Horsey Mere (DI Tanner 5), page 20
But Tanner remained stubbornly where he was, burying his own hands down into the depths of his pockets.
‘I suggest you jump,’ he eventually offered. ‘You never know, you might even make it.’
‘Take my hand first,’ Carter pleaded, his scrawny body trembling with fear.
Tanner took a cautious step forward to peer over the edge of the building.
‘Nah,’ he eventually said, pulling back. ‘Looks a little too high for my taste. You’re on your own, I’m afraid.’
Carter’s lips began to quiver as tears cascaded down the sides of his face. ‘But – you can’t just leave me!’
Tanner watched him for a moment, his mind taking him back to when Jenny had been lying on that pavement, staring down at the blood oozing from the wound left by this scrawny little shit’s knife.
His heart turned to stone.
‘An eye for an eye,’ he eventually said, the words creeping out through a smile full of vengeful malice. ‘Isn’t that what the bible says?’
‘Please!’ the boy sobbed, ‘I’ll do anything! I’m begging you!’
‘Tell you what. If you can bring my fiancée back to me, I’ll be more than happy to give you a hand.’
‘But – you know I can’t do that.’
Tanner glared over at him. ‘Then you’re of no use to me.’
As the words came out of his mouth, the entire structure shifted violently to one side, but this time it didn’t stop.
‘NOOO!’ Carter screamed; his eyes wide with terror as he reached desperately out for help.
But Tanner did nothing but to remain where he was, watching as Carter’s scrawny body plummeted down into a torrent of twisted steel, shattered masonry, and all-consuming concrete dust.
CHAPTER FIFTY EIGHT
TANNER CONTINUED TO stand on the roof’s crumbling edge, staring out towards Norfolk’s vast open horizon. Having seen the person who’d murdered his fiancée die before his very eyes, he was expecting to have experienced some sort of emotional release. But his thirst for vengeance remained, just as it had before, boring relentlessly down into the darkest depths of his soul.
His head dropped to take in the twisted remnants of the fire escape, shrouded in a ghostly layer of swirling dust. He took a half-step closer, so that both his feet were resting on the building’s edge. It would be easy enough for him to follow Carter over. He’d only need to lean forward, just slightly.
With a jolt, he forced himself back, shaking his head as he did. He’d nearly gone, but there wasn’t a chance in hell he was going to, not if it meant ending up lying next to the person who’d already taken so much from him.
It was then that a thought slid its way into his mind. None of this had started with Roy Carter. He’d only been a cog in a much bigger wheel, one that had begun turning inextricably around ever since that MP, Patrick Hopkins, had been found hanging by his neck. That’s when the hostility towards immigrants had begun, fuelled by the Norfolk Herald’s stories about that 17th Century witch, and the supposed ancient curse she’d placed on the MP’s family name. For the sake of Jenny’s memory, and for the redemption of his soul, he could see he had been left with little choice. He was going to have to find out who’d killed Hopkins. Before he did that, he had to report what had just happened. If he neglected to, when Carter’s body was eventually found, and the shopkeeper told his colleagues that he’d directed him up to the Hatchmead Estate, he knew he’d immediately be suspected of having murdered him.
With those thoughts filtering down through his mind, he dug out his phone to alert the station to his location, and the events that had taken place.
CHAPTER FIFTY NINE
FINISHING THE CALL, he remained where he was until the sound of distant sirens could be heard drifting through the air towards him. Only then did he return to the roof access door and the ten flights of concrete stairs beyond. When he eventually reached the bottom, he ambled his way over to the estate’s main entrance. There he assisted the first squad car arriving at the site, helping them to cut through the estate’s security gates’ chain before heaving them open, allowing for what soon became a steady stream of incoming emergency traffic.
‘So, you chased him up the stairs, onto the roof,’ said PC Higgins, reading from the notes he’d been writing whilst taking another of the DI’s statements. ‘Then he climbed onto the fire escape to begin making his way down. That’s when it gave way underneath him?’
