It wasn’t the cries of the children that woke Shaw, but the sound of footsteps crossing the hall to the front door, quietly unlocking it and slipping out into the night.
Years of Wucker training had taught him to distinguish different people by the sound of their tread, and this was definitely not someone who he trusted to be leaving by this route in the middle of the night.
Mary was gone, but he wasn’t really surprised.
He dressed quickly and took his pistol in his hand, ready for action.
Quietly he crossed the room and slid along the wall towards the entrance. He stopped as he saw the door slowly opening again and a slight figure slipping inside. They moved quietly across the floor, failing to see Shaw ready to leap.
As they passed him, Shaw grabbed the figure and swung them around heavily into the wall, winding them and making them mute.
‘Who is out there?’
The figure fought for breath, swallowing and gasping until they finally felt oxygen coming back into their body.
‘Your friends. They’re your friends. I’m helping you.’
‘So why didn’t you think to tell me, Fix?’
‘You were busy in there with that girl.’ He tried to joke with Shaw but quickly saw that wasn’t endearing him to the bigger man.
‘They wanted to know if Barb or a strange girl had turned up. I was helping you, Shaw. They’ll be happy with you again now they’ve got them. You will remember your friend Fix helped you get back in with them, won’t you?’
Shaw pushed his face near Fix’s. ‘Oh, yes, I’ll remember this, Fix. The trouble is, you won’t want me to remember it.’ He pushed him onto the ground. ‘You’re so ready to believe I want this girl dead. Barb was only too quick to assume I’d be happy to go after my brother. You all have such a low opinion of me and my motives.’
He pointed the gun towards Fix.
‘You’re a Wucker.’
‘Yes. And you’re a snitch that would sell his granny if it made him money.’
‘My granny’s dead,’ Fix whimpered quietly.
‘What sort of Wucker did you sell us to?’
‘Don’t know what you mean.’
‘Yes, you do. Which ones, Fix?’
‘Black Crow.’
Shaw’s heart sank. The elite hit squad. Well, if he had to go down against the Black Crow, so be it. He hauled Fix up and dragged him to his office. Mary had gone from the bed in the back room, so he shoved Fix in and locked the door. He didn’t expect it would hold him for long, but it should test his lock-picking skills and delay him for a bit.
He opened the drawer of the desk in the office and took out a box of rounds, which he poured into his tunic pockets. The two shotguns they’d taken off Barb and her friends were leaned against the wall, and he grabbed them too.
He hadn’t been lying when he’d told Barb that his childhood memories had come flooding back when he’d returned to this place. Years of neglect and bullying here had ensured he’d found every nook and cranny in his attempts to stay hidden as a boy, and he doubted anyone knew the secret ways in and out as well as he did.
Back in the hall, he could hear the group making their way down to the third floor, where no doubt they would be leaving through the fire exit, into an open space and the waiting arms of the Black Crow. If they did that, they wouldn’t live.
Shaw headed for the stairs and took them two at a time. There was no time to lose.