The Ninth Step - John Milton #8 (John Milton Thrillers) (29 page)

DETECTIVE CONSTABLE Christopher Banks was frustrated. His specialty was surveillance, including on foot and mobile, and he had been following the pretty female journalist for thirty-six hours without a problem. It was boring, but it was easy, too. There were two of them on the job: Banks and his colleague Vince Edwards. Banks had handed her off to Edwards at midnight and had grabbed six hours of sleep. Then they had switched again at midday, Edwards handing her off to Banks as she took the tube to Piccadilly.

Banks had watched as she had met the man next to the statue of Eros, and then tailed them both as they walked to Leicester Square. He had known, immediately, that the newcomer was cautious. He checked back frequently, clearly looking to see if they were being followed. That wouldn’t have presented a problem as long as they stayed in places where there were plenty of people, but the man looked like he knew what he was doing. He had turned onto a quieter street and had stopped without warning and looked back. It was a classic anti-surveillance move, one that Banks had been taught himself at the College of Policing, but it had been deployed so skilfully and abruptly that there was no way for him to avoid being made. He had busied himself with his phone, but he knew it was pointless. The man had seen him, and there had been nothing for it other than to lay right back. If Edwards had been here, they could have swapped, but Edwards was at the hotel. Banks idled along Lisle Street, just close enough to observe as the man and the journalist got into a cab and disappeared to the south.

There was nothing else for it but to confess: he had lost them.

Banks had called Edwards and told him to meet him at Leicester Square. His partner, bleary-eyed from lack of sleep, arrived half an hour later.

“What happened?” Edwards asked.

“She met a man at Piccadilly. They came here, then turned up the passageway on the other side of the cinema and stopped. He was looking for a tail. He made me. Nothing I could do about it.”

“Where are they now?”

Banks shrugged. “They took a taxi. They were going south, towards the river.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah,” Banks said. “I know. Shit.”

“Bruce is going to kill us.”

Detective Inspector Charlie Bruce was their gaffer. He had given the two of them the assignment two days ago, told them to find the girl, learn whatever they could, and then keep a close eye on her. The duty logs would be amended so that it appeared that they were on legitimate police business in the capital. They had followed that procedure before, and there had never been an issue with it. Bruce had given them a grand each as down payments on the work that they would have to put in. They would make five hundred a day after that. Banks knew that the money came from Frankie Fabian, but he didn’t care. It was more than he’d earn in a week otherwise, and he had bills to pay. He had expensive habits, too, and money like that didn’t just fall into your lap. It required a little ethical flexibility, but that was fine. Banks could be flexible. He’d done worse for Bruce than just follow a woman around London for a few days. Edwards was the same.

“This guy she met,” Edwards said. “You got any idea who he is?”

“No. But I got his picture.”

He took out his phone and scrolled through the photos that he had taken that morning. There were several of the woman on the train, unaware that she was being photographed, and then more as she made her way through Piccadilly station. He had taken a handful as she had emerged at ground level, pretending to take a video of the tourists who had gathered around the statue, and then two photos as she had met the man. Banks had been ten metres away when he had taken them, and the first picture was spoiled by a pair of tourists who had paraded through his shot just as he had hit the button to take it. The second, though, was better. The man was in profile, turned very slightly in the direction of the camera, and when Banks tapped the screen to zoom in, his features became a little clearer and easier to identify.

He held the screen up so that Edwards could see it. “You recognise him?”

Edwards shook his head. “Never seen him before. But you’d better send that to Bruce and tell him what’s happened.”

Banks nodded his agreement. He tapped that he wanted to share the picture by email, added Bruce as the recipient, tapped out a quick message and pressed send.

OLIVIA HAD waited on the concourse at Liverpool Street station and watched Smith as he disappeared into the underground. She had asked where he was going and what he planned to do, but he had told her that he couldn’t say. He said again that she needed to stay out of the way for a few days until he contacted her again. He promised that he would give her everything she needed to write the kind of story that she had been dreaming of writing ever since Eddie Fabian had contacted her. The kind of story that would win awards. The kind of story that would make her career.

