They walked on in silence. Liz stayed five or six feet behind. At one point Karl tripped over the right-hand track, grazing his ankle, realising that the tunnel was curving to his left. The going was a little slower after that. The next problem announced itself a few minutes later – the sound of rushing water overhead. They didn’t see it until they were just a few feet away, where water was leaking from the roof of the tunnel in a great curtain. Liz stopped, refusing to go any further, and he understood her reticence. The waterfall could go on for a whole mile, or the tunnel could slope downwards and be flooded. The roof could be so weak that it fell in on them. What was above them? A sewage pipe, or some rich guy’s al fresco swimming pool?
Karl pushed aside his worries and forced his way through the curtain. The water was cold and drenched him in a second, but a second was all that it took to pass through.
Liz darted through after him and stood before him, soaked.
They moved on. Karl kept his eyes and hands ahead, his steps high so he didn’t trip on the rail again. His feet were cold and numb. Periodically Liz made a noise at him, and he had to stop and wait. He wanted to tell her not to dawdle, but figured it was probably his own haste that was creating distance between them. So, he said nothing, just waited for her shape to appear by him before he moved on again.
Minutes later, every muscle tensed as he tried to plant a foot on rocky ground. It sank into nothing, and his body started to pitch forward. He let out a shout, unable to stop it as he toppled. But before he could worry about falling into a bottomless hole, he landed on his hands, his arms buckled, and his chest hit hard ground. He scrambled to his feet and to one side, banging hard into brick.
Liz called out, asking him what was wrong. A damn depression, he told her, angry more than hurt.
Then, it was her turn to fall. He cursed, knowing that this was wasting time. He fumbled for her, helped her to her feet. She grabbed his arm, and her hand was wet with warm blood. He rubbed her hands, seeking a gash, but she corrected him: her knee. He bent and wiped her knee with his used-to-be-white shirt, and she thanked him. He grunted an okay and moved on. But she grabbed the back of his shirt, wanting to be led. So, he helped her along.
Down here it was easy to be lulled into a vision of time standing still. But that was not the case. Time was passing, and with each expired minute they had no idea of the safety of the people they loved. He tried not to think about Katie and his unborn son, about how much she might be worrying about him, because down here he could do nothing about it and it would only stop him from focusing on their escape. He told himself she was driving to her father’s, and then shut her out.
Liz, of course, would be thinking about her husband. Did she believe he was tied up in the cottage, or did she think he was out there on the streets with an army, looking for her?
And then he tried to put himself in the mind of the gunman and his cohorts. What would be their next move? How many were there, and what sort of connections did they— He stopped. Liz bumped into him. They both became aware of a low rumbling noise.
‘What is it?’ she asked.
‘A train.’
Thirty-One
Mick
Mick missed the days when CCTV cameras were giant boxes on poles and a doddle to avoid. These days minuscule cameras were embedded everywhere, and the police could put together a cinematic series of cuts to show a bad guy strolling around town. So, a high street phone box was out of the question. The only one he knew of without a single camera nearby, which he’d learned about when he visited the nearby charity shop where Tim worked, had already been used to call in the cavalry to Grafton’s hideaway cottage, and he couldn’t very well use that again. He had a burner phone, already charged, and a pre-paid sim collecting dust, saved for a rainy day. It was time to use it.
He drove a mile southwest from Sunrise Electronics, changed clothing in the driver’s seat, turned off the radio, and made the call. He watched the house. It was a semi-detached property halfway down a residential street. Invisible, inert, just a regular house. Just like the owners. But not for long.
‘Hey, is this Bexleyheath Police Station?’ he asked in a disguised voice so bad it almost made him laugh. ‘Okay, I’m not giving my name, okay, so don’t ask. There’s a guy called Aleksy, bit of a scumbag. I just saw him enter a shop, a mean look on his face. You got a detective based there called McDevitt, right? Murder squad boss or something.’
As he watched the house, the front door opened and he perked up. A tall woman in a bathrobe exited with a bag of rubbish and walked down the path. He hadn’t expected this and scrabbled for his keys.
‘I don’t need to speak to him. I’m one of his informants, and so’s this Aleksy guy. That guy, that Aleksy, he went into some shop on Beverley Drive, in Old Ford. Called Sunrise or something. And – what?’
Mick drove quickly down the street. The woman opened the wheelie bin at the end of the drive and tossed the bag in. Mick’s car got within range too late, though, and she turned away, heading back to the house, before he could see her face.
‘I saw the guy as I drove past. Think I saw a weapon. You might want to tell McDevitt because I heard he wanted to speak to this Aleksy guy. Been looking for him. That’s it.’
He slowed to almost nothing. Knowing it would cause a problem later, Mick lay on his horn. The woman stopped, and turned, and looked. Mick hid his face with the phone, but managed to stare right at her. She watched his car cruise slowly by without any real concern.
‘Call me Superman, if you like.’
He hung up. The woman returned to her house and shut the door behind her.
Mick pulled into the kerb 160 feet past the house. The new burner got busted in half and the pieces lobbed down a drain, along with the snapped sim card. Job done. He switched the radio on and drove by the house again, but didn’t spot her at any of the windows.
‘See you soon, Mrs Seabury.’
Thirty-Two
Brad
Three hundred feet southwest of West Ham Station, Brad’s satnav voice told him he’d arrived at the location. He drove slowly along Banker Avenue, watching his target approach and worrying over new developments. The plan had sounded so good: nail Grafton, blame Ramirez, watch the two crime lords wage war on the streets, then six months down the line he’d elope with Ian. A new country and a new life.
Then Mick had gone too far and killed Grafton, and they’d discovered that his house hadn’t contained quite the war chest they’d hoped. Brad remembered a time when Grafton carted at least a million around with him, but the secret stash under the bath had contained only enough to give each man ninety grand.
Not the end of the world, but then Ramirez had spoken Brad’s name, and now the police wanted to talk to him. Ian thought Brad was out of the crime game and was actively seeking legit employment back in the construction trade, so that was going to cause tension, even if Mick came up with a plan to clear Brad as a possible suspect. A day in and already two kicks in the teeth. What else might go wrong over the next hundred and fifty days that Brad was forced to remain in the danger zone?