by Sean Black
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Any luck getting hold of Ryan?’
‘He’s still off comms.’
‘In English please, Tyrone.’
‘His cell’s switched off.’
‘OK, as soon as you get hold of him, I want him in here for a briefing. In the meantime, can you start actioning our other procedures?’
‘Yes, sir.’
Stafford strode into his office, picked up the putter leaning in the corner and swung it like a baseball bat, narrowly avoiding his desk. He was the heir apparent, the man who’d be running the company one day, and he wasn’t even asked for his opinion. The building’s super had more say in the running of the company than he did.
The door into the executive bathroom was ajar and he caught sight of his own reflection. He paused, pleased by his own image, by the bright blue eyes and thick blond hair, both inherited from his mother. Only his father’s weak chin let him down. With a solid chin it would have been a face for the front cover of Fortune magazine. The face of a man born to greatness.
‘You look real pretty.’
Stafford spun round to see Brand framed in the doorway. He let the club fall into a more conventional position and mimed sinking a twelve-footer. ‘Don’t you know to knock first?’ he asked, feeling like he’d been caught with his pants down.
Brand put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Don’t let the old man get to you.’
‘This was our chance to get past all this animal rights crap. Why couldn’t he have given this to one of your guys? I mean, anyone but Lock. I hate that guy.’ Stafford kicked out at the wall with the point of his English-made leather Oxford brogues.
‘You’re not the only one.’
‘So what do we do about him?’
‘Can’t you have a word with your old man? Maybe suggest to him that it’s time Lock pursues other opportunities outside the company.’
Stafford smiled. ‘And make you head of security?’
‘Hey, that’s not a bad idea.’
‘He won’t go for it. Not after what’s happened. He thinks the sun rises out of Lock’s asshole.’
‘There’s an image. You know what I think? Lock’s probably the one who set up this interview. The broad who’s doing it, Lock was seeing her for a while.’
‘Maybe I can use that.’
Brand clapped Stafford again on the shoulder. ‘Your chance’ll come, Stafford. You and me, we’re the ones to watch. Your old man and Lock, they’ll be history soon.’
Twenty
A ‘For Lease’ sign hung like a white flag outside the Korean deli. Further down, the Meditech building looked the same as it had before the shooting, albeit with one or two muscular additions in the form of half a dozen Metalith™ anti-ram barriers. The glass frontage had been made over too, the tint of the windows, even in this light, hinting at blast-proof capabilities.
They threw back Lock’s reflection at him as he stood outside, studying the face of an ever-changing stranger. What had once been a shadow was now the approach of a full beard. His eyes had large dark half-moons underneath them. His pupils were wide but the whites bloodshot. He was reminded of someone else. It took him a moment to think of who. That was it. He looked like Richard Hulme. He took off his ball cap, reached up and rubbed at the stitches in his scalp. Maybe they’d all end up looking like Richard Hulme before Josh was found.
He took three steps into the foyer.
‘Excuse me, sir, who are you here to see?’
It was one of Brand’s team. A baby-faced former Marine who went by the name of Hizzard.
Lock glanced at the bulge under the guard’s overcoat. ‘Hizzard, it might be freezing out there, but it’s eighty degrees in here. You look like a moron.’
Hizzard reluctantly took off his coat to reveal a Mini Uzi with what Lock guessed from first glance was a fifty-round mag.
‘Jesus, second thoughts, put your coat back on before someone sees that thing. What the hell is this? Get Rich or Die Tryin’?’
Hizzard looked sheepish.
‘Listen up, Fiddy,’ Lock said, ‘you pick a weapon based on its suitability for the job. No other reason.’
Footsteps echoed on the marble floors behind them. Lock looked over, pleased to see Ty loping towards him across the lobby.
‘They want you up on twenty-five. We can talk on the way up.’
‘Damn straight,’ said Lock, glancing from Hizzard to Ty.
