Fightback (11 page)

McIntyre's Motors (
Cars are our passion
) was a five-minute taxi ride from the station and occupied a large site east of Morden Park. The forecourt was lined with a selection of top-of-the-range cars – Porsches, Ferraris and BMWs – all of them waxed, polished and glinting in the afternoon sunshine.

‘Can you wait for us?' asked Kier, handing the taxi driver a twenty-pound note through the hatch.

The driver took the note, held it up to the light and nodded.

‘Sure,' he said. ‘No problem.'

‘Ready?' asked Saskia, slamming the door shut.

‘Yeah, let's do it,' said Kier. ‘Let's buy a car.'

The salesman was all smiles, smart suit and slicked-back hair.

‘Hello, sir, madam,' he said. ‘Can I help at all?'

‘I think you probably can.'

Kier had detected a slight
touch those cars and
you're dead
kind of tone in the salesman's voice and decided to do something about it.

‘My girlfriend's got a birthday coming up in a few weeks and I'm thinking of buying her something a bit special, if you know what I mean.'

‘I see, sir.' The salesman looked at Saskia and raised an eyebrow. ‘Special birthday, is it?'

Saskia giggled, as if she had temporarily misplaced her brain cells. ‘I'll be seventeen!' she said, clinging on to Kier's arm and gazing up at him adoringly. ‘Isn't that exciting? I'll be old enough to drive!'

‘Yes, you will,' said the salesman. ‘Yes, you will.' He smiled thinly, trying to figure out the best way of framing his next question. ‘And, um, how exactly were you thinking of funding this purchase, sir?'

Kier beckoned him over, indicating that he had an important secret which he needed to share.

The man leaned in closer.

‘My numbers came up,' Kier whispered, ‘on the lottery.'

The salesman's eyes widened.

‘But don't you have to be eighteen to do the lottery?'

Kier thought quickly. ‘Went halves with my brother,' he said. ‘Two point five million each.'

The salesman whistled.

‘Two point five million, eh? Quite a result.'

‘Yes indeedy.' Kier winked at Saskia and flashed her a hundred-kilowatt smile. ‘So then, babes. Anything here that catches your eye?'

‘Ooh, I don't know,' said Saskia, running her fingers along the bonnet of a Porsche Boxster. ‘They're all so shiny and
pretty
.'

‘Heh-heh,' said the salesman, pulling out his handkerchief as the strain of smiling brought beads of sweat to his forehead. ‘Aren't they though?'

‘What's that one over there?' asked Saskia. ‘The shiny blue one with the top down.'

‘Ah, yes, the BMW convertible,' said the salesman with a knowing smile. ‘I see the lady has good taste. Please. Follow me.'

Kier could see that Saskia was enjoying herself. But he could also see her checking out the showroom, looking to see who might be watching.

‘Well, here she is,' said the salesman, pointing at the car. ‘Do you want to sit in her?'

‘Ooh, could I?' squeaked Saskia, all wide-eyed excitement.

‘Sure thing, little lady. Just one moment and I'll fetch the keys.'

‘I take it he's not our man,' whispered Saskia when the salesman had disappeared off into the showroom.

Kier shook his head. ‘No, McIntyre's got to be the
owner. Probably inside counting his money. But don't worry, we'll smoke him out.'

He looked up to see the salesman heading back in their direction.

‘Listen, when he gets back, just sit in the car and act dopey while I see what I can find out, OK?'

‘OK.' Saskia prepared another simpering smile and aimed it at the salesman. ‘This is
so
exciting,' she gasped as he approached. ‘I haven't had this much fun in ages.'

Kier smiled at the salesman.

‘She doesn't get out much. Too busy counting your diamonds, aren't you, babe?'

‘Oh,
you
,' said Saskia. ‘He's such a tease, isn't he?'

‘Heh-heh,' said the salesman. ‘Heh-heh-heh.'

‘Could I have a quiet word?' asked Kier, putting his hand on the man's elbow and steering him away from the car.

‘Of course,' said the salesman, relieved at not having to laugh any more. ‘How can I help?'

‘You seem like a man of the world,' said Kier, ‘and the thing is, I really want my girlfriend's birthday to be a bit special.'

