Freefall Read online

  Three red tents dominated the large space, each connected to a long, wide, flexible tube that fed into a dehumidifier. Inside the tents were three cars: a gold sixties Mercedes Pagoda, a black Ferrari 308, and a silver Aston Martin DB6.

  “My babies,” Terry enthused, gesturing toward the cars. “Put him on the bench,” he added, indicating a long, laminated workbench that was set against the north wall of the barn.

  An assortment of tools hung from pegs above the smooth surface, and they shook slightly as Frank and Danny deposited Mayfield.

  “Wake him up,” Terry said as he reached for a hacksaw.

  Danny balled his hand into a fist and drove it into Mayfield’s groin. Bailey shuddered as the man snapped to life with a shriek of pain. Mayfield curled up and tried to soothe himself, his movement releasing a stench that wafted from the folds of his leather jacket: blood, sweat, and misery.

  “Hold him down,” Terry instructed, and Frank and Danny unfolded the feeble man and pinned him to the counter.

  Bailey’s mouth ran dry, parched by the memory of his own ordeal. He felt uncomfortable watching Mayfield subjected to torture, but reminded himself that the man was at least responsible for, if not involved in, his own suffering.

  “Right,” Terry said, placing the saw blade against Mayfield’s little finger. “This is to get your attention.”

  Mayfield’s scream shocked Bailey, and he was taken aback to see Terry hacking through the man’s flesh. He looked at Melissa, who’d turned away, her hand pressed to her mouth as though trying to suppress vomit. Frank and Danny held the struggling man as Terry finished the job. Salamander kept his attention fixed to his phone, his thumb working as furiously as the blade, tapping out messages to unknown recipients. It was all over in less than twenty seconds, but Bailey knew the moment would last a lifetime. He had crossed a line.

  “Shut him up,” Terry told Danny.

  His son stuck his hand over Mayfield’s mouth and pressed down hard, until the spy’s scream had withered to a whimper.

  Terry held up the severed digit.

  “Right, now you know I’m not fucking about, you’re gonna answer every single question we ask you. Play silly bugger an’ I’ll cut off another finger. I get a sniff you’re not telling the truth, or that you’re fucking us about, and I’ll get my circular saw, you see it there?” He nodded toward a fearsome-looking machine mounted on thick pegs. “Bloody sharp, it is. I’ll use it to cut your arms an’ legs off and let you watch as we feed them to my pigs. You got me?”

  Sweat beaded Mayfield’s brow, and his eyes were wide with pain and fear, but he had the sense to nod.

  “Let him talk,” Terry said, and Danny removed his hand.

  Mayfield gulped like a dying fish taking in huge breaths of air.

  “What you told me in the cathedral, about the Foundation, was it true?” Bailey asked.

  Mayfield nodded, his red, tear-filled eyes looking toward the detective.

  “Are you a member?” Bailey continued.

  “Yes,” Mayfield replied, his voice weak and hoarse.

  “How many of you are there?”

  “I don’t know. I was recruited by Max Byrne—Pendulum.”

  “Who handles you now?”

  “I don’t know his name. It’s run from the States. Organized into cells. None of us see the full picture. They got me to recruit a bunch of guys from the Box.”

  “MI5,” Bailey explained to Terry. “Why?” he asked.

  “You’re a cop,” Mayfield rasped. “You see how it’s going. The rich are getting richer, and the rest of us are left fighting over the scraps.”

  “Why the Online Security Act? How’s that going to strike at capitalism?” Melissa interjected.

  “I don’t know,” Mayfield replied, looking nervously at Terry. “I just follow orders.”

  “You said you saw me at Wallace’s place,” Bailey continued. “You were helping Pendulum?”

  “We all were. He was one of us. A comrade. What happened to his sister . . . when he told me about it, I offered to kill them myself,” Mayfield revealed.

  “How do you make contact?” Bailey asked.

  “Secure private network. Encrypted with a daily key.”

  “Where’s Francis? Is he still alive?” Melissa asked.

  Mayfield hesitated, his face twisted by pain and indecision.

