Maloney's Law

by Anne Brooke

  I’ve blown it. Even if I say anything else, no-one will believe me, no-one will feel any fear. Why should they? It might as well have been nothing. The response I’ve hoped for, the small push to send one of them, either of them, over the edge into making a mistake won’t come. It won’t ever happen. No matter what I say. Stumbling out of Dominic’s office, down the stairs and past the receptionist onto the wet City streets, I leave behind me two men, one I love and one I hate, carrying on their deeds as if nothing has happened. And for them, nothing has.

  I’ve not even been an hour at DG Allen Enterprises, but I can’t imagine the effort it would take to claw myself back to where I was when I first walked into reception. I can’t face driving. I’ll have to abandon the car. Setting my face into the wind, I begin the long journey home. The drizzle seeps through the collar of my jacket, sending cool fingers down my neck. I continue to walk, not seeing the tall City buildings I pass, the offices, the clubs, the restaurants. At the end of Old Street, after a few paces my feet turn aside from the noise and thunder of the Hackney Road with its hospitals and never-ending movement. Instead I creep home through Columbia Road and the quiet order of Quilter Street. I pass the vibrant colours of Bethnal Green and then veer northwards at last on Mare Street like a fox seeking refuge from the hunt.

  Car lights glitter in the darkness, sweep over me, and are gone. For once in my life I’ve loosened my grip on time, and I don’t even want to know what it might be. As I walk, the headlights sliding, fading, sliding, fading over my skin, I undo my watch strap and let it slip away. For a pace or two my stride lengthens. All the while, I can smell the day’s dirt being washed away in the rain. And perhaps a hope for tomorrow in the passing of bodies in the street, the sound of their laughter or their grim silence, the purposeful tread of their feet.

  I keep on walking. As I walk, all the acts and memories I’ve counted as mine seem to fade away, washed clean in the damp city streets. Each step nearer home and familiarity frees me from the things I cling to. It’s as if I’m walking my own history to nothing.

  I don’t understand what is happening, but for the first time in a long time the ropes holding me to the past are for the moment gone.

  The houses around me begin to take on recognisable shapes, their dark outlines hovering through the dampness and gloom like ancient creatures. I’m nearly home. The freedom I can taste like the rain on my tongue, the chill on my flesh, is too precious to relinquish now. But where to go to keep it? I could carry on walking, but the final touch of control still lingers on my skin. It would be beyond me to walk without a purpose. Maybe it’s the sense of an end point to come that has given me the illusion of freedom.

  Without conscious thought, I turn off down the first side street to my left, then right and left again. My home and the call of it vanishes, and in front of me I see only the neutrality of the office. On my journey there, I pass one or two groups, laughing, talking, challenging each other with youth in their voices and their walk, on their way to a night out. They take no notice of me. It’s then that the memory plunges in of how it might have been Jade and me doing the same, on the way to the pub, the cinema, a meal out, and I quicken my pace. The office, at least, will bring her close again.

  Once there, I remove my jacket, fling it over my chair and pace between the desks. I touch each item I come to as if committing it to memory: shelf, computer, desk tidy, mouse, cabinet, window, and shelf again. Here. I’ll stay here, I think, for a while until I’ve reached the end of this waiting time. I’ll know when that happens, I’ll know it though I can’t think how. Then when it’s over, I’ll go home, make one of the thousand possible decisions I have to make, and run with it. Commit to it this time and not be afraid. I can’t comprehend yet what that one decision will be: breaking into Dominic’s office or even his home to search for the other half of the file; trying Blake again to see if he has it, though it will make no sense if he has; telling what little I know to the police and hoping it might be enough. I have to decide soon, it’s all I can do, but later. Later.

  Later, but not now. Now my legs are shaking and I can’t feel my fingers. In my flesh, there’s a sense of anything that’s left inside being drained away suddenly. The next thing I know I’m slumped against the desk.

  I’m so bloody tired. I must sleep. When did I get to be this tired? I crawl ’round to my office chair. I fall, rather than sit, curving my arms onto the cool wood, my head feeling the softness of my flesh, nestling into bone.

