Especially Mark.
Mayer didn’t even want to think about the potential future. Should they not catch Pope and remove Devereux from the equation, he knew Frank would give the order.
Mark would likely kill him. Painfully.
Suddenly his phone buzzed, and he flicked open the message. For the first time in nearly two weeks, he felt a degree of positivity.
It was Officer Khambay.
Sam Pope had been brought in. Excitedly, he told Frank that they had him. When Frank demanded more, Mayer relayed the question. Khambay explained that Pearce had locked Pope in an interview room, but he had just seen Pope leave and head to the archive room. Before Mayer could try and wrest control of the situation once more, Frank ended their communication. He then called Brian Stack, who was in the very office that Sam was headed to. As Mayer sat, emasculated and praying for it all to be over, he felt his heart jump with panic at the order that followed. Without a hint of remorse in his voice, Frank ‘the Gent’ Jackson said two terrifying words.
‘Kill him.’
Under the glare of the halogen lights, Sam quickly ran his finger across the document separators, each one tagged to a set of boxes pertaining to certain cases. Before all of this had started, and after his family had left him, this had been his life. Countless hours spent in these darkened corridors, lined by dusty shelves packed to the brim with old boxes. Inside was a myriad of paperwork, all of them pertaining to different cases, all diligently filed away by himself.
The quiet of the archive room was what had attracted him to the job. After what had happened all those years ago, when he lost his drive to serve the country once more, he welcomed the solitude of the darkness. No one else had access to the room, and the walkways between the shelves were so narrow he could only just stand straight.
It was the loneliest place in the station.
As his hand began to run along the tags marked H, he heard a shuffle behind him.
Instantly he turned, fists clenched and his defence up.
The temp shuffled by, holding up an apologetic hand as he pushed the metal cart, the wheels squeaking under the weight of the two boxes. The temp was middle-aged, stocky, and bald. He looked more like an ex-convict than an administrator, but Sam had seen worse. Harding was hardly a saint. He scolded himself for thinking ill of the dead, a state that his previous job had made him accustomed to.
He found the box.
Eagerly lifting it from the shelf to the floor, Sam squatted down and began to rummage through. The files had all been labelled and he found the manila folder that had all the case notes for Howell’s final case.
Sam snatched the paper from the folder and stuffed it into his jacket pocket, hoping it would hold a clue.
At that second he realised he had seen the temp before—driving the four-by-four that Chris Morton had left the court in a few weeks previously.
He heard the footstep behind him just in time.
Brian reached around Sam’s head, his gloved hand eagerly grasping a jagged blade with the intent to slice his throat. Sam managed to raise his arm just in time, wedging it between the vicious weapon and his throat. The rough, coarse metal sliced into his forearm and the burly man applied as much pressure as he could, intent to push Sam to the floor and murder him in cold blood.
Sam’s fists clenched.
Survive.
With all his might, Sam launched backwards, dropping the attacker onto his back and driving the air out of both of them. With a hard shunt of his arm, Brian loosened his grip from his throat and Sam sprang forward, the blade wildly slashing behind him and running across his calf.
It split the skin, a roar of pain shooting to his brain, but Sam instantly shut it down. Brian got to his feet, blood dripping from the blade and a murderous glee shimmering in his eyes.
Sam faced him, and in that moment the silence sat between them in the narrow confines of the archive.
They stared at each other, silently agreeing that this was to the death.
Brian lunged forward, slicing the air with the blade as Sam took a few steps back, the pressure causing more blood to pump from his calf. Brian took one step too far and lunged too close, allowing Sam to turn in and throw a forearm up to block the attempted stab before rocking him with a hard right to the ribs. Brian stepped back before swiping once more for the throat. Sam dodged, ducking under and nailing another few hits before kicking out and catching Brian on the shin. Brian stumbled, the knife flailing wildly through the confined space, and Sam grabbed his wrist, trying to snap it and disarm him. Brian, considerably heavier, threw himself into the shelving unit, crushing Sam against the metal.
