Snatching it from his pocket, he squared his shoulders as though preparing himself. I watched him, my stomach knotting.
‘You’re sure?’ he said, his expression carefully guarded. ‘There isn’t any…?’
There was a long pause. I watched the broad shoulders sag. He put his phone away.
‘They’ve found her.’
Rachel called me at seven o’clock that morning, nearly beside herself with worry. She’d heard about the explosion at St Jude’s on the BBC’s World Service. It had said only that there had been casualties following a hostage situation, but she hadn’t been able to get through on the boat’s satellite phone. She’d had to wait until they put into the nearest marina before she’d been able to contact me.
‘You’re sure you’re all right?’ she kept asking.
‘I’m fine,’ I assured her.
Her call had woken me from an exhausted sleep, but I didn’t mind. It was good to hear her voice. I didn’t know what time it was when I’d got back to the apartment, except that it was late. I’d taken a taxi, since my car was still out of bounds at St Jude’s for the time being. Even though I hadn’t been close to the blast, I was still gritty with dust. But I’d been too tired to shower. After everything that had happened I just wanted to sleep.
It had taken several hours to bring Ward out. After instructing me to stay put, Whelan had hurried off, leaving me alone with my thoughts as I’d stared at the floodlit shell of St Jude’s. Ward’s husband had emerged from a trailer with Ainsley not long afterwards. He’d looked unsteady and almost overcome with emotion as they’d headed towards the ruined building.
For a long time after that nothing had happened. Then I’d seen a sudden flurry of activity outside the hospital. I’d moved to get a better view, hands clenched so tightly my fingernails dug half-moons in the skin of my palms. Emergency workers were trooping back from behind the shattered building, the reflective strips on their dirty protective clothing glinting under the floodlights. Paramedics came next, bearing a stretcher, and while I could only see a blanket-covered form strapped to it, I’d recognized Ward’s husband walking alongside.
Then an arm had emerged from beneath the blanket as Ward reached up to grip her husband’s hand.
Whelan came back over after the ambulance had left. He’d still looked drained, but now it was from relief instead of tension. He’d handed me a bottle of water.
‘I wouldn’t want another night like this,’ he’d said, his voice hoarse.
Neither would I. The call Whelan had received earlier had been to tell him that rescuers had heard banging from beneath the rubble. When they’d hammered in return, the bangs had repeated the same rhythm. Somehow, Ward had survived the explosion and the building’s collapse. After consulting blueprints supplied, ironically enough, by Jessop himself, they’d realized she was in the underground tunnel linking the basement to the now-demolished morgue at the back of St Jude’s.
There was no way they could get to her through the hospital. The tunnel’s entrance was buried under hundreds of tons of debris and any excavation would risk bringing the surviving structure down as well. Instead, the decision was taken to free Ward from the other end of the tunnel, clearing a route to her through the more manageable wreckage of the morgue.
The rescue had seemed interminable, and must have felt even longer for Ward and her husband. With her phone unusable so far underground, no one had any idea of her condition until the rescuers actually reached her.
‘She’s in pretty good shape, considering,’ Whelan had told me, taking a drink of water. ‘Shaken up, and she might have a perforated eardrum from the explosion, but other than a few cuts and scrapes she came out in one piece.’
‘What about the baby?’
‘They’ll check her out at the hospital, but so far everything looks OK. She’s a tough one, the boss. Tougher than a lot of people give her credit for.’
There’d been fondness as well as pride in his voice. I’d looked at the ruined shell of St Jude’s, remembering the force of the explosion that had brought it down. Even now I still found it hard to believe anyone could have survived.
‘How did she get away from Jessop?’
‘She didn’t. He let her go.’ Whelan recapped his water. ‘From what she’s told us, he was hitting the vodka while he went round rigging the explosives. She managed to get him talking, and by the time they got down to the basement he was getting pretty maudlin. She tried to persuade him to give himself up, but he lost his temper and yelled at her to get out before he changed his mind. She’d made it as far as the tunnel when he triggered the charges, so she ran in there as the place came down.’
Remembering the tunnel’s dark mouth, criss-crossed with police tape and asbestos warning signs, I didn’t envy her. Trapped and alone underground, it must have been a hellish experience.
‘Did she think he meant to do it?’
‘God knows. By the sound of it he was drunk and not making much sense towards the end. But he did what he said he was going to, and if anyone deserved to have that place dropped on his head it was that murdering bastard.’
I wasn’t about to disagree. But even through the fatigue and relief something didn’t seem right.
‘Why did he let her go?’ I’d asked.
‘She didn’t say. Maybe because she was pregnant.’
‘That didn’t help Christine Gorski.’ She’d been stunned by at least one electric shock before being left to die in the hospital’s loft. And the degree of cruelty evident in the deaths of Darren Crossly and Maria de Souza, even the brutal snuffing of Adam Oduya’s life and the callous disregard for Mears, were hard to reconcile with Ward being allowed to escape.
Whelan had shrugged, growing irritable. ‘Then perhaps he had a fit of conscience, I don’t know. He did, that’s the main thing.’
It was, and that wasn’t the moment to be questioning such an unexpected reprieve. Whelan left shortly afterwards, heading for the hospital for a more formal interview with Ward. With my car still off limits, I’d called for a taxi to meet me outside the main gates and then walked down the long, unlit driveway to the main road. Halfway along I’d stopped and looked back. The floodlights bathed the shattered hospital in a white glow, hard edged against the black sky. Like the church ruins in the woods, there seemed something natural about it, as though St Jude’s had always been destined for this end.
Turning my back on it, I’d walked away for the last time.
The street beyond the police cordon had been packed with waiting media vans, cameras and spectators. I’d kept my head down as I hurried past, ignoring shouted questions as I saw my taxi waiting. One persistent journalist ran after me as I climbed in, but I’d slammed the door on her and told the driver to set off. Ignoring the woman’s angry yell, I’d sat back in the seat, wanting nothing more than to fall into bed and sleep.
Which I had, until Rachel’s call woke me. Finally reassured that I wasn’t hurt, her attention swung to Ward.
‘It’s a miracle she got out alive. And the baby’s OK as well?’
‘So far as I know.’
I heard Rachel give a long sigh. ‘God, when I heard it on the news… I thought you said it wasn’t dangerous?’
‘I didn’t think it was. Things just… developed.’
‘Developed? Jesus, David, you could have been killed!’
‘I was a bystander, that’s all. It was Ward who was inside the hospital, not me.’
‘And what about the hit-and-run? The news report said that someone from the investigation was hurt then as well. It could have been you.’
I hadn’t told her it nearly was, and decided that now wasn’t the time. ‘I’m fine. Really. If you were here, you’d see that for yourself.’