Paul Finch - The Killing Club

They slid to a halt, sparkling with sweat. Farthing made to double back, but Heck motioned for silence.

Seconds passed as they listened.

Suddenly, there was no other sound.

‘Let’s kick our way out,’ Farthing said, lurching towards the window, which no longer sported glass beneath its metal cladding.

‘Wait!’ Heck whispered.

They froze again. Still there was no sound. Had the maniac lost them? Or was he creeping up even now?

‘Fuck this!’ Farthing said, but Heck grabbed his arm.

‘Just wait! He’s had a couple of chances to pop us, and he hasn’t taken them. It may be he needs to get close.’

‘So?’

‘So hang on! We don’t know how solid that shutter is. It could take us five minutes, and if we make a racket it’ll bring him right to us.’

Farthing licked his lips. ‘You go see where he is … I’ll try and get it loose quietly.’

Heck padded back to the door, stopping alongside a low shelf, on which someone had left a wrench. It was old and rusty, but still satisfyingly heavy. He grabbed it, and peered out into the half-lit corridor. To his left it right-angled out of sight; to his right it ran straight for forty yards before vanishing into shadow. He glanced back, to where Farthing was feeling around the edges of the corrugated metal. With a slight creak, it shifted. The PC gazed at Heck.

‘Couple of kicks and this is gone, I’m telling you!’

Heck motioned to him to wait just a second, and slipped out into the corridor, walking to the nearby corner. Around it, the passage led twenty yards to what looked like a fire-exit. He hurried up there and shoved down on the escape-bar, but there was no budge in it. As he pondered this, there came a series of thundering blows from behind. He knew that it was Farthing – hammering on metal.

He darted back to the corner and around into the main corridor, just in time to see the tall shape of Cooper loom out of the shadows at the far end, gun levelled.

‘You total prat!’ Heck shouted, barging back into the office.

Farthing was still working on the corrugated metal, half of which had been bashed through, though the rest of it wouldn’t shift. ‘Didn’t know where you were!’ he wailed. ‘I thought he’d nabbed you!’

‘Fucking idiot!’ Heck grabbed up an office chair, hurling it through the air.

The impact was cacophonous, and the rest of the corrugated shutter fell away, more dim light spilling inward. Farthing vaulted out through the empty frame first. Heck followed, sensing the figure appear in the office door behind.

‘Oh shit!’ Farthing screamed.

They weren’t outside.

They were in another enclosed space; some kind of garage, empty except for dust and debris. Farthing staggered across it towards a set of double doors, the central cleft of which promised daylight. Heck twirled back to the window. Cooper was framed on the other side, bloody-chinned, gazing along his pistol barrel.

Heck threw the wrench.

It flashed through the air, a spinning blur, and struck its target in the middle of his chest. Cooper went down with a choked gasp and Heck tensed, ready to pounce back through the empty frame and overpower him, but there was no clatter of a firearm dropping loose. So he turned and hurtled across the garage, to where Farthing was throwing his shoulder at the double doors. Heck joined him, left foot first. With a splintering crash , the bolt on the other side gave way. The doors swung open, and fresh air poured in. They tottered out into a yard which seemed to run along the back of the main building and was dotted with the relics of cars and trucks. Another brick wall, maybe twelve feet high, hemmed them in.

‘That way,’ Heck said, pointing left.

About seventy yards in that direction stood a pair of tall wrought-iron gates. They were closed and chained, but there was a gap between the top of the gates and the overarching brickwork. It was a climb, but it wouldn’t be impossible.

Farthing shook his head. ‘N— no … that way!’

He pointed right, where only thirty yards away, beyond the gutted shell of a van, stood a single gate – this one wide open. Some instinct told Heck this was a mistake – but Farthing was already stumbling towards it. Heck followed, glancing over his shoulder. There was still no sign of Cooper. The wrench had caught him a good one; there was even a chance it had done the job for them, but that would be a hell of a gamble.

‘Bloody hell, no!’ Farthing cried. Now that he’d circled the van, he could see through the narrow gate – into a cul-de-sac; a smaller yard encircled by yet another high wall, this one surmounted with shards of glass.

With a creak of hinges, the garage door opened behind them.

Heck snatched Farthing’s collar and dragged him down to his knees, so the wrecked van would fleetingly screen them. He flattened himself on the concrete to gaze underneath it. Cooper’s feet limped into view on the other side. The guy was obviously hurt, limping and breathing heavily; he moved away from the garage slowly, warily – scanning for his prey.

‘Doesn’t give up, like, does he?’ Farthing breathed. He slumped alongside Heck, shoulders pressed back against the crumpled bodywork. His face was pasty-white, and dabbled with beads of hanging sweat. ‘Really … really wants to kill us.’

‘Got no choice,’ Heck mumbled, still watching.

Cooper had advanced about ten yards, and now appeared to be pivoting around. If he ventured right, he’d locate them almost immediately. But if he went left, towards the double-gate, there was a possibility they could sneak into the garage and double back.

Only after several torturous seconds did the gunman make his choice, cautiously edging left. Heck held his breath, though Farthing appeared to be struggling with his. He gave a slow, sharp gasp.

‘Shhh!’ Heck said.

Cooper progressed into the wider yard, checking every nook and cranny.

‘Can you make it back through the building?’ Heck asked, glancing up.

Farthing looked dismayed. ‘All that … all that way again?’

‘I’m guessing he already knows that smaller gate leads nowhere. So he’s covering the other one. He’s got us bottled up in here. All he needs to do now is find us. We’ve got to make a run for it.’

‘I don’t know …’ Farthing shook his head, clutching the side of his chest. ‘I don’t know if it’s my heart, but …’

‘Your heart?’

Fresh sweat streamed down the older PC’s face; he wasn’t so much white now, as green. ‘Something’s wrong. I’m not in shape … as you’ve probably seen.’

Heck glanced back under the vehicle. Cooper’s legs were a considerable distance away – maybe sixty yards. If he was short-sighted, that might be an adequate distance for them to chance it. But now Farthing had a problem with his heart …?

‘It never bloody rains,’ Heck said under his breath. He glanced back up. ‘And you’ve got a wife and three daughters, haven’t you?’

Farthing nodded and swallowed, his brow tightly furrowed.

Heck sighed and made his decision. ‘If I can get back inside and leg it through the interior, it may draw him away. If I manage that, can you at least make it to that double-gate over there?’

‘Don’t know if I’ll be able to climb over it …’

‘Jerry … rough as you may feel, you’re going to have to do something. The SAS aren’t going to turn up!’

Farthing looked agonised by the choice he was facing, but finally nodded. ‘Suppose I’ve … more chance getting over that gate than of making it all the way back through this place … especially if you’ve drawn him off. But … what if you get lost in there? He knows his way around!’