One Dead Witness

Chapter Four

Steve Kruger fidgeted, trying to make the radio harness a little more comfortable beneath his armpit. Though allegedly ‘body moulded’ and well hidden by his jacket, it was tight and unwieldy, as though he were carrying a set of books. It was a psychological problem Kruger had always had on surveillance, right back to his undercover cop days; he always thought that the equipment would be completely obvious to the public and constantly expected to be approached and exposed.

He had begun to sweat already.

Myrna came into the office wearing a smart, stylish suit in beige with a very short skirt displaying her excellent legs. She had been in the ladies’ restroom fitting her radio harness underneath her blouse, next to her skin. Kruger peered at her chest — for professional reasons, obviously and was relieved to find he could not detect any bulges there other than legitimate ones.

She executed a pirouette for him.

‘ Can’t see a thing,’ he admitted.

He slid the miniature encrypted radio into the pouch, then threaded the fine wire of the press-to-talk button down his sleeve and into the palm of his left hand. He secured it with flesh-coloured Band Aid, adjusting it minutely so he could grip it and comfortably press the button with his thumb. A wire-free earpiece was already implanted in his ear and a microphone — doubling as a tie pin — was pinned to his tie. In order to transmit he had to talk down to his chest without falling into the trap of mumbling his words.

He stood to attention and tugged down the hem of his jacket. He cocked his head at Myrna.

‘ Obviously I can see the bulge when you do that,’ she said witheringly.

Kruger let go. The jacket bounced back to its normal shape.

‘ That’s better.’

He picked up the pistol from his desk top — a Sig Sauer P230 in. 765 Browning calibre, the standard blue-black version with an eight-round magazine capacity. It was the gun all his operatives were issued with whenever necessary, and had been chosen by Kruger following his Army and police experience. A lightweight weapon, rugged and very simple to handle and a good size for concealed carrying.

He clicked the magazine out, emptied and re-loaded it so he was satisfied. After slotting the mag back into the butt, he placed the gun into the holster on his belt at the small of his back. Another piece of equipment hopefully hidden by his jacket.

Myrna had done exactly the same.

She smiled at him.

‘ Sorry about all this,’ he said with a pathetic shrug.

‘ We all make mistakes. Let’s just hope this puts yours behind us all.’

There was a light knock on the door. The three other members of that night’s team sauntered confidently into the room.

There were the two brothers, Jimmy and Dale Armstrong — two ex-cops with a lot of SWAT and undercover experience behind them. Then there was Kelly Marks, former employee of Bell in the area of Communications Engineering. All three had been fully briefed.

They were bang on time. Kruger greeted them warmly. They had been approached for their expertise and trustworthiness… and, of course, they were volunteers because Kruger would not make anyone act against Bussola against their will.

‘ Ev’rybody a-rarin’?’ Kruger asked.

He received assent from all.

‘ Let’s go then,’ he said.

Danny stirred uncomfortably in her double bed.

She had been there six hours, had trouble getting to sleep initially, and once there, had problems remaining. She tossed and rolled, sweating uncomfortably into the pillow and duvet. Too hot, then too cold. Never in quite the most comfortable of positions.

She was feeling sore from her encounter with Sands. Physically and mentally.

Her face smarted from the open-hander he had given her. The blow the base of her spine received when he’d dropped her onto the ground had jarred the whole of her body and her lumber region throbbed. The bump on the back of her head had transformed into a tender swelling the size of a ping-pong ball and was giving her a roaring headache despite the Anadin.

And she was angry — deep down and all over. Why had she let herself get taken by surprise like that! She should have known what a sneaky, low-down bastard Sands could be — after all, hadn’t he been having an adulterous affair for several months? And why hadn’t she fought back? She was perfectly capable of it. And now, damnit, she was indebted to Henry Christie. For God’s sake, she could fight her own battles, didn’t need a man to come to her rescue.

Danny sighed as she remembered the heavy figure of Sands straddling her and admitted to herself that she had been well and truly beaten. It was a good job Henry had come along, but (and here she thumped her pillow with frustration), she did not want to be beholden to anyone, let alone a man, even if he was a nice guy. The frustration turned to a giggle as she pictured Henry dancing about, holding his sore fist… and then the laugh faded. A feeling of dread seeped into the pit of her stomach when she recalled Sands’s body out cold on the garage floor… and she knew it wasn’t over.

She rubbed her eyes, squinted at the digital alarm clock. 4.03, the green figures informed her. Time to get up in just over three hours’ time.

She cursed, gingerly resettled herself in the bed, eyes wide open, all senses switched on full blast.

‘ Sleep… sleep… deep sleep,’ she willed herself rhythmically.

From outside she heard a noise which sent a shock right through her. A kind of scraping that put her teeth on edge. Metal on metal. Then a cracking, snapping sound, like a dry twig being broken in two.

She listened hard. Her body tensed up.

Silence.

She relaxed, breathed out, certain she was hearing things that were not there.

It came again, the scraping.

She flung back the duvet and shot out of bed in an instant, crossing the room, drawing the curtain back just far enough to see out. Her car was parked in the short driveway in front of her house, partly obscured by a tree in the garden.

She put a hand over her eyes to eliminate the glare from the nearby street lamp.

Nothing. No movement. Bugger all.

Just imagination. Or cats screwing.

She uttered an expletive, let the curtain fall back, trotted to the 100, then dropped wearily back into bed.

At 4.10 she closed her eyes and was immediately asleep.

At 4.11 a full house brick, expertly aimed, exploded through her bedroom window, shattering glass with a sound like a shotgun blast. It powered its way past the curtain and landed on Danny’s pillow, only inches from her face, showering her with glass.

A particularly nasty shard sliced into her left cheek.

‘ This is nice, Steve, I’m really impressed,’ Myrna nodded approvingly. She heaped another forkful of the excellent Arroz con pollo into her mouth and licked her lips after she had consumed it.

‘ Yeah, and it’s also owned by Mario Bussola,’ he said, adding begrudgingly, ‘and every damn cent we spend in here goes from our accounts into his. We are helping to support his lifestyle.’

