‘You’re going already?’
‘I have to. I’ve got a lot to do.’
She stands and faces him. She hopes for a hug before he leaves. Maybe a peck on the cheek.
Cody brushes past her.
‘I’ll speak to you later, Grace. Thank you. You don’t know how much this means to me.’
And then he’s gone, and Grace is left staring down at her mute, unfeeling companion for the night.
’Twas ever thus.
57
Cody half expects there to be a huge police presence outside his building, just waiting for him to show up and explain why he’s been keeping a clown in his basement.
But there’s nothing. The building looks as empty and ghostly as it always does on a dark evening.
Something within Cody urges him to turn his back on this and walk away. Just get as far away as possible. Let the man in there die and rot.
But he knows he can’t do that. Waldo wouldn’t let it play out in that way. There are scenes in Waldo’s movie still to be directed.
Cody puts his key in the lock of the glossy black front door. He turns the key, pushes the door open. Inside, the usual gloom, the aromas of dental hygiene, the rush of water through the central heating pipes. The boiler man obviously did his stuff.
Cody puts on a light and walks straight through to the rear of the building. He stops at the basement door beneath the stairs. He tries the handle and finds that it is locked. He takes out his key.
A few minutes more won’t make any difference, he thinks.
He returns the key to his pocket, then trudges up the stairs to his apartment. There, he undresses, showers, and puts on some jogging bottoms and a sweater. He knows he should eat, but he can’t face it; knows he should sleep, but that his brain won’t allow it.
Grabbing his keys, baton and phone, he heads downstairs again. This time he traipses all the way down to the basement. At the locked door of the room holding Keenan he pauses and listens. He’s not sure what he’s expecting, but he gets no surprises. Not a hint of life or death.
When he unlocks the door and enters, he finds Keenan sitting on the floor again, his back to the wall. The water bottle and crisp packets lie empty next to him.
‘You’ve been gone a long time,’ says Keenan.
‘I’ve got better things to do with my time than spend it all on you.’
Keenan forces out a laugh. ‘That’s not the impression you gave last night. Seems to me I’m the most important person in your life right now.’
‘Keep thinking that if you want, James.’
At the sound of his name, Keenan tenses. ‘What?’
‘I said you can keep believing you’re useful to me. I’m not so sure anymore.’
‘You called me a name.’
‘Oh, that. Yes. James. James Keenan.’
‘H-how . . . Where did you hear that?’
Cody holds up his phone and waggles it. ‘Your friend Waldo called. He told me a lot about you. Where you live, who your friends are, what you do for a job. I must say, I didn’t have you down as a financial advisor. Not the most exciting job in the world. Is that why you chose the clown act as a sideline? Spice things up a bit?’
‘You’re lying. Waldo wouldn’t have told you all that.’
‘No? To be honest, I think he’s become bored with you and this whole game. He wants to bring it to a conclusion. You see, he got it wrong. I haven’t acted the way he expected, and so now he’s thinking up new rules.’
‘What new rules?’
‘I don’t know yet. He’s going to call me again tonight. He wants me to come looking for him, so he’s going to give me some more clues.’
‘And what about me? What part do I play?’
‘You don’t. You’ve become redundant, James. The plan is to hand you back to Waldo.’
Keenan tries to hide it, but terror jumps into his eyes. ‘You can’t do that. He’ll kill me.’
‘Not my concern, James. I gave you a chance to cooperate, but you turned it down. You snooze, you lose.’
Keenan gets to his feet, his chain jangling as he moves. ‘That’s not right. You can’t do that.’
Cody starts moving back towards the door. ‘Too late. It’s happening. The next time this phone rings, you’re out of the equation. See you later, James.’
He leaves the room, locking it behind him, then leans back against the door and closes his eyes for a minute. He has hope now, where before he had nothing: Keenan might break, and Grace might find some vital information on his computer.
What he tries not to think about is where he will be if neither of those pays off.
