Next to Die (43 page)
He stalled, then turned on the spot, exasperated. He looked back to the view of the old station, a light breeze ruffling his hair, and then his gaze fell back to the tracks, in the direction of the oncoming trains. He didn’t have long to work out what to do.
‘Is it near here?’ Joe said, craning forward towards the windscreen, driving past the bright taxi ranks of Piccadilly, a queue of black cabs to one side, the long stretch of streetlights along a glistening empty road ahead.
‘Just ahead, there on the right,’ Gina said.
Joe saw where she was pointing, a large block of brick and dereliction. He skidded to the side of the road, his trims scraping along the kerb, opening his door and switching off the engine at the same time.
‘Come on! We haven’t got much time.’
They ran towards Mayfield station, their steps loud in the wide, empty street, audible even over the steady rumble of idling taxi engines and the ping of the railway announcer from the station above the arches. The orange of the streetlights gave the glaze of the redbrick a deep glow.
As they got to the corner, Joe saw why it had been used as it had by those who sought peace and quiet. It was the size of a football field but two storeys of Victorian brickwork high, with the main part of the station like a grand old house and the platforms hidden behind walls and stretching into the distance. The front was covered in displays for fleapit music concerts, fly-posted and repeated along the side, foliage making its way through some of the cracks. It would make people cross the road rather than walk past.
‘How do you get in?’ Gina said, looking frantically around.
‘I don’t know,’ Joe replied. It was hard to see any access. The roof was crumbling, with the rafters visible in places, but the exterior looked solid, with bricked up window spaces and thick walls. As he looked, his eyes went to the high arches opposite, his attention attracted by the rumble of a train. There was a train platform, high and exposed, people watching them. Then he saw Sam, who was pointing straight ahead.
‘Sam’s there,’ he said, pulling on Gina’s arm.
When she looked round, she said, ‘Thank God. He hasn’t jumped. Now let’s find Ruby.’
‘Which way?’
‘We can’t get in through the front, so we need to find another way,’ she said, and then she set off running again.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Down here, where Sam’s pointing,’ she called, racing down a street that ran alongside but disappeared into darkness, the streetlights broken.
Joe sprinted to catch her, to get ahead. It wasn’t chivalry. Gina had been a cop and didn’t need his protection, but Ruby was his sister and he owed it to her to be first through the door.
The thump of their footsteps became louder as they got further away from the lights, echoing between the high walls of the station and the student accommodation that rose tall next to it. Joe was trailing his hand along the bricks as he ran, worried that he would miss something in the gloom: some loose bricks or a well-hidden doorway. The brooding shadow of the building gave way to the night sky, and so they were running past the wasteland around it, still protected by a high wall.
Then he stopped.
‘Hang on,’ Joe said, urgency in his voice. ‘The wall runs out here.’ He took some deep breaths as he felt along with both hands until they clanged onto a heavy metal plate. As he looked up, he could see the blades of razor wire against the sky. But then he saw something else: a flash of light, moving. Torch beams. ‘We need to get in there,’ he said, pushing against the metal plates.
‘I’m calling the police,’ Gina said.
‘I’m not waiting for them.’
As Gina spoke on the phone, Joe ran his hands along, looking for a weakness. His hands clanged against the metal, solid, unmoving. Then it changed. He looked round at Gina, her face barely visible in the darkness. His hand had struck corrugated metal. The sound had been different, a higher pitch, thinner metal, but more importantly, there had been movement. It hadn’t been much, just a swing inwards, but it had been enough.
Joe pushed against it harder, and then there was the loud scrape of metal across stone and the corrugated sheet moved.
‘There’s a way in,’ he said.
Joe didn’t wait for Gina to reason with him. He pushed harder at the metal. He ignored the noise and eased his body into the gap. He strained and grimaced until he was through, and held it so that Gina could join him.
They stood there in the dark, trying to get some sense of where to find the way inside. The sounds from the street had gone and the view ahead disappeared into bushes and trees, nature reclaiming the space. There was a low wall at one side and the steady bubble of a stream. There was only one way and that was into the blackness ahead.
Joe saw the flashes again, through the holes in the roof. ‘We need to keep moving,’ he whispered.
