CHAPTER 1

Colin Owens was going back.

His cloak of invisibility was still giving him good service despite the years he’d been living in West Africa, spending his days lounging in the sun and plotting. He had made the occasional flight to Europe, as had his wife Sue. Colin’s trips had been for cosmetic surgery; minor alterations to his nose and jaw line. Sadly, Sue’s journeys back to Europe had been far more serious and ultimately futile.

It had started out as yet another sun soaked lazy morning at their luxury villa at Cape Point. They had breakfasted late and while Colin used one of his recently acquired skills to drive their beach buggy into the local town of Bakau for a few odds and ends, Sue had taken a leisurely shower and as she had on thousands of mornings previously, checked her body for things she hoped she would never find. Colin found her sat on the end of their bed when he returned.

“I’ve found a lump dear,” she said, then crumpled. Colin consoled her and tried to convince her to remain positive.

“We can afford the best treatment darling,” he had told her “let’s get moving quickly and hit this thing hard, head on. You’ll be fine. Don’t worry.”

The tears were soon gone, followed by anger and a steely will to fight whatever was going to be thrown at her. Sue Owens returned to the UK and sought out the best medical help. She made those long flights back and forth for almost two years, but she was to discover that she was in that small percentage of women who despite all medical efforts, are destined to suffer the hell of secondary cancer which spreads beyond the breast and the lymph nodes into the bones, liver and lungs.

Sue’s last flight home, ironically on her sixty third birthday some ten months before, had been when she resolved not to fight anymore, but to see out her final days with her second husband; the man she had married despite the knowledge that she had gained from her trip down into the tunnels of the Shaw Park mines almost a decade before. The man she loved unreservedly, despite knowing he was a stone cold killer.

Colin had listened to her decision as they drove back to Cape Point from the airport. He spent days trying to get her to change her mind to no avail. Sue would find him sat on the veranda with his laptop staring into space, the screen showing yet another possible treatment option that he was researching, no matter how expensive or bizarre.

Every now and then a tear would appear on his cheek. Colin didn’t readily show emotion and Sue loved him even more in those final weeks than she had before, but as each week passed, all treatments having been withdrawn, her body slowly began to lose the battle that it was now fighting alone.

The end was painful for them both and as Colin had cradled Sue’s head against his shoulder on that last terrible afternoon, he had known that as her life was slipping inexorably away, the softer loving side of him that Sue had uncovered and nurtured was slipping away too. When the end had finally come and Sue’s ragged breathing had fluttered to a standstill, Colin hadn’t shed a tear. His heart was now a solid block of ice.

Colin was alone in the world.

The next few weeks were spent arranging a simple funeral for one of the only two people he had ever truly loved; the other of course being his beloved daughter Sharron, who had been so cruelly dispatched by Neil Cartwright, a man Colin had considered a friend, someone he believed he could trust. In his naivety, Colin had handed his little girl over to a practised and cunning sexual predator.

Sue Owens was buried near Cape Point overlooking the beautiful home they had shared since they had made their hurried escape from the UK. The villa was sold and the proceeds, together with the sizeable amount remaining in their joint bank account, were safely tucked away in accounts in Switzerland and the Cayman Islands.

On the long overnight flight from Banjul to Schipol airport in the Netherlands, Colin had time to think; time to remind himself why he was making this journey.

The unfinished business back in the UK could now be dealt with once and for all. His constant checking on what was happening back ‘at home’, while he and Sue were enjoying the high life in The Gambia, had given him lots of new projects to attend to. The first priority however was Neil Cartwright. Colin allowed himself a brief smile of satisfaction as he closed the file on his laptop with all the data he had gathered on his first target.

Despite all the protestations in the British press, after several failed attempts, Neil Cartwright had eventually been granted parole. Colin had learned very early on that Neil had been incarcerated in HMP Frankland in County Durham. The increasingly inept justice system, so out of touch with the mood of the nation, had seen his beautiful daughter’s murderer banged up rather than strung up.

Neil Cartwright was housed in relative comfort; he was with other Category A prisoners in single occupancy cells. Prisoners whose notoriety had been plastered across the headlines of the national press and in countless television programmes while their crimes were fresh in people’s minds, but who now worked the fragile system to ensure they lived their lives in more pleasant surroundings than thousands upon thousands of pensioners who shivered in their homes, frightened to turn on the heating and frightened to walk the streets day or night.

