The NSC Boxset: Heart of Stone

by D H Sidebottom

  “Fuck!” I hissed when the timer showed minus four minutes.

  Think! Think, Grace.

  My eyes landed on the huge portrait my father had done of the family and I snapped my eyes to Kade. “Go pack a bag. Hurry.”

  His face wrinkled in puzzlement but I ignored him and lifted the painting off the wall, “Move Kade, now. We need to get out of here!”

  “Why?”

  God, this man was bloody hard work but I held him with a stern glare until he sighed and relented, giving me a disappointed shake of his head, “Fine.”

  He shuffled from the room and I wondered if a kick up the arse would move him any faster or maybe a bullet in the back of his heel.

  I closed my eyes and sucked in a deep lungful of oxygen to calm my nerves as I spun the combination lock, my heart leaping at each satisfactory click the dial made. It had been seventeen years since I had accessed it and I prayed to God that everything was right where my dad had left it for me.

  A relieved sob ripped up my throat when I spotted the two backpacks and the laptop bag, “Thank you, dad.” I blew a kiss to the ceiling as I hoisted both bags on my shoulder, took hold of the laptop and my own laptop, and making sure I had removed the USB, popped it in my bra along with my gun into the back of my jeans; I went in search of the man who would drive me crazy on our journey into extinction.

  * * *

  “Tell me again why we are suddenly upping sticks and hiding from your boss, the man who has nearly brought you up as his own?” Kade asked as he peered out of the car window and hunted for road signs or anything that would tell him where we were or where we were heading. He was angry and he had every right to be.

  “There’s things you don’t understand Kade, please, just trust me.”

  “But, how can dragging me away from the whole protection of the Security Service, and isolating your intelligence help safeguard me?”

  “My God, are you always this damn awkward?”

  “No,” he turned to look at me and I could see the struggle as well as the apprehension on his face. “No Beaumont, I’m not always this awkward. But when you are being hunted like a damn hare at a greyhound track and have bullets fired your way, not to mention a gun thrust an inch into your face. Then watch as someone puts a hole in the back of an old woman’s head and the woman you are supposed to trust, suddenly changes momentum and thrusts you into a car and won’t give you any bit of information as to what is happening, then maybe I have every right to be bloody awkward.”

  I sighed and glanced at him, “Okay. We’ll find somewhere to stay for the night and I’ll tell you as much as you need to know.”

  He smiled softly and nodded, “Thank you.” His tone held genuine gratitude and I smiled unsurely as my stomach flipped with what I would, for the first time, divulge to someone other than Liam what I had discovered six years ago. Would I be able to handle it and would the grief of the situation destroy what little spirit I had left, as I opened the can of worms I had padlocked shut years ago, once again?

  Chapter Thirteen

  Kade

  I WATCHED AS she flung the bags on the bed and started to pull things from one of the backpacks; a couple of guns with ammunition, knives, medical equipment and my favourite—rope, amongst other things, until she found a disc and inserted it into the laptop she had fired up ready.

  I frowned at the screen when a shit load of data scrolled up and then a log in screen appeared. Grace closed her eyes, blew out a steadying breath and blindly keyed in a password. My heart stopped when what I presumed was her father filled the screen.

  I watched her throat constrict as she opened her eyes slowly and sank her teeth into her lip as a shiver ravaged her body. She seemed to be struggling with herself before she moved her finger over the enter key and clicked the still image.

  Her father spluttered to life as he smiled softly at the camera, the skin beside his eyes crinkling lightly with the love openly relayed in his expression.

  “Hello, my darling.” He said with sadness as Grace reached out and touched the screen lightly, her fingers stroking across the image of the man she obviously loved dearly. “I presume he has succumbed and it has started if you are watching this.” He sighed and reached out to the camera, his fingers resting on the screen as though he was touching his daughter. Grace shifted her own hand until her fingers were covering her father’s exactly and I swallowed as a wave of grief flooded my heart.

