Mac checked his watch again: 1.10 a.m. in Los Angeles.
He left the office and took five hundred pounds out of two ATMs. Then he caught a cab to a scrapyard in South London and asked one of the workers there if he could speak to his boss. The guy went away and then came back to say he couldn’t, the boss was busy. Mac told him to go back and tell him John ‘Mac’ MacDonagh wanted to see him. The man did as he was told and, on returning, escorted Mac up a flight of metal stairs to a makeshift office that overlooked the scattered pipes, sheet metal and broken cars that littered the yard below. Behind the desk was a tattooed heavy in a baseball cap. He looked warily at Mac when he came in and then checked behind to see if anyone was accompanying him. When he saw that there wasn’t, he offered him a seat and a cuppa, which Mac accepted but didn’t drink.
There was a brief silence before the guy said, ‘Well, Mr MacDonagh, long time, no see.’
‘How long did you end up serving?’
Jimmy shrugged his shoulders. ‘You know, the standard five for possession of a firearm. I was a good boy so I only did half the sentence and then they knocked another couple of months off because the prison was overcrowded.’ He shrugged his shoulders a second time. ‘Can’t complain.’
‘Well, I’m sorry about that.’
‘Sorry? Why? I used to sell firearms and you catch people who sell firearms. That’s the deal ain’t it? I’m not complaining. People in my line of work know how it works. You were only doing your job as I was doing mine.’ Then he hastily added, ‘Although I’ve left all that behind now. The only hard metal I deal in now is in the yard below.’
Mac looked around the office. It was covered in calendars that featured topless models. Whatever his other problems, it was clear Jimmy always knew what the date was. ‘That’s a shame.’
The other man’s left eye twitched. ‘Oh yeah – why’s that then?’
‘Because I need to buy some hard wear and I want you to sell me one.’
Jimmy looked baffled for a moment before he burst out laughing. ‘Bollocks Mr MacDonagh, don’t tell me your arrest rate is so low, you need to entrap unfortunate ex-offenders like me. I might end up feeling sorry for you.’
‘I’m serious. I need a piece.’
‘No-can-do Mister M. You know how it is.’
‘Five hundred quid. And I need it today.’
Mac took the money out of his pocket and put it on the desk. Jimmy picked it up and examined it. ‘You won’t get much for that.’
‘Why don’t you give me a discount for old time’s sake?’
Jimmy shrugged. ‘Maybe I will.’
‘We can trust each other here, can we?’
Jimmy smiled. ‘I can see you’re in trouble Mister M. I recognise the look of a man who’s been backed into a corner and needs something special in a hurry. I’ve seen it often enough. And if you needed it for police work, you’d book one out at the station wouldn’t you? Go for a coffee somewhere. In a couple of hours, I’ll text you a location. You can pick it up there.’
Mac went for a coffee in a working caff in a nearby street. He wasn’t sure why he’d chosen the place but it seemed familiar. He took his coffee from the waitress and then left it to go cold in front of him. The only surprise about the abduction of his own son was that he hadn’t been arrested already. He was sure he would be all over the security footage in the hospital and that someone would recognise him from the shots. But then he’d admitted being at the hospital in the afternoon. Plus he’d wrapped John Mac securely in his hoodie already bulked up by its natural padding. Perhaps Phil was having trouble getting the timings right. They’d been careless not impounding his car and checking for the baby’s DNA. But then he’d already got rid of the baby carrier and he was sure little John Mac hadn’t left any trace on the seats. Perhaps he would get away with it.
Mac roamed over the other evidence, back and forth. He tried to put himself in Elena’s high-heeled shoes. What would her next move be? She was in London, he was sure of that. He wondered if she’d have back-up in town to recover the boy? Of course she would. Murky people like her could always afford to pay for local guns for hire. Firstly, she’d have find out where her son was. Then she’d have to devise a plan to get her hands on him, before finally getting him out of the country. If the baby was still in the hospital, she would have had no problem. But now the situation was more complicated. Even he didn’t know where John Mac was. Perhaps it wasn’t such a bad thing that Foster had kidnapped his son in turn. The creepy lawyer might be as twisted as a python around a tree trunk but he knew how not to get caught.
His phone pinged. Mac looked at his watch and realised that he’d been brooding for two hours. A simple message from Jimmy: The café where you picked me up. 15 minutes.
That’s when Mac remembered why the place he was sitting in seemed so familiar. It was in this café – or one very much like it – that Mac had arrested Jimmy the gun dealer and a couple of his associates five years or so previously. Or was it somewhere else? Ten minutes later, a council worker came through the door, took a seat and looked over the menu. He ordered the all-day ‘big breakfast’ and then asked the waitress where the toilets were. On his way past, he reached into his pocket and produced a green supermarket bag, which he placed on the seat next to Mac. It was done so seamlessly that it was a few seconds before he realised what had happened. When the man returned to begin tucking into his breakfast, Mac studied him. The guy was familiar too but the new owner of an illegal firearm couldn’t place him.