Many of those same murderers and rapists, like Neil Cartwright had merited far more draconian sentences and all hope of release should have been extinguished, but as Colin had feared, whichever party was in government, they were woefully weak when it came to dealing with scum like Neil Cartwright and his ilk.

Colin’s mission was clear. He was the only person prepared to do what was necessary. As he had studied events back in the country of his birth from his luxury home in the Gambia he was convinced that his return home was long overdue. “The streets are dirty,” he had told Sue a few days before she died “they need to be cleaned.”

In the hours following his daughter Sharron’s death, the policeman who had come closest to catching Colin Bailey, as he had been known in 2001, DI Phil Hounsell had listened to the young girl’s father swear he would take his revenge. Phil Hounsell had known that it was no idle threat made when emotions were running high, but the words of a cold, calculating individual who would have no problem carrying out his own form of rough justice.

If Phil Hounsell had eavesdropped on that conversation on their Cape Point veranda, there would have been a chill running down his spine, but at least he would have been prepared for the challenges that would face him once his old adversary set foot on British soil again.

Colin looked at his watch. Time for an hour or two’s sleep, then he would be at Schipol airport. There should be no problems negotiating border control; he was moving straight over to check in with KLM and then he had booked a first class seat on the 9.45am flight to Aberdeen. People were a lot more affable when you could afford to pay the extra to be treated like a human being. Colin closed his eyes and slept like a baby. His conscience was untroubled; his meticulous planning meant that everything was running smoothly and on time as always.

“Excuse me, Sir,” said the stewardess “would you please fasten your seatbelt, we’re landing in a few minutes.”

Colin stirred, stretched his weary body and was wide awake. He had never been on a plane before that journey he had made to join Sue after Karly had been ticked off his list. Even now he was a relative novice. He was always a little tense on take off and landing; but the bit in between he could cope with no problem. As he felt the wheels bring the big bird back down to earth with hardly a bump he breathed a small sigh of relief. Then he sat back and watched the usual pantomime.

“Please keep your seatbelts fastened until we reach the terminal building and the aircraft has come to a complete stop.” Colin didn’t know why they bothered, as soon as the plane was on the tarmac the muppets were up out of their seats, retrieving heavy bags from the overhead lockers and practically braining a few old dears in the process. Then they stood listlessly in the aisle trying to anticipate whether they would be disembarking from the front or rear door.

Colin had noticed a similar ritual on the odd occasion he had travelled by train; indeed it was an even stranger ritual in some ways. He sat quietly conserving his energy while people from the rear carriages marched purposefully up the aisle towards the front of the train in the vain hope that they would arrive that little bit quicker to their destination. What planet were these people on?

He wondered why the morons he was now watching hadn’t worked out that the airlines used various delaying tactics to keep passengers from baggage reclaim to minimize the length of time they needed to be hanging around. Getting steps and walkways into position was a vital tool to this end; as was parking the plane as far away as possible from the main terminal, thus necessitating a route march of epic proportions for the elderly and a further nightmare for parents with young children.

While they were striding along marbled hallways or risking life and limb on the moving pavements, the airline personnel were taking their own sweet time unloading cases and other paraphernalia; then with the minimum of effort they were delivering the contents of the cargo hold to the reclaim area. Every now and then they miscalculated and the bags arrived before the passengers and Colin wondered whether there were any repercussions; no doubt a few internal memos flew around the offices and steps were taken to ensure it didn’t happen again.

Colin sat in his seat and watched the familiar process unfold in front of him. When the doors were finally opened, there was a melee as the people in the aisle split into two factions; those who thought it might be beneficial to exit via the front door and those who believed they had heard that the back door was open and turned to head towards that.

As the scrum was sorted out and the number of fellow passengers dwindled to a trickle, Colin rose from his seat, collected his carry-on bag, and walked coolly and calmly off the plane. He patiently followed the swarming mass of humanity ahead of him and was mercifully diverted from the vast majority as he headed off to catch his connecting flight.

The short flight to Aberdeen was far less crowded and Colin enjoyed the elegant comfort of his first class facilities; he had room to relax and time to reflect on the irony of the situation that awaited him. Neil Cartwright was going to be released both from HMP Frankland and this mortal world on the anniversary of Sharron’s murder. His arrival in Scotland had been timed to allow him enough time to make his way south and get into position.

