The End Game by Bill Rogers

Author:Bill Rogers [Rogers, Bill]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-05-30T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 41

Nexus House, 3.00 p.m.

‘We do have one development, Boss,’ Nick Carter said.

There were just three others standing in front of the progress board: Jimmy Hulme, Duggie Wallace and Caton himself.

‘We have doorbell CCTV footage from one of Terry’s neighbours showing Terry arriving home at half past five last night, and then nothing until he left for work this morning, after we’d finished searching his house. As for him leaving on his bike via Millgate Lane, he doesn’t appear on any of the local cameras. The only way he could have avoided them would have been by taking a detour through the park.’

‘That would mean him having to lift his motorbike over the locked gates, there and back,’ Jimmy Hulme pointed out. ‘I know he’s fit, but he’s hardly The Rock.’

‘Who?’ Wallace asked.

‘Dwayne Johnson, holder of multiple world wrestling titles,’ Carter told him. ‘Keep up.’

It put Caton in mind of a case fourteen years earlier when the perpetrator had used a specially modified ramp to wheel his first victim over the locked gates of a Central Manchester park. That perpetrator was still alive in a prison hospital, but in a permanent minimally conscious state. As this could not be described as an end-of-life situation or even a terminal condition, the state was not legally able to switch off his life support. The irony was that Caton had actually watched him attempt to kill himself.

‘Boss?’ Carter said. He sounded concerned.

‘Sorry,’ Caton said, ‘I was thinking.’

‘We’ll be the judge of that,’ Carter quipped. ‘Anyway, I was asking if you still have Terry down for this one?’

‘I always kept an open mind as far he was concerned,’ Caton replied, ‘but it’s certainly looking unlikely that he was involved in the firebomb or the dognapping. That doesn’t mean he’s not involved at all.’

‘Whether he is or not,’ Carter said, ‘we do know that he’s been a very naughty boy! Tell him, Duggie.’

‘The analysis of the hard drive on Terry’s computer,’ the intelligence officer said, ‘revealed that he’s been using a colleague’s log-in to access ANPR records relating to his wife’s car and Jake Gorlay’s car.’

‘Inappropriate and unauthorised access to information, and use of a colleague’s personal password without their knowledge. That’s gross misconduct on both counts,’ said Jimmy Hulme. ‘He’ll be suspended and then given the boot.’

‘And the Army Reserve will have to be informed,’ Carter said. ‘They’re sure to kick him out too.’

‘God knows how he’ll react to this,’ Caton said, ‘or his wife. We know he has a temper. There’ll be duty of care issues for both of them.’

‘Not our responsibility, Boss,’ Carter said. ‘That’s down to the Professional Standards Branch.’

‘We’ll need to warn them before we tell his line manager,’ Caton said. ‘Leave that to me. But so far as Operation Sentinel is concerned, he remains a person of interest. Is that clear?’

‘Yes, Boss!’ they said in unison.

‘Good. Now, as I understand it, the only people who we’re aware of having a potential personal motive are Terry and Gorlay’s girlfriend, Becky Kerson.

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