CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Paull Cold Storage looked abandoned in the way expensive criminal property often did.
Too abandoned.
The weeds were high but the security light worked.
The sign had lost three letters but the camera above the gate tracked Drew's Range Rover as he passed without slowing.
He drove another four hundred yards, turned down a farm track and stopped behind a line of hawthorn.
Owen's van pulled in behind him.
Leah checked her phone.
"Calder is seven minutes out."
"You said that three minutes ago."
"Because time continues to happen."
Drew opened the door.
She caught his sleeve.
"I mean it. We do not storm a building because your new job title has damaged your brain."
"Temporary job title."
"That is the part you objected to?"
He looked toward the cold store.
"Daniel's bleeding."
"And if you run in blind, he'll be bleeding next to you."
Owen appeared beside the bonnet.
"Can we save the marriage counselling until after?"
Leah looked at him.
"We're not married."
Owen frowned at Drew.
"You should probably fix that."
"Please go away."
Sam came around the van carrying binoculars.
"Two cars at the rear. Gareth's grey Volvo and a black BMW I don't know. Side door open. One bloke smoking by the loading bay."
"Redmile?" Drew asked.
"No cut. Could be police. Could be accountant. Could be a very lost smoker."
Leah held out her hand for the binoculars.
The man by the bay wore dark trousers, boots and a rain jacket too square around the waist.
"Police."
Owen squinted. "How?"
"Shoes."
"That's ridiculous."
"So are most police shoes."
Her phone buzzed.
A message from Calder.
POSITIONS SET. DO NOT ENTER.
Drew read it over her shoulder.
"Good."
"That means wait."
"It means they're here."
He started walking.
Leah swore and followed.
They crossed the field low behind a broken concrete wall. Sam and Owen moved toward the rear fence. Nobody spoke now.
The cold store hummed.
Compressor.
Exactly as Sam remembered.
Leah reached the side door first.
Voices inside.
Gareth.
"He won't do it."
A second voice came from a speaker rather than a person.
David Renn.
"He already did. He took your club."
Silence.
Leah looked at Drew.
His expression changed.
Renn continued through the speaker.
"Your vice-president called an emergency table thirty minutes ago. Four men have already told my people you're finished."
Drew's expression hardened.
Leak.
Even after everything, Renn still had ears close enough to hear a club vote before the smoke cleared.
Gareth said, "Drew doesn't want the chair."
"Men say that when they're standing behind it."
Daniel laughed.
Weakly.
"That's because you've never met my brother. He hates furniture."
A crack.
Someone hit him.
Drew moved toward the door.
Leah blocked him.
Not with force.
Just a hand flat against his chest.
He looked at her.
She shook her head once.
Inside, Gareth said, "Enough."
Daniel coughed.
"Sorry. Acting president upset?"
"Shut up."
"He won't stay acting. You're going to prison. Owen hates paperwork. Sam has the charisma of a tax demand. Pete's a traitor. That leaves Drew."
"I said shut up."
"You always did prefer orders to arguments."
Renn spoke again.
"Gareth. Midnight is still the deadline. Original Rotterdam pages. Michael Quinn's signed statement. The route keys. In return, Daniel walks. You walk. North End keeps enough business to survive."
Drew closed his eyes.
There it was.
Gareth still believed him.
Or needed to.
Leah leaned toward Drew's ear.
"Calder needs Renn talking."
He whispered, "Daniel needs his shoulder."
"Two minutes."
"One."
"One and a half."
"Fair."
She almost hit him.
Inside, Daniel said, "Ask him what happens to Amy."
Gareth did not answer.
Daniel continued.
"Go on. Ask. If you're doing all this for her, make him say she walks too."
"Amy isn't part of the deal."
"Exactly."
Gareth's voice dropped.
"Don't."
"You've used her name every time you were scared. Venn threatens the club: Amy. Rigg wants a route: Amy. Renn wants evidence: Amy. She told you to stop. You still haven't."
A chair scraped.
Gareth said, "I kept her alive."
Daniel answered quietly.
"You kept yourself president."
Drew heard something in Gareth's breathing then.
Not anger.
Recognition.
The speaker crackled.
Renn said, "Vehicle arriving. Gareth, open the east shutter."
Leah's phone vibrated.
CALDER: MOVE NOW. ARMED TEAM EAST SIDE.
She nodded.
Drew opened the door.
The room beyond was enormous and cold enough to turn breath white.
Empty storage racks rose toward the ceiling. Condensation shone on the concrete.
Daniel sat beneath a hanging work light, wrists tied behind the chair, left shoulder dark with blood.
Gareth stood three feet behind him with a pistol.
The smoking man turned.
Leah had her gun on him before he finished reaching inside his coat.
"Don't."
He froze.
Drew walked into the light.
Gareth stared.
"I told you not to follow."
"You also told me you were president. Been a difficult day for accuracy."
Gareth looked toward the side door.
Owen entered behind Sam.
For the first time, fear touched Gareth's face.
Not because of the guns.
Because of his brother.
"Owen."
Owen removed his cut.
The front still carried SERGEANT AT ARMS because he had put the patch back on before they left the tyre shed.
He held it at his side.
"Table voted."
Gareth looked at Drew.
"You called a vote while Daniel was here?"
"No. I called it because Daniel was here."
"You stupid bastard. Renn will wipe us out."
"Then he wipes out a club you don't run."
Gareth raised the pistol slightly.
Owen's face hardened.
"Point that at him and I swear to God, Gaz, I forget you're my brother."
Daniel looked between them.
"This is better than Christmas."
"Daniel," Drew said.
"What? I've had a bad evening."
The speaker came alive.
Renn's voice.
"Drew."
Drew looked at the phone on a crate beside Gareth.
"David."
"You have no idea what you're stepping into."
