‘Are you going to use it?’ I ask.
‘I want to talk to you. Can I trust you?’ she says.
‘It depends what you tell me.’
She nods. ‘I understand. You are part of a taskforce. Your search sometimes leads you to people and organisations that have great influence. More than they should have. Maybe more authority than the government has because they operate in more criminal conditions. Maybe you people even hope to bring such corporations down.’
I narrow my eyes a fraction before I can stop myself. She shouldn’t know this, yet she does. She sees the slight tell and knows she’s right. She glances around, then looks back at me.
‘I worked for such an organisation. They are more powerful than you could possibly imagine,’ she says.
‘You mean you don’t work for them now?’
She looks over her shoulder again, as though she expects that someone is watching us.
‘I got away from them. They will eventually find me. It’s inevitable,’ she explains. ‘And when they do, they won’t just slap my wrists and say don’t do this again.’
‘Yet still you left?’ I say.
She nods. ‘I couldn’t go on anymore.’
‘What can I do to help you?’ I ask.
Our eyes meet in the mirror above the bar.
‘Are you willing to?’
It’s my turn to nod.
A group of girls on a hen party converges on the bar. She tenses as the loud chatter takes up behind us. Her eyes dart from me and back to the bar. She frowns at the girls.
‘Now’s not the time. I’ll be in touch,’ she says.
As she disappears into the throng of bodies, I jump from the barstool. My heart thumps in my chest but it’s not fear that causes the adrenaline, rather the excitement that Anna has made contact. This could be a breakthrough. I look round but cannot see her anywhere in the busy bar.
‘You okay?’ says Ben beside me.
‘I have to go. A work thing came up.’
‘Oh, right. Nothing to do with that blonde I saw you talking to then?’
I shake my head. ‘No. Just work. Sorry. Give my love to Mia.’
‘Sure,’ Ben says. Then he sits back at the bar and orders another beer.
I weave through the groaning crowd and head towards the main exit, all the time searching the room. But there’s no point. She’s already gone. I reach into my jacket to take out my phone as I go outside, deciding that I’d better call this in. In my pocket, my hand falls on an unfamiliar shape. I pull it out. Anna has left me a phone of her own.
I look in the contacts list, but it’s empty. I hear her words again: I’ll be in touch. She wants to call all the shots. Well, that’s fine with me.
I put the phone back in my pocket. I don’t take out my work phone. I don’t call it in.
I just don’t want to.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Michael
I’m unused to feeling paranoid but because Anna found me so easily, I start to take extra precautions. I toy with the idea of mentioning to Beth and Leon that she’s made contact. The problem is, I can’t help thinking that somehow Anna will know and she’ll never get in touch again. This is how I justify my silence. It’s so important to keep what’s happening to myself, at least until I win her complete trust. Then, perhaps, she will believe that I can help her stay safe from her former employers.
Even though Anna said she had a gun on me, I hadn’t felt threatened. I know she is dangerous. Her whole lifestyle revolves around death. Yet I knew she wasn’t going to shoot me.
Anna’s unexpected approach tells me a lot about her. Perhaps she’s been waiting for her moment since we met a few months ago. This shows she’s willing to play the long game to get what she wants. But what does she want?
Help. She asked for help and she took a risk in approaching me. She was sure I’d agree.
She could be setting me up, of course. The people she says she no longer works for might well be trying to compromise me. I was warned about these approaches as part of my training. This alone should make me cautious. I should at least tell Ray of her approach. But I have no intention of doing anything that will prevent Anna from contacting me again.
I’ll share this with the team when the time is right.
I will. When I have something important to tell them. Before then, anything I say or do may jeopardise the next meeting. The thought of never seeing Anna again leaves a cold chill inside me that I can’t explain.
‘Use your gut and always follow your instincts,’ Andrew would say if ever I discussed anything I was unsure about with him.
I feel the urge to arrange our regular lunch meeting, but I know I’ll be unable to ask his advice, any more than I can my colleagues.
It’s best, I think, that I leave my uncle out of this.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Michael
It is a week before I hear from Anna again.
The call comes when I’m walking to the tube station after work. I’ve carried her phone all along, but during my working hours it is on silent. I don’t want it to ring when I’m with my colleagues. I’d have to explain having a phone that isn’t regulation, as well as the call received on it. But my worries are unfounded; Anna picks her moment with the usual attention to detail.
‘Do you know Abney Park Cemetery?’ she says.
‘No.’
‘Stoke Newington. Two hours.’
She hangs up as if she’s expecting me to try to trace the call. Yet I’m sure she knows where I am and that it isn’t possible.
I go into the tube station and start mapping the route to Stoke Newington. The burner phone vibrates in my pocket just before I pass the barrier. I take the phone out. There’s a text from the same number that called me.
New location. The Langham Hotel, Marylebone. One hour.
I take the Jubilee Line to Bond Street. When I leave the station, I hail a cab to the Langham Hotel. I’ll be there earlier than she wants me to be, but that’s better than being late. And I’d prefer to choose a vantage point before she arrives.
