Page 47 of Murder in Shades of Fire and Ash

“Who the fuck are you talking to?”

Charlie knew that voice. Jeff Burton. The phone went dead.

35

Tuesday evening

The first thing Charlie did was call Will.

“Find me Alun Evans MP’s home address right now. Jeff Burton is in his house, with a knife, issuing threats. I’ll go there and then you send as much backup as you can get.”

Charlie heard the phone being dropped onto a hard surface, then the rattle of keys.

“Ty Castell, Bryn Road, Pont Derwen,” Will said. Charlie put the address into his map app.

“On my way,” he said. The app told him it would take him fifteen minutes, and looking at the route, the first fourteen would be spent finding his way out of Wrexham on the right road to Pont Derwen. “My ETA is fifteen minutes. Tell the back-up to come without blues and twos. We don’t want to spook Burton. I think he’s already unhinged.” Navigating his way around a roundabout on guesswork, Charlie missed Will’s next comment. “Say that again,”

“There isn’t any back-up,” Will said. “What there is, is a riot, a full-blown one, on the coast. Looting, cars overturned, riot shields, the lot. The uniforms the Chief Super lent us have goneto join the party, along with Mags. The back-up is us. We’ll get there as soon as we can. No noise.”

Charlie went round another roundabout, counting the exits as he listened to the prissy voice on his app. It seemed like the wrong direction, all the signage pointing to places he definitely didn’t want to go, and then there was another roundabout which disgorged him on to a narrow road with high hedges on both sides, and a half-hidden sign to Pont Derwen, three miles away. Three miles on these kinds of roads could stretch to half a lifetime of blind bends, missed turns and edging past tractors.

Trees cast deep black zebra stripes onto the road, alternately blinding Charlie and plunging him into darkness. The sun was beginning to dip, but it was still bright enough to create watery mirages on the tarmac. He kept blinking, pushing the sun visor up and down, accelerating as hard as he could, imitating Eddy’s speed round the corners, wishing for X-ray vision.

“In about three hundred yards, your destination is on the right,” the prissy voice informed him. Charlie kept driving. He would stop beyond the house, so that he could see it before he had to try to get in. Ty Castell was on the edge of the village, with fields on three sides. Despite its grandiose name, it was a simple detached stone-faced house, almost identical to the one he shared with Tom. He drove past and started to look for a place to stop.

“Perform a U-turn,” the prissy voice said, and then began telling him to “return to the route.”

“Shut up,” Charlie told it, and pulled into a gap in the hedge in front of a gate. He put aPolice Officer On Dutycard in the windscreen and cancelled the prissy voice, turning the phone to silent and slipping it into his pocket. As for weapons, he had none. No pepper spray, no baton and no stab vest. Only a pair of crutches. Because he’d been going to tell a family that their son was dead, not to go up against a knife wielding nutcase.

His leg had stiffened up during the drive, and getting out of the car was painful. It would ease. It would have to. The sound of distant tractors filled the air, along with the squeal of red kites and even the scratches of crickets. That noise, together with the heat, made the evening seem more dreamlike. Charlie limped carefully back along the road until he could see the house. Close to, nothing looked out of place. Plenty of windows were open, but no sounds came from within. He drew back into the hedge and got out his phone, calling the MP’s number. He heard the phone ring inside the house, loud enough that it must be at the front. Confirmation came with a shout from Britton. Right then, round the back it was. Charlie cut the call, and silence fell again inside the house. He worked his way back to the car and climbed, painfully, over the gate and into the field.

The grass was still green and uncut in the field, reaching to Charlie’s knees. He was hidden from the house by the hedge, which somehow he was going to have to get through, bad leg or no bad leg. But thank all the gods, someone had made a gate from the back garden of Ty Castell into the field. It was overgrown and rusty, but it would do. Charlie pushed, and the gate collapsed towards the house, with a screech of tearing metal. Charlie froze, heart pounding in his chest, his breathing shallow and fast. Nothing happened. Should he try the phone again? To check that they were still at the front of the house? Or would that make Britton more jumpy?

An enormous tractor and trailer came towards the house down the narrow road, the engine loud in the evening calm, the empty trailer bouncing on the road. Charlie stepped over the fallen gate, and hopped to the house wall, using the noise as cover. If anyone was looking out of the back window, he would be seen. But the garden was laid to a perfect lawn and flower beds. Nowhere to hide. The back door was open. Charlie flattened himself against the wall outside and listened. Nothing.Then, as his heart slowed, he heard it. Steps, very faint, so that he knew they were from the front of the house. Someone was walking up and down the living room, and, he strained his ears to listen harder, muttering.

Grasping the crutches, Charlie stepped through the open door and into the house.

36

Tuesday evening

The kitchen layout was the same as in Charlie’s own house. But where the walls of Charlie’s kitchen were covered in Tom’s sketches of the girls, the cat, and also, embarrassingly, of Charlie, these walls were painted a fresh pale yellow with a single canvas: one of those posed family pictures, where the members were all at odd angles to each other. The MP was recognisable, and the others must be his wife and children, all brown-skinned, with dark eyes and black hair; two girls and a boy. Here was another white man who had married a woman of colour, being threatened by a man who thought it was a betrayal of all that he believed was right.

Fuck this noise.

Charlie moved silentlythrough the kitchen door, and towards the front of the house. The pacing and muttering became louder. He put one of the crutches under his arm, eased the phone from his pocket and called Alun Evans. As the ringing started, Charlie moved, dropping the phone and holding the crutch like a club. Burton swung round as Charliecharged towards him, crutch upraised. He almost made it, but Britton was too close to Alun Evans who was tied to a dining chair. Before Charlie could strike, Burton had the knife against the MP’s neck. The phone was still ringing, until it suddenly stopped. In the quiet, Charlie could hear Burton breathing heavily, and Evans whimpering.

He’s going to faint.And then he did. Eyes rolling up, face turning grey, Evans fell backwards, and the knife in Britton’s hand traced a thin line of blood down his neck and onto his chest.

“Drop it,” Charlie said.

“You drop it,” Burton sneered, and poked the tip of the knife into Evans’ skin. A pearl of blood welled up beneath it.

Mindful of his lack of balance, Charlie put the crutches down carefully beside him.

“This is over, Jeff,” Charlie said. “My colleagues are coming, and they will be armed. You can still walk away. I would.”

Burton didn’t move. Blood began to soak into Evans’ T-shirt. “People will have to listen,” he said. “They can’t keep this quiet. You think I care what happens to me? Let them shoot me. They can’t coverthatup.”

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