State of Fear

by Tim Ayliffe

  ‘You’re bloody hopeless,’ Dexter said, stepping out of his embrace.

  ‘And hopeful.’

  She smiled. It was good enough. For now. ‘I’ve got to go. Wait up for me . . . maybe a late dinner tonight?’

  ‘Sounds good.’

  Bailey watched her drive away as Ben sidled up beside him, a cheeky smirk on his face.

  ‘So you and the cop, eh?’

  ‘It’s complicated.’

  ‘Always is.’

  Bailey turned to face him after Dexter’s car disappeared up the road. ‘Do you like rugby?’

  ‘Yeah, I do. Used to play a bit.’

  ‘Didn’t we all,’ Bailey said. ‘Local derby between Harlequins and Saracens. Kicks off in an hour at Twickenham.’

  ‘The Stoop,’ Ben said, knowingly.

  ‘Guess you won’t mind coming with me, then?’

  ‘Do I have a choice, Mr Bailey?’

  ‘No, you don’t,’ Bailey said. ‘And, Ben, one more thing before we go.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Stop bloody calling me “Mister” Bailey.’

  CHAPTER 50

  The Stoop was an old stadium with seats painted the same maroon, blue and green as the Harlequins’ playing jersey. The grass was immaculate, but the stadium was in serious need of a refurbishment. It didn’t bother Bailey, he’d watch a game of rugby anywhere, anytime.

  They’d made it in time for kick-off and, just as the ball was sailing into the air off the boot of the Harlequins’ New Zealand import, Bailey was sitting down with a hog bap in his hand.

  People with accents from New Zealand, Australia, Ireland and Scotland were mixing in with the locals, belting out songs and yelling at players on the field. Tackle harder! Run faster! Smash him, bro! Rugby might be having its problems back in Australia, but hearing the crowd reminded Bailey that it was a global game. And he loved it.

  There was nothing like watching rugby live. Hearing the thud of the tackles, broad shoulders crashing together in scrum-time collisions, scrum halves directing the traffic and fly halves calling the moves. Bailey loved the camaraderie of the contest.

  Today the Saracens were on the back foot and their players were screaming for someone to take down the Quins’ little winger who’d been cutting up the field every time he got the ball.

  Ten minutes in and the Quins were 12-nil up on the scoreboard. They were running the ball from everywhere, and the Saracens players didn’t seem to have any answers.

  Rugby was like a chess game. It could turn at any moment. One poor kick, intercepted pass or missed tackle, and the Saracens would be back in it.

  Bailey was getting into it, egging the visiting team on.

  And then his phone started vibrating. Dexter.

  He answered just as the Saracens number two jumper plucked the ball from the air and his forward pack crowded behind him, forming a perfect rolling maul, the ball transferring to the back, tucked under the arm of a wily hooker who, seconds later, fell over the line to claim the Saracens’ first points of the game.

  Yeah!

  The crowd erupted in cheers.

  ‘Sharon! Are you there?’ Bailey yelled into the phone, his hands cupped around the receiver. ‘Sharon!’

  When the roar of the crowd subsided, Bailey could just make out Dexter’s voice on the other end of the phone.

  ‘Where the hell are you, Bailey?’

  ‘I’m watching a rugby game down at Twickenham.’

  ‘You’re what?’

  ‘Don’t panic. I’ve got young Ben here watching over me.’

  ‘Twickenham Stadium?’

  ‘The Stoop,’ Bailey said.

  ‘Ayesha wants to talk to you.’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘I can barely bloody hear you over the noise of the crowd.’ Dexter was sounding annoyed. ‘I’m coming to pick you up, I’ll text you when I’m close. Meet me out the front.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Bailey looked at his watch. Beer was off the table but he probably had time for another hog bap. It’d be a crime not to.

  ‘There she is.’

  Dexter was double-parked about fifty metres up the road from the stadium, leaning on her car and looking at her watch.

  ‘Hello there, stranger,’ Bailey said. ‘Twice in one day, I’m starting to feel blessed.’

  She walked up close to Bailey. ‘Are you sure being out like this is a good idea?’

  ‘I’ve been locked in a bloody room for days,’ Bailey said, slightly annoyed. ‘I needed to get out.’

