?’

‘“Please can I have a drink?’
Dave was stirring and feeling the effects of serious dehydration. Probably if he had thought about it, Johnson would have ignored him or fucked him off. As it was, he was too busy thinking about his little twat of a brother and tossed a full bottle of coke onto Dave’s lap. He couldn’t grip it with his left hand and, in much the same way as his captor earlier, grasped the plastic between his knees and twisted the top. He drank slowly and felt the sweetness and fluids bring him round a bit more. During the next five minutes or so he drank about three quarters of the bottle before he was alert enough to take in their surroundings. He caught John’s eye in the mirror and quickly glanced over at Johnson. He wasn’t paying him much attention as he was looking out of the window, more than likely contemplating bodily injury to his brother in a few minutes time. Dave passed the coke bottle between the seats to his colleague who tried not to draw attention to himself as he drained the remaining contents of the bottle.

They weren’t far away from Garston now. They had passed the directions for Liverpool Airport a few minutes before. John didn’t know it yet but they were heading for the old railway sidings. This part of the rail network wasn’t used for trains anymore. The decrepit railway arches had been given over to loads of small businesses over the years. They were cheap to rent because of their poor condition. Even in the summer months, the arches were always damp and dripping because of the rail lines and compacted soil and substructure above; in the winter, the water just pissed through.
They were well used by lots of dodgy characters. The arches were a favourite haunt for the criminal fraternity; both small time thieves and villains who were involved in stealing cars, chopping them and changing their identities up to the serious criminals like the Johnsons and their cohorts.

‘
Slow down here, take the next left.’

Johnson and his brother had used one for storing stolen property and carrying out most of their criminal activities in recent years. The details of the cash van robbery had been worked out in their little office many years ago and he smiled a little as he thought back to the look of horror on the security guards face when he had chopped his wrist off. Yeah, enjoyed that one he nodded to himself as the BMW turned into the street.

The road was tired and worn like the run down two up, two down houses that lined one side of the street. Like the rest of the surroundings, they’d all seen better days and the car bounced along as John negotiated the potholes and puddles in the tarmac.

The stolen cash had been destined for the arches earlier that morning where it would have been kept out of the way for a while before being moved elsewhere.

Their retirement plan was now well fucked and Johnson looked over at the bloody captive once more and gave a twist of the noose. Dave winced.

‘Don’t be getting too fuckin comfortable now; we’re getting out in a few minutes.’

He’d never killed a copper before. 24 million quid up the fuckin swanney because of this cunt. Now there were two to be sorted. Not bad, 12 million quid each. He took his finger off the trigger. Wouldn’t want to spoil my pleasure this late in the game he mused as they got closer to the two huge timber gates to the yard.

Built into the right hand side gate was a much smaller wicket gate. This was the one used to get into the yard before you could open the big gates to drive any vehicles in or out. As they drove along the street, John picked out the silhouette of Tony’s head in the headlights of the car as he peeked out of this pedestrian gate. He didn’t want to rile his big brother any more than necessary and hadn’t waited for the sound of the car horn. He thought it better to be ready to open the gates right away and allow them to drive straight in.

He lifted up the drop bolts on the left hand gate and removed the large horizontal timber beam that secured the gates from inside. Each gate was about ten foot wide and he didn’t need to open them both. He left the right hand gate in position and opened the left one back into the yard. Johnson told John not to stop and in order to complete the turn, he swung the car out to the right and then turned left straight into the yard. Tony took one last look up and down the street to make sure they were not being followed and then closed the gates together once more. He dropped the beam back in place and the yard was sealed off once more.

As Johnson dragged his captive out of the car by the noose he looked back at the barred and bolted fifteen foot high gates with a smile and a nod of satisfaction. They certainly knew how to construct things in days of old. Johnson was quite sure they would need a bulldozer to smash down the gates if anyone wanted to surprise them and he felt a certain sense of security now that the animal was back in his lair. No need to rush things too much; time for a brew first.

The door to the control room swung open and Paul Wilson strode quickly over to his boss.

‘
Sir, the tech lads have had a hit on Mrs Hollins mobile phone. She left her bag behind when she was put out of the car near Keele. Her phone was in the bag and it was used about fifteen minutes ago. They’ve triangulated the signal and have pinpointed it to the A561 near to the airport. The ARV’s have made good time back up the motorway and they are somewhere near to the Halewood car plant.

The ‘Jacks’ have been busy putting the arm on their informants and there is some good intelligence coming back that the Johnson brothers use an old railway arch somewhere in the Garston area. The lads are trying to firm up the location but that’s th
e best we’ve got at the moment.’

‘
Well done Paul. Let’s hope we can still salvage something out of this shitty mess. I know I don’t need to tell you, but time is running out for our lads. If Johnson has taken them back to his yard or whatever, there’s only one reason for that, and it’s not a good one. If he was just going to do a runner, he would have dumped them earlier. He’s going to kill them before he runs. There’s nothing more certain Paul.’

Chief Superintendent McKay’s thoughts drifted back to the siege at the Industrial estate. It had only been abo
ut nine or ten hours previous but it seemed an awful lot longer. He had disobeyed orders from on high, Assistant Chief Constable level no less, when he had opened the container after the unmarked car had left the scene with John and Dave in. The control room had received the instruction from headquarters that the container was not to be opened until the arrival of the ACC. Andrew McKay was not about to have his authority at the scene undermined. If his officers had been kidnapped, beaten and half killed, he wanted to know what the reason was.

‘
Is that right Paul. Well, as far as you are concerned mate, I never got that message from you until after I had opened the box. I’ll take any flak that’s going. You tell the ACC that I’m out of the command post and looking over the wagon and I’ll get over there now. I want to know what the fuck this is all about.’

It would be fair to say that the ACC was spitting feathers when he arrived at the siege location with several ‘suits’ about 15 minutes later.

‘
Sorry Mr Henderson sir, I was actually stood in the back of the container alongside the pallets when Chief Inspector Wilson came and found me and passed your instructions to me. As soon as I got your message, I ordered the immediate sealing of the box and awaited your arrival.’

A door banged shut and he came back to the present.

‘
As soon as we opened up that container Paul and found what was in the back, I knew Johnson would have only one thing on his mind. He knows that he won’t get out of prison again if and when he gets locked up. He’s got 24 million reasons now to kill young Watkins; John Walsh will be the icing on his cake. I don’t need to tell you Paul how much kudos a double cop killer will have in the nick.’