by Joy Ellis
A moment or two later Joseph backed out onto the pavement, dragging an inert form with him. Nikki tensed with fear, but it took only a second to realise that it was not one of their officers. It was a male, wearing a navy nursing tunic with epaulettes on the shoulders. Although she’d never met him, she was sure that she was looking at Todd Ramsey.
She took a ragged breath in. This did not bode well. If Snipe could kill his only ally, then his victims’ lives would hold no value at all. And neither would hers.
She watched as Joseph felt the side of the man’s neck. Then he nodded, did a thumbs-up sign, and gesticulated for two of the officers waiting behind her to approach him. He held his finger to his lips, telling them silently that he wanted the man evacuated as swiftly and silently as possible.
So he wasn’t dead. But he was out of the game. Nikki felt a rush of excitement. When she finally got to confront Snipe, it would be him and her. Just Snipe and Nikki Galena. She thought about Bob Wilshire’s son, Danny, and she saw again the bloody dressings on the floor beneath the trolley that Cat lay on. A steely calm took possession of her.
In that moment she decided that the most dangerous person in the whole scenario was not Snipe, neither was it big Vinnie Silver, Joseph Easter, nor the officers with the rifles. It was her. Hate and contempt for what he had done threatened to consume her, but she couldn’t let that happen. She would channel it, use it, make it work for her and for the hostages.
She looked back to the doorway. Vinnie was beckoning to her, and without hesitation she moved towards him.
Inside there was chaos. Broken furniture was heaped into one corner of the big reception area, boxes and packaging in another. Some of the ceiling panels were down, exposing a crawl space above and tangled plaits of plastic-coated wiring for old strip lights.
Joseph stood silently at a junction of two corridors, the heat-seeking camera in one hand. He pointed down the right-hand aisle, a harsh look of concentration on his face.
Nikki moved up close to his shoulder.
Joseph spoke in the softest of whispers. ‘Three doors along. Small operating theatre with back and front access. Four thermal images, two lying on the floor, one seated, and one standing.’ He looked at her with the oddest expression. ‘Are you sure about this, Nikki?’
‘Don’t piss about, Joseph. I’m absolutely certain,’ she hissed.
She glanced back to where Vinnie, Dave and the armed officers were standing. They looked impassive, immobile, and very threatening.
‘Then buy us all the time you can, but don’t trust or believe a word he says. Don’t rise to any bait.’ Sincerity flooded from him. ‘Remember, whatever happens, I will be there if you need me, okay?’
Nikki brought her hand up and gently touched Joseph’s cheek. ‘You always are.’
She slowly moved off down the corridor and away from safety.
As she passed the first door she called out, ‘This is DI Nikki Galena. I want to talk to you. I am alone and I’ll stay that way, as long as you allow me to see my detective constable and the others.’
She waited, and in the silence a touch of the old fear tried to creep back into her heart. Bugger that, she thought. ‘I know you have Cat Cullen and two others with you. Can I please see them? I want to know they are safe.’
‘You are not alone, DI Galena. Don’t lie to me.’ The voice sounded a little muffled, but it somehow served to pinpoint what she had to do.
‘I had help in finding you, that’s true. But I promise I will come in alone.’
‘But you’ll be wired?’
‘I am not.’ I don’t need to be, she thought.
‘I don’t care if you are. Come in.’
So this was it. Nikki took a moment to centre herself. What happened from now on in was crucial to saving her colleagues’ lives — if there were any lives left to save. She had to get this right.
‘I said come in.’
Nikki closed her eyes, offered a quick prayer, took a deep breath and walked coolly towards the door of the disused operating theatre.
The big area was full of shadows. There was still power to this part of the building, but the only lamp left undamaged was a single low wattage bulb in a lamp over a battered metal instrument table.
She tried to be professional, to observe everything impassively and accurately. But it didn’t work like that. Nikki saw a tableau displayed in front of her, and it seemed surreal and almost ghostly in the gloomy half-light. But the first thing she needed to ascertain was whether Snipe’s three hostages were still alive.
