As Good as Dead

by Ben Westerham

  “What do you mean ‘snatched her’?” I asked, thinking my head might still be so woozy and I might not have heard him right.

  “They used two cars to box ours in on a narrow side road, then pulled guns on my officers while Miss Rudd was dragged out the back of the car. One of my men did try to stop them and got knocked out for his troubles. It’s one bloody big cock-up.”

  I could hear the frustration in Durham’s voice clear as day, despite my groggy state. He’d been warned Groves had more men in the area and yet he’d still gone and lost Alex to them. He’d no doubt be in for a hard time from his gov’nor and it was easy to think the Met would be on his case too. Just when he would have been thinking everything was under control and Alex would soon be in the hands of his London colleagues, everything had blown up in his face, big time.

  “Did your men get a good look at the blokes who grabbed Alex? Were they the same ones who picked me up?”

  “No idea. They had masks on, but there were three of them, so it’s reasonable to think it was the same lot.”

  “How did they know she was in that car? You put a big sign on top, telling everyone she was in there?” I couldn’t help being sarcastic, not when they’d been so bloody careless. I wanted to shout and swear, but I didn’t have the energy.

  “I suppose they must have been watching the hotel. Probably waiting for us to move her if they were worried about trying to drag her out themselves, especially after you’d left them with the idea we were mob-handed in there. Then all they needed to do was bide their time, waiting for a suitable chance to make their move.”

  “Poor bloody cow is probably scared stiff that she’s not going to see another day. What are you doing to get her back?”

  “We’ve got as many men as we can out looking for her and all units have been told to keep their eyes peeled. I’m hoping they won’t waste any time heading back to London, which means they’ll use one of the main roads out of town, northbound, in which case we’ll get them. We know what cars they’re in and I’ve already got those roads being watched.”

  “And if they’re too smart to do something as stupid as to head straight for London, then what?”

  “Then we’re going to struggle. But what do you think? Are they smart enough to take a detour?”

  I thought back to the, thankfully, short spell I’d spent with Hoskins and his mates. Were they the usual gormless idiots people like Groves employed to do their dirty work, or did Hoskins have enough up top to think things through and take the kind of route that would leave Durham struggling to track them down?

  “I’m not sure, to tell you the truth. Hoskins is the one in charge, that much was obvious, but while I wouldn’t say he was a candidate for Brain of Britain, he didn’t seem to be a total idiot either. But it’s hard to say. They didn’t give me long to suss them out.”

  “Well, I’ve already updated the Met, so they can keep an eye out for them if they do slip through the net here, though I suppose it will be even harder for the Met to spot them in a place the size of London. In the meantime, we’ll just have to keep our fingers crossed this lot mess up, or my men get lucky.”

  Luck was never the kind of thing you wanted to rely on; it had a nasty habit of letting you down. But it sounded to me like Durham couldn’t do a whole lot more, even if I wished he could. And I did.

  “You’ll keep me up-to-date if anything happens?”

  “I will. If anything is going to happen, it’s going to be sooner rather than later. You’ll be at the hotel the rest of the day?”

  “Yep, with my fingers crossed.”

  *

  My assignment, the one that was supposed to be a straightforward babysitting job, had already taken more turns than you’d find at Spaghetti Junction and now it had taken another one; one that looked for all the world like it was going to end up dropping Alex into the hands of the one person she really didn’t want to meet. What was worse, there didn’t seem to be a thing I could do to help. I didn’t even drive, so it wasn’t like I could jump in my motor and cruise around town looking for her.

  I phoned reception, hoping to speak to Angela, if for no other reason than it was something to do, but she was in a meeting with some food suppliers and wouldn’t be out for at least half an hour. So then I tried calling Ant, hoping he might be able to pick up something on the grapevine, but every time I tried him the phone was engaged. After that, all that was left for me to do was to start wearing out the carpet, pacing round and round the room, staring at the phone every minute or two, trying to make it ring.

