Permission Granted

PERMISSION GRANTED

Grant & McNulty Stories

Colin Campbell

PRAISE FOR THE BOOKS BY COLIN CAMPBELL

Very real. And very good. —Lee Child

There’s nothing soft about Campbell’s writing. If you enjoy your crime fiction hard-boiled, the Jim Grant series is a must read. —Bruce Robert Coffin, author of the Detective Byron series

A cop with a sharp eye, keen mind, and a lion’s heart. —Reed Farrel Coleman

Campbell writes smart, rollercoaster tales with unstoppable forward momentum and thrilling authenticity. —Nick Petrie

Grim and gritty and packed with action. —Kirkus Review

The pages fly like the bullets, fistfights and one-liners that make this one of my favourite books of the year. Top stuff! —Matt Hilton

"An excellent story well told. A mixture of The Choirboys meets Harry Bosch." —Michael Jecks

Sets up immediately and maintains a breakneck pace throughout. Its smart structure and unrelenting suspense will please Lee Child fans. —Library Journal Review

This is police procedural close-up and personal. A strong de-but with enough gritty realism to make your eyes water, and a few savage laughs along the way. —Reginald Hill

Compilation Copyright © 2020 by Colin Campbell

Previously published stories include Granted, Chasing Tail, East Village Down, Boquillas Crossing, Fat Cat and Little Owl, Two Men in a Bar, and Trouble and Strife; all other stories are new.

All rights reserved. No part of the book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

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The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Permission Granted

Introduction

Granted

Chasing Tail

East Village Down

Boquillas Crossing

Fat Cat and Little Owl

Hollywood Light

Split Shift

Remaindered

Missing

Snow Blind

Resurrected

Two Men in a Bar

Two Men and a Lady

Trouble and Strife

Plus One

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Books by the Author

Preview from Catawba Point by Colin Campbell

Preview from White Trash and Dirty Dingoes by Jason Parent

Preview from Deep Red Cover by Joel W. Barrows

For Lee Child

(or should I say James Grant?)

Not only for his support but for letting me steal his name

Thanks

INTRODUCTION

I always consider short stories to be single incident adventures as opposed to the linked incidents that form a novel. As such I find them refreshing to write since there is no extended narrative. However, when it comes to the stories in this book, there is definitely some connective tissue.

But I get ahead of myself. Here’s something you should know.

I started writing short stories as practice before getting into long form storytelling. Then I had a couple of books published and the short stories became a bit of fun between novels. I was still in the police at the time and used to write a festive story each Christmas which I gave out to members of the shift instead of a card. Then I included colleagues in the stories and requests for inclusion almost became threats. That’s how it started.

As for the stories in this anthology, they all have different reasons for being, and different timelines to follow. For instance, Granted was a test run for the character of Jim Grant, getting inside his head and seeing if it played. I’d only recently found out that Lee Child wasn’t really Lee Child. When I met his brother Andrew Grant. I thought he was adopted or something. Anyway, Jim Grant was a good fit and I sent Lee a copy of the story to see if he minded. He didn’t, and so we have the Jim Grant thrillers.

Other stories slot between books. Chasing Tail is some time after Montecito Heights while Boquillas Crossing comes after Adobe Flats. There are even a couple of stories I wrote as Christmas cards for Donna Bagdasarian, my agent at the time, which became a running joke. Then there’s Vince McNulty.

That name I stole from one of my favourite TV shows, The Wire, changing Jimmy McNulty to Vince for the books. Once again I did a practice run with Hollywood Light to bring the character from his UK standalone, Northern Ex, to being technical advisor for a tinpot movie company in America. Further stories linked Grant and McNulty in the same way their novels became intertwined. They will no doubt continue to have their own adventures, and their own stories, but two Yorkshiremen in Boston? That’s too much of an opportunity to miss.

Back to TOC

GRANTED

Jim Grant (2010)

The door went in with one kick. It was a good solid door, but the lock was council cheap and the frame repaired so often it had been screwed more times than the prostitute living next door. Any other part of town at two in the morning and the explosive splintering of wood might have aroused suspicion but in the litter-strewn alley behind the Big Snack all-night café violent noise was a way of life.

