by Lloyd Otis
No one saw the lorry.
It had stopped just ahead, with scaffold spiking out from its rear, and the car’s momentum brought it racing towards them.
The impact took out the windscreen.
When the glass exploded inside, it missed Kearns’ face but a shard sliced Breck’s hand. He released an agonising scream. The IRC approached from behind at breakneck speed and their lead officer Francis, saw the danger but not in time. It collided with the left side of Breck’s squad car then bounced off, and spun several times, hitting a sea of loose scaffold. The debris strewn road caused its tyres to lift off the ground and the IRC flipped over onto its side.
A deafening silence followed.
FIFTY EIGHT
Breck opened his eyes without recalling when they had closed, and turned back to see Beatrice out cold on the back seat. He leaned over and checked her pulse then felt a jabbing pain in his leg. She was breathing so he checked on Kearns who mumbled a few incoherent words. Red marks were pencilled across her forehead and Breck grimaced as he unbuckled his seatbelt. He tried to move the top half of his body before tapping Kearns.
‘How are you doing?’
‘A bit …shook up…I think I’ll live.’
‘Something hit us at speed. Not sure what though.’
Breck unlocked the door of the car to step out, but the sharp pain stabbed him again. He could pinpoint it now. The length of scaffold that smashed the windscreen, had wedged itself against his left thigh.
‘Pat, can you get out?’
‘Think so,’ she said, still dazed.
‘If you can, get this sodding thing away from me so that I can move.’
Kearns gathered her strength, all she had, and stumbled out of the car. The gashes on her forehead were more evident now, and she hobbled over to the front of the vehicle. She opened the door and just managed to push the scaffold back far enough for Breck to reposition his leg, and clamber out.
He felt the trickles of blood run down his leg. ‘My hand feels red hot,’ he told her.
The nosey parkers were out in force but Kearns ignored them enough to find her bearings. Breck watched the whispery smoke escape from the engine of the IRC but saw movement. Breck beckoned Kearns over.
‘Phone the emergency services, and help them over there.’
He took several steps forwards but found his natural movement a bit hampered from the injury.
‘What are you trying to do?’
‘I’m doing what I have to. You’ve been hiding something from me, Pat. Something concerning Troy.’ Kearns opened her mouth to speak but Breck cut in. ‘Save it. I need to locate Marcin Dvorak because Troy will be there or thereabouts I’m sure. If I don’t then he’s going to die, if he hasn’t done so already.’
Breck didn’t mention the package he collected at the car park in Plumstead. The records stated that Alexander Troy had died in 1941, aged five, along with his family during one of the World War Two air raids on Birmingham. If that were to be true, then just who was Breck on his way to save?
*
Troy’s arms were heavy weights. He couldn’t move them, even when Marcin Dvorak entered the room, laughing to himself. Marcin used his strong hands to hoist his love rival up and in a bizarre act, pressed his nose against Troy’s cheek to smell him in the way a wild animal would. The Alpha male laid down the gauntlet then threw Troy away. It amused Marcin to see his head slam against the wall. A defenceless Troy couldn’t see his loaded SIG anywhere and Marcin made no mention of it.
Visually things were still a bit blurred for Troy, and double vision ensured two versions of Marcin were in front of him. He ran a hand across his chest and realised he could still do what he had to. For that he was grateful.
‘Marcin, what have you done to me?’ he asked.
‘I fed you Ketamine so you might be feeling groggy. The horse tranquilliser may also cause you to see things that are not there. Hallucinate.’
The sardonic expression across Marcin’s face accentuated his dead sunken eyes. ‘Is this about Ceinwen?’
‘I heard about you a long while ago. How you were courting my woman while I was locked up inside. Some city high flier with big dreams. To kill you straight away became my first wish, but then I thought about it. First, destroy your reputation then have my fun.’ Marcin’s face twisted, he wanted the recognition. Needed it. ‘I found out where you worked idiot, dangled the carrot for the deal you broke the rules for. I made it easy for Janet Maskell to find out. Then had her killed so the finger could be pointed at you.’
