The Hunter's Prayer (12 page)

‘You could be right. I’ll kill him.’

‘Jesus, no, I only . . .’ Lucas smiled and he sputtered to a stop. ‘You have the weirdest sense of humor I’ve ever encountered.’

‘You’re still young.’ Lucas stood to leave and said, ‘Nice meeting you. Good luck.’ He hesitated as he walked towards the door, drawn to an array of photos on the wall. Ella was in quite a few of them but no more prominent than a number of other repeated faces, a bunch of kids messing around, doing stupid stuff, at the beach, skiing.

‘Will I see you again at all?’

Lucas turned, trying to work out whether he was nervous or hopeful, and said, ‘Wouldn’t imagine so.’ There was the answer; Chris was relieved.

And in a strange way, he was hurt by that, because he’d liked Chris. He’d have happily killed him for blowing their cover in Florence but he’d truly liked him, even envied him. He’d turned his back on Ella, an act of weakness that wasn’t a million miles from the one Lucas had performed fifteen years before with Madeleine, but apart from that he was the kind of kid he would have liked to have been himself.

He hadn’t been that kid, though, and if her life hadn’t been destroyed Ella Hatto would never have needed him. But here he was, preparing to guide her through the wreckage to the dark core of her family. Chris was probably right about who they’d find there, too.

Lucas had thought about suggesting it to her himself. For all he knew she was still in danger. Worse still, she could force her uncle’s hand if she let him know what she was doing. He’d said nothing, though, aware of the emotional impact it would have on her, aware too that they could be wrong.

And something told him that she wouldn’t tell her uncle. She was probably in denial, refusing to believe that the man who’d taken her in had also tried to kill her, but somewhere deep within her she had to suspect him, a suspicion that would keep her cautious. Maybe that was the real reason she’d checked into a hotel. She knew. Deep down, she had to know, and he was confident that she wouldn’t put herself in danger, that she’d be vigilant.

He was confident too that if the trail did lead to her uncle, her need for vengeance would be all the greater for having denied it, her wrath intensified by the acts of kindness he’d shown her in the past three months. If Simon Hatto was behind it, no amount of smiles and sympathy would help him now; his only hope was to do what he should have done in the first place, and finish the job he’d started.

Chapter Twelve

T
he guy at reception was polite, obsequious even, but in a way that managed to be cold and vaguely condescending. It was clear too that Lucas didn’t look at all familiar to him, even though he’d stayed in the hotel for a couple of nights just over a week ago.

He’d almost finished checking in when something stirred in the receptionist’s memory and he picked up a note from behind the desk, saying, ‘Oh, Mr. Lucas, there’s a gentleman waiting in the bar for you.’

‘What kind of gentleman?’

‘Young, Australian, wearing a suit.’ The final words somehow managed to convey a disapproval of Lucas’s casual dress. ‘The bar’s just through there.’

‘I know. I’ve stayed here before.’

‘Of course.’

He walked through to the bar, where Dan was sitting on a stool, deep in conversation with the barman. When he saw Lucas, he stood up, smiling as they shook hands.

‘Good journey?’

Lucas nodded.

‘How about a drink? They’ve got an eighteen-year-old Macallan.’

‘Sure.’

‘I’ll have one too. Rico?’ The barman nodded and the two of them sat down at a table, Dan saying, ‘Rico’s from Brazil, shoe designer for catwalk shows.’ Lucas laughed to himself, that Dan had been there maybe twenty minutes and already knew the barman’s name and story. The next time he went in there he’d probably get his drinks on the house.

‘So, Novakovic.’

‘Yeah, Novakovic,’ said Dan, repeating the name like it was a toast. ‘How’d you get the lead on him anyway?’

‘I called in on Lo Bello, asked him who might do a job like that in London.’

‘He mention me?’

Lucas smiled, amused by Dan’s vanity. ‘In passing. We both concluded this was probably a bit low-rent for you.’

Dan laughed, ‘I can’t believe you actually know Lo Bello—that’s so cool.’