  “Let me help you remember,” Terry said, pressing the saw blade against Mayfield’s ring finger.

  “He’s at a safe house near Oxford,” Mayfield said hurriedly. “Three guards. Ground floor, back left room.”

  “How many have you compromised?” Bailey asked.

  “My cell? Maybe two dozen. Politicians, journalists, police.”

  Bailey shook his head in disbelief. “How?”

  “I get sent information. Your friend Greene,” Mayfield said, directing his remarks to Melissa. “Early in her career she was involved in the cover-up of a pedophile ring.”

  “You’re lying.” Melissa stepped forward, and Bailey thought for a moment that she was about to strike the man. “Sylvia would never do something like that.”

  “She did. She was just as corrupt and rotten as the people she exposed,” Mayfield said.

  Terry punched him in the mouth.

  “Did you kill her?” Bailey asked.

  Mayfield stared back, full of indignation, until Terry applied a little pressure with the saw.

  “We knew she was going to expose us. She wouldn’t back down.”

  “And David Harris?” Melissa interjected.

  “That was your fault,” Mayfield said spitefully. “We had to shut him up before you got to him.”

  Bailey shook his head in disgust and stepped away from the bench, signaling to Melissa and Salamander to join him.

  “Terry’s right,” he told them. “We need to break this story. It’s the only hope we’ve got of clearing our names and exposing this blackmail ring. And when we’ve done that, I’m bringing this guy in to stand trial.”

  “You sure?” Terry asked quietly. “People like him don’t see jail. I’ll serve justice better.”

  “I can’t do that,” Bailey replied. “I’m already over a line I said I’d never cross. People need to know what he’s done. I have to believe the system won’t fail us.”

  “But we need to rescue Francis first,” Melissa insisted. “If we put this on the front page they might—”

  “Yeah,” Bailey agreed. “They might kill him in retaliation. You in?” he asked Salamander.

  “Of course,” his friend replied. “We can’t do business with our faces all over the evening news. We gotta fix this.”

  “OK. Melissa—”

  “It’s Mel,” Melissa interrupted. “After what we’ve been through, I think you know me well enough now.”

  “Mel,” Bailey smiled. “How’d you feel about staying here and questioning this guy? Get the names of everyone he recruited, all the people they’ve blackmailed, details of how they helped Pendulum—anything and everything he knows.”

  “OK,” she replied.

  “Make sure Terry don’t kill him,” Salamander said. “Least, not right now,” he added darkly. “Frank, Danny,” he called to the two men. “Get the safe house address off our friend there and then meet us outside.”

  Bailey heard a vehicle rolling across the gravel and hurried to the door to see the bright lights of a car. Salamander joined him.

  Cullen heaved himself out of the vehicle. He was in a fresh red tracksuit, which clung tightly to his muscular frame.

  “Ya get ya’self patched up?” Salamander asked.

  “Just about. Doctor Death’s off his head,” Cullen announced. “Almost stuck me in the eye with a needle.”

  “They’re in a place called Cuddesdon,” Danny announced. “Sounds like something off Harry Potter.”

  “Jimmy, how bad was it?” Salamander asked, placing a hand on the huge man’s arm.

  “All right, Sal,” Cullen replied. “The
bullet passed right through. Didn’t hit nothin’ vital.”

  “Just your brain, then,” Danny noted, provoking Cullen’s ire.

  “Ya feel ready for work?” Salamander asked.

  Cullen nodded.

  “Ya comin’ with us. Danny, I want ya to stay with ya dad. Get this guy to spill,” Salamander said.

  Danny nodded and went to join his father at the workbench.

  “Let’s go,” Salamander told the others.

  “Bailey,” Melissa said, as Salamander, Frank, and Cullen went outside.

  The detective hung back.

  “Be careful,” she warned, her eyes alive with concern.

  Bailey nodded. “You too.”

  He hurried across the gravel and joined Salamander in the back of the Range Rover.

  “We can go alone. Ya sure ya want to do this?” his friend asked.

  Bailey nodded and swung the door closed. “I’m in.”

