by Kate Johnson
‘Hands out,’ he said, and Cécile protested in French.
‘You have a thing about bondage?’ I asked, and Jack said nothing, grabbing my wrists instead and twisting them behind my back before wrapping the rope about them tightly, roughly. ‘Careful! I have scar tissue there,’ I grumbled, and he pulled the rope tighter. ‘Bastard.’
He poked the gun in my back and said, ‘Downstairs. Slowly.’
‘Or what? You’re going to shoot me with my own gun?’
‘Why not? You shot Irene with mine.’
I frowned as I half-tripped down the stone stairs to the main landing. This was beginning to sound familiar.
‘Had you been to see her that day?’ I asked. ‘Had people seen you together?’
‘You would know. You framed me for it.’
‘Do I look smart enough to frame anyone for anything?’ I snapped, and Jack hesitated.
‘I wouldn’t put it past you,’ he said.
‘What’s that supposed to mean? And can I get a sweater or something? I am bloody frozen.’
‘So I see,’ Jack said, looking at my chest as he reached past me to open the door.
‘Pervert.’
He nudged me with the gun and I went down the main stairs before he pushed me and I tripped and broke my neck and was dead, dead all over the floor. Melodramatic, me? Never.
In the kitchen, he pushed me down onto a chair and tied my ankles to the legs, wrapping another piece of rope around my waist to hold me there firmly. It was a far cry from the hospitality I’d received last night.
Cécile, arguing with Jack all the time in French, fussed around lighting candles – I wondered if she even had electricity – and pouring wine and getting bread and cheese out of the pantry. She offered me some ham, and I shook my head politely.
‘Bien sûr,’ she said, and whirled back to the table to get me some cheese.
‘I’m not hungry,’ I lied, because I was starving, but how could I eat with my hands tied behind my back and my arms pinned to the chair?
‘Jacques?’
He was leaning against the table, in black jeans and boots and a faded t-shirt. He looked menacing and brooding and quite like he’d practised the pose in front of a mirror.
‘No,’ he snapped. ‘Thanks.’
Polite, to her at least.
‘I can’t believe I’m tied to a bloody chair,’ I rattled it. ‘Couldn’t you at least let me get dressed?’
‘No. Why did you kill Irene Shepherd?’
‘I didn’t. I don’t even know who she is.’
‘You’re lying.’ He hefted my SIG.
‘Don’t you call me a liar.’
Cécile babbled something in French that I think was along the same lines. I’m not sure why I was being so belligerent. I think it’s just part of my nature. Besides, Jack revealing those scars reminded me of the last time someone had threatened me with death. And last Christmas, when someone else had had a go.
Then there were the high-school kids who tried to kill me in New York. The crazy Czech who thought I was dead right up until the minute I shot him. The duo of former colleagues who tried to bring me down by any methods possible.
Do I have ‘kill me’ taped to my back? Is it like some sort of beacon that only crazy people can see?
‘You’ve killed before.’
I knew this’d come up.
‘Yes, but both of them were crazy people who’d spent quite a lot of time trying to kill me. It was self-defence.’
‘Kill or be killed?’
‘Exactly.’
‘So what did Irene do to make you want to kill her?’
‘Nothing! I –’
‘So you just killed her for the hell of it?’
‘No! I didn’t kill anybody!’
‘You just said you did.’
I could see now why he’d tied me down. I could have killed him, then.
‘Listen,’ I said. ‘One of them had pillaged his way across Europe murdering academics because he was looking for an ancient artefact. He blew up the house I was staying in and nearly killed both of the people who lived there. And the other one sabotaged a plane full of people so that it crashed into a primary school. Seventy-eight children died. And all the passengers – a hundred-and forty-three people in total. Not including my boss and another colleague who are both dead because of him. I didn’t murder him. I shot him because he was trying to shoot me.’
‘Ah. I see,’ Jack said. ‘You both reached for the gun, right?’
I narrowed my eyes. ‘I reached for my gun as he was aiming his. You can check my record, since you seem to know so much about me.’ I cocked my head. ‘How do you know so much about me?’
