This Is How It Ends Page 12

  ‘My dad. . .’

  She speaks the words so softly I can’t get anything from the tone.

  ‘What about your dad?’ I ask tremulously, thinking this is it, she’s already told him. We’re done. Or she’s going to tell him and we’ll be done then. ‘Ella, honey, what about your dad?’

  Another big, jagged sigh. ‘It’ll kill him if he ever finds out.’

  ‘He won’t find out,’ I tell her, as firmly as I can. ‘Not if you stay here and keep calm.’

  ‘All I ever wanted was for him to be proud of me.’ The sound of a cover rustling and a small sniffle. ‘I’ve messed everything up, Molly.’

  Quietly she begins to sob and I feel a tug in my chest, wishing she’d come to me rather than working herself up into this state.

  ‘You haven’t messed everything up,’ I say. ‘You’ve been unlucky, that’s all. There’s a way through this, Ella, believe me.’ I force a smile I hope she can hear down the phone. ‘You are such a clever girl. You’re strong and resourceful and you are going to get through this. We are going to get through this together.’

  Ella laughs. It’s almost a gasp, like a last breath before drowning.

  ‘I’m doing important work, aren’t I?’

  ‘Too important to give up on, yes.’

  ‘I don’t want to waste my life,’ she says, so desperately that I feel tears coming. ‘I want to do so much more than this.’

  ‘You can.’

  ‘I want to change things.’

  ‘You will,’ I tell her and even as I hope it’s true, I fear it isn’t. That she can’t get beyond this, that I can’t bring her through it in one piece.

  That neither of us are quite good enough.

  Ella

  Then – 24th November

  Suddenly it all very felt real.

  Sitting on the floor of the back room of an empty house a minute away from their target, a single, heavily shaded lamp lighting the faces of the men sitting opposite her, all of them waiting for it to get late enough for the streets to empty so they could make their move.

  ‘We’ll give it another half hour,’ Quinn said, but he kept fidgeting, toying with the laces of his trainers and the zips on his black combat trousers.

  Next to him the younger man Ella knew only as Lewis was perfectly still. He looked almost like he was meditating, with his legs crossed and his hands on his knees, palms turned up. But his eyes were open and by the lamplight she could see the agitation stirring there. He was all angles, long-legged and rangy, too big for stealth, she thought, but he was Quinn’s friend and she couldn’t stop him coming.

  Three of them to do this; it was madness.

  One person could accomplish the task easily enough, two was better so they’d have a lookout, but Quinn insisted they all go. That this was a group effort and everyone should share in the triumphant final act.

  Lewis had scoped the place out, made several passes, day and night, and picked between three and four a.m. as the ideal time. He’d suggested the best route to evade the network of CCTV cameras and the windows of the flats that overlooked their target. When Ella had made her own survey of the site she realised there was no clean way in. Dozens of windows gave on to the single viable entry point and they only needed one insomniac busybody to blow this.

  That was when she started to get nervous.

  Walking along the side street on a blustery afternoon last week, with a scarf pulled up over her nose and a hat tugged down to her eyebrows, she’d tucked every strand of hair carefully up under it so she couldn’t be identified when the footage was later checked. A good copper would go to those lengths, know that they should look for anyone reconnoitring the spot in the days preceding an attack.

  She’d gone to the supermarket across the road and bought a few things so she’d have a shopping bag and an excuse, then walked a circuit of the block the building stood on, checking for escape routes and hiding places she felt confident of reaching if things went south.

  She didn’t trust these men.

  Part of her suspected this was a set-up; Quinn wanting to get dirt on her. He didn’t seem to appreciate that she would be getting the same on him.

  Lewis . . . Lewis she couldn’t figure out at all.

  They’d met twice before and he’d said very little, was precise and controlled and didn’t appear particularly impressed by Quinn. If Lewis had deferred to him that would make more sense – another acolyte devoted to the cause. There were hundreds of them on the fringes, and they all made damn sure you knew how dedicated they were.

