Chase The Devil: (DI Jake Sawyer series Book 5) Read online

  DC Moran pushed through the crowd and caught Sawyer’s eye for a second. He offered a sour little smile, then headed off into the back of the house, after Drummond.

  ‘Okay, lover boy.’ A male voice from behind. Sawyer turned. DI Martin Pittman ground a cigarette into a poolside ashtray and slipped an arm around Sawyer’s shoulders. ‘Let’s get you out of the blast zone.’

  Pittman led Sawyer down the drive, where his blue Subaru Outback was parked at the front of the house. ‘How did you get here?’

  Sawyer clutched at his side. ‘Taxi.’

  ‘I’ll give you a lift home. But you should probably drop in to A&E first.’ Pittman opened the passenger door and Sawyer eased himself in. Pittman looked back towards the house as he ducked into the driver’s side. ‘That’s one way to leave your mark.’

  He closed his door and they sat in silence for a moment. Sawyer closed his eyes and breathed in deep through his nose. Leather upholstery, the flat citrus of Pittman’s cologne. The car interior had been baked in the summer heat. Sawyer brushed pool water off his arms and looked for a manual window roller.

  Pittman half-turned the ignition key and pressed a button which rolled down both windows. ‘When’s your last day?’

  ‘Not sure yet. It’s all done in principle, but the brass are still working out where to put me.’

  Pittman whistled. ‘Keating saw some of that. Might be awkward.’

  ‘I don’t think it brought the service into disrepute, trying to not get punched by a drunken man who thinks—’

  ‘I’d rather not know, Sawyer. Can’t hurt me then, eh?’ He lit a cigarette and held it out of the window. ‘Haven’t had a chance to congratulate you yet. DS is a strange one. Kind of like middle management.’

  Sawyer laughed, winced. ‘It’s taken me a long time to rise to the middle.’

  Pittman blew a neat jet of smoke out of the window. ‘It’s tough at the middle, y’know.’

  Sawyer nodded. ‘Crowded, too.’

  Pittman laughed. Music throbbed from the house. ‘Forget Me Nots’ by Patrice Rushen. ‘You’ll do well in London. But they’re not as sophisticated as they like to think.’

  ‘Dunning-Kruger effect.’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘Never mind. I’m just in a big-city mood at the moment. I like the idea of a bit of anonymity.’

  ‘Easier to keep your secrets. The cases will be more complex, though.’ He drew on his cigarette, puffed away more smoke. ‘Hey. Remember that thing last year? Missing professor.’

  Sawyer frowned. ‘The neuroscience guy?’

  ‘Yeah. Pope. The place we checked out, where the professor’s phone had pinged? The old abattoir. It was closed in 2009. The guy who ran it when it was operational, a fella called Sherratt. Vanished. Been missing for almost a week now. Out of character, usual.’

  ‘Did Sherratt have any connection to Pope?’

  Pittman shook his head. ‘No. The trail on Pope is ice cold. Apparently, his wife has shacked up with another academic type. Didn’t waste much time.’

  Sawyer shuffled round to face Pittman. ‘And does Keating see this bloke’s disappearance as a lead?’

  ‘More of a possible link.’

  ‘I could look into it. Go out on a high.’

  ‘No chance. You’re as good as on garden leave now, depending on Keating’s mood over what he saw in there. And I don’t want any jurisdiction grief if you dig up something and then piss off down south.’

  ‘We might also be joining imaginary dots. A lot of mispers do turn out to be runaways.’

  Pittman finished his cigarette and threw the stub out of the window. ‘C’mon, Sawyer. We’re big, tough detectives. The FLOs like to play it soft for the families, but we both know that most people don’t just disappear. They get disappeared.’

  33

  PRESENT DAY

  Bruce leapt up onto the bed and marched back and forth across Sawyer’s chest. Sawyer checked the time on his phone—10:15am—and rolled out onto the floor. Bruce jumped down and wound around his ankles, purring.

  ‘Breakfast, big man. Not far off lunch.’

  Lately, Sawyer’s sleep was longer but fragmented: an hour of vivid and baffling dreams, followed by a period of tossing and turning before the next hour. He padded through to the kitchen, rolling his head around his neck, cracking his muscles. He was tense, tenderised. Rested but not recharged.

  He scooped out Bruce’s food and made coffee, staring into the cup as the machine huffed and hissed. His phone buzzed against the bedside table and he hurried through to take the call.

