The Losing Game

by Lane Swift

  No, that was the wrong way to look at it. Losing was a passive choice of word—implying that there was no blame. Grace had been robbed of her life. It had been stolen from her by Richard Shaw.

  It happened so automatically that Lucas didn’t remember going down the stairs and opening his laptop feed to Facebook, to Denny. He was on Twitter and Instagram—a fully paid-up member of the “post it and like it” generation, too busy seeking the world’s approval to realize no one cared. People like Denny clicked the “like” button so that someone would “like” them back—an endless round of shoulder slapping that served no purpose whatsoever.

  Lucas was glad, though. Denny didn’t care who knew his business or that he looked like a prick in that Santa hat.

  As did Richard Shaw.

  Richard Shaw.

  Lucas looked again. Posted thirty minutes ago. Shaw was at the Blue Bell. With his wife? Was that where they’d gone? What did it matter? This might be the chance Lucas had been waiting for.

  As he had the night before, Lucas changed into his running gear. He took out his gun, loaded the magazine, and slotted it inside the handle, then went through the ritual of turning off the lights.

  He checked his handset. Quarter past eleven. If he was quick through the park and Milton, he could be in his hiding spot behind the tree in twenty-five minutes.

  Outside, at the back, the neighboring houses and gardens were dark and quiet. Lucas had always loved how quiet this street was, populated with families wanting a bit of peace and privacy. He jumped the fence and hit the ground running. He had a good feeling.

  Doing the run to the Blue Bell didn’t feel as long tonight. Lucas fell into a quick and easy rhythm. His stomach settled, and he felt that rare lightness that came only when he ran. The cold air snapped at his face and down his throat, trying and failing to bruise his lungs. He’d hardened against that, got used to the burn. Once his body warmed, the cold air was refreshing.

  The tide was in. Lucas heard the tumble and pull of the waves as he slipped through the hedge on Hare’s Lane. By the time he reached his tree, the only sounds were his breathing and the wind catching in the twigs and hedgerow.

  By the looks of things, the Blue Bell had extended its closing time. Orange light spilled from the windows, and the car park was half-full. Lucas prepared for a long wait.

  The night didn’t feel as cold as the one before, even as the minutes ticked by. Maybe the meal with Dante and the burning light of hope, was keeping him warm.

  Lots of people were in the pub. Maybe Shaw was amongst them. Over the next half an hour, several taxis came. Revelers piled in. Taxis went. People left on foot or got into their own cars.

  As the car park emptied and the lights in the pub windows dimmed, Lucas found himself edging ever closer into the hedgerow. A stray branch scratched at his face. His heart beat faster.

  It was after midnight, and there were only four cars left in the car park. Those could belong to the staff. Lucas drew in a sharp breath, flexed his fingers, and closed his hand around the gun. Maybe tonight wasn’t the night. Maybe he’d need to think of another way to reach Shaw on his own, out of sight.

  He shook out his legs and decided to give it five more minutes.

  Then five more—

  The side door opened.

  Shaw appeared behind Denny. Denny was stumbling, almost tumbling down the side steps. He held out his arm, and the orange blink-blink of a car’s lights flashed.

  It couldn’t be. Denny could hardly walk. He couldn’t possibly—

  Lucas’s blood boiled. He pushed his scarf over his nose and took a step forward, unmindful of whether he’d be seen.

  Shaw spoke to Denny loud enough for Lucas to hear. “You’re not driving in that state.”

  Denny handed his key to Shaw and slumped over his bonnet. Shaw laughed, pulled Denny’s arm over his shoulder, and opened the passenger door. He bundled Denny in, then made his way around to the driver’s side.

  Lucas’s body froze like the ice beneath his feet. Shaw was going to drive Denny’s car. Lucas’s voice stuck in his throat. Like the air had turned to soup, he found himself wading through an atmosphere that wouldn’t give. His legs moved, like runners’ legs always did, onward, onward, the movement ingrained, to keep going through exhaustion and pain. But far too slowly.

  He couldn’t feel his arms anymore, let alone his hands. He was moving as if he no longer had control over his body, and he wasn’t sure whether that frightened him more than finally confronting Shaw. With the gun. That he couldn’t seem to reach.

