Betrayal's End, C14 - "Where Did You Say It Was?" (FRT)
Chapter summary: Eames and her very temporary partner’s detective work continues, but a nasty surprise awaits.
Chapter no: 14
Story: Betrayal’s End.
Warnings: Some mild language.
Rating: FRT
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters of “Law and Order: Criminal Intent” and acknowledge the rights of those who do. I will make no profit from this story.
As they pulled up outside the grimy block of apartments, she rechecked the address. “It’s up there somewhere, I guess.” She looked up at the maze of grimy concrete walkways and shuddered. It was a grim place, windswept and cold, and the lowering grey skies didn’t help. I guess crappy social housing looks the same the world over.
Ampirelli peered over her shoulder. “I reckon it’ll be on the top floor. You won’t wanna go up there on your own. Tell you what, we’ll go together.”
“You can’t, they sent me because they don’t think the people I’m talking to will trust a male… Could you come up with me as far as the same floor, then wait - are you okay with that?” She was not afraid, but it made sense to be cautious in a place she didn’t know, particularly if it was the sort of place Ampirelli had just described. There was a certain appeal in having backup in the form of a six-foot-plus male lurking in the background. Ampirelli was not far off the same size as Bobby, and though somewhat chubby, there was obviously a fair amount of muscle on him too. Then again, he was maybe half her age, perhaps less, and she didn’t want to put him in danger.
“Yeah, of course. I’ve done this sort of thing before.”
“This sort of thing?”
“Well, Tanya does a lot of work in the local community, you know, helping women learn self-defence and that. Sometimes if they don’t show up, she likes to go round and check they’re alright.” He pulled a face. “I mean, where we live’s not a bad area, but there’s some really rough places round here. It’s why she does the self-defence, like, keeping kids out of trouble and teaching the women to stand up for themselves a bit, keep themselves safe and that… I sometimes help out at the classes, the women there really like being able to beat up a big bloke…”
He chuckled “…but anyway, yeah, I go with her. I mean, it’s not like she’s afraid of owt, but there’s some people are just stupid about that sort of thing. It doesn’t matter that she’s a scary fucker herself, excuse my language, it’s when they see she’s got a bloke with it, it sometimes stops them from kicking off, ‘cause they think they’ll have to go the park with me.” He shook his head. “Silly buggers. Tanya’s a shedload more scary than I am, but…”
She broke into the stream of words. “Yes, well, can you come with me?”
“Yeah, of course.” They got out, having carefully parked the van facing away from the apartment block (in case a quick exit might be needed) and he locked the van. They set off up the stairs together.
She couldn’t help but be aware that they were the recipients of several unfriendly stares and comments from a set of five teenage boys hanging around on one of the landings. Ampirelli gave them an unfriendly scowl, and they backed off, muttering swearwords under their breath.
They headed on up to the apartment she had the address for. Ampirelli waited just out of sight as she knocked on the door. There was a timid-sounding shuffling from behind, and the sound of someone standing behind a door.
“Hello? What do you want?” a nervous-sounding voice asked.
“I’d like to speak to Amina Farooqi-“
“She’s not here.” The door suddenly opened, and a worried-looking female face appeared. “She doesn’t live here any more, okay? She moved.”
“When was that?”
“About a month ago.”
“Have you got the address?”
“Yeah, it’s somewhere round here…” The woman went back inside, leaving the door on the chain, and Eames heard her rooting through some papers. She finally reappeared clutching a piece of paper with an address written on it. “Here you go.” She slammed the door.
Eames rejoined Ampirelli, who frowned at the address. “I haven’t seen that street before, it must be new-build. Hang on, I’ve got satnav in the van.”
They walked back downstairs, Ampirelli scowling at the same kids on the way down. He inspected the van carefully, or at least as carefully as he could in the fading light. “It looks alright- you never know when someone’s going to stick a screwdriver in it for a laugh,” he explained. They got in and he moved off carefully, looking around for stray pedestrians, then pulled out into the road. “I’ll just park up at the petrol station, I’d rather not hang around here,” he explained as they pulled out of the estate and back onto a main road.
At a nearby petrol station, they pulled in sharply, causing the driver of a black SUV behind them to nearly run into the back of them; it stopped short with a squeal of brakes. Amp cheerfully waved back at the tinted windows, parked the van in a parking space at the back of the garage, and Eames went to find some snacks in the shop inside and use the bathroom. She returned to find an absence of Ampirelli, but he wandered back a minute later, adjusting his jeans. He rooted through the glove compartment to find the satnav, then started it up and put in the postcode.
