Someone Else's Conflict

by Alison Layland

  ‘Please don’t. Give me chance to get there alone like he said.’

  Jay was still trying to breathe steadily.

  ‘Take this.’ Vinko offered him the knife.

  Jay frowned at it, shaking his head. ‘No way. He said come unarmed.’

  Vinko mimed putting it in his pocket. ‘How will he know?’

  ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake! You want me to get done for carrying an offensive weapon on top of everything? They’ve got guns, right? Didn’t do you any good, did it?’ He realised he was shouting. First Polly, now Vinko. ‘Shit, I’m sorry. I know you mean well.’

  Vinko looked at him. That conspiratorial smile again. ‘You perhaps need it for freeing Lucy, that is all.’

  Jay tried to smile back. He had to admire the lad’s quick thinking, but shook his head. ‘I’ll find a way. And, Vinko, don’t try and follow. They might see you. Please.’

  He looked at Polly, any idea of warning her to keep an eye on Vinko engulfed by his dread of leaving her. He wanted to reassure her, hold her, say goodbye properly, but the boy from Paševina was standing between them and Jay couldn’t move. He could only hope his eyes spoke for him as he tore himself away and made for the fire door.

  ‘Be careful,’ she said as he started down the cast-iron fire escape stairs.

  ‘I’ll be back before any of us knows it,’ he managed to say, fearing that neither Polly nor Vinko believed it any more than he did.

  Chapter 30

  Jay glanced over his shoulder, though he knew there was no one behind him at the cash machine. He forced himself to act deliberately and carefully as he stuffed the notes into his wallet, wishing the limit for withdrawals was higher. He hadn’t dared enter the bank as he didn’t trust himself not to give in and ask for help; to run away. Lek wanted to see him, alone; to attempt anything else was too much of a risk. Reminding himself that he’d be doing his best not to hand anything over to Lek, so the amount didn’t matter anyway, he stepped aside from the machine and dialled.

  ‘You took too long, Šojka.’

  He felt the world jolt around him. ‘But—’

  Lek laughed softly. ‘Nearly. You listen now.’

  The pause felt endless. Someone else’s story.

  ‘Where do you want me to go?’ he asked, hoping the edge to his voice sounded like confident impatience rather than desperation.

  ‘You know where is Queen Street? You go to newspaper shop on the corner.’

  This was completely the opposite direction from the one he would have expected, if his rapid assessment of all the buildings in sight from the fire escape had been correct.

  ‘I’ll call you back when I get there,’ he said.

  ‘No, Šojka! You stay with the phone. I don’t want that you get lost.’

  Jay could almost hear the other man’s unpleasant grin and wondered how he’d been so naïve as to think Lek wouldn’t prevent him from telling anyone where he was going. He realised how much he’d been wanting Vinko to disobey and come after him. Hoping for Lucy’s sake that the battery in Vinko’s phone would last, he walked as quickly as he could around the edge of the busy Friday morning market, keeping out of sight of Mike Greene’s stall. As he muttered responses to Lek’s occasional prompts, he tried not to think how often he’d looked with disdain from his busker’s vantage point at passers-by with phones clamped to their ears, playing their lives out ostentatiously in public. It was as if Lek knew his opinion and even now was thinking of new ways to humiliate him. He worked at his scarf with the hand that wasn’t holding the phone, eventually freeing it and wiping the sweat from his forehead. The town centre was small, but Lek’s tortuous route made the walk seem endless. The phone signal threatened to break up occasionally, filling him with cold fear every time. He was thinking painfully clearly, all his senses alert. The boy walked slightly ahead of him as if he, too, had a direct line to Lek. Jay ignored him. He kept glancing in the direction of Barton Mill, but despite its elevated position he never seemed to come to a point where the windows of the upper storeys were visible.

  From the craft shop fire escape, Vinko watched Jay cross the market square. He kept in shadow, smoking a cigarette from the packet Lucy had given him, and scanned the buildings again; if Lek really had been watching them, it shouldn’t be too hard to make out his vantage point. Jay had said he saw nothing, but Vinko prided himself on his long-distance vision. He suddenly caught a hint of movement, narrowed his eyes and concentrated further. He was certain the occasional soft flash like an erratic lighthouse beacon was the low autumn sun catching a pair of binoculars. It could have been his imagination, but he caught it again. It was a starting point.

