The man who walked through the door was dressed sharply in a dark designer shirt worn under an equally designer suit. Steve quickly took in the expensive watch on his wrist and costly shoes on his feet. He walked with a calm confidence. This man was obviously enjoying the rewards of his illegal blackmailing schemes.
His gaze swept quickly around the room and fixed on Steve. He walked forward with hand outstretched. "Terrell Clark," he said smoothly. "You must be Steve Barber."
"It's great to meet you at last," Steve said sincerely, shaking his hand.
"And you. A shame it has to be in this situation," Terrell said. "Max has filled me in. Take a seat everyone, and we'll discuss it." They sat quickly on the assorted chairs in the office, but Terrell Clark remained standing. "Max, did you do what I asked?" he said.
"Yes," Max said guardedly.
"And did it confirm my suspicions?" Terrell asked.
"Yes," Max replied shortly.
"Very well," Terrell said with a sigh. "The situation saddens me gentlemen, but it appears we have the wrong hostage upstairs. Get rid of him."
There was an uneasy silence. "You mean drop him somewhere?" Greg asked.
"No," Terrell replied calmly. "I mean kill him."
Everyone exchanged glances. Steve tried to gauge the mood of the others.
"Why can't we just dump him somewhere?" Greg queried. "He doesn't know where he is, or anything about us."
"It's too late for that," Terrell responded, still composed. "He's friends with the cop here." Indicating Steve with his left hand, he drew a handgun from under his jacket with the other and pointed it at him.
Steve was startled. What on earth was going on? He felt his heartbeat quicken as he looked at the barrel of the gun.
"Huh?" Vincent Harley exclaimed. Greg looked similarly astounded, but Max simply looked smug.
"You've got it wrong," Steve stammered, but in his heart he knew that his cover was somehow blown.
Terrell stepped closer and kept the gun trained at Steve's head. Not taking his eyes off Steve, he pulled a video cassette tape from his pocket. "Play this, Max," he said.
Max silently took the tape and inserted it into the player beneath the TV set. Carter, Greg and Harley were looking at Steve in bewilderment that was quickly turning to anger.
The tape began to play and all eyes turned to the TV; all except Terrell's who stayed fixed on Steve's face. The picture was black and white and there was no sound, but the clarity of the image was good. Steve watched in horror as the video showed the room Jesse was being kept in and he saw himself walk through the door and greet the captive. The timeframe was stamped in the bottom of the shot and Steve realised that this was video from when he had guarded Jesse last night. He had checked for a surveillance camera in that room, dammit! On the screen, Jesse looked up at him with a smile as he walked in; Steve was obviously a friend as there was no fear in Jesse's face. When it reached the point where Steve undid the bonds tying Jesse's hands Harley gave a snarl and whipped round in his chair.
Steve felt that Harley was about to jump him, but Terrell silently held up a hand to keep Harley from doing so. The tape ended, and everyone turned back to look at Steve. He felt distinctly uncomfortable with all those angry eyes upon him. He looked up at Terrell and met his gaze. He didn't like the expression he saw there. Terrell looked faintly amused by the situation and Steve thought that rather than panicking that he had an undercover police officer in his gang, he was actually enjoying it.
"An error on your part, Mr Policeman," Terrell said. "I have high quality micro-cameras installed in every room of this building. The security system already here was lacking. Don't feel bad, you couldn't have known. They fit into tiny holes drilled into the wall, and transmit the data back to my computer at home. You wouldn't have seen them even if you looked."
Steve mentally kicked himself. He had known these men used sophisticated equipment when the situation called for it. Early on he had been concerned with bugs in his apartment. He knew it was possible. But in the excitement of the last twenty-four hours he hadn't been concentrating as well as he should have been.
Carter, Greg, Max and Harley were looking at him murderously. "You've got it wrong, I'm not a cop," Steve tried, not really believing he could rescue the state of affairs now. "I just didn't want to hurt anyone. I was just trying to make the captive comfortable. I only got involved with you guys for blackmail scams. You know, affairs and stuff. Not hurting anyone," he tailed off, feeling stupid. Terrell had let him talk without interrupting, and he had rambled on and it had sounded exactly as if he were just making excuses.
