by Jan Swick
"Matt?" she yelled.
"In the pit, under the car," he called back.
"I know. I saw through the window. That's why I brought the car in."
"Well you took your bloody time."
She waved the gun at the bruiser on his knees. "Move, I put one in you, and you'll be screaming like your pal over there." The guy shook his head.
She got back in the car, leaving the door open and still aiming the gun. One handed, she started it, put it in gear, and reversed it ten feet, clearing the pit. As she exited, she saw Matt climb out of the pit, soaking wet.
Matt rushed over to the bruiser on his knees. Lisa moved towards the pit, looked down. There was the guy called Hardy, on his back, breathing but not moving. Both of his arms were bent funny, clearly broken. His face was a mask of blood. She wondered for a moment if the car had hit him after all. But no, he had landed in there with Matt. Might as well have fallen in a wood pulper.
Matt was tying the bruiser with a length of cable, and the guy was letting him. She moved the gun periodically between all three bad guys until Matt had tied both bruisers to a workbench bolted to the floor. Then she kept it trained on Hardy, in case he magically got a burst of consciousness. But the guy was out.
When Matt was done, she heard him speaking to the bruiser who'd taken no damage. He asked who ran this garage, and the bruiser said it was Hardy's, a side-job. Anyone else work here today? No, just evenings. He turned to Lisa. Matt approached her.
"We can leave them here. Should have a few hours."
"You want to do it here, then?" Lisa said.
Matt knelt in front of the two bruisers. Patiently, he told them the score. They were to be left tied until someone rescued them tonight and pretend they tied each other up as part of some game that went wrong. After that, they should try to live peaceful lives, and forget about the man and woman who got one over on them today. Tell anyone about us or what happened here, or try to come after us, and the peace will bid adios to your lives.
Both guys nodded their understanding. Lisa said, "So, you want to do it here?"
"No. Help me get Hardy out of there."
Liam Hardy woke in his car, alone.
He was instantly aware of his arms, because of the fiery pain. Hot agony that reminded him they were broken. One after the other, the guy had snapped them. He couldn't move them. Grey duct tape held them flat against his chest in a cross-shape, like a topless woman trying to hide her breasts. Still disoriented, he briefly thought that the guy had tied his arms to keep him from moving the damaged bones, to keep him comfortable. He realised his error when he saw that his ankles were tied to the pedals by a thick mass of more tape. The awful truth wiped aside the last of his confusion after that.
He tried to jerk free, but his ass didn't leave the seat. More tape was around his waist and wrapped around the seat to hold him in place.
Not just some guy who was shafting Hardy's ex, then. He got the feeling he'd been tricked. Whoever that guy was, he'd planned all this. Planned to kidnap him.
He tried to work out where he was, but it was impossible. He could hear a river, but all he could see all around was thick shrubbery, pressing up against the doors and the front of the car. He couldn't see behind, but figured the scenery would be the same. They had driven him into the middle of nowhere.
"You still want to cost me a fiver?" a voice said above him. He looked up. The sunroof was open, and there was a face there. It was the guy. And all of a sudden Hardy realised that he'd seen the guy before. Last night, in the casino. Him and the woman – the pair he'd ejected. Shit, this was a revenge thing for being booted out. But where was the woman?
"What do you want, man? What's this about? I was just doing my job. Get me the fuck out of here, you goddamn lunatic. I know people."
"Liam, be quiet and listen to me, okay? It's some of those people you know that I'm interested in. Are you ready to answer questions?"
He held up a box of matches. Hardy's own matches. Right then Hardy realised what he was smelling. What his clothing was soaked in. Petrol. His own fucking petrol, probably. He started to struggle against his bonds, but the guy struck a match, and that made Hardy freeze.
"Okay, man, okay. Tell me who you are. What do you want? I ain't gonna fuck you around."
The guy blew out the match and tossed it away. He moved. Jumped onto the bonnet of the car, turned, and sat, and both men stared at each other through the windscreen.
