by Chris Ewan
There was a mobile phone on the floor by Dad’s feet. It was a cheap pay-as-you-go model. I was pretty sure it was the phone he’d answered my call on. It certainly wasn’t his own.
He hadn’t said much when he’d answered. Just a strained ‘Hello’ before the phone was snatched from him and another voice came on the line. Issuing an ultimatum. Telling me to return home with Rebecca in no more than thirty minutes, and to make sure I brought whatever Laura had left for me in the sports centre. He made it very clear that I shouldn’t call the police or attempt to contact anyone else. He told me Dad’s life depended on it.
He hadn’t sounded like he was bluffing. Now I knew for sure that he wasn’t.
‘Did you bring it?’ the man asked.
I unfurled my fingers. Showed him the memory stick.
‘That’s all?’
I nodded.
‘Nothing else?’
I shook my head.
‘Then why the holdall?’
I swallowed, but my voice was still croaky when I spoke. ‘I didn’t know what I might find. I thought it might be something big.’
He stared at me as he mulled over my answer. He took his time, as if there were hidden angles he wanted to consider, whole dimensions I hadn’t thought of.
‘What’s on that thing?’ he asked.
Rebecca took a step to my side. ‘We don’t know,’ she said. ‘And to be honest, we really don’t care.’
The man considered her response. His eyes narrowed and he pushed the gun harder against the back of Dad’s head. The muzzle twisted his unruly grey hair, like he was aiming to open Dad’s skull with a corkscrew motion.
‘What happened to your face?’ he asked Rebecca.
‘Erik Zeeger’s people,’ she said. ‘We ran into them outside the sports centre. They wanted the memory stick, too.’
‘I don’t believe you.’ His words were steady. Unhurried. ‘You wouldn’t be here if that was true.’
‘We got lucky.’
Dad’s eyes widened with alarm as he saw Rebecca’s injuries for the first time. He probably thought her definition of ‘lucky’ was badly misplaced.
The man with the gun nodded towards the memory stick. ‘You make a copy of that?’
‘No.’
‘You plan to speculate about what’s on it? You plan to go to the police or the press?’
‘We just want this whole situation to be over. We don’t want anyone else to get hurt.’
‘That’s good. Because it wouldn’t get you anywhere, anyway. I disappear after this. You never see or hear from me again. But the people I work for are powerful people. Highly capable people. They can hurt you, your family, in ways you can’t even begin to imagine. And then there’s your sister. Her memory. You don’t want that sullied, correct?’
Her memory.
I no longer felt any need to question if Laura really was dead. She had to be. I knew that now. I knew Laura. I knew the good in her. And despite what Rebecca had suggested, there was no way she would have stayed in the background while this mess played out around us. Once it was clear her family were in jeopardy, she would have stepped out of the shadows.
I caught a glimpse of movement from the corner of my eye. Rebecca had inched away from me. Not by much, but by enough to give her a little more room. I didn’t like it. I didn’t appreciate what I guessed she was trying to do.
I thought about the Beretta nestled in the crook of her back. I thought about how she’d need to whip her hand behind her, hitch up her jacket, grab for the gun, straighten her arm, adjust her grip, line up a shot, pull the trigger. She was probably a good shot. Maybe better than good. She’d proved to me many times already how skilled she was. But the bald man had his pistol pressed against Dad’s head. He had his finger on the trigger. And while the way he’d reached inside his jacket back at the sports centre had suggested he was naturally right-handed, I was pretty sure his left hand would do. There was no way Rebecca could get a shot off in time. And even if she did, there was a real danger she’d hit Dad.
I stared at her. Willing her not to try anything.
The man tracked my gaze.
‘Whatever you’re cooking up,’ he said, ‘I’d advise you to forget it.’ He jabbed his pistol forwards, jamming Dad’s head down towards his lap. ‘Put your hands up,’ he barked.
I complied right away, raising my right hand in the air. I couldn’t do anything about my left, except keep it still.
Rebecca hesitated.