‘ Aw, it don’t stop it being nice though,’ Myrna said through another mouthful of chicken. ‘We might as well get something good out of this before we all lose our ‘jobs,’ she concluded wickedly.

Kruger frowned, unhappy at being unable to relax. Had the circumstances been different he could really have enjoyed the evening and no doubt have chanced it with Myrna, even though she was strictly a ‘no no’ on his list as far as women were concerned — i.e. married and employed by him. A very uncool combination.

He tried to chill out and soak in the atmosphere. It wasn’t easy, not least because of the radio under his left arm, gun at his back, earpiece in his ear and transmit button stuck to his palm.

The Club Montoya was a nightclub situated in the basement of the Hotel Montoya. The hotel was perhaps one of Bussola’s finest establishments, if not the finest of the seven hotels he owned. It was also one of South Beach’s hottest locations. The hotel was Art Deco done to death, all the rage with the young business end of Miami, with four themed restaurants, two pools, a sports complex and very, very superior-priced rooms.

The nightclub, open from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. every day, and soundproofed from the hotel, had become very much the place for everyone who was anyone to be seen in. Gays, Latinos, cross-dressers. Even white male heterosexuals.

It had a dozen bars and two restaurants, one of which clients had to skirt through to enter the nightclub proper. This was the one in which Kruger and Myrna were sitting. It served expensive, but highly palatable Cuban food.

Kruger hoped the information given by Felicity about her wayward husband’s whereabouts ‘sometime tonight’ was good gen. Otherwise it would be a wasted evening and Kruger wanted to spend as little time and effort on a case which would bring his company nothing in terms of money or kudos.

He hoped to end it tonight by jumping onto Bussola’s trail, finding him with a piece of unofficial ass, reporting the news back to Felicity, together with some evidence, and then — zap! — calling it quits.

Kruger was enough of a realist, though, to know things were unlikely to turn out as smoothly as that.

‘ You told hubby you’re dining out with the boss tonight?’ Kruger smiled.

‘ Of course. He’s away in Salt Lake City for a couple of days at a seminar. We spoke on the phone earlier.’

‘ Is he very liberal?’

‘ He trusts me, Steve.’ She leaned forwards, elbow points on the table, and rested her chin on her thumbs. ‘He knows I would never be unfaithful with you.’ She stressed the last two words with a light sneer.

Kruger raised his eyebrows. But before he could respond with a feisty remark…

‘ He’s here!’ Their earpieces blurted into life, making them both jump out of their skins.

It was Kelly’s voice, broadcasting from the back of the comms van parked a little way down the street outside the hotel. She commanded a good view of the entrance of the Hotel Montoya through the lens of a high-powered night intensifier camera mounted in the side of the vehicle. She was sitting in the back of the van in a cosy little room with a bank of miniature TV screens and radio equipment. ‘He’s getting out the back of his car… accompanied by another guy and two bodyguards… they’re going into the hotel… they’re out of my line of sight… now!’

‘ And coming into the foyer,’ Jimmy Armstrong said, taking over the commentary from his position half-hidden by a huge marble pillar near the reception desk.

‘ I hope the two assholes with him are not the two who were with Liss yesterday, the ones who kidnapped me,’ Kruger mused, thinking out loud. ‘If they are, we might as well call it off right now. Damn, shoulda thought about that.’ He wasn’t too concerned about Bussola slapping eyes on him because Kruger believed the mobster had never seen him before.

‘ Now he’s headin’ towards the club entrance,’ Jimmy continued. ‘It’s his usual firepower,’ he added, referring to the bodyguards, meaning they were Bussola’s regular minders.

Kruger sat upright. He reached out, gently took Myrna’s hands and held them across the table. He looked into her bright brown sparkling eyes.

‘ Kruger received,’ he said into his radio. He tried to give Myrna a look of love tinged with lust.

Myrna eased herself into her role. She leaned further forwards, making the scenario seem more intimate, but also giving herself a good, unobstructed view over Kruger’s shoulder to the club entrance.

Bussola, A.N. Other, and two bodyguards came into sight.

‘ Here he is,’ she whispered to Kruger, fluttering her eyelids. ‘Got him,’ she said into the miniature mike which was positioned, secured by tape, between her breasts. In her present lean-forwards position, Kruger could see it there. By angling his head forwards a few more degrees he could have spoken into it. He caught his breath and concentrated on the task in hand.

‘ He’s coming towards us,’ Myrna warned, seeing that Bussola and his small entourage had entered the club.

Myrna lifted an arm languidly and placed a cool hand around Kruger’s neck. She scratched him naughtily, drew his face a little nearer to hers, then suddenly pulled him even closer across the small table so that her mouth was next to his ear and his mouth was only millimetres away from her cleavage. He became very hot.

She pretended to whisper love things into his ear.

‘ He’s only feet away now,’ she said. ‘I confirm he’s with another guy and two goons.’

Kruger was content to receive the information from his present position.

‘ Now walking around the perimeter of the restaurant.’ Kruger felt Myrna’s big soft mouth brushing his ear. Her voice became very husky. Her lips tickled him as they moved. ‘He’s right behind you, babe,’ she murmured. ‘I didn’t realise he was such a big, fat bastard, and the guy he’s with is enormous too… I could reach out and touch them

… now he’s gone past… approaching the entrance to the Tropicana Bar.’

As Bussola and company went through the doors to the bar, a roar of loud music boomed out.

‘ And now I’ve got him,’ Dale Armstrong confirmed from his position inside the bar.

Myrna leaned back and pushed Kruger gently away.

He blew a long breath and loosened his neck-tie, sadly aware that he had been as close as he would ever get to Myrna’s breasts.

‘ Enjoy, big boy?’

‘ Not in the slightest,’ Kruger lied, wiping his forehead with his napkin.

Danny held the flannel tightly against her bleeding cheek. Though some thirty minutes had passed since the brick had crashed through the bedroom window, she was still shivering with shock.

She had dressed in a tracksuit with her dressing-gown over it and wrapped tightly. Even so she was very cold and numb.

She eased the flannel away from her face to inspect the damage in the mirror. No doubt about it, medical treatment was required. The cut was only about three quarter’s of an inch long, but was quite deep. She prayed it would not need stitches.

