Chapter Twenty-Eight
‘ETA, ten Minutes.’
That wasn’t good enough, thought Ashton, who had never felt her heart race with such excitement. Even as night ascended on a Monday evening the London roads were tough to navigate. It was just under six and a half miles, but through the London traffic, it felt like forever. The estimated arrival of the Armed Response Unit wasn’t good enough and although they would get there just before she would, she wanted Sam in cuffs as soon as possible.
‘Do whatever you have to, but I repeat, we CAN NOT lose him again.’
Her words were as stern as she was worried. The opportunity to catch Sam would all but guarantee her the Commissioner job. While her superior had done an admirable job, there were murmurings that it was time for a change. The Metropolitan Police had taken a bit of battering over the last year, a large part due to the Marathon bombing, another part due to the corruption that Sam Pope had uncovered.
The press was making a hero of him.
A man fighting for the people.
He was a vigilante and a murderer and once Ashton had him in cuffs, she would paint the story for the world to see. With the press leaning heavily on the Met’s failings, the notion of replacing the Commissioner had been mooted.
A new leader. A new beginning.
Ashton was the clear front runner and she was hoping that her recent rendezvous with Wallace would tip the odds in her favour.
Bringing Sam Pope to justice would rubber stamp it.
As her driver sped round a corner, his sirens wailing, she held onto the door handle for support. It had been a long time since she’d ventured out into the field, her days as a street officer were long behind her. When she’d started out in the Met, she’d the same doe eyed view as all the other young upstarts pulling on the uniform.
She wanted to help people.
She wanted to make a difference.
The years of long hours and crushing disappointments soon stamped the optimism out of her, replacing it with a cold, hard realism. She played the game then, working hard for those in power and stepping on the toes of those not strong enough to claim it.
Along the way, she’d made some vital contributions to the cause. Her work on Project Yewtree had seen her name lauded in the papers and would no doubt, be one of her more pushed pieces when the time for her promotion came.
Her coronation to the top of the Met.
That was why it was imperative that she brought Sam in, and hopefully, she thought, catch Singh in collusion with him. It was such a disappointment to see her lose her way. Ashton had such high hopes for her and had championed her for leading the Task Force. Not only did she see potential in Singh but promoting a female officer of ethnicity would look great on her record.
Ashton knew how to play the game.
But she’d become a problem and Wallace had made it abundantly clear that he wanted her removed. Without due course, Ashton had struggled, loosely fabricating the stories of her betrayal of the Met but not enough for it to stick. It had been enough to suspend her pending an investigation, but without Pearce, the best internal investigator, on the case, it had hit many a roadblock.
Catching her with Sam would be two birds with one stone.
Factor in that Pearce, the other perennial pain the arse had willingly stepped aside, it was turning into a good night’s work.
She couldn’t wait to look Sam in the eye and tell him that she’d won.
Nor could she wait for the grateful thanks Wallace would heap on her for ending what had been a long campaign.
As the car whizzed through the traffic on Loughborough Road, Ashton pulled up the radio, barked further instructions to the team, and stared out of the rain speckled window, looking at the city she couldn’t wait to be put in control of.
Farukh took two steps towards Sam and then lunged forward with the curved blade, slicing the air inches from Sam’s throat. Sam leant back, dodging the attack, before sliding out of the way of the follow up swipe. Farukh wasn’t looking to toy with Sam this time.
This was to death.
And Farukh wasn’t holding back.
With a grunt of frustration, he swung again, and Sam ducked, latched onto the arm, and wrenched it backwards, the blade dropping from Farukh’s hand. Before Sam could move, Farukh’s solid elbow cracked the side of his jaw. Sam stumbled to the side, slightly dazed and Farukh charged, slamming his shoulder into Sam’s chest and sending him sprawling over the large oak desk and to the hard floor on the other side.
It was like being hit by a double-decker bus.
The man was as thick as a sand block and Sam gasped for the air that had been driven from his lungs. As he clambered on all fours, the thudding of boots closed in on him.
In the corner was the gun that Sam had tossed, but as he inched towards it, a mighty boot crashed into his rib cage, flipping him over onto his back, and driving what little air was left straight from his lungs.
Farukh dropped down to one knee, his leather clad hands shooting out and locking onto Sam’s throat.
Sam gasped for air, slamming his fists into the man’s meaty forearms, but he just struck the leather of the jacket.
While he wasn’t hanging Sam in the traditional sense, the twinkle in Farukh’s eye told Sam he was enjoying it. Choking the life from another man was one of the most powerful things he could do, and Farukh pushed his immense weight down, the air supply cutting off completely.
Sam gasped for air, his face turning a sickening purple as his eyes began to bulge.
This was it.
The entire fight coming to an end by the hands of the most dangerous man he’d ever face.
A horrifying thud echoed in the room, as the metal slammed against the back of Farukh’s head with enough force to knock it clean from his shoulders.
Moaning with pain as blood splattered to the ground, Farukh wobbled, releasing his hold on Sam’s throat. Singh, who had decided to repay her debt to Sam, had returned, wielding a metal pipe she’d taken from the scaffolding.
The first swing had loosened the big guy up.
