Hunter

by M. C. Adams

  Klein, who has managed to stay quiet up until this point, whimpers as he opens the cupboard and crouches down at the safe.

  I’ve been practising this moment with Samson and the gang all afternoon, but now that I’m about to do it, I’m clamming up. Is this really going to work?

  I can hear how quickly Klein is breathing, and I take a deep breath. It’s now or never.

  ‘Go, boys, go!’ I yell, quickly, decisively.

  Immediately, without a moment’s hesitation, Samson leaps out of the stationery cupboard, and Rowan jumps out from behind the desk.

  Samson wrestles the gun out of Grant’s hands before he even has a chance to register what’s happening, and Rowan pushes him down onto the floor and flicks a handcuff around his right wrist. That’s one benefit of knowing these boys. Some of them — including Rowan — work at a BDSM nightclub in the centre. That means it was super easy to get hold of twenty-two pairs of handcuffs at short notice, which meant we were able to kit out every single bouncer in the house.

  ‘Nice one, Rowan,’ I say. Rowan’s nerdy as fuck and he’s got literary tattoos scrawled all over his back, but he’s also hard as nails. Very cool.

  ‘Fuck! Watch out, everyone!’ yells Samson.

  Suddenly, the blood in my ears begins to whoosh.

  There’s noise — so much noise. Heavy boots charge up the stairs, pushing past me and into the room, and now, more men than I can count surround us with pointed guns.

  What the fuck? Where did they come from?

  Grant, lying on the floor, begins to laugh. His laugh turns into a long wheeze. Nobody interrupts him. Finally, he looks up at me with a smile.

  ‘Didn’t expect that, did you?’

  I look over at Klein. He looks at Samson. Samson is pointing Grant’s gun at Grant. But there are seven other guns trained at him now.

  Grant stands up, brushing the dust off his tracksuit. ‘Didn’t take me long to order back-up once I saw that shitty doughnut-eating cop outside the house. I never even shut the door properly when I came into your house. Not that you noticed. Saves these guys having to smash a window. Not that that’s going to matter, very soon.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asks Klein.

  Grant smiles. ‘You’ll see. Or… maybe you won’t, gay-boy. Depending on what happens to those pretty blue eyes of yours.’

  ‘The cop’s going to witness all this,’ I say. ‘Don’t do anything you’ll regret getting busted for.’

  Grant begins to laugh again. ‘You lads are so cute,’ he says. ‘Such optimists. Even when I’m about to murder the lot of you.’ He looks first at Rowan, then at Samson. ‘I knew you would be up to something. But never in my wildest dreams did I imagine you’d find two little faggots to jump out of the closet at me. Oops. Forgive me. You are out of the closet, aren’t you?’ He grins wickedly.

  I can see that Samson’s desperate to tell him where to get off, but he bites his tongue. He keeps looking over at me, ready to follow my lead… and that’s when I realise: I’m the leader.

  It’s down to me to save us all.

  And I… don’t have a plan.

  ‘Please,’ I say softly. ‘We might not have fifteen million in that safe, but there is some money in there. We put in a few hundred thousand. Enough to offer you if things went south. Please. Take the money. Seven-hundred-thousand. You could get yourself a really nice place with that kind of cash.’

  Grant laughs. ‘In London? I could barely afford a fucking stationery cupboard with that kind of cash. Might suit this little poof here, living in a cupboard…’ He points at Samson. ‘But not me.’

  My eyes become like saucers. ‘Do what you want to me, just don’t hurt the others.’

  Just then, we hear more feet coming up the stairs, less quickly this time.

  Please, please let it be the police.

  ‘Alright, everyone?’ says a familiar voice. ‘’Ow’s it going?’

  Into the room she walks. Her platinum blonde hair is tied into a high ponytail, swinging as she strides in.

  Kitty.

  And, right behind her: a tired-looking woman in a duffle coat.

  15

  KLEIN

  * * *

  ‘Charlotte?’ I ask, my lip trembling. ‘What’s going on? Are you behind all this?’

  Charlotte’s grey eyes are downcast and slightly bewildered. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she says. ‘I didn’t realise how serious this all was. I should have helped out sooner. I… I can’t help you now… I’m so sorry.’

  The blonde bimbo looks at me with a smile, and reaches out to shake my hand. I don’t shake it.

