The Invisible Assassin (13 page)

‘I’m very grateful, Gareth,’ said Jake. ‘If you let me have the address, I’ll make my way there.’

Like hell I will, thought Jake. If you think I’m walking into the arms of someone who can strap me down and inject me, you have another thing coming!

‘Make your way there?’ repeated Gareth, his face a picture of incredulousness. ‘Good heavens, Jake, we wouldn’t dream of it! Say something happened to you on the way? You fell under a bus, or under a tube train, or something.’

It was him!
thought Jake. He arranged for me to be pushed under that train, and he’s telling me! Warning me! Threatening me!

‘No, no,’ continued Gareth jovially. ‘I’ve arranged a car to take you. Nothing but the best for our Jake!’ He looked past Jake and his smile broadened as he announced, ‘And here he is! Your driver!’

Jake turned, and his heart sank. A tall, tough-looking man stood there, dressed in a neat dark suit that barely contained his muscle-bound physique.

‘Adam,’ said Gareth, gesturing at Jake, ‘this is Jake Wells. You’re to take him to Harley Street. Dr Endicote’s expecting him.’

‘Right, sir,’ said Adam. To Jake he said, ‘The car’s ready in the car park.’

‘Right.’ Jake nodded. He picked up his case, then he turned to Gareth. ‘You’re taking a lot of care about me, Gareth,’ he said. ‘I’m sure I’m not really worth it.’

‘Nonsense!’ Gareth beamed.

Jake forced another smile and followed the bulky figure of Adam out of the office and along the corridor that led to the lift to the underground car park.

Once I get in that car I’m a dead man, thought Jake.

They turned a bend in the corridor, and then another, and suddenly the lift doors were in front of them.

Act now! Jake told himself, panic rising in him.

‘Hang on!’ he exclaimed.

Adam turned to him, puzzled.

‘I forgot something!’ said Jake apologetically. ‘It’s in my desk. I’ll be back in a second!’

Adam hesitated, then nodded. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘I’ll wait here for you.’

‘Good idea.’ Jake smiled. ‘I always get lost going to the car park.’

Jake turned and walked away. Once he was round the bend in the corridor and out of Adam’s sight, he broke into a frantic run. Get out of the building! his senses told him. Run!

He hurtled along the corridor, and past the open door of his office. Even if Gareth spotted him, Jake felt he was moving too fast for Gareth to do anything about it. What would Gareth be able to do, anyway? Shout ‘Stop that man!’ That was hardly Gareth’s style. It would rouse all manner of suspicions in the rest of the staff.

There were no shouts as Jake rushed past his office, nor as he ran at full speed down the stairs, barely keeping his balance. He hit the marble floor of the main reception area, and then ran out through the revolving doors into the street.

I have to phone Lauren and warn her! he thought. But not just yet. Wait till I’m far enough away that I can stop moving. He’d slowed down to a walk now, so he didn’t attract attention. He walked past the local sandwich bar, past the printer’s and stationer’s, and reached the roundabout at the end of Marsham Street. The pedestrian crossing that led over the main road, and was his route to the back streets and safety, was about a hundred metres away. He was just heading towards it, when a man stepped into his path.

‘Excuse me,’ said the man politely but unsmilingly. He didn’t move.

‘Pardon?’ asked Jake, startled.

Suddenly, he was aware of someone just behind him, and then he felt something hard push into the small of his back.

‘This is a gun. Don’t make me use it,’ murmured a voice.

Chapter 16

A gun!

Numbly, Jake looked at the man who’d stepped in front of him. He was small but wiry. Unsmiling face, cold eyes, hair cut so short his scalp was almost shaved. He had a thin scar that ran right down the left side of his face, from his eyebrow to the corner of his mouth. A knife or a sword, thought Jake. Or a bayonet. He was wearing a casual jacket over a black T-shirt; and jeans and trainers. He looked like one of the SAS soldiers Jake had seen in documentaries, small and incredibly fit, like human pit bull terriers.

