Don’s bodycam caught the very moment that Middleton’s eyes glazed over, and his own muscles squeezed the life out of him.
Janet had left her own party shortly after Zardari because she knew if she’d stayed, she’d have fainted or puked or had a fucking heart attack. She called in to the prison surgery just after eight thirty, asking if she could be of any assistance. She was told Rodney Middleton had been found in a zombie state, unable to move, bent over on his bunk bed. He had died at the scene, but the paramedics had still attempted to revive him with epinephrine and a defibrillator. Zardari had arrived moments later and pronounced him dead.
Back at her flat, Janet had to sit down and take several deep breaths before she picked up the burner phone Josh had given her and reported that the deed was done. As usual, he spoke tersely, simply giving her the location of her passport and plane ticket and her fifteen thousand pounds. To her annoyance, they had all been stashed in her own kitchen under a floorboard by the fridge.
‘Get rid of the phone,’ Josh said. ‘And I mean right now. Have a nice flight,’ he added.
After Josh hung up, Janet sat with her knees jiggling and her hands shaking as the adrenalin slowly left her body. It was not until she had retrieved her stuff that she began to calm down properly. Packing the money into her case and the passport and ticket in her handbag, she took a hammer and smashed the burner phone into pieces which she would throw into different bins. She was too nervous to make any further calls to the prison, but she knew Middleton’s cell would be searched, and perhaps they would find something that could incriminate her. She told herself she had been very careful in the dosages, always making sure he swallowed the capsules and did not hold them under his tongue to either retain for later or sell to another inmate. But she needn’t have worried; in the end, Middleton couldn’t wait to get his hands on the fentanyl-filled capsules as he was gripped by his new addiction. He hadn’t noticed that it had been eating him alive for two weeks.
Janet left her keys with the landlady and took the train to London, booking in to a Holiday Inn near Heathrow. She still had two days before she got on the plane, but until then, her life was in the hands of the one person who knew she’d just committed murder.
Chapter 15
It was ten thirty and Jack was just pulling into his driveway when his mobile rang. It was Laura: ‘Are you up for a drink?’ But it didn’t sound like a casual invitation or like he really had a choice. Penny had seen Jack’s headlights and was now standing in the open doorway, smiling. He opened his car door and held his mobile in the air.
‘Laura needs to speak to me. I’ll be an hour, tops.’ Penny waved her understanding then went back indoors.
They sat in a corner booth of a pub not far from Jack’s house. He had ordered a gin and tonic for Laura and a half pint for himself. ‘OK, out with it, what’s up?’
She hesitated, sipping her drink before she began. ‘You know I said Josh could stay over on his way back to New York, and you said he could always stay with you. Well, I’m a bit concerned as I had a date on the night he wanted to stay over, so I tried to contact him via the drug squad. I spoke to Dave, the detective involved in that huge drug case, the one at the big house in Kingston. You remember him?’
Jack frowned. It sounded as if she thought he’d lost the ability to recall anything. ‘Yeah, of course, I remember. That case was how we met Josh.’
Laura nodded. ‘I asked Dave if Josh was back in London and he didn’t know what I was talking about. He hasn’t seen him for ages. When I mentioned he was doing this lecture tour of prisons, talking about the flood of fentanyl coming into the UK, Dave said it was news to him; maybe something Josh had organised with his US drug unit. He also told me that Josh was retired.’
‘He mentioned that to me. I think he said he’s semi-retired on medical grounds: you know, with his leg.’
‘What else did he tell you?’
Jack shrugged, having no idea where this was all going. ‘Not a lot. We had a few drinks. Caught up. He left early the following morning.’
‘From what Dave said, I got the impression Josh is very sick. He was not that forthcoming but said he was told Josh was having major mental health issues. Apparently, his youngest son went to San Francisco a few years ago. Josh found him on the streets, but it was too late. He was addicted to fentanyl and this new xylazine drug they call tranq.’
Jack was shocked. ‘He never mentioned anything about his son.’
‘Today I tried to talk to the New York drug team I knew Josh worked with, but they didn’t say much; protecting their own, I guess. But I got the impression he was actually forced to retire, because he’d become obsessed with tracking down his son’s dealers, like some sort of vigilante.’
Jack shook his head. ‘He never said a word about any of that to me. God, it makes me feel terrible. Going on about my own problems.’
‘I tried to catch you at the station but Armani’s had us doing different stuff all day. Jack, I saw a memo on DCI Clarke’s computer screen when I was in there collecting a file... his emails were just open, and it pinged through as I was right there. Well, when something pings, you look, don’t you? This is hot off the press, Jack.’
‘About Josh?’
‘Rodney Middleton was found dead in his cell. They’ve only just completed the postmortem. It was a fentanyl overdose, but they also discovered he had been taking this new drug, xylazine. And he had open wounds on his body. It’s terrifying because they don’t heal and, when someone ODs, they can’t use naloxone to reverse it.’
Jack was speechless, hardly able to comprehend what Laura had just told him. But he straightened out fast when she asked him if he knew if Josh had been at the prison Middleton was in. Laura drained her glass and sat twisting the stem.
‘There’s more, Jack... they have Amanda Dunn in custody, suspected of supplying the fatal dosage.’
‘You are joking!’ Jack barked, before checking his volume. ‘I thought she was inside for her part in the murders. She was his girlfriend for God’s sake.’
‘She got a year. But as she had been held in custody before the trial and then turned Queen’s evidence, she was only inside for six months. She did have orders not to contact or fraternise with Middleton, but of course they checked all his visitors once he’d OD’d and there she was — wig, fake tan, contacts to change her eye colour. Signed in as a Gail Leadbetter, a paralegal from the firm of solicitors representing Middleton. So she’s been rearrested. I don’t have all the facts, but they found drugs in her B&B and in her handbag and coat pockets I think.’
Jack was shaking his head, trying to take it all in.
‘Do you know which prisons Josh was supposedly visiting?’ Laura asked.
‘How the hell would I know?’ Jack responded angrily, then checked himself. ‘I’m sorry Laura, this is hard for me to take in, but I don’t like you inferring that I was privy to whatever Josh was up to...’ He hesitated, then lied. ‘I never discussed Rodney Middleton with him.’
Laura sighed and bit her lip. ‘I think I did. In fact, I think I showed him a file I had on Middleton, newspaper cuttings and stuff.’ She was becoming upset. ‘Jack, I think the best thing is for neither of us to mention any contact we’ve had with Josh. Walk away from it... it’s nothing to do with us. And anyway, Rodney Middleton was a vicious killer of innocent young girls who deserves what he got. And I’ll be glad if that precious lying girlfriend of his goes down again, too.’
Although he offered to get another round in, it was obvious they both wanted to end the evening. Laura even refused a lift to the nearest tube station, preferring to walk. Outside the pub, he gave her a hug.