58
It has taken Sara hours to find him, but it could have been worse. She was prepared to do this for days – weeks even. The army taught her the virtue of patience when it comes to warfare.
That scumbag in Bootle gave her a list of three locations: the nightclub, the pool hall and the gym. She has been driving between all three, watching and waiting. She knew he would turn up at one of them eventually.
And now here he is, outside the gym. Climbing out of his big black Mercedes. Sniffing his armpits before opening up the boot and pulling out a grey sports bag.
She observes from her own car across the street as Ozone walks to the front door of the gym. It’s almost ten o’clock now, and the gym is closed, but Ozone takes out a key, opens up, and steps inside.
Sara pulls up the hood of her cardigan and gets out of her car. She puts her hands in her pockets as she looks up and down the deserted street, then marches swiftly across to the gym. She tries the front door, but finds it locked. To the right of the building is an alleyway. She follows it for a few yards, nearly craps herself when she is suddenly bathed in yellow light.
The light is from within the building. Through the frosted glass and security mesh she can make out the movement of a blurred figure. A few seconds later she hears a metallic slam, like that of a locker door.
She hopes that Ozone isn’t about to undertake a late-night gym session, but then the light goes out again, and she doubts he would bother to do that if he were staying.
She races back to the front of the building and waits by the door. Less than a minute later, she hears noises coming her way. She flattens herself against the adjoining wall, flexes her fingers.
As Ozone appears in the doorway, Sara spins into view. She shoots out her right hand, the fingers and thumb forming a V-shape that strikes hard into Ozone’s throat. He staggers backwards into the building, clutching at his neck. Before he has time to think about a response, Sara runs straight at him and launches a kick into his chest. Ozone flies further backwards and hits a rickety wooden chair behind him. The chair collapses and he crashes to the floor amid the wreckage. He tries to roll away from her, reaching towards his waistband. Sara picks up an arm of the broken chair, then swings it hard onto Ozone’s wrist as he tries to point his gun at her. She hears a sharp crack of bone, and then the clatter of the gun hitting the floor.
Ozone screams in pain. ‘My arm!’ he splutters. ‘You broke my fucking arm!’
Sara retrieves the pistol, points it at Ozone. ‘You broke my fucking house. That makes us even.’
Ozone rubs his wrist and then his bruised Adam’s apple. ‘Not even close, girl. You’ve just earned yourself a death sentence. What the fucking hell do you think you’re doing?’
‘I want to know where Metro is.’
‘I don’t know where he is.’
Sara cocks the hammer of the SIG. ‘I may have earned a death sentence, but I’ll take you out first. Where’s Metro?’
Ozone puts his good arm up in surrender. ‘Seriously, I don’t know.’
‘Don’t move,’ says Sara. She backs up to the front door and closes it, then approaches Ozone again.
‘Get up.’
‘What?’
‘You heard me. Stand up.’
Ozone struggles to his feet, wincing with the pain.
‘In there,’
says Sara, gesturing to the locker room.
‘Why?’
‘Just do what I say.’
Ozone staggers through to the locker room that he must have been in a few minutes earlier. Sara keeps a respectable distance behind him.
‘Put the light on. Good. Now, which locker?’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘The locker you put the bag into. Which one was it?’
‘Bag? What bag?’
Sara takes a step towards him, aiming the gun at his forehead.
‘You were a big man when you had this gun pointed at me in my house. But do you want to know what I think? I think you’ve never actually shot anyone. The difference between us is that I have. I know what it’s like to splatter someone’s brains all over a wall, and I won’t hesitate to do it again.’
‘Yeah, well this isn’t a fucking war zone. You can’t get away with that shit here.’
‘No?’
Sara suddenly lowers her aim and fires a single round into Ozone’s foot. The blast reverberates around the room, but Sara doubts there will be anyone outside to hear it.
Ozone screams again and drops to the floor. ‘You shot me! You fucking shot me, you stupid bitch!’