‘We want the book,’ said the short man.

‘The one you took from Hadley Park,’ came the quiet voice from behind him.

The pressure in Jake’s back had eased, but Jake was still aware of the man standing very close behind him.

How did they know? Government black ops, thought Jake. They know everything. They must have caught me on camera, some secret CCTV system.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he said.

The short man obviously expected to get this answer. His face didn’t register annoyance. In fact, he didn’t seem to register emotion of any sort.

‘Shall I shoot him in the leg?’ asked the man behind him. ‘Just so he gets the message we mean business?’

‘The arm would be better,’ said the short man. ‘We need him to be able to walk.’

The way they spoke about shooting him was so casual, so matter-of-fact, it sent a wave of terror surging through Jake. They’re going to kill me, he thought. They’ll torture me to get what they want; and then they’ll kill me.

‘You can’t shoot me!’ he protested. ‘People will come running!’

The short man gave a weary sigh.

‘It’s fitted with a silencer, dummy,’ he said in exasperation. ‘We’ll just take you somewhere.’

‘We’ll have come to your rescue after you’ve injured your arm in the street,’ whispered the man behind him. ‘Two friends looking after another.’

‘Or you can save yourself a lot of pain and just hand over the book,’ said the short wiry man.

Jake thought quickly. ‘OK,’ he nodded, ‘it’s in my office.’ And he gestured along the street back towards the Department of Science building.

These men aren’t from Gareth, he thought. Unless Gareth was playing a double game and Adam’s job had been to frighten Jake into running out of the building and into the clutches of these two. But that didn’t make sense. Adam had Jake trapped inside the building. He had a car waiting to deliver Jake to Dr Endicote, where he would undoubtedly be questioned. The way they answer this will tell me whether the men are also working for Gareth. If they think I’m able to just walk back into that building, they’re not connected with Gareth. In which case, who are they working for?

The short wiry man hesitated.

He’s thinking about it, thought Jake. And if they do let me go back inside the building to get the book, I’ll find somewhere to hide and then get out another way. Providing Adam and Gareth aren’t waiting for me, of course.

‘OK,’ said the short man. ‘Phone your pal in the office and get him to bring it out.’

Jake stared back at him, dumb-struck.

‘What?’ he asked.

‘You heard,’ said the man. ‘Take out your phone and call him. Tell him to bring the book out.’

‘I don’t have a pal in the office,’ said Jake desperately.

‘Yes, you do,’ said the man. ‘His name’s Evans. Paul Evans.’

How do they know that? thought Jake. ‘I don’t know his number,’ he flailed.

The short man gave a snort of disbelief.

‘Oh, come on!’ he sneered.

‘I don’t!’ protested Jake. ‘I never call him on the phone! He sits next to me!’

‘He’s faking,’ said the man behind him. ‘Wasting our time. I’ll shoot him.’

‘No!’ blurted out Jake desperately. What could he do? He didn’t have the book. Parsons had the book. Or, he
had
had the book. He could have put it somewhere safe by now. He gulped. ‘I don’t have his extension number on my mobile,’ he said.

‘That’s no problem,’ said the short man. ‘Phone the main switchboard and give them his name. They’ll put you through.’

Jake hesitated, looking about him. He was trapped. Everything else was going on normally around him: people coming in and out of the sandwich bar; traffic passing by; people going about their daily business, and in the centre of it, Jake was trapped between two SAS black ops soldiers with a silenced gun aimed at him. These men would have no pity for him, no sympathy. They were here to do a job: get the book off him. And they’d get it, even if it meant tearing out his fingernails, breaking his arms and legs, electrocuting him and burning him. They wanted the book.

With trembling fingers, he pulled out his mobile. He looked at it, then gulped. ‘It’s low on charge.’

‘No problem,’ said the short man. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a mobile phone. ‘This one is fully charged.’ He handed it to Jake, his face set in a grim expression. ‘Dial,’ he said firmly.

