[Alicia Friend 01.0] His First His Second Page 25

  Stacy’s voice inside him, don’t do this, don’t do it.

  He said, “Maybe letting you live is more cruel.”

  “I already lost my wife. Not my daughter too.”

  Alfie sat against the side of the van, his back cold on the metal. According to the morning papers, Richard Hague was a widower, lost his wife to cancer, not a psychopath. And as Richard lay there, pleading for the phone, Alfie smiled.

  The empty feeling inside him was now filled. He was satisfied. Now he knew what he’d do, what his plan was.

  “I think I’m going to take a walk when McCall gets back. Then, Richard, I’m going to turn on the radio. And when your little girl’s body finally shows up, I’m going to let you make that call, and you can live with the grief I’ve had to live with, for the last twenty years.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Katie’s plan was not complicated. She told it to the girl and she agreed via a series of grunts and head-nods.

  The man entered, pressed the buttons to lock the door, and came down the stairs. And as he had before, a day (or was it two or three days?) ago, he turned on all the lights, revealing the entire room, and revealed himself in full military camouflage dress, including a black beret sideways on his head, and a firearm holstered at his hip. The room was ten metres long and five wide, the floor tiled in white, the walls also tiled but only to shoulder height. It was plumbed and had drainage, and the bath in which Katie cleaned herself sat in one corner, awaiting the next victor. An old-fashioned thing, no taps plumbed in. Shadows would not stay still. They merged with other shadows, then disappeared completely, fading in and out of existence with each movement.

  The man placed a metal toolbox in the centre of the room and walked around the girls, hands clasped behind him, appraising them as if they were privates on parade. He nodded approvingly. Then he strode to the corner opposite Katie, behind the other girl, and brought the chain forward. He secured the girl as he had Katie, a manacle about one ankle, and then freed her from the chair. This chain was longer than Katie’s at the moment, enabling her to reach Katie if so desired. He then wound out the slack from Katie’s too. Both now had the run of the room. But both understood they must remain seated until otherwise instructed.

  “You may stand,” the man said.

  They did so.

  “You may remove your gag, Siobhan,” he said to the other girl.

  And when she did, Katie recognised her fully. It wasn’t only the hair and the face. She was sodding famous! This maniac had stolen a pop star. If he’d managed that, to take someone who would constantly be surrounded by minders and her “people” what hope did Katie have? Or the one he referred to first as Rachel? Were there more?

  “Now.” He held his arms out like Christ on a cross, brought them together respectfully, as if opening a ceremony. “Rachel, you are my First, so you will be given the weapon.” From the tool box he brought out a mallet with a rubber-covered head, meaning it was light but would do some damage. “I’m sorry, Siobhan, but this is how it works. My First has the advantage. My Second must rise to the challenge, like Rachel did last time.”

  Katie had not told Siobhan everything that happened, thinking it may worry her to know her new fellow captive killed the previous fellow captive. She felt ashamed now, dirty. This man’s pride was not something she wanted bestowed upon her. She gripped the mallet in both hands. He stood within striking distance.

  “I felt the crowbar was a little … base for something like this. And a rubber mallet may actually prolong the contest.” He unhooked the clip securing his gun holster. “You two are truly beautiful. But you must join me, join me in every sense. Only one of you may live. If you do not obey, I shall choose who dies.”

  Siobhan was trembling. She should have done something by now. Katie urged her with her eyes each time the man glanced away.

  Go on, do it.

  Siobhan shook her head.

  Go on. Now.

  No. I can’t.

  The man gripped the gun in one hand and removed it from the holster. It was an automatic, with a large barrel. He pointed it in the air. “If either of you refuses to fight, the other will kill you. If you both refuse to fight, I will kill you.” He pointed it at Siobhan. “Is that understood?”

  Clever, thought Katie. If Siobhan doesn’t fight, she dies anyway. If I don’t fight, that’s okay, because Siobhan dies.

