The Lost
- Автор: Бекетт Саймон
- Серия: Jonah Colley #1
- Год: 2021
- Язык: английский
- Год: Orion/Trapeze
- ISBN: 978-1-398-70690-3
- Жанр: Триллеры
Электронная книга - «The Lost». Краткое содержание книги:
Ten years ago, the disappearance of firearms police officer Jonah Colley’s young son almost destroyed him.
A GRUESOME DISCOVERY
A plea for help from an old friend leads Jonah to Slaughter Quay, and the discovery of four bodies. Brutally attacked and left for dead, he is the only survivor.
A SEARCH FOR THE TRUTH
Under suspicion himself, he uncovers a network of secrets and lies about the people he thought he knew — forcing him to question what really happened all those years ago...
Whoever was on the other side was big. The impact jolted Jonah’s teeth and hurt his head, but there was a whuf of escaping breath. The torch clattered onto the floor, breaking the darkness with crazed swathes of light as it rolled back and forth. Flinging back the door, Jonah launched a kick at the figure but made only a glancing contact. Then the air was driven from his lungs as a shoulder rammed into him. He slammed into the wall, breathing in a sour, vinegary smell of old sweat. Heavy blows pummelled at him from the darkness. Jonah took most of them on his raised forearms, but something caught him on the side of his head. He managed to swing an elbow and felt it hit bone, bringing his knee up as the man in front of him jerked away. It thudded into a meaty thigh rather than groin, but caused his opponent to stumble back. Through blurred vision Jonah saw him double over, and for an instant thought he was falling. Then he heard the scrape of metal on stone as the shadowy figure snatched up a length of scaffolding pole from the ground. In desperation he kicked out before the other man could swing it and felt the flat of his foot sink into a heavy gut. There was a gasp of pain.
Then Jonah’s kneecap exploded.
He cried out, but as he fell he grabbed the other man and dragged him down as well. They crashed onto the stone floor. His opponent was bigger and heavier, and there was a thock as his head struck the stone floor. Jonah clawed for a flailing arm and managed to lock it under him. He tried to clamp his legs around the man’s middle but his left one refused to work. Gritting his teeth, Jonah used the pain as a goad, squirming around and partly pinning the bigger man. He bucked like a fish but Jonah clung to him. A fist clubbed at his head. He held on, close to passing out. The man’s breath was coming in choked whistles now, his struggles becoming more frantic. Hold on. Just a little longer. Hold on. It became like a mantra, repeating again and again as Jonah rode out his captive’s attempts to break free.
At some point he realised the thrashing had stopped.
For a while he didn’t let go. Couldn’t. His body felt locked, clenched in place. Even when he tried, his limbs wouldn’t obey. Eventually, he forced them to loosen their hold. The man slumped and lay still. Jonah flopped over onto his back, muscles quivering as he sucked in air. Pain threatened to carry him away. There was a humming noise in his ears and a fluttering, like wings beating behind his eyes. The darkness seemed to take on depth. He felt himself sinking into it.
Come on! Move!
Jonah rolled over, and promptly threw up. Retching, he took a moment to recover, then he groped on the floor for the torch and shone it on his attacker. The man lay crumpled on his side, one arm draped over his face as though to shield his eyes from the light. His head was hidden by the dirty jacket that had rucked up around it during the struggle. Tensing, Jonah reached out and prodded him in the back.
The man lolled, but there was no other reaction.
Jonah sagged. He couldn’t tell if the man was breathing or not, and the possibility that he might have killed him flitted through his mind before being drowned out by the need to get help. He started to push himself to his feet, only to cry out as his knee gave way and dumped him back on the floor. He lay gasping, then turned the torch onto his injured knee.
Oh, fuck...
His jeans were soaked with blood. The knee beneath them was misshapen and already starting to swell, and Jonah knew that he wouldn’t be walking out of there. Pushing himself until he was sitting upright, he checked his phone. Still no signal. Stifling his anxiety and fear, he shone the torch across at the plastic-shrouded victims.
‘Nadine, can you hear me?’ he called, making his head throb even more. There was no answer. ‘I’m going for help... Just hold on, OK?’
He held the light on the polythene bundles, hoping to see some sign of life. There was nothing, and Jonah knew he couldn’t wait any longer. Gripping the torch in one hand, he pushed himself over to the wall and tried to climb to his feet. Dizziness and nausea washed over him. His knee wouldn’t hold him up, and he slid back down the damp wall to the floor.
So much for that idea. He looked over at the door leading into the main warehouse. The fight had carried them back into the loading bay, but the doorway wasn’t far away. Jonah told himself all he had to do was make it into the other side of the warehouse, away from these thick stone walls, and he’d be able to get a signal. A few metres, that was all. Nothing to it.
With the torch in one hand, he began crawling towards the doorway, trailing his injured leg behind him. Each movement sent a jolt of agony from his knee. It had swollen so much that it felt constricted by his jeans, and the throbbing in his head was almost blinding him. He felt crushed between the twin centres of pain, dwarfed by them. The few metres to the door seemed endless. He had to stop repeatedly, fighting not to throw up as he waited for the pounding to subside. His progress was agonisingly slow, and it was only when his hand struck something hard that he realised he’d reached the door. Pawing it open, he dragged himself through, then fumbled to try his phone again.
No signal.
Oh, come on... Jonah rested his head on the stone floor.
It was cold and soothing, smelling of dirt and mould. It wouldn’t be such a bad thing to stay there, he thought, closing his eyes. Just a few minutes. Just to rest...
He jerked awake, convinced he’d heard a noise behind him. In a panic, he shone the torch back through the doorway, expecting to see the tall figure lurching towards him. There was no one there, and the loading bay was still and quiet. Turning away, Jonah started crawling again. He fixed his eyes on a pillar ahead of him, willing himself to reach it. Only a few more metres, you can do that.
But he couldn’t. After a few more attempts he realised he couldn’t go any further. He tried to think what he was supposed to do next. Get help, that’s right... The phone screen swam in front of him, but his vision was too blurred to make out anything on it. He stabbed at it with dead fingers, mumbling in case anyone could hear. Please. I need help. He was losing it now, a rushing in his head drowning out everything else. As awareness slid away, only a sense of urgency remained.
Then blackness closed in around him.
Chapter 3
There was something wrong with the sky. It was a uniform, dirty white, in which the sun was a static glow directly overhead. It never changed, and there were shadows on it as well, darker areas in the corners. Gradually, the realisation came that there shouldn’t be any corners. It wasn’t like sky at all.
More like a ceiling.
Jonah blinked, moistening cracked lips. He was in a small room. Lying in a bed. His head and entire body ached but the pain felt muted, as though filtered through cotton wool.
Where...?
His memory was a blank. He raised his arm and saw tubes and wires emerging from flesh. He tried to push himself upright and gasped as pain ripped through his knee. Looking down, he saw his left leg was held in a raised metal structure, resting on what looked like sheepskin pads. It was covered in a white bandage from his foot to the top of his thigh, thick and constricting. Confusion fogged his thoughts. What the fuck...? Had he been injured on an op? Or a car accident? He tried sitting up again, but his leg refused to move. The attempt brought another spasm of pain.
‘Hold on, love, don’t do that.’
He hadn’t noticed the nurse standing by the bed, half hidden behind a suspended drip and trolley of digital monitors. She finished making an adjustment to the drip flow and came to where he could see her more easily. She gave a cheerily professional smile.