by Emma Tallon
Anna peered around the boxes and her heart constricted. She screamed, a loud blood-curdling scream as she saw what was piled up on the floor. She took a step back and covered her mouth with her hands. She shook with horror and panic.
Tanya ran over and gasped as she saw what Anna had found. ‘Oh my God. Oh shit.’ She held her head in her hands trying to keep calm and not be sick. ‘Not an animal then,’ she said tightly.
They looked down on the mound of dead bodies. There were four of them in total, piled up one on top of the other. They were badly decomposed; nearly all the soft tissue had gone, leaving just a few patches of dead skin attached to the bones of the skeletons. Anna was pretty sure that the two lying side by side underneath were the elderly owners of the farm, by the look of their clothes. The others she wasn’t sure about. One could have been their son, perhaps, but she couldn’t tell for sure. He wore a suit and a bright green tie. The last she could tell was a female from the skimpy clothes on her decaying corpse. Anna’s eyes filled with hot tears. How could anyone do this? He was a monster.
A hot stab of pain shot through Anna’s abdomen and she doubled over with a cry.
‘Anna? What is it?’ Tanya asked, grabbing hold of her friend.
‘The baby,’ Anna said. ‘I think I’m losing it.’
‘Oh God, right, let’s get out of here.’ Tanya glanced back at the bodies one more time and pulled Anna away. ‘Come on, I’ll just smash the window. I’ll open your door from inside, hang on.’
Tanya left Anna at the passenger door and ran round to the driver’s side. She grabbed a wrench off the wall and smashed it through the glass. Throwing the wrench to the floor, she reached her hand through the jagged glass, trying to reach the lock.
The main barn doors flew open and sunlight flooded in. They winced against the sudden intrusion and Tanya shouted out to Anna as she saw who it was. ‘Run, Anna, run!’
He bounded forward and grabbed Anna around the waist from behind, holding her to him. She tried to wriggle out of his grasp but he was too strong.
Tanya picked the wrench back up from the floor and with a primal roar started to run towards him, with it held up over her head.
Within a second he pulled out his gun, pointed it straight at her and pulled the trigger.
Time seemed to stand still as the bullet hit Tanya in the stomach. A look of surprise came over her face and she looked down. She dropped the wrench and fell to her knees. Her hands touched the entrance wound and she stared at the blood that quickly covered her fingers. With a last confused look at Anna she slumped backward, still clutching her stomach.
There was a moment of total silence, the world seeming to pause on its axis as Anna’s shock gave way to realisation and horror. ‘No!’ she screamed. ‘No!’ Her cries were hysterical as she fought like a wildcat, bucking and twisting, scratching anything her nails could reach, trying to get out of his grip and over to her best friend. ‘Get off me! Tanya! Tanya!’ She screamed out her name over and over as he dragged her back towards the house.
‘Get off me! Tanya!’ she sobbed. ‘How could you? How could you shoot her? You bastard, get off me!’ Anna screamed at him as he carried on steadily without response. ‘Tanya,’ she wailed helplessly, tears blurring her view of the barn.
No matter how she tried to break out of his grasp, she couldn’t. He was too strong and her body was weaker than usual.
Guilt washed over her as the memory of Tanya’s shocked face burned into her brain. It was her fault. All of this was her fault. If it wasn’t for her, Tanya wouldn’t even be here. And if it wasn’t for her screams when she’d seen the bodies, he wouldn’t have heard them. They might have been halfway down the road by now if she hadn’t done that. Tanya wouldn’t have been shot. Her best friend in the world would not be dead.
‘Oh God, Tanya, no!’ The pain twisted through her voice as she cried in devastation. ‘This can’t be happening.’ The world spun around her. She closed her eyes and stopped struggling as they reached the house. The life seeped out of her as what had just happened sunk in. Tanya was dead. He had killed her without hesitation, taken the shot and ended her life without a second thought. Just another body for the pile. So many bodies. So many lives cut short by this man.
‘You’re a monster,’ she whispered through her streaming tears, her voice catching in her throat. There was no reply.