Sam refused to let go, digging his thumbs into the pressure points and relenting as the knife clattered to the ground. Brian responded by head-butting him, crashing his forehead into Sam’s jaw before slamming his head off of the shelving unit. Sam fell backwards and Brian swung a vicious right. Sam, gathering his thoughts, threw up an elbow, catching Brian in the centre of the forearm. His arm jolted back and Sam followed with two left jabs before catching his attacker with a hard hook. The skin above Brian’s eye split, blood trickling down like war paint.
The bald gangster yelled in anger before hauling a box of files from the shelving unit and hurling it at Sam. Despite Sam deflecting the heavy box with his shoulder, it still knocked him off balance, the next box catching him hard in the chest.
He stumbled back, the air driven from his lungs before Brian charged, slamming his shoulder into Sam’s midriff and lifting him from the ground. A few more steps and Brian dropped him onto the hard tiled floor below.
The air shot from Sam’s body.
His vision blurred as his skull cracked against the floor.
As his brain rattled in his skull, Sam knew he had to get up, turning onto his front and hauling himself towards the end of the aisle. Behind him, he heard the blade scrape against the floor as his attacker retrieved it. The footsteps echoed behind him as he pulled himself up, turning just in time for the knife to be driven into his shoulder.
Sam shot both arms up to hold off the attack, the bald attacker pressing forward with both hands and his entire body weight. The blade split the jacket and his skin, the top inch slicing through his muscle and into his shoulder as the two men stumbled backwards.
Sam let out a groan of pain and they stumbled back through the shelving units and into the small admin area, slamming into an old metal filing cabinet. Sam felt the strength in his shoulder giving out as the blade slowly burrowed into his body.
His eyes dashed around his surrounding area, looking at anything he could use.
He needed to get free.
With a roar of pain and adrenaline, Sam pushed the blade out of his shoulder and lifted the man’s arms above his head. Then, as quick as he could, he drew him forward and spun to the side, slamming the man’s face into the edge of the filing cabinet, his nose exploding as blood and cartilage splattered the metal.
Three striking blows—one to the neck, one to the ribs, and another to the base of the spine—sent the man crashing into the cabinet once more. From the bloodcurdling wheezing, Sam knew the man was beaten.
He picked up the knife, shaking his head as the pain from his shoulder began to intensify.
Sam needed to leave.
With a limp, he slowly made his way back through the shelving units towards the door, hoping to God that Pearce was waiting for him. Whatever the hell he had stumbled onto, they had tried to murder him in the Metropolitan Police Office.
They wanted him silenced.
As he shuffled through, the sudden sound of footsteps thundered behind him, the shelves shaking in terror.
Brian raced at him, his face a broken and bloodied mess.
Sam instinctively threw the knife, the blade spinning through the air and embedding itself right in Brian’s meaty neck.
The blood sprayed like a Las Vegas fountain as the man hit the ground, twitching feebly as his life quickly escaped through t
he gushing pool of blood that quickly filled the aisle.
Sam sighed, knowing he had broken his promise to his son yet again.
Brian was dead.
With the file notes in his pocket, blood pouring from three knife wounds, and a dead body to explain, Sam slowly made his way to the door and back into the police office.
CHAPTER TWENTY
As Sam opened the door, he was immediately slammed against the wall. Officer Khambay snarled as he tried to cuff Sam, latching one of the metal clasps around his wrist. The other officers, who were previously lurking behind their apparent leader, were cheering him on.
He was going to be the one to catch Sam Pope.
The glory was his.
‘You are under arrest for…’ Sam cut Khambay off by slipping his grasp and tugging the stab-proof vest that rested on his broad torso. The momentum pulled Khambay face-first into the wall, the hard surface breaking his nose.
‘Enough!’
Pearce burst through the crowd, stepping between a clearly injured Sam and a furious Khambay.
‘He broke my fucking nose!’ Khambay roared, provoked further by the lack of fear on Sam’s face.
‘Just back off,’ Pearce ordered.