The salesman nodded enthusiastically. ‘A special day for a special lady, eh?'

‘Quite,' said Kier. ‘The thing is, I'm looking for
something to make her party go with a bit of a swing.'

‘A swing?' The salesman frowned. ‘I'm afraid I'm not quite with you, sir.'

‘I need some of the right stuff,' said Kier, raising his eyebrows, ‘or perhaps I should say … the
white
stuff.'

Instantly the salesman's face changed. Kier could tell from the glint in his eye that he knew exactly what Kier was talking about. But he wanted to make sure.

‘The white stuff?'

‘Yeah. You know. Coke. Charlie. Any idea where I could get some?'

The salesman nodded, suddenly serious.

‘I might. How much are you looking for?'

Kier decided to go for it. ‘It's a pretty big party. How about a kilo?'

‘A
kilo
? You're joking, right?'

Kier shook his head and patted his pockets. ‘Not with this kind of money. The way I look at it, we're all going to crash and burn some day. Might as well live life in the fast lane while we can.'

The salesman grinned. ‘I hear you,' he said, and Kier could practically see the pound signs lighting up in his eyes. ‘Just give me a minute, will you? I need to go and have a word with somebody.'

‘No problem,' said Kier.

A wave of nausea swept over him as he suddenly realised how close he was to seeing the man who had killed his father. But he reminded himself to stay calm. McIntyre was almost certainly sitting on a big pile of the stuff and finding it would be the perfect way to get back at him. All they had to do was locate the stash, then they could put him away for a very long time.

He walked back to where Saskia was sitting in the BMW, making
Brrm-brrm
noises.

‘It's all right,' he said, ‘you can knock it off now. He's gone inside to have a word.'

Saskia raised an eyebrow.

‘About getting the stuff?'

‘Yup.'

‘Look. Over there. Do you think that's him?'

Kier turned to see a gold Bentley Continental driving slowly across the car park, its six-litre engine purring like a blender full of cream.

‘Damn, it's got to be,' said Kier, angry to have missed it. ‘Only the boss would drive a car like that.'

‘Don't worry, I'm on to it,' said Saskia jumping out of the car. ‘You stay and talk party planning so they don't get suspicious. Soon as I find out where he lives, I'll call you.'

By the time the salesman came scuttling out of
the showroom, Saskia was already climbing into the waiting taxi.

‘Is everything all right?' he asked, watching the taxi drive away.

‘Everything's fine,' said Kier. ‘She just remembered a hair appointment, that's all. Maybe I should buy her a diary too.'

‘Is she still interested in the car?' asked the salesman, trying not to sound too desperate.

‘Oh yeah, she's made her mind up about that,' said Kier. ‘Says it goes with her eyes. Can you believe it?'

The salesman looked relieved. ‘So, erm, do you want to put down a deposit?'

‘Sure, I'd like to. But to be honest, I didn't think she'd make her mind up that quickly. So I'm going to need to take a trip to the bank. What kind of deposit are you looking for?'

‘Say ten per cent?'

‘Four grand. OK, that's no problem. And what about, you know … our other conversation?'

The salesman glanced around as if he was worried someone might be listening.

‘I think we can do you a deal there. Is it still a kilo you're after?'

‘Yeah, if the price is right.'

‘Tell you what. How about we put the car and
candy together in one package and call it seventy-five?'

‘I was thinking more like sixty-five.'

The salesman sucked air through his teeth and shook his head. ‘Can't be done, I'm afraid. But maybe we could meet somewhere in the middle.'

‘Seventy?'

‘Seventy would do it.'

Kier nodded and stuck out his hand.

‘You've got yourself a deal.'

As the salesman shook his hand, Kier saw the look in his eyes and realised money was a kind of drug too, pulling you in if you let it.

‘I can have it here by tonight,' said the salesman. ‘Do you think you'll be in a position to proceed by then?'

Kier nodded. ‘You can count on it,' he said.

As Kier walked across the forecourt, the phone buzzed in his pocket. When he took it out he saw that it was Saskia's number and that there was a message.

The message said:
Help
.

Kier immediately hit speed-dial but there was no answer. After the third attempt he gave up and called directory enquiries.

‘I need the address of M-Taxis,' he told the operator. ‘Somewhere in south London, I guess. But can you hurry?'

