To Fight For (21 page)

I touched the Makarov in my jacket pocket and walked up the driveway, the gravel crunching beneath my feet, past a silver S-Class Merc, brand new. I felt alert. Something inside me stirred. I was about to end it, kill the last one who'd killed Brenda. I was going to close the circle, at last. Adrenaline started to flood me. I felt my muscles tighten, my heart race.

I rang the bell, waited, rang it again. There was no sound from inside, no movement that I could see. I took a step back and kicked the door open. I had about twenty stone behind that foot. The lock smashed apart. The door flew back.

I had my gun out now, held low. It felt good. It was cold and heavy and endless. It was death, and I liked it.

I stayed where I was, in the doorway, and waited for sound, movement, something. Still nothing. I stepped inside. Ahead of me were stairs. To my right was a door, closed. To the left was a doorway leading to the lounge. I went that way, moving quietly, the carpet softening my steps, just in case nobody had heard the door smash off its hinges.

I saw the woman as I went into the room. She was on the floor, blood dripping from the gash in her head, soaking into the blue carpet making a small black pool. Her hands were tied behind her back, her eyes closed.

I took a step forward. And stopped.

Her blood was still dripping. The bloodstain was small. Fuck.

I turned.

He was a yard behind me. He swung something dark and heavy and missed and grunted with the effort. If I hadn't turned he'd have caved my head in.

I saw then what he was holding. It was an assault rifle with a collapsible stock. He brought it up and tried to swing it in my face, but he'd forgotten that the stock was back. And he'd forgotten that I used to be a boxer. I stepped outside him and he swung and hit air and staggered forward, unbalanced. I threw my free fist into his kidney and his head snapped back with pain and shock. He dropped the rifle, fell to the ground and whimpered, squirming around. I kicked him in the head. Then I saw shadows and threw myself aside as the bullets tore the place apart.

I rolled and turned and emptied the magazine from a kneeling position, both hands holding the Makarov. I hit space. They were gone.

I heard a screech of tyres. I jumped up and ran to the front window. Two men dragged a struggling figure towards a white van, while another helped the bloke I'd floored. The back doors of the van opened and they threw the struggling man in.

I recognized the figure. It was Glazer. The bastards had got him.

I was out the front door as the van was pulling away. I got the last three letters of the number plate. I cursed myself for not driving. Tails. Fuck. They didn't need to tail me. They knew where Glazer was.

But I knew something too. I knew who they were. I recognized the man who'd tried to hit me with his gun; he worked for Vic Dunham.

It crossed my mind that I'd been set up, that Marriot's son had wanted vengeance on me and had arranged this. But no. He wouldn't have sent me here. He'd have sent me to a corner of some wasteland. And, besides, Dunham's men would've finished the job. As it was, it looked like I took them by surprise. Maybe it had been coincidence.

I rushed back in. The woman's eyes were open now, but they were empty, blank.

‘Car keys,' I said.

She mumbled something but I couldn't understand her.

I went through the ground floor until I found the kitchen. I threw open drawers, tore through the place and found nothing. Then, I stopped and thought about it. I went back into the hallway and saw a coat stand. I saw a man's jacket and put my hand in the pockets and found them.

I was on my way out the front door when the image of the woman on the floor came into my head. I don't know why that was, and I don't know why it made me stop, but it did.

I went back, and cursed myself for doing it.

Her eyes were closed. The blood had stopped flowing, which might've meant she was dead, or that the blood had congealed. I knelt down, checked her pulse. She was alive. I put her in the recovery position, got the phone from the sideboard, dialled 999 and asked for an ambulance.

I left the line open, wiped the phone down and left it on the floor, near her.

Browne would've been proud of me.

The Merc span as I pulled out of the driveway, the wheels throwing gravel all over the place. Dust filled the rear-view. I fishtailed across the road and straightened it out. Thank Christ I was driving an auto.

I gunned the motor down Bush Hill Road. It was mostly residential, and traffic was light, although the parking was a bastard and I had to weave my way through it, and all the time I was looking for a white van – in London. Fucking brilliant.

