I want to tell him that everything's going to be fine, but I don't want to make it sound like I doubt his mental strength. Instead, I think about Eddie Cosick and what he has against me. Maybe I've crossed him somehow without knowing it. Maybe Leah was his mistress, and he found out I'd slept with her and wanted to get his revenge.
For a split second, I think I may be on to something here. But then I realize that it leaves too many unanswered questions. The first and most obvious is how on earth would he have found out? And why would he have gone to such elaborate lengths to set me up, leaving me
very much alive in the process? It would have been vastly easier simply to send someone round to the showroom and blow my head off. Job done, honour restored. There's no way he would have decided that as part of his revenge I should be made to go and pick up a briefcase containing something so valuable to him that he's willing to pay a hundred and fifty grand for it.
No, there's some other reason he's using me. I just can't see what it is.
And I've got to admit that I'm nervous too. It's not just that Cosick may not supply the answers I need; this time, I may not even get out of there alive. Since waking up this morning, I've ridden my luck. I could have been the first out of the kitchen door back at the house where I picked up the case and taken Sellman's bullet, but I wasn't. I could have been arrested afterwards, but somehow I managed to escape. If I hadn't taken the flick knife from Dracula in the brothel . . . In all these things, the dice have rolled my way. At some point, and probability tells me it'll be soon, this luck is going to stop.
And you know what? I really don't want to die. Today's been a strange day. In most ways
it's been awful. But I've felt something I haven't felt since the best of my army days. I've felt alive. I've been thrown into conflict after conflict, found myself alone in the middle of a minefield, and walked right through it. In other words, I have survived. And now I want to make it to the other side so that I can turn round and say, 'I've won.'
But I'm terrified that it's not going to happen.
We're almost there now. As Lucas turns off Holland Park Avenue and into a quiet street lined with mature cypress trees that runs parallel to the western side of Holland Park, the GPS system tells us that Eddie Cosick lives down here somewhere.
I look round with a combination of admiration and jealousy. Cosick has clearly done well for himself. The houses here are grand Edwardian villas of whitewashed stone that loom into the night sky. Only the truly rich have a chance of living here, and the truly rich know it, surrounding their homes with high walls and elaborate security systems to keep out those of lesser means. Cosick's own place, a detached,
three-storey corner property, is no exception, set back from the street behind wrought-iron gates and a high wall that borders the entire property. There are two cars visible in the gravel driveway, a bright red Audi convertible with its top down, and a Jaguar XJS, both of which are illuminated by the twin lamps on either side of the front door. A single light shines dimly on the first floor behind drawn curtains.
'Well,' says Lucas, 'it looks like he's in.' He tries to sound casual, but I can hear his nervousness.
He indicates, and takes the first right, parking several hundred yards up the road, well away from Cosick's place, between two immense four-wheel-drives. He chucks the latest cigarette he's been smoking out of the window and cuts the engine.
'You OK?' I ask.
He manages a weak smile. 'No worse than foot patrol on the Falls Road.'
'Exactly. We've done it all before. Things that would scare the shit out of most people. And we've always survived.'
He looks a little more confident now. 'When this is over, you're going to buy me a nice big drink, right?'
'Count on it,' I tell him. 'Have you got the guns?'
He reaches down behind his seat, which is the place where he seems to keep everything bar the kitchen sink, and retrieves a Tesco bag.
'Have you still got the gloves I gave you earlier?'
I nod, take them out of my back pocket and pull them on, while Lucas reaches into the bag and removes a package wrapped in white cloth. He hands it to me, I unwrap it, and a well-kept, recently cleaned long-barrelled Browning pistol stares back at me. I place it in the waistband of my jeans as Lucas takes out his weapon, a silver Walther PPK, and stuffs it in his own waistband.
'You might want this,' he says, reaching into the glove compartment and producing a couple of black balaclavas.
