Lucie stood up from the sofa, ignoring the twinge in her knee as she rose, and stepped closer to the fuming young woman.
“Did things get out of hand with Ines?”
“What? Who wants to know?”
“I do.”
For the briefest of moments, Lucie thought she may actually get a worthwhile answer, Ludmita’s deceiving eyes flickering for just a second with concern and what looked like a desire to tell the truth. Instead, she walked stiffly to the wall and slammed her palm against a bright red button alongside the door.
“That was bloody stupid,” Lucie sighed, shaking her head. “I just wanted to talk.”
“I’m here to fuck and be fucked,” Ludmita spat, with a new and profound contempt in her voice that didn’t quite suit her. “If you want to talk, go see a priest.”
The suite door thumped open, and in the frame stood the female bouncer and her bearded friend from earlier, accompanied by another black-jacketed figure of equal stature.
“Problem?” The female asked, her fists clenching and unclenching, and her eyes narrowed and fixed upon Lucie.
“She’s another one of that lot,” Ludmita shouted, her passions rising with each syllable. “The fucking do-gooders. This one wants to know about the last one that was here.”
“I just want to know what happened to my friend,” Lucie protested, her voice calm and her hands raised.
“Who can say?” said the new woman. “The world’s a nasty place. It’s time you left, madam.”
The bouncer strode up and gripped Lucie tightly by the arm with a strength the spy would not have suspected from a woman her size. Although she fancied her chances in a fight with her, this wasn’t the time or place and would have blown the whole point of being there. In any case, she had no way of knowing just how many security were there and would pile in if she started throwing her fists around. Instead she simply let herself be guided from the room, casting a glance over to Ludmita as she left and offering her a defiant stare.
“You should have just told me the truth,” she said as the door closed behind her, just slowly enough for her to see the certainty drop from Ludmita’s face.
“That sounds like a threat,” one of the men grunted as he led the march down the corridor. “We don’t like threats in this establishment.”
“Why? Too much of a pussy to deal with them?
Lucie’s voice was confident and strong, and she felt the immensely powerful hand around her arm grow tighter still as she spoke. Far from being simple thugs, most bouncers Lucie had known were professionals, with an excellent level of self-control; such traits were essential in fact to do their job well, and Lucie knew that she would have to press harder than that if she were to get a rise from them, harder still if she wanted to see quite how far they were prepared to go. In any case, if there was any truth in the theory that the venue’s security were responsible for Ines death, she knew at the very least they would do nothing on the premises, where every movement was recorded. To get the response she wanted, she had to get them outside.
Marching past the reception desk the seedy assistant looked up from his enjoyment of the activities going on in one of the streamed suites to grin in malicious triumph at her. They reached the main entrance, where Lucie began to drag her feet and claw at the woman’s taut grip.
Lucie’s other arm was quickly pulled behind her, and she could feel the bouncer’s breath on her neck as she struggled, the stench of strong cigarettes and stronger coffee overpowering her as she felt herself pulled closer to the woman’s chest.
Shit, she was strong, Lucie thought as she played up to the role of the uncontrollable punter, kicking her legs out and shouting profanities in as many languages as she could muster at her escort.
“Bloody hell, we’ve got another foreigner, Debs,” said the second male, grabbing a hold of Lucie’s kicking legs so that she was effectively being carried through the door. “I thought they were all supposed to be fucking off home now?”
“Not here, Jim,” ‘Debs replied, a note of irritation in her voice for the first time. “Wait ‘till she’s outside.”
‘Good,’ Lucie thought as they carried her through the main doors and down the steps to the path, whereupon her legs were promptly deposited back on the ground, so roughly her bad knee howled in protest. She looked around quickly and noted the camera attached to the front gates and guessed that they wouldn’t do anything here either; a guess that proved accurate as she was frog-marched down the gravel path, nerves for the first time beginning to trouble her as she contemplated what must surely now be a physical confrontation.
One of the men held back at the gate, standing, Lucie guessed, so as to block the camera’s view of the street outside, while Debs and Jim walked her tightly onto the street and continued down it for a few yards, before coming up alongside an alley and making to turn her into it.
“Where the fuck do you think you’re taking me?” Lucie shouted, as loudly as she could without risking the unwanted intervention of any passers-by.
“For a chat,” answered Debs coldly, twisting her clasp on Lucie’s arms and pushing her forward.
The alley was filthy, unlit and strewn with the stench of dirt, rotting food and waste.
‘This is it,” Lucie thought to herself, the adrenaline she had supressed until now beginning to freely pump through her body and the instinct to fight becoming almost impossible to ignore. She needed to know what they’d do, and if she fought back as she could, she would never find out. She could only hope that by the time the full extent of their intentions was clear, she had retained sufficient control to prevent them.
The blow, when it came, was hard enough to make Lucie stagger, but not so hard to knock her to the floor. Debs had in an instant released the painful grip and pushed her back, hard, following up with an enormous cuff around her head which made her ear throb and sting.
Lucie spun around, poised and ready to fight off the expected lunge of the ape-like male accompanying them. But the lunge didn’t come. Jim simply took a step towards her, his face screwed into a vision of utter contempt that was obvious even without light.
