Ultimatum

Twenty-five

15.01

Jetmir Brozi clearly didn’t invest a huge amount of money in clothes. There were barely a dozen items of clothing hanging up, and a few pairs of shoes cluttered round the floor, but nothing that gave Tina any real cover as she crouched in the half-light of the closed wardrobe.

She could hear him speaking on the phone, his voice faint and guttural. He was getting closer. A stair creaked, then another.

He was coming up.

Jesus, why did she let herself get in this situation? Why couldn’t she just do her job properly?

For the first time, fear replaced excitement. If Brozi discovered her, she was trapped, and with no weapon. She wasn’t even carrying pepper spray, for Christ’s sake.

The bedroom door opened and he walked inside, finishing up his conversation on the phone. He was talking in English but his voice was low and she wondered if what he was saying was being picked up on the audio.

She looked through the wardrobe’s narrow keyhole and saw him walking round with his back to her. From this angle, it was impossible to tell whether or not the screensaver on the PC had kicked in or not.

Brozi stopped talking, and Tina’s whole body tensed. She could hear her heartbeat — a rapid-fire tattoo that she would swear was audible from outside the wardrobe. He was standing still and looking over towards the PC. Slowly, he replaced the phone in the pocket of his trousers and exited the room, his movements unhurried. A few seconds later she heard him going down the stairs.

Tina waited, trying to work out what to do. She couldn’t stay in there for ever. At some point, Brozi was going to want to get something out of, or put something into, his wardrobe. He might go out again, of course, in which case she’d be fine. But if he didn’t, she was going to have to try to sneak out past him.

The staircase was creaking again. He was coming back up, and his movements were slower, more purposeful, this time.

She stared out of the keyhole, keeping as still as possible, watching the doorway.

Brozi reappeared, and this time he was holding the gun in front of him.

And he was looking right at her.

Tina held her breath.

After looking round the room again, he walked slowly towards the wardrobe.

Tina leaned back, clenched her fists, preparing. Her mobile phone vibrated in her jeans pocket, but she didn’t have time to wonder who it was. It was irrelevant now. She was on her own, and none of her new colleagues could help her.

He was right outside the wardrobe now. She could hear his slightly forced breathing. Any second now he’d open the door, take a step back so he was out of range of an attack, and there she’d be. Defenceless and totally vulnerable.

She exploded out of the wardrobe’s double doors, leaping straight into him, grabbing for his gun hand.

Caught completely by surprise, Brozi stumbled backwards as Tina yanked his arm upwards, and the gun went off with a deafening bang, the bullet striking the ceiling. They landed on the unmade double bed in a violent embrace with Tina on top. Brozi snarled, showing yellowed teeth, and, as he lifted his head, Tina butted him hard on the bridge of the nose, knocking him back.

But he was strong, and with a grunt of exertion he rolled over, knocking her off him, the gun swinging wildly as he tried to point it at her. Tina kept her grip but allowed herself to be pushed off the bed, landing on her feet and bringing Brozi with her. He spat in her face, and tried to butt her back, but she dodged the blow, and drove her knee into his groin.

Immediately, Brozi’s grip weakened and he yelped in pain. Tina gave him a hard shove that sent him tumbling, then turned and ran for the door, slamming it shut behind her. She took the stairs two at a time, going so fast she almost stumbled and lost her balance.

As she hit the first floor, she heard the bedroom door open and the sound of rapid footfalls on the staircase, and then she was on the last flight of stairs down to the ground floor, the front door and freedom only feet in front of her. She reached the door, pulled both handles, saw that he’d put the chain across, slammed it back shut, pulled back the chain, went to open it again-

‘Hands up or I shoot!’ came the angry, heavily accented shout from the top of the stairs.

Tina didn’t know if he was bluffing or not but she made the split-second decision not to stay and find out. Yanking the door open in one movement, she dived on to the steps, rolling down on to the pathway, trying to make herself as difficult a target as possible, before jumping to her feet and vaulting over the gate, noticing with relief that Brozi still hadn’t pulled the trigger.

Bolt was already running across the road to meet her, holding his warrant card in one hand, the tension etched all over his face. ‘Are you all right?’ he shouted, grabbing her by the arm.

‘Yeah, I’m fine,’ she panted. ‘Let’s get out of here. He’s armed.’

But at that moment Jetmir Brozi came striding down the steps, holding the Glock in both hands in front of him. ‘Who the fuck are you?’ he yelled.

Tina and Bolt retreated, backing away from each other at the same time, hands in the air in non-confrontational poses as he bore down on them in this quiet little street that suddenly felt like the loneliest spot in the world rather than the middle of an immense and bustling city.

But Brozi kept coming. He was heading for Tina, the gun pointed straight at her head, the end of the barrel barely ten feet away now. His eyes were wild and he looked coked up, which probably explained why he was pursuing her on to the street armed with an illegal Glock 17 in broad daylight.

‘What were you doing in my house?’ he demanded. ‘Tell me now or I shoot you fucking dead! Understand? And stop moving.’

