The Ninth Step - John Milton #8 (John Milton Thrillers) Read online

  The vault was soon filled with a cacophony of noise: the crash as sledgehammers were driven into the metal fasciae and then the screams of anguished metal as the drills were used to force the locks. There came an exuberant whoop as Marcus went through the contents of the first drawer that he had opened. He tossed the empty tray on the floor and held up a tiara. It was mounted in gold and set in silver, with rose-cut and pear-shaped stones.

  “Look at this shit!” he gloated. “Look at it! This is going to be insane!”

  “Into the bag.”

  Milton went back to his corner of the vault. He addressed the box with the stencilled 221 and crashed the sledgehammer against it until the protective cover fell away. He drilled into the box, popping the lock and opening the door. Everything was as he had left it, as he had known it would be: the ten envelopes, one atop the other. The two at the bottom were uneven with the shape of the cable ties, and he felt the bulk of the mobile phone in the envelope on the top. He made a show of opening the top envelope and glimpsing inside it. He found the phone, reached inside, switched it on and hid it in his palm.

  “Anything?” Marcus said. Milton looked up; Marcus was watching him suspiciously.

  “No,” he said. “Just papers.”

  “What kind of papers?”

  “Newspapers.”

  “Let me have a look.”

  Milton readied himself for action. The timing was unwelcome. He would have preferred them to have found the evidence before he was forced to put his plan into effect, but there was nothing for it now. He primed himself. Spencer wasn’t looking, and he was the one with the pistol. Milton had the phone in his right palm, shielding it from Marcus. He held up the envelope and waited for Marcus to draw closer. His muscles itched with adrenaline. He would disable Marcus as quickly as he could and try to get to Spencer before he could draw the gun…

  “Ty che, blyad?”

  It was Vladimir.

  Marcus paused. “You what?”

  Milton spoke enough Russian to understand that Vladimir had cursed in surprise.

  Vladimir was proffering a velvet bag, the drawstring held open. Marcus turned to look, temporarily forgetting Milton. Vladimir told Marcus to hold out his hand and poured out the contents of the bag: twelve large diamonds tumbled out, their facets sparkling in the glow of the work lamps.

  Marcus exhaled. “Holy shit…”

  Milton moved quickly.

  He pressed DIAL on the phone and slid it into the hip pocket of his trousers. By the time Marcus had finished replacing the jewels in the velvet bag and dropping that in with the rest of their loot, Milton had stood and moved to start work on the box that was beneath 221, quickly prising it open and withdrawing a stack of fifty-pound bank notes that were held together by ancient, crumbling elastic bands.

  Marcus turned to him, a quizzical look on his face as if he was trying to remember what he had been about to say. He paused there, his mouth open, before he laughed, gave a happy “fuck it,” took up his sledge and went back to the drawers.

  Milton felt the shape of the phone pressing against his leg. He had the sudden, awful thought that the tightness of his trousers might lead to the phone’s buttons being pressed against his hip. If that happened and the call was interrupted…

  He put the concern out of his mind. Nothing could be done about that now. He had to hope that everything held together. He considered himself a skilled improviser, but, down here, with three men against him, at least one of whom was armed… there would only be so much that he could do.

  He forced the fascia of the box away, picked up his drill and set about the locks.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  MILTON REGULARLY checked his watch. It took around fifteen minutes to open each box: ten minutes to pulverise the fascia until it could be pulled off, then another five to drill inside without damaging the contents of the tray. Milton had been approached by the others on five occasions with what might have been the photographs that he was looking for. He opened the envelopes and wallets and skimmed through the contents. There were photographs, some of people in compromising positions, a couple that he even thought he recognised, together with wills and deeds and other legal documents. But there were no pictures that resembled those that Hicks had described to him. Milton started to worry that they would not be here at all. What if Hicks had been wrong?

