Dead Smart Page 7

  I retreated quickly towards the bottom of the row of cars, taking off my beanie, which I stuffed into a pocket hoping the change of appearance wouldn’t attract attention. I rang Boyd.

  ‘What’s happening?’ I hissed into a hand cupped over my mobile.

  ‘Horne has reappeared from somewhere. I’ve noticed one of those big Mercs parking.’

  ‘He must be waiting somewhere in the shadows.’

  ‘Wait, he’s moving.’

  The seconds dragged until Boyd rang me back, warning me Horne had spotted another unsuspecting car owner. I moved back towards one of the 4x4 vehicles and as I did so caught sight of Ferris standing, mobile phone at his ear, a hand fluttering the air. At least he was trying to make a performance. This time they allowed the car owner to walk a little further, until he was stopped by Ferris and then, as they talked, the two men with hoodies reappeared staggering around before bumping into Ferris and the other man. Their body language apologised but all they needed were seconds for hands to dip into his pockets before they faded back into the crowd. By then I had seen enough. I called Boyd.

  ‘That’s two.’

  ‘What do we do, boss?’

  There was every possibility that both the Lexus 4x4 and the Mercedes were going to be stolen. Time was against us. Ferris and Horne were probably walking over towards the vehicles as we talked. I should be contacting the owners. Or at least stopping their vehicles being stolen. But doing that meant I’d never have the chance of finding out who was behind the thefts.

  That person might well have been responsible for Westford’s death.

  ‘We follow them.’

  Boyd and I sat in our cars waiting for the Lexus and Mercedes to appear. I checked my watch every five minutes until an agonising thirty minutes passed. Fewer and fewer cars had been parked as time for kick-off approached. Once the game had started the stewards at the VIP entrance went to sit in a small hut. I squinted over and saw them drinking from small plastic cups. There was probably a radio playing the commentary of the game. Minutes later, I saw the Lexus moving and tapped out a message to Boyd. I squeezed the steering wheel, clenched my jaw, and watched as the Lexus approached the exit, the yellow barrier lifting open. The stewards paid it little attention and the 4x4 pulled away. I started the engine and followed him. Boyd had instructions to follow the Mercedes.

  The Lexus kept under the speed limit as it wound its way through the suburbs of Bristol. I half expected it to head towards the port but he indicated for the M32 motorway taking him north out of the city. This route led to the M4 which could take him west towards the Severn Bridge and over towards Cardiff. But he never made it that far, indicating left for Hambrook. I followed through the suburbs of Bristol until, after various side streets, he pulled into an industrial estate and then into a unit owned by a freight forwarding company.

  I drove on and then turned around, parking the car well away from any prying eyes. Thankfully the unit abutted a piece of disused ground and I scrambled up through clumps of weeds and rubbish until I reached higher ground elevated above the unit. I could see three men standing by the Lexus. In one corner was a large container. Moments later one of the men got into the Lexus and drove it slowly into the container. I could make out the owner’s logo on the container but I strained to make a note of a series of numbers and letters at its base.

  Centrally located for the M4 and M5 motorways and near the docks in Bristol, the unit was an ideal location. I slid down the bank, using my fleeced gloved hands to break my fall. I sat in my car, smoking a cigarette, wondering if I should now be calling the Avon and Somerset police. After all, I had witnessed a crime; I knew where the perpetrators could be located. It was one of those decisions I could live to regret. I thought about Terry, realising I had to protect him. Ferris and Horne were small players. I called Boyd.

  ‘I’m following the Mercedes now, boss.’

  ‘In what direction?’

  ‘He’s travelling north on the M32.’

  Twenty minutes later Boyd slipped into the passenger seat. I gave him a brief summary of what I had seen earlier before we left and scrambled back up to the vantage point. There was no Mercedes in sight. A tractor unit reversed towards the container, two men securing the door. They worked quickly and a few minutes later the container was securely fastened. Boyd and I rushed back to the car just in time to watch as it drove out of the industrial unit.

  The suburbs of Bristol were quiet and twenty minutes later the container disappeared into the entrance of Avonmouth docks.

  Boyd and I found a café nearby that served strong coffee and bacon sandwiches on enormous thick slices of white bread.

  ‘What we do, boss?’ It was the second time that night I had avoided his question. I stirred a spoon lazily through my coffee.

  ‘Only one thing we can do now.’

  Chapter 12

  Sunday

  07.30

  ‘Couldn’t sleep?’ I said.

  Boyd looked as bad as I felt. Eyes swollen, dark rings underneath, and a grey tiredness that tugs at your back and burns your eyes. I had slept only four hours, awaking from a vivid dream of peering over a conference table at Cornock and Hobbs who leered at me as though I should have known better. It had been late when we had completed all the relevant notifications to the Avon and Somerset police. The duty inspector at the station in central Bristol sounded wary as I explained why we were following Ferris and Horne. Within an hour a customs officer had arrived. He had wandering eyes and a twitching jaw as though he was aching to punch someone.

  My comments about wanting to protect my source of information were met with silent derision.

  ‘Go back to Wales. We’ll deal with this,’ he had said eventually.