  ‘I’m Kitty,’ she announces to the room. ‘I’m the one that’s been fucking ’is wife, innit? Or… not fucking him, as the case may be.’

  Grant laughs softly.

  Kitty reaches into her shoulder bag and pulls out a length of thick rope. ‘Come ’ere, Charlotte.’

  ‘What are you doing, Charlotte?’ I ask. ‘What’s she doing?’

  ‘Lie down,’ Kitty says, and Charlotte does as she says.

  What on earth…?

  ‘She… she told me she’d hurt my mother if I didn’t follow her here,’ Charlotte says, looking up at me.

  ‘Shut it,’ says Kitty, tying Charlotte’s hands behind her back, and then tying her legs together. ’It’s actually pretty funny that I’m hog-tying you, Charlotte, because you are a fucking hog. A butt-ugly, badly-dressed, ugly old hog bitch.’

  I’ve called Charlotte every name under the sun in the past before… but hearing someone else say those words about her right now fills me with anger.

  ‘Wait a minute…’ I say, as things finally click. ‘So… you know Grant?’

  ‘Give him a fucking medal,’ says Kitty, as she continues to tie up my ex-wife. ‘Get on your knees, idiot. I need to tie your feet and hands together.’

  Charlotte sighs wearily and gets onto his knees as Kitty ties him up even more securely. I’ve never seen anyone admit defeat so readily. As much as Charlotte has messed up in her life, she still doesn’t deserve this. Nobody does.

  ‘Of course she fucking knows me,’ says Grant. ‘She’s fuckin’ fuckin’ me.’

  Suddenly, Hunter gasps. ‘Oh my god,’ he says quietly. ‘When I met you… in Starbucks… and I asked you to tell your partner to leave us alone… who did you think I was talking about?’

  Kitty shrugs. ‘Well, Grant of course. Charlotte isn’t my partner. She’s just a pathetic puppy dog I keep around to make me drinks and lick my shoes clean. Seems to love it, though, don’t you, Charlotte?’

  Charlotte closes her eyes, wincing, as if the memory is too painful to bear. ‘I thought we were role-playing,’ she says. ‘I thought you were my Mistress. It’s what I always wanted from a woman… It’s why Klein and I never…’

  ‘What?’ I ask, shaking my head in disbelief. ‘All that stuff about us not being right for each other, about me being too boring for you… You didn’t just want a woman? You wanted a dominatrix? You wanted to be a woman’s sex slave?’

  Charlotte bites his lip. ‘I… I should’ve been more honest with you, Klein.’

  Grant laughs. ‘So many dirty little perverts in this room, aren’t there?’ He claps his hands together. ‘Ah well.’ He looks at Samson. ‘Time to give me my gun back now, bruv. Say thank you to me for letting you play with it for a while.’

  Samson shakes his head. ‘You’s fucking evil, man,’ he says in a low voice. He looks at all the guns pointed at him, one by one, and then, slowly, he hands the gun back to Grant.

  I mean, what choice did he have?

  ‘Now get on the floor, gents,’ says Grant. ‘Kitty’s gonna hogtie the lot of you, and then you’re gonna squeal like piggies for me.’

  Hunter looks across the room at me. Poor Hunter.

  He looks so full of shame, but none of this is his fault. How was he to know it would end up like this? I wish I could run over to him, take him in my arms and kiss him. I wish I could just snap my fingers a
nd open my eyes and realise this was all a dream… then wake up, naked and warm in bed with him… I only wish I’d had time to tell him how I feel before we…

  Oh god. Are we really going to die? Would Grant actually kill us? I mean, we’re all witnesses to this now, aren’t we? There’s no way he’d just let us all leave.

  Our only hope now is that the police come and rescue us.

  I always thought, if I knew the end was coming, I’d be so horrifically scared of dying that I wouldn’t be able to think about anything else.

  All that stuff about your life flashing before your eyes just before you go seemed like a lie to me.

  Why think about the past when what’s happening in the present is so all-encompassing?

  And, actually, I was half-right. Now that I’m faced with the possibility that my life is about to be over, I’m not thinking about the past.

  But then, I’m not really thinking about the present, either.

  I’m thinking about the future.

