by Nick Oldham
‘What?’
‘If you didn’t kill them – and don’t get me wrong here, I can’t pretend you’re not in deep, but not so deep I can’t get you out of this.’ Henry flinched, feeling the embedded glass and buckshot in the flesh of his cheek and along his jaw line, and could only begin to imagine how FB was hurting. ‘You do the right thing, lad, and I’ll look after you.’
Jake sneered a harsh laugh. ‘You’re not in a position to look after me.’ He pointed the shotgun straight at Henry. ‘Know what I mean?’
Henry regarded him cynically. He was the type of lad who was a follower, three layers down from the leader. A weakling, but still dangerous for that. Henry could see he was dithering, but also knew that his and FB’s time was short. Once the other two returned from their deliberations, things would really fall to pieces. Henry knew he had to get under the lad’s skin immediately.
‘If we die now, you’ll be to blame. Think of that, killing two cops on top of everything else. How does that grab you?’ Henry said, trying to do a snake-charm with him. ‘Then everything will get pinned on you. Those two down the end of the stable and us. Four murders … those other two guys will sacrifice you like a lamb. What’s your name?’
‘Jake,’ he divulged.
Henry held himself together. A tiny breakthrough.
‘Let us go, Jake. C’mon, son, let me take care of you.’ Henry’s eyes pleaded with him.
It was too late. Charlie and Luke slid back into the stable.
‘They said anything to you?’ Charlie demanded.
‘No, no.’ Jake shook his head vehemently.
Charlie looked at the two miserable figures of Henry and FB. ‘I’m gonna enjoy killing two cops.’
Henry said nothing, just stared challengingly into his eyes. Then he glanced at Jake, who diverted his – and in that fleeting moment he felt a surge of possibility.
Charlie laid a hand on Jake’s shoulder and pulled him a few steps away from the cops and the three of them had a hurried, heads-down, muted conversation, after which Charlie and Luke broke away to the far end of the stable, out of sight of Henry.
Jake stepped towards him.
‘What are you going to do, Jake?’ Henry said, just loud enough for him to hear.
Massive indecision crumpled Jake’s face.
Henry raised his right eyebrow. The left one refused to move and he was sure there was a piece of glass in it.
‘Fuck off,’ Jake responded.
‘Open the door,’ Charlie shouted across the stable. Jake backed off to the stable door and shouldered it open.
Charlie and Luke then reappeared, dragging Johnny and Annabel. The police Land Rover had been reversed up to the stable and its back door was open. Henry watched this gruesome scenario unfold as the men, with the legs of each body tucked under their arms, dragged them across the floor, dropping the legs heavily before considering their next move. This consisted of pulling them up into a sitting position first. Henry’s face showed his horror as he saw Annabel’s head loll, her whole body just a bag of bones. It was easy for Charlie – although Henry did not yet know the name of this violent man, hadn’t yet been formally introduced – to heave her up on to her heels, then throw her face first into the back of the Land Rover and fold her legs in after her, shoving her body in as far as possible between the bench seats.
Charlie was sweating heavily after this and placed his hands on his hips, surveying what he had done and what he had to do.
‘My God,’ Henry whispered in fear.
‘What is it, what is it?’ FB asked, almost insensible. ‘What’s going on?’
‘You don’t want to know.’
Jake glanced at them and Henry nodded urgently at him, but got no response.
‘Oh God,’ he said again. ‘Not good, not good.’
It took both Charlie and Luke to heave the heavier body of Johnny Asian to his feet. He was only a slat of a lad really, but he was bulkier and taller than Annabel. They staggered comically with him, trying to balance him like a drunk, then they threw him face down into the Land Rover on top of Annabel and folded him in.
Henry then watched one of the most brutal, coldest things he had ever seen in his life.
Charlie grabbed the top of the Land Rover like a monkey swinging on the cross bar of a set of goal posts. He raised his feet off the floor, swung back and then flat-footed Johnny’s body into the vehicle, kick after kick, making him fit.
