Deadly Inferno (Detective Jane Phillips Book 11), page 19
‘They’d be as good a place to start as any. He could easily blend in unnoticed with a bunch of people who are glad to have a roof over their heads.’
‘Maybe we start there? Get uniform to start canvassing those types of places?’
‘That’s a big job, guv. There must be hundreds of dodgy hotels like that across the city.’
Phillips sighed in frustration just before her phone beeped. Glancing down, she could see a notification had flashed up on-screen. Unlocking it, she frowned. ‘What the hell?’ she muttered.
‘What is it?’ asked Jones, sitting to attention.
‘Another post from the Real Firestarter.’ She turned the screen so he could see it.
Leaning forward, he took the phone to get a closer look.
‘Apparently another photo, which has some relevance to his next target.’
Jones scrutinised the image. ‘Where on earth is it?’ He turned the phone sideways, and his eyes narrowed. ‘I can’t make it out.’
‘Me either,’ she replied.
Just then the phone began to ring. ‘It’s Whistler,’ Jones said as he passed it back.
‘Whistler, what’s up?’
‘Have you seen Twitter, guv?’
‘Yeah,’ said Phillips. ‘Jonesy and I are looking at it now.’
‘Any idea what it is in that image?’
‘No idea. How about you?’
‘Not a clue.’
‘Give me a second,’ she said as she pulled X up on her laptop and took another long look at the post. ‘I can’t say why, but I feel like I should know it. There’s something vaguely familiar about it.’
‘I’m looking at it now on my tablet,’ he replied. ‘But for the life of me, I can’t make it out.’
‘How quickly can you get in?’ she asked. ‘We need to identify what this means as a matter of urgency.’
‘If I leave now, I’ll be there in half an hour.’
‘Great. As quick as you can.’ Phillips turned her attention back to Jones. ‘I wonder if Fox has seen this yet?’
‘Well, if she has, we’ll find out soon enough, I’m sure.’
Phillips sat in silence for a moment as she continued to stare at the image on-screen. ‘I’ve had an idea,’ she said before scrolling through the contacts in her phone.
A second later, she was making a call, and Jones watched on as she activated the speaker function.
‘DCI Flannery,’ came the sharp response as it was answered.
‘Danny. Jane Phillips.’
‘Jane? How you doing? Your number didn’t come up.’
‘My way of protecting myself from strange men,’ she joked.
‘I hope you’re not referring to me,’ he said with a laugh. ‘Anyway, what can I do for you at this hour on a Thursday morning?’
‘I’m wondering if you might have some specialist kit that can help me.’
‘What did you have in mind?’
‘I’m trying to trace a structure that’s been posted online, and wondered if you have anything that might scan the image, then locate where it is?’
‘What do you mean by a structure?’ he asked.
‘Probably best if I send it to you. Give me a second.’ Phillips placed the phone down on the desk as she emailed the image from her laptop to Flannery. ‘It should be landing any second,’ she said, picking up the phone once more.
‘Here it is.’ Flannery fell silent for a moment as he opened the message. ‘What the devil is that?’
‘That’s what we’re hoping you can help us find out. We think it’s part of a police building.’
Flannery blew out a breath. ‘Unless we know specifically what we’re looking at in the first place, it’d be impossible to trace it. Sorry, Jane.’
‘Not to worry, Danny.’ Phillips felt her shoulders sag as she locked eyes with Jones. ‘It was worth a shot.’
‘If you can maybe get more of the image, we might be able to do something, but even then, it depends what images we have stored on our databases to reference against. Alternatively, you could maybe try Google images. See if you can find a match on there.’
Phillips dropped her chin to her chest. ‘Needle in a haystack springs to mind.’
‘Sorry I can’t give you better news,’ Flannery said, sensing her despair. ‘You know I’d help if I could.’
‘I do, yeah.’ Phillips raised her head once more. ‘Look, I’d better go. This one’s super urgent.’
‘Good luck with it,’ said Flannery. ‘And shout if you need anything else.’
