The Tangled Web: an international web of intrigue, murder and romance (9 page)

TWELVE

The sun was poised as if deciding whether to set and then without warning, it disappeared leaving the mountains in shadow against the fast fading sky. Lights coming on here and there were the only indication of early evening activity in the homes perched on the lower foothills huddling the capital.

In a house on a hill with a premium view, Mike watched a fire burning in the distance. Curious about it, he reached for the binoculars on a nearby table. He peered into them, training them across the city until the fire was in focus. Completely absorbed by it, he didn’t hear the knock on his door.

She knocked again then pulled her mobile from her handbag. She speed dialed Mike’s number and waited for him to pick up.

“Where were you? Didn’t you hear me knocking?” Mike’s lady of the moment complained.

“Sorry, Cindy, I was on the balcony,” he apologized opening the door, the phone still to his ear. Before he could hang up, she leaped into his arms.

“Hi, babe,” he murmured kissing her. She pressed her body against his, prolonging the kiss until she was forced to come up for air.

“Whew!” Mike gasped taking a deep breath. “You’re going to kill me one day, know that? Had dinner yet?”

“No, I’m starving. Got any ideas?” she smiled suggestively.

Mike held her again, pulling her lithe body tightly to his. “I have a very good idea,” he whispered in her ear. “Why don’t you and I go work up an appetite?”

She thrust her tongue into his mouth and groped for his erection.

“Come,” he said taking her hand.

Twilight had long gone as, satiated from their lovemaking, Cindy curled up against Mike and threw a long leg over him.

“Mike, something’s been on my mind,” she murmured pensively.

“What?” Mike asked mindlessly as he roved over her naked body with his eyes.

“There’s something really bothering me.”

“What’s bothering you, babe?” he asked caressing her breast.

“I heard something I think you need to know about.”

Now curious, Mike turned to face her fully.

Cindy took a deep breath. “I don’t know how well you know Dave Evans, but he’s been saying some worrying things. I just hope they aren’t true.”

“What is this about?” Mike asked uneasily.

“It’s about the McGuire boat, the murders.”

Mike bolted up on his elbows. “What are you talking about?”

Seeing his reaction she began to retract. “Forget it. I’m sorry I brought it up.”

“No, no tell me,” Mike insisted. “What about the murders?”

“Dave claims he knows who did it.”

The pulse in Mike’s temple throbbed visibly as he sat up. “Who told you this?” he asked.

“The lady who does my laundry.”

“Wait a minute here, I’m confused. What does your laundry lady have to do with anything?”

Cindy gave him a disparaging look. “She does Dave Evans’ laundry, of course. What else would she be doing in his house? Why don’t you get it? The woman overheard Dave talking on the phone while she was doing his laundry. He was talking about the murders on the McGuire boat.”

Mike suddenly felt sick. “Your laundry lady must have been mistaken,” he said weakly.

“I’m only telling you what she told me, Mike.”

“Look, I need some fresh air. Let’s go out on the balcony,” Mike said abruptly.

Out on the balcony, Mike scanned the city, now blurred by darkness, until he found the fire again.

“You seem upset,” Cindy said, seeing his worried expression.

“No, I just have a lot on my mind.”

“I hope you weren’t upset by what I just told you.”

“No, of course not.” He handed her the binoculars. “Look,” he pointed. “There’s a fire out there. Looks like it’s in the direction of Sea Breeze Gardens.”

Cindy panned the binoculars to where the fire was still raging and a small group of bystanders stood watching helplessly as the house blazed and the screams of a child pierced the night. An onlooker observed the buildings on either side of the burning house, worried the flames would spread if the fire department didn’t arrive soon. Standing not far from him, an old woman, unable to stand the little girl’s agonizing screams any longer, turned and shuffled away shaking her head. Fearing it wouldn’t be long before bullets flew, she quickened her pace and hurried towards the safety of her home.