‘I used to know everyone.’ He wanted to add something about it all being a long time ago but held his tongue, saying instead, ‘So where is our friend Novakovic?’

‘Under our noses. West London, room in a house with a load of other Balkan boys, most of them illegals. Could be unpredictable, so I was thinking I’d pick you up around four this morning, get in there while they’re all in bed.’

‘Sounds good.’

The waiter put their drinks down.

‘Thanks, Rico.’ Dan picked up his glass and said, ‘Good health, and good to have you back in the game, mate.’

Lucas raised his glass too but said, ‘I’m not back in the game.’

Dan smiled, disbelieving, but became distracted by the honeyed scent of the whisky in his glass. And why should Dan believe him? Lucas was here and he’d killed people that summer and had implicitly agreed to kill another. The only extent to which he wasn’t back in the game was his own fragile conviction that he’d finished with it.

‘So what have you been up to?’

‘Not much. I run in the summer, ski in the winter. I read, I think.’

‘Dangerous,’ said Dan. He looked intrigued. ‘Don’t you miss it, though? I mean, what happened in Italy—didn’t it give you that buzz again?’

‘A little.’ He thought back but there was no adrenaline in the memory of it, only the torment of Ella Hatto and the strangely intertwined thoughts of Paris and Madeleine and Isabelle. ‘I saw my daughter this summer.’

Dan put his drink down, shocked, saying, ‘Jesus! I didn’t know you’d been married, but a daughter!’

‘We weren’t married, and when I say I saw my daughter, I don’t mean I met her. I just saw her.’ He smiled, thinking of her sitting in that cafe. ‘But no kidding, Dan, it gave me more of a buzz than anything I’ve done in the last twenty years.’

Dan nodded. ‘I bet.’ He seemed deep in thought for a while, then, ‘You know, this business tonight, I can handle it on my own if you want.’

‘No, this job’s personal; I want to see it through.’ He knew that was a lie, though, and that if Madeleine had reacted any differently he probably wouldn’t have been there.

Dan picked him up at four and they drove out of central London, passing a steady flow of light traffic until they got out into the scruffy western no-man’s-land where rows of old houses were divided into bed-sits and individual rooms, crammed with immigrants and asylum-seekers, the underside of the melting-pot.

As Dan parked, he said, ‘Our man’s in the middle room on the ground floor.’

‘Makes life easier.’ Lucas attached his silencer and added, ‘Remember, though, I don’t want anyone getting hurt.’

‘Are we included in that?’ He smiled and got out of the car.

There was a mattress in the small front yard and the smell of rotting food. The house looked like it needed some work, even in the forgiving glow of the streetlights. He’d done business over the years with the people-smuggling rackets and he couldn’t believe this was what the immigrants were all so desperate to reach.

Neither of the doors posed a problem and the house remained darkly silent and stifled as they moved swiftly from the street door and into the bedroom. Dan turned the light on, but Novakovic came around only as Lucas put the gun to his head, and even then, managed little more than a drowsy downbeat acknowledgment.

Dan threw off the duvet and gestured for him to sit up. Lucas backed away slightly with the gun and Novakovic sat up, naked, sinewy and powerful. But when Dan asked him quietly where his gun was he pointed languidly at a chest of drawers.

Dan dug around in the top drawer and took out a couple of guns. Lucas glanced around the rest of the room, surprisingly tidy given there was so much crammed into it. It was bare of any personality, though; no books, posters, nothing to hint at the kind of person he might be.

And considering he was developing something of a reputation, Lucas had to wonder what kind of fee he commanded. After all, he’d been called in to do a job like the Hattos and yet here he was living in one cramped room in a slum of a house. It made him pity the guy, whatever his motivation.

‘Okay, let him get dressed. I’ll keep a watch at the door.’ Lucas stepped out into the hall, closing the bedroom door behind him.

He walked the few paces to the kitchen, making sure it was empty, then back to the door, listening carefully to the occasional sounds from the rest of the house: someone shifting about in bed, floorboards creaking, a cough, light snoring.