Colin’s preparation was as immaculate as ever and although there was only the remotest possibility that border control would recognize the character arriving at Dyce airport as Colin Bailey, thanks to the plastic surgery, or that the English police would even be anticipating his arrival, he knew better than to take any unnecessary chances.

As he descended the stairs on his way to passport control he nonchalantly glanced around the terminal building; there were armed police in evidence as was usual these days with heightened terrorist threats from home and abroad, but no one seemed to be too interested in the small group of passengers who had just landed on the scheduled flight from the Netherlands.

Only minutes later he was stood alongside a conveyor belt with perhaps two dozen fellow passengers, watching a few lonely bags and cases that had somehow managed to remain unclaimed. Then he spotted movement to his right and as he tensed involuntarily in anticipation of a hand on his shoulder and a voice informing him he had indeed been spotted, an elderly lady in a tweed suit showed a surprising turn of speed as she darted forward and whisked a battered old suitcase up and away as she bustled past Colin on her way to Customs. Colin breathed a sigh of relief and joined the others as they retrieved their belongings.

Colin had nothing to declare and headed for the green lane; indeed he had nothing to fear from Customs if they had intercepted him and checked his case and carry-on bag. He wasn’t so dim as to try to bring a gun or a knife into the country. He appreciated both were readily available for a price within twenty four hours in most parts of the UK so he had plenty of time to get fixed up before Neil’s day of reckoning.

Colin took a taxi into the city and was dropped at one of its more modest guest houses. The first class air passenger was now going deeper under cover and the middle aged female owner who watched him register in her three star lodgings had him pegged as a married businessman in his late thirties who spent too much time in the tanning salon.

Once Colin had left the reception desk and disappeared to his room, Morag Mackenzie forgot about him; he was just another unremarkable occupant of Room 8, the sort of person who if she was asked what he looked like in a week from now, she’d be hard pressed to remember anything about him and that suited Colin Owens just fine.

CHAPTER 2

Detective Chief Inspector Phil Hounsell was alone with his thoughts in his office overlooking the Thames. He looked around his overly plush surroundings and wondered how the hell he had managed to get himself into such a mess.

“Oh for the good old days,” he mused as he sipped tea from a bone china cup “when I was chasing bad guys I could see and at least had a reasonable chance of making a difference. This is like pushing elephant dung uphill with a toothpick.”

Phil Hounsell had been headhunted by the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) in 2006 when the then Labour government had set up an elite unit to fight major crime. It was his own fault, he had been involved in several successful operations and his superiors were forever patting him on the back and whispering to him that, “you’re destined for bigger things.”

Why did he not learn the first lesson taught him by his old sergeant back in Bordesley Green all those years ago?

“Keep your head below the parapet son and life will be a bed of roses. Keep popping up to have a look and some bastard will get to thinking you want to be somewhere else. The grass is definitely not greener. Whatever bullshit they feed you. So think on lad. Think on.”

The suits in the ivory tower even forgave him his one real failure; that of not catching up with Colin Bailey and nailing him once and for all. Since Colin Bailey had scarpered to a country where no extradition treaty was in place with Great Britain, his bosses quickly lost interest in getting a result on that front. As for Phil’s pet project of proving that the quiet, unassuming site manager had been responsible for the deaths of his parents, a discredited doctor and eight violent gang members, well they had never seen things his way on that one right from the beginning.

When things had returned to the normal levels of criminal activity you would expect from an ostensibly quiet West Country town, Phil Hounsell suddenly found himself being invited to an interview, where he discovered the meaning of the phrase ‘fait accompli’; by the following Friday night, he was buying farewell drinks for his old team at the Wagon & Horses in Harrington End.

Right from the kick off the other so called team members drafted in from the different departments of Police, Customs and Immigration were at odds with one another; either that or they totally denied their existence. This amalgamation was not a marriage made in heaven. Rather than becoming a cohesive fighting force akin to the FBI, to combat the growing menace of drug and people trafficking, terrorism, gang warfare and money laundering, sadly the British version was doomed to be known as FBI – Failure By Indecision.