Blood oozed out of it immediately.

She replaced the bloody flannel, stared blankly at herself, thinking what a god-awful-tired-weary mess she looked.

‘ Dan?’ came a voice from the foot of the stairs. It was the night-duty Patrol Sergeant, Lesley Elvin, one of Danny’s best friends. She, along with two of her PCs, had attended Danny’s 999.

‘ Yep?’ Danny came out of the bathroom and teetered unsteadily down the stairs towards Lesley who waited at the foot, a concerned expression on her face.

‘ You okay, honey?’

Danny nodded, knowing she wasn’t.

‘ You look as white as a sheet.’

‘ I’m okay,’ she insisted.

Lesley shrugged. ‘A twenty-four-hour glazier will be here soon to board up the window. Once it’s done I would not recommend you sleep in that bed until you’re sure all the glass has been removed… and you need to go to hospital to get that cleaned up. There could be some glass in it.’ She pointed at Danny’s face.

‘ I don’t think I’m very likely to go back to bed now. I’ll probably drop in to Casualty before work.’

‘ Do you want a lift? I can arrange one.’

Danny placed a hand on her friend’s shoulder. ‘No, it’s okay. I’ll see to it myself.’

Lesley’s personal radio crackled, requesting her to attend the custody office at Blackpool to assist with processing some prisoners.

‘ Gotta go, hun.’

‘ Yeah, thanks.’

‘ The lads’ve had a good look around… can’t see anyone. I’ll tell ‘em to keep a passing eye on you until we go off-duty at six, though I doubt there’ll be a problem.’

‘ Mmm.’ Danny sounded unsure.

‘ You got something to tell me?’ the Sergeant enquired. She was usually pretty intuitive with things like this.

Danny shook her head.

She went to the front door with Lesley, offered her thanks, watched her walk away up the driveway past the Mercedes. Something in the light, the shimmer of the trees against the street lamp focused Danny’s eyes on the front radiator grille of the car. For a moment Danny could not see what it was that made her look. Then she groaned out loud and rushed to the car.

Lesley spun round.

‘ The bastard!’ Danny uttered.

She stared down at the top of the radiator grille and the jagged stump of metal upon which the famous three-pointed star used to proudly sit. It had been snapped off.

Danny’s mouth tensed angrily. Anger boiled up inside her.

When she checked the rest of the car, she found what she feared. A track of scratches had been gouged down both sides, from front wing to rear, making some sense of the noises Danny had heard earlier.

Kruger thought it pointless to leave Kelly outside in the comms van whilst everyone else was inside the club and they knew the precise whereabouts of their target. Accordingly he teamed her up with Jimmy Armstrong and, as a couple, they came into the club after a lengthy period of queuing.

Dale played the part of a single, unattached male, targeting various females throughout the evening. It was a part he played well.

Meanwhile, Kruger and Myrna danced the night away. He began to enjoy himself, despite sweating profusely because he was unable to remove his jacket for obvious reasons.

Keeping tabs on Bussola was easy.

The mobster, his fat friend, and the two bodyguards occupied a table in one corner of the room, constantly being attended by waitresses. The two minders remained detached and alert, whilst their boss and his buddy were fawned upon by a stream of sexily-clad women, who mostly looked like hookers. The two men spent some time on the dance floor, gyrating as rudely as their bulk would allow with a number of these women who all seemed to be very impressed with them.

Kruger hazarded an educated guess that if Bussola was playing away at all, it was probably with prostitutes or women who were only interested in screwing him because of his exalted position in low-life. Having been fucked by the biggest mobster in Florida was probably quite a thrill, Kruger assumed. They were probably not any sort of threat to Felicity, other than by way of sexually transmitted diseases.

Myrna enjoyed herself too. This was the first time in years she’d been to a nightclub and although it was work which brought her here, she decided to get full value.

She moved slinkily to the beat. So slinkily that Kruger often found himself transfixed by her mesmeric gyrations. The sweat poured down from her scalp, temple, neck, shoulders and cleavage, making Kruger’s tongue flicker in anticipation of being able to lick it off her body.

So near yet so far.

It was just as well he was a man of high moral values, otherwise he could easily have been driven by lust.

Just before two o’clock, Bussola and company made a move to leave.

Kruger and his employees left quickly, discreetly, ahead of him.

Kelly returned to the comms van; Dale and Jimmy went to a car each. Kruger and Myrna got into Myrna’s Lexus.

They had only a short wait.

Bussola’s stretch limo drew up to the hotel entrance. A doorman opened the rear door in readiness. The two bodyguards appeared ahead of Bussola, checking.

Moments later the man himself emerged from the hotel. His friend — or whoever the hell the other guy happened to be — was at his shoulder. They squeezed into the limo and the bodyguards got into the front seat next to the driver.

‘ No women,’ Kruger observed. ‘He’s had plenty of opportunity to pick one up.’

‘ Perhaps he’s faithful after all,’ Myrna suggested.

‘ And lions don’t have big teeth.’

The limo pulled smoothly away into the night.

Kruger’s team began to follow.

Despite the early hours, tailing the limo through Miami was an absolute breeze because Miami is one of those cities which never sleeps and the amount of traffic about was phenomenal. Kruger found the experience exhilarating, though he would have preferred to have been behind the wheel rather than passenger. It was too many years since he had been involved in mobile surveillance. He’d almost forgotten how much fun it was. He was also pleased to note that his people had following techniques off a ‘T’ — because he’d taught them all he knew.

The limo worked its way out of South Beach, down to MacArthur Causeway, over the Miami Channel and into the city. From there it meandered south. For a few blocks Kruger thought the tail had been spotted, particularly when the limo executed a series of V-turns, sudden stops and block-loops. The team held its nerve and after five minutes of these anti-surveillance manoeuvres continued its journey. Bussola was obviously going through the motions as he probably did on every journey he undertook. However, they were moves that a good following team should be ready for and act accordingly.