  It quickly became unbearably hot. The vault was not ventilated, and they were working hard. Milton had started to sweat and had been the first to remove his shirt. Marcus had looked at the tattoo of an angel that Milton had across his back and had made the kind of juvenile comment that he had come to expect of him; but, ten minutes later, he grumbled that he was hot, too, and took off his own shirt. His skin was white and he was put together like a featherweight, muscles taut with the exertion of the work. Within ten minutes Spencer and Vladimir had followed their example, with Spencer taking his pistol out of the shoulder holster and shoving it into the waistband of his trousers.

  Another half hour had passed when Milton saw in the corner of his eye that Spencer had stopped working. He had just opened a box and was rifling through the contents.

  “Is this it?”

  Milton rested the sledgehammer against the cabinet, picked up his shirt and used it to wipe the sweat from his face.

  Spencer came across to him with the box in his arms.

  “Well?”

  Milton took the tray and looked inside. It was one of the larger boxes, and it was full. The bottom two-thirds was taken up by neatly stacked courses of banknotes fastened together with paper straps. Sitting atop the money were two clear plastic documents folders. Milton set the box down and opened the first folder. It held a sheaf of photographic paper. Milton took the photographs out and looked through them. He recognised Leo Isaacs, much younger then, shirtless and with a look of wide-eyed pleasure on his face. There were other pictures of Isaacs, together with several other men, some of whom Milton thought that he recognised. There were boys, too, young boys. Many of them were naked. There were pictures of the men embracing them. Milton felt a knot of anger in his stomach as he worked through the pictures.

  “Is that it? What you’re looking for?”

  Milton blinked twice, bringing his focus back, reminding himself where he was and how much danger he was in. He put the box on the floor and stood. “No,” he said. “Keep looking.”

  Spencer exhaled impatiently. “Come on,” he said. He turned and indicated the wall of boxes. “We’re nearly halfway through them. What is it you’re after?”

  “Now,” Milton said.

  “What?”

  “I mean I’ll tell you when I see it,” he said.

  Milton took in the room. He did it nonchalantly, without taking his attention away from Spencer, but he positioned each man in relation to where he was standing: Spencer, right in front of him; Marcus, at the other side of the room; Vladimir, behind Spencer.

  “You have some nerve,” Spencer said. “You turn up, tell us what to do, talk to me like you’re in charge? Well, you ain’t in charge. This says I am.” He drew the pistol and waved it in Milton’s face like an amateur. “What do you think about that?”

  “Now,” Milton said.

  Spencer looked at him, confused. “What?”

  “I think you should just relax.”

  Spencer laughed. “You’re unbelievable.” He turned his head to his brother. “He’s unbelievable.”

  “Just put the gun down,” Milton said. “You’re in charge. But just put it down, all right? Put it down now.” He laid extra emphasis on the last word, trying to find a difficult middle ground between urgency and conciliation. It was difficult not to sound like he was delivering an order, and that appeared to be the way that Spencer interpreted it.

  “I’ve had enough of this.”

  He raised the pistol.

  “Do him,” Marcus suggested. “He’s bluffing about Eddie. We’ll take our chances.”

  #

  ALEX
HICKS pressed the Bluetooth headset to his ear and tried to make out the conversation.

  “What?”

  “… should relax.”

  Shit.

  Hicks pulled the balaclava down over his face, collected the plastic bottle and the rag from the seat next to him, opened the door and stepped out of the car that he had stolen earlier. He hurried across the street to the large black doors that led to the ground-floor reception area of the vault. He saw the white Transit van with the woman inside it. He had been watching her all night, ever since the van had delivered Milton and the other men. She was keeping a watch. He had been careful, and he didn’t think that she had seen him. He had to hope that she was unarmed, but there was not much to be done about that now.

  Laughter.

  “… unbelieve…”

  “… gun down.”

  There were ostentatious signs fixed on either side of the door that announced THE LONDON VAULT LIMITED. The door was significant, with golden figures that read 88–90 above it and a brass letterbox in the right-hand door, next to a polished door handle. He pushed the letterbox open, jammed the nozzle of the plastic bottle into the gap and squeezed. He had filled it with turpentine, and he squirted it inside until the bottle was almost empty. Then, he took the rag, emptied out the rest of the accelerant, stuffed it into the letterbox and lit it with his lighter. He pushed it all the way inside.