  Salamander pursed his lips thoughtfully and signaled to Frank, who put the car in gear and drove away from the farm. Bailey glanced over his shoulder and saw Melissa standing in the doorway of the barn, her silhouetted curves making him wish they’d met under different circumstances.

  There’s still time, he thought, as the car sped into the night.

  61

  A dark corridor, the walls wet to touch, the air fetid. Light ahead, the faint outline of an open door. The sound of someone whimpering just loud enough to hear. Wallace’s feet trudged on, even though his mind told him to run the other way. He wasn’t in control of his body, but nonetheless, he tried to swallow the rising fear which was building to a scream. He was by the door, his hand reaching out, touching the moist wood. When he glanced at his fingertips, he saw they were covered in sticky blood. The door swung open silently, revealing a filthy bare mattress in the middle of a room whose edges were shrouded in endless shadow. Wallace’s autonomous feet carried him closer to the mattress, toward a battered naked figure who lay on its squalid surface, hunched in the fetal position. He knew who it was. He recognized her legs, her arms and her hair, which fell in lank tresses against patches of dried blood. Run, he screamed inwardly, willing his legs to comply. But they carried on, forcing him within sight of her face. He tried to look away, but his head wouldn’t move. It was as though rock-steady hands were holding his jaws, and, like an unruly dog, he was being compelled to confront the mess he’d made. He welled up when he saw her: Christine Ash, lying broken, near death. He tried to reach out a hand, but his arms stayed firmly by his sides.

  A thunderous bang shook the space, jolting Ash’s body. Wallace heard the sound from another place, a world beyond his nightmares.

  Another jolt, and this one shattered Ash and the mattress, dispersing everything into blackness, as his conscious mind woke.

  Wallace opened his eyes, convinced the noise that had roused him from his nightmare had been real. He tensed, listening closely, his eyes growing accustomed to the dim, orange light of his Fresh City Hotel room. His body trembled with the lingering effects of his terrible dream. When he heard another loud crash, and the splintering of wood, he sprang from the bed. Three shadows were rushing into his room. As they emerged from the dark hallway into the dim light that bled through the thin drape, Wallace was immediately transfixed by the sight of their Pendulum masks.

  Two of them pressed forward while Wallace’s mind struggled to comprehend what was happening. His heart thundered and his legs shook as they laid heavy hands on him, pulling him forward by his arms. Wallace’s stomach flipped, and his head went light as he saw the third man draw a silenced pistol. The other two masked men were pulling him toward the gun, which was being leveled in his direction.

  The first gunshot shocked Wallace almost as much as it did the man holding his right arm, who whipped round to see his companion fall down dead, a smoking hole torn through the front of his mask.

  “Hey!” the shocked man exclaimed, wheeling round to face the shooter.

  His cry was the last thing that passed his lips. A bullet tore through his cheek and burst through the back of his skull. It was swiftly followed by another that ripped through his neck. His arms flew up instinctively and he clutched at his throat, making a grim wet choking sound as he fell to the floor.

  Wallace watched in shock as the man writhed at his feet.

  “We need to go,” the shooter said calmly, but his voice seemed muted and distant.

  Wallace was reminded of the explosion outside the Marwand Compound in Kandahar when the shock and severity of what had happened seemed to thrust him into a dream. His breathing was shallow and rapid, his heart thundered and his body was shaking, but his mind was clear, detached, and suddenly full of purpose.

  He had to know.

  “Come on,” the shooter urged.

  Wallace ignored the man and reached a trembling hand down toward the man dying at his feet. He brushed the man’s feeble hands away and felt for the edge of the mask. He had to see.

  “We don’t have time for this.”

  Wallace sensed the shooter’s gloved hand on his shoulder, but he resisted the pull and lifted the Pendulum mask, peeling it away as though he were skinning a chicken. The face beneath was contorted in pain, a gaping wound in its left cheek. The gold that grimaced back at him left the man’s identity in no doubt. It was Smokie’s lieutenant, Toothless.

  “What did you do to her?” Wallace cried, surprising himself by grabbing the wounded man by his bloody throat. “What did you do to her!”

  The shooter pulled Wallace off the dying man. “Don’t do this, John.”

