Half Moon Chambers (2 page)

I loved him for seeing it. I spreadeagled
myself
on the desk, the first buzz of climax
beginning
in my fingertips and toes. I tightened and
released
the muscles of my backside, resisting the
shove
of his cock. The friction rebounded on both
of
us
--
he groaned and swore at me, and a
cramping
pressure rolled down through me, hard
enough
to push him out if he hadn't been buried so
deep
. "Bastard," he rasped. "Don't bloody crush
me
."

"Gonna come."

"Oh, yeah. Oh, doesn't take much, does it?
Hold on, Vinnie
--
I'll get you there."

My mobile phone started to ring. At first I
confused
the sound with the singing roar of blood
in
my ears, but then it got through to me. Jack had
told
me
--
as a complaint
--
that I was a copper
over
, under and before everything else, and he was
right
. Even now I wasn't so lost in the action that I
could
ignore the damn phone. I made a flailing
grab
for my pocket.

"Vince! Don't you fucking
--
dare!"

"Got to get it. Might be
--
"

He yanked my arm up my back. "
I said no!
"

You arsehole
, I thought dimly. I would take
this
out of him later. But my body's tide rose in
spite
of myself and him, and I stifled a scream on
my
wrist and came, painfully hard, bucking wildly
in
his restraint. Then there were thirty gritted-teeth
seconds
while he got there himself. Never spared
me
in the aftermath, did Jack
--
took his time,
banging
me hard enough to knock the heavy desk
inch
by inch sideways. I groaned in relief when he
loosed
his familiar cry
--
always a triumph in it,
like
he'd won, and to hell with all other
contenders
--
and went soft.

He slid out of me, panting. I pushed upright
and
hauled the phone out of my pocket. "Great
,
Jack. Fucking great. That was Chrissy."

"Oh, right. Your junkie brother's dope-head
girlfriend
. Can see why you're pissed you missed
that
."

"Chrissy's clean now. She's trying to help
him
."

Off in the depths of the building, the lift doors
clanged
. We both jumped. Automatically I handed
him
his shirt, and he began to tuck mine back into
my
trousers. "If you recall," he said bitterly, "last
time
you and me got drunk together, you told me
your
brother Phil was everything you wanted to
leave
behind in this godforsaken city. You said
--
and
I quote
--
you hated his guts, and him and his
kind
were the reason you became a copper in the
first
place."

I stared at him. I had said all those things. I'd
meant
them, too. I'd been running around after Phil
since
he'd nicked his first bottle of prescription
pills
out of our mam's knicker drawer. I hated him.

No point in my coming across all saintly and
compassionate
now. "I've still got to call her
back
."

"You'd better be quick about it, then. Boss is
in
a hurry."

I glanced through the porthole glass. There
went
Inspector Bill Hodges, the off-shift
commander
, jogging purposefully down the
corridor
, and thank God he hadn't glanced in at me.

I hit callback, and let Jack redo my tie as the line
rang
out. "Chrissy," I said when she picked up.

"Sorry I missed you. I..."

She was crying, or trying hard not to. I heard
her
electronically filtered gulp for control. "Vince.

It's Phil. He's... Are you okay?"

"Yeah, fine. Why?"

"You sound like you've just finished a
marathon
."

"Oh. Yeah, I..." I ran a hand over my head,
glad
my hair was cropped short enough not to
allow
for dishevelment. "I'm on an op. Been
running
."

"God, I'm sorry to call you at work! Phil's
disappeared
. He met up with some mates of his
this
afternoon and he never came home. He
promised
me he wouldn't touch anything, but it
was
Joe Bates and that mob. He never
--
"

"All right. Calm down. I'll see if I can get
someone
to cover my desk, and I'll run a car past
some
of his haunts. He'll turn up."

"Thank you! Oh, Vince, what are we going to
do
when you're not here any more to..."

I didn't hear the end of it. Jack's hand had
closed
around mine, his thumb coming down on the
cut
-off button. I opened my mouth to snarl at him,
but
he pressed one finger to my lips. "No. Shut up
and
listen. If Bill's that excited, something's up
--
something
big. Don't let Phil make you miss it. You
said
it yourself
--
he's been making you miss things
for
years. I don't want to be a hardarse, but he does
it
to himself. And if I don't try and stop you, he'll
find
some way of..." He paused, some of his post
-
orgasmic
flush fading away. I so seldom saw him
anything
other than cheerfully composed that I
swallowed
my protests. "He'll find some way of
keeping
you here, and screw things up for both of
us
. He'll make you miss your whole life."