I had to slam on the brakes when I got to the bottom of the road and some delivery van was backing out of a parking bay.

Then I hit red lights at the junction with the A105. I pulled the car to a stop and thought. Which way now? Left? Right? Straight on?

I had an idea where they were going. Or I thought I did. Surely they wouldn't take him to one of Dunham's homes. So, they'd probably head for the club, go in the back way. I had to head towards the West End, then. That was easy. And I had a fast car. And they were in a slow van and wouldn't want the law stopping them for speeding or running lights, not with a kidnapped copper in the back.

The A105 went to the North Circular, which was to the right. But I could get to the North Circular by the A10 too, which was straight ahead.

The bloke in the car behind blew his horn. The lights were green. He blew his horn again. People were looking.

Central London was south of us, and to the east. They could take the A10 to the City, or to the North Circular. Either way, they'd use the A10 for a bit.

I had to take a chance on that. I slammed my foot on the gas and left the bloke behind sitting there as if someone had glued his car to the road.

I weaved through the traffic, always looking as far ahead as I could, trying to make out anything white, anything big.

I was going through suburban streets, large semi-detached houses on both sides. The road was wide, few parked cars. The Merc was a cinch to drive, smooth, powerful. All I had to do was move my foot, move my hands. I'd swing past one car, floor it, feel the motor scream, then bring the whole thing back down when I was about to pile head-on into something coming towards me.

It was fine. Except for one thing: there was no white van – at all.

I hit the A10 junction. I didn't bother stopping for the red light this time. The car slewed across the lanes, ahead of a jack-knifing truck, and onto the two-lane. I had to throw the wheel over to correct the back end, but I brought the motor round, just missing a white-faced woman in a Honda.

Then I really opened the Merc up, foot to the floor; fifty, sixty, seventy. The traffic was heavier here, but my adrenaline was high, rising with the speed, the thrum of the engine feeding blood to my body, my heart pumping, my head clear. Eighty.

The steering wheel was easy in my hands, and the car was smooth, like I was driving on ice, sliding between cars, vans, buses. It felt like I was slicing through the world, through all the bollocks, through my own impotence, pounding the engine, hearing it roar, gritting my teeth, squeezing the steering wheel as if it was Glazer's neck, Paget's, Dunham's.

I was going to catch the van, ram the Merc right into it, smash the cunts to pieces and fuck everything else. Fuck it all.

Right then, with that adrenaline pumping, I felt good, my head clear, unclouded, and I wanted to kill. I ached to murder.

Anyone.

Everyone.

I saw white vans, but they all had something wrong with them; too dirty, too small. I saw one up ahead, about two hundred yards. It was the right size, shape, everything. I closed on it in seconds, and saw the registration was wrong.

I saw another van in the left lane and pulled in, but when I closed the gap enough I could see it had writing on the back door, some plumbing firm. I smashed the accelerator and flew past it.

I was running out of space, closing in on the North Circular. If I didn't get the van soon, I'd have to give it up. It could go right at the North Circular, or it could carry straight on. I supposed, at least, that I knew where it was heading. If I lost it, I could look to find it again nearer Dunham's club.

The traffic was getting thicker as we neared the North Circular. I knew the roundabout up ahead. It was a bastard.

There were coaches in the way now, and everything was slowing down. I got the finger a few times, got flashed and hooted at. I saw a cop car pass on the other side of the reservation. He wasn't going to be able to cross over for a while, but he might radio ahead. I was driving a stolen car belonging to a kidnapped copper. And I was armed with a pistol that could tie me into crime scenes all over London.

And then I hit a clear stretch and forgot all about the law. Up in front, nearing the roundabout, was a white van. I eased closer and saw the last three letters of the number plate.

KJP. That was it. That was the van. As soon as I saw it, I eased back, pulled into the left lane, let other cars overtake me. The van was sticking to the speed limit and pulled into my lane when they'd gone past an Astra. That was fine. I backed off a bit more and a small Ford overtook me, came into the lane.

