The Ardmore Inheritance, Rob Wyllie [best novels for students TXT] 📗

a fair amount of groundwork in preparation for the raid, and in particular had managed to suss out the physical layout of the place, courtesy of a short conversation with the leaseholder of the building. It turned out the suspect occupied a river-facing flat, one of eight on that floor, his front door immediately opposite the entrance to the lift with the safety stairwell alongside, which was perfect for securing the op scene. All they had to do was station one of the armed boys in front of the lift doors and there would be no means of escape even if he did manage to burst past them. And as to the name of the suspect, the Canary Wharf bank and the leaseholder of the building had finally come up trumps, although it had taken them a fortnight to do so, and then it took just five minutes to cross-reference the two lists. There he was, standing out resplendently in both. Daniel Clarkson. It was early days, but now they had a name, it wouldn't take long to put together a profile of the guy. The request had already gone into the bank's procurement department to release whatever personal details they held on their cyber-contractor, and they expected to get a lot of useful information from that. Disappointingly, he didn't seem to have a criminal record, but of course that was about to change. Big time.

'Right lads, you know what to do,' Frank said as the lift doors slid open. 'I knock the door, we give him twenty seconds, and then in we go. And please, no shooting.' It was meant as a joke, but neither of the armed guys responded with a smile.

He rapped on the door three times. 'Daniel Clarkson. This is the police. Open up.' They stood silently, awaiting a response.

'Daniel Clarkson. Police. Open up.'

'We need to go in,' French said impatiently. 'He might be destroying evidence. Guv, come on, let's get in there.'

Frank raised an eyebrow in mock disgust. 'Aye all right then. Ok, in we go now boys.'

The officer with the battering ram took a wide backswing and then let rip, smashing open the flimsy door with his first attempt.

'Daniel Clarkson,' Frank shouted as they streamed in, 'this is the police. Stay exactly where you are and don't move.' Behind him, he saw one of the officers had drawn his pistol. 'No bloody guns I said, for god's sake. He's a hacker not a bloody terrorist.'

It seemed as if the suspect had been relaxing on his sofa before their unexpected arrival. On the wall, a huge wide-screen television was showing a Premier League football match but with the sound muted. A laptop sat on a small table, open on a Facebook page. Geordie, Street Artist.So now there was no doubting they'd got the right guy.

'Right, grab that laptop Frenchie and then let's see where he's hiding.' He pushed open a half-closed door and found himself in a kitchen, feeling the breeze on his face from the wide-open window.

'Not here,' Frank called. 'He can't be far away. There's just two bedrooms and a bathroom.'

'We've already looked,' shouted one of the officers. 'No sign of him.'

'Well we're on the fourteenth floor so he's not jumped out of the bloody window, has he?' At least, he hoped he hadn't. 'Have you looked under the beds and in the wardrobes.'

'Yeah, all clear,' came the reply. Which just left that door in the hallway, the cloakroom or broom cupboard or whatever you wanted to call it.

Silently, Frank took hold of the handle then nodded to the officer with the Glock 17, who dropped down on one knee, pistol pointed at the door. With a deft movement, he yanked it open.

'Bloody hell.'

Slumped against a bundle of coats was the body of a man, mouth and eyes open in a grotesque expression, frozen in place by rigor mortis. Beneath him, a pool of congealed blood had spread almost to the door of the little cupboard, evidence to this being the location where the murder had been perpetrated. Six to eight hours probably since he'd been killed Frank reckoned, but they'd let the forensic guys work that out exactly. What was certain was that Daniel Clarkson wasn't going to be answering any of their questions now.

◆◆◆

Next day, down at Paddington Green, Frank and Ronnie French were with DCI Jill Smart and DI Pete Burnside for an informal briefing on the Clarkson murder. The critical question they were addressing was if there was any concrete evidence linking it to the Elspeth Macallan case, and therefore should it be handed over to Detective Superintendent Colin Barker to become a joint investigation. The truth was, Frank couldn't say one way or the other.

'What are the forensics saying?' Jill asked. 'About the cause of death I mean.'

'Stabbing ma'am,' Frank said. 'Two or three times in the abdomen. They're doing the formal autopsy later today and then we'll know for sure.'

'Poor guy,' Jill said.

'Sounds like he got what he deserved,' Burnside said with characteristic lack of sympathy.

'So ma'am,' Frank explained to Smart, 'one interesting thing is the phone records put him at the scene of that tragedy up in Scotland where Elspeth's father killed her brother Peter and then shot himself. We don't know why Clarkson was there and whether he saw anything, so we don't know if there's a connection. To be fair, we don't know too much about the guy at the moment, but we should be able to fill in most of the blanks with a bit of digging.'

'I'll be on to that as soon as we're done here ma'am,' French said helpfully. 'Now that we've got his name and address and where he works it shouldn't be too hard.'

Frank nodded. 'And as to his murder, it seems likely that someone took exception to being blackmailed and this was done to shut him up. So that's going to be our first line of enquiry.'

'Yes, I'd go along with that,' Smart said, nodding. 'Find out who