“What time is the Chief Super expected?” asked Trish the next morning.
Since Dido’s revelation about her true past life, Trish had been doing a lot of thinking. Dido knew her well enough to let her do her own thing, and she’d talk to her in her own good time.

The two of them had just finished clearing away the breakfast things.

“I’d expect them to take about 4 to 5 hours to get up from Essex.”

“After lunch, then?”

Dido shook her head.

“A late lunch, I think, unless we hear from him in the meantime.”

“What’s the plan then? I mean, before they arrive.”

“A trip to Morrisons in Caernarfon is on the cards. The Beemer needs some fuel. We can do both at the same time.”

“But… you went shopping yesterday before you picked me up?”

“I did. But I got this text early this morning,” said Dido.

She picked up her phone and showed Trish a text.

“I was expecting them to stay just a couple of nights. John didn’t give any reasons why they were staying longer. John is not a man to do things on the spur of the moment.”

“There has to be something else?”

“That’s what I thought, but John is old school. He prefers to give people bad news to their faces. None of this email or texting of important stuff for him. He is direct and honest, and that I what made me trust him in the first place. Now? I dare not think what I’d be doing if he weren’t part of my life. His whole style is one of gentle persuasion. He drops hints and suggestions so that you come up with an idea that was perfectly aligned with his all along. That is what made him such a good boss in the Met. Believe me, I scoured the press for dirt on him. Even the reports of his retirement were oozing with praise for his skills as a cop and the regret that he was leaving. There was nothing that even hinted at him being on the dark side”

After half a second of thought, Dido added,
“His late wife was trans. He read me right from the start but didn’t make a scene out of it. That’s why I began to trust him.”

“He seems to be quite a man?”

“Trish, he is a decent human being… for a cop.”

Trish laughed.

“We seem to have bought half the shop,” complained Trish as she loaded the last of eight bags of shopping into the back of the BMW.
Dido grinned.

“I just took advantage of the extra pair of hands to stock up. Besides, with four to feed, then this lot won’t last that long if I know John.”

“He eats a lot then?”

Dido smiled and shook her head.

“No. John loves getting out of the car and walking… I mean for miles. If the weather looks good, I expect that he’ll propose a gentle stroll up Snowdon. That requires fuel at halfway and at the top, if not beyond.”

“A gentle stroll?”

“John was a uniform cop for nearly all his working life. He started on the beat… I mean a PC who walked the streets. Back then, it wasn’t unusual for him to walk 10 or even 15 miles a day. Even when he became a Chief Inspector, he continued walking. He’s completed the London Marathon four times in under three and a half hours. He walked me to death when I started living with him. It was his way of getting most of the wild girl out of me. No matter what I did, I could not outwalk him. As a therapy, it worked big time. Gradually, his gentleness got through to me.”

“He seems quite a good person… for an ex-Chief Super that is?”

“He is very much old school when it comes to policing. Pounding the beat makes you very observant of the world around you. On our walks around the forest and in the pretty villages in Suffolk, he’d challenge me to observe the world around us. He taught me so much about life. In my eyes, he is about as good as it comes. I learned early on not to underestimate him. There is a steely determination about him. There has to be… He would not have made it to Chief Super if there hadn’t been something special about him.”

“I’ve seen your observational skills at first hand. I’m starting to be a bit in awe of him.”

“Don’t be in awe. Just be natural and none of this ‘Sir’ crap. Ok?”

Trish laughed, then she said,

“If I know anything about ‘Uniforms’… Once you get to Chief Inspector, the job is mostly about man management.”

Dodo chuckled.
“He told me early on that there are two styles of managers. Those who rant and rave and make themselves known to their bosses. He called it the ‘Being seen to be doing nothing’ manager. The other is the quiet sort who looks and listens.”

“I guess that he’s the latter sort then?”

“He is. As I said, he gets people to do what he wants not by ranting and raving but by gentle persuasion, plus a bit of arm-twisting when needed. That’s how I began to trust him. He… He became the father that I never had. He will always be that to me, no matter what happens. He is the one person in the world that I trust implicitly.”

