Joe Dempsey drank in the details of a devastated Lonsdale Square. He could sense the usually tranquil feel to the place, so rare in the heart of London. To see that torn apart was a crime in itself.
A presence at Dempsey’s shoulder broke into his thoughts. Alex Henley had joined him. They had managed two more drinks before news of the Islington bomb had broken through the blanket McGale/Matthewson coverage.
The pictures that had appeared on the screen were all too familiar. The smouldering remains of a car, unrecognisable from the violence of the explosion. Surrounding vehicles damaged beyond repair. Nearby homes wrecked by debris and detritus. All typical of the bombings Dempsey had investigated in his career.
Such images had become common in mainland Britain in the last two years with the resurgence of Northern Irish terrorism. But, coming so soon after the Trafalgar Square shooting, Dempsey and Henley reached the same conclusion: two terrorist attacks in such quick succession were unlikely to be unconnected.
Within minutes of the news report they were hailing a black cab on the streets of Westminster. The journey to Islington took little more than fifteen more. An hour earlier the roads had been jammed. Now they were almost empty, as if the traffic had cleared for the urgency.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ Henley shouted.
Dempsey turned and followed the assistant commissioner’s gaze. He knew immediately what had caused the outburst. Three young officers were setting up a cordon to keep the public away from the scene. The purpose was to avoid contamination. But they were doing more damage than they were preventing as they trampled over possible evidence.
Dempsey allowed himself a smile as Henley produced his Metropolitan Police identification and took temporary control of the scene. The shock on the faces of the local police as a senior officer tore into them amused him. But there was no time for entertainment. Instead Dempsey turned to the best source of information at any crime scene. The bystanders.
One person in particular caught Dempsey’s eye. An elderly woman at the front of the crowd. Her location told him that she had been one of the first on the scene. If she arrived late she would have been at the rear, too frail to push her way through.
Dempsey approached the crowd and flashed his DDS credentials. Meaningless to a public generally unaware of his agency’s existence, but at this point any sign of authority would have an effect. He scanned the crowd. Just for a moment. Then his eyes settled on his target.
‘Did you see anything, madam?’ Dempsey asked.
‘I did, yes. It was horrible!’
The elderly woman replied without hesitation, without asking who her questioner might be. She seemed to revel in the opportunity to tell her tale. Dempsey could tell that it was not for the first time. She continued.
‘I was sitting in my flat when I heard the bang. I live over there, on the second floor. Number 28C. The, erm, the green windows.’
‘What did you see?’ Dempsey moved her along. He had no time for superfluous information.
‘Well it wasn’t what I saw. Not at first, anyway. It was the bang. Deafening. I didn’t know what to think. But then I went to the window and I looked out, and I saw young Michael from number eighteen standing there, by the burning car. Next to him, on her knees, was a woman. Then he picked her up but before he could go inside a man on a motorbike came out of nowhere and started shooting. Michael and the girl only just managed to get out of the way.’
Dempsey listened. Every word added to the picture.
A car bomb alone could be a simple terrorist attack, if there was such a thing. A residential square was hardly a typical target, but he had dealt with stranger. A car bomb followed by a motorcycle gunman, however? That was something altogether different.
That was a professional hit.
‘Did you see what set off the car bomb?’ Dempsey asked.
‘No,’ she replied. ‘Like I said, it was the bang that made me look out the window. Anyway, like I was telling you, Michael went—’
Dempsey stopped the story by raising his hand. He was not yet ready to move on. He turned to the other men and women in the crowd.
‘Anybody else see what set off the bomb?’
No answer.
‘No one saw?’
Still no answer.
‘What about the car itself? Any of you know who it belonged to?’
Dempsey thought he already knew the answer, based on what he had just heard. The same elderly witness confirmed it.
‘Yeah,’ she replied. ‘That’s Michael’s car. That’s why it was parked outside his house.’
Dempsey looked down at the speaker. She was going to be his best source. That much was clear.
‘OK. Tell me what happened next.’
Dempsey listened as the woman described what she had seen. None of it surprised him, up until she described the fight between the resident and the gunman.
‘Sorry, but this Michael guy? He took on the motorcyclist?’
‘For a few seconds he did, yeah. And he got an awful leathering for his trouble. Knocked all over the place until his dog – great big thing – jumps on the fella with the gun. Which is when Michael and the girl ran to the bike and rode off.’
Dempsey did not respond as the story tailed off. He was mentally re-arranging the woman’s confused syntax into a coherent account. Only when he had a picture clear in his own mind did he go further.
‘And did the gunman follow them?’
‘I don’t think so.’
