‘Someone fired at me as well,’ added Bear.
‘Did you get any of them?’
Fox shook his head. ‘No. They were definitely ordered back.’
‘So someone told them about our ambush. Your plan failed, Fox. You’ve made us look like fools.’
‘No, I haven’t. They came in. We fired at them. They left. Which meant it was a victory to us.’
‘But you didn’t kill any of them.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Fox, who was beginning to get heartily sick of Wolf. ‘The point is, we’re still in control, and holding the military at bay. All we have to do is keep this up for another three quarters of an hour and then the hotel goes up in flames and we make our escape. Just as we’ve always planned. We can still say we repulsed their attack. It’s still a victory.’
‘Except we didn’t humiliate them. That’s what we always wanted. To make the great SAS look like amateurs.’
Fox noticed Bear bristling as Wolf said this. For all his anger with the government and the establishment, Bear was still a patriot at heart, a man who’d been disfigured for life fighting on behalf of his country, and he didn’t like the British Army being disrespected. Fox didn’t either, but he was sensible enough not to react and he needed to make sure that his old army buddy kept his cool as well. ‘I think they’ve been pretty badly humiliated already,’ he said, meeting Wolf’s hard stare with a far harder one of his own. ‘And right now, it’s the best you’re going to get.’
Wolf grunted. ‘All right. You and Bear watch the hostages. I need to speak to the negotiator again.’ He turned away, motioning for Cat to follow, while Fox and Bear took up positions standing twenty feet apart.
‘Can you tell us what’s going on?’ one of the younger female hostages asked Fox. ‘Please.’ She fixed him with a vulnerable, doe-eyed gaze.
‘No,’ said Fox, loud enough for the whole group to hear. He pointed his AK-47 at the girl, and made a play of putting his finger on the trigger. She immediately looked away while Fox scanned the rest of the hostages, knowing that it was essential they were kept under control. Their plans had been thrown off course, but if he kept calm, soon most of these people would be dead, and he’d be on his way to a new life.
TINA HAD WRAPPED
the children in blankets she’d found in one of the cupboards and they were now sitting at the kitchen table taking it in turns to speak to their mother on her mobile. They were both in tears, and by the sounds of things, Arley was too. Tina couldn’t blame any of them.
She left them in there, putting up a finger to say she’d be back in one minute, then returned to the bedroom where the kidnapper lay face down on the carpet. Crouching down, she felt for a pulse, but there was nothing. He was dead.
Jesus, thought Tina, standing back up, I’ve killed again. She might have taken a pretty bad beating herself, but she was still standing, whereas the last blow she’d laid on the kidnapper had been to the side of his head with a piece of lead piping. But as far as she was concerned, he’d deserved what he got. There were some people out there whose crimes were so terrible they didn’t deserve life and, in her opinion, this man was one of them. What did bother her, though, was being on the receiving end of a manslaughter charge; she still had enough enemies in the Met to make this a definite possibility. Either way, she was in a lot of trouble.
She went back downstairs and made her way into the living room, where the kidnapper had been sitting when she arrived. A rucksack was on the sofa and she went over to it, wondering if there’d be a clue to his identity in there. The news had been saying for most of the day that the prime suspects in the bombings and the subsequent siege were Islamic fundamentalists, but the man she’d killed was white, and the single curse word he’d uttered when they were fighting sounded like it belonged to someone with a local accent.
She pulled open the rucksack and stopped dead when she saw the battery pack and wires, realizing she was staring at a bomb.
Slowly, very carefully, she stepped away from the device, knowing she had to get the kids out of there. As she turned towards the door, she glanced briefly at the TV, which was showing live footage from the Stanhope, and saw the rolling headlines saying that explosions and gunfire were audible from the back of the hotel and that unofficial sources suggested a rescue attempt by Special Forces was being repelled.
The nausea Tina was already experiencing suddenly grew a whole lot worse. So there
had
been an assault on the building by the SAS, and it seemed that things had gone badly wrong, which meant only one thing: Arley must have told the terrorists of their plans, despite Tina’s warning to her about having blood on their hands as a result.