  ‘Well, you’re about to get locked in another one. Ayesha’s waiting for us.’

  Bailey turned to Ben. ‘You get your car, I’ll travel with Sharon.’

  ‘Sure,’ Ben said. ‘But you’ll need to wait for me.’

  Dexter nodded her head. ‘Meet you here?’

  ‘Yeah, give me five.’

  Ben turned around and jogged off towards the carpark.

  It was getting cold outside so Dexter and Bailey climbed in the car to wait for him.

  ‘So, what’s this about?’ Bailey said.

  ‘She wouldn’t tell me. Something about Mustafa al-Baghdadi, I’m hoping,’ Dexter said. ‘It’s not the first time she’s asked for you. What you did on that bus – apart from being stupid – it left an impression on her. She trusts you.’

  ‘Yeah, well. As I keep trying to tell people, she’s just a kid.’

  Dexter checked her rear-view mirror to see if Ben was close. ‘What’s this idiot doing?’

  Bailey turned and clocked an old four-wheel drive speeding on the wrong side of the road towards them.

  ‘What the –’

  At the last minute the four-wheel drive swerved and rammed into the side of their car, throwing Bailey out of his seat and up onto the dashboard, bashing his head on the windscreen, before he bounced off the door and back onto his seat.

  He opened his eyes. Something warm and wet was running down his forehead.

  Dexter had her seatbelt on so she hadn’t been thrown like Bailey, but there was blood coming from her nose and she was holding the back of her neck.

  ‘Are you okay?’

  Bailey felt Dexter’s hand on his shoulder.

  ‘Bailey? Are you okay?’

  He was dizzy but he didn’t feel like he’d broken anything. ‘Yeah, I think so.’

  The four-wheel drive’s bonnet had crinkled like a potato chip and smoke was billowing out the sides. it had rammed into Bailey’s side of the car, which meant that he couldn’t open his door. Two men wearing face masks were walking around the front of the car, pistols in hand, towards Dexter’s door.

  Bailey’s senses were coming back. ‘Hit the lock!’

  Dexter locked the door just as the two men appeared at her side of the car. One of them pulled a crowbar from his jacket and used it to punch through the window, then reached inside and unlocked the door. He grabbed hold of Dexter and started pulling her out of the car.

  ‘Let her go! Let her go!’

  Bailey had a hold of her left arm in a tug-of-war with the two men outside, while Dexter bashed at them with her fists. As an Australian cop on British soil, Dexter wasn’t carrying a gun. All she could do was fight. The bastards were strong and Bailey was being dragged across the gear-stick and onto the driver’s seat as they tried to wrench Dexter out the door.

  One of the men let go of Dexter and pushed past her to get to Bailey. He pointed his pistol like he was about to shoot Bailey in the head. Only he didn’t, switching grips so that he was holding his gun like a hammer, bashing it into Bailey’s cheek.

  Once.

  Twice.

  By the third blow, Bailey was out cold.

  Bang! Bang! Bang!

  The sound of gunshots brought Bailey back.

  His head was aching and he was lying across the centre console of the car, his cheek resting on the driver’s seat in a pool of his own blood.

  He looked up and saw Ben standing in the middle of the street
pointing his gun at a blue van speeding off down the road. A few rounds from Ben’s gun smashed its back window. It wasn’t enough to stop them. The van disappeared around a corner.

  Bailey was clambering out of the car, trying to steady himself, looking for any sign of Dexter. There was glass from the shattered window all over the footpath. A splatter of blood. Dexter was gone.

  ‘Your car! Where’s your car?’ Bailey yelled at Ben.

  Ben turned around and Bailey could see that he was talking on his phone. Calling it in. Calling for back-up. Calling for a helicopter to track the blue van with a rear window that had been blown out by gunfire.

  ‘Where’s your bloody car?’

  Ben put his phone away and jogged over to Bailey.

  ‘I never made it back to the car. I saw the four-wheel drive speeding along the street . . . the men in masks . . . I didn’t have time. I just bolted.’ Ben was trying to catch his breath. ‘When I got here they were shoving Dexter into the back of the van. They were coming back for you when they saw me with my gun out.’ Ben pointed at the footpath beside Bailey. ‘I was right here. I tried to stop them. I did. I’m sorry.’

