by J G Alva
“I’m sorry,” Fin said inadequately.
Toby looked away, but nodded.
Sutton said, “Patrick Harris, Darren Board, and Robert Costar.”
“Those are the names?” Fin said. He pulled up a blank Word document. “Spell them for me please.”
Sutton did, and Fin made a note.
“You know some people in the Avon and Somerset Constabulary,” Sutton said. “Do any of those names sound familiar to you?”
Fin shook his head.
“I’m sorry, no.”
“Okay. So we need to find out anything about them. Current religious status. Any family members linked to the Cult. Employment history. Financial status. Anything that will tell us a little about who they are.”
“These guys,” Fin said, pointing to the names on the screen, “or at least one of them…are they working with the guy that attacked you today?”
“You were attacked?” Aimee asked, shocked.
“Actually,” Sutton said, holding up a hand to stall her panic, “they were after Fin.”
“To get to Sutton,” Fin added.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” Aimee asked, the tension rising in her voice.
Fin said helpfully, “did he also tell you they set fire to his apartment?”
“Oh God,” Aimee said, putting a hand to her head. “This just gets worse and worse. They’re never going to stop.”
“That’s why we need to find out which of these guys we can trust,” Sutton said urgently. “We can’t fight the Cult on our own. They’re too powerful. And there’s too many of them. We need the police.”
“I’m sorry,” the old woman said, coming into the room and holding out a cordless phone to Sutton. “I’ve been on the phone with the locksmith, Tom Headley. He has a message for you, from someone called Lisa Hopkins.”
At the name, Sutton immediately went on alert…like a guard dog primed by a whistle.
“What?”
“Lisa Hopkins?” Dot said.
“What’s the message?” Sutton asked.
Dot looked upset when she said, “bring the boy, or the girl is dead.”
◆◆◆
CHAPTER 16
Pat stayed at Alfred Alger’s house until the investigating officers had arrived and interviewed him, but all the while his mind was rolling forward.
As a young man, he’d worried about a career in law enforcement; he wanted to be a detective, but he didn’t think he was smart enough. He wasn’t an idiot, but his mind moved glacially slowly in comparison to other people he knew. It was as if his brain was wired differently, and the neurons had to go on a different – longer – route.
He sat in his car for at least twenty minutes, trying to decide what to do. He knew what he had to do: find the traitor, and then move on the Cult. But he couldn’t do one without doing the other first. The thing was, he had to control the information; that was the only way he was going to know who was who. He thought of the Tarot cards then, specifically of the card Audrey had turned over for his Present: the Queen of Wands.
He thought he knew what it meant.
Not that he believed in those sorts of things.
When he had finally decided exactly how he was going to do it, he started the car and drove back to Bridewell Station.
◆◆◆
“Sutton, you can’t,” Fin protested.
“I have to.”
Sutton took the car keys from Dot.
“You won’t stop him,” Aimee said to Fin. She didn’t seem affected…but there was something in her eyes. “He won’t listen.”
Sutton paused then, his hand on the latch of the front door.
“It’s a trap,” Fin said. “They’re just going to kill you and take the boy.”
“Which is exactly why Toby can’t come,” Sutton said, looking over Fin’s shoulder at him.
Toby said, “if it will stop this-“
“No,” Sutton said, a hand up. He took a breath. “If they get you then your father died for nothing.”
With implacable logic, Toby countered, “even if they don’t, he’s still dead.”
Aimee said with motherly scorn, “Toby, you can’t go. You know that.”
Toby shook his head but seemed to acquiesce.
Fin tried one last time.
“If you get killed – if you get hurt even – who’s going to protect Toby then?”
Sutton smiled.
“You will,” he said. “And Aimee will. I’m sure even Dot will chip in. Being the good people that you are, I have complete faith that you – that all of you – will do the right thing.” He indicated the living room, and by association the laptop. “Find out which one of these three policemen we can talk to. When I come back, we’ll try to contact the one we deem as the most trustworthy.”
“And if you don’t?” Aimee asked.
“Then I fully expect you to step up, Miss Graham,” he said. “You’re eminently capable.”
Sutton pulled the latch and opened the door.
“Have you even got anything with you to protect yourself with?” Fin asked, aghast. “A weapon might be handy, you know.”
Sutton paused on the threshold.
“I do, actually.”
“What?”
He turned to him. The sun was behind him, so Fin couldn’t make out much of his features, but he appeared to be smiling.
“The imagination to entertain the inconceivable…and the will to act upon it.”
He closed the door on them.
◆◆◆
Pat found Sally Rutter – after ten minutes of stalking the building’s deserted corridors – in the small canteen on the first floor.
She was in the corner by herself, eating an apple and reading a book: a Danielle Steele novel. A romantic, he thought. Like his wife used to be.
“Detective Harris,” Sally said with some surprise, as his shadow fell over her table.
“Sally,” he said, in greeting. “How are you?”
“I’m fine.” She stared at him warily. “Is everything alright? You look worried.”
