Blood Falls (2 page)

‘What d’you want him for, then?’

It was Danny Morton who replied. ‘He murdered my brother.’

Two

JOE DIDN’T DARE
move. Given what Ryan had just heard, even a tiny unconscious glance upwards could give him away.

His options for self-defence were limited, to say the least. Perhaps wait until Danny or his sidekick reached the top of the ladder, then swing a can of paint at them …

Except that they wouldn’t need to mount an assault on the scaffolding. Joe knew that Danny routinely carried a gun – and he was deranged enough to use it.

That meant flight was the better alternative. Smash a bedroom window, get out through the backyard and across the rear of the neighbouring property. He should gain twenty or thirty seconds’ head start on them: it might just be enough.

He hoped that neither course of action would be necessary. It all depended on Ryan now. Whether he would stay loyal or whether he would crack.

‘Jesus,’ Ryan said. ‘So he’s on the run?’

‘Four years.’

‘And is he, like, dangerous? You know how the police always say you’re not to approach—’

‘We know he’s round here somewhere, and we want him.’ Danny sounded impatient, as well he might. Ryan’s inquisitive nature had
driven Joe mad at times over the past few weeks; right now it was a tactical masterstroke.

‘I’ll keep my eye out,’ Ryan promised. ‘I assume the cops are on the hunt for him as well?’

From Danny, only a grunt. His colleague must have offered a card or a note.

‘You see him, call us on that number. There’ll be a drink in it.’

‘Unless you don’t want cash in hand?’ Danny muttered scornfully.

‘Yeah, no, that’s great. I’m happy to help. I mean, no one wants a murderer on the loose.’

Don’t overdo it
, Joe thought. Fortunately Ryan’s interrogators had tired of him and were moving away. The bad news was that they continued along Princess Victoria Street, where the pavement ascended on a gentle but – for Joe – potentially fatal gradient.

He lowered himself down, wincing as the scaffolding boards shifted and groaned on the transoms. Lying flat on his belly, head turned to the side, he felt like a butterfly pinned under glass. He prayed that the toeboard would be high enough to conceal him from view.

Ryan was back at work, whistling furiously as he painted. Joe took that to be a signal of sorts:
Stay where you are
.

Sure enough, after a couple of minutes he heard Ryan put down his brush and tap on one of the uprights.

‘They’ve gone.’

‘You sure?’

‘Yeah. Do you wanna come down and tell me what the hell is going on?’

Ryan Whittaker was short on stature but big on character, a successful entrepreneur at twenty-four. As well as the building and decorating business, he was also a key investor in his older sister’s chain of hair-dressing salons and had recently set up a website selling, of all things, designer baby clothes and maternity wear.

He’d agreed to employ Joe on a trial basis, carefully monitoring his skill and diligence for several days before pronouncing him acceptable. Contrary to what he’d told Danny Morton, he was perfectly willing to pay cash in hand. The only source of tension had been Joe’s vagueness about his past, but Ryan had accepted that it was information he could do without. He was simply glad to have found someone willing to work as hard as he did himself.

‘And it’s not like you’re all that young, either,’ he’d added with sublime tactlessness.

‘Pretty ancient, compared to you,’ Joe had said.

‘Well, yeah. But you know how to graft, don’t you? Not like lads my age, pissing away their wages and then calling in sick ’cause they’ve slept till bloody lunchtime. What kind of attitude is that?’

In a gruff military tone, Joe had declared: ‘Bring back national service!’

‘Bring back …?’

‘Doesn’t matter.’

A slow grin from Ryan. ‘No, I get you. I sound like a miserable old sod, slagging off the youth of today.’

‘They’re not all bad, are they? You aren’t. Your sister isn’t.’

‘I s’pose not,’ Ryan had conceded. ‘Becoming an employer, it changes your view of the world. So bloody frustrating to see people choosing
not
to do what’s best for them.’ He’d sighed. ‘Though we’re all guilty of that at times, aren’t we? We’re all a bit fucked-up.’

‘Yep, we are,’ Joe had agreed. ‘But trying our best not to be.’

As soon as his feet hit the ground, Joe pulled off his gloves and started undoing his paint-splattered overalls.

‘I’m sorry. I owe you more of an explanation than I can give you right now.’