The elderly witness seemed conscious of the attention as she delivered her well-rehearsed tale. She also seemed to enjoy it.
‘I mean, he fought with that dog for a bit. So I reckon they were probably long gone by the time he got it off of him, poor animal. By then there was a lot of people coming out of their houses or shouting from the windows. And someone must have called the police by then, too, cos he took off in a hurry.’
‘How?’
‘On a different bike. One of those ones that are always parked on the corner. He done something to make it work and he rode off. But too late to have gone after Michael, I think. Him and his young lady were long gone.’
Dempsey took in all the information the elderly informant could offer. It was a lot, but it still missed much of what he needed to know.
‘What do you know about Michael?’ Dempsey asked. ‘His full name? Job?’
‘Nothing, really. He’s an Irish lad in his thirties. Good-looking blond fella. Always very pleasant. But that’s about it. I don’t even know his surname.’
‘I do.’
A voice from the crowd cut through the background noise. Dempsey took a closer look. The speaker was a well-dressed, middle-aged man.
‘His name’s Michael Devlin. He’s from Northern Ireland and he’s a barrister. Lives alone, keeps himself to himself.’
‘So how do you know him?’
‘We sometimes speak when we’re walking our dogs.’
‘Do you know anything else about him?’
‘No, not a thing. Like I said, he’s pretty private.’
Dempsey scanned the crowd one more time.
‘Does anyone else know anything more about him?’
No response.
‘Anyone see anything this lady didn’t?’
No response.
Dempsey nodded. It was as expected, and it was enough. The two witnesses had told him more in just a few minutes than an undirected examination of the crime scene ever would. Dempsey thanked them, turned his back and headed towards the police cordon.
A flash of his DDS identification took him past the manned perimeter, into the scene. Here he was far from alone. A stream of forensically trained crime scene investigators were moving back and forth, scouring every inch of debris for evidence. Dempsey stopped one of them and took a pair of blue forensic gloves. Put them on and left the examiners to their job.
He edged past a convoy of white suits and walked into what remained of Michael Devlin’s ground floor. The scene was strikingly familiar. Interior bomb damage, caused by an exterior explosion. Dempsey had already known that this was the case. Typical of a residential car bomb. Little else could be learned inside. He spent a few more minutes there regardless, surveying the debris. Half-destroyed photographs littered what was left of the room. None seemed to be of value.
Dempsey turned his attention elsewhere.
The remains of Michael Devlin’s car were almost unrecognisable as a vehicle. The front was a mangled, blackened mess. Only the remains of its four wheels helped distinguish what the smouldering wreck used to be.
Three white-clothed forensic investigators were in and around the car. Dempsey flashed his credentials to the closest.
‘What do we know?’ Dempsey asked.
‘No doubt it was a bomb. No car goes bang this bad without one.’
‘Any idea what started it?’
‘Best bet is the detonator was connected to the ignition and that it went up when the engine turned over.’
‘You mean there was someone inside?’
‘Still is. Only now he or she is melted into the driver’s seat.’
Dempsey was surprised by the information. He leaned down and looked inside. The forensic investigators were better than him. Dempsey could not make out a driver’s seat, let alone that it had been occupied.
He looked up.
‘What about the other seats? Anyone in them?’
‘Doesn’t look like it. Driver only, as far as we can make out.’
Dempsey responded with a nod. A gesture more confident than he currently felt. Someone had been driving Michael Devlin’s car at the time of the explosion, but it had not been Michael Devlin. That much was clear from what the neighbour had told him. But if it was not Michael Devlin, who was it?
And what, Dempsey thought as he glanced up from the car and towards the damaged CNN van that was still next to it, has that thing got to do with this?
He returned his attention to the car. The same forensic examiner was standing by.
‘Have you found any sign of the bomb mechanism?’ Dempsey asked.
‘Not from the portion of the vehicle we’ve been able to examine.’
‘Where’s left?’
‘Just the underside. We can’t go under until the chassis has been secured. Health and safety regulations.’
‘Is it solid?’
‘Seems to be. But that’s not the point. We still have to wait for the engineers.’
‘I don’t,’ Dempsey replied.
Dempsey dropped to the floor by the vehicle’s side. From there he checked the integrity of what was left of the frame. It seemed unlikely to collapse. Satisfied, he turned onto his back and edged his way underneath the chassis.
The under-frame of the car seemed strong. More intact than the devastated upper body. The damage was still catastrophic, but from here Dempsey could make out a number of important details. Details that should not have been there. The remains of a two-inch-square sheet of magnetic metal carried the telltale scars he was looking for.