"What I want from you is just a lift up, Liam. I'm climbing a ladder. You're the next rung, right above the guy who told me all about you. I'm protecting him in the same way I'll protect you from the guy above you. All you have to do to make it home tonight is answer some questions. Easy. Are you ready for your first question?"
Hardy considered screaming for help. Help might come running, but if no help heard his shout, the guy might punish him. So he just nodded.
The guy said, "Then here we go. You bought a van a couple of weeks ago. It belonged to a florist. It had a picture of a flower and a horseshoe on it, but you probably had to peel that off. Now, you asked a guy to find you a van, but did someone ask you to find one?"
Hardy paused. He remembered the van. The one with the sticker he did indeed have to peel off. Was this guy the owner? Had that little fucker Tchevsky stolen it despite being carefully told to legitimately get hold of one? Tchevsky! The runt had given this guy Hardy's name!
The pause, it seemed, was too long. The guy struck another match. Hardy blurted, "Yeah, a van. Blue, a Mercedes Vito, sliding door, eighty thousand on the clock." In his panic, he spluttered a few more useless facts about the van, because he didn't know what the guy needed to know, how many of the details might be important. The guy held up a hand and Hardy stopped talking.
"That's not what I asked, is it?"
For a second he couldn't remember the question. Then he did and words tumbled out again: "My boss at the casino, he wanted a van. Needed it untraceable. His name's Anderson Orbach. That's the guy you want. Not me. I don't know what he wanted it for. Was it your van? Is that what this is about?"
"Tell me about Anderson Orbach. Describe him."
"Mid-forties, about six feet, bald. American. Likes golf. Ex-army. Er… I don't know what else to say."
"Who else is involved with running the casino?"
"I don't know, honest. Just him, I think. He never seems to need to ask permission to do things in the casino. Never talks about any kind of boss. But I don't know if he owns it or not. Don't know much, honest."
"How do I get close to Orbach?"
That shocked Hardy, but also motivated him. If these people were after Orbach, then Liam could still get out of this okay.
"I don't know, man. The guy is paranoid about that sort of stuff. He comes and goes by car or bike. Keeps all sorts of different hours. Uses the underground garage at the casino. Half the time he never even leaves his apartment. Got his own apartment in the casino. I don't know what else to say."
"Who gets to see him? All staff? Who has access to him? To the apartment?"
"No one gets in the apartment. I've never been in there. Now and then he calls staff to the office, but it ain't often. He never comes downstairs onto the floor unless the place is closed. You planning to kill him?"
The guy paused. Thinking. Twirled the matches in his fingers, as if considering lighting Hardy up. "What was the florist's van to be used for?"
"He didn't tell me that, man. Honest. Serious."
"After you got the van, what did you do with it?"
"I left it parked outside my shop, that shop we took you to. Left the keys in it. That was it. That was the plan. Next I knew, it was gone. Never saw it again, never heard about it. Serious."
"But that's not the only van you ever had dealings with for Orbach, is it?"
"Just that one van. I don't know about any other van."
"You were asked to steal a van the Saturday before last. Or someone you know was-"
"No way, I don'
t know anything about that."
The guy was nodding slowly. "I think you do, Liam. Saturday before last. In Hackney. You stole a van from outside a drug dealer's house, and then you drove it past a wasteground. Made sure the CCTV cameras got it. And then you parked it right back where you nicked it. That was the plan and you did it."
Hardy was shaking his head, wild-eyed.
The man said, "You deny it, yet I know Orbach made that happen, and you're his head of security, and that means he tells you everything."
"Does he fuck. He knows lots of people. I'm just one. If he set that shit up, then he did it without me. Go see him about that, man."
The guy paused again, and Hardy thought the guy believed him. The anger had done it. Hardy was genuinely angry about that final accusation, because he truly knew nothing about some drug dealer's van or a wasteground or CC-fucking-TV cameras. A liar wouldn't have exhibited the annoyance Hardy felt at being falsely accused – surely the guy could see that?