‘Will do,’ Phillips replied, ending the call.
‘Like you say, guv,’ offered Jones. ‘It was always going to be a long shot. What now?’
‘We do what Danny suggested; get online and start looking at photos of every major police building in Manchester to see if we can figure out where the bloody hell he’s going to strike next.’
An hour later, after splitting up the city’s police properties into three segments dependent on location, Phillips, Jones and Entwistle began frantically searching Google for anything that remotely resembled the mysterious image posted by @therealfirestartermanchester. Bovalino would be in later after taking Izzie to her latest doctor’s appointment.
It was approaching midday by the time the big man strode into the office, carrying a cardboard tray filled with hot drinks and sandwiches, which he quickly handed out. ‘I thought the least I could do was fetch some supplies, seeing I wasn’t here first thing.’
‘You all right, big man?’ asked Entwistle playfully as he took the lid off his coffee. ‘You’ve been bunking off a lot lately, haven’t you?’
Bovalino produced a tight smile. ‘A few things at home to deal with.’
‘Any news on Norman Clarke?’ Phillips asked, keen to change the subject on his behalf.
‘Yeah,’ said Bov as he took a seat. ‘He’s definitely not the next target.’
‘And what makes you say that?’ asked Jones.
‘Because he’s dead. Died of a stroke a few years after leaving the force.’
Phillips didn’t know whether to feel relieved or frustrated that such an obvious target was no longer in the frame. ‘Which means we really have nothing to go on right now.’ She sighed as she dropped her pen on the desk and exhaled sharply.
‘No luck figuring out what that post last night was all about, then?’ Bovalino asked.
‘Nope.’ Phillips glanced at the clock on the wall. ‘The three of us have spent the last three hours reviewing God knows how many pictures of police buildings in Manchester, and the reality is we haven’t got a clue.’
‘Have you thought about putting it out on our social media?’ Bovalino asked, unwrapping his sandwich.
Phillips frowned. ‘Ours? As in the GMP?’
Bovalino took a bite before replying. ‘Yeah. I’m no expert, but last time I checked, we had over half a million followers on there. You never know, one of them might recognise it.’
Phillips sat to attention. ‘That’s a bloody great idea.’
‘He has one every now and again,’ said Entwistle with a grin.
Bovalino flashed him the V-sign before grinning back.
‘Thanks for the brainwave, Bov – and the coffee.’ Phillips paused for a moment. ‘I need to go and see Dudley,’ she said, jumping up from the chair before rushing out of the room.
Five minutes later she found Rupert Dudley sitting behind his desk in the small office on the fourth floor that he called home. He appeared to be grimacing as he stared intently at the computer screen in front of him.
‘Everything all right?’ she asked as she tapped on his open door.
Dudley glanced up, and his posture visibly softened. ‘Sorry, Jane. I was miles away. Just trying to get ahead of things with the latest Firestarter posts that went up last night and this morning.’
‘Is Fox giving you a hard time over them?’
‘That’s just it,’ he replied. ‘She’s not mentioned it at all. In fact, I’ve not heard from her since the aftermath of the Townsend article, which is quite unnerving. She’s rarely quiet when it comes to anything like this.’
Phillips shrugged. ‘It’s probably still the jetlag. It always knocks me out of kilter.’
‘Yeah, maybe.’
‘Anyway.’ Phillips handed him her phone. ‘I need you to put this out on our social media pages.’
Dudley’s eyes narrowed. ‘That’s the image from the Firestarter post that landed this morning.’
‘Yeah, it is.’
‘Why would you want to put that out?’ Dudley was incredulous.
‘Because we’re having no luck figuring out what it is, and time is running out before he strikes again. If we can get this out in front of our followers – people who actually support the police – one of them might be able to tell us where we should be looking.’
‘I’m not convinced, Jane, and I’m not sure Fox will go for it either.’
‘Let me deal with her,’ she replied briskly. ‘And besides, if she’s out of action like you say, then Carter can probably give us the go-ahead on it instead.’
Dudley fell silent for a moment, evidently deep in thought.
