Time stood still as the doctor crumpled in front of them all, blood obliterating the front of his white shirt. It took a second before Jo registered the paramedics’ screams, then saw Tony raise his gun towards them. In a flash, Saira grabbed Tony’s right arm, clamped it under her own and with a lightning swivel powered him to the ground, his screams suggesting that she’d dislocated his shoulder. In a second, she’d goosenecked his wrist and the gun dropped to the floor. She grabbed it, aimed it at Evans on the ground and stamped down on his clavicle. ‘Stay where you fucking are,’ she yelled.
Jo was momentarily taken aback by the PC’s devastating martial arts skills, a millisecond too long as Sir Ben bolted from the room.
‘Get back here,’ she yelled, almost tripping over Dr Blaketon’s body. ‘See to him,’ she shouted, hoping that the paramedics would know that was aimed at them. Confident that with the gun in Saira’s hands, Evans was going nowhere and that, if she had misjudged Blaketon as being a reluctant conspirator, he was in no state to be a threat anyway, she headed off after Sir Ben. 328
He had a good five seconds on her which, in a house this size and with his forensic knowledge of it, might as well have been an hour.
As she sprinted along the landing, he could have taken any one of the doors that flanked its oak-panelled walls. Or none of them. Her instinct told her that he was running to get away, rather than hide, so she headed for the way he had brought her and Saira minutes before.
The pound of steps on stairs confirmed her theory and as she neared them, she glanced over the balustrade and saw Sir Ben stumble on the half-turn.
‘Get back here,’ she yelled, causing him to glance up. In that brief moment, fear flashed in his eyes. He regained his footing and she guessed he’d created enough distance to go where the hell he liked.
She grabbed the bannister as she reached the top step then, taking two at a time, seemed to fly down the stairs. As she reached where he had tripped, a tremendous crash came from below. On completing the turn she saw what it was. A huge Welsh dresser which, in her trepidation, she’d not spotted on the way up had been heaved on its side and blocked the bottom of the staircase.
It served to distract her attention but as she got to the bottom, with the downward momentum, she was able to leap it with relative ease. Thankfully her trainers provided good grip as she landed on the wooden hall floor, and whilst she had lost sight of Ben, a door slamming to the left gave his position away. As she took in where the noise had come from, she had the pick of three doors.
There was no logic to apply, so she went right to left. The first door swung open easily in her hand and she was able to discount it immediately. The small toilet had no room to hide and the window, some ten feet up, looked like it hadn’t been opened in decades.
She spun round and tried the second. She should have guessed this would be the washroom. Equal in size and certainly Sir Ben had not been here.
That meant the left door must be the one. Jo was about to wrench it as 329she had the others – impetuously, now she thought about it. If he was in here, he could be waiting with God knows what ready to attack her. She took a breath, held it, wedged her ear against the wood and waited for any sound.
Silence.
She shuffled to the side of the door, inched the handle down and shoved it open, keeping to the edge. When the counter-attack did not come, she crouched down and peered in. Instead of a knight of the realm in front of her, there was a stone staircase descending into the darkness.
The chill wafted up, bringing with it a sharp tang of damp and chemicals, which Jo couldn’t name. She thought about leaving it and calling for back-up.
She was tempted to reach for her phone and use its torch to guide her but knew that would be tantamount to putting a target on her head. Instead she glared into the darkness, waiting for her eyes to grow accustomed to the gloom. Then her little boys’ faces flashed in her mind. It took a minute or two but soon she had as much night vision as she guessed she ever would, so step by oh-so-slow step, she made her way into the unknown.
She could just make out the bottom when, she estimated, she had half a dozen steps to go. Her strained eyes scoured the black, willing that she would spot Sir Ben before he saw her.
‘Stay where you are,’ came the shout from the near distance – about two o’clock. Jo squinted but could see nothing.
‘Come out,’ she said as she squeezed against the left-hand wall, tiptoeing down the last few stairs.
‘You’re not getting away with this,’ Sir Ben said. ‘Even if you survive, with everything you’ve done you’re finished.’
Jo had no idea exactly where he was nor whether he had any weapons, so played it safe. Her foot touched the floor.
‘Think about your mum. She needs you and we can sort this. Come out with your hands on your head and I’ll take you to see her.’ She took two more steps. 330
‘I said stay still, or you’ll get hurt,’ he shouted.
She stopped, but every time he spoke, Jo was able to reassess where he was. But she had no idea whether he had the means to harm her. It was a risk she might have to take, but for now her mission was to keep him talking.
‘No one needs to get hurt. I just need to know what’s harmed my kids, then Saira and I will be out of your hair.’
She allowed her voice to mask more steps, but the last one clanked against something heavy. She leant down and, among the debris, her fingers brushed a cold metal object which she gauged was about two inches wide. When he next spoke, she would pick it up. If she could.
It was the scurry of a rodent to her left that made her jump first, then, true to form, Sir Ben couldn’t resist what he thought might be the last word. ‘You don’t expect me to believe that, do you?’
She managed it and stood up. ‘I’m serious. This has gone too far. Let’s save my boys and your mum. What do you say?’ She ran her hands over the heavy tool in the darkness. As her fingers explored the end, she worked out that it was the heftiest adjustable spanner she’d ever held, not that there were a whole lot of lighter ones. Its surface was cold to the touch and felt pitted with rust. Her right hand gripped the shaft and she rested the head in her left.
Jo suspected that, unless he had a gun, Sir Ben wouldn’t have a tastier weapon than this. In any case, time was running out for her boys.