Picking up the green bag, Mac went to the toilet and locked the door. He looked inside his bag to find what he’d got for his five hundred pounds. Hidden in a shoe box was a Beretta automatic and twenty rounds of ammunition. The pistol was old but had been well cared for. His only concern was that the amount of ammo might not be enough if he was going up against Elena Romanov.
On the way out, Mac finally recognised the courier who had brought him the gun. It was one of the other men he’d arrested in the café with Jimmy the scrap metal merchant. That meant two convicted criminals would be able to implicate him in the illegal purchase of a pistol if they chose to do so.
But Mac didn’t care. He didn’t even care when he returned to work and was arrested by Phil Delaney.
Ten
‘I’m surprised you came back,’ his superior officer told him. ‘I thought you’d have gone to ground by now Mac. I’ve got officers on the road looking for you, so I suppose I should be grateful you’ve decided to put in an appearance at the office.’ Phil Delaney did indeed seem relieved that Mac had saved him the trouble of continuing a hunt. In fact, Mac had a very good reason for returning to work but he wasn’t telling his boss what it was.
When he didn’t respond Phil continued. ‘Do you know what this is?’
On his desk was a length of rope. When Mac kept his silence, Delaney picked it up. ‘You should do. You used it yesterday in an attempt to gain access to my office from the floor above. We found traces of DNA on it – hair and whatnot. It’s your DNA – matched with the samples left on the system from the last time you tried to make a fool of us. Do you have any comment to make on that?’
Mac looked behind him to where two burly officers stood. Phil had stationed them there for the interview to which he’d summoned his subordinate when he’d returned from South London. ‘Yeah. I was trying to get into your office to find out what you had on my son and his mother, but I didn’t make it – so arrest me.’
Phil seemed satisfied. ‘I can’t be bothered to look up which particular rules you’ve broken but you’ll understand I have to suspend you with immediate effect.’
‘Fair enough, I’ll clear my desk . . .’
Delaney gestured to the guards who took a shoulder each and pushed their prisoner back into his chair. ‘We’re not finished yet . . .’
Phil Delaney read him his rights:
‘You do not have to say anything. However, it may harm your defense if you do not mention when questioned
something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’
Mac was astounded. ‘You’ve got to be kidding—’
Phil smartly cut him off. ‘I’ve now got two clear images showing you abducting your son from Mission Hill Hospital yesterday afternoon. Have you got any comment on that?’
‘I was up there. I’ve never denied that. But I didn’t abduct anyone.’ Mac meant it. As far as he was concerned the notion you could abduct your own flesh and blood when he was in danger was absurd.
‘I’m trying to help you here—’
‘Oh piss off with all that “cop interviewing a suspect” crap Phil. I’m in the game, remember?’
Delaney sighed. ‘Very well. You’re under arrest for . . .’
When he’d completed the legal formalities, it seemed that Phil had finished for the afternoon. But he hadn’t. ‘There’s something else I want to talk to you about. I had a phone call from one of our colleagues in South London this afternoon. He tells me that they’ve had information that suggests you illegally purchased a firearm this morning. Have you any comment on that?’
Mac wondered which of the two individuals had informed on him. Jimmy or the ‘council worker’ who’d delivered the gun? He decided it was probably the council worker as Jimmy had seemed genuinely sympathetic. Not that it mattered. By way of explanation he sneered, ‘rubbish.’
‘Where’s your car? Is the gun hidden in it?’
When Mac didn’t reply Phil shook his head. ‘I’ll tell you what I will do, my old friend. If you tell me where the baby is and we pick him up, I might relent and not oppose bail. But I want the gun too of course – you understand?’
‘I don’t know where my son is.’ Mac sounded both forlorn and sincere. He looked at the white-faced clock on the wall: 4.00 p.m. in London and 8.00 a.m. in Los Angeles.
‘OK. Go and sit in the cells. When you’re ready to talk, send me word.’
The two officers took an arm each but Mac pushed them back. He turned to Phil. ‘Aren’t you forgetting something? My phone call? I’m entitled to a phone call.’
Delaney sighed and pushed his phone over to Mac who picked up the receiver. Mac stared balefully over the desk and reminded him, ‘A private phone call . . .’
After some hesitation, Phil took the two guards out of the office. But the three cops didn’t go far. They stood on the other side of the glass partition, arms folded while keeping careful watch on the man inside.
Mac dialled directory enquiries and asked them to find the number and put him through to the FBI office in Los Angeles. It took several minutes to be put through. Precious minutes, as he wanted the call to take as long as possible to give his guy the chance to get to his desk. When he got through to the switchboard he asked to be put through to Agent Tom Bracken. While the phone rang he closed his eyes, desperately hoping that Tom hadn’t been out drinking the night before and was at his desk bright and early. His phone was finally picked up a woman who told him Bracken wasn’t in yet.
‘Can’t you put a callout for him? It’s urgent. Tell him it’s London.’
The woman promised to try. Another few minutes passed. There was a rattle of knuckles on the glass partition. When he looked round, he saw Phil standing outside with his hands in a ‘what gives’ gesture. Mac raised two fingers to indicate he was nearly finished and then turned back to his call. ‘Come on you bastard . . .’
