Jennifer’s bladder was now pleading with her once again, one step from taking matters into its own hands. She unzipped her trousers and squatted down. As the sense of relief flowed through her, she considered what she might do to immobilise the motorcycle.
The surprise of two screaming policemen tearing open the Passat’s front doors and the petrified Chinese prostitute being ripped from in front of her eyes delayed Olivia Freneton’s response by a second at most. Derek Thyme was still swinging Mandy around and away from him when Olivia reached for the side-handle baton. She could see that McPherson’s first priority was the key; his eyes were not on her. He had made the mistake of half climbing into the car as he lunged at the key dangling on the right side of the steering column.
Gripping both the baton’s handles, Olivia executed a vicious swing that connected squarely with the bridge of McPherson’s nose. Blood burst from the flattened tissue, spraying onto the windscreen as McPherson collapsed onto the seat. Olivia raised the baton again and whipped it down on his head with every ounce of her considerable strength. She didn’t wait to see the effect: no one could be on the receiving end of such a blow and remain conscious. Instead, she focussed her attention on Derek Thyme, who was both bigger and stronger than she was. She jumped from the car in time to see him turn towards her as he recovered from the momentum of swinging the girl away from the car. At the same moment, she became aware of the roar from the engine of a fast-approaching car. A grim smile appeared briefly on her lips as she assessed her situation. Neither Bottomley nor the ageing Hurst would pose much of a problem individually — Olivia fought far dirtier than they’d ever imagine possible — but the combination of all three men together posed a problem. And maybe Jennifer Cotton was with them. Four to one were not good odds, and they would be even worse when uniformed officers arrived, which they undoubtedly would.
Derek’s eyes were now fully focussed on Olivia. There was no time for her to circle and feint; she needed to attack. Gripping the baton with both hands and swirling it menacingly, she advanced, hoping Thyme would be distracted into watching it while she positioned her feet. Her eyes not leaving his, she waited until she saw him glance away for the briefest moment. Then she pounced. Stepping forward onto her left foot, she swung her right leg up, snapping it straight into a powerful kick as she did. She was aiming low, given his chest was protected by the reinforced jacket. Her foot buried itself in Derek’s crotch and he tumbled backwards as if his feet had been torn from under him.
It wasn’t a permanently crippling blow, she knew that, although he would be incapacitated for several seconds, at least. She wanted to finish him with the baton but she couldn’t — she could hear Hurst’s car screeching to a halt on the gravel and its doors opening. Any second, at least two overweight men would be throwing themselves at her and she didn’t want to be distracted by killing Derek Thyme as they did.
As she sprinted the few steps necessary to reach the car, she saw Hurst was half out of the passenger door. She launched herself at it, spinning to hurl a kick at the handle. The door smashed back into place, slamming onto Hurst’s right arm. There was a crunch of breaking bone as he yelled in pain. Olivia wanted to gloat, to enjoy the moment, but she couldn’t afford that luxury. She started to raise the baton, ready to give Hurst the same treatment as McPherson when she heard the crunch of twigs underfoot followed by a piercing scream. Spinning around, she saw Mandy launching herself at her, the point of the knife clutched in her hand heading straight for Olivia’s chest.
Olivia reacted fast. In a blur, her left hand whipped across the path of the blade to deflect it. The move worked, but instead of Olivia’s hand connecting with the girl’s wrist as intended, it found the razor-sharp edge of the knife. The blade cut deeply, blood spurting from the wound. Instinct took over as the pain seared through Olivia’s left arm. She flicked her right wrist upwards and the baton, still clutched in her right hand, smashed into Mandy’s chin like a prizefighter’s uppercut. The blow lifted the girl from her feet, sending her tumbling backwards, but as Olivia stepped forward to finish her, a voice behind her said, “Give it up, Freneton, it’s over. We’ve got you.”
It was Bottomley, the fat detective sergeant. Olivia snarled, invigorated by the challenge — he hadn’t even got a weapon; he was just standing there, slightly hunched. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Thyme climbing groggily to his feet. This was getting out of control. As Bottomley took a step towards her, she flicked her liberally bleeding hand at him, spraying blood into his face. He faltered and she swung the baton at him, catching him in the mouth. There was a choking yell as he grabbed at his face and sank to his knees.
“Stop, you bitch!”
It was Hurst. He was stumbling towards her, his right arm dangling. He was clearly in great pain. She had to leave: there would be uniforms arriving in seconds and she’d be lost. Hurst was about eight feet away and advancing. She weighed the baton in her hand and then threw it hard at him. It was a clean shot, catching the side of his head and bouncing off into the bushes. As he too sank to his knees, Olivia took to her heels, tucking her bleeding hand under her right arm as she raced off along the track.