The limo hit the Latin Quarter and eventually landed in Shenandoah where it stopped outside a parade of rundown shops and offices. Jimmy Armstrong just happened — to be the eyeball at the time and the rest of the team, following his instructions, parked discreetly in an arc 200 to 500 metres away, but not in visual contact with the limo — which was intensely frustrating for all concerned. They had to rely totally on Jimmy’s commentary.

‘ It’s like some sorta shop,’ Jimmy said over the radio, trying to describe the place where Bussola’s limo had pulled up. ‘Low rise… dunno… difficult to see properly without getting much closer.’

‘ Roger,’ Kruger acknowledged.

‘ Well, boss, what we gonna do?’ Myrna asked with a yawn. Since leaving the club her energy had dissipated and she needed her bed quite badly. Suddenly she felt her age.

‘ Sit tight, I suppose.’

Myrna slid down her seat, reclined it and closed her eyes.

Jimmy watched all the occupants of the limo, with the exception of the driver, get out and go into what was probably once a shop with a couple of floors above which could have been storerooms, offices or apartments. The shop at ground floor, with a massive plate-glass window white-washed from the inside, seemed to be derelict.

Jimmy reported there was definitely a light on at both ground-floor and first-floor level.

To Kruger it sounded like it could be some kind of illegal gambling joint, but he had heard lots of things about Bussola from his time as a cop and never was there a whisper of gambling. Everything else imaginable in the criminal line, but not gambling.

Still, you never could tell. Money was money to people like Bussola and where it came from was immaterial.

‘ Update,’ Kruger snapped into his radio. It had been a good thirty seconds since Jimmy had finished speaking and Kruger was getting crabby.

‘ Very little going on… hang fire, the limo’s pulling away without our man. He could be settled here for a while.’

‘ Is there much other traffic?’

‘ Naw — quiet as a grave.’

‘ Pedestrians?’

‘ Nope.’

‘ Anything else?’ Kruger said desperately.

‘ An all-night drugstore at the end of the block.’

‘ Dale — did you receive that?’ Kruger asked the other Armstrong brother.

‘ Affirmative.’

‘ Go check the place over, will ya? See if you can find out anything — discreetly, of course. Treat yourself to a packet of Jiffs while you’re in there. Put ‘em down to expenses.’

‘ Roger. I need to renew my supply… the last ones I bought have gone right past their “best before” date.’

Kruger and Myrna chuckled.

A few seconds later, Dale’s car cruised slowly past. Kruger settled back to wait for an update.

Five minutes later Dale was back on the air.

‘ The guy from the drugstore thinks it’s a telephone sales place now. Used to be a barber shop. Closed down about eighteen months ago. Guy didn’t have anything else to say voluntarily. I got the impression he knows who owns the place and he ain’t too happy about divulging. And I’ve walked past and tried the front door. Locked.’

‘ Idiot,’ Kruger said to Myrna before replying over the radio to Dale. ‘Received and understood. Now you pull outta there and don’t try any more stunts.’

Dale acknowledged.

Kruger was puzzled. ‘Telephone sales?’ he said with disbelief. He looked thoughtfully at Myrna. ‘Telephone sales at this time-a day?’

She shrugged… and something dawned on Kruger. He sat bolt upright and thumped the dash triumphantly. ‘Not tele-sales — tele-sex! Let’s check it out. I’m intrigued.’

Tracey was hot stuff. She was one of the favourites on the sex-line. This was because of her northern English accent, now so familiar to millions of Americans through the medium of the sit-corn F rasier and the character of Daphne, whose dubious vowels are supposed to originate in Manchester.

Tracey was in constant demand from a stream of men who happily jerked themselves off with the assistance of her voice, a telephone and whatever aids they had available.

She had just finished a particularly horrible call with one of her regulars who purported to be a Texan billionaire. He was on the line every night and if he was calling from Houston, as he claimed, it would be costing him a fortune… which, of course, was the whole idea, with Bussola and the phone company splitting the revenue.

Easy money. Big profits.

‘ Keep ‘ em on the line!’ one poster proclaimed on the wall in front of Tracey.

‘ Premature ejaculations we don’t need!’ said another.

And Tracey kept the Texan on the line. Right from the moment she allowed him to rip her clothes off, unpack the whip and vibrator and gently eased the latter up her ass. Thirty-five minutes later, as decreed by the customer, Tracey changed her mind about sex and entered the ‘rape’ phase where the Texan beat up on her — and still managed to make her come at the same time as he did. Except that he really did come all over his belly and she faked a multiple orgasm whilst at the same time chewing on a slice of pepperoni pizza.

She slammed the phone down, closed her eyes wearily and sniffed up through her cocaine-damaged nostrils.

A line of lights flashed on her little switchboard, demanding her attention. She frowned and ignored them, leaning back in her telephonist’s chair and glancing down the row of booths. There were a dozen in all, each one soundproofed from its neighbours, around the walls of the former barbershop which still smelled of hairspray.

Each booth was occupied by an experienced sex-telephonist busy handling calls. Leaning a little further back, Tracey could hear some of the things going on. Grunts, panting, screams of pain and passion, loving whispers, sexual demands. The noises were like the combination of a zoo and a blue-movie soundtrack.

The telephonists — two male, the remainder female — came from a range of backgrounds, each with their own personal reason for being there, not least of which for all of them was that they were paid tax-free. There were single mothers, supermarket cashiers, a former prostitute with a tongue of silk, and a couple of out-of-work actors trying to make ends meet whilst ‘resting’.

And they were all good at sextalk: chat which could make the customer — always a man — ejaculate whilst imagining a vivid sexy scenario. They could ad lib at will, immediately adopting the role required by the caller, always giving their best shot.

‘ Answer yer fuckin’ lines,’ Tracey’s earphones informed her.

She looked over her shoulder and shot a sneering glance at the supervisor who was sitting behind a large switchboard on a small raised dais at the back of the room. From there, the supervisor could dip into all the workers’ calls, keeping a check by listening in… and also being able to tell when a telephonist wasn’t working.

And work they did. This was no easy option. It was draining, emotional toil. Twelve-hour stints. Continuous, consecutive calls. Constantly talking and listening to the weirdest fantasies imaginable and having the ability and imagination to match them. It was beginning to take its toll on Tracey that night as she suddenly found she needed the lift which only one thing could give her.