Troy struggled for breath brought on by his anxiety. ‘Why murder the girl. Young Geraldine?’
‘Another connection to your place of work. That’s all.’
Troy’s eyes burned. Marcin’s failure to keep his mouth shut would come back to haunt him for sure.
‘And what about the other Troy?’
‘I threw him into it to add to the confusion but in the end, he knew too much so had to go too. I don’t like loose ends.’
Marcin glimpsed the time on his Rolex then left the room without saying anymore.
Troy pushed himself into the corner with every last ounce of strength, hoping to use it to leverage himself up but failed. Then Marcin returned, this time with someone else. Ceinwen.
She refused to look Troy straight in the eye and Marcin noticed this. He left her side and gripped Troy’s jaw, letting his fingers dig deep, and they threatened to rip the flesh from Troy’s face.
‘Look at him! You left me for this?’
She gave no answer and that infuriated him, so he let go of Troy then leapt towards her. Marcin grabbed the roots of her hair and Ceinwen screamed as he began to twist them. It amused him for just a short while however, because he soon stopped. But when he spotted her mouth the words, ‘I love you,’ to Troy, he exploded. Marcin pushed her away, causing her to lose her footing and Ceinwen hit her head on the floor. Marcin watched as she lay unconscious.
It incensed Troy but he had to play it smart. ‘You’ll get locked up again after this. For a longer time too.’
‘I’m untouchable you idiot. My uncle Aychm has many people on his payroll.’ To Troy’s surprise Marcin rolled off a few names of those people but ended with a deadly warning. ‘There will be no charges even if I kill her and you.’
Marcin’s smugness became too much to bear, but the fear which once inhabited Troy had all but diminished. He caught a glimpse of the time on Marcin’s Rolex and knew the end had come. He had done the best he could, with what he had been given.
‘I don’t need anymore,’ he told him. Then Troy began to laugh.
‘What do you mean? Why are you laughing like a crazy man?’
The answer to his question never came so Marcin replayed the words in his head.
I don’t need anymore.
I don’t need anymore.
I don’t need anymore.
Marcin’s gut twisted and the most horrific look spread across his face. Raging, he sprung forward and ripped open Troy’s shirt to see a book-sized tape recorder strapped fast with adhesive around Troy’s waist. The wires to the microphone and the mic itself, were taped to his chest.
‘You’ve been recording me?’
‘Yes, with every single fucking word captured.’
It sounded crazy, but after having concealed the recorder for so long, Troy now felt exposed. He closed up the torn shirt with a satisfied smile, while the confession pushed Marcin over the edge. He’d been tricked. He had set himself up to be convicted by his own loose tongue. His revelations threatened the dealings of his own uncle too. Only one thing rushed to the forefront of his mind.
Kill Troy.
Marcin released a heart wrenching wail then unleashed a machete from his waistband. His fury forced Troy to cower, while he held the blade aloft, but before Marcin could thrust it down, an interruption occurred. The door opened and the man known as The Messenger walked in.
He assessed the situation in the room – Troy in the cor
ner, Ceinwen on the floor, Marcin about to kill. He grabbed Marcin’s arm, which left the blade hanging in the air.
His action confused Marcin. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Maybe you forgot, but that woman on the floor over there was important to everything your uncle wanted to do, pal. The murders you’re behind have created a problem. A big one. So here’s a message from him to you.’ Marcin’s eyes were still so wild with anger that he struggled to latch onto the true meaning of those words. Regardless, The Messenger concluded. ‘Liabilities are always bad for business.’
Then it happened in a blink.
The machete was twisted away out of Marcin’s grasp and Troy saw the foot-long blade skid across the floorboards. The Messenger knocked him to the ground, pressed his right foot down into his chest, and pulled out the Berretta. He fired three shots in quick succession and two of those, blew a clean hole through Marcin’s chest, separating his oesophagus from his stomach. The last shot ripped a hole just above the centre of his eyes. Right through his glabella.
