Watching You, Chapters Thirty-Seven and Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Seven

‘So you’re telling me you’ve no idea.’ Preston stared at Jacobs, then raised his eyes to the ceiling.

Absolutely not.’ Jacobs lifted his face from his paperwork, fixed Preston with the kind of gaze that suggested it was absurd to ask the question. ‘The guy’s a maverick. How can you determine what sort of place he’d use as a base? A smart residential, a rundown dive in the centre of town? He lofted his hands. ‘Who knows? No way of telling with that man.’

‘Okay.’ Preston frowned, placed his hands flat on the desk, and raised himself from the chair opposite. Jacobs was engrossed in his paperwork before he reached the door; a quick glance back confirmed as much. Precious little regard the man seemed to have for Withers’ safety, but as Preston reflected, there had only been any conversation between the pair when it couldn’t be avoided.

Preston paced along a bland corridor, bore left at the top, and strode the few yards to his end office. He stepped past his desk, shoved his hands in his trouser pockets, and stared out the window. The rain had returned, splattering the panes in large drops, smearing his view of the rooftops of Whitehall. But it wasn’t the view he was interested in right now.

The slim figure of Carl Withers dominated his thoughts. A man in trouble, though how much only he alone knew. Preston’s mind travelled back through the many years he’d known him. From the moment he’d joined the department on recommendation from a trusted source, he’d noticed unusual qualities in Withers: the man had perception and intelligence in abundance and a willingness to undertake duties from the demanding to the mundane. The scale never bothered him the way it might have some of his colleagues.

Preston had studied Withers’ credentials upon his recommendation to the unit. He came from a middle-class background and hailed from somewhere near Tunbridge Wells. He had received several commendations, and his attendance and work reports were first-class. From Preston’s own observations, there was a distance about him that might be regarded as aloofness, almost certainly was in some of his colleagues, but Preston thought he had seen through that. His commendations, his assessments, and his own intuition told him it wasn’t the problem. It sprang from something else – Withers was ill at ease; some personal shortcoming seemed to be gripping him like a vice.

Preston lowered his gaze to watch the traffic crawl along The Mall, cupping his right hand beneath his chin. What had caused Withers to return to Cumberton, asking for forty-eight hours’ grace, when on his own admission, his assignment had been completed? What had taken him to the multi-storey car park and then caused him to be whisked away from under the noses of the local police?

Preston had no idea, but for Withers’ sake, and the outcome of the operation, he had to find out. For Withers’ sake, as much as anything, if the truth were told. The future of a good man and bright young officer lay in the balance.

Preston glanced at his watch and raised the phone. He spent several minutes talking to the Cumberton station commander. Withers had been snatched from the top floor, outside the CCTV operations control room. Was there something in that? Had he been heading there?

Whatever the odds on that, he was sure something within the confines of the multi-storey held the key. He placed a request to the local commander, which was followed by a long pause. The man had not been particularly accommodating, but Preston could understand why. Cumberton police had not been fully informed of the department’s operation; nonetheless, he knew they’d have to comply.

‘Okay, we’ll expect you around midday then,’ the blunt voice finally came back. The line went dead before Preston could reply.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Withers took a deep breath and wished he hadn’t. The air from the smoke-filled room raked his lungs. Not a habitual smoker, he’d participated only when necessary to fit in with the required ‘code of conduct’. Not that there was any point in that now.

His three captors were restless; one sat perched on a filthy window ledge, his face turned towards the window, fingers tapping impatiently, his cigarette seemingly glued to his mouth.

Across the room, his mate stood by the table, constantly shifting his balance from one foot to the other, throwing frequent glances at the clock that hung skew-whiff from the wall behind the chair to which Withers was bound. The third of the trio was the most restless of all, and, Withers felt, the most impulsive, which potentially made him the most dangerous. He continually paced the room, to the window and back, from far wall to door. Casting wide-eyed glances at Withers as though he were the villain of the piece, and of course, in their eyes, he was.

But where was Main Man? That question was as urgent to him as the one about his own fate. Was he even now stalking the girl? Again and again, his vision had hammered through his mind, bringing fresh blasts of torment; soon, it would become reality, and there was nothing he could do to stop it. Not now, not with three morons like these loose around him. He tried to angle his wrists, handcuffed to the leg of the chair but got no movement at all, then to shift his outstretched legs that were bound at the ankles, but the shackles bit sharply into his skin.

The one pacing the room shot daggers at him as though he might be trying to free himself – as if he had any chance of that. He met the glare, their eyes locking as he followed the man across the room, ‘Give yourself a break, make a run for it like your … ah!’

‘Shut the fuck up!’ The burly man stopped his pacing, snarled, and lunged, swiping Withers across the face, stinging his unshaven chin.

‘Truth hurt, does it bud – your boss done a runner?’

‘Leave it be, Johnson, can’t you see what he’s trying to do?’ The one on the ledge raked a hand through short black hair and jumped to the floor.

‘Yeah – but just suppose the scum might be right.’ Johnson had resumed pacing but stopped, shifted his gaze from Withers, directing it from one crony to another – suppose the cunt has left us in the shit – only a matter of time …’

‘You got it, bud, just a matter of time – why don’t you just cut and run?’

‘I said shut the fuck up.’ Johnson was screaming now. Withers tried not to flinch as a large right arm came crashing towards his face, only to be deflected by an outstretched arm. ‘I said leave it out, letting yourself get worked up ain’t gonna help. Main Man will be here shortly.’

‘What makes you so sure?’ Withers glanced at the pair, forced his head to the one behind him. ‘What makes you so sure he hasn’t just cut and run?’

‘Because he wants your blood – bad …’ the one behind him scowled, coming around to face Withers. ‘Whatever’s keeping him, he’ll be here, don’t you worry your pretty face about that.’

‘Yeah, unfinished business, pal, that’s all it is,’ the thick-set man who’d been on the ledge sounded convincing, but he looked uncertain, ‘and when he gets hold of you, you’ll wish you’d never been born.’

Withers met his gaze without blinking, then lowered his eyes. Probably without realising it the thug had struck a chord. Didn’t he often feel that way? He did so now, but it wasn’t his predicament that was determining his thinking.

He thought of the woman with the corn-coloured hair.