‘But we’re part of the public service and that means we serve the public. How the heck are they going to have any confidence in us if their sons and daughters end up taking their last breath inside a prison cell?’
‘I am what I am. I know what I did was wrong, but what about you, Rio? You going to continue letting a wrong be a wrong, while you sit around bleating about playing it by the book? While Nikki Bell’s life’s still at risk?’
Rio shoved out of her seat. Started pacing. Where was another Devil’s Juice when she needed one? Rio knew he was right . . . but so was she. When she’d joined the police force she’d signed up to all the rules and regulations, all the processes and procedures. They were there for a reason: to be fair; to keep order, so everyone, including the bad guys, knew exactly what to expect. Start breaking that cycle and chaos reigned supreme. Hadn’t she just seen that in action when she’d gone against orders on the raid? But no matter how she tried to convince herself, Rio couldn’t get Nikki’s face out of her head.
Nikki crying.
Nikki smiling.
Nikki sulking.
Nikki dead?
‘I . . .’ Rio swung back around to find Strong almost on top of her. His gaze was intense, so was hers. Without really thinking what she was doing, Rio clasped her palms around his face and drew his face down to hers. Strong jerked out of her hold. They stared at each other breathing heavily.
Rio spoke first. ‘For God’s sake don’t say you think of me as a daughter.’
‘No,’ Strong uttered softly, ‘I think of you as a mate and mates don’t break that unwritten rule.’
Rio looked up as she shook her head. ‘If only you’d been by my side three years ago with that advice.’
There was a moment’s silence before he said, ‘You – friend – need to get some shut-eye. Spend the night. I’ve got a spare room.’
Less than a minute later they were in a room that Rio suspected had once been his daughter’s but she kept that to herself. Instead she stared at the neatly made single bed.
‘I’ll leave a towel for you in the bathroom—’
‘Thank you . . . for coming to get me.’ Rio didn’t turn around as she talked.
The only answer she got was the quiet click of the door as it closed. Now alone, Rio moved towards the bed and sat heavily on it. She flopped back into its softness as her mind came to terms with her new status in life and started figuring out what she was going to do about Nikki Bell.
thirty-seven
1:04 a.m.
Rio checked her watch. She hadn’t been able to sleep. Couldn’t stop thinking about Nikki.
1:30 a.m.
Rio still couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t get rid of the thoughts that might turn her world upside down.
1:49 a.m.
Rio got out of the bed that Jack Strong had offered her for the night and went to the bathroom. She took her mobile phone.
1:55 a.m.
‘Are we agreed on this?’ Rio’s tone was quiet, but rushed and urgent as she spoke to Calum on her mobile.
She stood in Jack Strong’s unlit bathroom. Chill clung to her half-open blouse and the floorboards drove cold through the bare soles of her feet. She’d been speaking rapidly to Calum for the last five minutes. Her breath almost hurt in her throat as she waited for his answer.
He kept her waiting another half minute before saying, ‘OK. Are you coming over now?’
Rio shook her head. ‘No. I still need some massive thinking time—’
‘Rio?’ Her gaze bounced up at the door as she heard Strong call out her name.
‘Got to go,’ she hurriedly whispered to Calum as she heard Strong’s movements in the corridor.
‘Was that another voice?’ he asked. ‘Who’s with you?’
The handle to the bathroom started turning.
‘I’ll see you at your office later on.’ The words came out quickly.
The bathroom door opened as she cut the call. Rio wrapped her hand around her phone as Jack Strong appeared in the doorway. They looked at each other. Neither moved.
‘You OK?’ he finally asked.
Rio’s palm tightened around her mobile. ‘Yeah. Couldn’t sleep. Mind just keeps moving. Can’t get it to stop.’
‘I make a mean chamomile tea—’
‘Jack Strong and herbal tea?’ Rio let out a low laugh. ‘Now that’s a combination I never thought I’d see.’
