The Decalogue

By Mark Pettinger

DCI Jonny Priest, fresh from his recent promotion bids a fond farewell to The Metropolitan Police and heads north west for a new challenge with the Greater Manchester Police Force.

He is immediately thrown into a murder investigation; a teenager brutally murdered in a nightclub. Priest soon comes to realise that this is not the first murder of its kind in the area, and with a truly sinister pattern emerging, DCI Priest and his team have a race against time to prevent further deaths.

Fresh starts never quite delivering the promises they hold; DCI Priest is met with two elements from his past - one very much welcome, the other tragic and long forgotten.

Has he got what it takes to lead and inspire a new team? Can he keep his personal challenges separate to his work life ? Can he catch a killer before he strikes again, and again.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jun 27, 2012
• ISBN: 9781483538273

Book preview

30

CHAPTER 1

3rd October 2009

Has it only been two hours? It seems like I’ve been on this bloody motorway all day.

His sat-nav indicated he had still got eighty-three miles left to reach his destination; Gorton.

Gorton, known back in the 13th century as ‘dirty or grubby township’, given its name probably due to Gore Brook, a dark water course stained brown by the surrounding peat land. DCI Jonny Priest had been doing some homework on his new station; and his new home for that matter.

Priest had recently been promoted to Detective Chief Inspector and had been stationed for the last twelve years at West Hampstead, a nice leafy suburban part of north west London. The station there wasn’t the largest in London by any means, but it did house a variety of different police units from Vice, Drugs and Firearms and Armed Response, together with the usual uniformed and CID officers. There had been no immediate vacancies for a DCI in the Metropolitan Police Force. Somewhat strange really, Priest had thought at the time; what with thirty-three thousand officers at any one time and a fairly high attrition rate, he had assumed that a few vacancies at every rank would always be available.

Priest had been made aware of a vacancy within the Greater Manchester Police. Their Detective Inspector had recently retired, and no like for like replacement had been recruited. The DI in question was, now at least, a lower rank than Priest, but apparently he was a senior and experienced DI with thirty years’ service, and had successfully led numerous large investigations during that time. It had been suggested to Priest by his senior officers that he might like the challenge.

The silence was punctuated by a rousing chorus from Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries. It was his mobile phone ringing. Thank God. Something to relieve the boredom of the tedious journey as the dulcet tones of the latest recruit to BBC Radio 2’s late morning show wasn’t really doing it for him. Priest fumbled around on the passenger seat.

‘Hello, DCI Priest.’ He usually answered with a simple hello, but had little opportunity since his promotion to revel in his new title…. So why not?

‘DCI Priest,’ came a sharp and firm voice. ‘This is Superintendent Sawden.’

‘Good morning, sir,’ Priest replied. Priest had only met Sawden twice. Despite the move north resulting from what Priest understood to be a simple force to force transfer, Sawden had insisted on meeting Priest twice prior to authorising his transfer. Once yes, of course, but twice; why?

Priest recalled how Sawden had spent more time talking about his tenure within the Flying Squad in the 1970s, than actually questioning or vetting him.

‘You sound as though you are driving. I assume all is well, and you are en route to Gorton?’

‘Yes, sir, I should arrive in a couple of hours,’ Priest said confidently, placing his trust in his sat-nav. ‘And I will be bright and breezy on Monday morning,’ he added.

‘Ah yes, that’s the reason for the call, Priest.’

Priest looked briefly concerned. What had gone wrong? Had his transfer been revoked? Of course not, why would it? It was approved four weeks ago. Priest switched on his indicator and pulled over onto the hard shoulder of the motorway.

‘There has been another murder early this morning.’ Priest could hear Sawden’s sharp intake of breath before continuing.

‘A young male was found dead this morning in the toilets of a local nightclub.’

Another murder….There had been a murder two weeks ago, and Priest was to head up that investigation; his first case as a DCI.

‘Are they linked?’ Priest enquired.

‘Not sure,’ Sawden said. ‘I don’t really have any facts at present, but I don’t think so….Anyway, I want you to get straight onto this. You can settle into your accommodation later tonight. When you arrive in Gorton, can you make your way over to the Meridian nightclub?’

‘The Meridian nightclub?’ repeated Priest. Sawden didn’t reply. Priest knew that it wasn’t really a ‘would you mind terribly stepping into your new role twenty-four hours earlier, Jonny’ type question, but more of a direct order. He didn’t question it.

‘Yes, sir, I’ll find it when I arrive.’

‘Good man.’ And with that the line went dead.

