Hobart suddenly felt a pang of unease in his core as Skender moved into his space, looking more dangerous than he’d ever seen him before. Everything he knew about the man, his history of violence since his youth, appeared to be written on his face. He suddenly felt uncomfortable being this close to it.
‘So what was this line I crossed?’ Skender asked, his voice sounding more croaky as it got quieter.
‘Kidnapping, for one,’ Hobart said, feeling as if he might get the upper hand at this meeting if he showed Skender some purpose.
‘What are you talking about?’ Skender said, genuinely surprised. Then his suspicions flashed to Cano but he did not look at him.
‘Sally Penton’s kid,’ Hobart explained. ‘The woman your two boys killed, Leka and that moron Ardian,’ he said, deliberately staring at Cano, knowing that the man was furious but did not dare show it. ‘They’re the reason you have a bomb in your building,’ Hobart continued, looking back at Skender. ‘Come on. Don’t you know what’s going on in your own house? Maybe I should be talking to this guy. I bet he knows what’s going on. What do you say, Vleshek? Or should I say Cano, Ardian’s brother?’
Cano choked back his surprise. But at that moment he was more concerned about Skender who had thrown him a most dangerous look.
Skender was beginning to boil over inside. Had Hobart been able to see the danger he might have held back a bit. He had Skender on the run but did not know how tight was the corner that he was chasing the Albanian crime lord into.
Skender instantly believed Hobart about the kidnapping though he genuinely knew nothing about it. Nor did he know of the supposed bomb in his building but he believed that too. Cano had kept everything from him. Skender knew that Cano’s deviousness was rooted in fear as well as in the hope that he could resolve the problem on his own but matters had gone beyond that now.
‘The walls are closing in, Skender,’ Hobart said, unable to hide his satisfaction at seeing these two evil men in mental turmoil. ‘I’ve been waiting for you to drop the ball. It was only a matter of time.’
Suddenly Skender’s fist slammed into Hobart’s solar plexus under his heart, stopping it just for a second and knocking every ounce of wind out of him.
‘Time is what you ain’t got a lot of,’ Skender said. As Hobart toppled forward, grabbing his chest in pain, Skender took him by the throat with a gnarled peasant hand, pushed him upright against the central pillar and powered a fist into his side, cracking something. ‘You need to learn your place in this world, little man.’
Hobart’s legs buckled. As he went down Skender kneed him viciously in the face, knocking the back of his head against the pillar as his nose burst open.
‘Now tell me. How much do I give a damn?’ Skender demanded.
Hobart dropped to the floor, trembling as he tried to roll onto his side. Skender kicked him brutally in the face and as Hobart collapsed onto his front the Albanian loomed over him like a salivating wolf savouring his kill.
‘Let me tell you your future,’ Skender said. ‘My deal with the Feds goes on. I have what they want and I’m gonna deliver, from time to time. One of my new conditions is that they dump your ass. You know they will, because I’m more important to them than you are. Now I’ll tell you what else I’m gonna do, and I want you to listen carefully. Are you listening to me?’
Hobart was in a bad way but Skender callously rolled him onto his back with his foot. Blood trickled across Hobart’s face and he blinked to hold on to consciousness as Skender went in and out of focus.
‘One day,’ Skender went on, ‘a year, maybe two years from now, you’re gonna be somewhere, driving along, maybe leaving a restaurant with your fat wife and you’re gonna have an accident. Hit-and-run maybe, a mugger, whatever. The point is, you’re gonna die, Hobart. That’s an Albanian promise, my friend. I want you to spend every waking minute until that day thinking about it, knowing that it’s going to happen.’
As Hobart stared up at Skender he heard a ringing sound that seemed to go on for an age. But he was so consumed by what Skender had done and said to him that he was unable to realise it was his mobile phone. Hobart had never been so physically abused in his life and nothing had prepared him for it.
Skender sneered at the pathetic figure before turning away to rest his callous stare on Cano. ‘Where is he?’ Skender asked with a malevolence that shocked even the other Albanian.
‘He got into the building somehow—’
‘I’m talking about the kid!’ Skender yelled, his face going red as he closed on Cano.
‘The floor below,’ Cano said, wondering what his reaction would be if Skender struck him too. To hit back would mean that he would have to kill Skender, for that would be his own fate if he did not.
‘You brought him here?’ Skender growled. ‘Are you completely stupid?’
‘No one would think—’
‘You’re the only one who doesn’t think around here. Where?’
‘In the janitor’s cupboard.’
Skender wanted to kill him there and then. But this was not the time to execute a man who was obsessed with killing another who was a more immediate threat. Besides, he would expect Cano to fight back and that could be problematic. He fancied his chances against Cano, even with their age difference. Cano was brutal but he lacked Skender’s experience. Nevertheless, this was not the time. ‘How does Hobart know there’s a bomb in this building?’ he asked, turning his attention to the immediate and potentially more dangerous situation.
‘I don’t know.’
‘The Englishman?’
Cano nodded.
Skender was aware of Stratton’s abilities with explosives but the truth was that he had no concern for his own life, feeling secure in such a large structure. What angered him was the thought of even a speck of damage to his beloved new building.
‘When was he here?’
‘An hour ago.’
‘Inside the building? You’re sure of that?’
‘He nearly killed one of our people in the garage.’
Skender looked away in thought. ‘This guy will have a plan.’
‘He wants the kid,’ Cano said.
That was fairly obvious, thought Skender as he stepped towards the glass doors, pausing at them. ‘Get that creep outta here,’ he said, indicating Hobart. ‘And Cano – if that guy does anything to this building, and I mean one broken window, I’m gonna kill you myself.’
The two men stared at each other. Cano did not doubt the threat for a second.
Skender walked along the corridor behind the frosted-glass wall to the emergency exit. Cano lowered his gaze to Hobart who was trying to pull himself up, using the edge of the table. But his damaged ribs, among other things, were causing him extreme pain.
Hobart persevered and pulled himself up enough to slump awk-wardly into a chair, every breath accompanied by a burning stab inside his chest. The pain was one thing but much worse was the degradation and humiliation. He had entirely miscalculated Skender’s contempt for authority and lust for brutality.
‘You know where the elevator is,’ Cano said as he walked out of the room, too much on his own mind to care what happened to Hobart.
Hobart wanted nothing more than to get out of there but at that moment he was not sure if he could get to his feet without help, let alone out of the building. His face hurt like hell, his jaw was probably broken and God only knew how bad his ribs were. He cursed himself for being so stupid and putting himself in such a situation. He should have asked the cops to accompany him but he had been too arrogant to predict for himself what he might have warned others of. And there was yet more to come when he faced his staff and superiors. They would hold him partly to blame for his stupidity in confronting Skender alone. Without a witness Hobart was helpless.