Shadows: The gripping new crime thriller from the #1 bestseller

Chapter 4

Owing to Crowley’s status as a one-time coal and textiles hotspot, its warehouse and factory district was almost in the town centre, primarily because that was where the main rail-yard was, but it was also only a stone’s throw from the main shopping area.

As such, as recently as the 1970s, Crowley’s ‘inner ring’ had been crammed with working mills and factories, their forest of tall chimneys pumping smoke into the air above the Greater Manchester township day and night. It had certainly given the place some character back in the day, and it did so now – to a degree – a succession of immense industrial structures towering over the red-brick terraced neighbourhoods which for so many decades had supplied their workforces.

Of course, in the twenty-first century such buildings were an anachronism. Some, rather ambitiously, had been renovated into blocks of ‘desirable apartments’ (many of which were still for sale), while others had become visitor centres. Of the rest, most had been boarded over and left. To some this was a blight on the environment, but others saw it as an opportunity. For example, it was in Rudyard Row, a weed-filled backstreet snaking its way between several of the most decrepit of these empty Edwardian monoliths, where Roy ‘the Shank’ Shankhill ran his ‘business’.

Rudyard Row wasn’t an alley you’d stumble into by accident, because you had to work your way through a warren of similarly-squalid passages just to reach it, and so most folk, even locals, didn’t know it was there. In addition, there was next to no reason to go there. Some of the former workshops that lined it on either side were still used, but most of them were soulless facades of brick, with plank-covered windows.

It looked as dismal as ever on that dull, damp day in mid-October, when Malcolm Pugh showed up there. This was nowhere near his first visit, and highly likely it would not be his last, but he was no less nervous for that.

He’d come into town from Bullwood by bus. It was late-morning, rush hour long over, and so he’d travelled on the top deck alone, mulling endlessly over his plethora of problems. As he walked warily down Rudyard Row, he felt even more alone, but now he was frightened too.

In many ways, it was a good thing he was doing here today. He expected it to curry favour, but you could never be absolutely certain what the outcome might be when dealing with the Shank. He glanced left and right before knocking on the door to No. 38, the two numerals hanging rusty and limp amid strips of peeling paintwork.

What he neglected to do was look directly behind him, so he didn’t see the door to the derelict building opposite swing silently open on recently oiled hinges.

Initially there was no sound from inside Shankhill’s premises. Pugh was about to knock again when he heard what sounded like a rustle of newspaper on the other side of the door. He knew what that would be: Turk, that great slab of meat and bone that Shankhill called a minder, getting irritably up from his stool, rolling up whichever of the daily rags he’d been reading – probably something with lots of tits, bums and suspenders – shoving it into his jacket pocket, and …

‘Yeah, who is it?’ came Turk’s voice through the wood.

It was a curious accent. Pugh couldn’t place it. He’d always assumed from the guy’s nickname, and because of his swarthy complexion and short tangle of oily black hair, that he’d originated in the Middle East somewhere. Not that it was important. All that really mattered where Turk was concerned was that he was six-foot four at least, and that he worked out daily, and/or did lots of steroids, which had built him a herculean physique. Reputedly, he liked nothing better than to imprint his many sovereign rings on the bodies and faces of those his employer took issue with.

‘It’s Malcom Pugh. I need to see Roy.’

A snicker of laughter sounded on the other side. ‘You never get tired of it, do you?’

‘I’m not here for a loan … I want to pay him back.’

‘Yeah?’ Turk sounded amused, as though this had to be a scam and he wasn’t buying it.

‘Seriously. Come on, Turk … Roy’s expecting me.’

There were two resounding clanks as, first, a top bolt was drawn back, and then a lower bolt. The door started to open, and Pugh put his foot on the step only to be struck from behind as somebody barrelled into his back.

It threw him forward into the door, which bounced inward with tremendous force, impacting massively on the guy behind it. There was a crump of splintering wood and a garbled grunt from Turk, and Pugh – who was too stunned to know what was happening – was grabbed by the back collar of his anorak, a gloved hand slapped across his mouth, and forced inside.