As if summoned by magic, the phone was picked up at the other end and a voice, interrupted by chewing and slurping, wanted to know, ‘Bracken here. Who is this?’
‘This is Phil Delaney’s deputy in London. Strictly off the record Tom and this call never happened. We’ve got information that Elena Romanov is in London looking to recover her kid. We’ve put the boy back at Garcia’s house under guard to keep him safe. But if you hear anything about Romanov’s movements, be sure to let us know . . .’
He put the phone down before Bracken could answer as his prisoner escort came through the door to take him down to the cells. He hoped he’d done enough. As he was taken away, he heard Phil’s voice behind him call out, ‘Where’s the kid Mac? Just give us the kid . . .’
It had been his boss who had once told him that the world was divided into two sorts of people. Those who were locked behind closed doors and those who weren’t. Throughout his career, Mac had been locking the doors and now they were locked on him. But he wasn’t as bothered as he might have been. He’d lived locked behind the closed doors of personal grief for years. He sat on his bunk staring at the walls and then he formed a plan. In any other circumstances, he would have sat it out. Might even have welcomed the opportunity to do some jail time. You don’t have to worry behind bars; everything is taken care of for you.
Except for one thing. Prisons don’t take care of your children. You have to do that for yourself. Mac got up and went over to the cell door. He’d seen every conceivable attempt to escape from a cell, from the brutal to the fiendishly clever. His problem was that so had the people on the other side.
But he had seen one attempt by an escape artist work in his early days. It was a question of moving location first. And it meant that the artist had to be strong enough mentally and physically to pull it off without doing himself irreparable damage.
Mac wasn’t sure he was. But he decided he had to try.
Eleven
When a cop came to check on his prisoner a few hours later, he entered the cell to find him curled up in the foetal position in the corner of the cell. He stood over him for a few moments before saying, ‘Not trying to con us Mac into thinking you’ve had a breakdown are you? You should know we’re not stupid.’
When he got no response, the officer grunted and clanged the cell door shut behind him.
Mac remained tightly wound up in his ball. His limbs were already in agony from the stress position he’d adopted and his muscles begged for release. But there was none. He knew to drop his position even for a few moments would be to run the risk of being caught by a prying eye through the peephole and his scheme would be ruined. He kept himself tight. How long he would be able to survive doing this he didn’t know but he figured he would need to last until the morning.
He imagined taking his smiling son for a walk in the park in an effort to stave off the pain that seemed to be creeping over his body like an incoming tide. The mental fatigue would come later. That was what really worried him. Faking a breakdown was the surest way he knew how to produce one. Only the prospect of saving his son would have induced him to do it.
Two hours later the cell door opened and a different officer came in after a change of shift.
‘Are you alright there?’
When he got no answer, the cop went and got a colleague. The two men stood over their curled up prisoner discussing what to do next. One prodded Mac with his foot while the other knelt down and gently shook his shoulders. Then they conferred again in whispers.
‘Shall we call the doc?’
‘Bit late in the evening for that. There’s no duty doctor available so we’ll have to get one from outside. He’s probably just had a bad reaction to being put a cell.’
‘What if he kills himself?’
‘With what? Anyway, he’s not going to kill himself down there, is he?’
There was the sound of footsteps as one of the cops went over to the cell door. ‘Blimey, he’s in the police. It’s John MacDonagh – one of Delaney’s cowboys.’
‘He should know better than to act up like this. We’ll check on him later. He’ll be alright.’
The cell lights went off. A few minutes later they were turned back on again. Then off. Then on, as his guards looked in to see what was happening with their charge. About half an hour later, when it seemed that the officers had got fed up with checking whether he’d killed himself, Mac tried to move his limbs slightly. They were no longer hurting. Only with the greatest of effort could he get any response and he was in so much pain he had to stop. It seemed his body was
seizing up. But Mac wasn’t worried about his body. He was worried about his mind. A body could be set right but the mind sometimes couldn’t.
As time drifted by, it seemed to Mac that he was floating in space with clear images of the past and future joining him for the ride. He was ecstatic when he saw Stevie smiling and waving at him. The joy turned to horror when he realised that the boy was in fact John Mac, lying dead, strewn with flowers. A shadowy black figure with deep brown hair fluttered around above him. He couldn’t see her face but he knew who she was. There was silence, followed by extreme noise, joy and pain until he heard another voice, a man’s voice asking, ‘How long has this man been lying here like this?’
There was a pause before another voice offered by way of apology, ‘I dunno. About an hour maybe?’
A stethoscope dangled over his face and then his body turned to fire as his limbs and torso were massaged and then stretched. When he tried to cry out, he found an oxygen mask had been attached to his face and there was only silence belting from his mouth. The following moments were hazy but it seemed suddenly there were a lot of people in his cell. He was gently lifted by three figures in green onto a stretcher and carried out. Two embarrassed men in blue uniforms watched him go.
This was all real.
But the shadowy black figure with brown hair was still fluttering above him. Was she real or not?
When Mac awoke the next morning, he opened his eyes to find a doctor standing over him and a police officer sitting by the bed.
The doctor asked, ‘How you feeling?’
‘Good.’
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