  ‘Come.’

  He beckoned Marilyn over and they studied the buildings and streets between them and the movement Vinko had seen. Eventually satisfied he’d be able to find the place, he turned and went back into the shop.

  ‘He will be moving now,’ he said. She glanced unnecessarily at her watch and nodded. ‘Perhaps we should phone him and not wait. In case he losed the number.’

  ‘Jay? Do a stupid thing like that?’

  She laughed nervously and he made himself smile back. He watched her make the call, remembering how Jay had left without even saying goodbye to her properly and wondering if he’d got it wrong – perhaps this wasn’t the woman Jay loved, either.

  ‘It’s engaged.’

  Her worried expression echoed Vinko’s own fears. He suppressed them. They waited for a few seconds, then tried again. She shook her head.

  ‘Then I go.’

  ‘You can’t!’

  ‘I must.’

  ‘I’m calling the police.’

  ‘Please.’ Vinko hurried to the shop door. ‘You go to the man downstairs and talk about the phone if you are scared. After you give us time you call the police if you want. But please, some time!’

  He ignored her protests and hurried down the stone stairs, hoping he’d got it right that the entrance onto the car park would be out of Lek’s line of vision. He paused by the doorway to let a man pass.

  ‘Morning.’

  Vinko nodded and smiled but didn’t reply, reluctant to let this man hear his accent.

  ‘Hey, Matt!’ The man Paul who’d come about the phones was standing in the door to his unit. The one called Matt paused. He looked about to move to let Vinko past when Paul said, ‘I’m glad I caught you. Did you know Marilyn’s at your place?’

  ‘Marilyn?’

  Paul shrugged. ‘Seemed a bit weird. I went up a bit back – phones are off, I wanted to ask if yours was too – and the place was shut. I knocked and I couldn’t believe—’

  ‘Excuse me.’ Vinko felt panic rising as he moved to get past.

  ‘Just a minute.’ Matt was staring at him with a frown, and Vinko realised this must be the boyfriend whose clothes Lucy had lent him.

  ‘Excuse me.’ He pushed past before Matt had time to react.

  ‘Oy! What’s going on?’

  Without pausing to think, Vinko ran across the cobbled car park and slipped out onto the street, following the direction they’d planned from their vantage point. He didn’t look back, but ran, slowing to a walk when he got too tired, hoping that Marilyn would be able to deal with Matt and, silently, apologising yet again….

  It seemed like another day, another week, when Jay finally followed the harsh-voiced instructions to a passageway between a couple of two-storey, stone-built warehouse buildings typical of the little town. One bore a jumble of signs – Jay registered a graphic design office and a flaking board with a logo that meant nothing to him – and the other looked empty. As he entered the passageway, hoping he was out of sight of the building’s windows, he dropped his scarf and walked on. The sound of his echoing footsteps almost drowned out Lek’s gloating voice and the short passage seemed to stretch before him like a tunnel. The dreamlike sensation had returned and he had to push each foot in front of the other to keep moving. It was almost a relief to reach a yard, neatly swept with a
tub of flowers to one side, and a few weeds poking through the flags to the other. There was a gate across the yard ahead of him, presumably to the next street, an open door to the offices on his left and a couple of old but solid-looking doors to the building on his right. One or two of the windows were boarded up; the rest looked swathed in cobwebs. A tiny inner voice told him this was a mistake, to walk away while he still had the chance. He briefly considered ducking into the graphic design studio and calling for help, but he thought of Lucy and the way Vinko had been treated and knew he couldn’t. He heard a lorry approach and the gate across the yard being opened. Lek swore down the phone.

  ‘You wait there where I see you, Šojka.’

  Jay stepped to one side and tried to look as if he were making a normal phone call.