  He held the letterbox open and glanced inside. It was dark for a moment until the turpentine caught fire. The interior of the hallway was revealed in the sudden glow from the flames, oranges and reds and yellows, and Alex felt the waft of heat on the flesh around his eyes and against his lips. Black smoke gushed up to the ceiling and started to leak out through the letterbox and the gap between the door and the doorstep.

  An alarm shrieked out a warning.

  #

  MILTON STARED into the small black hole at the end of the pistol. Where was Hicks? Something had gone wrong, and now he was underground, looking into the business end of a Glock with no support and no plan B. Spencer straightened his arm, the gun held out in a confident grip. What was their plan? Shoot him, leave him in the vault for the police to clean up? There was no connection between him and them. He would be a useful diversion, a red herring that would lead them away from the Fabians. And, in the meantime, they would have made a tremendous score from the loot they had been able to filch from the vault.

  It was not how Milton had envisaged the end of his life.

  “Do him!” Marcus urged.

  The vault was suddenly filled with an ear-splitting shriek. There was an alarm on the wall on Milton’s side of the room, and it was deafening. A half second later, the sprinklers in the ceiling gushed into life and water spilled down onto them.

  There was a moment of confusion, and that was all that Milton needed.

  Spencer had turned a fraction to look up at the alarm. His attention was off Milton just for a moment. Milton punched hard into Spencer’s stomach, hard enough to knock him back. Spencer stumbled, tripping over a drill and falling to the floor, the contents of a nearby drawer spilling over him.

  Marcus went for the small pistol that he had kept hidden inside the pocket of his trousers. Milton had anticipated that he was armed, and had prioritised him for attention. Marcus’s fingers struggled to get into the pocket. Milton’s right hand went out to the handle of the sledgehammer propped against the wall next to him, already moving quickly enough to yank it off the ground and begin a long and powerful swing. He hopped forward as he swung it, closing the distance enough so that Marcus was within the radius of the sledge. The head smashed into the side of his body with terrific force. Marcus collapsed. Milton let go of the sledge, crouched down and took his pistol—a Beretta—from him. He was wheezing as he inhaled, and Milton guessed that he had broken his ribs. That would be painful.

  Milton quickly examined the pistol. It was a Px4 Storm subcompact with a single-action trigger and an ambidextrous thumb safety. The pistol was perfect for concealed carry, weighing less than thirty ounces when it was unloaded. This one weighed more.

  Milton turned back to Spencer. He was on his back and the impact of his landing had jarred the Glock from his hand. Milton knelt down, collected the gun, and used it instead of the Beretta. He tossed the smaller pistol out of the vault.

  Vladimir regarded him warily.

  Milton trained the pistol on him.

  “You,” he shouted to Vladimir. “Go and get box 221. It’s on the floor. Over there, where I was standing.”

  Vladimir did as he was told, collecting the tray from the floor and bringing it open.

  “What are you doing?” Spencer wheezed.

  “Open the envelopes at the bottom,” Milton ordered Vladimir. “Tip them out.”

  Vladimir looked to Marcus and Spencer. “I—”

  “Don’t look at them,” Milton said. “They don’t have the gun. I do. Get on with it.”

  The man did as he was told, opening the envelopes and upending them until the double-loop cable ties poured out.

  “Hands behind your backs, gentlemen,” Milton shouted, making himself heard over the sound of the alarm. “Vladimir is going to tie you up.”

  Vladimir was resigned. He started with Spencer, looping the ties around his wrists and fastening them tight. Marcus grunted from the pain in his ribs as his arms were drawn behind his back. Milton then indicated that Vladimir should lie on his stomach and told him to put his arms behind his back. He knelt down so that his knee was pressed into Vladimir’s spine and fastened the ties around his wrists, pulling them until they bit into his flesh.

  “Why are you doing this?” Marcus croaked. “What was in that fucking box?”

  Milton knew that he shouldn’t tarry, but he couldn’t resist.

