Killing for the Company

by Chris Ryan

  ‘No . . . it’s about halfway up the street.’

  ‘Where are you now?’

  ‘Just up the road. I thought I should call . . .’

  ‘Please tell me what number you’re calling from.’

  Chet recited the number displayed in the phone booth.

  ‘Stay away from the area, caller. A patrol car will be . . .’

  But Chet had already hung up.

  He knew the police would be there quickly. Any sniff of gun crime and they were all over it like the clap. Would it be quick enough? He’d have to wait and see. Chet walked back towards where the white Golf was parked. He stopped about twenty metres away from it, on the same side as number 124. From here he could see the entrance to Suze’s building, and also the vehicle. If the intruder made a move, he could intervene. But otherwise he was going to wait.

  A minute passed.

  Two.

  It was faint at first, almost indistinguishable from the general hubbub of London, and the roar of traffic on the flyover. But gradually it got louder: the sound of sirens, two of them, maybe three, it was difficult to tell. Chet had to time it right. Too early and he’d announce his presence to the intruder. Too late and the police would be here, stopping him from gaining access to the flat.

  He waited until he could see the first car, its blue light flashing, scream round the corner into Wimbourne Terrace before he moved. He covered the distance to Suze’s flat as quickly as he could, keeping his head down so the intruder wouldn’t recognise him until it was too late. But, stepping on to the chequerboard path, he couldn’t help looking over his shoulder.

  The driver’s door of the Golf was open. A figure was getting out.

  He rang the bottom bell as the sound of the sirens got louder.

  Five seconds passed before there was an answer. It felt like five years. ‘Hello.’

  ‘Police,’ Chet replied, knowing the occupant would be able to hear the sirens. ‘Open the front door and stay in your flat.’

  The woman from the Golf had crossed the road.

  ‘Open the door, now!’ Chet barked.

  A buzzing sound and the latch clicked. He pushed the door open and slipped inside. As he turned to close it behind him, he saw her: the woman’s eyes were flashing angrily and she was striding towards the door, no more than five metres away. Chet pushed the door closed, hearing the latch click just as she reached the threshold. Through the frosted glass he saw her silhouette, with the blue lights of the police car flashing behind her.

  Chet didn’t linger. He moved along the short hallway, past the door of the ground-floor flat and up the thinly carpeted stairs. By the time he’d climbed three flights, his leg was in agony, but he kept going. Less than a minute later he was standing outside the door to the top flat. Flat 6. He hammered on the door: three heavy thumps, followed by another three when there was no answer. But he could hear movement inside. ‘Suze,’ he shouted. ‘Open the door. You’re in danger and you need to let me in.’

  No reply.

  Chet spoke quickly. Urgently. ‘Listen to me. One man’s already dead because of yesterday. One of us will be next unless you open this door now.’

  At first there was nothing. But then, just when Chet thought he was going to have to break his way in, the door opened just an inch. Warily he nudged it open wider with his foot.

  The tiny flat was in darkness. Chet saw a sofa, coffee table, TV, bookshelves, and a window with the curtains closed. The place reeked of incense and panic. At the other side of the studio, by the TV, stood Suze. She looked like she hadn’t slept; her eyes were red and mistrustful; and she was holding a kitchen knife.

  Chet stepped inside and closed the door. ‘We need to get out of here,’ he said. ‘Now.’

  Suze shook her head and raised the knife a little higher. ‘I’m not going anywhere with you,’ she whispered.

  He gave her a steady glare, then moved over to the window and opened the curtains. He could see the flyover, solid with rush-hour traffic. Below, and immediately outside, were three police cars, with four officers surrounding the white Golf. Standing about thirty metres away, as though she was just a bystander, was Chet’s wannabe assassin. She’d clearly slipped the attention of the Old Bill. He pointed in her direction. ‘See that woman?’ he said. ‘She tried to kill me last night and she was parked outside your flat when I arrived.’

  Suze stared down on the street. Chet could sense her trembling.

