'Damage limitation. Pathways forward. All that managerial bollocks.'
Winter stifled a yawn. 'Where are you, then?'
Suttle briefly described what had happened to Dave Pullen. Mackenzie, it turned out, had got word that the state of Trudy Gallagher was down to Pullen and not the Scousers at all. Far from suffering at the hands of a bunch of Liverpool toe rags she'd in fact been smacked around by her so-called boyfriend.
'We'd sussed that already,' Winter pointed out.
'Yeah, but Mackenzie hadn't. He'd believed Pullen. That's why he ordered the Scouse kid to be sorted. Now it turns out that Pullen was lying all along, just to protect his arse, because he knew Mackenzie would go ballistic if he thought he'd laid a finger on the girl. And he's right.'
'So what did Bazza do?'
'You won't believe this.' Suttle began to laugh, then told Winter about the little tableau he'd discovered in the wreckage of Pullen's bedroom. 'Kippered,' he said finally. 'Totally fucking kebabbed.'
'But why the Stanley knives?'
'Because Mackenzie's put the word out to the Scousers that Pullen's there for the taking. Directions. Address. The lot. The guy's caused them no end of grief so his front door's open and the rest is down to them. That's why Pullen's been cacking himself. Literally.'
Suttle's description of the mess beneath the bed drew a low whistle down the phone. Even Winter had heard of Michael Owen.
'And you're telling me he's still up there? Still on offer?'
'Yeah.'
'And he's really expecting a visit?'
'Yeah. You can smell it in the next street.'
'But they'd be mad, wouldn't they? Half the city looking for them?
Attempted murder charge in the offing?'
'They are mad. That's the whole point.'
There was a moment's silence. Pullen could imagine Winter at his desk, computing the possibilities. Suttle cleared his throat. Time for a suggestion of my own, he thought.
'Why don't we just leave him there? Mount surveillance? Wait until they turn up?'
'And then nick them?'
'Yeah. Bloody sight easier than racing around after a bunch of lunatics.'
Suttle heard Winter chuckling. Then the older man put his finger on the obvious problem.
'We'd get crucified in court,' he said. 'Imagine what a half-decent brief would make of this. Hazarding a victim's life. Exposing him to further injury.'
'But he's not a victim. What he did to Trudy adds up to GBH.'
'Can we prove that?'
'Yeah.'
'How?' 'She told me.' 'Who told you?' 'Trudy.'
'Trudy Gallagher told you? When?' 'Yesterday.' 'When yesterday?'
'Last night.'
'Ah…' Winter was beginning to chuckle again. 'Then I think we have a real problem.'
Faraday was summoned to Willard's office minutes before the big troubleshooting meeting with Secretan. He'd put a call through to the Det-Supt first thing, as soon as he'd spoken to Graham Wallace, and now a couple of hours later Willard had reached a firm decision.
'We run with it,' he said briskly. 'We have no option.'
'I already told Wallace that.'
'You did?'
'Yes, sir, subject to your approval. Wallace says Mackenzie's definitely up for some kind of negotiation though he's still waiting for him to come back with a time and a place.'
'You think he's going to fuck us about? Switch locations at the last moment? Throw the covert?'
'I'd imagine so. Wouldn't you?'
'Yeah.' Willard was gazing at a newly arrived e-mail on his PC. 'I suppose I would.' He scribbled a note to himself and then turned back to Faraday. 'So we're talking the weekend?'
'Saturday or Sunday.'
'Can't Wallace pin him down? Try and box a meeting off?'
'I'm suggesting Sunday. It's busier in Southsea, more cover. Wallace took the point, said he'd plead a prior engagement for tomorrow.'
'But you're telling me it might still be tomorrow? Regardless?'
'I'd put money on Sunday, but yes, tomorrow's still a possibility. I've talked to Wallace's handler at Special Ops. Wallace is happy to wear a wire.'
'Recorder/transmitter?'
'Yes.'
'Fine, but we'll need to record at our end as well. If Wallace gets shaken down, they'll find the recorder and we lose the lot. As long as he's been transmitting, at least we've got a fallback. People with nothing to hide don't shake business partners down. Plays really badly in court.'
'Fine.' Faraday nodded. 'I'll tell Wallace that.'
'You don't sound convinced, Joe.'
'I'm not, sir. We're hanging this guy out to dry. Mackenzie could turn up mob-handed. What happens if it all gets silly?'
'We deal with it.'
'How?'
Faraday's challenge hung in the air between them. This was the crux of the issue, and Willard knew it. Enlist half a dozen blokes to supply back-up and they'd give themselves an enormous problem. There had to be time for proper briefings salted with the kind of information that any Pompey cop could turn into the target's name. From that point on, no matter how briefly, Tumbril itself might be at risk. Something similar had already happened on the aborted vehicle stop before Christmas, with Valentine taunting them afterwards on the covert.
Spreading the word about Tumbril might trigger another disaster.
Willard was gazing out of the window, deep in thought. At length, he appeared to make some kind of decision.
'We handle it ourselves, Joe.'
'Ourselves?'
'Yeah.' He nodded. 'You, me, and the handler from Special Ops.'
Minutes later, Willard and Faraday descended a floor to Secretan's office. Most of the key players had already gathered, familiar faces around the Chief Superintendent's conference table, and Faraday slipped into the empty chair beside Cathy Lamb. She was busy sorting out a trayful of coffees but she still found time to enquire about J- J.
'How is he?'
'Fled the nest. Decamped.'
'Really?' Cathy stopped pouring. 'When?'
'Last night. He seems to have moved in with Eadie.'
'That's two of you, then.'
'Yeah.' Faraday offered her a bleak smile. 'For now.'
While Cathy began to hand round the coffees, Faraday pushed J-J to the back of his mind and tried to take stock of the assembled company. He and Willard were representing the Major Crimes Team. Len Curzon, the DI in charge of the city's divisional detectives, had driven over from Highland Road, while Cathy Lamb would be inputting contributions from the newly formed Portsmouth Crime Squad.
One surprise to Faraday was the presence of Harry Wayte, the DI from the Tactical 'Crime Unit. His was a similar mission statement to Cathy Lamb's: get out there, talk to the bad guys, anticipate their every move, then turn all that intelligence into arrests. The current buzzword for this style of policing was 'pro-active', a description which gave the higher echelons of management a certain degree of comfort. The belief, no matter how fanciful, that
