Deadline (24 page)

Emma scratched away at the brickwork with the
nail. It was so worn down now that it stuck out
barely half an inch from between her thumb and
forefinger, the end blunt and splayed. Progress
was desperately slow. She was on her hands and
knees, the bed pushed out from the wall to give
her room, but her back still ached from where
she'd been bent over for what felt like hours, and
her fingers were almost numb with the pain and
stiffness. But she refused to stop because she
knew that her life might depend on success. Even
more so now, after what had happened earlier.

A couple of hours or so after she'd recorded the
message to her mum, telling her it was Saturday
and that she was coming home soon, there'd come
the familiar sound of the cellar door being
unlocked, and she'd wondered if it was the smelly
one coming down to collect the plate she'd used
for breakfast. She'd had to push the bed as
hurriedly and as quietly as possible back against
the wall, and slip on her hood.

But his footsteps hadn't come. There'd simply
been a cold, dead silence, and she'd known
without a shadow of a doubt that it was the cruel
one who'd come to visit, the one whose footsteps
she could never hear.

An icy sensation had crept slowly up her spine
as she sensed his presence in the room with her.
Watching. Could he have spotted what she'd been
doing to the wall? Had he heard her move the
bed? Was this the end? Right now?

'Die, bitch!'

The voice was mocking and close.

She'd felt a sudden rush of air, and his hand
had grabbed her shoulder in a tight, vicious grip.
She'd screamed, instinctively – a terrified wail –
and he'd laughed.

And that had been it. He released his grip, and
she thought she heard something click, like a tape
recorder. His parting words were delivered in a
quiet sing-song voice, just before the cellar door
shut again: 'Back later, bitch, back later.'

Ever since then she'd been working frantically,
stopping every so often to yank at the chain,
ignoring the frustration when still it seemed no
looser. The sheer terror she was feeling kept her
going, but it was also tiring her out. She wanted to
sleep desperately, to lie down and shut her eyes.
Forget this awful nightmare. But she refused to
stop, knew that if she did she'd probably never
start up again.

And then finally she got her break. For the first
time, the brickwork really started crumbling. Full
of hope, she scratched away even harder, and a
load more brick dust poured down so that two of
the screws holding the plate in place were almost
completely revealed. She grabbed the chain and
pulled furiously. Something gave, and one of the
screws came out completely. She kept at it, but she
simply didn't have the strength to tear it free.

But she was nearly there. A quick rest, and
she'd carry on.

She lay back on the bed, her eyes shutting
almost immediately. She was so tired, so weak.
She felt herself dozing, drifting away . . . tried to
come back, but never quite made it . . .

Bolt was sitting in heavy traffic on Tottenham
High Road, only a few hundred metres away from
where it had all gone so badly wrong. Darkness
had fallen, and the sound of the sirens was
becoming more sporadic. The helicopters still flew
overhead, but their constant circling felt pointless
and redundant. Not for the first time in his life he
was left on the outside, no longer wanted on an
investigation he'd helped to get started.

He didn't want to go home, not with Emma still
out there somewhere. The two mobile phone calls
the kidnappers had made to Andrea's landline
had come from round these streets, and he
doubted that the guy with the money had gone
far. Much easier to disappear into a nearby house,
away from the helicopters, the pursuing cops and
the prying eyes of the CCTV. It would take some
nerve to organize the ransom drop so near to
where they were holding Emma, but nerve had
never been in short supply with these people. He
was sure that suspect number one was Scott
Ridgers, and if necessary he'd drive round and
round hoping that at some point Ridgers emerged
from his hideout. It was the longest of long shots
but it had to be better than doing nothing.

The traffic was moving at a snail's pace, and the
worn-out buildings around him – cheap takeaways,
charity shops, a few boarded-up wrecks –
felt foreboding and claustrophobic. It was on
nights like this that he hated London with its
noise, its litter and its gridlock, and he felt an
almost physical yearning for space. He remembered
back to the day he'd bumped into Andrea
on the Strand, and how it had been the start of
their affair. What if he hadn't been there? What if
he'd been doing something different, and their
paths had never crossed that second time? How
much happier a man would he be now.

