Chapter 23 George
George
As soon as he’s pressed send on the message, George hurries down the mezzanine stairs.
He’s been sat up there for hours, watching this man for two of them, and he’s not about to let the bastard get away now.
Miles must have seen his message because he is out of his chair and walking towards the bar.
George rushes over, grabs Miles and steers him towards the door. ‘We need to move,’ he says.
They step outside, the pounding music still ringing in George’s ears. Miles says nothing, just looks at him for a cue. George checks right and left. He points left and whispers in Miles’s ear: ‘You see that guy in the denim jacket?’
Miles nods and moves in his direction.
George holds him back. ‘Wait. Not yet.’
They watch as the man ambles under the yellow glow of streetlights, past a row of shuttered shops. He glances briefly behind him and takes the corner.
‘Okay, let’s go,’ George says.
‘Are you sure that’s him?’ Miles whispers.
‘I’m certain.’
Miles quickens his step. ‘I didn’t see any facial hair.’
‘He’s had a shave, obviously,’ George says. ‘Trust me, it’s him – that freak has been watching you all night.’
It was about nine o’clock when George spotted him.
Three hours he was sat up on the mezzanine, and the whole idea was beginning to seem like a waste of time.
And then suddenly a shiver ran through him.
There he was, sitting at a table with two women on the far side of the room.
Short dark hair, black T-shirt. A hooked nose and thin lips.
And he was staring straight at Miles. Straight at him.
It was so obvious. The man turned his eyes to his two companions but before long they were back on Miles.
And that’s how it continued – his attention moving back and forth between them.
Shortly before eleven, the two women left, and the man stayed put.
And from that point on, he barely took his eyes off Miles.
George tried to gauge the expression on the man’s face.
He looked thoughtful and sullen, but was there something else?
Anger, maybe? It stirred something in George, too – an irritation that grew stronger the longer he looked at him, until it churned into fury.
How dare this man come after his friend?
After everything he’s been through. With the memory of it clear in his mind, George quickens his step, and Miles shuffles his feet to keep up until they reach the end of the road.
They slow down as they round the corner on to a quiet street that leads towards the lake.
The man walks the pavement under the shadow of storefront canopies.
He pauses and looks back over his shoulder, but his face is unlit and featureless – barely more than a silhouette.
He carries on, apparently untroubled by their presence.
They’re closer to him, now – around fifty yards away – close enough that they can hear his hard-soled shoes clop against the concrete.
It’s the only sound, save for their own footsteps and breathing.
They daren’t speak. The air carries not even a murmur, and the sky is cloudless, black and dusted with stars.
A waning moon lights a faint path across the lake.
The man leaves the pavement, briefly looking back at them as he crosses the road.
George and Miles share a glance. They keep their pace until he disappears around the corner, then George gives his friend a nod and they cross the street.
His heart knocks against the wall of his chest. The temptation to run after the man is almost irresistible.
All the questions he has for him turn over in his head.
But they must keep their distance, for now.
They need to see where he goes. They need to know where he calls home, for now at least. After that, all bets are off.
George and Miles reach the end of the street, where the waterfront opens up before them.
They take the corner. George freezes. The street in front of them is empty.
Completely empty. ‘Bugger.’ He stares at Miles.
‘Where’s he gone?’ Between the street and the lake is a footpath, flanked by a column of trees.
The path, intermittently illuminated by streetlights, is also deserted.
But George’s eye is drawn to thrashing, shadowy movement on the grass beyond.
Someone sprinting. ‘There!’ he says, pointing as he charges forward.
George and Miles run after the man, who now has about a hundred yards on them.
He must’ve started his sprint the second he went around the corner.
How could they have been so stupid? They charge along the path, past a playground and the last buildings before the waterfront gives way to a wooded park.
The man runs into it and takes a right where the path forks in two.
George and Miles continue their chase into the park.
It’s even darker, here. Fewer lamps light the path, and for a moment the man disappears into the shadows.
George tries to find an extra gear. Miles is falling a few paces behind.
The man reappears, then darts off into the trees.
Within seconds, he’s faded into the darkness.
George chases across the uneven grass. His eyes dart about as he sprints, searching for any movement.
He gambles and turns right. But it’s dark and he can’t see the man anywhere.
He slows to a tentative jog. A grid of shadows, cast where feeble lamplight has struck the trees, quickly fades, and within thirty seconds he’s shrouded by the pitch-black.
The man has disappeared. And now George realises his mistake – he’s completely exposed.
They just followed some psychopath into a dark and empty park in the middle of the night, and now they don’t know where he is.
George glances back to the path, which lies empty. He stops dead, listens. A hushed whisper from the leaves above. Light footsteps on the grass. A hand grabs George’s shoulder, and his guts turn to liquid.
George spins around to see Miles, his face cut in half by a grey trace of moonlight. ‘Bloody hell, don’t do that,’ he says, through gritted teeth.
‘I think we should leave,’ Miles says.
‘Hard agree.’
George spins slowly, taking a final look around for any sign of the man, then walks back towards the path, with Miles at his side.
Once they’re under the glow of lamplight, George turns and shouts: ‘Stay away from my friend!’ There’s no echo to his words – they die instantly on the night air. And there’s no response.
Miles tugs at George’s arm. ‘Come on.’
They move quickly, back to the waterfront. On the way, Miles stares ahead as if in a daze. George vocalises his thoughts as they go. ‘How did we let him get away? He was fast, wasn’t he, faster than I expected. Who the bloody hell is he? What does he want?’
Miles is monosyllabic in response to everything he says, to the point that George starts to wonder if he’s being punished with silence.
Is he annoyed with George because the plan didn’t work out exactly as it should?
Surely not. It was a good idea, and George sacrificed his whole evening to make it happen – he relished the thought of being able to hold that bastard’s feet to the fire and force him to explain what the hell he was doing.
No, Miles has just gone quiet because he needs to crunch the ramifications of it all.
On one hand, Miles’s stalker doesn’t seem overly dangerous – he fled like a hare when they caught him off guard.
But there’s no denying he still has the upper hand, for now.
Assuming the police take this seriously, it shouldn’t take them long to find out who he is.
But in the meantime, this man knows who they are; he knows where they are.
And only he knows what the hell he’s planning next.
They’re approaching the hotel when Miles snaps out of his stupor. He grabs George by the shoulder. ‘Please tell me you got a picture of him.’
‘Of course I did.’
George opens the camera roll on his phone and swipes through the pictures he took in the bar.
Some are, admittedly, blurrier than others – he was some distance away when he took the shots, and he had to be sly about it.
He selects the clearest one and zooms in.
And there he is. He’s smirking, the smug prick.
At that point, he had no idea he’d been rumbled.
But now they have a picture of him. Whoever he is, the net is about to close, and fast. George hands the phone over for Miles to examine.
‘Here’s your stalker,’ he says. ‘Do you recognise him?’