Standing about six feet to one side of the motorcycle’s rear wheel and well shadowed by bushes, Jennifer was startled by the commotion along the lane that began with Derek and McPherson screaming as they wrenched open the Passat’s doors, the noise intended to disorient and distract the occupants. She considered running to join the men but then she remembered Hurst’s order. She pulled a face. Better get back to the Mini Cooper and wait; the four of them should have no trouble subduing Freneton. But as she turned away from the bike, she heard Hurst’s voice yelling at Freneton to stop. She froze in her tracks. His voice had sounded different, strained. When Hurst’s cry was followed by a dull thump and the crunch on gravel of pounding feet as someone raced down the lane in her direction, she realised that Freneton had not been stopped, that she was escaping. She crouched in the bushes and waited.
The pounding of feet was suddenly replaced by the sound of twigs and small branches snapping as Freneton broke from the lane into the bushes, ploughing her way through the undergrowth towards her bike. Jennifer pulled her body lower and waited.
The stillness surrounding the motorcycle was shattered as Freneton burst from the bushes. Jennifer had half-expected her to vault onto the machine, but instead she stopped on its right side, took hold of the grip with her right hand and eased herself on.
It was then that Jennifer saw Freneton’s left hand tucked under her right armpit. She was injured! Jennifer waited as in one motion Freneton leaned forward on her feet to push the bike off its stand while she reached under the fuel tank to where she’d hidden the key. When she turned it in the ignition switch, Jennifer knew it wouldn’t work: she’d cut the cable feeding it with a small pair of scissors she kept in the bag now slung round her neck.
This was the moment she should have pounced, while Olivia was still processing the fact that the bike was dead. But she didn’t. Instead, she waited the extra second that was all Olivia needed to work out exactly what was going on. When Jennifer burst from her crouch and hurled herself at the figure on the motorcycle, her hands outstretched to grab her collar and pull her off, Olivia was ready. She ducked down, flattening her body onto the petrol tank, shifting the weight of the frame to her right foot as she leaned the bike in that direction. Jennifer saw her move but her arms were committed as they flailed forward. An instant before their bodies collided, Olivia brought her right elbow up sharply, burying it in Jennifer’s diaphragm.
The impact lifted Jennifer’s feet from the ground. Olivia pushed with her right foot, but the bike’s rear wheel slipped on the loose stones and it slid away under her. Both women fell onto the motorcycle’s frame, Jennifer on top but half paralysed by the blow to her body.
Olivia tried to push Jennifer’s body up and away from her, but she didn’t have the leverage and Jennifer sagged back. She needed to use both hands. Win
cing with the pain of the cut, Olivia pushed Jennifer’s torso upwards, her bleeding left hand now full in Jennifer’s face. Then, bringing her right knee up to her chest, she shoved her hard with her foot, sending Jennifer rolling away.
Olivia sprang to her feet. She could hear people running along the lane, voices shouting in question. She glanced down at Jennifer, who was clasping her chest, but clearly regaining her strength. She wanted to finish her, this clever little bitch who had ruined her fun. Contingency plans were one thing — there were several outcomes to this mess already mapped out — but retribution was another. One voice in her head was screaming at her to finish the girl now — it would only take seconds. But another voice told her that every second counted; that she had to leave. The first voice got the upper hand and she lashed a foot out at Jennifer’s gut, burying it deeply, a gasp exploding from Jennifer’s mouth. A second vicious kick, this time to the side of her head was rewarded with a loud grunt of pain.
She stood back. She didn’t have time to kick Jennifer to death; she needed a weapon. Her eyes scanned the gloom around the fallen motorcycle searching for a branch, or better, a rock. Then she saw it, a large flat stone four feet beyond the bike’s front wheel. She could hear the blood pumping through her head as the adrenaline filled her body with the strength for this final act before running into the darkness, before torches suddenly filled the scene with stark white light and strong hands grabbed and subdued her. Then above the rushing of her blood, she heard other sounds: the crashing and breaking of undergrowth, and the screaming of a voice getting louder and closer, a desperate, anguished plea for a response.
“Jennifer! Jennifer!”
She had bent over, her hand was on the stone, but it was too late. She stood and looked over to where Jennifer’s now motionless body lay in a jumble of dishevelled clothing, hair, leaves and mud, her face covered in blood. Maybe the final kick to the head had been enough.
“Jennifer! Jen!”
Olivia turned, away from the direction of the lane, away from the shouting and running. She broke into a trot, her right hand pushing away the branches, her left back in the protection of her right armpit. Even this potential escape had been planned, a ‘what if?’ She knew where she was going and she had the edge. The discovery of Cotton’s body would distract them, slow them. She didn’t have far to go.
She was only twenty feet into her escape when she heard Derek Thyme crash through the bushes into the small clearing behind her.
“Jennifer! Oh, Christ. Jen!”
Chapter Forty-Four
Swirling grey mist and billowing smoke covered everything, making it impossible to see clearly. There were fires everywhere, fires lapping at her feet, fires singeing her shoes, fires still finding fuel in scrub already blackened to a crisp. But she was cold. So very cold.