‘Come on, Rupert. All you need to do is draft up the post. I can deal with the politics. Okay?’
‘Okay.’ He nodded finally, but still a little hesitant. ‘When do you want it to go out?’
‘As quick as you can.’
‘I’ll work it up, and as soon as Fox or Carter signs off on it, I can post it.’
‘You’re a legend, Rupert,’ said Phillips before turning around and setting off towards the fifth floor.
Ten minutes later, after sharing her plan to post the image with the chief superintendent, she waited impatiently for him to give her the green light.
‘Something like this really should go through Fox,’ said Carter, running his hand through his salt-and-pepper hair. ‘I’m authorised to sign off on general posts, but this one is a little more contentious.’
‘I know that, sir,’ Phillips replied, ‘but the truth is, I don’t think she’ll go for it. And as we’re running out of time, I figured it might be better to ask for forgiveness rather than permission on this one.’
Carter pursed his lips and remained silent for a long moment before his face wrinkled. ‘Come to think of it, she might be off this afternoon; something to do with her son’s school, according to Diane. I can always use that as my excuse for not running it past her in the first instance.’ He picked up the phone on his desk. ‘I’ll call Dudley and give him the green light.’
‘Brilliant. Thank you.’ As Phillips stood, her phone began to vibrate in her hand. Bov was calling. ‘I’d better take this, sir?’
Carter gave her the thumbs-up before waving her away.
‘What’s up?’ she asked Bovalino as she marched past Diane in the outer office.
‘There’s been a sighting of McDonnell in Longsight, guv.’
‘Is it credible?’ Phillips picked up speed as she turned out onto the corridor.
‘Yeah, the manager of an independent hotel has called it in. Reckons McDonnell is staying there.’
Phillips’s pulse quickened. ‘Tell Jones to get the car ready. I’ll meet him in the carpark.’
42
With their anti-stab vests in place under their coats and with Jones driving under blues and twos, Phillips and Jones raced through the afternoon traffic from Ashton House to Longsight – a multicultural suburb located three miles southeast of the city centre. As the world zoomed by the window in a blur, Phillips felt her phone vibrate once again as Dudley’s post of the mysterious structure flashed up in a notification. With her eyes locked on the image, she wondered again what about it appeared so familiar. Despite having no idea what she was looking at, she couldn’t shake the fact she had at some point seen it before.
Just then her phone rang through the car’s central console. She could see from the display it was Entwistle and hit the green answer icon. ‘What’s the update?’
‘The tactical team are en route, guv,’ he replied. ‘I’ve briefed Andrews, and they should be at Lionsgate Villas in ten minutes.’
‘Same as us,’ said Jones as they accelerated past a line of cars that had pulled to the side of the road to let them through.
‘Have you seen the comments on the post?’ asked Entwistle. ‘Bov was right; it’s getting quite a positive response. Very different to those on the Real Firestarter’s post.’
‘I’m looking at them now,’ Phillips replied. ‘Can you and Bov start cross-referencing the suggestions with images online?’
‘We’ll get straight on it.’
‘Great, thanks. And have the phone on standby in case we need you.’
‘Goes without saying, boss.’
Phillips turned her focus back to the image on her phone screen.
Exactly ten minutes later, Jones pulled the car up to the kerb about a hundred feet down the road from the hotel next to the tactical unit’s large van.
Jumping out, she was met by the team leader, Sergeant Louise Andrews, a six-foot, physically imposing cop with a fierce reputation for kicking down doors on behalf of the GMP, and someone Phillips had worked with on many occasions over the years. ‘Lou,’ said Phillips as they approached the four-person team.
‘How do you want to play it, ma’am?’ asked Andrews.
‘If the target is in there, I don’t want to spook him, so we need to be discreet initially.’
‘What did you have in mind?’
‘Jones and I will go in and speak to the manager, and I’ll need two of your team ready to follow us in and the other two covering the back of the building.’
‘Of course,’ said Andrews.