The smell of piss and three-day-old burgers was overpowering. Jim Grant took a small aerosol from his shoulder harness and gave the darkened room a healthy dose of green apple and water lily. He slipped the miniature Air Wick spray back into the pouch where his CS canister used to be and ignored the lack of handcuffs or a police radio. This arrest was off the books.

A police siren howled along a street somewhere across town. Grant paused for a moment, waiting to see if the siren was coming his way. It wasn’t. The siren faded as it sped into the distance. A dustbin was knocked over further down the alley. A dog barked. An unknown man shouted at his unknown wife and the unknown wife screamed back. In this neck of the woods there were no victors, only victims, and even the victims weren’t innocent.

Grant concentrated on the darkness inside the ground floor flat. He knew the layout from previous visits but wasn’t sure if the furniture had been moved since the last time he’d dragged Chusan Palm out of bed. There were no streetlamps in the alley and the curtains were closed anyway. Grant didn’t think they were ever opened, even during the day, and the lack of ventilation only made the stench worse. A small black and white TV flickered in the corner, part of the 24-hour broadcast culture that provided late night repeats of programmes that were rubbish during their first run. The television threw out enough light for Grant to check any obstacles.

It only took five seconds.

There was a two-seater settee in front of a battered electric fire. Next to that was a coffee table overflowing with Big Snack food containers and empty beer cans. There were no ashtrays but there was plenty of ash and cigarette butts. The settee was covered with more food cartons, a second television, and a green plastic garden waste bag large enough to hold a small fortune. The far wall was the kitchenette area and beyond that was a door to the bathroom. Grant knew better than to brave a search of that room. He also knew where the unkempt single mattress was and gave it a hefty kick at the same time as he reached for the light switch beside the splintered doorframe.

A dirty low-energy bulb blinked twice then came on.

A dirty low-energy body moaned beneath an even dirtier bedspread.

Grant kicked Palm again.

Come on, fucknut. Hands off cocks and on with socks.

The company sergeant’s favourite wake-up call. Grant’s military training always came to the fore at times like these. The police force had tried in vain to drill it out of him but soon realised that the toughness instilled in him by the army was one of Grant’s strengths as a cop. He stepped over the coffee table and turned the TV off. His hand brushed the screen and he realised it wasn’t a black and white set it was just so dirty that no colour showed through.

He kicked the bed again.

Up. Now.

A tousled head emerged from the blanket.

Officer Grant. What the fuck? I ain’t done nowt. Honest.

Grant stepped back out of Palm’s fighting arc but kept his legs flexed and shoulders hunched. Years of experience told him that the most dangerous time was the first ten seconds when a rudely awakened prisoner was most likely to kick out and try to escape. Before the cuffs went on or the gas was deployed. Palm saw the broad shoulders towering over him and immediately chose pleading his innocence over physical action.

Honest.

Grant reached for the green plastic bag on the settee and unfurled the neck. An ornate lampshade poked out of the top. There was also a Roberts portable radio and a tortoise shell jewellery box.

Palm held up his hands in surrender.

That’s not mine officer. Someone must have left it while I was sleepin’.

The hulking ex-soldier picked up a delicate glasses case and clicked it open. A pair of horn-rimmed spectacles glinted in the light. Grant fixed Palm with his hardest stare.

There are none so blind as those who cannot see.

Palm gulped down his protest. He’d seen that stare before and spent six weeks in the hospital before being sent to prison. Grant expertly kicked a pair of grubby jeans across the room.

Get your pants on, chief.

Palm obliged. This wasn’t the time to explain that Chusan wasn’t Indian.

Palm didn’t realise that this was no ordinary arrest until he reached the car. It wasn’t the lack of handcuffs—Grant’s reputation meant very few prisoners tried to make a run for it so he didn’t bracelet them—and it wasn’t the fact that the plainclothes detective hadn’t read him his rights. The big ugly cop had arrested him so often they both accepted that Palm knew what his rights were. It wasn’t even the unmarked car that didn’t come from the CID pool, because Grant often used hired cars or personal vehicles to disguise his presence on the streets.

It was when Grant opened the boot instead of the back door.

The cobbled alley was deserted. The only illumination came from a security light three doors along that shone off the wet cobbles and threw harsh shadows across the crumbling back yards. Tangles of rusty wire atop the low walls ensnared torn newspapers and empty crisp packets. A wheel-less baby pram lay on its side in the middle of the alley. A bent pushbike with two flat tyres was wedged in a gateway that had no gate. The security light was a farce. There was nothing here worth stealing. This was where shit that had been stolen ended up, not where you took it from.

