The Hunted

by KERRY BARNES

  Willie pulled out his phone. ‘I’ll call the lads.’

  Zara stared as he rounded up his men – Mike’s men. It should have been Mike by her side. She shook her head in frustration – it was no time for being sentimental.

  By the next evening, they had rolled off the ferry and were heading for Kilkenny. The meeting was arranged for three o’clock that afternoon at a remote guest house owned by the Lanigans. Willie jumped in Lou’s Range Rover and Staffie drove Zara in her Mercedes; the Audi was way too small for the likes of any of Mike’s men. The van drivers were all accompanied by Mike’s old firm; they included Willie’s and Staffie’s younger brothers and two cousins – all built like brick shithouses.

  Just as they approached the narrow lane that led to the meeting point, they stopped the vans, and some of the men climbed into the back, out of view. It was a prearranged precaution. In the eventuality of something going wrong, a driver would hoot his horn as a warning, and the men in the back would leap out, ready for combat.

  Zara looked in the mirror and smoothed down her hair; she didn’t want to look either tired or sleepy. This meeting was a big deal, and it was all going so well that it would set her up for serious business in the future. While Lou waited outside with a clear view through the front windows of the guest house, Staffie and Willie accompanied Zara but not before Willie had snorted another line, ready to be fired up if there was any action to be had.

  Zara felt pretty confident as she walked in to meet the main man. The first thing that struck her was that the décor of the guest house reminded her of Alice in Wonderland, with odd chairs and tables and china teacups and plates. With so much chintz and sugar for a meeting, it was very different from the meeting places she was used to, which these days seemed to be workshops, basements, and warehouses. To the right sat three men, who were so chunky their suits looked ridiculously tight against their bulging biceps. She guessed right away they were Lanigan’s backup. Then her eyes diverted to the left where two much older men were sitting at a table.

  The first man was thickset, with white skin and a mop of jet-black hair with not a grey streak in it. He looked her up and down. He didn’t smile or nod or even offer her a chair. His piercing blue eyes cast down to his watch, and then, slowly, he glared up at her. For a moment, she felt her heart rate increase. Behind that dark, intimidating expression was a soulless man. Keeping her breathing calm, she followed his eyes as they shifted towards Willie and Staffie.

  The thickset man pointed to the chair, but she had other ideas. She needed to exert her authority, and so she remained standing and gave him a look of contempt.

  The person sitting next to him was smaller, thinner, and had ginger hair peppered with wisps of white. He was roughly the same age. He needed putting in his place as well, so, with a flick of her head, she motioned for him to leave, to the amusement of the dark-haired man who she concluded must be Lanigan.

  With the tension rising, Zara remained composed and reticent. She then nodded her head towards an area on the other side of the room for Willie and Staffie to sit down. They instantly moved as she indicated, signifying to Lanigan that she was in charge.

  Willie didn’t sit down; instead, he leaned against the wall and glared at the men sitting on the sofa. Staffie decided to sit on a high stool by the small bar area.

  Lanigan nudged the man beside him to leave, and as soon as he was gone, Zara sat down. She was used to doing business, and it had never bothered her before, but her father’s warning about this meeting had spooked her. She told herself to get a grip and not to be intimidated by Lanigan’s fiendish eyes.

  He leaned forward and whispered, ‘I’ve a gun under the table that can blow your fecking fanny off, so just ta warn yer, that if yer think for one minute that you’ll do me over, then think again.’

  As he leaned back to face her, a slow smile crept across her face. ‘And if ya think you can do me over, then, likewise, I have a gun under this table pointing right at your bollocks – or ya stomach, if it’s hanging over them.’ She hardly moved her lips when she hissed the words like a snake. ‘So now, Mr Lanigan, we have that matter cleared up, let’s get down to business, shall we? Firstly, I’m not in the fucking habit of traipsing all the way to Ireland, but, on this occasion, out of politeness, I was prepared to meet with you here. Secondly, I am a businesswoman, and I conduct my business with trustworthy people like myself. And thirdly, if you ever threaten me again, I won’t return the threat. I’ll fucking blow your bollocks off.’

  Lanigan smiled, showing his perfect set of teeth. But Zara didn’t return the smile, knowing that if she did, a nervous giggle would leave her mouth. Right now, she had to keep her cool.

