by Ellis, Tim
‘They were fools.’
‘And you’re not?’
They heard a noise.
She felt the cold metal of the Glock 17 against her temple and heard Jacob’s laboured breathing close to her cheek.
‘Nervous?’ she asked him.
‘Not in the least. The first person to come through that door will die. Then it’ll be one against one.’
She had no idea which part of the building they were located in. Where was Randall? Did he know Jacob had her captive? Was he coming to rescue her again, or would he simply walk away? She wasn’t very nice to him, and she wouldn’t blame him if he decided that she simply wasn’t worth the effort. If she got out of this, maybe she’d try to be nicer to him.
The tie at her ankle fell away.
Jacob gripped her wrists. ‘Get up. Time to go.’
She struggled up. The back of her head hurt like hell. She could sense the fear in the room, but didn’t know whether it belonged to her or Jacob.
He held onto her wrist tie with his left hand as if it was a leash, and pushed her ahead of him through a door into a corridor. The swing doors were in front of her and it looked as though they were still on the third floor. Without the torch it was difficult to make anything out.
‘Move,’ he said, holding the barrel of the Glock against her cheek.
She could have taunted and undermined him, but contrary to what she’d said before – he was no fool. He’d know exactly what she was up to and she’d probably get a smack in the mouth with the Glock for her trouble. She had to wait until he made a mistake, recognise that it was a mistake and act upon it. Psychopaths all made mistakes sooner or later.
He pushed her through the swing doors, hiding behind her like a coward.
Just then, John came round the corner of the stairs above them. He aimed his shotgun, but didn’t fire – presumably because of Molly.
Jacob put two bullets into him. He crumpled and slithered down the stairs onto the landing at her feet.
She wondered who John was. Another death in this bloody Hansen saga. What if Jacob did succeed? What if he killed Randall, and then there was just the two of them? What if . . . ? God, she had to get free. She’d rather die than be subjected to more of Jacob’s insanity.
Where the fuck was Randall? Had he walked away and left her? Had he decided that she was more trouble than she was worth? Fear gripped her insides like a many-tentacled beast. Was she on her own now?
‘Keep moving,’ he whispered in her ear, guiding her step by step down the stairs. ‘I expect you’ve got your car with you. We’ll use that, go back to your place and make a night of it.’
She could hear him laughing to himself.
They reached the first floor landing.
‘Nearly there, Molly.’
On the ground floor he shoved her towards the half-open door. A ghostly orange light filtered in and she shivered as she felt a gust of freezing wind caress her.
‘I knew that if I waited long enough you’d get here,’ Randall’s voice came out of the darkness.
Jacob put his left arm around her throat and pressed the gun barrel into her cheekbone.
She felt him trying to make himself smaller and less of a target behind her.
‘Come into the open where I can see you, Randall.’
‘I’m not an idiot.’
‘I think you are. Come out, or I’ll shoot Molly.’
‘You won’t shoot her, you need her as a shield.’
‘I can still use her as a shield if I shoot her in the arm.’
Randall moved into the faint orange glow between them and the half-open door. The sawn-off shotgun was poking out towards them from his donkey jacket.
Jacob began to swing the Glock towards Randall.
She felt his foot touch the back of her shoe and stamped down hard.
He let out a grunt and at the same time released the grip on her wrists.
She threw herself forward.
Randall fired the shotgun he was holding.
A searing pain creased the back of her head as she sprawled face down on the damp mildewed carpet covering the floor.
Randall’s torch came on as he squatted down next to her.
‘Are you all right, Molly?’
‘You fucking shot me.’
‘You’re welcome.’
‘You need to do something about your aim and your timing. Did you hit Jacob, or was it just me?’
Randall moved along the corridor shining his torch on the floor. ‘Yeah, I hit Jacob. There’s a trail of blood.’
Molly made a sound like a bubbly fart with her lips. ‘Lucky shot probably.’
‘It must have been,’ Randall threw back at her. ‘I was really aiming at you.’
She was surprised at how easily they had slipped into the verbal sparring of old. It had been two years since they’d been partners, but the chemistry between them was still there.
‘I can believe that,’ she said trying to push herself up. ‘Well, are you just going to leave me tied up and bleeding down here, or what?’
‘Yes. If I help you up you’ll want to go after Jacob. We’ve already tried that once and look where it got us.’
‘If I have to get myself out of these restraints I’ll be coming after you as well.’
She felt him search her pocket for the small cutting tool to release prisoners in an emergency, and then her hands were free. Blood trickled down her neck. She put her hand up and felt the thin wet groove the shotgun pellet had scored into the back of her head. ‘You always were a lousy fucking shot.’
‘Thanks.’
Standing up she said, ‘Did you see which way he went?’
‘Into the basement, but he could be anywhere by now.’
‘We need help.’
‘We had help and look what happened. I presume John is dead?’
‘Sorry.’
‘He knew what he was getting himself into.’
‘We still need help.’
‘I’m open to suggestions.’
‘I haven’t got anybody. Tony would probably help, but I’m not going to ask him. I thought you had “people”?’
‘Not for murder, Molly. We have to do this on our own.’
