Fifty Two Weeks of Murder (17 page)

Chapter 10

Barrelling up the stairs, feet pounding loudly, Barry registered the sound of glass smashing ahead. The stairwell led to a long corridor that skirted the side of the theatre. It was bare, with wooden floors and a couple of rooms off to the side. At the end, a large window had been broken and Barry made for that, gun raised, quickly checking each room as he stormed by.

Mal followed closely behind, blood pumping through his head in a pulsating rhythm as he focused on staying upright and keeping up with Barry. As he passed the first room, he didn’t notice a cupboard door open and a figure step out. He was tall and wore a hoodie jumper with the hood up. Grabbing a wooden stool as he entered the corridor, the figure swung it at Mal, knocking him into the wall with a meaty thump.

Barry, hearing the noise behind him, turned just as the stool was swung towards his skull. Cursing himself at falling for such an old trick, he punched outwards with his forearms, the old stool shattering against them. At this range, his gun was more likely to kill his opponent, so he used it as a club instead. His training kicked in and he smothered the figure with heavy blows, not giving him a chance to defend himself. The assailant gave several satisfying cries of pain and Barry put all of his power into a thump across the temple, sending the hooded figure crashing into the wall.

Without pause, Barry slammed into him, his full weight driving the air from the man’s lungs. Pulling his arms backwards, Barry used his speedcuffs to immobilise the attacker. Using the plastic bar across the cuffs, Barry swung the figure round to face him as Mal groggily got to his feet, using the walls to help him stand.

“You ok?” asked Barry. Mal shook his head.

“No,” he replied and staggered forwards, pulling the hood off the figure. His addled brain took some time to work out who he was. The figure looked like Buckland, but much younger, the cheeks not as sharp and the jaw slightly wider, but the Buckland genes were prominent in his features.

“Buckland junior,” he said, his voice rasping from the explosion. “And here’s us thinking you were still in America.”

Chapter 11

Duncan looked like he was going to vomit as he lay his findings on the floor. He’d had the foresight to take some vodka from the shop opposite and followed Anders’ directions. She had one hand dug inside Lucy, the other pressed against a seeping wound above her waist, just below where the vest reached. Lucy had slipped into a coma and Anders could see she was dying. Duncan had borrowed a phone as well and propped it on the floor of the shop, rubble and debris everywhere. Jesse’s voice came through the speaker.

“Blood group Jesse,” Anders said as she instructed Duncan to sterilise the tubing and open the first aid kit.

“Ambulance will be there in ten,” Jesse was saying.

“She’s got minutes Jesse, get me her blood group.”

“Doesn’t matter,” said Duncan. “I’m type O.” Anders shook her head.

“You’ve lost too much blood recently. You’ll be in danger too.” Duncan gave her a forceful stare.

“Do it,” he said. Anders reassessed him. He was far braver than she’d given him credit for.

“See that syringe there? Pull the needle off. Use the lighter, melt that end. Stick it in the vodka, let it cool. Take the plunger from that syringe.” She directed him with a firm touch, and, even though his hands were shaking, he cobbled together a way to get some blood into Lucy, cutting the plunger and tube and using a lighter to melt the rubber to the sides. It was the same method developed by a Canadian in the First World War and Duncan hoped it would work.

“You’ll need to find a vein in her right arm.” Duncan scrabbled to find a vein. Lucy’s vital signs had receded and Anders was unable to help. Eventually, he found it and plunged the needle in.

“Artery in your left hand. See the one I’m holding? Imagine that running down your own arm.” Anders took her hand from Lucy’s stomach wound and, still holding her brachial artery tightly, showed Duncan how to put the needle in and lift the plunger to start blood flowing into her. Duncan waited with baited breath, feeling faint as his blood was directed into Lucy. He wasn’t sure what to expect and was disappointed when nothing seemed to change in her.  Leaning back against a wall, he slurred his words as he spoke.

“Will she be ok?” Anders looked at the ruined stump of her arm and the side of her body that had been shredded and shook her head.

