caught in the shooting. No innocent person sat watching TV will get shot by accident.’
Henry knew they were about to be the victims of a drive-by shooting.
The car was closer now. It was a big, heavy estate, but no slouch. It was moving fast, now almost level with the CID car.
Henry twisted to Mark and Bent. With a yell, ‘Get down, get down,’ he powered into Mark, tearing him from Bent’s grip and drove him over the edge of the low wall that formed the boundary of one of the boarded-up houses. He heard the rake of gunfire, saw the flicker of flame from the muzzle of the Skorpion as the two of them went head first over the wall.
He saw Bent drop like a stone where he was. In another thought he hoped his colleague hadn’t been shot. But the same could not be said for old man Costain. He hadn’t reacted, other than to jerk his head from side to side, wondering what the hell was happening, his roll-up still between his lips.
There was a second burst of fire, a quick ‘Drrrrh’ sound and a line of four bullets sliced across Costain’s chest, flicking him like a demented puppet, driving him backwards.
Then a third burst. Henry kept Mark pinned down. The bullets ripped into the low wall that protected them and just above their heads. Henry felt them go by, their slipstream almost parting his thin hair. He knew that if the car stopped and the shooter got out, they would all be dead.
But the Volvo accelerated past and was gone.
Henry raised his head cautiously. He saw Alex Bent kneeling over Billy Costain. Henry crawled over the wall to them. Bent’s face rose, terrified.
‘He’s dead,’ the DS said, a wobble in his voice.
Henry bounced down on to his haunches. Costain had been wearing a white tee shirt, now soaked in blood. Amazingly, the cigarette was still wedged at the corner of his mouth, bent double but still lit, smoke rising from it. Henry removed it.
‘Are you all right?’ he asked Bent, who nodded.
Then Henry stood up and looked over the garden wall for Mark.
But the teenager wasn’t there.
ELEVEN
‘ Yeah, yeah, I’m OK, Don.’ Karl Donaldson paced the hotel balcony, his phone to his ear as he spoke to Don Barber, his boss. ‘We musta surprised each other. I don’t think he was expecting me and I got lucky and managed to trap him behind the hotel room door… yeah, an empty room opposite… no problem for a professional to get into… hmm, he’s been a busy guy, first Fazil, then the cop, then me. I just got lucky, as I said.’ Donaldson paused and listened. ‘Yeah, the locals have got cops crawling everywhere, but I doubt if we’ll see him again. No, I didn’t get a look and no he didn’t utter a word…’ He looked out across the harbour, breathed in the warm night air. ‘There’s two cops outside in the corridor now, so I’ll be fine… Yeah, still returning to the UK tomorrow, at least that’s my plan… No, I’ll do it, don’t send anyone else. I’ll liaise with the SIO up there… Yeah, the witness to Petrone’s murder intrigues me. I’ve no doubt there’ll be some connection with what’s going on here… OK, Don, see ya pal.’ He ended the call, breathed out, massaged his temples and mentally worked thorough his injuries. His head still had a lump on it the size of an egg and it throbbed, but the skin wasn’t cut. His nose had stopped bleeding and wasn’t broken, thank God. Other than that, just minor cuts and grazes. It could have been far worse. He’d left sports fields with nastier injuries.
‘I need some of that.’ He spun quickly. A very pale and shaken neighbour was standing unsteadily on the adjacent balcony. ‘Something to ease the pressure.’ She rubbed her own temples. ‘You know what I mean?’
He gave a short laugh and realized that the incident had had quite the opposite effect on the woman than Donaldson had anticipated. Instead of wanting to get away from him, she needed comforting, to feel protected, to be wrapped up in someone’s arms.
Donaldson had been about to phone Karen, but decided he needed something more immediate than the voice of his wife a time zone away, as harsh as that might seem.
He nodded. ‘There’s a helluva big bath in my room,’ he said, ‘and I don’t know about you, but I need a long, hot soak, maybe accompanied by a glass of whisky. Maybe accompanied by you, too.’
Her eyes came alive.
He moved across and helped her to negotiate the frosted glass panel that divided the two balconies. She fell into his arms with a little squeak and a gasp as he caught her and pulled her to his chest. Her chin rested on his wide body and her eyes danced at him. She hugged him tight and his senses responded instantly with a surge of blood. She moaned as he bent to kiss her, then picked her up. She was light, easy to carry. He took her through to the bedroom and laid her gently on the unmade bed.
The soak, he thought, would have to wait. He tore off his tee shirt, and she unbuckled his belt skilfully and released him.
And in that different time zone, two hours behind Maltese time, Henry Christie, Senior Investigating Officer, was coordinating a third murder investigation with the help of the Force helicopter, Armed Response Vehicles, uniformed patrols, and trying to placate an irate wife.
‘Look, honey, I’m really, really, really sorry…’ The line went dead. He almost chucked the phone against the wall and he made a strangling motion with his hands, tightening on something.
‘Henry,’ came a commanding voice. At that moment Henry was facing the back wall of the office in the MIR. He spun to see the somewhat bedraggled figure of Lancashire Constabulary’s chief constable filling the door widthways. Bobby Big-nuts, no less.
Grim faced, Henry greeted him. ‘Boss.’
‘You lost the witness,’ FB accused him. His opening gambits were often confrontational and without preamble.
Henry could not stop himself glaring. ‘At least he’s still alive, and if he’s still alive we have a good chance of bottoming this mess.’
‘Mess being the operative word.’
Henry continued to glare.
‘It looks like time we brought in New Scotland Yard,’ FB teased him. The myth of bringing in ‘the Yard’ to help solve cases was just that. A myth perpetuated by second rate forties and fifties B-movies, but it cut like a dagger into Henry. ‘Maybe this thing’s beyond you,’ FB went on nastily.
‘Not long ago you were telling me I had to miss my holiday,’ Henry started to fume, the Scotland Yard jibe really annoying him.
‘That was before you got some poor bastard killed, even though the guy is no great loss to humanity.’
Henry ground his teeth. He was feeling just a little bit delicate. He could feel his head starting to shake as he spoke. ‘Let me tell you what we’re dealing with here, Bob. A hit man, or men, have taken out a Mafia godfather who was lying low on our patch. These killers have then murdered someone who witnessed their crime, and now they’ve tried to do the same to a second witness and in the crossfire have killed an innocent man, great loss to humanity or not. At the same time they almost killed me, one of my officers and the second witness. I — we — are lucky to be alive.’ Henry’s whole being churned at the words. He shook as he spoke. ‘These are ruthless killers who will stop at nothing to remain free because they are frightened of being identified.’
‘You still want to go on holiday?’
‘Actually going on holiday sounds like a damned good option at this moment. And until some bastard took a pot shot at me, I would have gone away, believe me, Bob, I would’ve, whatever you said. But not now. Now it’s stepped up a notch… and if you’ll just excuse me.’ He stood up and barged past the astonished chief, rushed into the corridor and headed to the nearest gents, where the combination of fear and anger bubbled up and made him throw up into a washbasin.
‘Oh hell’s teeth,’ he said, looking at himself in the mirror over the washbasin after he’d emptied his guts. He washed away the vomit, then splashed his drained, exhausted face, and tried to get a measure of control over himself. He leaned on the basin with both hands and stared at his reflection, not liking what he saw. The harsh light in the gents made him look old and haggard. And afraid. He swore again.
