Villain Page 2

  Bailey noticed her mother frowning at her.

  ‘You know, you don’t look very happy, Bailey.’ Her face broke into a beaming smile. ‘Today is a day of joyous celebration.’

  ‘I’m fine,’ lied Bailey.

  ‘Today is the day that our Lord Jesus Christ came into the world. You should feel privileged to share your birthday with Him.’

  Her mother had become increasingly religious as she’d grown older and her social life now almost exclusively revolved around her church. For Bailey’s combined Christmas and birthday present, she’d bought her a silver hairgrip in the shape of a fish.

  ‘It’s an ancient Christian symbol,’ her mother had explained. ‘It’s a fish.’

  ‘Yeah I can see that,’ Bailey had replied, turning it over in her hands. The minimalist design consisted of little more than two intersecting arcs of thin flat silver, the tips joining at one end to form the nose, and crossing at the other end to form a tail.

  ‘In ancient times, during the darkest days of Roman oppression, when those brave few who followed the Christian faith—’

  ‘Thanks, Mum,’ Bailey had said, cutting her off. ‘I’m sure it’ll come in very handy.’ Once her mum got started on Christian matters she never shut up and sometimes Bailey just couldn’t stomach it; she didn’t possess any religious convictions whatsoever, having confronted far too many acts of senseless evil in her line of work to trust in any form of divine goodness or justice.

  Her father had bought her The Bumper Book of Cryptic Crosswords, knowing how fond she was of them.

  Now, sitting at the dinner table, she idly flicked though it while her mother took their dirty dinner plates out into the kitchen and went to get dessert.

  Her father tilted his head and fixed Bailey with a serious look. She felt a pre-emptive surge of unease. She recognised that expression only too well.

  ‘Bailey, I want to talk to you about Mister Snigiss,’ he said, arching one eyebrow gravely.

  Bailey rolled her eyes. ‘Not again,’ she muttered.

  At the time that Jennifer had gone missing, she, like many children her age, had possessed an invisible friend. The name of this invisible friend had been Mister Snigiss. Mister Snigiss had been present throughout many of their childhood games, leading both sisters on an array of imaginary adventures. Bailey remembered how hard she’d always strained to see Mister Snigiss, but only Jennifer had been able to see him, and Bailey had just taken it on faith from her older sister that Mister Snigiss existed.

  In the wake of Jennifer’s disappearance, Bailey’s father had seized upon every aspect of her childhood in an effort to try and work out what had happened to her and Mister Snigiss was no exception.

  ‘I want you to help me find Mister Snigiss,’ he said, without an ounce of irony.

  Bailey sighed. ‘Mister Snigiss was nothing more than a figment of Jennifer’s imagination, Dad.’

  Her father shook his head. ‘Mister Snigiss was real.’ His eyes bore that all-too-familiar glaze of conviction and Bailey knew he was deaf to anything other than his own dogmatic beliefs.

  ‘As I recall,’ she said, ‘Mister Snigiss wore a funny hat and had a pet cobra called Sid. Kids make up all kinds of stupid stuff.’

  Her father was shaking his head vehemently. He was building up to one of his rants.

  ‘No! The more I think about it, the more I’m convinced that Mister Snigiss was a real person. An adult. A man who secretly wormed his way into Jennifer’s life. He was grooming her. That’s what he was doing. He told her not to tell anyone about him, told her to make out like he was her invisible friend so we wouldn’t get suspicious. If only I’d paid more attention to her! If I’d known he was real, I could have saved her from him. He was the one who took her. It was Mister Snigiss who abducted her.’

  ‘Dad, you’re beating yourself up over something that doesn’t exist and never existed.’

  But her father wasn’t listening. He was in full flow now.

  ‘That pet snake of his was probably just a way to lure her to meet him. You remember how much Jennifer wanted a pet snake and we never let her have one. Well, Mister Snigiss told her exactly what she wanted to hear.’