A few of Khambay’s colleagues moved forward, pulling Khambay away from the senior officer. Pearce turned back to Sam, whose face was grimacing as he clasped his shoulder. The stab wound was clear and Pearce was terrified at what he would find in the archive office. As the officers led Khambay to get medical attention, Pearce knew it was only a matter of time before the order came down from higher to hand Pope over.
‘Thanks,’ Sam offered as Pearce hauled him away from the wall. Blood dripped between the fingers of the hand pressed against his arm.
‘Well, don’t thank me yet.’ Pearce smiled, guiding Sam towards the corridor.
They moved quickly, with Pearce pushing open the door to the office. Through the gap in the door, he could see Khambay and his crew talking to a few other officers.
They were baying for blood.
‘We need to go out the back,’ Pearce decided, turning back to Sam, who nodded his agreement. Just then, the alarm squealed from the ceiling above and the building instantly went into lockdown mode. The shrill alarm echoed down the corridors, ricocheting off every surface like a ping-pong ball. As the noise tore its way through their ears, Sam tried his best to yell over it.
‘I don’t think that’s the bell for lunch.’
Pearce shook his head, then nodded to the stairwell, which they headed to, taking them two at a time. They almost collided with a few panicked admin workers, who were stunned at the sight of Pearce and a bloodied man bounding up the stairs. They burst out into the corridor of the third floor with Sam groaning gently with pain, the blood seeping through the back of his jeans. Pearce stopped at a green first-aid box attached to the wall, ignored all regulations, and ripped it from its plastic bracket.
Suddenly the drumming of regimented boots hurtling up the staircase they had just taken caused them to turn. Pearce ducked back through the door, only to see eight armed response officers racing up the stairs.
Whatever it was that Sam had stumbled upon, Mayer was determined to keep him quiet.
‘This way,’ Pearce yelled, jogging down the corridor and pushing open the door to a small conference room. The walls were a bland white, faded with age. A few posters adorned the walls, offering membership to the police pension and encouraging officers to trust each other. Sam could have laughed at the irony. He shuffled in behind Pearce, who closed the door before quickly turning the latch. The armed response unit would march to the top floor before systematically working their way down, floor by floor, sweeping the building before they found them. With the exits blocked, Pearce knew it was only a matter of time before the door crashed open and a number of laser dots befell both men. Whether or not they would be followed by bullets, Pearce couldn’t be sure.
Judging by the look on Sam’s face, neither could he. Sam eased his arm out of his bloodied jacket, the sleeve looking like it had been dipped in water. His T-shirt had a small tear in it, revealing the stab wound. Pearce instantly placed the first-aid box on the table, wrenching it open before pulling out some antiseptic.
‘This is going to hurt,’ he warned, but Sam reached up, snatched the bottle, and tipped it over the tear in his skin. He gritted his teeth, his fist clenching with pain causing his bicep to stretch his T-shirt. Pearce, impressed, took a cotton pad and pressed it against the wound before taping it down with the surgical tape. It was crude, but it would be enough until they could get to Theo.
Or, more likely, they were both arrested at gunpoint.
‘What the hell happened in there?’ Pearce demanded, slamming the box shut and pushing it to the side.
‘Someone attacked me. Not police. He’s a henchman for the Gent.’
‘The Gent’? Pearce questioned, his grey eyebrow arching. ‘How the hell do you know about him?’
Sam sighed. ‘Really, Pearce? You want to do this now?’ Sam said angrily, lifting his ruined jacket from the conference table and rummaging in the pockets.
‘I was right, wasn’t I?’ Pearce stated confidently. ‘You were my guy. You’ve been working those night shifts.’
‘You know what, yes. I have been. And you can arrest me for it or you can help me figure out what the fuck is going on. Because right now, whatever is happening is bigger than you and me.’
Pearce smiled, happy with his own suspicions being confirmed but also knowing that despite having been correct about Pope being a dangerous vigilante, he was also a soldier. A man who had risked his life for his country. And a man who, at that moment, was going against the Metropolitan Police to get the truth.