Priest pulled back onto the motorway and continued his journey. The call from Sawden had made him a little more nervous than he already was. He was thirty-nine years old, what did he have to be nervous about? Well there was the new job, with new responsibilities, managing a new team, at a new station, in a new area. All of which was now somewhat compounded by the added pressure of investigating two murders that had occurred in as many weeks. It should be a doddle!

CHAPTER 2

The Meridian nightclub was known locally as both a dive, and the hotbed for drugs activity in the town. It had been temporarily closed down twice over the last two years following successful raids by the drug squad. The council had initially refused to close down the nightclub upon repeated requests by the police, but had to concede when a court order was granted. On both occasions, it had re-opened again immediately after the three month closure order had expired. The police had failed to convince certain councillors and the magistrate, that a permanent closure order was necessary, despite garnering support from many of the local residents.

And, so the cycle continued. On an ad hoc basis, plain-clothed officers from stations on the other side of Manchester used to go into the club to try and identify and apprehend the drug dealers. It didn’t work, of course. Each of the non-uniformed officers stood out like a sore thumb. With their regulation short back and side haircuts and straight leg denim jeans, complemented by a Yves St Laurent collared shirt with a checked design that housewives would probably have as a kitchen towel, neatly tucked into their jeans.

That’s why the drug squad existed. Twenty-somethings with either shaved heads or long straggly unkempt hair, and almost always a couple of days’ stubble growth. They had street smarts and knew the lingo; they took the time to get in with a single group, which led to introductions to other groups, and before they knew it, all the regular clubbers knew them and trusted them. They could, and did, pass for clubbers, junkies and dealers alike. The trouble was; there were bigger challenges in the area than that posed by the two-bit dealers that sought to use the Meridian as their base of operation. So in the main, the drug squad never really turned their attention to the club.

Detective Sergeant Baxter and Detective Constable Simkins were met just inside the front door by Detective Constable Gilbert.

‘Sarge,’ proffered DC Gilbert as a kind of morning greeting.

‘Mr-T.’ Came the acknowledgment from DS Baxter. Mr T was a nickname derived initially from DC Gilbert’s Christian name Tony, but also from the fact that at six foot three, with a heavy athletic build, and being of African parentage, DC Gilbert bore a striking resemblance to the actor Laurence Tureaud, a.k.a. Mr T, best known for his role as B.A. Baracus in the 1980’s television show The A-Team. A resemblance most thought tenuous at best, as he was certainly bereft of the trademark Mohican haircut and half a kilo of gold necklaces adorning his neck; but this was CID and every CID rank and file officer had to have a nickname, it was the law.

They strolled through the narrow foyer paying passing glances to the promotional posters that adorned the walls. Free Entry and 2 Free Drinks B4 10pm, and Buy Two get One Free noted several more.

‘It’s no wonder that uniform have so much hassle on Friday and Saturday nights when these guys are peddling these kinds of offers,’ scoffed DS Baxter. ‘They don’t have two for one down at my local.’

No reply. DC Gilbert was teetotal, and DC Simkins was still young enough to partake of such debauchery on a Friday and Saturday night.

DC Simpkins changed the subject. ‘So, Sarge, what have you heard about the new DCI?’ Superintendent Sawden had made an unexpected call into the CID office last week to advise the team that they were to expect a new DCI, and that he was transferring from the Met. He had offered little more in terms of his name, experience, or indeed the exact date on which he would arrive. The message had been well received by the entire CID team; however much the young constables looked to their sergeants for leadership, and however experienced and skilled the sergeants were, they all knew that the team needed senior management, if only to deal with the bureaucratic and pompous interference that came from the Superintendent and the Assistant Chief Constable’s office.

Both Simkins and Gilbert stopped in their tracks and turned to look at DS Baxter. Baxter glared back at them both. The intensity was building up in his face; it looked like he was about to explode with rage, and explode he did.

‘Priest…’ he said. ‘They are sending us bloody Priest.’

‘Of all the DI’s or DCI’s we could have been sent, we get that twat,’ Baxter raged.

Simkins and Gilbert looked at each other, slightly aghast. Baxter had vented his anger on many occasions before, generally at them when they had forgotten to do something, but this was different. It seemed personal.

Baxter was still ranting when Gilbert ventured, ‘It sounds like you know him, Sarge.’ No response. ‘How would you know a cop from The Met?’

Baxter scowled back in that I’m no local yokel; I’ve been around the block kind of look. Gilbert stood off.

