Gray Vengeance (16 page)

Chapter 25

16 December 2014

Paul Roberts was already awake when he heard the quiet knock.

His first instinct was to reach for his gun, and he carried it to the door, peering out of the spyhole. He’d expected to see swathes of armed police, but standing in the dark corridor was a man he hadn’t seen for many months.

Someone he hadn’t expected to see again.

He opened the door and let Efram in.

‘What are you doing here?’

The visitor adjusted his wool cap, which covered his hair, giving the impression that he was bald. ‘I tried calling, but it seems your phone is no longer with you.’

Roberts explained about his altercation the previous evening. ‘How did you know I was staying here?’

Efram laughed. ‘Paul, do you really think we would just give you the training and a bundle of cash and let you get on with it? I’ve been watching you, and I like what I’ve seen so far. I just want to make sure you’re ready for the final act.’

‘You don’t need to worry,’ Roberts said. ‘I’ve already scoped out the target. I’ll be heading over there soon.’

‘You sure? You look a little nervous.’

‘I’m fine. I just didn’t expect visitors at this hour.’

In truth, Roberts was more than apprehensive. He’d had time to learn a lot about his target over the last five months, and the prospect of taking his man down was daunting, to say the least. Still, it was all part of the master plan, though how his target fitted in only Efram would know.

‘I’ll be fine,’ he repeated, in answer to Efram’s quizzical look.

The visitor looked at the quad copters scattered around the living room floor.

‘Are these ready to go?’

‘In fifteen minutes,’ Roberts confirmed. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I have to add the final touches before I release them.’

Efram took the hint and made for the door, checking through the spyhole before opening it. He stopped and turned to Roberts. ‘This is an integral step in our strategy. I know you won’t let me down.’

Efram left, quietly closing the door behind him, and Roberts locked it before going through the rest of the setup process. Once the last of the drones was primed, he carried them all through to the bedroom, where he opened the French windows onto the veranda.

At this hour of the morning, the street below was thankfully quiet. Few would see his toys leave the building, and by the time anyone linked them to the attacks, he would be long gone.

One by one, he took the machines out into the cold morning air, hit the power buttons and watched them lift off. Each one was programmed to soar to a thousand feet then navigate to its
target
. With a three-hour battery life, they would reach their respective destinations and then hover until the time was right. Being so small, it was unlikely that anyone would see or hear them once they reached their optimum altitude.

The first indication of danger would be when they released their payloads.

When the last of the machines climbed out of view, Roberts scanned the area. He saw nobody taking an interest in his aerial fleet, so he closed the windows, put on his coat and picked up his backpack.

The silenced pistol went into an inside pocket, and he left to face the most challenging part of his mission.

Roberts was soaked when he arrived at the house an hour later, the heavens having opened halfway through his journey. He tried to shrug off the discomfort and focus on the job, the first stage of which was getting over the back garden wall. It was seven feet high and topped with broken glass to deter unwanted guests, but
Roberts
had come prepared.

He gripped the top of the wall with his fingertips, carefully avoiding the glass, and pulled himself up, peering over the top. The impressive detached red brick house sat in darkness, as did the garden. Roberts dropped to the ground and took a hessian sack from his backpack, wondering how his drones were getting on in the rain. They should be dropping their payloads right about now, but there was nothing he could do to help them except hope they worked as intended.

He threw the heavy sack over the top of the wall and pulled himself up again, this time throwing his right leg up and climbing all the way to the top, the hessian protecting him from the glass shards. He crouched there for a moment, listening for sounds, but none came, so he lowered himself into the garden and pulled the sack down after him. It went back into his pack, and he to
ok the pistol
from his jacket before edging towards the house.

A light suddenly came on in one of the upstairs windows.

Roberts froze.

For what seemed an eternity, he wasn’t even aware of the rain running down his face, or the chill wind. He was totally focused on the building in front of him, waiting to see if anyone came out to challenge him.

After what turned out to be just three minutes, the light went off again and the area returned to darkness. Roberts gathered himself and kept to the side of the garden as he approached the house. He made it to the back door and peered in through the glass.

He assumed that whoever had woken up had done so to visit the toilet, and so he waited a few minutes for them to fall back to sleep. In the meantime, he checked the door to see how he could force entry. The uPVC frame looked fairly new, as did all the windows. Picking the lock was out of the question: it simply wasn’t part of his skillset. His only option was to apply brute force and hope to get upstairs before the element of surprise was lost.

Roberts stepped back, took a couple of deep breaths, and fired two shots at the lock.

