Stalkers

He passed between Coventry and Nuneaton, where he came to a contra-flow, and swerved through it recklessly, barely slowing down. His many cuts and bruises, some of which on a normal day would send him to casualty, meant nothing. Heck had tunnel vision; all he saw was the empty motorway spooling out ahead.

The phone rang again.

‘Go into the rest-lounge at Corley service station, and wait. We’ll contact you there at exactly two o’clock.’

Heck did as instructed. At Corley, he shot up the access ramp so fast that he skidded across six or seven parking bays before he was able to bring the Lexus to a halt. The engine — which he’d only managed to activate by breaking the housing on the steering-column and inserting a key between the ignition heads — stalled and cut out.

Seconds passed as the vehicle cooled and Heck prepared himself for the ordeal ahead. He glanced across the car park.

Corley services was one of those typically impersonal motorway structures — all sheet glass and bare concrete. There were lights inside, but few people visible. The car park was almost deserted. He climbed out and waited warily. Behind him, there was the occasional VOOOM as some other nocturnal traveller rocketed past.

He looked at his watch. It was one-fifty.

Slowly, he walked across the tarmac, his footsteps clicking. As soon as he entered the station, he scanned for suspects. The shop was empty, aside from an overweight young man sitting at the till. Behind the fast-food counter, two girls in uniforms and paper hats had drawn down the trellis and were now tidying things away. There were very few customers: a dishevelled businessman who walked out past Heck, carrying a briefcase; two maintenance guys in steel-capped boots and fluorescent jackets, also on their way out; and in the rest-lounge itself no one at all except an elderly lady in a pinafore, moving up and down with a mop and bucket.

Heck bought himself a coffee, and sat in a window seat. He glanced at his watch. It was one-fifty-five. He sipped the tepid brew, all the time watching the lounge entrance. Bang on two o’clock, three figures came filing purposefully in, and Heck’s hand clenched on his mug. But it was two girls and a man, all in their early twenties. They were laughing and chatting. The young man was carrying a guitar. They bought coffee and sat down in another area.

Heck relaxed a little, but continued to watch the entrance with hawkish intensity.

The minutes ticked by. At two-fifteen, they left. Heck crossed the room for a refill, and resumed his seat.

There was a massive crash outside the window, like an explosion of gunfire.

He jumped, whipped around — and saw that it was a lorry unloading crates of foodstuff. He drank his second coffee. It was nearly two-thirty when someone else came into the rest-lounge. Heck regarded him warily. It was a rugged, burly man, wearing a green sweater and green, canvas trousers. He got himself a coffee and sat nearby with his back turned. Heck’s eyes locked onto him. Still the minutes ticked by. The man didn’t move, even when he’d drained his cup. Heck was shifting into hyper-tense mode, his breathing short and shallow; there was a streak of chill sweat down his back.

The man got up again. He walked across the lounge area. And left. Heck peered out through the window, and saw him climb into a battered old Mazda, which he drove off towards the motorway.

Confusion was now replacing Heck’s nervousness. They had definitely said Corley service station, hadn’t they? They had said two o’clock? He glanced again at his watch. It was almost three. He looked back across the lounge. The only other person in there was the cleaning lady. Even she looked to be leaving. She thrust her mop into the bucket and headed towards the entrance — where she stopped and turned to face him.

And beckoned.

Heck rose unsteadily to his feet.

He followed her out through the lobby into the car park, where she left her cleaning utensils next to a wall, and set off walking towards the rear of the building. She was moving quickly, keeping a good five yards ahead of him, though this was made easier for her because he was following cautiously, constantly glancing over his shoulder. She crossed the slip-road leading to the garage, and took a paved path between two motel blocks. This was lit, but at this late hour the blocks themselves were in darkness. The warmth and light of the service station was falling away behind.

Heck slid his hand under his jacket, seizing the Colt Cobra’s grip, but the woman strode on ahead without speaking. She was short and dumpy in stature; from the glimpse he’d had of her, she looked to be in her late sixties. The paved path terminated at a line of bushes, but now another path — this one unpaved — wound off through them. The woman followed it, so Heck had no option but to do the same.

Beyond the bushes there were fir trees. These closed in thickly from both sides, and were wet with dew. The path narrowed and steepened as it descended a slope. Again, Heck glanced over his shoulder — but no one was bringing up the rear. He looked back to the front, and saw that the woman was no longer in sight. Jarred, he lurched forward, hurrying to catch up with her — and emerged on a quiet canal bank. A stretch of black water rippled in front of him. Its brick-built sides were thick with moss and other rank vegetation.

The woman was waiting there, facing him. She had lank, thinning hair and a pudgy, wrinkled face, but she was wide-eyed — almost certainly because she was frightened. When she spoke, she had a strong Polish accent.

‘The man say you go that way.’ She pointed west along the canal bank.

‘What man?’ Heck asked.

‘I never see him before. You go.’

‘He paid you to give me this message?’

‘No question. I need money. You go! Go!’ And without waiting to see if he would comply, she hurried back up the path towards the service station, vanishing from view.

Heck glanced again over his shoulder. Around him lay only the blackness of night, the stillness and silence of the dead hours.

Though every molecule in his body was screaming at him to do otherwise, he began to edge along the canal bank in the direction he’d been shown. There was no sound. The only light came from the moon, just visible through the interlaced branches above. He’d advanced maybe a hundred yards, before a narrow-boat came into view, moored on the other side of the water. Curtains were drawn on its windows, but muffled lamplight could be seen inside. Then Heck spotted something else — a stocky figure waiting on the tow-path, just across from the vessel. A thrill went through him when he realised that the figure appeared to be leaning on a stick.

‘That’s far enough,’ came a voice. It was clipped, resonant; Heck remembered what Ian Blenkinsop had said about Mad Mike Silver once being a member of the officer corps. ‘Empty your pockets onto the path in front of you. Every single thing you’re carrying — weapons, mobile phones, notebooks, recording devices. Everything.’

Heck hesitated, his fingers caressing the Colt Cobra under his jacket.

‘It’s up to you how you play this,’ the figure added. ‘But we hold all the cards, as I’m sure you’re aware.’

‘Are Lauren and Dana alright?’

‘I know no such persons. Now do as you’ve been told.’

Realising he had no choice, Heck took the gun and both Deke’s mobile phone and his own, the latter of which was still waterlogged from the river, and placed them on the path in front of him.

‘That’s a good chap,’ the figure said, slowly approaching — definitely walking with a limp, definitely using a stick. ‘But that had better be everything. I’ll shortly be searching you. If you haven’t done exactly as you were told, there’ll be a severe outcome. Likewise, if I find you’re wired … trust me, that will prove to have been a big mistake.’

The man was now about ten yards away. Heck saw the moonlight glinting on his short, silver-grey hair. It was uncanny the way this fellow fitted the image that Blenkinsop’s brief, drink-sodden description had put into his mind.

That was when he sensed movement behind him.

Heck swung around. Two other men had stepped from the bushes a couple of yards to his rear. Both wore gloves, hoodie tops and knitted masks with holes cut for their eyes and mouths; one was purple, one orange. The taller one was armed with a machete, the shorter one with a small submachine gun — it looked like an Uzi. Heck