"People keep saying that. Starting to feel rude."
"Gareth made an agreement."
"Gareth doesn't represent North End."
Silence.
Then Renn laughed.
"You think a vote in a shed changes anything?"
"Changed his job."
Gareth looked ready to shoot the phone.
Renn continued.
"The east shutter opens in thirty seconds. If it doesn't, every officer arriving will be told armed members of North End are holding a senior police witness hostage."
Leah said, "Bit awkward, considering the NCA are already outside."
Renn paused.
"Leah."
"Still disappointing you."
"Consistently."
"Occupational habit."
The east shutter motor started.
Nobody had touched it.
Remote control.
The steel door rose three inches.
Six.
A foot.
Blue light flashed beneath it.
Drew checked Leah.
Her attention stayed on the smoking man.
His expression told her enough.
"Those aren't Calder's."
The shutter rose to waist height.
Black boots appeared.
Armed officers.
Wrong team.
The smoking man reached again.
Leah hit his wrist with the pistol before he cleared his coat.
The first shot came from outside.
The work light exploded.
Darkness swallowed the cold store.
Everyone moved.
Drew dropped beside Daniel and dragged the chair backward as bullets struck steel racking.
Owen fired toward the shutter.
Sam shouted, "Left!"
Leah saw a torch beam and fired once at the floor in front of it.
A man yelled.
"NCA! DROP WEAPONS!"
Calder's team entered from the side doors at exactly the worst possible moment.
For five seconds nobody knew which armed police belonged to which armed police.
Drew hated systems again.
He grabbed Daniel's chair and pulled.
"Could untie me."
"Busy."
"Always an excuse."
Gareth appeared out of the dark.
Pistol raised.
Drew aimed at him.
So did Owen.
Gareth looked past them.
"Down!"
He shoved Daniel sideways.
A shot hit Gareth beneath the ribs.
He folded.
Drew fired toward the muzzle flash.
The shooter disappeared behind a pallet stack.
Owen reached Gareth first.
"Gaz!"
Gareth lay on his back staring at the ceiling.
Blood spread through his shirt.
Daniel's chair had fallen sideways.
He looked at Gareth.
"Why?"
Gareth coughed.
"Because I'm tired of you being fucking right."
Owen pressed both hands against the wound.
"Don't talk."
"You always say that after I say something useful."
Drew cut Daniel's wrists free with the folding knife he had carried since the first warehouse.
Daniel rubbed his hands.
"You still have that thing?"
"Sentimental."
"You hate sentiment."
"I hate you too. Stand up."
Daniel tried.
His left leg gave way.
Drew caught him.
For one second they were boys again.
Daniel falling off the back wall.
Drew underneath, furious because his older brother had ignored him when he said the brick was loose.
Then the cold store returned.
Gunfire stopped.
Calder's voice filled the darkness.
"CLEAR! EAST SIDE CLEAR!"
Emergency lights came on red.
Three men lay near the shutter.
Two were in police tactical clothing.
One wore no markings at all.
Calder crossed the floor with four officers.
Her eyes landed on Drew holding Daniel, Owen kneeling over Gareth, Leah with a pistol, Sam beside a freezer door and the unconscious smoking man.
"I said do not enter."
Drew looked at her.
"We had a difference of interpretation."
"You have a talent for those."
Leah crouched beside one of the tactical officers.
He was alive, bleeding from the thigh.
A plastic security tag hung from his vest.
Not police identification.
Evidence contractor.
She turned it over.
EAST YORKSHIRE SECURE RECOVERY.
Daniel saw it.
His face changed.
"Drew."
"What?"
Daniel pointed.
"That's Renn's exit."
Calder looked at him.
"Explain."
Daniel leaned against Drew, pale.
"Hale used seizures to move drugs. Venn used routes. Renn has something cleaner. Evidence recovery. Anything seized can disappear between police storage and destruction if the paperwork says it was transferred."
Leah looked at the tag.
"Where?"
Gareth laughed weakly from the floor.
Everyone turned.
He was still conscious.
"Goole."
Owen pressed harder against the wound.
"Shut up."
Gareth ignored him.
"Old bonded warehouse. Renn bought the contractor through a shell company. He told me after Hale died. Said there was one last load. Enough to pay everybody and disappear."
Calder crouched beside him.
"How much?"
"Forty kilos. Maybe more. Cash too."
Leah said, "When?"
Gareth looked at Drew.
"Midnight."
Drew checked the time.
Eight fourteen.
Daniel closed his eyes.
"That's not the whole thing."
Leah looked at him.
"What else?"
Daniel opened his eyes.
"If Renn is clearing evidence recovery, he isn't just moving drugs. He's moving the things that prove where the drugs came from. Phones. Seizure records. Cash books. Venn's private files."
Calder stood.
"A mobile archive."
Daniel nodded.
"And if he gets it onto a boat, this week becomes stories against stories."
Gareth whispered, "He'll burn it."
Drew looked at him.
"You were going to help him."
Gareth's face tightened.
"I was going to get Daniel out first."
"And then?"
No answer.
Owen looked away.
Drew understood.
After Daniel.
After Amy.
After North End.
There was always another after.
Calder shouted for paramedics.
Leah stood beside Drew.
"You got your brother."
Drew looked down at Daniel leaning against him.
"Apparently."
Daniel gave him a tired smile.
"Touching."
Drew tightened his arm around him just enough to hurt.
Daniel winced.
"There he is."
Outside, sirens arrived from every direction.
This time Drew did not run toward them.
He looked at Gareth being lifted onto a stretcher.
Former president.
Brother.
Traitor.
Alive.
Then at the evidence contractor tag in Leah's hand.
The war had changed again.
North End had spent years moving drugs around police.
Now the police were moving drugs around North End.