Cruelly ironic, I thought. When all this started I’d been hunting fugitives. Now I’d become one.
And once that happened, there was no turning back.
“Are you taking her?” the kid asked.
I’d forgotten he was there.
“What’s it to you?” I said, not unkindly.
“I … I just love her, don’t I?”
“You and me both.” I went to the bed and sat next to Zoey. Turned to the kid and asked for some privacy.
Once he was gone, I said, “I feel as though I regained a daughter but lost a sister.”
“Bullocks,” she said. “You and I will always be brother and sister, won’t we? Doesn’t matter that we had different biological mums and dads. Blood doesn’t mean shite, does it?” She paused, looked into my eyes. “Please say no, because if it does I’m right fucked, aren’t I? Being the daughter of that monster and all.”
I held her to me.
Said, “I don’t know what anything means anymore, Zoey. We just do our best and hope for some luck.”
I stared into Hailey’s ghostly white face. “Any way to bring her around?”
Zoey nodded. “Let me run upstairs and fetch my handbag.”
* * *
Ten minutes later Zoey held a syringe in her right hand.
“Naloxone,” she’d said when she first came down the stairs with her handbag. “It’s a pure opioid antagonist.”
“Why do you have it?” I asked.
“All heroin users should carry it round. It counters the effects of an overdose.”
“How does it work?”
“Tricks the brain into thinking there are no more opiates in the body.”
“Is it safe?”
“Safer than heroin. Certainly safer than a heroin overdose.”
“Did she overdose?” I asked with some alarm.
Zoey shrugged. “Technically, yes, I suppose. Her life’s not in danger. But she has all the symptoms of an OD. Excessive sleepiness, shallow breathing.” She lifted the lids of Hailey’s eyes. “Dilated pupils. And she didn’t wake when I spoke to her loudly while you were gone. I tried rubbing her chest firmly. That didn’t bring her round either.”
Now she twisted Hailey’s arm, asked me to hold it in place. She removed a rubber tube from her handbag and tied it around Hailey’s upper arm just below her meager bicep. She tapped the inside of Hailey’s forearm, searching for a vein.
“Found it,” she said.
She started the injection.
“How long does it take?”
“She’ll come round pretty much straightaway.”
Before she finished the sentence Hailey opened her eyes. Immediately they filled with tears and she tried to push herself up on the bed.
“Hold her down,” Zoey said.
Hailey was sweating, twitching, crying, pleading for another hit.
I took her by the shoulders and held her down, tears welling in my own eyes, threatening to fall.
“Sadly,” Zoey said, “Naloxone sends you into immediate withdrawal. It’s an awful feeling but it will pass.”
I looked toward Hailey’s gear on the floor, specifically at the half-empty vial.
“Shouldn’t we give her some,” I said, “to make her feel better?”
Zoey looked me in the eyes. “Are you mad? More heroin will send her straight back into overdose.” She leaned over Hailey and said, “It’s all right, love. You’ll start to feel the dope again in about forty minutes and the sick feeling will go away, I promise.”
It was pure agony watching her like that. But I trusted Zoey and I told her that.
“Kind of funny,” Zoey said, “when you really think about it. I used to believe I had a mind for medicine because my father was a doctor. But all along, it was because my father was a bloody career drug dealer and my mum was an addict.”
I leaned over and kissed my sister on the cheek.
She smiled, tears forming in her own eyes. In that moment I saw her clear as day as she’d appeared thirtysome years ago on the opposite side of a loose circle on our primary school playground, singing “The Farmer Wants a Wife.”
With the back of my index finger I wiped a tear away from her cheek.
“Run upstairs now,” she said. “Say good-bye to Damon. He’s a right bastard most of the time. But his heart’s in a good place, innit?”
* * *
Ashdown’s heart was in a good place, I decided. Upstairs, shortly after Ostermann excused himself and went outside for a smoke, Detective Chief Inspector Damon Ashdown conceded that he had been able to intercept my call from D.C. because he’d issued an alert for the name Simon Fisk the very day he was assigned to Interpol Manchester.
“I never imagined we’d meet under these particular circumstances,” he said as he set down his empty pint glass. “But when I first discovered your name linked to the young American girl who went missing in Paris, I figured I might one day be of assistance. Possibly in getting your arse out of hot water with UK authorities.”
“You put yourself at considerable risk these past few days,” I told him. “Your career, your safety. Your very life a time or two. Why, Detective? Why take those chances for someone you’d never even seen before?”
He grinned. “You were family, weren’t you? At least once upon a time you were, even if we’d never had the opportunity to meet in person.”
“You did all this for Zoey,” I said. “You want her back, don’t you?”
His grin faded as he shook his head. “Want her back? No. No, Simon, that ship has sailed. I know we can never be a couple again. But I do love her. Love her more than I’ve ever loved anyone. And I’d go to war with the devil himself if I thought it would do Zoey a lick of good.”
I nodded but said nothing.
He said, “She’s had a rough go of things, hasn’t she? Time and again she’s walked through the fire. And each and every time she’s come out the other side that much stronger. I love her, sure. But more important, I admire her. And after four decades on this earth, half of them spent rummaging through the wreckage of unfinished lives, there aren’t many people I can still say that about.”