But as the cab approaches the hotel, I receive yet another text.
Royal Opera House. Ticket booth. Give your name.
I redirect the taxi driver to the Opera House. As the car pulls up outside, I check the phone again. There are no further texts, but it’s obvious that Anna is not taking chances. She’s making sure I’m not being followed, and that I haven’t betrayed her. She doesn’t trust me, even though she’s chosen to talk to me. I have no intention of deceiving her, even though this might be a trap and she may well be planning something for me. Perhaps I’ve somehow become a target. I subconsciously pat my jacket, feeling the gun in the holster beneath, then I get out of the taxi. I know this could be dangerous, and a serious mistake, but my curiosity is such that I’m willing to put myself at risk. I’m driven to explore this situation no matter where it leads.
There’s a group of people standing outside the building wearing dinner suits; one of them is smoking, while other opera goers drift into the lobby. La Bohème is playing.
Feeling underdressed, I pay the taxi driver, then turn and walk towards the box-office door.
Inside, I approach the ticket booth.
‘I believe there’s a ticket for me? Michael Kensington.’
The girl behind the glass smiles at me, then reaches for an envelope that lies beside her keyboard.
‘You’re in a box. Best position directly over the stage. You’ll love it there. Enjoy the show,’ she says.
I take the envelope, open it, and find a ticket inside.
‘That way,’ says the girl.
A helpful usher directs me up the stairs and into the box. I enter with caution, expecting an ambush of some kind, but other than a few seats, as well as an ice bucket with a bottle of Bollinger chilling, the box is empty.
There are two glasses. Is this some kind of bizarre date with Anna? The thought makes me feel uncomfortable in a way that’
s difficult to express.
I choose a seat at the back – a position that grants me a clear view of the door to the booth, as well as the stage.
From this vantage point, I watch the theatre fill as people take their seats. I check the phone again, but there are no further messages. And so I put it on silent, but place it down on the table with the champagne bucket so I can see if the screen lights up.
The lights in the theatre dim. The orchestra starts playing and I look over the balcony, checking out all the other booths around the room. All of them are full, which suggests that Anna had to pull strings to get this one.
I pick up the phone and glance at it again but already I know there won’t be any messages.
Then the curtains open on the stage.
Beside me, a figure slips into the booth and takes a seat. A female shape. Bobbed dark hair is all I can make out in the dim light. I hold my breath as she reaches for the champagne and expertly pops the cork. As the opening song begins, she sits down in front of me. I wait for her to turn around to talk to me but she says nothing as she pours the champagne into the two glasses. She doesn’t offer me any, but takes one of the glasses herself and sips. I watch her as she appears to be concentrating on the show. I glance at the stage. Is opera so enthralling?
I can’t understand the words, and the music, though vaguely familiar, does nothing for me.
After ten minutes, I lean forward and take the other glass of champagne. If you can’t beat them, join them. I sip. The wine is perfect. Chilled. Delicious. Even so, I place it back down, concerned it might be drugged, or poisoned, as suspicion kicks in again. What is this all about?
Anna – if this is her, and I cannot be sure – tops up her own glass and continues to drink. I have no more. My eyes are on her back, not the stage, even as she remains riveted.
When the interval arrives and the lights in the house go up, I think I must have dozed off.
Then the woman turns: it is Anna. She looks … beautiful. The dark wig suits her, bringing out the blue of her eyes, and I’m taken by how chameleonic she is.
‘My name is Neva,’ she says. ‘That’s what they called me. Not Anna. Or any other name I’ve used in the process of working for them. This name has become who I am.’
‘Who are they?’ I ask.
‘I know them only as “the Network”. We were never told about our masters. I only ever saw a few faces, mostly handlers.’
‘Tell me what you do know,’ I say.
‘I’ve been remembering things. I believe I was five when I was taken. From that day, I was conditioned. Trained. Made into who I am now.’
‘Who was your handler?’ I ask.
‘I think you already know that.’
‘No. I don’t.’
‘She went by the name Tracey Herod. She was one of the people who trained us,’ Neva says.
I nod. It all makes sense.
Then Neva tells me what Beth and I already suspected. How she and six others were taken to a house and then their whole lives changed. Neva’s story fills in some of the gaps for me, but she knows so little herself that the whole tale is still not revealed.
‘This room they took you to, with the doctor. It was brainwashing?’
‘They’d give us drugs, tell us the same thing over and over until we believed it. So, I guess brainwashing is what you would call it.’
‘What things did they tell you?’ I ask.
‘That we’d always been theirs. We were born to serve the Network. After a while, we forgot our former homes and families. Our handlers became the only family we had.’
‘And … you went against them. You killed your handler? You killed Tracey.’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’ Michael asks.
‘I began to remember things. I knew what they’d done to me was wrong. I didn’t want to be owned anymore,’ she says.
‘You’re implicating yourself in several murders by telling me this.’
‘I know,’ she says.