"Know anything about a guy called Daniel Bathow?"
"Never heard that name. Serious."
"Sure? Sure you weren't told to break into the guy's flat and plant things?"
Hardy shook his head again. "No fucking way." He hoped that same incredulous look was on his face, the same tone in his voice, because again he felt annoyed at a false accusation. "Serious."
"Stop saying you're serious," the guy said, "If I believe you, I believe you, and it won't be because you're promising you're telling the truth."
"I am telling the truth. Ser... Look, you need to talk to Anderson about all this, because he's the boss and I'm no one. If this was something Anderson set up, he set the thing up without me, man, so you need to go ask him."
"Heard the name Armstrong?"
Hardy shook his head.
The guy didn't look pleased. "I think you might be lying, Liam. Head of security, yet you claim to not know quite a lot."
"Look, I don't hear names. I don't know any names. I'm an errand boy, that's what I do. I do the odd side job for Anderson, and there's never any fucking names. I'm not involved in half the stuff Anderson gets up to. Go see him."
"So tell me about this little line in side jobs, Liam."
"We do shit on the side as well as the casino, but they're all Anderson's babies, okay? If there's some big shit going down that you need to know about, I'm the wrong man. He just comes to me for little jobs."
"So tell me about the last little job one you were involved in."
"Three days ago. Anderson told me about some guy moaning about his neighbour's wall. Guy built it overlapping his land. He paid Anderson to fix the problem and Anderson paid me a hundred quid to help. I just got a couple of local idiots to take a cut-and-shut I had in the shop and crash it into the guy's wall. That was it. I got a hundred to break some guy's wall. Don't know what Anderson got paid."
"And you found out about this guy how?"
Hardy opened his mouth, but seemed reluctant to speak.
The man said, "You seem concerned about saying the wrong thing, so let me help you, Liam. I know you listen in on conversations at the casino. All those cameras and microphones. Sounds like great fun, eavesdropping on people arguing…and flirting…and maybe moaning about a neighbour's wall…"
The guy was grinning, and that put Hardy at ease a little.
"Casino gets thousands in, man. Cameras and microphones pick up everything. The shit you hear. Some of it's funny stuff. All sorts of shit. So, yeah, sometimes we hear about some guy with a problem that we can help with."
"Sounds like a good setup. So if you guys overhear some guy in the casino say he wants to fuck his neighbour over, you step in and offer a service?"
"That's right. Good earner. No one really gets hurt."
The guy struck another match, anger on his face. "Things is, Liam, people do get hurt. Because this side-line of jobs you and Orbach have isn't always about boundary disputes between neighbours. Is it? Sometimes you guys do real damage, don't you? Like sinking a million dollar yacht. Remember that one?"
Hardy paused. At first he couldn't think, but then he could. He remembered a boat. It was the first time Anderson had come to him with a side job. "Yeah, I know that one. Anderson called me in the office, told me about it. Said he'd overheard some lady in the casino talking to her brother on the phone. The brother had some problem with his wife, cheating on him or something. I took her to his office so he could talk to her, but I don't know what happened, what they discussed, but I remember Anderson got me to find him the phone number of an expert on boats, and I know it had something to do with the cheating wife guy. That's all. End of my involvement."
"So some people do get to meet Orbach. Some people get close enough to touch him. He doesn’t live in a protective bubble." He paused, thinking, and doing so with a slight smile on his face. "Okay, next question. We're nearly done here, Liam, and you're doing well. Ready? Need to think even harder about the next one."
Hardy nodded. The man's voice was suddenly more serious, and Hardy knew this was the epilogue, the endgame, whatever you wanted to call it. Maybe all the rest had been fishing, or a test. Whatever, the next question was going to be the sixty-four thousand dollar one. The reason why Hardy was tied up and covered in petrol.
"We're back to Saturday before last, Liam. Cast back your mind. You there? I'm there. I'll always be there. A girl was killed. Murdered. A...prostitute. She was dumped in a wasteground in Hackney. Tell me what you know."
