Gemma Fox - Hot Pursuit

Caught in the flickering light from the TV screen, Cain – sipping a piña colada – nodded just as someone from Slade pulled a fish the size of a corgi up over the side of a boat.

Nimrod groaned, closed his eyes and pulled the pillow over his head. Within minutes he was sound asleep.

While Robbie Hughes snored peacefully on the Gotcha office sofa Lesley poured over the telephone directories she’d brought up from the in-house library and busied herself making lists from the books and the database she’d pulled up on the computer, as well as from the Internet. Lesley had always been very good at cryptic clues and puzzles and games of logic – so far she had made all sorts of connections to all sorts of names on her list. First thing tomorrow she’d start ringing round to see how many more pieces she could slot into place. She liked puzzles. Maggie Morgan’s name was right up under Bernie’s mum and his first wife.

Lesley looked over at Robbie. His mouth was open, head thrown back, a little trail of drool glistening on his chin. She smiled indulgently. He wasn’t an easy man to work with but then was anyone of his calibre?

Some days she saw Robbie Hughes as a natural leader; fiery, quixotic, one of life’s visionaries, while on others he struck her as a grumpy little man with an ego the size of an emerging African nation. She suspected, with a wisdom far beyond her years, that he most probably was a subtle combination of the two and that one side fuelled the other. Whichever it was, working with Robbie had to hold more of a future than answering phone calls from women worried about the brown mould on their pot plants on the family channel. Getting up from the desk, Lesley very carefully pulled a woolly blanket off one of the chairs and covered Robbie up. Couldn’t have him getting cold, now, could she?

‘So here we go, then. Photos, gloves, guns, Mintos.’ Nimrod, talking aloud to himself, ran through his mental checklist one more time, although he had been repeating it over and over in his head like a mantra for most of the morning. He and Cain had managed to get up early, showered, had a coffee, even fitted in fifty sit-ups. Life was sweet, the traffic was light and Nimrod had got everything on his list.

If anyone had ever asked Nimrod Brewster for his tips for success in the hit man business, they would have included a clear sense of purpose about what he was trying to achieve, good photos of the target, precise information, an accurate to-do list, a sharp suit, comfy shoes and a good selection of boiled sweets for the journey.

Tucked away under the CD player, the radio scanner that the Invisible Man had left them was tuned into the police frequency. It burbled and bipped and peeped away in the background, snatches of police messages adding a rather piquant soundtrack to Nimrod’s thoughts.

Nimrod slipped the envelope of photos out of the glove compartment of the undistinguished silver-grey hire car and took one final long hard look at Nick Lucas’s face, fixing the features in his mind.

Nimrod was good at his job, and when it was a hit, not a beating-up or a frightening or something just for fun – which to be frank, as he got older, Nimrod was less and less keen to be involved in – he prided himself on a certain swiftness of execution. These days he preferred to specialise. There was no mess, no unnecessary pain or fuss if he could possibly help it, just in and out and all over. Cool, steely, clinical. Nimrod saw himself as an emissary of death, not that he would ever say that to Cain, or any of his clients. He tugged his lapels straight. He was death’s personal postboy.

It was an easy drive – M25, M40 all the way – empty roads, good weather. Nimrod stretched. Beside him, Cain drove; he always drove just under the speed limit, carefully, considerately, with gear changes as smooth as oiled glass. Broadshouldered, newly shaved and dressed in their neat charcoal-grey suits and crisply tailored macs the two of them could easily pass for Mormons or off-duty police officers. Invisible, low-key, discreet, that’s what Nimrod liked best. He made a mental note to add this to the checklist in case anyone ever asked him to appear on a This is Your Life Villains’ Special.

The little Oxfordshire village of Renham was still early-morning quiet, with just the odd car or two pulling out of driveways, exhaust fumes spiralling away in the new dawn air. Sunlight reflected on the morning dew, birds busy in the horse chestnut trees that sheltered the caravan site behind the Old Dairy. All in all it was a lovely morning.

‘So,’ Nimrod said, as they parked up under a tall hawthorn hedge close to the caravans; not so close as to draw any unwanted attention to themselves but not so far away that they had to cross a lot of open ground to reach their target. ‘Number fourteen, here we come. In, out, over and home in time for tea and buns.’

Cain pulled a face. ‘What, buns, for breakfast? I was hoping we could stop off for egg and bacon somewhere when we’re finished.’

‘It’s just a turn of phrase.’

Cain thought for a few seconds and then said, ‘Oh okay. So can I have the window seat when we go home, then?’

Nimrod pulled a face. ‘No. What the hell brought that up? It isn’t a done deal yet.’ He nodded towards the regimented row of vans.

‘Oh come on. How much trouble do you think one chef’s going to give us?’

Nimrod surreptitiously slipped a hand around his well-toned belly to check the butt of the gun concealed in the small of his back, tucked away neatly in its custom-built holster. Warmed by the heat of his body, he still liked to make sure it was there, always afraid – in the way of bad dreams – that one day he would reach for it and find it gone.

He took a deep breath to calm himself. Photos, gloves, guns, Mintoes. Today’s mantra.

‘I wasn’t talking about Mr Lucas, I was talking about the bloody window seat,’ said Nimrod. ‘Anyway, yer never know, I might fancy it.’ He shot his cuffs and then pulled his jacket straight.

‘The window seat? Oh, yeah right,’ snorted Cain. ‘You always say that but you hate looking out of the window. I’ve seen you with your eyes closed when we’re taking off, pretending to read the instructions on them cards. You don’t fool me for a minute.’

They were out of the car now and walking without apparent hurry through the crisp early morning light of a brand new summer’s day, every sense alive, sniffing the air like feral dogs.

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