Thunder (46 page)

No-one there.

“Deuce!” A voice calls out from the large, wooden, shed-like garage in the corner of the plot. “Deuce! I’ve had enough of this! Let’s talk! Let’s work something out!” The voice sounded like it was frightened.

Ellard smiled to himself.

He moved cautiously toward the building. He’d quietly checked it out on his first visit and, again, earlier today, before surprising Tin. He knew there was a strongroom built into the back, and that it was locked solid. He assumed it was where Tin kept his valuables and weaponry. Gaining access would likely be messy and time consuming, and would probably involve him getting through the breeze-block walls. He’d have plenty of time for that later. He knew Mercury wasn’t armed. The fiasco with the SIG wouldn’t have happened otherwise. The only risk was if Mercury had got into the armoury.

“Please Deuce!
Please!
Don’t hurt me...!”

The voice was coming from somewhere near this corner of the structure. Far away from the strongroom.

He eased himself around, and in front of, the open double doorway.

The armoury door stood at the back.

Its keypad glowed red.

Locked.

~~~~~

The long silencer comes first through the wide opening. Then pistol. Then hand.

~~~~~

There’s a strange noise like a fat guitar string being plucked, and then a faint whispering sound, coming from out of sight to his left.

~~~~~

My first arrow slams straight through his wrist, its momentum forcing his arm round in an uncontrolled arc so that arrow and flesh together are swung round and pin themselves, deep, into the wooden doorframe.

He screams and, unsurprisingly, drops the gun.

I like that.

~~~~~

Ellard stared incredulously at the carbon fibre shaft jutting out of his impaled wrist. He could still move his fingers, but his arm was pinned fast against the door frame. He reached round with his left hand and grabbed the shaft.

He had to free himself.

In the dark shadows, he was aware of Mercury moving around in front of him. The man no longer gave any impression of being frightened. He was holding some weirdly shaped contraption out in front of him. Was that a bow? It didn’t look like any bow he’d seen before.

He pulled harder on the slippery shaft.

His own blood was making it hard to get a firm grip.

His hand kept slipping, up to the strange polycarbonate flights.

He tried again.

“Stuck, are you?” growled Mercury, as he collected up Ellard’s Browning from the floor and swapped bow for gun in front of him. Ellard watched for a chance to strike out as the man moved closer, but Mercury maintained a safe distance as he inspected his penetrative handiwork. “Oh dear,” he said coldly. “I’m afraid I might have let that one go, with just a touch
too
much force. It looks like you could be here for a while.” Then Mercury eased carefully around behind him and pulled the double doors closed. Ellard had to shuffle forward half a pace as the wooden panels slammed shut.

“What are you doing?” he asked nervously.

“Are you worried?” grunted Mercury, returning to the front of him, and swapping gun for bow again. An array of strip-lamps above the workbench provided the only light. Mercury loomed as a threatening shadow in front of them. “Worried about being locked in a room with
me
?”

Ellard heaved at the shaft again. It didn’t budge. The pain from his wrist was getting more excruciating by the second, as the initial shock started to wear off.

“Are you frightened that I might want to
play
with you?” taunted Mercury.

Ellard let go of the shaft and span himself round so his back was flat against the doors. “I’m not fucking scared of you, Gay-boy!” he shouted angrily.

~~~~~

This was too easy. The moron was so easy to goad.

“Perfect,” I say, as he waves his left hand in the air.

~~~~~

Ellard heard a second thrumming guitar string sound, and his left hand was suddenly picked up, and slammed backwards into the heavy wooden doors.