  But there was something not quite right about Lewis and that was setting her nerves on edge. His stillness, the way he looked at her now, with a slight smile, then looked away again.

  Quinn stood up and started out of the room.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Ella snapped.

  ‘For a shit,’ he said. ‘That alright with you?’

  He stomped out into the hallway and up a set of uncarpeted stairs, unbothered by making noise in what should be an empty house. Another nerve frayed.

  Ella knew she should get out now, before she’d done anything illegal. Leave these idiots to it. There was too much she could lose and no certainty of gaining anything beyond an already hollow sense of satisfaction.

  No, she reminded herself, there was more at stake than that and if she wanted to fulfil her true potential she needed to push through the nervousness and silence the timid voice that always wanted to retreat, stay safe, be sensible.

  Sensible people never make history, she thought.

  ‘Ryan’s just nervous,’ Lewis said, in a soft West Country accent completely out of place in this stripped and mouldering room. ‘He’s not done as much of this kind of thing as he likes to make out.’

  ‘What about you?’ Ella asked.

  ‘Bits and pieces back home when I was a kid.’ He shrugged, gave her a sly, self-deprecating look. ‘But we need to fight them where they live, don’t we? Too late by the time they’re down my way buying their second or third fucking holiday cottage.’

  Ella wasn’t sure how he thought tonight’s action would stop that.

  ‘How long have you been in London, then?’ she asked, feeling absurd making this small talk.

  ‘Two years. I got into UCL; history.’ He twisted to face her full on, beaming now. ‘I was at the Camden protest. I saw you break the cordon. That was – shit – it was superhero stuff.’

  ‘It was stupid,’ Ella said, her fingertips going to her arm, feeling the bone through her skin. ‘I’m lucky all I got was a broken arm.’

  ‘Scum,’ he spat. ‘Did you ever go after him?’

  Ella’s toes curled away from the end of her boots, all the recoil she could allow herself.

  ‘No, I never found out who he was.’

  Lewis nodded. ‘Took his numbers off, yeah?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Shame. We could do something now. Two years on, nobody’d connect it to you. Fuck knows how many people he’s laid into since then. Plenty of other suspects to take the fall.’ He took a sip of coffee from the lid of his Thermos. ‘Your old man was one of them, right?’

  She nodded. ‘He was, yeah. We don’t get on.’

  ‘No, I bet you don’t.’ Lewis grinned and lifted his cup in a toast. ‘Sticking it to the man.’

  Ella wrapped her arms around her shins, rested her chin on her knees. She felt anxiety bubbling in the pit of her stomach. She hadn’t eaten all day, too nervous to swallow even a bite of toast, and now she regretted that. She felt vague and woozy from low blood sugar, unsure of herself.

  ‘Was it his idea for you to go into the police?’ Lewis asked.

  It had been a long time since anyone had mentioned that and Ella thought the conversation was long done with. But Lewis didn’t know her and she could understand why he needed to hear it from her mouth. Especially now, when he was trusting her just like she was trusting him.

  ‘Dad didn’t give me much option,’ she said. ‘He forced
my brother to sign up – morally blackmailed him, basically – and he’s not made for the job. He wanted to be a chef, but Dad was having none of that. Then he did the same thing to me.’

  ‘What did you want to be?’

  ‘A teacher,’ Ella said. ‘I wanted to help people. Dad told me the police help people more than teachers. He thinks they’re all Trots.’

  Lewis snorted. ‘The country wouldn’t be in the mess it is if they were.’

  ‘My history teacher was one. Really hardcore; she got in shit every year because she wore a white poppy for Remembrance Sunday. She told me to stand up to Dad and do what I wanted, but it’s not that easy, is it?’

  ‘You got out, though,’ he said. ‘Eventually.’

  ‘Three months at Garton.’ She bit her lip. ‘You wouldn’t believe what that place is like.’

  ‘My cousin’s at Deepcut,’ Lewis said. ‘I know what kind of shitholes those places are. She hates it, but she can’t get out. You know what happens to the women.’