The cab company turned out to be in a side street close to the station. It was a distance of two miles and Kier ran it in under fifteen minutes.

‘Hi,' he said, still out of breath as he entered the office. ‘I'm looking for a girl.'

‘Aren't we all?' said the stubble-faced man behind the counter.

He looked at his bald, bullet-headed friend and they both laughed unpleasantly.

‘You don't understand,' said Kier, leaning on the counter. ‘She caught one of your cabs about twenty minutes ago. I need to find out where she was dropped.'

‘Maybe you should try saying please,' said Bullet.

Kier wanted to try throwing him through the window, but he held up his hand and said, ‘OK,
please
. It's really important.'

‘What time did you say she caught the cab?'

‘About half an hour ago. It was the same one we caught from the station.'

Stubble Face nodded.

‘All right, wait a minute.'

He tapped the computer keyboard and then put his radio headset back on.

‘Hi, Andy,' he said. ‘Where are you now?'

Kier couldn't hear the response, but something about the way Stubble Face looked at him told him it wasn't the reply he had been expecting.

‘OK. And the boy was in the car when you picked them up?'

Kier saw him studying his clothes and his face. He wished he could hear what the other guy was saying.

‘Yeah, that's the one. OK, no problem. Leave it to me.'

Stubble Face took off his headset and smiled.

‘He says he dropped her off in Richmond. Said she didn't seem to know where she was going.'

Kier began to wonder if perhaps the
Help
message had been a jokey thing – her way of telling him she'd got herself lost.

‘If you come round here I can show you where he dropped her.'

Kier opened the hatch and stood next to Stubble Face, peering over his shoulder at the map.

‘See?' said Stubble Face, stabbing an oily finger into the Richmond area. ‘Just there.'

But as Kier leaned forward for a better look there was a sudden, vicious pain in the back of his head and then the world went black.

‘I think he's coming round,' said a voice. ‘Throw some water on him or something.'

Kier saw bright, painful lights and felt as though he was falling. Then someone threw cold water in his face and he opened his eyes to see the blurred features of Stubble Face and Bullet swim into view. He was in some kind of storeroom. Paint was flaking off the walls and a single electric bulb burned above his head.

Kier squeezed his eyes shut and opened them again. He was sitting on a hard wooden chair with his hands tied behind his back.

‘Where's Saskia?' he asked.

‘Never mind about her,' said Stubble Face. ‘It's you we want to hear about.'

‘Is this how you treat all your customers?' said Kier, still trying to focus. ‘If so, I can't see many of them coming back.'

‘That's funny,' said Stubble Face. He looked at Bullet. ‘The kid's a comedian.'

‘Oh yeah.' Bullet nodded but didn't smile. ‘He's a laugh a minute.'

Kier saw he was holding a Micro-Uzi machine pistol, a gun capable of delivering twenty rounds in under a second. Which was definitely not good news.

‘What do you want to know about me for? I just came looking for my friend.'

Stubble Face stepped closer.

‘Oh, we know what you were looking for. But the question is, who sent you?'

Kier did his best to ignore the pain jumping around in the back of his skull, but it wasn't easy.

‘I have no idea what you're talking about.'

‘No? Well, maybe I can jog your memory. You see, your little girlfriend made the mistake of asking the driver to follow the car in front.'

‘So?'

‘So that car was driven by Mr McIntyre, the man who owns this taxi firm and also a local garage. But then I guess you knew that already, didn't you?'

‘Why would I?'

‘Because, according to the driver, the first place he dropped you was McIntyre's Motors.'

‘So I was looking to buy a car. Doesn't make me his best buddy, does it?'

‘You ain't old enough to drive a car,' said Bullet.

Kier squinted up at him.

‘Who said anything about driving it?'

‘Why else would you want one?'

‘It was a present for my girlfriend. Listen, when you've got money, you can buy anything you want. But then you probably wouldn't know about that, would you?'

‘I'll tell you what I do know, rich boy,' said Stubble Face, leaning in so close that Kier could smell the sweat and cheap aftershave. ‘I know you ain't buying your way out of this one. See, when he was driving home, Mr McIntyre got a phone call telling him how two of his guys got turned over at a hotel by a couple of kids.'