Jake gulped. He tapped in the first digit, and then suddenly threw the mobile into the doorway of a nearby shop, and at the same time ran out into the road, hurling himself in front of a car.

The car slammed on its brakes, tyres squealing in protest, and there was the horrifying sound of metal crashing into metal as the car following behind ran into the back of it; then the car behind that running into the back of the second car.

Horns blared, and the door of the first car was thrust open. A middle-aged man got out, his face twisted in fury. He reached out and grabbed hold of Jake by his jacket with both hands and began to bang him against the bonnet of the car.

‘My no-claims bonus!’ he roared, and then began punching Jake.

‘Sorry! Sorry!’ burbled Jake, putting up his arms in front of him, doing his best to defend himself.

Other people had arrived on the scene now: passers-by, tourists, drivers from some of the other cars that had pulled up on the roundabout, and the figure of a policeman.

‘Stop that!’ ordered the policeman, and the angry man reluctantly stopped punching Jake.

Jake shot a glance towards the pavement. The short wiry man had disappeared. He guessed his accomplice had also gone, but only for the moment. He was sure they were somewhere near, watching, and they’d be back.

Chapter 17

Jake sat on the hard wooden chair in the interview room at the police station. He’d just given his statement to the uniformed police constable about what had happened: being threatened by the two men, and running into the road to escape them. It was obvious to Jake that the constable hadn’t wanted to come all the way back to the station and take his statement. The constable had hoped this would be just a simple matter, with Jake being cautioned (or possibly charged) for causing an accident at the scene. One crime committed, one crime solved. A box ticked. 100% crime-solving success rate.

Instead of which, Jake had insisted he’d been the victim of a potentially deadly assault, and equally firmly insisted on being taken to the nearest police station to give his statement.

From Jake’s point of view, it had been a strategy to ensure he was protected. The two men would keep away from him as long as he was in the company of the constable.

The constable read through Jake’s statement, then slid it across the table for Jake to sign. As Jake put his autograph at the bottom, the constable added gravely, ‘There may be charges against you in respect of the collisions, sir.’

Jake slid the statement back across the table.

‘These are the men responsible,’ he said, pointing to his statement.

‘You’ve only given us a description of one man,’ the constable pointed out.

‘Because I didn’t see the other one,’ said Jake. ‘He was the one holding a gun on me.’

‘Yes, sir,’ said the constable, not really bothering to hide the note of scepticism in his voice. He read aloud from Jake’s statement. ‘A short man. About five feet six inches tall. Almost shaven head. Wiry, but with a muscular build. Scar running down the left side of his face from his eye to the corner of his mouth. Dressed in a casual brown zip-up jacket over a black T-shirt. Also wore jeans and trainers.’ He looked at Jake.

‘Yes.’ Jake nodded. ‘That was him. The scar makes him very distinctive.’ Still playing for time, determined to remain in the safety of the police station for as long as he could, he added, ‘If you like, I could go through those book things. The ones with photographs of known criminals, see if I can spot him. I’ve seen them do that on TV.’

‘Yes, well, it’s not that easy, sir,’ said the constable. ‘Everything’s computerised these days.’

‘I can look at them on a computer,’ offered Jake.

The constable stopped short of uttering a heavy sigh. Instead, he said, ‘Thank you, sir. I shall contact the ID Department and see if that can be arranged, although it may take a day or two. We’ll contact you and make an appointment for you to come in.’

No, you won’t, thought Jake. As soon as I’ve gone, you’re just going to file this statement away and hope I forget about it.

The constable stood up.

‘Well, sir, if there’s nothing more . . .’

No, there isn’t, thought Jake ruefully. I have to go out there and hope the pair aren’t waiting for me.

‘Can I call a taxi from here?’ he asked.

‘I’m afraid our phones are only for official use,’ countered the constable.

‘No, I meant, can I call one and wait here for it to arrive?’