  ‘Do you have the merchandise – all of it?’

  She nodded and rose from her chair. As soon as she did, Willie pushed himself away from the wall and Staffie got up from the stool. Lanigan glared. ‘So, you felt the need to have protection?’ This time, his smile irritated her.

  She replied casually, ‘Like you, I’m not taking any chances.’ She looked over at her two burly associates. Out of the corner of her eye, she sighted the ginger-haired man hovering at the doorway that led to the back of the house.

  As soon as they stepped outside, Zara could see to her left a large blue Transit van hammering along the lane, and then, as she looked to the right, another one was about to block her and her men in.

  Her heart was in her mouth – it was a bastard set-up! Now her own cars and vans, all lined up, were completely boxed in. She spun around to face Lanigan, who laughed in her face.

  ‘You fecking stupid sly bitch, ya thought you could stab me in the back!’

  No sooner had the Transit vans come to a halt than three men jumped out from each vehicle. Staffie went to pull Zara away towards her car, but he was too late to spot the danger. Lanigan grabbed her hair, and, at the same time, one of Lanigan’s minders cracked Staffie on the side of the head with a metal cosh. The blow was hard enough to knock him off balance, breaking his back tooth and causing his mouth to fill with blood. In a fit of rage, he turned, steadied himself, snatched the cosh from his attacker, and proceeded to beat him about the head with it.

  Zara’s driver sounded the horn. Instantly, her men leaped from the back of their vans and began tearing into Lanigan’s mini army. Willie’s brother, twice the size and twice as ugly, grabbed two of them and smashed their heads together.

  Meanwhile, Lanigan was dragging Zara by her hair back towards the guest house. As he tried to grapple with the gun that was shoved down his belt, Zara had time to spin round and give him a karate kick in the solar plexus, causing him to hit a stone wall, loosening the rocks. Momentarily stunned by the impact, he didn’t see what happened next. With one quick movement, Zara grabbed a heavy rock and smashed him in the face, knocking him out cold.

  She turned and was amazed at what she saw. Staffie was beating the life out of the man who had struck him with the cosh, and Willie was ploughing a hammer into another bloke’s skull. Even Lou, the smallest of them, had managed to take a bat from a man much bigger than himself and was using the man’s head as a baseball.

  Quickly, Zara searched around for the ginger-haired man, the one she’d asked to leave the meeting. As the carnage continued, she opened the door to the guest house, and, to her surprise, there he was at the table. With a cup of tea in his hand, he looked up and smiled. ‘Your father said you could handle business. I guess he was right, Zara.’ He held out his hand. ‘Davey Lanigan. I’m pleased to meet you. All the money is in the room at the back. You can count it, if you like. And I trust all the goods are as your father promised?’

  Still catching her breath, she curled her lip in anger and slid her hand behind her belt. ‘Oh, no, Mr Lanigan. You tried to have me fucked over.’ She pulled out her gun and pointed it at the man’s face. ‘I was fair, decent, and honest, but you, ya cunt, weren’t. So you don’t get the goods. But I will take payment, thank you very much.’

  She heard the door
open behind her but didn’t dare to take her eyes away from the person she now believed to be Lanigan.

  Willie and Staffie walked up behind her. ‘Everything all right, boss?’ asked Staffie, still spitting blood.

  ‘Yeah, believe it or not. Meet the real Mr Lanigan. He’s just offering us compensation. The money’s in the back, lads.’

  Staffie frowned, totally confused. ‘What? But I thought that geezer out there was Mr Lanigan?’

  ‘Nope. Apparently, this prick is.’

  ‘That’s fucking right!’ spat the man.

  Willie, who was making strides towards the back room, suddenly stopped dead in his tracks and spun around. ‘Say that again?’

  Lanigan looked down.

  ‘I said, say it again, you cunt!’

  Staffie was rattled by Willie’s action. ‘What’s going on, Willie?’

  ‘This ain’t Lanigan. This guy’s a fucking Londoner.’

  He turned to Zara. ‘Something stinks!’

  As Willie stared, his brain was rapidly processing events and images from the past. Of course! It was the man’s hooded dark eyes.

