Shoot to Kill Read online

  James Craig has worked as a journalist and consultant for more than thirty years. He lives in Central London with his family. His previous Inspector Carlyle novels, London Calling; Never Apologise, Never Explain; Buckingham Palace Blues; The Circus; Then We Die and A Man of Sorrows are also available from Constable & Robinson.

  For more information visit www.james-craig.co.uk, or follow him on Twitter: @byjamescraig

  Praise for London Calling

  ‘A cracking read.’ BBC Radio 4

  ‘Fast paced and very easy to get quickly lost in.’ Lovereading.com

  Praise for Never Apologise, Never Explain

  ‘Pacy and entertaining.’ The Times

  ‘Engaging, fast paced . . . a satisfying modern British crime novel.’ Shots

  ‘Never Apologise, Never Explain is as close as you can get to the heartbeat of London. It may even cause palpitations when reading.’ It’s A Crime! Reviews

  Also by James Craig

  Novels

  London Calling

  Never Apologise, Never Explain

  Buckingham Palace Blues

  The Circus

  Then We Die

  A Man of Sorrows

  Short Stories

  The Enemy Within

  What Dies Inside

  The Hand of God

  SHOOT TO KILL

  James Craig

  Constable • London

  Constable & Robinson Ltd

  55–56 Russell Square

  London WC1B 4HP

  www.constablerobinson.com

  First published in Great Britain in 2014 by Constable

  Copyright © James Craig, 2014

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book

  is available from the British Library.

  ISBN 978-1-147211-517-1 (paperback)

  ISBN 978-1-47211-511-8 (ebook)

  Typeset in Times New Roman by TW Typesetting, Plymouth, Devon

  Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Mackays

  An Hachette UK Company

  www.hachette.co.uk

  CONTENTS

  Acknowledgements

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Thirty-Four

  Thirty-Five

  Thirty-Six

  Thirty-Seven

  Thirty-Eight

  Thirty-Nine

  Forty

  Forty-One

  Forty-Two

  Forty-Three

  Forty-Four

  Forty-Five

  Forty-Six

  Forty-Seven

  Forty-Eight

  Forty-Nine

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  This is the seventh John Carlyle novel. Thanks for help in getting it over the line go to Michael Doggart and Chris McVeigh at 451, as well as Krystyna Green, Rob Nichols, Martin Palmer, Clive Hebard, Joan Deitch and all of the team at Constable & Robinson.

  Thanks for their help and support go to Michael Webster, Will Baldwin-Charles and Ryszard Bublik.

  As always, the greatest thanks are reserved for Catherine and Cate. This book, like all the others, is for them.

  ‘When you have to shoot, shoot, don’t talk.’

  Tuco Ramirez, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

  Il ne faut pas vendre la peau de l’ours avant de l’avoir tué.

  French proverb

  ONE

  ‘Inspector Carlyle?’

  Shit. He could see the door and, beyond it, the real world. Life going on outside this asylum, waiting for him to jump right in and disappear. All he had to do was keep walking.

  ‘Inspector!’

  John Carlyle hesitated, cursing as he did so. He should have taken the back exit.

  ‘INSPECTOR!’

  Gritting his teeth, Carlyle tried to fix the approximation of a smile onto his face as he wheeled around and said, ‘Yes?’

  Angie Middleton, one of the newer desk sergeants, waved a sheet of A5 paper at him, a standard-issue worried look on her face. A massive black woman, she was sporting the kind of look that she normally reserved for times when the canteen had prematurely run out of her favourite roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. It suggested despair, laced with the slightest threat of impending violence.

  Carlyle stopped about a foot from the desk in the hope that he could still make a getaway. ‘What is it?’

  ‘We’ve had a report of a suspicious package,’ she said, suddenly lowering her voice. She thrust the note towards him.

  But I’m off the clock, he thought wearily. ‘Yes?’ he repeated, making no effort to take it from her. A suspicious package in London was about as suspicious as a pigeon in Trafalgar Square. And probably a lot less dangerous.

  ‘It’s in your building,’ Middleton added somewhat belatedly, her voice now barely a whisper.

  The inspector tensed. ‘Winter Garden House?’

  Winter Garden House, where he lived with his wife and daughter, was a 1960s block of flats in the north-east corner of Covent Garden, near to Holborn tube. A mixture of owned and rented properties, its inhabitants mainly consisted of low- and middle-income families, and others who qualified for social housing. The idea that anyone would want to try and blow it up was, quite frankly, ludicrous. But that was the thing about the so-called ‘war on terror’ – no one ever sought to deploy the weapon of common sense.

  Angie nodded. ‘Yeah.’

  Grabbing the piece of paper, he turned and hurried towards the exit, quickly scanning the details of the call as he did so. ‘EOD are on their way,’ Angie shouted after him. The Met’s Explosive Ordnance Disposal Unit was a group of ex-Army officers called to deal with suspected Improvised Explosive Devices. In the aftermath of an explosion, they were also called to the scene, in order to determine its cause. ‘They should be there in about five or six minutes.’