‘We could use our phones to light the way.’
‘No, they might see us. We need to surprise them, so that they don’t do anything rash. I don’t care where they go. I just want Ruby back.’
They moved forward slowly, feeling with their feet as they went. The ground was uneven, with small mounds of rubble and tangles of undergrowth. Leaves stroked his face, and he waited all the time for a hand to reach out for him.
The darkness got deeper as they got closer to the building, which rose in front of them, blocking out the glow from the streetlights and station on the other side. Gina grabbed the back of his jacket so that they wouldn’t get separated. His footsteps were light and careful, but still he felt like he was shouting his arrival, from the race of his pulse to the short gasps of his breaths.
He didn’t see the piece of metal sticking out, a long-discarded strip left to rust on a pile of stones. It caught his shin, cutting at the skin, making him shout out in pain.
There was a pause as they stood there, Joe grimacing, unsure if they had been seen. Then a torch flashed from one of the windows upstairs, lighting them up, making them squint into the glare.
They’d been spotted.
‘They’re here,’ Ronnie shouted, panicking, running back to Carrie.
‘Who’s here? Where?’ Carrie said.
‘Joe Parker, and a woman from his office.’
‘Shit.’ A pause, and then, ‘This is it, Ronnie. It’s over.’
Ruby started to cry, but they were tears of hope. Joe had come for her. Then she pushed back against the pillar. There was someone in front of her. She could hear the breaths, close, watching.
‘What is it?’ Ruby said.
Ruby yelped as the blindfold was pulled off. She blinked her vision clear and then looked around. Carrie was in front of her, on her haunches, breathing heavily, looking scared.
‘Your rescuer is here,’ Carrie said. ‘They’re going to be too late though.’
‘What do you mean?’ Ruby’s lips quivered as she spoke. ‘No, please, I’m scared. Just let me go. You can run. Get away. I’ll tell them you spared me.’
‘No,’ Carrie said. ‘Sam hasn’t suffered enough.’
Carrie reached into her pocket and produced a sheet of clear plastic. It looked strong, thicker than a shopping bag. ‘If your brother wants to find you, he can.’
Ruby screamed, shrill in the large space, but it was cut short as Carrie forced the plastic sheet over her face and pulled it tight. Everything was blurred, out of focus, except that she could see the snarl of Carrie’s mouth as she pressed. She tried another scream, but it caught in her throat and she was unable to take a breath.
Joe heard the scream, short and loud. It hit him like a grab to the throat, making him gasp. ‘Ruby!’
Gina pulled at his arm. ‘Come on,’ she said, and set off running, scrambling over rubble, weeds and discarded metal.
Joe followed, grimacing at the pain in his leg. Gina was heading for the darkest spot, pulling out her phone, pressing the button to provide a glow. The light bounced as she ran, making the shadows of the undergrowth shift and move on the walls.
Gina tripped on something, her phone tumbling out of her hand, but Joe kept on going, dragging her up by grabbing a handful of her jacket as he went past.
The overhang of a large doorframe seemed to loom ahead, and so Joe ran at it, not knowing if he would meet something solid. His hands were out in front of him, ready for the impact. He grunted as he hit more metal, but there was movement. He pushed hard with his shoulder, shouting, snarling. The metal scraped on the ground as it moved, slowly inching open. Gina joined him, pushing hard, grimacing.
‘Someone’s placed a rock behind it,’ Gina said, straining.
They made a space big enough to squeeze through. Joe went first, shedding his jacket as it snagged on the rough edges, and then he held the metal back so that Gina could get through.
Once on the other side, Joe tried to get his bearings. It was dark, but he could see stairs that went upwards, the faint glow from the top picking out the long bar of a handrail. There was the steady drip of water from somewhere, the noise bounced around the tiled stairwell, and there was a faint glow at the top. Joe set off, using the handrail to guide him upwards.
‘There’s only one way,’ he said, and then shouted, ‘Ruby!’
There was no response.
He started to run.
Sam heard the scream. It changed everything.
He looked along the tracks. The next train was coming in, swaying on the tracks, screeches and bright lights, rumbling towards him, but that didn’t matter anymore. Ruby needed him.
