Stolen

by Paul Finch

  ‘Why are you telling me all this?’ Lucy asked, genuinely puzzled.

  Torgau pondered. ‘It’s a good question, DC Clayburn. Most of my life, I’ve flown under the police radar. You can call it skill, you can call it luck, you can call it the Devil looking after his own. But after a lifetime dedicated to breaking the law – I mean, I’ve barely ever done an honest job and look at the life I lead – I have the smallest criminal record imaginable. So maybe, just maybe … this is an opportunity to show at least one of you what you’ve been missing. Cosy in the knowledge that it won’t mean a damn thing.’

  ‘Dad hasn’t told you what he was really good at yet,’ Ivana chipped in.

  Lucy saw that she’d lifted the poker from the flames and was blowing gently on its tip, which had started to glow.

  This was Torgau’s cue to talk a little more about himself.

  ‘Wild Bill was impressed no end by the gun thing,’ he said. ‘But what he really liked about me was how I excelled at violence. You may not believe that, because I’m not a big man. And back in Moston in the bad old days, when I was very young, that made me a target for every kind of bully. It began with my father, who hammered me regularly for the most minuscule things. But mainly it was this big kid in the neighbourhood – Arun Swaraj. He gave me a kicking every single day. Until my father saw it happen and refused to let me in the house afterwards. He put an empty milk bottle in my hand and said that I couldn’t come home until I’d smashed it over this guy’s head. I knew he meant it. So that was what I did. Arun went down like the pathetic sack of shit he was. But the really amazing thing was the way his wingmen ran away. My father taught me an important lesson that day, DC Clayburn. Violence works. Especially the nasty kind. The kind from which there is no coming back. That kind of violence doesn’t just earn you respect, it can actually earn you a living.’

  Lucy was stunned, not just by how unconcernedly he was revealing his criminal past to her, but by how long he was taking to do it. It was a dead cert that they wouldn’t be telling her all this if they intended to let her live. But shouldn’t there be an air of urgency by now? She was a police officer who’d vanished from the grid. She’d be missed.

  Unless that was the purpose of the delay.

  Were they waiting to see what would happen?

  They were clearly ready to run – the weighty travel-bag for example – but perhaps they weren’t sure whether that was a good option. Were there other cops out there, covertly watching them? Would they be followed if they ran? All of these had to be considerations. Or would it be safer to assume that any surveillance team should have reacted by now? Lucy was ‘local fuzz’ after all, not ‘Murder Squad’. So, might it indeed be the case that she wasn’t here as part of a larger operation? Might it be that the Torgaus didn’t need to flee at all?

  Martin Torgau was still talking, shedding more light on his villainous life. Describing the street-gang he put together, and how it came to enjoy unparalleled success because of his ruthless leadership. How various enemies sought to tear him down. How he and his cronies responded savagely: shooting them, stabbing them, clubbing them, the bodies disposed of down derelict mine-shafts or thrown into lakes and reservoirs with concrete chained to their feet. And how, in due course, Wild Bill had persuaded Torgau that his real vocation lay not in petty crime, like selling guns, but in real problem-solving.

  ‘We’d just done a one-off job for Bill,’ Torgau said. ‘A Stockport gangster called Jerry Coonan was cutting in on Bill’s action. Bill didn’t want the problem solving publicly. Nevertheless, he wanted to know that Coonan had been properly punished. Me and a couple of lads, we nabbed Coonan when he came out of his local and took him to this derelict workshop. We’d already got a workbench laid out, with clamps and vices. And we had a camera set up – we had to film it, you see. Bill wanted to watch it for himself.’

  Torgau half-smiled, as though it was a fond recollection.

  ‘We did a real number on him. Pliers, nutcrackers. Then I got this ripsaw, and I cut him up while he was still alive. Piece after piece. After it was over, we bagged him, laid him down under some new cement. He’s holding up an office block these days. Anyway, Bill watched the video, and he was so happy afterwards that he said: “Martin, you can be my personal problem-solver.” And he’s certainly kept me busy since then. Too busy really. Which is why I’ve been training up the girls.’

