David Lorimar tried to sleep for a few hours, but his mind was racing with ideas of turning into a legitimate member of society. Luke could be his ticket out of this dangerous world he lived in and the chance to move into a safer life. He needed to put his thoughts aside and then move on with the job. The money Jinx would pay him would be enough to invest in the business with Luke and pay his rent for the next few years.
Today he was planning to kill Dean Hines, and he had finally traced him to the Royal Liverpool hospital. He would need to use a disguise today. Dava drove to a lockup a few miles away from his house, changed vehicles and clothes and picked up Griff on the way to the next hit.
“How come you’re late?” Griff moaned as he belted up.
“I encountered a few hurdles. Here, put this on,” Dava answered irritably as he passed him a freshly laundered green uniform. “Put your clothes in the bag.”
“Okay, I know shit happens, and now I have to dress up,” Griff grunted. “Who are we after?”
“His name is Dean Hines,” Dava answered. Griff had made his way further into the circle of trust on the Jackson job, so there was little point in being secretive. “He proved difficult to find.”
“How come?” Griff asked.
“He hasn’t been at home.” Dava tapped his nose. “Found him in the end though.”
They weaved through traffic on the way across the city. It was an uneventful thirty-minute drive to the huge hospital close to the city centre. As they circled the building, Dava said, “He’s parked his car outside the Royal, but there’s no sign of him yet.”
“He must be inside,” Griff commented.
“He must be either sick, or visiting someone,” Dava nodded. “It’s time to sit tight and wait.”
David Lorimar parked opposite the hospital away from the CCTV cameras watching the car parks. The hospital was busy, and there were several exits and entrances around the building.
“It will be difficult to monitor them all simultaneously,” Griff said as they parked. “There are more exits at the side there, where we can’t see. I don’t like hanging about.”
“I can see Dean’s vehicle from this position.” David Lorimar smiled. “We can see his car and three of the exits from here.” He was an experienced mercenary, and this was second nature to him. “Waiting for our target is all part of the job.”
“It’s a pain in the arse and a waste of time, in my opinion.”
“Shut up,” Dava said sourly. “You know the score. In Africa, I waited two weeks one time for a target to surface.”
“Two weeks?”
“Two weeks dug into a hole in the jungle with one canteen of water and a bag of beef jerky to live on,” Dava recalled. “I was close to giving up when the target arrived.”
“Fuck that for a game of soldiers,” Griff scoffed. “You should have gone back to base and then gone back after dinner. The bloke would have turned up eventually.”
“It was a woman.” Dava turned to see his colleague’s reaction. Griff looked at him and sneered.
“I like your style,” he nodded and looked out of the window, thinking. “How come she was a target?”
“She was a western journalist causing problems with the whale huggers,” Dava smiled. “The government wanted her silenced.”
“Did it pay well?”
“Yes, it paid.”
“Did you ask for a bonus for sitting in a hole for two weeks?”
“It was all part of the job, tracking, waiting and then moving in for the kill,” Dava bragged. He was proud of his experiences abroad. “Did you ever work any cleaning jobs?”
“No, never did any hits abroad. It was all close protection work mostly.”
“Mostly?” Dava laughed.
“You know the score,” Griff smiled. “There were a few people who needed removing from circulation, but it was never a sanctioned hit. It just made life easier.”
“Nothing wrong with taking out the bad guys,” Dava said as he watched the hospital.
“They were not always bad guys,” Griff grunted. “Sometimes our employers didn’t want to pay some of the foreign mercenaries. It was cheaper to take them out than to pay them.”
“Doesn’t sound like cricket to me?” Dava looked at him. Maybe Luke was right about Griff.
“It happens. You know it does.”
“I couldn’t take out someone I had worked with.”
“Everyone has a price.”
“I suppose they do,” Dava agreed grudgingly, although it didn’t feel right. It was a complicated world when fighting for money rather than a belief. He decided to change the subject. “Did you ever work in Africa?”
“No, never did,” Griff yawned as he looked around. They were in a quiet spot. “Africa must have been difficult. Murder over there is part of everyday life though. Big difference here is masking the murder.”
“Yes, it’s different alright.”
“Easier over there, I think,” Griff scoffed. “In the jungle you could leave your kill dead where they lay, no one would go hunting for you, right?”