  Too exhausted to run, but making himself keep walking as quickly as possible, Vinko soon came to the end of the street Marilyn had told him to look for. He pretended to read the notices in the window of a corner shop as he scanned it. It was only short, one side lined with terraced houses, the other occupied by two smallish stone-built warehouse buildings. One of the warehouses looked empty and Vinko noticed a familiar scrap of fabric in the entrance to the passage between them. He saw no movement from the upper-floor windows but the sight of Jay’s scarf and the knowledge that Lek was so close froze him with fear.

  He recalled the way Matt had looked at him. It wouldn’t be long before the police arrived. Goaded into action, he crossed the road and moved quickly towards the alleyway, keeping close in to the wall in the hope that a watcher from above would miss him. Vinko ducked into the passage and slowed. The sound of a lorry’s engine running, with the occasional clattering and voices of a delivery being unloaded, drowned out the sound of his footsteps in the echoing space. Halfway down the passage he saw a cobweb-encrusted window with a broken pane and a door. The door was bolted; he peered in at the window. Scattered cans and cigarette ends, together with the charred stain of a bonfire against the wall, told him others had been here before him. It made him crave a cigarette himself, but he suppressed the feeling, annoyed by his own weakness. He eased the window open and climbed in, wishing his heart was thumping merely with the thrill of breaking into an illicit drinking den.

  The interior door was ajar and he picked his way towards it, taking care not to trip and rattle the cans and bottles. The faint smell of old smoke and urine felt like a fog surrounding and concealing him as he peered through the door, gripping his knife and making the burns on his hand smart. An empty corridor led to a staircase. The sound of the lorry was more distant now and as he paused, listening, he heard the distant murmur of a voice from upstairs. The sound of his tormentor threatened to immobilise him again and he had to force himself to move slowly on. Action caused his terror to settle into a simmering anger. The hulking shape of a cupboard against a wall between him and the staircase offered a scant sanctuary should anyone appear. He crept past an open door, which revealed a huge dingy room, and his heart leapt as he saw Novak waiting by a door to the courtyard. Crouching in the shadow beside the cupboard, he paused. When it came again, Lek’s voice was still distant but Vinko had tuned in and could catch the words.

  ‘You stay waiting. If they ask you something you make the excuse and go, you stay talking to me and you come back when I say. Remember, Šojka – you mess with me, I mess with her.’

  Vinko shuddered. He heard footsteps on the floor above and shrank back into the shadow. Once he was satisfied Lek wasn’t coming down, he crept silently but swiftly up the steps, keeping a wary eye on the top. The staircase was dark and he kept close to the side in deepest shadow, heading for the relatively bright light of the room on the first floor. He paused before approaching the open entrance, the wall between the stairwell and the room concealing his presence but blocking his view. The fear that Lek might have turned from the window and was now waiting just around the corner grew until he could almost smell the man’s sour breath. But he had no choice, and peered into the room, his blade cold comfort in his aching hand. He scanned the room ahead of him in a split second. A row of windows ran down each side of the wide room; Lek was silhouetted against one to the left, his back to Vinko and his attention outside. The window was open and sound of the lorry loud, but the room was empty – no chance of a hiding place. Terror gripped Vinko as he saw no sign of Lucy. She wasn’t here, this was a trap, and he’d walked into it. Was he too late to stop Jay walking into it too? He almost shouted out – anything to distract Lek, somehow let Jay know. He was about to open his mouth when he noticed the glazed door to a room on his right, above the ground-floor corridor. Lek spoke into the phone again; Vinko didn’t hear the words as he took the opportunity to dart for the room.

  She was there, tied to a chair and gagged. Vinko was momentarily glad of the gag as without it she’d probably have betrayed his presence in the seconds before she registered who he was. He worked at the ropes with the knife and freed her, a hand on her arm compelling her to stay where she was and stay quiet after he removed the gag. As rapidly as he could, he indicated with hands and fingers the escape route, hoping the intensity of his gaze would force her to obey when he gave her the signal. Trying to stay hidden, he peered out through the glazed door into the warehouse. Lek was still by the window, the phone still at his ear, the air now menacingly silent. The lorry must have gone. After a tense pause, Lek spoke.

  ‘Good. Tie him and bring him up here to me.’