  ‘Believe me,’ he said quietly. ‘If it was me that wanted to kill you, you’d be dead by now. I don’t know who this woman is, but she’s armed, she has access to information and she’s a professional assassin. We have to get away from her, and we have to do it right now. Is there any way out of here, other than the front door? A fire exit? Can you get on to the roof?’

  ‘No . . . I don’t think so . . . no, I’m sure.’ She looked like all her worst nightmares were coming true.

  Chet tried to keep a clear head. ‘Do you know anyone else in this block? Do you have friends here? People you can trust?’

  It took Suze a moment to reply, as though the question hadn’t quite sunk in. ‘An old couple,’ she said finally. ‘Flat 5. Vern and Dorothy. Not friends, exactly, but . . . but . . . they’re not there anyway . . .’

  ‘Are you positive?’

  ‘They’ve gone away . . . on a cruise . . . I’ve got their keys . . .’

  ‘Give them to me. Now.’ Chet looked out of the window again as Suze put the knife down on the windowsill and rummaged in her colourful patchwork handbag. The police had created a cordon around the white Golf; the woman was still loitering thirty metres down the street, leaning against a tree and watching.

  ‘You’ve got thirty seconds to get ready,’ Chet told Suze as she handed him a set of keys.

  ‘Thirty seconds . . . I can’t . . . I . . .’ Chet grabbed her by the arm and pulled her towards the door. She started to struggle. ‘Wait,’ she said. ‘The tape.’ She broke free and scrambled towards the bookshelf where a Dictaphone was lying at an angle. When she came back with the tape, he gripped her arm again and dragged her out of the flat and down the stairs.

  By the time they reached the door to the flat below, Suze was crying, but she’d stopped fighting so much. Chet unlocked the door and pushed her inside before quietly closing it behind him. Flat 5 was bigger than Suze’s attic studio. They were in a long hallway, lined with oil paintings and even a small alabaster statue on a pedestal of a cherub peeing. Suze’s sobbing was noisy. ‘Get away from the door,’ Chet whispered. ‘Stay away from all the windows, don’t switch on any lights and don’t make a fucking noise.’

  Suze stared at him. She was breathing in short, frightened gasps.

  ‘Get away from the door!’

  She staggered back along the hallway, and collapsed on the thick carpet.

  Chet grabbed the figurine. It was small enough to grip in one hand, heavy enough to do some proper damage to someone’s skull. He stayed by the entrance. There was a spyhole in the door, through which he could see the landing outside. He kept his eyes on the exterior of the flat, gripping the statue in his right hand. ‘Shut up,’ he said. When it was clear the girl couldn’t stop crying, he tried to block out the sound so that he could concentrate on any noise that came from the stairwell.

  Two minutes passed. There was a brief commotion – voices talking excitedly – that sounded like it came from the floor below, though it was difficult to be sure. It was followed by the banging of the door, and then silence.

  ‘What’s happening?’ Suze asked.

  ‘Shut up.’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Sshh!’

  Someone was coming. He found himself holding his breath.

  It was fleeting – the black-clad figure of the woman slipping past like a ghost before heading up to the top floor – but it was enough. Enough for Chet to see the determination on her face and the weapon in her fist.

  Chet turned to Suze. She’d recovered a little, but
she still looked shit-scared. He tried to sound reassuring, but it was difficult, given what he had to say. ‘She’s going into your flat,’ he whispered, ‘and she’s got a gun. We have less than a minute before she realises you’re not there. We’ve got to go now, and we’ve got to go quietly. OK?’

  She looked up at him and nodded. Chet helped her to her feet, and pulled her gently towards the door.

  ‘Ready?’

  ‘Ready.’

  He opened up as quietly as possible, and they stepped out into the landing and towards the stairs. Chet nodded at Suze to go first, and followed close behind as she descended. He was still grasping the cherub. Not much use against a nine-millimetre, but it was all there was. Every four or five steps he looked back over his shoulder, but he saw nothing. The further they got towards the ground floor, the faster and more panicked Suze’s steps became, until it was difficult for Chet to keep up. By the time they were both on the ground floor, she was sobbing again.

