Birthright: Pray your past stays hidden (Alex Turner Book 1)

by Richard Blade

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Run

  The narrow streets weaving through the center of the village of Thaxted were deserted. It seemed all two thousand eight hundred and forty-five people who called the former Saxon settlement home had congregated in the square in front of their cherished church, watching and sadly saying goodbye, as a major part of their town’s history burned.

  The only movement came as a dark figure emerged from the shadows and scurried toward a parked Ford Fiesta. He struggled for a moment, then opened the locked door, climbed in and vanished from view as he reached under the dashboard. Seconds later, the car roared to life and the figure popped back up and waved. Seeing his signal, two other people, a man and a woman, appeared and rushed to the car, getting quickly inside.

  Eddie, smiling from ear to ear at his success, swiveled in the driver’s seat, “Where to, boss?”

  “As far from here as possible.”

  That was all Alex had to say, and Eddie slipped the Ford into gear, pulled away from the curb, and keeping the burning church in his rearview mirror, headed out into the night.

  The sun was starting its rise as Eddie filled the car at the petrol station off of the A14. They had chosen this route north to Manchester as it avoided the M6 and the inevitable cameras waiting on the toll road there.

  Cate strolled out of the busy snack shop, her arms full of sandwiches, drinks, junk food and two newspapers. She clambered into the back, and she and Alex waited for Eddie to finish with his gas duties.

  As he jumped into the driver’s seat, Alex gave his next directions, “Pull up about a hundred yards. There’s a rest area by the big trucks. We can eat and drink and I can check the papers.”

  While the other two tucked into a world of fast food, Alex concentrated on the main front-page story in both publications, the bombing of Thaxted Parish Church. He read and re-read the articles before finally putting down the newspapers. Cate and Eddie stopped munching and waited to find out what the professor had discovered.

  “The Express and the Daily Mail say we’re dead.” Alex stared at them, knowing they were tough words to hear.

  “Dead? Whoa, that’s weird,” said Cate.

  “You’ll get used to it. It’s the second time for me in one week,” joked Eddie.

  “The good thing about it is we have room to move, they won’t be looking for us now. They think we were killed in the fire when the bombs we were planting went off.”

  “Why do they keep saying we are bombers?” wondered Eddie.

  “To cover up the destruction at the church. As far as the readers know, we were terrorists trying to destroy a landmark and we made a mistake with the explosives. They tied it in with what happened at the British Museum.”

  “Yeah, but why that story? Why bombs?”

  “To keep people frightened. There’s so much fear in the world today,” said Alex.

  “Excuse me, Gandhi, but we’re the ones with a reason to be scared. They’re trying to fry our asses.”

  “And we still don’t know why.” Cate was confused.

  “The answer may lie in finding out who Albert Wettin was,” offered Alex.

  “Do you think he was Jack the Ripper?” asked Eddie.

  “Possibly. But even if he was, it wouldn’t explain their interest in you.”

  “Interest? You call drugging me, flying me half-way around the world, trying to shoot me, then torching a church, interest? Haven’t they got better things to spend their money on? Haven’t they seen all the homeless everywhere?”

  “You’re right. Interest is an understatement. We have to make sense of this. If we find Mary’s husband’s roots, we may get an idea of what’s driving them. We need a good library or bookstore where I can conduct some research. We can’t go back to London, so we keep going north. Manchester is Britain’s second biggest city; it should have what we’re looking for.”

  Eddie reached under the dash and shorted two wires, starting the car back up. “The sooner we get there, the sooner we get this shit sorted out. You guys ready?”

  Cate nodded.

  “Let’s go, Eddie. But stay within the limits. The last thing we need is to be stopped for speeding.”

  “Got it, teach.” Eddie sedately backed out of the rest area and headed onto the A14 North.

  Blackwell’s Books featured an attached coffee shop with indoor and outdoor seating for both snacks and reading, which made it the perfect place for Alex to find the books he needed to reference and research while giving his companions a chance to relax, eat and drink.

