Find Me

by Nell Grey

  Then, there was Jake’s diary. That proved there were plenty of chancers in these parts too. Lowlifes scanning the dark web in search of a few easy bucks.

  He checked the car over again. For something, anything that might be a clue. The seats. The footwell. The boot. The dirt around the car. He couldn’t see any discarded cartridge casings. No guns had been fired as far as he could determine.

  She’d been taken. He was sure of that. And she’d been taken alive.

  He prayed that she’d not been harmed.

  But if Claire was the target, why now? What had changed? The Scousers could easily have grabbed her in Greece.

  His stomach knotted as it hit him.

  Claire was being watched all along. She’d unwittingly led them to him. The bikers taking photos of them on the beach. It was the only time he’d met Claire.

  There was only one course of action to be taken. He had to get Claire from wherever she was being held. Even if it meant taking the bullet himself.

  His hand reached down to something in the dust below the porch. The used filter from a smoked roll-up.

  Claire wasn’t a smoker.

  He put the butt to his nose and inhaled the sweet, cloying smell of marijuana.

  The diary was evidence that the biker gang had gone after contracts at least once before. It had to be them. The Cobras.

  Shaun grabbed his phone.

  “Ari?”

  He cut short his friend’s quip that he was missing him already.

  “Listen, mate, Claire’s been abducted. I need directions to the Cobra camp in the forest. Can you help me?”

  Chapter 18

  ---------✸---------

  A bead of sweat runs down onto my lips and I taste its saltiness. My tears are dry now and my throat is parched. It’s so suffocatingly hot in here.

  The light coming in between the rotting slats is fading. Soon it will be pitch black in this wooden sweatbox. I try not to think about that, it’s claustrophobic enough.

  I try also to block out the stinging pain, pins and needles fizzing through my fingers. They’re hot and swollen from the tight binding of the tape.

  At the start, I tried shouting. Then I begged them for help. I pleaded that my hands were hurting and I needed water. But all I got was a rough kick to the side of the shed that cracked one of the rotten wood walls. That was followed by a blunt warning to shut the fuck up with the noise or they’d cut my tongue out.

  I’ve not made a sound since.

  I’m so angry with myself that I hadn’t seen them. But they’d hidden their truck out of sight.

  My head was full of things that seem so silly now. What I was going to cook for Shaun. Which of the new dresses I was going to wear. And whether to go for the classic satin lingerie or the more scanty, daring lacey set I’d bought.

  I remember unhooking my belt and I was leaning across the seat for my handbag when they sprang me.

  For big guys, they were real fast. They yanked the door wide open. A huge fist came slamming down over the keys, flinging them away before I could start up the engine.

  Then he was grabbing me, tearing me from my seat. His friend behind him backing him up, ripping me roughly out of the ute and flinging me down onto the dirt.

  There was no point in fighting. A third dude was pointing a gun at my head and his mean eyes told me he’d use it too. They bound my hands brutally tight with gaffer tape and hauled me into the back of their truck.

  And here I am. At the place they call ‘the camp.’ From what I can see the place is an old horticultural unit in a clearing in the woods. We’re not that far from the lodge, but we’re deep down a maze of tracks in a thick jungly forest.

  We parked up by a small scruffy wooden house where the men are living. It’s a mess. Beer cans and bottles scattered everywhere. They’re not into recycling. And there are rows of shiny chrome motorbikes. Harleys, choppers, serious big bikes. They look to me like an outlawed biker gang. Probably worse. It’s definitely not tomatoes they’re growing in the polytunnels, that’s for sure.

  Across the front of the house, they’ve hung a massive flag. At the centre is a hissing snake. Above it the words ‘The Cobras’ are written large in a graffiti-type font. It’s the same design as on the photographer’s jacket that day. They’ve been watching me for a while.

  I got dragged out of the truck, then two mean-looking men marched me at gunpoint past two of the polytunnels to a row of homemade sheds where they keep their dogs.

  They’ve shoved into the one at the end. The only one with a wooden door instead of chicken wire. I think they’ve jammed the door with something on the outside because I didn’t hear a lock or a bolt. But whatever it is, it’s heavy. My shoulder can’t budge it.

  The shed is cramped, it stinks of dog and it’s as hot as Hell.

  I try to comfort myself that they’ve not killed me yet. But, I’m not deluding myself, this has to be about Shaun. They’re keeping me alive to draw him here.

  Every so often, I hear men’s voices floating around me. And the odd motorcycle engine noise approaching and then cutting out. There are dogs too, with low loud deep barks real close to me. They sound big and dangerous. I can hear them sniffing, scratching and moving about in the next box. And every so often one of them gives off a low menacing growl that I’m sure is directed at me.

  ◆◆◆

  “Rawiri? What you doing out at the lake?”

  “Ari sent me. He asked me to take you to the camp.”

  Shaun frowned.

  “You could get killed for this.”

  Rawiri shrugged it off.

  “Yeah. And?”

  “And... I can’t let you do it.”

  “Too late, bro. I’ve already raxed their quad bike.”

  Shaun rubbed his cheek. When he’d asked his friend for directions, he hadn’t meant for the kid to get wrapped up in it too.