The immediate interior was a narrow space at the foot of a steep, dank stairway. A single grimy fanlight only weakly illuminated its wet brick walls and the stool to one side. Turk lay sprawled backward on the foot of the stairs, the lower half of his face spattered crimson from a smashed nose. Pugh, meanwhile, had his legs kicked from under him, pitching him down onto his knees, as two burly bodies crammed into the tiny space behind him, moving with catlike stealth. The door closed with a thud, but its top bolt was shoved back into place as quickly and quietly as possible.

Blinking with shock and pain, Turk groped for the Colt Python he kept in the armpit holster under his tan leather jacket. But before he could reach it, the muzzle of what looked like a sub-machine gun was jammed against his chin. His hand froze.

Pugh cowered where he knelt, a crumpled adult foetus, only glancing up slowly and fearfully. The two intruders, who hadn’t yet said a word, let alone shouted out a threat or warning, both carried automatic weapons with shoulder straps. Pugh had no clue what make or model they were, but they looked terrifying, especially as they had big magazines attached to their undersides.

The intruders wore zipped-up black leather jackets, black leather gloves and bright red woollen ski-masks with only narrow slots for the eyes. They were about average height and size, though one was slightly taller than the other. This taller one kept his gun under Turk’s jaw. It was firm in his left hand, as he put the index finger of his right to the place where his lips should be, and said: ‘Shhhh.’

Turk watched him balefully, but said nothing. Pugh, of course – a much smaller and older man than Turk, with a reputation even at home for being a weakling and failure – whimpered aloud, which earned him a vicious side-kick. The taller gunman leaned even closer to Turk, forced the muzzle into his Adam’s apple, and pressing it in hard, dragged a glottal gurgle out of him. With his right hand, he rummaged around under Turk’s jacket until he found the grip of the Colt Python and drew it out, slipping it into his own pocket.

He straightened up and backed off, but only for half a foot or so, the sub-machine gun trained squarely on his captive’s battered face. ‘Get up,’ he said quietly.

Turk did as he was told. At full height, he stood several inches above even the taller of the two gunmen, but that scarcely mattered. He now fancied he recognised the weapon under his nose as a SIG-Sauer MPX. At this range, its 9mm slugs would cut him in half like a buzz saw.

‘Arms out where I can see them,’ the taller gunman said. ‘Then turn around.’

Turk complied, spreading his empty hands and shuffling round in a semicircle.

‘Upstairs,’ the gunman instructed. ‘Make a sound out of the ordinary … anything I think is meant to be warning, and you’re on your way to Allah sooner than you ever imagined possible.’

Slowly, with heavy but careful footsteps, Turk ascended the stairs, the gunman close behind, the muzzle of the SIG jammed into his spine.

The second, shorter gunman nudged Pugh with his foot to indicate that he should go too.

‘Please,’ Pugh whined. ‘I’m not even supposed to be here …’

A strong hand snatched Pugh by the collar and hauled him to his feet. Pugh headed up the stairs at a petrified stumble, the second gunman treading stealthily at his rear.

There was a corridor at the top, all loose boards and rotted, hanging wallpaper. Only one door led off it, down at its far end. The occupant of the room beyond, Roy ‘the Shank’ Shankhill, a hefty porcine individual with pinkish features, slit-eyes, a mat of lank, gingery hair, and as always, wearing a patterned house-robe over his stained shirt and scruffily-knotted tie, sat behind a broad, leather-topped desk, which, aside from the free-standing electric fire in one corner and the small, steel safe in another, was the only furnishing in an otherwise empty shell of a room.

Shankhill thought he’d heard a bump downstairs – he even put on his glasses, which normally hung on his chest from a chain, and squinted across the room at the half-open door. But no other sound had followed, and he’d soon written it off as Turk knocking over his stool or something. It might even be Malcolm Pugh arriving for his appointment – though frankly Shankhill would believe that when he saw it. It wouldn’t be the first time the inveterate gambler had failed to show when he was due to make a repayment. Even if it was Pugh, it wouldn’t be the whole whack. It was never the whole whack – and it wouldn’t even suit Shankhill if it was. He could hardly have his debtors paying him back before they’d accrued some real interest. It wasn’t like he needed full and immediate repayment anyway, as the heaps of used banknotes on his desk, which he was currently sorting into orderly piles, would attest – along with the chunky gold rings on all his fingers, the chains around his neck and the various bracelets adorning his wrists, not to mention his diamond-studded Rolex.