‘Pretty much,’ Tanner confirmed.
‘OK, thank you, sir. I’ll type that up when I get back to the office.’
As the young police constable spun away, Vicky’s auburn hair came bobbing into view.
‘Are you alright?’ she asked, her forehead creased with concern.
‘I’m fine,’ Tanner replied, struggling to hold her eye.
‘Are you sure it was him? Roy Carter?’
‘No question.’
‘How did you find him?’
‘The owner of the corner shop saw him running up the road towards the estate. There weren’t any other places he could have been. It was then just a question of flushing him out.’
Vicky paused for a moment. ‘Forensics aren’t going to find anything, are they?’
‘Anything, as in?’
‘You know; that you –’
‘That I threw him off the top of the building?’
‘Well, after he’d put Jenny into intensive care.’
‘Don’t worry. I didn’t so much as breathe on him.’
‘I’m sure, of course,’ Vicky responded, her face blushing slightly. ‘It’s just that, well, it’s a shame you were here on your own when it happened.’
‘I didn’t see much point in calling for backup. Not after what you told me about the new DI.’
‘Speaking of whom,’ Vicky muttered, stealing a glance over at a square-jawed middle-aged man dressed in a pristine charcoal grey suit, swaggering his way over towards them.
‘DI Tanner, I presume?’ the man called out.
DI… ?’ began Tanner, staring vacantly over at him. ‘Sorry, I don’t seem to know your name.’
‘Morton’ the man replied, taking Tanner in with a condescending glare. ‘DCI Forrester told me you were taken off the Horsey Mere investigation.’
‘That’s correct.’
‘So may I ask what it is that you were doing chasing after one of the suspects?’
‘I was responding to this morning’s report of a robbery. Apparently, nobody else could be bothered.’
‘It may surprise you to learn that we have other slightly more pressing matters to attend to, at least we did until you managed to kill one of the people involved.’
‘I sincerely hope you’re not accusing me of murder?’ Tanner asked, his inner rage finding a new channel of focus.
‘Not yet, no, but I will be recommending that the matter is handed over to Professional Standards. What with your much documented anger management issues, plus the fact that the victim, Roy Carter, is alleged to have stabbed your girlfriend, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you dragged him up there with the deliberate intention of shoving him off the top.’
‘If you’d been doing your job properly, you’d have been over here yourself. He’d already confessed to the attempted murder of Nadira Matar, by throwing a petrol bomb at her mother’s shop. It was subsequently blindingly obvious that it was him who set fire to the Glenwood Estate as well, killing literally dozens of innocent people in the process, including Nadira’s friend, Zara Haddad. When you add in the fact that Anya Chadha’s DNA was found in his van, the girl found hanging at Horsey Mere, anyone would have to be a brainless moron not to have arrested him at the first opportunity they had.’
‘And you think his motive for having done all that was because some teenage witch had cast a love spell on him?’
‘In part.’
The new DI laughed. ‘And you’re the one calling me a moron?’
‘Er, no. I called you a brainless moron, and I was being generous.’
Morton leered back at him. ‘From what I can understand, it was thanks to your total inability to do your job properly that he was allowed to walk free in the first place. Had someone been feckless enough to have done that in the MET, they’d have been strung up for gross incompetence, especially in light of the fact that he went on to stab your girlfriend. By the way, I hope you’ve apologised to her, being that it was your fault that she was attacked in the first place. And whilst I’m on the subject, being that you’re her supervising officer, it was your responsibility to have made sure she was wearing a stab vest before allowing her anywhere near someone wielding a knife.’
Morton had hardly had a chance to finish the sentence when Tanner snapped, throwing first a punch, then himself at the interim DI.
As the man immediately began fighting back, a voice exploded over the top of them.
‘Just what the hell is going on here?’
Breathing hard, Morton shoved Tanner off of him before drawing himself up to straighten his tie.
