by Ashe Barker
“Patch me through to the speaker system.”
Whilst the control room makes the connection, I return to the three nines. “Where is that ART?”
“Outside your location. Request advice regarding the best entry point?”
“I’m about to evacuate the centre, so the exits need to be clear. Send the team around to the goods entrance. I’ll have someone meet them there.”
“Understood.”
I return to the control room. “Patch me through to whoever is closest to Debenhams.”
“Sir?” It is Graham’s voice.
“Where are you?”
“Third floor. I’m evacuating customers onto the rooftop car park.”
Good idea, but someone else will have to take over. “I need you to go to the basement, service entrance. You’ll meet the Armed Response Team there. Send them up through the internal lifts in Debenhams, Fosters, and Petworld.” I choose the three stores with direct access to the admin mezzanine floor. This way we can get the armed police to within spitting distance of our crazy woman without her being any the wiser. “I’ll meet them at my office.”
“Right, boss.” The radio clicks off.
“Am I on loudspeaker?” I check with the control room.
“Affirmative, boss.”
I speak into my phone. “This is Josh Novak, head of security at Hunter’s Gate Centre. All members of the public and store personnel are to make their way to the nearest exit. Do not try to recover possessions or secure premises. Go at once, in an orderly manner.”
I peer around the edge of the Nativity display to see what effect my instructions have had. At first, nothing much. People are still cowering under tables, or lying on the floor, looking at each other, clearly puzzled, and too terrified to move.
I speak into my phone again. “The gunman has agreed to allow the public to leave. Go. Now.”
People start to slowly get to their feet. I reach for Libby’s hand.
“Come on. We’re going, too.” Or, she is, at least.
“But she’ll shoot us. You.”
I shake my head. “I’m not in uniform. She won’t recognise me moving through the mall with the crowd.”
“But weren’t you wearing the same when you took the baby from her? Won’t she remember you because of that?”
“I doubt it, not at this distance. We’re lucky she doesn’t appear to have binoculars of a telescopic sight.”
Christ, I hope I’m right. With Libby right next to me the last thing I want is to draw her fire, but the alternative is to stay pinned down here, like sitting ducks.
The stunned and terrified shoppers have begun to respond to my invitation to get the hell out of here. Already, people are thronging past. I need us to be lost in that crowd, not trying to escape among the stragglers. I tug Libby along with me, and we join the mass of people making for the exit.
I manoeuvre us towards the outside of the crowd and murmur in Libby’s ear, “When I veer off, you keep going forward with the rest. I’ll see you outside.”
“No, Josh, I won’t—”
“Do as I say, girl.” I harden my tone. It’s imperative that she gets it and obeys me. I won’t have her in danger.
My target is Petworld, coming up on the left. As we pass the doors, I duck down and head between the shoppers making their exodus. No one seems to register my sudden move, and I find myself inside, in the tropical fish department. I sprint past the angelfish, the guppies, the Japanese fighting fish, and head for the lifts at the rear of the store.
I hit the ‘call’ button and wait, my ID card in my hand. There’s a sound behind me. I whirl, to find myself face to face with Libby, tears streaming across her cheeks.
“What the…?”
“I’m not leaving you. I won’t. We stay together. You promised…”
I narrow my eyes. There will be a reckoning, but not now. Not today. I take her hand and turn to face the lift again, just as the doors glide open.
The six armed police in the lift all level their weapons at us. I raise my hands, the ID card on show.
“Josh Novak, head of security. This is my wife, Libby Novak.”
I hold my breath for the few moments it takes for the team to satisfy themselves as to our identity, then we both join them in the lift. “We need to be on M floor,” I explain. “Once we get up there we can approach her from two different directions.”
“Her?” The leader of this team eyes me from below his black reinforced helmet.
I nod. “Our CCTV identified the shooter as female, possibly a woman who was apprehended here some weeks ago attempting to snatch a baby.”
“Not terrorist, then?”
I shrug. “Not ruling that out, but no evidence to suggest it at present. If we’re right, the shooter is called Christina Kelly. One thing I do know, she’s a damn good shot. Took out one of my men with one bullet at a range of perhaps fifty metres. She’s aiming at uniforms.”
The team leader nods. The briefing is over.
Even though my grey business suit isn’t likely to attract Christina’s attention, I still envy the ART men their bulletproof vests.
We arrive at M floor and emerge into a corridor already thronging with armed police. Graham is there, too.
“Good work,” I say. “Now, you need to stay out of sight, mate.” I turn to speak to the team leader from the lift. “The balcony where she’s shooting from is just around that corner. Ms Kelly has a good view of the food court and the arcade as far as the mobile phone accessories island.” I point to the relevant location on a wall-mounted plan of the centre. “She’s about here.” I indicate the spot where I last saw her. “We can get to here and here without being spotted,” I’m prodding at the map to indicate both ends of the mezzanine balcony, “so we’ll be surrounding her. You’ll have visual from either side. If some of your men can follow me, I’ll show them how to get to the other end, via the admin offices.”