  He was pulling volumes from the shelves when Cate joined him, “I can’t get on their Wi-Fi without a credit card, and that could be how they found us before-”

  Alex cut her off with a smile, happy to be surrounded again by books, “Don’t worry about it. Their ancestry collection is very comprehensive. They should have what we need here. If not, we’ll find somewhere else you can go online.”

  Cate checked one of the shelves and took a step back in surprise, “You’ve got your own section! They have all your books. You’re famous even here in England. You should sign a few of them for fun.”

  “Famous is the last thing I want to be about now. More importantly, I found these books on European names and lineage. You take this one, I’ll go through these two, and let’s see what we come up with.” He led Cate towards a reading table. As they sat down, he noticed Eddie was missing, “Do you know where Eddie is?”

  “He’s fine. He’s at the front of the store. That’s where they have the graphic novels.”

  “Graphic novels?” Alex was not familiar with the term.

  “Fancy way of saying comic books. Last time I saw him he was buried in a story called Downing Street versus The Dead. It’s about Winston Churchill fighting Nazi zombies.”

  Alex was about to tell her he didn’t remember that chapter of the Second World War but thought better of it and turned to his first research volume.

  The top floor office at Vauxhall Cross was still filled with pictures of Eddie adorning one wall. Colin Brown sat at his desk staring at the river traffic cruising up and down the Thames, unable to shake the doubts lingering in his mind about the outcome of the previous night’s operation. The plan had seemed so perfect, but until forensics could search through the debris and retrieve what remained of the bodies, he couldn’t be one hundred percent certain. And with that much fire, devastation, and rubble to be cleared, they wouldn’t be able to even start for days, which meant he might not get confirmation for weeks. Until he knew for sure, the boy’s photographs would remain on his wall. Only after the results were in would he close the mission out. That was the way he had always worked in the past, and he was certainly not going to change now, not on such an important case.

  The intercom buzzed and a voice informed him, “I have Simon Foster from MI5 for you.”

  Colin was instantly alert, “Put him through.” He stared at his small phone bank waiting for it to light. The moment it did, he punched the button.

  “What is it? Why are you calling me on an internal line and not my cell? The switchboard logs all incoming calls on this number.”

  “I am fully aware of that, but this is not ministry business, it’s a courtesy call. That’s why I’m using this line. Someone wants to talk with you.”

  Colin rolled his eyes, “More press? I’ve been putting out releases all morning with an explanation of how three Americans died trying to blow up British monuments. Not exactly the norm for a terrorist profile.”

  “We’re doing the same at our end. One of the reporters I spoke to wanted to use the headline The United States of Jihad. I shut him down quickly. Our whole angle is pushing the theme it was a joint op, emphasizing domestic and international agencies coming together to protect the country. The tabloids love it when Five and Six are written about in the same story.”

  “Too true. Who wants to talk with me?”

  “I’m sorry to bother you with this, Colin, but it’s the cop from
Thaxted. He insists on speaking with you, and I didn’t want to give him your direct number.”

  “Thank you for that. Last thing I need right now is some Constable on the verge of retirement trying to get his kicks from a few spy stories.”

  “And that’s about his speed. He’s called me twice this morning already. I’ll text you his number. If you can give him a ring, it should rid us of him.”

  “I will, and put an end to his annoyance.” Colin clicked the phone off. Seconds later his cell buzzed as the text with the local policeman’s number came through.

  Colin stared at the display for a while, obviously irritated at the theft of his time, then steeled himself and dialed from his desk phone. The call was answered on the second ring.

  “Constable Darby, here. How can I help you?”

  “This is section chief, Colin Brown at Six. You wanted to speak to me?”

  Constable Darby’s voice picked right up at the sound of such a high-ranking person calling him, “Hello, sir, thank you for getting back to me. I need to get my report done before my sarge returns or I’ll catch hell. He already heard what happened and called me from his holiday in Spain. I was hoping to attach a copy of your report to mine for confirmation. And if you have one with an MI6 letterhead, it would make a lovely souvenir.”