Over the past five years Phil had worked with teams investigating drug smuggling and money laundering; some of these operations had been moderately successful and a few fairly big hitters were taken out of the game. His promotion had been welcome but increasingly he had become disillusioned. All too often basic errors screwed up the legal process and every now and then a case they had worked on for months had to be dropped. Frustration wasn’t the word.

When the teams had been debriefed and were winding down with a few beers before being seconded to other teams across the country, they would all have a moan about the amount of red tape that seemed to hamper their progress day after day. Just a seemingly simple task like getting a green light for a surveillance operation took interminable committee meetings and as often as not the bird had flown by the time a decision was handed down.

As he gazed out of his window across the sprawling London landscape his mind drifted back to his old colleagues. Every now and then he had bumped into Danny Bevan, who had moved up here to join the Met in the early nineteen ninety’s; he had been invited to join SOCA too and was stationed in the Nottingham office these days.

During his time in the Met, Danny had spent some time working undercover, so ‘horses for courses’ as soon as SOCA got him on board, he was sent to work for the Operational Delivery directorate, planning the ‘how’, and ‘where’ efforts should be directed to achieve the greatest impact. Danny missed the excitement and danger of his old work, no matter how accurate the planning element his section delivered was, the criminal fraternity always seemed to be one step ahead. On the last occasion the two former colleagues had found time to have a beer, Danny had told his old boss on the quiet, that he was convinced that SOCA had a few ‘rotten apples’ and there were several officers with their hand in the cookie jar.

Phil Hounsell wasn’t overly surprised, but he warned Danny to watch his back; if some corrupt officer wanted to earn a big payday and heard him making those sorts of accusations, they might reveal his previous work experience to someone who would like to do him harm.

Callum Wood and Debbie Turner were still keeping the sleepy West Country streets free from blood and mayhem as far as possible. Even though Phil still lived in the area he rarely had a chance to catch up; a policeman’s lot is not a happy one, someone once said. He promised himself that he would phone Callum this weekend and see if some of the old crew could get together for a meal, plus the obligatory bottles of wine to help the conversation flow more readily. Not that that was usually a problem with that crowd.

As he was wondering whether to book a table somewhere, the phone rang and his reverie had to be put on a back burner as yet another thrusting initiative was about to sink without trace and the suits needed a conference meeting to discuss how to limit the fallout; translated into English this meant, who’s going to carry the can for this cock-up, because it sure as hell isn’t going to be one of us.

Three hours later he was driving back to his weeknight digs and the traffic welcomed him into its arms and he crawled sleepily forward towards a less than welcoming evening. It was standard off duty copper fare; a takeaway meal, a warm beer and some paperwork in front of a miniscule TV. A name he’d read in a recent report popped into his head; Neil Cartwright.

Phil Hounsell had kept an eye on Neil Cartwright’s parole attempts and idly wondered whether Colin Bailey would dare to come back to the UK to carry out his promise. Over the months since a restricted parole had been agreed, he had asked the immigration colleagues he had worked with whether there had been any sign of his nemesis.

They couldn’t give him any good news; nobody answering to the description he gave them had been spotted, but then it was ‘open house’ at many ports and airports these days anyway, depending on where and when you arrived.

Phil sat in his car, stationary now for a couple of minutes and wondered when the shit would hit the fan. “We don’t have a clue who the hell we’ve got on this island or how many. Anyone who believes that all the people who come here are honest hard working individuals who mean no harm to anyone wants their head read. Christ! Colin Bailey could be here already for all we know.”

With that the massed horns from the cars behind him suggested he get a move on. He turned into a now familiar side street and thanked his lucky stars when he found a parking space only ten yards from the Beijing Express. Happy days!

As he sat in the takeaway waiting for his order to be prepared he made a mental note to find out when Neil Cartwright’s release date actually was. He glanced at the clock on the wall opposite him and added another note to his ‘to do list’. As soon as he had polished off this chicken curry and boiled rice, he must ring the wife. “She’ll be wondering if this marriage is going down the toilet like most of those where one or both of the participants are on the force.”

Ten minutes later Phil was sat alone in his flat, with a tray of food on his lap and his mobile phone tucked under his chin, ringing home. Just another boring evening to while away, then a few hours sleep and that alarm would be interrupting his recurring dream. For some reason he had the same dream every few weeks and he never seemed to get to the end. Colin Bailey was stood in the dock, the jury was filing back into their seats and the judge, who worryingly looked like the owner of the Beijing Express, had a black cap on the bench before him and was obviously itching to put it on. He kept touching it and spinning it around on his finger.