Dido’s admission didn’t altogether surprise Trish. Some days, she could not read Dido’s body language, but today, it was being broadcast loud and clear.

“We need to get this frozen stuff back to the cottage!” remarked Trish.

“True.”

During the drive back to the cottage, they passed the spot where they’d been stopped by the local Police Officer the previous day.

“If this is an ex-police car… was it just the run around for a senior officer or?” asked Trish

“Was it an ‘interceptor’? Is that what you are thinking?”

“Damm it, girl, you know me too well…” replied a smiling Trish.

“Yes, it was an interceptor. It might not have the ‘M5’ badge, but it is that and a lot more under the bonnet. I took a look at it this morning and saw a very non-standard twin turbocharger. Why?”

“Why would John want a car this powerful? It seems out of character for him?”

Dido laughed.
“John has one weakness in life, and that is cars. His restored old Ford Cortina is now set up for classic car racing but is still street-legal. The same applies to this beast. He takes the BMW to various circuits and takes on Porsche 911s on ‘track days’. That’s how he blows off steam. Thrashing a 911 is very satisfying, I know that personally. I saw him do that, and then he would buy the Porsche driver’s dinner. That’s the sort of man that he is.”

“Yet? He lets you drive her?”

“I know my limitations thanks to the former Police Driving Instructor who taught me to drive in this very car. I’d probably kill myself in pretty quick order if I tried to use even a small proportion of the capabilities of this beast. The electronics of this beast allow me to select the drive mode. I set it in comfort before I left to come up here. I’ve never dared try any of the other modes.”

Dido frowned and then smiled.

“Fancy a small wager?”

“How small?”

“A fiver. That’s small.”

“Ok, what for?”

“If we don’t go up Snowdon, what are the odds that he’ll suggest a trip over to Anglesey and a few laps of the racing circuit there?”

Trish thought while Dido slowed down and took the right turn onto the lane that led to Dinas Dinlle.

“Snowdon for a fiver,” she said as Dido pulled up in front of the cottage.

“Done!” agreed a smiling Dido.

Once the food had been put away, Trish made her move.

“Dido, I know that telling me about yourself was hard. Anyone who has been through what you have and has come out the other side with your head screwed on as you have it, someone that I want to be with.”

“What are you saying?”

“What I’m saying is that I’m here for you. Last night, I thought long and hard about Fox, and you are right about him. He needs to be taken down if even a tenth of what you say he did is true.”

Then, without any hesitation, she kissed Dido.

“Are we good then?” asked Dido when they broke apart.

“More than good, my darling.”

Trish’s show of affection surprised Dido. She’d never experienced anything like it before.

“We have a problem, though,” said Dido.

“You mean when we go back to University?”

“Yeah.”

“We have the rest of the summer to work it out, don’t we?”

Dido smiled and gave Trish a quick kiss.
“Let’s go for a walk along the sea wall to the old castle. I need a bit of sea air in my lungs.”

Hand in hand and with smiles on their faces, the couple went out for a walk. A crime-fighting team had just been formed.

John and Joanne arrived just before 2 pm. The lunch that Dido and Trish had prepared was very much appreciated.
Once the dishes had been done, John said,

“Ladies, my… our extended visit is not purely to be social.”

His tone of voice told everyone that he was serious.

“If Dido and Joanne could sit down at the table, I have something to tell them.”

He looked at Trish, a little uncertainly.
“John, Trish knows about me, and we are cool about everything.”

John's left eyebrow lifted so high, it almost reached his hairline.

“Dido?”
“Sorry, John, things sort of changed between us… and I had to tell her everything.”

John thought for a few seconds.
“Trish? How did that make you feel? Knowing about Dido and what she has been through?”

“To be honest, Sir, I felt both unclean and unworthy. Dido is a remarkable woman.”

“None of this Sir crap, please. I’m retired.”

“Sorry, S… John.”