“Well done,” said Mercury. “Now you’re really stuck.”

~~~~~

I’m feeling pleased with myself. Those two shots were quite tricky but, all things considered, possibly not the most difficult I’ve had to pull off in these last few weeks. Deuce stands, pinioned, arms akimbo, like he’s been caught up in some grotesque mock crucifixion. He’s fixed solidly to the door panel on his left, the doorframe on his right. It couldn’t have worked out better if I’d planned it.

I place Vengeance down, carefully, on the workbench, check his Browning – full mag and chambered – and then hunt round to see what other goodies I can find.

“You okay back there?” I ask pragmatically over my shoulder.

He groans a little. Not surprising. Those arrows are
very
sharp. “Mercury,” he mutters. “Listen, that gay stuff, you know, that sort of thing, well, it’s up to you, right? I was only jerking you around...”

I stand and turn around and, unsurprisingly, he shuts up. You see, I’ve found Jack’s hunting knife, and now is the perfect time for me to hone its edges with this handy whetstone. It’s much bigger and not as balanced as my stilettos but, unfortunately, they’re safely locked in the strongroom. I toss it in front of me a couple of times, catching it by the handle.

“Listen. Mercury. Perhaps we can come to some arrangement?”

I look at him quizzically.

“I have mone...”

~~~~~

The blade glinted in the half light as it span through the air toward him. Ellard squeezed his eyes shut, ducked his head to one side, and waited for impact. The blade struck with an almighty bang, shaking the wooden panels, and causing a fresh wave of pain to flow up from his left wrist.

He opened his eyes.

The blade was sticking out of the door, a few inches from his face.

“Oops,” growled Mercury. “Missed.”

~~~~~

That was a lie. Naughty me.

“Listen, Mercury!” Deuce is looking pale. A trickle of sweat runs down the side of his face. “I can make this worth your while. No-one else needs to die. Just let me go. I can set you up for life.”

I’m not even slightly interested by his whinging. He clearly doesn’t understand that, for me, living is an unappealing prospect. “Tell me one thing, Deuce,” I growl. “Why?”

“Orders,” he replies, as if that’s sufficient explanation.

I wait patiently for more.

“Listen!” he splutters. “I don’t
know
! Tidying up loose ends? Risk of leaks? Whatever the reason, it doesn’t matter now,” he sounds almost genuine. “In this line of work it makes sense to have some contingency. Hell, you should know: this place is
Tin’s
backup plan!” He shouldn’t have reminded me of that. “Look. I have a place too. Serious wealth. I’ll take you there. More than enough for you to create a whole new identity. To vanish.”

“And your
mission
?” I grunt.

He sees my response as a glimmer of hope. “I’ll report you dead. Only I will know different. No-one will come looking. You’ll be free of all this.”

“Until you turn me in.”

“And admit I failed? Admit that I deliberately didn’t kill you? Admit that I helped a target to escape?” His head dropped. “At best, I’d end up rotting in jail. More likely, I’d just end up dead myself.”

“What are you offering?” I ask.

He picks his head up. “It’s all in here,” he nods toward his jacket. “Take it. See for yourself.”

I heft his Browning in my hand, move closer, and press it hard into his sweaty temple. “Not a twitch,” I snarl.

“Understood.”

Gently I reach one arm into his jacket, maintaining eye contact throughout. I can feel a small notebook in his inside pocket. I pull it out swiftly, and step back expecting him to try something, but he just looks defeated. Broken.

Shame. I expected more from him.

I step backwards into the pool of neon light radiating from above the workbench, and flick through the little journal. On the first page are a couple of addresses: a flat in London and another address in France. I turn the book round, and point with one finger. “Is this the place?”

He nods reluctantly.

Most of the rest of the pages contain a long handwritten inventory. It’s very comprehensive including dates, items and rough values. I can see he’s done a lot of research. There’s everything from antiques, to jewellery, to paintings and, of course, the requisite stockpile of munitions and military equipment. Obviously, discrete disposal would erode much from legitimate market prices but, even so, it represents a sizeable fortune. The dates go back for decades. He’s been collecting for a long time.

On the last few pages the idiot has scrawled his lists of login codes and passwords. I shake my head. How stupid can you get? The old fool must struggle to remember them...

Fuck. Somehow the sight of these codes has unfrozen my own recalcitrant synapses. I’ve remembered Jack’s stupid door code: 58008. He never would tell me why he picked such a crazy number...

I turn back to the end of the inventory. At the end of the list are a few newer looking handwritten lines. I recognise these things. They’re over there, in the house.

They belong to Jack.

I step forward.

“How about it?” he asks, eyes full of hope.

“Let me think about it,” I lie, and crack him one hell of a right hook, landing my tightly bunched fighting-knuckles precisely onto the back of his despicable jaw bone. His head flies round, smacking into the door panel with a sickening crunch, and then flops forward limply onto his chest.

Truth is: Right now, I need a little personal time.