The team leader nods again and gestures to half a dozen of his men to follow me. I leave Libby in the capable hands of the rest of the ART and take my pass key from my wallet, the little slip of plastic that affords me access to every inch of this building. I open the door leading to the offices.
As I expected, the rooms are deserted. Everyone has heeded my instruction to make themselves scarce and left in a hurry. Still-warm cups of coffee have been abandoned on an empty meeting table. The photocopier still spits out sheet after sheet. Computer monitors remain lit up as no one bothered to log off. We jog between the desks, then out of the opposite side, by the staff toilets.
“Round that corner is the balcony,” I say, more than ready to hand the formalities over to the experts now. The experts with guns, and flak jackets.
One of the police officers mutters into his radio. A few moments later, the shout goes up.
“Armed Police. Put down your weapons.”
Silence.
The order is repeated. “Armed Police. You are surrounded, Ms Kelly. Drop your weapons now.”
I cringe. This is only likely to end one way.
She’s ill. Seriously poorly. She must be, to have pulled such a crazy stunt. She needs help, not…this. Then I remember Trevor. Loyal, hard-working, looking forward to retirement and just doing his job, trying to help people, to protect the public. He deserved what happened to him a whole lot less.
In any case, it’s out of my hands now. Events will take their course.
There’s the sound of running feet. We all brace. Suddenly, the woman appears at our end of the mezzanine, and I’m left in no doubt whatsoever of her identity. It’s Christina Kelly, all right. I recognise her, just as Trevor did the moment before she shot him.
Clearly, she’s spotted the armed police at the other side and tried to escape, only to be confronted by half a dozen automatic weapons and more men in black helmets.
She steps back, hoists the gun to her shoulder, and gets off one shot.
The ART respond. Three shots, and she’s down.
I step forward, but my knees buckle under me. I drop to the hard, cold tiles, suddenly, belatedly, aware of the searing pain ripping through my chest. I’m struggling to breathe. Oddly bewildered, disbelieving, I lift my hand, feel the sticky wetness. My fingers come away red, coated in blood.
The bitch got me. My last thought before darkness descends.
Chapter 16
Libby
I had been seated in Josh’s office when I heard the shots. A quick volley, three or four at most. I covered my face with my hands, sorry it had come to this though not surprised. What other end could it have?
I never, in that moment, dreamed that there would be anyone else injured. Certainly not my Josh.
I rushed out to see what was happening, expecting to find Josh barking out orders, in control as usual. He wasn’t there. I ran along the now deserted mezzanine, calling out to him.
I saw her first, facedown on the floor, surrounded by police. Her rifle lay a few yards from her.
I was sorry for her, I suppose. Just briefly. Then, I rounded the corner, and the bottom fell out of my world.
So much blood.
That was my first thought as I dropped to my knees beside my husband’s motionless body.
“Is he…?”
The officer closest to me nodded. “He’s hanging in there.”
“Don’t leave me. You can’t leave me. You promised…”
I grasp his limp hand, watch in horror as Josh’s features lose their usual healthy colour to take on a sick, deathly grey. He’s still breathing, but barely.
Two of the armed police are kneeling beside us. One attempts to staunch the flow of blood. The other rams an oxygen mask over Josh’s pallid face. I am dimly aware that just a few paces from us another pair of officers are doing what they can to help the woman who shot my husband.
A rush of hatred so intense it takes my breath away assails me. I hope she dies. She deserves to die, for what she did.
I clutch at my husband’s arm. “Please, hang on, Josh. Help is coming…”
Is it, though? And is he already beyond help? What will I do if I lose him?
I can’t believe what has happened. I fought so hard to get him to come home, to leave the military and get as far as he could from the madmen with guns. He was supposed to be safe here, at home.
And now look. I should have left him where he was. At least, there, he was prepared for what might happen, alert to the danger. He was armed, protected, other soldiers around him. He could fight back.
There’s a pounding of feet, and someone grasps my shoulder. The touch is firm, determined.
“Let us deal with this.”
I am shouldered aside by a paramedic, the woman already rolling up Josh’s sleeve to get a needle in. The police first-aiders withdraw to let the real experts have a go. One of them grasps my arm and helps me to my feet.
“He’s in good hands, Mrs Novak.”
I nod. I know he is, but are they good enough?
Helpless, all I can do now is plead with Josh, and perhaps a higher power still, that he not leave me.
A trolley materialises, and the paramedics lift him onto it. A drip has been set up, and another oxygen mask. They continue to pump drugs into him, constantly monitoring, checking, muttering incomprehensible words to each other.
“He’s stable enough to move,” announces the woman who arrived first.
Now I have chance to take in the details I see she has ‘Doctor’ plastered across the back of her fluorescent jacket.
“I’m coming, too,” I say.
She nods and offers me what I suppose is meant to be a reassuring smile.
We set off at a run, the paramedics handling the trolley with practiced ease. Down in the lift, then along the smooth tiles of the arcade and out into the fresh air where two ambulances are waiting. Josh is loaded into the closest one, and I clamber in behind him. The doctor joins us, and the sirens start up.
