by LJ Ross
Gregson wielded the knife with one hand and swayed, the effects of exhaustion and severe head trauma taking their own toll. They faced one another, two broken men, each holding their own ground.
“What are you going to do with that?” Ryan jerked his chin towards the blade and his voice was steady. “You tell me you’ve never taken a life. Are you planning to start now? If you take that step, there’s no going back,” he added quietly.
Gregson jabbed the knife in the air between them, as Ryan made to step towards him again.
“Get back!”
Ryan tried to maintain eye contact, techniques skipping through his mind. Eye contact, use the suspect’s first name, build rapport, he chanted silently. He just never imagined he would have to employ such methods on his own superintendent.
He watched the man edge backwards, darting swift glances towards the main exit. Ryan smiled and shook his head.
“You’ll never make it past the clock tower, Arthur,” he said.
“Shut up! Just shut up! I’m trying to think.”
“Think fast, because sooner or later they’ll figure out where we are,” Ryan continued, thinking of Lowerson, of Phillips and MacKenzie so tantalisingly close. “Why did you do it, Arthur? You had a good life.”
Gregson turned and the confused glaze in his eyes lifted, replaced with pure venom.
“What would you know about it? Tell me what the hell you would know about the kind of life I had before the Circle found me!” he demanded, gesturing wildly with the knife he still held. “Little Lord fucking Fauntleroy is what you are! Cushy parents, smug background, pretty boy face,” he sneered. “You haven’t got a clue how the other half live, surviving day-to-day, week-to-week, living off the dole. You wouldn’t know how it feels to be the scummy one at school, who nobody wants to know.”
Gregson pointed the knife at Ryan, while he let loose the anger of a lifetime, one he rarely voiced.
“Must be hard for you, always playing the bloody hero! Somebody’s in trouble, call out DCI Ryan, he’ll take care of business. You’ve never known what it feels like to be an average bloke, have you, Maxwell?”
Ryan said nothing but continued to watch the knife with the silver eyes of a predator preparing to strike.
“Let me tell you, it feels shit! Scrounging for money, trying to get ahead when every door slams in your face—you know why?—because you’re not ‘one of them.’ People can see it on you, it’s like they can smell it. Oh, that’s Arthur Gregson, his da is serving time and his ma puts it about for money,” Gregson spat, then his voice changed into something reverent.
“Then, one day, you’re offered a once-in-a-lifetime chance, an opportunity to shine. Important people want to know you. Doors start opening for you and women start giving you a second glance. Well, I took the chance,” he butted his chest with the heel of the knife to emphasize the point. “And, I’d do the same again. You can sit there in your ivory tower and judge me from here to kingdom come, because I’d do the same again.”
Gregson seemed to run out of steam and in that moment Ryan lunged forward. In one swift upward motion, he knocked the knife to the ground. The action stretched his body and cost him a couple of stitches, which burned as they opened, but he set his teeth against the stabbing pain. His objective was to bring Gregson to the floor and he put his back into it, struggling to pin the man’s arms.
It took a couple of seconds for him to react but, when he did, Gregson fought like a tiger, spitting and snarling as he reared up against the unexpected ambush. Whatever vestiges of DCS Arthur Gregson that may have remained were gone now. Here was no gentleman fighter, Ryan realised, but a street kid who had grown into a man. Underneath the grey hair, Gregson was the same snivelling boy who resented his lot in life and no amount of power, wealth or women had changed that.
At his heart, Ryan was not a violent man. But he would not back away from a fight if the situation demanded it, and it was demanding it now. He drew back his arm, intending to shove a fist in Gregson’s face, but doubled over as he took a vicious elbow to the side. He could feel his wound bleeding through the bandages beneath his shirt and he raised an arm to block a further blow. When Gregson turned to scan the ground for his knife, Ryan forced himself upward, reeling with nausea.