Bitch, she thought. She gave the supervisor a one-digit salute, ensuring she didn’t see it, of course. She ripped the headset off and stood up. ‘I need a piss,’ she announced and picked up her purse.

At that moment the front door opened.

Bussola, his two meat-head bodyguards and the other guy came in. They walked straight inside, completely ignoring the telephonists, went through a door at the back, down a short corridor and up the stairs beyond.

One of the bodyguards stayed at the door and sat down in a plastic chair.

Tracey watched the entrance of the men, completely astounded. She shook her head, hardly able to believe who had just walked through the door.

Two people she thought she would never see again.

Bussola and the man accompanying him.

Charlie Gilbert.

Charlie Fucking Gilbert.

The man she had once trusted. The man who had promised her the earth. Her guts coiled with the hatred she harboured for him.

Because look where she had ended up. At the age of nineteen she was working on a sex-chatline, verbally masturbating guys over the telephone wires.

Tracey walked numbly towards the seated bodyguard. He looked tiredly at her and stood up as she approached the door through which his boss had just gone.

‘ Where ya goin’, girl?’

‘ I need to pee,’ she said truthfully. ‘The toilet’s through there.’ It was — down along the ground-floor hallway, last door on the right.

The bodyguard raised his big square chin and dark bushy eyebrows in a kind of acknowledgement and nodded slightly. His eyes bore down the length of his broken nose. ‘How much d’ya cost, babe?’

‘ I’m too fuckin’ expensive for you, ya greasy dago,’ she responded, and tried to push past him. He grabbed her arm and pulled her roughly towards him, raising her up onto tiptoe so that her belly was at his groin level. He was already hard. She could feel it through her clothes.

‘ Don’t push your luck, babe. If I want you, I have you.’ His breath was enhanced by garlic.

Tracey uttered a short laugh of contempt, even though she was fully aware that she was very close to annoying him. Her eyes traversed slowly down to his hand, the big fat fingers squeezing like a vice around her bicep. ‘Let go.’

He eased his grip slowly. His mouth was open and his nostrils were dilating. Long hairs grew out of them. His ears also sprouted a bushy forest. He had blackheads on his nose and around his mouth. Specks of perspiration were dotted all over his face.

All these things Tracey saw as she regained her proper footing.

All these things made her cringe and find him utterly repulsive.

She edged past, through the door.

‘ And don’t go upstairs,’ he told her. ‘Or else.’

Kruger looked down at the object he held between his left forefinger and thumb.

It resembled a doll’s eye with a sty in one corner of it and was surrounded by a rubber sucker rather like the tip of a kid’s arrow, though it was half the diameter. In his right hand was a palm-sized portable TV which he flicked on. The tiny screen, four centimetres square, was fuzzy for a few moments then gradually cleared and came into focus, giving him a dear, monochrome, slug’s-eye view of the underside of his chin and his nostrils, transmitted from the lens he was holding in his fingers.

He pointed the lens towards a shop doorway and saw that image reproduced on the screen. Kruger was impressed. He could see why this was one of his top selling lines. It was like having an extra eye on the end of your fingers.

He was standing at the rear of the comms van which was parked in a quiet street. Myrna and Dale stood next to him. Kelly was in the van, the back doors being open. She peered over Kruger’s shoulder, looking at the tiny TV.

‘ Excellent,’ she said. ‘The lens has a powerful night intensifier built into it which self-focuses and adjusts to the available light. There’s a mike fitted in the lens too which can give pretty good results, even through glass.’

Kruger nodded approvingly. He was not sure if there would be any call to use the surveillance kit tonight, but decided to take it along just in case. ‘Are you receiving okay?’ he asked Kelly.

She turned into the van, switched on a monitor, made a couple of minor adjustments and the screen blinked into life. She saw exactly what Kruger saw on the mini screen. ‘Yep — no probs.’

Kruger looked at Myrna and Dale.

Like himself, they had changed into more appropriate clothing for the little foray ahead, having ditched their party gear for all black — jeans, T-shirts, jackets and sneakers which had been kept ready in the van for such an eventuality. ‘We play it by ear — literally,’ Kruger said. ‘We don’t know what the hell’s going on there. They could just be playing cards. We’ll leave Jimmy watching the front. Myself and Myrna will go to the rear of the property to see if there is any way of getting a view inside. Dale, you be our lookout, okay?’

Both nodded.

Myrna was now raring to go, having got her second wind.

‘ Anybody any further suggestions?’ Kruger asked.

They shook their heads.

‘ Let’s go then — and take care.’ He picked a set of aluminium extending ladders which were part of the van’s equipment store and hauled them over his shoulder.

Tracey took her time in the restroom. Her mind was in complete turmoil. She had never expected to see either of the two men again, particularly Gilbert. He had conned and tricked her, and used and ultimately abused her, then discarded her into the clutches of people who did it all over again. It was only through her strength of character that she had risen from the gutter to her present position — on the kerb of the sidewalk. But at least it was upwards.

She finished peeing and washed her hands carefully, soaping them thoroughly whilst she continued to think about Charlie Gilbert in particular.

She looked up from her hands and caught sight of her reflection in the cracked, dirty mirror above the washstand. She closed her eyes quickly, not wishing to see the ragged reflection of someone who had been a drug abuser from the age of thirteen. The skin sagging off the bone, sunken eyes, dried-up, wrinkled lips.

The reflection of a drug addict who had not yet died, but would do so, in the not-too-distant future. She opened her eyes and sneered at herself, briefly able to see the discoloured gums in her mouth.

She sniffed and blew her leaking nose on a paper towel. Above her was the sound of clumping feet moving about.

Her watery eyes rose towards the ceiling.

The alleyway behind the shops was pitch black. Briefly Kruger regretted not taking Kelly up on her offer of night-vision goggles. However, he took his time, allowed his eyes to adjust and used the night-eye in his fingers to assist himself and Myrna as they walked down the alley, monitoring their progress on the tiny TV screen.

She stayed at his shoulder, a cool hand gripping his bicep.

The extension ladders hung off his other shoulder.

He led the way without incident to the rear of Bussola’s place.