  And there’s one beat of my pulse, two, then...nothing but darkness and a dreamless clarity.

  I don’t know how long I sleep, but, when I wake, it’s with a sense that something is terribly wrong.

  Chapter Fifteen

  It’s dark, and I don’t know what it is I’ve heard that’s woken me. Neither do I remember whether I turned the light off or not before I slept. I don’t think so. And if I haven’t, then—

  Another sound pierces my thought processes. It’s the sound of the door handle being turned and turned again. I spring to my feet, the chair scraping along the floor behind me. This is far sooner than I’d ever anticipated. I’m not ready. My head is buzzing, and my thoughts are filled with air. Got to get out, got to...stop them. Got to hide. But where?

  There’s no time. A flurry of gunfire, softened through the reinforced oak, and the door swings open. Flinging myself forward, I shove it onto the man behind who rewards me with a sharp curse. Whatever happens, whether I’m dead meat or not, at least I’ve managed to cause someone some well-deserved pain. When I’ve landed on both feet again, I don’t stop to see the result. In four quick paces, I’m in the kitchen, my fingers struggling with the window latch. This isn’t what I should be doing. It isn’t what I thought I’d decided, but, shockingly and irrevocably, more than anything I want to live.

  I get the window free, and the gush of cold air stings my throat. Got to jump. Don’t care how high up I am. There’s no choice. One foot is already on the sink and I’m levering up when a hand grips my shoulder and wrenches me back. I hit the floor with a crack but kick out, landing a blow on my attacker. He lurches back, muttering in Arabic. I propel myself upright and start to run.

  I don’t get far. His hands seize my legs, and I take a tumble to the floor again, this time dragging him with me. Together we roll over, smashing limbs and backs against cupboards, the pedal-bin, an old beer crate. I drag myself to my knees and punch him hard, stabbing my knuckles into his eyes. His scarred face jerks back and there’s another wail of pain. I recognise him as the knife attacker from Cairo and keep on jabbing. Just as I feel I’ve beaten him enough to give myself a chance for escape, there’s a movement behind me. Of course, stupid, stupid. There are two of them. When I turn, fists raised, there’s barely enough time to glimpse the shadow of something narrow and long rushing towards my head before I collapse into blackness.

  The spikes of light are dazzling and words are being spoken that I can’t hear. It seems important I try, but the sounds are too distant, too fragmented for meaning. The sharp yellow of them pierces my eyes, and there’s a sour taste in my mouth, a dull thud in my stomach. From nowhere there are other shapes muffled behind unseen barriers, mysterious, threatening. Around me the darkness becomes lighter, and I’m gasping for air, for escape. The fire in my gut punches a way through my flesh, and suddenly...suddenly I’m awake, trying to sit up. I can’t move my arms, and I turn my head to one side as my body gives one more heave and a stream of clear vomit hits my shoulder and the hardness beneath me.

  ‘You’re awake then?’ a gruff, accented voice whispers into my ear. ‘Good. We’ve been waiting.’

  I don’t answer. I can’t. My head is floating in a sea of swirling impressions, and I don’t know if I’m going to be sick again. At the same time, I’m racing to understand where I am and what happened. I don’t remember. I don’t know anything. All I know is that my arms are stretched out alongside my body, and when I try to move them pain stabs into my wrists. When I fl
ex my legs, there’s more pain. The effort makes me gag, and, as I turn to spit the bile out, somebody hits my face hard enough to slam my head back against the solid object beneath it.

  ‘Disgusting,’ the voice says. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’

  I wait for the wave of pain to dissipate and then open my eyes. When I focus, I can see the clock on the wall says 3.15, and the darkness outside tells me it’s night. I’m in the kitchen, laid out like a sacrificial goat across my desk, which they must have pushed in here. Why? There’s only just enough room for me and the two men. There’s a soft fizzing sound I can’t recognise. My wrists and ankles are tied with dark brown cords so tight I can see red weals on my flesh. The skin of my back and buttocks feels chilled against the wood, and at that moment I realise I’m naked. God.

