Everything he did was outside of the law.
But everything he did was for a reason.
While the police were busy trying to bring him to justice, he was rattling cages and fighting his way to a young girl whose life was about to thrown into a blender. A time would come, Sam thought, when he would face the music and pay for the crimes he had committed.
But not yet.
Not while people still needed him.
He had driven from Farnham to Tilbury in Essex, passing through Guildford and Ockham until he joined the M25. The ring of death that circled the capitol like a cramped, concrete moat was delightfully quiet at three in the morning and Sam had travelled the seventy plus miles in just over an hour. The Port of Tilbury was one of the few working ports in the UK, along with Felixstowe in Suffolk and Southampton in Hampshire. With the Thames running through it, it allowed for a number of ‘authorised’ shipments to venture down from the capital. Sam was certain that Jasmine would be here, locked away in a steel prison, trapped in the dark with nothing but fear to keep her company.
The rain was relentless as he’d stepped from the driver’s seat, dumping the car outside of the gated entrance and doing his best to peer through the fence. A labyrinth of metal, corrugated containers were stacked high and irregularly. While to the dock workers themselves there was a knowledge and routine, to the outside eye there was no discernible system.
Blue crates stacked on red crates. Four to one pile. Six to another. This continued over the seven kilometres of the quay that comprised the port, all of it under the metallic arms of several cranes and winches.
Sam was looking for a needle in a haystack.
After a few moments of peering through the gate, Sam noticed a security guard rounding one of the crates and he stepped away from the gate, before looking around the surrounding areas. A large radio tower stood next to the port, long since abandoned and covered in graffiti tags and wooden boards. Sam eventually made his way inside and climbed to the top floor, his mind racing back to the evening this all began.
Him lying in a derelict building, aiming a rifle into a room full of criminals.
Now, as Sam pulled the car into a parking space at the far end of the road, he began to wonder exactly what would happen if he couldn’t find Jasmine.
Aaron was relying on him to bring his daughter home. He had killed three men, wounded over a dozen more, and tortured a man to near death. He had gone to war with police and left a number of them in the hospital.
The entire country was looking for him.
He was public enemy number one.
It would all have been for nothing.
He scolded himself for even thinking it. If there was even a half per cent chance he would be able to bring Jasmine home, then he would do it all again. If he ended up facing a lifetime behind bars or the barrel of a gun, then so be it. As long as there was a breath in his body big enough to push him forward into the fight, then he would gladly go.
He would fight. Until there was nothing left.
Sam pushed open the gate to Aaron’s house and froze on the spot. Aaron was sat on the steps, soaked through and with a bottle of whisky in his hand.
In the other was a gun.
Sam slowly stepped forward, one hand out protectively, trying to gauge the mindset of a desperate father who had clearly reached breaking point. As he stepped closer, Aaron lifted his head, his hair drenched and his eyes red through crying.
‘Sam.’ His voice was slow and slurred. ‘It’s about time.’
‘Aaron.’ Sam stepped forward carefully. ‘Give me the gun.’
‘I need to show you something,’ Aaron spoke joyfully, the alcohol clearly behind the wheel. He pushed himself to his feet. ‘I need you to do something for me.’
‘Let’s just go inside.’
‘No,’ Aaron snapped, pointing the gun towards Sam. ‘It’s in the garage.’
‘Garage?’ Sam asked, alarmed. Aaron stumbled off the steps and towards the garage door. ‘Aaron. What have you done?’
Without a response, Aaron lifted the metal door and woozily stepped into the darkness. Sam quickly followed, stepping in just as the lights pinged on and the door behind him began to close. As he adjusted his sight from the immediate blast of brightness, Sam saw the shape of a car. It was a newer model, with a logo of a rental company on a faded sticker stuck to the inside of the windscreen. Aaron shifted around the vehicle, pressing himself against the wall for support. As he reached the boot of the car, the garage door connected with the concrete, shutting them in.
‘I’ve got him,’ Aaron said, his words slurring like snakes coiling around each other.
‘Who?’
‘Him. The one who took my daughter.’
Sam took a few steps further, confused, his eyes locked on the weapon in the drunken man’s hands. As he got to the rear of the car, Aaron stepped back, raising the gun once more.
‘Open it.’
Sam kept his eyes on Aaron, watching as he took another excited swig from the bottle of whisky, a trickle dribbling down his chin. Sam searched beneath the logo for the latch, clicked it and lifted the boot. Sam soon realised that Aaron hadn’t just reached the edge.
He had gone over it.
‘What the hell have you done?’ Sam asked once again, taking a step backwards. Lying in the boot of the car was a black, teenage boy. A horrible gash was pumping fresh blood over his blindfold and a gag was wrenched into his