~~~~~

A sudden dousing of ice-cold water made his eyes blink open.

The barn doors stood open again, but their bright rectangle was swinging gently back and forth in front of him. It took a couple of seconds for him to work out why they looked so strange. It was because they were upside down. He was hanging by his feet. His arms were bound tightly behind his back.

He was strung up like some piece of meat.

The dusty floor of the barn drifted around beneath him, about a foot or so below his head.

Ellard tried to look around.

“Wakey, wakey,” grunted Mercury, from somewhere behind him. “Time to get moving.”

This sounded promising. Perhaps the dumb-arse had decided to do the sensible thing? Perhaps he’d managed to convince the dullard, with his wild promises of wealth and freedom? Ellard knew he needed to buy himself time. Given time, he knew he could recover this situation. Regain the upper hand.

The rope holding his feet in the air went suddenly slack, and he crashed down, painfully, head first, onto the hard packed ground.

“Get up,” says Mercury...

~~~~~

I watch as he scrabbles clumsily to his feet. He’s not too mobile, but that’s not surprising: he’s been hanging around for some time, from one of the barn’s sturdy cross beams. I’d half expected him to have regained consciousness on his own by now, so the need for me to administer a cold bucket of water has been an unexpected bonus.

“This is
my
Browning,” I explain as I prod it in his direction. “I
really
like this gun.” I see his eyes flicker toward the open strongroom door. “Get moving. Straight down the hill.” I spur him into motion with the end of the suppressor and he starts stumbling forwards. “Make one wrong move and you’re dead.” He grunts something that I’ll take to be an acknowledgement, though it’s impossible to be certain, given he’s got a gag bound tightly round his head which is holding his mouth open like he’s wearing a horse’s bit.

A large, bright-blue dragonfly rises from the long grass a short distance in front of us.

“Just so you know,” I growl, as the Browning coughs into its silencer and the unfortunate insect blinks out of existence.

The bullet will have passed very close to him. I can see how much he enjoyed my show of spectacular marksmanship, by the way he’s staggering to one side and almost collapsing in front of me.

“Keep going,” I snarl. “Straight down.”

It takes a while to make our way along the narrow pathway to the shoreline. Disappointingly he maintains his best behaviour throughout the trek, and I watch in silence as he stumbles forward in front of me, the rough bandages I’ve bound round his wrists becoming steadily redder as we go. He’s not losing a huge amount of blood, but I know he is weakening. The pain alone will be taking its toll.

The boat is pulled up onto the beach, where I’ve dragged it ashore. Temporarily it sits tied off to our old tractor tyre.

“Get in,” I instruct him, and he clambers exhaustedly over the side and rolls into the small, inset, seating area.

I leap in beside him and haul him violently up into one of the moulded fibreglass seats. His wrists are handcuffed. I smack him hard in the face, and while he’s reeling, I unlock one end of the cuffs and re-fix it onto the cabin area’s metal handrail. There are lots of fixing points in here. I snap a second handcuff round his ankle and secure one of his legs as well.

“Make yourself comfortable,” I pronounce insincerely, as I start heaving the boat back afloat. “Enjoy the scenery. This is going to be quite a trip.”

~~~~~

Ellard sat uncomfortably in the small seating area. He was in a bad way. Queasy with the pain from his wrists, he carefully attempted to inspect his injuries as best he could within his shackles.

Where was Mercury taking him?

By the position of the sun it was late afternoon. He must’ve been out for some time.

The boat wasn’t large. Some kind of fibreglass construction. At least ten years old. Maybe twenty? Mercury stood facing away from him, piloting the vessel as it slowly chugged out into the middle of the lagoon. They were gradually turning right: a direction which would eventually lead to the Mediterranean.

Mercury was standing in the boat’s simple three-quarter wheelhouse. He had a small section of roof to keep the hot sun off his head. Ellard had no such luxury. He could feel his pale skin starting to burn. There was a small inset doorway, down a couple of steps, next to where Mercury was standing. The door presumably led to a cabin up front.