Hunter Hunted, Jack Gatland [good story books to read .txt] 📗

‘Not yet, but I’m working on it. It has to be someone who knows Baker, though.’ Trix walked to the door. ‘I’ve been here too long already,’ she explained. ‘Just be careful, eh? Someone’s trying to rewrite your narrative.’

Now at the door, she stopped.

‘Listen. Before you caught me, I had a way out,’ she said. ‘Never got to use it though. When I joined the Unit, I got hold of the building plans. The whole place was bombed during World War Two, and they kept the external walls, building effectively a whole new block within. Created a lot of crawlspaces.’

‘So?’ Declan was confused at this sudden architecture lecture.

‘Your offices didn’t have toilets originally, as they linked to next door. When the police were given the floors, they added them in, in the process bricking over a door at the back that connected to the next office via a back staircase.’

‘There’s only one staircase,’ Declan corrected.

‘Now there is, but originally there were two,’ Trix continued. ‘In the toilets, over the middle cubicle is a hatch into the crawl space between the second and third floors. Get in, crawl north five yards, and you bypass the wall. You drop into the corridor next door, leading to the stairway. Follow the stairs until you reach the top floor. Once there, follow the corridor west, to the front facing windows, effectively skylights to the roof. Once on the roof, run north until the end, and drop off the western side onto the roof beside. West, north, and west again around Old Mitre Court, jump north onto the next building—‘

‘Jump buildings?’ Declan almost laughed. ‘I think we’re falling more into the Mission Impossible school of escapes here.’

‘Listen!’ Trix’s voice rose in anger. ‘I’m not talking about me! I’m telling you, in case you have to escape!’

Admonished, Declan stopped. Trix continued.

‘When you jump, carry on to the end, and up a set of white metal stairs to the white door. Code to enter is 5022. Once in, go down the stairs to the bottom. It brings you out on Fleet Street, beside Messrs Hoare Bankers. You’ve then got several routes of opportunity while they’re still working out if you’re still in the building.’

‘Why are you helping me?’ Declan asked as he opened the door for Trix. She shrugged.

‘When he hurt you outside your apartment, back at the start of all this, that wasn’t supposed to happen. I realised then that people like Pearce Associates and Rattlestone believed they were higher than the law. What I did to your friend’s reputation wasn’t great, but she’s a stranger to me. You guys? It’s complicated.’ As if remembering, she patted Declan on the arm. ‘Behind the toilet in the cubicle is a taped burner phone. It has my number in it. I put it there last night. If it all goes wrong, call me.’

And with that Trix walked over to her Fiat 500, parked half on the curb. Declan went to shout out after her, but his phone, currently on the coffee table, rang. Closing the door on Trix, Declan walked over to it, seeing on the screen that it was Anjli.

‘Yeah?’ he answered.

There was a moment of awkward silence, and then Anjli spoke. She was outside, and she was nervous, shocked even.

Declan had a sudden fear that Monroe was dead.

‘We’ve got a body,’ she replied. ‘You need to come.’

‘Where?’

‘Brompton Cemetery, in Chelsea,’ Anjli’s voice was breaking. ‘Declan, it’s personal.’

‘Who is it?’ Declan thought back to the call last night, where Lizzie had claimed that Jessica hadn’t come home. A sensation ran down his spine. The one that people always claimed was when someone walked over your grave.

‘I don’t want to say on the phone,’ Anjli whispered. ‘Just get here now.’

The phone went dead. Declan stared at it. Then, in a flurry of action, he called Lizzie.

No answer.

He called Jessica.

It went straight to voicemail.

Now suddenly scared, with the gut wrenching feeling that the sky was falling, Declan grabbed his coat and keys and ran out of the front door, locking up and clambering into his Audi. It was an hour to Brompton, but with the sirens on and his foot down on the accelerator, he could make it in twenty minutes.

He started the car but paused as his phone went. On the screen read JESSICA.

‘Thank God,’ he said as he answered it. ‘Do you know how worried I’ve been—‘

There was no reply. Just a slow, soft breathing.

A male’s breathing.

And then a chuckle. A quiet, mocking one.

And then the phone went dead.

10

Bad Day

Declan drove to Brompton like a man possessed. He couldn’t get through to Lizzie, and Jessica’s phone was now turned off. He left message after message as he sped down motorways and A-roads, his siren blaring and his blue lights flashing. He almost changed direction halfway along the route, driving directly to Lizzie’s to see what was happening, but Brompton was closer and he knew that this couldn’t, wouldn’t be the worst-case scenario that he was thinking it could be. There were a ton of reasons why he couldn’t get through to his daughter, or why a strange man had her phone—

He almost took out a car as he sped across a crossroads.

He couldn’t stop himself. He started screaming with impotent rage.

Jessie was fine. Jessie had to be fine.

Pulling up outside the North entrance of Brompton Cemetery, Declan realised it had been less than twenty-four hours since he’d attended a secret meeting here with Kendis. He hadn’t expected to be back so soon.

Waving his warrant card at an approaching Scene Of Crime Officer, he was waved through the crime tape, past the curious bystanders and mourners currently barred from entry and started making his way down The Avenue towards the first crossroads where he could already see a gaggle of police officers and forensic teams gathering, the white crime tent already raised.

His phone buzzed; pulling it out, he saw with a mixture of relief and fear that it was Lizzie.

‘Christ,’ he said,