give him a full body search. I don’t trust him an inch.’
Thomson frowned. ‘Where are they taking him, sir?’
‘I don’t know. And to be perfectly frank, I don’t care. He’s someone else’s problem now.’
Sixty-four
20.55
Mike Bolt’s head hurt like hell, but he was feeling a lot better than he had three-quarters of an hour earlier when he’d been hit by whatever it was he’d been hit by.
Since then he’d been sick twice, and ordered to go to hospital by the doctor who’d treated him at the scene, but he’d steadfastly refused. While he could still stand, he wanted to be involved, which was exactly what he was saying now to Commander Ingrams as he paced the street with the phone pushed against the bandage that had been wrapped round his head. ‘I’ve worked this case from the beginning. I’ve been involved in everything all day. And the fact is, I don’t want to stop now.’ He was at a crossroads a hundred yards from Azim Butt’s ruined townhouse, the sound of it burning still clearly audible. To his left, the Shard stood like a tall, wounded giant breathing smoke and fire, a symbol of his failure.
‘Listen, Mike,’ said Ingrams in a weary voice that told Bolt he’d already made up his mind, ‘we really appreciate all your efforts, and your bravery today, but there’s nothing more you can do.’
‘Have we caught the shooter yet?’
‘No. And we haven’t brought in Cecil Boorman yet either. Or the man he’s supposed to be working for, Cain.’
‘So there’s still plenty to do.’
‘It’s in hand, Mike.’
‘You need to talk to Jones. He might be able to help.’
‘We would do, but we can’t find him. We sent two officers round to his home address, and he wasn’t answering the door.’
Bolt tensed. This wasn’t good. ‘Did they try to get inside?’
‘The door was locked and we haven’t got a warrant to break it down. I’ve had to pull the officers away for other duties.’
‘Let me go up there. He might be back now. Come on, sir. It’s not as if I’m on my deathbed.’
‘Sorry, Mike. According to the doctor, you’ve got concussion. I can’t let you carry on. You need to get to a hospital straight away.’
Knowing he wasn’t going to win this particular battle, Bolt conceded defeat and ended the call.
He took a deep breath, shivering against the cold. Ingrams and the doctor were right. He needed to go to hospital. But he’d always been a stubborn man, and fiercely competitive too. Tina had been in the firing line just as much as him today, and yet she was the one taking Fox to the safehouse. He was also worried about Jones. There was no reason for him suddenly to go AWOL. Two hours ago he’d been fully prepared to make a statement, and had promised to wait at the pub for the guys from CTC to pick him up. Which meant that either something bad had happened to him or, more likely, he’d turn up again soon.
Bolt might have been officially off duty, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t go and have a look for him. After all, he was the one who’d got Jones involved in all this in the first place. Maybe he’d stop in at a hospital afterwards if his headache failed to dissipate.
Having made the decision to carry on, and immediately feeling better for it, he walked back up towards the police cordon. It was time to retrieve Islington nick’s battered Ford Focus and make himself useful once again.
Sixty-five
21.05
When the knock on the cell door came, Fox had to resist smiling.
‘Prisoner 407886,’ came the barked command, ‘stand up and show yourself, and keep your hands where we can see them.’
Fox got off the bunk and stood a few feet in front of the door, holding up his hands in a gesture of supplication as the guard peered through the inspection hatch. A second later the door was unlocked and four screws stood there, headed by Officer Thomson. All the guards were wearing plastic gloves, which could only mean one thing.
‘This looks ominous,’ said Fox, as the screws came inside.
‘You know the drill, Mr Garrett,’ said Thomson. ‘Clothes off. We’re going to give you a full body search.’
‘Any particular reason why?’
‘I don’t have to give you a fucking reason, Mr Garrett, but since you ask, you’re being transferred with immediate effect, and we’re making sure you don’t take anything that doesn’t belong to you.’
‘I have to say, I’ll feel a lot safer being out of here, sir. For some reason, the other prisoners don’t seem to like me. Sounds like they don’t like you much either.’ He nodded in the direction of the corridor where the sounds of shouting, yelping and banging as the prisoners vented their frustrations were clearly audible.
‘I don’t know what your game is, Garrett,’ hissed Thomson, coming close, ‘but whatever it is, remember this: you can be as cocky as you like, but you’re never going to taste freedom for as long as you live. And I’ll tell you something else. I hope you live a long fucking time.’
Fox didn’t say anything. Thomson’s words reeked of frustration. In the end, he was a small fish trapped in exactly the same pond as the men he was guarding. All he had were empty threats, and both of them knew it.
The search was thorough and invasive, just as it was supposed to be. Fox stood there and took it in cool silence, ignoring the jibes about how much he enjoyed having fingers rammed up his arse, ignoring the taste of those fingers then being deliberately shoved into his mouth, zoning out of the whole experience by staring unblinkingly at the wall and thinking of what lay ahead of him: the heat and the sunshine, and the sound of waves lapping gently on some distant shore.
It was all over in a couple of minutes and they didn’t find anything. Though they tried to hide it, the guards were clearly in a hurry and Fox had hardly got the last of his clothes on before he was pushed up face first against the cell door and his hands cuffed roughly behind his back.
‘Come on, you fuck,’ said Thomson, grabbing him by the collar and almost lifting him off his feet as he hauled him out of the cell. It was as if he was trying to get as much unpleasantness in as possible while he still had the chance.
Let him, thought Fox. In the end, Thomson was just like everyone else who chose to play by the rules. Impotent. He was probably hoping that Fox would snap and assault him, so that he’d have the justification to give him the kicking he’d doubtless been wanting to ever since the day Fox had first arrived. But there was no way Fox was going to give him the pleasure, and he didn’t resist as he was marched down the corridor towards the front of the main building.
En route, they passed a long line of black-clad, helmeted officers heading the other way. This was the Tornado Team, the Prison Service’s equivalent of riot police, who were always sent in to deal with prison disturbances. Fox had never seen them before. Westmoor had been remarkably peaceful during his stay, but these guys looked suitably mean and moody behind their flame-retardant masks, and Fox had little doubt that they’d quell the trouble easily enough. Most of the prisoners had little stomach for a fight, not when there was real opposition. But it didn’t matter. The violence had achieved what it was supposed to, and now, whatever Officer Thomson might have thought, Fox was going to get his first taste of life outside the prison gates for fifteen months.
There was still much that could go wrong but he felt a real excitement as he was led through various barred doors to the prison’s main reception area, and saw Tina Boyd waiting there, flanked by two armed cops carrying MP5s.
This was it. He was finally on his way.
