CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Gareth Pike did not deny meeting Mason Rigg.
That made Drew angrier than a lie would have.
Calder had hidden Gareth in a farmhouse outside Malton with Amy, Owen and Sam. By eleven thirty, Drew and Leah were standing in the kitchen while rain battered the windows and Daniel's photograph lay on the table between them.
Amy stared at her father.
"Tell me that's fake."
Gareth sat with one hand over his bandaged stomach.
"It isn't."
Owen swore.
Sam closed his eyes.
Drew said, "Why?"
Gareth looked at him.
"Because six months ago Venn told me Daniel was alive."
Daniel stood by the door.
His face gave nothing away.
Gareth continued.
"Venn said Daniel had evidence that could destroy North End along with Hale. Said if I wanted Amy left alone, I had to help keep Daniel buried."
Amy stepped back as if he had struck her.
"You keep using me as the reason."
"Because you are the reason."
"No. I'm the excuse."
Gareth looked at her.
She was crying now and furious about it.
"You sent routes to Venn. You met Redmile. You lied to everybody. Every time you got caught, you said it was for me. Stop making me responsible for what you chose."
Nobody spoke.
Gareth's face broke.
Drew had seen him shot without looking that afraid.
"Amy--"
"No."
She left the kitchen.
Owen followed after a moment.
Gareth looked down at the table.
Drew asked again.
"Why Rigg?"
"Venn told me Rigg had access to the Rotterdam material. I went to buy it."
"With what?"
"Routes."
Daniel laughed once.
No humour.
"So while you thought I might be alive, you sold our runs to the club everybody believed murdered me."
Gareth looked at him.
"I thought you were working with them."
"You didn't ask."
"I couldn't find you."
"You found Rigg."
That landed.
Leah watched Drew.
He had gone still in the way he did when anger became useful.
"What was in the envelope?" she asked.
Gareth answered.
"Cash. Twenty grand. Rigg said he'd get me the pages. He never did."
"And six months later he's demanding them from Daniel."
"Meaning he didn't have them," Ben said from the hallway.
He entered with Calder.
Calder looked deeply unimpressed with everyone.
"I leave you alone for two hours and you conduct a witness confrontation."
Leah said, "Suspended."
"That defence is getting old."
"Still valid."
Calder put a map on the table.
"Rigg sent the exchange point. Old ferry maintenance shed near New Holland. Midnight. Thermal drone shows at least nine people. Pete is there."
Drew looked at the map.
"Michael?"
"No sign."
Leah said, "Renn wants the same pages. Rigg wants the same pages. Why use one exchange?"
Daniel leaned over the map.
"Because they're not partners anymore."
Everyone looked at him.
"Rotterdam recording. Renn told Venn to replace whichever club he couldn't control. Mason heard enough over the years to know what happens to disposable partners. If Hale and Venn are gone, Rigg knows he's next."
Drew understood.
"So Rigg wants the pages to protect himself from Renn."
"And Renn wants them destroyed."
Calder nodded.
"Which means both may attend."
Gareth started to stand.
Drew pushed him back into the chair.
"No."
"Pete is there because of me."
"Pete is there because Pete sold us to Hale. Sit down."
Gareth's eyes hardened.
"You don't give me orders."
Drew looked at the president patch on Gareth's cut hanging over the chair.
Then at Gareth.
"I do tonight."
The room went silent.
Gareth stared at him.
"You calling a vote?"
"No."
"Then don't pretend you're president."
Drew leaned closer.
"I'm not pretending anything. I'm telling you that while you're bleeding through staples and lying to your daughter, you don't get to decide who walks into another hostage exchange."
Sam looked away.
Daniel almost smiled.
Gareth did not.
"Go, then," he said. "See how much of a club you have left when you come back."
Drew straightened.
"Maybe that's the point."
At eleven fifty-three, the Humber looked black enough to swallow headlights.
The maintenance shed sat beside an abandoned slipway, corrugated roof rattling in the wind. One access road. River behind. Marshland on both sides.
Rigg had chosen well.
Leah hated him immediately.
Calder's team stayed back beyond the tree line. She wanted arrests, not a gunfight. Drew wanted Pete alive. Daniel wanted Rigg's phone. Ben wanted Renn.
Leah wanted her father.
Nobody was likely to get everything.
Drew and Daniel walked toward the shed carrying a waterproof document case.
