Kiss & Die - Lee Weeks [72]
Above their arguing she heard sirens and her heart leapt. She shook her head in relief. It was then that the stallholder saw her and reached in and dragged her out. ‘Thief! Stealing my toys whilst I am being distracted. What are you? A team of thieves?’
Tammy tried to shut him up. ‘I’m a police officer. Do as I say. Shut up for Christ’s sake. Please…shut the fuck up.’
The stallholder lifted his voice again. ‘Thief!’ He had heard her well enough but he wanted a distraction away from the argument with the irate mother.
She had no choice but to run. She looked up to see what appeared to be the whole market closing in on her. Either side of her the tourists stared as the gang members wove between them. Tammy saw the first knife flash bright amongst the tack and plastic. She ran.
Chapter 51
‘Police officer down,’ Detective Inspector Johnny Mann shouted into the radio.
The noise all around him was deafening.
‘I said police officer down. For fuck’s sake get an ambulance here.’
The woman clutched her little girl to her as she stood staring down at Mann and Tammy who was convulsing on the pavement amidst the nodding puppies, replica toys, t-shirts and sunglasses.
‘At the junction of Saigon Street. There could be other casualties…I don’t know…Just move it.’
Mann knelt over Tammy’s unconscious body and pushed his fingers over the wound in her chest to try to stop the bleeding. ‘Give me that. Quick…’ he shouted to the woman who was still holding the white silk shawl she had been haggling over. ‘Another one…more. Quick! Quick!’
She looked around, flustered, threw it to him. He pressed the fabric into the wound. Above the screams of frightened tourists, Mann heard Ng shouting for him.
‘Over here, Ng. It’s Tammy, she’s hurt.’
Ng crouched beside them for a second. Shrimp ran past. Ng called out to him: ‘Check if there’s any sign of them, Shrimp.’
‘I’m on it,’ Shrimp answered, leaping over the smashed stalls, dodging the screaming tourists who were caught in the middle of it, frantic to get away. He caught sight of the backs of running gang members and increased his pace. As he exited out from the tunnel of stalls he heard voices. He came face to face with an Indian boy holding the bloody knife in his shaking hand.
Shrimp pinned him to the ground and read him his rights.
The ambulance screamed down Saigon Street and came to a halt as its lights filled the night sky above the bright stalls.
Mann felt Tammy’s pulse…nothing. He knelt over her, locked out his arms, placed one hand above the other over her chest. Tammy’s body bounced under Mann’s pressure as he pressed hard and fast rapid presses onto her chest. Blood seeped through his fingers turning the white silk shawl crimson.
Chapter 52
Mann watched one of PJ’s customers dip naan bread into the bright red tandoori sauce and wipe it around the metal bowl. His stomach knotted. Tammy’s blood was ingrained in his fingertips. It had been a terrible night and it showed. Mann was ashen faced and his eyes were smudged and dark with tiredness. Mann had helped the paramedics for forty minutes. They had stabilized Tammy before leaving the market but she was barely alive. He waited for PJ to finish wiping his hands on the white starched napkin that hung over his arm, traditional waiter style, then he called him over.
‘Is everything all right, Inspector?’ PJ smiled, but his eyes showed concern as he looked at Mann’s face. Mann gave a small nod and half a smile by way of answer and thanks for the concern. He took a sip of water and wiped his mouth on the cloth napkin – a nice touch, cloth napkins in a place where all you could eat came for less than a coffee in a plush hotel.
‘Please sit down at a table, eat.’
Mann kept one eye on Hafiz as he talked. He kept glancing