Chapter 62
An hour later Hailey and I were in Ostermann’s suite at the Corinthia. Hailey was resting in the bedroom while Ostermann and I stood across from each other, reluctant to say good-bye this time, because both of us knew, it was probably our last.
“Where will you go?” he said.
“Better if you don’t know,” I told him.
He motioned with his strong chin to the bedroom. “Does she know what’s going on?”
“Not really. When she finally came around and started feeling better, she kept asking for Terry.”
“What did you tell her?”
“I tried telling her who I was.”
“And?”
“And there was no recognition in her eyes. None at all. She asked me where Terry was again, and I told her I didn’t know. She went ballistic, so Zoey told her Terry was all right. That someone else brought Jack Noonan the ransom.”
“Probably for the best for the time being.” Ostermann turned and paced the length of the room. “Stockholm syndrome, I’d suspect.”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe something more than that.”
“It’ll take time, Simon. Time and patience.”
“It’ll take that, all right.”
“And your father? Where is he now?”
“He headed back to Heathrow as soon as Zoey told him we’d found Hailey. That’s the last we’ll ever see of him.”
Now that I knew the truth, now that I knew why he’d taken me from my mother and Tuesday in London, I could probably forgive him that. But I could never forgive him for all the secrets and lies, for all the bullying and emotional blackmail. I could never forgive him for the way in which he raised me in the States over the next decade. I could never forgive him that.
My BlackBerry buzzed in my pocket. Ashdown’s number appeared
on the screen. With a sudden feeling of foreboding, I pressed the phone to my ear.
“You need to get the hell out of there, Simon,” he said urgently. “They’re on their way.”
“Who?”
“The NCA. They have your location. Which I can only assume means you still have Eli Welker’s bloody phone.”
Christ, how could I have made such a stupid mistake?
I dug Welker’s phone from my pocket and ripped the battery from it.
“They’re after Shauna Adair, specifically, Simon. But chuck your phone out as well. Just in case.”
I nodded. “Right. Soon as I hang up.”
“Which needs to be now, Simon. Good luck.”
Before I could thank him Ashdown was off the line, and hints of red-and-blue lights entered the room through the open curtain.
I tore the battery off my BlackBerry and tossed both phones onto the bed.
Ostermann grinned. “You have no manner of luck, Simon, do you? No manner of luck at all.”
“Help me with Hailey,” I said.
Together we ran into the bedroom.
* * *
“I’m experiencing a bit of déjà vu,” Ostermann said in the stairwell minutes later.
“That’s been going around a lot these days.”
Only this time Ostermann and I were heading downstairs rather than up as we had in Berlin two years earlier. And thankfully, we wouldn’t be jumping off the roof onto another building this time.
Once we hit bottom, we bound through a red metal door into the parking garage.
“This way,” Ostermann said. “The concierge hid your bike near the service entrance. So you may have caught a bit of luck after all.”
A few seconds later a big blue tarp came into view.
We ran toward it and Ostermann pulled the cover free as I held on to Hailey.
I set her on the bike.
“You’ve only one helmet,” Ostermann said.
“Put it on Hailey.”
“I’d argue, but Magda always said you were pretty thick in the head, so you should be fine.”
I peeled off my jacket and helped Hailey slip into it. Then I got onto the bike.
Ostermann stared at my black T-shirt, which had a tiny hole just over my heart from Duncan MacBride’s bullet in Liverpool.
“It’s fairly cold out there,” he said.
“I’ll think warm thoughts.”
I lit the ignition.
“Speaking of warm thoughts,” he said, “mind if I call your sister?”
The machine roared to life, all five hundred horsepower.
I turned and looked at Ostermann, expecting to find a smile. But he’d been dead serious.
“All right, then,” I said.
I grinned and showed Ostermann my middle finger.
In my mirror I saw him smile as Hailey and I sped off.
Chapter 63
TWELVE YEARS AGO
I’ve read about a man named Gustavo Zapata. He lives in Tampa and works out of his home. Some papers call him a vigilante. And at first glance, I suppose, that’s what he is. He commits wrongs, in order to put things right.
This past week I resigned from the United States Marshals Service.
Sold the Georgetown home and returned most of the money to Tasha’s parents. They fought me at first. But when I mentioned donating the money to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, they had a sudden change of heart. Somewhat surprisingly, they agreed that it was a brilliant idea. “Just let us do it,” Tasha’s father said to me. “You know, for tax purposes.”
Of course.
I park my Ford Explorer and step into a motor vehicle dealership in Arlington, Virginia.
A salesman immediately approaches. “How can I help you today, sir?”
“I want to trade in my SUV. Get something smaller.”
“What kind of vehicle are you looking for?” he asks.
My eye catches on a sexy black sportbike.
“Ah,” the salesman says, “the Kawasaki Ninja 500R. Great middleweight bike. Perfect for starters. A regular thoroughbred when it comes to handling.”
“I’ll take it.”
