Deadline by Simon Kernick Read Free Book Online

hers.
Waiting, always waiting.
    She was home by mid-afternoon, and carried
the holdall with difficulty up to the front door.
Half a million pounds, she was discovering,
weighed one hell of a lot. Jimmy was out, for
which she was thankful, and she took the opportunity
to sit on a lounger in the back garden, look
out at the trees and listen to the sounds of early
autumn. This was her refuge, her place of peace,
and today it gave her hope. There was still that
numb fear that it could all go wrong, and that
these people, whoever they were, were simply
stringing her along, but Andrea was a pragmatist,
and the more she thought about it the more she
shared Jimmy's view that their primary motive
was money. If she did what she was told, they
would release Emma. And then maybe, just
maybe, things could start to get back to normal.
Just the two of them together again.
    Jimmy returned at seven o'clock, telling her not
to worry because he'd been careful leaving and
coming back. She didn't bother asking him where
he'd been, assuming he'd been visiting associates.
Frankly, she didn't care. She just wanted tonight
sorted, and then she wanted rid of him for ever. It
remained to be seen whether she'd made a
mistake by involving him at all, but it was too late
to worry about that now. Tonight she had to focus
on the task ahead.
    And so, for the next two hours, the waiting
continued. They didn't speak much. There was
little to say, and it was difficult to plan anything
given that neither of them knew what procedures
the kidnappers intended to set for them. Andrea
kept looking at her watch. Sometimes she counted
the seconds ticking on the clock in the hallway,
and all the time the tension cranked up inside her
little by little.
    The clock struck nine.
    She looked across at Jimmy. Her mouth was
dry. He looked back, and for the first time she saw
that he too was worried. He was frowning,
his eyebrows almost touching, the lines on his
forehead heavily pronounced and suddenly
making him look his age. The room was thick
with silence.
    A minute passed. Andrea counted the seconds
on the clock. Neither of them spoke, but Jimmy
looked at his watch several times and sighed. It
was a cheap thing with a black plastic strap, not
like the Cartier he'd worn when she'd first known
him. Times had obviously been hard for Jimmy.
Maybe even hard enough for him to consider
getting involved in a kidnap . . . No, she didn't
want to go down that route. She had to trust
somebody, and right now there was no one else.
    The phone rang. The receiver was next to her on
the coffee table. She picked up immediately.
    'Yes?'
    'Have you got a pen and paper?' asked the
disguised voice – the one that had first called her,
she thought.
    'Yes.'
    'Good. Do exactly what I say and you'll have
your daughter back before the end of the night.'
    'That's all I want,' she told him.
    'Fuck us about, though, and she dies. Painfully.
Do you understand?'
    She tensed, thinking of Jimmy. Was it a big
mistake bringing him in? She said that she
understood.
    'Here are your instructions. Get in your car –
the Mercedes – and drive up to the junction of the
M1 and the M25, then proceed eastbound on
the M25 to junction twenty-five. Turn left on to the
A10, then turn left again at the next roundabout
on to the B198 signposted to Rosedale.' He waited
while she wrote all this down. His breathing was
audible on Andrea's end of the phone. 'There's a
turning on the left about two hundred metres
down. Follow the road for approximately three
quarters of a mile until you see a sign on the right
for Gabriel's Saw Mill. Drive down there two
hundred metres.' He paused again. 'At that point
the track forks. Take the right-hand fork and
follow it approximately fifty metres. A burnt-out
single-storey building with no front door will
appear on your right. You can't miss it. Stop the
car but leave the engine running. Take the bag
containing the money inside, and drop it against
the front wall so that it can't be seen