by Tom Barber
‘Oh. Thanks,’ Chalky muttered, correcting his rookie’s mistake and clicking on the safety catch.
Beside him, his friend swallowed down his anger and desire to rip his head off as Porter pulled the car to a halt, applying the handbrake.
‘We’re here lads,’ he said.
Without a word, the four police officers opened their doors simultaneously. The quiet of the car was instantly shattered by a cacophony of sirens, screaming and shouting. It sounded like something out of a nightmare. They each slammed their doors, and came to stand in a line, facing the car park. The four of them were momentarily rooted to the spot as they surveyed the scene before them for the first time.
‘Oh my God,’ Archer muttered.
It was absolute pandemonium.
Outside the big stadium, there were fans everywhere, fleeing like ants from a nest as they streamed from every exit. Ambulances were scattered all over the car park, their paramedics working frantically amongst the gathering crowd of wounded that was growing by the minute on the tarmac. Those able to walk helped carry those who couldn’t as they staggered towards safety, like something from a war movie. Archer could see most of them were wearing torn Arsenal and Tottenham shirts, spattered with blood and singed from char. And over it all, a chorus of screaming and shouting filled the cold air, awful sounds that made the hairs on Archer’s neck stand up.
Behind the four officers, the other two cars from the Unit pulled up fast, stopping abruptly beside the other parked Ford. The doors opened, and the remaining six officers ran forward, led by Deakins and Fox. Each man was fully-equipped with both the throat mic and MP5 sub-machine gun, and each was good to go. They gathered in a semi-circle around Mac, who snapped into command mode. He turned, and addressed them.
‘Listen up!’ he ordered. He turned to Fox.
‘Foxy, take Spitz and Mace. Go and check the other stands. Look everywhere. Rubbish bins. Dressing rooms. Offices. Toilets, I don't care. This could be half the job. There could be another device inside.’
Fox nodded, without a word. He turned and ran towards the stadium with Officers Spitz and Mason, dodging those rushing the opposite way.
Watching them go, Mac turned to the remaining six men before him. ‘The rest of you, stay out here,’ he ordered, loudly. ‘Move through the crowd. Help the medics and the other coppers. Gather the wounded, calm the civilians. And keep your eyes open for anything suspicious. Stay on the radio and stay mobile. Move!’
The men nodded and turned instantly, walking swiftly and dispersing into the stricken crowd.
Hannah Gibbs wasn’t a fool. When she’d seen her name down for the New Year’s Eve shift three days ago at St Mary’s Hospital, she knew she was in for a long night. Most people who celebrated the New Year were just out to have an honest good time. They had some drinks, had some fun, then partied away until the early hours or whenever their head hit the pillow. But then again, wherever there’s alcohol, there’s trouble. The shift was renowned as an especially hectic and busy one with all the drunken injured stumbling in. Alcohol and injury went hand in hand, like bread and butter. Yin and yang.
Two years shy of thirty, Gibbs had finished her degree in medicine at Nottingham University some four years ago, then moved south and taken up a post at St Mary’s. Although she’d been there for less than five years, she thought she’d seen everything. Gunshot wounds. Stabbings. She’d even once had to take a call to help a guy who’d impaled his jaw on a fence spike. He’d been running to catch a rugby ball, misjudged it and had turned to find the metal fence barb slicing into his chin.
So given that it was New Year’s Eve, she’d been expecting a rough one. But as she looked at the crowd around her, she realised this was beyond anything she could have ever imagined.
She was in the middle of the car park, trying to make her way through the mass of wounded and emergency services who were using the tarmac as a sort of makeshift triage. She was attempting to push a gurney holding a female Arsenal fan who’d been close to the blast. As she forced her way through, Gibbs heard the woman on the bed whimper like a puppy. She was in a bad way. She’d been standing just ahead of the explosion, about seventy yards away, her back turned. It was a miracle that she was still alive. Her Arsenal shirt was torn and singed from the explosion, and covered with blood, her back riddled with nails and chippings of glass, some of it lodged in her vertebrae and spine. She was in such a critical condition that every second would count. A moment’s delay, or hesitation, and she’d die in the ambulance or on the operating table. The clock was ticking, and Gibbs had to get her out of here immediately if she had any chance of making it.
