The tone changed – more menacing, accentuating the last two words.
Hewett altered his own voice, mindful of the fact that he needed to shield any outward sign of fear, but his caller had already disconnected, parting with the advantage.
He sat alone, his mind was in tumult – damned if he did. His parents’ lavish lifestyle had come with a price and their precious son had followed in their footsteps, except his debts had been less naïve, more illegal. Underground and reckless, but oh so exhilarating. He had become just another gambler with breeding, a class act with an exponential obligation to a man he had never met and who offered him a lifeline via one of his more adventurous and alluring employees.
Hewett claimed diplomatic immunity, but it meant nothing to a borderless group whose reputation and tactics alarmed even their most avid enemies.
He stared into his rear-view mirror. His normally smooth chin was covered in a light stubble, his eyes red and his skin pale. He hadn’t slept for days and when he ate he soon expelled any of the valuable nutrients from his body.
‘Just this once’ he had said as he signed over the four hundred thousand pound debt to Alexandru Stefanescu.
He shook his head.
“Bastard.”
The Jackdaw grinned as he placed the classic-looking Bakelite phone handset into its receiver.
“I am such a bastard. But I am your bastard, Mr Hewett.”
“No sign of ‘em boss. It’s as if they’ve vanished. We’ll keep searching, they must be nearby.”
“Thanks Andy.” Daniel involuntarily turned three hundred and sixty degrees and came back to the same start point. Nothing had changed.
Roberts had arrived at St Thomas’ Hospital and breaking all the rules had been allowed to leap-frog the queue. His injury had been triaged, he’d been made as comfortable as possible and was now on his phone, trying to ring his wife. He looked up at the two uniformed staff who were stood at the door to his side room.
It was a look that said ‘I appreciate you being here boys, but really, right now I just want some space.’
The phone was answered after four rings.
“Hi. It’s me.” He took a quick breath; time to compose the lie.
“I’ve had a bit of an accident.”
He’d decided that tactically speaking it was a good idea to massage the truth slightly. The fact that his radius was in two pieces was one thing for his wife to contend with. The fact that he had avoided the impact of a nine millimetre round, not once, but twice was something altogether different. Hopefully, it would remain his secret.
He outlined a version of the truth and said that yes, in the scheme of things, he would appreciate her coming to the hospital at some point soon – but sort the kids out first.
“No, honestly, nothing else. It’s just been a busy few hours.”
It was a horrendous lie; it had been a chaotic few weeks and despite the pain he was glad of the rest.
“Anyone else hurt babe?”
“No. Just me. Look hun, I’ve got to go. I’ll ring you when I can.”
Another lie.
He pressed the red button and ended the call, leaned back into the pile of cushions, none of which offered anything like comfort, and allowed his head to sink into the one that stood out as the most pleasing.
As soon as he had relaxed, the pain started. The throbbing pulse of agony got worse by the second. The temporary cushioning effect of the soft splint only suppressed the pain for so long. But it did allow him to think.
It was only then that he realised that O’Shea was technically in the same hospital. St Thomas’ was part of the amalgamated Guy’s and St Thomas’ hospitals. He was in the A&E Department and she was in the nearby Urgent Care. But they were, for all intents, miles apart.
He stared at his own reflection through dilated pupils. “Christ, how could I forget?”
He looked outside, called out and got the attention he craved. One of the two uniformed staff walked in.
“Yes skipper, what do you need?”
He took a moment to contain any thought of being wheeled to her by two armed guards.
“Get someone to find out how Carrie is, please. Now.”
“Carrie boss?”
“O’Shea. She’s one of my team. Best analyst in the force. We, I, allowed her to become a target. I need to know how she is. Fast as you can. She’s somewhere in Guy’s.”
In the Victorian sewer, Constantin ducked under the greasy surface but immediately panicked and started to inhale water. He shot back to the surface.
“I can’t do this.”
“Then get out of my way and let me live. Go on, move out of the way. I am far too young to end my life in an English sewer…with a rat.”
“OK. OK. I will do it.” He was fooling no one.
He nodded repeatedly, convincing himself to go, looking through the bars, focusing on one in particular, then past it and out into the river. He lowered his face to the water once again.
No longer sympathetic, Gheorghiu slammed his palm onto the back of his partner’s head and pushed as hard as he could, driving the older man down into the water, and then using his thigh he propelled him deeper into the river.
Half way through, Constantin opened his eyes. He didn’t see the outline of his mother, or ethereal beings, or for that matter anything other than opaque and cloudy water, a series of metal bars and then in the distance, dark, cold, deeper water.
Gheorghiu was kicking him now, using his feet to get him to the other side. He waited a moment, cognisant of the fact that he couldn’t go until the channel they had hurriedly created was clear.
‘Where the hell was he?’
He was back. There. An infant at his dear Mother’s hands. He looked up but all he saw was the impassive face of a broken woman pushing him down into the water, tears in her cold, detached eyes.
“Merge. Lasă-mă în fiul meu.”
“Go. Leave me, my son.”
He wanted to speak to her. To ask her for forgiveness, quite what for he did not know. But soon her face became a façade, a featureless embodiment of a once-proud woman.