He smiled.
“I’m fine. Can I sit?”
“Of course.”
“I don’t want to interrupt your lunch…”
She waved the comment away, and then indicated the empty seats.
“I’m not exactly a social magnet,” she said.
“Well,” he said, and looked around. The room was deserted. “You’re probably the only one left in the building.”
She laughed dutifully, appreciating the effort.
Pat smiled again, but it was distracted. He sat down.
“I need you to do something for me,” he said gravely, in his soft whispering voice. He was like an old priest delivery a sermon. He cast about, but there really was nobody else in the building…or at least it seemed that way. “I need to put out an alert. For some vehicles. But I need it done without anyone else knowing.”
“Uh…that’s going to be a little difficult-“
“Sorry,” he said, waving a hand in the air. “No one here knowing.”
Sally frowned.
“Okay…”
“Can you do it?”
“Yes. Yes, I think so.”
“And I want this out to the surrounding districts as well, please.”
“Okay.”
“The thing is…you need to inform them that all information goes back through you. And you alone.”
“Me?” Sally said, concerned.
“Yes. And from you to me. And no one else.”
“Why?”
He side-stepped that for the moment.
“I don’t expect there will be anything,” he said, to allay her fears. “But if there is, you must bring it to me. And only to me. Not to Bob, or Darren, but to me. And if you can’t find me, you hold it…until I’m back. Is that understood?”
“Yes, but…”
“What?”
She hesitated.
“Can you tell me why?”
She looked uneasy.
Pat nodded.
Inspiration had struck him suddenly.
“Yes. It’s a procedural test. For standard communication. We just want to make sure everyone can follow the rules. Okay?”
There was no such test, and Pat wasn’t sure whether she fully believed him, but she nodded.
She would do it.
◆◆◆
He knocked again.
When the door finally opened, it was to an overweight man with a beard, dark hair, and glasses.
“Yes?”
Sutton pushed on the door, and then stepped into the man’s flat.
The man, surprised, automatically stepped back to allow him to enter.
“Wait,” he protested, but Sutton shut the door and moved past him.
The flat was noticeably different to Freddie’s: even though the dimensions of the rooms were similar, there was only one level. Sutton realised that Freddie’s must be a premier version.
“Wait,” the man said again. “What are you doing? This is my flat.”
“I just want to get to your balcony,” Sutton threw back over his shoulder.
“What?”
Sutton slid open the French Doors.
The balcony was a small square of tiles, about five feet by five feet, bare except for a small sun lounger and a potted plant. Barriers bracketed the balcony on three sides, sheets of burnished metal fastened to tubular supports. It made the space seem very modern.
“I’m calling the police,” the man said, from two feet inside the flat.
“Good,” Sutton said.
“What?”
Sutton looked over the edge of the balcony and decided he had misjudged things.
Freddie and Lisa lived in a new building, on the eighth floor of a large grey shiny monolith on the outskirts of south Bristol. The split level design meant that there was a good fifteen foot drop to the balcony below, not easily traversable for a man in his late thirties. He could break a leg, or twist an ankle; either option could dangerously compromise his ability to fight.
But…
He didn’t have a choice.
In a way, this was his fault.
Sutton said, “when you get through to them, tell them a husband and wife are being held hostage in the flat directly beneath yours.”
“What?” The man said again.
Sutton walked around the balcony, to see if there was anything that might ease the descent, and on the right hand side, closer inspection revealed that there were gaps between each metal panel affixed to the exterior of the building – a chamfered edge, between each panel – and that he might just be able to get his toes in, and use them as a ladder.
It was something.
Sutton climbed over the balcony wall and, still holding to the balcony, put his shoes in the gaps. They just about fit, but it was a precarious and uneasy union to say the least: an inch deep, he would have all his weight on his toes and the tips of his fingers.
Below him, a hundred feet of open air separated him from a brutal end on the concrete below. If only there was a way to switch gravity off; this would be so much easier. There was nothing to grab hold of if he made a mistake; no second chances; just a moment of time to review his life before it ended, unceremoniously and abruptly, by a compression of his brain matter through inertia and good old physics.
This is ridiculous.
Just fuck it, he thought.
Still keeping one hand on the balcony, he started down. Each plate was approximately three feet high, which made movement between each foothold relatively easy. When his head was at the same level as the balcony wall, he let go with his remaining hand. All that now held him aloft was his hold on the edge of the metal plates between each division, with only the tops of his fingers and shoes securing him to the wall. It was enough to produce the icy sweat of mortal fear at his temples.
He started down.
Five feet from reaching the wall surrounding Freddie’s balcony, his left foot went out from under him.
The motion of his foot elastic-banding away from the wall as it slipped out was enough to loosen his grip and, knowing that he was falling, he did the only thing he could think to do: he pushed off from the wall with his other foot, twisted his upper body toward the balcony and threw out his hands.
He caught the balcony wall easily.
No problem.
His heart was pounding so hard he thought he might have a heart attack and drop anyway.