‘Your DI just physically assaulted me, sir, as witnessed by everyone here.’
‘For Christ sake, Tanner. What in God’s name are you doing here?’
‘I found Roy Carter,’ he replied, his eyes remaining fixed on the interim DI.
‘So I heard, and only a few minutes before he just happened to fall off the roof of a ten-storey block of flats.’
‘That was hardly my fault.’
‘But the fact that you were in active pursuit of him was, though, wasn’t it?’
Tanner didn’t respond.
‘Have you told everyone about Jenny?’
With Tanner not even looking as if he was listening, it was left to Vicky to ask, ‘What do you mean? What about Jenny?’
Realising he hadn’t, Forrester stopped. ‘Look, Tanner. Just go home, will you.’
‘Er, excuse me?’ questioned Morton, staring over at Forrester with incredulous indignation. ‘That man just assaulted me. You can’t just let him go home.’
‘What’s happened to Jenny?’ Vicky repeated, her voice changing in tone to that of a demand.
With Tanner’s countenance remaining unchanged, Forrester let out a remorse-filled sigh.
‘She passed away,’ he eventually replied, his eyes dropping.
The air fell into a cold, lifeless silence.
Vicky’s eyes darted between Forrester’s and Tanner’s. ‘But – I – I don’t understand.’
‘I called the medical centre this morning,’ Forrester continued, his voice no more than a whisper. ‘Her condition deteriorated last night, leaving them with no choice but to undertake a second operation. She didn’t survive.’
‘But – she – she can’t be.’
With pleading eyes she gazed over at Tanner, only to find his head slumped forward, his eyes fixed on the ground.
‘John?’ she questioned, her voice cracking with emotion. ‘Tell me it’s not true?’
Every fibre of his being longed to tell her that it wasn’t, that the doctor had been wrong; Jenny was making the full recovery he’d been promised. But that wasn’t what had happened. It was only then that his mind was fully able to accept the truth. She was gone, and there was nothing he could do to get her back.
His bottom lip shuddered as he searched for an answer. But instead of words came an outpouring of raw, unchecked emotion. Sinking to his knees, his head held in trembling hands, he began rocking backwards and forwards, openly sobbing as he did, with neither malice, embarrassment, nor shame.
CHAPTER FIFTY NINE
FINISHING THE CALL, he remained where he was until the sound of distant sirens could be heard drifting through the air towards him. Only then did he return to the roof access door and the ten flights of concrete stairs beyond. When he eventually reached the bottom, he ambled his way over to the estate’s main entrance. There he assisted the first squad car arriving at the site, helping them to cut through the estate’s security gates’ chain before heaving them open, allowing for what soon became a steady stream of incoming emergency traffic.
‘So, you chased him up the stairs, onto the roof,’ said PC Higgins, reading from the notes he’d been writing whilst taking another of the DI’s statements. ‘Then he climbed onto the fire escape to begin making his way down. That’s when it gave way underneath him?’
‘Pretty much,’ Tanner confirmed.
‘OK, thank you, sir. I’ll type that up when I get back to the office.’
As the young police constable spun away, Vicky’s auburn hair came bobbing into view.
‘Are you alright?’ she asked, her forehead creased with concern.
‘I’m fine,’ Tanner replied, struggling to hold her eye.
‘Are you sure it was him? Roy Carter?’
‘No question.’
‘How did you find him?’
‘The owner of the corner shop saw him running up the road towards the estate. There weren’t any other places he could have been. It was then just a question of flushing him out.’
Vicky paused for a moment. ‘Forensics aren’t going to find anything, are they?’
‘Anything, as in?’
‘You know; that you –’
‘That I threw him off the top of the building?’
‘Well, after he’d put Jenny into intensive care.’
‘Don’t worry. I didn’t so much as breathe on him.’
‘I’m sure, of course,’ Vicky responded, her face blushing slightly. ‘It’s just that, well, it’s a shame you were here on your own when it happened.’