  It had been two in the morning when we drove back into Cardiff. I lay on my bed staring at the ceiling; although my body shouted at me to sleep, my mind forced me awake.

  The door of the Incident Room crashed open: a cleaner stood there, surprised, then stammered an apology and left.

  I stepped towards the board and peered at the image of Westford and then Clayton and Haddock.

  ‘When are they raiding the container?’ Boyd said.

  ‘They’re going to text me.’

  He glanced at his watch. ‘I’ll call Avon and Somerset for an update.’

  I wandered back to my desk.

  I sank into my office chair and rubbed my hands over my face; my eyes felt sticky. There was a little over twenty-four hours remaining until the meeting with Hobbs when I’d have to explain everything that had happened.

  I read again statements from Kylie Westford and Eddie’s sister. I searched for inspiration but found none. Everything pointed to Westford having a source of income that low-level drug dealing wouldn’t explain. I scoured the statements gathered by the uniformed officers from various members of the public outside the Cardiff City Stadium on the night Westford was killed for something we might have missed. In the background, I heard Boyd’s voice and, seeing him in the doorway of my office, I ushered him in.

  ‘I’ve spoken with a sergeant in the Avon and Somerset police. Apparently three other cars were stolen last night: two new BMWs and an old E Type Jaguar.’

  ‘Did all the owners lose their keys?’

  Boyd nodded. ‘I’m amazed nobody has seen this pattern before.’

  ‘You know how it is. It’s an isolated incident. A one-off. It is given a low priority and nobody thinks to mention to other forces there were four car thefts when Cardiff played their local team.’

  ‘And Cardiff play each team once away from home so the pattern would go unnoticed.’

  ‘Top of the class, Sergeant Pierce.’

  Boyd left and I got back to picking up the rest of my inquiry, trying to compose some sort of report for Hobbs and Cornock that would not make me look a complete idiot. I wasn’t having much success. I found the YouTube video of Michael Haddock smiling to the camera as he sauntered through his collection of classic cars. I spotted
an old Morris Minor Traveller, its wood trim shining alongside the gleaming paint of the bodywork. He suggested an old Ferrari –his ‘pride and joy’–was probably worth about forty thousand pounds. He laughed off any suggestion that he was obsessive.

  Haddock regularly featured in the Cardiff press and I found a picture of him with his son, Jason, announcing a new product his company had developed. It all sounded too good to be true and I had the feeling I had missed something.

  I noticed the time and realised I should call the customs officer in Bristol.

  ‘Bad timing. I can’t talk now.’ The customs officer barked down the telephone.

  Unnerved, I sat chewing a nail wondering if anything had gone wrong at Bristol docks. It was another fifteen minutes before he rang me back.

  ‘A complete waste of fucking time.’

  My mouth suddenly dried; I drew my tongue over parched lips.

  ‘The container was full of garden furniture. Tables and chairs. And not even a toy car in sight.’

  ‘I don’t understand…’

  ‘I’ll need to make a report.’

  ‘Was it the right container?’

  ‘Don’t be stupid. It was the one you told us about.’

  ‘There must be some—’

  But the line was dead. I slammed down the handset as Boyd walked into my room.

  ‘Bad news?’

  ‘The container was full of garden furniture.’

  Boyd frowned.

  ‘We must have followed the wrong container.’

  ‘But …’

  ‘They must have switched containers before we met up.’

  ‘Hard to believe.’

  I slammed a fist onto the table.

  It wasn’t going to help; it wouldn’t change anything.

  ‘So we don’t know where either of these new cars have gone. And apart from the vintage Jag, cars worth a quarter of a million were nicked last night. And they are all on their way to Nigeria or somewhere similar.’

  Something Boyd said stuck in my mind. ‘What did you just say?’

  ‘Ah… I don’t…’

  ‘Vintage cars. How many vintage cars were stolen when Cardiff City played away from home?’

  ‘I’d need to check, boss.’

  ‘Do it, now. There’s something else I need to check.’

  I found the list of Jaguar XK Type R owners and, ignoring the name of Mrs Clayton, I focused on the various limited companies. It was the one thing we hadn’t checked. There were a dozen companies and I punched in the details of each into a Google search. The barest details appeared on screen of director and registered address. My breathing became shallow as I reached the end of the list with each unfamiliar name only aggravating my anxiety. I tapped in the name of Bell Kingston Ltd, the tenth company, and stared at the screen barely believing the name I was reading. Jason Haddock was its director.

  I stood up abruptly, pushed the chair against the radiator and then strode out into the Incident Room.

  ‘Jason Haddock owns a Jaguar XK Type R.’

  ‘I thought—’

  ‘The car is registered to a limited company.’

  Boyd nodded his recognition. ‘I’ve checked through the details of the reported car thefts around the dates of the Cardiff City games. None of them were vintage cars.’

  I dragged my fingers over my cheeks, down across my lips, wondering what the hell we were doing. I stumbled over my words. ‘Michael Haddock’s business is in trouble. It has been for several years. He has to refinance through some bank in Nigeria which he visits regularly.’

  ‘And we know stolen luxury cars often end up in that part of the world.’

