Andy McNab - Meltdown

Teddy gasped, but he didn't cry out.

Mr Muscles returned the blood that had splashed onto the sleeve of his leather jacket by wiping it clean on Teddy's shirt. He smiled. 'Good boy. Well done. I'm glad we understand each other.' In a wall socket in a corner of the room, a double plug adaptor that Fergus had installed in the twins' apartment on an earlier visit was picking up every detail of Teddy's torment. Inside it was a minute bug – a microphone and transmitter that had constant power when it was plugged in.

Outside, in the Mondeo, Danny winced as they heard Teddy take the blows.

Lee saw Danny grimace. 'Part of the job, mate – don't let it get to you. Just focus on what we have to do.'

Phil had parked his Vauxhall closer to the apartment and Siddie Richards's Jaguar, ready to go into action the minute he got the order. He nodded as he heard Teddy get another friendly slap; things were getting interesting at last.

Fergus was approaching the service entrance. That afternoon he'd taped back the lock on the door at the rear of the building. As he listened to the one-sided encounter through his earpiece, he hoped that Siddie's heavies hadn't been instructed to kill Teddy if he didn't co-operate fully. He thought it unlikely – they wanted Teddy's information – but with a monster like Siddie Richards, he couldn't be sure.

And Fergus needed Siddie to go into the apartment. He had to give it a while longer.

For the next few minutes they all listened as first one then the other heavy used his own particularly favoured torture technique on Teddy to soften him up. Teddy screamed like he'd never screamed before as he absorbed the pain. Blubber Man was proving to be less physical than Mr Muscles, but he carried with him specific tools of the trade. He reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out a large pair of pliers. 'That's a nice set of teeth you've got there.' He grinned at Teddy. 'Let's see how you look without the front two.'

'Wait a minute,' said Mr Muscles. 'We go on like this and he'll be dead. And we don't want that. Not yet, anyway.'

He pulled a mobile from his bomber jacket pocket and punched in a number.

A thin voice answered the call. 'Well?'

'He's ready for you.'

Siddie considered for a moment. 'I hope you didn't bust that main door lock. I don't want a break-in reported.'

Mr Muscles sounded almost indignant at the slur on his professionalism. 'No! I did it right – I used the code. You know, the one I gave you.'

Earlier in the day he had also made a visit to the apartment building and had quickly discovered the four-digit code number for the electronic key pad on the entrance door. It was easy, a technique he'd perfected as a teenager when he used to look over the shoulders of people using cashpoint machines before mugging them for their card.

This time he'd just smiled at a woman as she approached the door, watched her punch in the numbers, followed her into the building and even got into the lift with her. He waited until she selected her floor and then pressed the button for the one below. He nodded a goodbye and then went back to Siddie with the number securely logged in his memory. Mr Muscles was good at remembering numbers.

Siddie seemed satisfied. 'I'm coming in.'

Mr Muscles ended the call and smiled down at Teddy. 'Now it's really gonna hurt.' Outside the building, a rear door of the Jaguar opened and Siddie Richards stepped out carrying a baseball bat. Siddie had always had a special liking for the weight and feel of a baseball bat as a weapon of mass destruction.

Danny hit the pressel on the gear stick.

'Stand by, stand by! That's engine and lights off. Wait… wait… That's x-ray out of the Jaguar, approaching apartment building with a baseball bat'

Fergus was making his way up the concrete service stairs normally used by contractors. He pushed the pressel on the wire dangling from one sleeve of his jacket.

'Phil, you deal with the driver. Danny, Lee, the two x-rays are yours if they come out of the flat. I'm losing this earpiece now – don't want Teddy to see it.'

Fergus pulled the earpiece from his ear and shoved it into a pocket. As he took the stairs three at a time, he slid a silenced Welrod out of his waistband and pushed the safety catch from right to left so that it was ready to fire.

Designed in the Second World War, and looking like a 20cm length of pipe with a pistol grip stuck under it, the Welrod was still the ultimate silence weapon because it had no working parts once the subsonic round was fired: you couldn't even hear the sound of metal scraping against metal.

Siddie used the code to enter the apartment block reception area. Then he took the stairs – the main ones with the thick carpet and modern art on the walls – reasoning that it wasn't a good idea to be seen in the lift with a baseball bat for company.

Meanwhile Phil was already out of his Vauxhall. He took a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and put one between his lips.

He walked casually up to the Jaguar and knocked on the driver's window. As the man behind the wheel turned to look at him, Phil smiled and pointed at the unlit cigarette in his mouth. The driver didn't return the smile; he just turned away.

Phil knocked again, and this time the electric window slid down and the driver glared.

'Piss off.'

Phil looked offended. 'I only want a light, mate.'

'I haven't got a light. Now piss off before I get angry.'

Phil's right hand was in his jacket pocket. Before the driver had the chance to say another word, Phil whipped it out and jammed the Taser's two steel probes into his victim's shoulder. The driver didn't have a chance to react; he just shuddered uncontrollably as the electricity crackled. Phil gave him a five-second burst of 100,000 watts and he collapsed onto the passenger seat.

Phil opened the door and lifted the unconscious driver back into a sitting position. The Taser was designed to stun, not to kill, being high wattage but low amperage. But to ensure that the driver remained out of action until well after the operation was over, Phil gave him another fivesecond burst before closing the door and moving away from the Jaguar into the shadows to await further orders.

Siddie had reached the top of the building; the long climb up to the penthouse apartment had done nothing to cool his temper, which was always close to boiling point.

Fergus was waiting on the same floor, peering through the crack in the door to the service stairs. He watched the grim-faced Siddie go by and he waited.

By the time Siddie walked into the apartment, his two henchmen had hoisted Teddy up and then leaned his battered body against one of the expensive, but now bloodstained, sofas.

Teddy's face was a bloody mess; it would be some while before Mummy saw her son at his handsome best – if he lived that long.

Siddie looked down at Teddy and then back at the two gorillas. 'Which one is this?'

Mr Muscles and Blubber Man gazed at each other blankly and then back at Siddie. Mr Muscles shrugged his bulging shoulders. 'We didn't ask.'

Siddie sighed. 'Go and wait in the car while I talk to… ' He turned back to the young man on the floor and raised his eyebrows enquiringly.

The blood-soaked figure on the carpet swallowed a mixture of blood and mucus and managed to gasp out a single word: 'Teddy.'

'Siddie Richards. You might have heard of me.'

The two henchmen were on their way out when Siddie called after them, 'Use the stairs. And leave the paintings where they are.' This was exactly what Danny and Lee wanted to hear – they had picked up every word Siddie had spoken through the double-socket bug.

As Fergus watched the two heavies head for the main staircase, Danny and Lee were already out of the Mondeo and into the apartment building, also using the service entrance. Moving into the reception area at the front of the building, they pulled Tasers from their pockets before going through the doors to the main stairs.