Tina was in the middle of the road now, and she did as she was told, keeping her arms firmly in the air.

‘Mr Brozi,’ said Bolt firmly, ‘we are police officers. If you shoot either of us, you’ll go to prison for the rest of your life.’

Brozi stopped, and the first flicker of doubt crossed his face, although he kept the gun pointed firmly at Tina.

‘Put the gun down, Mr Brozi,’ Bolt continued. ‘Then we can talk about this.’ He edged forward ever so slightly as he spoke. ‘Armed officers are on the way here right now.’

‘Shooting us isn’t going to help you,’ said Tina, noticing Bolt’s forward movement.

Brozi suddenly turned the gun on Bolt. ‘Stay where you are.’

Tina had a flash of fear that he might shoot him and it would all be her fault. She thought about rushing him but it was too risky. He was too far away and she’d seen the damage that a bullet could do.

From somewhere to the south of them came the steady wail of a siren getting closer, and Brozi seemed to realize what an exposed position he was in, standing in the middle of the street. Fifty yards away, Tina could see two teenage girls in school uniform standing outside a corner shop at the end of the road, watching. Twin beads of sweat ran down her forehead and into an eye, but she didn’t dare move her hand to rub them away.

‘Put the gun down, Mr Brozi,’ she said with a calmness she wasn’t feeling. ‘This is not helping anyone.’

‘Fuck you, pig,’ spat Brozi, retreating up the street away from them. ‘Fuck both of you.’ Still keeping the gun trained on the two of them, he climbed into his car, a big Lexus saloon, and started the engine, pulling out in front of them.

Seeing the opportunity to get out of the line of fire, Tina and Bolt rushed over to their own car and jumped inside as Brozi roared past them.

‘We’re going after him, right?’ shouted Tina.

Bolt didn’t answer. He didn’t even look at Tina. Instead he yanked the key in the ignition and tore away from the kerb.

Tina started talking rapidly into the radio. ‘Alpha One to all units, shots have been fired inside Target One home and we are pursuing Target One now in his blue Lexus, licence plate Alpha Freddie Ten Alpha November Charlie, north on Roman Road. Target One is armed with a fully loaded Glock. I repeat, Target One is armed. Approach with extreme caution. Over.’

Bolt was driving fast, his face etched with concentration, and he was barely twenty yards behind Brozi as the Lexus headed for the junction. But then the Lexus’s brake lights came on, and Brozi leaned out of the driver’s-side window, pointed the gun at them, and started firing.

‘Shit!’ yelled Bolt, slamming on the brakes and coming to a halt in a screech of tyres, and ducking his head as bullets flew past, one pinging off the car roof with a high-pitched whistle, another blowing a hole in the driver’s-side wing mirror.

Tina ducked too, her heart pumping like a steam train, completely caught up in the thrill of the moment. When she looked back up, Brozi and the gun had disappeared back inside the car, and he was driving again.

But before he could reach the junction, a marked squad car appeared round the corner, and turned into the street, driving up it the wrong way and blocking Brozi’s path, forcing him to reverse.

‘He’s coming back!’ shouted Tina as the Lexus shot back towards them.

Bolt cursed, and they just had time to take up crash positions before the Lexus hit them with a loud bang, knocking their car several yards backwards, but not doing enough to shunt it out of the way completely.

Knowing there was no way out with the car, Brozi flung open the door and took off back up the street, running along the pavement, and keeping low behind the line of parked cars, still waving the gun around.

With the Lexus in the way, Tina couldn’t see whether or not the occupants of the squad car were an armed response unit, and she didn’t wait to find out, leaping out of their car and running along the road after Brozi. She was a lot fitter than he was, and within a few seconds she was drawing level with him.

He saw her and waved his gun but didn’t attempt to fire, still maybe thinking he could outrun her, even though he was panting heavily and looking like he might collapse at any moment.

Operating entirely on instinct — if she’d thought about it there was no way she would have done it — Tina abruptly changed direction and ran over the bonnet of one of the parked cars, before leaping off the other side and, as Brozi turned to meet her, diving into him and knocking him and the gun flying.

He went down hard, badly winded, the gun well out of reach underneath another parked car. Tina wriggled into position so she was squatting on top of him, her knees holding down his arms. Brozi tried to struggle but then his eyes widened as he saw Tina’s expression.

She punched him hard in the face, three times in rapid succession, ignoring the blood flying out of his nose, and the fact that he was no longer resisting arrest. She would have punched him a fourth time too, but she felt her arm being grabbed firmly from behind and looked back to see Bolt standing there.

‘Leave him, Tina, or you’ll be done for assault,’ he told her.

Behind Bolt, she could see two unarmed male uniforms jogging, rather than running, towards her, neither of them looking like they’d have done too much faced with a gunman, and she nodded and turned back to the man who just moments earlier had tried to kill her.

‘Jetmir Brozi, I’m arresting you for attempted murder,’ she said, as Bolt stepped forward and the two of them hauled him to his feet.