‘Please,’ I hissed.
She resisted a moment longer. Then she lifted her arms and laced her fingers together behind her neck.
‘Good. Now put that computer stick down on the kitchen counter,’ the man said to me.
I did as he asked.
‘Now step away. Hand up high.’
I returned to Rebecca’s side, my hand in the air.
‘Now shuffle along,’ the man said, jerking his gun in the direction he wanted us to move. ‘Both of you.’
We sidestepped to our right. Moving further into the lounge. Away from the kitchen. Away from the stairs.
The man waited until we were bunched up in the corner, next to my television.
He tapped Dad on the skull with the end of the pistol. ‘On your feet,’ he said. ‘Slowly. Hands on your head.’
Dad wasn’t in a position to move fast. I had no idea how long he’d been sitting on his hands, but it was long enough for his movements to be stiff and slow. His legs get that way if he doesn’t flex them every now and again – a legacy of the plates that had been used to stitch his shattered bones back together. And I imagined his hands were riddled with pins and needles. He was in no state to play the hero, even if he’d wanted to. For the first time in my life, he looked old to me.
The man positioned himself behind Dad and instructed him to take a series of steps in the direction of the kitchen counter. The two of them moved in sync across the floor. One step. Two. Three.
By the fourth step, the man was close enough to reach out and grab the memory stick. But he had a problem. His broken right hand wasn’t capable of picking anything up. It was no better than the hand of a dummy. And his left hand held the gun. If he went for the memory stick with it, there’d be a split second when he’d be unable to shoot. It would give Dad an opportunity to try something.
He paused and thought about the problem. I got the impression he was a careful type who liked to think things through.
Dad raised his eyebrows at me, as if asking if now was a good time to attack.
I shook my head minutely.
Long seconds passed. Then the man arrived at a solution.
‘Pick it up for me,’ he told Dad, and poked the gun into his ear, so that his head was forced down towards the kitchen counter. ‘Do it slowly, with your left hand. That’s right. Now, hold your arm straight out in front of you and move towards the stairs.’
Dad closed his fingers around the memory stick and did as he was told. The man shuffled behind him, keeping time with his steps.
‘Wait,’ I said. ‘Don’t take him with you. You can’t.’
‘It’s OK, Rob,’ Dad said, in a strained tone.
‘No, it’s not,’ I told him. ‘There’s no need for this.’
‘Don’t worry,’ the man said. ‘Nobody gets hurt so long as you all do as I say.’
I glanced at Rebecca, wondering if she’d make some kind of move. She gave no indication that she was considering it.
The man caught me looking again. ‘What is it?’ he asked. ‘What are you afraid of? Is there someone outside? Did you call the police?’
‘No,’ I said, shaking my head.
‘What if we did?’ Rebecca asked.
I glared at her. ‘We didn’t,’ I told him, insistent now.
The man remained still, unsure of his next move. He was just two strides away from the top of the stairs. But once he started down them, he’d be committed.
‘What do you want to happen here?’ he asked, half
to himself. ‘Do you want me to step outside on my own? Is that why you don’t want your father to come with me?’
‘There’s nobody there,’ I said. ‘We didn’t call anyone.’
‘Maybe you didn’t,’ Rebecca said.
I wanted to thump her. I shook my head wildly. ‘She’s lying,’ I told the man. ‘Believe me. She didn’t call anyone. Neither of us did. There’s nobody down there. No one at all.’
He gazed down the stairs. Flicked his tongue across his lips. ‘Is there another way out of here?’
‘You don’t need one. The yard is empty. There’s nobody –’
I didn’t get to finish my sentence.
Everything happened very fast.
There was the noise of my front door being thrown open against the wall. The drumming of feet on the stair treads. A booming, carefree voice from below.
‘Hello, my boy, it’s Grandpa. Just returning Rocky to you.’
He’d barely started to speak before the man with the gun pushed Dad away from him and leapt towards the top of the stairs. The hand with the gun in it came round in a long, looping arc. It passed over his head, started to dip.
