Collision Course

by Matt Hilton

  ‘You need to stay here and be with the girls,’ she went on.

  ‘The girls will be fine without me. I’ll make sure they lock up and don’t answer the door to anyone. After all,’ he eyed her with meaning, ‘your plan for calling the cops has changed, right?’

  ‘I still need you to come clean with the cops, but you’re right: I don’t want you to do it right now. Not while they still have Po.’

  ‘Yeah, I kind of figured.’ He looked back at the building. ‘Maddie’s not a bad girl, you know. Yeah, she’s doing wrong with this insurance scam she’s got going, but it’s only about the money. It isn’t personal. She’d never deliberately seek to cause anyone harm, same as I can’t stand by now and see your partner hurt because of us.’

  ‘Let’s not waste time moralizing.’

  He wagged a finger between them. ‘Pot calling the kettle black.’

  She understood. It was fine working outside the law when it suited her, but not for him or his daughter to do the same? ‘There’s a difference. I’m willing to break the law to save a life, it trumps scamming vulnerable people out of their hard-earned cash.’ She waved away another response from him. ‘To be honest, Mike, I don’t really care what Maddie is doing now, only that it has brought us to this. Jacob dead and Po in danger of being next. Now if you’re coming with me, go and tell the girls to lock the doors. Warn Hayley that her father, Jeff Lorton, might show up, but she must not open the door even to him. I’ll bring over the GMC.’

  He did as instructed while she headed across the parking lot. She was three paces short of reaching the GMC when realization struck, eliciting an uncommon curse from her. Po had the only set of keys! While Toner was upstairs she’d fully intended driving off without him, now her plan was scuppered. Angered by her lack of foresight she still approached the vehicle in the hope he’d left the keys in the ignition: it wasn’t like Po but she must check. The car was locked and going nowhere.

  She cursed again, heading back towards the building. She had no wish to place Toner in direct danger, but she’d accept a lift from him to Belfast to rendezvous with Pinky. Once there, she would demand he return to the girls’ sides. As she approached the roller shutter, she noted that it stood open about a foot above the ground. It hadn’t looked like that earlier, and it struck her that access via the shutter was the way in which Sampson or Temperance had gotten the drop on her partner. No, she thought, Po was too counter-surveillance savvy to allow either foe to creep up on him so easily … Oh! The reckless idiot! They hadn’t gotten the drop on him, he’d allowed them to take him hostage, knowing fully well that it’d lead him and – because she’d follow – Tess to the main villains of the piece. He’d let himself be snatched in order to infiltrate the bad guys’ lair and usher in what he saw as an inevitable showdown with their enemies.

  Tess heaved the roller shutter open.

  Toner’s pickup truck was an old workhorse, but it’d get her where she needed. The keys weren’t in the ignition and not in any obvious hiding spot behind the visor or glove box. The access door to the lobby stood ajar, again showing the route of Po’s ambusher into the building. She went through it and craned to look up the two flights of stairs. Toner was still up there, giving instructions to the girls. She danced from foot to foot, eager to get moving, but it was important that the girls understood the seriousness of the situation and didn’t leave themselves vulnerable. When he appeared again, Maddie followed Toner down the stairs. He’d pulled on a coat against the weather.

  ‘We’re going to have to use your truck,’ Tess announced before he’d made it halfway down. ‘Po had the keys for the GMC when he was grabbed.’

  Toner slapped at his jeans pockets: he’d changed out of the soiled trousers he’d been wearing yesterday. He cursed, raised a hand in apology and ran upstairs again. Maddie continued down. ‘I’ve come to lock the door.’

  Tess thumbed towards the garage. ‘After we leave, make sure that the roller shutter and this door’s secure too. Your dad told Hayley her father might turn up?’

  ‘He won’t get in, I promise. Tess, I, uh, I wanted to apologize for … well, you know?’

  ‘Acting like a selfish bitch?’

  Maddie grunted in surprise, but after a moment’s reflection she nodded in agreement. ‘I’m genuinely sorry about what has happened, and I know it’s entirely my fault. If anyone’s to blame, it’s me … not Hayley, not my dad. Please, Dad’s adamant he’s coming with you, but please promise that you won’t let him get hurt. He’s already suffered enough because of me.’