  ‘Training?’ Lucy said, trying not to show how sickened she felt.

  ‘In the end I did away with all my other sidekicks because I wanted it purely to be a family business. And now someone must take that business over. Anyway, your turn, detective.’ His mournful face split into an unexpected smile. ‘The game … remember.’

  It was difficult for Lucy to know how she should respond. She glanced at the fire again, where the poker lay white-hot.

  ‘Pretty green eyes you’ve got, DC Clayburn,’ Ivana said. ‘Would be such a shame.’

  My eyes … God almighty!

  Lucy still didn’t know how to respond.

  Quite clearly, she had to give them something. But what?

  Lie that the rest of the police knew everything, and even now were circling the neighbourhood, mustering their forces – and that might convince them that it was better to keep her alive. Though it might also mean that they’d adopt a scorched-earth policy, destroying all evidence, warning their contacts in the Crew that they’d been rumbled. A better option perhaps was to play things down. If they didn’t know anything about the connection she’d made between the van and the strangled dogs and the double murder on the Aggies, they might stay here and try to brazen it out. They’d still have to do away with Lucy – they wouldn’t be able to argue their way out of having abducted a copper – but there were ways to allay that too.

  ‘I’m investigating an assault on a homeless person,’ she said.

  ‘Indeed?’ If this was something Torgau had been hoping to hear, he didn’t sound a whole lot happier.

  ‘I came across the incident by accident, while working undercover to buy drugs in the St Clement’s ward.’ That sounded plausible, she thought. ‘I overheard the sound of the attack and intervened. I pursued the assailant on my motorbike, but she got away.’

  ‘You knew already that it was a she?’ Torgau sounded less than satisfied, but not necessarily with Lucy.

  ‘I saw that it was a she,’ she replied. ‘I saw her face during the attack. And this was confirmed later on by forensic examination of organic material found under the fingernail of the victim.’

  ‘That’s impossible!’ Ivana snapped, stepping forward with the brightly glowing poker.

  Torgau warned her off with a raised hand.

  ‘It was your sister,’ Lucy said to her. ‘Alyssa.’

  ‘Alyssa would’ve known if she’d been clawed,’ Ivana said.

  ‘I sometimes wonder if Alyssa even knows what day it is,’ Torgau rumbled.

  ‘Alyssa already had facial injuries when the victim struck her in the face,’ Lucy said, wondering why she was making excuses for the girl. ‘It’s probably no surprise that she didn’t realise blood had been drawn.’

  He still looked unimpressed.

  ‘After that, the DNA brought me here,’ Lucy added. ‘Alyssa has a criminal record, after all. I asked around the neighbourhood, to be sure, and two or three different people were able to direct me to your house. If it’s any consolation, Mr Torgau, they think you’re all very nice people who wouldn’t say boo to a goose.’

  I’m sure it’ll be no consolation, though, to now think that several different witnesses can place me right here, she added to herself. So checkmate, you bastard!

  Before Torgau could reply, there was a scuttling of feet overhead, as if Alyssa was running from one side of the house to the other.

  Ivana went rigid. Her father leaped to his feet.

  ‘Assault team, coming in by twos!’ Alyssa yelled down the stairs. ‘Front and back!’

  Lucy was as startled as the rest
of them but was still handcuffed to the chair and could only watch as Torgau lurched out into the hall. Ivana, meanwhile, advanced with the poker raised over her head. Lucy tried to duck away, the chair falling sideways. But when the poker came down, which it did several times, it was on the chair’s backrest, smashing and burning it. This proved to be a lengthy process, Torgau returning while it was still going on, unzipping his travel-bag and taking something out of it; to Lucy’s bewilderment it was a cardboard cylinder, about three feet long, with an old image of a bulldog wearing a Union Jack waistcoat imprinted on it. Possibly it contained a weapon of some sort, because he immediately took it back out into the hall.

  Ivana, meanwhile, threw the poker into the hearth, wrestled what remained of the chair’s woodwork apart, and dragged the hostage to her feet. The next thing Lucy knew, she was being hustled out into the hall, the muzzle of the Browning pressed into her neck.