  “Go back.”

  Rawiri smirked.

  “Give you a ride there, then?”

  The boy wasn’t giving up.

  Shaun blew out a breath.

  “Alright. Gimme a minute.”

  He dashed back into the kitchen and opened the freezer. At the bottom were two whole trout that Frank had caught.

  He grabbed the small rucksack he’d already packed with useful gear while he was waiting for Ari’s call back. His small pair of binoculars, an energy bar, water, a pair of pliers, gaffer tape, a kitchen knife. And on his shin under his cargo pants, he’d taped a small screwdriver and his penknife. It was an old trick but one that had saved his life before.

  He reached for his fishing rod, passing the parcel which now lay open by the door. Five large canvas prints of the lake. Photographs taken by Claire.

  He breathed deeply to force down all the pain and fear he felt and pushed past them back to Rawiri who was waiting for him on the quad bike.

  “Tell them you’ve been at the lake.”

  Rawiri grinned, placing the rod between his legs and fastening the plastic bag of fish to the handlebars as Shaun sprang onto the back.

  He patted the boy’s shoulder.

  “Thank you, my friend.”

  Together they took off, along the dusty track in the dusk back towards the main road.

  After a few minutes on the tarmac of the highway, Rawiri slowed. Then without warning, they turned off the road into the bush, bouncing over the rough grass through a break in the wire fence. It was no more than a bunny run, a tyre-tracked clearing into the forest.

  But then, Rawiri soon turned sharply again and Shaun could see the track becoming clearer and wider as the forest became thicker, closing off the last drops of daylight.

  Shaun touched his shoulder.

  “Stop.”

  Shaun hopped off and picked up two branches off the forest floor, placing them in a cross to mark the exit point.

  “I need to find my way back outta here.”

  Rawiri switched the quad lights full on and they carried on, deeper into the
forest.

  Four more times they stopped. At each fork, Shaun hauled branches across the wrong track.

  Finally, along a straight piece, it was Rawiri’s turn to pull up.

  “The camp’s not far from here. Around the bend, then a quarter of a k at the end of the road.”

  They heard a dog starting to bark.

  Shaun hopped off the back.

  “I’ll see what I can do about them bloody dogs.”

  “Appreciate it.”

  “The chick’s in the first dog shed behind the polys. The one with the wooden door. Good luck, bro.”

  “Gonna need it, mate,”

  Shaun flashed Rawiri a cocky smile though he felt far from confident inside.

  The boy turned to move off.

  “Hey, Rawiri?”

  “Ah, yeah?”

  The boy glanced back around at Shaun.

  “What you’ve done for me. It was very brave. I’m proud of you.”

  Rawiri nodded a little sheepishly and sped off with his new rod and the bag of defrosting fish.

  ◆◆◆

  My pulse races. I can hear footsteps outside. They’re coming closer. I bunch up into a ball in the corner at the rear of the shed as I hear them right by the shed.

  Then, something heavy is moved off the door and it swings open in front of me in the half-light.

  From the shadow filling the space where the door was, I can see it’s another bald biker. It’s too dark to see him properly, but this one is a monster of a man. He’s massive.

  He shines the torch from a mobile phone over me huddled up in the farthest corner.

  Bending right down, he steps inside the shed. It’s a squeeze for his huge, square shoulders through the door.

  In his other hand is a plate of food and a plastic bottle. It looks like some kind of stew with a hunk of bread on the side. He sets it down like he’s feeding a dog and then throws the plastic bottle of water after it, towards me.

  “I need to pee.”

  I sound bolshy but I’m past caring.

  I can feel his eyes on me, no doubt looking at the pitiful creature in front of him. Without words, he beckons at me with his head to get up and follow him.

  I stagger forward past the plate of food and come out of the shed into the cool evening air.

  “You can go over there.”

  “Shut ya yapping!” he snarls at the hysterical hounds. And they fall instantly silent.

  “Can you untie me? I won’t escape.”

  Something tells me to stand tall and I hold my head high in defiance, my eyes challenging his in the dusk.

  “My circulation’s gone and I can’t feel my hands.”

  He stares down at me and I quell the gasp of fright as the moonlight reveals his densely tattooed face. Thick blue lines cover his nose then fan out over his forehead and extend in sweeping arches around his mouth swirling into bold circles across his cheeks. He’s terrifying.

  His mouth curves at my mock-bravery. Pulling out a blade from his back pocket, he slashes open the tape, freeing up my hands.

  “Try to run and you’re dead.”

  I lift my chin proudly and walk to a spot by the side of the shed.

  He turns his head as I squat.

  Pulling up my jeans, I stumble my way back into the kennel, rubbing the circulation back into my hands.

  “Thank you.”

  He slams the door shut behind me and it goes dark again.

  “How the Hell did you get into this shit?” I hear him mutter outside the door.

  Perhaps to himself? Perhaps to me?

  ◆◆◆

  Shaun veered towards the bushes at the side of the track. He started to jog as quietly he could, making contact with the ground on his midfoot, limiting the force, keeping his posture straight. Efficient soft running, like he’d been trained to do all those years ago.

