round and gave the girl a last cursory once over. He was grateful for her sake; she’d be in good hands with Wolfe, even if it was too late.
It was cold, still dark and had just started drizzling. Typical, thought Brady as he slammed the passenger door of Conrad’s metallic silver Saab. In the distance he could hear the bleated moan of a foghorn. The air was thick with a salty dampness. Brady dragged heavily on the fading glow of his cigarette butt before throwing it into the gutter. Sixth one of the day, he thought; so much for giving up. He turned up his jacket collar as he looked up and down the hazily lit street. Cars were tightly jammed into any available space. It looked as if Gates had called in every officer, regardless of holidays or shifts. Brady limped slowly towards the heavily worn stone steps that led up to the station, kicking an empty beer can out of his path. What a dive, he thought as he watched the can crash into a smashed vodka bottle. The telltale leftovers of a Thursday night in Whitley Bay. Behind him the Saab skulked off as Conrad left in search of a parking space.
He limped over to the steps that led up to the closed wooden doors and decided to take the easy route and walk up the ramp that had recently been built as a PC suck-up to accessibility. The only time he had ever known it to be used was when a drunk in a wheelchair had been arrested for lewd and threatening behaviour. The crap that arrest had earned Gates with the press was still a standing joke at the station. Gates still hadn’t found out that Brady was the one who had leaked the arrest to the press as part of a bet with a couple of other coppers from CID. Gates was ever vigilant when it came to adhering to political correctness so to be accused of being the most un-PC PC in the North East by the local press was a hard blow. If Gates had known Brady was responsible his career would have been over long ago.
He steeled himself before pushing open the heavy wooden doors that led into the station’s Victorian tiled entrance. He looked at the public notice board on the wall. It was filled with the usual crap. The station was as gloomy and depressing as ever, just like the job. Brady breathed in the same acrid damp that had greeted him for too many years.
The station was housed in a dank Victorian building located in a side street leading off from Whitley Bay’s small town centre. These days the town was known for one thing: binge drinking. Once famous as a seaside resort it had sunk to an all-time low. A nirvana of pubs and guesthouses lined up together, catering for every stag and hen party’s wildest and crassest desires; from topless bar staff to lewd threesome live acts. Anything went now that the credit crunch had kicked in. Disposable cash was at an all-time low, so pubs and clubs were doing whatever it took to pull hard-pushed clientele in.
Brady shivered in disgust. He hated Whitley Bay; it was a shabby rundown ghost town during the day where empty, dilapidated Victorian buildings bleakly lined the sea front. But at night it became prey to the lowest of scum. Bouncers in dinner jackets and bow ties tried to maintain order as they threatened drunken punters with their small eyes and overweight, thuggish bodies. Bank holiday weekends were the worst. Scum travelled in from miles around in order to drink themselves into oblivion before ending the night by trying to get into someone’s knickers. He had seen it for himself; the gorging, the vomiting and the senseless shags in the back lanes as they drunkenly waited for a taxi to take them home to their other halves. In the morning the promenade would be strewn with half-eaten kebabs and chips covered in curry sauce fought over by scavenging seagulls. Occasionally the odd, shrivelled condom would be left discarded down a side street or on the beach, as readily forgotten as the drunken, fumbling act itself.
Brady pushed open the door that led into the reception area.
‘Bloody hell, Jack!’ exclaimed the desk sergeant as he looked up.
Brady gave a grimace of a smile. He was more than relieved to see Turner on desk duty. He’d had quite a few drinks with the desk sergeant over the years.
‘I heard you weren’t due back until Monday?’ Turner questioned.
‘Yeah, well Gates decided that today was a better day than any,’ Brady replied warmly.
Turner, a short, rotund, balding man in his early fifties, leaned towards Brady.
‘I better warn you, Jack, all hell’s breaking loose here,’ Turner said in a conspiratorial tone.
Brady searched Charlie Turner’s tiny, dark eyes hidden beneath sagging, crumpled eyelids and realised he was being serious.
‘What’s going on?’
‘What? You must have heard about Jimmy Matthews? He was suspended earlier this morning! I expect that’s why you’ve been called in early—’ Turner stopped as the doors behind Brady swung open and then slammed closed. The heavy dull sound reverberated throughout the old building.
The knot in Brady’s stomach tightened. Turner knew that he and Jimmy Matthews went way back. They had both signed up to the force the old-fashioned way and had worked hard, watching each other’s back to get to where they were now: Detective Inspectors.
‘I can’t say any more than I’ve said. But, watch your step, eh? Gates is in no mood for games right now,’ Turner said in a hushed voice before Conrad reached them.
‘So, Harry, how’s it going?’ Turner asked as he nodded at Conrad.
‘Fine, just fine,’ answered Conrad, straightening his tie.
‘It’s going to be one of those days,’ stated Turner as he shook his head. Murders were always bad news; especially when they landed on your doorstep.
‘Sure is,’ agreed Brady, wondering what the hell Matthews had done to be suspended. At least he now knew who it was he had replaced on the murder investigation. The question was why?
A sudden spasm of pain in his left thigh made him flinch.
‘You sure you’re all right there, Jack?’ queried Turner.
‘Yeah, it’s nothing. It comes and goes, that’s all,’ lied Brady as he tried to keep his voice steady.
‘Bloody bastards,’ Turner said in consolation.
Brady wanted to tell Turner to save his pity. He deserved everything he’d got. Maybe if he’d had his wits about him rather than feeling guilty about the previous drunken night with DC Simone Henderson it would never have happened.
The night he had been shot he had been following some low-lifes in North Shields when he had the sudden feeling that someone was tailing him. He didn’t say a word to Conrad or the three other guys in the back-up van a few streets away. He wanted to make sure first. Soon the dealers he had under surveillance were on the move. He shook the fear that he was being tailed, putting it down to paranoia, and made his way down to North Shields quayside. He had an instinct that something big was about to happen; he just hadn’t realised that it was going to happen to him.
He had parked in a dark side street which led down to the quay and got out of the car and waited. He had pimped his soul for what little information he had; the news of two warring drug dealers wanting to sort out territory was enough for him. He saw movement ahead as the men he had followed got out of their car and approached another one. He radioed Conrad and told him that it was going down but before he knew what had hit him, a bullet was lodged in his thigh, too close for comfort to his balls. The shock hit first, then the pain. He felt something; a sticky warm feeling seeping from between his clenched arse cheeks. For a God-fearing moment he thought he had shit himself. Then he realised with great relief that it was blood. Thank fuck was his only thought. He didn’t want anyone back at the station thinking his bowels had bailed out under pressure. Shit like that could never be lived down.
By the time he had realised what had happened it was too late. He had heard a car further up the street screeching as it tried to get away. The gun was never found. He presumed it was an unregistered piece loaned from any one of the enterprising, hardened scum that could easily be found if you looked long enough. Unsurprisingly no one witnessed the shooting. He was under no illusions. This was North Shields quayside late at night. The only witnesses that would have been around would have just as readily pulled the trigger on a plain-clothes copper as the shooter himself.
A huge investigation was ordered by his superiors. After all, one of their detectives had been shot and they had to look as if they gave a damn. His superiors put on a good show of solidarity for the media, but privately they let him know he’d crossed the line once too often and this time they held him responsible for blowing the investigation. The gunshot wound to his leg gave them the ammunition for deriding him as too much of a risk-taker; stating it had only been a matter of time before he or another officer under his command ended up injured, if not