Just as everything he saw indicated that Constantin was about to give up, Gheorghiu watched him emerge on the other side in a panic, exiting from beneath the water as if he had seen a ghost. He was ten to twelve feet away from the entry point, having quickly drifted with the tidal flow. He was now clinging onto the railings, skin white as freshly blanketed snow. Silent.
Gheorghiu dropped below the surface and using the railing pulled himself along, swiftly, bursting into the main stream and joining the still silent Constantin.
“It is OK. You did well. Look, Stefan is coming.” He smiled, but received nothing in return.
The boat was drifting now, Stefanescu coaxed it towards the wall, caring not whether he damaged it, but cautious not to deprive himself of a means of escape. His two colleagues had one chance only.
He held the boat against the wall, staring ahead to locate the two members of his team. The sheer scale of the river and its surrounding architecture made it difficult to spot them. And then, only a short distance away, he saw Constantin, then Gheorghiu, vermin, clinging to the bars. Filthy, cold and apparently afraid.
Gheorghiu was the first to pull himself up onto the stern of the boat as Stefan held it in position. Once safely on board he put a hand into the water and grabbed Constantin.
“Come brother, we have to go. Now!”
Stefanescu could see that both men were as good as in the boat so accelerated, away from the wall and away from danger. Gheorghiu was still holding onto the hapless older man who was exhausted from days of abuse, adrenaline overdose and complete tiredness.
Constantin could feel the cool water pulsing around his body and found the temptation to let go almost unbearable. But something drove him up and into the hull.
Cade and Nicol had found the entry way to the main tunnel.
“Jesus, I doubt anyone’s been down here since the war
Jack.”
“Don’t be too hasty, mate – look around you. There are marks on surfaces everywhere. There’s been a struggle here, and recently, and I don’t mean during the Blitz.”
“You are right, boss. Over here. I didn’t spot it at first, but there’s a hatch.”
Cade lowered himself to his knee to get a better look, then lower again. Beneath him, he could see the same perfectly constructed brick tunnel.
“It’s part of the old sewerage system. Work of art, shame, it stinks to high heaven. I’m guessing they’ve gone this way. They were lucky, or they knew this was here. Either way, we need to go down too.”
He cautiously looked left and right, sweeping his pistol in a deliberate arc.
“I can see more light to the right, it must be an outlet.”
Contrary to the fabled imagery of a waterborne death, Mary-Jane Shipley wasn’t having life-centric and dreamlike footage flashing before her. She had given up. Another victim of the ancient waterway and the second in a desperately short space of time at the hands of European criminals, all of whom exhibited the same simple blue mark on their right wrist.
How she died did not concern them, that she did was all that mattered.
But as fast as she had willingly turned her back on life, something concealed deep within her, physically, or residing in the darkest corner of her mind had shunted her brutally back into life.
She jolted, gagged repeatedly as she tried to expel the water and then began to thrash about, forcing herself onto her back. She was a Shipley. And despite her parents’ detestation of Anglo-Saxon language, she found herself thinking ‘Fuck this, and you, and everyone else. I am not ready to die.’
With a final push she elevated her body out of the water – it was a display of defiance if nothing else, but it was likely to be her last.
“Boss, in the water!”
It was Nicol that spotted her first. Her dark clothing had disguised her presence in the tunnel superbly, but now she was very evident; face down, suspended below the waterline and lifeless.
“Wait!” hissed Cade, causing his younger colleague to throw him a questioning look.
“Boss, we need to go. We need to get down there.”
He was right of course, but Cade was doing what he was trained to do.
‘Stop. Think. Plan.’
The next few seconds would make no real difference, but may save three lives.
Who was the person in the water? Was it the female? Was it safe to go down? Was it a trap?
He looked at Nicol, who was already preparing to drop down.
Cade held up a palm. “John, try the radio again. Somebody may be listening to the bloody thing.”
“MP from Whiskey One Three.” He repeated it twice.
Almost directly above them Jennings, in the comparative calm of the chaotic high street, heard it at the same time as the control operator.
They had received Nicol’s last transmission.
“Go ahead.”
Nicol outlined his situation and location and said he was going off the air – but they needed help. The two targets were no longer in sight, but it was assumed they were somewhere in the labyrinth of tunnels that intersected beneath the city.
Jennings cupped his hands and yelled across the road.
“John, did you hear that?”
Daniel, sensing a turn in events, was running towards him now and replying at the same time.
“No. What’ve you got Andy?”
“They are somewhere below us. In a tunnel. A sewer.”
“Typical of Cade to be in the shit.” It wasn’t meant to be funny.
Cade looked at Nicol. He trusted him, and the situation needed the trust to be mutual. They both nodded.
“Let’s go.”
He rammed the pistol into his trousers and hoped for the best as he lowered himself through the hatch, dangling as far down as he could to lessen the impact of the landing.
He dropped into the water and tumbled, but survived the descent without injury. He stood and guided Nicol, catching him and reducing the impact of his own entrance into the tunnel system.
They were both wading towards the grate, as fast as they could, now practically abandoning any sense of risk assessment.
