Chase (10 page)

It was dark and Shelley was ground down after fruitless hours in various London shitholes, when trouble leaned on the bar.

It was the last place he'd intended to visit that day: the Two Dogs on Exmouth Market, a pub that was always open and always gloomy inside, forbidding to all but the early morning traders, afternoon postal workers from nearby Mount Pleasant Mail Center, and gangs of rail-link laborers who descended at nighttime.

Shelley had cast an eye across the gathered throng with a sinking heart, sensing he'd get no joy from this lot. Most were already half in the bag. They were likely to give him the runaround, just for the hell of it.

So, a wasted day. The only thing to say for it was that Lucy would be proud. They'd both known there was a danger he'd simply dig in at the first pub he visited, emerging a day later with a hangover and a bad case of drinker's guilt. But no. All temptation and even the odd invitation had been resisted. He'd done the rounds as sober as a judge. A man on a mission.

Word of which had evidently got around, if the guy leaning on the bar was anything to go by.

“You're looking for somebody, I hear?” he said now, with a voice that sounded like a cement mixer.

Shelley stared into rheumy, drink-sodden eyes and knew a shakedown when he saw one. After all, with his black woolen overcoat and baker-boy cap tilted rakishly, he knew he stood out. That was the plan. But the same presence that made him a serious customer also made him a target for shakedowns and, from the looks of things, matey-boy here had in mind something more ambitious than a drink in return for yet more useless information. There was the knife he was wearing, for one thing.

“Yeah, I'm looking for someone,” said Shelley, smiling.

“Your brother, is it?” rasped the drunk. He wore an Adidas tracksuit top zipped to the neck. He had an air of menace that was as distinctive and recognizable to Shelley as the smell of shit.

“No, he's not my brother. A friend.”

Best friend,
he thought.
Always got your back.

“Brothers in arms, though, isn't it? You were in the forces together—you and this mate you're looking for.”

That was interesting. The guy was unfazed by Shelley's background. Which meant either he was very stupid or he had backup somewhere.

Shelley leaned towards him. “You're right, mate. Yeah, we served in the SAS together. Cookie and I were part of a covert three-man team operating in Afghanistan. We carried out assassinations, broke up kidnapping attempts, interrogated suspects. All three of us in the team were highly trained in surveillance, counter-intelligence, situational awareness, and marksmanship. Each of us was expert in unarmed combat—a combination of Filipino Kali, Krav Maga, and Jeet Kune Do, with a bit of street-fighting thrown in for good measure, just because we liked it that way. We were anti-fragile. You know what that means? It means the worse shit gets, the more efficient you are.

“See, that knife you're carrying in the waistband of your jeans, Cookie would take a pre-emptive approach to it. And knowing him as I do, which is very well indeed, he'd use one of those beer glasses as a field-expedient weapon. He'd glass you, take the knife, and you'd be picking bits of pint pot out of your throat while he was taking the piss out of you for not keeping your blade sharp enough.

“Thing is, Cookie was always a touch more reckless than me. Hit them first, hit them hard and make sure they know they'd been hit, that was his motto. Me, I'm a bit more ‘by the book.' I'd wait for you to draw the knife before I took it off you, and I'd break your arm doing it,
then
I'd take the piss out of you for not keeping it sharp enough.

“And so, knowing all that. Knowing now what you're dealing with here, how about you tell me any information you have? If it's useful, I can assure you I'll be grateful. Otherwise, you better take your knife and make yourself scarce before I get the wrong idea and decide to do things the Cookie way.”

The drunk affected a hurt look. “Well, if you're going to be like that, you can shove it where the sun don't shine,” he spat, then pushed himself off the bar and out of Shelley's orbit.

Shelley sighed and turned his attention to the barman, producing the same snapshot of Cookie that he'd shown at least a dozen barmen that day. The guy barely gave it a look, before shrugging and moving away.

That shrug, it must be in the manual,
thought Shelley. His eyes went to the mirror behind the bar and he watched the drunk skulk out of the door, thinking that he hadn't seen the last of that one.

He was right about that.

James Patterson
has written more bestsellers and created more enduring fictional characters than any other novelist writing today. He lives in Florida with his family.

Since the debut of his first novel,
The Narrowback,
Michael Ledwidge
has written fourteen additional novels, a dozen of them
New York Times
bestsellers coauthored with James Patterson.

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