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SIXTY-FOUR

Dave Holland was not in the best of moods – or was making a good job of seeming so for comic effect – when he slumped into the small conference room that Thorne and Tanner had commandeered on the floor above their own.

It was half an hour before any of them were officially due to start work and the offices of the various Major Investigation Teams were still relatively quiet.

Holland had encountered a handful of officers winding up their own shifts on the late turn, but it seemed that few were hugely keen to get in early for a day that would be spent managing the aftermath of Alex Brightwell’s death at Colindale station.

Not as keen as those who worked for the DPS, anyway.

Clusterfucks were their bread and butter.

‘This better be good.’ Holland was carrying a coffee and appeared to be half asleep, but he still looked less knackered than Thorne or Tanner. ‘Pippa and me had . . . plans for this morning.’

Thorne remembered what Holland had told him about he and his wife trying for a baby. It couldn’t be helped.

‘You’d best sit down, Dave.’

Somewhat nervously, Holland did so. ‘Sounds serious.’

Starting with what Emily Mead had told her the night before, Tanner began to lay out just how serious it was. Holland appeared to wake up very suddenly and took a hearty slurp of coffee. ‘ What? ’

‘He never met Emily in the flesh,’ Thorne said. ‘Not once.’

Tanner was looking at Holland. ‘He even said that on the message. He recognised her on the footage from Callaghan’s bodycam, so he knew he could never meet her. Never speak to her in case she recognised his voice.’

‘It’s why he monitored her initial interview remotely,’ Thorne said. ‘And why he was happy to let Walker run that press conference. He knew Emily would be watching.’

‘Maybe Emily’s got it wrong.’ Holland looked from Thorne to Tanner and back again. ‘I mean, it wouldn’t be her fault, but—’

‘She’s not wrong, Dave.’ Thorne knew that Holland was hoping Emily Mead was mistaken every bit as much as he had been the night before and for the same reasons. Now, it just felt like clutching at straws.

‘It was Russell who was feeding Brightwell all the information,’ Tanner said. ‘Setting up Tully and everyone else. Even setting up Emily in the end.’

‘How?’

‘He contacted him the same way we did,’ Thorne said. ‘Encrypted messages on the Dark Web.’

‘He learned how to do it,’ Tanner said. ‘I checked with Greg Hobbs and Russell was one of those “powers that be” he told me about that first time I went to see him at the DFU. He’d requested that all the anti-police sites and message boards be monitored, found out how to do it himself from home.

He saw the message Brightwell had left about Tully before we did.

The one accusing Tully of being a rapist.’

‘That’s when he knew he was in trouble,’ Thorne said.

‘From that point on he was sending messages of his own, passing on all the intelligence Brightwell needed to get rid of all the people he blamed for what had happened to his brother. Conveniently for Russell, they were the same people he wanted out of the way.’

Holland was still shaking his head, but he knew better than to doubt Thorne and Tanner’s obvious conviction, so by now it was shock rather than disbelief. ‘What about the forensics?’

‘He had access to that lab.’ Tanner was shuffling papers on her lap.

‘I got an email back from Hendricks’s ex, who finally managed to come up with a list of officers who were there on the key date.

’ She passed a printout across to Holland.

‘Russell visited Fin-Cel the day that freezer “malfunctioned”.’

‘Fuck.’ Holland stared down at the printout, at Brigstocke’s name highlighted on what was a very short list. He looked up at Tanner. ‘I presume this means he arranged for Daniel Sadler to be killed.’

‘I don’t know,’ Thorne said. ‘Sadler was definitely someone else he’d have wanted out of the way.’

Tanner produced another list and handed it to Holland. ‘Twelve years ago, Russell was one of the officers involved in the child pornography case against Sadler. Not directly, but he was certainly across it.’

‘He said he didn’t even remember it.’

‘He lied,’ Thorne said. ‘He’s been lying all the time.’

‘Promised me he’d look into it.’ Holland’s voice was low and the anger was obvious. ‘Well, now I know why he never bothered.’

‘He made that case against Sadler go away,’ Tanner said.

‘Which meant he now had a courier in his back pocket. Once Alex Brightwell crawled out of the woodwork and started making accusations, Sadler had to go and it was made to look like suicide. It might have been Brightwell who chucked him off that viaduct or else Russell lined up someone else to do it, same as he did when he finally got rid of Brightwell.’

‘Right now, we’d only be guessing,’ Thorne said. ‘I certainly don’t think he did it himself. He always got someone else to the dirty work. Brightwell, Healey . . . the prisoner in Frankland who tried to kill Craig Knowles. I’m sure it was Russell who pointed Brightwell in his direction.’