Gill was roused from her slumber by the incessant shrill and assumed it was her alarm clock. She fumbled for it on the bedside table, and when her hands hit empty space, she remembered where she was.

Wide awake, she realised the noise was coming from the master bedroom, and assumed it was Gray’s alarm going off. She knew Melissa was likely to wake if it continued for much longer, so she got out of bed, turned on the light and went into the hallway.

Gray’s bedroom sat at the front of the house, one of four on the upper storey. She went in and saw the bedside clock, but realised the noise wasn’t coming from there. Instead, on the opposite wall, a flashing light accompanied the shrill sound. She took a closer look and saw that labels under each bulb related to a part of the hou
se a
nd grounds.

Gill realised that it was a high-tech burglar alarm, an
d th
e
flashing
light told her that the garden was the source of th
e intrusion
.

Panic gripped her, and she struggled to think of what to do next. Call the police? Call Tom?

She settled for hitting the reset switch, which thankfully turned off the alarm. In the sudden silence, she was able to focus a little better.

Could it have been a fox or a cat? Or was it a burglar hoping to make hay while the police were otherwise engaged?

Gill decided to take no chances. She tiptoed through to
Melissa’s
room and gently lifted the sleeping child from her cot. She carried the girl through to one of the spare bedrooms and opened the linen drawer before removing several duvet covers and pillow cases. She placed Melissa in the drawer and closed it slowly, then threw the bedding into the dirty clothes hamper.

Next, she went back to her own room and found her phone. She decided to call Tom first and get his advice. If the phone were answered by one of the police officers at the station, she would let them know what was going on.

Gill was looking for Gray’s number in her contact list when she heard the popping sounds coming from downstairs.

Roberts was astonished by the sound that came from the weapon. It was the first time he’d fired a silenced pistol, and he had expected it to be just that: silent. Instead, each round made a very loud popping sound that seemed to carry forever. It was almost as loud as the unsilenced versions he’d trained with.

With all thoughts of surprising his target gone, he kicked the door in and strode into the kitchen. A door led through to the hallway and the stairs, which he mounted two at a time. At the top, he got his bearings and went to the room overlooking the back garden, bursting in with the weapon held in a two-handed grip.

Nothing.

The room was empty, and Roberts felt the first signs of panic clawing at his soul. He swivelled and went back out into the
hallway
, the gun flicking left and right as he worked out what to do next.

He moved to the next door and kicked it in, only to find a deserted bathroom.

Get a grip, man.

The next door he came to was slightly ajar, and he thought h
e h
eard a scraping sound coming from inside. Steeling himself, he kicked it wide open and flattened himself against the outside wall, expecting a volley of fire to blast through the doorway.

Instead, he heard a muffled cry from within the room.

The girl!

Edging his way inside, he scanned the bedroom. The bed hadn’t been slept in, and it looked like no-one had been in there for some time. He was about to leave when he heard the sound again, th
is ti
me a little louder. He got down on one knee and checked under the bed, but apart from a little dust, it was clear.

Roberts straightened and strained his ears, waiting for the sound that would announce the location of his quarry. What he heard was the sound of footsteps running down the stairway, and h
e s
et off in pursuit. He reached the top of the stairs in time to see a woman disappearing to the side at the bottom of the stairwell. Not quite what he’d expected. From his research, he knew that Gray lived alone, so why he found no sign of the man and saw only a strange woman running around Gray’s house, he had no idea.

He didn’t have time to ponder. If the woman got outside and raised the alarm, the police would be sure to come and investigate, especially if she saw his firearm. He pounded down the stairs after her, but found himself in an empty hallway.

He made a snap decision and headed for the kitchen. If he was being chased in his own home, he’d want to arm himself, and that was where the knives were kept. The door was almost closed, not how he’d left it, and he knew he’d guessed right. He ran to the door and kicked it open to find the woman cowering in a corner.

‘Please, don’t kill me!’

Roberts stood in front of her and pointed the weapon at her forehead. She looked to be in her fifties, and he didn’t figure h
er fo
r Gray’s girlfriend. A neighbour, perhaps, or maybe even a family member.

‘Where’s Gray?’

‘He’s not here,’ the woman sobbed, shaking uncontrollably.

‘I gathered that. Where is he?’

‘At the police station.’

Roberts knew this would take forever if she kept her answers short and vague.

‘What’s he doing at the police station?’ Roberts snarled, trying to force her into opening up.

‘He was arrested. He killed some men tonight.’

Killed some men?
That meant Gray was likely to remain behind bars for the foreseeable future, making him untouchable. It wouldn’t please Efram, but Roberts could hardly be blamed for something outside of his control. All he could do was finish off the job he’d been given.