The side of his mouth flicked up. ‘My Rachel loved the stuff. I always keep a box in the cupboard.’
Rio moved towards him. Looked in his eyes. ‘Never thought I’d say this but I do believe that you’re a good man.’
Before he could answer her she left him. A minute later she found herself back on the bed. This time she didn’t lie down, but fixed her hair into medium-sized twists. She needed an as-perfect-as-she-could-get twist-out afro for the day she was about to face.
2:10 a.m.
‘Nikki. Nicola. Wake up.’
Dazed Nikki felt the hand against her shoulder as she lay on her side, facing the wall, in bed. She groaned. Didn’t want to move. Didn’t want to move.
‘Calum. Too tired.’ She wrapped her hand around the duvet and pulled it closer to her chin.
‘No-can-do, little lady. We need to get out of here now.’
Nikki groaned some more as she finally turned to face him. He looked bigger than usual, looming over the bed. She scrubbed a fist over one eye and then uncurled her hand and ran her fingers through her Ophelia-styled shorn hair.
‘It’s still dark outside,’ she said as she sat up.
‘I know. But there’s good news. The people who murdered your family aren’t going to be a problem anymore.’
‘What? How?’ She pushed her legs over the bed and stood up.
Calum placed his warm palm against her shoulder. ‘That doesn’t matter at the moment. What you need to do is get ready.’ His hand fell away. ‘I thought you wanted to see your cousin Ophelia?’
Nikki couldn’t hold back the pants of excitement that escaped her. Lia. She’d be with cousin Lia again. Just the thought of being held in her cousin’s arms made the world seem right again. A place where no one could hurt her anymore.
‘Where’s my bag—?’
‘Don’t worry about that, I’ve packed up all your gear.’
‘But I need my gloves – the long, lacy ones that she gave me. I want her to see me wearing them—’
‘We need to move. Now. You can put the gloves on in my car.’
Calum was already out of the room by the time she started scrambling into her jeans and trainers. Her hands shook as she threw on her jumper. She couldn’t believe it – she was going to see Ophelia again. She wanted to laugh. Jump. Punch the air. Do some stupid dance where she rocked out to a made-up tune called ‘Ophelia’.
Nikki grinned as she joined Calum in the narrow, dark corridor. He stood by the door holding her black, lime-green handled bag. She liked the way he smiled at her as she joined him. One of those big, easy smiles that made any existing tension inside her disappear.
‘Will I get to see Rio again? I’d like to thank her.’
‘Yeah, you’ll get to thank her kid.’ His smile dropped away. ‘The car’s already open. Take this.’ He handed her bag to her. ‘Put your bag on the backseat. I’ll be out as soon as I put on the alarm.’
‘Alarm?’ She stared up at him. ‘I didn’t know that the house had one.’
He smiled again. ‘There’s a lot you don’t know, kiddo.’ He waved his thumb at the door. ‘Go on, hop it.’
And that’s what she did, opened the door and felt the cold blast of safety and the early morning at the same time. The Notting Hill street was dark, still. The solitary street light shone bright, much further down the road, but Calum’s car was parked in the shadows. Nikki hummed the theme tune to The Walcotts as she moved to the car. Kept up her humming as she pulled the back door open. Swung her bag . . .
A hand clammed over her mouth from behind. The sho
ck froze her. Her head was jerked back. She slammed into a body. The tick-tock of her attacker’s heartbeat pulsed against the side of her neck. Then her world became truly black as something was shoved over her head.
A voice growled deep and hard into her ear. ‘Do everything I say. Everything. You don’t want to find out what’s going to happen if you step out of line.’
2:57 a.m.
‘Let me out,’ Nikki screamed for what felt like the millionth time. She thumped her small fists against the door, then leaned back and let fly a kick that hurt her more than the door.
She was frightened, scared of what was going to happen to her now. One minute she’d been standing outside the safe house, waiting for Calum, and the next a hood had enclosed her in a nightmare of darkness. Then she was bounced in the back seat of this car taking her on the ride from hell.