The rain had stopped but the remnants of the overnight storm puddled along the gutters. The drains were as clogged as the dregs of society that lived here. Raindrops stood out on the Ford Sierra Sapphire like beads of sweat. The kind of Sierra with a boot not a hatchback. The undercover cop quickly skirted the rear passenger door and opened the boot. Palm stopped in his tracks, expecting Grant to get something out. Instead he jerked a knee into Palm’s gut, doubling him over, and bundled him into the luggage space. The boot lid slammed shut.

That’s when he knew he was in serious trouble.

Straight north from Bradford was the quickest route to the countryside. South was too industrial. East and west were too developed. Grant drove north and within half an hour civilisation faded into the night. There were pockets of domestic housing and even the occasional village or market town but for what he had in mind north was the way to go.

He didn’t dwell on the implications as he sat calmly behind the wheel of his battered old Ford. He didn’t look back on his police service and consider that this might be a career ending decision. What he did think, while he drove the burgling scumbag to his fate, was that this had been a long time coming. You don’t serve your country in the armed forces and then lay your life on the line in defence of the citizens of West Yorkshire without developing an acute understanding of right and wrong. Some things were just plain wrong, like robbing and stealing and picking on the weak. Some things were wrong but for the right reasons, no matter how wrong that wrong thing was.

Grant reckoned this wrong thing fell into that category.

He glanced at the green plastic bag on the back seat. Recovered stolen property. Procedure dictated that it should be catalogued and booked into stores at Ecclesfield police station. It should be handled with care to preserve any prints and SOCO requested for the following day. The Scenes of Crime Officer would powder any suitable surfaces and lift latent prints using adhesive tape and clear acetate sheets. Rough surfaces would be ignored. The bag itself would be sent to headquarters for tech process and fingerprint development.

That meant that Grant shouldn’t touch the bag or its contents without gloves, and even then only with extreme care so as not to smudge any prints that might be there. It also meant that the contents would be covered in powder and pretty much fucked before the owner got them back. He’d seen it many times. People too upset to use their property again. People who couldn’t handle the ingrained silver powder and the constant reminder it would always provide.

He turned his attention to the small object on the seat beside him.

He took a deep breath at the memory of the owner when she’d realised it was one of the things stolen during the burglary that changed her life. Some things were wrong but for the right reason, no matter how wrong that wrong thing was.

Grant was certain this wrong thing fell into that category.

The night was all consuming. His headlights swept the road before him and he took one last look around. No streetlights. No houses. Just trees and fields and the occasional farm track. When he saw the turnoff he wanted he dowsed the headlights and slowly pulled into the dark overgrown entrance.

Say it again.

I’m fuckin’ sorry, man. All right? For fucksake.

Palm was dripping sweat despite the cool night air. Stringy tangles of saliva dangled from his mouth and tears filled his eyes. Grant looked into those eyes and felt nothing. He was a rock. The sight of a little old lady crying like a baby overshadowed any regrets he might feel here. He stood over the kneeling figure at the edge of the sandstone quarry and felt no pity at all. No guilt either. What he was about to do was wrong but for the right reason.

What else?

Fuck? What? I ain’t never gonna do nothin’ like that again.

Grant kicked Palm in the ribs and the burglar almost toppled over the cliff. Their eyes had adjusted to the darkness and both could see the steep drop onto jagged rocks below. Palm’s eyes bulged in his head and the spittle shot out as he screamed.

Aargh. I will not break into houses. Never no more.

Grant stepped in close and grabbed Palm by the scruff of the neck. He twisted his fingers in the burglar’s collar and yanked him towards the abyss. For a moment the policeman was the only thing between balance and oblivion. Then he tugged the collar back onto terra firma and let go. He smiled a humourless smile. He’d bet that Chusan Palm had never had his collar felt quite like that before.

That’s right. You’re retired.

Yes, Officer.

Palm was sobbing now but he repeated the apology to be on the safe side.

Not never again.

Grant reached into his windcheater pocket and took out a small dark object. He held it in front of Palm’s face and clicked it open. The burglar flinched. Grant took out the pair of horn-rimmed spectacles.