  His attention was still out of the window, and Vinko hoped with all his heart that Marilyn had already sent help. No time to waste on fruitless thoughts; he nudged Lucy and indicated with his eyes for her to leave. She’d been immobile for a while and her movements were painfully stiff at first. He waited by the office door, ready to distract Lek’s attention away from her, dreading the moment when he’d have to. The distance to the top of the stairs stretched before them, impossibly vast. She ran silently, but too slowly. Vinko wanted to breathe but couldn’t. She was almost at the top of the stairs when Lek noticed the movement. As his gaze darted from Lucy to the office, he fixed Vinko with cold eyes and raised his pistol.

  Jay’s senses were heightened, taking him to a place beyond fear. A place he remembered. With the cold reality of a gun to his head, at first he didn’t resist, waiting for an opportunity as the man who’d been Vesna’s husband began to bind his hands. He must have had the cord in a loop ready and was working single-handed. Trying to judge the best moment to break free from the grip of a man with a gun, Jay followed the man’s every clumsy move, but the pressure of the weapon never slackened. The man’s muttered insults betrayed his fear, a fear that made him all the more dangerous. The rope was pulled tighter round Jay’s wrists – he had to act soon or admit defeat. He was tensing, ready to risk jerking free, when a shot cracked out.

  He remembered that moment of blissful unawareness before the pain kicked in. But this time, though the pressure against his temple had gone, no agony rushed in to fill the absence. A split second later he was thinking clearly enough to realise the shot had come from elsewhere, magnified by the empty building. He jerked up with his shoulder and knocked the gun from Novak’s hand. As it clattered to the floor he realised with relief that he’d recovered from the paralysis of shock momentarily faster than his adversary. He pulled his hands apart, ignoring the rope burn as a minor irritation, and bent to grab the gun a second before the other man snapped out of it and lunged towards him. Jay swung round and struck him hard on the side of the head with the butt, clumsy but effective.

  As the man sprawled behind him, Jay paused, trying to decide which way to go. There was a loading door at the far end of the room and a smaller door to his right. The sound of someone clattering wildly down stairs on the far side of that one caused panic to rush in and fill his mind in place of the pain he’d been anticipating a moment before. His overriding thought was that he was too late. Lek had fired. The bastard had probably never intended to spare Lucy. The thought made Jay feel sick, but he forc
ed himself to suppress it, along with jumbled questions about why Lek hadn’t waited for the chance to gloat as he forced Jay to witness the girl’s torment.

  He snapped his focus back; whatever had happened, Lek was on his way down. Jay checked Novak’s pistol as he moved quickly to the door, familiarising himself with a model he didn’t know. He had no time to do anything but hope. The footsteps drew level with the door and Jay braced himself. He saw the fleeting image of a figure running past, caught a momentary snapshot of a young woman’s face as she passed. Too surprised to question how or why, he reached the door and looked after her down the corridor. From a room at the end to his right he heard the jarring rattle of a can being kicked, and a scrabbling which suggested she was making her escape.

  He was about to follow her when he heard the sounds of a struggle in the room above. He’d been an idiot to assume there were only two of them. Before he could beat his own retreat he heard a curse in a language and a voice he recognised, and the new wave of fear that coursed through him was sharper, more real, than anything he’d felt all morning.

  Vinko.

  As he rushed up the stairs, wondering how on earth Vinko came to be there, he saw the boy from Paševina looking into the upstairs room. Jay ignored him, readied the gun and peered round the door at the top.

  A movement to his left drew his attention. Lek was waiting for him. He had Vinko held against the wall. The lad struggled ineffectually, his arms pinned behind him, a large dark stain spreading across his sweatshirt from a nasty-looking gash in his neck. Vinko’s knife lay on the floor, out of reach, the blade glistening with blood. Lek’s pistol touched the side of his head and he froze.

  Jay forced himself to look away from Vinko’s scared eyes to stare at Lek. He appeared older, much older, but the cold eyes were the same and he was still strong. Strong enough to hold Vinko in his weakened state.

  ‘I’m here as you asked.’ Jay’s voice was hoarse. He spoke in Croatian – someone else’s story. ‘Let him go.’