Fightback (7 page)

Closing the door behind him, Kier walked quickly past a room where shirt-sleeved officers were busy tapping away at their keyboards or talking on the phone. When he reached the security door, he punched in the number he had memorised and heard the click of the catch opening.

As he walked into the reception area, the desk sergeant looked up. For a brief moment, they stared at each other. Then the sergeant dropped his pen, leapt to his feet and Kier ran for the door. Outside there were four steps down to the car park, but Kier didn't touch any of them. He hit the ground at the bottom and kept on running. He saw two uniformed officers walking towards him and for a moment he was tempted to head for the street. But he knew he wouldn't get far without a fight and he figured there'd been enough of that for one day. Besides, Frankie had taught him that the more distance you can get at the start, the better your
chance of escape. Feeling for the keys in his pocket, he guessed the driver hadn't realised they were gone yet.

Oh well
, he thought.
He soon will
.

Sprinting across the car park, he pushed the button on the key fob and heard the locks thump open.

‘Hey!' yelled the sergeant from the top of the steps. ‘Stop him!'

The two other officers looked up from their conversation and then broke into a run. Diving across the bonnet of the car, Kier rolled over and pulled open the door on the driver's side. Throwing himself in, he flicked the door catch and the locks thumped shut just as the sergeant reached the car. Ignoring the shouts and bangs on the door, Kier fired up the motor and slammed the gearstick into reverse. Pulling the steering wheel hard around to the right, he glanced in his rear-view mirror and saw the two other officers dive clear as he screeched out of the parking space. Stamping on the brake, he shifted into first and was about to release the clutch when the sergeant stepped up to the car and swung his baton.

The windshield shattered, crystallising into a curtain of broken glass. Punching a hole through it with his fist, Kier saw he had a clear run to the gate.
As the sergeant swung his baton again, spraying the side window all over the passenger seat, Kier let the clutch out and the car leapt forward in a squeal of smoking rubber. Swinging out into the road, he dabbed briefly at the brakes and then floored the accelerator. As he approached the end of the road, the cars in front of him slowed to a stop as the traffic lights turned red.

Damn it
.

Blocked by the cars in front, Kier applied the brakes and glanced in the rear-view mirror to see several police officers running down the road towards him. A patrol car nosed its way out into the road with blue lights flashing and, for the first time since his arrest, Kier was worried. Until now he'd always had the advantage of surprise. But now they knew what they were dealing with, they weren't going to mess around.

Scanning the dashboard, Kier flicked a switch and was rewarded with the whoop-whoop of the siren, sound waves bouncing off walls and windows. As the cars in front pulled over he edged into the bus lane, slipped through a gap in the line of slow-moving traffic and accelerated past, siren wailing and blue lights flashing. He saw the other patrol car pull out behind him and knew his chances of escape were fading fast. An alert would already have gone
out over the radio; police vehicles all over London would be performing U-turns, while helicopters checked their co-ordinates, all searching for a juvenile bank robber who thought he could steal a police car and get away with it.

What a mess, thought Kier. Jackson was not going to be pleased.

People were staring now, shoppers gazing openmouthed as Kier headed up Brompton Road with the wind in his face, peering through the smashed windscreen in search of possibilities.

There was a small park over to his right and for a moment he considered bailing out, but there were few trees and even fewer people. The road swung around to the right and as he hit the bend he increased his speed slightly, hoping to put some distance between himself and the car behind. Up ahead he could see the green and gold canopies of Harrods department store, and beyond it a police van stopping the traffic.

It was now or never.

Stamping on the brakes, Kier flung the door open and ran. The pavement was crowded with shoppers and, after knocking into a newspaper seller, he veered right down Hans Road, suddenly finding himself outside the entrance of Harrods. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw police officers running
around the corner and quickly slipped past the doorman into the food hall.

It was mid-afternoon and the place was quiet, with just a few shoppers milling about beneath the chandeliers, gazing at neat piles of beautiful food that most of them probably couldn't afford. Kier ran past the displays of exotic sweets and coloured candy sticks, skidding around a golden mountain of chocolate coins before reaching the escalator and leaping up the moving staircase three steps at a time.