  Great, thought Carlyle as he lengthened his stride. The whole bloody circus is about to descend on us. It just gets better.

  Outside, the cold night air invigorated him. Once across Agar Street, he called his wife’s mobile. As always when he really needed to speak to her, it went straight to voicemail. Frustrated, he left a terse message: ‘Helen, it’s me. If you get this before I see you, either stay in the flat or don’t go home until I call back. Nothing to panic about, it’ll be sorted within the next ten minutes.’ Ending the call, he dialled up his home number and listened to it ring. Stepping off the pavement in
Bedford Street, he was almost mown down by a black taxi. Carlyle jumped backwards in fright as the cab came to a sharp halt in a line of traffic. ‘Stupid fucker!’ he hissed, giving the back wheel a kick as he manoeuvred his way around it. ‘Watch where you’re fucking going!’

  As he came round the driver’s side, the cabbie stuck his head out of the window. ‘Did you kick my fucking cab, you tosser?’ he snarled, threatening to get out and give Carlyle a good kicking of his own. He was a big bastard and the inspector had no doubt that he would be on the receiving end of a serious pasting if he stood his ground. Without the time or the inclination to do so, he lengthened his stride. Running down Maiden Lane, with the driver’s curses falling behind him, he groaned as he heard the robotic message on the home voicemail finally kick in. ‘Can’t you just answer the bloody phone for once?’ Without leaving a message, he pulled up his daughter’s mobile number. Third time lucky – Alice picked up on the fourth ring.

  ‘Hi, Dad!’ she said cheerily. Some kind of pop music was playing in the background and Carlyle caught laughter and a couple of words from an unfamiliar voice.

  ‘Where are you?’ Carlyle demanded.

  There was a pause. ‘I’m at Olivia’s,’ Alice said warily, suspecting a trick question.

  Ignoring the hostility in her voice, he ploughed on. ‘Who?’

  ‘She’s a friend at school. Not in my class, though. I’m having a sleepover.’

  That’s a result, he thought. ‘Oh.’

  ‘It was all agreed with Mum. I told you about it the other night.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Carlyle said hastily. He had no recollection of the conversation but he was happy that she was safe and sound. ‘Just checking. You have a great time. I’ll see you tomorrow.’

  ‘Yes . . . Dad,’ she said, the suspicion now replaced by embarrassment.

  ‘I love you,’ he said, as he slalomed round an old woman edging her way along the road with the aid of a Zimmer frame.

  ‘Yes, Dad!’ Alice laughed, ending the call.

  It took him another couple of minutes to jog up Drury Lane, past the Freemasons’ Hall and into Macklin Street. Outside Winter Garden House, more than a little out of breath, he listened to the approaching sirens. The Bomb Squad hadn’t arrived yet but they couldn’t be more than a couple of minutes away, even accounting for London’s impossible traffic. Punching in the entry code to the front door of the building, he stepped inside and headed for the lift. For once, it looked like it was working. Protocol said he should take the stairs but it was ten floors up, and getting up there under his own steam was out of the question. Also, he didn’t have the time.

  ‘Hold the door!’ he shouted at an anorexic blonde woman who was just getting in the lift with her shopping. The woman did as she was told and soon they were heading upwards at a steady if not exactly rapid pace. For once the smell of ammonia did not assault his nostrils and he let the woman and her shopping get off at the seventh floor, proceeding alone to the tenth, three floors below his own flat.

  Getting out of the lift, he turned right and made his way to number 20, home of Harry Ripley. Now in his eighties, Harry had lived in Winter Garden House since it had been built. He had no kids and, as far as Carlyle knew, no other family.

  There were three doors on the landing. All were firmly closed. This high up, there was no noise from the street; the only sound was that of the leather soles of his shoes on the smooth concrete floor, and the whistling wind outside. Stopping at Harry’s front door, the inspector bowed his head and listened. Hearing nothing beyond the wind, he banged on the door with his palm. After a few seconds he banged again, harder this time.

  ‘Harry! It’s John Carlyle! Open the door.’ He ran his tongue along his teeth. A large glass of Jameson’s would go down a treat right now.

  ‘HARRY! OPEN THE BLOODY DOOR!’

  ‘All right, all right,’ from somewhere came a tired, crotchety and rather fragile voice. ‘There’s no need to shout.’

  Suddenly disorientated, Carlyle looked around. There was nobody there. ‘Harry?’

  ‘I’m here.’

  Looking down, Carlyle realized that the old man was talking through the letterbox. Give me strength, he thought, trying to hold back an urge to wring the old codger’s neck. ‘Open the door.’

  ‘No,’ Harry said firmly. ‘The bomb!’

  Maybe he would kill the old bastard, after all. ‘What bloody bomb?’

  Harry cackled. ‘What kind of policeman are you? It’s at your bloody feet.’

  ‘Eh?’ Carlyle looked down. Next to his feet on the doormat was a small brown cardboard box that had been left next to the front door of the flat. Ten out of ten for observation, Inspector, he said wryly to himself.