‘What about the victims, though?’ Holland looked from Thorne to Tanner and back. ‘He gave Brightwell the address of the safe house, which means he was willing to see Emily Mead be killed, so why didn’t he try to get rid of the others? Siobhan Brady and Priya Kulkarni?’

‘My guess is that he was getting desperate by the end,’ Thorne said.

‘When it was all coming apart. Up to that point, I don’t know .

. . he didn’t see the need because he was getting away with it?

Or maybe he was just deluded and didn’t even see himself as the bad guy. Like he was above it all, somehow.’

They sat in silence for a minute or more.

‘So, what now?’ Holland asked eventually. He sounded like someone who very much did not want his question answered.

Thorne looked at his watch. ‘He should be getting here in ten minutes.’

‘And then what? Look, I’m not saying that this doesn’t all add up, because it does . . . but it’s circumstantial, all of it.’

‘We know that,’ Tanner said.

‘We haven’t got any proof .’

‘It’s enough to nick him,’ Thorne said. ‘To ask questions. To get him in an interview room and make things seriously difficult.’

‘Right, and he just denies it. He lawyers up and brings a federation rep in, or he tells us we’re idiots then does whatever he can to fuck up the rest of our careers.’

Tanner leaned towards him. ‘You don’t have to be involved if you don’t want to, Dave. Tom and I brought this to you. We won’t have a problem if you’d be more comfortable stepping back from it.’

Holland did not even blink. ‘No fucking chance,’ he said.

Forty-five minutes later, the three of them reconvened in a corner of what was now a busy incident room.

‘I’ve called down and he hasn’t rung in sick.’ Tanner glanced around to make sure they could not be overheard.

Thorne nodded. ‘He’s not answering his mobile.’

‘Have you tried him at home?’ Holland asked.

‘They don’t have a landline.’ Thorne thought for a few seconds. ‘Maybe we should just go round there.’

Tanner looked dubious. ‘Arrest him in front of Sally?’

‘Hang on, though.’ Holland stared at them both, like they were all being stupid. ‘Aren’t we forgetting the small matter of a death in custody? He said yesterday that the DPS would be talking to us all. He’s probably in with them.’

‘Makes sense,’ Tanner said.

Thorne had to concede that it did, but he couldn’t help but feel anxious nonetheless. As though they had a serious problem. ‘We can’t just call them up and ask,’ he said. ‘There’ll be twenty minutes of “ Could you tell me what it’s regarding? ” and “ I’m sorry but I’m not at liberty . . . ” ’

‘So, we just tell them it’s urgent,’ Holland said. ‘It’s an operational emergency and we need to talk to our DCI.’

‘Problem is, they don’t think anything can possibly be as urgent as whatever it is they’re doing.’

‘Desai’s got an “in”.’ Tanner looked across to where the DC was busy at her desk. ‘She kept it quiet for obvious reasons, but she used to go out with someone at the DPS.’

‘She must have been desperate,’ Holland said.

‘Maybe she could call him, just to catch up, you know.’

‘Worth a try,’ Thorne said.

Tanner went over to confer with Charita Desai and, when she turned to give a thumbs-up, Thorne and Holland walked back to their desks, with little option but to wait.

It was nearly lunchtime when Desai beckoned Thorne from the door of the incident room. Tanner wasn’t in the room, so Thorne moved across on his own. Holland clocked what was happening and followed.

‘Sorry,’ Desai said. ‘He’s only just called me back, but he did tell me that DCI Brigstocke isn’t with them.’

Thorne and Holland exchanged a look.

‘I think they’ve got their hands full anyway, mind you. Sounds like there’s progress on the death in custody. The Brightwell murder.’

Thorne waited, feeling that prickle at the back of his neck again. The sign that something important was coming, for good or ill.

‘That PC who was at the station when it happened. Healey?’ Desai looked at them.

‘Yeah, we know who he is,’ Thorne said.

‘Turns out the DPS has been looking at him for a while, got evidence against him for all sorts. So, once they laid everything out, Healey conferred with his rep and they started talking about a deal. My ex reckons he’s being pretty talkative.’

Thorne thanked Desai for her help and he and Holland stepped away.

‘Well, if Russell knows about that —’

‘Why wouldn’t he?’ Thorne had been hoping PC Michael Healey might turn out to be a weak link, but he hadn’t banked on it happening quite this quickly. He moved to grab his jacket from the back of a chair. ‘He knows about every other fucking thing.’

Holland ran to fetch his own. ‘His home address?’

‘I doubt he’s there, but it’s as good a place to start as any.’

They hurried towards the door. ‘I’ll drive,’ Holland said.