Which was when that old nagging thought
struck him. What if their meeting hadn't been
spontaneous? What if it had all been a set-up?
Perhaps Andrea's lover, Jimmy Galante, had
wanted inside information on the Flying Squad
and had encouraged her to take up with Bolt in
order to get it. He thought back, trying to
remember if she'd ever pumped him for information,
but nothing came to mind. But then, of
course, she might not have been doing it on behalf
of Galante. She might have taken up with Bolt of
her own accord, using him to bring Galante down,
either because she was genuinely desperate to
leave him and could think of no other way of
doing it, or . . . or what?

God knows. He sighed, wiping sweat from his
brow and turning the air con higher.

The sound of his mobile ringing jolted him from
his thoughts. He looked at the screen but didn't
recognize the number. He flicked it on to hands-free
and took the call.

'Mr Bolt?'

Bolt recognized the slightly officious tones of
Lisa Bouchera's father and tensed a little.

'Mr Bouchera, how can I help you?'

'He's called my daughter.'

Bolt felt a sudden flash of excitement. 'When?'

'Just now. I was outside in the garden but when
I came back inside she was crying. She told him
she didn't want to see him any more and he
started calling her all these filthy names.'

'I'm very sorry to hear that,' Bolt told him. 'We
can make sure he doesn't call her again. Have you
got access to your daughter's phone?'

'I can get it. Hold on.'

A few seconds later he was back on the line.
Bolt asked him to go into the Calls Received
screen.

'OK, let's have a look.' There was a pause. 'All
right, I'm in.'

His hands shaking, Bolt pulled out his notebook
and pen.

'Read me out the top number.'

The moment of truth.

Bouchera reeled off a mobile number and Bolt
wrote it down. By using a mobile to make the call
to his girlfriend, Scott Ridgers had effectively
given out his location, and, Bolt hoped, Emma's
location as well. The excitement he was feeling
was so powerful it actually made him nauseous
for a few seconds.

'And he was the last person who called her?'

'Yes. It was just now.'

Bolt looked at his watch. Five to eight. Just
under an hour since the money had disappeared.

'Thank you, sir,' he said, 'you've been a great
help.'

'And you. Let me know when you've got the
bastard in custody.'

'Course I will,' Bolt said, ending the call.

He took a deep breath, brutally aware that he
was suspended and that unless he played things
right this lead counted for nothing. He had to do
something, and fast. Mo or Tina – who did he call?
Who did he trust?

Mo was the colleague he'd always trusted the
most, but things had changed between them these
past twenty-four hours, possibly irreversibly.
Tina, meanwhile, was the person on the team with
the best access to the phone companies, and he
remembered the look she'd given him in the
meeting that morning. Was it empathy? Some
kind of understanding? He was stepping over a
line by contacting her, he knew that. Asking her to
put her own job in jeopardy as a favour to him.
And she was such an enigmatic person, so difficult
to read, that he had no idea whether she'd
help him or not.

There was only one way to find out. He dialled
her number, willing her to answer, concentrating
so much on this latest development that he didn't
even notice that the traffic ahead of him was moving
until he heard the horns blaring. As he touched
the accelerator and moved forward, her voice came
on the line. Clear and businesslike as always.

'Tina Boyd.'

'Tina, it's Mike.'

He heard her sharp intake of breath.

'I didn't expect to hear from you. There's no
more news. Matt's in surgery at the moment.'

His thoughts returned to Turner. Poor sod. If
only he'd stayed behind at Andrea's house.

'Listen, sir, we're snowed under here. I'm going
to have to go.'

'I need a favour.'

'But you're suspended.'

'I know that, but this is urgent, and it's to do
with the case. I've got a mobile number for Scott
Ridgers – that suspect I was talking to you about
earlier who turned out to be one of Andrea's
gardeners. He's just used it, literally minutes ago,
to make a call. If we can get a trace on that
number, it'll lead us straight to him.'

