Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Logan swerved as he pulled onto the street, swinging out wide to avoid a head-on with a taxi coming in the opposite direction. Both drivers blasted their horns, gave the finger, then floored it away in opposite directions.
It was only as Logan screeched to a halt outside his house that the significance of the close-call hit home. Had there been anyone in the back seat? Had the taxi been picking up, or dropping off?
He was up the path in a few big bounds. The early afternoon sunlight made a mirror of the living room window, so all he saw was himself. All he saw was panic.
‘Olivia?’
The door was unlocked. From somewhere in the house, Jack heard barking, and the scratching of claws on wood.
The kitchen. Taggart was shut in the kitchen.
But Taggart was never shut in the kitchen.
The living room door was ajar. There was noise from in there. Voices. He charged on through, coat tails trailing behind him, eyes scanning the room for someone. Anyone.
Empty. The cast of Loose Women prattled away on the telly about some old shite, but there was no one here. No Olivia.
Through in the kitchen, Taggart whined. Logan opened the door, and the dog shot out, zipped between his legs, and went tearing up the stairs.
The kitchen was empty, too, so Logan followed the dog, thundering up the staircase even as Taggart dunted Olivia’s bedroom door open with the top of his head.
Jack arrived at the door a little breathless. Olivia sat perched on the end of her bed, looking up at him, patting the panting wee dug, who had flopped onto his back with his legs in the air.
The room was as untidy as always. Shoes lay scattered across the floor. Clothes trailed from the back of a computer chair. There were enough Irn Bru and Coke cans on her desk to build a decent-sized pyramid.
But she was here. Safe. Alone.
Logan swallowed down the rising tide of nausea that had been building the whole drive over. He nodded to her, suddenly aware of how all this must look.
‘Alright?’
Olivia looked back at him impassively. ‘Yep. You?’
‘Yep,’ Logan confirmed.
‘What are you doing here?’
It was a fair question. Jack wasn’t sure he wanted to answer it. Not fully. Not yet.
‘I, eh, I just thought I’d check in on you.’
‘Well, I’m fine,’ Olivia told him. ‘Just took some painkillers. I was just going back to sleep.’
‘Right. Aye.’ Logan looked over at her bedroom window. The light from outside was spilling through them, making the room bright. ‘You not shut the curtains?’
‘No, the light doesn’t really bother me,’ Olivia said.
But there was something. A blip. A tiny hesitation that made the response feel off.
‘You sure you’re alright?’ Logan asked.
She rolled her eyes and laughed, then realised this was too far and immediately dialled it all down again. ‘I’m fine. Just… my headache. Might be flu or something. You should go before—’
From beyond the bathroom door, just a few feet away from where Logan stood, came the sound of a toilet flushing.
That look of panic that Logan had seen in his reflection earlier was now mirrored on Olivia’s face.
A tap sluiced on and off again.
A lock slid aside.
Logan faced the door just as the handle turned.
Just as the door inched open.
Just as a face from his nightmares stepped out from behind it.
‘Don’t hurt him!’ Olivia cried, although Logan couldn’t tell who she was talking to. He didn’t much care, either. The bastard was here. Bosco Maximuke was here, in his house. In his home.
Jack lunged, throwing himself at him. Hands like shovels slammed into the Russian’s chest, driving him backwards into the bathroom.
Bosco wailed as he was slammed straight through the shower screen, tearing it from its hinges. He flailed wildly, trying to stay upright, and his hands found the trailing hose of the removable shower attachment.
It was wrenched away by Logan before he could get a proper grip. His head hit the tiled wall, then his arse hit the plastic shower tray. He looked up in time to see, but not fast enough to react to, the shower head rushing towards him.
There was a crack. There was pain, and blood, and screaming, and barking from the hallway.
Logan had the hose wrapped around the Russian’s neck, and was starting to pull it tight when his shaving mirror smashed across the back of his head.
Bosco was digging his fingers below the hose, pulling on it, trying to wrench it free as blood pumped from his nose and down his chin.
‘Stop it! Stop it! Jack, stop it, please!’
Olivia wasn’t shouting so much as sobbing. Taggart hung back in the doorway, his fur standing on end, his eyes bulging as he barked and growled in panic.
‘I let him in! I told him he could come in!’ Olivia said. She dropped the frame of the broken mirror, and tried hauling at Logan’s arm. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she pleaded and pulled. ‘Stop it. Don’t. Please, don’t do this.’
Bosco was turning purple. Good enough for him. Good enough for the bastard.
After what he’d done? Given what he was? He deserved this. He deserved this, and more.
‘Please,’ Olivia whispered. She banged a fist against Jack’s chest. There was no strength to it, though. He barely felt a thing. ‘Please. Don’t.’
Logan’s hands shook. This man was a monster.
This monster was in his home.
He had every right to do this.
But, of course, that wasn’t true.
With a final roar, Logan released his grip. Bosco collapsed sideways, coughing and wheezing, as the hose uncoiled itself.
Logan stood above him, towered over him, staring down, his chest rising and falling with the force of his breath.
‘It… It is OK, Jack,’ Bosco said. His accent hadn’t been dulled by his time in prison. Quite the opposite, if anything. ‘You no worry. Please, no worry.’
With some effort, he propped himself up on an elbow. When he smiled, he showed teeth that were slicked red with blood.
‘No hard feeling, yes?’