  “They’re finishing the brief downstairs now. I’ll instruct them to send it over to your station.”

  “Thanks. Never had nothing like that happen in Thaxted before. Plus, I was up ’till dawn on another call. Two unusual things in one night. You know what they say, if it’s not one thing it’s another.”

  Colin had no interest in colloquialisms, but this tweaked his suspicions, “Two things?”

  “Yes. The other wasn’t near as big of course, but what could be?”

  “What was it?”

  “Martin Pritchard’s car got stolen.”

  “What is unusual about a stolen car?” After so many years of following leads and hunches, Colin felt the other shoe was about to drop.

  “Well, to tell you the truth, we haven’t had a car go missing in ten years. We’re a small village so you’d notice if someone nicked your ride and was cruising around in it. I’m pretty sure it must have been outside folks who took it, ’cause Martin’s car isn’t anywhere in Thaxted anymore.”

  Colin jumped to his feet and yelled into the phone, his face inches from the speaker, “Constable Darby, I want everything on that car, and not only the make and license. I want to know if it has scratches, dents, bumper stickers, when the oil was changed last. And if the owner-”

  “Martin Pritchard,” Darby cut in, helpfully.

  “Yes, whatever. If he has pictures of the vehicle, I want those too. This is your priority today, Constable Darby.”

  “But what about my sergeant needing the reports?”

  Colin raised his voice, his tone one of command, “Goddamn it, Darby, I’m not going to say this again. Have this on my desk within the next two hours or your sergeant will be the least of your worries. I’ll text you the number and email to send it to.”

  He slammed the receiver down, hanging up on the unfortunate constable, and furiously walked his room, considering his options. Knowing he had no other alternative; he pulled his secure cell phone and dialed Simon Foster at MI5.

  “Why did we leave so quickly? I hadn’t finished the story. And this place sucks!”

  Eddie was not wrong. The once lovely park outside of Manchester’s booming business center had become a last resort for the poor and homeless of the city, displaced by the ongoing gentrification of the municipality. Litter blew across the barren dirt where carefully tended grass had grown years before, and a wasteland of tents, cardboard boxes, and torn mattresses mixed with the rocks, syringes, and broken bottles replacing the verdant shrubbery that had encircled the park in its long-gone glory days.

  Over two hundred hopeless, derelict people gathered there in small groups, some sleeping, some smoking, others huddled close together to disguise what activity they were up to. It was a no-man’s-land where lost souls disappeared. And that’s why Alex had brought them there.

  He paced back and forth in front of the graffitied bench, as Cate and Eddie stared at him. He ignored their looks and checked and rechecked the marked pages, hoping he had made a mistake with his research, but knowing he hadn’t. His brow crinkled with deepening concern and he slammed the book closed and halted. He was silent as he locked eyes with his friends, his face a portrait of despair.

  “We have to go.”

  “Good. Happy to leave this shithole,” agreed Eddie.

  Cate sensed there was something more, “Where are we going?”

  “Anywhere.” Alex’s voice was flat empty, beaten, “But it has to be out of the country.”

  “Eddie can’t leave. He hasn’t got an ID.”

  “You’re right.” Alex put his hands to his face in desperation, “Fuck.”

  That single word shocked both Cate and Eddie. After all they had been through, they had never heard him swear or seen him close to this state. A man on the verge of giving up.

  Eddie broke the dreadful silence, “There may be a way. We have Brown’s passport. You can take a picture of me on my phone, and I can trick the photo out on Cate’s laptop. Then if we find a good print shop, I should be able to finish the job and come up with a serviceable fake. I’ve done it with IDs before and it usually works if they don’t check too closely.”

  “An ID is one thing, but getting into another country using an altered passport at their immigration, will be hard. It’s not the same as changing the date on a driver’s license to buy beer,” warned Alex.