  It meant that Siobhan—the one without the weapon—had to fight. And if Katie already killed one person, then she wouldn’t mind killing another. This is what made Katie realise that yes, there had been others. If there had not, the Rachel girl would not have attacked her with such enthusiasm, and without hesitation. But just because Siobhan was now in a position where she had to fight, it didn’t mean she had to fight Katie.

  Siobhan began to cry.

  “Stop that,” the man ordered. “Stop that at once. You are to be warriors. Not crybabies. Stop it!”

  Siobhan sank to her knees and sobbed hard into her hands. The man pointed the gun at her head.

  “Get up and fight. Now.” He cocked the weapon.

  “It’s okay,” Katie said, the chain clanking behind her as she stepped forward. “I’ll finish her where she is.”

  The man smiled and stepped aside slightly. Within striking distance again. But could Katie be fast enough? Would she make it?

  Siobhan didn’t move. She cried harder, while Katie stood over her with the mallet in her hands. How much easier it would be to land one solid blow on the top of her head, right in the soft spot, where the plates of the skull converge. It’d be painless. And less of a risk.

  “Ready?” Katie said.

  The man hung his head like a contrite child caught stealing the last chocolate from his mum’s box. “I’m sorry, Rachel. I shall try to bring you more of a challenge next time.”

  Siobhan looked up through her fingers. Katie winked. Then she swung the hammer down towards Siobhan, narrowly missing her—so close that strands of her hair wafted by—and in a reverse arc, followed through and into the man’s groin.

  He yelled out. He was wearing a box, like cricketers, but the force of the mallet was sufficient to flare pain right through him. Katie then thumped the mallet down on his head. With a wet crack, he dropped to the floor. He was breathing, but not moving.

  Siobhan darted forward, grabbed the gun from the man’s hand, and backed off, holding it in both of hers, the weapon now huge rather than the toy-like object their captor brandished, so huge, and clearly so heavy. She clasped it around the handgrip, her fingers away from the trigger, pointed at the man on the floor.

  “What now?” Her voice cracked, trembling; eyes darting back and forth.

  “Back away,” Katie said.

  They retreated in opposite directions, well out of reach should he regain consciousness. Katie dragged the toolbox to her chair and opened it. She didn’t want to search the man for keys.

  She found the crowbar and jammed the end into the manacle around her ankle where the two ends met. She pushed. Metal creaked.

  “Keep watching him,” Katie said, weak but angry, determined not to die in this hole. “If he moves, make sure you shoot him.”

  “I will,” Siobhan said.

  Katie was not convinced. They had to get free and go, run, before he could stop them. Who knew what other weapons he carried? Who knew where the girls were even being held?

  She pushed harder, the metal bending rather than snapping.

  “Break, damn it.” She breathed hard, sweating now. “Come on.”

  They could be in forest, or in a city, a sewer, perhaps under a lake. She remembered water. Why was she remembering water? What the hell did water have to do with anything?

  A rasping sound emanated from somewhere, and the harder Katie levered the jimmy, the louder the rasping came. It was like sand in a tray, moving side to side.

  There!

  The hinge snapped open and the manacle dropped off. She was free. She was going to ma
ke it.

  “Are you okay?” Siobhan asked.

  “Fine,” Katie said.

  But she didn’t say it. She tried to say it. The word was stuck in her throat, lodged like a marble. She tried again, but could not inhale. The rasping sound, the sand in the tray, it was her. Inside her, in her lungs. She couldn’t breathe.

  “My inhaler.”

  Yet again, the words would not come. She searched for the inhaler, that life-giving tube of plastic. She scrabbled about on the floor. There was nowhere for it to hide, the floor clear, no drawers, no hidey holes, nothing.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” Siobhan screamed.

  Katie, on the floor still, had no reply. She pointed at her throat, swelling, closing, in need of that last shot, something to save her. No! She’d survived this monster, only to succumb to a death so damn infantile, the one she’d been cursed with from birth.

  That bastard, lying there.

