Chapter Twenty-Two

“Shhh.”

Joe blinked. What had happened? He felt as though he’d been kicked in the ribs by a cart-horse. As Joe saw Alejandro leaning over him, his face streaked with tears and a purple bruise colouring his forehead, everything came thundering back. Zak had shot him. Alejandro held up a bloodstained finger to his own lips then leaned down to kiss Joe’s forehead. He pressed his lips to Joe’s ear and whispered, “He’s talking to somebody on the phone.”

Alejandro’s hand was covered in blood, he realised with a start. Where the hell was it coming from?

“He’s fucking well—” Shot me. Joe couldn’t speak. The pain in his chest was so intense that he had to dare himself to breathe.

He should never have let Zak in. But how the hell could Joe have known he’d have a gun?

Unless one of his plastic gangster mates might not have been quite so plastic after all.

“The bullet hit your vest,” Alejandro whispered urgently. “He’s locked us in here. He said Leviticus drove him here, Joe, and is going to sort me out now you’re out of the way! I’ve got a plan though.”

The blood was coming from Alejandro, Joe realised, but not from his veins.

Why does Alejandro have a willow-pattern teacup full of blood?

“You know I—” Joe hissed in a mouthful of pain, but was determined to speak. If a charred corpse could drive a car, then he could crack a joke. “I won’t make a convincing woman!”

“No, but you’ll make a convincing dead man.” Alejandro dabbed his finger into the cup, then drew a line of blood down from the corner of Joe’s mouth. “Zak said a man met him from the police station, that he made contact because he wanted to help and called himself Leviticus. He’s fed him God knows what drugs, Joe!” Alejandro glanced back to the door, where Zak’s voice could be heard, indistinct. “He thinks you’re dead, so I’m doing my best to make you look it. I need you to just lay here and get your strength back because when Leviticus, whoever he turns out to be, gets here, I need you to get the jump on him if I go for him from the front. Have you got your Mace?”

“It’s in my coat.” Joe hungrily sucked in a lungful of air as if he were drowning. Everything inside him felt broken. “Up-fucking-stairs.”

“I think you’ve broken a rib. I did it once with a corset, it hurts like hell but you’ll live,” Alejandro whispered urgently, looking to the door again. “I don’t know how long we’ve got.” He scrambled to his feet and crossed to the hearth, where he picked up a fire poker. Then he came back to Joe, slipping the poker between his arm and the carpet. “That’ll do as a weapon, yes? You can’t move, Joe, not if they can see you. Wait until I go for it, okay? Please, Osito, I know it hurts, but… Us being dead is going to hurt a lot more, right?”

Joe grimaced with pain as he took another deep breath. “I’ll keep still. Don’t worry. And besides…” he swallowed, “someone might come. If someone…heard the gun.”

No silent alarms out here. No panic buttons. But then, there shouldn’t have been any further risk.

I’ll have fucking strong words to say to Patrick when we’re back in London.

“He’s taken the phones and your tablet. I don’t think anybody’s coming.” Alejandro reached into the cup and began spattering blood from his fingertips onto Joe’s neck and throat. Then his gaze darted to the door and he threw the cup into the mess that had fallen from the coffee table. “Play dead, he’s stopped talking.”

Alejandro settled himself gently atop Joe’s chest so as not to hurt him further, sobbing and shuddering with despair. He was a hell of an actor, Joe realised. His parents would be proud.

The key scraped in the lock and Zak came back into the room. Through half-open, unfocused eyes, Joe saw Zak point to his phone.

“That was Leviticus. You’re going to meet him at last, Al. And he can’t wait to meet you. Can’t wait!”

“Have you been working with him from the start?” Alejandro sobbed, lifting his head to look at Zak. “You and Leviticus together? Who is it, Zak?”

Joe kept still even as Zak grew nearer and grasped Alejandro by his hair.

“No, I never met him until tonight. Clever fucker, he is.”

“Good luck, Zak,” Alejandro whispered. “Whoever Leviticus is, he talked you into murder. And you’re probably going to be next.”

The sound of a car engine split the silence outside, bright headlamps passing momentarily across the room before they were extinguished.

Leviticus. Baqil was always a fix-up. Leviticus has been one step ahead of us from the start, one step ahead of everyone.

What had Alejandro said?

‘Straight, white and British?’

Outside, a car door closed, then feet crunched on the snow and the front door opened.

We’re at war.

How the hell did Zak know we were here? No one knew.

Except Commander Holloway.

“What a night to be out and about!” Patrick’s voice called over the sound of the front door closing. “This is a night for home and hearth, not wandering about the Kent coast!”

Joe tried not flinch. The betrayal hurt him more than the bullet.

The fucking bastard. The fucking mad racist bigoted old bastard!