She raised her eyes and looked at Snipe. He was standing casually behind an old low-backed chair, and in front of him, tied tightly to it, was Cat. He had one hand resting gently on her shoulder, and the other held an open plastic bottle. It was just inches from Cat’s already injured face.
‘Acid. I think you met it before, didn’t you?’ he asked amiably.
Nikki nodded but said nothing. She couldn’t. He mouth had gone dry and her throat was constricted so tightly that she could barely breathe.
Snipe watched her with amusement. ‘Not who you expected, guv?’
Now she recognised the slightly melodic intonation in the voice.
Travis Taylor? For a second or two, nothing computed in her brain. This changes nothing, she told herself. But it did. It changed everything. She had believed Travis to be one of Cat’s few real friends, and she knew Cat thought the same. This made it so much worse, and it also made Snipe far more damaged than she had realised. He had maimed Cat, killed a man right in front of her, then visited her in hospital in the guise of a friend. Bile rose in Nikki’s throat and threatened to choke her. And now the sick bastard was standing over her with a bottle of acid!
Clarity returned in a flash, and the confused, befuddled woman was once again a skilled and capable police officer.
Her eyes flew around the area, missing nothing.
Cat was alive, although her head was bowed and she appeared sedated.
Two other figures were in a corner, slumped on the floor in a heap. She recognised PC Geoff Barry immediately, then realised that the other man was Stuart Broad. Their wrists and ankles had been secured with duct tape and there was also a strip across their mouths. Neither moved. Nikki looked intently at them, searching for a sign, something to tell her that they were still breathing. Travis hadn’t killed Todd, so maybe he would spare these two as well? But why were they so still? Why was their breath so very shallow?
‘A strong sedative.’ Travis answered her unspoken question. ‘Not sure about the dose, though. Todd kindly administered that for me, but I think he was than less than attentive to his work by that time. I think I managed to scare him somehow.’ Travis looked mildly irritated, then glanced over to another open plastic bottle that was balanced precariously close to the edge of a shelf immediately above the men’s heads. ‘Let’s just hope they stay asleep, shall we?’
Nikki stared at the bottle, then at the two thick plastic protective containers that stood next to it. She took in the bright yellow hazard warning stickers on the side and the fact that their wide screw-tops had been removed. She swallowed hard. Then she turned and looked directly at Travis Taylor, her nostrils tingling at the odd, acidic chemical smell that permeated the room.
Travis moved his thin frame a little closer to Cat. ‘We will talk, DI Galena, but first, there are things you should be aware of.’ He smiled coldly at her, but there was a strange sadness about him. ‘I know that I will die here, and that’s fine. It’s my choice. I know that your friend Joseph, your other buddies and quite probably a couple of impressive armed units are hovering impatiently outside.’ His stare intensified. ‘But I’d advise caution, Nikki. This,’ he indicated the bottle, ‘is that most insidious of substances, hydrofluoric acid. If one of your marksmen shot me, I would pitch either forward or backwards. Even a head shot would cause an involuntary spasm, and either of those actions would have a rather devastating effect on our Cat here, don’t you think?’ H
e looked thoughtfully at the bottle’s wide mouth. ‘I would only have to open my hand just a little, and . . .’ he wriggled his thin fingers slightly, making the liquid move within the container. Then he gave a little shrug. ‘They can come in if you like. Joseph? Dave? Yvonne? Whoever is out there! The whole gang! Why not?’
Buy us time! The words echoed through her head. ‘I’d rather it was just you and me, Travis.’
‘Okay. You’re the one I really want to talk to.’ His smile became a look of disdain. ‘So, how does it feel?’
Nikki tried not to stare at Cat. She wasn’t as sedated as the men, she did not appear quite so out of it. What would happen if she woke? ‘How does what feel?’
‘To be a loser. To have failed. To have failed to even play the game, let alone win.’ He glared at her. ‘You have blood on your hands, Inspector. If you’d been up to the job, you would have stopped me. Everything that’s happened has been your fault, just like it was before.’