Dad hit the floor, impacting hard on his knees.
I saw a streak of gold halfway up the stairs. Rocky, in full flight, racing to see me.
The man’s eyes went wide. His gun came down even more. Moving with a terrible certainty.
Then I felt a dig in my side. Rebecca’s elbow, striking me in the waist. She was clearing space. Yanking her hand out from behind her back. Whipping the Beretta through the air. Pointing fast. Aiming hastily. Pulling the trigger before her elbow was fully extended.
The noise was very loud. It exploded in my head like someone had stamped on my eardrum.
The man with the gun twirled at the hips. His left shoulder jerked backwards, like he’d been punched in the chest. His gun arm went high and loose. His legs tangled at the knee, undone by the speed of the brutal force that had spun his upper body around. He tripped and started to go down, falling away into the kitchen. The gun dropped from his hand. Then another huge explosion went off, and the back of the man’s head opened up in a gaudy pink haze.
Chapter Fifty-five
I helped Dad through into my bedroom, where he slumped on the end of my bed. I closed the door on the gory scene in the living room and watched Dad prod warily at the back of his head. He lowered his arm and stared at his trembling hands.
Rebecca had ushered Grandpa and Rocky back to the care home to find Mum. I didn’t expect her to return anytime soon. We’d managed to stop Grandpa before he’d made it to the top of the stairs but it would take a while to calm him down‚ and once Mum saw Rebecca’s face and her blood-caked T-shirt‚ she’d insist on treating her injuries. Rebecca was bound to be swamped with questions and none of the answers would be simple.
Her absence gave me a chance to talk to Dad one on one, and despite what he’d just gone through, I didn’t feel it was an opportunity I could pass up. There was a man dead in my kitchen – a man I knew to be a murderer, and very possibly an agent of the British government – and soon we’d need to decide what to do about it.
‘Dad,’ I said, and placed my hand on his knee. I was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of him. ‘I need to ask you something.’
He raised his head slowly, as if he’d forgotten I was there. His eyes were wet and red. He pinched the corners of them, near the bridge of his nose, like he was trying to clear his sinuses.
‘It’s about Laura,’ I said.
He nodded. Like he knew this had been coming.
‘Where did you get the mobile?’
‘They found it in her car,’ he said, his voice hoarse and scratchy. He swallowed. Thumped his chest. ‘In the glove box. After the accident. Mick gave it to me.’
‘You mean DI Shimmin?’
He nodded, eyes closed, as if in pain. ‘Your sister had two phones when they got to her. The one you called me on was new. It had no records. No calls out. None coming in. I’ve been keeping it charged. Keeping it close.’
‘Didn’t Shimmin need it as evidence?’
‘Evidence of what?’
Yes, evidence of what, I wondered, and then I posed the question I’d really wanted to ask. I told him about Rebecca’s theory. I explained that we’d begun to ask ourselves if Laura could have faked her own death. If the crash up at Marine Drive had been an elaborate smokescreen, a way for her to evade some kind of danger associated with her job. I told him that I knew what her job had been, now. I told him I had a fair idea of what the danger had been, too, and that it was linked to the man who’d held a gun on him.
Dad considered my words for a long time. His face gave nothing away. Then he reached out and gently rubbed his thumb across the dried blood on my forehead, like he was trying to clear away an oil stain. He cupped the back of my neck and tipped my head forwards so that he could inspect my wound.
‘Should have told you at the time,’ he said, in a voice that was heavy with regret. ‘Should have told you and your mum. Would have caused some heartache, but it would have been better than this.’
‘What is this?’
‘It was like you said,’ he told me, as if I had all the answers already. ‘Your sister came to me and said she was in trouble. Said she needed to get away. Reckoned there was only one way to do it.’ He almost smiled at the memory. Then his expression became glum and he let his arm fall away. ‘You know how stubborn she could be. Had her mind all made up. I’d always told her that her career would be the death of her. She said now it could be – in a way that would help her to get out.’
