by Davis Bunn
“Leave England?”
“We’ve already left England, you dolt.”
“This is different.”
“Too right it is. This time we’re never coming back.”
GERALD PHONED THE AIRFIELD FROM THE TAXI AND PROMISED A huge tip if the plane was fueled and ready to go. When they arrived, the mechanic was there to unhook the wings.
The mechanic slipped Gerald’s cash into his coveralls and asked, “Where are you headed in such a rush?”
“England.”
“In this?” Rain dripped off the hood of his jacket, causing him to squint. “Better you than me, mate.”
Gerald powered up the engines before Val had his seatbelt fastened. The wind mocked them with its force, rocking the plane before they were even moving. Now that he was once more behind the controls, Gerald’s features adopted the same grim cast as before.
He taxied them out to the runway, rogered his take-off to the tower, then glanced at Val. “You ready?”
“Just remember,” Val replied. “If we crash and burn, this whole thing goes to pot.”
The roller coaster started as soon as their wheels left the ground. The plane yawed furiously, swept up by a sudden gust, tilted sharply, and the engine howled in protest. Val took white-knuckle grips on the edge of his seat and the roof. The cliffs swept by beneath them, to be replaced by raging whitecaps stretching out to where everything became lost in the rain and wind.
An hour and a bit into the flight, however, everything changed. One moment they were flying through grey skyborne froth, surrounded by a dismal noonday twilight. The next, they entered a vastly different realm.
The storm peeled away as though ripped from the earth. The wind calmed.
They entered a placid universe, so different Val doubted his own senses. Even the motor was comforted into a softer purr.
Val looked at Gerald. “What is this, the Twilight Zone?”
Gerald released his death’s grip on the stick. “Just your basic schizophrenic English spring.”
The sky stretched blue-black ahead of them, washed sparkling clear. Below and to Val’s right, two freighters carved white streamers from a jewellike English Channel. Up ahead he could just glimpse the white coastal teeth and the emerald fields beyond.
Gerald asked, “Do you think we might take this as a sign?”
Val refused to answer.
The phone chimed just as Gerald began his initial approach to the Brighton airfield. “Get that, will you? Right jacket pocket.”
Val pulled it out. “Haines.”
It was Dillon. “Can you believe this ruddy weather?”
“I understand why you talk about it all the time. It never ceases to amaze.”
“Where’s Gerald?”
“Landing us.”
“I’m sitting at the entrance to Alders Way. Ask him does he know where that is.”
Gerald replied, “Tell him yes.”
“You lads get over here right sharp. I found the house they’re using.”
“You’re sure?”
“Pretty much.”
“We can’t be wrong on this.”
“Just don’t hang about. We’ll see what we see when you get here.”
Fifty-five minutes later, Val and Gerald pulled into the entrance of a cul-de-sac jammed hard against the base of a steep hill. The mound grew out of nowhere, punching up into the impossibly blue sky like a grass-covered block. A pair of trails crawled up the side, probably where kids climbed and played over the flat top. The houses ringing the base were nondescript clones, ten in all. White stone bases rose to red mock-Victorian fronts, three linked together, then a tight space, then three more. Only the middle house stood alone. Opposite the cul-de-sac’s entrance, the sea sparkled between rooftops and Hastings’s narrow lanes. A few sailboats were already leaving port and putting tentatively to sea. The morning’s storm was merely a fading memory.
Dillon rose from Audrey’s grey Rover at their approach. He had his phone plastered to his ear. He wore an open-neck shirt and jeans wrinkled below the knees by the rain. He waved them around the corner. Gerald halted his van behind a house, blocking them from view. Dillon walked over and nodded a tight welcome. “Everything go right in Jersey?”
“Far as we know. Where’s Audrey?”
“Hang on a sec.” He tapped one hand nervously on the van’s roof. “The house is in the middle, the only one standing all by itself. Inside that little wall there, see it? Number eight. Three toughs came tearing out of there and jammed into a car. Black beemer.”
“When was that?”