Her second swing was just a split second too late.
Farukh had already digested the pain, recalibrated, and he caught the swing under his arm, locking the pole in place and he hoisted himself up, driving his forehead into Singh’s face and knocking her clean off her feet. Sam gasped for air, gulping greedily as he tried to fill his lungs, aware that Singh was in danger.
Singh tried to get to her feet, but Farukh swung the back of his hand like a tennis racket, his knuckles crashing across her face and sending her sprawling to her knees.
‘You bitch,’ he spat, furious at the shocking display of disrespect. Never in his life had he been struck by a woman and to him, there was only one penalty.
Death.
Grabbing Singh by the hair, he pulled her to her knees, then with a hard wrench that made her howl in pain, he yanked her head back, exposing her slim neck.
With his other hand gleefully gripping the curved blade, he brought it to her throat and with his eyes locked on her terrified stare, pressed the blade to her skin.
Singh felt the blade just break to top layer of skin, the stinging sensation only adding to the tears as she accepted her death.
Sam slammed into the Hangman with all his might, lifting him off the ground and away from Singh who gasped loudly, narrowly avoiding death.
Sam, with his arms locked around the Hangman’s waist, continued charging forward, the brute slamming a hard fist into his already bruised spine.
Farukh slashed at Sam with the blade, and Sam felt the razor-sharp tool slash his arm and shoulder through his bomber jacket.
He kept running.
After a few more metres, Farukh’s heels clipped the concrete frame of the window and the two of them spilled out through the plastic sheet, falling dangerously onto the rickety boards of the scaffolding. Sam released his hold and clutched the edge of the board, stopping himself from sliding across the so
aked wood to his impending death below.
He wished he hadn’t looked at the steep drop, and he pulled himself back, just in time to welcome a hard knee to his chest from the Hangman. Farukh, with the rain crashing against his leather clad body, was irate and he swung a few vicious punches at Sam, rocking his body as he absorbed each blow.
With his left hand still clutching the blade, Farukh swung, but Sam ducked and leapt up, planting Farukh with a vicious left elbow to the side of the head, before sending him back a few steps with a right uppercut.
Farukh took a second, dabbed at his cut lip and smiled.
‘A fighter,’ Farukh said approvingly, before launching forward with another few rights, which Sam blocked, only to drill a knee into Sam’s stomach. As he hunched forward, Farukh drove Sam’s face off the metal pole that ran the length of the scaffolding, his nose crushed on impact. Disorientated, Sam stumbled worryingly near the edge and Farukh swung his left hand again.
The blade slashed down the back of Sam’s jacket, slicing through his clothes and drawing a mighty gash down his spine. Sam howled in pain, and Farukh drove a hard boot into his spine, sending him sprawling into the railing. Sam flopped over the metal bar, the agony of the assault getting the better of him. On the streets below, he watched as a series of blue lights pulled up outside the building, the police arriving in numbers to no doubt bring this all to a close. He saw the armed team jumping from the back of the van, mobilising, and getting ready to swarm the building.
It would all be over.
But it would be too late.
Slowly, he turned to face Farukh, throwing a few sloppy right hands that the Hangman batted away easily. Farukh reached out and grabbed Sam by the throat, pushing him further over the railing, pressing his slashed back against the cold metal.
‘This is the end.’
Farukh’s words were calm yet final and he skilfully spun the blade in his hand, pushed Sam’s head back to expose the throat and lifted the blade.
The gunshot echoed through the street like a sonic boom and the bullet blew out Farukh’s left shoulder. The blade instantly dropped from his hand, clattering onto the wooden walkway. Growling in pain, he turned to see Singh stood, the rain welcoming her to the fight with a wet hug. Her arms were extended, the gun held expertly between her fingers, the barrel smoking from the shot.
As Farukh turned to charge at her, she pulled the trigger again, but this time, the chamber clicked empty.
But it had been enough. Before Farukh could do anything, Sam dropped to his knee, grabbed the blade, and slammed it into Farukh’s calf. Roaring like a mountain lion, Farukh fell forward onto his knee, and before he could say anything further, Sam grabbed his thick beard, wrenched his head back, and drove the blade as hard as he could into the centre of his throat.
Farukh gargled, the blood filling his throat instantly and as he choked and spluttered for life, Sam pushed it in further, the curve driving the blade up through his neck and into his mouth.
Farukh’s eyes widened, his life ending quickly and as the rain soaked them both, Sam drilled one final punch into Farukh’s throat, slamming the blade clean through and he let go.
The Hangman collapsed into a pool of his own blood, a slight twitch reverberating through his body.
An echo of his life.
Farukh was dead.
Wallace was dead.
It was over.
The fight was over.
As the rain crashed against him, Sam looked at his fist, the knuckles split open from the beating, Farukh’s blood joining with own in a sickening scarlet glove.
Sam closed his eyes and dropped to his knees, the pain getting the better of him.
Below, he could hear the commotion of the impending police raid of the building.
Somewhere, he could hear the muffled sounds of Singh begging him to stand up.
Sam opened his eyes, and he saw his son, Jamie, stood in front of him, a hopeful smile on his young, innocent face.