She was following two men, one ancient and white-haired dressed in a ragged, stained toga, the other a younger man wearing doublet and hose, like someone out of the Renaissance pageants so popular in Italy. She couldn’t see their faces or hear their voices, but from their animated gestures, they were clearly arguing.
Huge gates loomed into view through the mist and smoke, their tortured hinges creaking, metal tearing against metal. She didn’t want to pass through the gates; she’d have given anything not to pass through them, but she had no choice: the two men ahead seemed to be drawing her on, controlling her feet.
On the other side, through clouds of ash, she could make out a sea of anguished people, terror in their faces as they tried to avoid clouds of hornets that stabbed at them incessantly.
As she drew level with the gates, she looked up at an engraved panel filled with writing. The last part was level with her eyes.
Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate
Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.
“No!” she screamed. She pushed herself away, back into the mist and smoke behind her. The two men turned and beckoned.
Jennifer. Jennifer.
She was fighting her way through a forest, alone now, then wading through a river blazing with fire that in an instant became a sea of mud, clawing at her, clinging, pulling her down. Thunder crashed and her name echoed across the sky.
Jennifer! Jennifer!
The storm disappeared and the sky filled with a blinding light, dazzling her, torturing her eyes as the sound of the voice calling her name became louder and louder.
Jennifer!
A hand was squeezing hers.
Her eyes opened and focussed slowly on Derek’s face. He was smiling at her but his eyes were etched with fear.
“Jennifer,” he whispered, “you’re back.”
She looked at his face in incomprehension.
“Where have I been?” she croaked.
“I don’t know, Jen, but you’re here now.”
In spite of trying to inject encouragement into his voice, it was full of doubt.
She drifted off again into a troubled sleep of demons. Tall identical female demons all with the same face. Olivia Freneton’s face. One had a hand dripping blood, one was wielding a massive side-handle baton, far too large and heavy to lift but nevertheless she was lifting it. Another was holding a large fluffy white cat in her arms. The cat was terrified. That particular Olivia Freneton pulled her lips back in a snarl as the cat tried to wrest itself from her clutches. The others were all screeching with laughter at its terror.
Jennifer’s eyes shot open.
“Languid!” she screamed.
“Shh. It’s OK, Jen,” said a male voice close to her ear. “Hey, you’re sweating.”
A damp cloth dabbed at her face.
She turned her eyes to see who was holding the cloth.
“Derek?” she said, her voice the thinnest of whispers.
He beamed. “Yes, Jen, it’s me, Derek. You know me?”
She frowned. “Of course I know you,” she whispered. “Why shouldn’t I? What am I doing here? Why does my head hurt?”
She shifted her body slightly and winced. “Ouch. And my chest. Why does that hurt?”
“Jen, they said it would be a while till you remember, they said …”
He stopped. Her eyes had closed again. She was asleep.
He bit his lip. He’d been lying to her. What they’d actually said was that there was a strong chance she’d never wake up, and if she did, she might never regain her memory. He remembered the doctor had patted him on the arm, thinking perhaps he’d overstated it.
“Of course, she might wake up and be fine, Mr Thyme. It does happen.”
Derek had glared at him. “You wouldn’t put money on it though, Doc, would you?”
The operation had lasted nine hours. There were blood clots in her brain that if not reached and dispersed would cause permanent damage. And even with them dispersed, her survival was in the lap of the gods. That had been three weeks ago. Jennifer had remained comatose since. Vital signs good, brain functions better than expected, but still comatose.
There was now just a nothing. No people, no spectres, no form, no sound, no colours. Nothing. Then, after about a century, distantly, she heard the faintest sound, the vaguest suggestion of air moving, the gentlest of onshore breezes barely strong enough to disturb a few hairs on her head. Zephyr breezes. And slowly, glacially, the nothing brightened as the breeze picked up. It was soothing, soft, cooling.
She opened her eyes, looking straight up into the light.
“Derek?” she said.
When there was no answer, she moved her eyes to one side. There was someone there but outside her field of vision. She willed her muscles to turn her head. It wasn’t Derek. This man was white. This man was …
“Henry,” she said softly. “Oh, Henry.”
A tear welled from the corner of her eye.
“Welcome back, Jennifer. I knew you’d make it,” he said softly, fighting the emotion in his voice. “No daughter of mine would be beaten by a little bump on the head.”
She stared at him for a long time
. Finally she said, “I don’t remember the bump on the head; I can’t have seen it coming. But I do remember her elbow jabbing into my ribs like a spear. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so much pain.”
Henry’s mouth was working, his eyes creased with pleasure.
“You remember that!” He was ecstatic. “How wonderful! Not the pain of course, but how wonderful that you remember. You’re really back, Jennifer.”
He stroked her forehead below the bandage covering her head.
“She broke three of your ribs,” he said. “They were amazed that your diaphragm wasn’t punctured.”
Irrefutable Evidence Page 35