Looking ahead, she saw an ambulance with its rear doors open. It had a slot available. Gibbs rushed forward as fast as she could, praying that someone wouldn’t get there first and steal the spot. She made it. A paramedic was inside the vehicle, clearing space, he’d seen her coming. Gibbs had already hooked the injured woman’s vein up to an IV which she passed up to him carefully.
‘This one?’ he asked, hurriedly, looking at the injured woman lying on the gurney.
‘Severe head and back trauma,’ said Gibbs.’ Multiple injuries. Nails, shards of glass in her neck and spine. She needs to get to theatre asap.’
He nodded as another man appeared from the side of the ambulance. The driver. He ran to the other end of the bed and together, the two men lifted it and pushed it into the ambulance, locking it in place. The woman lying on the soft mattress didn’t make a sound, Gibbs saw she’d passed out. The driver slammed one of the doors, he reached for the other one, but Gibbs suddenly spotted something and grabbed his arm.
‘Wait!’ she told him. ‘Hey!’
She called to four wounded fans, who were slumped together on the kerb ten feet from the ambulance. Together, they turned to look at her in unison, like four owls in a tree, dazed and wide-eyed with shock. Gibbs waved her arm frantically, beckoning them to come forward. Climbing up and helping each other, they shuffled over. ‘Get in,’ Gibbs ordered, helping them one by one up into the back of the vehicle. When that was done, she turned back to the driver. ‘We need to get as many of them out of here quick as we can.’
The driver nodded and ran to the front door, climbing in behind the wheel. In the back, it was a tight squeeze, the group gathered around the injured woman on the bed, but they’d all made it inside. Gibbs decided to jump in as well, she wanted to make sure the woman on the bed got to the operating room as soon as possible. As she took a seat and reached forward to shut the door, she saw a news reporter hurrying into position on the tarmac close by. Amidst all the wounded and blood-stained medical help, she looked absurdly neat and polished, like a model who’d just stepped off the runway. The engine roared into life as the driver fired the ignition, jerking Gibbs back to the present. She pulled the door shut.
With the siren blaring, the ambulance pulled out of the car park and sped off towards the hospital.
Outside the bar in the shopping centre in Angel, it was also time to leave.
The man smoking the cigarette was still watching the screens inside the bar. The volume was muted, so he couldn’t hear the report, but he didn’t need to. A picture tells a thousand words. The screen was showing all the wounded outside the stadium, smoke billowing from the South stand, people outside screaming and crying. It looked as if the whole place was packed with ambulance teams, paramedics and the injured.
Showtime.
He flicked away his fifth cigarette, and turned, walking away from the bar quickly. No one was standing near him, so nobody noticed his departure. Every person inside the pub was staring at the televisions, some covering their mouths with horror, all rooted to the spot as they watched the horrifying scenes unfold. The stadium was only a few miles from the bar, if they stepped outside they could probably hear the screaming in the distance.
Behind them all, outside the entrance, the two thickly packed holdalls rested against each other. As he walked towards the exit, the man glanced
back at the bags and smiled to himself. Nobody would notice they were there.
Not yet.
EIGHT
The Parisian café located on Rue De Chevilly was quaint and charming. Two miles from the city centre, it was convenient enough to allow easy access to the heart of Paris, yet was far enough out to give a sense of distance and escape from the hustle and bustle of the city. The interior was warm and welcoming. Small tables and chairs were placed around the room, seemingly random yet adhering to some sort of pattern. A number of them were in use, patrons enjoying drinks and talking in quiet tones. In one corner, a number of people had gathered to watch two older men play a game of chess, the whole group engrossed.
Across the room, Henry leaned his considerable bulk back into his chair as he watched a television mounted on the wall in the café. Someone had switched the channel to BBC World and it was showing footage from outside the Emirates stadium. Over a hundred feared dead, the banner headline was telling him. Henry snorted.