A sea of red began to nestle around his body, while the smell of gun smoke floated through the room. Troy thought his end had come but he never figured in the equation. Aychm viewed a civilian like Troy as no threat. He just got caught up in bad shit.
‘It’s your lucky day, pal. You’ll live to see another one, but if you talk about what you’ve seen I’ll come looking for you,’ The Messenger warned him before calmly walking out.
FIFTY NINE
Breck heard the gunshots from outside and it startled him. He took off his jacket and used it to wipe the sticky claret away from his hand, as well as from the top of his shoes. Then he threw the jacket onto the kerb, knowing that entering the house alone would be crazy. Breck radioed Kearns and although the sting of his wound continued to hurt, he pushed on. He had no plans to wait.
Breck approached the opened door where he believed the shots came from, and reached for his standard issue gun. Problem. It wasn’t in its holster. He couldn’t figure it out until he realised he must have lost it during the crash. The most probable explanation being, he didn’t secure it properly after taking off the safety. Breck still had his baton and knew what he had to do, so proceeded inside.
On the ground floor of the house, amongst the silence, he felt a deep sense of trepidation and wondered where to go first. Then he heard a shuffle of feet and a pressing down of the floorboards overhead. He used the sounds to direct him and edged his way upstairs.
With clenched fists and an extended baton, in case he needed to use either at short notice, Breck struggled to settle his nervous tension. He had been in the job for years but knew a bad situation when he saw one. He had it confirmed when he came face-to-face with a man standing at the top of the staircase. A man dressed in stonewashed jeans and a black leather jacket with epaulettes, wearing Ray Bans that hid his eyes. A rock star killer that carried an air of confidence and both men waited and watched each other like two dogs about to battle for territory. Until Breck initiated the conversation.
‘I’m a police officer, Detective Arlo Breck. I’ve got back up on its way here so let’s be sensible.’ Breck held his baton up in the hope that it would serve as a deterrent.
‘I’ve been looking forward to meeting you, pal. It’s been a long time coming.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ Breck remained on his guard, aware that the man was armed after hearing the gunshots.
‘Choices. We all have them and this is yours. You can pretend like you haven’t seen me and run upstairs. Be the hero.’
‘And if I do that what will I find up there?’
‘Three people. One dazed. The second unconscious. The third, almost dead.’
‘Almost?’
‘Almost, but not quite.’
Breck felt the stinging pain in his leg again but pushed it to one side. Could the third person be Troy?
‘You know I won’t just ignore you, whoever you are. I can’t do that.’
‘If you knew what I can give you then yes, you would.’
Breck leaned against the banister in obvious discomfort. ‘We’ll discuss it at the station. How does that sound?’
‘It sounds like bullshit to me.’
The man pulled away the lower part of his jacket to reveal his Beretta as a warning.
‘You don’t scare me,’ Breck lied.
‘Don’t you want to know what I can give you?’
‘A confession?’
He stepped down the stairs towards Breck, who then raised his baton up to head height, ready to strike. The man stopped just short of the baton and lowered his voice with a surreal amount of confidence.
‘I give messages to people. Some are good, most are bad, but for you, I can give something far greater than a confession. I can give you the man that attacked your girlfriend.’
Breck zoned out then his mind boomeranged back in. What did this man know about Molly and the attack? Did he know the person that did it? Breck battled to calm down otherwise he’d drive himself mad.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘Yes you do pal, and the more time you waste, the closer to death someone up in the room above gets.’
‘So if I let you go you’ll tell his name and then what?’
‘You’ll be the hero as I said, and you’ll owe me. That’s how it works.’
The conversation had brought the ‘man who sends messages’ close enough for Breck to have a chance of hitting him. A bullet would beat a baton, but a baton would beat a fist.
‘Give me his name,’ Breck demanded.
‘Have we got a deal?’
‘Give me his name and where I can find him, then I’ll tell you if we have a deal.’