  She wanted the defeated form to be the last thing she saw. The man she’d clobbered with the same hammer he wanted her to kill with. He breathed, but blood had gathered around his temple. He was going to die, and Katie thanked God that she’d beaten him. It wasn’t him that took her, and it wasn’t some poor girl like Siobhan. The asthma killed her. She could live with that.

  The man’s eyes snapped open.

  Katie would have screamed were she able. Siobhan was behind him so didn’t know he was awake. She held the gun loosely in both hands, trigger finger not employed, panic oozing from her in waves, asking over and over, “What’s wrong, what’s wrong?”

  He moved his arm. Siobhan screamed, scurrying backwards, gun extended. He did not stand. Siobhan cried for him to stop, to let her go. His arm swung out along the floor. In his hand was Katie’s inhaler. Siobhan saw it, understood. The man grinned, head lolling to one side. Katie tried to reach out, but she was too weak. Her lungs filled with lead. Her fingers found the floor and she tried to drag herself along. To no avail. Her life lay three feet away, in the hands of a madman.

  Now no air was getting in, not one fine channel. The room dimmed. Her fingers could no longer walk. She accepted it. Graciously too, she thought, under the circumstances.

  The loudest bang Katie had ever heard rang out. It filled the room, hit her like a physical force, like someone jabbing a pencil in her ear.

  Siobhan stood over her. No chain on her foot. Just a scorch mark on her leg and the impression of where she had been bound to the chair. She knelt beside Katie and lifted her up in a sitting position. They were so close to the man who’d held them, threatened them, and Siobhan would not go closer.

  “Come on,” she said. “We can make it.”

  A cough from the man. He’d left the inhaler midway between them and retracted his arm. He still looked stunned, weak, but it could’ve been a ruse.

  Katie didn’t care.

  “Should I?” Siobhan said.

  Katie couldn’t even blink. Everything was unclear, moving funny, pressure now off her lungs but increasing behind her eyes, in her head. This was her brain dying, starved of oxygen. In less than a minute she’d be a vegetable. In more than a minute, she’d be dead. But at least Siobhan would make it—

  She breathed.

  The inhaler sprayed her throat and almost immediately a fine channel of air broke through, like a jet of cold water on a burn. Another squirt and she lifted her arm and held the tube. She pointed to go back, watch their captor, but he was still on the floor. Conscious, watching.

  Grinning.

  Siobhan pointed the gun. “Should I kill him?”

  Katie still couldn’t speak. She shook her head. No. Not like this. Not in cold blood.

  She needed one more dose. She was always told only take two doses at once. If it doesn’t clear up with two, you should call an ambulance. Three can harm you. But she didn’t even know if there was going to be a phone. This guy was a military nut, so maybe he lived alone in the hills with no communication.

  Her lungs were free again, but still not right. Still a gravelly noise in her throat. She needed the extra hit. She placed it in her mouth, depressed the trigger.

  Nothing.

  “Empty,” she croaked. She threw it to the ground and shakily got to her feet. “Let’s go.”

  With Siobhan’s help she walked. Siobhan still held the gun, and the man on the floor continued to watch them. Katie used the wall for support as they climbed the stone steps, her legs shaking with each movement, so tired, yearning for sleep. Siobhan pushed the door. It was stuck fast. She tried pushing harder. The handle was solid; no moving parts.

  “No!” Siobhan cried. “No. Please, no!”

  Katie saw it first. The keypad. The combination on the wall beside the doorframe. Then Siobhan twigged too.

  “The first number is six.”

  They spun around to find the man standing in the spot where he fell, his beret on the ground at his feet. He held a hand to his head, clearly in pain. Siobhan raised the gun, although Katie was not confident of anything finding its target other than an exceptionally lucky shot.

  He said, “But that’s the only clue I’m giving you. It’s a four-digit access code. There’s only nine-hundred and ninety-nine other numbers you need to try.”

  He limped over to the hose, coiled along the same wall as the door. Siobhan followed him with the gun, hand shaking more than ever.

  “Should I kill him now?” she said.

  “You could.” He ran the hose a little, splashed it over his head, dousing the place Katie hit him. “But that combination resets itself after three wrong attempts, like an iPhone. You can’t try again for twenty-four hours. There’s no food down here, and the only water available is from here.”