Sara aims at his head again. ‘And I’m going to keep on shooting until you answer my questions. So, which locker?’
Clutching his foot, Ozone chin-points to a large, waist-high locker in the corner of the room. Unlike most of the others, which are coin-operated, this one is secured with a combination padlock.
‘What’s the code?’ she asks.
‘I’m injured,’ he whines. ‘I need a doctor.’
Sara points the gun at his other foot. ‘What’s the fucking code?’
‘Two, seven, seven, nine.’
Sara moves across to the locker. She faces Ozone while she enters the combination. The padlock snaps open. She unhooks it, pulls the door wide, then drags out the sports bag it contains.
‘So what do we have here?’ she says.
Ozone says nothing. He is too busy grimacing and swearing.
Sara kneels down, unzips the bag, pulls it open.
Money. Lots of it. Bundle upon bundle of used tens and twenties.
Sara steps across to Ozone again. ‘I’m guessing that this money is intended for Metro, right?’
Ozone nods.
‘So how will it get to him?’
‘He’ll pick it up.’
‘In person? When?’
‘I don’t know. Could be any time. Tomorrow, the next day, next week.’
Sara sighs. ‘Pick a leg.’
‘What?’
‘I’m going to shoot out one of your kneecaps, so pick a leg.’ She lines up the gun with Ozone’s left kneecap. ‘This one?’
‘Tonight! Okay? Tonight. He’ll pick up the money tonight. I swear I don’t know exactly what time, but it should be in the next couple of hours.’
‘Will he be alone?’
‘Yes. He always comes alone for the money.’
‘Then I suppose we’ll have to wait.’
‘I can’t wait. I need a doctor.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Sara says. ‘I’ll take care of you.’
59
Cody is getting sick of waiting. Literally. His tiredness, his lack of appetite, his adrenaline are all conspiring to turn him into a quivering mass of jelly, incapable of rational thought and the ability to act.
He wants to go downstairs and confront Keenan again, but he knows he has to leave him to stew a little longer. If he appears too desperate for information, Keenan will detect it and clam up.
Cody picks up his phone, jabs in a number and waits for an answer.
‘Hello?’
‘Hi, Grace. It’s Cody. I was just wondering if you’d managed to get anywhere with that computer?’
There’s a short silence, which Cody immediately interprets as disappointing news.
‘The problem is that the hard drive is encrypted. If I can crack the encryption, I should be able to see everything it contains, but that’s easier said than done.’
‘I see,’ Cody says, although he doesn’t really. ‘But it’s possible, right?’
‘Theoretically, yes. In practice, it’s not looking good.’
‘Grace, I really need this.’
‘I understand. I don’t know why you need it, but I appreciate the urgency. I’ll do everything I can.’
‘I know you will. Call me. As soon as you have any news – I don’t care what time it is – call me, okay?’
‘Of course. You have my word.’
‘Thank you, Grace. You don’t know how much I appreciate this.’
‘Any time, Cody.’
He says goodbye and ends the call.
And then he goes back to the sickness of waiting.
*
Metro Mackenzie is thinking about the girl when he pulls up at the gym. Sara Prior. He will remember her for a long time to come.
She was a definite nuisance, but he admires her for it. If he’s honest, he’d hoped for a bit more from her. She seemed made of sterner stuff.
Ozone did the trick, as he always does. He can always be relied upon. Metro recalls how Ozone phoned him up earlier today and gave him the news. He was characteristically succinct:
‘It’s done. She won’t bother you anymore. Not sure it was wise to tell her that we know how her husband died, though.’
‘But you did, right?’
‘Yeah. I did what you said.’
And that was that. Job done. Metro could get back to doing what he does best, which is collecting money, for others and himself, and Ozone could carry on doing what he excels at, which is following orders. Ozone doesn’t need to understand complexities; he just needs to obey.
Like now, for example.
