Death Trap (40 page)

Rio remembered hearing similar words spoken by her own mother to her auntie when her father had left.

‘I swear if Nikki is unharmed we won’t bring any charges against your son.’

The older woman breathed like a weight had been lifted from her head. ‘He part owns a nightclub, about ten minutes from here. It’s called The Delta Club. He works in the basement.’ She took a deep breath before adding, ‘I think the basement is soundproof.’

fifty-six

The Hit: Day 6

Midnight

‘No way am I letting you go in there Lone Ranger style,’ Calum told Rio as she stopped the car’s engine on the neighbouring road where the club was located.

The Delta Club was situated on the border with Peckham and Nunhead, not that far from Nunhead’s Victorian cemetery.

Rio turned to him. ‘You’re in no fit state if things kick off. And I’m still pissed that you wouldn’t go to the hospital.’

‘It isn’t happening, Rio. You go in, I go in.’

Rio didn’t have time to fight what she knew was a losing battle. ‘We can go through the front, but might not be allowed in by the bouncers. The last thing we need is to alert anyone that we’re here.’

Calum pulled out his mobile. ‘Let’s see if there are any photos of the interior online which might give us a head start on the layout.’

He got the Internet running, put in a search for images of the club. Nothing came back. He looked at Rio. ‘No images, which means there’s a strict rule about taking snaps inside. That’s not good; the only places that do that have got something to hide.’ He put his phone away as he carried on speaking. ‘Let’s hope there’s some way we can get in around the side or back.’

They hit the cooling night and turned into the street where the club was. Calum grabbed Rio’s hand. She tried to pull out of his hold.

‘What the effing hell are you doing?’

He tightened his hand. ‘Let’s appear to be a loving couple.’ Their eyes caught and held. Rio was the first to turn away. ‘That way we’ll look like two people minding our own business.’

The club didn’t have a neon sign or any other sign, just a group of young people standing outside, smoking and talking. Despite being a two-storey building, it appeared squat: oblong a better description for its shape than the more elegant rectangle. Painted a bland cream, it had two single lights at the front and a blue main door. Two, tall silhouettes stood in position beside the door. But their luck was in; one half of the building was detached.

‘The place is probably covered by security cams,’ Calum whispered as they walked past, ‘although sometimes they are just a show of muscle and either no one is keeping an eye on them or they’re not even on. Whatever the situation, we need to be quick.’

They played the hand-in-hand lovers routine until they got just past the alleyway at the side of the club. As Rio took another step she almost lost her balance when Calum jerked her close to his body and rushed into the narrow passageway. He wrapped his hand over her mouth and yanked her close to his chest as he backed into a wall.

‘Quiet.’ His voice was low, intense, blowing into her ear.

His hand dropped away as Rio did what she knew Calum was doing – her gaze scouted up and around. The environment appeared like it was up for a fight – razor wire stretched across the wall perimeter, brickwork that was broken, scarred and stubborn enough to take more abuse, and a ground that was dirty and hard. The one thing she couldn’t see was . . .

‘No cams,’ Calum uttered the words in her head. ‘Maybe this place isn’t as rough and ready as we thought. Let’s find the back door.’

They found it a few metres down, near a stack of bulging black bags. It was a thick block of rusting steel.

‘How are we going to get past this?’ Rio asked.

‘Well if there aren’t any cameras, maybe . . .’ Calum didn’t finish the sentence as his hand shot out towards the rusty, metal bar running along the width of the door. He pressed the bar down. Shoved. Click, the door groaned open.

Rio was the first to step inside. A long corridor with age-old white walls and boxes clumped together at one end. The muffled boom-bass of music playing somewhere on a dance floor vibrated against the walls.

‘You go that way and I’ll go down here.’ She pointed to the opposite side of the corridor. ‘Check out any doors that may lead to a way downstairs,’ Rio said, taking charge.

