Blind Alley (40 page)

‘Thanks,’ he muttered.

She gently touched his arm.

‘Really, I’m genuinely sorry, Jack.’

He knew he didn’t deserve her sympathy. If she had known that he’d left her standing for Claudia, she wouldn’t be feeling sorry for him. Not to mention the fact that he had spent the night with his ex-wife, instead of her.

In that moment Brady wondered if the outcome would have been any different if he had not responded to Claudia’s call. If he had ignored it instead. Where would he be right now? He was sure he wouldn’t be feeling as if the world had exploded around him and he was the only one left standing – with a box of memories.

‘Thanks, Amelia. But I don’t deserve it,’ Brady said.

With that he walked off and left her wondering what he meant.

Brady had gone voluntarily to North Shields police station to make a statement. He had no choice. Rather that than Bentley turning up at his door with an arrest warrant. But for what? Nothing. He had done nothing. But that was the problem. That was the bit that was killing him inside.

Claudia had come to him terrified and what had he done? He’d taken advantage of her. Then she’d left without a word, leaving him to wake up in a world that he did not know, or trust. A world that had no meaning without her in it.

Brady got Conrad to drive him home afterwards. Conrad had tried to insist on staying but Brady was adamant that he needed to be on his own. He had spent the last few hours pacing up and down like a sane person locked inside a mental sanatorium. But the worst part was he felt that this was his doing. That he had a part to play in all of this. He didn’t understand what or why. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was somehow involved.

He looked at his mobile phone, willing it to ring. He had it clutched firmly in his right hand. There was only one person in the world he trusted to help him find Claudia, to understand what was happening, but he couldn’t get hold of him.

Where the fuck are you when I need you, Nick? Where?

Then it hit him. The sickening reality. That he was deluding himself that Nick would hear the voicemail that Brady had left on his mobile – the only means of contact he had. Why had he left the message when he had a really bad feeling something had happened to Nick as well? That he had disappeared, just like Claudia?

Why? Nick, what the fuck’s happened to you? Was Claudia right? Have those Dabkunas bastards come back to the North-East? Had they ever really left?

If they had Claudia then what about Nick?
What about him? Oh shit . . . They would slowly torture him before . . .

Brady couldn’t bring himself to think about it.

Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!

He threw his phone on the ground. He couldn’t stand this any longer.

He walked over to the bay window and looked out. It was 8:33 p.m. and pitch black outside. But the time was all he noticed. He had been counting it down since he got back to the house.

Brady sighed heavily and crouched by the window. He cradled his head in his hands as he tried to think straight. He knew from Conrad that Claudia’s house in Jesmond had been ransacked. Conrad had made use of his contact at North Shields. The police had established that Claudia had gone back there after she had left Brady’s. The house had been turned upside down. Forensics had found blood, lots of blood, mostly in the bedroom. It was clear a struggle had taken place. Whether the murderers had turned up there looking for Claudia and had instead found Davidson, Brady had no idea. Had Davidson calmed down after his argument with Claudia and returned home to find himself overpowered by whoever it was that Brady was about to meet? They would have held Davidson and tortured him to find out where Claudia was. Brady assumed that would have taken place in the bedroom, accounting for all the blood. But Davidson would never have talked. Even if he’d wanted to, he would have had no idea where Claudia had gone. The last thing he’d have assumed was that she was with Brady. If he’d known that, they would have turned up on Brady’s doorstep. It would have made things a lot easier for them. They would have captured Brady and Claudia without the complication of murdering Davidson. Brady hated to imagine Claudia returning to the house with them waiting for her and Davidson beaten within an inch of his life.

Brady had managed to talk to Wolfe, the Home Office Pathologist, after he had made his statement. The autopsy on Davidson had unsurprisingly been prioritised. Wolfe had been able to confirm that Davidson was still alive when he had been locked in the boot of the car. That he was still alive even after the car had plummeted over the cliffs to the sea and rocks below. That he had died a painful and excruciating death, slowly drowning, trapped in a small, dark, enclosed space. Bound so tight he couldn’t move, let alone get free, watching as water slowly started to fill up around him. Worse still, he would have died knowing that whoever had done this to him had Claudia. That he had not been able to save her. That as he lay there, fighting against inevitable death, Claudia could be suffering a similar fate.

Brady fought the compulsion to get a bottle of whisky and blot it all out. Anything was better than this tortured, manic state. But he’d been there once before when Claudia first left him. Six months on the sick with a crippled leg, a lapful of divorce papers and a bottle of whisky permanently in his hand. Life had been a dark, miserable existence then, but at least he had been so drunk he didn’t remember most of it. It was tempting. So very tempting.

No! Don’t go there. Not again.
He sat there repeating the words over and over in his mind.

At 9:58 p.m. his mobile rang. Brady was still on the floor beneath the window. He pulled himself together and scrambled along the polished wooden floorboards for the phone. Grabbing it, he looked at the caller – unknown.

‘Brady,’ he answered, trying to sound calm. He was anything but.

‘Drive down to the end of Davy Bank towards the Tyne. You’re looking for an empty warehouse. You can’t miss it. Twelve thirty a.m.’

‘What do I bring?’

‘Yourself. Anyone else and she’s dead. Understand?’

‘Is she all right? Can I talk to her?’ Brady asked, trying to keep the desperation out of his voice.

‘Nick. You tell us where he is. Then we let her go.’

Before Brady could ask anything else the line went dead.

He sat there, not moving as he absorbed what had just been said. The caller’s accent wasn’t local, he was from the South. Brady automatically thought of Johnny Slaughter and then he remembered Weasel Face – Madley’s hired gun. He was from the East End of London.