Oliver was speaking on the phone when Tina came back into the kitchen. ‘I need to speak to your mum urgently,’ she said, taking the phone from him. ‘And we need to get out of here right now.’
‘What’s going on, Tina?’ asked Arley.
‘Give me a minute,’ she answered, pushing the kids out of the front door and on to the driveway, ignoring their questions. It occurred to her that there might be further devices in the house, and that the van might contain some kind of bomb too. ‘I’ve just seen the news on the TV. So the SAS went in. You all but promised me you wouldn’t let that happen.’
‘They did go in, but I managed to get a message to them to abort the attack. They pulled back just in time, and although there was some shooting and a couple of explosions, none of them were hurt.’
‘Are you sure? Because there’s no point lying to me now, Arley.’
‘I swear it, Tina. There were no casualties.’
‘Surely they must want to know how you came by the information.’
‘They do. It’s one more thing I’m going to have to deal with when this is over.’
‘Where are you now? It sounds like you’re in a cupboard.’
‘I’m in the mobile toilet. Listen, Tina, I won’t implicate you, I promise.’
‘It’s too late. You already have. And I’ve killed a man here. I can hardly try to hide it. That just implicates me more.’
‘God, I don’t know what to say, I really don’t.’
Nor did Tina. She could hardly scream and yell at a woman who in the last few hours had lost her husband, her career, and so nearly her children.
There was a long silence while both women processed the events of the night and their inevitable repercussions.
‘It’s all over for me, Tina,’ said Arley quietly.
‘I know it is.’
‘And I know how this must sound, but can I ask you one final favour?’
Tina almost laughed. ‘Jesus, Arley. You’ve got chutzpah, I’ll give you that.’
‘I need to see my children while I’m still free. I need to tell them about their father. And I want to do it face to face.’
‘I don’t see how that’s going to be possible,’ said Tina as she ushered Oliver and India down the muddy track outside the cottage.
‘My mother lives in Pinner. If I text you the address, please can you take them there? I know I’ve asked a lot of you.’
‘You’ve asked everything of me.’
‘I know. And I’m begging you … please.’
‘I need to phone the police. There are bombs in the house where I found your kids, as well as a body, and we need to get the area sealed off.’ Tina sighed, looking in turn at Arley’s children, shivering under their blankets. ‘Then I’ll take them to your mother.’
MARTIN DALSTON WAS FEELING
nauseous and tense, although he wasn’t sure how much of this was due to his illness and how much to the atmosphere inside the Park View Restaurant, which had deteriorated steadily ever since the execution of the hostage more than an hour earlier.
And then ten or so minutes ago they’d heard explosions and shooting coming from somewhere far below in the building. The taller of the two terrorists, the one Martin had overheard being referred to as Dragon, had told them in advance to expect some gunfire, but that the situation was under control.
But it seemed it wasn’t fully, because both terrorists were now on their feet, their body language riddled with tension as they kept their assault rifles trained on the hostages, screaming threats the moment someone so much as changed position on the floor. Dragon had his foot on the detonator pedal, and he kept exchanging nervous glances with the other guard, the one with the Scandinavian accent and the limp. Both were checking their watches every few seconds, as if they were waiting for something.
Their erratic behaviour, and the uncertainty of the situation, was also affecting the hostages, whose expressions were becoming more and more panic-stricken. One person in particular, a white-haired businessman in his sixties, only a few feet away from Martin, had started to breathe very heavily in the last few minutes, and it looked like he might be having a panic attack. People were ignoring him, and several had turned away, as if, like prey animals in the wild, they’d sensed his weakness and were abandoning him to the predators. Martin gave him a reassuring look, but the man either didn’t see him or chose not to meet his gaze.
Strangely, Martin himself was feeling less scared than he had done all night. Or maybe it wasn’t strange. Maybe it was because, having been so close to death earlier on, and realizing that at the last second he’d actually been ready for it, he felt there was little else they could threaten him with. There was also something comforting in being back among the group rather than being singled out and alone. He wondered what the bombs and shooting had been about. At first he’d thought it was an Iranian Embassy-style attack on the building by the SAS, but that didn’t make sense, because the two terrorists guarding them had known what was going to happen beforehand.