‘OK, enough’s enough,’ said Jo. ‘If you don’t show yourself, I’m coming to get you.’ She gave him no more than thirty seconds, then, ‘Time’s up.’
As she walked forward, she stumbled over a stack of paint pots. ‘Get out here,’ she shouted, intent on shielding her fear with anger.
‘Don’t come any closer,’ yelled Sir Ben. She was about to ignore him when a hissing followed by a whoosh and a flash stopped her in her tracks. ‘Stay back,’ he ordered as the spear of blue flame from an oxyacetylene torch he was holding danced in front of him, lighting his face like a Halloween mask. 331
Jo worked out that he was only about two metres away but had no idea what damage his makeshift flamethrower could do.
‘Put it down, you idiot, you’ll kill us both.’ Behind the fire she could make out his grimace.
‘Then get the fuck out of here and let us go.’
Jo stepped forward and took a swipe at the torch with her wrench, but it missed and clattered onto a steel upright. She tried again on the backswing but Ben dodged out of the way. As she brought the wrench back, the flame caught her arm and it flared her sleeve.
‘Ah, fuck.’ She dropped the spanner as her hoodie caught fire. Instinctively she dropped to the floor and rolled, desperate to snuff the flames. The acrid smoke gagged in her throat but all she could focus on was not combusting. She managed it just in time but her arm hurt like the worst sunburn.
Sir Ben sprung forward, the lance of the flame roaring. Jo shuffled away to stop him igniting her hair, at the same time grabbing his ankle as he tried to kick her. Using the only weapon she had left, she sank her teeth into his calf. He screeched and stamped down, Jo using her whole body weight to keep his foot rooted to the ground.
‘Get off me, you mad bitch,’ he shouted as he tried to shake her off. Still he gripped the torch though, and now both his other leg and the gassy flame were homing in on her. She bit deeper into the flesh; her jaw cried out for her to let go but she knew that would be fatal.
He managed to lift the leg she was biting and swung it from side to side. Jo was sure she’d get whiplash but his screams told her that she was having effect. He flipped her, thrusting the flame towards her, and as she put her hand out to steady herself, she touched the wrench again. Gripping it, she managed to bring it back and brought it square against the shinbone of his standing leg, his screams drowning out the shatter of bone.
Sir Ben collapsed in front of her, still gripping the torch but wailing like a footballer. Jo sprung up, just in time to see the flame catch a mass of dust sheets to her right. They erupted with frightening speed and, for the first 332time, Jo could see the whole cellar by the light of the fire. It was rammed with a lifetime of crap, like her dad’s garage but multiplied fivefold.
Sir Ben seemed to be inert on the ground and the flaming cloths were dangerously close to his head. She was about to leave him when she remembered why she was here in the first place.
Grabbing his smashed leg and straining every muscle, she heaved him along the concrete floor, away from danger. If his screams were deafening before, now they were ear-splitting. She blocked them out as she dragged him a good three metres away from the rapidly expanding inferno.
‘Get me out, get me out!’ he cried.
‘Tell me what the boys have taken.’
‘Get me out first.’
‘No. It doesn’t work like that. You tell me first, then I get you out. Otherwise you stay here and fry.’
‘You wouldn’t dare.’
‘You called me a mad bitch. Do you want to see how mad I can be?’ She stood up and backed towards the stairs. ‘See you in hell.’
She was genuinely prepared to do it. After all, Tony Evans was being held at Saira’s gunpoint upstairs. As a last resort, they could get it out of him.
‘OK. OK. Spice. They gave them spice.’
Jo was dumbfounded. ‘Spice, on kids? Have you seen what that stuff can do to grown adults? That’s it – fucking stay here and burn, you fucking monster. It’s too good for you.’
She took two more steps back, then saw a bank of five or so large plastic containers, close to the fire. White Spirit. She’d seen a demo of what one of those could do and, much as she would love to see Sir Ben cremate, she had to act.
Running back to him, she grabbed his arm. ‘Stand up.’ Her skin was exploding in blisters.
‘I can’t. My leg.’
‘You’ve got one chance, you piece of shit, or I’m leaving you here. I’ve 333got what I want, remember? Now lean on me and get on your feet.’ When she felt his weight bear down on her, she heaved him and, whilst she wasn’t strong enough to carry him, now she could use adrenaline and momentum to pull him to relative safety.
She adjusted her position so his arm was across her shoulder. ‘This is going to fucking hurt but we’re not stopping.’ She turned towards the stairs and, to her horror, saw their exit completely cut off by the fire. She glanced to where the spirit was and saw that as well as having no exit, she had about a minute, if that, to get out before the whole place went up.
‘Another door?’ she yelled in Sir Ben’s ears in an effort to be heard over his screams.
He didn’t answer.
‘Get us out or we die,’ she shouted. The flames advanced closer.
‘Over there,’ he said between sobs, his shift in body weight telling Jo which way to head. She dragged him in a straight line, shouting at him to walk so at least his goodish leg did some work. She clambered across a generation of clutter, ignoring Sir Ben’s cries. There was only one way they were going to get out of here and it wasn’t going to be pretty.
In a few seconds, having kicked God-knows-what obstructions clear, she found a doorway. She dropped Sir Ben like a sack, as she needed both hands to clear a stack of boxes away, then she worked the key so the door opened. She looked out and found she was in a courtyard with steps leading up to a lawn.
For the second time, she was tempted to run and leave Sir Ben, but she turned and grabbed him again, forcing him to lean on her so she could heave him out. As she got them both clear of the door and into the open, she slammed it shut, a second before what sounded like a bomb going off on the other side.