The confined space between the car and the road made it difficult to manoeuvre. It took Dempsey the best part of a minute to reach into his front trouser pocket and remove a small utility lock-knife. It took longer still to slide the knife between the car body and the magnetic plate. Dempsey had no choice but to take care. Too much force and he could find himself pinned to the floor by a two-tonne wreck.
Minutes passed as he prised away with the lock-knife. Finally the plate broke loose, its magnetic force now clinging it to the blade. With no room or light to examine the sheet more closely, Dempsey had no choice but to inch his way out from under the vehicle.
He gripped the knife in his hand as he got to his feet. The light in the square was artificial but blinding. More than enough to reveal the details that Dempsey had expected to see on the recovered item. It was not a lengthy examination. The first glance had been enough.
‘What have you found?’ Henley had seen Dempsey climb back to his feet and had watched as he examined the metal plate.
‘Mercury tilt switch,’ Dempsey replied. He handed the knife to Henley with the magnetic strip still attached. ‘Have your guys examine it.’
Henley held the knife up. Took a few seconds to consider what he was looking at. Finally:
‘This is military ordinance, right?’
‘It is.’
‘Then what the hell is it doing at a civilian crime scene?’
‘Because this isn’t a civilian crime scene, Alex.’ Dempsey’s voice was low. What he was saying was for Henley’s ears only. ‘We were right. This is Turner.’
‘You really think that?’
‘I don’t think anything. I know it’s him.’ Henley looked around at the devastation that surrounded them, before Dempsey spoke again. ‘It’s best if it’s recorded that you found the tilt switch, Alex.’
‘Of course.’
Henley had no need to question why. Dempsey had already explained that although he was officially barred from the investigation, this was just a front to allow him to continue unimpeded. A necessary political lie.
Dempsey’s attention returned to the van.
‘You know anything about that yet?’ he asked, pointing towards it.
‘Only that it shouldn’t be here,’ Henley replied. ‘And that there’s no sign of whoever was driving it.’
Dempsey nodded.
‘Then let’s see what we can find out.’
The driver’s door of the van had been welded shut by the heat and force of the nearby explosion. Dempsey looked through its shattered window to the passenger’s side. It was damaged too, but had been spared the brunt of the blast. If there was a way into the van it would be there.
Dempsey made his way to the left-hand side of the vehicle and tried the door. It was difficult to move, but he felt some give. With enough force it would open. Dempsey gripped the handle and the frame and, with considerable effort, he ripped the door ajar.
A short examination of the cab area revealed nothing of interest. There were no ID cards. No useful correspondence. Nothing that told him anything about the van’s occupants or the story they were chasing.
Dempsey wasted no more time with the cab. Instead he moved to the sliding door that guarded the rear. It slid open with little effort; its mechanism had been spared significant damage. What it revealed was an Aladdin’s Cave of information.
The rear section of the van was unsurprisingly cramped as Dempsey climbed inside. It was also well equipped and virtually undamaged. A khaki survival jacket rested on the back of a chair that was bolted to the centre of the floor. Dempsey riffled through the jacket’s many pockets. It contained batteries, notepads, cigarette packs and a CNN photo ID card in the name of Jack Maguire.
The thumbnail photograph looked back at him. A photo that could be of a dead man, Dempsey realised. Someone had been driving Michael Devlin’s car at the time of the explosion. And it had not been Devlin himself. With no sign of Jack Maguire and no other obvious reason for the CNN van to have been abandoned here, the odds were fair that it had been Maguire in that seat.
Dempsey put the identity card aside and searched the rest of the van’s interior. The vehicle’s official paperwork was filed in a compartment close to the sliding door. It revealed that the van was allocated to cameraman Jack Maguire and reporter Sarah Truman. There was no photograph of Truman. But the name was enough. Dempsey now counted three missing people. Michael Devlin, Sarah Truman and Jack Maguire. Devlin could be accounted for. Last seen fleeing the scene on a motorcycle, with an unknown woman behind him. It would be a leap to assume that woman was Truman, but with the abandoned outside broadcast van in the equation? It was a leap Dempsey was willing to make.
And one which made it ever more likely that Maguire was still just feet away, charred within the burned-out Jaguar.
The remaining paperwork told Dempsey nothing of value. Most was procedural, recording the use of official broadcast equipment. A small amount was more specific, including several short files of information on people of interest. There was nothing in the files to suggest what was so interesting about them, and so they were of little use. Putting them aside, Dempsey turned his attention to the state-of-the-art broadcast equipment. Perhaps Maguire and Truman had left recordings of what they had been working on.
