Never Coming Home (23 page)

He got up from the bed, picking up the phone. Only one of the calls he made woke someone.

He stared at the slim black cell, in the palm of his hand. The whole thing was coming, sickeningly, together. Did he really need to make the fourth and last call? His finger was poised over the keypad when the phone began to ring.

Chapter Thirty

Bobby’s head swam. He could taste something bitter in his mouth and his face was wet. Sweat, or blood. There was a lot of blood. Too much. His clothes were gone. So was most of the skin on his thighs. He’d known that when he’d still been able to focus.

There had been a moment, when Luce came to move him from the washroom, out onto the open floor of the office. His hands had been free as Luce pulled him to his feet. He’d faked grogginess and got a punch in. Two. Felt the surge of joy when Luce’s head snapped back, and he heard it crack against the tile. He’d been through the washroom door, down the short corridor and half-way across the empty space – disused office, just as he’d thought – getting away from the brightness of a string of naked electric bulbs, that Luce must have rigged, looped along the wall and across the ceiling, fast as he could. But not fast enough. On the very edge of the pool of light, with the blessed dimness beyond, the thrown knife had caught him, just beneath the knee, and brought him down. The pain had been hotter than hell, the ache in his heart, worse.

Now he couldn’t feel much of anything, in amongst the rest.

He was cold. Teeth chattering. The chair under his buttocks felt like ice. His hands were fastened somewhere at the back. Didn’t much matter now. Not much feeling in them. There was one thing, though. One thing he wanted to know. Been buzzing round his brain for quite a while. Might as well ask.

‘Hey, Luce.’ He raised his head.

The dark figure, standing to the side of him, moved into his sightlines. The darkness was foggy but that was probably something to do with his eyelids. Lots of tiny cuts there. He’d figured out what the rumbling noise was. Trains. They were somewhere near a railroad. Hadn’t been any going by for a while now, though. Just the muffled quiet of an empty building. He sat straight. He’d been about to ask something. Still had his tongue. So far.

‘Luce.’ Breathing hurt, but he wanted to know. Just how much of a sucker had he been?
Money and babes – what was a guy to do?

Luce was in front of him now, fiddling with that damn bloody knife. Concentrate. Ask. ‘O’Hara. None of that was for real right? You set that up?’

A low laugh. The bastard really did sound as if it was funny.

‘No, Bobby. O’Hara is for real. A genuine eccentric, with money to burn. I intercepted his message rescheduling. In a few hours time
 
–
 
’ Luce looked at his watch. Fucking Rolex. – ‘he’s going to be sitting in that fancy hotel in Dublin, wondering where you are.’

‘Shit.’ Did he want to laugh or cry?
That close. They’d come that close to the money. And the babes.

‘You should have been more careful, Bobby. The little blonde
barista
, from the coffee shop? The one you chat with every day? You really shouldn’t have boasted to her about O’Hara. Not when the lady has a younger brother who wants to play professional basketball. A badly broken leg – that can really ruin a promising career.’ A low, satisfied chuckle. ‘You came to Europe and straight to me. So much easier to be working on home ground. I might have left you out of this, if Devlin hadn’t disappeared to Italy. But then I thought, why not? I can use this. And you were as bad as the others. You turned on me. You all turned on me.’ The voice rose slightly, and was controlled. ‘Collateral damage, Bobby, you’re just collateral damage. And a means to an end. A much-desired end.’

Luce was looking at him. Assessing, like looking at a piece of meat. Of course.

‘Time, I think.’

Alarm stabbed through Bobby. He tried to pull himself up, get his shoulders back against the seat. One shoulder. The other was
 
… broken.

‘No sweat.’ The bastard was laughing again. ‘You’re going to ring Devlin.’

Triumph warmed Bobby’s depleted veins. ‘Can’t. Dunno Devlin’s number.’

‘I do.’ Luce held up a cell phone, close enough for Bobby to see. ‘He’s been trying to get you, left a number of messages.’