I could see the top of the van above the roofs of the cars in front. I had them, but I had to keep them. There was no way I could get to Glazer like this. I had to wait until they came to a junction or lights, and then ram them at speed, which meant I had to follow them for now, and try to anticipate when they might stop, then move into position.

Then movement caught my eye and I was looking at the back of the Ford, at a young girl, staring at me through the back window.

She was about nine, ten. She had large eyes, dark skin, dark hair. And for a moment, for just a beat of a heart, I was looking at Kid, and she was looking back at me in that way of hers, eyes wide with a kind of wonder, a kind of fear.

Then the line of traffic moved forward, slowly, heading towards the roundabout. I was just starting to edge out to overtake the Ford when I saw the van go over to the left. That was wrong, surely. If they were taking that slip road, then they were going to take the North Circular east, not west, as they should've done.

So now I had no choice. I had to close in and wait until they hit a junction, then ram the fuckers. They weren't going into the City. I no longer knew where they were going. If I tried to follow and lost them, that would be it.

The van slowed as it neared the North Circular. I tried to move past the Ford, but there was no room. We were all stuck in the same long, thin limb of traffic, all part of some massive animal, barely crawling along because it no longer had the life to do anything else.

My eyes went back to the girl again. She wasn't looking at me now. She was gazing out of the side window, hypnotized by the slowness of it all, by the endless fucking pointlessness. Or so it seemed.

The Astra right behind the van was pulling out now, deciding it didn't want to take this slip road. The Ford moved up, and I moved up with it.

I was twenty yards behind the van. They weren't going to be able to go anywhere quickly. All I had to do was stay cool, stay alert, wait my turn. All I had to do was make sure they didn't see me.

They saw me. The driver glanced in his wing mirror, then looked forward, then looked back. He spoke to someone next to him. A few seconds went by. Then the passenger door opened and a man got out and started to walk towards me. It was the man with short blond hair, the one I'd hit back at the house. He brought his assault rifle up. He had the stock locked open this time, and there was a smile on his face and I knew he was going to kill me if he could.

I had a chance if I got out on my side of the car and went down low, took his legs out.

I saw movement. The girl in the Ford had turned back and was watching me, a frown on her face. She was right between me and Dunham's man, right in the path of fire. The adrenaline froze in my blood and turned my insides to ice, and all I could see was the girl, Kid, killed in the crossfire when I'd taken Marriot out, killed, perhaps, by me.

For half a second I couldn't move. I had to do something, and I had to do it quickly. I should've pulled my gun, got out of the car and killed the man walking towards me. But it was already too late. I'd lost it.

Then he opened up.

I didn't hear the gunshots. But I heard the rounds hit the car, felt it judder under the impact, as if the sky was raining rocks.

The windscreen broke into lots of spiderwebs. Something buzzed past my ear and cracked into the metal door frame. I ducked, shoved the gearstick into reverse and floored the accelerator, slamming into the car behind me. I kept on, wheels spinning, burning rubber pouring out from beneath and clouding the view out of the side windows. The car behind me was screeching back. I could hear shouting. I could hear panic, other cars trying to pull out of the way of the automatic fire.

Then everything was different and I realized the car wasn't getting peppered with bullets. I looked up and through the laced windscreen and saw the van mounting the kerb and racing off.

I glanced back at the Ford, scared suddenly that the girl would be on the floor, another innocent victim of my life.

A woman was holding the girl tightly, her hands about the girl's head. The girl was unhurt, but she was staring at me, her eyes wide, fearful and yet, I thought, angry, condemning.

I thought for a moment about going back to Glazer's place and speaking to the woman there, but then I remembered that I'd called an ambulance for her. By now she'd be surrounded by law.

In the end, I wiped the car down and walked away. Someone shouted after me, but I didn't stop and nobody followed me.

I walked. I heard sirens, lots of them. I kept walking, cursing myself for hesitating, wondering why I'd done it, wondering if I'd lost it, somehow.