Crowley glanced back and saw no one in pursuit, then picked up his pace as Rose streaked away from him. She really did have a hell of a turn of speed. He wondered if maybe she was right when she said he wouldn’t be able to outrun her. He’d taken it for rhetoric, but had to smile at the truth of her words.
The lane was mostly dark and they hammered through pools of wan light under small streetlights, then came out onto a much larger, well-lit street. Traffic was a little heavier, but no pedestrians traveled the footpath.
“Ease up,” Crowley called. “I’m pretty sure we’ve lost them.”
Rose slowed to a jog, but kept moving. Crowley respected that and ran along beside her.
“What now?” she asked.
“Well, those guys are clearly determined to get their hands on you.”
She looked over at him, fear stamped on her features. “Those were the same guys from the alley?”
He nodded, put a hand briefly on her shoulder as they jogged. “It was. I’m sorry.”
“So I ask again, what now?”
Crowley thought for a moment. “Well, you can’t risk going anywhere you would normally go. If they found your home they could potentially find anywhere else connected to you. For now, you’d better come back to my place. We’ll settle down and figure out what to do next.”
Rose nodded, then stepped up to the curb and waved at a black cab coming along the street, the light on its roof bright in the night. The cab pulled over and they climbed in, slumped gasping beside each other on the back seat. Crowley gave the driver his address in Deptford and the man gave them a brief salute over the back of his seat and pulled away.
Two burly men stood at the end of the alleyway behind Rose Black’s block of flats and turned left and right, looking up and down the intersecting road. One of the men swore elaborately, slammed his fist into a wooden fence beside him, then shook the hand in pain and frustration.
“I can’t believe they got away again!”
The other man shook his head, pocketed his small revolver. “Damn it, Jeffries, I told you we should have brought more men.”
Jeffries turned on him. “Well, Patterson’s knee is messed up from where that bitch kicked him earlier and there wasn’t time to call in anyone else.”
The two men stood indecisive for a moment, then Jeffries spat and stalked around the building, heading for their car parked half a block away out front. “Walter, we can’t tell Landvik she got away again.”
Walter followed, caught up in a few quick strides. “You’re right there. He was mad enough already, yeah?”
“Cold fury,” Jeffries agreed. “Really quiet and still, like, you know?”
Walter smirked. “Yeah. I know.”
“Who the hell is that guy who keeps saving her?” Jeffries asked through gritted teeth.
“I don’t know, but he’s really starting to make me angry. We need to find out.” Walter pulled a phone from his pocket, dialed a number. After a moment, he said, “Dean? It’s Walter Brown. I’m here with Rob. No, we didn’t get her. That bloody hero got in our way again and they legged it.”
He paused listening. Then, “Well, I’ll tell you exactly why I’m ringing you. I don’t care how much your knee hurts, we have to find out who Rose Black’s man friend is and we have to find out as much about him as we think we know about Rose.”
There was the sound of a raised voice at the other end. Jeffries reached out. “Give me that.” Brown handed it over and Jeffries slammed it to his ear. “You listen to me, Patterson. We need to get both these renegades in hand very quickly or a sore knee will be the least of your problems. Landvik will be wearing very personal parts of our anatomies as jewelry if we don’t deliver them soon. So get dressed. We’re picking you up in ten minutes.”
Chapter 8
Rose walked along the main street of Dulwich Village, enjoying the sunshine and bustle of daytime after the threats and violence of the night before. Low rise brown brick buildings, wide footpaths and welcoming shops lined either side of the road, the area far more suburban than the tall, cramped city of London, yet only a twenty minute cab ride from Crowley’s narrow Deptford townhouse.
Arriving at his place the night before, well after midnight, exhausted and nauseated from adrenaline, it had seemed like her life was irrevocably altered. And while that might still be the case, at least the light of day and pleasant tree-lined pavements did something to inject hope back into her thoughts.
Spending the night at Crowley’s had been weird. The man was the next thing to a complete stranger, but Rose liked him. Trusted him. He was every bit a decent guy and had actually saved her arse twice. Then opened up his home to her. His place was neat and ordered, something of military precision about the sparseness, but it was homely nonetheless. He had two rooms upstairs, one a decent-sized bedroom, the other a study with a fold-out sofa bed. He had insisted she take his queen-sized comfort and he opened up the sofa bed for himself. She was sure she wouldn’t be able to sleep, but once ensconced into the comfort of sheets and quilt, exhaustion had won out and she’d fallen into a deep, dreamless sleep.
Crowley woke her the next morning with tea and toast, offered her anything else she might want: coffee, eggs, cereal. He apologized for his lack of other breakfast choices. Rose smiled at the memory. He was a strange guy, hard and strong, but somehow vulnerable and nervous too. She had to admit it was almost certainly because he had taken a fancy to her, and she didn’t really mind that. She certainly appreciated that he hadn’t tried to act on it in any way, that he remained the perfect gentleman.
After eating and showering, she insisted that Crowley go to work, she would be fine. He tried to head her off, offer more help, but she pressed her case. Reluctantly he agreed, after ensuring she would contact him at the slightest hint of trouble. He offered to drop her off at the clinic, but she waved that off too and caught a cab after ringing the museum and calling in sick. She assured them it was only a virus or something and she should be back in a day or two. She desperately hoped that was true, though something made her think it really wasn’t. Regardless, for the time being, she needed to be back in control, at least for a little while. Grateful as she was for his help, Rose wanted to feel like her own hand steered her ship for now.
She paused in the dappled shade of a flowering cherry tree outside a clothing store, tipped her face up to the late summer sun filtering between the green leaves. The air was still redolent with traffic fumes and refuse, but not nearly so strongly as it was in the city. She could smell the trees and various aromas of baking and cooking too. Much as she enjoyed life in Fulham, she often yearned to move somewhere a little more suburban like this, south of the river. More than an hour on two or three trains to get to work and back was less appealing. Her parents regularly hassled her to move nearer to them in Bromley, even further south. That would only make her journey to work more like an hour and a half on trains.
She shook her head gently, looked around. All this suburban speculation was no doubt born of the stress from the night before. Moving out of the city was unlikely to move her away from whatever violent men were chasing her, however much she fantasized. She needed to find out just what was going on.
Another hundred yards’ walk led her to the front door of the Holm Institute Laser Therapy Clinic. It seemed like any other unassuming shopfront along the street, but was clinically bright and clean inside, modern and sharply decorated. A young blonde with a million watt smile sat behind a brushed aluminum reception desk.