The heat from the flames close to scorching his face, a teenage boy stood mesmerized by the neighborhood’s latest offering of a violent reality show. If the child’s pitiful screams affected him at all, it was only marginally. The violence was nothing new to the fourteen year-old. He had witnessed things most men had never seen and never would. In his few short years, he had seen a man shot to death, heard the screams of two schoolgirls who lived down the road being raped. Just the year before, he had walked by a pregnant woman lying in a ditch, the dried blood from her slashed throat staining the ground black. He glanced at the gunmen still standing by their car, members of the drug posse that controlled the area. They were mocking the neighbors who had made futile attempts to rescue the child. Held at bay by the gunmen’s M-16s, they had been helpless to do anything but watch the house and the innocent victim trapped inside burn. The child’s screams had now died the boy noticed. Some of the bystanders had started to disperse. He decided to do likewise. He had had enough. He turned on his heels and, hands in pockets, sauntered home.

Two emaciated stray dogs rummaging through the garbage for unlikely scraps. The boy kicked an empty can and shrugged. The front doors along the street were locked, windows shut tight, blocking out all signs of life except for the occasional sliver of light. Not surprising on a night like this. Two houses had long been deserted, remnants of the once peaceful neighborhood that had sunk into poverty and crime. Their windows were smashed. Their walls were bullet scarred. The boy continued on his way along the litter-strewn remains of a sidewalk no longer lit by street lamps. He wasn’t sure what he would do for the rest of the evening. It was stifling hot inside the house. He preferred to remain outside until he had no choice but to go home.

The blinding headlights appeared almost as soon as he heard the sound coming at him. He bolted for the nearest cover, diving behind a hedge and grazing his elbows in his fall. His breath quickened to a frightened pant. The two cars flew past at a speed, their tires screeching to a stop in front of the burning house. The throbbing of his heart almost deafening him, the boy listened to the distance. And then he heard it, the screams of people fleeing or falling. The barrage of gunfire shattering the night sounded like war. Cowed behind the hedge, he froze. And then it subsided. All was silent again, but for the sound of two cars making a fast escape, and the screams of sirens coming from a distance.

Cindy put down the binoculars. “Looks like it might be a house on fire. Whatever it is, it’s certainly lighting up the sky over there.”

“Ready to go grab a bite to eat?” Mike asked.

“Yes. Just let me go freshen up.”

THIRTEEN

At C.I.D. headquarters the following morning, a detective slammed his notes down on his desk in frustration. “That’s it. That’s all we have. The car was stolen,” he said frowning at the detective sitting across from him.

The other man made no comment. There was no need to comment. They both knew what they were up against. They could take any number of guesses, but it was unlikely they would ever get to the bottom of the slaughter in Sea Breeze Gardens.

“I’m going to go back and see if there’s even one person willing to talk, even one person,” the first officer announced determinedly.

His partner shrugged. “We’re just spinning our wheels. Nobody is going to come forward – even if they witnessed the whole thing from beginning to end. Nobody in that hellhole who values his life is going to cooperate. The damn place is a war zone.”

In his office not far from where the two detectives sat huddled over their report, Chief Inspector Robert Palmer listened attentively to the party on the other end of his line.

“Looks like a coastguard helicopter spotted the boat, Inspector.”

“Where? Are they sure it’s the Bertram?”

“We can’t be sure ‘til we float it. To answer your other question, it was spotted about eight miles south of the Key.”

“How come it’s just been discovered?” Palmer asked irritably. “Weren’t they searching a twenty-mile radius after the boat disappeared? I’ll be damned if I understand how those people operate.”

“It was overcast for some time after the boat disappeared, sir. And the water is pretty deep where it was found.”

“Okay, okay,” Palmer said impatiently. “Get Marine cracking on it then. Report directly to me when you learn more.”

Palmer hung up and shook a painkiller from the bottle on his desk. He downed it with a glass of water. The whole McGuire thing was becoming a pain in the neck. The press was all over it like a flock of vultures while one of his best men had got all of one paragraph on some back page of the paper. Palmer got up and went to the filing cabinet on the other side of the room. There was something he wanted to check before Wallace’s backup arrived. He found what he was looking for. He read the text message again.

Proceeding as planned, though no sign of backup yet

“Come in, come in,” Palmer beckoned the two law enforcement officers gruffly. He motioned them to sit. “I’ve seen your report, but I would still like to hear what went wrong.”