  Bailey was up off his knees, wiping the blood from his eyes with his shirtsleeve.

  He dug his phone from his pocket, searching for the only name he could trust.

  ‘Ronnie,’ Bailey yelled into the receiver. ‘Dexter’s been taken.’

  CHAPTER 51

  The boardroom at Thames House was packed with people.

  For John Bailey, it felt like the loneliest place in the world.

  Documents and laptop computers were spread across the table and counter-terrorism police and MI5 agents were busily sharing intelligence and handing each other photographs and sheets of paper filled with information about terrorist suspects.

  Bailey knew that trying to find Dexter was like searching for a lost coin in long grass. A job that needed more luck than skill.

  ‘I want you to chase down every source you have, every rat hole that an Islamic Nation cell could be hiding in.’ Tony Dorset was addressing the room, standing in front of the whiteboard with Mustafa al-Baghdadi’s name and photograph on it. ‘Three thousand active terrorist investigations. Twenty-three thousand persons of interest. We’re looking for anyone with a suspected link to Mustafa al-Baghdadi.’

  Bailey felt like he was sitting in a war room listening to a general talk about dropping bombs without knowing specific targets. It was useless. But Dorset wanted him there because, whether Bailey liked it or not, he knew more about Mustafa than anyone.

  ‘If anyone fits the profile. If anyone has ever had any allegiance, suggested or otherwise, to Islamic Nation, then speak up!’ Dorset told the room. ‘Talk to me or talk to John Bailey. The clock’s ticking on this, we don’t know what the next play might be, we only know that it’s coming.’

  Ronnie Johnson appeared at the door with Ann Pritchard leading the way. They came straight over to Bailey.

  ‘I’m sorry, Bailey,’ Pritchard said. ‘We’ll find her.’

  ‘Yeah, you better.’

  ‘Anything more from the Met?’ Dorset had joined them. London’s Metropolitan Police had sent hundreds of cops to addresses all over the city looking for any sign of the blue van or the masked men who’d been at the wheel.

  ‘They found the van,’ Pritchard said. ‘Set on fire in St John’s Wood. Police are going through CCTV to see what they can find. Anything here, yet?’

  ‘We’re working on it.’

  Pritchard and Dorset excused themselves to the corner of the room so that Dorset could update his boss on everything else, leaving Ronnie and Bailey standing together.

  ‘We’ll find her, bubba,’ Ronnie said, resting one of his big hands on Bailey’s shoulder.

  ‘What makes you so sure?’

  ‘I’ve got my people working on it too.’

  ‘Yeah, well. I’ve seen how these things . . .’ Bailey stopped himself from finishing the sentence. ‘And we’ve been in here for hours, already. Where the bloody hell have you been?’

  ‘Working. We’ve got our own eyes and ears all over this city. It’s why I’m telling you that we’ll find her. This isn’t Raqqa or Mosul. In this city, these guys are amateurs. Fanatics. They won’t be able to hide in a concrete jungle for too long without getting noticed.’

  ‘Mustafa’s avoided you all so far.’

  ‘Trust me, bubba.’

  Over the next six hours, Bailey worked as hard as anyone in the room, answering random questions and studying photographs and files of people he’d never heard of before. There were empty pizza boxes and coffee cups piled in the corner along with plastic bags with half-eaten curry takeaways. The room was starting to smell like a sweaty kitchen in a cheap Brick Lane restaurant.

  Ronnie was off chasing his own leads from whatever American assets he had thrown together in London. He’d promised to check back in with Bailey if anything moved.

  Bailey looked at his watch. It was 1 am.

  ‘You should go get cleaned up, get some rest.’ Tony Dorset was standing beside Bailey with a plastic ID card in his hand. ‘I cut you a security pass, means you can come and go.’

  ‘I’m fine, mate.’

  ‘You’re not fine, Bailey, you’ve still got dried blood on the side of your neck and your clothes are a mess. I’m not saying don’t come back. I’m just saying at least go get yourself cleaned up. We’ll keep going here, don’t worry.’

  Bailey touched his neck and he could feel the crusted blood on his skin. He thought he’d wiped it away with the wet towel they’d given him hours earlier. His shirt was torn and stained with blood and dirt. Maybe Dorset was right. Bailey didn’t feel like he was contributing much at the moment, anyway.