‘That’s my fucking phone!’

‘Picked up off the bar in Dublin, by the sexy brunette in the red dress.’

‘Red dress?’ Bobby tried to think. So much was a blur. ‘Samantha?’ He could hear the slur in the word.
Shit
.

‘That’s the one. Surprising what a woman will do, for a few hundred euros. I had her too, in the alley behind the bar. She wasn’t expecting that.’ He was fingering the knife, relaxed, close. Bobby tried testing his heels. If he could get in one good hit. He flexed the muscle in his leg, to try to get it to move.

If he could drag the chair
 
–

No feeling in his feet.

Luce was still talking. ‘She wasn’t quite as good a fuck as the woman in Florence – she was willing to do
anything
.’ Bobby could see Luce’s eyes gleaming. Sicko. Major sicko. Always had been. Even before he was supposed to be dead. ‘Stupid little whore thought I was going to let the child go.’ With a brisk movement he sheathed the knife. ‘Enough romantic reminiscence. Business.’ He thumbed the phone.

‘Devlin? Or should I say Michael? Oh, come now, you
know
who this is. You left me a message. No, let’s be correct, you left a message
about
me. No, he can’t come to the phone, not just this second. Yes, well like they say, these things can get exaggerated. A meeting. I have our friend here. Quite a party. I believe he can talk to you now.’ Luce thrust the phone in Bobby’s face.

‘Stay away, Dev.’ Bobby put all the energy he had into bawling the words. ‘I’m gone. Get the hell away
 
–
 
’ The phone was pulled back.

‘No. Didn’t think you would. Alive, yes, but not in good shape.’ Soft laughter. ‘This is what I want you to do.’

Chapter Thirty-One

Devlin peered through the window of the cab. There had been rain when he set out, but it had blown over. At this time of the night/morning the A4 was quiet. Not empty, but quiet. Lorries mostly.

He felt his hands tightening on the edge of the seat and deliberately loosened them. Ice calm was the only way he was going to get through this. Forget Bobby and the way he had sounded, and that it was probably already too late. That bastard Luce knew him too well. Knew that he’d have to come, no matter what.

The turn off for Hayes was approaching fast. He hadn’t been this way for years. Memory and apprehension curled in his gut, quickly stifled. He would have felt better with a weapon, but there was no point in wishing for one. He’d figure something out.

No question but he was going to take Luce down and this time he was going to see a fucking body. See Luce’s blood. He might be seeing his own, too.
Bad thought.

Regret gave him a moment’s pang. If he didn’t get through this, and the odds were probably not good, Kaz was going to assume he’d run out on her again. He thought about a phone call and discarded the idea. Maybe this was best anyway. What did he have to offer her
 
–?

Christ.
He pulled himself up short. Where was he heading? If he didn’t make it through this, then no one was going to make sense of the paper trail that was spread out on the bed in a West End hotel. So he had to make it through. And get a name. From Luce.

He leaned forward, scouring the dim maze of suburban streets, looking for the landmarks Luce had given him.

It was a small office block, alongside the railway line. Derelict. Devlin had the cab circle around, paying off the cabbie outside the deserted station. There were steps on the opposite side of the road that led down to the street he wanted.

The narrow terraced houses opposite were quiet, curtains drawn, no signs of life. A thin ginger cat weaved around an empty milk bottle, mewling forlornly.
You and me both, buddy
.

He looked at his watch. Fifty-five minutes since the phone call. Luce would be expecting him any time soon. He didn’t have long to reconnoitre.

The entrance Luce had specified was at the end of the block. There was a tarmacked yard, around the front and side of the building, set behind a brick wall. Devlin prowled the perimeter, not caring for the open front gates. No need to announce himself too soon, crossing that exposed space to the main door. There was a gap in the brick work on the side, closest to the rail line. Demolition of the wall had already started in this corner. He climbed through and approached the front of the building from the side.