  Bailey was starting to run out of patience. It wasn’t that she was uncaring. It was more that because, as a police officer, she’d encountered enough similar cases to know that there was little point in her father holding out hope in this way. After twenty-four years it was time for him to face up to the fact that Jennifer was gone for good, one way or another.

  ‘Get a grip Dad. Listen to yourself. Mister Snigiss wasn’t real.’

  ‘You can’t be sure.’ He pointed a finger at her. ‘You could find out.’

  She rolled her eyes. She knew what was coming next.

  ‘You’re in the police!’ he said. ‘You can find these things out. You can find out the truth about Mister Snigiss. If we find Mister Snigiss, we can find out what happened to Jennifer.’

  Bailey resisted the urge to lean across the table and try and shake some sense into him. Instead she took a deep breath and attempted to rein in her emotions.

  ‘I already looked into Jennifer’s case. I told you before. I’ve told you a thousand times before.’

  ‘But you haven’t looked into it properly, have you? Not in any detail.’

  Not long after joining the police, Bailey had indeed examined the old case files pertaining to Jennifer’s disappearance and she’d even checked the Police National Database for evidence of Mister Snigiss, but, much as she’d expected, there had been no evidence of anyone with that name or alias. And she’d told her father as much, but he still wouldn’t give up, and they still always ended up having this argument, like clockwork, especially on Christmas Day even though it was her birthday and supposedly a day of joy and celebration as her mother always pointed out.

  ‘Well, I’ve got a new theory about Mister Snigiss,’ he whispered excitedly. ‘About who he is.’

  ‘Not another one,’ she said, rolling her eyes.

  ‘Just listen to me, Bailey! We know he must be at least fifty years old by now. But what if his name wasn’t really Mister Snigiss? What if—’

  Bailey slammed her hand down on the table. Her father recoiled slightly.

  ‘That’s enough, Dad! Can’t you get it through your head? Jennifer is gone! She’s dead! She’s been dead for over twenty years!’

  At the mention of the word ‘dead’, her father lapsed into a stony silence. Her mother, who’d just re-entered the living room holding a Christmas pudding, stopped and looked at Bailey in shock. Even she knew better than to say the ‘d’ word in the house.

  ‘Don’t you ever say that Jennifer is dead,’ said her father in a low, injured tone.

  ‘I’m going upstairs,’ said Bailey, thinking how yet again, despite whatever she might have hoped for, this birthday and Christmas had gone south in much the same way as all the previous ones had.

  ‘Don’t you want any Christmas pudding?’ said her mother.

  ‘Nah, I’m stuffed.’

  Bailey stood up, left the table and walked upstairs, laden with the customary mixture of frustration and sadness.

  Why couldn’t her father just accept the brutal truth? Bailey had. And her way to deal with it had been to join the police. If justice wasn’t going to materialise for Jennifer, then at least Bailey could try and do something about all the other bad things happening in the world.

  Standing by the window on the landing, she gazed out through the net curtains at the dull expanse of suburbia under the grey washed-out sky.

  Bromley.

  She couldn’t think of anything worse than ending up living here in one of these drab pebble-dashed houses, trapped in a nine-to-five existence, slowly dying inside from the sheer monotony of it.

  She tried to shake off the depressing thoughts. Maybe it had been a mistake coming to her parents’ house for Christmas. Maybe she should have just stayed at home in her flat in Crystal Palace.

  The sou
nd of the song ‘The Power of Love’ by Huey Lewis and the News suddenly blared from her trouser pocket, breaking the stillness of the upstairs landing. A committed fan of eighties power ballads, Bailey had changed the ringtone of her mobile phone to that of the 1985 number one hit in a moment of idle boredom the previous day.

  Pulling her phone from her pocket, she saw that the name flashing on the screen was that of Detective Superintendent Frank Grinham, her sometime boss who she’d worked for on numerous undercover operations in the past.

  Knowing him as she did, she couldn’t imagine he was calling to wish her either Merry Christmas or Happy Birthday.