Nikki had no idea what he meant, but considering that Cat’s last investigation had been about William French, she guessed that he was the connection. She decided not to tackle that right now. ‘You gave us nothing to play with, Travis. The game was stacked in your favour from the start, we were just pawns. So I don’t really feel like a loser, I just feel rather cheated.’ As she spoke she was aware of the slightest movement in the shadow behind the chair where Travis stood. She tried to ignore it, to keep the man speaking, but then she saw there was more than one dark figure in the background. Now she was really frightened. She must not allow Travis to realise that she was no longer alone, or Cat could die in agony.
‘What have you done to Cat, Travis?’
‘A mild sedative and Midazolam, I think. Date rape drug. If she survives, she’ll have no recall of any of this. That was Todd’s area of expertise. He slipped a sedative into her tea and later, after I’d “helped” her escape, he injected her with the relaxant. I didn’t want her fighting and getting this all over the place.’ He gave the bottle a tiny, frightening shake. ‘Todd turned out to be very useful, especially when my all-too-clever partner turned up unannounced.’ He threw a scornful look toward Stuart.
‘If he was so useful, what happened to him?’
‘He was new to the organisation, and it didn’t take me long to realise that he wasn’t totally committed, so . . .’ He shrugged. ‘It’s au revoir, Todd.’
But it’s not, thought Nikki. He’s still alive, and he could put you away for a very long while.
‘Enough of this. You are changing the subject. We were talking about your spectacular failures.’ He gave a short bark of laughter. ‘Ha, you would never have worked out about Magda Hellekamp’s locked room! I had to practically draw you pictures!’
Nikki gave a small laugh of her own. ‘Hardly surprising, considering it was you who orchestrated the technology for her murder. How long have you been part of Rent-a-Crook?’
‘Since college. I was headhunted.’ He looked at her disparagingly. ‘And by the way, they are not impressed by your ridiculous nickname of Rent-a-Crook. It’s an organisation that makes your police force look like muppets.’
Nikki watched him intently, praying he would be so caught up by what he was saying that he wouldn’t notice the silent figures gathering behind him.
‘And you were happy to join up, considering you hated the police so much?’
‘You have no idea!’ Travis spat out the words.
‘I don’t know what happened, Travis, and I realise you have a deep loathing of the police, but why hurt Cat? She cares about you, I know she does. She’s your friend, for heaven’s sake! We were all your friends, but Cat thought you were special.’
Travis looked down at Cat, a bewildered expression replacing the anger. Then he lifted his head and stared at her. Nikki could see that some kind of battle was raging in the young man’s head.
‘Did she? No, no, she’s police,’ he said flatly.
‘She was friend first, Travis, then a police officer.’
He chewed on the inside of his cheek, then bit on his bottom lip. ‘No, no, that’s not right. Not right at all. She’s police! End of.’ The anger was returning. ‘And the police and their bungling ineptitude took away . . . Ah!’ He almost shook with a sudden burst of fury. ‘Your incompetence in dealing with his father destroyed him! Remember the so-called safe house? Remember that innocent man in your protection? The one that you and your buddies allowed those thugs to walk right in and execute! Some protection!’ He almost spat the words at her. ‘And because of that, the most courageous and amazing person ever suffered so badly that he took his own life!’ His manic eyes drilled into hers. ‘I found him!’ Tears welled up, but the madness remained. ‘I found him dead and cold on his father’s grave.’
Nikki finally understood who he was talking about. She had no idea why he was eaten up with hate because of William French’s death, but he was. He was consumed beyond any reasoning with taking revenge. ‘William?’ she whispered.
‘William.’ It was one word, but it was brimming with grief and anguish.
For a moment she thought he would collapse, then his eyes widened and he stared at something directly behind Nikki.
‘Freeze! Armed police! Keep absolutely still, or we will shoot!’ And she knew instantly that officers White and Braden were behind her with their carbines pointed at Travis Taylor.
Fear for Cat’s life hit her like a runaway truck. But almost before she could compute what was happening, three figures had moved towards Travis with lightning speed. In the blink of an eye, a strong arm had snaked around the man’s upper body and a big hand had fastened itself around Travis’s wrist, holding it and the bottle immobile. His other arm was pinning Travis’s free hand to his side in a bone-crushing bear-hug.