  It wasn’t a promise Tess could make. Instead she said, ‘I’ll do my best.’

  ‘Thank you, that’s all I can ask for.’

  ‘In return, all I ask is for you to do the right thing,’ Tess said.

  ‘We’ve talked things through, Hayley and I. Helping you is the only right thing to do.’

  Tess studied her for any sign of deceit. Maddie stared back, clear-eyed.

  Toner returned, taking the stairs at speed. He clattered into the lobby, immediately noting the way the women appraised each other.

  He stumbled to a halt, holding aloft his truck’s keys. ‘Got ’em.’

  Tess reached and squeezed Maddie’s upper arm. ‘Remember what I said; lock everything after we leave.’

  Maddie went to her dad. She hugged him, whispered, ‘Be careful.’

  Toner kissed her on the forehead, said, ‘Lock up behind us, I’ll be back in no time, OK?’

  Maddie wasn’t ready to release her hold, and Tess couldn’t bear the delay any longer. ‘Come on, Mike, we have to get moving.’

  Within seconds they were in the truck, and Toner reversed it out of the garage. He pulled a tight turn to avoid the rail track, and swept past the building. Behind them, Maddie watched from the open garage, but as Toner took a left, she reached up and unfurled the shutter. Toner sped through the dogleg under the bridge. Tess sat with her cellphone cradled on her thighs, watching the screen. Her instructions had been to keep her phone on, to await further instructions: she wondered if Sampson had made the error of also leaving Po’s phone switched on. If she’d her laptop with her, she would’ve been able to patch in remotely to Emma Clancy’s systems and launch a program from where she could triangulate the location of Po’s phone. Hell. These days, with the phone’s GPS locator switched on she could easily do it from her phone, but Po – suspicious of such tracking devices – had his disabled. In future she would demand that he kept the damn thing switched on, as would she, to avoid situations like this one.

  She glanced over at Toner. He had his jaw set in determination as he drove. For now he was her tracking device, and she was grateful. He took her down roads she’d never have found, cutting minutes off the journey time, and they entered the small town of Belfast within the time he’d estimated. Pinky had gotten there ahead of him, and waited at curbside just after the road spanned the tongue-twisting Passagassawakeag River. Pinky stood alongside his Volvo SUV, his normally dark pallor a noticeable few shades lighter, his eyes wide and partially bloodshot: he looked as fraught with concern for Po as Tess felt. Pinky hugged her when she went to meet him.

  ‘How’d Nicolas manage to get himself snatched?’ he demanded.

  ‘That’s the thing, Pinky. I think it was a deliberate act.’

  ‘Oh? Right. I see.’ Some of the pressure was released from behind his bulging eyes as he snorted out a laugh. ‘Should’ve known that rogue was up to one of his tricks.’

  ‘It would’ve been better if he’d brought us in on his plan,’ she said.

  Pinky’s mouth stretched in a long-suffering grimace. ‘That’s Nicolas for you. He probably kept it quiet knowing full well you’d hear nothing of it.’

  ‘There is that,’ she agreed.

  ‘You heard anything from the bad guys yet?’

  ‘No.’ She hadn’t genuinely expected a call, because Sampson and Temperance would have been mobile too, and possibly not too far ahead of them. ‘I don’t expect they�
��ll call for an hour or more yet.’

  Pinky aimed a finger at the highway. ‘While I was waiting for you, I did some checking, me. We stay on this road and it takes us down the coast to Rockland.’ His next words were directed at the pickup truck. ‘What we doing about him?’

  Summoned by the attention, Toner stepped out of the cab. ‘You ain’t leaving me behind,’ he announced. ‘Even if you drive off together, I’ll only follow. I told you Tess, I want to help, and I mean it.’

  ‘I’ve no intention of leaving you behind,’ Tess said, because contrary to her earlier decision she’d come to appreciate Toner’s knowledge of the district. ‘Pinky can follow you. I’ll travel with him from here, Mike.’

  Toner eyed them both, suspicious of a double-cross, but finally conceded why would Tess lie? She wished to travel with her friend in order to concoct a plan for freeing Po. He nodded in agreement, slid back into the driving seat and readied to leave.