  He leaned over and spoke into Marcus’s face, loud enough for them all to hear. “The night you killed your brother, he was coming to see his sister because he was frightened. He was abused when he was a child. He wanted to tell that story, just like he wanted to confess to the robbery that he did with the two of you, and someone had threatened him. I know you killed him. And he was my friend.”

  “You’re dead!” Spencer Fabian shouted out.

  Milton told them to sit with their backs against the wall and then worked fast. The alarm was deafening and the water continued to pour down from the nozzles overhead. He collected the tray from Higgins’s box and upended it into one of the empty bags. The bundles of money were sodden, but he scooped all of them out and dropped them into the bag. The clear plastic folders had protected the photographs from the water, and he pushed those inside, too.

  “Smith!”

  It was Spencer again.

  Milton turned to the three of them trussed up and arranged against the wall, the water running around their bodies.

  “Don’t worry,” Milton said. “You won’t be waiting long.”

  “I mean it,” Spencer shouted. “You’re dead.”

  Milton collected the bag and pushed it through the hole in the wall. “You’re not the first person to tell me that. One day it’ll be true, but not today. Don’t do anything silly. The police will be here soon. You can tell them what you’ve been up to.”

  Milton collected his shirt. It was soaked through, but he put it on anyway. He pulled on the balaclava, put his head and shoulders into the hole and slithered ahead. It was an uncomfortable sensation again, made worse by the thought of the three men behind him and the clamour that announced that the emergency services must be on their way, and he was grateful when he managed to force his way through and into the corridor beyond.

  He slid beneath the two doors that they had forced and reached for the rope.

  He put the bag over his shoulder and started to climb.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  THE WHITE TRANSIT van drove away before Hicks could confront the driver. The sound of the alarm from inside the vault was loud, and smoke belched out from the gap beneath the door and a letterbox that
didn’t close all the way. Hicks guessed that the driver had made the assessment that there was nothing to be done, so she had evacuated the area to save herself before the arrival of the authorities.

  That moment was close at hand. As Hicks slid back into the stolen car and started the engine, he saw the flashing blue and red lights of a fire engine as it turned off Holborn and started north up Hatton Garden. Milton and Hicks had looked at the map of the area and added the locations of the nearest fire stations. It was one and a half miles to Soho, the location of the station they thought most likely to respond. With no traffic on the road and travelling under blue lights, they had estimated that the engines would take five minutes to arrive.

  That was going to be cutting it very tight.

  The truck killed its siren and pulled to a stop outside the vault.

  “They’re here, Milton,” he said into the microphone of the headset. “You need to be out of there.”

  No response.

  The fire-fighters spilled out of the engine and hurried to the door, the tendrils of smoke uncurling into the light from the streetlamps. One of the men tried the door; a second went back to the truck and returned with a sledgehammer.

  Hicks couldn’t wait any longer. He put the car into gear and pulled out, driving carefully so as to avoid drawing attention to himself. As he turned into St Cross Street, he saw another fire truck and a police car racing north along Hatton Garden.

  “Milton,” he said, “respond.”

  Still nothing.

  “You’ve got to get out, Milton. Now. I’m going to wait on Kirby Street for as long as I can.”

  Nothing.

  #

  MILTON STARTED the climb back up to the fifth floor. Smoke was dribbling into the lift shaft from ventilation shafts and between the imperfect seal of the lobby doors on the first floor. The sound of the alarm was louder as he ascended past the ground floor. The smoke thickened and he was glad of the wool of the balaclava over his mouth. He moved slowly and purposefully, hauling the rope hand over hand. There were plenty of footholds on his ascent, but the muscles in his arms and shoulders were burning by the time he reached the open doors. He stepped out and pulled the rope up behind him. He didn’t think that the men in the vault would be able to free themselves, but, in the event that they managed it, he wanted to make sure that they would find it as difficult as possible to follow him. He was confident that they would still be there when the authorities arrived and, as he rolled his shoulders to relieve the ache, he heard the sound of sirens from outside.