“I’ve had it up to fuckin’ ‘ere with you and your sort,” he said, his finger jabbing into the air in front of Lucie’s face. “You ain’t fuckin’ English, are you? Well you don’t get a fuckin’ opinion then, alright? Nobody ‘ere gives a shite about what you think about the time of day, and if you don’t like it, fuck off back where you came from, alright?”
“Is that what you say to the girls in the club?” Lucie spat, her body tense and her voice shaking.
“They’re different,” the ape snarled. “They’re alright, it’s the uppity ones like you who fuck me off. Stay the fuck away from here, got it?”
Jim turned away and began stomping back towards the brothel and those foreigners he considered ‘alright’, Lucie too shocked from not finding herself in a life-threatening scrap to shout anything in response. Debs, for her part stayed a little longer, not quite a smile appearing on her face, but little by the way of aggression, either.
“You heard what the man said,” she said after a moment. “Sorry we had to get physical, but we can’t have you upsetting the staff. Stay away, alright?”
“What happened to my friend?”
“I haven’t got a fucking clue, and that’s the truth. Now stay away.”
Offering what could have been mistaken for a look of sympathy, Debs turned away and followed her colleague out of the filth strewn alley. Lucie didn’t follow, but replayed the confrontation in her head and cursing the new puzzle it had presented: if the bouncers weren’t responsible for Ines’ death, then who was? The receptionist may be a seedy little shit, but try as she might, she just couldn’t picture him as a killer.
“That’s one plan that didn’t come together.”
Lucie spun around at the unexpected voice and exhaled in relief as Ismail stepped from the shadows and walked up to her, a concerned smile on his face.
&nb
sp; “Bloody hell,” breathed Lucie, laughing the surprise away. “I’d wondered where you’d got to.”
“Tailing you as instructed every step of the way,” he answered. “And no, it wasn’t nice watching you being roughed up and not being able to stop it. I nearly jumped in a couple of times.”
“If you had done, I’d have kicked you in the bollocks myself,” said Lucie, the pair walking together to the end of the alley and heading back up the main road to where Ismail had parked. “I needed to know how far they’d go; turns out not very far.”
“Which doesn’t really help us,” Ismail finished, plucking out the gun from his pocket and holding it distastefully in his hand. “At least I had no call to use this thing…”
Lucie looked at him in sympathy for a second. Considering the manner of his recruitment into the Overlappers, he had taken the situation remarkably well and had displayed no malice towards her, quite the opposite in fact. The mask had slipped for just a moment earlier that evening when she had handed him her weapon and told him to watch her back and be prepared to shoot if need be. It had been difficult enough for Lucie to adapt to the role when she first been press-ganged into service, and she had had cause to kill before, but in Ismail’s case, the request had only served to expose the culture shock he was feeling.
She took the gun from him and carefully placed it in her bag as they reached the car, a silver-grey Peugeot 306 that appeared to Lucie to be almost as world-weary as its owner.
“So, what do you think?” he asked her as he turned the ignition.
“I think my arm bloody hurts and my ear will still be throbbing this time next week, but other than that I’d almost swear they had nothing to do with Ines’ death.”
“That big one isn’t too keen on foreigners, though is he? He said some pretty nasty shit back there, I’m not sure I’d have held back from swinging for him.”
“Being a racist arsehole doesn’t make him a murderer,” Lucie countered as they pulled onto the relatively empty road. “Aside from a few insults he didn’t lift a finger to me back there; if he’d killed Ines, why would I get away with just a mouthful of shite?”
“Maybe. Did you get anywhere inside?”
“One or two things intrigued me,” Lucie answered, squirming a little. “I met a young woman named ‘Ludmita’, or so she says. Ines had definitely been there, and caused a bit of a scene apparently, but that’s as much as I learned before they kicked me out.”
“Well tomorrow I’ll pay an official visit to this ‘Ludmita’ and see if anything gives. Maybe…”
Whatever it was he pondered remained unspoken as the Peugeot’s rear window shattered into a thousand shards of glass, showering the two spies, who swore and cursed in surprise.
“What the fuck?” screamed Ismail, as he gripped the wheel tighter and pulled the car out of the skid.
“Gunmen, front and back!” Lucie shouted the words, her eyes everywhere before settling on the window in front. A black car was pulled horizontally across the road, a man stood in front of it, gun drawn and pointed towards them.
Other vehicles screeched and swerved past to avoid collision, blocking the other lane with horns blaring and passengers screaming, as the Peugeot drew ever closer to the obstruction and Ismail began to ease off on the accelerator.
“Foot down and drive!” Lucie ordered, pulling her gun from the bag.
“But…”
“DRIVE!”
Ismail swallowed hard and did as he was bade, gritting his teeth, dropping the car into third and slamming his foot to the peddle.
Firing one shot back through the shattered rear window, Lucie twisted back to the front and braced herself as the battered old car gathered speed, praying that this would pay off.
“One, two, three… DUCK!”
THIRTEEN
The aging, fourth hand Peugeot smashed into the rear end of the vehicle, Ismail having turned the wheel just enough to avoid a full-on collision, knocking the attacker’s car backwards with an almighty crash, and freeing the road behind it for the pair to screech into.