The outer door was propped open, as Luce had said it would be. Devlin studied it from the shelter of a rickety metal shed. Could be booby-trapped, but he didn’t think so. Too risky – too easily tripped by kids, a dosser looking for a place to sleep, even a patrolling cop, if such a thing still existed around here. Besides which, a bomb would be over too quickly to please Luce, and that was what this was about. Devlin frowned. Maybe there were sensors or motion detectors, but why, when Luce knew he was coming? Only one way to find out.

He left the cover provided by the shed, crossing to the entrance and easing into the small foyer. The stench of damp and urine came to greet him. Luce had hotwired the power somehow, so that the lift, in the corridor beyond, was working. Devlin looked at it, and at the stairs beside it.

‘I don’t think so.’ There was something else he’d noticed, outside the building. Impossible to know how far Luce was reading him. Surprise was doubtful, so which one would Luce expect?

After a moment’s consideration, Devlin ripped a panel from what was left of the reception desk. Pressing a few buttons he jammed it into the lift doors. It wouldn’t last long. Already the opening and closing of the mechanism had concertinaed it to half its size, but that was not the point. Luce wouldn’t know for sure. Devlin took off for the front door, and the other side of the block, as the wood splintered.

The metal escape ladder was on the next building, but Devlin had seen the narrow connecting walk between the two and the punched-out window slot beside it. Luce had invited him to the top floor. The walk-way was a floor lower than he needed to be, but if he was lucky there would be internal corner stairs and no gun waiting in the darkness.

He was.

He came out, after a scramble over an unforgiving wall, to reach the next building, a tense, muscle-wrenching climb, and a short stumble up a dark stairwell, in the corner of the top floor, well away from the main stairs and central lifts. Once he was through the sagging fire door, at the top of the stairs, he could see his battleground. The open-plan space, stretching in front of him, was mostly empty. There was enough light from the street to make out a few abandoned pieces of furniture and some battered screens, that had once divided the area into small compartments. Devlin scooted round a coil of disconnected cable.

Tiles had fallen from the suspended ceiling. He stepped on one, and it crumbled, powdery, under his foot. Gaping holes exposed metal struts and the ducts and pipes of the service void above. Air was blowing into the building, through cracked windows. It was getting light outside, the soft grey of predawn. Towards the centre of the floor, near the lifts, electric bulbs cast a harsh light.

It was the smell that warned him, bitter and metallic.

What was left of Bobby was suspended, head down, from one of the ceiling struts. Devlin didn’t need to look at the slashed throat. The dark pool, spreading across the ragged carpet, was enough.
That
had once been his partner and best friend. Nausea and cold, hard fury welled behind gritted teeth. He turned sharply away from the body.

‘Luce, you bastard.’ The words echoed. ‘You wanted me here. You got me. So come on out and let’s finish this.’

The part of his brain that was still functioning the way he’d been trained was screaming at him to get down, take cover, spread-eagle, anything. If Luce’s chosen ending was a bullet between the eyes, he was already a dead man. But that wasn’t Luce. This was the two gunslingers, facing off at the end of the movie, the man-on-man crap that would prove, finally, who was
the
man.

‘Michael.’ The soft voice had Devlin letting out a pent-up breath.
In front of him, not behind him.
Luce moved slowly into view. ‘Didn’t fancy the elevator, or the main stair?’ Luce’s voice was even, conversational. ‘Can’t say I blame you. Nice trick with the wood in the doors. Tried and tested and simple – but still effective.’

Devlin was scanning Luce feverishly. Hands relaxed and in plain sight, no visible weapons. But when were Luce’s weapons ever visible? Wrist holsters for the knives, and maybe one at the back, too. Bulkier body, new lines on the face, a slight stoop to the wide shoulders? Older, softer, flabbier, slower?

‘It’s been a long time.’ Devlin had to clear his throat. ‘You didn’t have to do that
 
–’ he jerked his head backwards – ‘to get my attention.’