See How They Run (35 page)

‘
D
id
you get me pregnant on purpose?’

Laird was about to reach for Evie. Now he paused, giving Ruth a sidelong glance.

‘Say that again?’

‘I was always careful, when we were together—’

‘Sure you were. That was all part of the plan. To entrap me.’ He made sure she was at a safe distance, then put the gun down and picked up the baby, cradling her with a natural ability that cut Ruth to her core.

‘And you knew that, didn’t you? Right from the start you made sure I got nothing useful.’

‘It wasn’t straight away, but yeah, I had a feeling something wasn’t right.’

‘So you impregnated me, as punishment?’

‘What you did to me was no less brutal. Worming your way into my life. Pretending to care about me. I was only a young guy, and a lot more tender-hearted than you give me credit for. When I realised what you were up to, I hated you for it. I thought you deserved everything you got.’

Now he had Evie in his left hand, gently rocking her calm. His right hand rested on the table, close to the gun.

‘And what about giving Benjamin away? When did you come up with that idea?’

He shook his head. ‘You’re leaping ahead here. First, let’s talk about how quick you were to abandon your maternal responsibility.’

Ruth winced, as if slapped. ‘That’s not true.’

‘When I said I wanted him, you couldn’t get him off your hands soon enough.’

‘That’s not true! That’s a horrible—’

‘Bullshit, Ruth. I never for one second thought you’d agree to hand him over. Any normal mother would move heaven and earth to keep their kid in a situation like that. So what if a load of stuffed suits at the Met went ballistic? You shouldn’t have given a damn about that.’ He leaned forward, his gaze hard and unflinching, giving emphasis to his next words: ‘Your own flesh and blood, Ruth. That ought to have mattered more than anything.’

R
uth felt robbed
of the ability to speak. Her brain was frantically winding back, trying to reassess. Could there be an element of truth in what he was saying?

She swallowed, dry-mouthed. ‘Are you telling me that you didn’t really want him?’

‘No, I did. Sort of. But not as much as I wanted to fuck with you. I never seriously expected to end up with him.’

‘I was scared,’ Ruth protested, her voice too high, too emotional, ‘because you’d made it clear you could come and take him any time you wanted. If I’d fought, there would have been reprisals. People I loved, people I cared about. That’s why I let him go – and I did it, believing you would let me have access to him, the way you agreed.’

‘If that’s what you tell yourself, fine,’ he sneered. ‘You’re good at seeing what you want to see.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Greg, for instance. He was quite happy with the arrangement.’

‘You’re lying.’

‘You think he wanted another man’s kid in the house?
My
kid? Dream on. All the time he spent later, sniffing round my businesses, that was just to earn brownie points. He’d have done anything to hang on to you.’

‘I’m only too aware of what he did for me,’ Ruth said bitterly.

S
he was bracing
herself to accuse Laird of Greg’s murder when his phone bleeped. She watched him carefully, conscious that if he picked up the phone he wouldn’t have a hand free to grab the gun. But Laird was wise to the danger and adroitly touched a couple of buttons, putting it on to speaker.

McBride’s Scottish voice said, ‘Boss, I can’t get hold of Mark.’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ Laird muttered.

‘Warley’s not answering, either. He there with you?’

‘No. Just keep a close eye out for the cops.’

Laird ended the call before McBride could respond, then glared at Ruth. She sensed that he wanted to ask her about Warley, but instead he checked his watch.

‘Foster and Bridge will be here any second.’

She ignored the reminder – the threat – and responded with a question: ‘Did Greg know about this scheme of yours, to sell the babies?’

‘He might have got a whisper or two.’

‘And is this where the idea originated? With what you did to me? Taking Benjamin and selling him to God knows who.’

Laird frowned. Evie, now awake, reached out and tried to swat at his nose. He chuckled, and it made his reply sound all the more derisory.

‘I didn’t sell Benjamin. Where did you get that idea?’

‘So you still have him?’ Despite everything, she couldn’t keep the hope from her voice. It faded as she registered that he was shaking his head.