‘I know.’ She wouldn’t be able to kill Jacob if they called people in. It would all get very messy. In the end, he’d be set free as an innocent victim in all of this, and she’d be living in mortal fear again. It had to end tonight. It was all or nothing.
Randall passed her the shotgun. ‘Stay here. I’ll go and see what else John has got in the boot of his car.’
He was gone for some time, but came back carrying a holdall.
‘Goodies?’ she asked.
‘Yes.’ He shone the torch in the bag and passed her another handgun. ‘Try not to lose that one.’
She could have tossed him a flippant response, but he was right – she had lost the last one. Jacob was in here fighting for his life, and she hadn’t appreciated that fact. Well, she wouldn’t make the same mistake twice.
‘What else have you got?’
‘Put these on,’ he said thrusting a head harness at her.
‘Night vision goggles?’
‘Yes.’
Switching them on, she slipped the goggles over her eyes and whistled. ‘Christ, I can see everything.’
‘He has a torch, so be careful. If he shines it in your direction you’ll be blinded and defenceless for at least a minute.’
‘Okay.’
‘Put that on your belt,’ he said, passing her a knife in a leather sheath. ‘Just in case you do lose the gun.’
She couldn’t think of a withering response fast enough.
‘And look what I found.’
She peered into the bottom of the bag. There were at least a couple of hundred lethal looking spiked metal balls about half an inch in diameter.
‘And?’
‘I took his shoes. He’s bare-footed.’
‘Ah! We can put them . . .’
/>
‘. . . everywhere,’ Randall finished for her. ‘If he treads on one of these little beauties we’ll know exactly where he is.’ He scooped up a handful of the balls and spread them on the floor in front of the door.
After donning the night goggles, they moved along the corridor to the far end. Randall dropped spiked balls at regular intervals, and especially on the stairs going up and down. Then they back-tracked to the stairwell nearest to the exit and made their way into the basement and the cells.
Randall took the lead.
They came across the cell Jacob had been kept in.
‘How the hell did he get out of here?’ she asked him.
‘I don’t know. We left him with his hands secured behind his back.’
‘You searched him?’
‘I’m not a complete amateur.’
‘I was beginning to wonder.’ She picked up the heavy-duty chain and padlock. ‘It’s been opened not cut.’
‘He must have found something to open it.’
‘Unless somebody let him out.’
‘Like who? He picked the lock and got out. Come on, we have an escaped prisoner to catch.’
Once he found the blood trail they moved quickly. It led upstairs – up to the attic floor.
‘Now we have him,’ Randall said.
‘Let’s not count our chickens . . .’ Molly said. ‘We thought that the last time.’
Chapter Thirty
Wednesday, December 5
The blood trail led the whole length of the corridor to the last office – the end of the line.
He recalled old times – Randall and Stone – solving crimes and bringing criminals to justice like Mulder and Scully, Booth and Brennan, Dempsey and Makepeace and all the others crime-solving duos. The trouble was – this was real life, not television.
How many times had they been in this situation? Crashing through doors into the unknown. Usually, they had back-up and wore bullet-proof vests, but tonight they were on their own and vulnerable to lead projectiles.
‘Ready?’ he said to her.
She nodded. ‘As I’ll ever be.’
He kicked the door open. Blinding light shot through the lenses of the night vision goggles and temporarily fried his optical nerve.
‘Jesus!’ he heard Molly scream.
Something smashed into his back and he just knew it was Jacob. He staggered into the room, lost his footing and went sprawling face down on the floor. The night goggles flew off his head, he dropped the heavy bag and felt the shotgun snap in two beneath his weight.
He tried to scramble up, get his bearings, but he couldn’t see a damned thing. Then a foot pressed down on the back of his neck . . .
‘Stay down, Randall. If you try to get up I’ll put bullets through the back of your knees.’
This was getting to be a habit. How many times had he been caught unawares now? Maybe it was time to give it all up, find a quiet retirement home for ex-policemen somewhere in the countryside and take up painting or origami.
‘Molly?’
‘I’m here,’ she said.
He couldn’t see her, but her voice came from on the floor next to him.
It looked like Jacob had won the war.
His wrists were secured behind his back.
Slowly, his sight returned.
Molly lay next to him. ‘Another fine mess you’ve got me into, Randall.’
He could see that she was scared, but she wasn’t going to show it. ‘So it would seem. Doesn’t look as though anybody’s coming to our rescue this time.’
‘Well, here we are all together,’ Jacob’s voice came from behind them.
They rolled over.
Jacob was standing by the open door bleeding heavily from several wounds in the left side of his neck and shoulder. He held Molly’s Glock in his right hand.
‘We’ve got back-up coming,’ Randall said.
‘No one is coming, Randall. Now, it’s just you, Molly and me and I’m the one with the gun.’
‘You’ll never . . .’
‘Can’t you find something else to say, Molly? Of course I’ll get away with it. With the exception of you two, no one else knows who I am or what I look like. I’ll walk out of here and disappear again. If it hadn’t been for Randall putting CCTV in your flat . . . well, only you and I would have known, Molly.’
She turned her head and stared at Randall. ‘You’ve been watching me?’
‘My people have been watching you.’
