After a minute or so, Roger’s breathing returned to some semblance of normality. He used one hand to push himself up into a sitting position, rubbing at his throat with the other and eyeing me warily. I made sure I was standing with my back to the lights.
“So, what’s this all about, Roger?” I asked, surprised that I could put the question without rancour.
He shook his head. “You wouldn’t understand,” he said and, while his face was sour, there was the faintest trace of fear, like an underlying thread.
“Try me.”
He gave me a look that would have been taken off him if he’d tried to go into a nightclub wearing it, and remained pigheadedly silent.
I squatted so my eyes were on his level. He met my gaze cursorily, then slid his own away. “I think it’s you who doesn’t understand the shit you’re in, Rog,” I said lightly. “In fact, you’re in it so deep you need a snorkel.”
I was rewarded with a sneer.
“This isn’t just aggravated burglary any more, Roger,” I said, speaking slowly and keeping my voice neutral. “This is serious. You can’t claim this was accidental, or it wasn’t you. This is full-on premeditated attempted murder.”
I let that one settle for a moment. “Attempted murder,” I repeated, pressing on without mercy, refusing to let myself weaken, “is an adult crime, Rog, and you’ll be dealt with in an adult court. Left to rot away your youth in an adult hell-hole.”
The fright jumped, full-fledged, in his eyes, in his face. “I can’t!” he cried, suddenly very much a child.
“Oh you can,” I said, “and you will. You’ve gone way beyond the limits of teenage rebellion this time. What do you think O’Bryan’s going to do about that?”
I glanced at him then, wanting to see how he was taking the information on board. He looked stricken. Tormented. I suppose I should have been pleased, but it wasn’t much of a victory.
Roger opened his mouth to reply, but before he could speak we heard it, and it stopped both of us stone cold in our tracks.
A single gunshot.
The echo of it rolled over and round us, stark and uncompromising. I froze, straining for additional sounds, but there was nothing.
Silence.
There were no further shots fired. No angry protests. No agonised screams. No evidence of continued pursuit, either, which could have meant Nasir had simply missed.
Or it could have meant that Sean was dead.
My mouth dried instantly as my system shut down unnecessary functions, like the production of saliva. My heartrate had accelerated faster than a top fuel dragster. The shaft of panic that arrowed through me was quite dazzling in its intensity.
There was a time when I’d come damned close to praying for Sean Meyer’s death. But not like this.
Oh no. If anyone was going to kill him, I’d wanted it to be me.
With half my brain numbed into insensibility by the picture my imagination had painted, I’m almost surprised it took Roger so long to take advantage.
I caught the faintest glimmer of colour and movement from the corner of my eye, then his lashing foot connected hard with the underside of my chin and it was my turn to go pitching raggedly onto my backside among the brickwork.
By the time I’d laboured to my feet, I took one look at Roger’s dim figure disappearing into the darkness on the other side of the site, and ruefully gave up any idea of the chase.
I put a hand up to my tender jaw, wriggling it experimentally a few times, but there was no permanent damage. Still, as an object lesson in what happens when you’re stupid enough to take your eye off the ball, I suppose it could have been a lot worse.
***
When I got back to the gym, I found Sean leaning on the front wing of the Cherokee, waiting for me. He looked very much alive and kicking. I ran through a track-list of emotions about that, most of which I didn’t care to put names to.
He straightened up as soon as he saw me, instantly alert like a cat, and lamentably unruffled by events. “You OK?”
I bit back an angry retort about why should he care, and nodded. “You?”
“Yeah.” He’d seen, of course, that I was alone and gave me a lopsided smile that suddenly took ten years off his harsh features. “And Roger?” he asked.
“Long gone, I’m afraid,” I said shortly, half-heartedly batting some of the brickdust and extinguisher powder from my jogging pants. It was a losing battle. “What about Nasir?”
“The other kid? Likewise,” he said wryly. “He freed the blockage and his aim seemed to be getting better with practise. I came down strongly in favour of tactical retreat.”
I shrugged and walked past him, wanting to check on the external cabinet that housed the electricity meter, which was on the front of the building. Even without benefit of a torch I could clearly see that the cover was hanging off and the main circuit breaker had been thrown.
“They knew just where to look,” Sean commented quietly from behind me.
“Hardly surprising,” I pointed out, without turning round, “seeing as how Nasir’s an electrician.”
“Who was he, the other kid?”
“Nasir Gadatra. He’s the son of my next-door neighbour,” I filled in. “He and your baby brother seem to be big mates.”
Sean didn’t answer, so I clicked the power on again and the fluorescent tubes inside the gym vibrated back into life. We went in to survey the damage. I was expecting it to be bad, and I wasn’t destined to be disappointed.
The now-defunct extinguisher lay on its side on the floor at the epicentre of a sea of the pinkish white powder. The stuff had coated the carpet in the immediate area so thick you couldn’t tell the original colour of the weave. It had blasted up onto the walls too, and layered round the machinery like dust in an old abandoned crypt.
We left trails of footprints as we moved into the main gym area. I noticed that the weight I’d chucked at the boys had splintered part of the wood panelling that Attila had used to line the lower half of the brick walls. I swore under my breath.
Sean bent and picked up the extinguisher. “This your idea?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I admitted. “It seemed like a good one at the time. No doubt I’ll have to get the damn thing refilled.”
“I wouldn’t bother,” Sean said, and something in his voice made me turn. He was staring at the cylinder in his hands. When I looked, I saw a big raw gouge out of the side, slicing through the paint like skin to the metal underneath. “You were lucky, Charlie,” he said, voice sober. “The round glanced off it rather than penetrated the steel. If this thing had gone up it would have taken your arms off.”
No, I thought, I had it on my shoulder at the time. It would have blown my damned head off instead . . .
I swallowed and didn’t comment on that one. There wasn’t a whole hell of a lot I could say. But my legs suddenly felt a lot less steady than they had done, before Sean had pointed it out.
I glanced round, pulling a face, distracting myself with the practical. “I suppose I’d better call the police,” I said wearily.
“No.”
The denial was too instant, too emphatic. It stilled me, brought my head up. Sean put the extinguisher down, moved in. I had to fight the temptation not to back away from him. I remembered what had happened the last time I’d let him get too close, even after four years. God, he even smelt the same.
“I don’t suppose you’d mind telling me why the hell I shouldn’t?” I inquired, my voice low with resentment.
I had to tilt my head up to meet his eyes. Liquid black eyes, deep enough to drown in. “He may be your kid brother, but he and his mate have just tried to kill me. That’s not something you can just sweet-talk your way out of, you know.”