Noughts and Crosses (41 page)

I stared at her back, my fists clenched, reining myself in so tightly, I thought my back would snap. Only when I could trust myself to stand without falling to the floor did I get up. I left the room, carefully locking the door behind me. I leaned against the door, my eyes closed. I had to do this, make it through this. And I would. I turned to walk back to the living room, only to find my brother further down the corridor, watching my every move.

‘Yes?’ I asked, annoyed.

Everywhere I turned at the moment, Jude seemed to be watching me.

‘Give me the disc.’

I handed over the T-shirt and Sephy’s hair before taking out the camcorder. I opened it up, took out the video disc and put it in its case before handing it over.

Jude held it up carefully, before slipping it into his pocket. He looked long and hard at the T-shirt. When at last he looked at me, his grin was full of admiration and relief. ‘Now I know for sure whose side you’re on. Well done, little brother. Pete and I are going to deliver all this as well as our demands. Leila and Morgan will guard the house. Sephy Hadley is your responsibility. Understand?’

I didn’t answer. It was unheard of for the first- and second-in-command to go off on a joint mission together like this. Why wasn’t Jude going with Morgan? Or Pete going with me? Why did Jude want to be with Pete? There was something going on here . . .

‘We should be back by morning,’ Jude continued. ‘If the General’s second-in-command arrives before we get back, make him welcome – after he’s given you the password.’

‘Which is?’

‘Golden Man.’

Jude went to move past me. I stood back against the wall to let him go. Jude was my brother but I trusted him less far than an elephant could jump. More than ever I sensed the need to watch my back, my front, my sides and every other part of me – if I wanted to keep them in one piece, that is.

The door opened again. I didn’t even bother turning around this time. I lay on my side facing the wall. Rubbing my sore hand over my aching stomach, I fervently wished the pain away.

‘Dinner,’ came Callum’s rough voice.

I ignored him and carried on rubbing my stomach, waiting for the sound of the door closing. It didn’t come. Callum’s footsteps echoed across the hard cement floor. I stopped rubbing my stomach at once, but I still didn’t turn around. Callum put his hand on my shoulder and pulled me round to face him.

‘Dinner.’

He thrust the plastic plate into my hands. I sat up and after firing a lasering look in his direction, I threw the plate across the room. It hit the wall with a thud and the plate fell first, followed by a brown sticky mess trickling its way down the wall towards the floor.

‘You shouldn’t’ve done that.’

I deliberately turned away from him and lay down again. Silence. But I wasn’t going to turn around to see what he was doing. After a short while, I heard him cross the room and leave, locking the door behind him.

He never forgot to lock the door.

If I could just stop thinking for five seconds then I could get some shut-eye. But it wasn’t happening. And the sleeping bag seemed to twist in the opposite direction to whichever way I turned. I couldn’t get Sephy’s words out of my head.

One of you is going to kill me . . .

But we didn’t have to do that. OK so she’d seen us, but once her dad met our demands we could be long gone. But even as I thought it, I knew I was just deluding myself.

One of you is going to kill me . . .

‘You look like you could use some company.’ Leila’s voice above me was the last straw. I opened my eyes, giving up all pretence of trying to sleep.

‘Who’s guarding the front?’

‘I came in for a loo break – if that’s all right with you.’

I unzipped my bag and sat up. ‘No, it’s not OK with me. You want to take a leak, do it in the woods, but don’t leave the front of the cabin unmonitored.’

‘I’m not a man,’ Leila protested. ‘I can’t wee standing up.’

‘That’s no excuse.’

‘Callum, you’re mad as hell at something, but don’t take it out on me.’

I pulled on my T-shirt. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘You don’t have to get dressed on my account,’ Leila said silkily, running her hands lightly over my chest.

‘Go and guard the front like you’re supposed to,’ I told her.

Leila stood up. ‘Suit yourself. D’you know, I think that’s why I like you.’ At my puzzled look she explained. ‘You’re the only man I know who hasn’t tried to get on my good side in five seconds flat!’

I smiled. ‘Nothing personal, Leila.’

‘Thanks!’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘That makes it worse!’

I got to my feet as she left the room. Pulling on my boots, I decided to hunt down a beer and join Morgan out back. Without warning, there was a sudden commotion out front. I ran towards the front door when it burst open. For one split second, I thought we’d been rumbled, that the police had somehow tracked us down. But it wasn’t the police. It was Leila and a stranger. He was as tall as me, with blond hair tied back in a pony-tail. He wore a dark polo shirt and expensive brown trousers tucked into fancy boots. His long, dark trenchcoat had the collar turned up and flapped open like a cloak or a cape. The peculiar thing was, the stranger had Leila in an armlock, not the other way round. Morgan came running up behind me.

‘Who’s in charge here?’ the stranger asked.

Morgan looked at me. I didn’t take my eyes off the intruder. The stranger turned to me. ‘I see that you are. I believe you’ve been expecting me.’

‘Let me go!’ Leila hissed, trying to twist away from the man who held her.

