Nick Oldham - Hidden Witness

Basically nowhere.

Panic overwhelmed him momentarily before he scrambled over to the settee, pulled it away from the wall and crawled in backwards behind it, like some crustacean reversing into its shell. He stretched himself out as long and as thin as he could and tugged the settee back up to him. He had to grind his teeth together to stop them chattering. He tensed every muscle tight and hoped he didn’t emit some wimpy squeak of terror or fart of fear that would give away his position.

‘No reply from either number,’ the comms operator informed Henry.

‘Keep trying, please.’

‘Will do.’

Henry and Donaldson exchanged a worried look. ‘Doesn’t necessarily mean anything,’ Henry said.

‘No, you’re right,’ Donaldson said.

Neither man meant it.

Robbins performed a dangerous swerving overtake through a set of traffic lights, finding the narrow channel between the vehicle to his nearside and the oncoming one. He saw the driver of that one, who seemed to have big, wide eyes and an expression of horror on his face. He powered on, the Galaxy having picked up momentum, a bit like a container ship.

‘We’re probably about thirty seconds away,’ Bill said, flicking off the lights and siren.

‘Pull in here,’ Henry instructed him, pointing to a spot at the roadside. Robbins braked sharply and veered into a halt.

A few beats passed.

‘What the hell’re you doing?’ Donaldson demanded.

‘Waiting for back up. This is the RV point — Wilvere Drive.’

Donaldson screwed up his face at Henry. ‘You kidding me? We need to get in there now, otherwise that kid’s dead and they’ve gone for sure. There’s no time to sit here with thumbs up our asses waiting for cops who might not get here. How far away from the house are we?’

‘Just beyond that slight bend,’ Bill said, pointing. ‘Just out of sight.’

Donaldson and Henry looked at each other again. ‘You know I’m right. Two patrols coming from the south, the ARV only just jumping into their vehicle in the garage. If we hesitate, he’s dead. These guys don’t mess around. And if we’re wrong, then let’s have red faces. I don’t mind lookin’ stoopid. We need to get in there now — and this talkin’ is just a waste of time.’ He reached for his door handle.

Henry nodded. ‘You’re right.’

‘Give me a minute,’ Donaldson said and opened his door. ‘I’ll go around the back of the place, then you hurtle in through the front door.’

‘You have no weapon,’ Henry reminded him.

‘I’ll improvise if I have to,’ He touched Henry’s shoulder, trotted diagonally across the road, leapt over a garden wall and disappeared.

‘Let’s hope he bowls into the right place. There’s lots of old biddies in these houses along here,’ Henry said. ‘Time to go.’

The first of the men stepped into the TV lounge, checked it quickly. Across the hallway, the second man opened the door of another lounge opposite.

‘Clear,’ the first man said, backing out of the TV lounge, his gun held combat style, an isosceles triangle formed by his arms and chest, the gun held in his right hand, supported by the left.

‘Clear,’ the second man echoed, coming out of the other lounge. He was the knife man, but now he was armed with a pistol, the knife wiped clean and sheathed at the small of his back.

The third man, clearly the leader, had waited in the hallway for his colleagues to do his job. He said quickly, ‘Upstairs and check the bedrooms. I’ll wait here. If you find him, bring him to me alive. I want him to look me in the face and ID me again before I kill him. Go.’

The two men sprinted down the wide hall, moving silently as they went, and took the stairs just as quietly and began a well structured, swift search of the bedrooms on the first floor.

Donaldson clambered over the brick wall and slithered down into a patch of damp soil. He moved quickly behind a rhododendron bush and inspected the rear aspect of Cleveley House. There was one door, which he guessed was a kitchen door, three ground floor windows and a patio door. On the first floor there were four windows, one with the lights on.

Keeping low, he stepped out from cover and, crouching, ran across the width of lawn, then over a paved area, to the back of the house, flattening himself up to the wall. He edged to the door that he now noticed was slightly ajar.

The man in the hallway, the leader, remained stock still, listening for any movement. He also had an earpiece screwed into his left ear, wirelessly attached to the radio on a harness at his waist. The police transmissions had stopped for some reason, but he wasn’t too worried. He estimated his team had about four minutes before the cops came in their size tens, by which time he and his men would be gone and the boy would be dead. He was certain of his skills and abilities.

He remained in a crouching position, weapon drawn and ready, constantly looking, evaluating, listening, reassessing. Upstairs he heard a door being kicked open. He backed up slightly, his eyes rechecking the two downstairs lounges that had been declared empty.

The one on the left, then the TV lounge on his right.

And then he saw it, and computed it, and instantly realized that the room wasn’t empty because he saw the L-shaped settee move ever so slightly — and knew exactly where the boy was hiding.

Bending low, Donaldson ran his left hand across the kitchen door and very gently put some pressure on it, pushing it further open by one inch. He waited for the creak that did not come. But it was a brand new UPVC door, so why would it creak? He opened it an inch further, then wide enough for him to step into a tiny vestibule, with an inner door six feet ahead that opened into the kitchen itself. Donaldson took a silent stride to this door, held his breath, opened it.

He was definitely in the kitchen. There was a sink, cooker, refrigerator, shelves, cupboards, work surfaces, a small dining table and a dead body with a horrendously sliced open throat, lying in a sea of thick, deep-red blood.

There was no time for sneaking about. The man crossed the TV lounge and dragged the settee away from the wall, revealing the stretched out, terrified form of the boy lying prone behind it.

Mark stared up at him as he tore off his balaclava and pointed his gun at Mark’s head.

‘Remember me, sonny?’

Mark did. He knew this was the face of the man who had killed the old guy on the street in Blackpool and who had probably killed Rory and Billy Costain. And also, his mother, Mandy Carter.

Mark was determined to show no fear.

‘I know you, you murdering bastard.’

‘Good, because I’m the last face you’re ever going to see.’

He placed the muzzle of the gun against the crown of Mark’s head. The boy shut his eyes tightly and at that moment, fear did overwhelm him.

Donaldson stepped over the blood to the kitchen door, braced himself for an instant before looking into the hallway and catching a glimpse of the back of a black-clad figure entering the next room on the right.

From upstairs he heard the clatter of doors being kicked open.

‘Henry, you should be here by now,’ Donaldson murmured under his breath.

The man curled his fingers around Mark’s collar and heaved him one handed out from behind the settee, keeping the gun jammed against his skull. He dragged him out as though he was a dog about to be put down.

Karl Donaldson stepped into the TV lounge doorway, his wide frame filling the gap. He’d wanted to say some profound words at that point and if he’d been in a movie, that’s probably what he would have done. He would have explained why he could not allow the killing to happen and the gunman would have had the opportunity to say his piece, too. But there was no time for such niceties. Explanations were rare in real life. If Donaldson had said something, even given a warning, the gunman would simply have turned and shot him, then the boy, because Donaldson knew what the man was capable of.