‘None of your business.’
I wondered if he was related to Docherty.
‘Then if you do know so much, you’ll know I didn’t bloody kill him!’
‘Who?’
‘Theodore Chesshyre.’ I looked up at Jack. ‘You do know about Theodore Chesshyre?’
‘I know you shot him then left the country.’
‘Right. So if I was in the business of framing people, don’t you think it might be slightly likely that maybe I might have thought about framing someone for this one?’
Jack stared at me. Cécile, when she’d caught up, laughed and said something to Jack in French. He scowled at her and said, ‘Non.’
‘What did she say?’ I asked.
‘I say ’e should untie you. Jacques, you are being ze pig.’
Jack muttered something uncomplimentary under his breath.
‘I’m going out,’ he said, standing up and making no effort to untie me. He picked up a packet of Cécile’s cigarettes from the table and stalked out of the kitchen into the evening darkness.
‘Il est un cochon,’ I muttered.
‘Oui.’ Cécile came over and started pulling at the knots that tied me to the chair. ‘But he is in trouble.’
‘What, you mean the murder thing? Someone killed this Irene woman and made it look like Jack did it, right?’
‘Yes. There is a person who steal his pistolet,’ she made a gun gesture at me, just in case I’d missed that one, ‘and they find his, uh …’ she waggled her fingers at me.
‘Fingerprints?’
‘Oui. Everywhere. He has visited her.’
‘Who was she?’
Cécile frowned. ‘Un juge.’ When I looked confused, she explained, ‘She decide who go to the prison, oui?’
‘Oh, a judge. And why did he visit her?’
‘I do not know. He says she was alive when he visits. But the videos, they do not show this.’
‘Videos?’
‘The cameras, in the house.’
I presumed this meant the judge had CCTV, and I also presumed it had been wiped. ‘Yeah, but did he do it? Shoot her, I mean.’
Cécile sent me a piercing look. ‘If he has killed her, then you have killed this Theodore.’
‘Thanks for clearing that up.’
My bonds released, I stood up and stretched. ‘So how long has he been on the run?’
‘Alors. What day is it?’
I counted up inside my head and realised in shock that it was five days since I’d found Sir Theodore. ‘Tuesday. Uh, mardi.’
‘Zen it is eight days. The Tuesday dernier, oui?’
I nodded. ‘Right. Okay. I really need to go and get some proper clothes on and maybe take a shower? Uh, une douche?’ I gave her a hopeful look, and she nodded and smiled.
‘Zere is a bathroom –’ere, I show you.’
She led me back upstairs and opened a door with a latch on it.
‘Tonight you must sleep in anozzer room,’ she said, and gave me a sly look, ‘unless want to share wiz Jacques?’
I got the impression she’d have been perfectly happy with this arrangement.
‘No,’ I said, ‘but why does he get that room?’
She shrugged. ‘It always is his room.’
‘He stays here often?’
Chapter Four
That damn car was still outside.
Luke drummed his fingers on the table and wondered how long it would take to construct a hologram to project normality onto the outside of the building. He’d searched and searched for bugs every time he returned to the flat, but they always sneaked in and replaced the ones he’d disabled.
Time for a new strategy. Looping footage was old-hat, but he’d been taken in by it before. The trick was to be smart about it. Anything with a clock in it was out, and he’d have to make sure Tammy wasn’t in the room. Watching a cat walk the same path every hour was going to raise a few suspicions.
He checked the angle of one of the cameras in the bedroom. It was aimed right at his bed.
‘Perverts,’ he said, and resisted the urge to wave at the camera as he got into bed. A few hours footage of him sleeping ought to be enough to loop, and it’d allow him to get on with helping Sophie while they weren’t looking.
He recorded himself watching TV with a beer, careful to accidentally knock the camera out of position so the screen couldn’t be seen. He’d had the radio on permanently to annoy the audio bugs, and he kept it that way even while the TV was on. Yes, they could isolate one sound from another, but he’d bet they’d give up when all they got was Radio 1 and a football match.
