Eoin Colfer - Plugged

In between the portholes, the walls are lined with signed pictures of celebrities. As far as I can make out, these are stock head shots with nothing to suggest that Kevin Costner frequents The Brass Ring. This guy Faber just gets classier by the second.

I hear voices at the end of the corridor and so I trundle the caddy that way. It’s either Faber down there or the cleaning staff; I am almost past caring. My entire existence is getting a little dreamlike and I feel bulletproof and doomed at the same time.

I barge through the kitchen door, barrels first, catching Faber in the middle of an anecdote. Two of his guys are gathered round laughing heartily like he’s Bill Cosby in his heyday. While I’m waiting for the hilarity to end, I spot an AirPort wi-fi base station plugged into a socket by the door and I nudge it out with the caddy’s wheel.

‘So the guy gets off with eighteen months suspended,’ says Faber, raising his hands for the punchline. ‘And I get paid by all parties.’ Everybody laughs on cue, and one of those ass-licking goons goes so far as to repeat the punchline and wipe a tear. Shameless.

Faber lets the laughter die to let me know how unconcerned he is by this whole thing. He deals with bigger fish than me every day.

‘You finished, Jaryd?’ I ask him testily, pushing the caddy to the centre of the room. ‘You want to let the lady out of the freezer now?’

Faber turns around, making a big show out of being surprised that I’m even there.

‘Hey, Dan. Is that the time? Shit, I’ve been telling the guys a couple of war stories here, forgot all about our little situation.’ He suddenly spots the massive barrels in the middle of his kitchen and claps his hands. ‘You brought me a present.’

I keep on pretending that I’m doing this for the money. ‘You got one for me? Fifty thousand ones.’

Faber drops a huge wink at his boys. ‘Yeah, sure. I got your present right here. Why don’t we just have a look at my pills first?’

I push the caddy towards Faber’s biggest guy and he has to do a nimble little shuffle to save his toes.

‘Knock yourself out.’

Faber has his three guys get to work. One covers me with a pistol, another gives me the brisk-frisk while the third tips a barrel from its perch and pops the security lid. The drum’s mouth glows and the guy’s double chin is swabbed by crescents of blue light.

‘Holy fuck,’ he says. ‘This shit is radioactive.’

Faber digs his arm in deep and lets the pills run through his fingers, like he’s a pirate feeling up his doubloons. This is the point where my what I like to call plan could have been seriously derailed, but I got away with it. It was fifty-fifty and I picked the right fifty.

‘Score,’ he says.

‘Score,’ I say. ‘You like MTV, Jaryd?’

I might as well needle him. We both know what’s coming. At least what he thinks is coming.

Faber opens his mouth to give the word, then has a thought that disturbs him. ‘Where’s Wilbur?’

‘Why’s that, Jaryd? You told him to bring up the rear?’

‘I asked you where Wilbur was.’

I shrug. ‘I don’t know, exactly. Not to the precise inch.’

Faber hurls a handful of pills back into the drum. ‘You prick, McEvoy. He better not be dead.’

‘Or what. You’ll kill me twice?’

The attorney’s grin is sly. ‘Kill you? Why would I want to do that?’

‘Because you better. I know about you and Connie, and I tried the cops once already but it didn’t work. Next time I’m gonna do the job myself.’

Faber acts frustrated. ‘Why are we still talking about that stripper? Screw it. I’m not wasting my time arguing with a dead guy.’

He walks to his laptop, arms swinging to let me know he means business. The guy is going to shock me again. I knew he would, he enjoyed it so much the last times.

‘Why don’t you lie down for a while?’ he says, which sounds rehearsed, and hits return.

The bracelet’s signal is activated, and on cue I fall to the ground gibbering. I feel embarrassed shaking and dribbling like that, but it should buy me a minute.

I feel a powerful urge to sit up and explain to Faber that even a child knows you can’t send an internet signal without a wireless transmitter, but I swallow it down and keep spasming.

A good thing too, because a couple of seconds after I hit the floor, things start happening pretty fast.

The first sign of trouble is the elongated whip snap of a pistol shot echoing down the corridor.

That’s Wilbur gone to meet his maker, I reckon.

So what? That arsehole shot Goran. Maybe he killed Connie too, so I won’t be shedding any tears.

Faber jumps up on his toes like a ballet dancer.

‘What the hell was that?’

‘Gunshot,’ says one of his guys, answering literally what he was asked.

Even though a shell has just popped outside, Faber takes time to turn on his own guy. ‘I know it was a goddamn gunshot, Abner. I fucking know that much.’

Abner? Abner and Wilbur? You cannot be serious.

Abner has his gun in a two-handed grip, pointed down between his toes. It’s a big gun and he’s a big man, but his brow is twisted like a child’s.

‘I guess you prob’ly did know that, Mister Faber.’

And predictably the pointing starts. ‘Go find out who fired that shot.’

Abner scoots out the door, and I am guessing he’s not coming back.

I take all of this in from my low vantage point. I’m not bothering to shake any more, but no one notices. I shift my gaze to the freezer and see the needle is way down in the blue.

There isn’t much time left.

A couple more shots crack outside the door and the wall thuds and buckles like a rhino ran into it.

That’s Abner gone.

Two left now, including Faber. I could probably take them, but then I’d have to take whatever’s coming in from outside. Better to move myself out of the equation.

I flip on to my elbows and crawl quickly towards the freezer head down like I’ve been taught. Faber is shouting something but it’s just panic. You would think a lawyer would know to dial nine-one-one, but he’s not capable of putting a plan together. I almost feel sorry for what I’ve unleashed on him.

Footsteps thunder along the corridor outside, moving towards the door, inevitable as a tidal wave. I pop on to my haunches and thumb the thermostat into the red, for all the good that will do. It will take minutes for this old freezer to shake itself awake. But it’s better than nothing.

I snap the steel handle open and roll inside through the hiss and steam. Two seconds later, the weighted door clunks shut behind me. The sound makes me wince, but it’s for the best. Inside is definitely better than outside for the moment.

Ronelle is strapped on the trolley, white as a marble statue, frosted like a birthday cake, parked carelessly in a forest of frozen carcasses.

So she’s a marble statue birthday cake. . in a forest .

Not now, Zeb. Really.

The buckles holding her down are cold and unnecessary. The detective is alive, but weak as a newborn and vibrating gently with the thrumm of deep cold. I throw off her straps and cover as much of her torso as I can with my jacket. Any bits sticking out, I rub briskly with my hands.

‘Don’t get any ideas, Ronnie,’ I tell her. ‘Just warming you up. No funny stuff.’

I move around the trolley and bump it over to the door with my hip so I can peek through the window. There is an emergency intercom set into the wall, and I lean over to press the switch with my forehead. Noise floods the freezer like a wave.

The porthole is frosted with crystals and streaked with grease, and it feels like I’m watching the outside world on an old gas-tube TV.