The Rotterdam originals were not inside.
Copies were.
The originals were with Calder.
Leah moved along the river side with Ben.
"You know this is insane," Ben whispered.
"Which part?"
"The part where a suspended detective is crawling through mud toward nine armed bikers."
"You were held prisoner for eleven weeks. Your judgement is questionable."
"Hard to argue."
She glared at him in the dark.
"Don't."
Inside the shed, lights came on.
Mason Rigg stood beneath them.
He was taller than Leah expected. Mid-forties. Shaved head. Grey in his beard. Redmile cut over a wax jacket.
Pete sat on a chair beside him, wrists bound.
He looked terrible.
Still alive.
Rigg spread his hands.
"Sayer brothers. Nice to finally have both in the same room."
Daniel said, "Family reunion discount?"
Rigg smiled.
"You were always wasted on North End."
Drew held up the case.
"Pete first."
"Pages first."
"No."
Rigg sighed.
"This is why hostage exchanges take forever."
Pete looked at Drew.
"I told you not to come."
"Nobody listens to you anymore."
"True."
Pete smiled despite the bruises.
Leah almost laughed.
Then she saw movement near the rear door.
Not Redmile.
Black tactical clothing.
No markings.
Renn.
She touched Ben's arm and pointed.
He nodded.
Rigg did not know they were there.
That was good for approximately three seconds.
A suppressed shot hit the light above Pete.
Darkness dropped across half the shed.
Rigg shouted.
Gunfire erupted from the rear.
Renn's people had arrived to kill everyone.
Drew dove behind an engine stand with Daniel.
Pete kicked his chair sideways as bullets punched through the wall behind him.
Redmile returned fire.
Leah and Ben entered from the river door.
"Pete!"
He looked toward her voice.
"About bloody time."
She cut one wrist free.
A Redmile man swung around the corner.
Ben hit him before he could aim.
Leah dragged Pete behind a steel cabinet.
"Can you run?"
"Define run."
"Annoyingly alive and moving."
"Probably."
Drew fired toward the rear doors.
Daniel shouted, "Renn! Left side!"
Renn appeared behind a concrete pillar.
His broken nose was taped. Pistol in one hand.
He fired at Daniel.
Drew shoved his brother down.
The round tore through Drew's sleeve.
Leah's stomach stopped.
Then he moved.
Alive.
She fired back.
Renn disappeared.
Mason Rigg crawled behind a forklift, swearing.
"Quinn!"
Leah looked at him.
"Your father is in the office!"
Everything narrowed.
"What?"
"Renn brought him ten minutes ago. Trade insurance."
Ben grabbed her shoulder.
"Could be bait."
"It is bait."
"And?"
Leah checked her magazine.
"I'm still going."
The office stood above the workshop floor with metal stairs leading up.
She reached the first step when a man emerged at the top.
Michael.
Hands cable-tied.
Blood down one side of his face.
Behind him stood Robert Hale.
Alive.
Barely.
Hospital gown beneath a long coat. One arm in a sling. Face grey.
Gun pressed into Michael's back.
Leah stared.
Hale smiled weakly.
"Family again."
"You look terrible."
"So did your mother near the end."
Michael moved before Leah could react.
He drove his head backward into Hale's face.
The gun fired.
Michael fell.
Leah screamed.
Hale stumbled against the rail.
Drew appeared below.
He raised his weapon.
Leah shouted, "No!"
Michael rolled.
Blood spread across his shirt.
Hale lifted the gun toward him.
A shot cracked from across the shed.
Hale jerked.
For the second time in two days, someone shot Robert Hale in the chest.
This one was lower.
He dropped the gun.
Then fell over the rail.
His body hit the concrete floor hard enough to silence the nearest gunfight for half a second.
Mason Rigg lowered his pistol from behind the forklift.
"That one was for me."
Leah ran upstairs.
Michael was conscious.
"Dad."
The word came without permission.
His eyes opened.
"That's new."
She pressed both hands over the wound in his side.
"Shut up."
"Also familiar."
Below them, sirens approached.
Calder's team.
Renn heard them too.
He ran for the river door.
Daniel saw him.
"Renn!"
Renn fired once and disappeared into the dark.
Daniel followed.
Drew shouted after him.
"Daniel!"
Too late.
History repeated itself with irritating efficiency.