The Devil's bounty

Two

In his line of work, Ryan Lock was constantly vigilant for two things. The first was the absence of the normal: a security guard missing from his post, a blank corner of an office, which had previously housed a security camera, a silent junkyard normally patrolled by a bad-tempered Dobermann. The second was the presence of the abnormal, something strange and out of place: an unfamiliar car appearing outside a school at pick-up time or a newly installed manhole cover on a parade route.

That evening, as he scanned the crowded hotel lobby, which was filled with revellers attending the after-show party for his latest clients, a double-platinum rap group called Triple-C, Lock spotted something that fell, most definitely, into the second category. Unnoticed by the rest of the partygoers, a young woman stepped gingerly from the barrel of the gleaming gold revolving door into the hotel lobby, and stopped, eyes darting around, searching someone out.

In and of itself, her arrival was hardly worthy of note. The defining feature of Triple-C’s after-parties was the number of young women in attendance. They tended, he had noted, to out-number the men by at least six to one. But no one looked even vaguely like the young woman walking through the press of bodies towards him.

For a start, their hair was perfectly coiffed instead of damp and matted on their foreheads. Their eyes sparkled with life, or excitement, or too much alcohol, while this young woman’s were like a doll’s: black and lifeless. And none of the other young women crowding the lobby had blood pouring from her abdomen, running down her legs and splashing, like thick scarlet raindrops, on to the hotel’s white marble floor.

As she staggered across the lobby, people fell silent. Cocktail glasses and champagne flutes hung in suspended animation inches from lips. Eyes widened in disbelief and horror. People stepped back, unconsciously clearing a path, as the blood continued to pour from her belly, leaving a trail on the marble.

As the silence washed behind her, the only person to react was Lock. Taking off his jacket, he half turned towards his best friend and business partner, the six-foot-two African American marine Ty Johnson. ‘Get the guys upstairs into the suite.’

There had been a disturbance at that night’s concert, a series of brawls among the crowd, possibly gang-related, and he was taking no chances. Ty did as he was told, quickly marshalling the rap group and their management towards a bank of elevators. Their movement punctured the silence, and a babble of incomprehension filled the void as Lock went quickly to the young woman, reaching her in four long strides.

Her shoulders were hunched and she was shivering. She flinched visibly as Lock reached out to her. He could see the pain pinching her face as he sat her on a nearby couch as gently as he could, hushing her whimpers with words of reassurance.

Blood was oozing through a hole in her shirt and he could see where the fabric had charred. A gunshot wound — clear as day. Just the one by the look of it. He balled up his jacket and pushed it hard against the wound. She screamed as he pressed, talking to her while he tried to staunch the bleeding.

A male receptionist had made his way over to them, lips puckered in apparent displeasure at the sight of so much blood on his formerly pristine marble floor — and now the designer couch. He nodded from the girl to the door, indicating, Lock assumed, that she belonged outside. He met the man’s eyes with a level gaze.

That was all it took. Lock’s stare was frightening. He had blue eyes that burned with rage at lives lost or taken.

The receptionist flushed bright red.

‘Call nine one one,’ Lock told him. ‘Tell them we have a gunshot victim and she’s bleeding out.’

As the receptionist ran, Lock looked around the lobby at the last of the stragglers. There was a knot of glamorous party girls in their twenties who had backed against a wall. He shouted across the lobby, ‘Ladies, check your bags and see if you can find me a tampon or a sanitary towel.’

They stared at him, horrified.

‘Check your purses, goddamnit,’ he repeated, raising his voice.

A willowy blonde in a black cocktail dress pulled out a pack of tampons. ‘Will these do?’

‘Perfect. Bring them here,’ he said, waving her over with his free hand.

She tottered towards him on high heels, holding a still-wrapped tampon at arm’s length between thumb and forefinger.

‘Take the wrapper off,’ Lock barked, ‘and see if you can find me some hand sanitizer.’

An Asian girl with the group piped up, ‘I have some.’

‘Good. Let me have it.’

Lock turned back to the victim. ‘Okay. I’m going to take the jacket away, and then I’m going to have to take off your shirt so I can pack the wound. I’ll be as gentle as I can but it’ll hurt.’

She looked up at him, her eyes tracing the contours of his face, like a finger running over a road map. Her pupils widened a fraction and life seemed to return to them.