The building was pretty much as Kruger expected it to be, making him glad he’d brought the steps. This was a high-crime neighbourhood and the rear of the disused shop was boarded up with sheet steel, riveted for the rest of time — or until demolition — into the brickwork.

Fortunately, the first-floor windows were just that — windows. There were two, quite large, both with drapes drawn across and lights on behind, indicating occupation. Running below the windows was a metallic catwalk which formed part of the fire escape. The folding ladders which were an intrinsic part of the escape were secured at that level, out of reach from below.

Kruger swung the set of ladders off his shoulders and gently leaned them against the shop wall. He gazed upwards at the underside of the fire escape. Slowly, quietly, he eased out the ladder extension.

The rubber tips of the ladders rested on the outer edge of the fire escape.

‘ Hold ‘em tight,’ he whispered to Myrna. He slid the night-eye and TV into his pocket and started to climb, rung by careful rung. When he was almost at the top, he hoisted himself onto the fire escape and dropped silently onto the catwalk.

He reached through the rails and held the top of the ladders as Myrna ascended.

She came up nimbly, leapt over the rail and landed next to Kruger, crouching down without a sound. Kruger relayed their progress to the team via the radio, whispering his message.

The two of them shuffled along the catwalk on all fours towards the first window. They stopped underneath it and listened. No noise emanated from inside; nothing seemed to be going on. Kruger took a chance. He eased himself up and tried to see in by way of a minute crack down the edge of the drapes. He saw nothing. He sidled along to the centre of the window and peered in through the small aperture where the drapes hadn’t quite met.

Instinctively he dropped back down.

‘ One of Bussola’s bodyguards,’ he whispered to Myrna. ‘He’s sitting reading. I couldn’t see anything else.’

Myrna helped herself to a quick look, confirming Kruger’s observation. The guy was reading a hard-core porn magazine.

Kruger pointed to the next window, some ten feet along the catwalk. Myrna nodded. Again on hands and knees they set off. Myrna stayed right up Kruger’s ass and almost kissed it when he suddenly stopped in front of her and rose to listen at the next window.

This time he could clearly hear voices.

He could not see into the room, but there was a crack of light where the drapes met carelessly in the middle and the possibility of a view. This time, instead of chancing a look for himself, he reached up, using his hand rather like a periscope, and pointed the night eye into the room.

What he saw on the TV screen nearly made him fall off the fire escape.

Although the most common method of using cocaine is by snorting, it is alleged that the subsequent rush is not quite as intense as that produced by mainlining. But Tracey knew that if the purity of the drug was high enough, the buzz was just as good.

The coke she used that night was first class.

She opened her purse, unzipped the small inside pocket and removed a twenty-dollar bill she had already prepared. It was rolled up tight as a straw, both ends expertly folded over after the required’ amount of the finely grained white powder had been sifted inside the tube.

With extreme caution, Tracey unfolded one end of the note and inserted this end into her left nostril. She closed the other nostril with her thumb to bring about better suction.

She tilted her head back and snorted.

Immediately her nostril froze up, showing just how pure the stuff was. Before the real buzz hit her, she quickly shoved the note up her other nostril and sniffed up the remainder of the coke from the tube, instantly freezing that one too.

She gritted her teeth as tiny particles of the drug were taken down her passages to her throat; other particles of it were transported by the small capillaries in the mucus membrane and delivered speedily and efficiently to her brain.

The rush slammed into her seconds later. Like an express train smashing into her cranium.

She staggered, dropped the twenty-dollar bill and grabbed the wash-stand to steady herself.

Her eyes rose to her reflection. She no longer saw the scrawny, drug-abused female; instead there was a transformation. She was beautiful again. Full of confidence and sass, raring to confront Charlie Gilbert and Mario Bussola. The two men who had promised so much and given so little.

Kruger angled the TV screen in the palm of his hand to enable Myrna to see the picture properly.

She stared down at the tiny set. Horrified, her face creased into a mask of anger. She looked quickly at Kruger. ‘The bastards,’ she uttered. ‘What are we going to do?’

‘ Call the cops, I imagine,’ he said. His heart rate had increased in pace to about a million beats per second. He stared back down at the sordid tableau which was being delivered to him by the latest in hi-tec. ‘Kelly?’ he hissed into his radio. ‘Are you receiving this picture?’

‘ I was, but its gone blank for some reason. I’m trying to get it back, but there’s interference on the screen from somewhere,’ she responded desperately.

‘ Get it fixed and get it recorded,’ Kruger ordered her, knowing there were video-recording facilities in the comms van.

‘ Yes, boss.’

‘ And call the go damned cops and tell ‘em to break their asses gettin’ here.’

‘ Okay, boss.’

‘ Cops could take for ever,’ Myrna said. ‘We can’t let this go on, Steve. If that’s not rape and that kid is older than ten years, my name’s not Myrna Rosza.’

‘ PI’s watch — they don’t get involved,’ Kruger baulked.

‘ Not in this case, Steve. Otherwise we might find ourselves accessories to murder.’

‘ Yeah, you’re dead right.’ He looked at the TV screen again and made a decision — but before he could translate it into words and action, something else happened on-screen and he gasped, ‘What the hell’s this?’

Tracey crept out of the restroom and stepped quietly down the hallway towards the foot of the stairs, feeling as though she was walking on air. She paused briefly, checked over her shoulder to ensure that the door to the telephonists’ room was still closed, then began to slowly climb the stairs. On the landing at the top she was faced with one door, which she opened.

Beyond was a sparsely furnished room, with simple, whitewashed walls; it had been a storeroom previously. There was a door in the opposite wall next to which sat Bussola’s second bodyguard, an overweight guy with a heavy moustache but hardly any other hair. His ample ass was stuck in a plastic stacking chair, his nose in his porno mag. At the sound of the door opening he looked up and an expression of vague annoyance crossed his face.

He thought it was his buddy from downstairs and was ready to give him a roasting for leaving his post.

The sight of the thin, waif-like girl puzzled him.

‘ I’ve come to see Charlie Gilbert,’ Tracey said.

