Anthony Horowitz - Evil Star

Now they were driving down a quieter, more residential street, moving away from the sea. Matt had the feeling they were getting close to the hotel.

“What time is it?” he asked Richard.

“I don’t know.” Richard turned his wrist to look at his watch. Matt realized that he had just nodded off. Both of them were half asleep, half awake, caught somewhere between the two. “My watch is still on English time. But right now it’s…”

He never finished the sentence.

The car stopped abruptly. Both Matt and Richard were thrown forward. The driver rapped out something guttural in Spanish. Matt saw what had happened. A blue van had driven at speed out of a side street, blocking the way ahead. At first, he thought it was just an accident, but then he saw the doors of the van open. Four men piled out and began to run towards them and at that moment he knew there was nothing accidental about it. They had driven into some sort of trap. These people had been waiting for them.

Alberto knew it too. With a sense of unreality, Matt saw him reach into the glove compartment and bring out a gun. Fabian must have been afraid of it from the start. He must have suspected that they might be attacked on the way into the city. Maybe that was why he had changed their destination. And why else would he have ensured that his driver was armed?

He wasn’t the only one. Two of the men coming at them from the van were carrying handguns. Everything was happening so quickly that Matt only glimpsed their faces – dark and determined, with long black hair. They were wearing jeans and open-necked shirts, the sleeves rolled up. Then somebody fired a shot and the front windscreen became a frosted maze of cracks with a single hole, a deadly eye, at the centre. Alberto cried out. He had been hit in the shoulder. His blood splattered against the back of his seat. But now he brought his own gun round and fired three times. The front window collapsed, the glass cascading onto the bonnet. The men from the van hesitated, then took cover.

And that was when Richard acted. Grabbing hold of Matt with one hand, he threw open the door with the other. He was in the right-hand side of the car, the side furthest from the van.

“Move!” he shouted.

“No, senor!” Alberto twisted round in the front.

Richard ignored him. Dragging Matt with him, he slid out of the car and into the street. Matt didn’t resist. His head was spinning. He didn’t know what was happening. But he agreed with Richard. He would feel safer in the open air.

Two more shots. From the corner of his eye, Matt saw Alberto heave himself clumsily out of the car and run off into the evening gloom, one hand clutching his wounded shoulder. He was abandoning them! They were in a street with houses on either side, but nobody had come out to see what was happening. Nobody wanted to help.

“Run!” Richard shouted. “Just keep moving! Don’t stop for anything!”

Matt didn’t need telling twice. He stumbled away from the car and began to run back up the street, heading in the direction from which they’d come. It was dark now. Streetlamps threw an ugly, artificial light over them, turning everything yellow. And it had become even hotter. Matt could feel the sweat trickling underneath his clothes.

The men were coming after them. Who were they? Who had sent them? Matt didn’t dare look round but he could hear their trainers hitting the tarmac, knew they were getting closer.

Richard cried out.

Matt stopped and turned. Two of the men had grabbed hold of the journalist. Matt saw one of them quite clearly. A round, almost feminine face. Unshaven. A small scar next to one eye. He was holding Richard around the neck. The two other men were coming up fast behind.

Richard was struggling and somehow, for just a brief moment, he managed to break free. “Keep going, Matt!” he shouted. “Move!”

He lashed out with a foot, kicking one of the men in the stomach. The man groaned and collapsed. But the second man, the one with the scar, had grabbed Richard again. Matt watched as the others reached them, making it three against one. There was no way to save Richard. Matt twisted round and began to run. He heard one of the attackers calling out to him and although he couldn’t be certain, he thought he heard them using his name. His real name. So they knew who he was! The trap must have been set up long before they arrived.

Matt turned a corner and sprinted down an alleyway. At the end, he turned again, came to a main road and crossed it, weaving recklessly between the traffic. Someone yelled at him. A bus shot past, punching at him with a fist of warm air. He came to a patch of wasteland and ran across it. A dog, dirty and half starved, barked at him. A few local women watched with idle curiosity.

At last he stopped, his breath rasping in his throat. He was covered in sweat. His shirt seemed to have glued itself to him. And he was weary with jet lag. He could feel it, sitting on his shoulders, trying to hammer him into the ground. But at least he was alone. He looked back across the wasteland at the main road and the traffic in the distance. Nobody was coming after him. He had escaped.

It was only then that the enormity of his situation struck him. He was in a strange country, with no money and no luggage. The driver who had been sent to collect him had run off, saving his own skin, and his only friend had been kidnapped by an unknown enemy. He didn’t know where he was. He didn’t know how to get to where he was supposed to be. It was night. And he was on his own.

Matt hadn’t even realized he’d fallen asleep until he began to wake up again. He groaned quietly and curled up, not wanting to return to full consciousness. He wasn’t ready to face reality quite yet. He was utterly drained. His entire body felt as if it had been hollowed out. Maybe it was the jet lag. More likely it was the shock of what had happened. His arms and shoulders were aching and his mouth was dry. What had woken him? Oh yes – a hand in his jacket pocket. Just to add to his troubles, he was being robbed.

Matt opened his eyes and saw a dark-haired boy leaning over him. At the same time, the boy’s own eyes widened in alarm. Matt cried out and pushed the boy away. The boy had been crouching on his heels. He lost his balance and fell over backwards. Matt sprang to his feet.

“Get off me!” he shouted. “Who are you? Leave me alone!”

The boy said nothing. Of course, it was unlikely that he spoke a word of English. Matt looked down at him and, despite everything that had happened, and all the confusion in his mind, he thought he knew him. It seemed to Matt that they had met long ago, but then he remembered – in the car, on the way from the airport. He was the boy who had been juggling at the traffic lights and who had sworn at them.

“No hacia nada. Solo intentaba ayudarte!” the boy said.

He was protesting his innocence, but Matt didn’t believe him. It was there in his eyes – deep brown and suspicious – in the way he held himself like a cornered animal, as if he was going to lash out at any moment. The boy was all bone. If Matt grabbed hold of his arm, he was fairly sure his thumbs and fingers would meet. He was wearing a yellow T-shirt that advertised a drink called Inca Cola, but the words had faded and the fabric had worn away into holes. His jeans were disgusting, tied with a piece of rope around the waist. He was wearing sandals made of black rubber.

The boy stood up and brushed himself down, as if the action could remove months of accumulated dirt. Then he looked balefully at Matt.

“No he tomada nada.” He showed his empty hands to make the point. He hadn’t taken anything.

Matt felt in his pockets. He’d had ten pounds when he came from England and fortunately he had kept it in his trousers. It was still there. His passport was still in his jacket. That was something, anyway. The boy was looking at him with injured pride, as if to say “How can you possibly mistrust me?” But Matt was sure that if he’d slept for another thirty seconds, he would have woken up with nothing.