They looked at the planned route, and Eames looked at her watch. She tried calling Tanya again, and this time got through.
“Hey, Alex! Good to hear from you!” Tanya’s voice sounded falsely bright, and Eames suddenly remembered with a jolt that someone might be listening in on the conversation.
“You too. Listen, we need to talk. Are you free?”
“I’m going to be stuck here at the hospital for another hour or so whilst they wait for my blood test results.”
“Anything…”
“No, it’s nothing serious. Just one of those pregnancy things. I’m in the café at the hospital. Listen, do you want to meet at my house in about, let’s say two hours, give Jack time to get home?”
“Okay, that works. I’ll see you then.” She ended the call and looked across at Ampirelli.
“Are you wanting to meet Tanya then?” He looked at the satnav. “We could do it, if you want to. I can get you there and back. It’s not somewhere I know, but it looks easy enough.”
They set off again, and the satnav guided them down a long main road, away from the main roads they had been travelling on. She called in and explained the situation to her contact at MI5, who seemed less than excited that she was running errands for the Metropolitan Police, but was pacified by the knowledge that she was on schedule to meet Tanya, explain the situation to her, and get back to Thames House in plenty of time to take part in the evening’s events. She felt her gut clench at the thought, just a little, and dismissed it. She was Alex Eames, and this was nothing to a Major Case detective. Nothing she couldn’t handle.
As she looked out of the window, she could see new houses in various stages of construction along the way. To judge from the occasional ruined old building nearby, it looked as though it was a mixture of new houses and converted old industrial buildings, as the city reshaped itself for the demands of the soon-to-be new year.
They continued down the road, Ampirelli frowning slightly as the satnav continued to tell them to keep going, even though they had passed the houses some way back. The area on either side of them looked rough and desolate. “I guess they’re still building this bit - are you sure we read that postcode right?”
She checked it again. “It looks right, but I guess that woman could have written it down wrongly.”
“Tell you what, we’ll keep going til we get there, then at least we’ll know if we’re in the wrong place.”
They kept going in uneasy silence, as the road continued. Eventually, they came to a large brick gate, which looked freshly built, and Eames’ spirits rose, only to drop again as the van stopped in front of a large, derelict-looking warehouse. A large sign proclaimed that there would soon be apartments to rent, but there appeared to be no other signs of life. Several sagging sacks of sand and cement and an abandoned metal container completed the general picture of depressing bleakness.
“Well, we’re here,” Ampirelli remarked. “Doesn’t look too good, does it?”
“I guess there could be houses being built behind it,” she replied without much hope.
“Okay, do you want to go round one way, and I’ll go round the other?”
She nodded. Might as well see it through to the end. They got out, and Ampirelli locked the van again, before the two of them split off. It was a big warehouse, and it took twenty minutes for her to walk around it, only to frown in dismay. The only thing at the back of the building was a large, barren looking field, with a dank brown river behind it. In the distance, a freight train clanked slowly over a rusty-looking bridge, trailing an endless stream of boxcars behind it. Ampirelli appeared around the warehouse’s other corner, waved at her and shrugged. She shrugged back, and they turned to walk back round the building again to the van.
She was mentally composing her explanation to Maldon, when an odd flicker at the corner of her eye caught her attention. She looked up, but there was nothing there. Strange, she could have sworn she’d seen something move… She paused to look around, scrutinising the broken windows of the warehouse carefully, but there was nothing there…. Wait.
She frowned. There was a movement coming from inside the building. Looking closely, she could see the outlines of two men, dressed all in black with balaclavas pulled over their faces.
Oh, shit. She had no idea who they were, but she did not intend to stick around to find out. She raced back to the van, and nearly ran into Ampirelli, whose expression was wild. “Did you see…” he panted and jerked a thumb at the warehouse.
“Yes. Let’s get out of here.”
“We can’t.”
Oh shit.
“What the hell do you mean, we can’t?”
“We’ve got a big fucking problem.” His face had gone white, and he jerked a large thumb at the van, which looked… odd. Lopsided.
Oh, fuck. Eames sprinted to the other side of it, and confirmed what she had already guessed. Two of the tyres were completely flat, one at the front, one at the back. Her memory supplied a perfect recollection of the road they had just travelled down… one road only leading here and away, and no-one else using it; it had been as quiet as the grave. They were trapped.
“I reckon someone stuck something in them when we stopped off to get petrol,” he muttered darkly. “Anyway, what now?”
Good question, Eames thought unhappily, and glanced at the warehouse. No-one had come out of it, but she could see definite signs of movement inside. Frantically, she retrieved her cellphone from the inside pocket of her jacket.