  Lucas crossed the road, his eyes never leaving Shaw, as Shaw took the driver’s seat. As the engine shuddered to life. As he pulled on Denny’s seatbelt (thank heavens for small mercies), then his own.

  Under the wide arc of the security light, Lucas stopped in front of Denny’s dark blue Range Rover, handset out in front of him. Hand shaking. Video running.

  Shaw’s eyes narrowed. He knew Lucas—even with his hood up and his scarf covering half his face. He’d seen him in court; looked him in the eye. Shaw opened the driver’s door.

  “Get out of the fucking way, Green, or so help me I’ll drive over you.” His voice was too loud, his words slurry and overenunciated. He was drunk.

  “You’re banned from driving. You can’t drive that car.”

  “What, you expect Denny here to drive himself home? He can hardly walk.”

  “Then he’ll have to get a taxi. I’m video-streaming this to the cloud. If you drive, I’ll have video evidence. Walk away now, or I’ll send the footage to the police.”

  Shaw sneered, baring his teeth like an angry wolf. Or a bear. “Like fuck you will.”

  “You’re prepared to risk it? Again? How many people are you going to kill tonight?”

  Shaw ignored the question and took a swaying step away from the car, toward Lucas. “Get out of the way. I won’t say it again.”

  In Lucas’s peripheral vision, the side door to the pub stayed closed. No witnesses. Except, behind Shaw the passenger window opened. “Wha’s goin’ on?”

  Shaw called back, “Nothing, Den. Close the window.”

  Lucas stood his ground, his entire focus on Richard Shaw and the car key dangling from his finger. He tried to keep his handset steady.

  (Don’t let Shaw see the tremor.)

  “If you break your parole, you’ll end up in prison.”

  Shaw seemed to consider this. For all of two seconds. His lips curled into an ugly, feral smile, making the hairs on the back of Lucas’s neck stand on end.

  “Okay, Green. I’ll tell you what. You drive Denny home. He only lives around the corner from me. I’ll walk it from there, and you can toddle off back to your miserable life and stay the fuck out of mine. How’s that sound?”

  Lucas lowered his handset and ground the heel of his other hand against his forehead. He couldn’t think. His mind was a pitiful blank.

  Shaw walked backward, slowly, to the rear passenger door. He opened it and put one foot inside. “Come on. See, I’m getting in the backseat. Save a life. Drive us home. You do drive, don’t you?”

  Lucas looked around, but there was no one else there. No one to tell him what to do. The ball was in his court. Shaw had played an impossible return volley.

  Return or lose, Lucas. Game, set, and match.

  “Yes. I can drive. But I don’t have insurance.”

  “This is Denny’s company car. My company car. I say you can drive it, then you can drive it.”

  Lucas slipped his handset into his pocket. What other choice did he have but to walk away? He got into the driver’s seat of Denny’s car—he didn’t even have to adjust it—took a few seconds to acquaint himself with the controls, and pressed the start button. The engine purred to life, along with the radio. Lucas switched it off and pulled onto the road.

  At the junction, he turned right toward Milton. He hadn’t been behind the wheel in five years. A warped part of him enjoyed it. The air in the car warmed, and Lucas
pushed down his hood and tucked his scarf back under his chin.

  “Take the next right,” Shaw said from the backseat. Denny had passed out, his face pressed to the window, his ragged snores steaming up the glass.

  Lucas glanced at Shaw in the rearview mirror, and caught him staring coldly right back into his eyes. He shivered. Shaw didn’t show a trace of fear or remorse. If anything, he looked pleased with himself.

  Why had Lucas given himself away?

  He should have waited.

  They turned off the main road into a sprawling neighborhood of mid-twentieth-century detached houses with large plots and high fences. The streetlights were thinly spread, but many of the houses had porch lighting. They probably had CCTV too, monitoring their driveways and gardens and the street beyond.

  Nothing could happen anymore. Lucas had blown his chance. From here on, Shaw would be on his guard. Lucas scowled in disgust. How could he have been so stupid?

  As if to hammer the point home, Shaw said, “How many times have you stood outside that pub trying to catch me out?”

  “Once or twice.” Lucas clutched the steering wheel tighter. “Why? Do you drink and drive often?”