  I suppose I’d been doing that for near on quarter of an hour when the phone did finally ring. I nearly jumped out of my skin I was so wound up. I snatched at the receiver.

  “It’s Good.”

  “Durham here.” Two words, but I could tell straight off he sounded more upbeat than before. “Looks like Miss Rudd isn’t giving up without a fight. There’s a call come in about an incident at a petrol station on the northern outskirts of town. Sounds like it could be her. We’re heading up there now. If you want to tag along, get yourself down to reception pronto and we’ll pick you up on the way.”

  “Got it. Hold on,” I almost shouted down the phone. “Is she still alive?”

  “Yes.” He hesitated. “As far as we know. Look, just get yourself down to reception and I’ll tell you more on the way.”

  He didn’t hang around long enough to give me a chance to ask anything else. By the time I put the phone down, I was listening to static.

  *

  I spotted Angela, tucked into a corner of the entrance hall, going over some paperwork with two members of her team. Keen not to let her get away before I’d spoken to her, I jumped in as soon as they had started to walk off. I suppose the cuts and bruises on my face must have given the game away because Angela knew something was wrong before I even opened my mouth to speak.

  “What’s happened, David? You look terrible. Are you alright?”

  “I’m OK. Had a run-in with some of Groves’s men. They snatched Alex on the way to the police safe house. Durham’s on his way here now to pick me up.”

  “What?” Angela’s mouth was open so wide you could have driven a lorry into it. “How did they manage to do that? And how, for that matter, did they know what route the police were using?”

  “They must have been waiting outside the hotel; watching for their chance.”

  “Is she alright, does anyone know?”

  “Not for sure. But that’s not all. Durham called again a couple of minutes ago, to say there’s been some incident at a petrol station and it sounds like Alex was involved. He didn’t hang around long enough to tell me much, but I think there’s a chance she might have given the heavies the slip.

  My heart was racing and I guessed I’d been talking faster than normal. It was not knowing for sure whether or not Alex had got away and that she was alright. Angela seemed to read the signs and took hold of one of my hands.

  “I hope you’re not blaming yourself for any of this, David. You did more than you were hired to do and that was without even being told what’s really been going on. If anyone is to blame here it’s the police, for losing her, and Alex herself for hiding the truth from you. If she’d been open and honest in the first place, maybe none of this would have happened.”

  Angela squeezed my hand gently. With that one little action I felt some of the weight I’d been carrying around with me, since hearing about Alex being grabbed, lift from my shoulders.

  “Yeah, you’re right, of course, but I can’t help being concerned. She was, still is, I suppose, a client and she’s a decent enough woman whose already put up with a lot. It doesn’t do to think about what she’s facing into right now.”

  “How did you ever take to being a private investigator, you big softy? I thought people like you were supposed to be hard-nosed and cold-hearted,” smiled Angela, with a sparkle in those penetrating eyes of hers.

  “I’ve asked myself that plenty of times. Trouble
is, I can’t help myself. I’m just too bloody nosy to give it up and, anyway, what else would I do?”

  “You could come and work for me, here at the hotel.”

  She sounded like she meant it, which caught me off guard.

  “Work here? Doing what? Making beds or cleaning dishes? Mind you, I wouldn’t mind working behind the bar. Think I’d do alright at that.”

  Angela laughed. “No, you could be my head of security. I think it’s about time we had one of those. And remember, you’re already doing a security job for me.”

  “True enough, although I haven’t got very far with that, not yet.”

  Angela was about to say something else when a familiar voice called me from the entrance. It was Durham and he looked harassed. I turned to go, but Angela stopped me.

  “Remember, it really isn’t your fault. None of this is.” Her voice was soft, but at the same time firm. “Don’t let anyone try to tell you otherwise.”

  Durham was giving me the old hurry up, beckoning me with an outstretched hand.

  “You’re too good for me,” I grinned. “And thanks, I needed that.”