  ‘Yo!’ the caller greeted him as he set the phone onto speaker and dug out some clothes.

  ‘My own personal Jesse Pinkman.’

  ‘Gayest name ever,’ said Ash. ‘What you saying?’

  Sawyer smiled and sat down on the bed. ‘So you know Starsky & Hutch but not Breaking Bad? Kids today.’

  Ash sighed. ‘Don’t know, don’t care. Look. Your man, Price. Yeah?’

  ‘I’m aware of his work.’

  ‘This shit about selling your boy “something stronger”. He was talking about the Big H, yeah?’

  ‘Haribo?’

  Ash sniggered. He had the laugh of an older man, phlegmy and abrasive. ‘Nah, man. Smack. Heroin. Well, sort of heroin. I heard it might be fentanyl disguised as heroin. Nasty shit.’

  Sawyer sipped his coffee. ‘When did it start and stop?’ A sizzling sound from Ash’s end. ‘Are you smoking dope? Bit early, isn’t it?’

  ‘Vaping. Bubblegum. Look, Price said that Darren bought the smack off him, but he didn’t think he was a junky. He wasn’t doing it himself. None of the tell-tale signs, like.’

  Sawyer sat forward. ‘So what was he doing with it? Selling it on?’

  Another laugh from Ash. ‘Nah. He was an errand boy. Picking it up for someone else. Sort of an inbetweener.’

  Sawyer looked through the window. A boxy, mustard-yellow Range Rover slowed and pulled in to the side of the lane.

  ‘You still there?’ Ash continued. ‘Do you want to know who the someone else was?’

  ‘Thanks, but I already know.’

  He ended the call, not waiting for a confirmation. DS Ed Shepherd got out of the Range Rover and ran the palm of his hand along his scruffy goatee.

  Sawyer tapped in another number; the call connected instantly.

  ‘Sir.’

  ‘Matt. The address you gave me, for Stuart Sutton. He wasn’t there. I think he was using Darren Coleman to pick up his drugs, after the exclusion. Look into further drug convictions. Did he cross paths with any local rehab facilities?’

  A knock at the door.

  ‘Do you think Sutton had something to do with Darren’s disappearance?’

  ‘I don’t know, but I’d like to put it to him in person. See the whites of his eyes. Cross-ref all the possible drug convictions, rehab programmes. We need to find him.’

  ‘We?’

  Sawyer walked to the front door. ‘Does Shepherd know we’ve been talking?’

  Walker hesitated. ‘No.’

  ‘Let’s keep it that way.’

  Sawyer opened the door. Shepherd nodded, and stepped into the sitting room, closing the door behind him. He hovered at the back of the sofa and grinned at Sawyer.

  ‘What?’

  Shepherd nodded. ‘Bed hair.’

  Sawyer swiped a hand across the top of his head. ‘How are things back on the bridge?’

  ‘Now I’m thinking of Keating as Captain Kirk.’ He shrugged. ‘Not great. You’ll love this.’ He hurled himself into an armchair, causing Bruce to startle and bolt into the bedroom. ‘In a meeting about the Hardwick case, Myers actually suggested we consult with you. Farrell flipped.’

  ‘Farrell is involved in the case?’

  ‘Yeah. While he’s working on your thing, Keating wanted to double him up on the Hardwick murder. He’s pretty chummy with Moran.’

  Sawyer perched on the sofa arm. ‘Gruesome twosome. How did
your DC get on? Serious crime related to the meat industry? Animals?’

  Shepherd took out his pad. ‘Pulled out a few unsolveds. 2006. Guy who ran a puppy mill from his farm near Hartington. Murdered. Beaten pretty badly. Plenty of items stolen, though. 2008—’

  ‘The broiler chicken farm guy.’

  ‘Yes. Beaten badly, but also tortured.’

  Sawyer nodded. ‘Partially flayed.’

  Shepherd continued. ‘2010. A spate of attacks on legal badger-culling staff. Man traps. No deaths but a couple of the injuries were life changing.’

  ‘I interviewed one of them.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yeah. Up at Cavendish. Pittman sent me.’

  Shepherd checked his notes. ‘Fenwick?’

  ‘Rings a bell.’

  ‘There’s a couple more. 2010. Neuroscience professor. Milton Pope. Missing.’

  ‘What’s the animal angle?’