“It’s never easy.” The comment irritated Dava.
“Depends.”
“Depends on what?”
“This is not a war zone.” Griff pointed out of the window as he spoke. “You can’t assassinate in public without recrimination. Murderers are sent to prison for life. It’s much harder here. No one gives a shit over there.”
“I’m aware of that.”
“You have to be careful here.”
“I am careful.”
“You have to be good here.”
“I’m good, too.”
“Here you have to kill without being seen,” Griff waffled on. “Killing Dean Hines will be simple enough, but the skill is in making him disappear.”
“Thanks for the input, but you’re getting on my tits now,” Dava grumbled. He knew what he was doing. No one would see them take Dean, and no one would find his body. Vanishing people was an art form he had perfected over time. Today he and Griff were dressed in paramedic’s uniforms. His estate car was an ambulance fast response unit with a green and yellow-checked pattern.
“Where did you get the car?” Griff asked looking into the rear of the estate car. “I like your style,” he added sarcastically.
“I picked it up from an insurance right-off company. Ambulances always come in handy.”
“It’s a coincidence that the target is at the hospital, but a convenient one,” Griff smirked.
“It’s not a coincidence. I found out where he was and planned the pickup. Planning works, believe me.” Dava didn’t look at his associate as he spoke. He was getting on his nerves. “When we’re ready to take Dean Hines, we render him unconscious, and it will be simple to put him in the back of an ambulance vehicle unnoticed.”
“No one will see him because it’s normal, too normal to remember,” Griff chuckled. “I like your style.”
“Something like that,” Dava muttered. He thought Dean would be minced and fed to the prize pigs before the night was out. Dava checked his phone. He had three missed calls from Jinx. Something must have gone wrong. There was no way Jinx should contact him while a job was running. “Shit.”
“What’s up?” Griff asked.
“Someone is calling for a progress report, no doubt,” David replied. He was slightly embarrassed that only one of the three men on the contract was dead. He had stipulated to Jinx that he would take out all three men within thirty-six hours. His reputation was important to him. He decided not to return the calls until he had dealt with Dean. At least then, he would be able to report that Leon was the only target remaining. As he debated the issue, he spotted Dean Hines approaching his vehicle on the hospital car park. David Lorimar started the engine and engaged reverse gear. It was time to go to work. There was a tap on the window, and he jumped in his seat.
“Fucking hell!” Dava hissed. A tall dark figure leaned down to his window and tapped again. He reached for the window winder and then remembered that it didn’t work. “What the fuck are you doing here, Jinx?” he exclaimed through the glass. He reached for the door handle.
“I need to talk to you,” Jinx said through the glass. He stepped back from the car.
“You shouldn’t be here,” David Lorimar growled. He was about to open the door when Griff Collins put a sawn-off shot gun against the back of his head and squeezed both triggers. The twelve-gauge blew Dava’s head in half as the lead shot ripped through his skull, spraying blood and grey matter all over the windscreen and interior of the car. His left eyeball and three front teeth were stuck to the driver’s window and they dribbled down the glass slowly held fast by grey matter.
Tank scrolled through his inbox and checked the information once again. He rubbed his shaven head and thought about the next move. He needed the go-ahead from Major Stanley Timms before he could do anything. His chair squeaked as his huge muscular frame moved. He stood up and walked toward the major’s office.
“Major,” he nodded as he opened the door. His biceps strained at the sleeve of his shirt, threatening to snap the elastic. “Can I have a word?”
“Come in, John.” The major looked perplexed. Something was on his mind. “I was just coming to see you.”
“Major?” Tank frowned. His icy blue eyes narrowed slightly.
“I have some interesting information,” the major placed his hands under his chin as he looked at his computer screen.
“Jack Howarth?” Tank smiled. It would seem that the major had placed a flag on him, too.
“Exactly.” The major didn’t seem too surprised that Tank already knew. “I think you should look into it.”
“Yes, Major,” Tank replied.
“Unofficially, of course,” the major added. “You are owed some leave, aren’t you?”
“Yes, unofficially, of course,” Tank smiled and closed the door behind him. “How much do you know, Major?”
“Just that his name has flagged up in a recent murder,” the major raised his eyebrows. “What do you know so far?”