  Shaw sniggered. “No comment.”

  “My handset’s off.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  Lucas didn’t have the heart to care anymore. He just wanted Shaw to admit it. To admit he’d been drunk when he ploughed into his sister.

  He dug in his pocket and lifted his handset. “Check for yourself.”

  Shaw snatched it from Lucas’s hand, powered down his window, and threw it out.

  Lucas slammed on the brake. Strong fingers dug into one shoulder, and a stronger forearm wrapped around his neck. “Keep driving. All the way to the end of this road.”

  Lucas thought they would turn left, farther into Milton. “But—”

  Shaw’s hold tightened. “Keep driving.”

  They passed two walled properties. From there, the street narrowed. The road flanked only by thick, tall hedges. “There. Pull into that layby.”

  The stretch of gravel approaching on the left preceded the entrance to a private road, leading to a private estate. Residents only.

  Before Lucas could ask (though not so very deep down, he already knew the answer) if this was where Denny lived, thick and breathy, Shaw whispered in his ear, “I could destroy you.”

  Lucas choked out, “You think you haven’t already?”

  “Not by a mile.”

  Lucas stopped the car as instructed, put on the handbrake, and gritted his teeth. Brilliant. How poetic. Shaw was threatening to destroy him.

  Under the lap section of the seat belt, the gun dug uncomfortably into Lucas’s hip bone. Outside, the night was pitch black, except for the two intersecting wedges of yellow light cast by the headlights. Lucas’s chance to act, to take the offensive and see this thing through, was diminishing faster than he could think.

  “Leave the engine running.” Shaw released his neck hold. “Get out of the car.”

  Lucas unclipped his seat belt. Over his jacket, he touched the butt of the gun. If he was going to kill Shaw, it had to be the moment he got out of the car. No pauses, no hesitation. He wasn’t going to get another chance.

  Chapter 20

  FOR A man Shaw’s size, who’d drunk Lucas-didn’t-know-how-much alcohol, he moved with startling speed. He was out of the car as soon as Lucas pressed the handbrake button. Lucas had opened his door, had one foot on the ground, when Shaw reached in, grabbed the back of Lucas’s head, and slammed his forehead into the steering wheel.

  Sparks exploded behind Lucas’s eyelids. His leg collapsed. He couldn’t breathe.

  “I said out.”

  Shaw clamped his big, meaty fingers too tight around Lucas’s upper arm and dragged him into the glare of the headlights. Lucas stumbled from Shaw’s grip, gasping and reeling, like he was the one who’d drunk too much.

  Shaw snarled, “You want a piece of me, don’t you?”

  Lucas gripped his forehead with both hands, rubbing and pressing the egg growing under his fingers, trying to ease the throbbing pain as he struggled to breathe.

  “I wish you were dead.”

  “Of course you do. I suppose I’d feel the same in your shoes. Only, unlike you, if it was me, I’d have done something about it. I wouldn’t have pussy-footed around sending video to the cloud.”

  He said the last with a mocking, singsong voice. He wasn’t scared of Lucas one little bit.

  Lucas stood to his full height, a good ten centimeters less than Shaw’s, and looked him in the eye. He curled his fingers into fists, feeling his skin move beneath the fabric of his gloves. He needed them to be warm and limber if he was going to make full use of his chance.

  Shaw opened his arms wide, palms up, fingers beckoning. “Come on. I’ll give you a head start. Look, I’ll even put my hands behind my back.”

  In the spotlight, Shaw looked superhuman. Larger than life. He puffed out his chest and lifted his chin like he was invincible. Like he could take it.

  How will he take it when he’s been shot? How many bullets will it take to kill him?

  Lucas swallowed drily.

  “What are you waiting for? Come on.”

  Lucas counted down—five, four, three, two, one—reached under the hem of his jacket, clasped the butt of the gun, and pulled it from the waistband of his running tights. He was about to slip his forefinger through the trigger guard, to point and squeeze, but Shaw roared and pounced.

  The impact lifted Lucas into the air. The gun flew from his grip. He slammed into the ground, shoulders first, then head, with Shaw landing on top of him. The air left his lungs. Whoosh. Sharp stones bit into his skull.