No one seemed to have anything to say. The silent seconds dragged out, and Steve could feel himself sweating. It's just making me look even more guilty, he thought. Not able to bear the silence any longer, he said, "You've got no evidence I'm a cop," and instantly regretted his words when he saw the flash of delight cross Terrell's face.
"As I think you know, Max went on a surveillance drive this afternoon, to investigate the old man seen with Mr Haughton-Handley," Terrell began suddenly, after a few more uncomfortable seconds of silence. He spoke in a sing-song voice, as if telling a story to a young child. "He went to a residence in Malibu. He told you he went round the back and saw Nathan Haughton-Handley on the deck. In actual fact he broke into the house and observed Nathan from inside."
Steve felt incensed that the safety of the he and his father's home had been violated like that by a crook like Max, but he kept his feelings to himself as Terrell continued his narrative.
"He quickly deduced that the boy on the deck was Nathan, of course, but as he turned to leave he caught sight of a photograph on the side. A framed photo of the old man, his arm around another man with a familiar face…"
On cue, Max brought out the photo showing Steve with his father. Steve was boiling with rage. Max had stolen a personal photo from his house. How dare he!
Terrell continued. "Max didn't need to do a great deal of research before discovering that so-called Steve Barber here is actually Lieutenant Steve Sloan of the LAPD."
The others exclaimed angrily as they looked at the photo, then at Steve. Terrell stepped forwards and placed the tip of the gun against Steve's forehead. "What do you say now, Mr Barber?"
Steve said nothing. It was too late for that; Terrell Clark even knew his rank.
"Why didn't you intervene before?" Greg blurted out. "As soon as you saw this?" He indicated the video player.
"I guessed that Steve was a policeman," Terrell explained. "But I still thought we had the right boy, until Max discovered the real Nathan hidden at the beach in Malibu. I asked Carter to keep an eye on him, to make sure he didn't go anywhere, until I had decided what to do."
So that explains the suspicious looks Carter was giving me, Steve thought. I should have acted on my instincts – I knew something was wrong.
Terrell continued, "Once we'd collected the money from Mr Haughton-Handley, who I was confident would pay up, I was going to dispose of Lt Sloan. I knew that, having come so far and not yet called in the cavalry, Steve must have been waiting to see me so he could arrest the whole lot of us. Greedy!" he sang out, clicking his tongue as if he was chastising a child. "Of course, that's not going to happen as our target obviously knows we don't have his son."
"Who do we have then?" Carter asked.
Max spoke up. "I couldn't find out exactly, but I saw a second photo in the house that interested me." He withdrew it from his pocket and held it up for them all to see. Steve noted with despondency that it was a picture of him and Jesse on the beach with their surfboards. He remembered it being taken just after they had caught a huge wave and they were both grinning with delight. There was going to be no denying it now.
"He's a friend of yours?" Harley snarled. "No wonder you didn't want us to beat him up! I'm going to beat the hell out of him right now." He got to his feet. Steve shot up too, but Terrell gave him a quick rap on the side of his head with the gun which made his head spin. "Sit down!" Terrell said sharply to Harley, pushing Steve back into his seat with his free hand. "Plenty of time for that later."
He lowered his voice again and turned back to Steve. "It's a very understanding friend you have there, who will remain a hostage while you do your work. You must be very close. You will be glad then, to spend your last moments with him."
He paused, and Steve bit back many a rejoinder that came to his mind, knowing that all would be fruitless. He had been weighing up his options for trying to fight them off and escape, but it was five against one. Even if Steve managed to cause enough chaos to get out of the door, he wouldn't have time to get upstairs and rescue Jesse. There was no way he would leave his friend at the mercy of these crooks.