Kier was taken aback by this. Who could have told him that?

His surprise must have shown, because Stubble Face grinned.

‘Yeah, that's right. And then the weirdest thing happens. He gets another phone call from one of his drivers saying some girl has climbed into his cab and wants to follow his car. Then Mr McIntyre
starts getting paranoid. You know what paranoid means?'

‘Yeah. It means he thinks people are out to get him.' Kier glanced at Bullet's trigger finger. ‘I'm starting to know how that feels.'

‘Oh, you ain't felt nothing yet,' said Stubble Face, squeezing his knuckles until they cracked.

Kier didn't much like the sound of that. He also didn't like the fact that he was stuck in here when he should be out trying to help Saskia. This was a mess, no doubt about it.

‘Now here's how things are going to work,' said Stubble Face, turning around and locking the door. ‘Either you tell us what you and your little friend are up to, or me and
my
little friend are going to break every bone in your body.'

‘That's a lot of bones,' said Kier, staring at a spot on Bullet's forehead and trying to remember the finger dislocation thing Chiang had shown him. ‘Two hundred and six to be precise.'

He straightened the forefinger on his right hand, slid his thumb underneath and wrapped the other fingers around it. Then he squeezed hard until it clicked.

‘In that case,' said Bullet, unfolding the stock of his machine pistol, ‘maybe we should get started.'

Kier nodded. ‘Maybe we should,' he said.

Then he moved his hands silently through the rope around his wrists, fell forward and brought the chair hard and fast over his head. Although it was an old chair, it had been well put together and didn't actually break until the struts hit the middle of Bullet's forehead. At which point it splintered into several pieces, all of which hit the floor about half a second before Bullet did.

Stubble Face stared at the space where Bullet had been standing, mouth open like a fairground clown waiting for the next ping-pong ball to pop up.

Kier smiled. ‘Two hundred and six, remember?' he said. ‘Where do you want me to start?'

Stubble Face had been in a lot of fights in his time and knew a lucky strike when he saw one. Now it was time to teach this kid a lesson. Pulling out a telescopic baton, he flicked his wrist and half a metre of hardened steel extended from the palm of his hand. Swiping the air in front of him, he beckoned to Kier and smiled.

‘Come on then, rich boy,' he said.
Swish, swish, swish
. ‘Let's see what you're made of.'

Kier knew he was made of blood and bones, same as Stubble Face. But while Stubble Face had spent years feeding his body with smoke and junk food, Kier had been learning to make his dance – the kind of dance that Stubble Face could never
even begin to imagine. Which was why, when he swung the baton at Kier's head, there was only a
swish
of air, followed by the crack of plaster as the baton struck the wall where Kier had been standing a second before.

When Stubble Face swung the baton again, Kier ducked, thinking of the hours he had spent standing in the centre of the monastery hall, eyes closed, waiting for the air pressure to change around him. He had been knocked over more times than he cared to remember as Chiang swung the ropes with thick wooden logs tied to the end. Sometimes there were five or six of them, all criss-crossing the monastery floor at the same time. But as Chiang was fond of saying,
Pain is the fastest teacher
.

Kier watched Stubble Face swing the baton a third time and then – deciding that enough was enough – he ran up the wall and flipped back on to the man's shoulders with just enough force to unbalance him and send him crashing into the door. As the baton spun away across the floor, Kier picked up the machine pistol and pointed it at the now terrified Stubble Face.

‘I need an address,' he said, ‘and I need it now.'

‘T-twenty-six The Beeches,' stammered Stubble Face. ‘Don't shoot! Don't shoot!'

‘Postcode?'

‘I don't—'

Kier lowered the gun a fraction.

‘Postcode?'

‘NW3! It's NW3!'

Kier unlocked the door and opened it.

‘Sweet dreams,' he said.

Then, as Stubble Face cowered in the corner, he shot out the light, locked the door again and took a set of keys from behind the counter.

‘NW3 please,' he said, unlocking the door of the taxi parked in the yard. ‘Certainly, sir,' he told himself. ‘We'll have you there in no time.'

Then he slotted the key into the ignition, fired up the engine and accelerated away beneath the dark and bloodshot sky.