She had felt so disorientated that she couldn’t say how long they drove for. But when the car stopped, she was taken out, not roughly, but with a gentleness that terrified her even more, and guided up stairs to someplace that felt flat beneath her feet.
‘Turn around in thirty seconds,’ the same voice had instructed.
Then the hood had been whipped off her head and something slammed behind her. Nikki didn’t wait thirty seconds, but immediately spun around to find a door shut behind her. Instantly she had gone for the brass handle, but the door wasn’t moving. So she’d banged, yelled, screamed – but no one came. There was no window, only a single bed and a freestanding black lamp in one corner.
Now she slumped to the bare floorboards exhausted, almost broken. She didn’t want to end up dead as well.
thirty-eight
7:56 a.m.
Rio was already dressed, ready to go as she stared at her mobile phone in her hand. Rain tapped against the window almost matching the rhythm of her beating heart. Today was going to take her down a path she never thought she would go down.
The mobile rang. She took a breath. Then calmly answered.
‘Detective Insp—’ She clawed the remainder of the word back, remembering she was suspended. ‘Yes? . . . What?’ She nodded. ‘I’ll be right there.’
She terminated the call, left the room and strode with ease towards the front door.
‘Who was that on the phone?’
She turned to face Strong who waited just outside what she assumed was his bedroom. ‘That was the Super. He needs me at The Fort. They can’t find Nikki.’
8:05 a.m.
Greenbelt Gang Die in Gun Battle with Cops . . .
A rain-soaked Cornelius Bell stumbled as he heard the breaking news headline coming from a car that had stopped at a red light near him. The headline made him feel sick, so he pulled even harder on the spliff as he found shelter from the aggressive rain huddling in the shadow of a closed shop doorway. He felt the three crack rocks in his jeans’ pocket and the desperate urge to indulge in something stronger than weed to take him to a place where reality wasn’t crowding in on him. His reality was that he needed to decide whether he was going to talk to that cop. But what was he going to say to her? How was he going to explain?
He felt the cold and the wind around him as he scurried into an alleyway. The pain was back: sharp this time, almost unbearable, as if he were drowning, lungs filling with his own self-inflicted torment.
The Greenbelt Gang were dead.
He pulled out his pay-as-you-go mobile. Called the number the cop had left with him. The phone connected, started to ring.
Come on, come on . . .
But no one picked up; just voicemail: This is Detective Inspector Rio Wray of the Metropolitan Police Service. Your call is important to me, so please leave a message after the tone.
The beep sounded harsh and too loud in his ear. He hesitated. Didn’t want to leave a message, wanted to speak to her directly. But he spoke, his words worked up by weed.
‘Cornelius Bell here . . . I need to speak . . . to talk . . . Now . . . Ring me back . . .’
The phone made a fussing sound Cornelius knew well – out of juice. He threw it as hard and as far as he could, but was so high on dope and his troubles he didn’t hear it clatter and smash in the distance somewhere. Shit. Fuck. He rarely cursed, even in his head. His mother had taught him that no matter how bad the situation you always minded your manners.
Mum.
Why wouldn’t her face leave him alone?
He thought about that girl at The Rebels’ Collective, who had come on to him a while back, right in front of Cookie – which had so embarrassed him – pushing her Canary Wharf high boobs and chat about karma in his face. Maybe she was right and all he needed to make everything right was some karma.
Yeah, right, the reading of the will had been some kinda karma.
The crack cocaine started to burn up in Cornelius’s pocket.
Why had he thrown the phone? He needed to call that cop. Or had he just done that? No, he couldn’t remember doing it; he needed a phone. He moved out of the shadows, into the savage rain, and hurried down the street. As he passed the shrouded railway station he looked over his shoulder, convinced he heard footsteps: no one behind him. He pushed only one thought in his head – get a phone. When he hit the high street he noticed several cars waiting outside a kebab shop. Cornelius hurried over to one and tapped on the door. The woman inside lowered the window a fraction.
