Free Return Fire (Sam Archer ) by Tom Barber

giant, known for never swearing, and an old friend.
    ‘I said get your hands up!’ Porter repeated.
    ‘Do it!’ someone else shouted.
    Pause.
    There was some smashing and faint murmuring.
    ‘Open it,’ Porter’s voice ordered.
    ‘I can’t.’
    There was another pause, and a rustle.
    No one in the tech area moved, listening to the recording.
    Pause.
    ‘Holy shit!’ the second voice said.
    ‘Look.’
    Pause.
    ‘Everybody out!’ Porter’s voice shouted.
    There was a sound of fast movement.
    And a terrifying blast a split-second before the recording went dead.
    ‘Stanovich knew we’d trace the call,’ Nikki said, turning in her chair to face them after a small period of silence. ‘He must have rigged the property to blow once our guys were inside.’
    ‘But he was in there too,’ Marquez said, shaking her head. ‘Why the hell would he kill himself if he knew you were coming? Why not booby-trap the apartment and leave?’
    ‘Nik, can you run the tape back?’ Archer suddenly asked.
    She nodded. ‘To where?’
    ‘Just after they entered. When Port ordered Stanovich to get his hands up.’
    She turned to the screen and traced back to the entry, then ran the recording again.
    ‘Get your hands up!’
    ‘Do it!’
    Following the two orders and amongst the smashing and shouts of Police , there was a whisper of sound.
    Someone had said something.
    ‘Pause,’ Archer said.
    ‘Who was that?’ Josh said, as Nikki stopped the tape. ‘Stanovich?’
    Archer looked at Nikki. ‘Can you rewind and isolate?’
    She nodded, winding the recording back. Tapping away on her keypad, she cleared the police shouts and background noise, leaving just the faint murmur.
    ‘Here we go,’ she said, hitting Play .
    The recording ran through again but with only the faint murmur; however, it was still to o quiet to be distinguishable. The group all frowned as they strained to hear, missing what was said.
    ‘Amplify, Nikki,’ Cobb said, standing beside Shepherd with his arms folded.
    She rewound, tapped a few more keys then ran the recording again.
    This time it was loud enough.
    ‘I can’t,’ the amplified whisper said. ‘Help me.’
    ‘That’s Stanovich,’ Nikki said, pushing Pause again as the others nodded in agreement.
    ‘ Help me?’ Josh said. ‘What the hell is he talking about? He’s the one who kidnapped Vargas and threatened to kill her. What did he expect your guys to do?’
    No one replied. The news feed was still focusing on the blasted-out apartment, smoke continuing to billow up into the sky, the circling hel icopter capturing the footage.
    As more thoughts and questions raced through his mind, Archer stared up at the screen.
    Eight of his friends had just been taken out in the blink of an eye, two of them dead, and one of Vargas’ kidnappers had just killed himself.
    And he didn’t even want to consider the possibility that Vargas had been somewhere in that apartment.
    As Chalky and Fox stood there silently beside him, everyone watching the screen, Archer heard Stanovich’s whisper echo in his mind.
    I can’t.
    Help me.
    Stanovich was dead.
    So where the hell was Payan?

 
    TEN
    At that moment in a house across North London, Ibrahim Payan was sitting pushed up against a wall, staring down at a silenced pistol that was jammed into his mouth. Having been on the wrong side of the law for almost his entire adult life Payan wasn’t a man who scared easily, but at that moment he was beyond terrified, doing his best to breathe around the greasy oiled barrel of the suppressor as his eyes readjusted to the light.
    He was sitting inside the sitting room of some house he’d never been in before, bound to a chair, his arms and feet strapped to the frame. He’d been here for over a day; yesterday afternoon he’d unlocked his apartment and walked straight into an ambush, three men lying in wait for him. One shoved a pistol into his face, a second closed the door behind him and the third hit him over the back