The master console of the electronic board meant nothing to Dempsey so he began to randomly press buttons. This continued for almost a minute until every screen suddenly buzzed into life. The sharp rise of static electricity lifted the hairs on the back of his neck. The sensation barely registered; his attention was on the silent screens. The image of an angry sergeant in what was obviously a British police station dominated.
Dempsey hit every button, dial and lever that might be related to the vehicle’s volume control. Nothing worked. His life and training had prepared him for many things. Raising the sound on possibly damaged, high-tech video machinery was not one of them.
Finally he accepted the inevitable and stopped. Opened the sliding door. Looked out. A young, white-suited forensic specialist stood nearby. Not the same guy as before.
Dempsey summoned him into the rear of the vehicle.
White Suit seemed nervous. Made worse when Dempsey forcefully slammed the sliding door shut when he was barely inside.
‘Are you any good with electronics?’ Dempsey cut to the chase. His voice bristled with intensity.
‘I’m not sure. I . . . I . . . it depends on what—’
‘The video equipment,’ snapped Dempsey. Surely an explanation was unnecessary, given the screens now surrounding them? ‘I need the sound on this equipment up and running now. And you look like a bloke who’s spent more time playing with wires in your bedroom than playing football. So can you do it?’
‘Yes, sir.’ White Suit’s confidence was returning as he realised he wasn’t being taken from his comfort zone. ‘I don’t think that will be a problem.’
‘OK. Do it.’
Dempsey shifted himself to the van’s second seat, to make way for White Suit. He watched as the pale young man began to connect loose wires at a remarkable pace. At first he was interested, but that quickly wore off. It then became a test of patience.
His mind wandered as White Suit worked. The timing of the attack. Its details. The military-grade detonator. Even Devlin’s nationality. It could not all be coincidence, Dempsey was sure of that. It had to be related to Trafalgar Square. To Turner. But how? How was it all connected? And if Dempsey was right – if the gunman was Turner – then how the hell had some lawyer escaped the most efficient killer Dempsey had ever met?
The sudden explosion of sound brought Dempsey’s musings to an abrupt end. The speakers were working.
And then some.
Dempsey turned, his ears ringing from sheer volume. He saw that the images on the screen were now perfectly accompanied by their audio recording. His earlier amateur tinkering must have set the now-working volume to its highest level.
Dempsey ignored the pain in his ears as White Suit fought to reduce the sound. Instead he concentrated on the monitors. The footage was coming to an end, taken as the camera was lowered to face the pavement. It was shaky. And it meant nothing without what had come before. But, as the volume came down and the image disappeared, Dempsey could make out a single word, spoken with a soft American accent:
‘Perfect.’
The screen went blank and immediately White Suit took the recording back to the start. He selected automatic playback and vacated the central chair. Dempsey replaced him without a word.
The footage onscreen was an obvious rough cut. There was no ‘to camera’ address to put the footage into context. Instead the scene began with the rear view of a tall brunette as she strode into a police station reception area.
The first minutes of footage were impressive, dominated by the attractive young reporter. Dempsey was as certain as he could be that he was watching Sarah Truman.
Truman had a soft American accent – the same voice Dempsey had heard say ‘perfect’ moments before – and she used her body language to devastating effect. Her manipulation of the young police officer at the station’s front desk was played out onscreen. Truman toyed with him like a predator. Little more than a boy, he was helpless to do anything other than her bidding.
Dempsey continued to watch. Nothing was said or done after the young officer’s disappearance. Truman was waiting for something. She did not have to wait for very long.
A single figure suddenly dominated the screen: the same sergeant who had appeared when the footage had first flickered into life.
‘What the hell are you doing in my station? Get out! Now!!’
The shout from the apoplectic police sergeant filled the van. It was exactly the reaction Dempsey would expect from an officer whose premises had been invaded by the press. It gave Dempsey no cause for concern.
Unfortunately for the man on screen, his next reaction was a lot less acceptable.
‘What the hell are you doing here?’
The way the words were delivered. The way the sergeant looked directly at Sarah Truman as he spoke. The way his tone switched from outrage to annoyed recognition. They all rang alarm bells in Dempsey’s mind.
These people knew each other.
The telling lapse ended as soon as it had begun. The sergeant turned his attention to Jack Maguire. Loudly demanded him to leave, as if he had no idea of who either reporter was. But Dempsey knew what he had seen and heard.
The footage continued in the face of the officer’s anger. Ignoring his orders to leave, Sarah forced a question. A question which injected life back into Dempsey’s tiring mind.
‘Sergeant, can you confirm that Eamon McGale met and consulted with a legal representative in this building just hours before his death?’
The question hit Dempsey like a shockwave.
