The Final Minute (27 page)

She launched herself from the sofa, grabbing the gun and yanking it upwards just as the blonde pulled the trigger. She heard another shout of ‘Armed police!’, caught a glimpse of smoking holes in the door as the giant continued to fire into it, and then she had the blonde by the hair and was using her momentum to drag her round so her body was between Tina and the giant.

They both fell to the floor, crashing into the chair Tina had sat in when she’d come to see Sheryl a couple of days earlier, and knocking it backwards. Somehow the blonde ended up on top. She was snarling and trying to pull her gun hand free but Tina put all her strength into giving her attacker’s wrist a single hard twist, digging her nails in.

The gun clattered to the carpet as the blonde let go of it, crying out in pain, and Tina used her hand to knock it out of reach. The blonde was fast, though. She immediately used her free hand to drive her palm into Tina’s face, delivering a blow that caused excruciating pain. She then forced down Tina’s arms and pinned them with her knees, before grabbing her round the neck with both hands and squeezing with real force.

‘Shoot the bitch!’ she yelled, and beyond her, Tina saw the giant looming into view, the gun in his hand, trying to find a good shot.

With her air cut off, Tina felt herself becoming light-headed. She kicked and bucked with everything she had beneath the blonde, but already her strength was fading, and the blonde’s grip was like a vice. But she wouldn’t give up … she couldn’t.

The giant was only a few feet away now, already pointing the gun at Tina’s head.

Then, from what felt like a long distance away, she heard the bang of the door being kicked open, and another scream of ‘Armed police!’

The giant turned to where it was coming from, firing again, a look of intense concentration on his face. At the same time, Tina concentrated on wriggling her left arm free from under the blonde’s knee, using all her remaining strength to lever it off.

As it came free, Tina punched the blonde in the side of the head and, as the grip on her throat momentarily loosened, drove herself upwards and raked her face with her nails. But in her peripheral vision she saw the giant was pointing the gun at her again.

He pulled the trigger.

It was over.

Except it wasn’t. He’d run out of bullets. He cursed and reached into his pocket.

But Tina wasn’t going to wait for him to reload. Already pressing her advantage, she yanked one of the blonde’s hands from her neck and managed to knock her off balance. Kicking and struggling free, Tina scrambled across the floor in the direction of the gun, grabbed it, and swung round, finger already tensed on the trigger.

But the giant and the blonde were running towards the rear of the flat, slamming the door behind them and leaving Tina aiming at non-existent targets.

Suppressing a choking cough, she clambered unsteadily to her feet and looked towards the open front door.

‘Oh Jesus,’ she whispered as she saw Jeff Roubaix sprawled on the hallway floor, his head propped up against the wall opposite. He’d been shot repeatedly in the upper body, and the blue shirt he’d been wearing that Tina remembered thinking she liked earlier was peppered with dark stains the shape of blooming roses. His eyes were closed and he looked dead, and she felt a hard wrench of shock and anger. Even though he’d been unarmed, he’d tried to save her, and it had cost him his life. She was responsible. This was her doing. Tina Boyd. The Black Widow. The woman no man wanted to work with because of the way they had a habit of dying around her.

She could hear heavy footfalls on the staircase and more shouts of ‘Armed police!’ These ones were real, though. The cavalry had arrived, but as so often, they were too late.

With the gun still in her hand, Tina ran through the flat in the direction the two assassins had taken. These were the two who’d come to kill Sean at the house in Wales, she was convinced of that, which now inextricably linked him to the disappearance of Lauren and Jen. But that was of no use to her if these bastards got away.

Passing through the kitchen, she ran into the back bedroom, gun arm outstretched. The room was empty and smelled of perfume, and the doors leading out to the narrow balcony were open.

The rear of the building looked out on to a residential street, and Tina ran on to the balcony and looked both ways. She was on the second floor, a good twelve feet above the ground, but the blonde and the giant had clearly jumped, because they weren’t there now. And she couldn’t see them either. They were gone.