  ‘You’re doing fine,’ Chet said, out of breath, as he opened the street door. ‘Keep going.’

  They stepped outside. There were still two policemen by the cordoned-off Golf, but they were talking so casually it was clear they’d found no weapons and didn’t consider the situation serious. Chet kept hold of Suze’s arm and guided her across the street.

  ‘Where are we going?’ she asked.

  ‘My car.’

  ‘Where then?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Why are you limping like that?’

  Chet sniffed. ‘Don’t worry about it. I’ll explain later.’

  Suddenly he stopped. He didn’t know why. Just a feeling. An uneasy one. He turned around and looked back towards Suze’s block. He could clearly see the top-floor window, the one he’d looked out of just minutes previously.

  There was a face at the window, looking out on to the street. It might have been indistinguishable at this distance, but somehow Chet knew, with absolute certainty, that the face was watching them leave.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Nothing. Keep going.’ He continued to walk. And as he walked, his mind turned over. Whoever this woman was that they’d just escaped from, she was skilled and she had resources.

  She was dangerous. And she wasn’t the type to give up.

  A good thing, then, that neither was he.

  Chet’s face was grim as he led Suze to his car and opened the door for her before looking up again at the window in the distance. He could still see the woman there, and that meant she had clocked his car. Nothing he could do about that now, though. He climbed in and drove off.

  The woman standing at the window watched her two targets disappear. Her face was expressionless.

  She turned away. Things had not gone well at all. She had killed the wrong man at the station that morning. That was a bad error, and as they had drummed into her during her training, one mistake invariably leads to another. A kitchen knife lay on the windowsill. Her fingers sought it out, almost of their own accord, and she gripped the handle. With a sudden burst of rage, she raised the knife in the air and drove the point down so heavily into the sill that the wood split. ‘Ben zonah!’

  Her eyes flashed and it needed every ounce of self-control to stop the anger from once more bursting out of her. She took a couple of deep breaths and ran her hands through her hair.

  Think, Maya, she told herself. You have to think.

  She closed her eyes. She forced herself to become calm.

  When she was a little girl, her parents had told her the story of Hansel and Gretel and how they were able to retrace their way through the forest because they had dropped little bits of bread behind them. It frequently struck her that most people dropped bits of bread behind them, even if they didn’t know they were doing it. If you wanted to find the person, all you had to do was follow the crumbs.

  She looked around the flat. It was a tiny place – smaller even than her safe house in Tel Aviv – but that didn’t mean it held no secrets. She continued to breathe deeply so as to calm her temper, and started to search.

  It took her seconds to spot the two box files marked ‘Stratton’ and ‘Grosvenor Group’. The image of the British Prime Minister rose in her mind, but she gave their contents only the most cursory of glances. That wasn’t the kind of thing she was after.

  A photo on the TV showed a young woman and a disabled old lady. So different, yet somehow similar. Now that was a different matter. She ripped off the back of the frame, pocketed the print and continued her search.

  She returned to the shelf where she had found the two files, but concentrated instead on the shelves below. There were a few books here, neatly lined up; a small mahogany box with some loose change inside; and on the bottom shelf what looked like a square briefcase with a lockable clasp. She pressed the clasp and it clicked open. Inside the briefcase were approximately ten green foolscap wallet folders, alphabetically arranged with neat, hand-written labels.

  Banking. Insurance. Rent.

  She ignored all these, and instead focused on a folder labelled ‘Mum’.

  To find the person, all you had to do was follow the crumbs.

  Smiling now, she opened up the folder and started to read.

  ‘How much money do you have?’

  They were heading up Edgware Road.

  ‘None,’ Suze snapped, like a moody kid. ‘You made me leave the flat without getting anything, remember?’

  Chet grunted. If she was after an apology for saving her life, she’d have a long wait.

  ‘Who the hell are you anyway?’ she demanded. Chet didn’t answer. He pulled out his wallet from the inside pocket of his jacket and threw it on to her lap.