'I don't think there's much point in me covering up,' I tell him. 'I have a strong feeling Eddie Cosick knows exactly who I am.'
'If you leave him alive, Tyler, he's going to come looking for you.'
I've thought about this. 'If Cosick's the man responsible for Leah and Snowy's murders, then I'm going to make sure that one way or another
he's brought to justice for it. He's certainly not going to be roaming the streets planning revenge.'
'You're going to need to be careful.'
'I will be,' I say, opening the door. 'Come on, let's go.'
He stuffs his balaclava in his jeans and follows me down the road.
The street's quiet now, and bathed in dark shadows. The only people I can see are a middle-aged couple thirty yards ahead of us, out for a night-time stroll. They hold hands, heads almost touching as they talk, oblivious to the world around them. Their intimacy makes me jealous, and reminds me what my life was like yesterday, and what it definitely won't be like tomorrow.
A light breeze, still warm, rustles through the branches of the cypress trees, and from somewhere over in Holland Park the faint strains of jazz music reach my ears. My heart beats hard in my chest, and I glance at Lucas. His jaw is set hard, his blue eyes narrowed in concentration. He's scared, but I can see that finally he's ready.
The wall bordering Eddie Cosick's back garden is a good ten feet high, and curved at the
top. There are no railings, making it useful only for keeping out the casual intruder. This is a bad move, and it surprises me, given the circles he moves in, but some people think it's never going to happen to them, and most of the time they're wrong. Tonight, he definitely is.
I take one quick look behind me to confirm there's no-one watching and ask Lucas to give me a lift. He grabs my foot in both hands and yanks it upwards, like he's tossing the caber. His strength surprises me, and he gives me real momentum. I jump, arms outstretched, grab hold of the top of the wall and haul myself up in one movement. I find myself looking into a well-kept garden, lined with interesting vegetation, including pampas grass and a dwarf palm tree, and with a covered swimming pool at one end. The garden's empty, so I lie across the top of the wall, gripping the brickwork between my thighs, and stretch out an arm for Lucas to grab hold of.
'You've put on weight,' I whisper as I struggle to pull him level.
'No,' he whispers back, 'you're just getting old.'
We slide down the other side, using a rose
bush as cover, and land on a brick path that runs along the edge of the lawn. I draw my gun, and Lucas puts on his balaclava and draws his. He looks sinister in the darkness, like an executioner, and it's disconcerting no longer to be able to see his face.
We make our way along the path, with me leading, until we come to the edge of a paved patio bordered on three sides by sweet-smelling lavender plants. There's a wrought-iron table and six matching chairs in the centre of it. Two of the chairs are at an angle, and on the table there are two half-full wine glasses and an open bottle of white in a cooler, as well as a jug of water with lemon slices bobbing in it. Clearly, Cosick is not expecting visitors, but then why would he be? He's got his briefcase back. He may have had a brothel burned down in the process, but I don't suppose he cares too much about that. It doesn't look like he's short of a few bob. And as for losing a couple of men . . . I'm sure they're not going to be too difficult to replace.
A pair of French windows leads into the house. They are slightly ajar, and the room beyond them is dark. We creep across the
flagstones and I open them further, stepping inside. I'm in a spacious drawing room with polished teak flooring and what look in the gloom like expensive paintings on the walls. The door at the end of the room is open, and I can hear music. It's not loud, but I recognize it as the classic 1980s anthem 'The Power of Love' by Huey Lewis and the News. I've always liked this song. It reminds me of when I was a kid in the summer of 1985 when Live Aid and bad haircuts ruled the day. When the song ends, it is followed by 'Heart and Soul', another Huey Lewis number from later on that year, which I always thought was underrated. Eddie Cosick is obviously a fan. He's listening to their greatest hits.
I turn round, and Lucas nods to let me know that everything's OK. Then I start forward again, the gun raised in front of me.