He pulled himself over the edge of the balcony wall. The angle of his position on the balcony in relation to the internal design of the flat was so acute that someone would have to be leaning against the French Doors to be able to see him. Cautiously, he scooted to the edge of the balcony doors and very slowly moved his head so one eye could look through the glass.
All the lights were on; the place seemed to be awash in football stadium illumination. On the other side of the dining table, facing him, Lisa sat meekly in a chair. Her cheeks were wet with tears, the mascara smeared in two tracks at the edges of her eyes. She hadn’t seen him, wasn’t looking for him. Instead, in her face was absorbed with a total absence of hope, and a surrender to fear and the knowledge of her own impending death. It was a look of the defeated and nearly-dying.
Two men sat on chairs on either side of her, leaning back against the table. One held a knife – not toward Lisa, but loosely in one hand – and seemed to be running things; he gestured with the knife, and seemed to be talking. The other looked like he had gone a few rounds with Mike Tyson: he was battered and bruised down one side of his face, and obviously in pain.
Of course, the question was whether Freddie was still alive or not.
Sutton hadn’t much hope. They hadn’t mentioned him in the phone message, and as a bargaining chip he was still more capital. But instead they had only offered the life of the girl.
God, he couldn’t be dead.
Sutton looked for him, in the small amount of flat that he could see from his compromised position, but he couldn’t find him. Maybe he was on the split level, up above…but if he was, did that mean someone else was with him? Would there be someone else to fight too? Or was he merely tied up?
Sutton needed a lure.
He searched his pockets. He had his keys on him; that would have to do.
He took off his jacket and bundled it into a ball. He took a breath, readying himself, and then threw the keys at the glass, hard enough to make a noise, but not hard enough to bounce them too far off the glass…he wanted them to land on the balcony in an obvious place, so someone could spot them without too much difficulty. They clattered on the glass and then fell just right, a foot back from the doors and catching the light.
Sutton quickly leant back against the wall, away from the glass.
He waited.
For a moment, there was nothing.
Then the sound of the French Doors being opened.
Sutton swung his jacket toward the figure in the doorway, and then released it. It unfurled and wrapped itself around the person’s head. There was a cry of surprise, as the person was enveloped. At the same time, he launched himself at the figure.
The brain is a strange thing. Although in one sense it was working at a level of heightened awareness, there was still a delay in realising that the figure was not right for one of the men, that in fact they had sent Lisa to investigate the noise.
Sutton couldn’t change where he was going, couldn’t stop his momentum, but he could change what he was going to do.
Grabbing Lisa roughly by her jacket covered head, he pulled her outside, on to the balcony; she fell behind him, on to her knees.
There was a clear moment of surprise, as the two men took him in…and he took in their surprise. The world seemed to slow for a moment…before juddering roughly into action again.
Sutton rushed inside. The man with the knife was on his feet, yet to make any decisive move. Still running, Sutton ducked down and scooped up the dining table with both
hands. With a hearty bellow, he charged Knife Man with the dining table, using it like a shield and a battering ram at the same time.
He connected with Knife Man at some speed, and they went down together, the table rolling on top of the man and Sutton rolling on top of the table. Knife Man quickly slid out from under it, rolling to come up on his feet but bungling it halfway, tangling his own ankles together so he fell onto his knees. Sutton rolled the other way off the table, snapping off a table leg in the process. Before the man was fully on his feet, Sutton came at him with the chair leg, bringing it down on the back of Knife Man’s head. He got his arm up to block it, but it wasn’t enough, and the chair leg bounced off his skull like it was connecting with a medicine ball. Knife Man fell sideways, tripping over his friend, both of them collapsing in a heap, and both of them crying out in pain and surprise.
Knife Man rolled away better this time, in a smooth practiced motion…but the bump on his head had done more than just hurt, and once he was on his feet, he stumbled, veering one way as if drunk. He was still able to defend himself however. He dropped into a fighting stance, the knife held out, ready.
Sutton didn’t fancy his chances – the boy looked strong, fit, and he had at least had some training – so he tried something altogether different: he turned the leg on the injured boy at his feet. He brought the chair leg down on his shoulders twice, and once on his arm – and felt the arm give under the blow – before, enraged, Knife Man was galvanised enough to risk coming into the fray to rescue his friend.
Sutton stepped back, twisting and bringing the chair leg around to knock the knife from the man’s hand; it didn’t work, but Knife Man cried out. He fell forward, tripping over his friend but keeping his feet. He skidded to a halt at the bottom of the stairs, stopped, looked at Sutton, looked at his friend…and then abruptly broke for the stairs, clattering up them in an untidy shamble that might very well have been panic.
What?
Shit. Was he going after Freddie?
Sutton chased after him.
At the top of the stairs, the modern kitchen was spread out before him…but Knife Man wasn’t in it. Neither was Freddie. The bedroom was down the hall to the left of it, and Sutton was halfway down it when a noise behind him made him turn back around.
