Siege: A Thriller

by Simon Kernick

  Arley smiled, trying hard to look impressed. “What about Michael Prior? How do you intend to find him?”

  “We’re still working on that, but if you can get a location for him, it would be a huge step forward.”

  “We’ll do everything we can,” Arley replied, feeling a knot in her stomach. Somehow they had to find a way to end the siege without the SAS having to go in. Somehow, too, Tina Boyd—a disgraced detective, with virtually no leads to work on—had to find her family and bring them home safely. Both things were still possible. They had to be. Hostages had been released, and right now, at least, the situation was calm inside the Stanhope.

  Allowing herself to see the tiniest chink of hope, she stepped out of the office and into the street as her mobile rang.

  “Are you on your own?” asked Tina.

  “Yes. What have you got?”

  “I’ve got bad news, and I’ve got good news. The bad news is bad, and there’s no easy way to say it.”

  Arley felt her stomach lurch. “Go on.”

  “Your husband’s dead. I found his body in your house.”

  The news was a terrible shock, but Arley didn’t have time to process it. “What about the twins?”

  “There’s no sign of them. I think they must have been taken this morning, not long after you left. Your husband’s been dead quite a long time.”

  “Christ . . . ”

  “The better news is I’ve just come from one of your neighbors, a Mrs. Thompson. She saw two men in a red van leaving your house just before eight o’clock this morning. She noted the license plate number.”

  Arley felt a rush of hope that seemed to lift her off her feet. As a senior police officer, she knew how much useful information you could glean from a simple license plate. “Give me the number,” she said, pulling a notebook and pen from her pocket. “I’ll get on to the ANPR guys.”

  “Arley, you know as well as I do that as soon as you make the request there’ll be a paper trail leading back to you, and you might have to answer some very awkward questions later.”

  “Right now, that’s the least of my worries.”

  “Have the kidnappers been back in contact?”

  “Not yet, no.”

  “They will be,” said Tina emphatically. “You know, we shouldn’t be doing this alone, Arley. A single license number isn’t going to lead us straight to your kids.”

  “Look, Tina, I really appreciate everything you’re doing for me but I can’t afford to tell anyone else what’s going on.” She paused, wondering whether she should put her concern into words. “These people know so much I’m beginning to wonder if it’s an inside job. The thing is, I don’t know who I can trust.”

  “You’re going to have to put your trust in somebody.”

  “And I have. You.”

  “I’m not enough, Arley. If the SAS go in and you give their plans to the terrorists, you’ll have a lot of blood on your hands. And so will I.”

  “I know, but just let me see what this license number gives us. Where are you now?”

  “Just down the road from your house.”

  “Can you stay there for the moment? I’ll call back as soon as I can.”

  “OK. And while you’re at it, try to get a trace on your husband’s mobile too. It might help me pin down a location for your children.”

  Arley hesitated. The man who’d called her on Howard’s phone had told her that if anything happened to him, the twins would be killed by the man who was actually holding them. But she also knew that Tina needed as much information as possible. “OK, I’ll do it. And, Tina?”

  “What?”

  “Thank you.” She felt herself beginning to well up as the emotions of the evening fought to get the better of her.

  Tina sighed. “Just get on with it, Arley. Time’s not on our side.”

  54

  20:38

  As soon as Arley stepped back inside the mobile incident room, she knew that something was wrong.

  “I’ve just tried calling you, ma’am,” said Riz Mohammed. Like everyone else in the room, his expression was tense.

  “What’s happened?” she asked, shutting the door behind her and telling herself to remain calm. Tina was looking for the twins. She had a lead. It might still turn out all right.

  “I’ve just had a call from the man called Wolf. Either we switch the Internet service back on inside the hotel or they kill a hostage publicly. They’ve given us fifteen minutes to comply. And the call came in at 20:35.”

  “We’ve got a tape of the call if you want to listen to it, ma’am,” said Will Verran.

  Arley shook her head. “Has either Gold or Silver been informed?”

  “I relayed the message to Gold,” said Riz. “We’re waiting for him to come back to us.”

  “What’s your assessment, Riz?”

  “Wolf sounded a lot more stressed than he did when we first talked to him. Given their propensity to violence, I’d say we’ve got to take this threat very seriously.”

  Arley’s gaze found Cheney, the most senior person in the room after her. “What’s your take, John?”

  “I agree with Riz. It’s serious. Is the SAS ready to go in yet?”

  Arley felt her guts clench. “I don’t believe so, no.”

  “Then we should let them have their Internet connection back. They probably only want to bang out one of their propaganda videos, and it’s not worth sacrificing a life not to let them. Not if we’re not ready for an assault.”

  “I think it would do a lot to help calm the situation,” added Riz.

  Arley was wholeheartedly in agreement, but what she knew and the other two didn’t was that Michael Prior possessed highly sensitive information that the government was desperate to keep inside the building.

  At that moment, Commissioner Phillips appeared on one of the screens as he sat back down at his desk in his office at Scotland Yard. “Can you hear me?” he said, his voice booming through the incident room.