  ‘I opened the door and saw it there,’ the old man explained, ‘so I shut it again and called the police.’

  Carlyle frowned. ‘And what makes you think it’s a bomb?’

  ‘They’re all over the place,’ Harry panted, ‘I saw it on the news. There’s a whatdyacallit . . . a terror alert thingy. Bloody nutters trying to blow everything up. Those Al . . . kayeeda folk, they’re everywhere. They should be deported, the lot of them. Send ’em back to where they came from.’

  That would be the provinces, then.

  ‘You’ve got to stay alert,’ the old man protested. ‘I wouldn’t stand there. You don’t want to get blown to smithereens.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah.’ Carlyle took a step backwards and peered at the box. There was some writing on it but he couldn’t make it out. You really need to get your eyes tested, he thought, and vowed to make an appointment at his local opticians as soon as possible. Less reluctant to bow to the inevitable than her husband, Helen had been there a few months earlier to get a pair of reading glasses. Now she spent half of her life wandering round the flat trying to find the damn things and accusing him of misplacing them. It drove him mad.

  Squatting down, he carefully lifted up the box and brought it closer to his face so that he could make out what it said.

  Unbelievable.

  Carlyle did a double-take.

  Un-fucking-believable.

  Bursting out laughing, he said, ‘Harry?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Did you order anything from Amazon recently?’

  TWO

  Dino Mottram finished his Suntory Whisky Cappuccino and signalled to a nearby waiter that he would like an espresso. Watching the last of his directors unsteadily leave the in-house private dining facility next to the main restaurant floor of Nobu London on Old Park Lane, he grunted his displeasure. ‘Fitzroy is pissed – again.’

  Dropping his napkin on the table, the soon to be ex-Mayor of London Christian Holyrod, watched one of the waiters scuttle over and take the elderly gent by the arm before he had the chance to walk into a broom cupboard. He then let out a small groan of pleasure and patted his ever-expanding stomach. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you did put on an excellent lunch. And not just the wine; the Beef Tenderloin was excellent.’

  ‘That’s no excuse for over-indulging.’ Mottram shook his silver head sadly. ‘I just hope he doesn’t go back to the office and grope his secretary.’

  Holyrod narrowed his eyes against the glare from the skylight atrium. ‘How very 1950s,’ he drawled.

  ‘I’m not joking,’ Dino said tersely. ‘We had to pay tens of thousands in compensation to the last one when he dropped his trousers in her office and asked for a blow job.’

  ‘Not ideal.’

  ‘No. The old bugger claimed he was having some kind of flashback to his days in the Diplomatic Service in Africa. Ridiculous. Anyway, I’ve told the new girl that if he does it again, just to kick him between the legs and run.’

  ‘Good advice.’

  ‘I’ll get him pensioned off as soon as I can,’ said Dino. ‘Monty Fitzroy pinpoints exactly why we need fresh blood like you to drag us kicking and screaming into the twenty-first century.’

  Christian Holyrod smiled.

  ‘I am genuinely delig
hted that we have got you at last.’ The older man gripped him firmly by the arm. ‘The Hero of Helmand residing in the boardroom of Entomophagous Industries – what a coup!’

  Holyrod bit his lip. Introduced to Dino Mottram only six weeks earlier, he’d only joined Entomophagous Industries on a whim, largely because of the name. Entomophagy – from the Greek éntomos or ‘insect’, and phăgein, ‘to eat’ – meaning ‘insect eating’, had tickled his fancy. That, and the six hundred thousand pounds per annum for three days’ work a month. He tried to affect something approaching humility. ‘Helmand . . . that was quite a while ago now.’

  Mottram jabbed a meaty finger into the space between them, his green eyes gleaming with passion. ‘It wasn’t that long ago. Anyway, the time doesn’t matter. What matters is that you did it.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ Holyrod agreed, although it seemed that his Army days were several lifetimes ago.

  ‘A Boy’s Own story made flesh,’ Mottram beamed. ‘One of Britain’s best soldiers – and then a stellar political career to boot.’

  ‘You are too kind,’ said Holyrod, grimacing slightly. The reality was that if his political career had indeed been ‘stellar’, or anything like it, he wouldn’t be here now, touting himself around the business world, looking to earn some proper cash for once in his life. As Mayor, he had been Prime Minister Edgar Carlton’s natural successor. But somehow, despite all the polls, Carlton had scraped a second election win and appeared to have every intention of holding on to the real political power at Number Ten for as long as possible. For Holyrod, well into a second term as Mayor, there was nowhere to go. No one was surprised when he announced that he would not stand for a third term. If, as the saying goes, all political careers end in failure, at least he had avoided failing on the biggest stage. Now, however, he had to earn a living. ‘I’m looking forward to getting started.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Mottram agreed, nodding vigorously.

  ‘I’m afraid that I don’t really know much about the company and what it does.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that.’ Mottram gestured towards the door. ‘Half of that lot have been on the board for years and they haven’t got a clue either. The trick is never to admit to your ignorance. You know what they say: never apologize, never explain and all that.’