Ty directed a ‘kids these days’ shrug at Lock as they headed for the first bank of elevators that would take them as far as the twentieth floor. They got in and Ty pressed the button. The doors slid shut. A camera concealed in the front right corner of the elevator was on them. Lock turned so his back was to it and counted to ten.
‘What’s with all the hardware, Tyrone?’
‘I told you, man, with you out we got the mother of all pissing contests here. Brand’s marking his territory.’
The doors opened on twenty. Waiting for them were two more members of Brand’s CA team. This time they were minus overcoats but both with the same model of machine pistol the boys downstairs were sporting.
Lock and Ty shared a look. The lunatics had clearly taken over the asylum.
Twenty-one
Walking into the boardroom on the twenty-fifth floor, Lock felt about as much at ease as a crack-head crashing the Rainbow Room. Not that anyone said anything — far from it. No one commented on his appearance. Or asked how he was. Or enquired as to how he was getting on as ‘official’ Meditech point man in the search for Josh Hulme. Instead, they all studied whatever pieces of paper they had in front of them and waited for their boss, Nicholas Van Straten, to start.
Nicholas Van Straten sat at the head of the table. Stafford was directly to his father’s right, Brand to his left. Not a good sign. Ty took a seat next to Lock, a few seats down. Scattered around the other chairs were five or six other employees. Some of them Lock could put a name to, some he couldn’t. It was a big company.
Stafford looked Lock up and down. ‘I didn’t realize it was dress-down Friday.’
The woman from the media relations department tittered like a schoolgirl.
Lock stared at Stafford. ‘My tux was at the cleaners.’
Nicholas Van Straten closed a thin manila folder with an expensively manicured hand and looked down the table, meeting Lock’s gaze for a second. ‘Thanks for being here, Ryan. I certainly appreciate it. How are you feeling?’
Lock directed his answer to Brand. ‘Ready for duty.’
Brand smirked.
Lock took a breath, and did his best to centre himself. ‘I apologize for my appearance. It’s been a hectic day or two.’
Lock could see Ty studying the table, trying hard not to laugh.
‘Quite,’ said Nicholas. ‘Now, shall we discuss where we go from here?’
The woman from public relations, who it transpired was the Missy of ‘outside press conference’ legend, launched into an enthusiastic pitch as to how best to handle the Josh Hulme kidnapping situation from a public relations perspective. Like the true professional she was, she started out with a little light ass-kissing. ‘Well, Mr Van Straten, with your brilliant intervention we’ve made a great start at wresting back control of this very delicate situation. Clearly our initial lack of involvement did some damage, but that shouldn’t last too long now that we’re being seen to help.’
The ‘being seen to’ jarred with Lock but he remained silent. The terrain had clearly changed a lot in a very short space of time and he needed to get an overview of it before he said anything.
As Missy continued, using words of three syllables or more when two would have been sufficient, Lock studied Brand. A square head on an equally square torso, he was sitting ramrod straight, staring directly at the woman speaking. His hands were folded on the conference table, his fingers interlocked. He gave the appearance of someone listening intently when, in fact, Lock knew from his experiences with him that he had pretty much no idea what was
being said. Still, he looked impressive. Calm and in control.
‘So, in summary,’ Missy was saying, ‘I think this is, in fact, an excellent opportunity to not only build brand awareness but reposition our company as one which truly cares about the wider community.’
Holy shit. Only in corporate America could a child abduction which had already yielded one dead body be seen as a way to make a business appear warm and cuddly.
‘I’ve an idea,’ Lock said.
All eyes swivelled round to him.
‘Maybe if we get the kid back in one piece we could do a tie-in with one of our drugs. You know, like Ritalin, or something.’
No one laughed. Or looked pissed. Missy jotted something down. ‘Or perhaps set up some kind of foundation?’
‘I think you’ll find Mr Lock was being facetious,’ Nicholas Van Straten said, drily.
‘Oh,’ she said, looking at Lock like he’d just taken a leak in the corner of the room.
‘If I may?’ Stafford interjected.
‘If you must,’ said his father.
