Jim Ford has been a journalist for 25 years. Born and bred in the North-east, he began his career in Newcastle and has since worked for national newspapers, magazines and broadcasters.
Read more about Jim Ford and the Bug House series at www.bughousefiles.com.
The Bug House series
The Bug House
Punch Drunk
In Vitro
THE BUG HOUSE
Jim Ford
Constable & Robinson Ltd.
55–56 Russell Square
London WC1B 4HP
www.constablerobinson.com
First published in the UK by C&R Crime,
an imprint of Constable & Robinson Ltd., 2014
Copyright © Jim Ford, 2014
The right of Jim Ford to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or 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.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events or locales is entirely coincidental.
A copy of the British Library Cataloguing in
Publication Data is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978-1-47211-204-0 (ebook)
Typeset by TW Typesetting, Plymouth, Devon
Cover copyright © Constable & Robinson
Acknowledgements
Special thanks to Krystyna Green for getting it and Marcus Trower for making sense of it.
For my girls
Part One
ONE
It is 9 a.m. Friday morning, and in a joyless room in central Newcastle two men sit opposite each other. One is Detective Chief Inspector Theo Vos. The other is a trauma assessment counsellor.
‘You know, maybe I’m not cut out for this job,’ Vos says.
‘Why do you say that?’
‘I can’t help thinking I lack the requisite baggage.’
‘Go on.’
‘Well, I don’t have a drink problem.’
‘Hmmm.’
‘I’m not depressed.’
‘And?’
‘And I fucking hate jazz.’
The counsellor gives a watery smile. ‘But you’re talking to me, Mr Vos,’ he points out.
‘Only because I’ve been told I have to.’
‘You wouldn’t have come otherwise?’
‘No.’
‘It’s been two weeks. You haven’t felt the need to talk to somebody about what happened?’
‘Like who?’
‘Friends? Colleagues?’
‘No.’
‘What about family?’
‘What about them?’
‘You have a son, yes?’
‘He’s sixteen years old. We talk about cars and girls.’
‘What about your wife?’
‘Ex-wife,’ Vos says. ‘I forgot about her. Maybe I do fit the profile after all.’
‘Do you ever speak to her about your work?’
‘She lives with a dentist in Orlando. We don’t speak, as a rule.’
‘What about when you were married?’
‘She made it perfectly clear she wasn’t interested in my work when she divorced me.’
The counsellor sips from a glass of water on a table beside him and studies Vos carefully. From the file in his lap, he knows his subject is forty-two years old and has held the rank of detective chief inspector with Northumbria Police for three years. But the details seem patchy to him; it looks like pages have been carefully excised from the file, leaving only the bare bones of his career.
‘I understand Mr Peel fell from the roof of a warehouse?’
‘No,’ Vos says. ‘He fell from the fire escape of a casino.’
‘But it is correct to say that just before he fell, you were chasing him.’
‘Your point is?’
‘How does that make you feel?’
Vos considers this. ‘Pissed off.’
The counsellor sits forward. ‘Go on.’
‘Pissed off that I wasn’t able to catch him first.’
‘Why?’
‘Because he made a hell of a mess on the pavement.’
The counsellor eases back in his chair. He taps the end of his pen against his teeth. ‘And your colleague Detective Sergeant Entwistle. I understand he was badly injured during the same incident?’
‘A thug called Terry Loomis shot him in the back with a .22 pistol,’ Vos says. ‘It’s unlikely he’ll walk again.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Yeah. Me too. And Vic’s daughter isn’t too happy about it either. He was supposed to walk her up the aisle next year.’
The counsellor’s eyes light up again. ‘Would you say, then, that you feel anger about what happened to DS Entwistle?’
‘Of course I feel anger. Wouldn’t you?’
‘Has it affected you in any other way? Have there been any physical repercussions? Anxiety? Sleeplessness?’
‘No.’
‘But the fact that you feel anger about DS Entwistle shows that you are capable of emotional response,’ the counsellor insists. ‘I’m just interested to discover why those responses appear muted when it comes to Mr Peel’s death.’
‘Look,’ Vos says, trying to keep the weariness out of his voice, ‘Jack Peel was a villain. He made a lot of people’s lives miserable. I won’t be losing sleep over the fact he died while evading arrest.’
‘Leaving aside Mr Peel’s alleged background—’
‘There’s nothing alleged about it.’
‘Leaving that aside for a moment, the fact remains that a man died. That you saw him fall to his death, Mr Vos. Some people might have issues about this.’
‘Issues?’
‘Feelings of remorse. Guilt, even.’
Vos stares at him balefully. ‘You’re determined to pin some kind of post-traumatic stress disorder on me, aren’t you?’
‘Not at all. I—’
‘Is that why I’m here? Because I’m supposed to have issues about Jack Peel’s death?’
‘Do you?’
‘Listen,’ Vos says. ‘That bastard hit the ground ten feet from a young WPC. His brains went all over her trousers. I’m no expert, but I’d say she has some issues. It’s her you should be talking to, not me.’
‘The counsellor seems to think you may have a borderline antisocial personality disorder,’ says Detective Superintendent Mhaire Anderson, area commander of the Major Crime Unit, peering at the report on her desk through a pair of cheap half-moon spectacles. She’s only recently started wearing them. They give her a professorial air that is not in keeping with a hard, thin face, and she does not look comfortable using them. ‘He suggests you continue with the sessions.’
‘I’ve had two,’ Vos reminds her. ‘That’s the obligatory number, isn’t it?’
‘He seems to think you’re an interesting case.’
‘I’m flattered.’
‘I wouldn’t be if I was you.’
‘Are you ordering me to go?’
‘I couldn’t give a damn if you go or not, as long as it’s on your own time,’ Anderson says. ‘I’ve got a department to run.’
‘It doesn’t bother you that one of your senior detectives shows signs of an antisocial personality disorder?’
A thin smile. ‘The whole country has got an antisocial personality disorder, Theo. What makes you so different?’ Behind her, beyond the grimy pane, it is raining from a sky the colour of dishwater. ‘Peel’s people are agitating for an independent inquiry.’