“I don’t know.” In the distance, they could hear the sirens of an ambulance and a tactical support unit. The very same one Lucy had insisted go with them. “Where did you get the tubing from?” she asked. More to keep Duncan awake and focused than anything.

“Bikes,” he replied. “There’s a few bikes outside missing some tyres. How did you learn how to do this?” he asked.

“History channel,” she said as red and blue lights bathed the area. She found them comforting and breathed a sigh of relief as Mal and Barry came downstairs pushing their prisoner in front of them. Lord Buckland’s son. They’d paid a heavy price for him. She hoped it was worth it.

Chapter 12

Several hours later, Mal assembled everyone in the Hub. He stood before them, covered in grime and dirt, crusty blood clotting the back of his head where Lawrence Buckland had hit him with a stool. He put his hands on the back of a chair, holding himself steady as he gathered his thoughts. Everyone sat facing him in a semi-circle, a strange mixture of the clean and the filthy. When Mal spoke, his voice was filled with regret and sorrow. 

“I need to apologise to you all. It’s my fault Lucy’s in surgery right now. We don’t know how it’ll go, but it doesn’t look good. They lost her for a couple of minutes in the ambulance but managed to revive her. If it weren’t for Anders and Duncan, we’d already be mourning her loss.”  Barry clapped a congratulatory slap on Duncan’s back and he almost keeled over, pale as he was with blood loss. He gave a weak grin, having refused to go home after a check-up at the hospital, wanting instead to be here. Mal had skipped treatment as well, rushing Lawrence back to the Hub for questioning.

“Lucy is strong. She will pull through,” declared Mal, more in hope than expectation. He turned to Abi. Both she and Helen clasped hands, tears streaking down their cheeks. They’d been shaken badly by events and Mal knew that this had pushed the team to breaking point.

“Abi, can you interview Lawrence. I want a basic profile before Anders and I question him. See if he’s a stable, rational human being or his fathers’ son. Are you okay to do that or do you want someone in there with you?” Abi shook her head.

“No. I’ll go in alone. Jesse will keep an eye out, won’t you?” Jesse, unusually sombre gave her the thumbs up.

“Of course Mrs A. Always got your back.”

“While Abi is doing that, we need to see if we can get hold of physical records from every county in the UK. Have each of the counties scan them in and email them to Jesse. We can then match them up with the IT records and see if there are any blanks. Could be that Buckland is hiding in one of those black spots he’s created.” It was a huge job and would require many hours of work, but this was the basic foundations of any investigation. Painstakingly gathering evidence and hoping it would reveal something useful. Jesse stood up and moved to his desk, speaking as he went.

“I’ll check previous IT records as well. If these buildings have recently been deleted from the system, I can see if any back up records show discrepancies.”

He set to work, fingers tapping furiously on his keyboard. After a brief pause, Mal turned back to the group.

“Helen, Ben. Have you got all the evidence you need from the Boyle site?” Helen nodded that they had.

“Okay, good. You guys get over to Soho and take the scene. See if Buckland senior has been there and find out what you can about the explosive device.” Barry spoke up, his background giving him some experience in explosives.

“Fragments I saw before we left looked like a mine, most likely an M18A1, take out the clacker, put in an M5 Pressure Release Device. Simple trip wire to set it off. Lucy moves the laptop a millimetre and...” He held his hands out in a helpless gesture, unwilling to explain further.

“Where the hell is he getting explosives from? Barry, see if you can trace that. It might help.” Mal sighed heavily and ran his hands through his hair, frowning as he noticed the sticky blood that smeared the back of his head. He stared at the dark flakes of blood in his hand for an age before speaking again.

“How did we miss Lawrence? He was supposed to be in America.”

“We were looking for Michael Buckland, not his son. We were also looking for a Buckland leaving, not coming in. He’s been here for three weeks.” Whilst Lawrence had been processed, Barry had run a search and found a Business Class flight from Washington with his name on it.

