As his eyes became accustomed to the darkness in the kitchen, Campbell moved to the fridge searching for the card. He found a phone bill, a supermarket discount voucher and a postcard that his parents had sent him several months before from Italy. No card.
‘Shit,’ he hissed.
She didn’t ask what was up. She didn’t need to.
For a second, the thought occurred to him that someone had been here and taken it but then he remembered suddenly that he had had it in his hand when last he was in the flat after having given Slater the slip at Liverpool Street. He had sat on his bed staring at it, trying to decide whether to call or not but deciding quickly against it before packing his bag and leaving. It would be on the bedside unit in his bedroom.
‘Wait here a sec,’ Campbell told her and moved through into the lit hallway — the light here left on by them on their return as a marker for Gresham to come and find the note that they had left. In his bedroom he dared not flick on the light, mindful that they might be sitting outside waiting for some sign. He found the card where he had left it and turned quickly, suddenly filled with an urgency to get away from the flat now they had what they had come for. Just then, more light spilled in through the doorway from the hall and it hit him almost physically. He froze. That must be the kitchen.
Sarah and Slater faced each other across the space of the room, his bulk filling the doorframe. The light had startled her but she had seen, in the split second before it flicked on, that the huge, broad shape looming in the doorway was not the one she had expected. He was tall, thick-necked and fierce looking and he stared at her with a mixture of anger and confusion. She was obviously not who he had expected to see.
Come to think of it, where was Daniel? It was less than a minute that he had been gone, tip-toeing through the door.
Slater nodded at her. ‘Now this is interesting isn’t it?’
She didn’t reply because she had no idea what he meant, except perhaps to scare her, and also because he was already scaring her. There was a spark behind his narrowed eyes that was as unsettling as the sight of him.
‘And who might you be?’ Slater asked. ‘Creeping around in the dark? Don’t you ring the bell like normal people?’
Sarah paused for a minute, unsure what to say. It struck her suddenly, crazily, that this man might actually live here, that Campbell had somehow tricked her. Slater took a step forward.
‘She got fucking invited in.’
Campbell was not actually visible, obscured by the size of the big man in the doorway, but she could just make out a flash of movement rushing across the hallway as Slater turned, and a huge ceramic plant pot came crashing down against his temple.
The massive frame of Slater came sprawling back across the kitchen toward her, his legs buckling immediately as he lost consciousness. He fell and his back crunched heavily into the sideboard before he slumped the floor, knocking plates from the side as he went. Sarah had jumped backwards to avoid him and she stood shocked at the sight of him on the floor, an enormous red gash running from his temple across his cheek.
Campbell stepped over the prone figure and grabbed Sarah’s hand. ‘I really hate that prick.’
‘Daniel,’ she said, pointing to the wound which was now bleeding freely. ‘What…?’
He shrugged and dragged her quickly through the back door again. ‘Owed him that.’
He almost walked into the man that was standing there waiting for him.
52
Tuesday. 12.35am.
The air outside was bitingly cold and Drennan and Tyler both had their overcoats buttoned to the neck. Tyler pulled a pair of gloves from his pocket and slipped them on after they had been sitting for an hour.
The leafy tree-lined street looked peaceful in the still evening and the lights burning softly behind drawn curtains gave it a safe, suburban feel. Drennan eyed the expensive cars along either side of the road, the litter free pavements, the well tended hedges.
They sat in silence for a spell, shifting occasionally in their seats and trying not to allow themselves to become distracted from watching Campbell’s flat or the street around them for signs of his return.
Soon Tyler was fighting off sleep as he sat and waited in the cold. His eyes grew tired and heavy and his head began to sag against his shoulder. Occasionally he had to blink his eyes open as he felt himself dropping off.
Suddenly a car swept noisily past them down the road and drew to a sudden halt up ahead, the tires squealing on the road. Tyler was sharply awake and trying to take things in as he sat up in the seat.
‘What the fuck is this?’ hissed Drennan as he sat forward and grabbed for the ignition.
Up ahead the driver side door of the car swung open and a tall, solid figure stepped out and jogged around to the rear door on the other side, pulling it open.
From the gap in the hedge in front of Campbell’s flat several figures emerged, a man and a woman in front as far as Drennan could see, both being manhandled by another two figures who pushed them roughly toward the open door.
As they bent toward the car the light from inside lit their faces briefly.
‘Shit. That’s him.’ said Drennan.
‘Yeah, but who the fuck are the rest of them?’
The driver had leapt back into the car and as one of the other two figures followed Campbell and Sarah into the back seat and the other man took the front, the car roared to life and sped away.
‘I think we ought to find out,’ said Drennan starting the car and pulling out after them.
53
Tuesday. 1.15am.
Gresham had not been lying about his kidnapped daughter and the evidence was sitting in front of him now looking tired, scared and unkempt, like she hadn’t slept or eaten or washed in days.
Even so he recognised her.
Campbell’s eyes met with hers and through the fear in her expression he could see defiance too, a strength that Campbell did not feel he could match. He was terrified.
He and Sarah were both standing, hands bound, in a small room lit with a naked lightbulb. The snot green paint on the walls was flaking and stained and a pair of long navy curtains hung loosely in the window.
In front of them stood a tall, slender man with short dark hair swept sharply across his scalp and parted at the side with almost geometric precision. His nose was thin and pointed and his eyes were small and intense as he stared at them drawing deeply on a cigarette. Nobody spoke.
On the floor in the corner sat the girl that Campbell had last seen pleading with him on his doorstep to let her in so she could get rid of the man that had started following her. A lie of course, which had led to Slater bustling through the door and dragging him off to meet Gresham.
This was Angie then.
Slowly and with a menacing assurance the tall man straightened up from where he had been resting against the wall and walked towards Campbell, stopping only when he was inches away from him and he could feel the heat of the burning cigarette near his face. The smoke wafted into his eyes and his eyelids instinctively blinked it away.
And this must be the very unpleasant man George had told him about. Frank Walker.
‘I won’t insult anybody,’ started the man looking from Campbell to Sarah where his gaze lingered, ‘by pretending that we don’t all know what this is about.'
Campbell tried not to break eye contact, failed.
‘Angela tells me that you have something worth a lot of money my friend,’ he continued as his eyes drifted back to Campbell and fixed on him. ‘You are going to give it to me.’
Christ, thought Campbell, who the hell else knows about this now?
Walker continued to stare into his eyes and slowly lifted the cigarette from his mouth, exhaled through his nose and then replaced it.