‘It’s a good job you’re going to die, because otherwise I would have killed you.’
He gave her a weak grin. ‘Sorry.’
‘Well, time to say goodbye. I would liked the night to have ended differently, but as you can see I’m not in the best of health.’
He lifted the gun.
Randall closed his eyes. He had no regrets. At least now he’d be joining Sarah and the children.
A deafening shot rang out followed by a thud.
He felt no pain. There was no light to follow – only darkness. Did he have to find his own way? Was he in Hell? A terrible sadness overwhelmed him. He’d been hoping that the accountant in charge of the debits and credits of his life might have overlooked some of his transgressions for the sake of Sarah and the children, but it appeared not. Now it was merely a question of which punishment he would have to suffer for all of eternity . . .
Someone was shaking him. ‘Randall?’
He opened his eyes. ‘You took your time,’ he said.
‘Yeah. Sorry about that,’ Crabbe said. ‘I forgot how painful it was taking two bullets in the chest. It took me a while to come round.’
‘What’s going on?’ Molly asked.
‘John volunteered to take two in the chest. He’s wearing a vest.’
‘And you didn’t think to tell me?’
‘Need to know. John came up with the idea. He suggested that the only way to take Jacob out was to have a man in the building that he didn’t know about.’
‘I’m going to fucking kill you as soon as someone takes these restraints off me.’
‘If that’s the case, I think we’ll leave them on.’
‘And what’s this about you putting cameras in my flat?’
‘Not me personally.’
‘Where in my flat?’
‘Oh, you know, the usual places.’
‘I bet there’s one in my bedroom, isn’t there?’
‘It’s funny, but I don’t recall where the cameras are located just at the moment. Do you remember where they are, John?’
‘I have no idea.’
Jacob lay face down in a pool of blood.
‘Check the bastard’s dead. We don’t want anything else to go wrong tonight.’
John checked for a pulse at Jacob’s neck. ‘He’s gone,’ and then took the restraints off him and Molly.
‘Now what?’ Molly asked.
‘We tidy up,’ Randall said, ripping one of the old curtains down from a window.
They wrapped Jacob’s body up and John slung him over his shoulder and carried him down to the boot of his car. Then they collected up as much of the hardware as they could find: The two Glocks, the shotguns, the spiked balls, the night vision goggles, the torches . . . by which time it was three in the morning.
John drove Molly back to her flat first.
Randall opened the door, climbed out and let Molly out from the back seat.
‘I want someone to remove the cameras tomorrow,’ she said.
Randall nodded. ‘Of course.’
‘And I want all the coverage deleted from laptops.’
‘I promised my people they could keep the juicy bits.’
‘You fucking . . . what juicy bits?’
He dived back into the car. ‘Time to go, John.’
John screeched out of the car park in front of Riverside Gardens and headed across Hammersmith Bridge.
‘You’ll dispose of the body?’ he said to Crabbe once they were parked outside the Pepper Pot cafe.
‘What body?’
He climbed out of the car. Before he shut the door he said, ‘Thanks for your help tonight, John. I won’t forget it.’
‘What help?’
John drove off as if the demons of the underworld were snapping at his heels.
The snow began falling. It was heavier this time, and there was no wind to whisk it away. A mantel of white began to form over everything, and he knew today would be difficult. If he wasn’t still trying to solve a case he’d stay in bed with Kiri.
When Jacob had pointed the gun at him he hadn’t felt any fear. Because of that, he knew he couldn’t be a father again, and he knew he was on a collision course with Kiri. Sooner, rather than later, it would create a wedge between them.
He opened the door and climbed the stairs to the flat. The shower beckoned – he was filthy. But he was also too damned tired. He stripped off his clothes and left them on the floor where they fell, and then slid into bed next to Kiri.
‘About time,’ she mumbled, and threw her arm across his chest.
Next, he had to find the O’Connors.
***
She felt as though she’d been drinking vino collapso for a month. Her head throbbed, and she ached all over. Blood matted her hair and clothes. She made her way up to the flat, opened the door, and was faced with a flashing box on the wall with a piece of paper attached.
Enter a five-digit code to activate your security system.
Any problems ring: 0901 226 3456
Fuck off – too tired.
She turned the key in the lock and put the security chain on the door. That would have to do. Jacob was dead, and as far as she knew no one else was coming to get her.
For a moment, she forgot about the cameras, but then she remembered. She didn’t know whether to be angry or . . . or what? All this time she thought she was on her own, but Randall had been keeping watch over her. She didn’t know what to make of that.
Where were the cameras?
She didn’t care and began stripping off her clothes as she headed for the bedroom – everything would need to go in the rubbish anyway.
The idea of men ogling her, slobbering and masturbating over her in secret, turned her on. Maybe she should ring Randall and tell him to leave the cameras just where they were. She could hold evening shows – matinees on Saturday afternoons – striptease, pole dancing, the dance of the seven veils . . . but then she caught sight of herself in the full-length mirror and decided that maybe she should have the cameras removed after all. There were cuts and bruises all over her body, and she was filthy. She looked as though she’d been in a road traffic accident and was looking for a hospital mortuary to lie down in.