‘ Who?’ As he said the word he remembered it was the name of Bussola’s pal. ‘Get the fuck outta here,’ he said, dismissing her with a gesture.

‘ No.’

He stood up and walked towards her. Tracey timed it right, ducked to his left and darted to the door, skimming past him with ease. He made a grab for her but ended up embracing himself.

Before he could stop her, she was through the door.

The bodyguard swore and roared at her.

The commotion caught the attention of the two naked men in the second room, but the third person in the room continued to struggle to try and free herself from her ordeal.

Bussola was situated at the rear of the young girl, slamming into her. He yelled angrily, ‘What the hell’s going on? Get her outta here, you fool!’

Gilbert was positioned at the other end of the girl. He held her head down in a vice-like grip, forcing her to fellate his flaccid penis. He simply looked up, unconcerned at the interruption; his eyes were glazed over a drug-induced euphoria.

Tracey didn’t hesitate.

She flew across the room at Gilbert, screaming, ‘Bastard! Bastard!’ Her arms flailed like some sort of medieval instrument of war.

Then she was on Gilbert, punching and pounding him madly, five years of hatred which had been growing inside her like a malignant tumour, now given a cathartic release.

Gilbert rolled with the blows. Other than to raise his forearms defensively, thereby letting go of the girl’s head, his brain was unable to coordinate a proper response; within seconds Tracey had punched him over a dozen times around his head and chest.

However, Bussola, who always kept a clear head, disengaged his cock from the girl’s anus and threw her roughly to one side. She sprawled awkwardly to the floor where she immediately scuttled to one corner of the room, cowering, shivering with fright and pain.

Bussola and his overweight bodyguard both laid hands on Tracey at the same time. They dragged her away from Gilbert and flung her against the wall, her light weight proving no problem for them. The bodyguard moved in and laid into her, landing a devastating punch on the bridge of her nose. Her coke-frozen nostrils flattened as easily as crushing an empty match-box. She gurgled, blood gushing down her face and chest, and sank to her knees, holding her face in her hands.

Once down there the bodyguard kicked her in the side of the head, making her jerk as if he was kicking a marionette. He continued to boot her remorselessly around the head and upper torso, watched by Bussola and Gilbert.

‘ Everyone! Front door now! Go, c’mon, move it!’ Kruger growled urgently into his microphone.

He had quickly considered and discarded the idea of trying to force an entry through the window, mainly because it was thick glass and would take a long time to break — and he didn’t have the right equipment anyway.

He ran back along the catwalk, leapt on the fire-escape ladders and heaved them from their fastenings. He put a foot on the bottom rung, stepped on and the ladders dropped quickly through the walkway to ground level. He jumped off.

Myrna was right behind him. She jumped the last five feet, hitting the ground running.

They sprinted side by side down the alley, Kruger silently cursing his knee which clicked loudly every time his foot jarred down, sending a searing pain up through his thigh.

By the time they reached the front of the shop, the other three had arrived. They looked cool and ready for anything. Kruger knew there and then his recruitment and selection process was spot on.

‘ No time for a detailed explanation, people,’ Kruger shouted as he approached them. ‘Assault and battery taking place in the upstairs back room. You may need your weapons drawn — but nobody’s obliged to follow me,’ he finished off.

He rammed his right shoulder against the front door of the shop and tried to burst it open. It didn’t budge. He measured a few steps backwards, eyed up his target area and flat-footed the door by the lock. Still nothing. He increased his effort and on the second kick it gave a little; on the third the door splintered open with a crack. Kruger rushed through like a charging rhino, having drawn his Sig which he held high in his right hand.

None of the team took the decision to hang back.

They followed him, guns drawn.

Kruger’s cold experienced eyes flitted around the room as he entered, instantly taking everything in: the phone booths, the raised dais of the supervisor — and more importantly, Bussola’s bodyguard who was still in his chair by the door at the back of the room.

Kruger dismissed the telephone side of things as no threat. He focused in on the bodyguard. Kruger was surprised to note the guy hardly moved. Their entry, which had taken three kicks and probably only ten seconds, had been long enough for any self-respecting bodyguard to prepare for appropriate action.

This guy, however, made a sloth look slick.

He rose from his chair and reached underneath his jacket for his piece. His eyes were wide with horror and a ‘silent scream of, ‘Oh fuck’ was on his lips as he thought, This is it. This is what I get paid for. And I’m too slow and I’m gonna die at the age of thirty-six.

He was right in one respect. He was too slow.

Kruger launched himself across the last six feet of space, driving his left shoulder into the guy’s lower belly, bundling him over, flattening him with a football tackle to be proud of.

All the air gushed out of the bodyguard, all his strength with it.

Kruger and Dale quickly heaved the man over onto his stomach, wrenched his hands behind his back. Dale knelt down in the middle of the guy’s back, driving his right knee down hard between his shoulder blades, forcing his whole weight onto him, pinning him down.

Dale then jammed the muzzle of his gun into the man’s ear and said, ‘Don’t move.’

‘ You take care-a him,’ Kruger said, rising. ‘Rest of you, with me now.’

With one last flicker of his eyes around the room of stunned telephonists — most of whom were well into sex-chat — Kruger opened the door and stepped through.

He took the stairs three at a time, creasing his knee in agony.

Jimmy, Myrna and Kelly were right behind.

When faced with a situation, it had always been Bussola’s policy to act first and ask questions afterwards. This was one of the reasons why he joined in beating up Tracey even though she had been overpowered within seconds. His other reason was that he was extremely annoyed at the interruption. He had been having a good time — and no one had the right to spoil that. This little bitch had to be made to realise that. Then he might talk to her. As for his bodyguards… if the stupid bastards couldn’t keep a little girl out, what chance was there of keeping someone out who meant business?

Bussola reached down. He wound his fingers into Tracey’s hair, got a grip and banged her head repeatedly against the wall.

The time for talking started. ‘Now then, you little shit-for-brains, what’s all this about?’ he screamed into her bashed-up face. Blood was being flicked everywhere.

Even if she could have replied, she did not get time, because Kruger stepped into the doorway, Sig in hand. His presence was menacing.

‘ Stand back,’ he shouted. ‘Leave her alone.’