  “Are there any countries that aren’t as strict?”

  Alex looked at Eddie, “I don’t know, I really don’t. I’m sorry.”

  “What’s changed, Alex? What did you find? Wasn’t it bad enough already?” asked Cate.

  “I’ll show you.” He sat between them on the filthy bench and opened the book. “I bought this at the store because it has everything in it. Everything. And it’s worse than any of us knew.”

  Cate and Eddie exchanged glances. Worse than attacking a legendary hotel, burning down a church, or innocent women being sliced apart by Jack the Ripper?

  “We were wrong in thinking it was Mary’s idea to travel to Thaxted and be married in secret because she didn’t want to be recognized. It was, in fact, the wishes of her fiancé, Albert, to hold their wedding way out there.”

  “But why?” asked Cate. “Mary was the one with the scandalous reputation. What had Albert done?”

  “Albert hadn’t done anything. The reason he wanted to be married in a small town in Essex was because he was too well known throughout London, and any ceremony there involving him, within the city, would have caused a sensation,” explained Alex.

  “How come he was so famous? Was he a movie star or something?” wondered Eddie.

  “This was long before movies were invented,” said Cate.

  “Eddie, your distant relative, Albert Wettin, was famous because he was the first-born grandson of Victoria Wettin. As such he was the rightful heir to his grandmother’s empire, as would be the first-born male of his line.”

  “Empire?” Eddie wasn’t expecting that word, at best he thought there might be an inheritance the long-forgotten in-laws were fighting over. “What kind of empire did this Wettin lady have? Was she like the Jeff Bezos of her time?”

  “She was much more than that. Your great-great-great-grandfather died unexpectedly under suspicious circumstances. He was barely twenty-eight and they said he died childless. As a result, Victoria Wettin’s line went to her second-born grandchild. Had they known Albert had a son with Mary Kelly, history would be very different.”

  “But she was a prostitute?” said Cate.

  Eddie forced a laugh, “Watch your mouth. That’s my whatever many times grandma you’re talking about.”

  “It didn’t matter what she did. Mary Kelly and Albert Wettin were
legally married in Thaxted in a Church of England ceremony. Their offspring should have inherited everything from Victoria Wettin.”

  “Is that why they wanted Mary killed, so the other relatives would get the money?” It was beginning to make sense to Cate.

  “If it was just money. But it’s so much more. And to avoid the embarrassment of having a prostitute linked with her family, Victoria may have ordered not only her murder, but also the murder of Albert, her own first-born grandson, when he refused to obey her and went looking for his child.”

  “And I’m related to her, a woman who’d kill her own grandkid? Who was this Victoria? She sounds like a piece of work.”

  “She was.” Alex focused on Eddie, “Your family, the Wettins, ruled with an iron fist over the largest empire the planet has ever known. Larger than that of the Romans, Mongols, or even the Persians. In 1917, when the world was at war, her family changed their name because it was too German sounding and they didn’t want to upset their subjects.”

  “Their subjects? What does that mean?”

  “It means they no longer used the name Wettin, and instead became The Windsors. The woman who began all this, your grandmother, five generations removed, is remembered as Queen Victoria.”

  Cate jumped up in shock as the implication became real, “You’re saying Eddie’s bloodline goes directly back to Albert, Queen Victoria’s first-born grandson.”

  “Correct. And Albert’s father became King Edward VII.”

  “Yeah, but what’s that got to do with anything?” Eddie couldn’t grasp the importance of such a far-off family tree.

  “Eddie, the family who rule Great Britain and the Commonwealth are there because the line of succession passed to them when King Edward’s son, Albert Wettin, died childless. But now we have proof he had a baby boy who should have been heir to the throne, and his blood runs in your veins. It was Prince Albert, the Duke of Clarence and Avondale, who they tested your DNA against. Hair and nail samples have always been saved from the Royal family. They must have found it matched and confirmed beyond any doubt you are the long-sought great-great-great grandson.”