“Where do you think you’re going to run to?” he shouted across to Gregson, hoping that the sound would be heard from the clock tower, though the waves made it difficult for him to hear the man standing a few feet away from him let alone if he were on the other side of the castle grounds.
Gregson stood there for a moment and then tried to skirt past Ryan, making for St. Oswald’s Gate and freedom beyond. It would be a dangerous night time descent over the steep ground he had climbed earlier, but it was worth the risk.
Ryan intercepted him, grasping his shoulders to thrust him away from the archway.
“Let me pass!”
Ryan stood in front of the archway to block it, trying not to stagger against the wind.
“I’m taking you in,” he repeated.
Gregson charged at him with a shout of frustration, his eyes feral and dangerous now that reason had left him.
Ryan anticipated the charge but his body was sluggish to react. He dug his heels into the grass and wrapped his arms around Gregson’s middle to prevent his escape.
Gregson punched him squarely in his wound, where the skin was tender and bleeding.
Ryan blacked out for a second, his mind protecting him from the unspeakable pain and he collapsed to his knees, then to the floor. Gregson panted above him, fingers still bunched and ready to administer another sharp jab if Ryan moved. He was about to give him a good kick, just for his own pleasure, when he heard the sound of running footsteps approaching.
CHAPTER 28
Ryan came around almost immediately and knew that his body was starting to go into shock. He was shivering and he could feel himself floating, as if the world were a surreal, distant place. He shook himself and dragged himself upwards, crying out as his skin wept. He pressed a hand to his side and could feel the damp material of his shirt, indicating that he was bleeding badly. He could hear footsteps approaching from the north and knew that his team were not far behind. Across the rough ground, he heard another sound, something akin to a hunted animal tripping over the uneven tufts of earth as it scrambled to get away.
Gregson.
He didn’t stop to wait for the others. Ryan staggered forward to stall the man’s escape, though he hardly knew how Gregson hoped to manage it. The only thing awaiting him on the other side of the eastern perimeter wall was a sheer drop towards the unforgiving North Sea.
Perhaps that was his goal, he thought fiercely, but not on his watch.
Ryan reached across to tear at the seam of his shirtsleeve and tugged at it until he heard it rip apart. He folded the material and held it against his side to stem the blood flow as he loped across the ground in the direction Gregson had turned.
* * *
A cursory glance around the area surrounding St. Oswald’s Gate told the three other members of Ryan’s team that the man himself was not there. MacKenzie stuck her head through the archway and pulled back again quickly, breathing deeply against the sudden vertigo. Phillips and Lowerson fanned the ground, straining to hear any sound which might give them an indication of Ryan’s whereabouts.
“Check the area along the western wall,” Phillips began, but Lowerson raised a hand to point in the opposite direction.
They all turned and, there, silhouetted against the moonlit sky, were two figures. They seemed to dance like puppets along the high stone wall which separated them from the safety of solid ground and hundreds of metres of oblivion.
“Christ almighty,” Phillips breathed, his heart skipping in panic.
Lowerson moved as if to sprint in their direction but MacKenzie said sharply,
“Don’t startle them! They’re walking a tightrope as it is.”
Phillips’ brain reverted back to full po
wer and he pulled out his mobile phone.
“Jack, approach from the southern end, at a safe distance. Try to remain undetected, we don’t want Gregson doing anything stupid. Denise, do the same from the north. I won’t be far behind.”
Both nodded and jogged away, leaving a wide arc so that the two men who skirted the upper wall would be less likely to notice their arrival. Phillips punched in a number and waited while it rang.
“H.M. Coastguard Lindisfarne, receiving. What is your emergency?”
“Walker? This is DS Phillips. We’ve got a situation on the outer seaward wall of Bamburgh Castle and we could be looking at some kind of fatality. We need assistance from the sea, just in case.”
In the Coastguard Station on Holy Island, Alex Walker spat out his chewing gum and kicked his legs off the table top to listen more intently.
“What situation?”