“Ok, if all three of you would sit down at the table. I have some news that could impact all of us.”

"Joanne knows a little of this, but there have been two major developments. Firstly, the gang of thugs who attacked Joanne have struck twice in the past week.

The silence in the room told him that he had everyone’s attention.

“The first victim is in Intensive Care. The Bottle cracked as it was inserted into her rectum. Her colon was ruptured and she lost a lot of blood. She should recover, but the big news is that the cracked bottle also injured one of the attackers. We have some of their DNA. These guys are always so careful, but this was unexpected. I suspect that a little bit of panic set in. There was a lot of blood and… their first thought was to leg it.”

“I take it that the DNA is not on record?” asked Trish.

“Correct. But it is the first real bit of evidence we have on them. We also know that they have at least access to some state-of-the-art electronics and weaponry. They laser-blinded three external CCTV cameras earlier that evening. Then they carry a phone signal jammer, as well as not carrying any phones themselves. These guys are very, very good.”

It was Dido who spoke next.

“Just the sort of kit that you can buy in several online stores in the USA. Don’t ask me how I know that, but I do.”

“Are you saying that at least one of them is from the USA?”

“From what Dido said, they are, or at least one of them has a job that or travels regularly between London and the USA… The City of London is full of companies with US Offices or vice versa,” remarked Trish.

“That is exactly what the task force is now thinking. I had a long talk with the SIO yesterday. The team are worried about the escalation in not only violence but frequency. I asked him about Joanne and, in particular, her safety.”

An icy cold had fallen over the room.

“The media is looking into each case with renewed interest. One paper has somehow gotten hold of the names of all the victims apart from the latest ones. It seems that at the weekend, there will be a huge article on it published and that detailed photos of the victims will be posted in their online editions overseas. They can’t post them here as the identities of rape victims cannot be made public unless the victim gives their consent. Joanne is the odd case out for obvious reasons. That will mean increased interest in her case. Naturally, we want to avoid that. In light of that, we have come up with a plan. It is early days yet, but it may involve a fake funeral for Joanne.”

It took the three women several seconds to understand what John had said.

John continued.

“Putting that aside, their modus operandi has evolved since the first attack and even more since the attack on Joanne. It could be that there are multiple teams at work. One idea put forward within the team is that it is a competition or even a game. One team does something, and the other one tries to outdo them. Whatever it is, they are very well organised and professional.”

“I get two things from what John has said,” remarked Dido.

“Firstly, they have spent time and money choosing a location. Sorry, Joanne, the more I hear about them, the more I think that your attack was more like an initiation than a planned operation. They had you for six hours and could have taken you almost to Scotland in that time, but they didn’t. Also, they needed to obtain the clothes that they took you to the club in. To me, this is all a bit ad-hoc and thinking on the hoof, whereas the other attacks are planned well in advance, especially the recent ones.”

John smiled.
“I can see that this student malarky is rubbing off on you?”

“Malarky?” exclaimed Dido.

“In a good way, naturally.”

“Trish, do you agree with Dido’s conclusion?”

“I do.”

She looked at Joanne.
“Sorry, Joanne, but at least it has allowed you to find out that you are not alone, and in time, I’m sure that you will play your part in taking ‘him’ down big time… when that time comes.”

“Thanks, Dido. It does get a bit daunting at times, but knowing that I have support from everyone here makes it all manageable.”

“The second bit of news also concerns Joanne,” said John as he changed the subject.

“Joanne, would you care to do the honours?” suggested John.

She managed a small smile before saying.
“My shrink has been working on me for months now. A couple of weeks ago, she broached the issue of how I look.”

Joanne looked at the others. Her expression said plainly, ‘I am nervous’.
“I resisted all talk about making me look a bit more feminine until… Until she showed me the before and after photos of you, Dido. Then the news came about a leak of the victims’ details, including mine. It didn’t take much persuasion from John, and the result is that I’m going to get fixed up. At least with a different face, identifying me will be harder, especially with that exposé about to be published.”