Cursing and shaking, still holding the gun, Tina strode back into the lounge, almost straight into the guns of two cops sighting her down the barrels of their MP5s. Behind them she could see a third cop crouched down beside Jeff, trying to resuscitate him. ‘It’s no good,’ she heard him call out. ‘He’s gone, he’s gone.’

‘Put the gun down now!’ the cop on the left yelled at her. ‘Now!’

She put it down.

‘Get on your knees.’

She got down on her knees, as the one on the right kicked the gun away from her.

‘Lie down on your front with your hands down by your side.’

‘My name’s Tina Boyd. I’m a private detective.’

‘I don’t give a fuck who you are, lady. Lie down or I’ll shoot you.’

Tina lay down, level now with Sheryl’s corpse, which was only a few feet away. Blood dripped slowly from the dead girl’s head wound on to the carpet. Tina knew it could have been her, and she found herself shaking, knowing once again that she’d pushed her luck to the absolute limits.

But at least it was finished.

For now.

Forty

It was the nicest evening I could remember, which, given my general lack of memory and the shit I’d had to put up with over the last two months, probably wasn’t saying too much. But the fact was I felt truly relaxed. Luda was a lovely woman. Kind, friendly, and a real conversationalist. During the course of dinner (a very tasty coq au vin with homemade bread and steamed veg from the garden) and two bottles of red wine, we really opened up to each other. Or perhaps more accurately, she opened up to me and I got into my role of the jilted salesman husband so well that I stopped thinking of it as a lie. It felt good, whereas being me just felt crap.

I think it was inevitable that we’d end up making love. Somewhere near the bottom of the second bottle she reached over the kitchen table and took my hand, we looked into each other’s eyes, and that was pretty much it. I leaned forward and kissed her tenderly on the lips, and she kissed me back, but harder and with real passion, and then we were in each other’s arms and trailing through the house and up the stairs, losing clothes on the way as we explored each other, mouths locked together in an almost desperate embrace.

When we got to the bedroom and were lying naked on the bed she turned to me with a nervous look on her face. ‘I haven’t done this for a long time,’ she said quietly.

I propped myself up on one elbow and smiled down at her, gently pushing back a lock of hair from her face. ‘Me neither,’ I said, which was the truth.

‘You and your wife didn’t …’

I shook my head. ‘Not for months. Listen, we don’t have to do anything. I’m happy just to lie here with you.’ This wasn’t quite the truth but I was conscious of what I’d been sent to prison for and there was no way I was going to push myself on Luda. Not after everything she’d done for me.

She smiled. ‘No. I want to do it with you.’

So, after some messing about with a condom from her bedside drawer, we did. It was wild, it was passionate, and it was going great. But then, just as we built up towards the climax, I found myself looking down not at Luda but at a beautiful blue-eyed woman with luscious lips, and thick blonde hair that seemed to cascade down on to the pillow. It was the girl from that recurring dream. Seeing her then, in place of Luda, I experienced an intense physical reaction that literally made me shake and, as the orgasm coursed through me and I buried my face in the crook of Luda’s neck, all I could think about was this girl from the dream and how much I’d been in love with her.

Afterwards, we stayed in the same position for a long time before finally getting into bed. Luda switched off the lamp and snuggled up to me as I put a protective arm round her shoulder.

Lying there in the peaceful darkness, I was transported back to a busy bar. I couldn’t remember who I was there with – I couldn’t even remember the name of the place – but it was definitely the place where we’d met. I was just peeling away from the bar with a beer in one hand when I saw her. Jesus, she was gorgeous. Tall, young and glamorous, with the kind of face that’s both sweetly pretty and sexually alluring at the same time. And she was smiling at me too.

It was like that feeling you get when you’re so attracted to someone that the strength of it almost makes you fall over. It was – I swear it – love at first sight.

I walked straight up to her. ‘Hi, my name’s Sean. I’m trying to think of something cheesy to say, and I can’t. So please just let me buy you a drink.’

She laughed then, a sweet, feminine sound. Although, to be honest, it wouldn’t have mattered if she’d honked like a Canada goose. At that moment she could do no wrong. ‘Sure, why not? My name’s Jen, by the way.’