  ‘Okay.’ He took the security pass and lifted the lanyard over his neck. ‘Thanks for this.’

  He was halfway down the corridor when a voice called out to him.

  ‘Mr Bailey!’

  It was Ben. Bailey stopped and waited for him at the lifts.

  ‘I’m sorry about what happened back there. I know that she was . . . is –’

  ‘Forget it.’ Bailey patted him on the shoulder. ‘Wasn’t your fault, kid. Just do me a favour: find her.’

  ‘I’m not going home till we do.’

  CHAPTER 52

  The warm water needles of the shower felt good.

  Bailey made a thick lather of soap with his hands and scrubbed his neck and face, watching the brown water circle down the drain at his feet. Dried blood turning to liquid.

  Drying himself in front of the bathroom mirror, Bailey caught sight of the discolouration on the right side of his face where the guy in the mask had bashed him with the butt of his pistol. There were red and purple bruises on his chest and stomach too. The adrenalin had long gone and the pain was kicking in.

  He swivelled his body and lifted his arm so that he could inspect his back. At least the burn was healing. A crusty scab had formed where the blistering skin had been.

  Bailey leaned across the wash basin, patting his face with the towel, staring at the middle-aged man in the glass. A man he barely recognised. Greying hair, drooping eyes, weathered skin. A man who’d become a danger to anyone who got close to him. Gerald. Father Joe. Miranda. Now Dexter had been taken and he felt powerless to find her.

  Whack!

  His fist crashed into the mirror, splintering the glass like a spider’s web.

  Specks of blood were growing like miniature balloons on his knuckles. One by one, they popped, leaving a bloody trail down his fingers as they trickled into the white porcelain sink.

  Bailey turned on the tap to wash away the blood and grabbed a small towel, wrapping it around his fist.

  He looked at himself again, the face in the mirror distorted by splintered glass.

  Bailey knew this guy. The damaged alcoholic loner who didn’t sleep. He knew this guy, all right, and he loathed him.

  Thud. Thud. Thud.

  Bailey woke to the s
ound of someone bashing on the door of his hotel room.

  Thud! Thud!

  The knocks were getting louder.

  He was lying down, flat on his back, naked on the bed. He looked at the clock on the bedside table. It was 3.07 am. He sat up, rubbing his eyes.

  Thud! Thud! Thud!

  An empty glass and four small bottles of whisky were sitting on the table next to the television. The brown liquid still inside. Bailey had just sat there, staring at them, wondering what kind of man hit the bottle after his girlfriend had been kidnapped.

  Turns out that it wasn’t him.

  ‘Bailey, you in there?’

  He recognised the voice, and the accent. He slid off the bed, onto the balls of his feet.

  Ronnie was chewing on an unlit cigar when Bailey opened the door.

  ‘Sorry, mate. Must’ve fallen asleep.’

  ‘There’s been a development. Get dressed.’

  Bailey hadn’t realised that he was naked in the open doorway. He didn’t care. ‘What is it?’

  Ronnie handed him his phone.

  ‘Oh my god.’

  He was staring at a picture of Sharon Dexter, seated with her arms tied to a chair, a gag splitting her lips in a false smile. She was a tough woman. But there was no hiding the fear in her eyes. The helplessness. Bailey felt like he was going to vomit.

  ‘Tell me you’ve got more than this,’ Bailey said. ‘Tell me you’ve got a fucking lead here, mate.’

  ‘I do,’ Ronnie said. ‘Get something on.’

  Bailey grabbed a pair of boxer shorts, socks and a flannelette shirt from his bag, quickly putting them on, along with the jeans that were lying, crumpled, on the floor next to his boots. He was dressed in under two minutes.

  ‘Let’s go.’

  They walked past Ronnie’s room next door and up the hallway to another room five doors away. Inside, a man and a woman were hunched over in front of computer screens. They looked up when the two men walked in, before turning their attention back to the screens.

  ‘Got an address, yet?’

  ‘We’re close.’ The woman sounded confident.

  ‘Everyone, this is John Bailey,’ Ronnie said. ‘Bailey, this is everyone.’