He found himself in a room full of expensive-looking luggage; to one side he saw tiny puffed-up handbags dripping with gold perched on columns like sacred objects. A few well-dressed ladies were moving slowly between them, pausing among the shrines to admire and worship. But Kier wasn't interested in handbags. He was interested in the fact that the young woman at the glass service counter was walking away from it. He watched her make her way towards a customer on the far side of the room and waited until she had engaged her in conversation. Then he walked quickly across to where she had been standing, picked up the phone and dropped down behind the counter at the same moment that two policemen appeared at the top of the escalator.

Huddled next to a box marked
Gucci
, Kier punched in 9 for an outside line and then phoned Saskia's number.

‘Come on,' he whispered as he heard a woman's voice say: ‘He was here just a few seconds ago.'

The sound of footsteps disappeared rapidly across the shop floor and then Saskia was on the line asking, ‘Yes? Who is this?'

‘It's me. Kier.'

‘Kier? Where are you?'

‘I'm in Harrods.'

‘
Harrods?
'

‘Listen. I'm in trouble. I need help.'

‘OK.' Saskia's voice was calm and focused, but there was an edge to it. ‘What kind of help?'

‘The kind that will get me out of here without half the Metropolitan Police force noticing.'

There was a pause on the other end of the line.

‘Saskia?'

‘OK. What floor are you on now?'

‘First.'

‘Right. Make your way to the ladies' toilets and I'll be there as soon as I can.'

‘What? Saskia, I—'

But the line had gone dead and Kier could hear the sound of high heels tapping their way across the floor towards him. He replaced the phone and
looked up to see the shop assistant staring at him with one eyebrow raised.

‘Can I help you?' she asked.

‘I very much doubt it,' said Kier.

Then he dropped the phone and ran.

He made it as far as the audio-visual department before they caught up with him. As two police officers walked towards him past walls of flat-screen TVs, a voice behind him said, ‘All right, son. Stay where you are.'

Kier looked over his shoulder and saw that another two policemen were approaching from behind. Rubbing the floor with the sole of his foot, he came to a decision. Not perfect of course, but it would have to do.

The men in front of him were moving cautiously, anxious not to startle him into a run, and he knew that the men behind him would be doing the same. He guessed they'd be feeling pretty confident right now. After all, there were four of them and one of him. How hard could it be?

Kier pressed the toes of his right foot against the heel of his trainer and slipped it off. Then he did the same with the other one, bending over and hooking
his fingers into the heels. He peered through his knees at the two men approaching him from behind, then stood up again.

‘Are you Richard Smith?' asked the officer in front of him as he was joined by his colleague.

Kier held the shoes up on either side of his head and waggled them back and forth.

‘No,' he said. ‘I'm Mickey Mouse.'

He waited until they were just over an arm's length away. Then, whipping his arms down hard and fast, he released his grip and the shoes flew backwards like stones from a slingshot. Hearing the startled cries from behind him as the shoes met their targets, he saw the surprise on the faces of the two men in front of him and smiled.

‘Squeak, squeak,' he said.

Then he leapt forward, put his hands on their shoulders and swung himself between them. As his socks slid him smoothly across the polished floor, he tensed his stomach muscles, shifted his weight forward and, before the laws of physics had time to slow him down, he was up and running through the door.

‘Excuse me,' he said to the startled woman as he skidded into the ladies' toilets. ‘I think I must have got the wrong room.'

Noticing that the doors to the individual cubicles were open and that there was no one else in the room, he followed her out and waited until she had disappeared around the corner. Then he reentered the toilets and caught sight of himself in the mirror.

‘Don't look at me like that,' he said. ‘It was Saskia's idea.'

Making his way into one of the cubicles, he bolted the door and sat down to wait.

After a while he heard the door squeak open, followed by the sound of two women talking.

‘What is it, do you think?'

‘Maybe a bomb scare or something.'

‘No, I don't think so. If it was a bomb scare, they'd have evacuated the whole store by now.'

‘I don't know then. But it must be pretty serious. The place is absolutely crawling with police.'

Kier listened as they reapplied their make-up and the more he heard, the more he realised Saskia needed to get here quickly. There was obviously no shortage of police officers doing their shopping in Harrods and they would almost certainly be watching the entrances and searching the building, floor by floor. Once they discovered he wasn't out there, it wouldn't take a genius to think of sending someone up for a quick cubicle check.

In which case, how was Saskia being here going to help?

Deciding he needed an alternative plan, Kier stood on the toilet seat and examined the window. It was made of a single pane of frosted glass; not too thick and, if it came to it, easy enough to break.