Colin Bailey couldn’t take his eyes off it. Phil was watching the drama unfold, waiting for the guilty verdict to be handed down then the alarm or. “Daddy, get up!” or very rarely, “the kids are still asleep, sweetheart, are you as horny as me?” would wake him and almost the last thing he could remember was a slight grin starting in the corners of Colin Bailey’s mouth. As the dream dissolved, so did that final image, just like the Cheshire Cat in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, that grin still remained, long after the rest of the courtroom and its occupants had faded away.

Phil Hounsell understood the black cap was a figment of his imagination, worse luck; but he was convinced that his and Colin Bailey’s paths would cross again. He promised himself that the next time they met, Colin Bailey would have very little to grin about.

Meanwhile, a hundred miles away, Erica Hounsell was sat on the sofa watching her favourite TV soap when she heard her mobile phone ring.

“Bugger,” she muttered as the familiar ring tone of the theme music to ‘The Bill’ told her that her husband had decided to ring her at last. She muted the television and carried on watching as Phil tried to conduct a meaningful conversation while spooning yet another Chinese meal into his mouth.

They hadn’t invented phones that carried smells as well as noise yet, but Erica knew her husband only too well. When he got home at the weekend, she could tell from his expanding waistline and tell tale stains on his sweatshirts that he wasn’t out wining and dining some young bird, but was becoming a fast food junkie.

When all the small talk was exhausted and they had expressed their undying devotion to one another, as they always did on evenings like this when they were separated, Phil said he’d see her and the kids at the weekend and could she check whether her mother could babysit Saturday night so they could go out for a meal with the old gang.

After Phil had rung off, Erica Hounsell had a bit of a sulk, “I only have him home for forty eight hours and he wants to spend a sizeable chunk of it with his old mates. That’s just typical.” As she got back into the slow moving storyline of her programme, her mind drifted back to the night they first met.

Erica Trueman had been working behind the bar at the Wagon and Horses in Harrington End for a couple of months and had put up with her fair share of married men asking her out, promising her a good time, plus the usual assortment of no-hopers who sat there all night nursing a pint and hoped they might get lucky if they followed her outside when she left to walk the short distance to her flat. She was just the wrong side of thirty and had almost given up finding someone who would tick all the boxes; in fact she was prepared to settle for wiping the odd box off her list within reason.

Phil Hounsell came in with several other men and women enjoying a well earned drink. It was pretty obvious they were all coppers, but when he kept coming back to the bar for a quick chat, making out he wanted packets of crisps, or nuts and whether they had enough time for another round she had found herself warming to his smile and didn’t want to stop serving him any time soon. She laughed to herself as she sat in their lounge, with Shaun and Tracey tucked up in bed upstairs.

She had woken up next to him next morning and wondered who had been serving who. She had wanted to tell him, “I don’t usually do this sort of thing” but his bloody phone had gone off and he was up, dressed and gone downstairs and into the street before she could get both eyes open. While she had lain there feeling quite alone and empty inside, she had wondered if he had just been using her; maybe they weren’t a match made in heaven after all. He hadn’t even left her his number.

She couldn’t complain; she had rather thrown herself at him. Maybe he’d be back in the pub again and who knows, if he enjoyed the experience as much as she did then perhaps they’d see one another again. That had been nearly seven years ago. Time flies when you’re having fun – and kids.

Erica had turned up for her regular evening shifts at the Wagon & Horses over the next few weeks and somehow managed to stop looking at the door for Phil to walk in long enough to serve those customers who wanted a drink or a bar meal. She got a few orders wrong and a couple of regular blokes who dreamt were in with a chance got miffed when she appeared to ignore them. In the end the landlord had had to have a quiet word with her and ask if she was feeling alright. She had tried to laugh it off, but ten minutes later she was in the Ladies with the landlord’s wife Helen, crying her eyes out.

“If you want him dear,” Helen had said as Erica was snivelling like a child on her bosom “why don’t you go and tell him? After all you know where he works. Just walk into the police station and ask him out. At least you’ll know where you stand.”

