Ready or Not (38 page)

             
Clayton turned his head. ‘What?’ he asked sharply. ‘What is it?’

             
Chris sat forward and hit the dashboard with the palm of his hand. Blood rushed to his head.

             
‘It’s Kate,’ he said. ‘That’s what he wants. It’s her.’

             
Clayton’s moustache twitched and he furrowed his eyebrows, not following Chris’ disjointed outbursts.

             
‘He’s been hanging around all week,’ Chris continued. ‘If he killed those men, why would he hang around at the station? It doesn’t make any sense - it’s asking to be caught. Why was he so interested in Katy? She said he lied to her about knowing where his son was. Why? It would only make sense if he wanted some excuse to get closer to her.’

             
‘Why…’ He was cut off by the sound of his mobile. Chris reached quickly into his jacket pocket; the station’s number flashed up at him.

             
‘Hello?’

             
‘Chris? Where are you?’ asked the officer on the end of the line.

             
‘Heading into Cardiff,’ Chris told him. ‘Just passed the turn off for the Coryton roundabout.’

             
‘Turn around,’ the officer instructed him. ‘We’ve just had a call from someone working in the industrial estate in Treforest. They heard a gun shot.’

Fifty Four

The bullet hit the ground just inches from her feet and ricocheted off the far wall. Kate stopped dead in her tracks. Neil looked at the weapon in his hands then slowly up at Kate; his mouth open in a twisted O.

             
              ‘Oops.’

             
              Behind him, both Sophie and Ben sobbed uncontrollably. The girl’s anger had been replaced by genuine fear at the very real sound of gunfire and her black make up was streaking her cheeks like spindly spider’s legs. Claire, awoken from the edge of unconsciousness by the detonation, seemed to realise for the first time that Kate was the woman she had spoken to on the telephone just the day before. Her eyes pleaded with her to help them.

             
              Kate had never felt so powerless.

             
              ‘I didn’t want to use this thing,’ Neil said, turning the gun in his hands and studying it as though it was a thing of great interest. He raised it and pointed it straight at Kate. ‘Next time,’ he warned, ‘I’ll be on target.’

             
              Kate’s left temple throbbed. She didn’t doubt for a second that his threat was real. Her wrists behind her back felt raw and she was sure she could feel blood on her fingers. Neil watched her with eyes so blue she felt them pierce her own, stabbing through her vision.

             
              For the first time, she saw it. The eyes took her right back to that day; to the last look she’d had of him before he had closed those beautiful blue eyes to count to ten.

             
              She blinked and shook her head, refusing to believe. She closed her eyes and pictured her brother as she had seen him last; three year old Daniel raising his hands to cover his eyes and count up to ten. She thought of how she had imagined him since; the way he’d look as an adult. She had always thought that when she finally found him he would look like her father, but he didn’t and she had always known, deep down, that he wouldn’t.

             
              Anyway, she hadn’t found him.

             
              Kate opened her eyes. Neil…Daniel...was still looking at her.              

             
              She shook her head again. ‘You were there when my father died?’ she asked, her voice shaking; the words like dried leaves crackling. 

             
              Kate had spent the past twelve months carrying around the guilt of her father’s death, regretting that he had been alone when he had died; alone, as he had spent the last several years up to that final moment. Now she knew he hadn’t been alone. There had been someone else there; someone who could have saved him.

             
              Someone who chose not to.

             
              But not his own son. Please, not like this.

             
              Kate’s head moved as though she had lost any control over it. She shook it violently, fighting away his words. ‘No!’ she said, her voice rising. ‘No!’ The anger turned to a sob and the tears flowed. They didn’t move Neil.

             
              ‘Matthew,’ he said. He walked towards him and handed him the gun. ‘No one moves.’ He went to Kate and took her by the wrists, pulling her back towards the door. When they were in the other room he made sure Matthew bolted the door shut, locking out everyone except Kate and himself.

             
              ‘Sit down,’ he said to Kate without looking at her. When she didn’t move he pushed her in the back. ‘Sit down,’ he repeated.

             
              Kate sat on the cold concrete awkwardly. Her wrists were really hurting now, the skin ripped and torn where she had struggled with the handcuffs.

             
              ‘I’ll take them off,’ Neil said, gesturing towards the cuffs, ‘but I swear to God, you try anything and he’ll kill all three of them. So you can try to hit me, you can unlock the door and let yourself out, but you’ll have three deaths on your conscience.’

             
              He paused and looked to the bolted door.

             
              ‘Don’t underestimate Matthew,’ he told her. ‘He might act like a lanky streak of piss, but he’s dying to use that gun.’ He leaned over her and touched her face, gently pressing her nose. ‘I think you’ve seen what he’s capable of,’ he said.

             
              He had her exactly where he wanted her, Kate realised. Neil knew that she wouldn’t do anything to jeopardise their safety; particularly not that of the children. The thought that her niece and nephew may be sitting feet away from her on the other side of the wall, gagged and bound, made her stomach churn with anxiety and sickness.

             
              Those conversations she’d had with Sophie; the nasty, spiteful things she’d thought about the girl, that girl who was just a child. Her own niece, perhaps: so physically close and yet a million miles from her.