  Lucas lay paralyzed, his chest unable to draw in a lungful of air. Helplessly Lucas watched with unadulterated terror as Shaw pushed onto his knees, drew back his arm, and punched Lucas. Hard. There was a horrifying popping sensation, felt more than heard. Muscles in Lucas’s neck were wrenched as his head whiplashed to the side. He’d never experienced pain like it—lancing, vivid, white-hot.

  Lucas might have blacked out for a few seconds. He wasn’t sure.

  Shaw clambered to his feet. Lucas craned his neck, the only part of his body that he could force to move, in tiny, agonizing increments and watched horror-struck. Shaw reached down, to where the gun lay on the gravel, like a gift, centimeters too far from Lucas’s reach.

  Don’t close your eyes.

  Shaw picked up the gun and held it like he’d used one before. He lumbered to Lucas’s side and aimed it at Lucas’s head.

  Then Lucas’s limbs responded. His arms raised up over his head. His legs bent at the knees.

  “Bang.” Shaw flicked up the muzzle and lowered it again.

  Lucas’s guts turned to water.

  Shaw said nothing. He stood stock-still, pointing the gun, looking for all the world like he was enjoying the pitiful sight of Lucas on the cusp of shitting himself.

  Lucas moved slowly, only his arms at first, under the blistering scrutiny of Shaw’s unblinking eyes. Little by little Lucas forced his body to move, curling onto his side first, then his hands and knees. On his feet, he swayed. A glob of bile rose into his gullet, burning the back of his throat. He coughed, spat, drew in a wheezing breath, and raised his hands again.

  Seconds dragged. Lucas considered running. That way, he might live. Was that what Shaw was waiting for him to do? If he ran, would Shaw bury a bullet in Lucas’s back?

  Shaw’s eyes narrowed—

  At the same time, there was movement from the front of the car. Sudden, unexpected. Denny opened the door, retched violently, and vomited. Lucas saw his chance and darted to one side. He only lost eye contact with Shaw for a split second. No time at all. But time enough for a thunderous crack to shatter the silent night.

  Lucas spun like he’d been blindsided by an international rugby player. His ears rang, and his left arm felt numb and heavy. His shoulder stung and throbbed.

/>   Shaw froze. Eyes wide. The color drained from his cheeks. Smoke rose from the gun muzzle in wisps, quickly disappearing.

  For an age, Shaw and Lucas stared at each other in disbelief.

  The multiple sources of Lucas’s pain flared, like fireworks bursting randomly across a wide skyline, then strangely, dulled. Lucas lifted his right hand, tentatively. He touched his jacket, at the left shoulder, close to the place it hurt the most. The pain seemed to have a life of its own, shifting and undulating in intensity. He didn’t need to touch the wound itself, and he didn’t dare look. He already knew.

  “You shot me.”

  If it sounded like a question, that was because in some part it was.

  Lucas’s voice broke Shaw’s fugue. Shaw ran to Denny—Lucas tried to keep track of him by rotating his body with minute, shuffling pigeon steps—and shoved Denny like a ragdoll back into his seat. Then Shaw charged around the front of car, took the driver’s seat, and drove away.

  The yellow headlights were replaced first by red taillights, then the all-encompassing shroud of darkness.

  Lucas dropped to his knees. His shoulder hurt with indescribable pain. Every inhale, every tiny increment his chest moved as he delicately tried to fill his lungs, was like someone had taken a hammer and chisel to his left collarbone. By comparison, his forehead and his jaw barely hurt at all.

  Lucas heard his blood rushing in his ears. Th-thud, th-thud, th-thud. Very fast. Over it, he heard the noise of a car engine.

  Was Shaw returning to finish the job?

  Lucas opened his eyes and saw the outlines of the hedges and the lavender clouds in an indigo sky. Ahead he heard the clunk of a car door closing. He squinted, straining to see something in the direction of the sound. He saw nothing. No one. Until he did. A silhouette in the shape of a slender man, completely black.

  “Lucas!”

  A shadow descended. Lucas blinked once, twice, to focus.

  “Lucas. It’s me, Dante.”

  Of course it was him. Lucas knew that silky voice, but he couldn’t work out why or how. He said, “Dante. It is you.” Which wasn’t what he wanted to say at all.