His left shin collided with something solid and he stumbled forward, his momentum driving him down onto the soggy floor. Something metallic snagged on his foot and whipped around, falling on top of him.
The old trolley!
He clumsily kicked it aside and struggled back to his feet, his leg throbbing, his face and hands covered with dirt and slime. “Why is nothing ever easy?” he complained bitterly. Ignoring the pulsating pain in his hands, he brushed himself down and continued to jog, knowing there was every chance he’d take another tumble and not giving a fuck.
He reached the bend in the tunnel and followed it around to the right. About fifty feet ahead there was a tiny glow of light. As he got nearer, he realised that the light was coming from the other side of another set of double doors, similar to the ones he had entered the tunnel by. Only they appeared to be made of metal, not rubber. Each of the doors had a small glass panel, about a foot square, set into it at head height. It was through these windows that he could see the thin beam of light dancing around on the other side.
It could only be the killer.
Tyler bunched his fists and immediately cringed at the searing pain from his burns. “I’m coming for you, you bastard,” he growled.
◆◆◆
Pritchard was battered, bruised and bleeding, and it was all Jack Tyler’s fault. His face and groin were in excruciating pain; every muscle in his body ached from the fall, and a deep gouge ran the length of his left forearm, where he’d caught it on a sharp piece of wood that jutted out of one of the bins he’d landed on. He’d be lucky not to end up with Septicaemia.
He shone the torch around, looking for something he’d seen on his first trip to the underground storage area, when he’d searched the building earlier.
There was no time to lose. Tyler wasn’t far behind, and although he’d heard the good Inspector take a fall in the tunnel behind – the killer hoped he’d broken his neck in the process – he couldn’t count on that, or anything else, stopping Tyler for long. The detective was too stupid and too stubborn to know when enough was enough.
An insidious thought had occurred to him after the fall, as he lay stunned on the floor, surrounded by a whirlpool of dust. It was one of those rare moments of undiluted insight that could only be described as inspirational – like the moment he’d decided to let Terri Miller listen to him torturing Sarah.
Tyler had become a thorn in his side, turning up unexpectedly, thwarting his plans, ruining the sacrificial timetable and – most importantly – spoiling his fun. Two whores, both equally undeserving of life, were still breathing thanks to Jack bloody Tyler – and one of them was the third bitch who was responsible for ruining his life. If she survived, she would reveal his identity to the world, and he couldn’t allow that. However, before he went back to the van to finish her off, his nemesis had to die – and The Disciple knew just how it was going to happen.
Tyler was going to go out with a very big bang.
He’d run down here, using the cloud of dust to mask his movements. It had given him the few precious seconds he’d needed. The storage room was approximately thirty-foot square with a low ceiling. It was cluttered with old equipment, including two acetylene cylinders sitting on a welder’s trolley, an assortment of rusted tools and stacks of general rubbish.
He’d entered through a metal fire-proof door, and when he was finished, he would exit through an identical door at the far end of the storage area, which led down to the loading area on the pier.
He ran the beam of light over the ceiling, which was covered with a series of anodised black pipes, and around the circumference of the room. More pipes: grey this time. A small, old-fashioned, emergency generator, mounted on a heavy-duty trolley, sat in the corner immediately to his right, and he dragged it over to the door, to use as a barricade. Next, he knocked an old filing cabinet over and wedged it behind the generator. Breathing like an old man with chronic asthma, the Pritchard grunted with satisfaction.
That should hold Tyler for a while.
He crossed to a giant metal cylinder that was at least ten-foot long and three foot in diameter. It lay flat on the floor, parallel to the wall, facing the doors he’d come through. Two thin pipes came out of the top end, ran up the wall, and disappeared into the ceiling.
A half-dozen identical cylinders were bracketed to the wall above it, each one slightly offset from the one below. All had the same twin set of pipes leading upwards. He shone the light over the bottom cylinder until he found what he was looking for, a circular turn valve set into the furthest end. If they contained what he thought they did, he would use the cylinders to devastating effect. He would introduce Jack Tyler to Hell – and then send him there.
The Disciple scanned the cylinder for ‘Hazardous Chemical’ or ‘Flammable liquid’ warning signs. He wiped a thick layer of condensed grime away from the centre, where he thought it should be, with the sleeve of his jacket. Sure enough, he found a large diamond-shaped sticker coloured in bright red. The words ‘DANGER – HIGHLY FLAMMABLE’ were written on it in big, bold letters, and accompanied by a picture of a single flame.
If, as the killer suspected, this set up fuelled an outdated cooling system for a cold storage facility somewhere within the building above, then it probably still contained plenty of chlorofluorocarbons, which are a highly