Rio went left, bypassing a greasy-looking stain on the grey lino floor. She stopped when she came to a door – listened – nothing. She pulled it slowly open and peered inside what looked like a large kitchen. It was clean, tidy but with no evidence of any hidden stairwells. Rio carried on until she reached another door; this one pulled back slightly from its frame. She tucked it back – a cupboard filled with cleaning equipment.

‘Think I’ve found it,’ Calum called.

He was near the end of the corridor on his side standing near another opened door. Rio joined him and peered inside to find a set of wooden stairs leading downwards. A single bulb mounted on the side of the wall lit the way. Calum reached inside his jacket, but Rio snapped her hand around his wrist.

‘No hard metal. We need to play this one out carefully. This guy is full of grief, so I think I might be able to talk him down.’

Calum shrugged his shoulders. ‘You’re the boss lady for now, but if things get dicey in there we may have to do this another way.’

Rio didn’t bother to challenge his words; if Nikki was in a bad way they wouldn’t have a choice. She took the lead as they went downstairs. The air was dank and dusty with a smell that told of a sewer nearby. As they got closer to the basement level there was the echo of sounds. At first, Rio couldn’t grasp what she was hearing, but as she got closer she realised that it was voices. It was hard to make out what was being said. But at any rate, Chiwetel’s mother had been wrong; the basement wasn’t soundproof.

They reached the bottom of the stairs and immediately saw the black door up ahead. Now the voices were clearer and what Rio heard sent a chill through her.

‘Don’t play the fool, little girl.’

‘I said don’t touch me. Don’t come near me.’

Both Rio and Calum belted towards the door at the same time. Calum got there first and bashed it open with an almighty shoulder. Rio froze on the threshold. Inside were Chiwetel Ibraheem and another young man. But that’s not what made her stop. It was a long time since she’d been shaken by in-your-face-shock, but she was now at what she saw.

Nikki stood in the middle of the room, illuminated directly under the powerful light of the naked bulb above. One of her hands, still wearing lime-green fingerless gloves, held a knife pressed against her throat.

No one spoke. No one moved. They were the only inhabitants of a subterranean world with its own rules; well, that’s how it felt to Rio. In this investigation she’d faced situations that she was well used to dealing with – murder gruesomely strewn in a domestic setting; being attacked with fists and weapons; a man hanging above drug paraphernalia that had only added more torture to his already tormented life . . . But a sixteen-year-old girl holding a knife to her own throat? Rio wasn’t sure she knew how to deal with that. The one person she had never thought how to protect Nikki from was herself.

‘She’s off her head,’ Chiwetel said, his voice breathless and frantic. ‘I only brought her here to talk to her. Just wanted to find out why Ade—?’

Rio snapped into action. ‘Shut up.’ She didn’t look at him, keeping her gaze pinned to the girl taking centre stage. ‘Nikki you’re worrying me. Please put the knife down.’

Nikki shifted slightly. The stark light above enhanced her paleness. The haunted and hurt emotions in her grey eyes. What worried Rio the most was that there were no tears in Nikki’s eyes. The girl’s voice was small when she finally spoke. ‘Everyone I know just keeps dying around me, so I thought if I wasn’t here anymore it would all stop.’

Rio dared to take another step. ‘A few years back someone attacked me. They tied me to a bed and slit my wrists.’ She held up a forearm, twisting it to show one of the scars. ‘It was bloody and hurt so much the pain was ringing throughout my body. But worse than the physical pain was the agony of one of my team being murdered. He was young and I was meant to be looking after him and he died on my watch. I was eaten up with guilt – thought it was all my fault. But I started to realise that putting the blame squarely on me wasn’t going to bring my friend back. And if you do something stupid now the only thing you’re going to do is make more people feel guilty. How’s Ophelia going to feel when she finds out?’