“An hour back.”
Which meant they were gathering forces before Arthur’s arrival at the hotel.
“I ducked down as they came roaring past, but not before I got a good look,” Dillon went on. “Audrey wasn’t with them. So I phoned for some backup. Here she comes now.”
The woman could have been forty or sixty. She turned the corner and approached the van with a balanced limp, as though both feet hurt her equally. She wore a buttoned cardigan and a flowered dress and reading glasses draped around her neck. She carried a rolled umbrella in one hand and a metal clipboard in the other. She bussed Dillon on the cheek. “All right, love?”
“Yeah, not bad.” Dillon slid open the van’s rear door. “Lads, this is Doris. Doris, these are the mates I told you about.”
“Help me in, that’s a dear.” Her features held the dignified sternness of someone who bore much in silence. Her hair was a chemically induced shade of copper. When Dillon slipped in beside her and shut the door, she asked, “Staying out of trouble, love?”
“Up to this morning.” Dillon explained to the others, “Doris is mum to a young lady I’m seeing.”
“Only so long as you keep your nose clean.”
“I’m trying, aren’t I?”
“Trying isn’t good enough.”
“Yeah, so you keep going on about.” Dillon said to the men up front, “Doris runs the largest holiday rental agency in Hastings. Yesterday one of her cleaners was telling her about a cottage where all the men wear suits. And we’re not talking about your basic business geeks, are we, Doris?”
“I manage eighty-three cottages. The things you see don’t bear thinking about.” She shook her head in disgust. “Do I want to know what’s happening here?”
“Probably not, love. No.”
Val turned fully around in his seat. “Dillon is not going to get involved in anything, ma’am.”
Doris inspected him carefully. “You’re going to see to that, are you?”
“Yes ma’am. I am.”
She studied him a bit longer, then nodded her head. Satisfied.
“I’ve had a word with Susie, like you asked.”
“Susie being the cleaning lady,” Dillon explained. To Doris, “You trust her, do you?”
“She’s a good lass in her own simple way. We’re not after rocket scientists here. We’re after honest, hardworking folk who won’t pocket what’s not theirs.”
“She saw something, your Susie.”
“Four men, just like you said. All in dark suits. Expensive cut. Drive ever so nice a motor. Foreign, she thought. Dark like the suits.”
“Not your normal sort of tourists.”
“What’s normal in this day and age, I ask you? So when you phoned back I decided to go have a look for myself. Delivering fresh towels, carrying my clipboard, just going about for a normal inspection. The bloke in there tried to give me some lip.”
“Just one man?” Val asked.
“That’s all I saw.”
“You gave him some lip right back, didn’t you, love?” Dillon said.
“They rent from us, we’ve got certain rights and obligations, I tell him. It’s our way of keeping up with the houses in our care. So he lets me in, but he doesn’t half keep an eye out. Stalking me, he was. And he wouldn’t let me near the back bedroom. Claimed there’s a mate of his in there, not feeling well. I can’t complain about that,
long as he lets me into the lounge and the kitchen and the loo. Which he does.”
Val asked, “Tell me what you thought of the guy.”
“Big hulking brute,” she said crossly. “A thug in a suit is still just a thug. Made my skin crawl, just being inside with the likes of him.”
“Thanks, Doris.” Dillon slid open the door. “You’ve been ever so helpful.”
“We run a proper service here for proper people.” She started for the door, then paused. “Straight up, now. You’re not back on the game, are you, son?”
“Not me, love. No. Not ever.”
“That’s right, he’s not,” Val confirmed. “We’re just trying to help a friend.”
“I’ll be off, then.” She stepped from the van. “You lads play nice.”
WERE IT NOT FOR THE PIPED-IN MUSIC, THE ELEVATOR MIGHT AS well have been a coffin fitted for six. They rode downstairs in silence. Terrance was hemmed in on all sides. Loupe had hardly spoken to him since getting off the phone with Val. Something about the conversation had unsettled the man. It was not a pleasant sight, the boss being unnerved. All his men were brought to the edge of barely contained violence, just waiting for Loupe to tell them which way to explode.