Erica hadn’t quite plucked up the courage to do that, but she had hung around outside the station for an hour after she finished her day job working as a cashier at the Western Counties Building Society branch on the High Street. Eventually, on the third night she spotted Phil looking miserable as he dragged his feet up the steps towards the revolving doors. “Hi,” she had called out brightly “how are you?”

As he turned towards her she panicked. “He doesn’t remember me,” she’d groaned and started to turn away in her embarrassment. Phil Hounsell had been having a bad few days. Colin Bailey had disappeared, destination unknown at that stage and despite all the positive feedback he was getting he knew their efforts were going to be useless, without having anyone to charge in person.

“Hello um, I’m all the better for seeing you actually,” Phil had said and gave her one of those smiles that had led to her inviting him back to her bed in the first place “what are you doing here?”

“Hoping that you were free tonight?” Erica had replied.

“Give me half an hour and I’ll meet you in The Crown and we can take it from there.” Phil answered eagerly, then darted down the steps and kissed her. When they came up for air a couple of minutes later he casually brushed a stray lock of hair from her cheek and said, “I’ve never been so glad to see anybody in my whole life.”

Well, you can’t say fairer than that can you? Phil eventually remembered her name was Erica and although their relationship was arguably as a result of Phil being on the rebound from his passionate pursuit of Colin Bailey, Erica wasn’t aware of that and the grin she had on her face the next evening she worked at the Wagon & Horses told Helen the landlord’s wife everything she needed to know; except how soon she might need to buy a new hat.

Dating a policeman is never easy; and it was certainly never regular. They had managed five months of snatched evenings for meals out or in, drinks out or in and sex (always in) plus one glorious weekend when Phil managed to get time off and they drove across the Severn Bridge and then pootled around the Gower Peninsula, spending more time in their room than walking on the beach or visiting places of interest. As they were driving back into the West Country Phil had sighed deeply and said, “Look, this is serious isn’t it?”

Erica had looked across at him and nodded.

“I’m fed up with only being with you every now and then, it would make more sense if we got married,” Phil said “what do you reckon?”

Erica had laughed, “Not the most romantic proposal a girl ever had. I’ll have to think about it.” She had sat in the car as they got nearer to home and sensed Phil was getting edgy, wondering if he’d done the right thing, was she going to turn him down. As they reached the outskirts of Bath, Erica couldn’t stop herself from laughing and as she was wiping the tears from her eyes, she told Phil, “Yes, of course I’ll marry you!”

Erica and Phil were married in the small village church in Harrington End and the reception was held in the pub, where else. They were only able to snatch a three day break for their honeymoon as Phil was involved in a big case involving some aggravated burglaries on jewellery shops around the West Country and couldn’t be spared.

Shaun had arrived just over a year later in 2006 and little Tracey two years later; her two little angels, well most of the time, were fast asleep in their beds and Erica had got her son into the local school and her daughter enrolled in a playgroup a couple of days a week so far. She was back working part time at the building society, but trips to the Wagon & Horses were much rarer these days, with Phil working in London all week and weekends given over to cramming as many activities in with the kids as possible.

Of course, they had an ulterior motive; the more they tired them out, the sounder they slept at night and Mummy and Daddy could have some quality time of their own. Well, that was the theory; in practice, Phil was shattered after the pressure of his job and the fresh air he experienced back in the countryside. Erica looked at the kids’ photos and a few toys still poking out from under a chair and thought, “I wouldn’t swop this for anything.”

She noticed her soap had finished fifteen minutes ago and turned off the TV. She picked up her phone and dialled. “Hi Mum!” she said “sorry it’s a bit late, but could you babysit Saturday evening. Oh brilliant! Thanks. We’ll pop round with the kids in the morning and we can sort out what time we need you. I’ve got to try to book a table for all of Phil’s mates; exactly, some will be going out already and others will be working, so it will be any number between two and about twelve; typical man, leave everything to the last minute.”

Everything was perfect in Erica Hounsell’s world; A happy marriage, two lovely young children, a nice home. “Things don’t get much better than this.” someone once said. Isn’t that always the time when something or someone comes along to try to spoil everything?

In Aberdeen, Colin Owens was lying on his bed in Room 8. On his laptop was a short list of names;

Neil Cartwright - Monday 20th June 2011

Phil Hounsell - unknown

Erica Hounsell - yes/no?