  Ella nodded and he looked away. He knew what she knew. That was on record as well; the official investigation and her own writing about it. Lewis had been thorough, checked her out ahead of time, and Ella found it reassuring that he’d done the research.

  Perhaps he was someone she could work with again, if tonight went off without a hitch. Shut out Quinn, bring Lewis in closer.

  She pointed to the line of ink just visible under the pushed-back cuff of his black jumper.

  ‘What’s that say?’

  He shoved it further back and held his forearm out to her. Ella took his wrist and leaned in, turning it gently into the light.

  ‘“You are responsible for the predictable consequences of your actions,”’ she read. ‘Chomsky. Nice.’

  ‘It’s to remind me not to do anything reckless,’ he said, with a wry smile. ‘Have you got any?’

  ‘They’re not as easily accessible as yours,’ Ella said, sitting back.

  ‘Another time then.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  Quinn came back into the room, gloved up now, jacket zipped to the chin. The weather was cold enough to justify it but all three of them, done up like that . . . if they were seen it would be obvious they weren’t just passing through on their way home after a heavy night out.

  He clapped his hands.

  ‘Time to go, boy and girl.’

  The streets were deserted, disconcertingly quiet, but in the distance Ella heard sirens and she flinched, sure that somehow they knew and were heading in this direction. She reminded herself of all the bad things that happened in the early hours of the morning, all the other dramas playing out around the borough that were bigger and more immediate than this.

  Barnard Close seemed wider and more exposed than it had last time she’d walked down it, and she hung back a few paces behind Quinn and Lewis, giving herself space to run if she needed to. Out the corner of her eye she saw a mangy fox slinking into the shadows, only for it to disappear through a gap in a wall and into a high-sided yard, setting off the security lights with an audible snap.

  Her breaths were beginning to shorten and she told herself to focus, get through this, move beyond it. She had her exit strategy; she was safe as long as she stayed alert.

  They went down a narrow alleyway narrowed further by a line of stinking bins and leaking bags and into a dead space behind a run of buildings, all in darkness, a cafe and some offices, none of them with any visible form of security. The upper windows were covered and maybe the rooms were occupied, but surely not by anyone who would call the police, Ella hoped.

  The back of Brighams was walled and solidly gated and there was the security camera Lewis had reported, ringed with a spiked collar. He went on ahead and sprayed out its lens.

  He boosted Quinn up over the wall and Ella heard him land on the other side. Lewis held out his cupped palms towards her and she hesitated for a second.

  ‘I’ve got you,’ he whispered. ‘Come on.’

  She planted her foot on his hands and he lifted her up like she weighed nothing. Ella grabbed the top of the wall and hauled herself over. A couple of seconds later Lewis was next to her and she realised how unprepared Quinn was, standing waiting at the bottom of the fire escape they’d decided was the weak point, jiggling from foot to foot, making the contents of his backpack rattle.

  Lewis went up the metal stairs, light-footed, but in the silence every step rang out. He took a crowbar from his bag and began working at the door, near the lock, prying and levering. The sound of the wood splintering seemed deafening.

  Quinn grabbed Ella by the shoulder and pushed her up the stairs ahead of him.

  Lewis was already through the hallway, empty offices opening up on their left, a stale-smelling, disused kitchen on the right. The charity previously housed here had been cleared out with little warning and no ceremony, taking only what they absolutely needed, leaving desks and chairs and battered filing cabinets behind.

  Ella heard a series of beeps coming from downstairs and got there in time to see Lewis punching a final string of numbers into the alarm’s keypad. Engineers’ codes he’d got from some security forum, allowing him to disable the system and reset it.

  Then he was moving again. Spraying out another camera, this one placed to watch over Brighams’ employees and customers rather than intruders.

  Even by the weak light filtering through the security shutters Ella could see how in control he was, like someone who’d done this many times before. He reached into his bag and tossed her a can of spray paint.

  ‘Five minutes.’

  She felt a thrill run through her as she started blanking out the Brighams signage on the very white walls, the smell of it catching in her nostrils. She glanced at Lewis, who’d taken off his black gloves, revealing a pair of thin surgical ones underneath, and saw him plug the USB stick containing the virus into the machine.