“Ryan and Gregson. Either or both of them could fall.”
“That crazy bastard,” Walker breathed, then swung into action. “I’ll get a boat across, although the water’s choppy and we won’t be able to get up close because of the rocks.”
“Just get over here,” Phillips said, then ended the call before heading across to face the two men who edged along the outer wall.
* * *
“You’ve always been a coward,” Ryan said, scathingly.
Gregson looked back over his shoulder to where Ryan stalked him along the stone wall. The wind was strong without anything to shelter him from the gusts, which pounded his weakened body as relentlessly as the sea pounded against the rocks beneath. He wanted to drop to his knees and crawl until he reached the narrow stairwell he was looking for, but he wouldn’t give Ryan the satisfaction.
“Are you hoping to climb down and hail a passing boat to China?” Ryan baited him as he tried to close the distance, bending his knees slightly to regain his balance when the wind threatened to carry him away.
“I’m leaving!” Gregson’s frantic cry carried on the wind as he ploughed onward, hunting for the stone steps which led down into a natural harbour that hadn’t been used for years. “God help me, Ryan, if you come any closer I’ll hurl you over the side of this wall.”
“Come on, big man,” Ryan jeered, thinking of all the innocent victims Gregson had wilfully ignored, of all the victims they had yet to find. “Come and show me what you’re made of.”
Gregson’s teeth ground together and his eyes were wild when he turned back. Ryan was within a few feet of him now and he concentrated on that, and not on the sickening drop to his left. In other circumstances, the view out across the sea would have been awe-inspiring.
Gregson huffed out a satisfied breath as he found the hidden stairwell, moulded into the outer rock and worn almost smooth by thousands of footsteps made centuries ago and the fall of rain in the years since. He dropped to his knees and swung his legs around, feeling for the first toe-hold.
He found it and began to descend the slippery steps, keeping his back to the wall he had just left, the prospect of escape outweighing the bowel-loosening fear of falling.
Then, a strong hand tugged at his collar and yanked him backwards.
* * *
Lowerson was the first to climb atop the seaward wall from the southern end and, fifty metres further along, he spotted Ryan. His blood curdled as he saw the man’s precarious position, leaning forward over the wall at a forty-five degree angle with one arm bent downward as he clutched Gregson’s neck.
Lowerson pushed forward and focused on gripping the thick stone wall as he rushed to help his friend.
“Ryan!”
The man didn’t turn but he heard the sound carry on the air and thanked whichever god was listening.
At the other end of the wall, MacKenzie struggled to move. Vertigo blurred her vision and she froze like a statue, trying to regain control. Her fingers shook against the stone and her stomach heaved. She hadn’t known it before, she thought weakly. She hadn’t known that this would be a problem.
The fear worked its way through her body and she flattened herself against the top of the stone wall, unable to move either forward or backward.
Phillips found her there and climbed quickly to place reassuring hands over her shoulders.
“Frank,” she moaned.
“Alright, pet, don’t panic. Frank’s here,” he said cheerfully, with a taut glance at the drop on the other side. “What we’re going to do is moonwalk off this wall.”
MacKenzie sobbed out a laugh.
“I’ll sing along, if you like,” he continued, making sure he had a firm hold of her. “Now, you need to loosen your grip on the wall—”
“I can’t,” she whispered.
He edged a bit closer until he was almost on top of her, then put his hands over hers.
“I’m not going to let you fall, love. Trust me.”
MacKenzie loosened her knuckle-white grip, little-by-little.
“I’m sorry, Frank. I’m so sorry,” she murmured, thinking of how she had failed their team.
“Don’t worry about anything except listening to my voice,” he crooned, then started to hum an old Michael Jackson song as they edged closer to the inside. “Now, I want you to swing your right leg down over the wall until you can get a toe in one of the cracks. OK?”
MacKenzie’s teeth were chattering so hard she had to snap them together, but slowly, she followed his advice.