Bussola stopped what he was doing, letting go of Tracey’s hair. Her head slopped to one side. The mobster stood up to his full height and coldly turned his big, fat nakedness to Kruger. Despite his predicament, his erection was still rampant and twitching against the folds of his big belly. ‘What the fuck?’ he sneered.

‘ I said stand back and leave her alone,’ Kruger reiterated.

Jimmy appeared behind him, Myrna and Kelly behind Jimmy.

Bussola shot a glance to his bodyguard who was standing next to Tracey, looking impassively at Kruger, weighing up the odds. ‘Shoot him,’ Bussola said.

A smile crossed the bodyguard’s fat lips. Kruger realised he was about to be tested. The guy’s hand went for his gun, but Jimmy took the initiative. He weaved past Kruger and pointed his Sig directly into the bodyguard’s face. ‘Yeah, that’s right,’ he breathed. ‘You pull that weapon out nice ‘n’ slow, thumb and forefinger on the butt, then you throw it across the floor. If you don’t, I’ll pop ya, babe.’ Jimmy’s finger tightened visibly on the trigger.

The bodyguard looked at Bussola for guidance. He got none.

Bussola was too busy eyeing Kruger.

The gun was extracted slowly as per instructions. The silence of the moment was punctuated by the young girl sobbing in a corner of the room and the sound of Tracey spitting blood on the floor by the bed.

The gun clattered to the floor.

‘ I hope you know what you’re doing,’ Bussola said. ‘Steve,’ he added.

A jolt, like electricity, whipped through Kruger. It must have shown on his face.

Bussola smiled. His erection wilted slightly. ‘Yeah, I know who you are. Surprised? That bitch I married talks of no one else.’

‘ Move over to the wall,’ Kruger said, feeling somehow that his advantage had been taken from him. He indicated to Bussola where he wanted him to stand. The mobster did not move. Just stood there with a taunting smirk quivering on his lips. ‘Move, Mario,’ Kruger repeated. ‘The cops’re coming and I’ll tell them all sorts of lies if I have to. Y’know — about how I had to save a wretched girl’s life, how you turned on me with a gun… all that kinda shit, and you won’t be able to say anything, cos you’ll be ashes and so will your fatso pal here.’ Kruger’s gun pointed to the bodyguard, then flicked back to Bussola. ‘All because you refused to stand next to the wall. Very intelligent.’

‘ What… what’s going on?’ Charlie Gilbert blurted from the bed. He had been watching the events unfolding with incomprehension. He then vomited spectacularly down his chest, stomach and genitals, fell forwards on the bed with a groan, huge ass in the air, and started snoring.

Kruger raised his eyebrows at Bussola. ‘Well?’

Reluctantly he edged towards the wall. His eyes lasered into Kruger with a fierce anger. ‘You’ll regret this, Steve.’

It was a statement of fact. It told Kruger nothing he didn’t already know.

‘ In fact you’ll all regret this,’ Bussola declared blandly.

‘ Get the girls out of here,’ Kruger said to Myrna and Kelly. The two women entered the room, careful not to step into the line of fire between Kruger, Jimmy and their two targets. Bussola watched them through veiled lids, lingering over Myrna. His face turned back to Kruger. ‘Why the hell are you here anyway, Steve?’ Bussola mused out loud. He licked his lips. The ex-cop felt himself begin to weaken underneath the tough exterior.

Even naked and exposed, Bussola was every inch a gangster. He’d paid his dues on the mean streets of New York and Chicago, punking around with the gangs, terrifying neighbourhoods, but always thinking about expansion and the future. In his thirties, with a well-established criminal organisation in those cities, he decided to move the centre of his operations to Miami where it expanded to epic proportions. He orchestrated some bloody — and a few bloodless — coups and continued to grow, though he only ever made the number two spot. Number one was held by a mobster named Tony Corelli. Corelli’s unexpected demise at the hands of two armed women — a case still unsolved by the cops — opened the way for Bussola to claim top spot. Which he did, ruthlessly taking over Corelli’s flourishing empire.

Bussola was widely believed to be a billionaire.

He was also widely believed to have personally killed several people on the way to amassing his fortune. Legend had it that he once chain-sawed a rival to pieces. This was never proved, but Kruger believed it.

And Kruger was frightened because he believed everything about Bussola, and frightened because he believed Bussola’s words.

He was also totally disgusted at a man who had so much wealth at his disposal that he could have bought anything legal in terms of sexual pleasure, yet resorted to a sordid back-street room where he, together with another man, got his kicks by raping a girl who did not look twelve years old.

Maybe that was part of the thrill. Doing something which, no matter what the circumstance, was unlawful — and getting away with it. The ultimate middle finger stuck up at a society he despised.

Except this time he would not get away with it.

Kruger found he could not prevent his mouth curling into a sneer of contempt as these thoughts went through his mind.

‘ What choo lookin’ at?’ Bussola growled.

‘ Scum.’

Bussola nodded, then winked at Kruger. ‘I’m a very bad person to have as an enemy.’

‘ So am I,’ Kruger responded. He could see Bussola was not convinced, whereas Kruger honestly believed the Italian would be a very bad adversary.

Myrna and Kelly escorted the two girls out of the room, the younger one of them covered up by a large, soiled towel Kelly had found on the floor.

This left Kruger and Jimmy facing Bussola, the bodyguard and the big fat guy spread-eagled on the bed in a sea of vomit.

Their guns never wavered.

‘ What now, Steve?’ Bussola raised his thick bushy eyebrows.

‘ Cops.’

‘ And what do you expect to happen?’

‘ Arrest and conviction.’

Bussola blinked as though he could not believe his ears. Then he roared with laughter, throwing his head right back. His penis, now limp, jiggled with merriment. Then the laughter stopped. He became serious. ‘I very much doubt it, Steve. Very much.’

A cop siren wailed not too distantly. A flood of relief passed through Kruger. ‘We’ll see, Mario.’ Inside he already had his doubts.

‘ How about letting us get dressed?’

‘ No — stay as you are,’ Kruger said, not wanting to lose any forensics. ‘Just as we found you — naked as jailbirds.’