Anna felt the warm flood of blood soak through her trousers as she was dragged up the stairs, but she didn’t feel the pain. The loss of Tanya was so all-consuming; the grief and the shock so overwhelming that she barely even registered that she was losing her baby.
48
Fraser burst into Freddie’s office at Club CoCo. ‘I’ve got an address,’ he said, catching his breath. ‘That car, I followed it on the traffic cameras. Kept with it for about a mile, but then we lost it. So I ran the plates and got an address. Here.’ He showed Freddie the text message that had just pinged up from his team.
Freddie scanned the address. Heathfield Farm. The name instantly rang a bell and he closed his eyes for a second, trying to think how he knew it.
‘It’s not that far from where Anna’s phone signal was, Freddie. I think we’ve cracked it. Who do you want to take? I think we need numbers; we don’t know how many of them there are,’ Fraser said.
‘Anna’s phone… Jesus Christ!’ The memory of how he knew that name and why that area had seemed so familiar before came flooding back and suddenly he knew exactly who had taken Anna.
‘Freddie?’ Fraser asked, confused.
‘I know that place; everything makes sense now. I know who it is. Fuck.’ Freddie looked to the heavens. ‘I need to call Paul. Listen, can you find Bill and Sammy for me? I’m going to call round a couple of other people too. Just meet me back here in an hour.’
‘On it,’ Fraser answered readily. He turned to leave.
‘Oh, and Fraser?’ Freddie stopped him. ‘Whatever weapons you have, you’re going to need to bring them.’
Tanya opened her eyes and her breathing quickened in fright as she heard the creak of the side door. Is he coming back to finish me off? Tears ran down her face as she pressed the dirty rag she had managed to grab down onto her stomach.
She felt so faint. She knew she had lost a lot of blood – too much blood. She tried to hold on to consciousness, to fight to stay alive, but it was so hard. She felt so tired. Maybe if I just close my eyes for a second…
Someone turned on a light and she was sharply brought back round. That’s right, someone is here, she remembered. The light harsh in her eyes after the darkness of the barn for so many hours, she squinted up at it. It was coming closer.
‘No, please…’ She was shocked at how faint her own voice was. It scared her.
The person walked around the car and came right up to where she lay. She cringed away, expecting the worst. He crouched down and shone the light of his torch onto his face.
It was Tom.
‘Oh my God, oh thank God.’ Tanya’s tears of fear turned to tears of joy. They had found them. They were here to save them. She might just make it out of this alive yet. She grasped Tom to her with her free hand and sobbed into his neck. She had never been so glad to see him in her whole life.
‘You came. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry for everything I said,’ she croaked.
He pulled her away and stroked her face with his hands. ‘It’s OK, shh, don’t strain yourself,’ he said, looking down at the blood-soaked rag in her hands.
‘Anna, oh God, she’s in the house, Tom,’ Tanya said fearfully. ‘He has her.’
‘I know. Everything is going to be OK,’ Tom replied.
‘Oh, Tom.’ Tanya closed her eyes and breathed him in. Speaking hurt her stomach even more but she carried on anyway. ‘I really am so sorry. I take back everything I said. I just want you back home. Can you forgive me?’
‘I forgive you, Tanya,’ Tom replied. He squeezed her hand and pushed it down off his shoulder. He lifted her head from underneat
h her chin and looked into her eyes. ‘I forgive you for hurting me and throwing me away as if I meant nothing. I forgive you for not seeing what you had in me. I forgive you for everything, in fact. Because it helped me realise that I needed to stop messing around with people who didn’t appreciate me and align myself with people who were ready to give me the opportunities I deserved. People who really see me.’ Tom stood back up and looked down on her.
‘What do you mean?’ Tanya didn’t understand. Why was he looking at her so coldly? ‘Where’s Freddie?’ she asked, her tone uncertain.
‘Ha!’ Tom barked a cold laugh. ‘Yes, the amazing Freddie Tyler, the kind of man you really want.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Tanya’s face fell. ‘That’s not true at all.’