He stood for a while, staring at the alarm pad by the door. Doubtless by now they knew his codes. He could see no signs that they’d been breaking in.
‘Oh, sod it,’ he said, and disabled the system.
Now. Every time they saw him leave the house, they broke in. So what if they never saw him leave?
His flat was on the first floor, in the loft of an old barn. Very little of his living quarters was visible from the road. This was a purposeful arrangement.
So … if they never saw him leave, they’d have no idea if he was in the flat or not.
There was only one way in or out, and as it was an outside staircase directly from the yard it was also impossible to hide. How else could he get out?
Luke leaned against the kitchen counter for a while, thinking. His flat was above a roofer’s yard, with men and vans coming and going all day. If he could get down there, he could shove on some old clothes and a hat and jump in one of the vans. No one would see him leave at all.
His gaze went to the cupboard by his front door. It held winter coats and sporting equipment, and this time of year he didn’t go in there much. But if he’d worked it out right, the cupboard was above the far corner of the lumber store below.
Luke fetched a saw and some ropes, and got to work.
Next morning I was feeling a lot better, more prepared and a hell of a lot cleaner. I had to be nice to Jack, and that was my main priority, because I needed three things from him. One, the return of my guns. Two, everything he knew about Irene Shepherd, how she’d died and who might have killed her. Three, his help in finding that person.
Because I was increasingly beginning to suspect it was the same person who’d killed Sir Theodore. The MO was so similar.
But when I went down to the kitchen, I found it empty. There were no other exits than the stone stairs and the back door, so I went outside. The yard contained the Vectra, and nothing more.
Upstairs on the ground floor, as I guess it would be with the house being built into a hill, there were several rooms that opened off the hallway. I’d guessed a lot of the house must be out of use, and from the look of it I was right. This place was damn huge. All the rooms were full of beautiful but rather neglected furniture, and they were all freezing cold. They were also empty of either Cécile or Jack.
I made my way up to the first floor and started knocking on doors. Several bedrooms, including one that had crumpled bedclothes and bits of women’s clothing strewn around that I guessed were Cécile’s. Then the pretty (pretty cold) room I’d slept in, huddled in my sleeping bag, blankets and jumpers. Bathrooms. Cupboards full of spiders, which I hastily closed up again. I knocked on the door to Jack’s room and when there was no answer, crept up the stairs.
Empty, but at least there were signs of it having been slept in. Last night, after Jack left, Cécile quizzed me about Luke until even I got bored of telling her how wonderful he was, and went to bed. The only useful information I’d got out of her was that Jack was Maria’s little brother. I’d wondered if that was how he’d found me here, if Maria had known and let it slip, but in reality it seemed far more likely that Cécile had been the one to be indiscreet. This didn’t fill me with an overabundance of confidence.
I went back down to the kitchen and sat down at the table to take the back off my phone. I removed the battery and sim card, but underneath them the circuitboard looked perfectly ordinary to me. That is, baffling. I’d no idea if there was a tracer in there or not.
But how else had Jack found me here? He couldn’t have followed me. Had he just called his aunt for a chat and she’d let it slip I was here? The coincidence was a bit too unreasonable.
I was just going in search of some coffee when I heard voices outside. Cécile and a man with a purple nose came into the room, jabbering so fast I couldn’t even make out the odd word, and eventually seemed to notice me.
‘Jean-Paul,’ she tugged him towards me, ‘voici Aleece, elle est la petite amie de Jacques.’
Even my schoolgirl French could translate that.
‘Alice,’ Cécile said to me, ‘this ees Jean-Paul, ’e works in the vineyard for me. ’E arrives for le petit dejeuner – breakfast. You weel eat wiz us?’
I nodded gratefully and stuck out my hand to Jean-Paul, who wiped his palm on his trousers and crushed my metacarpals. Wincing, I turned away to help Cécile, and said under my breath, ‘I’m his girlfriend now?’