There are none so blind as those who cannot see.

Palm’s eyes were streaming tears. He had to wipe them away on his sleeve to see what the detective was showing him. A whimper escaped his mouth. Grant took Palm’s left hand in a vicelike grip and spread it on the rocky precipice. He stood up and raised one heavy booted foot.

She was eighty-five years old. Couldn’t see a thing without these glasses. Couldn’t read the tablets she needed twice a day and at bedtime. The pills that were keeping her alive.

Chusan Palm closed his eyes. He couldn’t watch but he couldn’t move his hand either. He braced himself for the pain.

I didn’t know.

You shouldn’t need to know. And she didn’t need to have…

Grant didn’t finish. Instead he drove the foot down hard. The bone-crunching snap was loud in the quiet of the wooded clearing. It echoed around the quarry like a gunshot. Palm screamed then yanked his hand back and fainted.

The thick broken twig tumbled into the abyss.

Grant put the glasses back in his pocket and stepped back from the edge, both literally and mentally. He felt the anger ease. Tomorrow he would return the bag of stolen property to the old lady who had almost died. The paramedics had saved her life. Grant had saved her glasses. He looked down at the quivering mess that was Chusan Palm, persistent burglar, robber and thief. He was curled in the foetal position with both hands safely tucked under his stomach.

Damn right you’re retired. Permission granted.

He didn’t need to add any threats and Palm couldn’t hear him anyway. Grant got in the car and started the engine. Now let’s see if you know the way home, fucknut, he thought, and reversed back down the track to the main road.

Back to TOC

CHASING TAIL

Jim Grant (2012)

"Puts a whole new slant on Dog the Bounty Hunter, don’t it?"

Julius Posey’s shiny bald pate reflected neon light back into the dark despite him being as black as the ace of spades. Jim Grant climbed through the broken window from the back alley and crouched behind the shop counter next to his accomplice.

Not the kind of chasing tail I’m used to.

Yeah, man. You best keep that wrinkled hole puncher in your pants or you’s gonna be answering to bestiality charges.

Grant kept his voice low and serious.

Slept with a woman once, was a bit of a dog. Beer goggles polished her up for a while. Until I woke up.

That don’t even come close to translating into American. When you gonna learn to speak English?

I am English.

But you’re in California. Adjust or die.

Grant scanned the counter. It was clean and tidy with a display stand containing hair products and large-pronged combs. The cash register was open but empty to dissuade burglars from smashing it to steal the cash float.

Beats being a bank robber though doesn’t it?

It does not. Any more than it beats being a cop.

I am a cop.

Not in San Francisco.

Grant held a hand up and they both fell silent. The shop was in darkness. Neon light from Amoeba Music across Haight Street came in through the wide front window but nobody was moving outside. The only movement was inside the shop that smelled of dog hairs and shampoo. Shuffling movement and strange noises. At least nothing had started barking. That surprised Grant as he read the sign in reverse on the shop window.

HEAVY PETTING CHASING TAIL

ZEN DOG PET BOUTIQUE

The longest shop name he’d ever seen. The strangest place to find a bank robber turned bounty hunter and a Yorkshire policeman turned Boston cop. A pet shop full of pampered dogs that were too scared to bark. He doubted anybody’d be shopping here for guard dogs. Which brought him back to why they were here in the first place. Grant settled down with his back to the counter.

You sure his dog’s here? I pictured him as more of a pit bull kind of fella.

Posey looked offended.

You saying a man can’t pamper his pit bull?

Grant let out a sigh.

This is a fucking poodle parlour. Candyfloss on legs. Wash and blow dry and pretty in pink. Not exactly pit bull kind of stuff.

Posey shook his head.

Well he ain’t got no pit bull. This is a pet not a status symbol.

And he has it fluffed here?

Fluffin’s what them girls do to studs on a porn set. Round here it’s a wash and blow dry. Throw in a few doggy chews.

Grant nodded towards the cages at the back of the shop.

His Pomeranian Shih Tzu in one of those?

Posey knelt beside Grant.

Pomeranian is one breed. Shih Tzu is another. He ain’t got neither one. He’s having his poodle pampered.

Dickrooter’s got a poodle? I’ve heard everything now.

"Dagreuter. And it’s cos he