Just then, the lift chimed and Lady Margaret and Francis Buckland’s lawyer, Blackwell, stepped into the Hub. He looked as fastidious as ever, but Lady Margaret looked shaken. Her normally cool and polished demeanour cracked and tears of worry smeared her make-up. Mal growled as he saw the lawyer.

“Jesse, pull Abi from the room. Barry, take Blackwell to Lawrence.” He turned on his heel and walked into his office. He rarely went in there, preferring to work outside in the Hub and it was strange to see him in it with the doors closed. He moved to his chair behind the desk and sat on it heavily, head pounding from both the explosion and the wooden stool that Lawrence had introduced him to. Turning the chair on its swivel, he faced the wall behind him and closed his eyes, the day’s events resting heavily upon him.

A few minutes later, there was a soft knock on the door.

“Come in,” he called and turned to see Anders entering the room, holding a large medical kit. She was caked in dirt and dust, Lucy’s blood staining her clothes a darker hue.

“Let’s clean up that wound of yours shall we,” she said and shut the blinds as she made her way down the narrow office. She put the kit on the empty desk and leant against the table, facing Mal. Seated, he looked up at her as she gave him a comforting smile.

“It’s my fault,” he said. “She wanted us to wait. I just wanted it over with.” Anders reached into the bag and pulled out some saline tubes and gauze, turning Mal round with her foot on the chair so that she could clean his wound.

“It is, you should have and I know,” she said, dabbing the dried blood from his scalp and making him wince. Not just with the pain either. Her matter of fact tone held no judgement and he found himself comforted by her honesty. He thought back to the moment he had brought Lawrence down the stairs, seeing the mangled shop floor for the first time as the dust had cleared. He’d never forget the image of Duncan leaning against a wall, tubing running from his arm to Lucy’s, Anders with her hand inside Lucy holding some blood vessel to stop her bleeding out.

“That was some work you did back there,” he said. Anders took out some disinfectant and started to apply it to the wound itself. Mal gave a short cry of pain and she yanked him back by his collar as he tried to move away.

“Stop being a baby,” she said and he grudgingly held still as she applied what felt like acid to the back of his head. As she worked, her face a mask of concentration, she told him of her time in Iraq.

“I saw the damage land mines can do on my first tour. Stuff like that sticks with you. I’m going to have to glue this I’m afraid.” A flap of skin was still loose and had shrivelled because Mal had not sought attention sooner. It was too late to get stitches, but some glue would at least help it heal more quickly. Reaching into the medical bag, she pulled some out and applied it to the back of Mal’s head. She spoke softly as she worked.

“The team looks to you Mal. They need you. Yes, you screwed up, but they’ve not lost faith in you.” Her job done, Mal turned to her, their faces close, breath mingling and sexual tension rising.

“What about you?” he asked. “Have you lost faith in me?” Anders leaned forward and kissed him. A brief kiss, no more than a second, but it was enough to answer his question.

“Where do you keep them?” she asked. Mal looked confused, caught off guard by the sudden change in conversation.

“What?”

“Your range of high quality shirts?” She gave him a cheeky grin as he indicated a cupboard set into the wall. She walked over and opened the door, chuckling at the range of shirts and jeans in there. She wondered if he actually slept here. Taking a clean shirt and trousers from the cupboard, she walked back to Mal and held out a hand, the clothes clutched in the other. It took Mal a second to work out what she wanted.

“Oh,” he said and stood up to unbutton his shirt, dust and flakes of blood falling off as he struggled to get out of the grime infused material. He then unbuckled his jeans and stood in front of Anders in just his boxer shorts and socks. His chest was flat and firm, not muscled like the pretty boys down the gym, but lean and trim, his legs long and toned. He stood in front of Anders and folded his arms across his chest as she appraised him slowly, a sly grin on her face.

“Your turn,” said Mal mischievously. Anders raised an eyebrow at him, pausing long enough to let the tension rise, before tossing Mal his clothes and leaving the room.

“Get dressed,” she said on her way out. “We’ve an interview to conduct.”