  ‘His university lab was involved in animal experiments. I think he got the usual grief from the ALF before his disappearance. And then in 2012, Mervyn Sherratt. Owner and General Manager of the old Sherratt & Sons abattoir, outside Hayfield. Decommissioned a few years earlier.’ Shepherd looked up from his pad. ‘Missing.’

  Sawyer closed his eyes, casting through memories. ‘I looked into the Pope case with Pittman, too. We had a wander round the abattoir grounds. Couldn’t get into the main building.’

  Shepherd angled his head. ‘Couldn’t get in?’

  ‘Well. We could have, but it just wouldn’t have been appropriate. So, that was Sherratt’s place. It’s where Pope’s phone signal gave its final ping.’

  Shepherd pocketed the notepad. ‘Could be a connection, but the trail is stone cold for both. Talking of pings, any luck with yours?’

  ‘Not yet. What was the badger guy’s name again?’

  ‘Fenwick.’

  Sawyer pondered, shook his head. ‘Did Drummond come back with an answer on Hardwick being gagged?’

  Shepherd paused, turned to the window.

  ‘Ed. This is for the greater good. It’s just solid police work, consulting with your Hero Cop.’

  ‘No gag, according to Drummond.’ Shepherd swallowed. ‘So he must have done the flaying somewhere private. Because of the screaming.’

  Sawyer frowned. ‘Maybe he wanted to hear the screaming.’ He looked up. ‘So, how about Farrell? And Bowman?’

  ‘Farrell still hasn’t called me in about it.’

  ‘Keating has probably warned him off because of the Hardwick case. He talked to me again.’

  Shepherd puffed out his cheeks. ‘Did you lie to him?’

  ‘I was economical with the truth. I think he’s assuming you’ll co-operate.’

  Shepherd’s phone rang; he stepped out onto the porch and took the call, speaking in a low voice. Sawyer edged over to the kitchen, watching him.

  Shepherd called in through the door. ‘Got to go, sir. Urgent.’

  ‘Anything I can do to help?’

  Shepherd shot him a doubtful look.

  ‘Can I come along?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  Sawyer threw on his trainers, watching through the bedroom window as Shepherd climbed into the Range Rover. He waited for the car to move back onto the road, and hurried outside to the Mini.

  Shepherd U-turned and drove off towards the Hayfield crossroads. Sawyer crossed the driveway bridge and idled until he saw Shepherd turn left, away from the town. The flat, wide fields around the road to Sparrowpit made it easy to keep the Range Rover in sight at a distance, and when Shepherd turned into a lane guarded by two uniforms, Sawyer pulled over and made a call.

  Dean Logan slurped at something before speaking. ‘Jake Sawyer.’

  ‘Dean Logan. Vodka tonic to warm up the engine?’

  Logan laughed. ‘Fuck off, Sawyer. Way too early, even for me. Coffee, black.’

  ‘Like your soul.’ Sawyer watched the uniforms wave Shepherd through. ‘Enough with the baby talk. Information.’

  ‘As in, you want it?’

  ‘As in, I’ve got it. Cordon set up off Winnat’s Pass. Woodland, looks like it. The outer perimeter is set way back. Nobody getting anywhere near the side road.’

  Logan slurped again. ‘Sounds big.’

  ‘Get me the details and you can have your ripper story.’

  ‘On it like a car bonnet.’

  34

  Sawyer parked in Hartington village square and turned off the car engine. He sat for a few moments with his eyes closed, listening to the final section of Banstyle by Underworld: downtempo electronica, with a drowsy, stream-of-consciousness vocal. But the cinema behind his eyes unspooled its resident horror: bloodied faces, looming forward through flared sunlight; his beloved dead, forever alive and forever re-dying in an abysmal loop of flailing and screaming.

  ‘You went missing once.’

  He opened his eyes. Jessica sat in her usual place, in the back seat, head leaning on the window, framed by a torrent of coal-black hair. This time, she wore a faded T-shirt. Green with a patchy black print and the legend IRON BUTTERFLY in a psychedelic font.

  She smiled, but didn’t look at him. Because she didn’t see him. Because she wasn’t really there.

  ‘You were with some older lads.’ She gave a warm smile of recall. ‘Some quarry or waste ground, not too far from the house. Michael was with you. He said there was some kind of pit, with shallow sides. Not that deep. And you’d all been launching yourself off the edge, daring each other to land at the deepest spot.’