  There was only one reason he’d be contacting her, and that would be to present her with the opportunity of fresh undercover work. A way out. And with that tempting possibility in mind, she answered the phone.

  ‘Don’t you ever take the day off?’ she said.

  ‘Christmas is just a day like any other.’

  ‘You’re at the office, aren’t you?’

  There was a sheepish silence. She could visualise him right now, dressed in his grey suit, yellow tie and buffed black Oxfords, sitting in front of a computer, tapping away as they spoke.

  She was glad to hear his voice though. It had already started to lift her out of her gloomy introspection.

  ‘I know it’s a bit soon since the last one finished, but I’ve got a new job for you,’ he said.

  She hesitated for a few moments. It had been around five and a half months since the operation in the prison had come to an end, and following a little time off recuperating from that experience, she’d been back in the office working in her regular role as a normal detective constable.

  ‘I’ve been concentrating on trying to pass my sergeant’s exams,’ she said. ‘So I don’t think I’ll be able to do any more undercover jobs for the time being.’

  Working undercover for as long as she had meant that she’d let her career stagnate and she’d reluctantly realised that advancing up the ladder would probably be beneficial in the long term. Although there was no denying that she missed the rush that came with undercover work, she’d talked herself out of taking on any more undercover jobs until she’d sorted out her career. However, if she was to be honest with herself, her heart wasn’t really in it – the slow diligent slog up the greasy pole. It all seemed a bit too much like normal life, just the kind of thing she was trying to avoid.

  In the faint hiss of static over the phone, she sensed that Frank detected the lacklustre tone in her voice. After all, he knew her well.

  ‘It’s a job that requires a woman’s touch,’ he said.

  ‘Come on, Frank, you know I’m not that much of a pushover. Don’t try to flatter me.’ But secretly she knew she’d be climbing the walls if she spent much longer cooped up inside studying. Being on a new undercover job would provide a welcome break from the books and, after all, it was the only thing that really got her adrenaline going. She took a deep breath. ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘I’m listening…’

  ‘I can’t talk about it over the phone. When can you come in?’

  3

  ‘I don’t think the cleaners have got back from holiday yet,’ said Frank by way of apology as he and Bailey passed by a half-eaten chocolate Yule log lying at the end of a bank of desks.

  It was Boxing Day and the office was more or less deserted. A few sad-looking Christmas decorations hung from the ceiling and some bits of stringy tinsel were draped along the top of a few of the computers, a meagre counterpoint to the gallery of criminals staring back at her sullenly from the numerous mugshots pinned to the walls.

  ‘Have you cleared this job with my CID detective sergeant?’ she asked.

  ‘I left a message on his answerphone but he hasn’t got back to me yet. I can’t imagine there’ll be any problems though.’

  Undercover work was something Bailey did alongside her routine job as a detective constable, and whenever Frank wanted her to participate in one of his undercover operations he had to obtain approval from her superiors.

  ‘I did manage to get through to the psychologist though,’ he said. ‘The normal checks. Y’know. Just as a matter of course.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’ murmured Bailey apprehensively. ‘What did she say?’

  Frank glanced over his shoulder at her. ‘She told me you passed your most recent psychological evaluation. She said you were fit for work.’

  ‘That’s reassuring.’

  ‘Unless you’ve been deceiving her somehow?’ he said, with an enquiring glint in his eye.

  Bailey evaded his gaze slightly. ‘I’m glad you called me. I’m looking forward to starting a new job.’

  ‘You’ve already agreed to do it and you haven’t even heard what it is yet.’

  She followed him through to a small meeting room off to the side of the main office. He opened the door and bade her enter. She’d been expecting the meeting to be just her and Frank, but to her surprise there was someone else in the room.

  Lounging back in a chair with one leg crossed over his knee was a face she recognised from the distant past. He was tall, athletic, with a square jaw, blonde hair, blonde eyebrows and striking blue eyes which now observed her intently with a cool, measured calm. At the sight of him, Bailey felt her breath momentarily catch in her throat and her knees go a little weak.