  God help me.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ I moan.

  ‘You’ll find out.’

  ‘Ready,’ says another voice. At the same time the skin and hairs on my chest seem to catch fire. I scream and spit out a long stream of cursing. ‘Jesus, Jesus Christ. Jesus.’

  When I’m finished, I’m panting for air. My skin crackles with heat, and there’s a smell of burning flesh and shit.

  ‘You’re disgusting,’ the first voice says again. ‘And too loud. Make another noise, any kind of noise, and I’ll use the point of the knife in you. Understand?’

  I nod, and the haze around me lightens. One of the men has moved back from me. Two heartbeats later I hear the fizzing noise grow louder and at last understand what it is. In the stillness, it’s as if every sound is magnified: my own ragged breath, the soft rustling of the first man standing over me, the ticking of the clock. The bastard, I think, he’s branding me with a knife heated in the flames from the gas oven. God, why doesn’t he just kill me and have done with it?

  There’s a grunt, and I know the second man has finished his job. The shimmer of hot steel at the edge of my vision makes me sweat, and then the agony of it is placed down on my right nipple. My head jerks back and my legs go into spasm. Trying not to yell, I grit my teeth, and my breath hisses through them, saliva dribbling down my chin. The knife is removed and replaced on my stomach. My mind collapses and then there’s nothing but a merciful blankness.

  A river of fire, so hot it might burn the valleys it flows through, rages at my feet. I’m drifting, carried on a red sea, my whole body glowing scarlet with the pain of it. Around me, bright lights flash. From somewhere there’s the sound of moaning, but I don’t recognise the voice, and I can’t see who it is. I’m still drifting, drifting. It’s hard to get my breath, and a sharp slap explodes in my face and I’m...being shaken and the world is suffused with light and wild glitter. The onset of it carries a pain I can’t take in any more.

  ‘What? Wha...?’ I mumble, but another slap shuts my mouth. I can feel blood trickling into my lips. The stale iron taste makes my body shiver.

  ‘I said keep quiet, if you don’t want to feel this.’

  Something pierces the flesh on my upper left arm, and I gasp, ‘Jesus, please stop.’

  ‘Ah, Mr. Maloney, we’ve only just begun.’

  The man with the scarred face is talking to me. Good, good, I can work with that. Even with the wall of pain and horror I can work with it. This is my job. I can deal with difficult situations. It’s what I’m trained for, what I’m used to. But not like this, like this, like this. Stop it. Stop it. I have to talk, make him listen, make them both listen. Even a few seconds’ respite will be something.

  ‘Why...why do you want to do this?’

  ‘Why? We want to know what you’ve gained from the duplicate CD you stole. Because there must be another.’

  I have no idea what he’s talking about. My thoughts are lost in a fog of pain. Something tells me I should know what he means but I can’t get the sense of it.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ I say. ‘You’ll have to—’

  He doesn’t give me the chance to finish the sentence. Instead he rams the point of the knife right into my arm. I scream again and then the darkness closes in on me once more.

  This time when I wake there’s a white-hot flow of agony across my gut. I’m gasping for breath, sucking for air. The heat burns its way into the flesh just above my cock, and there’s the smell of singed hair.

  ‘Please, please.’ My voice sounds like a boy’s low whimpering, and I wonder when they’re going to kill me.

  There’s a sense of someone leaning closer, a deeper shade of darkness within the darkness already surrounding me. Then he speaks.

  ‘You want me to stop?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then talk, Mr. Maloney.’

  For a life-stretching three pumps of my hearts, I still have no knowledge of what he might mean. Then memory eases back into my control. The case. Dominic. The incomplete file, still at home. Blake. The papers. Jade. God, Jade. And—

  And something else clicks in.

  ‘You already know,’ I pant. ‘You took the CD, you bastard, when you murdered Jade.’

  I flex myself against the ropes as I speak, and the shaft of pain across my flesh is almost unbearable. When I groan aloud, the only response is laughter.