The official line was clear. McGale had seen and spoken to no one before taking his own life. That a reporter thought otherwise would not usually convince Dempsey that he had been misled. But these circumstances were far from usual. In all likelihood the cameraman behind this piece was dead, while the reporter who had asked the question was last seen clinging to the back of a motorcycle as she fled a gunman. That alone made it a query that demanded an answer.
Dempsey’s surprise distracted him from the next few lines. But his attention returned in time to hear what came next:
‘Sergeant, when we spoke yesterday you informed me that Eamon McGale’s lawyer had been selected. Shortly after that Daniel Lawrence, a defence lawyer, arrived at this station. He stayed here for almost two hours. There was only one person in custody during those hours, and so only one reason for Daniel Lawrence to be here: Mr Lawrence was the lawyer you mentioned and he did meet with Eamon McGale. That’s right, isn’t it?’
The familiar name pricked Dempsey’s ears. Daniel Lawrence. It was a name he knew. Or at least recognised. A name connected, in fact, to something he had seen in the last few minutes. His mind searched through its own internal files as his eyes returned to the screen.
‘Are you aware, Sergeant, that after leaving your station Daniel Lawrence was killed in a supposed car accident? On the very same night that Eamon McGale allegedly took his own life? Doesn’t that seem just a bit suspicious to a detective such as yourself?’
The sergeant had been unable to hide his reaction. At least at first. The news of Daniel Lawrence’s death had been a shock. That much was clear, and alone would have been interesting. It was made all the more so by his obvious effort to then hide his shock and feign outrage.
Dempsey had looked many guilty men in the eyes over the course of his career. None had been more transparent than the man he now watched.
As telling as the image was, it did not remain for long. The camera wielded by Jack Maguire instead took in the details of the floor, ceiling and walls as he was roughly escorted from the building. With pavement now filling the screen, Dempsey again heard the word ‘perfect’ as the monitor went black.
The light cast by the footage died. But Dempsey did not move. His mind was in overdrive considering the meaning of what he had seen. White Suit squirmed in his seat under the agent’s apparent stare. It was unnecessary. Dempsey was not even seeing him. His mind was much too busy.
And then it stopped.
After minutes of motionless thought, Dempsey became a flurry of activity. He moved away from the screens and back to the paperwork he had earlier dismissed. File after file was thrown aside as he scanned for the name he had just heard. His trained eye quickly found what he was looking for.
Sarah Truman had used the name ‘Daniel Lawrence’, the same name as had appeared on one of the manila envelopes that had been strewn across the floor of the van. In just seconds that paperwork was in Dempsey’s hands. He opened its outer jacket. Scanned the front page at a glance. He was interested in only one thing. The photograph of Daniel Lawrence that was attached by a single paperclip.
Dempsey tore it from the folder.
‘Can you make a copy of that recording using the equipment in this van?’ Dempsey asked.
‘Well that’s exactly what this van’s for, so yeah,’ White Suit winced at his own sarcasm. He seemed to instantly regret it.
Dempsey had not noticed.
‘OK. I want you to make me a copy, and then bag the original up as evidence. Exhibit it as having been retrieved by you. Make no mention of me.’
Dempsey turned to look at White Suit before continuing. His intense gaze made it clear that his next words were no request.
‘Don’t speak to anyone about what’s on that recording, or anything you’ve seen in here. Just get me a copy, bag the original and then forget all about the last ten minutes.’
These final words echoed in White Suit’s ears as Dempsey exited the van and closed the sliding door behind him.
Henley noticed Dempsey step out and walk back towards the house. Henley followed into the blackened lounge. Dempsey was already there, crouched over a small pile of charcoaled items that were heaped together near the corner of the room. He watched as Dempsey flicked away the broken remains of a smouldering wooden frame to expose the photograph that had recently sat inside it.
Henley moved closer, to Dempsey’s shoulder. From here he could see the photograph. It showed two young men in full morning dress. The dazed look in the eyes of the shorter man suggested that, of the two, it was his wedding day being recorded.
Dempsey held the picture carefully with his left hand and raised his right alongside it. The photograph he had taken from the Lawrence file was undamaged and the comparison was obvious.
Dempsey looked from one image to the other. A perfect match. The shorter man in the burned picture – standing next to a taller blond man who matched the description earlier given of Michael Devlin – was undoubtedly Daniel Lawrence.
It was the connection Dempsey had been looking for. A connection he would not share. Dempsey had had no choice but to include Henley in his illusory suspension. If he had not then he would have been denied access to Lonsdale Square. Henley had proved himself worthy of that trust, but it had its limits. As always, Dempsey would disclose only what he had to. And right now, the picture in his hand was for his eyes only.