He ran along the platform, ignoring the pain from his shoulder as he went. Evans and the others were gone. The train got closer. As he looked along, the platform was busy, a train on the opposite side spewing out passengers who had come in from the northern stations. There were guards and more transport cops and people with suitcases. He needed to get past them and beyond the train. They would slow him down.
Sam looked back towards the train. It had cleared the end of the platform and was now moving along, faces visible at the doors ready to be disgorged. He dodged people on the platform, weaving in and out, his breaths coming faster, not used to the exertion. He barged into someone, catching his injured shoulder. He cried out in pain as the other man went to the floor. There was a shout but Sam kept on going.
He looked across. He could see where Mayfield station ended and spilled out into the night, its mouth cavernous. Where there had once been an offshoot into Mayfield was just empty land that led to the tracks that fed into Piccadilly. Sam looked down at the rails. They were black and oily apart from the sheen on the top of the rails. There was a line of paving slabs on the other side, tight against the wire fence that overlooked the long drop to the street below. But it gave him a clear run and ended on the right side of the tracks.
He took one last look along the platform. The train was close but slowing. He could do it.
Sam jumped down from the platform, his shoes slippy on the oil of the sleepers. Someone screamed behind him. He didn’t stop. The train blared a horn and the brakes screeched louder. It was closer than he realised, the lights bright in his eyes. His feet found the sanctuary of the paving line as the carriages flew past him, the wind making his hair fly up and his face contort into a grimace.
He couldn’t stop to think about the train. He took one more look at Mayfield, at the flicker of torch beams through the crumbling roof. There was more movement there now.
He started to run.
His feet were slipping but he didn’t hesitate. He was above the line of the streetlights as he went, moving quickly, not wanting to look down, only a wire fence stopping him from falling. There were trains pulling in ahead, but they were on the other lines.
He looked over at Mayfield again. He was running along its length. He could get in that way.
His chest ached, his legs in pain, but he strained for one last burst. He could do this.
Ruby thrashed her head around, kicking out with her feet, trying to stop Carrie from getting a firm hold with the plastic. It was tight on her face, smoothing out her skin.
‘Just stab her,’ Ronnie said, behind Carrie, his voice frantic. ‘It’s taking too long.’
‘I want Sam to see that the little bitch knew what was happening.’
‘We’ve got to go.’
Carrie turned as the shout of ‘Ruby!’ came from the stairwell. The plastic sheet slackened. Ruby took a breath, a long gasp, and then she lashed out with her feet, shrieking, sending Carrie sprawling backwards.
‘You bitch!’ Carrie snarled.
Ruby screamed again. ‘Joe, Joe!’
Carrie scrambled to her feet and pulled out the knife from her pocket. It was a dagger, long and sharp, jagged edges catching the glare from the torch that she had dropped onto the floor.
‘Ronnie, have you got your knife?’ Carrie said.
‘Yes, here,’ he said, holding it up.
‘When they get up here, kill them.’
Carrie grabbed Ruby under her arm, her bound wrists making it easier to lift her. ‘Come with me.’
Ruby tried to pull away, until the knife jabbed under her chin, cutting her, making her yelp. Blood trickled onto the tip of the blade.
‘You either come with me or I skin you right here,’ Carrie hissed at her, and then pulled at her arm again. Ruby went with her this time.
‘Where are you going?’ Ronnie shouted, as Carrie started to run, prodding Ruby forward with the knife in her back.
‘She’s the only negotiating chip we have.’
‘What about me?’
‘Kill those bastards and then join me.’
‘And if I don’t?’
Carrie paused, and then said, ‘Sacrifice yourself, like Ben did. If you love me, you would.’ She turned back to Ruby and gave her another jab in the back with the knife. ‘Now run.’
Ruby felt herself propelled along as Carrie hooked her arm through hers, so that the knife was pressed against her ribs.
They were heading for the exit, towards the railway lines.
Joe’s legs were aching, his chest heaving from running when he got to the top of the stairs, but he wasn’t going to stop. He burst into a large open area, the station platforms, the rail sections overtaken by weeds and bushes that grew high in the middle.