“Yeah, should stay in, really. We’ll chuck the dead copper off a cliff tomorrow, right?” Zak grinned.

Patrick didn’t answer at first. Instead he crossed the room and nudged Joe with his walking stick, peering down at him.

Play dead, Joe reminded himself. Don’t move.

“I bitterly regret the sad passing of Sergeant Wenlock,” Patrick told them in that gentle, friendly voice of his, as though he were reading Joe’s funeral oration. “I personally mentored him. I’d hoped he might eventually succeed me as commander of the division. He gave his life for Queen and country and I only wish that I’d pulled the trigger myself. You did well, Mr Su, you should be proud.”

“I am.” Zak took the gun out of his pocket and passed it to Patrick with a coke addict’s sniff. “Only ever done clay pigeons before. I liked shooting a cooper.”

Joe focused on his barely perceptible shallow breaths. He was sorely tempted to wring Zak’s neck.

And now Patrick has a fucking gun.

Which Joe now knew Patrick had given to Zak in the first place.

“And when the authorities get here, they’ll find a murdered copper, a murdered queer and the body of the junkie who killed them before taking his own life.” In one smooth movement Patrick put the gun to Zak’s temple and pulled the trigger. The shot rang round the room and Zak went down like a broken doll. “It’s a tragic world we live in.”

Joe fought against every instinct in him to put his arms around Alejandro and protect him.

I’ve just seen Patrick commit murder. And he did it so easily too.

It wasn’t the first time. Did he kill Baqil as well?

“Queers and immigrants and actresses polluting our royal blood.” Patrick stooped and carefully set the gun down beside Zak. “The same sort of rodents who broke my back and still men like Joe here made excuses for them and their filthy, parasitic siblings! And queers like you poisoning good men like him.” He lifted his foot and kicked Alejandro in the chest, sending him sprawling back against the hearth and away from Joe. “I miked up your house, Osito, I know exactly what you two have been up to. I was the man who broke into Joe’s house. I was the man on CCTV in Baqil’s car, and I was the man who carried Baqil’s body into the studio and set the place on fire. You didn’t turn up, or there would’ve been three bodies to find. That was a mistake. I won’t make another.”

“Leviticus,” Alejandro murmured.

“Leviticus,” Patrick repeated. “Hello, Alejo.”

I trusted you, Commander. I trusted you with my life.

Out of Patrick’s sight, Joe closed his hand around the fire poker. He saw Alejandro register the movement. Peering up at Patrick, Alejandro said, “I’m disappointed. I thought Leviticus would be less…generic.”

Gritting his teeth against the pain in his chest, Joe crawled across the floor until he was behind Patrick, then jumped to his feet and braced the poker across Patrick’s throat. He held it firm. Any movement from Patrick and he’d choke.

“Sorry, Commander. You made another mistake.” Joe pulled the poker more tightly, but not so tightly that he’d kill the man. “Alejandro, find a phone. Dial 999. I’ve restrained Leviticus.”

“And look how fucking generic he is!” Alejandro shouted, jumping to his feet. “Look at him, the stupid, racist shit! Nobody knew it was you because nobody ever noticed you, because you’re just…this!” He gestured with his hand then knelt beside Zak, turning his gaze from the bleeding wound in his temple even as he took a mobile from his pocket.

“You were a better CPO than I thought,” Patrick told Joe as Alejandro pressed Zak’s lifeless finger to the phone screen, unlocking it. “I needed a man past his best, someone who’d let me get at Mr Fuente. You’re an outstanding officer, Joe, I trained you well. But you’ve learned something from this. One can never spot an extremist just by looking at him. Remember that when you’re the boss.”

Past my best?

The pain in Joe’s chest was getting worse, exacerbated by Patrick’s words. Joe finally allowed himself a roar of agony, and loosened the poker against Patrick’s throat.

“I don’t want to be the boss,” Joe spat. “Not if it means turning into an arsehole like you! I hope you enjoyed it, by the way. Overhearing Alejo and I. Together. Happy. In love. You’ll never find love now. You’ll die behind bars. And you know what a shit time bent coppers have in prison, don’t you?”

“What did I always tell you, Joe? Expect the unexpected.” Patrick’s hand moved, just enough to slip into the pocket of his greatcoat. The gun he withdrew, small and shining, caught a glimmer of firelight before he pressed the barrel beneath his chin and pulled the trigger.

A warm spray of blood and brain matter hit Joe’s face. The poker clanged to the floor and the lifeless body of Commander Holloway was, for a moment, in Joe’s arms.

Joe laid his boss, Leviticus, on the floor and closed his staring eyes.

“Alejo? Are the police on the way?”

Alejandro, the phone still held to his ear, nodded mutely. Then he came to Joe and held out his arms, taking him into a wordless embrace.