She shrugged. ‘Jean-Paul weel say nothing. ’E doesn’t speak no Eenglish and ’e does not speak much anyway.’
This I found to be blatantly false, as he grunted in French to Cécile all the way through the meal and totally ignored me. Not that I minded. My head was full of other things. First, call Maria to check Jack out. Then either find Jack or call Luke, whichever presented itself as easier.
As Jean-Paul lumbered away back to his grapes and I inhaled another pint of coffee, I asked Cécile, ‘Where is Jack this morning?’
‘Eh?’ She looked up from her croissant. ‘Oh. I sink ’e goes to the village for …’ She waved her hand, apparently having mislaid her translation skills after talking to Jean-Paul. ‘To use ze telephone.’
‘What’s wrong with yours?’
‘I don’t ’ave one.’
Great.
I went back up to my room and looked at my phone for a bit. I was nearly out of pre-paid vouchers for it and would need to buy more, although to be honest it was bloody confusing trying to top up with the instructions all in French.
Right. I’d call Docherty. He’d been in contact with Maria.
He answered on the first ring. ‘Did you find it all right?’
‘I’ve been here since Monday night.’
‘How lost did you get?’
Totally. ‘I was fine,’ I said. ‘Traffic was bad all the way.’
Docherty said nothing.
‘I got the passport,’ I said, holding the envelope Cécile had given me the day before. The picture in it was horrific. ‘And the driving licence – thanks.’
‘You’re welcome,’ he said silkily.
‘But, uh. What did you send with them?’
Docherty gave a low chuckle, which in itself is rare for him. I stared at the box that had been inside the envelope, which appeared to contain some kind of miniature condoms.
‘Fake fingertips,’ he said. ‘Should you need them. They scan that kind of thing in America, should you need to go there.’
‘Oh,’ I said, feeling rather foolish.
‘There are contact lenses, too,’ he said.
‘I already have contact lenses.’
‘Ah, but these are pa
tterned. They should fool an iris scan.’
Sometimes, the knowledge contained in the people I considered to be my friends really scared me. ‘Why would I need to go to America?’
‘I have no idea,’ Docherty said, ‘your thought processes baffle me.’
‘I need to speak to Maria,’ I said. ‘Do you know where she is?’
‘Probably at work and being monitored for her connection to you.’
Dammit. ‘Do you know anything about her brother?’ Then, remembering Maria had an endless supply of relatives, clarified, ‘Younger brother, Jack.’
I heard computer keys clacking. ‘Lives in America. He’s a bail enforcement agent.’
‘A bounty hunter?’
‘If you like. Got into trouble a few times in his youth for computer hacking. Sealed file.’ Keys clicked a bit more. ‘Ah. He was looking at government files. Conspiracy theorist, looks like. Why’re you interested?’
‘No reason. Cécile said something, that’s all.’
‘I shall tell Luke you’ve been enquiring after other men,’ Docherty said smoothly.
‘You will tell Luke nothing,’ I said, more sharply than I’d intended. I could imagine his reaction to being told I’d been threatened not once but twice by Jack, who had also had his hands inside my pyjamas.
Docherty just gave a low laugh.
‘Thanks for the info,’ I said, and hung up, massaging my temples.
‘And who is Luke?’ came a voice from the doorway, and I nearly had a heart attack.
‘Jesus, Jack, you scared me. You shouldn’t be eavesdropping.’
‘Maybe it’s my business to eavesdrop. Who’s Luke?’
‘My MI6 boyfriend. Which you knew, so stop pretending you don’t.’
He picked up the wallet that was by my bed and opened it to Luke’s picture. ‘He the guy in here?’
I nodded.
Jack studied the picture for a moment, his face inscrutable.
‘You know him?’ I asked.
He shrugged. ‘Maria’s mentioned him. I think she has a thing for him.’
‘I really don’t think he’s her type,’ I said, smiling.
It had come as a bit of a shock to me to discover Maria was gay. But not, she said, as much of a shock as it came to her. Jack raised his eyebrows. ‘Jealous?’