  I would have kissed her before legging it to the waiting motor, but she wasn’t keen on the staff knowing she was having it off with one of the punters, so I promised to show her later how grateful I was. Her last words before I legged it were to say she’d hold me to that and then some.

  “About bloody time. Can’t your girlfriend wait until later,” moaned Durham, hustling me out the door and on to the steps.

  I hadn’t realised my thing with Angela was that obvious and wondered if Durham had worked it out from his few brief visits or if some eagle-eyed member of the staff had noticed and mentioned it to him. Oh well, what would be, would be.

  Durham wasn’t up for having a discussion on the stairs of the hotel and bundled me straight into the back of the waiting Ford Granada. Wills watched me as I got in, a dark look on his young face. We were moving before I’d even realised Durham had dropped into the front passenger seat, the driver giving it the full blues and twos as he pulled away sharpish, moving us up to warp factor fifteen in no time at all. Someone had glued my right hand to the door handle and there didn’t seem any chance of it coming loose any time soon. Fast motors aren’t my favourite type of transport, not in the close confines of a town centre. The world outside was going past so fast it made my head swim.

  “So, what’s happened?” I finally managed to ask, desperate to know more.

  “The manager of a petrol station called in to say there’d been an incident,” started Durham, glancing back over his shoulder. “A man’s been found on the floor outside the toilets, apparently with a knife sticking out of his neck and blood everywhere. Sound sort of familiar?”

  I nodded. “The ashtray incident.”

  “Exactly. Well, the manager reported seeing the man walk into the place with a woman on his arm. He said it looked a bit odd, like the bloke was holding on to the woman, but he wasn’t certain about that.”

  “What happened to the woman?”

  “She disappeared. By the sound of it, she went out of the emergency exit at the back of the shop. But it doesn’t stop there. A few minutes later, two other blokes walk in and go through to the toilets, then run out of the shop, jump in their motor and are off like a shot. When the manager went to look in the toilets, he found the first bloke lying dead on the floor.”

  “It’s them, isn’t it? Has to be.”

  “Looks likely. Patrol are there already and forensics on the way.”

  Durham dragged a grey hanky out of a pocket to blow his nose and, for a second or two, I couldn’t hear the sound of the siren on the car, he made so much noise. In fact, I couldn’t hear much of anything. Watts gave me the old raised eyebrow routine and shook his head.

  “What about the two who legged it? Any sign of them?”

  “Not yet, but we’re looking. Trouble is, most of the other punters had left by the time the first patrol car showed up, so there weren’t many people there who could tell us what make and model of car they were in. Apparently, some bloke said it’s a Vauxhall, but then a woman, who was insisting she was right, claimed it was a Renault.”

  We went round a tight right-hander and I found myself leaning in towards Watts, who was himself pressed up against the door, then back the other way we went as we took a left-hander.

  “Glad I’ve not eaten recently,” I quipped, but no one took any notice, most likely because they were used to such stomach-churning driving.

  We’d been going for not much more than ten minutes when, with no warning, the driver flung the car over to the left and slammed on the brakes, bringing us to such a violent stop I bashed my bonce on the frame of the door. Durham and Watts were out the car and waiting impatiently before I’d done much more than release the seatbelt. I fell out the door and staggered round to the other side of the motor, wondering what had happened to my legs on the way there. They’d lost all sense of balance.

  It seemed like every copper from miles around had piled on to the petrol station forecourt in their motors. They were packed in tight, blue lights flashing everywhere, blokes, most of them in uniform, standing around smoking and chatting, looking as if they were waiting for their wives to leave the hairdressers. I wouldn’t go so far as to say they looked bored, but then again, I wouldn’t say they looked any too excited either. Maybe finding a corpse on the floor of a petrol station toilet was an everyday occurrence to them. Somehow, I doubted it.