Stafford pressed the palms of his hands together in apparent supplication and paused for a moment. ‘I don’t think we have a problem here. This is a public relations snafu, nothing that’ll affect us. And certainly nothing that’ll worry our shareholders. The animal rights protestors, now that was a problem for us. But seeing as they’re out of the equation we can get back to concentrating on our bottom line.’ Stafford stood up. ‘Now, this is what I propose. .’
Lock shifted uncomfortably, his recurring headache beginning to gnaw away again at the front of his skull. As he watched Stafford drone on, his mind drifted back three months, to the first time he’d run into the man.
Lock had been supervising a sweep of the upper floors of the building, taking the newly recruited Hizzard through proper civilian search procedure of a location while the place was quiet. Even those employees desperate to avoid returning to an empty apartment, or clocking up unpaid extra hours to impress their line manager, had long gone.
Lock had left Hizzard to check one half of the floor while he did the other. Lock had one office to try. Stafford’s office. A floor down from his father’s, Stafford’s was close enough that he could feel important, but not close enough that his father had to see him all that much. The door was slightly ajar, and as Lock pushed it open he saw a woman bent double over the desk. In Stafford’s right hand was a hank of her hair; his left hand was working its way up between her thighs. The woman was doing her best to fight him off, clawing at Stafford’s face with a free hand.
‘Shut the hell up, bitch,’ Stafford growled, sharply yanking her head back.
‘You’re hurting me,’ she pleaded.
Stafford’s face moved closer to hers. ‘Bet you like it rough, don’t you?’ he whispered.
Lock had seen enough. He stepped through the door.
‘This office doesn’t need cleaning, go somewhere else,’ barked Stafford, not bothering to look behind him.
When no answer came, Stafford let go of the woman’s hair and reached down to unzip his trousers.
Covering the distance between them with six large strides, Lock stopped as Stafford glanced round. The look on Stafford’s face wasn’t shame, or guilt, or anything approximating either of those. He just looked irritated that someone would have the audacity to disobey him. Never before had Lock felt such a strong urge to wipe a look from someone’s face.
He did it with a single strike to Stafford’s face, the ridge of his elbow meeting his nose with a soft crunch. If there was one thing guaranteed to make a rapist lose wood it was a severe jolt of pain. It usually worked a hell of a lot faster than a cold shower.
The woman disentangled herself and turned round. She was breathing heavily from the struggle. She put both hands up to her face and rubbed at it, as if wishing away a nightmare. She looked to Lock to be in her early twenties, either an intern or fresh out of college.
‘Are you OK?’ Lock asked.
She nodded, struggling to pull back up her torn pantyhose. Hizzard, the new recruit, blustered into the room and froze as he took in the scene.
‘There’s a bathroom just down the hall,’ Lock said to the woman. ‘Hizzard here will take you.’
She hesitated.
‘Don’t worry, you’re safe now,’ Lock said.
‘OK.’ Her voice wavered slightly. Pulling down her skirt, she walked out, head down, avoiding eye contact with Stafford. Hizzard padded after her, careful to keep his distance.
Lock reached past Stafford for the phone. He was pleased to see a flicker of panic in Stafford’s eyes.
‘Hey, wait a minute.’
Lock pressed nine to get an outside line. He could see that Stafford was desperate to make a lunge for the handset, but too much of a coward to go for it. He cradled the phone between his shoulder and chin. ‘What you gonna tell me? Rough was how she liked it? She’d been coming on to you for weeks now? Why else would she have stayed late on a Friday night with just you and her left in the building?’ He pressed down on another nine.
‘Lock? That’s your name, right?’ Stafford said, his voice suddenly falsetto with panic.
Lock hit a one. Only one digit to go.
‘Look, man, I’m not going to make any bullshit excuses. I don’t know what I was thinking. I’ve got a problem.’
‘You do now,’ Lock said, pressing down on the final one. ‘Police department, please.’