  What it might have looked like if he and I had been able to make it. Spending our first Christmas together. Taking a holiday in the summertime. Waking up beside each other, one random day, five years in the future.

  How he and I might both look.

  How we’ll talk, joke, touch each other.

  Would we have adopted a dog?

  Or a kid?

  How might we have grown together as lovers, as people?

  I can’t bear the idea of never finding out.

  That’s what it really means to be scared of dying. Scared of never finding out. Scared of not waking up tomorrow morning and being able to look at his face, to begin our journey into the future together.

  ‘Kitty’s very good at tying knots,’ says Grant. ‘I expect you know about that, eh, Charlotte? I expect she’s tied you up now and then, eh?’ Grant begins to pace up and down the room now. The meat-heads standing around the edge of the room keep their guns pointed at us, but their eyes follow him. What does a guy like that have to do to get people to obey him? Money? Are they scared of him? Do they worship him? Maybe it’s a bit of both.

  ‘Yeah,’ Grant continues, ‘Kitty was the brains behind this whole thing, as it happens. You wouldn’t think it to look at her, but she’s a clever little squirrel, aren’t you, Kittle?’

  Kittle? Ugh. That’s even worse than her actual name.

  I kneel on the floor. Kitty’s sharp, long fingernails dig into me as she ties me up.

  ‘You mean you’ve been planning this ever since you inspired my wife to cheat on me?’ I ask.

  Kitty grins. ‘Yeah. Amazing, innit? I had to put up with her all this time, whinging and whining at me about how shit she feels for cheating on you. Asking her to tie him up and flick her off while I tell her what a terrible person she is? Ugh, the stuff I’ve had to do to that disgusting woman, just to try and get her money. It’s a full-time job, I tell you.’

  ‘How come it’s taken you so long?’ I ask. ‘I found you and Charlotte in bed together over half a year ago.’

  ‘Yeah, well it wasn’t supposed to take that fucking long,’ Kitty says. ‘Charlotte said that once she left you, you’d be selling off some of your assets. The house in Greece, all that stuff. Plus, I knew you were just finishing off a major project. What was it? An eco-friendly community centre in South London? Some shit like that. Knew you’d be getting some big bucks for it. Wanted to make sure that when I asked you for ten million, I’d stand a good chance of getting it.’

  I’m never going to tell this to Kitty, of course, but I’m a billionaire. Ten million pounds is a lot of money, but if I sold all my assets, she’d be able to get her hands on way more than that.

  ‘If you kill me now,’ I say, ‘you’ll only ever get the seven-hundred-thousand from the safe. Is it really worth risking getting done for murder for so little?’

  ‘Thing is,’ says Kitty, ‘while we’ve been chatting, I’ve got men downstairs, taking all sorts of expensive shit from your house. Statues, artworks. Call them my insurance policy. I had Grant scope the place out when he last came here. Sent a few photos on his phone to local investors. Some of the ugly junk you’ve got in this place is worth a shitload, you know? Two and a half million will top up that seven hundred thousand very nicely indeed, ta very much.’

  Grant reaches into Kitty’s bag, and pulls out a huge silver tin.

  ‘Mmm,’ he says, taking the lid off the tin. ‘I just love the smell of petrol! Don’t you?’ He tips the can upside down and pours a huge glug of it onto my desk.

  ‘Oh my fucking god,’ says Hunter. ‘Are you seriously about to do this? You’re going to fucking burn us all to death? Are you a psycho?’

  Rowan shrieks. ‘No! Please. I’m scared of fire.’

  Grant laughs. ‘If you’re a good boy, I’ll save a bullet especially for you, then.’

  ‘No!’ shouts Hunter, crossing his arms. ‘You’re not shooting anybody. None of you are.’

  ‘Sit down, you cunt,’ says Grant. ‘It’s you’re turn to be tied up in a minute. Be a good boy.’ He looks at the boneheads pointing their guns at us, and says: ‘I take it you left your petrol in the hallway, fellas? Time to get pouring it out, just like we agreed. Do it everywhere. And fast.’

  Grant stops pouring for a moment, and grabs the money out of the safe, counting under his breath while the men tuck their guns into the backs of their jeans and march out.

  Is this our chance? Can we somehow take Kitty and Grant down now the other guys have gone? Grant still has a gun, and Hunter’s the only one that hasn’t been tied up yet.