‘I didn’t see much point in calling for backup. Not after what you told me about the new DI.’
‘Speaking of whom,’ Vicky muttered, stealing a glance over at a square-jawed middle-aged man dressed in a pristine charcoal grey suit, swaggering his way over towards them.
‘DI Tanner, I presume?’ the man called out.
DI…?’ began Tanner, staring vacantly over at him. ‘Sorry, I don’t seem to know your name.’
‘Morton’ the man replied, taking Tanner in with a condescending glare. ‘DCI Forrester told me you were taken off the Horsey Mere investigation.’
‘That’s correct.’
‘So may I ask what it is that you were doing chasing after one of the suspects?’
‘I was responding to this morning’s report of a robbery. Apparently, nobody else could be bothered.’
‘It may surprise you to learn that we have other slightly more pressing matters to attend to, at least we did until you managed to kill one of the people involved.’
‘I sincerely hope you’re not accusing me of murder?’ Tanner asked, his inner rage finding a new channel of focus.
‘Not yet, no, but I will be recommending that the matter is handed over to Professional Standards. What with your much documented anger management issues, plus the fact that the victim, Roy Carter, is alleged to have stabbed your girlfriend, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you dragged him up there with the deliberate intention of shoving him off the top.’
‘If you’d been doing your job properly, you’d have been over here yourself. He’d already confessed to the attempted murder of Nadira Matar, by throwing a petrol bomb at her mother’s shop. It was subsequently blindingly obvious that it was him who set fire to the Glenwood Estate as well, killing literally dozens of innocent people in the process, including Nadira’s friend, Zara Haddad. When you add in the fact that Anya Chadha’s DNA was found in his van, the girl found hanging at Horsey Mere, anyone would have to be a brainless moron not to have arrested him at the first opportunity they had.’
‘And you think his motive for having done all that was because some teenage witch had cast a love spell on him?’
‘In part.’
The new DI laughed. ‘And you’re the one calling me a moron?’
‘Er, no. I called you a brainless moron, and I was being generous.’
Morton leered back at him. ‘From what I can understand, it was thanks to your total inability to do your job properly that he was allowed to walk free in the first place. Had someone been feckless enough to have done that in the MET, they’d have been strung up for gross incompetence, especially in light of the fact that he went on to stab your girlfriend. By the way, I hope you’ve apologised to her, being that it was your fault that she was attacked in the first place. And whilst I’m on the subject, being that you’re her supervising officer, it was your responsibility to have made sure she was wearing a stab vest before allowing her anywhere near someone wielding a knife.’
Morton had hardly had a chance to finish the sentence when Tanner snapped, throwing first a punch, then himself at the interim DI.
As the man immediately began fighting back, a voice exploded over the top of them.
‘Just what the hell is going on here?’
Breathing hard, Morton shoved Tanner off of him before drawing himself up to straighten his tie.
‘Your DI just physically assaulted me, sir, as witnessed by everyone here.’
‘For Christ sake, Tanner. What in God’s name are you doing here?’
‘I found Roy Carter,’ he replied, his eyes remaining fixed on the interim DI.
‘So I heard, and only a few minutes before he just happened to fall off the roof of a ten-storey block of flats.’
‘That was hardly my fault.’
‘But the fact that you were in active pursuit of him was, though, wasn’t it?’
Tanner didn’t respond.
‘Have you told everyone about Jenny?’
With Tanner not even looking as if he was listening, it was left to Vicky to ask, ‘What do you mean? What about Jenny?’
Realising he hadn’t, Forrester stopped. ‘Look, Tanner. Just go home, will you.’
‘Er, excuse me?’ questioned Morton, staring over at Forrester with incredulous indignation. ‘That man just assaulted me. You can’t just let him go home.’
‘What’s happened to Jenny?’ Vicky repeated, her voice changing in tone to that of a demand.
With Tanner’s countenance remaining unchanged, Forrester let out a remorse-filled sigh.