Yesterday I signed a lease on a studio apartment on Dumbarton Street in the District. It’s a tight fit, even for one person. But the lease is only for six months. By then I’m sure I’ll be more in the mood to find myself something else. Something a little bigger. A little nicer. Right now, though, I’m just too grief-stricken to do any serious looking.
The transaction for the motorcycle takes the better part of two hours.
When the deal’s finally done, the salesman offers to have the bike washed and waxed.
“Not necessary,” I tell him. “I’ll drive it off the lot as is.”
“Sure thing, Mr. Fisk. Will you at least let me fill her with gas?”
“Have at it.”
Twenty minutes later I make a right turn out of the dealership.
The bike rides smoothly. It’s nice and light, comfortable. Yet packed with plenty of power. It handles even better than I’d expected.
Only once I’m on the road do I realize why I decided on a bike. On a bike you have to concentrate on the road. Really concentrate, or else it’s all over. End of story. Take your mind off the road for a second and you’re done. A car, on the other hand, leaves you plenty of time to think.
Too much time, especially during a fourteen-hour ride from Arlington to Tampa.
After the summer I’ve had, I could use a little time off from thinking. Just now I’d prefer to concentrate on the endless stretch of blacktop in front of me.
According to the articles I’ve read, Gustavo Zapata is a former Army Ranger. His referrals usually come from government types. Overall, his business is very hush-hush. But I figure I can find him. If I can find fugitives in every corner of the world, I’m pretty sure I can locate one good guy residing in the center of the Sunshine State. And if I can’t, well, then I have no business considering doing what he does anyway.
Which is retrieve children who have been abducted by noncustodial parents and taken overseas to a country that doesn’t recognize U.S. custody decisions.
Apparently, thousands of American parents are placed in this distressing situation every year.
As a formal U.S. Marshal, this is something I think I’d excel at. And more important, I’d be doing some good. I’m under no illusion; I won’t be able to handle stranger abductions because they’d hit too close to home. But parental abductions are a different animal entirely. And if it’s at all possible for me to save a few mothers and fathers from going through what Tasha and I went through this summer, I at least have to give it a try.
I know my way around foreign countries.
I know how to lie low.
I know how to fight and how to fire a gun.
And perhaps best of all, as I search the globe for other parents’ missing children, perhaps one day I can find my own. Or at least locate the man who took her.
I want to know who he is.
I want to know why.
And I want to make him answer for what he’s done.
But for the next fourteen hours I’ll remove all this from my mind and concentrate on the highway.
* * *
After a couple of hours stopping and starting on several different roads, I finally reach exit 84A toward Rocky Mount, North Carolina.
With the Beltway and Virginia behind me and the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida in front of me, I check my mirrors and steer my bike toward the exit to the interstate.
When I reach the ramp, I take a deep breath.
Lean into the turn.
Hit I-95 and accelerate.
Epilogue
A couple of years ago, at the suggestion of a sex peddler in Odessa, I read a book that described Moldova as the unhappiest place on earth.
Yet it is in a small village in this impoverished, landlocked country, where for the first time in twelve years, I truly feel happiness.
The drive from London to Moldova was an exhausting 1,600 miles and took roughly thirty hours on A4. In Belgium, I ditched the Dodge Tomahawk in favor of a somewhat more modest bike—an Italian MV Agusta F4.
We’ve been here in the former Soviet Republic four months and the weather’s finally begun to break. The villagers tell us to expect heavy showers and thunderstorms in the early summer but milder temperatures into July and August.
The best of it is that Hailey’s finally coming around. The physical symptoms of her withdrawal peaked just before we arrived, complicating things at the border—heftily raising the price of our bribes—and causing us some added difficulty as I searched for our new living arrangements.
Those first few days after we arrived were downright frightening.
Despite the frigid temperatures, Hailey was constantly sweating. Her stomach cramped so badly she was sure she was dying. Severe muscle spasms in her back and neck consistently led to horrific migraines.
The migraines made Hailey sensitive to light, so we spent much of that first week in total darkness, with her writhing in pain on a worn mattress and me running outdoors to empty alternating buckets of vomit and diarrhea.
She couldn’t (or wouldn’t) eat, and I had to beg—and sometimes even force her—to drink enough water to keep her from getting dehydrated.
One evening she was in such obvious distress that I finally broke down and risked our delicate new freedom by phoning one of the few people on the globe whom authorities might actually expect me to call.
“I will come there,” she said the moment I finished explaining the situation to her. “I will come to Moldova and help you.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Ana,” I told her. “You can’t leave your home and career in Warsaw to help someone you barely know and haven’t seen in nearly two years.”
“Do not be an idiot, Simon. I do know you; it is you who obviously does not know me. Because if you knew me at all, you would know that I cannot not come to Moldova to help you now that you have called.”
I knew her better than she thought. Though I could never tell her (and had trouble even admitting it to myself), it was precisely why I had called her. I needed Ana as much as anyone could need someone else. Truth is, I’d needed her ever since I last left Warsaw almost two years ago. I’d just been too goddamn stubborn—too much of a bloody Fisk—to concede the fact to myself. Because I hadn’t wanted to pull her away from everything she knew to join me in my desperate and melancholy world.
Gone Cold Page 24
