The Dragon and the Ghost by Mark Dawson

Author:Mark Dawson [Dawson, Mark]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781796640175
Google: hyH6xQEACAAJ
Amazon: 1796640174
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: 2015-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

35

Beatrix was washing the dishes in the tiny sink when she heard a loud impact from the hallway outside.

Grace looked over at her with alarm.

Beatrix dried her hands as there came a second impact and then, as she started to the door, a third. This one was immediately followed by the noise of a door splintering.

Beatrix stood at the door and put her eye to the peephole.

There were six men gathered in the small hallway. They were wearing tracksuit tops and new sneakers. Two of them were carrying meat cleavers. Three had pistols. One had a short-barrelled shotgun.

One of the men, the biggest, addressed the battered door, drew back and booted it again. The wood splintered as the lock tore through the frame and the door flew back, bouncing off the wall.

Grace tugged at her sleeve. “What is it?”

“Get in the bedroom,” Beatrix said quietly.

“Beatrix?”

“Get in the bedroom, Grace.”

“I—”

“Now!”

She glanced back to make sure that the girl was out of the way. She hurried over and closed the bedroom door, then went and took the cereal box from the kitchen cupboard. She opened the flaps at the top, reached inside the box and took out her Baby Glock from its hiding place. The ten-shot magazine was full and there was a round in the chamber.

She went back to the door and looked through the peephole again.

Two of the men were waiting in the hallway. The others had gone into the flat. She saw them through the open doorway, turning the place upside down.

They were looking for something.

She stayed where she was, watching.

Her view was distorted by the narrow angle of the peephole lens, and restricted by the two men left to guard the hallway. But it was obvious from the urgent, barked Cantonese that she could hear from the apartment that, whatever it was, it was something the triads wanted very badly.

The flat was tiny. It only took them five minutes to tear it apart.

The four men who had gone inside had now rejoined the two in the hallway. They conferred for a moment. Beatrix assessed them. It was obvious that one was senior to the others. He was wearing a white tracksuit top unzipped to the navel. The skin underneath was festooned with tattoos. He wore a heavy gold necklace and chunky rings on his fingers.

And he was angry.

She heard the door creak behind her.

She turned back and saw Grace, watching through the crack just as there came a heavy knock on the front door.

Shit.

She waved for the girl to go back inside the bedroom.

The knocking came again, angry and insistent.

She switched the Glock to her left hand, dropped the steel door chain into the receiving plate, unlocked the door and opened it.

“Yes?”

The man with the tattoos was standing in front of the door. She saw the butt of a pistol protruding from the waistband of his Levis. His face was spiteful, with small eyes that were a little too close together and a bulbous nose. He looked at her and a moment of surprise passed across his face.

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