The Killing (14 page)

‘Where do
 
you
 
want to go, James?’ Hannah asked.

‘I
dunno
,’ James shrugged. ‘Whatever you guys do, I guess. I don’t know what goes on around here.’

‘Diddly squat’s what goes on here,’ Liza snorted. ‘Saturday night’s so rubbish. I can’t wait till I’m old enough to go out clubbing and stuff.’

‘And get off with some nice fit bloke,’ Georgia giggled.

‘Trust
 
you
,’ Hannah said, as all three girls broke into fits of giggles. ‘At least I’ve got James, he’s lovely.’

James slipped his arm around Hannah’s back, glad that she wasn’t holding a grudge from earlier.

‘Sounds like you’re all having fun,’ a deep voice said.

James turned to find that two of the thugs from the other estate had come up behind them. The taller one had a wispy teenage beard. Both had the broad shoulders and muscular arms of the kind of people who are better not messed with.

‘You know what? I’m parched,’ the bearded one rasped, rubbing his hand over his hairy throat to emphasise his point. ‘I couldn’t help noticing that you’ve got some cans on you and I thought you might like to share.’

‘Just a couple of tins,’ his mate added.

Max scowled at them. ‘Why don’t you buy your own, instead of
poncing
?’

The bearded kid looked at his mate and shook his head. ‘Was that very nice, calling us
ponces
?’

‘I’m wounded,’ his mate grinned, as he pointed at Max. ‘You know who this one is? His dad’s that fat blob who owns the King Of Russia.’

‘A whole pub full of booze and he won’t spare us a couple of tins. Come on, hand ’em across.’

Max backed up as the shorter thug lunged at his carrier bag.

‘Leave off,’ Max juddered. The fear in his voice was obvious.

‘Aren’t you a brave boy?’ the beard giggled.

Hannah tugged at James’ arm and whispered in his ear. ‘They’re massive. It’s not worth getting done over for a few cans of beer.’

After wrecking his life with the last punch he’d thrown, James felt inclined to swallow his pride. He reached into the bag and snapped two cans away from the plastic binding strip.

‘Take ’em,’ James said sourly. ‘On me.’

‘How about the whole
sixer
?’ The big dude grinned ungratefully. ‘I’ve worked up a thirst and I really didn’t like your chum calling me a
ponce
.’

‘Or maybe you’ll be wanting a slap,’ the shorter one added, as he stepped forward so that his chest almost touched James’ nose.

‘Give it up, James,’ Hannah said desperately, as she backed away.

But the sudden change in terms gave James a nasty feeling that the two lads now required more than beer. Max had offended them and James suspected the thugs wanted to humiliate them in front of the girls.

If he offered more beer they’d probably ask for something else, like his money. And once he gave that up, they’d probably still give him a slap for his trouble. James reckoned he was going to have to stand his ground sooner or later, and it might as well be sooner.

‘You know what?’ James said, trying to sound cool. ‘I tried the peace offering, but now you’re getting zip.’

The thug in James’ face stepped back to take a punch, but as soon as he kicked off, James grabbed his T-shirt with both hands, tugged him forward and
nutted
him. The thug stumbled backwards, then crumpled up in the grass clutching a bloody nose.

The one with the beard dived in and tried grabbing James around the waist. James intercepted the arm and wrung his adversary’s elbow into an excruciating lock.

James had no idea if the other two boys from the Grosvenor Estate were about to join in. He couldn’t risk a four against one situation, which meant he had to take at least one opponent out of the equation. He yanked the thug’s arm straight, then thrust a palm into the back of his elbow, tearing the tendons and splintering the bone.

James had practised the move hundreds of times, but the difference between deliberately missing in training and the crunch of real flesh and bone was sickening.

As the bearded teenager screamed in agony, James felt weird: a mixture of nausea and awe at the extraordinary power he’d attained through hundreds of hours of combat training. He’d shot and killed a man ten months earlier, but anyone could have done that. The sensation of effortlessly breaking a human limb with his bare hands actually felt more horrifying, even though the consequences were nothing like as serious.

The other two thugs were closing on James, with their girls egging them on. James didn’t want to fight them and decided that mega-confidence was the best strategy for keeping them at bay.

He pointed at the guy clutching his nose on the grass. ‘Anyone want some of that?’ James sneered. ‘Come near me and you’ll get it.’

All the other kids in the field were looking at James, struggling to see what was happening in the moonlight. James was massively relieved when the yobs stopped a few metres shy. One of the girls crouched over the dude with the busted arm.

‘You’d better call an ambulance,’ James said, with a hint of sympathy creeping into his defiant voice.

The mention of adult presence turned the mood of the twenty-strong crowd from tense to panicked.
 
What if the cops show up with the ambulance? What if the thugs go back to get their mates?
 
Every chain of thought hurtled to the same
conclusion:
Got to get out of here
.

As his audience began to scatter, James felt Hannah tugging at his arm.

‘Come on, James,’ she begged.

Max, James and the three girls set off, chasing the shadows of other kids jogging downhill towards the exit gates on the Palm Hill side of the reservoir. Hannah gave James a tissue to wipe his face, while Max had suddenly found his tongue and taken the chair of the James appreciation society.

‘Where’d you learn to do that, James? It was awesome, like … Like
 
The Terminator
 
or something. That crunch when his arm smashed sounded a bit … Oh,
 
man!
 
You know when you get a chicken out of the oven and rip off the leg?’

James didn’t like being reminded and he was frustrated at how slowly his new pals were moving. The mixture of CHERUB training and frequent punishment laps meant James was fit enough run five kilometres without getting seriously out of breath. His companions were gasping after a tenth of that distance.