They entered the hotel lobby in a phalanx of muscle and gabardine and crossed to the opposite end from the front desk. Men were stationed at either side of the empty corner, their expressions telling anyone who approached that this entire area was off-limits. Terrance spotted more of Loupe’s men around the lobby and still others outside on the street. The old man sighed his way into the sofa, and pointed Terrance into a chair by his left.
Dust motes danced in the air. A stringed quartet played Debussy over the ceiling speakers. Elegant people passed wearing springtime pastels. The lobby held an atmosphere of moneyed calm. To Terrance’s left, sunlight splashed upon high rain-speckled windows.
The sight of his father limping into the hotel struck Terrance with such pain he actually gripped his chest.
Loupe observed Terrance carefully. “Who is that?”
“My father.” Terrance carted his stricken gaze back and forth between the two men as his father approached. “What is he doing here?”
But Loupe had dismissed Terrance now. The boss rose to his feet and demanded, “Where is Haines?”
Arthur d’Arcy glanced once at Josef Loupe, then returned his gaze to Terrance. “How are you, son?”
“Your boy is fine,” Loupe said. Their highly public surroundings kept his snarl very soft. “For the moment.”
Arthur’s gaze remained gentle upon his boy. “You look tired.”
Terrance was kept mute by the rising dread of this day. Just when he’d been certain it could grow no worse, another blow arrived. A constant rain of hellish force. His father, of all people, here to witness his failure.
Loupe was not accustomed to being ignored. He snapped, “I was addressing you, sir.”
Arthur d’Arcy displayed a remarkable strength of will for so frail a figure. “You do not control this moment. You only think you do.”
“Where is Haines?”
“Where is my daughter?”
“So.” Loupe drew out the word until it stretched his features with a tight smile. “It appears we must deal with the emissary at hand. Sir, I believe you have something I want.”
“I asked you a question.”
Loupe gave a dignified smile and resumed his seat. “I do so hope we shall be able to avoid any unpleasantness.”
“Where is my daughter?”
“She is safe.” Loupe snapped his fingers. Instantly an aide brought out his phone, keyed the pad, and handed it over. Loupe said, “Put her on.”
Very real pain coursed through Arthur’s features as he took the phone and murmured, “Hello, darling. Are you all right?”
A boulder was lodged where Terrance’s heart should have resided. Every word his father spoke caused the stone to tremble. The motions bruised his chest. He reached up and massaged the spot over his ribs. The agony was fearsome.
“Enough.” Loupe gestured with one finger. Instantly the aide reached forward and slipped the phone from Arthur’s hand.
Arthur said, “You promised Val my daughter would be here.”
“It appears we have both been somewhat inconvenienced.”
“You don’t want Val. He means nothing to you.”
“True.” Loupe extracted a cigar from a leather case, then pulled a tiny gold guillotine from his inner pocket. As he trimmed the cigar’s tip, he went on. “Your daughter will rejoin you soon enough.”
Arthur glanced around the room, taking in the men stationed like soldiers in Cerutti uniforms. “I must call Val.”
“By all means.” Loupe lit his cigar and nodded to the aide. “Allow me to explain to him how things stand.”
THEY SAT IN THE VAN AND WAITED. THERE WAS NOTHING MORE TO be said. Every now and then one of them walked to the end of the block and back, just checking on the cul-de-sac and the middle house. In and out of sight in a matter of seconds. Everything was placid, calm, just another lovely day by the seaside.
The call came right on time. Arthur sounded faintly breathless, but steady. “It’s me.”
“And?”
“Audrey isn’t here. He says he won’t release her until the money is in his hands.”
“Put him on.”
The afternoon’s glory was tainted by the voice on the other end. “I was so very sorry not to have the pleasure of meeting you, Mr. Haines. You’re not living up to your part of the bargain.”
“That’s something, coming from you. Maybe I should tell Arthur to walk away.”