Hooking his arm through the small window at the top, he swivelled his wrist and raised his arm at an angle of forty-five degrees to the glass.

‘Kier,' said a voice, ‘if you're about to do what I think you're about to do, then … don't.'

Kier spun around to see Saskia resting her chin on the top of the adjacent cubicle. Her neat, shoulder-length hair was dark and shiny as blackberries and her eyes were the kind of butterscotch brown that reminded people of kittens or puppy dogs. But Kier wasn't fooled for a minute. He could tell right away that she wasn't in a puppy-dog kind of mood.

‘Saskia,' he said, pulling his hand back through the window. ‘I didn't hear you come in.'

‘Of course you didn't,' said Saskia, her eyes glittering angrily. ‘Because you're an idiot, that's why. With less sense than you were born with.'

‘Nice to see you too,' said Kier. ‘What took you so long?'

Saskia narrowed her eyes. ‘I was twenty-eight minutes. Which, when you consider I had to stop
off and buy a few things first, was pretty damn good, don't you think?'

‘What kind of things?'

‘Things for you.'

Saskia swung herself over the top of the cubicle, landed neatly in front of Kier and handed him a large green Harrods bag. She was wearing a dark blue, box-pleated skirt, white knee-length socks and a blue and white gingham blouse. On her feet she wore a pair of flat, sensible court shoes. She looked exactly like a schoolgirl on her lunch break.

Kier grinned.

‘You look nice,' he said.

‘Yeah, that's it,' said Saskia, ‘go ahead and laugh. Then take a look in the bag.'

Kier picked up the Harrods bag and peered inside. He pulled out a dark blue, box-pleated skirt, a pair of white knee-length socks and a short-sleeved summer blouse complete with light blue stripes. At the bottom was a box containing a pair of flat, sensible court shoes. Beneath that was a blonde wig.

‘Oh, no way,' said Kier, shaking his head. ‘You have got to be kidding.'

Saskia unbolted the door and walked towards the washbasins. Then she turned back, smiled and held up a small container of eyeshadow.

‘Whenever you're ready, sweetie,' she said.

Kier stared at himself in the mirror. He shut his eyes and opened them again. But she was still there, the blonde schoolgirl with the blue eyeshadow, staring right back at him.

Saskia grinned.

‘Look who's here,' she said. ‘It's the lovely Kiera.'

Kier gave her a sarcastic smile.

‘Ha ha. Very funny.'

The door swung open and a woman police officer walked in.

‘Hello, girls,' she said, turning to look at the row of cubicles. ‘Have you been in here long?'

‘Not long. About five minutes, I guess.'

The policewoman peered into the cubicles.

‘Any idea who this bag belongs to?'

The bag. Damn
.

‘It's mine,' said Kier, doing his best to sound soft and husky.

Saskia gave him a look which suggested he wasn't really pulling it off, so he walked quickly back to the cubicle and squeezed past the WPC.

‘Thanks, officer,' he said, retrieving the bag with what he hoped was a suitably girlish giggle.

Saskia raised her eyes skywards, but Kier was relieved to see that the shoebox was the last thing he had put back in the bag, hiding the clothes underneath.

‘Have you seen anything strange at all, since you've been here?' asked the WPC.

A hijacked crashed police car
, thought Kier.
Four police officers lying on the floor of the audio-visual department. Myself dressed as a schoolgirl
.

‘Not really, no.'

‘Nothing at all?'

‘Come to think of it,' said Saskia, ‘I did see a boy running through the toy department. He seemed to be in quite a hurry.'

The WPC perked up at this.

‘When?'

‘Oh, I don't know. A few minutes ago. Just before we came in.'

Saskia followed this up with an innocent,
Why, do you think that might be useful?
kind of look, but the woman was already gabbling into her radio and heading out of the door.

‘Don't mention it,' said Saskia as the door swung shut. ‘I'm just happy to help.'

She looked at her watch and turned to Kier.

‘What's going on, Kier?'

‘I sort of got arrested.'

‘Yeah, well, I guessed that much. What happened?'

‘I, erm … got involved in the bank robbery.'

‘You went
in
there?'

‘I couldn't help it. There was this waitress and she—'

‘Oh, I get it.' Saskia narrowed her eyes. ‘Pretty, was she?'