Then the commotion started, as violent and immediate against that background as gunfire itself. Novakovic was shouting in Serbo-Croatian like he was trying to alert the other people in the house. Lucas heard Dan hit him and the screaming stopped as Novakovic fell heavily against a chair or table. Then a moment later it started again as more furniture bounced around the room.

Lucas strained to hear the rest of the house above the struggle. There was definitely movement, and that was the last thing he wanted. The door of the next room opened and a bleary head looked out, retreating as soon as he saw Lucas. Maybe they were used to being raided by police or immigration and knew when to keep out of the way.

The din continued, though, and the bleary-headed guy came running out again, waving what looked like a knife, his figure silhouetted against the light behind him. Lucas wasn’t sure it was a knife, but he shot him anyway. The guy dropped a couple of feet short of where he was standing.

There was panicked shouting upstairs now, then a gunshot, a startling crack that silenced the voices and momentarily silenced Novakovic before he resumed, shriller, louder.

Like a delayed response to the gunshot, a body tumbled down the stairs. The hallway and landing lights came on almost as he hit the bottom and then the second voice above resumed on its own, angry and desperate, wailing with the realization of what he’d just done.

Lucas looked at the two bodies, both young Eastern Europeans. The first had been holding a bread knife and was in his underwear. The second was wearing jeans and had a wound on his neck that was still gently pumping blood, his eyes startled.

Another shot cracked out, hitting the wall near the bottom of the street door, then another, before the guy with the gun hurtled down the stairs, screaming in fury, firing again. Lucas fired a shot up through the stair railings and the guy stumbled, his momentum vaulting him over the body at the bottom of the stairs and leaving him splayed awkwardly on the floor beyond.

He was dead—another young guy, lean and pale and red-haired, wearing track-suit bottoms. It was quiet in the house now, even in the room behind him. Lucas took a step towards the latest body, curious. He spotted the wound then, a lucky hit, up into the side of his abdomen, the bullet probably bouncing around inside his rib cage before lodging.

If there was anyone else in the house, they’d clearly decided on keeping quiet and out of the way. Lucas walked back to his position and then a moment later the door opened and Dan was standing there with Novakovic. Novakovic was dressed and cuffed, his face and T-shirt bloody and bruised.

Dan, on the other hand, looked like he’d been out for a stroll—not a hair out of place, his whole demeanor as relaxed and easy-going as it always was.

Lucas smiled and said, ‘Problem?’

‘Couldn’t find his shoes, that’s all.’ He looked around the hall then and said, ‘Jesus H!’

‘I only killed two of them.’ They both looked at Novakovic but he was taking in the scene coldly, like he’d seen this kind of thing too often to offer up any sadness for it.

They stepped over the bodies and walked back to the car with Novakovic between them. The street was quiet; no bedroom lights, no indication of curiosity about the gunshots that had burst out a minute before. Lucas sat in the back with Novakovic and they drove away, the sky showing the first uncertain hints of daylight.

Dan dropped him along the street from the hotel and said, ‘I’ll take him back to my place, give him some breakfast, then I’ll take him somewhere out of the way.’

‘Okay.’ Lucas thought about telling him to be careful but it was hardly necessary, and Novakovic was beaten, his spirit so visibly broken now that Lucas had to wonder how he’d got this far without being taken down. He looked like someone who’d been waiting these last seven years for his own history to catch up with him, whatever it was he’d temporarily escaped from back there in Bosnia.

Lucas slept for a couple of hours, then ordered breakfast and watched the news channel. He was waiting to see something of what had gone on but there was nothing, either because it still hadn’t been reported or because no one thought it mattered that much.

Novakovic wouldn’t matter that much either, except to Ella. She’d want him dead, but Lucas would try to steer her away from that course. It wasn’t that he wanted to spare Novakovic’s life, but that he thought he could protect Ella from the ugliness of what lay ahead of her.

And for all he knew, she didn’t want to be protected from it. Lucas couldn’t be sure what she wanted, or how far she’d strayed from the girl she’d been three months before, but he had an idea that the fate of Novakovic might tell him.