He acknowledged this wasn’t his field of expertise but something told him the amount and the placing would be more than enough to bring the whole of the stands crashing down around or on top of him. He took an almost involuntary pace backwards and slapped Dempsey’s hand down when he would have started dialling his own cellphone.
“Don’t be an idiot! Get to a safe distance before you use one of those things. Tell Cheever to evacuate the whole place and call the bomb squad. Now!”
Dempsey didn’t argue.
As he dashed out he almost collided with Lytton who was leaning in the doorway and holding onto the framework in order to stay upright.
“Inspector—”
“And you Mr Lytton. Get the hell out of here.”
He’d half-turned away so it was only out of the corner of his eye that he caught the display of the cellphone detonator as it lit up like the proverbial Oxford Street Christmas lights.
“Holy shit,” he said again.
150
Kelly had never actually been inside a building while some mad Russian woman attempted to blow them all to kingdom come but she had a pretty good idea this wasn’t how it was supposed to go.
Yana was staring at the BlackBerry with her face screwed up as if it had personally insulted her. She stabbed her thumb against the keypad again, redialling.
As if once wasn’t enough.
Kelly suddenly realised that she was just standing there—they all were—and letting this bitch have another go at killing them all.
Anger sizzled like a starburst inside her head. She took two rapid strides and launched, hitting Yana in the chest and bowling her straight off her feet. The BlackBerry spun out of her hand and clattered under a low sofa against the wall, shedding half its casing and the battery en route.
If Kelly hoped the shock of the attack would keep Yana from fighting back she was soon disappointed. The Russian woman bucked and clawed like a beast under her, howling.
Kelly jerked her face away. She levered her upper body upright, keeping her knees wedged either side of Yana’s waist and tried to pin the flailing arms. Inevitably, one got loose and caught Kelly a stinging blow to the cheek, drawing blood.
“OK,” Kelly muttered. “You want to play dirty . . .?”
She began to punch, hard and fast, pounding her fists into the other woman’s face. It was the way she’d learned to survive in prison—never to start a fight but always to finish it. As fast and brutal as possible. Less time to get hurt herself and it never did her rep any harm to be known for outbursts of absolute violence.
By the end of her sentence nobody had wanted to take her on because they knew if they didn’t put her down quickly there would be no respite until she was forcibly dragged away.
McCarron didn’t have the strength in his current state to force her to do anything, but his shouts finally penetrated the toxic mist of rage.
“Kelly love.” His hands were on her shoulders, his voice hoarse and desperate. “For God’s sake, you’ll kill her!”
“We’ll be all square then,” Kelly said gasping for breath. But she unclamped her hands from Yana’s dress and let the woman’s unresisting head drop back to the floor. It landed with a hollow clunk. Yana groaned through split lips. Her nose was busted, possibly a cheekbone too, Kelly noted with satisfaction—she was not going to look alluring to anyone without weeks of recuperation and probably a skilled cosmetic surgeon.
Kelly got to her feet, shaky from the adrenaline hangover. Her knuckles were already beginning to swell and tighten. She could hardly make a fist although most of the blood, she reflected, was not hers. She thought of Tyrone and her only immediate regret was that McCarron had pulled her away from Yana too soon.
It’s not enough Ty. It will never be enough.
She heard another groan. Dmitry was showing signs of coming round. He rolled onto his hands and knees, spitting blood and what might have been a tooth onto the polished floor.
Kelly twisted out of McCarron’s grasp and booted the Russian solidly under the chin and then again in the ribs as he started to drop. She only realised afterwards that she’d done it in the wrong order.
Should have gone for the ribs first—made the bastard feel it.
Then the world settled and her narrowed-down field of vision widened out. The breeze was cool against her sweating skin and the commentary on the race that blared in from outside was growing in pitch and tension.
“Saved me the trouble,” Grogan said calmly moving past her.
“Yeah well,” Kelly said. “You didn’t have a shovel on you.”
Grogan didn’t reply. He stepped over Dmitry’s outstretched legs and went to the window, just close enough to the gap to look down onto the course.
“Christ Almighty,” he yelped. Kelly and McCarron hurried alongside him. “I’ve missed half the bloody race!”
Below them a close-grouped herd of thoroughbreds swept through the final turn and stretched for the finish, the combined thunder of their hooves rolled up from the turf like distant gunfire. Kelly could see the only grey in the race was two back from the leader and bunched in next to the rails. It was impossible not to watch the final stages of the battle unfold.
“Come on, come on,” Grogan growled beneath his breath. “Put your bloody foot down . . .”
As if hearing the command the crouching jockey began to wave his whip. The colt flattened, barging his way forwards. The finish line flashed nearer. The second horse fell away, drifting outwards, his burst of acceleration spent.
One remained. The colt went after him with furious pace, utterly focused. As they crossed the line Kelly could not have said which was in front.
“Bloody hell,” Grogan said, his voice a growl. “If he’s lost it on a photo I’ll skin that jockey—”
“I skin you all first!”
They whirled. Yana, forgotten in her injury, was back on her feet and clutching the gun dropped by Dmitry. She held it with the competent grip of someone who has handled firearms before and knows how. Her face was a mess of blood and venom.
151
The short harsh smack of the gunshot echoed high above the racecourse, audible even over the bellowed roars of the betting public, just as the last of twelve runners in the Lytton-Warwick Cup crossed the finish line.
A moment later the woman’s body fell from the open box above the stands. With such a nail-biting climax to the day’s big race, nobody saw the beginning of her fatal plunge but they heard her screaming all the way down.