Dido chuckled as she remembered going through much the same anguish.

Dido turned to Trish.

“This is how ‘he’ does not recognise me at Uni. In case you have not noticed, I wear coloured contacts every day. It is all part of blending in, as Dr Martin calls it when he talks about undercover work. I found that out by accident when out panhandling. No one looks twice at a homeless person if they are there every day, especially one with badly bleached hair and in dire need of a good shower.”

Trish looked a bit surprised.

“I hadn’t noticed the lenses until Dido told me yesterday.”

“Joanne will be going away for however long it takes next week,” said John.

“That’s why we decided to come up. The clinic that is going to work on Joanne is in Cheshire, so… We are here, and we should make the most of our short time together.”

Trish looked a bit edgy. John saw that.

“That includes you, Trish. Once Dido had read you in on the case, you are part of the team, and I’ll have no arguments on that matter… Got it?”

None of the women raised any objections.

“Good. Now, in the meantime, the three of you should do something girly or whatever you call it these days.”

“What sort of thing?” asked Dido.
John grinned.

“I took the liberty and booked the three of you into a spa in Llandudno. A bit of pampering and the chance to make yourselves look stunning. Then some shopping because tomorrow night, we are all staying at the Pebble House Hotel, which is almost the best place in town, and I’ve reserved a table at a French Restaurant just a short taxi ride away.”

“When did you arrange all this?” asked Trish.

“Dido only told me about herself last night?”

John smiled.

“She texted me about reading you in on her situation when she went to bed. I burned a bit of midnight oil to sort it all out. The confirmations came as we drove up here. For some reason, she insisted that I play dumb about her reading you in on the case. I still don’t know why, but it does not matter now.”

“So that’s what all those messages were about?” asked Joanne.

“They were.”

John looked at the three women. All of them were buried in their own thoughts.

“Ok, who is doing the cooking tonight?”

Dido laughed.
“I’ll do it. We picked up some nice Menai Straits Mussels and some local smoked Trout on our recent shopping trip. They will need to be eaten up today. There is a nice Vino Verde that I can use to cook them with and drink. Now… If someone would like to make some bread… Fresh bread, mussels and wine make a great starter”.

“I’ll do it,” said Joanne.

“After all, what can go wrong when it comes to making bread?”

John rolled his eyes and shook his head.
“Joanne has had… shall we say, a few episodes when it comes to cooking.”

Joanne smiled and stuck her tongue out at John.

“May I suggest making Soda Bread?” said Dido.
“I bought some Bicarb today. Using that means that there is no need to wait for it to rise a few times.”

“Dido bawled me out for not telling her the full history of the BMW. For that, I apologise. Trish, sorry for possibly putting you on the spot like that.”

Trish grinned.

“That’s ok, John. It was an education for me. The way Dido handled it was textbook perfect. That is certainly an interesting car…”

Dido went a little red in the face.

The meeting ended on a happy note.

The trip to the Spa and the later shopping trip were a welcome break for all three women. Trish was reluctant to dress up for their night out, but some gentle arm-twisting got her into a dress and heels.

When they went down to the hotel lobby in their finery, more than a few heads were turned. Joanne was justifiably nervous, but with Trish and Dido at her side, she managed her first outing in the evening since that fateful trip to the Chinese takeaway all those months ago.

A visibly pleased and smiling John was waiting for them.

“Ladies, you look fantastic if you don’t mind me saying so…”

Trish went a little red in the face.

“Our chariot awaits,” said John as he directed the trio to the main entrance of the Hotel.

The meal was as good as the menu promised. Neither Joanne nor Trish had ever tried French Cuisine, so it was a voyage of discovery for both of them. With guidance from Dido and John, they chose dishes that were not too strange for their palates.

By the time the Taxi dropped them off near the Hotel, a good time had been enjoyed by all four of them.

“A little after-dinner stroll will help the digestion,” said John.

They promenaded back to the Hotel, although Trish was visibly struggling when they reached their destination.
“I’m just not used to anything other than flats or DM’s,” she complained.

