Free CHERUB: The Fall by Robert Muchamore

her expensive leather bag.
    After leaving the car park, James took a couple of quick double steps to catch up with his target. She turned left behind the discount store into a wide street with a building site on one side. A faded sign said that 55,000 square metres of shops and office space would be ready by the end of 1998, but the grand scheme had only risen half a storey.
    The young woman stuck her arm out to hail a passing taxi, but the driver was on his way to another call and didn’t pull over. After recovering from the shock of almost seeing his target escape, James realised that it was another good sign: poor people didn’t take taxis.
    But there would be another cab along in a minute and the chances were it would stop. James had to act fast. There was no one up ahead or across the street, and he checked over his shoulder to make sure nobody was behind. An elderly man was crossing the road, but he wasn’t going to be any kind of problem.
    The woman heard James run at her, but only managed two steps before he bundled her into the back wall of the store. She swung out harmlessly with the pillows and kicked him with the point of her leather boot, but James was too strong.
    He pinned her to the breezeblock wall and grabbed the bag from her shoulder as she twisted and spat. He’d hoped to be able to snatch the bag easily and run off without doing the woman any harm, but she screamed and clutched at the handle as James tried to take it.
    ‘Let go or I’ll hurt you.’
    ‘My boyfriend will kill you,’ she snarled. ‘Do you know who he is?’
    James didn’t know who he was, but the people who counted in Aero City were drug dealers, money lenders, or cronies of Denis Obidin. Whoever he was, James didn’t have time to mess about. Finally losing his patience, he grabbed the woman’s neck, slapped her in the mouth and gave her a shove. She ended up sprawled in the snow with a split lip.
    James guiltily snatched the bag and was relieved to see a purse and girly pink phone inside. It was an odd-looking device, branded with the name of the local cellular company.
    He stuffed the purse inside his jacket and couldn’t resist glancing at the phone’s status: two thirds battery, four out of five signal bars. He felt like a six-year-old looking at a big stack of presents on Christmas morning.
    He was tempted to dial straight away, but it didn’t seem like a good idea with a fair bit of traffic around and a woman bleeding on the ground in front of him. After running for a few hundred metres, James cut down to a brisk walk to avoid suspicion.
    Once in a while he checked the phone and noticed that the reception was getting weaker as he moved further from the city centre. After a kilometre and a half, he cut into an unlit alleyway that ran between two abandoned office buildings.
    The phone lit his face with an amber glow as he dialled the 0044 for the UK, but all he got was a Keypad Locked message on the display. Frustrated, he tried different combinations to unlock it: star followed by hash, like you did on a Nokia; holding down the number nine; holding down the zero; but he got the same message every time.
    After two minutes’ fumbling, James took a calming breath and studied each key in turn.
    ‘Stupid poxy phone,’ he growled.
    He considered taking the battery out and restarting the phone, but he’d be completely stuffed if the phone asked for a pin number when he switched it back on. Then he noticed that his thumb had been covering a little button on the side with a picture of a padlock on it.
    After holding it in for three seconds, the phone chimed and Keypad Active appeared on the screen. James felt triumphant as he started dialling – but then he noticed shadows at the end of the alleyway.
    They were on top of James before he had turned his head. The first thing he felt was a skateboard smashing him full in the face with enough force to knock the back of his head against the wall behind him. As he raised his arms