As soon as he walks through the door to the gym, Metro knows that his deputy has been here. Even up against the odour of stale sweat, Ozone’s scent cloud prevails. He has been here and carried out his instructions, no questions asked.
Metro makes his way to the locker room. He could do it with his eyes shut, simply by following the whiff of Ozone, which seems even stronger than usual tonight.
Metro goes over to the locker. Like an expert safecracker, he rubs his hands together before starting to enter the combination into the padlock, but he does so with the anticipation of further riches. The Abba song ‘Money, Money, Money’ runs through his head.
He removes the padlock, swings the door wide . . .
And is greeted with the sight of Ozone Fisher, crouched inside the locker, his hands covered in blood, his eyes staring widely, madly.
‘What the—’
Metro takes a step backwards, trying to take this in, trying to make sense of this craziness through the mist of fear that is starting to billow into his mind.
He takes another step back. Halts when he feels the cold barrel of a gun pressing into the nape of his neck and hears the echoing click of a hammer being cocked.
*
Sara so wants to pull the trigger. If she were certain that this man Metro was responsible for Matthew’s death, she would have no hesitation.
But, as yet, she’s not certain. All she has to go on is that this man’s name was mentioned in a letter. It’s not enough.
‘You know who I am?’ she asks.
‘Yes,’ says Metro. ‘You’re Sara Prior.’
‘You know why I’m here?’
‘You want to know about your husband.’
‘Did you kill him?’
‘No.’
‘Do you know who did?’
‘No.’
Sara pulls back her arm, then rams the butt of the pistol into the back of Metro’s skull. He goes down to the floor. Turns and sits there glaring at her while he tries to staunch the blood flowing from his wound. She gets a better look at him now. He’s lean and muscular, with eyes that beam contempt – for her and for everything that gets in his way. She doesn’t find it hard to b
elieve that he would have killed Matthew simply for bumping into him.
He says, ‘You don’t learn, do you, girl?’
‘Oh, I learn very quickly. You, on the other hand, keep making the same mistake of underestimating me. Take a look at your faithful hound there. See how quiet and subservient he is in his kennel? I tamed him. I can do the same to you.’
‘You know what? I actually believe you could. What do you want from me?’
‘How did you know my husband?’
‘I didn’t.’
Sara fires the gun. It chews up concrete an inch in front of Metro’s groin. Still in the locker, Ozone jumps in fear.
Sara says, ‘The next bullet will be slightly higher. I’ll ask you again. How did you know Matthew?’
‘Swear to God, I didn’t. Honestly, I’m not lying.’
‘Then why would Matthew give me your name?’
‘When did he do that?’
‘He sent me a letter before he died. He knew he was in danger, so he wrote to me. He mentioned you, and said you could be found in The Tar Barrel.’
‘I don’t know why he said that. I’d never heard of Matthew Prior until—’
‘Until what?’
‘Until I read about him in the papers.’
Sara advances swiftly on Metro. Puts the gun to the top of his head. ‘No, that’s not what you were about to say. Until what?’
‘Until—’
Metro doesn’t finish his sentence. He moves quickly, unexpectedly. He grabs Sara’s gun hand and pushes it away from his head. The gun goes off, the bullet punching a hole in one of the lockers. He tries to drive his other fist up into her solar plexus, but Sara twists and takes it in the side of her abdomen. The pain is excruciating, but as Metro tries to get to his feet, she brings her knee into his face. He starts to fall back, and as he does so Sara yanks her gun arm free, then whips the weapon across Metro’s face. He lands heavily on his back, blood gushing from his cheek.
Over at the locker, Ozone is halfway out. Sara points the gun at him. ‘Get the fuck back in there.’
Panting heavily, she stands over Metro and takes a two-handed combat stance, the gun pointing squarely between Metro’s eyes.
‘You have five seconds to tell me what you know, and then I pull the trigger. Five . . .’
Your Deepest Fear Page 25