Was it him? I don’t know . . . I don’t fucking know.

Brady tried to calm himself down. He had to focus. He was meeting them at 12:30 a.m. He knew the location; Davy Bank was in Wallsend. The road led down towards the Tyne River. It was filled with warehouses, workshops and factories. Most of them in disuse now. In other words the ideal place to do an illegal trade. Brady’s life for Claudia. Brady was only worth keeping alive until they got the information they wanted on Nick. He was under no illusion. They would put a bullet through his head as soon as he talked. Brady accepted that. He had no choice. But he would make sure that Claudia was released before he said a word.

Brady thought about calling Gates. But as soon as he did he discounted it. If he passed on this information to his superiors he knew the chances of being allowed anywhere near the kidnappers would be nil. They would hand the situation over to a hostage negotiator and an Armed Response Team. The outcome? Claudia would end up dead. The kidnappers would shoot her as soon as the police showed up instead of Brady. He had no other option than to follow her abductors’ instructions and not report it. Not that he saw it as a problem. He had been suspended from duty so at this precise moment he was a civilian.

Then he thought about calling Madley. He knew he could help him. Madley had the kind of back-up that Brady needed – ruthless. But something in him warned him against turning to his old childhood friend. Too much had happened in the course of the past few days. He didn’t trust Madley any more. He had no idea whose side Madley was on. Brady realised Madley was on Madley’s side, always had been. Thoughts of Jake Munroe and what he had done to Trina McGuire to extract information about Nick’s whereabouts was enough for Brady not to turn to Madley. After all, Munroe was on Madley’s pay, as was Weasel Face. Brady couldn’t discount the evidence. He had seen Weasel Face in Durham prison’s visiting room talking to Munroe. What more proof did he need? Would Madley really hire men to kill Davidson and kidnap Claudia so he could get Brady to trade his brother’s life for Claudia’s? Brady wasn’t sure any more. And that was what worried him.

Why kill Davidson? Why not? Maybe he was just a casualty. Maybe it was that simple.

Brady breathed in. He needed to clear his head. He had to think straight. The last thing he wanted to do was walk into a hostage situation and end up not only losing his own life, but also Claudia’s. Davidson’s life had already been wasted. Brady would be damned if Claudia became another casualty in this search for Nick.

Chapter Forty-Eight

Brady parked his car. It was Friday: 12:25 a.m.

He had made one call. He was not expecting to walk out of this situation alive. So he had called the only person left – Nick. Whether it was for himself that he left the message explaining exactly what was about to happen, he didn’t know. But he had said where he was going and what was about to follow – his life in exchange for Claudia’s. Maybe it was his way of mentally preparing himself for what was about to happen. Because if he was honest, he held out no hope of Nick hearing it. He hadn’t responded to the other messages that he’d left over the past few days, so why this one?

He switched the headlights off and cut the engine on his car. The place was desolate, the streetlights broken, adding to the feeling that he was in no-man’s land. He got out of the car. There was no point in waiting any longer. He looked around the deserted area. There was nobody around. But then, what was he expecting? No one in their right mind would be down here at this time of night. It was well and truly off the beaten track. The place was no longer used. The buildings scattered around him were empty. The factories and warehouses had been abandoned when the shipping industry had disappeared.

Brady headed for the warehouse right at the end of Davy Bank. He was sure he’d seen a torchlight stabbing around in the blackness.

He had resigned himself to his fate, so he had no fear. Not for his own life at least. The fear that he did have was for Claudia. He had no idea how this would turn out but he would do everything in his power to make sure she survived.

He approached the wasteland in front of the warehouse. He saw two cars parked up. Expensive black 4x4 Land Rovers. What else did he expect? He continued walking past them heading towards the door.

‘Brady?’ a voice said behind him.

The accent had a heavy Cockney twang.

‘Yeah?’ Brady answered, his voice steady, despite the cold pressure of the barrel of a handgun now pressed against the side of his head.

Brady wasn’t surprised. After all, they’d been expecting him.

‘Get down on the ground!’

But before Brady had a chance to follow the order he had his legs taken out from beneath him. He lay in as much surprise as pain, face-down in the dirt as his arms were forced back behind him and his hands quickly handcuffed. Before he even realised it something connected with his left calf.

FUCK!

His leg exploded with pain.

It took him a few moments before he realised he couldn’t move it without excruciating pain. It had to be broken. He raised his head off the ground to see who had attacked him. There were two men wearing black balaclavas and black military-style combat trousers and jackets. One held a gun, the other a crowbar. Both had attitude.

Before he had a chance to do anything one of the masked men bent down and yanked his head up by his hair.

‘Time to get up,’ he ordered.

His friend joined him. Between them they dragged Brady to his feet. They were about Brady’s height but heavy set and muscle-bound. He had no chance against them, with or without their weapons.

One moved ahead and opened the warehouse door while the other one kept his gun to Brady’s head as an encouragement to make him walk forward. Brady had no idea who they were but he knew that they meant business. These men were not your local hard nuts or criminals. They were trained militia.

A third militia type appeared out of nowhere carrying a semi-automatic rifle.

Brady had to remind himself that this was Wallsend, not some war-torn country ruled by despots.

‘He’s alone?’

‘Yeah.’

The man holding the semi-automatic looked around the bleak, dark landscape for confirmation before turning his eyes onto Brady.

All Brady could make out were the slits of his eyes through the black balaclava. It was enough to unnerve him. They were cold and detached. Brady was purely a business transaction. Nothing more. Nothing less. His life was what they were paid to take.

‘Move it!’

Brady did as instructed, despite the crippling pain as he dragged his left leg along. The cold metal at the side of his head was enough incentive to make him move.