No signal.
Oh, fuck.
Chapter no: 14
Story: Betrayal’s End.
Warnings: Some mild language.
Rating: FRT
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters of “Law and Order: Criminal Intent” and acknowledge the rights of those who do. I will make no profit from this story.
As they pulled up outside the grimy block of apartments, she rechecked the address. “It’s up there somewhere, I guess.” She looked up at the maze of grimy concrete walkways and shuddered. It was a grim place, windswept and cold, and the lowering grey skies didn’t help. I guess crappy social housing looks the same the world over.
Ampirelli peered over her shoulder. “I reckon it’ll be on the top floor. You won’t wanna go up there on your own. Tell you what, we’ll go together.”
“You can’t, they sent me because they don’t think the people I’m talking to will trust a male… Could you come up with me as far as the same floor, then wait - are you okay with that?” She was not afraid, but it made sense to be cautious in a place she didn’t know, particularly if it was the sort of place Ampirelli had just described. There was a certain appeal in having backup in the form of a six-foot-plus male lurking in the background. Ampirelli was not far off the same size as Bobby, and though somewhat chubby, there was obviously a fair amount of muscle on him too. Then again, he was maybe half her age, perhaps less, and she didn’t want to put him in danger.
“Yeah, of course. I’ve done this sort of thing before.”
“This sort of thing?”
“Well, Tanya does a lot of work in the local community, you know, helping women learn self-defence and that. Sometimes if they don’t show up, she likes to go round and check they’re alright.” He pulled a face. “I mean, where we live’s not a bad area, but there’s some really rough places round here. It’s why she does the self-defence, like, keeping kids out of trouble and teaching the women to stand up for themselves a bit, keep themselves safe and that… I sometimes help out at the classes, the women there really like being able to beat up a big bloke…”
He chuckled “…but anyway, yeah, I go with her. I mean, it’s not like she’s afraid of owt, but there’s some people are just stupid about that sort of thing. It doesn’t matter that she’s a scary fucker herself, excuse my language, it’s when they see she’s got a bloke with it, it sometimes stops them from kicking off, ‘cause they think they’ll have to go the park with me.” He shook his head. “Silly buggers. Tanya’s a shedload more scary than I am, but…”
She broke into the stream of words. “Yes, well, can you come with me?”
“Yeah, of course.” They got out, having carefully parked the van facing away from the apartment block (in case a quick exit might be needed) and he locked the van. They set off up the stairs together.
She couldn’t help but be aware that they were the recipients of several unfriendly stares and comments from a set of five teenage boys hanging around on one of the landings. Ampirelli gave them an unfriendly scowl, and they backed off, muttering swearwords under their breath.
They headed on up to the apartment she had the address for. Ampirelli waited just out of sight as she knocked on the door. There was a timid-sounding shuffling from behind, and the sound of someone standing behind a door.
“Hello? What do you want?” a nervous-sounding voice asked.
“I’d like to speak to Amina Farooqi-“
“She’s not here.” The door suddenly opened, and a worried-looking female face appeared. “She doesn’t live here any more, okay? She moved.”
“When was that?”
“About a month ago.”
“Have you got the address?”
“Yeah, it’s somewhere round here…” The woman went back inside, leaving the door on the chain, and Eames heard her rooting through some papers. She finally reappeared clutching a piece of paper with an address written on it. “Here you go.” She slammed the door.
Eames rejoined Ampirelli, who frowned at the address. “I haven’t seen that street before, it must be new-build. Hang on, I’ve got satnav in the van.”
They walked back downstairs, Ampirelli scowling at the same kids on the way down. He inspected the van carefully, or at least as carefully as he could in the fading light. “It looks alright- you never know when someone’s going to stick a screwdriver in it for a laugh,” he explained. They got in and he moved off carefully, looking around for stray pedestrians, then pulled out into the road. “I’ll just park up at the petrol station, I’d rather not hang around here,” he explained as they pulled out of the estate and back onto a main road.
At a nearby petrol station, they pulled in sharply, causing the driver of a black SUV behind them to nearly run into the back of them; it stopped short with a squeal of brakes. Amp cheerfully waved back at the tinted windows, parked the van in a parking space at the back of the garage, and Eames went to find some snacks in the shop inside and use the bathroom. She returned to find an absence of Ampirelli, but he wandered back a minute later, adjusting his jeans. He rooted through the glove compartment to find the satnav, then started it up and put in the postcode.
They looked at the planned route, and Eames looked at her watch. She tried calling Tanya again, and this time got through.