It was a shitty result, he knew from memory that the Emirates had over 60,000 seats inside. The ratio was one out of every six hundred killed. Only a hundred of them dead. A drop in the ocean. Pitiful. He wondered if Dominick was watching the report, wherever he was. He was probably pleased, figuring it was a good outcome, that it would buy him some credit whenever they next met. Instead of being sedated and waking up as he was being thrown into the Seine, he probably thought he’d be welcomed back into the fold with open arms, the prodigal son returned. Everything would be forgiven. Henry felt his mood darken at the thought of the boy.
He was in for a surprise.
His actions in New York had ended relations with a brother cartel which had been a major and profitable partner in recent years. Henry had worked tirelessly to set that one up. Not only had the boy cost his business a shitload of money, but one of the guys the moron whacked in the hotel was a lugarteniente, a lieutenant, one of the highest guys in the other group’s organisation. No wonder the boy was desperate to get back in his good graces. God only knew what the New York boys would do to him if they ever managed to catch him alive.
A waitress approached him. She looked nervous. She was petite and slim like so many Europeans and held a pad and pencil in her slender hands, ready to take his order. Before she had a chance to speak, he told her what he wanted. Three words. Coffee, three pastries. He wasn’t sure if she understood him, but he didn’t care. He had a feeling she’d end up giving him what he wanted. People always did, with him. Turning, he saw her cast anxious looks at the two giant men sitting fifteen feet away; they had their backs to her, watching the door. Henry saw her weighing up whether to approach them, she decided against it and hurried back behind the counter to fetch Henry’s order. Clever girl, he thought. He was hungry.
Tilting his wrist, Henry checked the time on his Rolex. He still had a few hours to kill. Faris had gone with the jet and the pilot to London to fetch Dominick, the coke still inside the cabin. The business deal wasn’t set to happen until after midnight, Paris time. They were only twenty minutes from the airfield so it wouldn’t take long to return. All Henry had to do was sit back and wait for his cocaine to return and for his nephew to be brought into the café, served up like a sacrificial lamb.
The waitress reappeared carefully carrying a tray, she was quick, impressively so. Great service. She arrived at the table and laid down a full cup of coffee with a pot of milk and sugar, which were then joined by a plate holding three Danish pastries. She stood up nervously, seeing if he was happy. Ignoring her, he grabbed one of the pastries and pushed it into his mouth, chomping down. It was delicious, fresh from the bakery, and the frosting smeared over his lips as he munched down on the treat.
The waitress turned and scurried away.
The accident and emergency ward of St Mary’s Hospital was in meltdown. Gurneys and the wounded were rolling in as if they were coming off a factory line. The most seriously injured were seen to immediately, the rest were tended to as soon as any staff became available. It was relentless work, as the injured just kept coming. By reception, the unfortunate Chief of Surgery for the evening, a grey-haired man in his fifties called Henry Mays, was desperately trying to direct operations and maintain some semblance of order.
Hannah Gibbs suddenly appeared, pushing her way through the double-doors. She still carried the IV hooked up to the injured woman on the bed, who remained unconscious and motionless on the frame. A group of medics rushed over. One of them picked up a medical pad resting on the bed. Hannah had filled it out on the brief journey over.
‘She’s critical,’ Gibbs told him.
He nodded, rapidly reading the sheet, then followed the bed as it was wheeled away out of sight. Gibbs paused for a split second, breathing hard. She turned, preparing to find another ambulance and head back to the scene. But as she went to walk back towards the entrance, she heard someone calling her name. Turning, she saw it was Chief Mays standing by the reception desk, he was beckoning her over. She moved towards him, dodging a wounded Tottenham fan who was being helped into the ward.
‘Have you seen Beth or Will?’ Mays asked as she arrived by the counter. He was referring to two of her fellow medics who were on rotation for the evening’s shift. Gibbs thought for a moment, then shook her head.
‘I checked in at 5.30. The next thing I knew, I was in an ambulance heading to the stadium.’