  They could have done it remotely but the message was as important as the action – we’ve broken you from the inside. It was spectacle more than disruption and damage.

  Gradually Ella became aware of another smell. Not spray paint. Lewis turned away from the desk just as she turned to look for Quinn.

  ‘Where is he?’ Lewis asked.

  Ella looked down the corridor leading back from the office, couldn’t see Quinn.

  Lewis was on his feet. ‘That’s kerosene.’

  Quinn came in, a bottle in each hand, pouring out two lines of pungent liquid along the floor, flicking it up the walls. He was singing under his breath as he did it and the weight of this miscalculation hit Ella square in the middle of the chest. She dropped the spray can she was holding, the room blurring in front of her.

  ‘This wasn’t the plan,’ Lewis said, striding across the room. He shoved Quinn against the wall. ‘We agreed. No violence.’

  ‘It’s not violence in an empty building, you pussy.’

  Quinn pushed him away. Liquid splashed across their feet and Ella started backing towards the door, slipping on the kerosene. Quinn doused more of it over the desks, the padded white swivel chairs and the display stands filled with properties.

  ‘There could be people in the other buildings,’ Lewis said angrily. ‘Are you happy to risk that?’

  Quinn kept moving. ‘This won’t blow the place up. It’s just for effect.’

  A siren blared outside, blue lights spiking through the gaps in the shutters, the vehicle going past at high speed.

  ‘We should leave,’ Ella said, her voice trembling, fear knotting her stomach. ‘We’ve made our point. This is what they want us to do.’

  ‘They don’t want this, believe me.’ Quinn threw the empty bottles down, took a lighter out of his pocket. ‘No one cares about your sit-ins and your petitions and your stupid banners. They don’t give a fuck. Nothing changes until you start attacking property.’

  ‘The police are in the area,’ Lewis said, gesturing beyond the shutters. ‘How the fuck do you think we’ll get away if they’re parked
up round the corner?’

  Quinn was smiling behind his balaclava, eyes crinkling with pleasure. ‘You scared, big man?’

  ‘I’m sane,’ Lewis said wildly. ‘I thought you were.’

  Quinn struck the lighter.

  ‘Ryan, just think about this for a minute.’ Ella watched the flame jump and snap, mesmerised by it and the power it contained and the pressure on her now to stop it. ‘We won’t get away with this. We already have a track record with Brighams; if it goes up we’ll be the first people arrested.’

  ‘They don’t know about me or Lewis.’ He smiled viciously. ‘You might get a visit but it’s all part of your learning curve.’

  Ella licked her lips. ‘What about Carol? They know about her. She’s going to be their prime suspect.’

  ‘She wants this done,’ he said, but there was a flicker of doubt in his voice.

  ‘Does she want to get arrested for it?’

  ‘She’s got an alibi,’ he said. ‘She’s working a night shift.’

  The moment of doubt had passed, Ella realised, seeing him draw up straighter and nod, as if satisfying himself that all the angles had been covered.

  ‘There are people in the flats next door,’ she said desperately.

  ‘The place’ll have fire alarms; they’ll be fine.’ Quinn shrugged. ‘See, Ella, this is the problem with you. You’ve got no fucking commitment. I’ve said it all along. I said you were a tourist and look at you now.’ He gestured towards her with the lighter, the flame licking his thumb. ‘You’re just another wannabe.’

  Lewis shoved a chair aside and started towards Quinn.

  ‘I’m not going to let you do this, Ryan.’

  ‘You’re not going to stop me.’

  Ella grabbed Lewis’s arm. ‘Come on, let’s get out of here.’

  ‘If you’re not up to it, then both of you go,’ Quinn said. ‘You don’t deserve to be part of this.’

  Lewis took Ella’s shoulders and walked her back into the hallway, his eyes fixed on hers as she protested, talking over her.

  ‘You have to run,’ he said. ‘Hide. You were never here.’