“I put a flag on his DNA when he escaped from the hospital.” Tank sat down at the chair facing his superior. “As soon as his name cropped up I checked which force had found it. It turns out it was the boys downstairs, so I contacted Graham Libby as soon as the information came up.”
“What did he say?”
“He said the information was brought to light during the investigation into the murder of a young woman. I need to speak to the doctor, but I wanted to let you know what I was doing first.”
“Of course you did.” The major sat forward and placed his chin on his hands. “What have you found out?”
“I accessed the Major Investigation Team’s database to see how far the investigation was progressed. There was no doubt about it. Jack Howarth had left his DNA at a murder scene and he was living here under the guise of one Patrick Lloyd.”
“I always wondered how he got out of the country,” the major sat back and tapped the desk.
“He didn’t go far, major. He knew every exit was covered, so he did the next best thing.”
“So uniform are going after him for murder?”
“More than one, from what I can see,” Tank answered with a nod. “There was another murder scene involving his name. The murder of a drug dealer by the name of Benjamin, but by the time the match had been made, Jack Howarth, alias Patrick Lloyd, had been released due to a lack of evidence. Now he’s linked to at least four murders.”
“Let’s not rely on the police to take him out of circulation, John,” the major said solemnly. “Howarth slipped through the net last time they crossed swords. I don’t want the bastard to get away again.”
“Anyone who will cut his own thumb off to slip out of his cuffs is a tough man to hold on to,” Tank smiled. “I’ll follow it and make sure they take him out. If they don’t, I will.”
When Jack Howarth had escaped, Tank had left the marker on the system in case he ever raised his head again. It wasn’t strictly taskforce protocol to track people traffickers, but the smuggling routes they used were also used to smuggle all sorts of nasty stuff, terrorists and explosives included. Those were taskforce protocol.
“How are we looking?” Alec asked the uniformed officer next to him.
“Four armed units consisting of six police officers in each are in position around the property. We have two units at the front of the house and two covering the rear.”
Alec Ramsay and his team were the second line on this operation until the armed officers assured them that there was no danger to them from an armed suspect. Detective inspector Eales raised a megaphone to his lips and called out.
“Patrick Lloyd,” he shouted. They would use his alias name for now. “You are surrounded by armed police officers. Come out with your hands held above your head.”
“Have we tried the landline at the property?” Alec asked.
“Yes, no answer.”
The curtains remained closed and still. They had cordoned the street off at both ends, and despite the fact that the remaining houses were derelict and ready for demolition, crowds were gathering at both ends to watch the drama unfold.
“There is nothing like a few patrol cars to attract a crowd. We have an audience already,” Alec said looking at the cordons.
“What do you think?” DS Eales asked Alec.
“I think that if Kisha is in there and he is not responding, then we go in regardless,” Alec replied. “The man is a psychopath, let’s not hang around.”
“What are the chances of the boy being in there too?”
“Slim, to be honest.”
“I’ll send them in.”
“Do it.”
“All units go! Go! Go!” Eales said over the radio.
Nate Bradley, once codenamed Gecko, watched from behind a crowd of onlookers as the ARU demolished the front door with a battering ram. He had wanted to silence Patrick Lloyd, but the police had arrived before him. The armed officers moved in unison with practised ease as they entered the old terraced house. Nate didn’t think that they would find Patrick Lloyd in there. He wished he had taken Patrick out himself when he had had the chance at the hotel, but what was done was done. It looked like Patrick was in the wind, and the further away he was, the better for Nate. He wanted to hit Leon Tanner and his Turkish suppliers where it hurt by stealing his crack shipment and his money. Then he would kill him, if his suppliers didn’t kill him first. Patrick Lloyd was out of his reach. There were police everywhere. Locals were milling about the police lines looking for a good vantage point. Press photographers snapped as the action unfolded, but one of the photographers wasn’t capturing the action at the house. He was discretely taking pictures of the crowd. He pointed his camera at Gecko just long enough to capture his face. John Tankersley clicked off three frames of the crowd who were watching the police raid because he recognised Nate’s face in it. He wasn’t sure where he had seen him before, but he knew he had, and he knew that he had been a covert intelligence agent once upon a time.