She thought for a moment. ‘Come to think of it, I didn’t see either one of them over there.’
‘Well I’m not surprised. Neither one showed up for work. I’m not happy, Hannah,’ Mays said. He looked at Gibbs as if she had all the answers, like she knew something he didn’t.
‘Well, I haven’t seen them in a couple of days. I thought they had time off,’ she said.
‘They haven’t. And wherever they are they have an ambulance. I’ve been trying to call them but they won’t pick up and answer.’
He shook his head. ‘I don’t know what they’re playing at but I need every available pair of hands.’
Grabbing a pad from the desk, he passed it to Gibbs. It was a contact sheet, a list of phone numbers for everyone on shift tonight printed on the paper. ‘Keep trying. Find out where they are,’ he ordered. ‘Tell them I don’t even care that they’re late, I just need them both here soon as possible.’
Hannah looked out the entrance and at the sheer volume of wounded in the room around her. She needed to get back to the stadium, not waste time doing errands like this. ‘But Chief-,’ she said.
But he was already walking away. Gibbs cursed under her breath, and snatching the phone she started dialling a number. Despite her frustration at being made to perform this mundane task, she was also surprised. She’d known the other two medics for four years. And neither of them ever missed work.
Inside a dark vehicle across the city, a fluorescent light flashed on and off like a firefly. It was a mobile phone. The small dark shape rang quietly, muffled and dimmed from inside a white piece of pocket fabric. It belonged to a woman lying in the back of the vehicle. She was lifeless, her body limp and sprawled in a heap, like a puppet with the strings cut. Another dead body had been dumped on top of her, a young man staring with lifeless eyes at the rear doors of the vehicle. Both of them were surrounded by a pool of congealed blood which had clotted and thickened, sticking them to the floor of the vehicle. The bruising around the young woman’s neck showed that she’d been strangled. The man had put up more of a fight, so his throat had been cut.
The phone continued to ring quietly, flashing on and off.
But no one was ever going to pick up.
On the street outside, the man from the shopping centre checked the traffic as he strode across Upper Street. Cupping his hands together, he blew hot air into his palms. It was cold, too cold. Dodging the traffic that passed down the road in front of him, he approached a vehicle parked on the kerb. An ambulance.
Checking to make sure no-one had followed or was watching him, the man moved around th
e side of the white vehicle. Pulling a set of keys from his pocket he opened the door and climbed inside, slamming it shut behind him. A sudden noise from the back of the vehicle startled him, he snapped his head round. But it was OK. It was just the dead bitch’s mobile phone. He sighed, and relaxed, the damn thing had made him jump.
Ignoring the constant, quiet ringing, he grabbed a set of overalls from the front passenger seat beside him. They were light green medical scrubs, he’d planned to use what the guy in the back had been wearing, but he’d had to cut his throat and the prick had bled all over the white paramedic outfit as he died. He’d been forced to improvise and raiding the ambulance, he’d struck gold. He’d found a set of scrubs in packaging tucked in a compartment near the back. They were perfect. Pulling off his shirt, he started to change into the uniform quickly.
Over his shoulder, the phone continued to ring.
Back inside the shopping centre, a bartender had moved out from behind the bar with a cloth. If his boss asked, he was wiping down tables, but in reality he was using the opportunity to gain a moment’s respite from the mass of customers at the bar, leaving a colleague to handle the orders. There had been a brief lull when reports of an explosion at the Emirates had flashed onto the screens. But business was now back in full swing and it was exhausting work, constant shouted orders, people vying for his attention.
As he moved from table to table, giving each one a cursory wipe, the barman zigzagged his way towards the exit. Picking up an empty glass from an outside table, he noticed something against the wall.
Two black bags, sitting alone and unattended.
He frowned, then looked around. There were sets of chairs and tables out there, but no one was using them. It was too cold for most people.
He shrugged. Someone must have left them by accident. They’d realise soon and soon be back to collect them, no doubt worrying that they’d have been stolen. The barman decided to move the two holdalls behind the bar for safe-keeping and until whoever owned them returned.