Cade took hold of the lifeless body, trying desperately to raise it above the water. Nicol joined him and clawed at the gag. Between them they managed to keep her mouth clear of the river, but it appeared to be a losing battle.
“We need to get underneath her John.”
It wasn’t an order. It wasn’t the time for such things. Moreover, it was a commentary of humanitarian need. Nicol’s face told Cade he needed to go first.
“I’m sorry, boss, I’ve got a real issue with water.”
“OK, mate, I’ll go first. Have you got a knife?”
Nicol fished around under the surface until he located one of two pouches on his belt. One contained handcuffs, the other his faithful Gerber multi-tool. He presented it to Cade, who gripped onto it and started to lower himself under the girl. As his face connected once more with the frigid water and his eyes were about to close he heard a sound.
A boat? The Police launch, perhaps? Lord knows they could do with the help.
He looked through the water to his right and saw a boat appearing in the aperture of the tunnel. A well-dressed male was at the wheel. Behind him two dishevelled men were pressed up against the hull, cold and clearly wet through.
Cade turned to Nicol. “It’s them!” Does that radio still work?”
Nicol pressed the microphone, but the set had died.
Cade fumbled for the Glock.
“Can you shoot?”
“I can boss but…we don’t have a reason…”
“No time for buts John. I need to get this girl back into the world of the living. Shoot the bastards. And that is an order.”
Like many British constables, John Nicol hadn’t actually ever fired a pistol, in anger or any other way. He looked over the top of the sight and squeezed the trigger, not quite believing he was doing it.
He anticipated the first shot which ricocheted off the bar immediately in front of him, passing harmlessly back into the tunnel. The brass cartridge case dropped to his right and hissed into the water.
He fired again. The trigger reset, reacting like clockwork. And again. It was surreally addictive. He had given no consideration to what might happen if he was to actually hit someone.
The noise was deafening in the confines of the tunnel, even under water Cade could hear the resounding boom.
He pushed up into the girl’s back, using the tunnel to brace his feet and keep her clear of the water. The idea, best laid was that Nicol would commence CPR until help arrived. But like most of Cade’s recent strategies, it had not gone to plan.
Nicol fired again.
Jennings heard it and looked at Daniel and smiled.
“That’ll be the Fat Lady singing boss. Let’s go.” He turned to his team, who had re-grouped upon hearing the gunshots. “You two get to the bridge, let’s have some eyes on the situation.”
Daniel was in full tactical mode now. “And we need to think about air support. Get them up Andy. Now.”
Cade groped around in the semi-darkness, running his hands across her submerged body, frantically trying to locate the bindings that prevented her from surfacing. He opened his eyes but the cocktail of river water and waste stung, but he knew he needed to at least try to see. Like many people in the same situation, Cade resorted to touch.
His hands were moving rapidly around her, darting here and there until his fingertips brushed against a coarse surface that instinct told him wasn’t clothing. Rope. Thick, industrial, saturated hemp.
He started to cut, at the same time telling himself not to breathe.
The Gerber sliced through the rope, strand by strand, but Cade needed air. He pushed back up to the surface and inhaled as fast as he could. He shook his head and cleared his eyes. Nicol was still firing.
/> Cade could see what the problem was. They were so low in the water that Nicol had lost all sense of perspective – he was firing over the top of the boat.
“Give me the gun!”
He grabbed the polycarbonate grip and settled his thumbs into a firing position, breathed and stared over the tritium front site. His target wasn’t the driver, he wanted to get the remaining rounds into the hull. If he couldn’t legally shoot them he was sure a magistrate, somewhere, would agree that in the circumstances sinking them was lawful under a long forgotten sub-section of the River Thames bylaws.
As he gazed up and over the site, both eyes open he found himself looking straight at the person behind the wheel, specifically, straight into his eyes. One was dark, chestnut brown almost, but the other was lighter, more distinctive, hazel.
Cade’s vision was intensely accurate. He could see the difference in the colours, almost to the point where everything else didn’t matter. The male was quite impressive, tanned but arrogant. It would be the word that Cade would use over and over again at later debriefs.
“He was arrogant.”
“That’s hardly a description, is it Jack?”
“You weren’t there. He was cold. Cold and bloody arrogant and I will never forget that face.”
He exhaled and pulled the trigger towards him. He had ten rounds left. The first drilled through the hull, the second, rushed, skipped across the surface of the water, which did its best to slow it down a little. The third was on target. And again. He was firing rhythmically now.
Nicol had overcome his fear and was doing his best to keep the girl alive. Praying in his own probable aquatic grave for an end to his insanely exciting tour of duty. He’d accept normality from this day forth.
The boat was moving out of range, the two males in the rear had dropped out of sight but the skipper was still in view. Cade had a choice to make; fire all three remaining rounds in a burst and hope for the best or fire two in succession into the hull and take his time with the last round.
Bang. Bang. The fifteenth and sixteenth rounds hit the boat, splintering fibreglass around the cockpit. A shard of the razor sharp material hit Gheorghiu in the thigh, causing him to yelp. It felt as if he had been stung by a wasp as the blood seeped from the incision into the damp material of his trousers.
Seven Degress (The Seventh Wave Trilogy Book 2) Page 34