‘At 6:00 p.m. he’ll leave the Pear Tree Pub in Cransham and go to the number twenty-three bus stop. That’s your man, one hundred per cent pal. Now, have we got a deal?’
Breck gave the man his answer. He smashed the baton over his head. The man groaned and fell back, and Breck surged forwards, but his blind enthusiasm made him careless. He was caught with a boot to the groin and a sharp punch followed to his temple. Breck toppled down the stairs.
As soon as he hit the ground he tried to climb to his feet, but his leg pulsed and slowed him down. The blow had scrambled his brain. Meanwhile, The Messenger’s Raybans were in bits from the strike, and the cut to his head pushed him over the edge. Before Breck drew his next breath, the daylight which lit up the floor, illuminated the figure of The Messenger, who now stood over him. The Berretta was drawn with the wild fire of death evident in his eyes. The same fire that had been witnessed by Janet Maskell, Geraldine Van Bruen and Marcin Dvorak, now had its fourth witness.
In those moments Breck thought about Molly. He thought about his life and those he loved, and wished he could have had more time. The Beretta was raised so that its barrel levelled with Breck’s line of vision. Then a burst of gunfire cracked the air.
Confusion followed. Breck could hear his own heartbeat. The Messenger remained standing.
Then his arm lowered and Breck watched the Berretta fall from his grasp. He toppled onto Breck, and while the detective wrestled the body off, he saw the bullet had entered his back and burst through his heart.
Kearns stood by the open door, pointing what appeared to be Breck’s missing standard issue firearm. She gazed at body she just felled and stepped forwards, devoid of any emotion. Almost in a trance.
‘That’s him.’
‘Breck’s eyes darted over towards the lifeless corpse he had just pushed away. ‘Who is that man?’ He pulled himself up.
‘Larry Sands,’ Kearns replied as she placed the gun on the floor. ‘The man that played a big part in ruining my life.’
*
Troy realised that Ceinwen Phelps and Peter Clarke would now be consigned to the past. Getting a job with Van Bruen, befriending Clarke and winning over Ceinwen, were all part of the plan. Except for one thing. Falling in love.
Breck and Ke
arns walked in as Ceinwen started to stir and Troy made sure his recorder remained hidden. It wouldn’t be long now.
Breck glimpsed Ceinwen. ‘How is she doing?’
‘She’ll need a visit to the hospital for treatment but she should be all right.’
‘And you?’
‘I’m doing better than him,’ Troy said, while he stared at the lifeless Marcin.
Breck cut across the room towards the body and Kearns followed. They both wondered the same thing. Why did Sands leave Troy alive?
The arrival of two vans interrupted their thoughts as they screeched to a halt outside. Kearns went out onto the landing to investigate, and after hearing the cattle of feet and feeling relieved the cavalry had arrived, Breck soon despaired when they appeared.
‘Lads, pleased to see you. I’m Detective Inspector Arlo Breck from the SCU.’
‘Out of the way!’
Kearns returned to the room. ‘Arlo, what’s going on?’
‘I don’t know.’
Their highest-ranking officer, with twenty years unblemished service, stood in front of them with a stark warning. ‘You two stay out of this.’
Breck challenged him. ‘On whose authorisation?’
‘From the person that tells your boss’s boss what to do. How to do it and when.’
The officers grabbed Troy without handcuffing him and used a blanket to cover his head. Breck protested but one of them shoved him out of the way, and they bundled Troy out of the house. They pushed him into one of the waiting vans, came back for Ceinwen, and pulled her out too. While Kearns remonstrated with the lead officer, Breck watched as they directed Troy’s married lover into the other van and he wondered what an earth was going on.
SIXTY
Kearns sat in Bashir’s office and felt drained after going through a catalogue of emotions. Bashir wanted them to keep up the pretence one last time.
‘They kept Beatrice in hospital overnight as a precaution but she’ll be fine. As for Arlo, it’s for the best that he believes what we discussed. It at least covers us.’