  “Hey daddy,” she whispered back, the tightness in her tone showing every bit of her sorrow but her face held a faint pained smile.

  “First, before we get you out of there I need to tell you I love you Grace, as does your mother, above and beyond.”

  “Above and beyond” Grace echoed quietly as a stutter broke her voice but she shook her head as I watched her physically fight the tears back.

  “Right,” he said determinedly as he removed his hand and squared his shoulders. “Marcus will be safe, he has nothing to do with this, darling, so don’t you go worrying about him. Secondly, you need to go to Grant. He will know what to do.”

  “Ahh shit.” she moaned but continued to listen as her father nodded his head and fixed her with a stern look.

  “And Grace,” his brow creased with his anguish and he exhaled heavily. “Don’t hate him for this, darling. We all feast on the Devil’s temptations once in a while. He loves you, don’t ever forget that.”

  “Oh, daddy, if only you knew.” She sighed and looked to her lap as the video stopped and a message to tell her that the footage was auto-deleting worked its way across the screen.

  She sat silently, her thoughts lost elsewhere and I left her to sort through them but suddenly she shot up, picked up her gun and stood beside the door as she gave me a hand signal to go into the bathroom.

  “What, there’s no-one . . .” A knock sounded on the door and I rolled my eyes, blowing out a defeated breath as I went to hide like I’d been strictly told.

  “Yes?” Grace said through the door.

  “You ordered fresh towels, ma’am.” A male voice on the other side informed her.

  “Okay, thank you. We’re both naked at the moment; can you leave them there please?”

  “Uhh, sure, can I get you anything else?”

  “No, we’re good, thank you.”

  She sighed and rolled her head around her shoulders as she moved back to the bed and tilted her head to tell me it was safe to venture out.

  She gave it a few moments then unlocked the door and reached out for the towels, dragging them inside before she closed it and secured it once more.

  “Are we going to talk?” I asked her as she shook out a towel and placed it across the bottom of the door. I frowned at her but she didn’t give any reason for the action so I sat on the bed and tapped the space beside me. She stared at me for a moment but took the small wicker chair in the corner of the room.

  We both sat and gazed at each other for a while until I thought she’d changed her mind but she took a huge breath and looked out of the window beside her, her eyes lost in the outside world as her memories shifted her to a place she obviously didn’t want to be.

  “You know,” she started then paused as a deep frown covered her face. “I haven’t cried for seventeen years.”

  Wow, I didn’t really know what to make of that. Seventeen years was a long time.

  “Okay, why did you cry last time?” I felt she needed this, needed to let it out and take me on the journey with her, so I encouraged her, helped her along with the questions we both needed answering.

  She turned to me, a haunted expression marring her face. The grief that settled in her eyes burrowed deep inside me, and I knew it would be a long while before it would ever leave, however, she sighed and rolled her lips and then began.

  “My father owned, or rather, developed his own company. He was involved in numerous things; pharmaceuticals, banking, technology, stuff like that but his main area was software development.”

  She smiled
softly as if remembering and her eyes lit with a flame that had most definitely died many years ago. “God, he was a great man. He loved us all with every breath, my mother especially. She was his heroine. She lived through a torturous childhood, fought breast cancer and nearly died when she got hit by a truck one winter and to him, she was a blessed angel.”

  I smiled with her, to have parents that loved each other so extremely was a blessing, and mine were also the same.

  “Marcus came along when I was around five, I don’t really remember much but I remember the huge arguments. The house was suddenly filled with them, vicious ones that frightened me.”

  She shivered and I watched the single tear track her cheek, its solitude was so soul destroying I had to fight not to give her others to accompany it. “I would take Marcus and hide. We were young and didn’t understand what was happening to our, once incredibly happy, family. My dad started going missing for days on end; working, drinking, womanising.”