‘Okay. We’ll park it for now,’ Pearce confirmed, turning to the paperwork that Sam was laying out on the table. ‘What’s this?’
‘It’s Howell’s final case before he was murdered,’ Sam said, not looking up as he sifted through the files. ‘Nothing too interesting. A complaint by some government man about being intimidated. Nothing new.’
‘Who?’ Pearce asked, lifting one of the pages.
‘Hold on.’ Sam lifted the paper. ‘The head of city planning.’
‘Earnshaw?’ Pearce said. The look on his face told Sam that a puzzle piece had just fallen into place.
‘Yeah. Why?’
‘Derek Earnshaw was one of the injured people at the bombing that killed Howell,’ Pearce stated. ‘He was passing the corner when the damn thing went off. Took his leg.’
‘Jesus,’ Sam said, remembering the injuries he saw during his tours, watching Theo treat an amputee in the heat of battle. They continued reading through, with Sam slapping a piece of paper down.
‘Here.’ He pressed his finger on the paragraph. ‘Earnshaw made a complaint that two bald men tried to break into his office after he denied an application for a takeover of three derelict buildings in the city.’
Pearce scooped up the sheet of paper, his eyes scanning back and forth like a typewriter. ‘How do you know it’s that?’
‘Because two bald men work for the Gent and he just happens to have a few buildings like that in the city.’
‘Yeah, the High-Rises. Where the police don’t go and the law doesn’t exist.’
‘You know about these places?’ Sam asked with interest.
‘Of course I do. Son, I’ve been investigating corrupt cops since back when you popping spots. I know all about the perks that man offers.’ He shook his head in disgust. ‘I’m guessing I don’t want to know how you happen to know about them.’
‘Morton,’ Sam confessed, getting a reserved nod in return. ‘And those bald men, one of them just tried to kill me.’
‘Is he—?’ Pearce didn’t need to finish the question. The stairwell door burst open, the sound echoing up the corridor. Their boots clapped against the tiled floor, their guns rattled as they burst into the first office, the commanding officer confirming it vacant as they moved
on.
Time was fast running out.
‘Earnshaw was released from hospital a few days ago.’
‘Then we need to speak to him,’ Sam said, walking towards the window of the office, and with his one good arm, shunting it open. ‘We need to know what exactly what is going on.’
‘Why?’ Pearce asked, stopping him in his tracks. ‘Why are you doing all this?’
Sam stopped, staring out at the Thames over twenty feet below. Across the river, the London Southbank burst to life in an array of lights, the London Eye towering over everything.
That question had run through his mind a few times; when he was ducked behind the sofa at Amy’s whilst bullets flew past him. As he drove down the wrong side of the motorway, confirming his stance as a fugitive. Or as he faced down a brutal killer with a knife in his hand.
Every time he arrived at the same answer.
The same one he replied with.
‘Because it’s the right thing to do.’
The door to the office next door slammed against the wall as the armed officers filtered in, their combined movements causing the table to shake. Sam nodded his gratitude to Pearce, knowing he had confessed to his own crimes before he slowly draped one leg through the window.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ a worried Pearce said, throwing down the paperwork and rushing towards the window.
‘I’ll be in touch.’
At that moment, the door to the office flew off its hinges, and black-clad men burst in, assault rifles pressed to their shoulders, their trigger fingers itchy. Pearce threw up his hands in surrender, blocking their view of the window and their line of sight to Sam.
‘Get down!’ the first through the door ordered, his gun aimed squarely at Pearce’s chest.
Sam leapt.
Pushing his feet off the wall, he launched himself away from the building, watching as the bright city whipped past him. The spring breeze rushed into his lungs as he plummeted, the Thames rushing towards him as he crashed into the water. Behind him, he could hear the muffled cries of the angry officers that had burst into the room. He swam, his shoulder creaking with every stroke, his breath held tight as he waded through the polluted water.
The Night Shift: A high octane thriller that will have you gripped. (Sam Pope Series Book 1) Page 15