Terrell sighed and looked up at the others. "You need to get rid of both of them. They know too much. I don't care who does it or how, but just make sure you do a good job. Then we'll have to relocate, as Lt Sloan may have shared details of our whereabouts with his superiors. I'll be back later tonight to discuss where we're going." He handed Max the gun, and Max kept it trained on Steve as Terrell shot a look at him that was little more than irritation as he walked out of the door.
Steve looked around at the furious faces of his former collaborators. Now he really was in trouble.
X X X
Unaware of the disaster that Steve was experiencing at the warehouse, Mark was at home washing up before getting ready for a late shift at the hospital. Amanda was drying up as she had been over for lunch. His shift didn't start for another two hours yet but Mark was finding his mind turning to Steve and worrying when he was stuck at home, and when he was at work he was kept occupied with other concerns, so he was planning to start early.
The phone rang and Mark quickly dried his hands before answering. It was Mr Haughton-Handley, and he sounded distressed. "They've left me another demand!" he said. "I think you should come over. You'll want to see this."
"I'll be right there," Mark said, anxiety rising. "As soon as I can."
"Is something wrong?" Amanda asked, astutely picking up on his emotions.
"Perhaps. I think so. I'm going to see Mr Haughton-Handley. He's got something he wants to show me. Will you come?"
"Of course," Amanda said, quickly drying the last glass. "Don't worry, I'm sure everything is okay. Cheryl would have contacted you if anything had been seriously wrong."
"Yes," Mark said, picking up his car keys. He didn't sound convinced.
When they arrived at the Haughton-Handley residence, the big gates being swung open by the gardener as they drew up, William Haughton-Handley ushered them inside quickly.
"I'd just got home from work and it was waiting for me," he said, indicating an envelope on the table in his lounge.
Mark looked at the envelope with foreboding. Mr Haughton-Handley was still agitated and he hated to think what it might contain. Seeing his hesitation, Amanda asked gently, "Would you like me to open it?"
Mark shook his head no. Steadying himself, he went over to table and picked up the envelope. He pulled out the pieces of paper that were inside. Amanda observed over his shoulder. The top sheet was a typed demand. 'See what happens when you don't play by our rules?' it read. 'We'll do worse than this. You have a new deadline, tomorrow morning at 9, same place. Your last chance to save your son.'
This didn't mean much, and Mark put it to the back of the sheets in his hand and uncovered the next. The image displayed was chilling and shocking. Amanda gasped and Mark felt unsteady. It was a picture of Jesse, who looked utterly terrible. His face, hands and clothing were covered in blood, and his left eye was black and swollen. His face looked extremely pale as if he hadn't been getting any sleep. His clothes were creased and the sleeve of his shirt was torn.
Amanda and Mark sank onto the sofa that stood beside the table. Mark flicked quickly through the other images. There were five pictures altogether, each showing Jesse looking battered and in a poor state. "Jesse…" Amanda breathed. "But how…? I mean, Steve…" Her voice tailed off.
Mark felt anguished as he looked at the pictures of the friend that he was unable to help. Why had he had to endure this? Steve should be there looking out for him. Mark felt an unexpected and extremely unusual burst of anger towards his son, surprising himself as that was an emotion he rarely associated with anyone, and particularly not Steve. The pictures were vivid and horrific enough to create it. The anger quickly faded to worry. "He wouldn't have let that be done to Jesse," Mark said, hoping he was right. Surely not? "But then something must have happened to Steve. He can't have been around to look out for Jesse. What if he's in trouble? Cheryl might not know. I need to use your phone!" he said, looking up at William Haughton-Handley.
The man nodded mutely and handed over the phone. His own thoughts were filled with guilty relief that it was not really his son that the kidnappers had grabbed.
Amanda tried to think of something she could say to reassure Mark as he dialled, but she was stuck for words. She couldn't help but imagine the conditions Jesse was experiencing and the pain he must be suffering from the wounds. What had they done to him? And why hadn't Steve intervened? This had gone too far. She hoped that the photos would convince Cheryl to pull Jesse and Steve out of the situation.