The journey must have only taken a few minutes, but it felt like an eternity. The doctor was working the entire time, checking vital signs, monitoring, regulating.
“Will he be all right?” I ask.
She spares me a glance. “He’s a fighter.”
“I know, but…”
“The bullet missed his heart but pierced a lung. There’s a lot of internal bleeding,” she explains. “He needs to be in hospital.”
I know. I know that.
But it missed his heart. That’s good, surely…
I cling to that hope as I trail uselessly behind the trolley when my husband is wheeled into the emergency department at the main hospital serving the city. A team is waiting for us. Josh is whisked away, and I find myself steered into a small waiting area. A nurse sits down with me.
“I need to be with my husband,” I protest.
“Soon. Let the doctors have a look at him first.”
“He needs me. I need to be there…”
“Of course. It’ll just be a few minutes, just while they assess him. Let them do their work.”
Her words make sense, but every instinct I possess is screaming at me to follow Josh. I can’t let him out of my sight, not for a moment. As long as I am with him, he can’t die. He can’t.
Can he?
“Will he…will he be all right?” I ask this nurse, not that she will have the faintest idea.
“We’ll know more very soon,” she trots out the practiced response.
“She shot him. She shot him in the chest,” I moan, still trying to process this monstrous turn of events. “Why did she do that?”
The nurse wisely doesn’t try to explain. “Can I get you anything? A change of clothes, maybe?”
I glance down, and for the first time realise that my blouse is soaked in Josh’s blood. My hands, too, are stained and sticky.
“Is there anyone I can phone?” the nurse presses me. “Family, perhaps?”
I manage to gather my wits enough to nod. “My sister…” I fumble in my pocket for my phone. “I should call her.”
The nurse gently takes my phone from me. “Let me do that. What’s your PIN?”
I have to think hard to even remember. I manage to splutter out the four digits.
“Okay. So, what’s your sister’s name?”
“Michele,” I manage.
“Okay. I have her.” The nurse presses the ‘call’ button.
I am aware of the low murmur of her voice, but I don’t hear the words.
A few seconds later, she hands me back my phone. “Michele’s on her way.”
The door opens. A young doctor enters. “We’re sending your husband straight to theatre,” she announces. “He’s lost a lot of blood and has internal injuries that we need to fix.”
“I need to see him,” I say, already rushing for the door.
“I’ll take you. Just for a few moments, though.” The doctor opens another door and gestures me through. “We really do need to get him into theatre as soon as possible.”
Josh is motionless on a bed in the centre of the brightly lit room. At least eight medical personnel are clustered around him, the one at the head, a middle-aged man, issuing rapid-fire instructions to everyone. They all move with synchronised precision, utterly calm, every one of them ruthlessly efficient.
I rush to my husband’s side. “Josh? Can you hear me?”
There’s no response. I look to the man who appears to be in charge.
“Can he hear me?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
“Please, you have to save him.” If anyone can, I am sure it is this man.
“That’s the plan, Mrs Novak.” He offers me a terse smile. “I need to take him to theatre now.”
“Can I come?”
“Some of the way, yes.” He nods to his team, and they shove the bed out into the corridor.
I run alongside, and so does the surgeon. We reach a lift and have to wait for the doors to open.
“You need to leave us he
re,” the surgeon tells me. “I’ll come and find you as soon as we’re done.”
“You promise?”
“Yes. I promise.”
I believe him.
I don’t even try to stem my tears when the lift doors close. I may never see my husband again.
The nurse is next to me. She touches my elbow. “Come with me, I’ll show you where to wait.”
I’m in a small but comfortable waiting area with a mini-kitchen in one corner. The nurse whose job, it seems, is to keep me company, plies me with tea and biscuits and generally tries to keep my spirits up without making any false promises. It strikes me that this is something of an art. I suspect she has been well-trained for it.
I appreciate her efforts, but she’s beginning to grate on me by the time Michele comes hurtling through the door, Pru at her heels.
I stand and fling my arms around her. “Thank you, thank you,” I sob. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“Where else would I be?” She steers me back into my seat and sits next to me. Pru is on the other side.
“You both came…”
“Of course,” Pru says, taking my hand. “And Heidi is on her way, too. We couldn’t believe it when we heard. It was on the news…”
I nod. Of course it would be.
“I should contact his family. He has a sister…”
“Heidi said she could do that, if you like. Through their old army channels.”
I blink at Pru. “Heidi was in the army?”
“Oh yes. That’s where she and Josh met.”
I shake my head. There is still so much I have to learn about the man I’m married to. If I’d been half as concerned about him as I was about myself… I give way to another bout of guilt-racked sobbing.
Michele takes advantage of the opportunity to quiz my nurse for news of Josh’s condition, not that there’s anything to add to what we already know.
“How long before he’ll be out of surgery?” Pru asks but gets nothing very definite in return.
We sit in near silence for a while. I lose track of time, despite having nothing better to do than watch the minute hand on the wall clock inch its way around the numerals.