‘Is it true you killed that guy’s brother?’

‘There’s more to it than that, but yes.’

‘And you’re wanted by the law?’

‘No. I was a police officer when I did it.’

‘Ahhh.’ Visibly relieved, Ryan’s hand drifted towards his cheek. ‘What’s with his scar?’

‘A screwdriver. That happened when he tried to kill me.’

‘Bloody hell. So how did they track you down?’

‘That’s what I need to find out. Once I’m well away from here.’

Joe stepped out of the overalls but kept his trainers on. Underneath he was wearing jeans and a black T-shirt. He bundled up the overalls and stowed them on the lowest deck of scaffolding, next to their empty coffee cups.

‘Any idea where you’ll—’ Ryan gave a twitch of a smile. ‘No, you can’t tell me, can you?’

‘Best not.’

‘Fair enough. But I’m sorry to see you go.’

As they shook hands, Joe’s gaze was drawn back to the overalls. There was something troubling him. Something he’d missed …

The coffee cups
.

Maybe he’d been lucky, he thought. Maybe they hadn’t noticed the cups at all, or had seen them but had failed to make the connection: that Ryan wasn’t working alone.

‘What’s up?’ Ryan said.

Joe didn’t reply. He was listening. There was a lot of traffic noise from the streets around them, but one engine sounded louder, more urgent than the rest.

He turned, saw a car roaring towards them. It was a beaten-up old Ford Granada: just what he’d expect them to use. Probably legally acquired but unregistered, set to be junked when the assignment was complete.

There were two men inside, their faces still indistinct at this distance. But the driver wore a brown leather jacket.

Three

THE CAR PICKED
up speed. From the passenger side Danny Morton leaned out of the window, his left arm stretching towards Joe. It didn’t make much sense until Joe realised that there was something in Danny’s hand.

‘Gun!’ Joe shoved Ryan away from him and leapt in the other direction. Both men hit the ground as a shot rang out, the noise a shocking boom in the stillness of the residential street. The bullet struck the front of the house, gouging out a chunk of pebble-dash and spraying them with fragments. The Granada was weaving in the road, the driver flapping his arm at Danny, suggesting a disagreement over tactics.

Even with Morton firing wild, Joe knew that a ricochet could just as be deadly: the lattice of scaffolding poles offered no real protection. He got to his feet.

‘I’ll draw them away,’ he told Ryan, who was lying face down on the pavement and seemed too shocked to respond.

Running for the corner, Joe stayed low, using a row of parked cars for cover. He was a little surprised by Danny’s loss of control. He’d always imagined that the Morton family would prefer to capture him alive. Danny in particular had a grisly aptitude for torture, but his old man, Doug, and even Valerie, his ferocious hard-as-nails mother, were almost as bloodthirsty.

But there was no time to dwell on it. He had to focus on an escape route. Turning into Sion Hill, with the grand Georgian facade of the Avon Gorge hotel directly opposite, Joe sprinted up the hill towards the east tower of the Clifton suspension bridge. A trick of the perspective made the thick supporting chains seem as delicate as a spider’s web.

Perhaps he should try to cross the bridge, he thought, then get hold of a car. Steal one. Hijack one, if he had to. Whatever it took to survive.

No. The bridge was a bad idea. Far too exposed, and there were lots of people around. Lots of cameras, too. Joe needed a route that would be difficult to follow in a car.

Cutting right at the next junction, he crossed the road and leapt up onto a grass bank. Then into Sion Lane, a narrow street of quaint cottages and slightly dilapidated workshops. It was clogged with parked cars. Better still, about halfway up it veered left, so he’d be out of sight within seconds.

Just before the bend he risked a look back, and his heart sank. Danny Morton was pursuing him on foot. The only consolation was that he no longer had the gun in his hand.

Joe put on a burst of speed. He had no idea where the Granada had gone, whether the driver would have been smart or lucky enough to intercept him at the top of Sion Hill. Bracing himself for an ambush, he emerged from the lane, the bridge now away to his left, and checked the traffic. No sign of the Granada.

He dashed across the road, narrowly avoiding a collision with a pickup truck. Its horn blared as Joe made it to the opposite verge. Now he was on the edge of Clifton Down, an area of parkland with plenty of mature trees to give him cover, just in case Danny still felt inclined to take another shot at him.

