She closed her eyes and inhaled. By now, Clive had moved to the other end of the car wash and left her standing with Annie. The place smelled like stagnant water and industrial strength cleaners.
Get a grip, she told herself. These are the guys you were planning to kill on your own. You can do this.
She’d never been more thankful for having been dragged anywhere against her will. What would have happened if they’d accepted her trade and left her at the scrapyard alone with a gun? She shuddered to think of it.
“Hello,” said a voice. She recognised it and it froze her to the spot with fear. “We can see you.”
She tapped Annie’s arm and nodded furiously when the woman turned to her. She didn’t trust herself to speak. It’s them. That’s them.
Annie looked over her head and something passed between her and Clive.
“Come on, now,” the man who’d paraded in front of Max said in a horrible sing-song voice that set her teeth on edge. “Come out before I have to go in there. It won’t be pretty. I just want to talk.”
Si held her breath.
Four doors. Four men.
Five of them, but only three guns. The confined space began to feel less like a stroke of genius and more like a prison cell. They had tried to convince her to stay in the car with Olivia but she couldn’t; not when there was so much at stake. She needed to be the one…
There was a loud bang from close by that made her jump in fright even though she’d been prepared for it.
“Now,” Clive hissed urgently.
He and Annie disappeared out into the forecourt leaving her alone. She wanted to peer around the corner and see what was happening, but a second gunshot made her flatten herself against the car and squeeze her eyes closed.
There was a third blast that sounded different to the others, immediately followed by a fourth. Si clamped her hands over her ears. By the time the fifth shot rang out, she was shaking uncontrollably.
No.
Something drove her out of there. It was the thought of Max. Hiding in the car wash wasn’t going to help him.
She forced one foot in front of the other and marched out of there unsteadily, as if she might fall over at any moment.
She felt woozy at the thought of what she might find. No-one was talking. There was a low moan but it was so indistinct she couldn’t say for sure whether it was male or female.
She came out of the carwash, bumping against the front of the car which she’d parked so it deliberately stuck out a foot or two.
Relief welled up inside her as she saw Annie and Clive cautiously approaching four figures on the ground. Si started to run towards them, but stopped. There was a fifth figure on the ground behind the Jaguar.
“Terry,” she croaked, stumbling forward. “He’s been hit. Oh God!”
She forgot about her immediate mission; the thing that had been driving her for the past several days. She had to get to him. He’d been the one to hold his hand up for the worst job of all. They’d all been at risk, but Terry especially. If those men had suspected that the carwash was a trap and drove around the back of the building instead, Terry would have found himself cornered with no-one to back him up.
Her heart flipped as she reached him and fell to her knees in front of him. Not that this way was a better deal.
A thick halo of almost-black blood had oozed around him. His eyes flickered, but weakly.
“Terry?”
He didn’t seem to have heard her.
“Oh my God,” Annie gasped when she reached them. “Terry!”
He didn’t respond. He was clutching his chest.
Si scrambled to her feet and ran blindly back to the car wash, where the door of the Renault was still closed.
“Olivia!” she cried. “Olivia, we need you!”
The woman looked at her with glassy eyes. Clive had given her more pills when they realised the Jaguar was chasing them.
“Come on,” Si said, tugging on her arm. “Please. Terry’s been shot.”
Olivia didn’t respond. Si gave up. There wasn’t time. She ran back to where the four men lay. Clive had taken their weapons and was waddling over to where Annie knelt, desperately trying to stem the blood.
Si faltered.
There was nothing she could do. There was two of them. Clive was a policeman—he must have known some first aid.
She stared down at the familiar faces lying on the ground. She felt nothing. She looked up. She didn’t want to bother Clive—he had more important things to do. Now she wished she’d thought to ask him for one of the guns.
Her heart sank. What if they were all dead? Red rage descended over her at the thought of them getting away easily.
She clenched her fists and hunkered down beside the older man. He’d been shot in the throat. Now she was closer, she could hear a faint gurgling sound that meant he was breathing.
It had been the plan all along. Clive had explained it patiently—they had to shoot to kill. It was the safest option. It was too risky to try and aim for an arm or a leg with all that adrenaline flooding their bodies. They’d likely miss and they might not have an opportunity to fire again.
She looked down at him feeling no pity, just loathing. It was his own fault he was in this situation.
He didn’t seem to have noticed her presence.
Bile rose up in her stomach. She unclenched her fist and slapped him across the face. He moved like a rag doll, putting up no resistance whatsoever.
“Where is he?” she shouted. “What did you do with him?”
The gurgling sound intensified. She wasn’t sure, but it looked like he was smiling and she was sure he hadn’t been before. His fingers jerked towards her and she shifted away before he could reach her.
Was he trying to say something? It was impossible to tell. The sound of blood sucking in and out of the wound in his neck made her feel sick. She moved to the next man.
He was silent. She felt for a pulse and couldn’t find one. She paused at the sight of the heavy gold bracelet at his wrist—it was engraved in fancy script. Could she use it to track him down? She dismissed that thought immediately. Too slow now there was no way of searching online. And she didn’t want to know his name. To her, these people were no better than animals after the way they’d treated Max.
Shaking her head, Si made herself get up and move to the other two. They were a short distance away from the others. She ignored the third and moved straight to the forth, who was lying on his front. Judging by the trails of blood at his feet, he had attempted to drag himself back to the car.
She kicked his shoulder and rolled him on to his front. His t-shirt was covered in blood, which was coming from a wound in his chest. But he was alive. He looked up at her.
“It’s you,” he gasped. “Oh god, it’s you.”
“What? What does that mean?” He couldn’t have seen her at the garage. She’d been careful to hide and they wouldn’t have just driven off without her.
“Just put me out of my misery, yeah?”
She hunkered down in front of him. “Where’s Max?”
His pained gasps paused and he frowned. “Max?”
“Don’t pretend you don’t know. I saw you take him.”
“I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head before wincing and becoming still again. “I don’t know anyone called Max.”
She closed her eyes. She had come so close—she wasn’t going to fail now. Covering her hand with the thick sleeve of her jacket, she jammed two fingers into the open wound on his chest.
He screamed and tried to wriggle away from her, but he was too weakened by his injury.