He was in a cell. They’d overpowered him. It wasn’t hard, the state he was in. They’d retied his hands. Gagged him. Dragged him. He remembered the weight of a blanket over his head, the slamming of a door. They’d locked him in here. In the prison. It was part of the plan, to convince everyone that it was he, Michael, who was the criminal. They were going back to clean up. To destroy the evidence. Then they were going to deal with him. Tanya didn’t know how. She hadn’t said that, but Michael could tell, could hear the uncertainty in her voice even as she’d barked out orders to the two men who seemed entirely in her thrall.
He shook uncontrollably, which increased the pain in his side. He was exhausted, felt like every last drop of life had drained out of him. He looked down, to the wound in his gut. His shirt was covered in blood, but the flow had reduced to a trickle. Fallaize had given him a tea towel. Balled it up, told him to hold it there. Michael wasn’t sure if he’d been trying to help or to minimise the mess made in Tanya’s living room. Either way, he had probably saved Michael’s life. Not for long. Michael was sure now that this was how it ended. Old and weak, trussed and gagged on a prison-cell floor. Not how he’d imagined it.
But then, nothing in his life had been quite how he’d imagined. There’d been a time when he’d had it all. A beautiful wife and daughter. Seemed so long ago now. Sheila, at least, was happy. She deserved to be. He’d done a good thing, letting her go. Moving on. He groaned. Pathetic, lying to himself, even now, pretending he’d ever moved on. The closest he’d come to feelings for another person was Margaret Dorey, and even then he’d held himself back, because she wasn’t Sheila. Jenny wasn’t Ellen.
Footsteps. Outside. Michael moaned. The gag cut into the corners of his mouth, but he ignored the pain, tried to open wider, to moan louder.
The door rattled. The padlock being unlocked.
‘Shut up!’ It was a panicked hiss. ‘I’ll help you if you shut the fuck up!’
Michael struggled to focus. The light flooded in from the narrow corridor outside the cell. It was Martin Langlais.
Michael moaned again, quieter this time, shook his head from side to side. Undo the gag.
‘No,’ Langlais whispered. ‘It stays on.’ He looked behind his shoulder. ‘We’ve got ten minutes, fifteen at most. I’m supposed to be checking on you. Waiting for the other two.’
Michael narrowed his eyes, questioning without words. This didn’t make sense. If Langlais wanted out, he could have just run.
‘I’m not a part of this. I knew about the drugs, same as most people. She paid me not to say anything. That’s it. The rest is madness. I’ll take you as far as the doctor. Then you’re on your own.’
He helped Michael to his feet. Michael groaned, long and low as the full extent of the pain wracking his body made itself known.
‘It’s late. There’s nobody about. But if you try to get anyone’s attention, I’m dragging you straight back here, you hear me?’
Michael nodded.
‘I could have just left. You know that? You’ll tell them? That I helped you?’
That was it. Langlais wanted brownie points. Something he could use to mitigate his involvement in this. Michael swayed. Tried to express just a tiny amount of the contempt he felt for Langlais through the weight of his stare. Nodded.
‘Let’s go. Keep your head down.’
Michael felt the sting of sand and dust on his face as soon as he stepped outside. The streets were pitch-black and deserted. They passed houses, the odd one with the cold glow of a television screen escaping from between closed curtains. The further they went, the fewer houses they saw. Langlais used his phone as a torch, but only long enough to illuminate the way for a second or two each time before switching it off.
It started to rain, just a few drops at first, but soon his face was wet and it was even harder to see where he was going. Michael felt like he was walking through treacle, Langlais’s tall, lean frame struggling to take the burden of his weight. They moved slowly, covering only a few feet a minute. Michael, with his hands bound behind his back, unable to reach out, to feel his way through the night, stumbled and swayed. He tried to remember where the doctor had said his house was. Up by La Moinerie. Far. They had been walking for twenty minutes or so when Michael finally stopped.
He was never going to make it.
‘Fuck are you doing?’ Langlais shone the phone on him.
Michael stayed still. Groaned through the gag. Untie me.
‘Keep moving!’ Langlais had to raise his voice to be heard over the wind.
He shook his head. No.
‘What the fuck? I’ll fucking leave you here.’
Michael moaned again. Go ahead.
‘Shit. Shit.’ Deep breath. ‘They’ll know by now. That I let you go. There’s no time to fuck around.’
Michael shrugged.
‘You make one sound and I swear you’ll die here.’
Hands on Michael’s face as Langlais fumbled to untie the gag.
‘Fuck.’ It came out as a hoarse whisper. The movement pulled at the corners of his lips, which were bloody and sore. He opened and closed his mouth, caught some rainwater, swallowed, tried to work it into his dry throat. ‘It’s too far.’
‘It’s less than a mile away.’
‘Too far for me. Take me to the nearest house. We’ll call the doctor from there.’
There was a long pause.
‘What is it?’ Michael coughed. Felt like he was being stabbed all over again. ‘You’ve helped me, but you’ll not get much credit for it if I’m too dead to tell anyone. Just dump me at a house and then run. Or stick around. It will look better for you in the long run.’
‘I don’t know who I can trust.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘The doctor. He’s only been here a few months. He won’t be on the payroll. Not yet. The rest of them . . . Anyone could be working for her. She has people. Watching. Listening. Everywhere. We turn up at the wrong house, she’ll get a call.’
Michael couldn’t believe it. ‘You’re paranoid, man!’
‘He’s not.’
They had failed to hear his footsteps above the storm. Fallaize’s hand was wrapped in bloody bandages, and in it he no longer held a shard of glass but a knife, the wide blade glinting in the trembling light from Langlais’s phone.