  A bright moon had risen, and as he approached the end of the track the forest was thinning out revealing the camp below him. It lay in a meadow with a stream running through it, a natural clearing in the woods.

  He crouched down and slid onto his belly.

  Retrieving the small pair of binoculars from his bag, he could see the layout of the buildings. First, a house with lots of motorcycles parked up. Choppers and custom bikes. There was a muscle truck there too, modified with jacked-up wheels. These guys liked to do a bit of showing off.

  Like Rawiri had said, there were makeshift sheds at the back, behind the polytunnels.

  It was a bad place to be. Behind the house. By the dogs.

  Swiftly and silently he slipped down towards the camp gate. There, he deposited his rucksack in the irrigation trench that ran by the side of the gate following the fence. He covered it in the long grass.

  Then he crept stealthily into the compound, staying in the shadows and heading through the motorcycles towards the polytunnels and the sheds beyond.

  An explosive shout. And then another.

  Shaun crouched low behind a modified Fatboy. The shouts were coming from the house.

  Rawiri’s quad bike was parked up to the side by the door. It was likely that he was inside with them. Taking the heat because of him.

  He weighed it up.

  He should get Claire first. But, dammit! There was no way either that he could leave the boy if he was in some kind of strife.

  He crawled around the motorcycles until he was safely under the back window, as close to the shouting as he could get without being seen.

  “So you nicked my fuckin’ quad, did ya? Ya little shit!”

  An aggressive male voice, a little high-pitched. Angry. Then Rawiri.

  “Didn’t know it was yours, Jon.”

  “Well you do now. And nobody takes it without askin’. Not never!”

  Shaun placed his ear under the windowpane, listening intently.

  “Where you been, boy?”

  A different voice this time. Deep and rumbling. Dangerous.

  “The lakes. Fancied givin’ my new rod a go.”

  Rawiri sounded upbeat. Cool. He was holding up well.

  “Sure it wasn’t the Antarctic?”

  They’d felt the fish.

  “Water was bloody cold, alright.”

  “That so?”

  “Yeah.”

  Shaun heard the note of defiance in the boy’s voice.

  “You don’t take the quad without askin’ first, ya hear me?”

  The tone was commanding but the words were a climb-down.

  “Sorry, King.”

  “That all yer gonna say?”

  The angry goat-voice again.

  “Yes!” the deep voice thundered. “That is all I’m gonna fuckin’ say. Unless you have a problem with that? Or with me?”

  There was no debate after that. Rawiri was off the hook. For now.

  Shaun moved swiftly away from the house towards the densely vegetated polytunnels.

  There was no mistaking the jagged leaf of the large plants. Marijuana. Probably hydroponically grown. The high THC psychoactive looney toons variety that was in global demand.

  He moved forward cautiously, past the end of the polytunnels stepping closer to the sheds.

  Then froze.

  A dog started up.

  Shaun kept rigidly still.

  Quickly realising that the others weren’t joining in, the dog wound down and gave up.

  Now was his chance and he needed to be quick. He sped forward again, running over the open ground towards the sheds fifty metres in front of him.

  Shit!

  He snagged his foot on something. It nearly sent him flying.

  Two temporary security arc lights flickered, and then suddenly the ground around him lit up like it was day again. He was bathed in brilliant white light.

  He groaned as he saw the fishing line snagged in his trainers. A homemade sensor. He hadn’t expected that.

  All the dogs were jumping now. Slavering and barking into a furious snarling crescendo. Winding themselves up
like an air raid siren into a cacophony of gnashing and growling against the mesh doors of their kennels next to Claire.

  This was his only chance. He needed to grab it now.

  “Claire!”

  “I'm in here.”

  His eyes darted to the end shed. It had a full wooden door barred across with a heavy wooden block.

  No time to think.

  He sprinted over and began lifting the solid block out of the way.

  The door swung open and Claire flung herself into his arms.

  “Shaun!”

  He held onto her tightly as the air around them filled with the loud clicks of gun barrels being locked and loaded.

  “Hey, King! We snagged ourselves a bite.”

  Ten armed men spread out in a circle around them stepped menacingly closer. With hands pointing upwards into the air and his back to his new guests, Shaun was roughly shoved with the end of a shotgun down onto his knees.

  “Sion Edwards?”

  “I’m Shaun Cobain.”

  “Whatever.”

  With a kick of a boot, he was forced into the kennel with Claire. The door jammed into place behind them.

  “What’ll happen to him?”

  Shaun heard Rawiri’s voice outside the door.

  “Some Pom’s coming,” a deeper voice answered. “Wanted to cut them up at the meat plant. King told him he could either put a bullet in their skulls or piss off home.”

  “I’m so sorry, Claire.”

  It was all Shaun could say. He was such an idiot. He should have known that it was all too easy, that they would have booby-trapped the place.

  Whatever had happened his brain had gone soft. He’d taken too many risks, been too careless. Now, they were both in deep trouble and it was his fault. Again.

  “Shhh.”

  Claire comforted him, finding his lips with hers.

  “One way or another you were always going to snag their line.”

  He kissed her again, this time more deeply, more passionately as if this kiss would be their last.