‘Hello, I’m Cornelius Bell. My parents were murdered by the Greenbelt Gang. Could you lend me a couple of quid to make a phone call? I’ll give it you back.’
The woman recoiled in horror, hastily closed the window and locked the doors. Cornelius started banging against the window with the flat of his hands. ‘I just need some cash for a phone call—’
‘Oi!’ a commanding, deep voice yelled. Cornelius turned to find a big, burly man looking at him. ‘Get away from my motor, you stinking junkie . . .’
Cornelius started running and running, his mind spinning, his thoughts churning. He ignored the looks he was getting until he reached The Rebels’ Collective. He bashed his fist heavily against the corrugated sheet door. He was let in by a face he didn’t know, and as soon as he was inside Monica, self-styled leader of the group, cornered him.
‘We’re setting off in the van for the anti-fracking demo at ten, so we can be there by late evening, and for the rest of the week. You are joining us, of course.’
She sounded like his dad, always telling him to do this crap, that crap. Always telling him he just wasn’t cutting it as a Bell.
‘Frack off,’ he roared. His eyes roamed wildly around the room at the others: ‘The lot of you. Get out of my face.’
Monica pushed herself into his space. ‘We’ve been talking about you, Connie, having doubts about your commitment to the cause. We all understand about your parents, but if you don’t pull your shit together soon, you’re out.’
The crack was eating away at his skin.
Without answering, he pushed past her, almost making her fall.
‘Sorry,’ he mumbled, remembering his mum’s advice, and rushed up the stairs. Once inside his room he leant heavily against the door, his breathing high and erratic. He was glad Cookie wasn’t here; she didn’t like seeing him like this. He reached for the belt in his trousers. Funny how wearing a belt was the one thing from his past life that he couldn’t let go of. Dad had impressed on him from an early age that belts were a man’s way of showing the world he was smart, decent, respectable, someone to be relied on.
When he’d left home the first thing he’d promised himself he would do was to stop wearing the belt – like he was sticking all that crap straight back into his father’s moralising face. He’d tried to do it, but couldn’t. Sure he got off his face every now and then, but maybe he wanted people to see him as a decent and respectable guy.
But he didn’t feel either of those things anymore. And he didn’t have a phone. He moved further into the room and stopped at the cardboard box that masqueraded as a table with its peaceful yellow cloth that Cookie
had put over it. He stared at the framed picture of the small boy, Cookie’s brother, and almost started to cry.
The rocks in his pocket burned deep into his brain. He dropped on to the bed, took out the crack and laid his belt neatly, like good memories, next to him.
thirty-nine
9:04 a.m.
Rio spotted a frantic Ophelia Bell as soon as she entered DSI Newman’s office. Strong had come back to The Fort with her, but he’d gone to the operations room while she’d come upstairs. The actress appeared haggard, her skin pale as if it hadn’t received any nourishment for a week. She was all bug-grey eyes and veins standing tall on her neck.
‘Tell me what’s happened?’ Rio asked as she took the seat that Newman waved her towards.
But it was Ophelia who dived in. ‘They can’t find her. I came here as soon as they called to tell me they would be releasing Nikki into my care, but they said they couldn’t find her.’ Her bony fingers weaved the air with her every word.
Rio turned to Newman. ‘I don’t understand, she was with Calum.’
‘Whose Calum?’ Nikki’s cousin asked, confusion deepening on her face.
Newman answered, with a nervous little cough as an introduction. ‘Calum Burns is a private security consultant that we sometimes use. He’s one of the best and has been making sure that Nicola was kept safe—’
‘’But I can keep her safe,’ Ophelia burst over him with anger. ‘She needs to be with family now.’
‘We all need to calm down,’ Rio said gently. She turned to her superior officer. ‘What happened?’
‘Calum said that she went missing early hours of this morning. The fool should have contacted us straight away, but said he was sure he could find her.’
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