‘Oh, but it is, isn’t it? You want a hard man, one who earns shitloads and has the respect of everyone around. That’s far more interesting than the likes of me, right? The stupid twat who works hard every day to make a fraction of what you piss up the wall on handbags each month,’ he spat. ‘You never had any respect for me. Even chucked me out when it suited you not to have me around anymore. Freddie didn’t see what he had in me either,’ he added. ‘I offered myself up to him, to work with him, do the things that needed to be done. I just wanted a chance to get into this life. But he made me into a complete joke.’ Tom’s face contorted with anger.
‘But that’s OK,’ he continued. ‘Diego approached me a while back. He brought me back here to meet the main man himself, who offered me a very well-paid position with this firm. They’d been watching me, you see; couldn’t understand why Freddie wouldn’t utilise such a good man. One day, after Freddie shot me down yet again, they offered me a deal. I would give them all the information they needed to carry out their plan smoothly, and I got a seat in their firm. And when we take over Central London, there is a big piece of the pie waiting for me. The reward for true loyalty, for stepping up to the mark.’
He shifted his weight. ‘I was only meant to help push Freddie off his golden throne at the beginning. He told me Anna would be looked after; she wouldn’t be hurt. Everything was going to be OK afterwards. New management, sure, a bit of collateral damage but that’s the price of progress. You were never meant to be involved.’
He looked her up and down. ‘But then you had to go and treat me the same way Freddie did, didn’t you? Like some worthless, expendable nobody. You crushed me, Tanya. I really thought we had a shot. But you’re all the same.’ He narrowed his eyes and held his arms out. ‘How d’ya like me now, Tan? Just the sort of man you wanted, right? Well, you’re too late. You made your bed and now you’ll go down with the rest of them. Maybe you should have treated me better when you had the chance.’
‘Tom, you idiot,’ Tanya breathed, ‘you—’
‘Yeah, I’m the idiot, right? Well, I’ll be the idiot in this life whilst you can be the clever bitch in the afterlife, yeah? Well done for throwing away the best man you were ever likely to get, Tanya. You brought this on yourself.’
Giving her one last look of hatred, Tom turned and left the barn.
Tanya began to shake with shock at Tom’s words and the tears fell even faster. She couldn’t believe it. He had betrayed them all. She’d trusted him. Despite their personal problems she’d still thought he was a good person. But all along he had just been pushing them right into the lion’s den, sacrificing them to the enemy to fulfil his own agenda. How could he do this to her? To all of them? She felt sick.
As the barn fell back into darkness, so did Tanya’s last hope.
‘I’m so sorry, Anna. I’m so, so sorry,’ she murmured through her sobs as she lay back and prepared to meet her end.
Two cars drove in convoy out of London and towards the rural area where the farm was located. The light was fading into the evening. Freddie knew it would be dark soon. He was glad of this. It would give them some extra cover on their approach.
In the car behind, Fraser drove Bill and Seamus, who was now out of hospital. The poison had not been a strong one. It had been easily treated and he’d released himself from hospital the following day against the doctor’s wishes. He was still weak but had insisted he was well enough for work, so Freddie had brought him along for the ride. They needed all the help they could get at this point, even if Seamus was just used as the lookout.
Freddie drove the car in front, with Paul and Sammy. He had tried to contact Tom but hadn’t managed to get hold of him. He didn’t even know Tanya was missing. Freddie guessed he was still hurting from Tanya’s rejection, but even so, he was his boss. He should be able to get hold of him.
‘I still can’t believe it’s him, Fred. There has to be a mistake,’ Paul said, shaking his head. ‘He wouldn’t do that to us.’
‘He wouldn’t do that to you,’ Freddie corrected. ‘But he wouldn’t have any qualms doing this to me.’
Paul shook his head. He couldn’t wrap his head around what Freddie was telling him.
‘We don’t know for sure it’s him,’ he replied.
‘It’s him, Paul.’ Freddie’s voice was ruefully confident. ‘And he don’t work the same way we do. He’s a psychopath. And we’re the enemy. It’s that black and white in his mind.’
There was a long silence before Paul asked his next question. ‘What are we supposed to do if it comes down to gunfire?’
There was another silence as Freddie warred with himself.