CHAPTER 3

Colin Owens enjoyed delving into the rich vein of priceless information contained on the internet. On those lazy hot mornings in The Gambia before Sue had been so cruelly snatched from him, he had surfed the net catching up on all the local gossip from back home. He regularly read the Courier, the free weekly newspaper from his former home town; it carried more adverts and local councillors bleating on about their pet issues than any real news but every now and then he’d find something he could store away for future use.

Colin had read the headline ‘Popular local policeman weds’ and was well aware that DI Hounsell and a Miss Erica Trueman had been joined in holy matrimony at St Katherine’s Church in Harrington End. He filed that little gem away on his laptop for future reference.

Some time later he spotted news of the birth of a son and then a daughter. A year later he spotted that Bob Trueman had passed away and was ‘sadly missed’ by his widow Mary and Phil, Erica and family. All these items were recorded in the Personal Columns of the Courier for him to know as much about his old adversary as if he was living in the next street.

Colin was aware too of a change of landlord at The Crown and that his Friday night music had been discontinued in favour of free pool and poker nights. Colin was a little upset at this news, as he and Karen had enjoyed dozens of good nights in there listening to the bands. He put a little asterisk against the new name over the pub door, just in case he had a spare slot in his schedule when he returned to the UK.

He was returning to grasp the nettle that the politicians and the judiciary singularly failed to do, that was cleanse the streets of the evil that was choking the life out of his once great nation; but there may still be time for a small personal payback or two. Surely he’d be forgiven that?

Colin closed down the files he had been browsing through. He went onto the net and visited the web page for a group who played the sort of music that interested him. Unfortunately, many of the songs he and Karen had liked, such as those that UFO, Hawkwind and the others had played at that Rock & Blues Festival at Donington were too painful to listen to these days; they reminded him of Sharron and that while he and Karen were away enjoying the music and the freedom that the festival weekend had provided, their precious child was at the mercy of a monster. They reminded him that he had befriended a sexual predator and invited him into his home. Colin licked his lips in anticipation of what was to come “Tick tock. Tick tock,” he snarled “It won’t be long now.”

The website he was checking out was for Maiden’s Hair, an Iron Maiden tribute band that had recently arrived from Canada and were about to start a short tour of the UK before travelling extensively in Europe. Colin looked briefly at the set list:

Moonchild; The Prisoner; Two Minutes to Midnight; The Number of the Beast; Run to the Hills; Wasted Years…

Yes, they were pretty much perfect for what he had been looking for. Colin clicked on the list of venues and copied the details onto his laptop. He added an asterisk at pertinent points after referring to the computer calendar, and then deleted a few venues immediately following his asterisks. Colin’s planning head was on and the jigsaw was almost complete. He saved his file as Operation Street Cleaner.

The amended file now read:

Aberdeen - Music Hall

Edinburgh - Sneaky Pete’s

Glasgow - King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut

Glasgow - ABC

Gateshead - The Sage

Newcastle - O2 Academy

Whitby - Pavilion Complex *

Preston - Guildhall Complex

Bury - The Met

Manchester - Bridgewater Hall

Manchester - Night & Day Café

Manchester - Roadhouse

Liverpool - O2 Academy

Sheffield - City Hall *

Nottingham - Rock City

Nottingham - Rescue Rooms

Birmingham - O2 Academy

Bilton - Robin R&B Club

Leicester - De Montfort *

Milton Keynes - The Stables

London - The Underworld

London - Borderline

London - Koko*

Colin closed down his laptop and lay on the bed contemplating life – and death. He was just dropping off to sleep when there was a knock at the door. He sat up and swung his legs off the bed. “There’s only one person who knows I’m staying here; so hello Mrs. Mackenzie.”

Colin opened the door and sure enough it was the proprietor herself; looking a little disheveled it had to be said, certainly not the image she tried so hard to portray when behind the reception desk or when she was making sure her small restaurant and bar facilities were being run to both her guests and her own satisfaction.

Indeed, Colin could well believe she had spent the couple of hours since the evening meal had finished being served emptying a few of the bottles of wine that had been opened for her handful of paying customers.

“Sorry to disturb you Mr. Owens,” Morag Mackenzie said huskily “I was just wondering if there was anything you needed.” She looked over Colin’s shoulder. “It seems a waste a gentleman like you being tucked away in your room all the time. Don’t you get lonely hen?”