The man pushed her forward – hard. She only just kept her balance. She spun around, arms raised, ready to take him out. The man raised one hand.

‘I wouldn’t if I were you,’ was all he said. But it was enough.

A second or two later, Leila dropped her hands.

‘So this is the famous
Stiletto
unit, is it?’ The man looked at each of us in turn. ‘So far, I’m not very impressed.’

‘We’ve been expecting you, have we?’ Morgan said.

‘That’s right.’

‘What’s the password then?’ I asked.

‘You first,’ the man ordered.

I regarded him. ‘I don’t think so. You’re the guest here, not us.’

I signalled to Morgan behind my back to get ready. We’d been caught on the hop but there were three of us and only one of him.

‘How about Gold Man?’ said the stranger.

‘Not even close.’ Morgan and I started forward.

‘Then how about Golden Man,’ the stranger laughed.

I regarded the man with undisguised venom. I didn’t like to be made a fool of and that was precisely what he was doing.

‘Hi. I’m Andrew Dorn.’ He held out his hand.

After a moment’s pause I took it, still on my guard.

‘You’re the General’s second-in-command?’ Morgan said sceptically.

‘Yeah. D’you want to make something of it?’ asked Andrew.

‘Only asking,’ Morgan shrugged. ‘Excuse me. I’m on guard duty.’

With a brief nod of his head, Morgan turned and headed for the back door. Leila followed his cue by heading out the front, still rubbing her upper arm where Andrew had twisted it behind her back.

‘Congratulations on the success of the first part of your mission,’ Andrew told me when the others had gone. ‘Let’s hope the rest runs as smoothly.’

‘No reason why it shouldn’t.’

‘No reason at all,’ Andrew agreed.

‘Want some coffee?’

‘Wouldn’t say no. Can I see the prisoner first?’

I opened my mouth to say that she was probably asleep, but I managed to snap it shut in time. We moved along the hall to the door. I dug into my trouser pocket for the key and unlocked it. Sephy was sitting up on her bed, facing the door. She regarded both Andrew and me without saying a word.

‘I hope for your sake that your father loves you very, very much,’ Andrew told her.

Sephy stared at him, frowning. I saw her glance down at Andrew’s boots, then start. I glanced down at Andrew’s boots myself. They were brown with silver chains just above the heel of each one. A bit too ostentatious for my taste but nothing special. So what was it about them that had caused such a reaction?

‘Be a good girl and you’ll soon be out of here,’ Andrew told her.

And still Sephy didn’t speak. If anything, her frown deepened. Andrew left without another word. I
followed him out, locking the door behind me.

‘Make sure she doesn’t leave that room alive,’ Andrew said quietly. ‘Orders from the General himself. Understood?’

The ground started rocking beneath my feet. ‘Understood, sir. I’ll take care of it myself.’

‘Good man. Make sure you do.’ Andrew headed towards the kitchen.

I stood totally still, waiting for the earth to stop moving.

The moment Callum locked me in again, I carried on exploring my room. A forty-watt bulb gave the only light in the room. There were no windows and the locked door could’ve been reinforced steel for all the good it did me. The floor was cement and the walls were bricks and plaster. I thought again about shouting for help but logic told me that we had to be kilometres away from anyone who could help me, otherwise they would’ve tied me up and put a gag in my mouth. I tapped my way around the walls, not really sure what I was listening for, but listening for some change of note, a hollow sound that could rekindle some hope within me.

But there was nothing.

That man who’d come in with Callum . . . I’d seen him
somewhere before. I knew I had and yet I couldn’t quite place him. It was frustrating the hell out of me. I pulled the bed away from the wall. It dragged across the floor with enough noise to wake the dead. I stopped at once and listened. I couldn’t hear anyone coming. I moved the bed more slowly. Was there anything behind it that could help me?

What was that scratched into the plaster behind the bed?

To my fellow Crosses, keep the faith
.

The writing was jagged and uneven. From the look of it, it could’ve been written with a fingernail.
Keep the faith
. . . God knows there was little else to do in this hell-hole.

There was nothing in the room, apart from the bed with its one blanket and a bucket in the opposite corner. And short of standing behind the door and using the bucket to brain the first person who came in, there was nothing in the room I could use as a weapon of any kind.

Keep the faith . . .

I pushed the bed back and lay down again. I wondered what my family were doing at that moment – Minnie and Mother and Dad. Did Dad know that I’d been kidnapped yet? I hadn’t seen him in almost six months. How would he take the news? How much money did the kidnappers want anyway? How much was I worth to them? Maybe they didn’t want money. Maybe they were after something else, like the release of
L.M
. prisoners or something like that. I didn’t even know. How long ago was it that I hadn’t wanted to go home? A day? Two? It was hard to tell how long I’d been in this place.

A strange joke. I hadn’t wanted to be at home and now
I’d got my wish. I would’ve given my right arm to see my family one more time. Just once more. And with that thought I knew that I’d given up on any chance of seeing any of them, ever again.