“Then, my dear, you should get some practice in. If you want to be a detective, then being able to go undercover is part of your job. It goes without saying that wearing heels is an essential part of being able to blend in with others when the case demands it,” said John.
Trish just glared at John. Dido laughed.

“You wear them then!”

John laughed.
“If you had some in my size, I’d gladly wear them. It would not be the first time that I’ve worn heels. My late wife loved her heels, and yes, she bought some for me to try. I still have them somewhere at home,” he said with a smile.

Trish had no answer to that put-down. She began to understand just how special a man John Proudfoot was and why Dido called him her father.

Once they’d returned to Dinas Dinlle, John got the three women to sit down.

“I have something to tell you,” he said.

“Yesterday, while you were in the spa, I received a phone call from DCI Masters, the SIO on the rape cases. He told me about a development that affects both Joanne and Dido.”

“Should I make myself scarce?” asked Trish.

“Didn’t I say that you are part of this team?”

“You did but…?”

“Trish, what I am about to tell you is confidential, but not illegal in any way. Please stay.”

She relaxed.
“There have been two developments in the past two days. One is hopeful and the other is not.”

He had the attention of the three women.

“The gang that so savagely attacked Joanne has struck again. This time, a 4th-year medical student in Edinburgh was attacked as she walked home from her shift at the Royal Infirmary. She is recovering in that very hospital. Her injuries are worse than Joanne’s but she should recover physically, but, mentally, she is now scared of all men including doctors. It appears that this crew hypnotised her into believing that all men are only interested in having sex with her. There is a treatment, but it will take a long time, as you can guess. These thugs need to be caught. They destroyed her life in a new and horrible way. The thing is, she was not LGBT but hadn’t dated since she started her course. The local CID think that money was tight. Her bank account had less than three hundred pounds in it at the time of the attack. It was emptied while she was in the ambulance on her way to A&E. Both the Hospital and University Computer systems were hacked, and all traces of her were removed less than an hour after the attack. Organised is just not adequate enough to describe this bunch of sadists.”

No one wanted to speak. Digesting the news was going to take some time.

“The good news was that her abduction was captured on the CCTV of a Bus. From that image, Edinburgh Police were able to get a good view of the van’s registration number. It belongs to a 2005 Ford Transit that has not been taxed or insured for at least seven years.”

“The registration number was put into the nationwide ANPR system.

After a brief pause, he continued.

“That same van pinged an ANPR camera the next evening on the A64 as it approached the city of Leeds. They had managed to get from Edinburgh to Leeds without pinging an ANPR camera. The ANPR Camera on this bit of the A64 was only put in a week ago. That tells us that someone on their crew or crew is a cop, or they have a cop under their control. I’m inclined to believe the former option, which makes me very sad.”

John let that sink in.
“A Police Car gave chase, but this van must have been re-engined as it outpaced the patrol car. The pursuing vehicle was not an interceptor, so it is understandable. The crew called in a nearby Interceptor and Helicopter support, who took over the chase. That ended close to Leeds City Centre when the two people on board bailed out and lost themselves in a crowd, leaving the Elland Road football stadium at the end of a pre-season friendly match. A team of forensic scientists from the NCA have been going over the van. They found DNA from more than twenty women, including Joannes’. Most of those women had been raped or kidnapped and came from all over the country.”

He turned to Dido.

“This all happened ten days ago. Since then, SOCO has been going over the van inch by inch.“

John paused for a second before saying,

“Dido, your DNA was found. It was degraded because of time, but it was an 85% match.”

Dido had given a sample of her DNA when she was picked up by the police as a suspect in an assault when she was living on the streets. The real assailant had been captured a week later, but her DNA was still on file.

Dido looked visibly shaken.
“But…” she muttered.

“Dido,” said John.

“This evidence seems to indicate some sort of causal link between the two sets of crimes. However, there is other evidence from the van that makes the link only incidental.”

“What sort of evidence?” asked a visibly confused Trish.