  Torgau had braced the front door with some furniture and was now shouting upstairs. ‘How many?’

  ‘Four, so far,’ Alyssa’s voice shouted back.

  ‘How are they dressed?’

  ‘Body-armour and balaclavas.’

  ‘Shit!’ Ivana swore. ‘SWAT.’

  But her father shook his head. His expression was uncertain, confused. ‘Police would have spoken to us first, tried to resolve it peacefully.’

  ‘Shotguns!’ Alyssa shouted.

  ‘Does it matter?’ Ivana asked, bewildered.

  Alyssa came hurtling downstairs, still clutching the battle-rifle. ‘I didn’t see any back-up or support vehicles!’

  ‘Give me that HK!’ her father replied.

  She threw the rifle to him. He caught it, passed the cardboard cylinder to Ivana, and swung around to face the front door.

  ‘Do that slag, Vana!’ Alyssa shouted. ‘Do her now!’

  ‘No!’ her father roared, glaring at them both, red-faced. ‘What do you not understand about bargaining chips?’

  ‘But if they’re coming in anyway!’ Alyssa protested.

  ‘You goddamn idiot bitch!’ Froth flew from his mouth. ‘These are not cops!’

  Chapter 39

  ‘Get out of here, the pair of you!’ Torgau roared. ‘Use the route. And take her with you!’

  The front door shuddered at a massive impact. Torgau shouldered the rifle and fired three deafening rounds, a trio of fist-sized holes exploding through the woodwork at chest height.

  His girls might be under orders not to kill Lucy, but they weren’t gentle with her. A stinging blow to the side of the face, delivered with the butt of the Browning, knocked her senseless, and she found herself stumbling across the hall between them, a hand hooked under either armpit. Meanwhile, a gunshot sounded somewhere to the rear of the house. Followed by another, and another. Lucy had heard something about shotguns. Presumably they were now being used to blow the hinges off the house’s back door.

  As if realising the same thing, Torgau dashed past them along the hall. He opened fire again with the battle-rifle before he’d even entered the kitchen. The noise was cacophonous in the suburban house, the air already thick with cordite.

  ‘Down here, you bitch!’ Ivana hissed.

  A triangular doorway had opened underneath the stairs, and Lucy was shoved towards it. Still dazed, she wondered why they were thrusting her into a closet, but then spotted the top of a staircase. A foot planted itself on her backside and propelled her forward. She tripped as she went, falling headfirst into darkness, turning over and over down the steep, stone flight. With hands cuffed behind her back, she was unable to protect herself, banging her head repeatedly, along with her spine, hips and knees. At the bottom she lay in total blackness, swooning with pain, only for a hand to slam a switch and a glaring white halogen light to come on overhead.

  Despite what sounded like continuous shooting, she heard two pairs of feet thumping down the cellar stairs after her. As she came to, they lugged her upright again. A corridor of whitewashed brick, with a white-tiled floor, lay ahead. They hurried her along it, cursing and hissing at her, passing doors on the left, all partly open but all made from heavy sheet-steel. On the right, meanwhile, stood a recessed wardrobe. Its front had been disguised with fake white polystyrene brickwork, but now stood open, revealing two steel racks inside, each filled with firearms. The upper contained automatic rifles, submachine guns and pump-action shotguns, the lower pistols and revolvers. As they scrambled past, Alyssa grabbed a handgun and a couple of boxes of ammunition. Yet more gunfire thundered upstairs. It sounded like a shooting gallery rather than a family home.

  ‘We should be up there!’ Alyssa said, her voice cracking with emotion.

  ‘No,’ Ivana replied. ‘He’s not buying us time so that we can just waste it.’

  Lucy, meanwhile, was now coming around properly and starting to figure things out. Torgau was right; it clearly wasn’t the police who’d arrived – they’d have given these lunatics a chance to surrender before attacking. There was likely no help to be had up there. But allowing herself to be dragged ever deeper into this stronghold of the insane made no sense at all. They were midway along the corridor, another half-open steel door awaiting them at the far end, but though the Torgau girls were fit, they were still teenagers, while Lucy worked out as well, and at thirty-two, was stronger than them anyway. She dug her feet in and brought them to an unexpected halt.