* * *

Jack had been right. Something big had come
up
, big enough to call in our back-up group from
their
beds and their weekend amusements. Our
own
squad were on their way back from
Ponteland
HQ as well. They would be here soon, arriving as
silently
as we had on the Sunderland quayside,
coasting
in, lights dimmed. I sat in the dark van,
waiting
. The River Tyne was beautiful here, and I
had
an unimpeded view. Ship lights and
streetlights
glimmered in the water, and over on
the
north bank rose the sheer planes of the
Glass
Centre, a rare success of an endeavour in this post
-
industrial
desert, where bones of the disused
shipyards
lay everywhere, skeletal shapes of
cranes
starred with warning lights for passing
aircraft
. My nieces and nephews loved the
Glass
Centre. You could go there and learn to make
paperweights
, or even blow your own decorative
vase
, or walk on the transparent floors a dizzying
hundred
feet above the workshops. My struggling
city
was trying for rebirth. And I adored her, but
the
pangs had been going on for decades now,
and
I couldn't stay and watch any more.

We also had a thriving drugs trade.
Bill
Hodges had taken a tip-off that a shipment
from
Denmark was coming up-Tyne on freighter boats
that
night. The intel was good, he had told us as we
buckled
up our body armour in the locker room.

Rock solid. There would definitely be action for
those
who cared to tackle it tonight, enforcement
against
the traffickers, both parties armed. In for
the
opposition, Goran Maric, a smack and cocaine
baron
of the highest standing all along my native
riverbanks
. Jack and I had been fighting to put the
bastard
down for years. And if we got him, we
opened
a trail to someone far more prestigious
even
than this local hero - Val Foster, a near
-
legendary
figure who ran Maric and dozens of
kingpins
like him right across the country.

I spared a glance from the shimmering water.

Jack was sitting by me in the van, making a last
check
of his pistol and ammo. His face was serene.

If there was a trace of self-satisfaction in the curve
of
his lips, I supposed he had a right to it. He'd
scored
twice tonight, hadn't he? Pinned me to the
desk
, stopped me from tearing off after Phil. I'd
soon
forgiven him for hanging up on poor Chrissy.

As soon as Bill Hodges had told us the stakes, my
blood
had been up, my fingers itching for
the
Glock 26 I'd made such good friends with on the
firing
range. I'd taken a 17 into raids a few times,
but
the 26 was the Met police special, so Jack
and
I had been working solidly with that.

I noticed that the shoulder strap of his
ballistic
vest hadn't quite engaged with its Velcro
pad
. I reached to fix it, and he gave me a quick,
sweet
smile. I'd been right to come with him. This
was
where I belonged. I had a prickle of transition
in
my bones, the sense of a shift in the weather.

Tonight was a night when everything could change.

Bill Hodges made a swift, silent gesture, and
the
fifteen officers in the van came to attention.

Two medium-sized freighters had just rounded the
bend
in the river. I watched, not without some
respect
for Goran Maric's cheek. This was a busy
quayside
, though quiet at this hour. Delivering his
goods
along with two shiploads of Danish flatpack
furnishings
was akin to hiding in plain sight, and
very
bold. The freighters slowed and began to
make
for the vacant berths below our position. It
was
time.

At Jack's side, I slipped out of the van and
down
the grassy slope from the road. My senses
were
keenly alive. I was at once tautly focussed
and
aware of all the scents, sounds and visions of
the
night
--
seagulls mewing, their cries bouncing
off
the metal warehouse roofs all around, their
wings
catching dull, eerie orange light from below.

I could smell the water, so much cleaner now than
when
I'd been growing up, but still rich with mud
and
decay. Jack reached the dockyard ahead of me
and
flattened himself against a wall, waving at me
to
do the same. I obeyed him, puzzled. We each
had
our assigned positions and a set time to get
there
before the boats landed. We were dark for
communications
unless plans changed, and
my
Airwave unit had remained silent. "What is it?"

"Thought I saw someone."

"Boss had the yard cleared, didn't he?"