‘Not yet, Dad,’ his son said. ‘Not yet.’
Sam closed his eyes once more, bowed his head, and let the water trickle from his brow.
The fight was over.
It was finally over.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
‘Sam!?’
Etheridge held his head in his hands. He had been calling Sam’s name for the last five minutes, to little avail. Sam’s earpiece had been disconnected earlier in the afternoon, no doubt during a heated discussion with Wallace.
From what Etheridge could see through CCTV of the surrounding buildings, someone had been hurled from the top of the old High Rise.
Was it Sam?
He had no way of knowing, but he had one of his screens trained on a CCTV camera which was pointed straight at the door of the High Rise. The building, destroyed a year prior by Sam, was armoured with scaffolding, the windows empty caverns poorly covered in dusty sheets, What was once the most sought after hot spot in the criminal underworld was nothing more than an empty husk, an eyesore of a previous regime.
Sam had cut the High Rise off at the source, destroyed the smaller sister arms of the business until it was nothing but a memory.
But now, inside the building where Sam had truly found his calling, Etheridge worried whether he would ever see his friend again.
The feeling was compounded when the radio piped up, with an all guns blazing Ashton bringing the full blue fury of the Metropolitan Police straight to the doorstep. Even if Sam was alive, his chances of getting away were dwindling with every passing second.
Etheridge felt sick and he popped two paracetamols in his mouth and threw them back with a mouthful of water. He rubbed his chin, the grainy stubble itching, and he realised it had been a few days since he’d showered. Since he’d focused on anything other than the mission.
In that aspect, they had succeeded.
The recording of Wallace’s confession had come though crystal clear and Etheridge had made several copies across servers, sticks, and discs.
Just to be on the safe side.
They had what they’d set out for.
Wallace. Bang to rights.
Whatever the outcome of the following events was, Etheridge knew that he would see the mission through to the end. Just as Marsden had willingly given his life for the files, Sam had risked it all to bring the man down.
To burn Blackridge to the ground.
As the excitement rose over the radio and the net began to tighten, Etheridge stared hopelessly at the screen, hoping beyond that his friend would emerge.
‘Come on, Sam,’ Singh said, her words shaking. ‘We have to move.’
Singh peered over the railing to the street below, the blue lights flashing like a street rave, illuminating the rain drops in their glow. The armed team was discussing tactics, and more uniformed officers were arriving, setting up the necessary cordons, keeping the public at bay. Wallace’s body had already been discovered on the other side of the building, and several officers were locking down the scene.
They were completely surrounded.
More worryingly, Sam was hardly moving.
Singh leant down, wrapped her arms around Sam’s and tried to lift him, but he was almost dead weight, like everything had shut down.
‘For fuck’s sake, Sam.’ She cursed. ‘Get up.’
‘It’s over,’ Sam said quietly. ‘It’s done.’
With visible discomfort, Sam reached up, taking hold of Singh’s arm and pulling himself off the ground. The large slice that ran across his spine had pumped warm blood across his back, his T-shirt stuck to him. The blood loss had made him woozy and combined with the probable concussion from the collision with the scaffolding pole, Sam could barely stand.
The rain was cooling, washing the blood from his face, and he stood for a few moments, letting the water crash against him.
Below, he heard the excited buzz of a police force, ready to finally bring him to justice.
Singh, defiant to the end, yanked at his jack
et.
‘We need to go.’
‘Where?’ Sam spoke softly, following her as she stepped back through the old window and into the High Rise. The office was splattered with blood, the thick trail from Wallace led to the other window, a horrifying splatter ran the length of the plastic sheet.
It was done.
Wallace was dead and Sam had got enough of a confession top burn everything he’d built with Blackridge to the ground. He had discovered the truth about Project Hailstorm, the life altering facts of what he himself had been a part of.
The source of the two scars that adorned his chest.
Sam had been through it all.
He had fought.
He had killed.
And now, as he stumbled into the room and dropped to his knees again, he knew it was over. Singh, panicked, rushed towards him, her bruised face wet from tears as much as the rain.
‘Come on, Sam. Fight, goddam it.’ She slammed a weak fist against him. ‘We have to go.’
‘It’s okay, Amara,’ Sam said, trying to smile as he reached a hand up, gently stroking the wet hair from her face. ‘It’s over.’
‘There must be a way out of here.’
‘There’s only one.’ Sam looked her dead in the eye. ‘You have to arrest me.’
Singh stood up, her eyes widening with shock as she shook her head.
‘What? No. There has to be something else. A fire escape or something.’
‘Amara, please.’ Sam’s voice was twisted with pain. ‘It’s the only way.’
‘Sam, you will go to jail for the rest of your life. Do you understand that?’
‘I know. But unless you put me in cuffs and march me out of that door, then so will you.’ Sam offered her a smile, his eyes watering and a tear trickled down his cheek. ‘The fight is over, Amara.’
She regarded him carefully, knowing then that the man she’d been tasked with hunting all those months ago had turned out to be the man she loved. While it wasn’t the usual romance she’d been force fed in books, or the preconceived notion of love conjured up by her parents.
Too Far Gone (Sam Pope Series Book 4) Page 22