‘Then why tell me?’
Neva glances away and back at the stage.
‘I speak seven languages,’ she says. ‘I discovered opera when I was on an assignment in Italy. La Bohème was playing then too. I heard it and loved it. I don’t know why. I had no other emotions. Not for possessions, and none associated with life and death. But music. That is something else. I suppose I have an advantage because I can understand the words. But these people down here, most of them don’t, yet they still engage with it. What that says is that music speaks to us on a primal level. It crosses language barriers. We don’t need to know the words because the notes tell us the story.’
I’m not sure where she’s going with this but I wait for her to explain. She looks back at me.
‘The closest thing to this is the rhythm of death,’ she says. ‘There’s a music to murder to.’
‘And you enjoy that too?’ I ask.
Neva smiles and shakes her head. ‘Some do. Like opera, when you first hear it, you don’t necessarily like it. But you can learn to appreciate it on a cultural level. Murder is an acquired taste, Michael. One I’ve learnt to be very good at. I feel no guilt or remorse when I take a life. If I ever did, some time in my life that emotion was removed from me. But equally I feel no enjoyment. There are plenty of us who do. But I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know as a profiler.’
For a moment I don’t know what to say. I absorb the information she’s giving, acknowledging that she knows more about me than I do about her. But from what she’s revealed, I know she must have been through so much, and it’s made her who and what she is. This is the worst case of child abuse I’ve ever come across. I question again if she can be held responsible for everything these people made her do? Surely not? I use this to justify my contact with her now and the secret of it that I kept from my colleagues.
For all this, I don’t see a victim before me. And I’m at odds with what she’s told me and what I know of her crimes. Could someone like Neva be rehabilitated?
‘You said you want my help,’ I say. ‘How? Do you want witness protection?’
‘I do want your help and I want to offer you mine. You and Archive.’
I blink at the use of the taskforce’s name. She obviously knows more than should be possible.
‘In what way?’ I ask.
‘I have resources that can find your assassins. But more importantly, the people who control them.’
‘How will you deliver this information to me? Will you let me take you in? Keep you safe?’
‘I’d be in more danger in custody than I am out on my own,’ she says. ‘Right now, I’m invisible. They can’t find me. By helping you I’ll be opening a chink in my armour. I’m putting myself at risk. But let me worry about that, and also about getting you what you need. You just have to promise me you’ll keep me a secret from your taskforce for as long as possible.’
I deep sigh. ‘I don’t know if I can.’
‘At least you’re honest.’ Neva smiles again. ‘Let me give you a helping hand with that. Here is your first lead.’
She leans towards me, retrieving a brown manila envelope from under my seat. She places it in my hands.
‘Inside is information about someone. They call him Sharrick. He was assigned to me as my handler after … after I killed Tracey. They didn’t know I did it at the time, but they probably do now. Sharrick is a lead that can get us closer to the hierarchy of the Network. But he’s still a minor cog in the works. A mere handler and former assassin. All handlers are. But Tracey’s death will have created a vacancy. I suspect Sharrick is next in line to fill it.’
‘Next in line for what?’
‘A seat at the table in the banquet hall of the Network. Think of it as a huge house, with many rooms. Promotions happen only from within. I only know about the ones immediately above me. And a little I learnt by spying on Tracey. She was more involved than the average handler, you see. She was also a trainer.’
&nb
sp; I want to ask questions but instead I open the envelope and look at the photograph of Sharrick. He’s a middle-aged man with white hair – possibly dyed. His face is clean-shaven. He’s like a young Rutger Hauer. The picture captures him leaving a London club that I’m familiar with. He’s carrying a briefcase and wearing a suit. For all intents and purposes, anyone would take him to be a businessman. But I notice other things about him: his well-built, strong frame. His lean, wiry, athletic appearance tells me more about him than the formal suit. Even in the photograph I can tell this man will be light on his feet.
‘This place…’ I say. The location is a small gentlemen’s club. I know it, but can’t remember why.
‘I’ll leave you to figure that out,’ Neva says. ‘But he’s there a lot. So that’s a starting point to bringing him in.’
‘How did you find him here?’ I ask.
‘One of my sources recommended I check the place out. I knew the lead was spot on when I saw Sharrick leaving the place.’
‘But you didn’t follow him, to see where he was staying?’ I ask.
‘No. He’s a seasoned operative. I couldn’t risk being seen,’ she says.
The house lights go down as the orchestra strikes up again.
‘You aren’t staying for the second act?’ I ask as she stands.
‘I never stay anywhere too long…’ she answers.
I don’t try to stop her. I sit back in my chair as Neva slips out of the booth. I stay until the last song before I leave, taking the envelope with me.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Sharrick
In a private office at the Methuselah Club, Sharrick opens his laptop and logs on. These offices are free and used by members on a first-come, first-served basis. It means that Sharrick, and others like him, can find refuge when away from their regular locations. In this building, all internet access is encrypted, so he can securely open his emails.
The House of Killers, Book 1 Page 15