  ‘You are in no position to accuse, I think.’ His breath withdraws a little from my cheek and there’s a faint flash of silver. ‘Scald this knife again. I believe the lesson should be learnt well.’

  A threatening swish as the second man turns makes me swallow, and I tense again. God, God, please help me.

  The fizzing noise grows louder, and a small moan escapes my throat. Must think, must keep him — them — talking; it’s the only way to survive.

  ‘I’ll tell you whatever you want to know. What do you want me to say?’ I don’t know if the words reverberating in my mind have actually been spoken, or rather whispered, but there’s a darkening in the atmosphere around me as the scarred man leans closer once more. What he says makes me want to cry again.

  ‘Now, as you are asking, Mr. Maloney, I am afraid my friend and I have been playing a game with you. You will forgive us. We would love to hear you talk. We are sure that anything you have to say will be most interesting, but it does not matter.’

  Mindful of my determination to delay whatever this man has planned, I manage to gasp out, ‘Why not?’

  A movement of air and stale breath against my face. I wonder if he has smiled.

  ‘Because,’ he says, ‘we already know everything. And you know too much. This is why, regretfully, you will have to die. But not before...this.’

  Another wave of pain rocks my lower belly, and fresh tears spurt from my clenched-shut eyes, ‘Please, please.’

  ‘Ah, we can only apologise, Mr. Maloney, but really there is no purpose to begging.’

  He may say more, I don’t know, but I’m unable to listen. I’m not ready, I’m not ready for this. I didn’t hear the second man come in earlier. If I’d been ready...but Jesus, Jesus Christ, the crystal sting of red-hot metal on burning flesh comes again and I’m screaming.

  ‘F-fuck you, why don’t you just kill me, please?’

  ‘Believe me, we will, the long way ’round. Unfortunately you are not as lucky as your friend. Now there we were merciful and killed quickly. Then again she was not a man, and so we did not have the pleasure of doing, my friend, what I am about to do with this knife to your...’

  The word he spits at me is a foreign one, but I don’t need him to translate it. God.

  I grit my teeth, trying not to weep. Before he can continue, there’s a banging from somewhere outside the office and the sound of shouting.

  My torturer grunts what sounds like a command. At once the other man’s footsteps head out of the kitchen. As he goes, I hear the click of the gun. The thought that when I’m gone tonight I’ll have been the cause of someone else’s death too makes the bile rise to my throat again, but there’s no shot. Instead there’s a distant voice I think I should know but I can’t place.

  ‘What the hell are yo
u doing?’ The last word of this question is much louder as whoever it is comes to the kitchen door. A gasp and a rising tone also breaks it in two. Somehow it’s that which places the questioner for me.

  It’s Dominic.

  Opening my eyes, I blink in the direction of his voice. I can only make out his shadow, the vague shape of him. What’s he doing here? Why has he come? Can’t he see the danger? Can’t he...?

  Too late. The answer threatens to overwhelm what little fight I have left. He knows. About this, too. God, God, Dominic knows. He knows everything I’ve suspected of happening. He has come here, and these men have not questioned it. They have not shot him or hurt him in any way. He knows these men, these...these killers. This, more than anything I have lost or anything I have felt so far tonight, is the one fact that sends me falling, falling into the unknown. It’s a realisation that causes a low wailing moan to break from my lips.

  The men are talking, arguing, but I do not know for how long, or what they say. All I know as I continue to spin down and down is that parts of my life I thought would be mine forever, all the things I thought I knew or understood, are being splintered off and lost. I am nothing but flesh and blood. There is no love, no hate, no comfort. I am for the first time truly alone.

  My breath slowly steadies. For a while the continuing pain makes me think I’m floating in a place I don’t recognise but which is no longer in flux. Then at last their conversation intrudes into my body again.

  ‘This isn’t the plan,’ I hear Dominic say, his voice low, urgent, with something in it I don’t recognise. ‘You were supposed to get in, cause enough damage to get him off the case for good, and get out. We were supposed to keep this clean, simple. What the hell do you think this is, the Third bloody World?’

  ‘We are carrying out orders.’

  ‘Not any orders I recognise. Untie him.’