Stephen Leather - False Friends

‘Nadia, I know what it’s like, family honour and all that, but if Harvey’s there he needs to get out here now, and if he isn’t you need to tell me where he is because his phone’s off.’ He winked. ‘Come on, honey, I don’t care what the two of you got up to.’

Nadia looked over her shoulder, then nodded. ‘He’s in the bedroom,’ she said. She reached for the chain.

Singh looked across at Shepherd and as he did so Nadia’s hand froze. She’d seen the look, Shepherd realised. And now everything had changed.

He pushed Singh to the left, stepped back and kicked out hard with his right leg. His foot hit the door just under the handle and he pushed forward with all his weight. The chain ripped out from its mounting and the door crashed open, banging into the woman. She staggered back into the room as Shepherd stepped across the threshold, bringing his left hand up to support his right as he swung the Glock around. He moved slowly and evenly, any jerking and his shots would be sure to be off target. There were four people in the room. The woman, still staggering backwards. An Asian man standing by the kitchen, holding a bloody knife. Malik, tied to a chair, a strip of cloth around his mouth, his eyes wide and fearful, his right foot hacked and bleeding, blood on his shirt. The door to the bedroom was open and Shepherd glimpsed another Asian man, this one holding a gun. Four souls, three targets, one gun, one knife. Shepherd’s training kicked in without any conscious effort. The man with the gun was the imminent threat. Shepherd brought the gun to bear on the man’s chest. He was in his twenties, tall and lanky with deep-set eyes, wearing grubby cargo pants and a Chelsea football shirt that was flecked with blood. Malik’s blood.

Shepherd didn’t shout a warning. He didn’t have to. Everyone in the room knew exactly what was happening. If the man with the gun had dropped it and raised his hands then Shepherd would have switched his attention to the man with the knife, but that didn’t happen. The man’s finger was tightening on the trigger and even though Shepherd could see that the man’s aim was off he still fired, just once. The bullet hit the man a couple of inches below the heart. The sound was deafening and instantly the stench of cordite assaulted Shepherd’s nose and made his eyes begin to water. The man fell back into the bedroom, a look of surprise on his face, his mouth forming a perfect circle. The gun dropped to the man’s side and then slipped from his fingers and fell on the carpet.

Shepherd stepped forward with his left leg as he swung the gun towards the man by the kitchen. He was aware of the woman’s arms flailing as she tried to regain her balance but she had no weapon so she wasn’t a threat.

The man with the knife was overweight, his hair greasy and unkempt. He had taken off his shirt and was wearing a string vest pulled out over baggy jeans. Clumps of hair sprouted from his armpits and chest hair was poking through the holes in the vest. The man was moving towards Shepherd, the knife raised high, his lips drawn back in a snarl. Again Shepherd said nothing. There was no need. He wasn’t a police officer; no one from Professional Standards was going to be investigating the shooting; there’d be no suspension, no court case, no comebacks. All the man had to do was drop the knife and raise his hands, but he didn’t. He started to run towards Shepherd, growling like a cornered dog. Shepherd shot him in the face. Blood, brain and skull fragments sprayed over the wall and the man fell forward, slamming on to the floor with such force that Shepherd felt the vibration through the soles of his feet.

Shepherd smoothly turned the gun towards the woman, his finger tightening on the Glock’s trigger. She had regained her balance and was already putting her hands behind her neck. Shepherd stared at her and she met his gaze with no trace of fear in her eyes. She knelt down on the floor, her eyes fixed on his. Shepherd kept the gun pointing at her face as she went down, knowing that the slightest increase in pressure on the trigger would send a bullet into her skull. There was a hint of a smile on her face as if she expected him to shoot her. Shepherd was breathing slowly and evenly, totally relaxed.

The woman looked up at him, the movement tightening her neck.

‘Amar, get in here,’ said Shepherd.

Singh stepped into the room and closed the door.

Shepherd gestured at the woman with his gun. ‘Very slowly now, lie face down and keep your hands behind your neck.’

The woman did as she was told.

‘Untie Harvey,’ Shepherd said to Singh. ‘But give me that roll of duct tape first.’

Singh picked the roll of tape off the table and handed it to Shepherd. Shepherd holstered the Glock, then straddled the woman’s legs and used the tape to bind her wrists. He ripped off another length of tape and put it across her mouth.

Singh went over to untie Malik as Shepherd put his ear against the door. He couldn’t hear anything in the corridor.

‘Try this,’ said Singh, and he tossed over the ceramic microphone. Shepherd slotted in the earphones and pressed the microphone against the door. Still nothing.

‘What happens now?’ asked Singh, who was on his knees behind Malik, working at the wires around his wrists. ‘Do the cops come?’

‘Not necessarily,’ said Shepherd. ‘It sounded loud in here but in another apartment it’ll just be two loud bangs and they won’t know where they came from. If they do dial three nines the cops will ask a lot of questions that the caller won’t be able to answer. It might not even get reported.’

Singh nodded at the body in the bedroom doorway, the man who had been holding the gun. ‘But you have to call it in?’

‘To Charlie, yes. Not to the cops. If we’re lucky it can be dealt with in-house.’

He went over to the window and pushed open the blinds so that he could squint down into the street below. The apartment looked out on to the side road where they’d parked their cars but if he pressed his head against the wall he could just make out the main road. Traffic was flowing freely. If the police did arrive then there would be an armed response vehicle and their first action would be to set up a perimeter around the building.

Shepherd went over and squatted down in front of Malik as Singh finished untying him. ‘Harvey, mate, can you stand up?’

Malik stared back at him but didn’t react.

‘Is he okay?’ asked Singh.

‘He’s in shock,’ said Shepherd. ‘Get a blanket round him and make him some tea. With lots of sugar.’ He put his head closer to Malik’s. ‘It’s going to be okay, Harvey. You’re safe now.’ Malik continued to stare at him with blank eyes.

Singh returned from the bedroom with a quilt and he wrapped it round Malik before heading to the kitchen.

Shepherd took out his phone and leaned over the woman. He prodded the back of her neck with the barrel of his Glock and she tensed. ‘You have no idea how hard I’m fighting the urge to put a bullet in your head,’ he whispered. He tapped the gun against her head and then straightened up and called Charlotte Button. She answered on the third ring. ‘We’ve got a problem,’ he said.

The four men in white paper suits with blue surgical caps and blue shoe protectors looked like a police Scene of Crime unit but they were all employed by MI5. They had rolled the two corpses into black body bags and were preparing to take them downstairs to their waiting van.

‘What’s going to happen to them?’ Shepherd asked Button.

‘We’ll have a medic remove the bullets and mess around with the wounds, then we’ll deliver them to a medical school that we use.’

‘Are you serious?’

‘Best way of getting rid of a body is to let a group of students dissect it,’ said Button.