  ‘Bailey, I believe you already know DI Dale Bleudore,’ said Frank.

  ‘I believe I do,’ replied Bailey. Eight years earlier, she and Dale had both formed part of the new intake going through training at Hendon Police College.

  Dale stood up and held out his hand.

  Bailey sheathed her hand in his firm cool grip, and her heart skipped a beat as she thought to herself that he was even more handsome than she remembered.

  ‘Although I don’t think we ever spoke more than two words to each other,’ he said, with a disarming smile.

  Back at Hendon, Bailey had got the impression that Dale was a bit arrogant, but looking back now, she wondered if her reticence to talk to him had partially been out of shyness because she’d been a little intimidated by his good looks.

  She brushed an imaginary speck of dust from the lapel of her Donna Karan trouser suit, suddenly glad she’d made the effort to dress smartly for this meeting.

  So Dale was a detective inspector, she thought with interest. He was the same rank as Frank. While she’d been working undercover, Dale had taken the time to get promoted and move up the police hierarchy. He’d clearly done well for himself.

  ‘So what brings you here?’ she said, genuinely curious.

  Dale raised one eyebrow and made an ‘over to you’ gesture to Frank.

  Frank rubbed his greying red hair and fixed Bailey with his dead watery eyes. ‘You know that car bomb in West London a few days before Christmas?’

  Of course Bailey knew about it. It had been all over the news. A nice posh street in Chiswick had been totally wrecked, all the windows blown out, including those of a restaurant belonging to some celebrity chef. Initial reports had speculated that it was a terrorist incident, but unofficial opinions were now leaning in a different direction.

  ‘Yeah, they reckon it was a gangland hit, right?’

  Frank nodded slowly. ‘The victim’s name was Adrian Molloy. A member of the Molloy crime family.’

  ‘The notorious Molloys, eh?’ murmured Bailey.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Frank, with a knowing raise of the eyebrow. ‘He was one of them. He got blown up, along with some poor floozy who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. They found bits of them everywhere. They found her head in a tree a hundred and fifty metres away… and they’re still finding bits.’

  ‘Urgh!’ said Bailey as she visualised the macabre scene.

  ‘Initial feedback from the murder investigation team indicates that the bomb was clamped magnetically to the underside of the car, probably to the petrol tank at the rear. A small device, likely an RDX charge, set off remotely, probably via mobile phone.’

>   ‘Any information as to the culprits?’

  Frank shook his head. ‘CCTV in the street got us a brief glimpse of someone moving through the shadows, but visibility was very poor, and then they disappeared down a side alley which wasn’t covered by any public surveillance systems. Whoever it was, they were very good at evading CCTV coverage. They just seemed to disappear completely.’

  ‘Sounds like a professional,’ said Bailey. She paused and frowned. ‘So what does this have to do with me? Why the need for undercover?’

  Frank swapped glances briefly with Dale and then turned his attention back to Bailey. ‘Do you know much about the Molloy crime family?’

  ‘Well, apart from their general bad reputation, I know they’re a pretty heavyweight OCG.’

  OCG stood for organised crime group.

  Frank nodded. ‘You’re definitely right about that. The best way to think of them is as a multinational corporation whose business portfolio includes extortion, gun-running, drug trafficking, prostitution, hijacking, kidnapping, money laundering, bribery, fraud, counterfeiting, armed robbery, large-scale car theft and contract killing… amongst other things.’

  Bailey smiled as she watched Frank run out of fingers as he counted off their crimes.

  ‘Their assets are rumoured to run into the hundreds of millions,’ he continued, ‘and they use every trick in the book to launder their illicit cash. In order to conceal their criminal enterprises, they operate a whole host of front companies, as well as a variety of legitimate businesses. They have hundreds, if not thousands, of people working for them, and most of those people probably have no idea that they’re actually really working for the Molloys.’

  ‘Impressive,’ said Bailey. ‘Where exactly are they based?’