  I stood and walked over to her as the tears now flowed in huge waves, each stream dripping from her chin and onto her chest as she purified herself with the release. She frowned at me when I settled on the floor at her feet but I don’t think she saw me. She was lost to the past as a choked sob tore up her throat and broke from her with so much desolation; I was frightened she had fractured something within her.

  She shook her head firmly when I went to hold her. “No, please. Let me get this out.”

  I nodded and settled back down but took her hand and gave it a soft squeeze, “Go on.”

  “I didn’t know it at the time but he started working on something that would one day take him away from us ultimately.” I watched as she rolled her tongue around her teeth and mirrored the action with her neck, rotating her head to stop her muscles from aching. I gathered she wasn’t the kind of person to sit for long periods of time.

  “He came home one day when I was around thirteen, full of everything. He was jubilant. Happy, so happy.”

  She chuckled as these memories comforted her. “He picked us up and spun us round, God I can remember the day so well. After four years of turbulence and tension, he was finally happy and to witness that was awe inspiring.”

  Then her face clouded over and darkness filled her eyes. It was so raw I had to gasp in a breath with the intensity that flowed from her and she snatched her hand from mine as she stood up briskly, her whole body stiff with her wrath. “A year later, my fourteenth birthday, I came home from school ready for cake and singing and partying, and found them, my mother and my father, both of them . . . slaughtered in the entrance hall. They had both been shot through the head and they had been beaten unrecognisably. The blood was everywhere and I can remember wondering at the time how it had managed to spray the ceiling, but . . .” She squeezed her eyes shut and exhaled heavily as she opened them and pinned me with a stare, “What I can’t forget, what refuses to leave my fucking mind. What constantly tortures my days, over and over and over, is the sight of a five year old Marcus sat rocking my mother in his lap, his hands and face covered in her blood. His tears washing pools of the fucking stuff along the floor in long, pink rivulets towards the front door. His quiet humming still slaughters my dreams, Kade . . .”

  She collapsed and I dragged her over and pulled her onto my lap as I held her tight and just rocked her, just fucking rocked her as she screamed and sobbed for the next hour. She tore at me with her fingers. She punched me repeatedly. She vomited violently but worst of all, she just fucking sobbed; just sobbed and fucking sobbed until she passed out with exhaustion.

  Then I cried for her.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Grace

  BLOODY HELL, MY eyes were like frosty letterboxes. They simply wouldn’t open. They were sore, heavy and felt like they’d been sandblasted but the loud laughter echoing around the room saw me forcing them into an open position.

  Kade was sat on the twin bed opposite me and I shot upright when I noticed the duvet under him covered with money. “What the hell?” I scoffed when I realised he’d emptied the contents of the second backpack.

  He looked at me, his face full of humour and laughed again. His bright blue eyes were utterly stunning when he laughed and I swallowed harshly at the slight clench in my chest. I was just overtired, that was all.

  “I presume your dad left this to help with your . . . going on the run?”

  I frowned at him but nodded, unsure of what was so funny. “There’s twenty thousand pounds here.” He added as he smirked at me and I shrugged, wondering if he had gone crazy over a bit of cash.

  “Yes, he left it with the other things, knowing I wouldn’t have access to other funds without alerting . . . people to my whereabouts.”

  He nodded and stared at me then laughed again. By now, I was starting to get pretty riled and I glared at him as tears started to roll down his face with his amusement. “Bloody hell, Beaumont. When did your father tell you about this?”

  I shifted my legs and planted my feet on the ground, twisting my bare toes into the semi-thick carpet for a sensation to concentration on and waken myself further as I struggled to focus on what Kade was finding so funny. I searched my memories as I blinked at Kade and shrugged, “Um, probably around six months before he died.”

  He nodded and shook his head humorously, “And that made you what? Thirteen?”

  I nodded, sarcastically pleased with his maths proficiency, “Yes, well done.”

  “Eighteen years ago,” he stated as he quirked an eyebrow, unaware of my mocking as he just held me with awaited expectancy in his gaze.