The black clothed and balaclava wearing gunman, who had thrown himself clear, scrambled back to his feet and fired at the escaping pair, but was soon passed by his colleague in the pursuing vehicle, who sped up in ferocious pursuit.
“Normally when people shoot at me it’s because I’m trying to arrest them!” Ismail shouted over the noise of the wind as he tried to keep his speed up while dodging oncoming traffic and hysterical civilians.
“Good to have a bit of variety now and then!” Lucie shouted back. “We need to get off the main road, too many people; head up to Primrose Hill!”
She twisted in her seat and pulled herself onto her knees as another bullet came through the broken car.
“Where the fuck are you off to?”
“Sunroof!”
“You need more fresh air in here?”
“Just keep driving!
Lucie pressed the switch and the roof panel receded, whirring and groaning. Lucie squeezed her head, arms and upper torso through the gap and pointed her gun towards the pursuing vehicle, shrugging off the shot which whizzed inches past her head. Firing as accurately as possible in the speeding car, she took out one of the pursuing black Audi A8’s headlights and put a hole through its windscreen to match the one in their own car, before losing her balance and clutching the roof for support as the Peugeot slid dangerously around a corner.
“Careful!” she shouted down to Ismail.
“Oh, sorry! Was I not escaping the nasty gunman safely enough?”
“Don’t worry about the gunman,” she bellowed, firing again, “you’ve got a gun woman!”
Despite her sarcasm, Ismail had skilfully pulled the car away from the main roads and led them into Primrose Hill, the Audi still relentlessly in pursuit and getting closer.
“Get back in here!” he shouted to Lucie, who slid back in alongside him.
“I’m nearly out of ammo,” she said.
“That’s not all we’re out of,” Ismail replied, pointing to the bright orange petrol pump illuminated on the dashboard.
“Shit…” She looked around, her eyes searching for a solution or a way out, as more bullets flew past them, before fixing on something and allowing a wicked smile to play on her lips. Reaching out, she grabbed the wheel and spun the car into a tight, angled turn onto a narrow and deserted gravel path. Their pursuers overshot the road and Lucie saw them slow down and spin to pick up the chase, before she turned back to the ornate black and gold gates standing imperiously before them.
“Fancy a trip to Regent’s Park?” she asked Ismail, who grinned back and slammed his foot down hard.
The impact shattered the car’s front chassis, jarring and jerking the two spies inside, but succeeded in bringing the imposing metal gates clanging down to the ground. The car was stuttering and belching, and Ismail pulled it off the path, using the last of its juice to reach a small cluster of trees and spinning it into a final stop.
The Audi had corrected itself and was speeding through the broken gates towards them, and Lucie knew as she kicked open the door and knelt behind it that she would get only one shot. Straining from the brightness of the car’s remaining headlight, she levelled her gun and peered inside, aiming for as low in the driver’s seat as she could, and fired.
The black car spun to the side, filling the air with the stench of burning rubber, before it thudded into the trunk of an unyielding oak, crumpling its bonnet and blowing airbags into the faces of its occupants.
Lucie and Ismail eased out from their cover and began heading from the stricken vehicle, as a figure began squirming and wriggling from the passenger door.
“Freeze!” Lucie shouted, her command unheeded by the attacker, who instead pulled himself free and swung his arm up wildly, ready to take another shot.
Lucie was too quick for him though, and he dropped the weapon as a bullet from Lucie’s gun tore through his bicep, the man letting out a cry of pain.
Still he refused to remain still, and instead made a run for the broken and twisted gates. Lucie clicked the trigger again, but the cartridge was empty.
“Check the other one!” she shouted back to Ismail, “and be careful, he might be armed!”
She set off on the heels of the would-be assassin, driven as much by the animal desire to punish his actions as her professional need to understand them. He was proving deceptively fast despite his injury, but Lucie pressed her tired body forward nonetheless, until her knee, already strained and sore from the day’s exertions, clicked and wobbled beneath her, pulling her up into a stuttered hop.
“Damn it,” she hissed to herself as she limped breathlessly back to Ismail, who leant on the wrecked Audi, staring back at his own half-destroyed car.
“I had my MOT due in the morning,” he mused as Lucie drew level with him.
“Well at least that’s your diary clear for the day. What about the other one?”
“Dead.”
Lucie’s spirit dropped, as though a boulder had been placed between her shoulder blades; she closed her eyes for what seemed like an eternity. Lucie leaned into the car and stared into the face of the man she had killed. There was nothing special about his appearance; the pale, unshaven features of a slightly overweight man in his thirties tarnished only by the blood splatter on his cheek caused by the gunshot wound to his chest.
Reaching into the car, she placed her hand on the dead man’s forehead and clamped her eyes shut tight.
“Lord,” she began, “I’m sorry for having once more offended you…”
Her words disappeared into a whisper, and the suddenly embarrassed Ismail looked down at his feet, and back into the car, anywhere except directly at her, unsure of what steps to take next but unwilling to break her meditation.
“I know him,” the police officer suddenly exclaimed.
Sealed With A Death Page 9