"Yeah. But still
--
"

I grabbed his wrist. He was right. The line of
the
rooftop nearest us was broken by a crouched
human
shape. Not one of our lads, unless he'd
flown
there. "Shit," I whispered. "Jack, this might
be
a bust. Let Bill know."

I had one chance. If my unit was walking into
a
trap, I could take down this one gunman
--
I could
see
his weapon now, a nasty-looking sniper rifle
--
while
Jack warned the rest of our task force to
hang
back. The sniper hadn't seen me yet. The night
was
warm. I only had to unhitch my Glock from
beneath
my light uniform jacket, and the weight of
it
came easy to my hand. A cold fire sprang up
beneath
my heart. Yes, Phil did it to himself
--
every
hopeless crackhead in the city did
--
but men
like
this one on the roof gave them the wherewithal
to
keep on doing it. London was the place where I
would
hack off the monster's head, but it would be
my
pleasure to slice away one of its coiling
tentacles
right here. Silently I prowled along the
warehouse
wall, and I took aim.

Someone punched me in the back. No
--
not a
punch
, but I couldn't connect the crack I had heard
with
the impact on my spine. I wheeled around,
or
I tried. My legs went out from under me and I
sprawled
face-down onto the concrete.

I couldn't have been shot. Being shot would
hurt
, and nothing did. Some other explanation, then,
for
the sound and the blow and my fall. I'd find out
when
I pushed up and sprang to my feet. I bunched
my
muscles ready for the action.

Nothing. Like putting a car into gear without
switching
on the engine. I tried again, and now
pain
did hit, a golden chrysanthemum flash.

Writhing away from it flipped me onto my back. I
could
see seagulls, orange clouds, stars. I choked
down
a howl. Mustn't embarrass Jack. Jack would
be
somewhere nearby, hunting down my hunter,
making
everything right. What had he said to me?

Hold on, Vinnie. I'll get you there
.

I waited. Breath heaved into my lungs,
exploded
back out of them with a coppery tang that
filled
my nostrils and my throat. I didn't want to
make
all this noise but something had cut the wires
between
my intentions and their results. I was
lonely
. The force of that surprised me. But Jack
would
come.
Hold on, Vinnie
.

A shadow fell across me. I stared up at the
stark
silhouette of a man and a rifle. It wasn't
Jack
--
not any of my colleagues, because although we'd
agitated
for these new armour-piercing HK MP-7s,
we
hadn't got them, apart from the training-gallery
samples
. Not within budget for a northern squad,
so
I was meeting this one from the wrong end. I
almost
laughed. Talk about living and dying by the
sword
...

A tiny movement behind the gunman's
shoulder
caught my attention. Jack was there,
thank
God. I tried not to look, not to blow his game. I'd
be
all right now, even if I had been hit, or at
least
I'd die in friendly arms. Jack would get to me.

He'd find a way.

He turned. He was staring straight at me, then
he
wasn't - his head was up, like a fox scenting the
air
. I hung on. I squeezed my eyes shut so I
wouldn
't betray him. Only another second or so
now
.

Footsteps scraped, and my eyes flew open
against
my will. There was only empty air behind
the
gunman now, a drift of orange rain. No - in the
very
far distance, dissolving into blood and tears,
a
running figure, dodging round a corner, vanishing
into
the night. I didn't understand. Then I did, and I
wished
I'd been killed outright first. Now a cry did
rise
up in me. I let it go
--
that and the one riding
hard
on its tail, and then the mortifying inrush of a
sob
. Jack was gone.

The pool of wet heat under me began to
spread
, and I started to care less about things. The
gunman
stood over me. He looked thoughtful, as if
wondering
where to put his kill shot.
Head's best
,
I wanted to tell him.
Heart's a block of ice now
anyway
. I was young to die, but I couldn't feel it as
a
tragedy. Twenty nine was hardly a kid, and I'd
done
a lot, answered a lot of my ambitions.

Probably packed more in than most people twice
my
age...

What else had Jack said to me? It had made
an
impression, a deeper one even than the sight of
his
fleeing back. It was my last thought and I
plunged
after it as it fluttered away from me into
the
vortexing dark.
He'll make you miss your life.

Jack had meant Phil, but now I knew that was
wrong
. I'd missed the point somehow. It was me,
my
fault. Somehow I'd missed my own life.