It was a steep ascent. Although Joe had been working hard for Ryan, he’d neglected his normal exercise regime for several weeks and he
was punished for that lack of fitness now: his lungs burning, his knees jarring on the uneven ground. But he knew he was running for his life, and that meant enduring any amount of pain.

He negotiated a diagonal path across the Down, heading broadly in the direction of Christ Church. Several times he glanced over his shoulder and saw he was extending his lead, but there was no mistaking the fury, the determination on Morton’s face. Having got this close to Joe, he wasn’t about to give up now.

Then Joe heard him yelling: ‘Here! Fucking here, you twat!’

He looked round. Danny was facing Gloucester Row, gesturing frantically. He was mightily pissed off, and Joe could see why. Having gone the wrong way, the Granada was caught in a line of traffic heading for the bridge.

Then a quick double-beep caught his attention. Not from the Granada, but off to Joe’s left, near the church.

Danny reacted to it as well. Joe saw the triumphant smile on his face as he nodded and made a broad sweeping motion with his arm. Its meaning was clear:
Cut around and head him off
.

For Joe, it was like a punch in the gut. They had a second car.

It was an old Vauxhall Astra. Like the Granada, it had seen better days, but it was more than adequate for its purpose. There seemed to be only one occupant. He was quick to respond to Danny’s command, racing along Clifton Down Road, no more than sixty or seventy yards away from Joe.

Crossing into Canynge Road, Joe heard the distant screech of tyres and a chorus of angry car horns – no doubt in response to some kind of illegal manoeuvre on the part of the Granada’s driver. Soon he would be back in the chase.

Thankfully Joe was now heading downhill. Running flat out, he calculated that he had no more than ten or fifteen seconds before the Astra caught up with him. He needed to vanish.

The opportunity presented itself halfway along the street. He passed
an office block on his right, then a narrow car park. The parking spaces backed on to a row of half a dozen tiny terraced gardens, bordered by a brick wall about five feet high. Perfect.

A quick look back: no one in sight. Joe raced through the car park and dropped to his knees behind a red minibus. A moment later he heard the Astra roaring past. As soon as it had gone, he hauled himself up onto the final section of wall. From here he was able to leap across a narrow alley and clamber up onto a flat-roofed building.

In a crouching run he crossed to the far corner and lowered himself onto another flat-roofed structure that faced along the next street. Breathing hard, he caught a faint tang of chlorine in the air.

It was only when he dropped to the pavement that Joe found he’d been climbing over the premises of Clifton High School’s swimming pool and gym. As he hit the ground, a woman locking her car turned and gaped at him. He straightened up, gave her a polite smile and was on the move again, his ankles protesting at every step.

At the bottom of Clifton Park Road he went left, checking in both directions for Morton or the cars. Still nothing. He crossed the road and turned right. Now he was into the home straight: College Fields.

It was a beautiful place to live, a wide, quiet street with the school’s playing fields on one side and a succession of large detached properties on the other. Big square bay-fronted villas, faced with pale Bath stone. Some had been converted to flats, but others remained as single dwellings.

Joe’s landlord was Lindsey Bevan, a retired professor of philology. After several decades of renting rooms to students he’d become tired of the aggravation and now ran something of a cross between a modern B&B and an old-fashioned boarding house. There were two long-term residents, Audrey and William, both retired academics and contemporaries of Lindsey’s. All three tended to be effusively nice to Joe even while they bickered like children among themselves.

Arriving in late August, Joe had negotiated an attractive deal by paying for the first two months in advance. Lindsey had been more
than amenable to Joe’s offer to carry out maintenance on the property in return for use of the washing machine and other appliances.

It wasn’t home – nowhere was home any more – but it was the best accommodation Joe had had in well over a year.

As he approached the house, there was no traffic in sight except for a refuse lorry passing the junction on Percival Road. The playing fields were deserted. He could see nothing untoward, nothing out of the ordinary, and yet he felt a tingling as the hairs rose on the back of his neck.

He slowed his pace. Directly ahead, a middle-aged woman emerged from her garden gate, a small dog scuttling beside her. She registered Joe’s presence with a sniff of disapproval, then cut across the road to avoid him. That was when he spotted the girl.