As Vinnie was executing his vicelike grip, Joseph and Dave had appeared on either side of him. Joseph, his hands enclosed in thick gloves, grasped the bottle and prised it from Travis’s claw-like fingers. He then handed it, with incredible steadiness to Dave, who thrust something oval and bulky beneath the open bottle ‘Got it, Sarge,’ she heard him whisper. Then he whisked the container away and called out, ‘Secured!’
Then, as relief washed through her, she heard a low, painful moan and she remembered the others.
Nikki spun around and saw that the drugged men had begun to move. Despite the duct-tape bonds, they were trying to get to their feet. ‘No! Geoff! Stuart! Don’t move! Keep still!’
Everyone looked towards the corner, at the two half-conscious men and at the innocent looking plastic bottle on the shelf just a few feet above their heads.
‘Acid!’ screamed Nikki. ‘The bottle! It’s more acid.’
Stuart Broad sank back down with a groan and tried to pull Geoff with him, but Geoff Barry seemed to be the only one in the room who didn’t understand what she was saying. His system was still flowing with the powerful sedative. His eyes rolled and, to everyone’s horror, he heaved himself upward.
In the next few moments time moved in slow motion. Nikki saw a hand flash out and, as the open bottle tipped, it fastened around it. She saw droplets of acid fly up and splatter the fingers, but it held fast. And then Joseph was there, and with his own gloved hands, removed the bottle from the clenched fist, placed it directly into one of the protective canisters and screwed on the top.
By this time, Travis had been handcuffed and lay face down on the dusty floor with Dave’s knee in his back and two guns trained on his head. It was then that Nikki had a chance to realise who had just taken a handful of agonising burns to save PC Barry.
Superintendent Rick Bainbridge slid down the wall nursing his injured hand. ‘Not exactly the kind of swansong I’d have liked, but hell, I’m not having any more of my officers hurt.’
Nikki ran to him, and saw a uniformed police woman already approaching with a large bowl of clean, cold water. ‘Sergeant Easter said we might need water in case of another acid attack.’ She carefully took hold of the superinten
dent’s arm and guided his hand into the bowl. ‘Looks like he was right. In here, sir, as quickly as possible. Irrigation is our best chance to slow it down. Help is on its way.’
Nikki crouched down beside her boss. ‘What a way to leave the job.’
‘Well, can’t go out with a fizzle, can we? We’re used to sky-rockets in this division.’ He winced. ‘My God, this stuff hurts like hell!’
‘You saved PC Barry and Stuart Broad from some horrific injuries, sir.’ She took his other hand in hers. ‘I’ve known it for years, but maybe I should tell you to your face. You’re a very brave man, sir.’
‘No braver than the woman who just walked into a psychopath’s lair to save her colleagues.’
‘Touché, sir, but I had one heck of a back-up team.’ She looked up at the others.
‘That’s not a civilian, is it?’ Rick looked towards Vinnie with narrowed eyes.
‘My fault,’ Joseph pulled off the protective gloves. ‘Last minute change of plan. Two of us could not have contained the acid satisfactorily, so I called on Vinnie for help. I take full responsibility, sir.’
‘I see, and as a conscientious member of the public, he could hardly refuse the officer’s request, could he?’ Rick grimaced through the pain. ‘Thank you.’
The big man gave a courteous bow, followed by a salute. ‘My pleasure. sir.’
‘Medics are here!’ someone called out.
Two paramedics pushed through the gathered officers and knelt down beside Rick Bainbridge. ‘A & E are expecting you, sir. They are ready to start treatment immediately.’
‘I’ll be over to see you as soon as we get this mess tied up,’ Nikki called after him.
‘Just get that man locked up, Nikki. Before someone tries to lynch him for what he’s done. Not that I’d blame them.’
‘Do I stop them if they try?’
‘I’ll leave that to you.’
Nikki walked over to where a doctor was shining a light into Cat’s eyes. ‘How is she?’
‘Away with the fairies. We’ll get her back on the ward and run some tests, but she should sleep this lot off overnight.’