  “Shoot him,” Katie murmured. “I’d rather die than stay.”

  Siobhan trembled, barely able to hold the gun straight.

  He continued, “Nobody knows about this place. I found it by accident once. Did it up a bit, made it special. I really did it for us, Rachel.”

  “I’m not Rachel,” Katie said. It was supposed to be loud, confident, but it came out like an extension of her breath.

  “Oh, but you are Rachel. In a way. Although no one could be as beautiful. Tanya was the closest I ever came to finding another Rachel, but you bested her, didn’t you? You were magnificent. Even now I’m not angry at this … rebellion. I’m just impressed. And incredibly proud. Again.”

  Siobhan looked angrily at Katie. She had every right to. Katie hoped Siobhan would shoot her right now, get it over with, so she could sleep. She slumped on the top step.

  “That’s right, Siobhan.” The man turned off the tap and stood directly below them, staring right down the barrel of his own gun. “Your friend there killed my First. She relieved her of the weapon and hit her head thirteen times off the floor—I counted. Took an ear in the process. According to the rules, she has to be my First now. You are the Second.”

  Katie, so drowsy, tested her breathing again. It worked, but if her lungs were a car you wouldn’t chance the motorway.

  She said, “Shoot him. Then us. Don’t let him win.”

  “The fight had technically begun,” the man said. “If you shoot Katie right now, you become my First, Siobhan. You become my Rachel.”

  Katie tried to think what she’d do given the option. Last time, she’d fought to stay alive, let the pain and anger drive her to the kill. This wasn’t the same. This choice was impossible.

  “You kill me, we all die. You kill her, you get to live. Come on, Siobhan. Make the choice. A true warrior kills without question, but always for a cause. This is my cause, and you all fight for it. Only a pure woman can replace Rachel. And if you do this right now, if you kill little Katie, sat helpless on those steps, I guarantee you only have to take one more life to prove your loyalty. One more, Siobhan, and then it’s all over. I’ll bring you a Second. You’ll be my First. And your weapon will be a sword.”

  Siobhan glanced side to side, Katie to kidnapper, the gun lo
ose in her hand. She cried, wailing, “Please, please let us go.”

  “A sword, Siobhan. You get to fight the next girl with a sword.”

  Katie wished she’d hurry up, becoming surreally impatient. “Him or me,” she managed to say. “Just do it. Kill one of us. Please.”

  Siobhan dropped the gun.

  It clattered to the tiles below. The man watched it fall, and when he looked back up, it wasn’t a look of victory or success. He gave a deep sigh, a slow shake of the head. He closed the gap between them in five long strides, collected the weapon, and slid it back in his holster. He gestured for Siobhan to move, and she skittered down the stairs, pressed hard against the wall, cringing the closer she got to him. She ran to the other side of the room, screwed herself into a ball, and squatted in the corner, sobbing.

  Then the man carried Katie down the steps, like a groom carrying his bride, and placed her gently in the dry bath.

  “It’s comfier than the floor,” he said. “And you need to rest.”

  He put everything away, back in the toolbox, and even tidied up the chains and the hose. He climbed the stairs and input the code, shielding the keypad with his body. The door hissed open and he walked through, pausing halfway out.

  “I’ll be back tonight,” he said. “And we shall do it properly this time.”

  The door closed. The lights went out. The only sounds were the tears of a pop princess, and the laboured breathing of Richard Hague’s daughter.

  Chapter Thirty

  She needed to talk to Roberta. From the Vauxhall, Alicia watched her friend, there, in the high school playground, her gorgeous dark skin gathering snowflakes. Schoolgirls played all around. They texted on mobiles, applied makeup, admired how they managed to adapt their uniforms to look so ridiculous whilst presumably staying within the school rules. They were roughly the age Alicia’s child would have been, just a little older.

  She didn’t feel right unburdening herself on Roberta. Especially while she was working.

  I should go.

  Her phone rang. She ignored it.