‘If it comes to that, we shoot to kill. He has my family in there and nothing is more important than that now.’ Family meant everything to him and sometimes that meant difficult decisions had to be made to protect them.
Paul nodded, his expression heavy. He was loyal to his big brother over anyone else in the world. He would always do what needed to be done, even when he didn’t like it. Because that’s what true loyalty meant.
Freddie pressed his foot down harder on the accelerator and pushed forward down the dark road. There was no going back anymore.
49
Anna slumped down against the door she’d been banging on, her cheeks streaked with the tears that wouldn’t stop falling. She covered her face with her hand, crying bitterly into them. ‘Tanya…’ she wailed softly, but still nobody came.
The agonising spasms started up in her abdomen again and she cried out, grasping her stomach. A fresh wave of blood flooded out around her, where she sat. She moved to the bathroom and tried to clean herself up. She had been miscarrying for hours but still it hadn’t stopped. She closed her eyes and prayed that it would end soon.
She had never felt so much grief. The emotional pain engulfed her like a tidal wave. Not only had she watched the monster who was holding her captive murder her best friend, but now she was losing her precious baby – hers and Freddie’s perfect creation. All the plans, all those exciting future moments that she had thought they might have together as a family, all of them were gone. They would never happen. The life that she had been growing inside of her had been snuffed out and now her body was rejecting it. And Freddie had never even known. She felt overwhelmingly guilty for all the negative thoughts she’d had when she’d first found out she was pregnant. Maybe it was her fault. Perhaps this was karma for being so ungrateful.
Anna’s mind kept jumping from one to the other, the baby to Tanya. She thought back over all the memories she and Tanya had shared. The night she first met her, when Tanya had been abandoned in a petrol station and she’d caught sight of her shouting expletives at a pair of fading taillights. She’d given Anna a bed for the night, no questions asked, at a time when she had nothing.
Fresh tears washed down her face. Tanya had been the first real friend she’d found in this city. And she’d become the best, very quickly. She was like a sister, and now she was gone, shot by a psycho in some barn in the middle of nowhere.
Walking back through to the bedroom, Anna gingerly changed her leggings and laid herself down on the bed. With all the stress and the blood loss, she was feeling light-headed. She just nee
ded to close her eyes and get some rest. But rest didn’t come easy and instead she lay with all her memories continuing to play out in her head.
She must have fallen asleep, because the next thing she knew he had entered the room and was shaking her awake. She screamed and tried to back away, but he clamped a hand over her mouth.
‘Shhh – be quiet,’ he ordered. She obeyed, too exhausted and grief-stricken to do anything else. He slowly removed his hand. ‘Get up,’ he ordered.
Anna stood, holding her aching stomach. For the first time since she had been here, he sounded stressed. There was a note of panic in his tone.
‘Walk. Go,’ he barked, pushing her towards the hallway.
Anna felt more blood leave her body and the ache intensified into deep pain. ‘I can’t. Wait,’ she muttered through gritted teeth as she braced herself against it.
‘Move,’ he yelled, grabbing her around the waist and pushing her along in front of him.
‘Argh!’ Anna cried out, slumping back into him as another wave of agony took hold. ‘Where are we going?’ she asked.
‘To another room. What’s wrong with you?’ he asked, irritated. They had moved into the light of the hallway. He turned her round and looked down to see why his leg felt wet. He touched his dark trousers and his fingers turned red with blood. His eyes moved to Anna and he realised what was happening.
‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Well, it’s for the best,’ he reasoned calmly. ‘We can start anew with no ties to the past.’
‘Oh my God,’ Anna cried. ‘What the fuck are you talking about? In what world do you think I could ever see you as anything but the monster you are?’ The anger she had held inside bubbled to the fore. His callous words on top of everything that had already happened triggered a snap in her brain. ‘You murdered my best friend. The stress you’ve put me under has killed my child. You stand against everything that I care about and you think I won’t turn on you the second I get a chance?’ She barked a bitter, high-pitched laugh. ‘Because I will. If I live through this, even if you win your fucked-up crusade, I will kill you the second I get a chance. The second you turn your back, I’ll be ready and I will fucking kill you.’