Henry held back a retch and knew for certain that this man, whoever he was, was one of the most violently depraved psychopaths he had ever come across. If he hadn’t known it for certain before, he knew now: he and FB would be the next victims. They would not leave this place alive.
Charlie and Luke gasped for breath, the effort of moving the bodies having exhausted them.
‘I need a drink, I’m gagging,’ Luke said.
‘Yeah, me too,’ Charlie agreed. To Jake he said, ‘Think you can look after these two for another five minutes, then we come back and see if we can make them fit on top of these two?’
‘Course I can,’ Jake said bravely.
‘Make sure you do,’ Charlie warned him. His eyes roved murderously over Henry and FB, then he and Luke ducked out of the stable door.
Jake watched them go, then turned to Henry.
‘They come back in here, we’re dead,’ Henry said. ‘And you are guilty of four murders, Jake. I’d say think about that now but you haven’t got time. You need to act. Release us, we jump into the Land Rover and we’re gone – and you helped us to do the right thing.’
‘I don’t know, I don’t know,’ Jake said, panicky.
‘The handcuff keys are still in my pocket. Let me stand up and you get them, unlock the cuffs, then we all run.’
Then there was ‘that’ moment, the one Henry called the ‘Sliding Doors’ moment, after the film of the same name. The choice. The route. Decision time. The moment when life changes for ever.
‘There will be no mercy for you if I’m dead, Jake boy.’ Henry probed the lad’s conscience even deeper. ‘You might run, but you’ll be found within hours and you know that because you’ve actually nowhere to go, have you? Armed cops will come for you and if that goes wrong, you’ll be as dead as me.’
‘Stand up,’ Jake snapped, jerking up the shotgun.
Henry scrambled to his feet and held out his arms. ‘Key’s in this pocket,’ he said, indicating his left hip.
‘Don’t you try to take this off me,’ Jake said, shaking the gun.
‘I won’t – just do it.’
‘Turn, face the wall.’
Henry did as instructed, finding himself nose up to a blood-smeared wall.
Jake walked up to him and forced him tight against the brickwork, placed the shotgun on the floor. He put the back of his hand between Henry’s shoulder blades, then slid his other hand into Henry’s jeans pocket, pulling out the handcuff key on its basic ring. Then he reached over Henry, manoeuvred him slightly and slid the key into the lock, releasing the ratchet on the right wrist, freeing Henry’s hand.
He stepped quickly back, scooping up the shotgun, and Henry hurriedly unlocked the ratchet on his other wrist, then dropped the cuffs and bent down to help FB to his feet and unlock the cuffs that secured him with the same key.
‘Come on pal,’ he encouraged FB. ‘We’re going to get out of this. Where’s your warrant card?’
‘Eh?’ FB said dully.
‘Don’t ask, just give it to me,’ Henry said.
FB raised his face and looked at Henry, who clearly saw the damage done by the shotgun blast. Another inch to the left and Henry knew FB would have been a dead man. He fumbled in his jacket, found his ID and gave it to Henry.
The cops then looked up.
Jake stood there numbly, awaiting instructions: the story of his life.
‘Land Rover,’ Henry said.
Jake spun as Charlie and Luke came back into the barn.
Charlie instantly understood what was going
on.
‘You weak-kneed bastard,’ he screamed and charged Jake, who reared back, terrified.
Henry grabbed FB’s arm, hauled him sideways, then ran to the stable door, having to drag the chief behind him.
Luke blocked their exit.
Charlie threw himself into Jake and they started to grapple for control of the shotgun, but Charlie was the stronger of the two and he danced Jake back against the wall of the loose box.
Luke dropped into a cricket fielder’s stance, crouching as though he was going to catch Henry and FB.
Henry released FB, dinked left in a feint, then powered into Luke and for the second time that night smashed his fist as hard as possible into Luke’s face, just under his left eye, felling him instantaneously. Henry knew he would hurt his hand again – it had been like hitting a square of concrete – but he knew he had no time to dwell on it, or even shake it. He had to get himself and FB out of the stable.
He grabbed FB’s jacket and ran out with him, glancing backwards just the once.