Fuck! Someone close to this guy had been killed, and he thought Hardy was involved. It explained the petrol and the matches. He was suddenly a lot more scared. "Jesus, I don't know anything about a murder. Seriously."
"You didn't get a whiff, Liam? Anything from a series of little jobs that might have given you a clue, no dropped word from Orbach that made you wonder how big his latest job was?"
"Nothing, man. Nothing. I wouldn't have sat back and let shit like that happen."
There was a pause. Quite a long one. Hardy lowered his eyes and wondered if this was the end. If the guy didn't believe him, he might not ask again, might just light him right on up.
Then: "Who was the last person who went to see Orbach? Of the customers. The last big, important one. Forget people who want cats rescued from trees. The last big one that you were cut out of because you're small fry. Say three weeks ago, given a week to set things up."
Hardy didn't have to think about this one. He remembered it well. And told the guy. Some old man in a suit, they'd overheard him, drunk as hell at the bar, spouting off to one of the waitresses, some shit about how she should stop flaunting herself because not all men found it attractive, that some got turned on by making women suffer, by dominating them, hurting them. The old man had taken pleasure in taunting the waitress, saying she could only turn him on if she was struggling for her life, if she was bleeding. She had run to tell Hardy, who had told Anderson, who had barred the old twat. But a week later Hardy had been asked to secretly find out the old guy's mobile number. Anderson called the old guy out of the blue and the deal was done over the phone, and the weirdo had never worked out how they knew of his desire to hurt a woman. Certainly never suspected the casino.
"So did this old guy kill someone you know?" he finished.
"You still have that mobile number, Liam? An address? A description?"
No number, sorry. Just one of many on a list he got. Anyway, Anderson wanted no record of his own number calling the old guy's so he got the client to destroy the phone. No address – people come from all over London to play in the casino. Description? Just some old guy, plain as hell.
"Your wife or sister, this prostitute?" he added, and really didn't know why.
"My sister," the man said. "And I'm going to kill everyone involved in her death."
"Seriously, man, I know nothing about that. Please believe me."
Another long pause.
"I do believe you, Liam," the man said finally. "I believe you weren't one of the people dir
ectly involved in my sister's murder. But I could be wrong, and I have to make sure."
"I wouldn't lie to you, man. Look where I am."
"That's not what I meant. I meant I have to make sure I get them all." And with that he struck another match, and stood up, and leaned over the sunroof, and Hardy stared up at the little flame held above him, and then watched it fall.
Amongst the thousands of people entering London by train that evening was a jolly Scotsman with curly brown hair and a bushy grey beard. Maybe there were dozens such. The beard made him look much older than his 45 years, but it was a look he enjoyed. He thought it got him more respect, and it hid two massive tattoos on his cheeks, put there by drunken soldiers during a drinking game they unimaginatively called FIRST TO PASS OUT GETS THEIR FACE TATTOOED.
He hailed a taxi, then he checked the address he'd written as a draft text message on his phone. He told the driver to take him to a car hire firm.
Once in his own vehicle, a plain Nissan, he found a B&B and settled down for the evening.
Around ten o'clock, he made his way to the address in his phone. He parked a street away and continued on foot. A hundred metres up the street from the place he wanted was a doctor's surgery with a gloomy car park, and there he hid, watching the building. In his hand was a stun gun.
Darren "Daz" McKinley waited just a few minutes before he saw what he expected. Clutching the stun gun down by his side, hidden by his forearm, he exited his hiding place and moved towards his target.
The sign out front said the door would be locked at eleven p.m., no admittance after that time, so Daz expected it to be open. It was. He walked right in like he belonged. On his left was a staircase heading up. Past, at the end of the hall, was some kind of alcove with a tiny desk and computer and a register, but no attendant. An open door on the right emitted the chatter of people. He went up the stairs. He glanced into the chatter room as he climbed and saw old circular tables with people eating. A late dinner. No one saw him.