  ‘You trust him not to warn the bad guys we’re coming?’ Pinky asked.

  ‘He’d give his life for his daughter,’ Tess said. ‘Right now he wants only to protect her, and thinks helping us is his best way of doing that.’

  ‘Unless he thinks selling our lives for hers is a fair price.’

  THIRTY-TWO

  Anyone seeing Dom on his drive to Rockland would be forgiven for thinking they were looking at a crazy man. He drove with his nose angled towards the windshield, his bristling beard split by his clenched teeth in a wide, demented grin. He still smarted from the punch in the testicles he’d taken, but he’d all but forgotten his seething hatred of Temperance in anticipation of what was coming. Maybe Blake had reconsidered punishing him, and for sending Sampson off to put the situation to rights, because Sampson had royally fucked up. Now Dom was back on the job. He’d show Blake who could really be relied on in a pinch, and it wasn’t that whining punk Sampson, or the high-yeller bitch Temperance, who was good for nothing but driving, mopping up piss, and – if, no when, he had his way – going down on her knees and blowing him.

  ‘Yeah, bitch! Try punching me again with my junk bouncing off your goddamn chin!’

  Anyone hearing Dom’s disgusting proclamation would have to reconsider, not only was he crazy but they’d realize they were witnessing the passing of a completely deranged sicko.

  He couldn’t care less.

  For starters the road was deserted for most of the drive up the coast, and when passing through the tiny conurbations clustered up against the highway, he ensured he kept his thoughts silent for his own amusement. He was inordinately happy, an emotion uncommon to him. He had Sampson to thank and the irony was sweet; through Sampson’s mishandling of the job his vaunted superior was about to hand Dom vengeance on a plate.

  Dom glanced in his side mirrors, stirring again the memory of yesterday evening when Nicolas Villere had made him flee after disarming him. Shrouded by the pouring rain, the tall southerner had watched him leave, seemingly unmoved by Dom’s promise they’d meet again. More than he’d been annoyed at Temperance’s sneaky punch, or at Blake elevating Sampson so highly, was that he’d been forced to run away from his enemy. He’d soothed his bruised ego by telling himself he was evading the cops, not running from Villere, and now he’d get the opportunity to show just how little he feared Villere or his blade.

  ‘Yeah. See you real soon, asshole,’ Dom crowed, emphasizing the timescale.

  He entered Rockland, taking Park Street almost to the same spot where he and Sampson had met Mike Toner off the fishing boat. That had been a little more than thirty hours ago, but to Dom felt a whole lot longer. He picked up Maine Street north, past the ferry buildings and the pier and several boat yards at Lermond Cove. Everything dripped from the most recent shower, scintillating diamonds of light shining everywhere, but all beauty was lost on Dom: beauty to him was in the crimson of spilled blood, the purple of bruised flesh. His destination wasn’t far. Just before the North End Shipyard he took a right turn, slowing down when he spotted workers at a nearby boat maintenance shop but they were too busy to be distracted by his appearance. He drove to the deserted building where he’d almost throttled the life from Toner yesterday. He hid the saloon car out of sight of anyone coming or going from the shipyard.

  The building was included in BK-Rose’s property portfolio. Its previous tenants had tried unsuccessfully to run it as a seafood restaurant, but this had been in a town already brimming over with longer established seafood outlets. Entering the ground floor, Dom could make out the layout of the dining room; some of the tables and chairs still gathered dust in ungainly stacks against the back wall. Faded menus and chalkboards carried the ghosts of meals past. There was a bar, complete with beer taps, but none were hooked up to barrels – Dom knew this for a fact, because he’d checked – and the only liquor bottles were those that’d been recycled as candle holders.

  He moved through the dining room towards the back. Out there was a fully equipped kitchen, now unused, and empty storerooms – one of them contained walk-in freezer and refrigeration compartments, that Dom preferred to avoid because of the stench of rot and decay it held. Beyond the storage area was a short service vestibule to the back door. He unlocked it in anticipation of the van’s arrival. Temperance would deliver her hostage to the rear door to avoid the possibility of anyone witnessing Villere’s arrival.