  ‘Even if he gets a fraction of what the cars are worth he would still be making enough money to help with his cash flow.’

  Boyd stood up and marched over to the board. ‘And he uses Westford and the likes of Ferris and Horne as drivers.’

  ‘Westford must’ve got greedy.’

  ‘His son saw him arguing with somebody.’

  Then another piece of the jigsaw fell into place. ‘Of course, of course. Find the young lad’s statement.’

  Boyd flicked through the paperwork and pulled out a brief statement from Hartley Westford. ‘What are you looking for, boss?’ He pushed it over in my direction.

  I sat down and focused on reading the statement.

  It was halfway down the second page. I stopped, blinked and then re-read the sentence ‘Dad was talking to a man who looked like a seagull had pooed on his hair.’

  ‘Here it is,’ I said, handing the statement to Boyd with my finger pointing at the relevant section. Then I walked back to my room and clicked through into the images I had seen earlier that morning. I shouted at Boyd and when he reached my desk I had the image of Michael Haddock and his son open on the screen. Jason Haddock’s flash of white hair above his left ear was clear for all to see.

  Chapter 13

  Sunday

  11.30 am

  Superintendent Cornock opened his eyes wide enough for the whites to glisten in the artificial light of his office. Then he stared at me as though I had taken leave of my senses and that any minute he would have to call for paramedics to remove me.

  ‘It’s the evidence of a child, for Christ’s sake.’

  I paused, crossing one leg over the other knee. Cornock drew a hand over his hair and blew out a mouthful of air.

  ‘John…You’re asking me … Let’s go through this again.’

  I went over the evidence again. Once I had finished I realised that I wouldn’t even be able to convince myself. The two cars we had seen stolen were in a container we couldn’t trace, in a port we couldn’t locate, being prepared for loading to a country we couldn’t identify. And I was trying to persuade my senior officer we should raid the home of an upstanding member of the Cardiff community.

  ‘Ferris and Horne are involved in a major organised crime group targeting luxury cars.’

  ‘I accept that. It is the link to Haddock that worries me.’

  ‘He has links with West Africa, and his business is struggling.’

  ‘Look, you know how these things work. We’d need a search warrant. Can you imagine the reaction from a magistrate? They all probably play golf with Haddock.’

  An awkward silence filled the room as Cornock stared at the brief summary I had prepared for him. He sighed, turning one of his expensive fountain pens through his fingers. The last thing I wanted was more delay and when he glanced at the telephone on his desk I could sense his mind contemplating consulting a superior officer.

  A brief text arrived on my mobile telephone. It was from Boyd relaying a message from the plainclothes detectives I had requisitioned the night before to stake out Haddock’s luxury property. ‘Ferris and Horne have just arrived’. A buzz of excitement pulsed through my body. I looked over at Cornock’s anguished face.

  ‘Michael Haddock has just had some guests arrive: Ferris and Horne.’

  The whites of his eyes glistened again but this time the relief was evident as he forced a grin. ‘What are you waiting for?’

  I left his office and marched back to the Incident Room where Boyd was already on his feet.

  ‘Superintendent Cornock has authorised an arrest.’

  Boyd punched the air, then reached for the phone. ‘I’ll tell the DC at Haddock’s property.’

  ‘We’ll need a team and a full complement of CSIs,’ I said, making for my room.

  Half an hour later I sat in the passenger seat of the pool car clutching the search warrant in my hands as Boyd hammered along Newport Road out of Cardiff towards the motorway. Regular contact with the officer outside Haddock’s property kept us up-to-date and I was relieved nobody had left and nobody else had arrived. The satnav took us along the motorway for a few miles before we indicated off towards the countryside around Abergavenny.

  We parked some distance from the entrance and called the detective sitting in his car nearby.

  ‘All quiet,’ he repl
ied when I asked him if anything had changed.

  We waited until a second car with a search team pulled up behind us and then my mobile rang. It was Alvine Dix. ‘I hope this isn’t a wild goose chase, Marco.’ Then I saw the scientific support vehicle slowing behind us.

  ‘Just wait for my signal,’ I snapped before finishing the call.

  I glanced over at Boyd and nodded.

  He accelerated through the gates and the search team car followed us.

  Through an avenue of silver birch trees we descended until we reached an opening that led to a gravelled area near the main entrance to Haddock’s Georgian manor house. The front elevation of the building was perfectly proportioned with two large windows either side of an ornate front door. I jumped out and realised there were no cars in sight.

  The second car drew to a halt behind us, both officers joining Boyd and I.

  I waved a hand to both of them. ‘We’ll go round the back. There must be some outbuildings. You try the front door first.’

  Boyd and I jogged round to the rear of the building passing a walled garden to our left. We reached the back of the property; even for a Sunday it all felt eerily quiet. Fear gripped my chest – that we were too late and that there was some other exit.

  Boyd rattled the rear door which was securely locked and I jogged over a cobbled area one side of which was occupied by three cottages. On the other was a large wooden gate set into the side of a building that probably had a courtyard behind it. I wondered if this might be the home of Haddock’s classic car collection. Boyd had been peering into one of the cottages before joining me.

  ‘They look empty, boss.’