He saw Luke rolling on the floor, covering his face with his hands.
Saw Charlie and Jake fighting in the loose box, trying to wrench the gun from each other. Charlie was the stronger of the two. The one who fought without hesitation, or thought about consequences. He was the one who would put another man on the ground and then jump on his face without even the slightest shred of regret.
They fought over the weapon, face to face. The sinews in their necks were as tight as wound steel wire and the conflict seemed to drop into slow motion. Jake began to lose as the stronger arms of Charlie Wilder slowly rotated the weapon as if he was grappling with a rusted submarine hatch, twisting and wrenching slowly but surely until Jake could hold it no more and it snapped out of his hands.
Henry forced FB out of the door and as they reached the driver’s door of the Land Rover, there was the blast of the shotgun being fired.
Henry ducked instinctively but did not look back. He ripped open the door and saw to his horror that there were no keys in the ignition. Even though his eyes told him and his brain understood the situation, he still reached in and fumbled around the steering column.
He swore, then to FB he said, ‘We run.’
FB nodded and Henry steered him across the farmyard to the gate, this time looking back in fear.
‘We need to move fast,’ Henry told FB.
‘I know, I got it,’ he said, upping the pace of his lumbering.
‘Otherwise we’re dead.’
‘Like I said,’ FB huffed angrily, ‘I fucking get it … I just can’t see a friggin’ thing.’
At the gate, Henry paused in the lane that ran by the farm. Going left would take them back towards civilization. Going right, he didn’t have a clue.
Then there was the clatter of the stable door opening and Charlie ran out. He had the shotgun open and was picking out two spent cartridges, throwing them aside and replacing them from the supply in his pocket. He snapped the gun shut, looked up and spotted the cops at the gate.
He raised the weapon and fired.
Henry had seen the process of unloading and reloading and just as Charlie closed the shotgun, he pulled FB sideways behind the stone gate post to give them some cover.
Henry felt the shock of the shot. FB spun and groaned.
‘Shoulder, fucking shoulder,’ FB shouted, feeling the new pain of shot in the joint.
Now Henry was not thinking, he was just reacting, drawing on the reserves of self-preservation fuel that are hidden deep in most people, but which rarely have to be plundered.
‘I know,’ he said, and dragged FB across the narrow track to a stile over the dry stone wall opposite. ‘Got to get over this,’ he said, and directed the chief to the narrow wooden steps which, to his credit, he climbed up and over, then leapt into the field beyond.
Henry followed, paused for just one moment to do something, throwing himself after FB, hitting and rolling on the soft, drenched grass just as Charlie reached the farm gate and loosed off another two barrels.
‘Keep down and move,’ he told FB.
Both men scrambled up the hillside, their feet slipping, not knowing what they were putting their hands into, but keeping low, hoping that the heavy rain and darkness would be their lifeline.
Charlie reached the stile and peered into the darkness, trying to spot movement, then, after reloading, blindly blasted the gun again hoping to hear a scream, which did not happen.
Luke staggered up behind him, cradling his face. Charlie looked contemptuously at him. ‘If they get away, we’re knackered.’
‘So what do we do?’ Luke snuffled.
‘Hunt them down, that’s what we do.’
Although Rik Dean had been dealing with what had initially been reported as a road traffic accident but had then turned into something more sinister, he had still managed to make it to the Tawny Owl for a planned evening with Henry and Alison and, of course, Lisa, Henry’s sister, Rik’s fiancée.
He hadn’t expected to find Steve Flynn there. He didn’t know him especially well, but was aware that Flynn and Henry had what could be delicately described as an uncomfortable past.
There had been no real reason for the get-together that evening, just a bit of socializing, and neither he nor Henry had expected to be dealing with stuff that turned up out of the blue. But such was the nature of the job, especially that of an SIO. People got murdered at all sorts of unsocial hours.
At Alison’s instigation, Flynn had been invited to stay the night, which made Rik a little uncomfortable, too, because he knew – or at least so Henry had whined to him on several occasions – that Flynn supposedly had the ‘hots’ for Alison.