Up close, he could tell that she was younger than she had first appeared. Nineteen. Maybe twenty at a push. Her skin was pale and sallow. She had small, delicate features, and bright green eyes. Her hair was a deep chestnut brown, almost auburn.

Finally she nodded. He looked at the blonde who had given him the tampon. ‘What’s your name?’ he asked.

‘Ashley,’ said the blonde.

‘Okay, Ashley, I’m going to need you to hold her jacket where it is for a moment.’

‘But I… the blood… What if she, like, has something?’ Ashley protested.

Lock fixed her with the same gaze he’d used on the receptionist. ‘If we don’t do this, she is going to die right here in front of us. So, please, just do as I asked.’

She complied. He cupped his hands and the Asian girl pumped four squirts of sanitizer into them. He rubbed it in. ‘Okay, Ashley, you can move the jacket away now and give me that tampon.’

She did as she was told and Lock began to peel away the cotton shirt from the edge of the wound. It was maybe a half-inch in diameter, bad but not the worst he’d seen. It looked as if the bullet had stayed inside — better than there being an exit wound and two places to lose blood. He pulled out the blue cord of the tampon and pressed the other end into the wound. Almost immediately it began to expand as it absorbed the blood, puffing out and filling the hole in the girl’s stomach. Blood seeped from the edges of the wound but just moments before it had been pouring out.

He glanced at the desk. The receptionist had the phone at his ear. ‘They’re on their way,’ he called.

‘How long?’ Lock asked.

The receptionist went back to the phone.

Lock worked the numbers. Where had the girl been when she was shot and how long ago? Life or death would be separated by seconds rather than minutes.

‘Mr Lock?’ she said, tears welling in her eyes.

She knew his name. He tried to place her. Had he met her before? He didn’t think so, but something about her was familiar. Had she been at the concert earlier, maybe at the stage door? Over the last month he had seen some pretty elaborate stunts to grab Triple-C’s attention, not to mention that evening’s near-riot.

‘You were looking for me?’ he asked her.

Her chin fell on to her chest. ‘They tried to stop me,’ she stuttered.

‘Who? Who tried to stop you?’

‘He sent them. He wants me to stop looking for him. But I won’t.’

The hairs rose at the back of Lock’s neck. He scanned the crowd, which was slowly drifting away, their backward glances a mix of disgust and curiosity. No one stood out. No one appeared to be a threat.

‘Who?’ he asked her gently. ‘Who does?’

Her lips started to form a name but no sound came.

‘Is this person after you?’

She shook her head, the deadness settling back in her eyes. ‘You have to catch him.’

Lock’s patience was fraying. ‘Whoever you are, whatever this is about, I’m not a cop. I don’t catch people, I keep them safe.’

‘That’s why it has to be you,’ she said.

‘Why what has to be me?’ he asked.

‘The one who brings him back.’

She was talking in riddles. Every answer she gave led to more questions. ‘Bring who back?’

‘Joe tried. But they killed him.’

‘Joe? Is that the name of the man you want me to find?’

‘It’s not fair. He should be in prison for what he did.’

‘Who?’

She stared at Lock and a sudden intensity flared in her eyes, like the last burst of a candle flame before the wind snuffs it out. ‘You’re my last chance. If you don’t catch him and bring him back, they’re going to kill me.’

Lock kept the pressure on her wound as best he could. The fire was dying down. She was blinking. If he didn’t keep her conscious, he would lose her before they made it to a hospital. He had to keep her awake, and the best way of doing that was to keep her talking. ‘Listen, let’s start over, okay? Can you tell me your name?’

Her eyes focused. That was good. ‘Melissa,’ she said.

A tiny victory. ‘Okay, Melissa,’ he said. ‘I’m going to come with you to the hospital, and on the way, I want you to tell me everything. But start at the beginning. Can you do that for me, Melissa? Can you tell me your story all the way through? If you do that, and I feel I can help you, then I promise I will. Do we have a deal?’

‘Deal.’

Lock turned back to the receptionist. ‘ETA?’

The man looked at him blankly.

‘How long until they get here?’

‘They said ten minutes.’

Lock did the math. If the EMS ambulance had deployed from the hospital, that would mean at least another ten minutes. In twenty she’d be dead.

He scooped the girl into his arms and ran for the door, struggling to stay on his feet as his shoes slipped on the bloodied floor.