  “Loud and clear, sir,” answered Arley.

  “I’ve just spoken with the PM, and it’s been agreed that Internet access can be restored to the hotel as the terrorists have requested, as long as we are able to speak to Michael Prior and ascertain that he’s in good health.”

  Arley felt a rush of relief. “We’ll get on to them straight away, sir.”

  Riz picked up the secure phone and the incident room fell silent. The mood was tense for everyone, but for Arley it was almost unbearable, and she had to make a conscious effort not to drum her fingers against her cheek, a nervous habit of hers that was capable of driving others to distraction.

  The phone rang twice before being picked up.

  “We still haven’t got Internet access,” said Wolf angrily. “Don’t you care about your hostages?”

  “Of course we do,” said Riz, his tone firm yet conciliatory. “But we need something in return.”

  “What?”

  “We need to speak to Michael Prior.”

  “He’s not available.”

  “Is there a specific reason why we can’t talk to him?”

  “Yes. Because we don’t take orders from you.”

  “But I’m not ordering, Wolf. I’m asking you to allow us to talk to him. If you do that, we’ll restore the Internet immediately. I promise you that.”

  “Just turn the damn thing on. Understand me? Now. I gave you an ultimatum, and you’re ignoring it. Your deadline runs out in ten minutes. After that, a hostage dies. And then one dies every five minutes until you reconnect us.”

  “This is not going to help anyone,” Riz said, working hard to keep his voice calm, but Wolf had already hung up on him. He exhaled loudly, and looked at Arley, and then at the screen where Phillips still sat impassively at his desk. “Do you want me to call back?”

  Arley wanted to shout: Yes, call back, do whatever you can to delay things. If a hostage was executed then the SAS would go in and that would be the end of everything.

  But it
was Phillips who answered him. “No. We can’t show weakness here. We have to call his bluff.”

  “I’m pretty certain he’s going to do it, sir,” said Riz, and for the first time there was a definite quiver in his voice. “And it’s very likely he’ll kill other hostages until he gets what he wants.”

  “And I have orders from the Prime Minister not to restore access until we speak to Prior.”

  Arley’s body was rigid with tension. She desperately wanted to throw up. “Doesn’t the PM realize the kind of flak he’s going to get if the family of the hostage finds out that he or she died because we wouldn’t let the man holding them have a bloody Internet connection?”

  “This is a matter of national security, DAC Dale,” the commissioner said coldly. “You of all people should know that. I’m sorry, but on this we’re going to have to stand firm.”

  55

  20:50

  You’re never so alive as when you’re on the verge of death. Martin Dalston remembered reading that somewhere once. And the thing was, it was true. He felt more alive than he’d felt in years. Probably since those heady days with Carrie, almost a quarter of a century ago now. He wanted to survive this night. He wanted to tell his friends all about it over a pint and a decent Italian meal.

  It was quiet in the restaurant. The thirty or so hostages looked tired and drawn, but an uneasy calm seemed to have descended on everyone. For the last hour there’d been no threats or angry scenes. The guards had become visibly more relaxed, and occasionally one would disappear into the kitchen for a few minutes, leaving the other on guard alone. At the moment, the cruel Scandinavian with the limp was the one in there, which made Martin feel a little better. He was thirsty, but knew better than to ask either of the men for a drink. Best just to keep his head down and count the hours, because at some point this ordeal had to end. Either way, he’d decided that he wasn’t going to carry out his plan for a quiet, dignified departure from the world. He wasn’t usually superstitious, but he took the day’s events as a sign that perhaps he should make the best of his last few months rather than throw away what little time he had left.

  Still keeping his head down, he looked over and caught Elena’s eye. They hadn’t spoken since the incident earlier, when the Scandinavian guard had threatened her with death, but they’d exchanged the occasional smile, and he’d mouthed more than one “thank you” at her for sticking up for him when he was being beaten.

  He smiled at her again now, and she smiled back. “Tell me something,” she whispered, stealing a glance toward the guard to check that he wasn’t looking at them. “I’ve been wanting to ask. What happened to Carrie? If she was the love of your life, why did it end?”

  Martin never spoke about Carrie, not to anyone. She’d always been the guilty secret he’d carried with him all his adult life, but now he was suddenly keen to talk. “Because I was a fool.”

  “Tell me about her.”

  He leaned closer, keeping his voice low as he pictured Carrie Wilson as she was more than twenty years ago. “She was beautiful. We met in Australia when I was traveling after university. That’s where she was from.”

  Elena’s eyes lit up. “That’s where my fiancé Rod’s from too. We’re going to move there at Christmas.”

  Martin grinned. “You’ll love it. I loved it. Carrie and I bought a clapped-out Beetle and traveled the whole country. It was the best time of my life. I still dream about it at night.” For a few seconds he took himself back to those wild, carefree days, with the heat and the sun and the azure sea. “When my visa ran out I had to come back here. But we were still together, and we kept in touch, and we talked about all the things we were going to do. She was going to move to the UK for a couple of years, and a few months later she came over on business. She added a week to her stay and we spent it driving all over England. That’s when we came here for a romantic weekend.” He smiled to himself. “I don’t think we left the room once.”