They continued through the foyer and down a wide staircase that led to the first dancehall. Baxter pushed through the two-way doors and strode through into the empty room. Mirrors, mirrors and more mirrors, which was about all he could see. Every piece of wall space, every pillar, every railing or partition was adorned with the ultimate accessory for the egotistical and self-conceited youth of today. A look at me, don’t I look good mirror. Baxter stood still for a second, his mind wandering back to his youth. He hadn’t been one for spending his weekends in nightclubs really; he was happier spending most nights down at his local. He had got to know the landlord quite well and had been cordially invited to extend his drinking experience beyond that enjoyed by most of his fellow drinking partners – a lock in! What little he had seen of the inside of a nightclub was, well, pretty much the same as confronted him now. Baxter wondered if the nightclub owners had left the décor unchanged for the past twenty-five years.

Simkins knew the nightclub well as he was a frequent Friday night reveller. What did surprise him, though, was how the mixture of a darkened room together with an increasing spiral of intoxication does a pretty good job of hiding just how dirty, tacky, sleazy, awful and downright trashy the nightclub was. His eyes scanned left to right across the floor. There were endless pieces of chewing gum embedded in the threadbare carpet, trodden in ten thousand times every weekend. The crescent-shaped booths, covered in the vilest purple velvet, were sporadically torn on both the seat and the back rest; and the foam filler was visible. Simkins recalled how he and his friends would regularly stand on the sofa and dance for many an hour; no doubt contributing to its current sorry state.

Baxter’s eyes were drawn to the far side of the room where he saw a uniformed officer standing in front of another set of double doors. That’s where they needed to be, and he picked up the step.

Out of the blue as they walked around the dance floor, he announced, ‘The Monk. That’s what they call him; the Monk.’

‘Sarge?’ replied Gilbert and Baxter in a somewhat rhythmic duet.

‘The new DCI; they call him the Monk. It’s his nickname,’ Baxter elaborated.

There was a momentary silence as Gilbert and Simkins were unsure as to whether they should enquire further, as a few moments ago, Baxter had blown his top at the mention of his name. Would he explode again? Or was he feeding them titbits, an enticer, wanting them to ask for more? Gilbert ventured forth.

‘What’s that all about then, Sarge? I assume it’s because his surname is Priest?’

Baxter stood still for a second to revel in his own smugness. He enjoyed knowing information about other officers that his colleagues were unaware of. He was Manchester’s very own information grapevine. It gave him a perverse sense of power. Knowledge was all in this game.

‘Yeah, kind of,’ Baxter began. ‘I called an old colleague down in the Met to find out who this new hot shot DCI was that we were getting. He told me that it was a newly promoted DCI called Priest, Jonny Priest.’

‘And…?’

‘And, he told me that they call him The Monk. Yes, it’s a play on his surname, but it mainly reflects on who he is, what he is like as a person.’

‘What does that mean?’ Gilbert asked. ‘You mean like, he’s into God and church and shit like that?’

‘No,’ Baxter replied. ‘Apparently he has no wife or girlfriend, no friends to speak of, and in the five years that my mate has known him, he has never socialised with any of his colleagues.’

Baxter finished, ‘He lives his life like a monk. Focussing on work and pretty much abstaining from everything and anything that’s, well, fun.’

The group passed through the double doors into a smaller dancehall; their focus immediately drawn to a group of individuals gathered a few metres over to the right hand side, outside what appeared to be the toilets. The group included half a dozen uniformed officers and two paramedics.

Upon reaching the group, DS Baxter cleared his throat and opened his mouth, just about to speak. ‘So, what have we got then, Sergeant?’ said a voice from behind him. Baxter turned to face the man that had clearly been walking behind them, quietly, for a few moments.

‘Sorry, you are…?’ Baxter quickly responded.

‘Priest…. Detective Chief Inspector Priest.’

CHAPTER 3

‘Well, Sergeant?’ Priest said, after what had seemed like minutes since his self-introduction. There was no response from DS Baxter in almost purposeful contempt.

‘Don’t know, guv, we’ve only just arrived ourselves,’ jumped in an eager Simkins. ‘DC Simkins, sir. Robert Simkins,’ he elaborated. ‘We thought that you weren’t starting until tomorrow, guv.’

‘Nice to meet you, Constable,’ Priest acknowledged. ‘Let’s keep the formal introductions until we’re back at base, shall we? Have you got any crime scene gear I can have please?’

‘Err, yes, guv.’ Simkins reached behind him into the three boxes placed on the floor that he had brought in with him. They were marked Crime Scene Shoe Covers, Crime Scene Gloves, Crime Scene Overalls, and he took from each and passed them to the DCI.