A second passed as he was put through, Lock perched casually on the edge of the desk, enjoying Stafford’s obvious discomfort. In his gut he knew one thing for sure: this might have been the first time Stafford had been interrupted, but it sure as hell wasn’t the first time it had happened.
‘The hell with you, man,’ Stafford blurted. ‘What you saw adds up to nothing in court. It won’t even go to trial. It’s her word against mine.’
Lock replaced the handset. What Stafford had read as a scare tactic on Lock’s part was far from it. Lock had put down the phone not because he’d scared Stafford enough but because Stafford was right. A call to the police would change nothing.
He removed his Sig and levelled it at Stafford’s bloodied face. The movement was relaxed to the point of casual. ‘You like guns?’
Stafford’s face was white with shock now. ‘I was in the ROTC at college,’ he stammered.
‘Remember the first thing your firearms instructor told you? The cardinal rule?’
Stafford swallowed. ‘Never point a gun at someone unless you intend to shoot them.’
‘Very good. Ten out of ten. Now, outside.’ Lock waved Stafford over to the door.
There are lots of ways a man might think he’ll react when a gun is pointed at him. In combat, Lock had known blowhards lose control of their bladders, and cowards find a relative calm in which they could fight back. But the first surge of emotion is the same for everyone. Fear.
Stafford walked meekly to the door. In the corridor, Lock holstered his gun but made sure that Stafford was ahead of him and didn’t look back. Behind them, Hizzard stood sentry outside the ladies’ washroom.
Lock guided Stafford to the elevator. Confirmation that they were being watched came in the form of a voice from the control room in Lock’s ear.
‘We’re fine. Just taking a little night air,’ Lock replied.
They got out on the top floor. From here they could access the roof. Lock punched in a key code and pushed Stafford through the door with a shove.
Outside it was dark. High forties at best. A sensor light snapped on, throwing both men’s shadows to the very edge of the roof.
The walk appeared to have given Stafford the opportunity to compose himself a little. ‘So what now? You gonna shoot me?’ he asked.
‘No,’ replied Lock, ‘you’re going to jump.’
‘What? Are you crazy? You walking me up here is all on disk.’
‘You mean the hard drives that are gonna be accidentally wiped on my command about the same time as you’re h
itting the sidewalk?’
‘What about the girl?’
‘You think she’s going to say anything after what you did?’
‘There’s no way you could explain this away.’
‘I was ten years in the Royal Military Police. You seriously think I couldn’t cover my bases?’
Keeping his gun trained on Stafford, Lock paced across to the edge of the roof. ‘I catch you trying to rape a junior member of your staff. I pull you off her. All that’ll be corroborated, right?’
Stafford didn’t answer.
‘There’s no cameras up here, no one to know you’ve admitted to anything,’ Lock continued, moving his gun up a fraction so it was pointing directly at Stafford’s face.
Stafford put his hands up. ‘OK, so I accept that she’d support that version of events. What difference does that make?’
‘Well, I have a duty to report you. You beg me to reconsider. You have an offer for me. We take it up on the roof, where no one can overhear us. All that’s on tape is two guys taking a walk up here. We get up here, under the stars, nice and cosy, you make your offer. But I won’t accept it. In fact I’m going to mention it when the case comes to court. My saying you offered to bribe me makes her story a whole lot more convincing, wouldn’t you say?’
Lock had circled round, so he was facing Stafford and Stafford had his back to the edge. As Lock had been talking he’d advanced on him. Just enough to crowd his personal space. Stafford had instinctively inched back, unaware that he was even doing it. He was maybe six feet from the void now.
‘You’re distraught. Sobbing. Not making any sense. Because you know what happens to rapists in prison. Especially handsome young ones like yourself. You’ll be catching instead of pitching. Plus the shame to your family. So’ — Lock wrapped his finger round the trigger of his Sig — ‘you jump.’
‘No one’ll believe that,’ Stafford said, taking a step back.
‘Oh, some people won’t. It’s a hell of a story, isn’t it? But in a court of law it’ll boil down to my word against yours. And you won’t be doing any talking.’