‘I considered it, for a while. A healthy baby, in many ways it’s an asset.’ He shifted Evie in his arm as if to illustrate the point. ‘But in the end I decided against.’

‘Then where … ?’

‘He’s with my sister. Well, half-sister. She had problems conceiving, though she’s since had two of her own. Both girls. They adore their older brother.’

Ruth let out a sob. She couldn’t help it. Tears made her vision swim out of focus, and she didn’t care that Laird was probably smirking at her reaction. Let him feast on it. Let his men beat the crap out of her. Let her world end now, if it had to.

‘Is he …’ She paused to compose herself. ‘Is he aware of what happened?’

‘Of course not. He thinks I’m his uncle.’

‘So he doesn’t know about me … at all?’

Laird shook his head. In a softer tone than she might have expected, he said, ‘Better that way, isn’t it?’

And Ruth, somehow, found it within her to nod. ‘I suppose it is.’

L
aird’s phone buzzed again
: a text. He leaned forward to read it, then grinned.

‘They’re here.’ He looked up at her. ‘I hope it was worth it, given what that information’s gonna cost—’

He broke off as a terrible booming noise came from the other side of the house. It sounded like a bomb going off.

T
he driveway turned
out to be longer and wider than some of the country lanes Harry had driven along today. It ran up a steep incline, veered right, then disappeared over a ridge. The Mercedes was already out of sight.

Harry came to a halt just inside a set of gates.

‘I need you to get out.’

‘What?’ Alice sounded angry as well as mystified.

‘There isn’t time to explain. Can you follow on foot? Please.’

The tone of his voice must have convinced her. She jumped out, swinging the door shut as he pulled away. If his insane idea had any chance of working, he had to put it into effect right now.

Harry gunned the engine, vaguely wondering if Alice had guessed his intentions. He was hoping this wasn’t as dangerous as it appeared. If it was, better that only one of them was hurt.

He barely made it in time. He came hurtling over the ridge and saw the house about fifty yards below him, positioned on a neat plot of land with wilderness on either side. The Mercedes had just pulled up alongside another car parked at the front of the house.

Harry stamped on the accelerator and heard the engine roar. He pressed himself back in the seat and tried to prepare his body for what was to come. By now the men in the Mercedes had heard his approach. The driver was staring at the rear-view mirror, while his passenger made the mistake of turning to glance over his shoulder.

Harry didn’t dare look away from his target as he raced down the slope, but he guessed that his speed on impact was around forty or fifty miles an hour.

The noise was astonishing. Apocalyptic. But that was all Harry was able to register before the force of the collision knocked him out.

R
uth identified
the ear-splitting crunch and grind of metal on metal as a car crash. A bad one. The odd thing was how close it sounded: not out on the road.

While her reaction was to freeze, Laird grabbed the gun and turned towards the house as if expecting to be attacked. He was holding Evie against his side, trapped beneath his left arm, and she started to wail. The distraction made Laird furious: for a second Ruth thought he was going to strike the baby.

She steadied herself, glad that his focus was elsewhere. She tried to gauge her chances of overpowering him before he opened fire. The honest answer was: not great. But she was also well aware that she had nothing to lose. Once Foster and Bridge got here they were going to kill her, slowly and painfully, while trying to extract information that she didn’t possess.

The problem was Evie.

Evie had everything to lose.

A
lice ran up the drive
, then cut across the grass bank on a more direct route towards the house. It meant she was just in time to see the Range Rover collide with the Mercedes.

Harry did it deliberately, there was no doubt about that. She watched in horror as the front of the Range Rover crumpled against the rear of the Mercedes, which was rammed forward and pushed side on to the house. The wheels hit a low step and the car tipped over, spun a half circle and slammed into the front porch, bringing down a shower of masonry and tiles on to the bodywork.

It seemed like neither of the men inside had their seatbelts fitted; their bodies were thrown around like clothes in a washing machine. As the door frames buckled and windows exploded, Alice saw an arm flop loosely from the passenger side. The sound of the impact slowly reverberated across the valley, and as it died away she realised there were no screams, no shouts or cries for help.

