At 5 a.m. the front door opened and the other guy emerged, dressed in the same clothes, his hair a little ruffled, his clothes not on properly. Why’s he taking a walk at 5 a.m.? He was carrying a black holdall. Halfway along the road he stopped, unzipped it, checked inside and then closed it again.
I got out of the car.
He clocked the movement, his eyes pinging towards me. I stepped around to the back of the BMW and flipped the boot. He carried on walking, his interest in me lost. In the boot, next to the spare wheel, was my escape plan; there in case it all went wrong. I removed the crowbar, slid it into the back of my trousers and made a beeline for him.
‘Excuse me, mate.’
He looked back. No reply.
‘Excuse me,’ I said again, and this time he stopped.
‘What?’
He glanced down at the holdall, as if I might be coming for that, and shifted it behind one of his legs to protect it.
‘What d’ya want?’ he said.
South London accent. So he’s from around here somewhere.
‘I’m looking for Adrian Wellis.’
Another frown. His eyes moved from me to the car then back to me. He shifted position slightly and glanced down the road to the house. Panic in his face.
When he turned back to me, he shrugged. ‘Never heard of him.’
But even if I hadn’t seen him come out of Wellis’s house, I would have seen right through the lie. He couldn’t play this game – he wasn’t canny enough – and all of a sudden I saw him for what he was: Wellis’s lapdog.
‘What’s your name?’ I asked.
‘What the fuck’s it gotta do with you?’
‘I’m just interested.’
‘Fuck off,’ he said, and started along the road again.
‘You’re going to help me find Sam Wren.’
He stopped and looked back. ‘What did you say?’
‘You heard what I said.’
He turned fully towards me, bag swinging around to his front, and tried to make himself bigger and more aggressive. But it didn’t work. A man who barely weighed ten stone wasn’t going to be a match for me. He wasn’t going to be much of a match for anyone. Inside a couple of seconds he knew his ruse had failed and seemed to shrink in his skin. I took a step in his direction, just to underline its failure.
‘Let’s go and see Adrian,’ I said.
‘He doesn’t like strangers inside his house.’
‘Yeah, that’s what I figured.’
‘So he’s not going to open the door to you.’
‘No. But he’ll open it to you.’
26
The man stopped outside the house and knocked a couple of times. We waited. Ten seconds later, a silhouette moved along the hallway, distorted in the mottled glass panel. I took a subtle step away from the door as the silhouette leaned in towards the peephole. Then the lock flipped and the door came away from the frame.
Adrian Wellis filled the gap.
He was dressed in his boxer shorts. Nothing else. I could see the crucifix tattoo at his neck, and more on his body: a snake’s head on his left breast; the numbers 666 on his hip. ‘What the hell are you doing back?’ he said to the man, and then, as he took a step closer, spotted me off to the side. His eyes flicked between the man and me, and he pulled the door back as far as it would go. He had a faintly amused expression on his face. ‘What the fuck is this?’ he said. He was Welsh.
‘He stopped me on the street and I –’
‘Shut up,’ ordered Wellis. He turned to me. ‘Who are you?’
‘I want to talk to you about Sam Wren.’
Something registered in his eyes, like a flash of torchlight cutting through the dark. On. Then off. ‘Who?’
I didn’t bother repeating myself.
His eyes narrowed. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Ben Richards.’
‘Who do you work for?’
‘I don’t work for anyone.’
He frowned for a moment, then broke out into a smile. Perfect teeth. Expensive, just like his clothes. He pursed his lips. ‘I don’t know who you’re talking about, Ben.’
‘I think you do.’
Beyond him the decor was probably the same as the day the house was built. Most of the wallpaper had either fallen from the walls or been torn off. The carpet was threadbare, from the front door to the kitchen at the back of the house. Three or four holes had been punched into the staircase and walls, about the size of a boot, and there were stains everywhere: on the walls, on the carpet, on the stairs. The house was filthy.
I looked back at Wellis. ‘So?’
He studied me a while longer, then looked at the man standing next to me. There was a mix of disgust and pity in his face. ‘You want me to invite you in, is that it?’
‘Not necessarily. We can chat here.’
‘I don’t do my chatting on the doorstep.’
‘Then it looks like I’m coming in.’
He snorted. Didn’t say anything. Didn’t move.
‘Or I can head back to the car, dial 999 and tell them you know where Sam Wren is. It’s up to you, Adrian.’
He stared at me, then stepped back and let the man through.
‘No,’ I said. ‘Your friend stays outside.’
‘You dictating the terms now, is that it?’
‘It’s simple maths. Two of you, one of me.’
The thin man stood there in the hallway, waiting for Wellis to tell me where to go – but Wellis ordered him to wait outside, and his face took on the look of a disappointed teenager. He dropped the holdall to the floor – making a clattering sound; metal against metal – and did as Wellis said. I stepped inside the house and pushed the door shut.
The house stank of sweat and fried food. In the living room the TV was on, but the screen was blue, as if a DVD had just been turned off. I shifted around, my back to the wall, so I had Wellis in front of me.
‘What do you want?’ he said, running his tongue around his mouth.
He didn’t seem conscious of the fact he was semi-naked. Or if he did, it genuinely didn’t seem to bother him. His body was squat; not fat, but hard and chunky, muscle in his chest, through the centre of his stomach and up into his arms. He rolled his shoulders back and then brought his hands together in front of him.
‘I want to know what happened to Sam Wren.’
‘Who?’
‘You know who he is.’
‘Do I?’
‘You’re in his phone.’
He shrugged, didn’t seem worried. ‘I’m in a lot of people’s phones.’
‘You called him in August last year.’
‘And?’
‘And you put him on edge.’
Wellis smirked. ‘And?’
‘And I want to know why.’
‘What the fuck’s it got to do with you?’
‘I guess we’ll see.’
‘Yeah?’
I nodded.
Wellis shook his head, like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. ‘Let me just remind you of something, dickhead. You’re in my home.’
‘I can see that.’
‘So, what, you’re RoboCop – is that it?’
‘I’m not a cop.’
‘Then who the fuck are you?’
‘I want to find out what happened to Sam Wren. So I can either get the answers from you, or I get them from Lassie out there, but I’m going to get them.’
He took a step towards me, ready to attack.
Then, from above us, there was a noise. A bump. Like a big, dead weight being dropped. Wellis shot a look upstairs. I followed suit.
‘What was tha–’
But before I could finish he was on me.