  “It sounds lovely,” whispered Elena.

  Martin sighed. “It was, and I really thought it was all going to work, but she had to go back to Oz, and although she applied for jobs over here, it was in the midst of a recession and there wasn’t anything. She didn’t want to come without a job so she asked me to go over there. I was working as an accountant and I think I probably could have got something over there, but I dithered, and I made the mistake of listening to my dad, who kept telling me I had a good job, with good prospects, and shouldn’t even think about leaving it. And in the end, I didn’t. Our conversations got fewer, I kept delaying a decision even though I was desperate to go, and finally the conversations stopped altogether. She stopped taking my calls, and then eventually she sent me a letter. It said that she’d met someone else.” He paused. “That was twenty-two years and two months ago, and we haven’t spoken since.”

  Elena put a hand on his arm. “Sometimes things just aren’t meant to be.”

  Martin felt tears well up and forced them back down. He looked away, which was when he caught the eye of a well-built man in his mid-twenties who was sitting on his own a few feet away. He was dressed in a crumpled suit and had the lived-in, slightly puffy face of a rugby player. The man looked at him and gave a very small nod. There was a grim determination in his face, as if he’d recently come to an important decision, and Martin noticed that he was inching closer to him across the floor.

  Martin looked away quickly. He knew the man was thinking about some kind of escape attempt, and he wanted no part in it. It was far too dangerous, and he didn’t think he had the physical strength or the necessary speed to take on the guards. Deliberately, he lowered his head and stared at the floor, telling himself he wasn’t a coward, that under the circumstances he was simply being rational.

  The sound of an elevator door opening, followed by purposeful footsteps, interrupted his thoughts, and he looked up to see the leader of the hostage-takers march into the room through the kitchen door followed by the female terrorist in the black dress and jacket. They were both holding handguns with silencers attached, and the Scandinavian was just behind them.

  Something about their demeanor told Martin that their presence meant bad news.

  They stopped and conversed with the other guard in hushed tones, occasionally looking over at the assembled hostages; then, as Martin watched, the leader handed the woman a balaclava, which she quickly pulled over her head.

  The tension in the room seemed to mount substantially. Something was about to happen. Everyone could feel it. Martin and Elena exchanged glances but neither spoke.

  The woman broke away from the others and skirted the floor and the hostages before leaning over the furniture and pulling up one of the six blinds that covered the restaurant’s viewing window. She secured the drawstring then stepped to one side, facing the hostages again, the gun pointed at a forty-five-degree angle in front of her—a pose that, with the balaclava, gave her the appearance of an executioner.

  “Your government, the people you voted for in your precious elections, do not want to help you,” announced the terrorist leader, stepping forward, his tone angry. “You are not important to them. None of us here wants violence, but we have to make your government listen to us.” He paused. “And for that reason, one of you has to die.”

  A collective gasp went up. Someone cried out, a strangled “Oh God,” but otherwise there were no hysterics. Just a cold, silent sense of shock. Two young women to Martin’s right, still in their work clothes, probably no older than he had been when he came here with Carrie, clung to each other, shaking with fear.

  Keeping his gun in front of him, the leader walked out among them, his eyes scanning the group as he hunted for a victim.

  Martin stared at the floor, every nerve in his body taut, every sense heightened, more alive than he’d ever been. More terrified too.

  I don’t want to die. Not anymore. Not yet. I want to see Robert, my only son, one more time. I want to phone Carrie and tell her that I’ve never stopped loving he
r, that my greatest regret in life is that I didn’t follow her to Australia when I had the chance.

  He could sense rather than hear the footfalls as they came closer, and he bent his head down even lower, as if this would somehow make him invisible.

  I know it should be me. I’ve probably got the least amount of time of anyone here. But I just want one more chance at life.

  He could hear breathing right above him, knew that the leader was there. Only inches from him. He didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. Just waited. Praying.

  “You,” said the leader, and Martin felt a hand grip him firmly by the shoulder.

  His prayers, it seemed, hadn’t been answered.

  56

  Arley Dale stared at the ops room screens. Three of them were showing close-ups of the Park View Restaurant, where the recently opened blind was giving the whole world a narrow view inside. Behind the piled-up tables and chairs, Arley could clearly see hostages sitting on the bare floor, and a masked gunman moving among them. As she watched, the gunman leaned down, pulled a middle-aged man to his feet, and put a gun to his temple. The man looked pale and terrified as the Sky News camera panned in on him, and Arley felt her mouth go dry.

  “CO19 has a moving target inside the building,” said Chief Inspector Chris Matthews, speaking from the incident room next door, his voice reverberating loud and clear through the loudspeaker in the incident room. “They have a clear shot at him, ma’am. They can take him down now.”

  Everyone in the room was looking at Arley. Waiting for her to say something. Rather than leading from the front, Gold and Silver—Commissioner Phillips and Assistant Commissioner Jacobs—were nowhere to be seen. Doubtless keeping their heads down, leaving the hard decision for her. Bastards.