Colin could smell the alcohol on her breath; but there was something else too, a smell he recognised that stirred up feelings deep inside him that he had suppressed for too long. Mrs Mackenzie was wearing his late wife’s favourite brand of perfume. He had never been close enough to her to notice before. As she swayed unsteadily before him in the corridor Colin wordlessly stood back to let her enter the room.

“Well now hen, you’re a quiet one aren’t you?” remarked Morag as she peeled off her suit jacket “is it true what they say about the quiet ones being the worst eh?” Colin hardly gave her time to place her jacket on the back of a chair before he lifted her off her feet and threw her down onto the bed.

“Now look here!” started Morag but Colin silenced her with his mouth on her lips as her scent and the anticipation of what she could offer blinded him. He undressed her roughly, burying his face in her ample breasts. In his desperation, his trousers had hardly dropped to his ankles before he was inside her and he was thrusting into her like a madman. It had been so long. Morag clung onto him as best she could and tried to get him to slow down or the couple in No10 would soon be knocking on the wall.

“Take it easy, there’s no rush dearie. Breakfast isn’t until seven thirty!” she squealed as Colin carried on regardless. He shuddered as he came and groaned with the pleasure and the pain of that release. He missed Sue more than he had realised; the woman beneath him was no more than a warm receptacle for his seed, he had no feelings for her whatsoever. He was disgusted with himself for being so weak.

“It’s been a while then hen?” Morag purred in his ear “never mind, maybe next time you’ll pay me a little more attention eh?”

Colin was slowly getting control of his breathing and his thoughts. He could quite willingly strangle this whining woman right now, but it would hardly fit in with his plans. He had to keep her sweet; he couldn’t afford her to start running her mouth off about one of her guests. Lying here on top of a beached whale was not keeping a low profile that was for sure.

“Sounds good to me,” Colin managed. Morag was more than happy to oblige as despite her lodger’s brief performance she’d certainly felt him inside her and was looking forward to that feeling again.

They finished undressing and got into bed. Morag slid beneath the sheets and went to work; she emerged a minute or so later with a smile on her face. She sat astride Colin and guided his now fully erect penis into her.

“Right then dearie, now it’s your turn to hang on, because I’m going for it,” she cried and true to her word, she did. Colin had to exercise all the control he could muster, not down below, but trying not to laugh. As Morag wobbled up and down on his stiff shaft her breasts swung alarmingly only inches from his face and her chubby face was getting redder and redder with her exertions. Her language deteriorated from the refined hotelier she purported to be in front of her paying guests and descended to the level of the roughest back streets of the city.

There were a few phrases Colin half recognised from Scottish TV programmes he had watched over the years and a few more which he had no idea about. All he was certain of was that Morag was about to come.

“Jeez hen that was great!” she sighed after the desired result had been achieved and then she collapsed in a heap on top of Colin. He struggled to catch his breath. One thing he was certain of though as Morag Mackenzie rolled away to allow him to breath normally again, he had done enough to keep her sweet.

He was convinced that in amongst those half familiar and foreign phrases there had been some compliments about his “size” and “knowing how to treat a woman” and after she climaxed he was fairly positive Morag had admitted that, “nobody has ever given me a seeing to like that darling.”

Colin only slept fitfully that night. Morag had succumbed to a combination of the drink she had consumed before she tapped on his door and their exertions, and was snoring away next to him showing no sign of going back to her own room any time soon. Eventually, Colin dropped off and awoke to find he was alone. He glanced at his watch on the bedside table; it was just before eight o’clock.

There was a note by his watch, scribbled on a sheet of the guest house stationery. Morag had written, “I forgot to ask, will you be staying with us many more nights, only I’ve enjoyed having you so much, it would be a shame if you had to rush off?”

Colin knew only too well what the date was and that he had an appointment at the Music Hall the following day. Just one more night in Room 8 and he was starting his journey south. He looked at the chair where the previous evening Morag Mackenzie had hung her suit jacket. He wondered whether that would hold if he jammed it under the door handle later that day; he would need to get a full night’s sleep before that journey began.

Colin decided that breakfast could wait; his plan was set but it was always worth just running through everything one more time in his mind. Just to be extra sure.