Then the door to his office slammed open, hitting the wall with such force that plasterwork flew, and Shankhill – a juggernaut of a bloke in physical terms – almost leapt from his seat.

Turk came wheeling in as though pushed, the lower half of his face a mask of glutinous blood. A balding, runty short-arse of a bloke – Malcolm Pugh, Shankhill realised – tottered in alongside him. The pair had been kicked through the door with such energy that both now fell onto all fours. Their two abductors came in behind them, also side by side, sub-machine guns levelled.

Shankill went rigid with disbelief, regarding the intruders through his lenses with a blank, fishlike stare, his podgy, sweaty hands hovering over the piles of money. Then he turned sharply – a Winchester pump was propped against the wall, perhaps only a yard away.

‘Uh-uh!’ the taller gunman said, cocking his weapon.

Shankhill scrutinised them intently, eyes almost popping behind his thick glasses.

Their guns hung from leather shoulder straps, making them immediately accessible. They’d spaced out so they were about two yards apart, making a more difficult target of themselves and yet at the same time easily able to cover the whole room. Their stance was solid, unflinching; they wielded their weapons with the look of expertise.

Professionals, then. Resistance would be extremely ill-advised.

The slightly shorter of the two stood on the left; he now circled around the kneeling figures of Turk and Pugh, before heading around Shankhill’s desk, where he took possession of the shotgun. He backed away, cradling it under his right arm while balancing the SIG in the left, in effect, covering the three hostages with both weapons. The taller one, meanwhile, let his SIG hang from its strap, while he took a rolled-up black canvas bag from his coat pocket, shook it open, came forward and commenced sweeping the money off the table into it.

This took no more than twenty seconds. The kneeling captives could do nothing, fresh blood still trickling down the front of Turk’s shirt, Pugh hunched forward, eyes screwed shut, a pool of yellowish fluid spreading out around his sodden knees.

When the taller gunman had cleared the desk, he dug into a large holdall alongside it, lifting out several more bricks of banknotes and cramming them into his sack.

‘Do you know who I am?’ Shankhill couldn’t resist asking.

‘I couldn’t care less if you’re Donald Trump’s condom supplier,’ came a voice from behind the taller intruder’s scarlet ski-mask. ‘Open the fucking safe.’

Shankhill pursed his lips and gave a tight shake of his head.

The gunman’s eyes widened in the holes in his mask – not so much with anger, Shankhill felt, as with fascination. ‘Seriously?’ the guy asked.

‘Seriously,’ Shankhill replied in a stern but patient tone, like a teacher trying to impart a lesson. He’d decided that he was going to tough this thing out. ‘You’re on very fragile ice, boys, let me tell you. Time is not on your side, and if you actually do know who I am … you wouldn’t even be here. Now, I strongly suggest you don’t push your luck any more, and you get out while the getting out’s good. As it is, you’re going to be hunted for the rest of your life.’

The taller gunman regarded him with apparent deep interest. ‘The safe?’

Shankhill shook his head again, slowly and deliberately.

The gunman seemed to consider this, and then whipped around, grabbed Turk by the collar of his jacket and yanked him up to his feet, before pushing him hard towards the far corner of the room. ‘Turn around!’ he barked.

Still with his arms out, Turk shuffled around until he was facing them, eyes expanded to an amazing size in a face not just bloodied but now pale and damp with fear. Without warning, the taller gunman raised the SIG and, single-handed, fired a deafening burst at his legs.

