whoever the intruder was, he wouldn’t look down.
The intruder was inside the store cupboard now, rummaging around on the shelves, probably looking for something to eat, his booted feet only inches from Clinton’s face, the barrel of a wicked-looking rifle dangling down by the side of one leg.
Clinton desperately wanted to breathe. To breathe and to pee. Terror coursed through him as he realized that he could be just seconds from the end of his life and meeting a God he’d genuinely not expected to see for many years yet, because no one thinks this sort of thing will happen to them, do they?
Which was when Clinton felt the wetness running down his leg as his bladder finally gave way.
His eyes filled with tears as he tried to stop himself. But he couldn’t seem to manage it, and now he could hear the urine dripping on to the floor beneath him, forming a puddle that any second now was going to be discovered, because the boots were only inches away. And still he couldn’t stop himself.
The man grunted as he dropped a can of something on to the floor. It rolled towards Clinton and he reached out a finger and rolled it back out, away from the crawlspace, praying the man wouldn’t look down and see the growing puddle, or pick up the strong odour of urine that seemed to Clinton to be overwhelming.
The seconds crawled by like days in the hot, claustrophobic silence. At last, Clinton managed to stop the flow of urine, but still he didn’t dare breathe, even though his lungs were close to bursting.
Finally, the man turned and walked out of the store cupboard, carrying a case of bottled mineral water under one arm. He didn’t shut the door, allowing Clinton to catch a look at him for the first time as he placed it down on one of the worktops, and pulled one of the bottles free. He was short and squat, with a wide frog-like face peppered with acne scars. What truly scared Clinton, though, was the fact that if he could see the man, then the man could surely see him.
Feeling utterly exposed, Clinton lay still, conscious of the pooled urine on the floor beside him, at least part of which was clearly visible from outside the door.
Then he heard the kitchen door open more widely and a moment later a woman came into view, pulling off a black balaclava. Clinton could only just see her because the other man was in the way, but she was dark-haired and pretty, and wearing a surprisingly sexy black dress underneath a thick bomber jacket. She had a handgun down by her side.
The man said something in Arabic, his tone subdued, and walked over to her.
Clinton couldn’t hear the remainder of their conversation because a few seconds later the woman let out a wild animal howl that filled the room before storming into view, a hand covering her face. The man pulled her back and they continued to talk in hushed voices for several minutes more before she broke free from him and paced the room in ferocious, intense silence, while he watched her, making no move to intervene. On three separate occasions she passed just in front of the open store cupboard door, but was thankfully too preoccupied to look inside.
Finally, she stopped. ‘I want him alive,’ she hissed to the man, speaking in English for the first time. ‘And I want to be the one who slices his balls off.’
‘You shall have him, I promise you that.’
‘When?’
‘Later. There are things we need to do first.’
‘Like what?’
‘We have to release the children.’
‘That is more important than finding the man who murdered my brother? Your fellow countryman and soldier?’
‘We need to give a sign of goodwill. When we have done that, we will look for this man. Remember, this whole building will burn tonight, and he will burn with it.’
‘I want them all to burn,’ she said, walking into view and putting a manicured hand on one of the worktops. Her face was no longer pretty but set hard and merciless, and her dark eyes blazed with a terrible anger. ‘I want to kill as many of these dogs as possible.’ She was looking past the man now, right towards where Clinton was lying.
‘Something smells strange in here,’ she said, wrinkling her nose.
Clinton almost cried out with fear as he heard those words.
The man turned round, and now he too was looking straight at Clinton. He frowned. ‘It’s something in there.’
Clinton didn’t move. It was over. He was going to die here in this hot, windowless place, away from the family he loved so much.
The man was walking towards him, his rifle dangling from his arm. Getting closer and closer.
And then, in one single terrifying movement, he slammed the door shut, plunging Clinton back into welcome darkness.
Forty-two
19.05
ARLEY DALE WAS DRINKING from a huge cup of Starbucks coffee and thinking about having a cigarette. In the last few minutes, things in the mobile incident room had quietened right down, and the phones had stopped ringing. Will and Janine, the two technicians who’d also been acting as coordinators and receptionists, were still tapping away on their computers while Riz Mohammed and John Cheney were leant over another desktop going through lists of terror organizations and their various front companies, searching for anything that might provide a link to the Pan-Arab Army of God. Their body language suggested they hadn’t found anything of use yet.
So far, Arley was reasonably satisfied with the way she was handling her end of the operation. The situation was contained; there’d been no further reports of shooting in the previous half hour, or threats made by the hostage-takers; and it seemed they hadn’t noticed that the hotel’s internet access had been switched off. Riz might not have been able to make contact with Michael Prior, but Arley wasn’t so worried about that. There was no point forcing the issue and running the risk of antagonizing the terrorist who called himself Wolf. In the end, he’d call them. Like most sieges, it was a waiting game, each side hoping that the other would crack.
The orders from Commissioner Phillips, and from the Prime Minister himself, who as Platinum Commander was in overall charge of the operation, were to attempt a negotiated settlement, but they were also hedging their bets. A full squadron of SAS troops and support staff had arrived on the scene a few minutes earlier, ready to stage a rapid assault on the hotel if the situation suddenly deteriorated. They were being billeted in an office building behind the hotel that had been requisitioned by Chris Matthews, on Arley’s orders, and which was well away from the dozens of camera crews.
Arley was going to need to call the SAS leader and give him a briefing, but she decided to have that cigarette first, figuring she’d earned it. ‘Anyone fancy joining me for a smoke?’ she asked the room.
‘Sorry,’ said Will, still tapping away on his PC and pulling a face like he’d just smelled something bad. ‘I’ve never smoked.’
‘I’ve quit,’ said Janine ruefully, ‘and it was so bloody hard, I don’t dare go back to it.’
Apparently, smoking was against Riz’s religion, or so he said, and Cheney only smoked these days when he had a drink. ‘Although if things deteriorate too much I might end up doing both,’ he added, giving her one of his winning smiles, which she made a point of ignoring, so as not to give him the wrong idea.
Thinking that she really ought to quit herself, and that the youth of today were turning into lightweights, Arley went outside, walking away from the office and the police vehicles as she lit up.
In the near distance, the Stanhope rose high above the other buildings, with lights on on every floor, and Arley thanked God neither she nor her loved ones were trapped in there. She was hopeful that a Mumbai-style massacre might still be averted, particularly if negotiations continued, but even so, she couldn’t begin to imagine the terror the hostages were feeling. It was her job to get them out of the hotel safely. It was, she thought, as she took a long draw on the cigarette, a daunting responsibility.
