Warhol's Prophecy

Tears were coursing down her cheeks.

She waited for the phone to be answered.

Waited . . .

Were Becky and Rob already dead?

Waited . . .

Her daughter and her husband, both riddled with bullets?

She looked towards the open ballroom doors, expecting Walker to emerge at any minute – his weapons aimed at her.

The phone was still ringing.

Inside the ballroom the bursts of fire were replaced by an appalling silence, now broken only by screams of agony and moans of suffering.

He must be reloading yet again, she thought, her body racked by sobs.

Jesus, how much fucking ammunition did he have with him?

To Hailey it seemed as if this nightmare had been happening for hours.

Less than six minutes had actually passed since he’d fired the first shot.

‘Emergency here. Which service do you require?’ She heard the calm voice in her ear.

‘Police and ambulance,’ she said, trying to control her gasping. ‘Please hurry.’

‘Can you give me your name?’ the voice asked.

‘Help me,’ Hailey shrieked.

‘I need your name and . . .’

‘The Pavilion Hotel. For God’s sake, send someone to the Pavilion Hotel now, please,’ she begged and dropped the phone.

Inside the ballroom the shooting had begun again.

115

THREE MEMBERS OF Waterhole were already dead.

Adam Walker could see them lying on the marble floor, each in a pool of his own blood.

Nearly everyone else inside the ballroom was either dead or wounded by now . . . Apart from a small group still trying to force their way through the emergency exit at the rear.

There were corpses piled up in front of them, and the stench of blood and excrement filled the air as densely as the more pungent odour of cordite.

Walker laid the MP5 on a table and pulled the Sig-Sauer P225 from his belt.

Nicholas Barber turned to face him, his features contorted with fear and splashed by blood.

‘Please don’t kill me,’ whimpered the MP, dropping to his knees. He clasped his hands together before him in prayer. ‘Please.’ He lowered his head slightly, unable to look at the yawning barrel of the Sig.

Walker touched the automatic to his forehead, and he heard a soft rumbling sound. Barber had filled his pants.

‘Please,’ the MP sobbed.

Walker fired once.

The bullet punched in a portion of Barber’s skull, ripped through his brain, and erupted from the back of his head.

He went down like a butchered calf in an abattoir, blood spouting from the hole in his forehead, his body quivering.

Jenny Kenton was lying close by. A bullet had punctured her left eye, blasting the lens of her dark glasses back into the riven socket. Pieces of glass had been forced into the blood-filled hole. Vitreous liquid was spilling down her cheek. Another bullet had punched in two of her front teeth, and ripped away most of her top lip.

Her blonde hair was matted crimson.

Beside her, Trudi was trying to crawl away on one arm, the other having been practically severed at the elbow by a 9mm round. The shattered bone protruded whitely amidst a bleeding pulp of flesh. Another bullet had torn off her right ear: just the lobe remained attached to her head, her earring still hanging from it grotesquely.

Walker shot her in the face, and moved on.

Something crunched beneath his feet and he noticed that several teeth lay on the floor. Blown from other dead mouths by his well-placed bullets.

‘You fucking cunt!’ screamed Craig Levine, turning to face him.

Walker raised the 225 and shot him twice. One bullet entered his mouth and exited through the back of his neck, severing his spine, killing him instantly.

Ray Taylor was slumped over a table nearby, eyes open accusingly. His body had been punctured by more than a dozen shots.

Others, either wounded or hiding, knew that all they could do was wait.

Walker moved swiftly around the room, overturning tables, looking for those who sought to evade him.

He shot in the head each one he found.

As he made his way back towards the main entrance of the ballroom, he realized how hard he was finding it to breathe. The smoke in the room was now choking him too, and he was sheathed in sweat. He took a glass of mineral water from one of the tables as he passed and drained its contents, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

Hot work.

Walker heard breathing. Low, guttural, close by. To his left.

He noticed that two tables had been pushed together on their sides, as if to form some kind of rampart. A bloodied tablecloth had been drawn over the top.

Walker could see bullet holes through both the table-tops and the cloth.

He stood still, ears alert for the sound.

He heard something else: a faint whimper.

He raised the Scorpion and aimed it at the two tables. Taking hold of the cloth, Walker pulled it away and looked down.

There were two of them hiding there.

The man had been hit in the shoulder, but it looked as if the bullet had gone right through.

His companion, whom he sheltered, was unharmed.

Walker smiled. ‘I wondered where you were,’ he said quietly. ‘Hello, Becky.’

116

‘GET IT OVER with.’

Rob Gibson looked up defiantly at Walker, one arm around his daughter, the other hand clamped firmly to his shoulder. Blood was seeping through his fingers.

Walker pulled the tables aside and offered his hand to Rob to help him up.

Becky was crying softly.

‘If you’re going to kill us, then do it, you insane fucker,’ Rob snarled.

Walker lashed out with the butt of the automatic, and caught Rob across the face.

Becky grabbed at her father, clinging to his leg as he rose uncertainly, blood now running down his cheek from the new cut just below his eye.

‘Watch your language in front of your daughter, Rob,’ Walker said evenly, staring straight into his eyes.

‘At least let Becky go,’ Rob offered.

‘You want to stay with your dad, don’t you?’ Walker said, smiling.

Becky looked up at him with swollen red eyes. She sniffed back tears.

‘You bastard,’ rasped Rob.

Walker struck him again. A blow that cracked two of Rob’s front teeth and sent him reeling backwards.

‘I warned you about your language,’ Walker hissed, pointing the automatic.