'How did you find this out?'

Bolt explained as briefly as he could.

'I can speak to Steve Evans, but I'm not sure
he'll be able, or willing, to authorize it.'

'No, don't speak to him. I can tell you now, he
won't authorize it. Just do it. Please.'

'I can't, sir. You're suspended. It could cost me
my job.' She sighed. 'I'm sorry.'

'She's my daughter, Tina.'

'What?'

'Emma Devern. She's my daughter. Check with
Mo if you don't believe me. It's why I've been so
highly strung since this all began.'

'God, I . . . I don't know what to say.'

'Don't say anything. Just help me, please. If we
don't act fast, Emma could die.'

'I can't believe you're putting me in this position,
Mike.'

'Do you think I want to? Look, there's no way
on God's earth I would ask you to do this unless I
absolutely had to.' He could hear the desperation
in his voice, hated it.

Tina was silent for two, maybe three seconds.

'OK, let me have the number.'

He reeled it off for her.

'I'll do what I can, but it might take some time.'

'This is my daughter. There is no time.'

'If you're lying to me,' she said evenly, 'I'll kill
you.'

Emma awoke with a start, sitting bolt upright. It
was dark in the room, and her mouth felt bone
dry. She wondered how long she'd been out.
Without a watch it was difficult to tell, but it was
a while. Half an hour, something like that. She
rubbed her eyes, swung her legs off the bed and
remembered that she'd been very close to getting
the chain free from the wall.

And then she heard a loud bang. It was the
sound of the front door shutting.

They were back.

She grabbed the chain with both hands, closed
her eyes and pulled as hard as she could. There
was a crack – something giving – and more dust
showered on to the stone floor. She could hear
footfalls on the floor above, but no voices.

Clenching her teeth, ignoring the nauseous
feeling flowing through her, she kept pulling,
leaning back so her whole body was behind it,
knowing this could well be her last chance.

Another crack.

Movement near the cellar door – a shuffling of
feet.

They're coming
.

She was out of time.

And then suddenly she was falling back off the
bed, landing painfully on the floor with the chain
uncoiling on top of her.

She'd done it. The metal plate had come free.

Bolt was driving aimlessly down yet another
grimy terraced back street when the call came.
The clock on his dashboard said 8.07. Only
nine minutes since he'd got off the phone to
Tina.

So much of a person's life seemed to him to boil
down to those single, long, terrifying moments
of anticipation when you're given the hugely
important news you've been waiting for: the
results of medical tests; exam results; a jury's
verdict; the location of the man who's holding
your daughter.

'Tina,' he said, his voice hoarse, 'what have you
got?'

'The phone's still on. The location's been triangulated
to an area around a farm called
Woodlands in Crews Hill.'

'Where the hell's that?'

'Just north of Enfield, south of the M25.'

She gave him the address and he fed it into the
car's sat-nav system. The distance was just over
six miles from where he was now. He swung the
car round in a rapid three-point turn so that he
was heading back towards the main road.

'Thanks, Tina.'

'What are you going to do?'

'I'm going to go and check it out. If it looks like
it's a lead, I'll call in straight away.'

'This could put me in huge amounts of trouble,
Mike. They're going to know the info's come
from me, and you know as well as I do that
it's totally illegal to get an unauthorized triangulation.'

'If it comes to nothing, there's no way it'll ever
get back to you. You've got my word on that. And
if it does lead somewhere, I'll come up with a
reason why I found out about Ridgers' location
without mentioning your name. I really appreciate
this, Tina.'

'I talked to Mo. Christ, I can't believe she could
be your daughter.'

There was a silence then, because Bolt didn't
really know what to say. Tina ended it by wishing
him good luck.

'Call us as soon as you've checked it out,' she
added.

'Sure.'

He cut the connection, and accelerated on to the
main road, ignoring the blast of the horn from the
driver he'd just cut up. All that mattered to him
was getting to Scott Ridgers.

Six miles and counting.