I want in!’ Snake blurted on the tape.
‘You want in, Snakey … just like that?’
‘You were right. We dreamed it … but we never actually did it.’
‘I can’t take you on the next job, Snake. Not yet. I need you to sober up and think it through. Just steer well clear of Little Milden in Suffolk, on July 31.’
That had been all Snake had needed to know. After playing the tape to Heck and SCU, he’d told them about Ostara, an ancient Viking festival which fell on March 21. That was the night the first cleric had died. The other two murders had coincided with other pagan Nordic celebrations, Valpurgis on April 30 and Midsumarblot on June 21. They now had the date of the fourth one as well: Freysblot, which was July 31. And the location, Little Milden, where there was only one church: Milden St Paul’s.
Heck glanced again at the lurid cover to HellzReign.
‘But nah,’ Snake said again. ‘The Hellstroms aren’t involved. Why would they be? Much better to be the gurus who sit on the mountain and get the kudos without taking any of the risk. Anyway, when do I get paid?’
Heck tossed the magazine aside. ‘Soon as the Black Chapel get convicted.’
‘Look, Heck … don’t fuck this up, all right?’ The ex-roadie looked vaguely troubled. ‘We don’t want those five nutters walking free again. Let ’em rot in jail, so any other rootless, confused idiot toying with the same idea might realise that murder isn’t some bloody joke.’
‘Good luck with that,’ Heck said, standing. ‘We might have cleared the new Vikings off our streets, Snake, but I’ll tell you … there are people out there even as we speak, who, in their own minds at least, will have perfectly sound reasons for the total bloody mayhem they’re about to unleash.’
Heck got back to SCU at Staples Corner, in Brent, early that afternoon. The first thing that struck him were how many more vehicles there were than was usual on a Monday. He prowled the crowded bays before managing to locate a parking space. It was just his luck, of course, after he’d manoeuvred his Megane into it, to realise that the car on his left was Gemma’s aquamarine Mercedes E-class, and not only that, that the detective super was currently on her way across the car park towards it, with one of the civvy secretaries.
As he watched them through his rear-view mirror, they opened the boot of Gemma’s Merc and humped out a couple of sealed boxes of paperwork. The secretary set off back across the car park, carting one of these. But Gemma waited with her arms folded.
Sighing, Heck climbed out.
‘And where’ve you been?’ she asked. ‘I’ve only been trying to contact you since lunchtime.’
‘Thought it might pay some dividends if I went to see a grass,’ he replied.
‘I gauged that from the scruffs.’
Heck hadn’t yet had time to change out of the paint-stained jeans, sweatshirt and work boots that he’d worn for the meeting with Snake.
‘Unofficially?’ she asked. ‘As in … on your own?’
He shrugged. ‘I was out and about, but I just had a thought to go and see him.’
She considered this, before nodding at the box by her feet, turning and heading back towards the personnel door.
Heck picked the box up and tagged along after her.
‘Who are we talking about?’ she said. ‘Wait, let me guess … Snake Fletcher?’
‘Of course.’
‘For crying out loud, Heck …’
‘Partly it was to reassure him. He was very happy that we’ve made his intel count.’
‘So would a lot of lowlifes be if all they had to do to get paid was drop dimes on their mates.’
‘Thing is …’ Heck knew he had to choose his next words carefully. ‘I don’t know … I thought it went too well, to be honest.’
She glanced at him quizzically. ‘What do you mean?’
‘The takedown at Little Milden,’ he said. ‘The Odinists turned up when Snake said they would. All five of them. We nabbed them. Each one banged to rights … we had enough evidence to charge them almost straight away. By the time we get to trial, we’ll have even more. They haven’t got a chance.’
They reached the personnel door, and Gemma tapped the combination into the keypad. ‘Murder cases aren’t always complex, you know.’
‘I understand that. I just can’t help feeling that we might have missed something.’
‘Is this your natural pessimism talking?’ she asked, as they went inside and she summoned the lift. ‘Or did Snake say something?’
‘No, he thinks we’ve got everyone.’
‘So you have no actual grounds for this concern?’
He shrugged.
‘I thought so.’ She folded her arms as they waited in the small lobby. ‘Heck, as always, your determination to bottom out every single job does you credit. But sometimes you make too much work for yourself. And for everyone else, including me. Which, as you can imagine, is not always appreciated. Now, it may be that something else comes up in due course regarding the Black Chapel, and if it does, we’ll follow it to the end of the line. But in the meantime, we’ve got another, equally big job on our desk. Heard about Operation Sledgehammer yet?’
‘Erm … Sledgehammer?’
‘I had a meeting at the Yard over the weekend, and another one this morning. We’re going to be doing some work with the Met’s Cold Case team.’
‘Oh …?’ Heck wasn’t sure he liked the sound of that.
‘Gwen Straker’s coming in on it.’
‘Oh … right.’ This was better news.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, when Heck and Gemma were at Bethnal Green, Straker was their DI, and an able and affable boss she’d been. He hadn’t seen much of her in recent years, but from gossip she was still one of the most popular supervisors in the Met. Heck was sure that the next question Gemma expected him to ask would be about this mysterious Operation Sledgehammer, but the good news about Gwen Straker notwithstanding, he wasn’t yet ready to dismiss the case they’d only recently closed.
‘I keep thinking about this black-metal band, Varulv,’ he said.
She regarded him carefully. There were lots of things about Heck’s reckless style of policing that worried Gemma immensely, but she’d learned through hard experience that his instincts could often
