‘We got a confession,’ Rachel said, ‘we-’
‘Am I talking to you?’ Godzilla roared. ‘Be quiet.’
Rachel’s cheeks burned. Bitch. She could feel the wound in her right forearm, the supposedly superficial one, throbbing in spite of the painkillers they’d given her.
‘The armed response unit didn’t reach the scene until at least ten minutes after I did,’ Janet said, sounding furious. ‘He could’ve shot and killed Rachel by then. He could have got out and run amok.’
‘We’ll never know, will we?’ The boss wheeled round and then back, placed her palms together. ‘And perhaps if you hadn’t piled in like a fucking rhinoceros he wouldn’t have freaked and shot her anyway. Did you think of that?’
Janet said nothing.
‘Protocol is there for a reason, because it works.’
‘Yes, boss,’ Janet said, a cold fury in her reply.
‘As for you,’ Godzilla glared at Rachel, ‘you’re injured, first you are shot and then you are knifed and then you go barrelling after an armed man. Have you got a fucking death wish? Had you got your body vest on? No. Taser? No. Baton? No.’
Anger flickering through her, Rachel said, ‘I just wanted to stop him.’
‘Just? There is no “just” about it. You didn’t think, Rachel.’
‘I got him,’ she said, ‘we got him.’
‘You could have been seriously hurt. More seriously. You and Janet both. I could have been going round to your husband…’
Rachel blinked, still surprised that she had a husband.
‘… to Janet’s family. If I wanted to run a training exercise in how not to deal with a violent offender, I could use this, you know.’ She walked across the width of her office and back. ‘You should know better,’ she said to Janet. ‘I thought you did. And you,’ her eyes bored into Rachel’s, ‘give me strength. When are you going to learn? I don’t want to be burying you with your bloody badge on the coffin and the police pipe band playing, but every time there’s a situation like this you turn into some suicidal nutjob.’
Godzilla took a breath then spoke slowly. ‘If someone is running around with a knife, someone who has already shown a predilection for violence, you do not pursue them. You run the other way. You alert people to the danger. You minimize the risk. Mi-ni-mize. Three syllables. Do I need to carve it on your forehead?’
There was a long pause. Rachel broke the silence. ‘Connor Tandy?’
‘You’re going nowhere near him, lady. Too much history. Too involved. Get someone to transcribe that confession,’ she pointed at Rachel’s phone, ‘and sod off home. Janet, you prep for the interview. His mother will act as an appropriate adult. Solicitor is ready, with him now. But at his medical he declared he’s taken amphetamines so we can’t interview him until he’s clean. Doc reckons another couple of hours. Now go,’ she said.
‘You reckon Greg Tandy knew it was Connor?’ Rachel asked Janet.
Janet thought back to the interviews. The fleeting reaction to the physical evidence, that moment when he’d faltered. ‘I’m not sure, I think at first he thought he was being framed, thought it was a fit-up. But maybe he worked it out. Figured out who had access to his gloves. He was carrying the bag when the neighbour saw him on the Saturday but not on the Friday.’
‘Been to fetch it on the Saturday?’ Rachel said. ‘He left the family home on the Friday after the argument.’
‘You walk out,’ Janet said, ‘you don’t necessarily take everything with you.’
‘He’d take the guns, keep them close. Maybe some clothes.’ Rachel coughed and winced.
‘Should you be here?’
‘Don’t you start,’ Rachel said. ‘So you’ll ask Connor about the gloves and the accelerant?’
Janet nodded. ‘We have the twins and Greg Tandy meeting at the Bulldog Army malarkey on Sunday. Maybe they’ve heard he’s the go-to man for firearms. They get his number, rendezvous at Bobbins on the Tuesday and buy the gun.’
‘Not hired,’ Rachel said. ‘If they’d hired it, they’d have given Tandy it back but according to Connor they sold it to Victor in exchange for some gear.’
‘Which we found in their bedroom,’ Janet said. ‘So, the twins kill Richard Kavanagh and burn the Old Chapel. They go to the warehouse, sell the gun and get the drugs.’
‘On the Thursday!’ Rachel said. ‘Shirelle saw them leaving that day when she was on her way with new merchandise. She takes the money Victor and Lydia have made, stocks them up and calls at Keane’s on the Friday to give him the takings and get more drugs. Once the murder is made public, Greg Tandy’s cheering about it and his missus chucks him out but he won’t take Connor, in fact he slags him off and the stupid lad decides he’ll prove himself by committing a double murder.’
‘It fits,’ Janet said, ‘it all works.’
‘Don’t mess it up,’ Rachel said.
What the…? Janet stared at her. ‘Me, mess it up? I’m not the one you want to worry about. Did you listen to a word-’
‘Just saying,’ Rachel retorted, ‘we’re nearly there. If you-’
‘Zip it,’ Janet said.
‘I only meant we’re so close-’
‘The hole’s deep enough. Stop digging.’
Unlike his father, Connor Tandy was prepared to answer questions. If only his mother would let him get a word in edgeways. She’d interrupted twice already, running him down, and Janet had to ask her to be quiet and let him talk.
‘You had your knife,’ Janet prompted him.
‘Yes. And we had some fuel for the barbie out the back. I took that and an old wine bottle and a bit of cloth. My lighter.’
‘Anything else?’ Janet said.
He thought. ‘A bag to carry it all and some gloves. In case of fingerprints.’
Janet nodded, non-judgemental, as if they were discussing the weather or bus timetables. She placed a photograph of Greg Tandy’s holdall on the desk and the gloves in their protective bag.
‘I am now showing Connor exhibit MG10 and exhibit MG16. Are these the gloves and the bag?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Your dad’s?’ Mrs Tandy said. ‘You stupid little idiot. What the fuck did you use his for?’
‘Mrs Tandy,’ Janet said sharply, ‘please. Just let Connor speak. Go on.’
‘I went down there when it was getting dark.’
‘To the warehouse?’
‘Yes. They were just chilling.’
‘Victor and Lydia. Had they taken any drugs?’ Janet said.
‘Yes, and I had some weed… I was working out what to do, who to do first…’ His voice trembled slightly, the first emotion he had betrayed. ‘… then Victor, he says, “Check this out.” And he’s got a gun. I says, “Where’d you get it?” and he says, “The Perry boys,” and if he sells it on how much will he get? Or maybe he’ll keep it for protection, right? In case of trouble. Lydia, she wants him to sell it though. They’re arguing but not shouting and I says, “Can I see it?” And he says sure. And I take it and I shoot him, two pops and she’s screaming, trying to get up, and I do her, three, ’cos the first one misses.’
‘Oh God, Connor.’ His mother covered her eyes.
‘Then I get the bottle ready and light it and chuck it by them and it works. Starts the fire.’
‘What were you, what in God’s… Jesus, Connor.’ Mrs Tandy sputtered to a halt.
‘What then?’ Janet said.
‘I went home,’ he said.
‘The bag and the gloves?’
‘Put them back under the stairs.’
‘And do you know what happened to them?’ Janet said.
‘My dad must have taken them.’
‘He did.’ Gloria shook her head. ‘He came round and got his stuff on the Saturday.’
‘You didn’t see him?’ Janet said to Connor.
He gave a shrug. ‘I was in bed.’
‘And the gun?’ Janet said.