But Cheryl was nowhere to be found.
Danny actually wanted to believe that she had done a midnight flit, yet the state of the flat was unsettling. People who do runners usually take their fags and dope with them. Their lifelines. They don’t leave stuff like that behind.
As Danny went back on to the landing, she again noticed the damage to the door. She paused, patted her pockets and located her ciggies. She lit one, breathed smoke in deep and bent down to inspect the door. She exhaled through the side of her mouth. Had something happened here? she speculated. Some form of retribution because of the drugs? She pulled the door to behind her and made her way back to the car, going in the opposite direction to the teenage gang around the corner, thinking, Time will tell.
Where interpersonal relationships were concerned, Henry Christie was a coward at heart. Because he and Kate had parted on such sour terms and he had made little effort to keep in contact with her, he thought it was going to be very hard for him to present himself on the front doorstep and announce, ‘Honey, I’m home!’
He drove back from Manchester that morning, planning what he was going to say. One of his main problems was that he had thrown himself on to her mercy too many times in the past. Even for Kate, the most patient and forgiving of people, there must be a point at which enough was enough. Henry prayed she had not reached it.
On the M61 he stopped at Bolton West services. After a cup of tea, he bought several bunches of flowers and combined them into one big one, a box of chocolates and a pop music tape each for the girls… peace offerings. He had the sneaking suspicion this would not be nearly enough to appease Kate, probably rightly so.
As Blackpool drew nearer, he caught sight of the Tower. His intestines lurched. In ten minutes, or less, depending on the traffic, he could be home. He knew today was Kate’s day off — she worked part-time — and that on a day like this, glorious sunshine, she would probably be gardening.
He came off the motorway at Marton Circle, where he should have left the roundabout at the three o’clock exit. His nerve failed him. Instead, he looped right round and rejoined the motorway into Blackpool, deciding to bob into the station instead. Just to catch up on work. See what was happening in his absence. Give him a little more time to think about himself, Kate, their daughters and the future. And maybe see Danny Furness.
Colin Hodge, the driver for the security firm, was completely in control of the situation. He felt it, believed it, and was experiencing it right at that very moment as he walked into Thomas Cook’s Travel Agency on Fishergate in Preston. He said very firmly to the lady behind the counter, ‘I want you to book me on a flight to Tenerife as soon as possible.’
She smiled nicely. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’
Hodge sat down on the comfy chair, leaned back, smiled complacently to himself. Yes, he was very much in charge of the whole shebang. Otherwise, why would those two stupid bastards have immediately bunged two grand his way, told him to take his annual holiday and get down to Los Cristianos where he was to go to a certain address and wait to be contacted? The contact, he had been assured, would be very soon. In the meantime, he should chill out, have some fun. If he wanted anything ‘extra’ he only needed to call a number he was given and his whims would be attended to. Hodge had already memorised the number.
The travel agent tapped some details into her computer. There was a delay of a few seconds before she turned the screen so that Hodge could see what was available. ‘There’s one tomorrow, if that’s any good,’ she said.
At the same time, Billy Crane and Don Smith were at Manchester Airport looking up at a departures screen. The flight to Lisbon was due to take off in three-quarters of an hour. Crane would be on it. He rarely travelled direct from the UK to Tenerife if he could avoid it. He wasn’t too concerned about making it difficult for people who might be tracking him, but did not want to make it too easy.
The two men regarded each other affectionately.
‘ It’s been a good break, lots achieved,’ Crane said.
They shook hands, patted each other’s shoulders.
‘ I’ll do some digging on Hodge,’ Smith said, ‘then I’ll be out to see you in a couple of days. I know a guy who can do it for me, discreet like. Someone who’s good.’
‘ Fine, but remember this — I haven’t said I’m in this for definite. I’m just sniffing a dog’s arse at the moment, that’s all,’
The departures screen rolled out instructions for the Lisbon flight: passengers to make their way to the boarding gate now. The two men parted and anyone observing them would not have been able to guess from their demeanour that both had been involved in murder only hours before.
Because of his dislike of airports, the Russian left it to the very last minute before arriving and checking in at Manchester. He walked briskly away from the BA check-in desk towards Passport Control, dropped his hand luggage on to the conveyor belt which trundled it through the X-ray machine, stepped through the metal detector without incident, collected his bag and presented his passport to the Customs official at the desk. The document received only the most cursory of glances. He might as well have offered his real one. Once in the International Departure lounge he turned into W.H. Smiths and bought a morning newspaper which he tucked under his arm and made his way to the boarding gate.
He stepped on to the first travellator at exactly the same time as another man of much the same age and build as himself. They ignored each other. The Russian stepped
slightly ahead and came off at Gate 21.
Billy Crane carried on towards Gate 33.
At the boarding gate, the Russian was slightly aggrieved to see there was a delay of a few minutes on the Paris flight. He chuntered and sat down to read his newspaper, annoyed that he was actually sitting in an airport and not touring naval dockyards on the south coast as planned. But that was the nature of his occupation. He was very much in demand, well paid for what he did and never turned anything down.
After dealing so publicly with Jacky Lee, he had contacted his masters in Russia to report back. They were very pleased. Before he could tell them he was going to have a short break, he was instructed to get to Paris as soon as possible. He was given sketchy details of where and what the job entailed, and told that he would be properly briefed on his arrival in the city. He almost refused, but the lure of a quarter of a million dollars and the assurance that it would be a simple, straightforward hit swung it.
Which is how he came to be at Manchester Airport. If he had to travel by air, he chose provincial airports where appropriate.
In just over ninety minutes he would be in Paris.
Eight hours after that, he expected to be on a train heading south.
He laid out the newspaper on his knees, thought back to the Jacky Lee assassination.
It had gone well. Publicly as requested. Everything had slotted neatly into place. Timings, everything. The Russian closed his eyes and tilted his head back, working through the scenario moment by moment. Then his forehead furrowed. His heart blipped. Something had not gone quite right — but he could not place his finger on exactly what.
His brain rewound. He went through it all again. Pulling up, entering the transport cafe, seeing Lee, killing Lee, the getaway… the tense moment when Lee’s business partner pointed a gun at the speeding car but did not fire… then he was away. The car had been destroyed. All very smooth.
Except for… he wracked his brains. Two things now. Yes, the more he thought deeply about it, why didn’t Lee’s partner shoot? The Russian found that very suspicious. And the stance the man had taken with the gun. A professional stance. The Russian opened his eyes. Maybe the guy had been a cop!