Brotherhood of Blades by Linda Regan Page A

got round to wearing them.
    He still had her teddy too, in a drawer in the back bedroom: the pink Care Bear she’d had since childhood and she took everywhere. The tearstained, grubby toy was hardly even pink now, but he had been her prize possession and no one was going to take it away from him.
    His father had told him to get a grip and clear her stuff out, but he didn’t listen. Perhaps if his father had shown more feelings before and not maintained his stiff upper lip, maybe, just maybe . . . But Dawes was tired of maybes. Things were as they were, and that meant nothing but a few cans of beer on top of the fridge to welcome him home.
    He switched on the CD player and, as Willy Nelson’s soulful voice began to croon Without Her , he flopped on to the sofa and popped a can of lager.
    He didn’t feel especially tired, even though he had been working flat out for nearly twenty hours. Hearing about the murder down on the Aviary, then learning that he was being seconded to the case because of his knowledge of South London gangs, had set his adrenalin pumping. Finally all his research on South London gangs was paying off. They’d had a hard night tonight but the police had won out, and they had that bastard Reilly in custody. Dawes was almost sure he was the one who had dealt that fateful heroin to Philly.
    The lager felt cold and sharp as it slid down his throat. He couldn’t wait to get Reilly in interview. He knew Reilly ran the drug trade down on that estate, but he needed to find out exactly how long that had been the case. More than that: he wanted to know if the Aviary had been exclusively Buzzard territory before Reilly’s Brotherhood moved in, or if other dealers had used the territory too. He was pretty sure Reilly was his target, but he had to find out for sure, and now Reilly was securely locked away Dawes was confident the residents would start talking. He had been told there was an informant down on the estate already.
    This was also a crucial time for police/resident relations. If they could persuade some key people that the police could be trusted, there was a good chance they might get a grip on the violence which was teetering out of control. DI Georgia Johnson had said she was confident that they would tie up the case against Reilly over the weekend; it was all but in the bag. They even had a witness; all they needed was confirmation of the DNA evidence to put it to bed.
    Dawes hadn’t said a word, but he didn’t share her confidence. Stuart Reilly had a very smart brief. No one had made any charge stick thanks to him; he was more bent than the two hundred-odd South London gangs put together. Georgia Johnson had taken on a lot, and she would learn it wouldn’t be as easy as she thought.
    But once Dawes knew for sure it was Reilly who had sold the heroin that killed his sister, that bastard was going nowhere. Reilly might have spread terror across the Aviary estate by cutting fingers off his enemies or marking them with spider scars, but if he had sold Philly that fatal dose, it would be the end of the road for him. Dawes would do whatever it took.
    Dawes wasn’t entirely convinced that Yo-Yo Reilly had murdered tonight’s victim himself. He was certain he was behind the killing; he was behind all the crime on the estate. But if he hadn’t actually done the deed, the case was far from open and shut. If Reilly had stabbed her, the victim would have had twenty or thirty wounds, not three or four; the spider scar was his trademark. But Dawes wanted him in custody; he wanted it more than the rest of the Met put together. If DI Johnson thought Reilly was guilty of the murder, Dawes would say nothing, at least for the moment. His task was to bring in the person that murdered Haley Gulati, whoever that was. He would, too; he was a good detective and he’d do his job. But for now it was enough that he had Reilly in custody; he wasn’t going to miss the chance of a crack at him.
    As soon as the front