There was a Travelodge near to the station. She took the escalator to street level and took out her phone for directions. But then she stopped.

She had listened to everything that Smith had said. She knew that there was a lot that he hadn’t told her. She knew that he was not who he said he was. She knew, for
damned
sure, that he wasn’t just a cook. She started to doubt herself, and him.

She had known that Frankie Fabian was a dangerous man. It had been a risk to confront him, but she hadn’t had a choice. She had been stymied. Eddie was dead, and all she had was innuendo, nothing that she could even think of running without censoring it so severely that the story wouldn’t make sense. The story was as dead as its source. She had had no choice but to visit Fabian and try to shake things up.

As she stood on the street with city workers streaming by on both sides, she had a terrible sinking feeling. There were the doubts about Smith, but she put them aside. If he had been right and she
had
been followed to their rendezvous that afternoon, what was to prevent whoever it was who was interested in her from visiting her apartment? Smith had refused to tell her who it might be, save vague threats about Fabian and vaguer and more worrying threats about people who were interested in protecting Isaacs. If they were interested in her story, what would they do to get hold of her notes? She felt ill as the ramifications of that possibility became apparent. She had backed up the story to an external hard drive and a USB stick, but both of those redundancies, and her computer, were in the flat. If someone broke in and took them, she would lose everything from her meetings with Eddie. She would be back to square one.

She took out her phone and was about to call Smith. Her finger hovered over the button for a moment, but then she changed her mind and put the phone back into her bag. She realised that she didn’t know him, either. He was lying to her about what he did for a living and evasive about plenty more besides. Who was he? Was Smith even his real name? She had doubted it at the start, and it seemed even more unlikely now. What was to say that he wasn’t involved in some angle that she hadn’t been able to divine? What if he wasn’t what he appeared to be? What if, for all his good intentions, he was working against her?

No. She couldn’t afford to take any more chances.

She turned around and hurried back to the station. She would take the Central Line to Mile End and then change onto the District Line there. It wasn’t far. She would be back at her building in half an hour. She would collect her computer and pack a bag, and then she would find a hotel.

“WAIT HERE.”

Higgins stepped out of Woodward’s car and crossed the dark street to Watson Square. He avoided the main entrance, keen that the concierge not see him, and went around to the side of the building and an auxiliary entrance that was used for goods and tradesmen. He’d seen it before, and using it made more sense than going through the main entrance. The door was open, and Higgins was able to access the service lift without anyone seeing him. He pressed the button for the seventh floor and waited patiently as the lift—scratched and utilitarian in contrast to the luxurious alternative used by the residents—made its ascent. The lift opened into a service area where laundry trolleys and maintenance equipment were stored.

Higgins opened the door to the corridor, looked outside, and then made his way to apartment number eleven. He didn’t think that he had been seen. He knocked on the door. After a moment, it was opened. Leo Isaacs stood aside and let Higgins into the flat.

“Richard,” he said as Higgins made his way past him, “what’s the matter?”

“Thanks for seeing me,” Higgins said. He didn’t look at Isaacs; his attention was directed to the flat itself. He looked in the bedroom and then the bathroom and the lounge until he was satisfied that they were alone.

Higgins’s behaviour made Isaacs concerned. “What is it? What was so important?”

Higgins opened the French doors and stepped out onto the narrow balcony. Insipid drizzle was falling, a fine mist that clung to the skin. Higgins looked out into the courtyard beyond. It was dark, and the lighting in the gardens below was not strong enough to illuminate this high up. The other windows that Higgins could see were closed, and there was no one else visible on any of the other balconies. He was satisfied that they were unobserved.

Isaacs followed him outside. “What are you doing? It’s bloody freezing.”

“I wanted to say that I was sorry, Leo.”

“Sorry? For what?”

“Things have gotten out of hand.”

“What has? I don’t understand.”

“The situation.”

Isaacs’s mouth fell open. “You said it would be handled.”

“It was, but events have overtaken us. I can’t guarantee that it won’t come out.”