  Wallace stumbled back, suddenly very aware of the blood on his hands. When he looked down, Toothless had stopped moving, and his eyes were lifeless and still.

  “Come on, we need to get out of here,” the shooter reiterated, but Wallace fell on to the floor, broken by the experience.

  The shooter pocketed the pistol as he crouched down. He removed his Pendulum mask, and Wallace registered the man’s face but couldn’t piece together what had happened and why he’d killed two of his own.

  “Ethan Moore?” Wallace asked uncertainly, recalling the name of the man who’d posed as Max Byrne’s nurse.

  He launched himself with the savagery of a wild animal, but Ethan sidestepped the attack and Wallace fell flat on his face.

  “You’re one of them!” Wallace yelled. “I saw you in the picture with Max, Rosen and Smokie!”

  “My real name is Ethan Pope,” the shooter replied, trying to pull Wallace to his feet. “And yes, I did serve with those men. I’ve been led down a dark path and I’m trying to make it right. Come on, John. There’s still a chance we can save her.”

  Wallace looked up, hardly daring to hope. “Who?”

  “Christine Ash,” Pope said softly. “She’s alive.”

  62

  Alice sat on the low bunk, clasping her knees. The sound of indistinct voices permeated the cell. The building used to be a garage. It was made of cheap concrete blocks, and was located at the very edge of the Clan’s land. The windowless cells lined the west of the building, and small high windows were cut into the north and south ends of the corridor that ran alongside them. There was a desk set into an alcove near the door, where the duty steward was allowed to read his or her devotions, setting an example for those in the cells. Only Manny watched television, and Alice wondered how he avoided being put in one of the disciplinary cells himself. Maybe his sly smile kept him out of trouble?

  Sitting in the cell nearest the door, Alice was far from the bright sunshine that came through the high windows, and she had spent three days living in twilight. The nights were worse. If Manny wasn’t on duty, the cell block was pitch black, and her mind conjured terrible monsters to fill the deep darkness.

  She could feel her cell starting to warm up. The California sun baked the block, and by midday the air became so thick with heat that Alice spent the afternoons gulping down shallow breaths, sweating, and praying for cooling nightfall, even thoug
h the darkness would fill her cell with terrors.

  She heard more voices, and thought of the people outside, carrying on with their lives, completing their devotions, finishing their chores, smiling and laughing, while she sweltered in her disciplinary cell. She was the only one in the block, and for today at least, she was the only failed soul in the entire Clan.

  She wondered whether her mother ever thought about her while she was locked up. Would Nicholas ever catch her glancing toward the building, fretting about her daughter? Alice doubted it. Her mother was now a very obedient woman, devoted to Nicholas and his faith.

  Alice hoped that Manny would soon take over as duty steward. She longed for television to distract her from the roasting heat. Esther was sitting in the alcove, her eyes closed, her palms pressed flat against the desk as she rocked gently back and forth, her lips moving rapidly in prayer. The block door opened, blinding Alice with bright light, and when her eyes adjusted, she saw her father standing in the doorway, the golden sunshine blazing through his kaftan. Alice shivered and shrank into herself.

  “Father,” Esther said, hurriedly getting to her feet.

  It unsettled Alice to hear all these grown-ups calling Nicholas father. Maybe he would be a better father to her if he wasn’t spreading himself so thin?

  “Leave us, Esther.” Nicholas’s voice was melodic and soft.

  Alice saw that his eyes were wide and distant, as they sometimes were after ministry.

  Esther bustled out of the building, bowing as she passed Nicholas. When she was gone, he approached, allowing the door to slam shut behind him. The cell block was returned to twilight, and the clang of metal on metal made Alice jump.

  Nicholas took a key from the alcove and unlocked the door to Alice’s cell. She felt the crunchy concrete wall against her back as she recoiled. If he saw her fear, he pretended not to notice, and crouched beside the low bunk.

  “Do you know why you’re here?” he asked, his voice little more than a whisper.

  Alice took a deep breath, suddenly aware that the wrong answer would be painful. “Because I’ve been bad,” she replied hesitantly.