The girl’s eyes widened. In that instant Rio realised what her hook was – Nikki’s biological mother. Rio took another cautious step. ‘She loves you. I see that clearly every time she looks at you. That’s why you called your iPad Hamlet, wasn’t it? Because you knew he was in love with Ophelia, just like you love
your
Ophelia. How am I going to tell her that one of the people she cares for most in the world is gone?’ Rio saw the knife shaking in Nikki’s hand. ‘I’m close to shutting down this case, which means that you’re going to be able to live with Ophelia if that’s what you want.’

Rio didn’t give the teenager more time to think. Just stepped forwards until she reached her and calmly took the knife from her hand. Instantly Nikki threw herself into Rio’s arms, hugged her tight and started sobbing.

Rio ran her hand over her short, rich chestnut hair. ‘You’re OK now. Safe.’

Rio caught Calum’s gaze over her head. He moved towards them and took Nikki from her arms and led her from the room. Rio immediately turned her fierce gaze on Ade’s brother and his associate.

‘What the fuck were you thinking?’

Chiwetel stood his ground, his stance defiant. ‘I needed to find out the truth—’

‘By terrorising some grief-stricken girl? A girl who your brother cared so much about? If you weren’t trying to harm her, how did she manage to get a knife?’

His tone was now equally as fierce. ‘She already had the knife on her. I never searched her because I didn’t think some teen from the suburbs would be armed.’

Nikki had a knife? Where the hell did she get that . . .? Rio’s mouth tightened as the answer fell into place: the reason none of her team could find the hitman’s knife at the hospital was because Nikki had taken it. The sixteen-year-old must have had it hidden all this time. Fuck!

‘You know what I am, so you going to haul me into the cop shop?’ Chiwetel threw at her.

Some of the fight went out of Rio. ‘No. But let me give you a bit of advice; you’re not the only one grieving. Your mum is too. Go home. Put your arms around her and make her think that the world isn’t such a bad place.’

She started moving for the door. As she passed him he said, ‘I’m going to find out who killed my brother and when I find him . . .’

Rio shut the door on his vengeful words.

fifty-seven

12:46 a.m.

‘Have you seen a knife like this before?’ Rio passed the blade to Calum.

They stood beside her car in the dark a good ten-minute drive away from The Delta Club. Nikki was exhausted and asleep in the back of the car.

Calum held it up as he carefully examined it. ‘The handle’s soft; rubber. Now this part of the handle,’ he held the knife out for Rio to see more closely, ‘they’re finger grooves. More deep that your average kitchen knife. Whatever job it’s meant to be used for involves giving the user a tight enough grip.’ He ran his thumb lightly along the blade edge that was slim and curved into a point at the end. Then he used his thumb and forefinger to try to move the blade; it moved. ‘It’s flexible, slim, tipped.’

‘Have you seen one of these before?’

Calum tilted his head at her to emphasise the question he was about to ask. ‘Why are you so interested in the knife?’

Rio explained whom it had belonged to and how Nikki had got it. ‘If she had only left it where it was we might have been able to pull off some prints and find this killer a lot sooner.’

Calum turned his attention back to the knife. ‘I think this is a specialist knife that is created for a particular job.’

Without waiting for Rio’s response he handed the blade back to her and took out his phone, started up the Internet and got searching. Less than a minute later he passed the mobile to Rio. On the screen was a photograph of an identical knife, except this one had a navy-blue handle.

‘A fisherman’s filleting knife . . . Some contract killers have a speciality – a way of killing their victims. Maybe our bounty hunter is known for gutting his with a fish knife.’

Rio’s mouth turned down in disgust at the image his words left in her head. ‘Do you think you might be able to find out?’

Before he could answer Rio’s phone pinged. Text.

Your country needs YOU

The message finished with a skull and crossbones like the other message she had received yesterday. What the hell was going on? She scrolled up and found the other message.

It’s a long long way to Tipperary.

‘What’s up?’ Calum asked.

‘Someone keeps sending me these weird texts.’ She held out her phone to him.

Calum considered the messages. Then looked at her. ‘World War One.’