  Hunter, still standing near the doorway, looks out at the guys in the hall, watching them spread out into different areas of the house. He looks at me, and then at Samson, who Kitty has almost finished tying up, and then, in the most blood-curdling voice I have ever heard — a voice that sounds nothing like him — he screams ‘Code red! Code fucking red!’

  Suddenly, everything descends into chaos. I hear the sound of cupboard doors flying open and bouncers screaming, wrestling with the big, bone-headed men, and then… I can hear bodies, thumping down on the floor… handcuffs being clipped around wrists…

  ‘You stupid faggot,’ says Grant, whipping around and pointing the gun in Hunter’s face.

  But at that moment, just as Kitty is bending down trying to finish off her knot, Samson lunges forwards and headbutts her.

  Kitty immediately drops to the floor, and Hunter takes advantage of the distraction to deliver an uppercut to Grant’s jaw that’s so forceful that the gun flies out of his hand.

  Then, he whips something out of his pocket and sprays it in Grant’s face. Of course: the pepper spray.

  Grant yells and staggers backwards, falling to the floor, writhing around in pain.

  Quick as a flash, Hunter grabs the handcuff that’s still attached to his left hand, and clips the other cuff around Kitty’s wrist. Then, he runs over to Samson, and unties his hands and feet. Samson grabs the money that’s sticking out of Grant’s back pocket. He tries to roll over, to see what’s going on, but he’s weighed down by Kitty.

  ‘Give me back that money,’ he says, his eyes red and streaming. He reaches into his pocket, and takes out a silver lighter. ‘Otherwise this whole house is going up in flames.’

  ‘You set this house on fire, you’ll kill yourself,’ says Hunter, untying Rowan next.

  I’m the last one to be left tied up, but I know why Hunter’s doing it this way. Got to set the strongest free first, as they’re the most useful. They can fight… unlike me.

  Grant rolls onto his side and manages to heave a still-unconscious Kitty into an upright position, so that he can sit up beside her.

  ‘I’m not joking,’ he says. ‘I’ll send this whole place up in flames if you don’t hand over that cash. If you don’t give me that cash, I’ve got fuck-all to live for anyway.’

  Hunter shakes his head. ‘You’re not having the money,’ he says. ‘And you’re going to live a very long and healthy
life in jail, don’t you worry.’

  ‘Fuck it,’ Grant says, with a growl. ‘I’m not going to the fucking pokey.’

  I hear the quick, scratchy sound of the lighter being ignited, and then I see the orange-blue flame.

  ‘Evacuate the building!’ yells Hunter. ‘Get the fuck out, everyone, now!’

  He puts his arms around me and hoists me up into the air at the same moment that I suddenly start to feel very hot, and the room becomes very bright. Coughing and spluttering, he carries me down the stairs, and I hear the sound of footsteps running all around us.

  ‘Out, out!’ yells Hunter.

  He puts me down on the pavement on the other side of the road and instructs Samson to untie me, then he does a quick head count. ‘Twenty-one,’ he shouts. ‘There’s one more. One more! Who is it? Where the fuck is he?’

  ‘Stop!’ I cry out. ‘Please, Hunter! It’s not safe!’

  But Hunter has already started running back towards then house, and then, he ducks into the thick, grey smoke and the angry, red flames.

  My breath catches in my throat as I watch and wait.

  ‘Hunts is fuckin’ tough,’ says Samson. ‘Don’t worry. He’ll be out. You’ll see.’

  But it’s not Hunter that emerges from the flames now. It’s three of the guys who were carrying guns. Their hands are cuffed behind their backs.

  ‘Someone call the police!’ I scream. ‘Call a fire engine! And an ambulance! Call everything!’

  Samson finishes untying me and I start running towards the house.

  ‘No!’ yells Rowan, barring my way. ‘Let me go.’

  My eyes fill with tears, and I let him go.

  I don’t know what to do. I’m so scared. I look up and down the street, trying to think.

  And then I remember. Of course. The policeman waiting in the car. He can help us.

  I run down to the end of the street, wondering why he hasn’t bothered to do anything about all this yet.

  When I get to the car, I see him slumped over, asleep, a pile of uneaten jam doughnuts on the seat next to him.

  And then I realise that it’s not jam at all.