‘Pleased to meet you, Jen,’ I said, taking her hand in mine and shaking it gently. ‘I bet you’ve got a really exotic surname as well.’

‘Not really,’ she said, still laughing. ‘It’s Jones.’

Jen Jones. The woman I’d been in love with.

I closed my eyes, and with Luda in my arms I fell asleep basking in memories of a time in my life when, for a few brief minutes at least, I’d felt truly happy.

Forty-one

It was a long night for Tina. She was formally arrested and taken straight from Sheryl’s flat to Camden nick where she was forced to undergo a number of forensic tests designed to find out whether or not she’d fired the gun she was carrying, before being examined by a doctor who asked if she felt fit enough to be interviewed. Tina knew there was no point in delaying things so she said she was, and waived her right to legal counsel, which was something she’d never recommended to anyone being interviewed. But all she wanted to do was tell the truth and get the hell out of there.

The interview got underway at just after eleven p.m., and was conducted by two male detectives from the local Murder Investigation Team. It was clear they knew who she was, and her background as a Met police officer, but they didn’t refer to any of this, and instead treated her first and foremost as a suspect, which was standard procedure. However, Tina kept solidly to her story, explaining why she’d gone to the flat, and the relevance of Sheryl Warner to her own investigation. The only part that wasn’t the truth was the reason she gave for meeting Jeff Roubaix that evening, which she said had just been a friendly drink.

The point was, the story was plausible, and eventually the questioning softened as the two detectives admitted that Jeff had called 999 to say that she was in trouble and was being threatened with a firearm. They also confirmed that Jeff had died at the scene. Tina took this hard, and she had to work hard to stop herself from breaking down. They also told her that there was no sign of the two killers, although two men walking on the street behind the building had confirmed that they’d seen two people matching Tina’s description running away from the scene.

Eventually, at just after two a.m., they let her go, the custody officer telling her that there was someone waiting for her in reception.

It was Mike Bolt, and he was on his own.

‘What are you doing here?’ she asked as they walked out of the building into the night.

‘I heard about what happened. I wanted to check you were all right.’

She stopped and lit a cigarette with unsteady hands. ‘Thanks. I appreciate that, but I’ll be fine.’

‘You don’t look it.’

She didn’t feel it either. The shock of the violence and the knowledge of how close she’d come to death filled her with an anxiety she was finding it hard to keep a lid on. For the first time in a while, she was desperate for a drink.

Mike’s expression was sympathetic. ‘I’ve spoken to my bosses and they’re organizing twenty-four-hour protection for you because it’s clear you were the target of the killers.’

‘I don’t need twenty-four-hour protection, Mike. I’d appreciate a couple of officers outside my house so I feel safe there, but I’ve got a missing woman to find, and I don’t want to be trailed everywhere I go.’

‘You’re still in danger, Tina.’

‘I don’t think they’ll try it again. It’s too risky.’

Mike raised a sceptical eyebrow. ‘Let me give you a lift home. You don’t look like you’re up to driving tonight. There’s already an ARV outside your place so you’ll definitely be safe there. You can pick up your car in the morning.’

Tina looked at him and saw the concern in his bright blue eyes. He was a good man and he cared for her, and right then, that felt good. ‘Sure, I’d like that,’ she said.

When they were in the car and driving through the silent night streets, she asked him about progress on their case with the mysterious Carl Hughie.

‘Slow. He’s still not cooperating, and he got himself lawyered up with some high-level representation. What he did do, though, finally, was give us the name of his colleague, the murder victim. He’s William Balham, and he’s on the payroll at MI5, so it looks like it might be one of their ops went wrong.’

‘What kind of op does MI5 conduct which involves abducting a British citizen on British soil, taking him to an isolated farmhouse, and then torturing him? You know that William Balham pulled out one of Sean’s teeth? I was there. I saw it. They might work for MI5 but I’m telling you, they work for someone else too. Someone who wants some information from Sean Egan very badly.’

Mike sighed. ‘That may well be true, and if Hughie and Balham have been working for someone else, we’ll find out who. But right now we’ve got the Home Office and even the Home Secretary involving themselves and putting pressure on us to drop everything against Hughie.’