  What the hell was he getting . . . ?

  “Oh bloody hell!” I groaned as I shot off the bed and went to take a note from him.

  He nodded slowly and grinned at me, “Now you get me.”

  I picked up more twenties and studied them before I flung them back on the bed, rubbing my forehead in frustration as I groaned deeply. “Shit!”

  “Each and every one is out of date, sweetheart. They haven’t made twenties like this for years. You won’t be able to spend it.”

  I flopped beside him as he picked up the bundle of rope and started to unwind it from its coil, and then proceeded to wrap it around his other hand in a sort of pattern unconsciously. “Shit!” I repeated with a sigh. “We need cash, Kade. I need to buy our way where we’re going.”

  He glanced at me with a puzzled expression but I sighed again and shifted from the bed, making my way into the tiny bathroom and using the toilet.

  “Do you have a credit card?” He shouted through the door I hadn’t bothered to shut. Shit like personal space was extinct when you went into hiding with someone, but it had never been an issue that had bothered me anyway.

  “Kade, we can’t use my card, they’ll be tracing it,” I said as I re-entered the room.

  His soft pink lips lifted at one side and the sight of his naughty side had my belly throbbing in hunger.

  Fuck! I couldn’t act on this. I needed to step back so I turned and started to shift through my bag for something to eat. Anything really, so long as it drew my attention away from the black haired display of pure sex that was dominantly attracting my constant attention.

  “Just give it me” he said as he pulled various devices and a laptop from his own bag.

  “In my bag” I said as I refused to turn and look at him until I’d got my arousal in check.

  He tutted and I realised I was actually currently hunting through my bag, “Ahh.”

  He chuckled as I grinned up at him sheepishly and flung him my card, “Thank you.”

  I sat beside him and watched as he fired up the numerous gadgets, my eyes widening when he inserted my card into a swipe machine and ran a program on the small tablet linked to it. “What exactly are you doing?”

  “Erasing the existing data and creating a new account.” He divulged as he tapped rapidly on the keys, “Which now belongs to a Francine Rosenthal, who has funds of sixty thousand pounds available.”

&n
bsp; I blinked at him then smiled widely, “I think I might like you after all.”

  He smirked as he took the card from the machine and held it out between his fingers for me. As I went to take it he snatched it back and tipped his head slightly, “Thank you, Kade. You are a wonderful person and I cannot live without you.” He prompted mischievously and I barked out a belt of laughter as I leant forward and attempted to grab the card back.

  “Ah, ah.” He laughed as he rolled over and flipped off the bed, holding the card high in the air. “Say it, Beaumont. Tell me how awesome you think I am.”

  I couldn’t hold the laughter in as I leapt onto the bed, raising my height dramatically but he jumped backwards and out of my reach again.

  “Just give me the card, Kade” I giggled when he wiggled his hips to mock me.

  I dived for him but my foot caught in the strap of the backpack on the bed. My face hit the floor with so much force, I was sure I had broken my nose. The bag soared through the air with me and landed heavily on my back, forcing the air from my lungs with a loud oomph.

  “Oh Christ, Beaumont” Kade snorted boisterously as he reached down to help me up between his cackles of laughter.

  I took hold of his hand, letting him pull me up slightly until I yanked him hard, flipped him under me and had him pinned beneath me in seconds. He grinned up at me as we both laughed, “I’m glad you find my misadventures hilarious.” I joked as I poked him in the ribs. He jolted underneath me and I grinned wickedly. “Oh, Mr Hamilton, I do believe you are a tad ticklish.”

  He shook his head rapidly and tried to buck me off him but he underestimated my strength as I tightened my thighs and held him down.

  I wiggled my fingers at him and laughed when his face paled slightly. “Oh, don’t be such a baby,” I mocked, repeating his words when I had complained about being ill. “You kick ass Kade Hamilton, I’m sure you can handle a little tickling.”