Phillips continued, ‘If McDonnell is inside, then as soon as we identify which room he’s in, and based on the threat to life he poses, we’ll need you to go in with full screens and Tasers.’
‘Not a problem.’ Andrews passed across two police radios. ‘The frequencies are all set to channel B, which is scrambled and untraceable to any scanners.’
Phillips took hers. ‘Everybody ready?’
Andrews and Jones nodded in unison.
‘Let’s go,’ Phillips added before setting off down the street with Jones at her back.
As they approached the hotel, it was evident that the converted, redbrick Victorian villa had seen better days; its paint was peeling, and the neon ‘vacancies’ sign in the front window was broken. Now it intermittently flashed out the word ‘acancies’.
‘It’s exactly the sort of place you said he’d pick, Jonesy,’ Phillips whispered as she led the way up the short path to the battered front door. As they stepped inside, they found themselves in a familiar setting. The team had hunted down criminals in buildings such as this many times before. Again, it seemed that the majority of the hotel owners offering the city’s cheapest accommodation shared a common view on the renovation and upkeep of their properties; namely, that it was an unnecessary expense.
The unmistakable smell of damp filled the air, and despite the No Smoking signs, Phillips noted that the woodchip wallpaper was heavily nicotine-stained and peeling back from the walls where it connected with the ceiling. The threadbare carpet resting underfoot was a trip hazard waiting to happen.
Fixed to the wall to the right of the small reception counter was a doorbell with a sticker underneath that read ‘Press for assistance’. Phillips followed the instruction, then waited. When no one appeared, she pressed it again. A minute or so later, a door behind the counter finally opened, and a rotund woman with frizzy, greying hair and glasses hanging on a cord around her neck stepped through with a quizzical look fixed to her face. ‘Yes?’ The accent was undoubtedly Eastern European.
Phillips pulled out her ID and kept her voice low as she turned her phone screen so the woman could see the mugshot of McDonnell displayed on it. ‘We were told you may have this man staying with you.’
The woman’s eyes narrowed as she pulled on her glasses and leaned forward to get a closer look at the photo. ‘Room eleven – top of house,’ she said in broken English.
‘Is he in the room currently?’
The woman shrugged. ‘Don’t know. He come and go. Unless he need something, I don’t see him.’
‘Are you the one who called to tell us he was here?’ Jones asked.
‘No. My sister, Agnes,’ the woman replied gruffly. ‘I told her not to. It bring trouble.’
‘In that case, please take another look at the picture.’ Phillips pushed the phone closer. ‘Are you sure this is the man in room eleven?’
‘I think. Yes.’
That was all the encouragement Phillips needed as she pulled her radio from her coat pocket. ‘Alpha team, this is Mike-Charlie-One…’
Jones turned to the woman. ‘Best you go back inside the office and close the door. It’s about to get very busy round here.’
The radio crackled into life. ‘This is Alpha team,’ Andrews replied.
‘Alpha team, we are clear,’ Phillips barked into the handset. ‘Strike, strike, strike!’
At that, the frizzy-haired woman disappeared back where she’d come from, and twenty seconds later, Andrews and PC Nelson arrived wearing helmets and visors as they rushed through the front door. Andrews also carried a transparent plastic shield while Nelson gripped a single-person door ram in both gloved hands.
‘Top floor, room eleven,’ said Phillips, pointing the way.
Andrews didn’t need telling twice as she and Nelson took the stairs two at a time with Phillips and Jones tucking in behind.
As they reached the top-floor landing, Andrews stood back, holding the shield in her left hand, before drawing her Taser in the right.
Nelson took his lead from her, banging heavily on the door. ‘Police, open the door!’
The space fell silent.
Nelson banged once more and repeated the instruction. ‘Police, open the door!’
Again, no response.
Andrews turned to Phillips. ‘It’s your call, ma’am.’
‘Break it down,’ she said flatly.
With a loud crack, Nelson slammed the battering ram into the door just below the handle, splintering the frame as the door flung open on its hinges. As he stepped back, Andrews moved forward with the shield and Taser ready.
