boots off. Dean had no other clothes on the boat. He wanted to get to the mouth of the Thames before day light, but knew he wasn’t going to make it. He couldn’t take the boat through channel waters in daylight as he assumed the boat’s owner and the passenger would be reported missing and air sea recue, coastguard and lifeboats would be alerted on the assumption that the boat had run into trouble. He was unaware of Dean’s survival.
Come daylight the Navy would be scouring the ocean. He had to have another plan, a plan B. He didn’t want to get back on land. He fancied sailing in and sailing out. He ran into less people that way and he liked it. He might be tired, but in the dark at sea he felt safe from capture.
Once he’d turned the boat left at, right angles, skirting the needles and land’s End he calculated the time and fuel and knew he wouldn’t make the Thames Estuary by daylight.
He put the boat on autopilot and made a coffee then he checked the charts. Southampton was not too far away, full of boats. He could moor up, dump this craft and steal another. The navy wouldn’t be looking in a harbour for it. He checked the currents on the chart. It looked complicated and could take hours, what he needed was an open harbour in a bay. He ran his finger back along from Southampton and stopped it at Torquay. It was close enough for the fuel to last as well. He had made up his mind.
Chapter 83
London
4 a.m.
April 19th
The smash of the door had woken Aliesha from a sweet dream. She didn’t have time to get out of bed before an armed policeman with an MP5 shone his barrel torch in her face and screamed at her not to move. There were shouts of ‘clear’ all over the house and she was dragged, wrapped in her duvet down to the lounge. They’d let her dress, cuffed her and taken her to Albany Street. She was left alone in the interview room for half an hour. Tony Deany, Ellie and Liam had been called back to Euston Tower, where they gratefully went to their rooms and slept. Tony didn’t even take his clothes off he just laid down on the bed and fell asleep.
The wait at Albany Street station for Aliesha was for Diane Peters and the DIC psychologist Else Patrick to arrive. Else wasn’t happy at being woken up and called out in the early hours.
Else was a PhD in Psychology, Masters in Psychotherapy and had numerous qualifications in Occupational Health. She was a sixty year old short blonde woman from Lancashire. Her short, neat stature, belied a giant mind, but she was a woman of regular habits and disliked being woken at odd hours.
She and Diane were let into the locked interview room. They both sat down opposite Aliesha. Diane put, stereotypically, a brown cardboard docket on the table.
“Who are you two, you don’t look like police?”
“I’m Mrs Peters and this is Mrs Patrick, we’re from a government agency.”
“Oh spooks eh?” Else raised an eyebrow.
“We’d like to know about Peter Mason, the man you took home from the nightclub.”
“There’s nothing to tell. He came to the hair salon, where I work, I cut his hair, and I fancied him so I told him the night club I was going to. When I got there he was sat at the bar, I got off with him and he wanted to go back to my place. We went to my house had sex and when I woke up he’d gone.” Aliesha spread both hands out in ‘a that’s it’ manner.
“Did he tell you anything about himself?”
“Not much?”
“He told you his real name at the salon though?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t lie!” Diane’s voice was like a whiplash in the room and left a thick echo for a moment.
“I’m not lying.”
“He booked and paid for his hair cut in the name of Marc Townshend, but you knew he was Peter Mason. So he must have told you later. That tells me there’s some connection between you that’s more than casual sex for both of you.”
“Clever bitch aren’t you.” Aliesha folded her arms and stared into mid distance.
“If Peter Mason told you his name then you’re either lucky to be alive or you mean something to him and I’d bet on the latter and as that’s true it means you can tell me about him.”
“I’m telling you nothing. You have nothing on me and you’ll have to let me go in twenty four hours.”
“That’s not true. I’ve got a link between you and Mason and that means I can hold you on the prevention of terrorism act. I can hold you here for 42 days, well when I say here I mean I can have you put in a prison cell and transported between there and here every day, so don’t get cocky with me Miss Jones!”
“I haven’t done anything. I just met him and… he was a bit rough, he scared me… he even told me his name… but I don’t know anything else I swear…” Aliesha’s switch to a half pleading earnest, innocent victim from a confident young woman would have drawn sympathy in most people, but Diane knew her job and she looked left at Else, who was sitting, hand over her mouth thoughtfully gazing at Aliesha.
“She’s lying.” Else said slowly.
“What?” Aliesha stood up. “What the hell is she, a psychic or something?”
“She’s an insecure young woman, probably fell out with her parents, the usual East West clash, her brothers got all the attention. She’s changed her name by deed poll to ‘Jones’ to make the break complete, probably at seventeen, it’s usual when legally free for the unhappy to do that. The black clothing and pseudo anarchic culture of Goths and metal appeals to her because of the occult links which fly in the face of the gentle and respectable values of what would have been a Hindu upbringing, but being genetically inclined to seek adventure the family life didn’t appeal and drove a wedge. Now she thinks she’s a night life good time girl, but really she’s just a naughty little girl inside. If she didn’t know who Mason was when she met him, she does now and she’s protecting him because he’s like the father figure she wants…”
“You Bitch!” Aliesha went to slap Else, but Diane had risen and executed a neat block, grab and twist, spinning ‘Leash’ into the chair.
Else continued, “… he’s lied to her and she believed him. It’s typical really and somewhat predictable. He’ll have known they’d find her so why didn’t he kill her…?”
“He wouldn’t have killed me. He loves me! We’re in love!” Diane looked at Else again.
“Hmmm yes that is a sensible suggestion. Though he more likely likes the idea of having a girl with him, perhaps he’s getting past his prime. She does love him though or rather she’s smitten, little girls can’t tell the difference.”
“That hit home. Okay Else thanks you can go. Sorry to wake you, but this was crucial.”
“Don’t make a habit of it Diane.”
“Is that it?” ‘Leash' asked stunned.
“No.” She paused as Else left the room. “She’s something of an expert. Rarely wrong. Now I know the situation we can get down to what you can tell me… oh and before you say you haven’t committed a crime you’re an accessory to the theft of a motorcycle okay.”
“He had the keys how was I supposed to know it wasn’t his.”
Diane ignored her. She opened the brown file and spread pictures on the desk. There were crime scene photos from Beech Bottom Dyke, The crushed Volvo 440 with clear images of the dead officers’ lifeless bodies at odd angles in the blood spattered carnage of the dumped vehicle. The shots were enough to turn anyone’s stomach over. ‘Leash’ turned her head away.
“Look at them!” Again the whiplash voice which this time pulled her head round, but there was no trace of shame.
“He said you’d lie to me. Say he was a murderer”
“Really, we’ve got his DNA off your bed and any minute now I will be able to link it to the bodies and when we’re done we’ll have him for any other assassinations he’s done here or abroad.”