Priest moved through the group towards the Gents toilets, stopping briefly just outside the door. He turned towards one of the uniformed officers standing beside the open door. Priest had been to enough murder scenes over the past few years to know that uniformed officers were always first on the scene, and that the officer that had found the victim was generally the one still standing closest to the body: a noble act of outdated loyalty waiting for the victim’s soul to be lifted to a higher plane prior to removal of the body? Hardly, it was more likely that the officer was looking for praise, a hearty pat on the back for a job well done.

‘Were you first on scene?’ Priest asked.

‘Yes, sir,’ the constable replied. ‘About ten-thirty a.m. this morning.’

‘Follow me inside,’ Priest abruptly said.

Priest stepped through the door. His eyes were immediately drawn to the lifeless body of a young male that lay prone on the wet floor. He took a few steps forward towards the body, gently kneeling beside it.

‘Is this how you found the body?’ Priest hadn’t averted his gaze from the body, nor turned around to direct the question, but the constable knew he was asking him.

‘Err, yes, sir. We haven’t touched anything.’

‘I assume that the doctor hasn’t arrived yet.’

‘Not yet, sir, but he is on his way.’

‘Okay, thank you, Constable. Hang around for a while, will you?’

By this time, the rest of the CID team had ushered in behind Priest and were standing behind him. Priest viewed the body. He was young. He didn’t look much older than eighteen or nineteen, and was dressed in jeans and t-shirt, both of which had, on the underside, soaked up significant dirty water from the floor. He could see from the scuff marks on the wet floor around the body that there appeared to have been a scuffle, but couldn’t place why the front of the jeans and t-shirt would be quite so clean and dry. In his mind, he pictured the victim and his attacker tussling together, the wet floor making it almost impossible to stand as they grappled and slipped and slid from one side of the room to the other. Both of them must have fallen to the ground, writhing about on the sodden floor until such time as the attacker gained the advantage. But a tussle on the wet floor would have ensured that almost all of the victim’s clothes would have been wet and dirty. Anyway, he would come back to that a little later.

Around the victim’s neck was a white cable tie. It had been obviously been used to asphyxiate the victim. It had been tightened and held with such force that it had cut deeply into the victim’s neck, now leaving top and bottom lines of congealed blood where the skin had been broken.

The young man’s eyes were stark wide open, just like those of a rabbit caught in the headlights of an approaching car prior to dawn. The loss of oxygen had caused severe haemorrhaging, almost completely transforming the whites of his eyes to a dark blood red.

Further down his face, his mouth lay agape. A darkened, almost twisted tongue lay heavy on his bottom lip. His tongue almost alone told the story of the horrendous agony he had endured as he had fought for every breath, and tragically lost.

It had been glaringly obvious since Priest had walked into the room and set eyes on the young man, but after analysing the victim’s body his attention now turned to the object that was resting on his chest; a bible.

The bible had clearly been placed on the victim’s chest carefully. Its positioning was one of thought and care, and not simply thrown on as an afterthought post death. The bible was laid on the victim’s sternum; it came no higher than his jugular notch and was positioned in perfect line with the length of his body.

‘Has anyone touched this?’ Priest asked. ‘Is this exactly how it was found?’

Baxter and Simkins turned in unison to the uniformed officer. Baxter raised his eyebrows in his direction as though silently reiterating the question. Despite collectively thinking this slightly strange as the DCI had asked this very same question not two minutes ago, the constable duly answered again.

‘Yes, sir, just as I found him,’ confirmed the constable.

Priest thought this to be most intriguing, so he took a closer look. A King James Bible had been placed on the chest of the victim after death. He pondered on the significance of the bible, but he had no idea as to the meaning of any such message it was supposed to portray. It was too early to say.

‘Who found the body?’ Priest enquired.

‘Me sir,’ quickly chirped up the constable once again.

‘Not you. Who found the body and called the police?’

‘Mrs Verity Haywood,’ Simkins hastily jumped in. Soon after Priest’s arrival and after having handed out the crime scene clothing to all; Baxter had dispatched him to question and take a statement from her. He hadn’t been gone more than five minutes. Too eager to look at the bloody dead body, Baxter had surmised.

‘She’s the cleaner, guv,’ he elaborated. ‘She started work just after ten a.m, and usually cleans the gents’ toilets first due to the state that they are usually in. She found the body around ten-thirty a.m. and called the nightclub manager, a Mr Tim Sherwood. He wasn’t in the