  Sawyer watched his mother’s lips. Not real but moving. Not there, but somehow conjuring the words.

  ‘You jumped a long way and they thought you were hurt, so they legged it.’ She laughed. ‘Michael came running home and Dad came to find you. But you’d gone. They looked all over and Dad was close to calling the police when Michael found you in a mini digger that had been left there by the workmen, luckily without power. You said you wanted to use it to make the hole deeper, because it was “too easy”. You were only five, my darling. You’ve been making things hard for yourself ever since.’ She lifted her eyes to him, and he felt the urge to smile, to show her he still had the dimple. ‘That poor woman. Find her boy, Jake. All she can do is look back. Find her boy so she can start to move forward again.’

  Sawyer turned away, gazing out of the passenger window at the stone cottages lining the main street. ‘What am I missing? I can’t see it. Help me remember, Mum.’

  Tap, tap, tap.

  He startled. A squashed, elderly man wearing driving gloves leaned in at the driver side window, making a prodding, downward motion with his finger. Sawyer pressed a button and the glass slipped down.

  ‘You just got here, son? We’ve got an hour left on this.’ The man passed a small parking ticket through to Sawyer. ‘It’ll save you 80p. All adds up, eh?’

  ‘Yes. Thanks. That’s kind of you.’

  The man gave a dismissive wave and walked away. ‘No problem at all. You take care of yourself.’

  Sawyer studied the parking ticket, braced, and checked the back seat in the rear-view mirror.

  Empty.

  ‘Are you sure you don’t want a cup of tea?’

  Sawyer hovered by the window of the cottage sitting room. Across the road, the sandwich board outside The Nut Tree café asked, IS EVERYTHING OKAY? with arrows emerging from both YES and NO into an image of a steaming mug and the solution: COME IN AND HAVE A COFFEE.

  ‘I’m fine, thanks.’

  ‘At least sit yourself down, then.’ Lillian Fowler gestured to a puffy armchair with embroidered antimacassars.

  Sawyer smiled and sat.

  Lillian took her place on a matching sofa facing a vast stone fireplace with dormant wood burner. She was mid-sixties, with a hairsprayed whip of dyed auburn hair. ‘Have you been to The Nut Tree?’

  Sawyer nodded. ‘Yes. I sometimes meet my friend there.’ A pang of something. Guilt?

  ‘It’s been there for a fair
few years.’

  ‘Mrs Fowler. As I said, I’m working with Lewis Vaughan, the partner of Virginia Mendez, the young woman you picked up last night.’

  Lillian toyed with her wedding ring, sliding it up and down against her knuckle. ‘Oh, it was awful. The poor woman. I don’t know what she’d been up to. My husband thought she was on drugs or something.’

  ‘Is your—’

  ‘Ron is resting. He sleeps quite late, anyway, and I think it was a bit of a shock for him.’ She leaned forward. ‘You’re a detective, yes?’

  Sawyer nodded. ‘Detective Inspector. But I’m helping Lewis, the woman’s partner, on a private basis. Exactly where did you first see Ms Mendez?’

  ‘Oh, we were driving back from a friend’s house in Chapel. Ron mentioned the woman up ahead. He said he thought she was walking too near the roadside. She turned and saw the car and just stepped out, waving her arms and shouting for us to stop. He slammed on the brakes and she ran around and got into the back seat. She kept looking behind her, into the woods.’

  ‘Did she say anything specific?’

  Lillian dropped her eyes to the worn Havana rug in front of the fireplace. ‘She was sobbing and pleading. She kept saying, “Go!” and “Please!” And she tried to lock the doors from inside, but they’re automatic. Only the driver can do that, you see.’

  ‘And was she walking in the direction of Hartington?’

  ‘Yes. I’m sure I saw her coming out of the woods. Just before she saw us. I thought she was, you know, doing her business.’

  Sawyer managed a polite smile. ‘Was there anything near the location where you picked her up? Any landmarks?’

  Lillian thought for a moment. ‘There was a traffic cone, across the road. Just opposite the spot where I first saw her.’

  Sawyer looked at Lillian’s hands. She was twisting the ring now, loose around her finger. ‘Did Virginia look hurt?’

  ‘She had a nasty bang on the head. I gave her my bottle of water and she drank it in one go, then just sat there with her mouth pinched shut, staring out of the window. Ron turned the car round, heading back towards Buxton, and said he was going to get her to a hospital. She nodded but didn’t look at us.’