The Drop

phone since he picked me up outside the railway station. No answer. I was worried sick but I couldn’t let that distract me. I’d be no use to her dead.
    The only sign of a struggle was in the hallway; an up-ended table, the phone lying redundantly on the carpet next to it. We gave the downstairs a quick once-over and found nothing. There wasn’t a sound. I left Danny watching the door and slowly inched my way up the stairs, not bothering to call out because I didn’t want to warn anyone who might still be up there keeping a guard on Sarah. I could feel my heart thumping. I’d have sworn the sound was audible it was pounding so fast.
    The landing was clear, the door to Sarah’s room open. It was empty, the posters from her pre-college days seeming absurdly innocent, all pop stars and cute animals.
    There was a light on in what I took to be the master bedroom. I could see it beneath the crack in the door. I listened intently but heard nothing. I began to feel too vulnerable on the landing. This Russian could drop me through the door before I even saw him, but it was too late to go back now. I had to find Sarah. I took a few quick steps towards the door and kicked it open, pointing the gun out in front of me Jack Bauer-style as I stepped through.

THIRTY-THREE
    ...................................................
    S arah was on the floor. She was sitting up, dressed in just a fleece and knickers like she’d been about to go to bed but there was a pair of torn leggings on the floor nearby. From the look on her face, she was in shock. And she had good reason to be judging by what else was on the floor in front of her; a big, shaven-headed, presumably Russian, bastard, lay face down and motionless. His trousers were round his knees and there was an old lock knife sticking out of his neck. The full size mirror had a big, wide arc of blood across it and more blood covered the floor. Some of it had even reached the ceiling. As I drew nearer, I realised some of it was on Sarah’s face.
    Good girl, I thought, and the relief flooded through me. Sarah Mahoney had never been near her old man’s world, yet the minute she was cornered, her instincts kicked in and she killed rather than be killed. Talk about a chip off the old block.
    It looked like the Russian had been dead a while. She must have been sitting here on her own looking at the body for hours, too shocked to move, just waiting for someone from Bobby’s crew to turn up and help her but, of course, no one came. I was the only one left.
    When she finally registered it was me, Sarah jumped to her feet and ran towards me. I had just enough time to move the gun before she threw her arms around me. I couldn’t tell you how relieved I was that she was alive.
    ‘Are you alright?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Did he hurt you?’ I asked.
    ‘Tried,’ she said.
    We left the dead Russian where he lay and I steered her to her bedroom. I pulled an old suitcase down off of the top of the wardrobe and told her, ‘pack some clothes, enough for a couple of days,’ then I added, ‘you’ve got two minutes.’ I didn’t want the other Russian guys turning up looking for their friend.
    Sarah pulled on her jeans, stuffed some clothes and toiletries in her bag and we got out of there.
    ‘This is my brother Danny,’ I told her when we reached the bottom of the stairs.
    ‘Good to meet you pet,’ he said.
    The keys to Bobby’s Jag were on the floor by the phone. I picked them up and said, ‘Danny, take the Beamer and follow me.’ I didn’t want Bobby’s car sitting there in the morning. That wasn’t part of my plan.
    ‘What happened?’ I asked as I roared along the driveway.
    ‘They took dad and Finney,’ she said. ‘I was in my room and I heard a big bang and when I went to the top of the stairs to see what had happened the door was hanging off and there were these big blokes with shotguns - Russians or Poles?’
    ‘Russians,’ I told her. ‘Was anybody else with them?’
    ‘Yeah,’ she said with anger in her voice, ‘a Scottish bloke and a fucking bitch.’
    ‘A woman?’ she nodded. So Lady Macbeth was in on the act. She’d live to regret that if I had my way. ‘Did she say anything to you?’
    ‘She told one of the guys to stay behind and watch me then she called up the stairs, telling me to come down. I could see they were dragging dad and Finney away, so I legged it into dad’s office. He keeps his lock knife in a desk drawer so I opened it up and stuffed it