‘Where’d you learn it, James?’ Max repeated, wide-eyed and grinning in awe.

‘One of my foster parents was a Karate instructor,’ he lied.

‘Can you show me some moves?’

‘It takes months,’ James said irritably, as he looked back over his shoulder to find that the girls had fallen even further behind.

The first siren didn’t worry anyone: they assumed it was an ambulance. But the symphony that broke out half a minute later wasn’t good. There should only be one ambulance, which meant the other four or five sirens belonged to police cars.

James spotted torchlight when a group of kids running a couple of hundred metres ahead of him reached the exit gate.

‘Cops,’ Liza said anxiously.

James felt a shot of fear. He considered hiding out in the trees, or doubling back and going over a wall, but he didn’t know the neighbourhood and reckoned they could bluff their way through.

‘Stop running,’ he said. ‘Act normal.’

Max looked anxiously at James. ‘We’d better dump the booze.’

James sighed as he lobbed the carrier bag containing twelve quid’s worth of vodka and lager into a bush.

He looked back at the girls. ‘Is there another place where kids hang out in here?’

Georgia nodded. ‘There’s a playground.’

‘That’s good,’ James said. ‘If the cops ask, we were in the playground.’

Hannah closed in on James. ‘Let me look at your face.’

James stopped walking for a second. Hannah licked a tissue and used it to wipe the last few traces of blood off his forehead. He felt edgy as they approached the cops, but the previous bunch of kids had been waved through after less than a minute of questioning.

‘Hello,’ a female officer said politely, stepping out in front of the kids and switching on her torch. ‘Do you mind if I ask a few questions?’

‘Has something happened?’ Hannah asked innocently, as they all stopped walking.

The second officer, an Asian man, stepped out and lit up his torch. Max recognised him immediately. ‘Hello, Sergeant Patel.’

‘Hey, Max,’ the officer said, nodding half-heartedly. ‘Keeping out of trouble I hope. Not broken any more windows?’

‘Nah,’ Max grinned guiltily.

‘Where have you kids been?’ the female officer asked.

Georgia and Liza spoke in unison. ‘Over the playground.’

‘Not up top, by the brook?’

The girls both shook their heads.

‘We’ve had reports that some lads from the Grosvenor Estate got ambushed and beaten up. One of
them’s
ended up with a broken arm. You could get yourselves in serious trouble by lying to me, so I’m going to give you another chance. Are you sure you weren’t really up by the brook?’

James was relieved when all the girls shook their heads. ‘No, miss.’

‘Like I say, there’s been a serious incident. So I’m going to have to ask all of you for your names and addresses and we might be in touch later.’

Hannah was at the end of the line and she faithfully read her name and address to the policewoman. James was next.

‘James Robert Holmes. Flat sixteen, block six, Palm Hill estate.’

The policewoman smiled. ‘And your postcode?’

James fumbled. ‘E, something?’

The policewoman clearly thought she’d caught James out. ‘Don’t you know your own postcode? How long have you lived here?’

‘We just moved in this morning.’

‘Did you indeed,’ the policewoman said suspiciously.

‘It’s true,’ Max said. ‘He’s four doors down from me. I can vouch for him.’

But she didn’t sound convinced. ‘What’s your home phone number?’

‘We’re not hooked up yet,’ James said.

‘Well what about your parents? Do they have mobiles so that I can ring up and speak to one of them?’

‘My parents are both dead,’ James explained. ‘My older brother looks after me, but he’ll be out.’

‘So you moved in today to live with your
 
brother
, who
just
happens
 
to be out,’ the policewoman said incredulously. ‘How old is this brother?’

‘He’s seventeen, technically I’m still in foster care, but I’m allowed to live with Dave …’

The policewoman clearly thought James’ story was bull. She moved her torch beam upwards and shone it in James’ face. It took a second for a look of revelation to blossom.

‘What’s that under your chin?’

‘Where?’ James asked.

James touched his chin with his index finger and felt the tip drag through something that could only be a drop of blood.

‘And how did that get there?’

James realised he was in trouble, but Hannah nailed down the coffin.

‘Miss, it’s not James’ fault,’ she yelled. ‘It wasn’t an ambush. They started on
 
us
.’

‘Yeah,’ Georgia added. ‘They were miles bigger than him.’

‘OK, one at a time,’ the policewoman shouted, hardly able to contain her grin. She looked over her shoulder at the other officer. ‘Michael, get James here in handcuffs and call another car, we’ll have to take all of this lot in for questioning.’

‘He’s a bit on the small side,’ Patel observed.

James was angry at getting himself caught. He should have remembered something as obvious as his postcode. And now he thought about it, Hannah had said hers thirty seconds earlier and it was probably identical.

‘Get over here,’ Patel said wearily, as he pulled a set of handcuffs off his belt. ‘And you’d better not start mouthing me. I’m not in the mood.’

James stepped forward and held out his wrists. Patel snapped on the cuffs and read James his rights in a monotone as they walked to a police car parked on the double yellow lines outside the gate.

‘You do not have to answer any questions, but anything you do say will be taken down and used in evidence …’

James had been arrested before and knew the words off by heart, but this particular reading had a surprise ending. As he ducked down to get in the back of the car, Patel grabbed James’ head and thumped it hard against the edge of the car roof.

James was seeing stars as he collapsed across the rear seat.

‘We’ll sort you out,’ Patel snarled, as he slammed the car door. ‘You’ve got no idea how sick I get of nicking dumb little brats like you.’

James woke up on a bare vinyl mattress and shuffled across to the cell toilet in his socked feet. While he peed, his fingers explored the small cut on the side of his head where Sergeant Patel had assaulted him.