Simon Kernick - The Last 10 Seconds

His footfalls came steadily closer, and the floorboard just inside her bedroom door creaked.

He was in the room.

She held her breath, feeling herself wobbling, trying not to lean too hard against the back of the wardrobe.

The room was silent as she waited, no longer able to hear the intruder. Had he gone?

Then her foot slipped, knocking into a pair of shoes with an audible clack, and Tina froze, clenching her teeth, cursing herself for letting her guard down like this.

The wardrobe door flew open and the coats were yanked aside in one angry movement.

For half a second, Tina stood there face to face with a man in an ill-fitting balaclava and a long raincoat who was holding a pistol with silencer in one gloved hand; then she leaped at him with an angry scream, going for his wrists in an effort to stop him from using the gun.

But the drink had made her movements awkward and uncoordinated and he stepped away easily, punching her in the back of the head as she stumbled past him. She put out a hand to head off a collision with the bedroom wall, before tumbling to the floor.

As she turned round, the gunman loomed over her. ‘The tape. Where is it? Tell me now.’ He hissed the words, clearly trying to disguise his voice. But the accent was educated, possibly upper class. There was an edge of fear in it, too, as if he genuinely didn’t want to be in this position.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she said, enunciating her words carefully, strangely ashamed at having her private drunkenness exposed as she played for time.

‘You know exactly what I’m talking about. We can do this the easy way or the hard way. If you tell me, I leave now. If you don’t, I’ll put a bullet in you and turn this place upside down until I find it. And I will find it.’

Tina looked up at him, trying to work out whether he would actually let her go if she gave it to him. She was desperate not to hand it over and see her last chance of bringing Paul Wise to justice disappear, but she also knew that she didn’t want to die.

He held the gun steady. ‘Last chance.’

She swallowed, something stopping her from telling him, even though she knew she was taking a huge risk.

‘Tell me,’ he snarled, and she thought she saw the first hint of doubt in his eyes.

But then he picked up a pillow from the bed, folded it in half and pushed the end of the silencer against it, still pointing the gun at her. Now if he fired, the report would be close to inaudible. Not even the neighbours would hear through the paper-thin walls.

She was about to die in her own home, the last sanctuary she had from the violent world outside. Yet still she couldn’t bring herself to speak.

The gunman took a step closer and leaned down towards her so that the pillow obscured her field of vision. ‘I’m not going to ask again,’ he whispered, a renewed determination in his voice. ‘Where is it?’

The buzzer to the apartment went as someone from outside the building called up, a long, uninterrupted noise, as if the caller was holding his hand down on it.

She had no idea who it was — she never had evening visitors — but it managed to distract the gunman, who momentarily looked away.

Which was when the drink took over and she launched herself upwards at him with an angry yell, ignoring the way her head spun as she went for the gun.

I was still pushing down on the buzzer to Tina’s apartment on the fourth floor of the bland-looking apartment building when I heard a shot — a faint but unmistakable pop — and the sound of breaking glass.

Behind me, the taxi driver was already out of his cab. He’d been demanding that I pay the fourteen-pound fare — something I hadn’t been able to do since I had no money — and he was getting steadily more irate as it became clear that the person I was visiting, and who I’d said would pay the bill, wasn’t answering.

But now he stopped and looked up as pieces of glass landed on the ground. ‘What the hell was that?’

I hobbled back from the apartment entrance and looked where he was looking. The window that had been broken was on the fourth floor, confirming my worst fears.

Then I heard a second shot.

I rushed back to the entrance and began ringing the buzzers for the other apartments, desperate to get inside. ‘Help me get this door open,’ I shouted to the taxi driver, who was a big guy about my age. ‘The woman up there’s in trouble.’

He put up his hands. ‘Look, mate, I don’t want to get involved.’

‘I’m a police officer, for Christ’s sake! Sean Egan. You might have seen my name in the paper. The Creeper case. And up there is DI Tina Boyd, being attacked. Now help me get this bloody thing open! Now!’

‘How?’

‘Kick it!’

He looked worried, but to his credit came forward at a steady run and launched a kung fu kick at the door while I continued to press the other buzzers desperately.

The door shook but held. The taxi driver grunted in pain.

A woman came over the intercom. ‘Hello?’

‘This is the police. Let me in.’

‘Show the warrant card to the camera.’

‘I haven’t got time. Let me in.’

‘No.’

The taxi driver did another flying kick and this time the door flew open and I hobbled inside on the crutches. I told him to dial 999 and pressed the button for the lift. It opened immediately, and I got inside and pressed for the fourth floor. The taxi driver made no move to follow me as the doors shut, the phone already to his ear.

I knew what I was doing was insane. I was unarmed, on crutches. I could offer Tina no protection whatsoever, and could easily get myself killed. But I owed her. This was my fault and I didn’t know what the hell I’d do if I was too late and she was already dead.

The lift doors opened and I charged through them. Apartment 4B was opposite me, and straight away I saw that the door was on the latch, but as I shoulder-barged it, with no obvious plan of action whatsoever, it only opened a few inches. The chain was across it. Somewhere further inside I could hear the sound of a struggle.

I cursed, hobbled backwards and charged it again. This time it flew open, and I stumbled inside, only just about keeping my balance, before starting off down the narrow hallway in the direction of the struggle.

Another shot rang out, followed by the loud bang of someone hitting the floor, and I heard Tina let out a short, sharp cry of pain.

I hobbled faster. ‘Police!’ I screamed. ‘Drop your gun, Samuel-Smith! It’s all over!’

As I reached the doorway, I saw him standing above Tina, who lay sprawled out on the floor, her eyes shut, moaning in pain. He was still wearing the same raincoat he’d had on earlier, except now he also had a balaclava covering his bald head, and a gun in his gloved hands.

He turned my way, lifting it up to fire, his eyes frowning behind the mask.

Without hesitating, I threw one of the crutches straight at him, and as he knocked it aside with his gun hand, I threw myself forward, ignoring the searing pain in my leg, and slammed into him.

My momentum and his lack of preparedness drove the two of us across the room and we slammed into the windowframe. I grabbed his gun hand by the wrist so that the weapon was pointing away from us, and with my free hand punched him hard in the face. He fell backwards so that he was half hanging out of the open window, forty feet above the street below. I could see the taxi driver staring up at us, a look of shock on his face, the phone still to his ear as I punched Bob in the face again and again, leaning all my weight into him, ignoring the agonizing pain in my leg, a pure and terrible rage surging through me as I thought of all the treacherous things this man had done: the way he’d protected the men who’d murdered my brother; the way he’d mutilated an innocent woman to protect a discredited politician; the way he’d come here to murder Tina. I wanted to kill him now, to tear him to pieces. To keep punching him until he finally fell sprawling and lifeless on to the concrete like the piece of dirt he was.