Savage Night (25 page)

And Tommy said, "Yes. Very. Completely."

"Nice to hear you say so." Smith stood up, his knees clicking. "But Milne isn't important any longer. We're here because of Grant. You need to pay for that. What're we going to do, Tommy?"

"You can have everything," Tommy said. "All my money. My house. My properties."

"You think Grant has a price tag? Sums you up." He disappeared behind Tommy. "Say your prayers."

The wind moaned in the trees. Tommy could smell the sweet earth he was kneeling on. He wondered how the steel would feel biting into his neck.

He closed his eyes and waited for the blow, muscles tensed in the back of his neck, eyes squeezed so tight his forehead hurt. He wondered how it would sound. Nothing. Still nothing. His neck muscles burned like they'd been stretched and twisted into a series of complicated knots.

Tommy said, "Get on with it." Behind him, he heard Smith's feet scuffing the ground.

"Not now," Smith said. "Get up."

Tommy stood, tasted the air. Filled his lungs with it. He didn't dare speak.

After a while, Smith said, "Back to the car," and Tommy started to move.

Halfway along the path, Tommy said, a tremor still in his voice, "Why did you change your mind?"

Smith said nothing.

"Thanks," Tommy said.

Old Mrs Yardie's

THE BEDROOM WHERE Tommy was imprisoned contained an old-fashioned heavy iron-framed bed, a dark-wood wardrobe, matching chest of drawers and a bucket. Tommy was chained to the bed.

There was no clock in the room, and Smith had taken Tommy's watch. As he'd taken everything else. Stripped him bare. Literally. Given him just a ratty steel-grey blanket to wrap around himself.

This was Old Mrs Yardie's house, Smith had told him. What had happened to Old Mrs Yardie was anybody's guess. Tommy hadn't heard any signs of anyone else living here and he suspected that she wouldn't have willingly allowed someone to be held captive in her own home, so Tommy didn't rate Old Mrs Yardie's chances.

Must be about two weeks Tommy'd been here now.

He'd had time to think. Lots of it. It dragged, day and night. Time to think about Phil, Mum, Fraser, Jordan. Time to wonder how Hannah was coping with life in Johannesburg. Time to wonder how he might have saved their marriage. Time to wonder what he ever saw in her. Time to resolve to call Bella from Napoli just as soon as he was free to do so. But mainly, time to think about how he'd got himself into this mess and to wonder if he was ever going to get out of it.

Spikes of fear punched into his temples. Adrenalin flooded his bloodstream, mixed with the fever.

There was a constant burning in his stomach.

Each day, he grew sicker.

He lowered his eyelids. An image of torchlit blood on glass flashed into his head, vivid enough to make him shudder. If they'd called an ambulance right away, maybe the boy would have made it. Maybe that was Tommy's punishment. Left alone to think about what he'd done.

Tommy dug his nails into his hands. Forced the image to change. After a while, he was back home, sitting at the desk in his office, staring at his computer screen. Ah, yes, he remembered that day. He was checking out the website of a sash and case window specialist.

For one reason or another, half the windows in the house wouldn't open properly. And Mum was fed up with it. Told him he'd never treat one of his business properties the way he treated his own home. And she was right. So he'd been having a look at what was available. He'd thought about modernising, but wanted to keep the traditional look. And these guys came recommended.

He was thinking he should get a quote when there was a knock on the door and Jordan came in.

Tommy looked at his watch. He was surprised to see Jordan this early, then remembered it was the school holidays. And then remembered he was due for a conference call in just under two minutes. He said, "What have you done?"

"Nothing."

"What do you want, then?"

Jordan shrugged. He looked at the floor, scuffed the carpet with his shoe.

"Jordan. I'm busy."

He muttered, "Got to go to Fraser's."

"Good. Be careful on the road."

After a while: "Dad, I think I'm too tired to take my bike. Been playing football all morning."

"You want a lift? Is that it?"

"Suppose."

Tommy nodded. Never liked the idea of Jordan riding a bike. Could have strangled his mother when she bought the damn thing. "Give me twenty minutes?"

"Okay. Can my friend come too?"

"Sure, who's your—?"

Jordan pointed over Tommy's shoulder.

Tommy turned, saw something about the size of a well-fed dog just as it hurtled through the window. Tommy ducked, put his hands over his head.

A crash, a thump. Then silence. He stayed hunched over.

When he dared to look, shards of glass glinted on the floor, littered his desk, glistened like water on the keyboard. There were slivers of glass on the back of his hands. He wiped them off. Somehow, he wasn't cut.

He looked over to the door, asked Jordan, "You okay?"

Jordan nodded.

There was no sign now of the dog, or whatever it was. But it couldn't have just disappeared. Tommy scanned the room, still couldn't see anything. He peered over the edge of his desk.

There was nothing there.

He brushed glass off his chair with his sleeve and sat back down. Jordan smiled again. Tommy smiled back, but realised that his son wasn't looking at him. Jordan was looking to his right.

Tommy snapped his head to the side just as something shoved him, sent him sprawling to the floor. He put out a hand, cut his palm, cried out. Twisted onto his side, gasping. And suddenly he was face to face with someone he never thought he'd see again.

