A wave of cold fear, the type that makes your heart lurch, hit me head-on. But I’m a quick thinker by nature and I took a pack of cigarettes from my shirt pocket and pulled out a smoke, deciding to break my after-meal-only rule on the basis that it might well save my life. I kept my head down, pretending I couldn’t light it, fighting the urge to turn and run for it.
Mitchell was taking his time counting, going through the notes one by one, and I was conscious that I couldn’t keep standing like this without looking conspicuous, so I lit the tip and took a long drag, turning my head as casually as possible in the direction of the far wall so Grimes couldn’t see my face. Willing Mitchell just to hurry up so I could get the hell out of this airless place.
Finally, he stopped counting and grinned. ‘All there, mon. Good doing business with you.’
I nodded curtly, not wanting to speak in case my voice was recognized. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Grimes turning round and looking at me. Beginning to stare. I couldn’t see whether or not there was recognition in his gaze, but I wasn’t going to wait to find out, so I picked up the holdall and turned for the door, still keeping my face away from him.
Five more seconds and I’d be back on the street and out of danger. But I’d barely taken a step when the words I’d been dreading broke the silence, delivered in Grimes’s peculiarly whiney tones that I suddenly remembered all too well.
‘Hey, I know you. Mitch, man, I know this fucker. He’s a cop.’
Immediately, the young guy standing at the door, the one with the cap and the hand behind his back, tensed.
I hesitated, unsure whether just to keep going or turn and front this out.
The decision was made for me when Mitch barked an order and the guy on the door brought the hand round to reveal a pistol that looked too big for his grip, which he pointed directly at my head, coming forward, so the end of the barrel was only a couple of feet away.
At the same time, the big guy in the apron stopped chopping the lamb and slowly turned round, the bloodstained cleaver still in his hand.
I turned on Grimes. ‘What are you talking about? I’ve never seen you before in my life. Get back to cutting your vegetables, and don’t poke your nose into shit that doesn’t concern you.’ My voice resonated with confidence and anger, just like it had to if I was going to get out of here in one piece, and for a tantalizing half-second Weyman Grimes wavered, taken in by the act. I’m a pretty ordinary guy — medium height, medium build, no stand-out features — and I looked a lot different than I had when I’d nicked Grimes all those years back.
But then his features hardened. ‘No way, man, you’re a fucking cop. You put me away years ago!’ He turned to his boss. ‘He’s undercover, Mitch. He was the one who nicked me for that old coke deal back in Dalston. I never forget a face.’
‘Don’t insult me, you piece of shit, or I’ll take you apart. Understand?’ I took a step forward and he backed away instinctively, looking pleasingly nervous.
Mitchell looked confused, but the problem was that Grimes wasn’t letting it go. ‘He’s a fucking copper, Mitch, I tell you. I swear it. Seriously, I wouldn’t bullshit you about something like this. We should do the bastard.’
I took another step forward, which was when the big chef raised his cleaver to let me know it wouldn’t be a good idea to go for Grimes.
‘Fuck you,’ I said, waving a hand dismissively and turning away. ‘I’m out of here. You’ve got your money.’
‘You ain’t going nowhere, blood,’ whispered Mitch, pulling a flick knife from his jeans and clicking open the blade, the fifth time now one had been pulled on me. ‘Not ’til we find out exactly who you are.’
‘He’s a pig,’ crowed Grimes, a smile on his face now as he saw an opportunity for revenge. ‘Let’s gut him.’ He grabbed a large chopping knife from the worktop and held it up.
I was surrounded. Standing alone in a stinking room with four violent thugs. Three of them with knives. The fourth holding a gun only three feet from my head. The sweat poured down into my eyes, making me blink, and the adrenalin pumped through me as I hunted for a way out, telling myself that there had to be some way of extricating myself from this situation.
‘J-Boy, bring him over here,’ barked Mitchell, and the gunman grabbed me by the arm, pushing the barrel of the gun into my face.
‘Drop the bag, pussy,’ he hissed, showing teeth, a sadistic glint in his eyes, revelling in his moment of power.
I did as I was told, thinking that this guy had seen too many films because he’d made a huge mistake by standing so close to me with the gun against my face. I’d been told once by an ex-SAS guy that all you have to do when a gun’s pointed to your head is knock the arm holding it out of the way, and by the time the gunman’s pulled the trigger it’ll be pointed elsewhere. Then all you had to do was deliver a gut punch, twist his wrist round until he let go of the weapon, and bang, you were sorted.
It had sounded easy when he said it over a few beers one night. A lot less so when you can feel the cool, bare metal of the barrel against your skin.
But I didn’t have much choice, because these guys weren’t going to let me go — not until they’d torn me into way too many pieces. So, as he gave me a shove, I made my move, knocking his elbow with my forearm and punching him in the gut at the same time.
Just as my SAS man had predicted, I caught him completely by surprise. The gun went off with a tremendous bang in the confines of the room, deafening us all as the bullet ricocheted off the ceiling and the floor. The gunman grunted in pain and the other three instinctively hit the floor, buying me a couple of seconds. I grabbed his gun hand at the wrist, keeping the barrel pointed away, then butted him in the face, two, maybe three times, twisting his wrist at the same time. But this guy wasn’t going to give up easily and his grip on the gun remained strong as the two of us struggled around the floor together in a tight, awkward waltz, with him trying to bring the gun round so he could take me out with a shot, and me trying desperately to keep it pointed just about any place else.
The others were getting to their feet now, and the one with the cleaver came striding forward with it raised high above his head, his mouth opened in a roar I couldn’t hear, and an expression of pure murder on his face. Behind him, Weyman Grimes followed, knife outstretched, while Mitchell jumped up like a jack in the box from behind the table, a weird grin on his face, his bloodshot eyes bugging out like they were on stalks.
The gun went off a second time, almost taking off the top of Mitchell’s head before hitting the far wall. Mitchell went down fast, disappearing beneath the table like he’d been grabbed from underneath. Cleaver Man and Grimes froze like kids in a game of statues as they recovered from the blast.
That was when I used the palm of my hand to smack the gunman on the underside of his nose in a classic martial arts move, and as he stumbled backwards I kneed the bastard hard in the balls.
Finally, he let go of the gun and fell to his knees, but Cleaver Man had recovered and was now almost on me, and I had to dive backwards to get out of his way, landing hard on my shoulder blades. But I had the gun and, turning it round in my hands, I pointed it up at him, holding it two-handed, my finger tensed on the trigger.
He kept coming, raising the cleaver, moving almost in slow motion.
My reaction was a reflex. I didn’t make a conscious decision to pull the trigger. I just did it. Three times in rapid succession, the retorts muffled by the intense buzzing in my ears.
One round struck him in the thigh, taking out a chunk of flesh as it exited and spinning him round wildly so that the next round struck him in the arse. I didn’t see where the third went, but I thought I saw Grimes go down in a heap, just before Cleaver Man dropped his cleaver, which landed blade-first in the filthy linoleum flooring. He then grabbed at his wounded leg with two huge hands and let out an animal howl so loud that it roared through my deafness. He stumbled forward, towards me, and I fired again, a last shot that took him just above the knee in the other leg, and this time he fell hard to the floor.