  Without warning, he lunged forward and grabbed the ginger-haired man by the throat. ‘Liar, ya cunt! I fucking know who you are. I know your rat-like face! It’s haunted my dreams, you evil bastard.’

  In a second, he tore at the man’s jacket, ripping it from his shoulders, and then he pulled the shirt away to reveal a long uneven scar from the neck down past his shoulder. ‘I remember cutting this fucker up, before I was done over by him and his mates. I don’t forget a face, not one that left me with this mark.’ He pointed to the scar that ran from his forehead down to his chin.

  Staffie gasped. ‘What the fuck? Who is he, Willie?’

  Still gripping the man’s neck, Willie slowly replied, ‘Some shit of a man that needs a gang to fight for him.’ He glared at him. ‘Ain’t that right?’

  ‘Wait, Willie. Don’t kill him yet. I wanna know who the fuck this cunt is. Staffie, go and find out if the man I’ve just bricked is the real Davey Lanigan. We need to know who this geezer is.’

  Still holding the cosh, Staffie returned to the scene of the bloodbath. It resembled a film clip from The Walking Dead but on a smaller scale. Battered and bruised bodies, with chunks missing from their heads and faces, were crawling around moaning and crying.

  Lou, out of breath, was leaning against the wall, still trying to make a roll-up.

  ‘Lou! Organize the boys to get our vans out of here, will ya?’

  Lou waved his hand in acknowledgement, too out of breath to talk.

  Staffie looked down at the meathead who he’d battered with the cosh. His head was swollen black and blue and his hand was crushed, but he was alive and slowly coming out of his dazed state.

  ‘Who’s Davey Lanigan?’ he hollered at him.

  The battered man groaned. Still unsteady, he tried to get to his feet. Staffie grabbed his arm to stabilize him but he pulled away from Staffie’s clutches and took three steps.

  ‘My dad,’ he croaked, before he slumped down next to his unconscious father.

  ‘And who the fuck are you?’ asked Staffie, determined to get the facts straight.

  ‘Neil Lanigan.’

  Staffie watched as Neil attempted to bring his father around. All he got were incoherent mumblings. Blood dribbled from his mouth and a wheezy sounded vibrated in his throat.

  Neil looked up at Staffie. ‘Please, help him.’

  Staffie threw the cosh aside and leaned down to help Neil hoist his father to an upright position. He was a heavy lump, but, between the pair of them, they managed to drag him inside and onto the sofa.

  ‘This is Davey Lanigan and his son Neil.’

  ‘Get the men a drink. I want them talking!’ instructed Zara coldly. Staffie marched to the small bar area where he found a bottle of Irish whiskey and brought it over to the Lanigans.

  Managing to drink some and dribbling the rest out, along with blood and fragments of teeth, Davey Lanigan opened his left eye and tried to focus. The right eye was completely closed.

  ‘Who is that guy!’ demanded Zara, as she pointed to the ginger-haired man.

  A sudden scream made Zara and Staffie look over at Willie, who, by now, was as high as a kite on cocaine and carving a line down the ginger-haired man’s face with his diver’s knife.

  Staffie rolled his eyes. Willie had turned into the monster again. ‘Wait up, Willie. We need answers first.’ It was like talking to the Hulk when he’d turned green.

  As soon as Zara heard the vans starting up to drive away, she frowned at Staffie, her nerves clearly rattled.

  He returned a smile by way of assurance. ‘It’s okay. Lou’s organizing them. Lanigan’s lot are all incapacitated. But we need to get the goods away from here, before we have any other visitors, ’cos something dodgy is going on.’ He looked over at Willie, who was now angrier than he’d ever seen him.

  They waited another few minutes for the ginger-haired man to recover his senses, and as soon as he was wholly focused, Zara asked him his name. He glared at her but didn’t speak.

  With a deep Irish accent and slurred speech, Neil Lanigan began to talk. ‘He came to warn me father that you were setting us up and not to trust you or yer men.’

  ‘Well, he fucking lied. Those vans had the gear, as promised. I am a woman of my word and your stupid father was hoodwinked. Who? I mean, who the hell is he?’

  ‘His name is Harman. Ronnie Harman.’

  Instantly, Staffie hollered, ‘No! Willie! No!’

