Stratton could not see Ardian among the group and his stare focused on Skender again as if he was compelled to look at him. The group exuded an unmistakable malevolence as tangible as the drab, solid walls of the stairway.
As the corridor emptied, Skender’s lead bodyguards, large and fearsome-looking, continued on their way down the stairs. Stratton moved to the wall to let them pass. This was not enough for the lead bodyguard who reached out a hand to push him down.
‘Get outta the way,’ the thug said as he took hold of Stratton’s jacket at the shoulder.
The blood quickly rose in Stratton and he held his position. The bodyguard grimaced at the insolence and responded by putting more weight behind his shove. But he was unprepared for the reaction that this provoked. Stratton stepped back to make the bodyguard straighten his arm while at the same time taking hold of the bruiser’s wrist. As the bodyguard overreached, Stratton twisted his wrist with sudden force, jerking the arm forward and then slamming the palm of his other hand up against the elbow joint, almost breaking it. The bodyguard yelped as his knees automatically gave out and he dropped the last step, his two hundred and fifty pounds flattening his face against the concrete floor. His lips split open.
Two more bodyguards instantly grabbed Stratton who released the first one’s wrist and went limp as the others slammed him back against the wall, their hands reaching inside his jacket to frisk him. He could not take them all on and had no intention of trying. Though it had not been the wisest course of action to take down the first bodyguard he had been unable to help himself. The sight of these men, knowing of their callous contempt for others as well as their brutal history, had filled him with hatred.
‘He’s clean,’ one of the thugs said. Cano stepped close, their noses inches apart as the rest of the group headed down the corridor.
‘Cano!’ a man’s voice called out from the hall. ‘Take your wolves and join the rest of your pack.’ The man spoke with some authority. He was in plain clothes and was one of the party escorting the Latino prisoner. Judging by his age, bearing and authoritative voice, he was a senior officer of some kind.
Cano ignored the man who closed in, not intimidated by the group.
‘Move on,’ the man said, a more threatening tone entering his voice ‘Now – or I’ll personally charge you with disturbing the peace,’ he added.
‘How you doing, Agent Hobart?’ Cano said.
‘I won’t ask again,’ Hobart said. He was an intelligent-looking Anglo-Saxon with greying hair. In his late forties, he had a degree of refinement about him.
‘He assaulted one of my men,’ Cano growled coldly as the bodyguard got painfully to his feet, holding his sore elbow, blood trickling down his chin.
‘Looked like self-defence to me,’ Hobart said. ‘What do you think, Hendrickson?’
A younger man, also in plain clothes, stepped in behind his boss. ‘That’s exactly how it was, sir.’
Cano’s face broke into a thin smile. Then he stepped back and nodded to his men. They released Stratton. ‘One a’ these days, Hobart …’
‘Cano,’ a strange-sounding, gravelly voice interrupted. It was Skender, who was standing with the rest of his people at the entrance. His gaze moved from Cano to Hobart, and he smiled slightly and nodded. Hobart did not respond.
Cano stared into Stratton’s eyes long enough to relay an instant hatred. Then, like a well-trained Rottweiler, he turned around and joined the rest of the group as they left the building.
Seconds later the hall was practically empty.
‘Who are you?’ Hobart asked Stratton none too politely.
‘I was on my way to see the DA—’
‘Then get going,’ Hobart said, interrupting Stratton. The lawman walked away with Hendrickson. ‘Damn it! Why wasn’t I told that Skender was going to be here today?’ he demanded.
Stratton remained on the steps for a moment to adjust his clothes and loosen the tension in his neck. So that was Cano and Skender, he mused. They were indeed a fearsome group and he was confident that had the incident taken place in a less public place it might have had a different ending for him. It served as a warning to respect the dangers they represented.
He headed up the steps to the next floor where the DA’s office was signposted at the end of the corridor. After waiting half an hour he was eventually told by a secretary who showed little interest in what he had to say to come back the following day. She added that he should bring a lawyer with him.
Stratton walked back down the stairs feeling sure that he would achieve nothing unless he could fund some massive legal representation privately. He stepped out into the bright sunlight and headed away from the court buildings.
As he tried to think of other peaceful ways of resolving the situation he found himself leaning more and more towards walking away from the whole thing. But as soon as he contemplated the possibility voices in his head hounded him, accusing him of deserting his friends. He fought back by telling himself that he was not yet abandoning them. Stratton felt he was going mad as his mind was dragged first one way then the other, loyalty pitted against common sense, duty towards friends against self-preservation.
As he crossed the road he knew that he was on the verge of turning his back on Jack and Sally. He was unaware of the black Mercedes stretch limousine with dark-tinted windows that drove slowly out of the police department parking lot and pulled onto the main road behind him.
Stratton cut down Second Street, passing a McDonald’s on his left. Feeling hungry, he decided that right then junk food seemed okay to him. The famous fast-food establishment was quiet inside and after ordering a hamburger, some fries and a soda he considered eating the meal in the restaurant. But after a quick scan of the other customers, namely two overweight families and their children on one side scarfing down a feast that would sustain a small village in the Sudan for several days and a filthy bum eating like a pig on the other, he elected to eat while he walked. A stroll along the front might help to clear his head, he thought, and he headed for the entrance.
As Stratton walked outside two large men in Hawaiian shirts stepped from either side of the door and followed him. He glanced over his shoulder and slowed to face them, recognising them as two of Skender’s bodyguards from the courthouse. He prepared himself for an attack.
But instead of moving in on him they stopped at a safe distance, eyeing him warily. They had seen the ease with which he had taken down their friend and although they felt confident in their ability to crush him they were cautious.
‘The boss vants to speak to you,’ one of them grunted in a heavy accent, jutting his chin past Stratton.
Stratton looked over his shoulder at the black stretch limousine, the only vehicle on the far side of the large car park. His mind raced as he considered various evasive-action options. This was obviously to do with the bodyguard he had felled since Skender and his men could not possibly know of his interest in Sally’s killers.
‘What does he want?’ Stratton asked.
‘You should ask him,’ the thug said, taking a step forward.
‘Maybe some other time,’ Stratton said as he stepped back and headed off across the car park. Another thug appeared in front of him and he stopped to look around. Another goon was behind him and a fifth, a fat one, climbed out of the limousine and put his hand inside his jacket as if he had a weapon concealed there. Stratton reviewed his options which were limited to making a run for it.
The original pair closed in and halted a yard away from him. ‘You can do this the easy way or the hard way,’ the first thug said, pulling back his jacket to reveal a semi-automatic pistol in his belt. ‘Don’t matter to me. Boss didn’t say you had to walk to the car yourself.’
Stratton wondered if these people were genuinely fearless of using guns in public but he was not curious enough to find out.
‘You can eat your lunch in the car,’ the thug said.
Stratton accepted that the situation was out of his hands, for the time being at least. He faced the limousine and walked towards it.
He reached the vehicle where the fat thug standing outside it looked him up and down before beckoning him closer. Stratton took another step forward.
‘Raise your arms,’ the man ordered.
Stratton obeyed, holding his meal in one hand and the drink in the other while the man frisked the length of