‘What happened?’
He met my eyes full on. It felt like the first time he’d done that in a while. ‘She was scared, Rob. Truly scared. And she wouldn’t listen to reason. She wouldn’t entertain the idea of going to anyone at her work, or speaking with the police. She had it all figured out. Everything. She wanted it done over here, so we could control it.’
‘Was Shimmin involved?’
‘He was going to be. That was part of it.’ Dad paused. ‘But it was also where it came undone. Laura had been so sure that it was possible, she couldn’t accept it when Mick started to poke holes in what she was suggesting.’
‘He didn’t like the idea?’
‘He’s a good man. A good friend. He wanted to help us. And if it was just down to him, he would have done, I’m sure. But he said there’d need to be other people involved. At least five. And he said that was too many. You couldn’t rely on them all to keep quiet about it.’
‘So Shimmin stopped the whole thing?’
‘He tried to.’
‘Tried to?’
Dad shook his head, exasperated. ‘Laura wouldn’t listen. She said it would all be fine. She had money saved. Enough to spread around. And when Mick still said no, she decided to force his hand.’
‘I don’t get it.’
‘She called Mick in the middle of the night and told him what she was planning. She was up at Marine Drive by then. Said she was going to nudge her car off the road and climb down to it and make it look like an accident. Told him she had some kind of sedative and she was going to inject herself with it. Reckoned that unless anyone checked her closely, it’d look like she was dead. She told Mick he had to come out and find her before anyone else, or the whole thing would be ruined.’
‘And did he?’
Dad sighed. ‘He said he wouldn’t go. He couldn’t get involved. He hung up on her. Didn’t answer when she called him again.’ He clasped a hand to his forehead. Ran it down over his face. ‘We think she lost it then. We think she began to believe she had no other way out. That’s when she did it for real, Rob. That’s when she drove off that cliff.’
I leaned backwards, shaking my head. ‘But DS Teare told us that Shimmin was the first person to find Laura.’
‘He was. He felt bad about hanging up. So he drove up to see if he could speak to her. Reason with her. But when he got there,
it was already too late.’
‘It doesn’t make any sense,’ I told him. ‘She left me a trail. She wanted me to find that memory stick. She wanted me to call the mobile I spoke to you on.’
Dad glanced quickly away. ‘Originally, maybe. I don’t know anything about that. But she changed her mind, son. She made her choice. I wish I could go back and do things differently. I wish there’d been some way I could have convinced her otherwise. But I tried, Rob. Believe me. I really tried.’
*
Lena had taken a chance on the grubby cafe because it was empty. No customers. No staff. She’d pressed her face up against the wire-glass door. Spied six unoccupied table booths and an abandoned service counter. The doorway behind the counter was obscured by a curtain made up of long strips of colourful plastic tape.
An electronic bell had chimed as she pushed the door open. She’d started at the noise, then jumped again when a woman parted the coloured tapes with her hands and peered out at her. The woman was black-skinned and vastly overweight. Her mouth was very large, crammed with teeth and gums. The way the coloured tapes arranged themselves around her spherical head and rounded shoulders served only to emphasise her size.
The woman’s easy smile died on her lips the moment she saw Lena. Her greasy, crazed hair. The dried blood on her arm and blouse. Her swollen, discoloured wrist. The dirty socks on her feet.
Lena felt herself shrink. She was used to walking into restaurants and being stared at. But normally the restaurants were fancy and the staring was of a different order.
‘Lord, child, what happened to you?’ the woman asked. She had an exotic accent. Jamaican, maybe.
‘I need to use your phone,’ Lena told her, in a voice that was shakier than she’d intended. ‘I don’t have any money.’
The woman raised a callused palm. ‘Somebody been beating on you, child?’
‘Please,’ Lena said, and glanced back towards the door. ‘Just one phone call.’
The woman rubbed her chin and stared at her some more. She leaned her considerable weight to one side and peered over Lena’s shoulder towards the street.
‘I won’t stay long,’ Lena told her.