Both limbs were visibly shattered as the shells ripped through them, hammering into the wall behind, spraying it with blood and bone and meat. Turk fell full-length onto his side, gagging in almost unimaginable pain. Malcolm Pugh screamed in terror, clapping his hands to his ears, fresh streams of piss seeping through the front of his trousers. Shankhill, who’d banked that his temporary tough talk might do the trick, could only goggle in horror. He too had half put his hands to his ears, and now, as the echoes died away and the dust cleared, could do no more than blink in rapid-fire shock at the sight of his fallen comrade.

‘He gets the next lot in the head,’ the taller gunman said. ‘After that, we start on the little fella.’

‘No … please!’ Pugh squawked.

‘Be quite a fucking mess for you to clean up given that you run an unlicensed money-lending business from these premises,’ the gunman added. ‘And you won’t even be able to call a friend when your own knees and elbows are shot through, will you? Because trust me, pal … we’ll get round to you too before we leave here.’

Shankill’s mouth sagged open as he gaped first at one, and then at the other.

This was serious. This was absolutely for real. Roy ‘the Shank’ Shankhill was being robbed inside his own office.

‘The safe!’ the taller one said again. ‘You fat, greasy-headed fuck!’

The money-lender held his position for another moment – just long enough for the various bits and pieces to finally fall together inside his stunned mind. Beaded with sweat, he stumbled away from his desk to the safe and squatted down, where he adjusted a dial, turning it back and forth to listen to the requisite number of clicks. When the door clunked open, Shankhill rose to his feet and backtracked away.

At the far side of the room, the wounded Turk gave a low, animalistic whine. The gunmen ignored him, the shorter one stepping in front of Shankhill so that he could cover him with the SIG while keeping the shotgun trained on the fallen henchman. The taller, meanwhile, hunkered down at the safe, and began lifting out rolls and rolls and rolls of banknotes, all of which he shovelled into his sack. After that, he helped himself to jewellery – bracelets, brooches, necklaces – quality stuff too, not of the bling variety that Shankill generally adorned himself with, but platinum and white gold, embedded with diamonds and other gems. When he’d finished, he straightened up and turned to face the Shank.

He offered an empty hand. ‘We’ll take your neck chains and your rings, while you’re at it. And the Rolex. Jesus … you wash your hair in chip-fat, or what?’

Shankhill scowled as he handed the valuables over. ‘I’ll find you,’ he said quietly.

‘Yeah?’ The taller gunman stepped backward. ‘Maybe my bootprint’ll give you a head start.’

Then he opened fire at Shankhill’s legs. A fusillade of lead shredded through muscle and bone, all but blowing the ungainly limbs away completely, hurling the overweight money-lender down onto the blood and urine-spattered floorboards.

To prove he was a man of his word, the taller bandit concluded by stamping on Shankhill’s pale, sweat-soggy face some two, three times. When he’d finished that, the two of them rounded on Malcolm Pugh, who wailed even more loudly than before.

‘Shut it or you die!’ The taller one stabbed a warning finger into Pugh’s face.

But the little gambler was wild-eyed and wet-mouthed with fear. ‘My inside pocket!’ he gibbered. ‘It’s in my inside pocket … all of it. Take what you want …’

‘We don’t want your money,’ the taller one said.

When Pugh filched a handful of twenties from under his jacket and waved it at them, the shorter one simply knocked it out of his grasp, sending it fluttering across the room, and then twisted his hands behind his back, causing him to shriek again, his time with agony, before binding them together with duct tape. He repeated the process with Pugh’s ankles.

‘It’s dead simple … Malcolm,’ the taller bandit advised him, when Pugh lay trussed in a corner. He’d read the first name on a credit card from Pugh’s wallet, though he now reinserted the card into the wallet, and replaced it in the captive’s pocket. ‘You’ve survived this. You even get to keep your own cash … you’ll be able to get yourself free in a few minutes. But it isn’t over. We know who you are. So, you go to the cozzers about this … you even call an ambulance for these two goons, and we’ll come back for you. And you won’t need me to tell you … it won’t just be your legs we shoot off.’

Pugh said nothing, closing his eyes against the stinging sweat dabbling his lashes.

When he finally risked opening them, the masked assailants had gone.

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