“When we got to the docks, we found the parking area barricaded, sir,” one of the men explained uneasily. “They were checking IDs. We didn’t expect an ID check. We were unprepared. We couldn’t get in.”

“If that’s a new thing, I don’t know about it,” Palmer grunted dubiously. “Was there no other way to get into the docks?”

“No, sir. Not without arousing suspicion. We tried getting in at the other end, but every area of the docks is under tight security.”

“Wonder who’s providing that security,” Palmer shot back sarcastically.

The men exchanged nervous glances. “When we tried to warn Wallace, his cell kept going to voicemail,” one attempted to explain. “We tried texting him, but we got no response.”

Palmer’s eyes narrowed on the two men. He knew they were lying through their teeth. “You say you got no response despite attempting to send him a text message? Is that correct?”

“That’s correct, sir.”

The second officer hurriedly rose to their defense. “We’re very upset about what happened to Wallace, Inspector. Please understand we made every effort to contact him. There was nothing more we could do – without jeopardizing the investigation.”

Palmer gave the men a long, hard look. “I don’t take the murder of a law enforcement officer lightly. This matter doesn’t end here. That will be all for now, thank you,” he said dismissing them curtly.

“Rotten eggs everywhere you turn,” Palmer spat in disgust as they left. How many more like them were there? The ranks of trustworthy law enforcement officers had been thinning at an alarming rate. He wondered if it was wise to try and take the port investigation further now. Palmer felt as if a noose was tightening around his neck. He had already taken the only recourse available by bringing Margaret Thomas’ attention to the dire situation. How the minister would use the information remained to be seen.

Palmer eased back in his chair and stroked his chin thoughtfully. It had only been by a fluke that the C.I.D. had stumbled upon that evidence. True, Frank Sterling had not been under any suspicion at the time. However, had the C.I.D. had reason to try getting into Sterling’s home, they would have found it impenetrable. As it turned out, Frank’s fortress had fallen without so much as an attack. It had a fatal weakness. That weakness had just happened to have been a jilted mistress. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, Palmer smiled mirthlessly. Better yet, hell hath no fury like a jilted woman with a friend in the Criminal Investigation Department.

FOURTEEN

Pavel Popescu AKA Paul Morrison paused for a moment in front of the house on an undistinguished looking residential street in Hammersmith, London, then rang the doorbell three times. It was a minute or two before he heard footsteps and the door opened with a loud creak. He crushed his cigarette out on the steps and followed the burly man down a dingy passage, its only source of light a solitary bulb dangling from an overhead electric cord.

The man, his obesity covered only by a sleeveless undershirt that stretched tautly over the bulge of his stomach, breathed heavily from the burden of his weight as he led Pavel down the passage. He ushered Pavel into a room on the right. “Have a seat,” he wheezed, indicating a threadbare armchair. Pavel sat fastidiously on the stained chair bracing himself against the smell of stale cooking that permeated the room. He placed his briefcase on his lap as he watched the man waddle over to a faded print of a Renoir and remove it from the wall. “It’s ready for you,” the man said, scratching furiously at his left armpit as he opened a safe. He reached inside and pulled out an envelope. Waddling over to Pavel, he handed it to him.

Pavel removed the passport from the envelope. “So what name have you given me this time?” he asked.

“Look and see. I think you’ll be pleased. It’s a very English name. I think your excellent English accent will do it justice.”

Pavel opened the UK passport. The name of the holder was one Philip Duncan. “You must have gone to a lot of trouble with this one,” he smiled appreciatively.

“Yes, it was a bit of trouble,” the forger shrugged. “UK passports are getting harder and harder, but anything is possible with money.”

Pavel turned the pages. The passport carried stamps of alleged visits to various Caribbean islands and the U.S. Expertly forged with pages that belied their newness, it would stand up to the closest scrutiny. “It’s a work of art,” Pavel complimented the man as he clicked open his briefcase. He removed the first of three bundles held together by elastic bands. He handed the man the first bundle. “I think this passport will serve me well.”