“And the money I’ve been paying you?”

“It bought you peace of mind for thirty years. You got good value.”

“So what do I do now? If this comes out, there’ll be an investigation. A trial. There’ll be…” He stopped mid-sentence, the full horror of his future revealed to him. “I’ll be ruined.” He looked down at the floor of the balcony and when he looked back up at Higgins there were tears in his eyes. “You have to help me.”

“I’m sorry, Leo,” Higgins said. “There’s nothing more I can do.”

“I paid you to look after me!”

“And I will.”

Higgins reached out and took the man by the shoulders. They were both old, but the difference between them was stark. Higgins worked out every morning and kept himself in excellent shape. But age had stalked Isaacs and withered him. Higgins felt Isaacs’s bones through the fabric of his shirt as he manoeuvred him through a quarter turn, pushing him until his back was pressed against the metal balustrade. Only then did he realise what Higgins intended, because it was only as the general reached down for the old man’s belt that he started to struggle. Higgins pushed his left hand hard against Isaacs’s sternum as he fastened his fingers around the belt and pulled up. The old man pivoted, the balustrade acting as a fulcrum, and Higgins gave a final heave and tipped him all the way over the edge. He looked down, watching as Isaacs somersaulted once and then twice, his body bouncing up as it crashed into the ornamental gardens twenty-five metres below. It came to rest on the lawn, one leg bent underneath the body at an obscene angle, the arms flung out wide.

Higgins went into the kitchen and collected a dishcloth. He used the cloth to cover his fingers as he opened the cupboard underneath the sink and collected the kitchen cleaner. He went back to the French door and cleaned the handle, removing any trace of his fingerprints, remembering to leave the doors open. He returned the cleaner to the cupboard and closed the door with his foot. Then, finally satisfied that he had left no trace, he opened the front door by pushing down on the handle with his elbow, went outside and let it swing closed behind him. He set off for the service lift.

DETECTIVE INSPECTOR BRUCE waited in the car outside the development. He had driven up from Oxford as soon as Banks had told him what had happened. The three of them had been taking turns: one of them would be here, the other would be at the tube station, and the third would be at the junction with Bow Road.

“Turning your way now,” radioed Banks.

Bruce leaned forward and started the engine. He was driving a Ford Focus Estate, rented under a false name, and he had parked it on the other side of the road, twenty metres from the security lodge. It would have been impossible to get to the woman without being seen, but the positioning would limit their exposure as much as possible. Bruce was relaxed about it. It wouldn’t take long to do what they needed to do.

“I see her,” Edwards reported. “Get ready.”

Bruce had been furious when Banks and Edwards had reported that they had lost Dewey, and his fury had curdled to confusion and fear when he had recognised John Smith in the photograph that Banks had emailed to him. Bruce had never seen Frankie Fabian as angry as he had been when he was summoned to the house two nights ago. He was incandescent. Bruce had listened, agog, as Fabian had explained what had happened to Marcus and Spencer. Fabian had described how he had been blackmailed by Smith on the day after Eddie’s funeral. Smith had threatened to release a confession that Eddie had written, and that Smith had somehow acquired, that would implicate Frankie’s boys in a heist that had taken place years earlier. Bruce and his men had been responsible for searching Eddie Fabian’s house the day after they had killed him. They had found nothing, and neither had the moving company they had sent in the following day to empty the place out. Bruce had vouched for the fact that there was nothing incriminating at the property, and he had had no option but to stand there and take it as Fabian tore into him. He had suggested that Smith was bluffing, and that had just made things worse. He had kept his own counsel after that.

Once he had mastered his temper—and that was a temporary cessation, at best—Fabian had gone on to recount how he had been visited by Olivia Dewey. She had suggested to Fabian that she was a reporter, and Bruce’s enquiries confirmed that that was true. She had confronted Fabian with the allegation that the family had been involved in the heist and that Eddie had been the source of her information. Fabian told Bruce, with barely concealed contempt, that she was giving him a chance to put his response to the allegations on the record.