He stared into the face, the white lips even whiter than the cheeks.

It couldn't be. Didn't make sense.

He looked down, along the pale throat, down the chest, past the stomach, to the waist. Where the torso stopped abruptly.

Grant said, "Yeah, can I come too?"

***

TOMMY OPENED HIS eyes. Squinted at the sunlight streaming through the curtainless window, shivered as waves of cold rippled down his body. The fever was worse. He sat up on the bed, tried removing the cuff from his wrist again. He'd bruised his fingertips with repeated attempts. It was a waste of time, but that didn't stop him.

It was something to do.

Fear, fever and boredom. Bastard of a combination.

The solid steel chain was about four feet long, if that. A closet chain, Smith had called it. One end was attached to a bedpost at the foot of the bed. The other was cuffed to his left wrist. The chain tightened well short of the door.

He had tried lifting the bed. He'd tried dragging it. Smith was prepared. Both legs at the foot of the bed were bracketed to the floor and the headboard was bolted into the wall.

For the first few days he'd spent a lot of time walking round the bed for exercise, but his arm hurt too much now.

The outside door slammed.

Smith was back. Popped out to get supplies again, no doubt. Hadn't left the house often, just a handful of occasions that Tommy knew about.

He came into the bedroom regularly. To bring food. To check on Tommy. To empty the bucket. Sometimes, they talked. Then he'd leave, and Tommy would hear the shower running or the low babble of voices from the TV along the hallway, or Smith's voice, quiet, talking to someone on the phone.

Footsteps pounded up the stairs. The door along the corridor opened.

Must be dinner time. Tommy wasn't hungry.

Clatter of floorboards in the corridor and the door to Tommy's room opened.

Smith, masked as always, had Tommy's
katana
in one hand, a laptop in the other.

Tommy wasn't stupid enough to think that he'd be allowed internet access, but he'd kill for a game of Minesweeper. Take his mind off things.

Without a word, Smith plugged in the laptop under the chest of drawers. It was a couple of feet beyond the reach of the chain. But the screen was big enough for Tommy to see from the bed.

Smith fiddled around with it for a bit, then stood back and said, "What do you think?"

***

THE EVENING AFTER Smith kidnapped him, Tommy had been forced to make a call, the phone held away from his ear with the speaker volume turned up so Smith could hear.

Mum answered. When she realised it was Tommy, she said, "What happened? Where are you?"

He was naked, wrapped in a blanket, sitting on a bed with a lumpy mattress in an old house somewhere in the country. "I'm fine," he said. "Just that—" he looked at Smith, watched his eyes dart from side to side through the holes in his ski mask "—something came up."

"What came up? How can something come up? Things don't just 'come up'. What do you mean?"

"Look, Mum," Tommy said, "I need you to trust me." Smith had warned him what would happen to his mother if she suspected anything. "It's just that I have to go away for a while."

"What's wrong? What are you hiding? I spoke to Phil."

He was alive.
Thank Christ
.

"He tried to cover for you," Mum said. "Pretended he knew where you were."

Yes. Phil would come looking for him.

"Tommy?"

"Yeah?"

"If you don't tell me what's going on, I'm calling the police."

Smith held up a warning finger.

"Don't worry about me," Tommy said. "Just take care of Jordan till I get back. And don't expect to hear from me for a while."

"Tell me what's wrong, Tommy, please."

"Look," Tommy said, watching Smith's eyes through the ski mask, "I just need to stay away for a while. Till things calm down."

"What things? You said everything was fine."

"You don't need to know. Just trust me."

"I'm trying. Give me some help."

"Please, Mum. I don't need the police looking for me, believe me."

"You're in trouble with the police now?"

Smith nodded.

"Yeah," Tommy said. "Bit of bother. But it'll die down. Nothing major."

Silence. "But if you to have to go into hiding..."

"For a while."

"And it's nothing major?"

"Not on the phone, Mum."

"The tobacco again? Tommy, I thought—"

"It's not that."

"Tell me," she said. "I can keep a secret."

"I haven't … I can't say."

A pause. "Is there anything I can do?"

Smith leaned forward, whispered in his ear.

Tommy said, "Tell the boys I've had to go abroad for a while. They won't be able to get in touch. Don't worry them."

"Of course not."

Smith whispered some more.

Tommy turned, looked at him. "And Phil can't know either."

"He doesn't know?"

"Not a word, Mum."

"Okay."

"Okay. 'Bye, Mum."

Smith took the phone from him, gently, so Tommy didn't protest, and cut him off. "Very good," Smith said. "You're a natural liar." He fiddled about with the keys, dialled. After a few seconds he said, "Phil, how's the head? Listen carefully. If I hear that you've been snooping around trying to find your brother, I'll kill him. You got that?"

Phil must have replied cause Smith said, "Yes, that means he's alive. Worked that out all by yourself. Very clever. Now be quiet and listen. Someone will be in touch in due course. Just behave yourself till then and don't go poking around or breathe a word to a soul. Your family thinks Tommy's abroad. Let them think that or Tommy dies."