  ‘You bitch!’ Ivana hit her with the Browning again, smacking it across her left cheek.

  Lucy responded with a head-butt, delivered right to the middle of Ivana’s nose.

  Cartilage cracked, and the girl squawked. But Alyssa dug a right hook into Lucy’s lower back, specifically her kidneys, knocking her physically sick. With legs like water, Lucy sagged forward, a karate chop clobbering the back of her neck. She was so stunned for the next few seconds that she hadn’t even realised she was being dragged forward again, this time on her knees. With a clang, they crashed into the metal door at the end, which swung open, revealing a small but empty brick room. Like everything else in this extensive cellar area, it had been whitewashed, but in the centre of the floor lay what looked like a circular metal lid with a dial-type handle in the middle of it.

  A manhole? Even as her senses swam back, Lucy was nonplussed. They dropped her to the floor alongside it, where she lay still, feigning semi-consciousness.

  Ivana, bleeding freely from the bridge of her nose, squatted and turned the handle left and right in a sequence she’d evidently memorised. She then tried to lift the thing, but this wasn’t easy; it was more like a circular slab of steel than a regular lid. Alyssa helped, all the time keeping the muzzle of her pistol jammed into Lucy’s neck. Together, they got it upright, a stale reek wafting free. Lucy glimpsed the hole underneath. At first, she was perplexed. It was about two feet across; perhaps half a foot down there was a polished crossbar of tubular steel, and below that a similar tubular bar, this second one descending into pitch darkness like a fireman’s pole. But only when Ivana put the cardboard cylinder down, letting it drop into the blackness, did Lucy realise what she was seeing.

  This was it. The route.

  Though how she was supposed to get down there with her hands cuffed behind her back, she didn’t know.

  ‘Just drop her,’ Ivana told her sister, wiping at her nose with her sleeve, smearing red all over her once pretty face. ‘So what if she breaks her fucking legs?’

  Alyssa snickered, tucking the gun into the waistband of her shorts so that she could grab the hostage with both hands. Lucy knew that this was the sole opportunity she would get, and so, with the sort of Herculean effort only the truly desperate can muster, she swung her torso upward, slamming the flat of her left foot on the floor, and levering herself upright on one leg.

  ‘Fuck!’ Alyssa shouted, trying to grapple with her.

  Lucy kneed her in the groin. It was a better tactic against male opponents, but it still had the desired effect, Alyssa doubling forward, gasping. Ivana, hunkered alongside the hole
, tried to grab her legs, but Lucy kicked at her, knocking her sideways, and then turned and, still with hands cuffed, bolted out into the corridor.

  She ran down it pell-mell.

  Ivana shrieked incoherently, coming out behind her.

  Lucy could sense the gun levelled on her back. But before they could fire, a figure came stumping down the stairs ahead of her. She slid to a halt, blinking through her sweat. It was the unmistakeable form of Martin Torgau. He stood as though barely seeing her, the battle-rifle hanging by his side. He was swaying, she realised, face milk-white, eyelids fluttering.

  She looked down at his chest, where blood seeped from eight or nine minor puncture wounds. When he pitched heavily forward, smacking the tiled floor with his face, the jagged meat and bone of the exit wound in the middle of his back was the size of a dinner plate.

  More heavy feet came clumping down the stair behind him.

  Blocking her escape.

  Bone-weary, still dazed from the blows she’d taken, Lucy sank to her knees and slumped against the whitewashed bricks at the side of the passage. As she did, she glanced behind her. Ivana and Alyssa were both at the far end, framed in the doorway to the manhole room. They’d levelled their pistols at her but hadn’t opened fire. Instead they stood stock-still, faces blanched, mouths agape.

  Their father had just died in front of them.

  Then another shot was fired, this time from the direction of the stairs. An almighty shotgun blast. Lucy felt the pellets whistle over her head and saw them rip their way along the wall, exposing streaks of red brick beneath the white.