Harry too was slumped in his seat, his head forward on his chest. Alice thought she understood why he had done it – to put two very dangerous men out of action – but still it seemed like a suicidal gesture.

She sprinted down the slope, terrified of what she might find – and only now was she struck by the fact that no one had come from the house to investigate. Did this mean Nerys wasn’t here? That
Evie
wasn’t here?

T
o Ruth
, Evie’s crying had a worn-down, defeated tone that was truly heartbreaking. To Laird, her misery was nothing but an irritation.

Then his phone rang. Sensing an opportunity, Ruth immediately let her shoulders slump. She leaned back, giving him the impression that she was fearful, retreating.

He glanced at her, then at the display. By now he must have concluded that the crash meant bad news. He would want to take the call.

She listened to it ring a second time, then a third. Rather than look at him directly, she faced outwards, gazing at the house, waiting for the telltale movement in her peripheral vision.

On the fourth ring, Laird gave in and answered it. He set the gun down and snatched the phone. Ruth was lightning fast, her right hand whipping out to grab the gun, bringing it up to aim at him even as she darted out of his range.

With a snarl of rage Laird turned towards her. He dropped the phone and almost dropped Evie, too. As he stood up he tipped the table over and sent a couple of chairs crashing towards Ruth. She stumbled and nearly fell but managed to stay on her feet.

Laird edged towards the doorway, glanced that way and then looked down at the baby, making sure she was covering his chest. Evie had been momentarily silenced by this latest shock; now she began to cry again.

‘Stay there,’ Ruth ordered. But Laird was smiling, seeming relaxed.

‘You won’t shoot me.’

As if to test that proposition, he backed out of the summer house and stepped on to the lawn. Ruth had no choice but to follow, kicking the fallen chairs out of the way without taking her eyes off Laird.

‘A head shot’s easy from this distance. Evie will be bruised from the fall, but that’s a lot better than what you have planned for her.’

He shrugged. ‘I could put her down and you still wouldn’t shoot.’

‘Really?’

‘I meant too much to you, Ruth. I still do.’

She shook her head. ‘I hate you.’

‘No. You hate yourself, and you deflect those feelings on to me. It’s how you cope, knowing you gave your son away just to save your precious career.’

Ruth couldn’t understand why he was goading her. ‘Put the baby down.’

‘No.’

A standoff, in the murky winter dusk.

Evie was crying herself to exhaustion. Taking her in both hands, Laird held her out at chest height, ensuring that his entire upper body was shielded. Ruth could shoot at his legs, but there was no way of knowing how he would react to such an injury. It was too risky, given that he could kill Evie with a single blow.

Even now, even though she had a gun in her hand, he had outwitted her.

T
he sound
of Alice calling his name permeated through the blackness, but it was the pain that brought him back. Harry felt like he’d been dragged into an alley by half a dozen bouncers and given a good kicking. But why?

Alice was struggling to open his door. Finally it yielded with a sound like fingernails on a blackboard. Now Harry realised where he was, but the
why
still eluded him for a second.

‘What happened?’

‘You bloody nearly killed yourself, you idiot.’ Then she took his cheeks in both hands and kissed him. ‘You beautiful idiot.’

He released the seatbelt and eased himself out, gingerly, every muscle screaming.

‘I knew we couldn’t take them on directly. Not when they have knives, guns …’

Without warning he bent double and was violently sick. Alice stayed close, her hand on his back. He could sense how nervously she was looking around.

‘Where is everyone?’ she murmured. What she meant was:
Where is Evie?

The question galvanised Harry, who ignored his reeling head and moved with her to examine the wrecked Mercedes. There was a lot of blood and broken glass, and after a quick look he knew two things: the men inside were either unconscious or dead, and Harry had no desire to find out which it was.

The front door was inaccessible, so they followed a path around the side of the house. The back door was open, but as they reached it Alice put a hand up for silence. Harry still had tinnitus from the crash, but gradually he heard what she was hearing.

It was a baby crying.

Their
baby crying.