“Hey, Alex! Good to hear from you!” Tanya’s voice sounded falsely bright, and Eames suddenly remembered with a jolt that someone might be listening in on the conversation.
“You too. Listen, we need to talk. Are you free?”
“I’m going to be stuck here at the hospital for another hour or so whilst they wait for my blood test results.”
“Anything…”
“No, it’s nothing serious. Just one of those pregnancy things. I’m in the café at the hospital. Listen, do you want to meet at my house in about, let’s say two hours, give Jack time to get home?”
“Okay, that works. I’ll see you then.” She ended the call and looked across at Ampirelli.
“Are you wanting to meet Tanya then?” He looked at the satnav. “We could do it, if you want to. I can get you there and back. It’s not somewhere I know, but it looks easy enough.”
They set off again, and the satnav guided them down a long main road, away from the main roads they had been travelling on. She called in and explained the situation to her contact at MI5, who seemed less than excited that she was running errands for the Metropolitan Police, but was pacified by the knowledge that she was on schedule to meet Tanya, explain the situation to her, and get back to Thames House in plenty of time to take part in the evening’s events. She felt her gut clench at the thought, just a little, and dismissed it. She was Alex Eames, and this was nothing to a Major Case detective. Nothing she couldn’t handle.
As she looked out of the window, she could see new houses in various stages of construction along the way. To judge from the occasional ruined old building nearby, it looked as though it was a mixture of new houses and converted old industrial buildings, as the city reshaped itself for the demands of the soon-to-be new year.
They continued down the road, Ampirelli frowning slightly as the satnav continued to tell them to keep going, even though they had passed the houses some way back. The area on either side of them looked rough and desolate. “I guess they’re still building this bit - are you sure we read that postcode right?”
She checked it again. “It looks right, but I guess that woman could have written it down wrongly.”
“Tell you what, we’ll keep going til we get there, then at least we’ll know if we’re in the wrong place.”
They kept going in uneasy silence, as the road continued. Eventually, they came to a large brick gate, which looked freshly built, and Eames’ spirits rose, only to drop again as the van stopped in front of a large, derelict-looking warehouse. A large sign proclaimed that there would soon be apartments to rent, but there appeared to be no other signs of life. Several sagging sacks of sand and cement and an abandoned metal container completed the general picture of depressing bleakness.
“Well, we’re here,” Ampirelli remarked. “Doesn’t look too good, does it?”
“I guess there could be houses being built behind it,” she replied without much hope.
“Okay, do you want to go round one way, and I’ll go round the other?”
She nodded. Might as well see it through to the end. They got out, and Ampirelli locked the van again, before the two of them split off. It was a big warehouse, and it took twenty minutes for her to walk around it, only to frown in dismay. The only thing at the back of the building was a large, barren looking field, with a dank brown river behind it. In the distance, a freight train clanked slowly over a rusty-looking bridge, trailing an endless stream of boxcars behind it. Ampirelli appeared around the warehouse’s other corner, waved at her and shrugged. She shrugged back, and they turned to walk back round the building again to the van.
She was mentally composing her explanation to Maldon, when an odd flicker at the corner of her eye caught her attention. She looked up, but there was nothing there. Strange, she could have sworn she’d seen something move… She paused to look around, scrutinising the broken windows of the warehouse carefully, but there was nothing there…. Wait.
She frowned. There was a movement coming from inside the building. Looking closely, she could see the outlines of two men, dressed all in black with balaclavas pulled over their faces.
Oh, shit. She had no idea who they were, but she did not intend to stick around to find out. She raced back to the van, and nearly ran into Ampirelli, whose expression was wild. “Did you see…” he panted and jerked a thumb at the warehouse.
“Yes. Let’s get out of here.”
“We can’t.”
Oh shit.
“What the hell do you mean, we can’t?”
“We’ve got a big fucking problem.” His face had gone white, and he jerked a large thumb at the van, which looked… odd. Lopsided.
Oh, fuck. Eames sprinted to the other side of it, and confirmed what she had already guessed. Two of the tyres were completely flat, one at the front, one at the back. Her memory supplied a perfect recollection of the road they had just travelled down… one road only leading here and away, and no-one else using it; it had been as quiet as the grave. They were trapped.
“I reckon someone stuck something in them when we stopped off to get petrol,” he muttered darkly. “Anyway, what now?”
Good question, Eames thought unhappily, and glanced at the warehouse. No-one had come out of it, but she could see definite signs of movement inside. Frantically, she retrieved her cellphone from the inside pocket of her jacket.
No signal.
Oh, fuck.