Lockdown

‘That’s all we came to say, really.’

‘Thank you.’

They started back to the door.

‘Wait,’ she said, moving from behind the counter. ‘My father thought you were a hero. You know we’d been robbed once before. And people did nothing. Just stood there and watched it happen.’

‘Have the police said anything about the men who broke in?’

‘They’ve asked about the people who were doing the protests down the street.’

‘That figures.’

‘Why?’ she asked.

‘Doesn’t matter. When the shooters came in, what did they say?’

‘They didn’t say anything.’

‘Nothing at all? Not even “get down” or “don’t move”?’

‘They gave us each a note.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Instructions on a piece of paper. The one they gave my father was in Korean.’

Lock felt suddenly wide awake. Ty, who had picked up a newspaper to kill time, put it back on the rack.

‘And what did it say?’

‘Just told us what to do.’

‘And the notes were definitely written out in Korean?’

‘And English. Yes.’

‘Did you tell the police this?’

‘Of course.’

‘And what did they say?’

‘Nothing. Why?’

‘Did you give them the notes?’

‘The men didn’t leave them behind.’

Lock looked at Ty, both thinking the same thing. They told her again how sorry they were to hear about her father’s passing and left.

A civilian cop wouldn’t have made the connection. To him or her it would just have been a neat trick, perhaps a way of making sure that the victim didn’t pick out an accent. But to Lock and Ty the written instructions meant something else. Something heavy.

In Iraq, when military patrols conducted raids on houses where they didn’t have access to a local interpreter, they used cards written out in all the local dialects. They relied on the fact that the Iraqi population was an educated one, and that although literacy levels were high, it wasn’t guaranteed that people could speak English. They also knew that a failure to understand instructions led to misunderstanding, and misunderstandings led to death. So the cards were brought in.

Lock felt a jolt of adrenalin. Whoever had taken over the store had been military, or ex-military.

Speed-walking along the sidewalk, they made it to the entrance of the Meditech building in under a minute. They spoke only once they’d reached the elevator.

‘Cody Parker have any service?’

‘Don’t think so.’

‘Don Stokes?’

‘Are you shitting me? With that kid’s attitude he’d last about two seconds.’

Brand was sitting behind a desk as they filtered into the makeshift ops room. Above Brand’s head a huge poster-size blowup of Josh Hulme gazed down on them.

Brand pushed back his chair, put his hands behind his head. ‘The wanderers return.’

Lock leaned over the desk so his face was inches from Brand’s. ‘Where’s Hulme?’

‘Safe.’

Lock took a step back, lifted his boot and used it to roll back Brand’s chair into the wall. ‘I said where, not how.’

‘I know what you said, Lock. But while you’ve been trawling the titty bars of the five boroughs for fresh skank, the situation’s moved on. He’s up at the Bay, if you must know.’

‘Brand, cut the shit. What’s going on?’

‘Relax, it’s all being taken care of.’

‘I’m in charge here, and you know it. When things happen, I need to be told.’

‘Correction. You were in charge.’

Brand stood up and picked up two white business envelopes from the desk. One was addressed to Lock, the other to Ty. He passed them over.

Lock ripped his open. The single line in bold upper case beneath the letterhead left no room for interpretation: NOTICE OF TERMINATION.

Thirty-eight

Stafford stood on the deck of the family’s Shinnecock Bay compound, phone in hand. Ten thousand square feet of property porn with nothing between it and Europe, save the Atlantic. New money fronting the old world.

He ended the call and turned to the two men standing behind him. One was his father, the second Richard Hulme. ‘It’s agreed,’ he said.

Richard’s shoulders slumped, gravity seeming to return to normal for him. ‘Tell me he’s OK. Tell me my son’s safe.’

‘He’s fine, Richard.’

‘So when can we-’

‘If everything goes smoothly, this’ll all be over in less than twenty-four hours.’

Richard nodded to himself, desperate to believe this, as Stafford knew he would be.

Nicholas Van Straten walked to the edge of the deck, arms still folded. ‘How much?’

‘Three million.’

Nicholas’s eyes narrowed as he stared beyond the swimming pool beneath them to the ocean. ‘A small price to pay.’

‘Especially when we have someone else picking up most of the tab,’ added Stafford.

‘Richard, would you allow me a moment with my son?’

‘Of course.’

Nicholas waited until Richard was out of sight.

‘Well done, Stafford.’

It was the first unqualified piece of praise Stafford could recall his father ever giving him. Even as a child, any compliment had always been tempered by an immediate addendum that while he’d done well it was the least that could be expected given the advantages of his birth.

He wanted to savour it. But all he felt was resentment.

‘Thank you, sir.’

‘Perhaps I should have involved you earlier.’

‘Perhaps you should have.’

And then it came, the ubiquitous qualification: ‘Let’s just hope the handover goes smoothly, shall we?’

Thirty-nine

The room snapped to darkness. Josh felt his way on his hands and knees over to the TV set and pushed the