Martin caught Elena’s eye and they gave each other the kind of supportive look they’d been exchanging all night. Something had changed between them, though. Elena looked more self-conscious under his gaze, embarrassed even, and he guessed it was because she hadn’t intervened earlier, when he was about to be shot. Not that he blamed her. Ultimately, there was nothing she could have done. He wanted to explain this to her but he wasn’t sure how he could do so without it sounding like he
did
actually blame her; and anyway, since the killing of the hostage, everyone had been taking seriously the warnings not to speak to each other. Nobody wanted to be the next to die.
A few feet away, the businessman’s breathing was getting louder and more laboured, and he was now bent forward, one hand on his chest, the other holding a handkerchief to his forehead. Martin could see he was in a bad way, and he wanted to do something to help. Too many people had died needlessly already that day.
Elena was looking over at him now, a concerned yet helpless expression on her face. She wanted to help too. Martin could see that. But she wasn’t going to. None of them was, including Martin himself.
He suddenly felt a terrible anger, not just towards the terrorists, but towards himself, for not doing something. He might be unarmed, physically weak, and desperately thirsty, but he had one huge advantage over all the hostages: he had nothing left to live for. He was already a dead man. It was just that his body hadn’t yet realized it.
The businessman suddenly cried out in pain and fell over, clutching at his chest with both hands as he began to hyperventilate.
Several people gasped, but no one moved.
Martin knew that for once in his life he had to stand up and be counted. ‘This man needs help urgently,’ he shouted at the two terrorists, who were both looking over but making no move to do anything. ‘Please. You’ve got to help him.’
Other hostages murmured in agreement, their confidence boosted by Martin’s actions.
‘Leave him, he’ll be all right,’ said Dragon dismissively.
‘He won’t be all right unless he gets some kind of medical attention.’
Martin crawled over to the man on his hands and knees, feeling liberated now that he was actually doing something, and put a steadying hand on his arm. The man stared up at him with wide, frightened eyes, but he was still conscious, and Martin had no idea whether he was experiencing a panic attack or something more serious.
He looked round at the other hostages. ‘Does anyone have any first aid experience?’
‘Get back!’ yelled the Scandinavian, the crueller of the two terrorists. ‘You were told to leave him alone. Get back now.’
But Martin was defiant, the fact that he was finally doing something worthwhile empowering him. ‘He needs some water. Come on. Please. Have some kind of humanity.’
The man’s gasps were coming thick and fast now, and Martin feared some kind of heart attack.
‘I’m a retired doctor,’ someone called out from behind him, but before Martin could turn round to see who it was, the Scandinavian marched over.
‘You want to see my humanity?’ he sneered. ‘Yeah? I’ll show you my fucking humanity.’
He grabbed Martin by the shirt and yanked him out of the way. Then, with barely a moment’s hesitation, he took a step back, pointed his assault rifle down at the businessman’s chest, and pulled the trigger, shooting him three times in rapid succession.
The man’s desperate, rasping breathing suddenly stopped, just like that, and he lay still.
The Scandinavian turned to Martin, his bright blue eyes alive with excitement. ‘There. That’s my humanity. Anyone else move, and they get the same. And that includes you, big man.’ He aimed the rifle at Martin’s head. ‘Get it?’
Martin looked down. Said nothing.
‘Good. Now shut up. All of you.’
The gunman turned away, walking back towards his colleague.
Which was when Martin Dalston leaped to his feet, fury sweeping through him in a physical wave that gave him a strength he’d never experienced before. He charged at the Scandinavian, grabbing him in a bear hug and biting him as hard as he could in the exposed flesh of his neck, almost immediately tasting blood.
The Scandinavian let out a startled yelp and tried to throw him off, but the adrenalin was pumping through Martin and he held on tight. He knew that the moment he fell off, he was dead.
Then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a flash of blonde. Elena was on her feet and leaping towards him too, her momentum knocking all three of them to the floor.