  Zara’s eyes widened as Willie held the diver’s knife in the air, ready to plunge it into Ronnie’s head.

  * * *

  Zara casually sat opposite Ronnie, as if she were about to have tea. She slid the gun down the back of her trousers and pulled out a packet of cigarettes.

  ‘Now then, Ronnie Harman, how did you get the information that I had a deal with the Lanigans?’

  She sparked up the end of her cigarette and blew the smoke into his face. It was a deliberate act. Ronnie’s eyes were already stinging from the blood that oozed out of the deep cut to his forehead that Willie had given him.

  The cocky expression had left Ronnie’s face, and he appeared the old man he was. He huffed. ‘It seems that when ya father departed this world, he may have left you the business, but he didn’t leave you with the truth.’

  Willie’s knife was now an inch away from Ronnie’s neck. ‘Don’t talk in fucking riddles. What truth? What are you on about?’

  Zara could sense that Willie was a heartbeat away from slitting Harman’s throat. ‘Willie, wait! I want Ronnie to tell me everything he knows – starting with why his family felt the need to interfere in my father’s business, why they grassed Mike to the Filth, and why they killed an innocent six-year-old boy.’

  Harman’s face turned slowly into a provocative sneer, and it had Zara raging. With her eyes filling up, and her anger boiling, she shot up from her seat. ‘Ya know what? Fuck it! Take this disgusting turd outside and tie the bastard to a chair. I’m gonna look for marshmallows.’ Totally incensed, she stormed off in search of petrol. Staffie and Willie had never seen her so angry.

  With a high-pitched laugh, Willie dragged Ronnie outside by the throat whilst Staffie carried a chair. It suddenly hit Ronnie what she meant – Christ, they’re going to set me alight.

  Staffie noticed Lou and his brother, Felix, were still dragging the wounded men towards one of the blue Transit vans. Lou called over to Staffie. ‘I’m gonna load them up in their own van and take ’em away.’

  Staffie nodded. ‘Nice one, Lou.’ He looked over at Felix and grinned to himself. Whilst Lou was short and suave, Felix was his polar opposite – tall, well-built, and clumsy, his immense muscles indicating considerable strength – akin to Colossus. He was dragging two men, one by each hand, leaving Lou straining to pull one dead weight.

  Struggling and pleading, Ronnie was tied to the dainty pink chair. Zara returned with a can o
f petrol. She knew that being out here so far from anywhere, the place would have a fuel supply somewhere. The back of the house led to a garage, where, inside, there was a conspicuously large can of petrol.

  The men stepped back and watched in horror as she poured the fuel over his head and then whacked him with the can. ‘You scummy bastard. Now you’ll fucking speak!’

  With his face burning and his eyes streaming, he screamed like a girl. ‘No! Please, I’m begging you!’

  ‘Who’s the grass, Ronnie? Who fucking told you about this job? Why are you out to get us?’ She stepped back and took a few deep breaths to calm her anger. She had to get a grip. Holding her lighter and flicking it over in her hands, she noisily breathed in and out through her nose.

  His eyes widened, and he struggled so much that the chair tipped over.

  Staffie, however, pulled it back onto its four legs. His stomach was now churning; he had never seen anyone set alight before. As he looked at the expression on Zara’s face, he realized that she really was bloody dangerous. Izzy was right to have let her take over.

  The recognizable sound as she sparked the light made everyone hold their breath, except for Willie, whose fury often made him very excitable.

  ‘Wait! Please, I’ll tell you!’ yelled Ronnie. He took a deep breath to give himself enough time to think. Whatever he told her, she was going to end his life. But, by giving a name, there was an outside chance he might save himself from being murdered in this horrific way. ‘Please, if I tell you, will you just give me a bullet in the head?’

  Slowly, she nodded, her face showing not even a twitch.

  ‘It was your cousin Joshua.’ He held his breath and prayed she wouldn’t throw the lighter.

  With her breath now intensifying at every heartbeat, she fought back the urge to set the man ablaze.

  ‘You fucking liar! Joshua wouldn’t grass me up. Not in a million years.’

  Ronnie knew he needed to wear a poker face, just for a moment, to ensure that Zara would believe him. ‘He did, though. He gave me the information because he has a debt to pay and he needed the money.’