             
              ‘So,’ Neil said. ‘What do you think?’

             
              ‘Just take them off,’ Kate pleaded. ‘I won’t try anything.’

             
              Neil raised the palm of his hand. ‘Scouts honour?’ he said, smiling thinly.

             
              She said nothing. How had it come to this? If he was her little brother, what had happened to him to turn him into this monster? He was mocking her. She considered telling him to fuck off again, but decided against it. She had angered him enough. Neil reached into the pocket of his trousers and took out a small key. He knelt on the floor beside her and unlocked the cuffs. He put the key back in his pocket. As soon as her hands were released Kate moved them painfully in front of her, working her wrists to try to get some life back into them.

             
              Neil sat on the floor beside her. He stretched his legs out in the dust and studied his feet for a moment. Kate considered moving; standing quickly and kicking him in the face, but what would she do then? If she went next door, Matthew would shoot her. Not that she could anyway; Matthew had locked the door. If she ran out of the warehouse, he would shoot Ben, Sophie or Claire. Maybe even all three of them. She couldn’t risk it. She wasn’t fast enough, or brave enough. She didn’t want anyone leaving this warehouse in a body bag.

             
              ‘You don’t believe me, do you?’ Neil asked slowly.

             
              ‘Believe what?’ Kate asked, staring ahead.

             
              ‘You don’t believe that I’m Daniel.’

             
              She turned to look at him. She didn’t need to; she knew well enough what he looked like. His face had imprinted itself on her brain the first time they had met in the car park back at the station. It was a face she was unlikely to ever forget. Those eyes, the curve of his cheekbone: she had known there was something about him; something she was unable to put a finger on, that had joined them like an invisible thread: Theseus in the minotaur’s maze.

             
              Of course she believed.

             
              ‘No,’ she said flatly. ‘No, I don’t.’

             
              She didn’t think for a moment that he would believe the lie. He already seemed able to read her better than anyone, and besides, she was a terrible liar. Her emotions betrayed her displaying themselves on her face in true, full-colour glory.

             
              Neil reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a mobile phone and threw it into her lap. ‘You want to be more careful with your things,’ he commented causally.

             
              ‘You?’ she said incredulously, grabbing for her phone. She thought back to the previous evening and scorned herself for being so bloody naïve. Of course, she told herself. He’d taken her mobile from her bag when she’d gone to the toilet. Devious, thieving, manipulative…

             
              ‘You’ve got an answer phone message.’

             
              Kate called the messaging service and listened as the automated female voice at the end of the line read her the options. She connected to the messages and waited hesitantly. Message received Thursday 8
th
February at 9.53pm the voice informed her.

             
              9.53. They were still in the pub then. He must have taken her phone, switched it off and hidden it in her pocket.

             
              ‘Kate? It’s Andrew Langley. I’m so sorry we keep missing each other. My daughter was rushed into hospital this afternoon, suspected early labour but turns out it was a false alarm. They kept her in for checks, so I stayed with her. Anyway, sorry again. Look, there’s no easy way of saying this. I’ve been working for your brother, Daniel. I’ve been trying to find you for over three years now. Well, I should say, I’ve been trying to find Daniel’s family. I didn’t want to go into this over the phone, but I suspect he’s going to try to find you and…’

             
              There was a pause where Andrew tried to string his words succinctly.

             
              ‘I think you might be in danger, Kate. Your brother’s name is now Neil Davies, he’s had that name most of his life. Please, if he tries to contact you before we next speak, don’t meet with him. I’ll be able to go into greater detail face to face, but there’s a lot of history here and I’m pretty sure he’s intent on revenge. Like I said, there’s too much to go into on an answer phone message. I’ll try you again tomorrow. Take care, please.’

             
              When Kate looked at Neil he was mouthing Andrew Langley’s words in sync with the answer phone message, as though he’d memorised them by rote. He reached into his jacket pocket and produced a packet of cigarettes. He offered her the packet.

             
              ‘You don’t smoke,’ he said as she refused his offer. ‘Don’t blame you. Very bad for your health,’ he sniggered.

             
              He produced a lighter from the same pocket with the dexterity of a side street magician, holding the cigarette between long, slim fingers and lighting it. He inhaled deeply before blowing thin smoke into the air between them.

             
              ‘A shame,’ he said thoughtfully.

             
              ‘That I don’t smoke?’

             
              ‘That you don’t believe me. I mean, surely,’ he said, gesturing to the mobile in Kate’s lap, ‘you must believe me now, right?’

             
              Kate said nothing. Her thoughts were a blur, too much to process and try to separate. If only she and Andrew had spoken earlier. She wouldn’t be here; Ben and Sophie wouldn’t be here. Maybe she could have avoided ever knowing the truth.

             
              Perhaps ignorance really would have been bliss.

             
              On the day he had gone to visit his estranged father, Neil Davies had reeled off his list of Kelly family facts. Now he did the same, giving dates, places; details that even Kate hadn’t given him. At first, although she already believed him, Kate responded with the same cynicism as her father: that anyone who could read, anyone who could use the internet, could have discovered those facts about her family.