“That’s the girl. Now, swing your other foot around, that’s right.”
MacKenzie gripped the top while her feet found purchase in the crevices of the inside wall and with a grateful smile of thanks, she began to climb down again towards safety.
Phillips waited until her feet thudded back against terra firma, then looked ahead to where Ryan’s body stretched at a death-defying angle as he maintained a stranglehold on Gregson’s collar.
* * *
Gregson struggled to release himself from Ryan’s grasp without losing his balance against the slippery rock face. He scratched at the man’s hand and wrist until he drew blood but Ryan had a grip like iron.
“I’ll jump!” Gregson threatened and realised that he meant it. Why not? He thought. Where was he running to? He had no friends to help him anymore. No family to shelter him. Only the rest of his life in prison or an eternity with his Master.
“You’re not getting off that easy, you pathetic bastard,” Ryan managed, as sweat poured down his face and the tendons in his arm screamed for him to let go.
The decision was taken from him.
In one decisive movement, Gregson simply went limp against his hand, stopped struggling and without another word fell forward. Without Ryan’s grasp on his collar, he would have plunged face-first into the sea.
“Gregson!”
Ryan nearly careered over the edge of the wall and, from his position a few feet away, Lowerson’s heart crashed against his chest, driving him onward like a madman to save his friend.
Ryan threw out his other arm to grip the inner edge of the wall to prevent himself falling over the edge, while his other arm still grappled with Gregson’s collar. The man’s leaden body dangled loosely in his grasp, strangling him at the neck. Spread-eagled against the top of the wall, Ryan felt himself slipping, felt his grip slacken while his body was torn apart; the remaining stitches in his abdomen ripped open and the pain was incredible. His mind was somewhere else, somewhere pain could not touch. In that moment, his only objective was to ensure Gregson lived. The pain could wait.
It felt like an agonising minute, but in a few seconds Lowerson had bridged the gap. He took his own fear in his hands and lowered himself over the seaward wall, gripping the stone with one hand while he threw his other hand out to grab at Gregson’s shirt. No words were spoken; time was precious and in a few more seconds Ryan would have to let go or lose his own life.
Lowerson tried once, twice, a third time.
He grabbed a fistful of Gregson’s shirt on the fourth try, and pulled him back towards the wal
l.
The man was losing consciousness but Lowerson pinned him to the wall with his free hand, lining his feet up against the stone steps so that Ryan could ease his grip.
“Is he secure?” Ryan ground out.
“As much as possible,” Lowerson answered, taking in the full danger of his position now that the immediate urgency had passed. Across the water, he saw the bright lights of the Coastguard’s lifeboat motoring over the waves, circling to avoid the jagged rocks which lay hidden beneath. A white spotlight shone from the front of the boat, illuminating the water in front of it. Much good it would do them, if they plummeted into the sea.
“Phillips is nearly here,” Ryan whispered, almost ready to pass out. “I can hear him. He’s nearly here, Jack.”
The world went dark.
Lowerson heard Ryan go silent and a moment later felt Gregson stir against his restraining hand. He adjusted his grip and held him upright against the wall with one wiry arm while he waited for Gregson’s eyes to open again.
“Open your eyes, you murdering bastard,” he muttered.
Gregson coughed and choked, then desperately shoved against the wall in a futile effort to escape from Lowerson’s grip and throw himself over the edge. In the seconds before he lost consciousness again, all Gregson saw was Jack Lowerson’s clenched fist, right before it connected with his face.
* * *
Anna found herself in the waiting room at the RVI living out what felt like Groundhog Day as Ryan’s stitches were re-sewn and his body was treated for shock. His parents were in the recovery room with him now but she hesitated before joining them. She had thought that she understood Ryan’s life and the kind of danger he would face, dealing with unscrupulous men and women who wouldn’t blink at deploying extreme violence to achieve their goals. She had experienced a taste of that kind of psychopathy before and was grateful that she had walked away alive.