‘No. Yes. Kind of … Look, it doesn't matter. I just thought I could get her out, that's all. But then it got complicated. They had guns, Saskia. Someone could have been killed.'

‘Including you.'

Kier gave her a smug look.

‘No chance. Those guys were amateurs.'

‘No, Kier.' Saskia grabbed his shoulder and spun him around angrily. ‘
You're
the amateur. Your problem is that you're fresh out of training and suddenly you think you know it all and no one can tell you anything. But see what happens when you don't listen?'

‘Yeah,' said Kier. ‘I stop a bank robbery.'

‘Oh, right. Well done.' Saskia folded her arms. ‘You stopped a bank robbery which probably would have been stopped anyway and now you've got half the Metropolitan Police force out looking for you. That's brilliant, Kier. Give out the pencils.'

Kier caught sight of himself in the mirror and saw that, beneath the blonde wig, he was wearing a rather shamefaced expression. It was irritating. Saskia suddenly seemed to have developed a knack of making him feel like a five-year-old.

‘Did you manage to take some pictures?'

‘Yeah, but I shot the phone up.'

‘Great.'

‘OK, I admit it. I messed up. But there was no sign of the guy in the photograph. And there was something else I noticed.'

‘Go on.'

‘The police were there very quickly.'

‘Wow. Amazing. Well, at least someone's doing their job properly.'

‘No, I mean incredibly quickly. Like one minute after the cashier pressed the alarm.'

‘So?'

‘So they turned up fully armed and ready for action, Saskia. It wasn't a surprise to them. No way. They
knew
this robbery was going down.'

‘Hmmm.' Saskia nodded thoughtfully. ‘Maybe that is interesting. Have you told Jackson yet?'

Kier gave her a look. ‘I've been a bit busy, to be honest.'

Kier counted at least eleven police officers as they made their way back through the store.

‘Saskia,' he whispered when they reached the toy department. ‘Those guys by the giant panda. They saw me before. They know what I look like.'

The men – who had been on the receiving end of Kier's shoe trick – were moving carefully through the store, checking every customer. Kier noticed one of them had a swelling under his left eye.

‘Saskia?'

‘Relax, Kier. Just keep talking to me, OK? Remember, you're a schoolgirl. And schoolgirls are not what those guys are looking for.'

‘OK,' said Kier under his breath. ‘I'm a schoolgirl, I'm a schoolgirl …'

‘So tell me,' said Saskia, ‘what do you think of Gabriella's new hair extensions? I mean, hello? What is
up
with that?'

Kier pointed to his wig. ‘Don't talk hair,' he said.

‘Oh, OK. Are you going to Jennifer's party tonight?'

‘Oh, shut
up
!' said Kier, trying to make his voice
high and soft. ‘Of
course
I'm going. I wouldn't miss it. All those
hot
guys and stuff!'

‘OK,' said Saskia. ‘Don't overdo it.'

‘Hello, ladies,' said the officer with the swollen eye. ‘We're looking for a boy of about thirteen, maybe fourteen.'

‘Aren't we all?' said Kier, fluttering his eyelashes. ‘Join the club.'

‘Take no notice of her, Officer,' said Saskia hurriedly. ‘I think the heat must be getting to her.'

‘Yeah, well,' said the man, tugging at his shirt collar. ‘I know how she feels.'

He looked at Kier and studied his face for a moment or two.

‘You look kind of familiar,' he said. ‘Don't I know you from somewhere?'

Kier mentally measured out the distance. He could sweep the guy's legs out from underneath him no problem; they'd be gone before the man even hit the floor. But Saskia was glaring at him, sending out signals, and he decided against it.

‘Oh, I don't think so. I must just have one of those faces.'

The man kept staring, so Kier turned to Saskia and said, ‘Marie, what time did you say you have to be at the dentist?'

Saskia's hand flew up to her mouth and she said,
‘Oh, my gosh, it's a quarter past two and I'm supposed to be there at half past! Will you excuse us, Officer?'

The officer smiled and said, ‘Sure, no problem,' because the girl was pretty and nice and of course she needed to get to the dentist on time. In fact, he was still smiling seven seconds later when it suddenly occurred to him why her friend looked so familiar.

‘Wait!' he shouted, spinning round on his heel.

But there was no sign of them. The two girls had completely disappeared and, in spite of the tight security cordon around the store, not a single person could recall seeing them go.