The Last Enemy(57)

Special forces, realised Jake.

As Jake and the special forces soldier neared the van, the rear doors swung open, and Jake found himself being bundled into the back. He was shoved towards a wooden bench and pushed down on to it. Then three black-clad soldiers clambered in and sat down, one opposite and two sitting one on either side of him.

The last thing he saw was a black-clad soldier standing over Guy’s still body, then the rear doors slammed shut, and the van moved off.

‘What’s happening?’ asked Jake. ‘Where are we going?’

‘Shut up,’ grunted one of the soldiers tersely.

‘Do you know Lauren? Is she all right?’

The soldier opposite him shook his head.

‘Don’t know who you’re talking about,’ he said.

‘But . . .’ appealed Jake.

‘No questions,’ snapped one of the soldiers beside him.

Jake shut up.

They rescued me, so they must be all right, he told himself.

But where was Lauren? Was she safe?



The journey took over an hour, the van shaking the whole while as it raced along. During that time the soldiers didn’t exchange a word with Jake, or with one another.

Finally, the van pulled up. The rear doors opened and a tall man in a dark suit looked in.

‘Welcome, Mr Wells,’ he said in friendly tones. ‘You can get out now.’

Bewildered, Jake stumbled out of the van. He looked around and saw he was in an underground car park. The man shut the rear door, and the van raced off, heading for the exit.

‘Who are you?’ asked Jake.

‘You may call me Gerald. Think of me as a friend,’ said the man.

‘Where’s Lauren?’ demanded Jake desperately.

Gerald nodded. ‘She’s fine. You’ll see her in a moment. Please follow me.’

Jake followed Gerald to a lift, the door of which was already open. Jake hesitated.

‘You’re quite safe,’ the man reassured him.

Gerald stepped into the lift, and Jake followed.

‘Second floor,’ said Gerald, and a mechanised electronic voice repeated: ‘Second floor.’

Then the door closed and the lift rose.

Jake stepped out of the lift, and found himself face to face with a uniformed police officer, holding an automatic rifle.

‘Pig seven,’ said Gerald calmly, and the police officer stepped to one side and took up a position beside the lift.

Jake followed his escort along a corridor lined with numbered doors. I’m in an apartment block, he realised.

Gerald stopped by a door and rang the bell. The door opened, and Lauren looked out, apprehensive and nervous, until she saw Jake, and then her face broke into a huge smile of relief.

‘Jake!’ she burst out.

‘I’ll leave you two,’ said the man who called himself Gerald. ‘I’m sure you’ve got some catching up to do. If you need anything, just use the phone.’

With that, he turned and headed back along the corridor towards the lift. Jake stepped into the flat, and into Lauren’s arms, and they hugged as if their lives had unexpectedly come back to them.



‘So, what is this place?’ asked Jake.

‘It’s an MI5 safe house,’ said Lauren.

Lauren had patched up Jake’s cuts and bruises, and now they were sitting in the very comfortable living room, drinking coffee.

‘How did you get here?’ asked Jake. ‘How did you and Gareth and Dan get out of there?’

‘Special forces,’ said Lauren. She shook her head. ‘I still don’t know how they found us, and I don’t think Gareth does, either. Although I didn’t see much of him afterwards. They took him off to hospital.’

‘But how did they know where to find you?’ persisted Jake. ‘They’d smashed our mobile phones. No one knew where Gareth was, or you, or me.’

‘I don’t know,’ Lauren admitted. ‘All I do know is that we were in that dungeon, and I was thinking of you at Laker Heath, and terrified about what was going to happen to you, and then suddenly we heard an explosion and gunfire from upstairs, and then these special forces types came down into the dungeon and released us.’

‘The kids?’

‘Locked up. But not before the explosion we heard freaked them all out. It was some kind of stun grenade going off.’

‘And then?’

‘And then I was brought here. I asked everyone what had happened to you, but no one would tell me.’

‘Oh, I was OK,’ said Jake.

‘No you weren’t!’ burst out Lauren angrily. ‘You went off with Guy to a place where you knew they didn’t have The Index. You nearly got killed!’

‘The Index was there,’ said Jake.

Lauren stared at him.