  ‘How much is in there? Count it.’

  Suze gave him a harsh look, but started to rummage through the wallet. ‘A hundred and sixty,’ she said finally.

  Chet glanced at the fuel-level indicator. Half full. That was thirty quid gone before they’d even started. Not good.

  ‘We can’t use any credit cards,’ he said, more to himself than to his passenger.

  Suze looked confused. ‘Why?’

  Why? It was a good question, and now that they’d got safely away from her flat, it was one that was occupying every moment of Chet’s thoughts. The intruder had tracked the girl through the call he’d made to her. That wasn’t straightforward. It took time. Resources. Who was equipped to track phone calls at such speed? Five? The Firm? If so, they’d need to go through GCHQ, and that meant someone high up had given the order. That wasn’t a very comfortable thought. Someone wanted to find them. Really wanted to find them. Tracking their phone calls was just one way of doing that. Following a trail of credit-card payments was another. And there were more. Chet was going to have to make sure he was ahead of the game.

  Suze was biting her fingernails. ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘Out of London.’

  ‘That doesn’t really narrow it down.’

  ‘I don’t know yet, all right? Just shut up and let me think.’

  Suze looked like she was going to respond, but she thought better of it. Instead she sat in silence, looking out of the window, still gnawing at her thumbnail.

  Chet made for the M1. The road was clear, but he kept a steady speed – to get pulled over now would be a really bad idea – and it was twenty minutes or so before they hit the junction with the M25. He took the clockwise carriageway and drove steadily round to just before the Dartford Tunnel, where he pulled off for petrol at Thurrock services. The service station was crowded and they had to queue for a pump. Only when they drew alongside one did Chet speak.

  ‘Keep the doors locked.’

  ‘Why? No one knows we’re here.’

  ‘Keep them locked.’

  Chet filled up and went in to pay. He bought a stash of chocolate bars, bananas and high-energy drinks, before stepping back out on to the concourse.

  He clocked it immediately: a police car parked up just by the air and water machine. T
wo uniformed officers next to it, one talking into a radio mike fixed to his lapel, both of them looking at – and now walking towards – the black Mondeo.

  Chet put his head down, and continued walking to the car. He was coming towards it at a different angle to the police, and was slightly closer. But he didn’t want to speed up yet, because that would alert them to his presence.

  Ten metres to go. He tried to catch Suze’s eye, but she was staring vacantly into space and clearly hadn’t noticed either Chet or the officers.

  Five metres.

  Chet could hear the crackle of the police radio. He pressed his key to unlock the doors, and the lights flashed twice.

  ‘Excuse me, sir. Sir!’

  Chet opened the door and climbed in. He was turning the key even before the door was shut. The two officers were right in front of him, one of them holding up his hand, palm outwards, while the other was hurrying round to Chet’s side.

  ‘Oh my God,’ Suze wailed.

  Chet said nothing. He centrally locked the doors, then put his foot on the accelerator and drove slowly towards the policeman blocking his way. At first it looked like the cop was going to stand his ground, but he jumped to one side when he realised Chet wasn’t going to stop. The second policeman managed to rap his knuckles on the driver’s window, but Chet had the space to accelerate now, and that’s what he did, ignoring the alarmed looks from the other customers at the petrol station.

  The Mondeo’s tyres squealed as he raced towards the exit. In his mirrors he saw the two police officers running back towards their car.

  ‘What’s . . . what’s happening?’ Suze stammered. ‘How did they know where we were?’

  Chet swung round the perimeter road of the service station and back on to the northbound M25, pushing the car through its revs until it was touching ninety.

  ‘Number-plate recognition,’ he murmured, his jaw clenched with determination. ‘Police cameras at all the main motorway junctions. They use them to track stolen vehicles. Gets fed through to the Police National Computer.’

  ‘Bastards!’

  He checked his mirrors. No sign of the police tailing him yet. ‘Someone’s instructed them to bring us in.’