“Very dangerous, that. People who get in my way tend to regret it as long as they live. Which is not as long as they might like. Do I make myself clear?”
“Yes.”
“So I advise you to instruct d’Arcy senior here to hand over what is mine.” There was a protest from the other end, to which the man said, “Do be quiet, that’s a good lad.”
“Was that Terrance?”
“What d’Arcy junior wants or does not want at this point is immaterial.”
“Call the Jersey bank. The man in charge is a Mr. Richards.” Val’s words were punctured by his thundering heart. Short verbal bursts proved easier to hold steady. “Terrance will access the codes for you. Richards will only release the funds when Arthur confirms that he, Terrance, and Audrey are safe.”
“I can well understand your desire for personal vengeance on young d’Arcy here.” The words were softly spoken. Merely a quick breath of smoke. But the dragon’s flames licked the side of Val’s face. “But do you think you are any more capable of wreaking havoc than I?”
Val pressed a fist tight against his gut. “That’s the deal.”
“I fear you do not hold all the cards, Mr. Haines. Do I need to send you a taped message from the young lady to prove my point?”
The cramp wracked his gut so tight that Val doubled over, drenching his knees with the sweat from his face. “No.”
“Now here is how things are going to play out. You will tell d’Arcy senior to hand over the computer which you stole. I will walk through the transfer process with d’Arcy junior. The two gentlemen will depart. When I am satisfied that everything has gone smoothly, and no pesky authority figures come around asking difficult questions, I shall release your young lady.” He might have been smoking a cigar. Or perhaps it was merely that the flames had finally escaped and were eating away at the phone. “Do we have a bargain?”
“Put Arthur on the line.”
“A wise choice.”
There was a moment’s pause, then, “Yes?”
Val swallowed hard against the gorge. “You heard?”
“I did.”
“We have no choice.”
“No.”
“Good luck.”
“Ah. That is not required.”
Val shut off the phone. The effort of dragging in another breath left him unable to lift his head. He
felt a heavy hand pat his back. He heard Dillon ask, “All right there, mate?”
“No.”
“Ease up, now. That’s it. Can’t go to pieces on us now.”
Gerald asked, the dismay and nausea there in his voice, “What did he say?”
Val let his hands guide him upright. There was a dark stain of dread on his knees where his face had rested. “They’re not going to let her go.”
Dillon’s voice carried the pained ease of one used to life’s im-possibles. “We knew that going in, mate.”
But now was different. Now it was no longer a plan spoken in the safety of a night-draped kitchen. Val heard anew the anguish in the old man’s voice and swallowed hard. The two men waited him out.
Finally he managed to unclench his grip and hand Gerald the phone. “It’s time.”
LOUPE REFUSED TO EVEN GLANCE TERRANCE’S WAY AS ARTHUR rose from his seat. Terrance watched his father cross the lobby in that odd tilted gait of his. Loupe sat and smoked his cigar, examining the glowing tip between puffs, until Arthur limped back inside the hotel. Terrance’s computer was at his side. He reseated himself and placed the laptop in Terrance’s hands.
When Terrance did not move, Arthur said gently, “Son, this man intends to kill you.”
“Nonsense.” Loupe spoke the words to his cigar tip. “What an absurd concept. Young d’Arcy is a valued ally.”
Arthur ignored him entirely. “His kind does not share. You know this far better than I.”
“My kind.” Loupe seemed mildly amused by the exchange. “My kind.”
Arthur reached over and opened the laptop. “Give the man what he wants.”
Terrance watched his own hands betray him. They turned on the laptop, coded in the ID, made the wireless online connection, and entered the secret Web site. He swiveled the computer around, pointed to a line of numbers across the top of the screen, and fell back into his seat. “That’s it? That’s the lot?” Loupe snapped his fingers. The driver handed him a cell phone. Loupe asked directory assistance for the Syntec Bank’s main number in Jersey. Terrance listened as Loupe asked for Mr. Richards. But all Terrance truly heard was the shards of ambition and of his plans falling about his feet.