We slip into a windowless entrance hall with a high vaulted ceiling dominated by a crystal chandelier. The hall is empty and dark. To my left, a wide, richly carpeted staircase with banisters on either side runs up to the next floor. Huey's deep, macho warbling is coming from up there, and it's where the only light in the
house is on. Directly ahead of me the front door is closed, as are all the doors off the entrance hall. There is no sound nor sign of activity coming from beyond them.
'Looks like whoever was here might have left in a hurry,' Lucas whispers, his eyes shining like sapphires behind the mask.
'Why would they leave?'
'Shit, Tyler, I don't know.' He hisses these last words, but his voice sounds artificially loud in the stillness of the hallway.
Slowly, I start up the staircase, my legs feeling heavy. The Browning's stretched out in front of me, but if this is a trap and someone appears from nowhere, gun blazing, it's going to be next to useless. Feeling increasingly tense, I glance round at Lucas. He's following three steps behind, but like me, he's looking backwards to check that the ground floor remains clear - acting point, like he used to do in Belfast and Crossmaglen when we were out on patrol.
Above me, a long balcony stretches the length of the floor. There are three doors visible, and unlike the ones downstairs, they are all open. It's from the middle one that the light and music are emanating, the light casting an all too faint
glow. My grip on the gun tightens, and I put a little more pressure on the trigger. It's an utterly reflexive move, based on years of experience as a combat soldier. I shift the barrel in a low arc, watching for any movement.
A stair creaks; a long, low whine.
I keep going, my attention drawn to something on the carpet at the top of the staircase, partially obscured by the angle I'm viewing it from.
It's an unfashionable cream-and-tan brogue, the toe end sticking through a gap in the balcony's banister, and it's attached to a leg.
I clench my teeth. There can't be two people known to Eddie Cosick with this kind of bad taste, so it has to be the shoe that nearly kicked my face in earlier this evening, the one that belongs to Marco.
My heart is beating loud in my chest. I remember Sellman and his friends feigning death this morning to catch Ferrie and me off guard.
If this is an ambush, I'm dead. No question.
As the staircase swings round ninety degrees, I see more of Marco, still wearing that same dark suit, sprawled out on the carpet directly in
front of me. He's lying on his front, one arm dangling over the top stair, his head and shoulders hidden by the retaining wall at the end of the balcony. Behind me, I hear Lucas curse as he too catches sight of the body.
I reach the final step and stop only inches from Marco. I count to three in my head, listening for a sound that may indicate that someone is just out of sight, waiting to put a bullet in me.
This is the problem with house clearances. There are always so many ambush points.
As I wait, my eyes move in the opposite direction, which is when I catch sight of the guy who was with Marco in the cafe in King's Cross this afternoon - the shifty little bastard with the MAC-10. He's lying on his back, his head and shoulders propped up against the doorframe of one of the unlit rooms. He's got the very same MAC-10 in his left hand now, and he's staring at me.
At least it looks like he's staring; in reality, he isn't actually seeing anything. A deep, curved gash like a grinning mouth crosses his throat from ear to ear, from which a curtain of blood has cascaded down onto his suit, drenching it. There are even flecks on the pale hand that still
clutches the weapon he never got a chance to use.
'Heart and Soul' finishes playing on the stereo, and I know I will never be able to listen to that song again because I will always associate it with the ice-cold cloud of fear that's creeping up my spine.
The CD ends, and silence envelops everything.
As I step over Marco's body and his head and shoulders become visible, I see that he also managed to pull his gun and that it lies a few inches clear of one of his outstretched arms. It doesn't take a detective to work out that he died the same way as his friend. Although his face is pushed into the carpet, a large pool of blood has formed round his neck, and I can see each ragged edge of the wound he's suffered.
I swing my gun round, looking up and down the empty hall. I'm reminded again of Ferrie's grim story this morning concerning the deaths of my two former comrades, Maxwell and Spann. Two rigorously trained soldiers who'd been taken out without a chance to fire their weapons, their throats cut, just like this.