“The current thinking is that it appears that there is an underworld version of Avis or Hertz operating.”

“Didn’t anyone know about this before?” asked Trish.

“That, my dear, is the knockout question. The answer is ‘possibly’. It has long been known that there is an active supply chain of stolen vehicles that are ‘cleaned’ and then sold on to criminals. This seems different. The cab of the Transit had recently been disinfected, much like a crime scene cleanup, but the back of the van was a total mess of DNA and rubbish. It had also been modified in a very surprising way. I am sure that you are aware that in recent years, many Police Vans have had mobile cells added to the back. It is designed to make the transport of prisoners safer for all, prisoners and officers alike. This van was recently modified to have what the NCA people are calling a proper Police Cell. This is causing all sorts of questions and finger-pointing. It is not as if you can pop down to a B&Q or Halfords and leave with a Police spec cell under your arm. That one thing has sent a lot of Chief Constables into a frenzy. Everyone in England has been ordered by the Home Secretary to account for all vehicles that have been through their hands with one of these cells. The Scottish First Minister has herself ordered the same inventory. The First Minister in Cardiff and the interim head in Northern Ireland are doing the same. If just one van was sold off for some reason, the cell unit intact, then heads will roll. In my opinion, the cell was added by the same people who put a turbocharged V8 engine in a rusty old Transit. The drivetrain and suspensions were upgraded, and it had the latest Police Radio hidden in the dash. This would be a serious piece of kit if it were in the hands of the Police. If there are more like this van in the armoury of the bad guys, it represents a huge escalation in their capabilities and the corresponding threat they present to all police forces across the nation.”

“What does all this mean?” asked Joanna.

“The short answer is… we don’t really know. The longer answer is that we took one step forward and five hundred back.”

“What I want to know is, now my DNA is still in the Van? The last time I can positively remember being in the back of a Transit was when I was sold to the traffickers. That was when I was 8 years old. Unless…”

Everyone looked at Dido.

“I remember that I got a bad toothache about a year before I escaped. He… as in Fox gave me something for the pain. The next thing I remember was being back in my cell minus one wisdom tooth. It could be that they transported me in the van to somewhere that gave me treatment. I don’t know any more.”

“That problem, my dear, is causing a lot of head-scratching in the Met and with those involved with Operation Chesil that now spans all forces in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.”

“In other words,” remarked Joanna,

“The darlings of crime fighting in the Murder squad are no further forward in solving my abduction and rape. Nothing new there then…”

“There is something else, Dido. The Met team want to interview you. They went looking for you on Oxford St. but…?” said John.

Trish looked a bit concerned. John saw this.

“Trish, Dido used to run a team of pickpockets in the West End.”

Trish looked a bit uneasy, so John continued.
“Before giving all that up to become a student, she had been quietly tipping off the Met about some very serious crimes up to and including murder, for several years. Without her information, some very serious crimes would not have been solved. There was… shall we say, a gentleman’s agreement between the various parts of the Met to leave her and her team alone while she continued to give them good information.”

Trish smiled.
“For a moment there, I thought that you were some master criminal?”

After a second or so of silence, everyone laughed.

“Nothing I have said could be deemed admissible in court. I’m sure your studies would have told you that.”

“That’s true. If the Met turned a blind eye in return for some hot tips, then I’m happy to do the same, even if some of our Law lecturers would disagree,” said Trish.

“It looks like I should head back to London and talk to the Operation Chesil team ASAP. The discovery of the van has, IMHO, really muddied the waters. It does link the two cases, but that link is very tenuous,” said Dido.

“Who’s the criminologist now?” joked John.

“But seriously, do you now see how useful your course will be in bringing to justice those who defiled you and Joanna will be?”

He added,
“A long time ago, I saw something in you that made you very different from most of the victims I’d ever come across in all my years in the Met. With every passing day, I see you becoming a really good investigator. We will bring Fox to justice, then… we can look at the gang of rapists. Small steps, ladies, small steps, and we will get there.”

No one could argue against that.

[to be continued]