  Dom poked his head outside. The restaurant’s service yard backed very close to the sea; waves sloshed back and forth against the rocky outcrop and among the wooden pilings of a nearby jetty. The wind blowing in off the harbor parted Dom’s thick beard. He spat between his teeth, then grinned openly at the next weather front forming a mountainous bulwark on the near horizon. Upstairs, with plans for a live music venue, the last owners had soundproofed one large room; it was the room where Dom plied his trade. Ordinarily the sounds of torture didn’t filter beyond the walls. But he welcomed the coming storm, because by the time he was done, he wanted Villere screaming for mercy and the storm’s ferocity would help muffle them.

  He checked his wristwatch. Sampson and Temperance weren’t due to arrive for another twenty minutes. All good, it gave him time to prepare a proper welcome for their hostage. He left the door unlocked, and backtracked through the vestibule to the single set of stairs. He went up, flicking on a light at the top. He was in the short hallway containing the bathrooms. He took a leak. His attention was drawn to the mirror he’d caught Sampson staring into yesterday, and he wondered what the fuck the man had seen in the grimy glass. Dom saw only his own smug grin. He left the bathroom. At the end of the hallway was the soundproofed room. Beyond it a couple of storage rooms Dom had never visited. Opposite the bathrooms was the room that Kelly employed as an office whenever she visited. She liked it because it was the only room on the upper floor with windows and gave a view over the harbor town. In there, concealed in a desk drawer, Dom kept a few tools wrapped in a chamois. They weren’t for completing maintenance chores on the building: he opened the chamois on the desk, disgorging a pair of leather gloves, a set of brass knuckles, a leather sap filled with coarse sand, and lastly a pair of gardener’s pruning shears. In the past he’d utilized the knuckleduster and sap to good effect, unfortunately the shears had been employed merely as a threat. This time he intended using them, whether given permission by Sampson or not.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said aloud, as he held up and studied the slightly tarnished shears, ‘let’s see Villere pick my pocket with none of his fingers attached.’

  He made a couple of test clips with the shears, and snarled in satisfaction at the meaty clacks they made each time.

  He dragged a chair to the center of the soundproofed room. Because Kelly wasn’t joining them for this round of torture, there was no need of the desk that was primarily used to safely separate Kelly from her victims. Along with some rolls of duct tape, he set out his tools on a small plinth to the side of the door. Villere would be ushered inside hooded and would not see what was in store for him until Dom chose
to show him. Keeping a victim ignorant until the last moment was always Dom’s preferred method; he loved each fresh look of desperation as the next torture instrument was brought into play.

  He filled a bucket with cold water and set it aside.

  A tough guy like Villere, he might withstand the blunt force trauma of Dom’s brass knuckles and sap, he might even endure the removal of a finger or two, but Dom was yet to find anyone able to tolerate prolonged waterboarding.

  He worked his hands into the gloves, then fisted them on his hips. Observed his preparations for a moment and nodded in satisfaction. Turning for the hallway, he crept a hand under his jacket and felt the butt of his pistol. He’d reloaded it after having it taken away by Villere. Villere would be blind, tied up and guarded by Temperance and Sampson, but Dom wasn’t about to take any chance of his gun being liberated again. He drew it from its holster and also set it on the plinth with his other tools.

  From below he heard the squeak of door hinges and the soft thud of feet. The building thrummed as a gust of wind pummeled through it. Familiar voices filtered up to him. He grinned nastily as he strode down the hall.

  ‘Dom?’ Sampson called up from the dining room.

  ‘Up here. Ready and waiting.’

  Temperance was first to appear at the foot of the stairs. Her features were set as she trained a steely gaze on Dom, awaiting a nasty comment no doubt.

  ‘Hey, come on up. You bring me a gift. All is forgiven, my girl.’

  ‘I’m not your damn girl,’ Temperance growled.

  She stepped forward, and into the vacated spot Nicolas Villere stumbled. He was hooded, hands secured behind him. The southerner paused a second, head tilting as he tried to make sense of his surroundings. From behind, Sampson shoved him forward with a gruff warning to ‘Mind the step.’