The short time that Rik and Lisa had managed to spend with Flynn and Alison had been quite convivial, although Henry’s non-appearance and intermittent phone calls were clearly annoying Alison, who was becoming convinced that Henry was just being pig-headed because Flynn had shown up. The two men were alleged to have put their differences to one side, but this obviously wasn’t the case.
There had been a couple of moments when Rik thought that Henry might be right about Flynn and Alison. He had seen them having a deep conversation when they thought they were not being watched and they were very touchy-feely all the time. The way Alison looked at Flynn also made Rik furrow his brow. It was as though they shared a special something, a secret … a tryst? Rik did not like what he saw but didn’t feel it was his place to challenge anything, because what did he know?
Rik had hit the sack with Lisa at midnight, assuming Flynn would not be far behind. He had not fallen asleep immediately, which he found annoying because of having to be in early next day to kick-start a full-scale murder investigation.
Lisa had snuggled up to him. Though he had thought she was out for the count, she surprised him by saying, ‘Penny for ’em.’
‘Eh? Uh? A mindful of whizzing thoughts,’ he admitted. ‘Murder and mayhem amongst them; wondering what the hell Henry’s got himself into over in the valley, though I expect he’ll slink in any time now. And whether there is anything between Flynn and Alison.’
‘They do seem close.’
‘You noticed?’
‘Couldn’t miss.’
‘Mm … I caught them having a heart to heart.’
Lisa sighed, stifled a yawn. ‘Probably nothing. Just good friends.’
‘Heard that one before.’
Rik hugged her tenderly and this time, for definite, felt and heard her breathing become regular and deep with sleep.
She disentangled herself and turned her back on him.
He closed his eyes, fell asleep, and next thing he knew his mobile phone was ringing and a worried Jerry Tope was on the other end of the line.
After that call, Rik dressed quickly, explained to a comatose Lisa that he was turning out, but did not give her details. He left the room, went down the corridor and stairs to the bar area.
Where he found Flynn and Alison.
Rik�
��s throat dried up. ‘You guys still up?’
They were sitting in the lounge area of the main bar and, to be fair, on chairs opposite each other with a small brass-topped table between them, next to the dying embers of what had earlier been a roaring fire in the grate. Their body language seemed to convey their comfort in each other’s presence.
‘Not interrupting anything, I hope?’ he added with meaning.
Their total lack of guilty response, either verbal or visual, reassured him and made him wish he hadn’t asked.
‘Hardly,’ Alison said.
They were both sipping whiskey.
‘What are you doing up, Rik?’ she asked.
‘I need to turn out. I … er …’ He hesitated.
‘What is it?’ Flynn asked.
‘They … um … seem to have lost contact with Henry.’
Both shot to their feet.
‘What?’ Alison screamed. ‘I’ve been trying to call him but I just thought he was in a bad reception area, or whatever they call it. What’s going on? Can’t they get him over the radio?’
Rik shrugged. ‘I don’t know. It seemed he went to revisit a job but then disappeared off the grid. And yeah, it’s in a radio and phone signal black spot, but that’s how it is sometimes. I’m sure he’ll be fine. He is with FB and the two of them are pretty formidable if it has to be that way.’ He did not want to share anything more with Alison because the information he had just got from Jerry Tope was quite upsetting if you read between the lines – and so were the lines themselves. All Rik wanted to do was jump in his car and get going and halfway there get a message that Henry was all right, no panic, and he could get back to bed. He was sure that was what would happen.
‘Whereabouts?’ Flynn asked.
‘Rossendale Valley, Whitworth – a one-horse town.’
‘Know it,’ Flynn said. He was an ex-Lancashire cop. ‘Right on the edge.’
‘Yeah, next stop Manchester. Look, guys, I want to get going. I’m sure it’ll be nothing untoward, but I’d like to make certain.’
Alison sagged. Flynn caught her before she hit the ground and eased her back on to her seat.
‘Bloody fucking job,’ she snarled.
‘He’ll be all right, I promise,’ Rik said. ‘I’ll keep in touch, yeah?’
