Plan B

Chapter Fifty-five

It was only fifteen minutes before Bruno rang back, but to the boys in Rico’s room, it felt like years.

“We were right about the mole,” Bruno said once the call had connected. “It was Frankie’s ex-bodyguard, Malcolm. He seems to have done a runner. Didn’t show up to work today. The station’s currently in uproar.”

“Frankie used to have a bodyguard?” Rico queried, nonplussed.

“I don’t get it,” said Arthur. “If he was his bodyguard, why did he fight off the people trying to kidnap him?”

“We’re not sure. Conrad reckons divisions within the sect. They seem to have followed Frankie for some time before trying to make off with him. I suspect it was because they thought they’d found him, but it was way beyond the time that they needed to sacrifice him, so some of them would have been against kidnapping him immediately because of the amount of time they’d need to keep him hidden and alive. Constant attempts to get hold of him meant that they could place their own man near him under the pretence of guarding him, but my guess is that he was really just there to keep an eye on him and make sure he didn’t disappear, but in order to remain his bodyguard, there had to be some kind of threat to him, so those attacks were sort of faked.”

“That’s disturbing,” said Piers.

“We’re dealing with people who think human sacrifice is okay,” Bruno snapped. “Of course it’s disturbing.”

“Well, wherever Frankie is,” said Isaac, “I hope he keeps out of the way of these blood-thirsty lunatics.”

There was a ping from Bruno’s end of the phone.

“Hang on a tick,” Bruno said. “Freddie’s just sent me something.”

“Who’s Freddie?” asked Rico.

“Frankie’s brother,” Arthur replied dismissively before anybody else could supply the information.

Bruno swore loudly. “F*ck.”

“What?” chorused the other boys together.

“Some police officer’s just turned up at Freddie’s house saying they know who Frankie is.”

Brookie finally spoke up. “In that case, thank God Frankie left when he did.”

“Seems to be the only good thing about this whole situation,” Bruno agreed.

“Yeah,” said Arthur. “Let’s just hope he can look after himself for now.”

And the watches went off at ear-splitting volume.

The watch siren was so loud and so unexpected that Bruno dropped his phone in shock. He stared at his wrist for a couple of seconds. The watch’s screen was flashing an angry red.

“GPS,” he muttered. “Come on, give me the GPS location!”

Two blue flashes interrupted the red ones, signalling new messages from both Conrad and Freddie. Then the wailing died and the screen cleared. Digital numbers flickered across the display for several seconds before settling into a set of coordinates. Bruno snatched up a pen from his bedside table and scrawled the numbers quickly on the back of his hand before checking the messages from the other two.

Sh*t, Freddie had written. Bruno couldn’t agree more.

Conrad’s was slightly more cheerful. Operation Crossdress launched, it read. Get your *ss on the road.

Bruno paused only to snatch up his car keys and his click-biro before high-tailing it out of the room.