  The shop was a bit on the pokey side, to put it mildly, with a couple of aisles of antique shelving stacked almost to the ceiling and so close together it left hardly enough room for two people to pass each other. There were two tills squeezed in shoulder-to-shoulder at the far end. The place was silent, except for the low hum of the cooler units for the milk and such like, plus the sound of Durham’s big feet making for a narrow doorway in the far corner, outside which stood a tall, skinny copper in a uniform that looked to me like it had just come out the wrapper, it was so crisp and clean.

  Durham said something to the copper, then called over me and Watts.

  “Right, you two, there’s not a lot of room in here, so mind your feet. Good, you can watch from the doorway, while me and Watts go about our business.”

  Watts looked at me and nodded, as if to underline the fact I was nobody, while he was someone. Twat. We poked our heads in through the doorway and got a bit of a shock. Well, I did.

  “Christ.” I said, before I could stop myself. There was blood everywhere, splattered up the walls of the short, narrow hallway and a wide, dark pool of the stuff across a large swathe of the linoleum covered floor. It didn’t take much effort to see it was coming from the neck of a short, dark-haired bloke whose eyes were staring unblinking at the ceiling. I deployed all my experience and skills to deduce that what looked like a knife sticking out the side of his neck was responsible for the mess and the death. However, it also didn’t take much of an effort to recognise the face of the bloke sprawled on the floor.

  “I know him. That’s Tosh,” I said.

  Durham looked back at me. “Tosh who?”

  “No idea. They didn’t use his surname or maybe that is his surname. He’s one of the crew who did me over in the empty warehouse.”

  “Well, that’s cleared that up, then. It’s Groves’s crew alright.”

  “And that means the woman was Alex,” I added, looking past Durham at the fire exit just beyond him. “That must be where she got out.”

  Durham turned back to take a look at the pair of white-painted doors behind him.

  “Yeah. I guess he was supposed to keep an eye on her while she used the bog,” Durham said, tapping a finger against one of the doors. “But she must have been ready for her chance.”

  Durham squatted down on his haunches and looked at the sharp thing sticking out of Tosh’s neck.

  “It’s a knife. She the kind of woman who carries this sort of thing around with her, is she?” He gla
nced back up at me, an expectant look on his face.

  “I wouldn’t have said so, no. Maybe she picked it up out there in the shop.”

  “A chance find, you mean?”

  “It’s possible.”

  It was, but who left something like that lying around in their shop? Durham scratched his chin and went silent for a bit, before getting back to his feet. The fire exit was unlocked and he pushed it open with ease, before stepping outside. Watts followed, then me, stepping over the corpse of Tosh. As I did so, I thought what a shame it was that it wasn’t Turner lying there. The bastard had beaten me up good and proper.

  Durham stood in the same spot, a little way out from the open doors, for a moment, taking in everything around him. It wasn’t much. We were in a small yard, enclosed on two sides with six foot high wooden fencing that appeared to be in good nick, with the brick wall of the shop behind us and an opening on to the forecourt to our right.

  “She would have had no trouble getting out of here,” pointed out Durham, walking the few paces to where the yard opened up on to the forecourt.

  Watts followed, stepping right out on to the forecourt before looking down the side of the fence that separated the garage from a row of a dozen or more shops.

  “There’s an alleyway, sir,” he said, as he disappeared behind the fence.

  Durham and I followed and found ourselves looking down a short, narrow alleyway, maybe fifty yards long, which opened up on to another road. We walked to the end of the alleyway and found ourselves looking at houses on either side of a curving road running in both directions.

  “Once she got beyond here, they were never likely to find her,” observed Durham, scratching the back of his thick neck. “And the other two wouldn’t have clocked there was something wrong right away, so she would have had plenty of time to disappear into this lot.” He waved a hand at the twin rows of housing, behind which could be seen the rooftops of yet more homes.

  “You’d have thought she would have found a phone box by now, governor,” said Watts, looking hard in both directions. He had a very good point there, thought I.