Jennifer knew what she would be thinking: had Jennifer left an incriminating message on it?
Jennifer hadn’t, but she didn’t need to tell Catherine that.
“I need to talk to you,” she said.
Catherine gave the aide a look that said get me out of here. She stepped backwards, then realised they were at the end of a corridor. Maggie had prepared well.
She sniffed. “What about?”
Jennifer stepped forward. “Samir. My son.”
“I’m not sure that’s appropriate. Anyway, I thought you were still in prison.”
“You know where I was. I got out. Passed. Surely you knew that too?”
“I need to get to a meeting. Please let me pass.”
“I’m not stopping you. But please, Catherine. I really need to talk to you. You’re the only person who can help me.”
“Prime Minister!”
Jennifer turned to see a young woman heading their way. A lobby correspondent from The Times. The journalist spotted Jennifer and stopped in her tracks. She smiled.
“Ms Sinclair.”
“That’s me.”
The journalist swallowed. “Does this mean you’re coming back to Parliament?” She looked between Jennifer and Catherine. “In the Lords, maybe?”
Catherine laughed. “Don’t be preposterous. Jennifer has come for a visit, haven’t you Jennifer?”
“Um, yes.”
Catherine took another step towards Jennifer. She was wearing the same perfume Jennifer had detected in Yonda Hughes’s office, back at the centre. Elegant, floral. Expensive.
“Come to Downing Street,” she said, her eyes stony and her voice low. “Four o’clock. I’ll give you five minutes.”
“Five minutes.”
“You’re lucky to get anything. And keep it low key, will you? The police on the gates will be expecting you. The press won’t. They won’t be there if they don’t expect anything.”
Jennifer looked back at the journalist, who was pulling a phone out of her bag.
“Four o’clock,” she said. “See you then.”
Chapter Sixteen
Downing Street was quiet. There was no press gathered and only a few officials passing along the road as Jennifer walked towards the famous black door.
Her job as prisons minister hadn’t been Cabinet level so she hadn’t been a frequent visitor, back when Michael Stuart lived behind that front door. But there had been meetings here; with advisors, with colleagues, and sometimes with Michael. They’d never been close; John had always been the filter between them, passing information and instructions back and forth. When she’d resigned to rebel against the ban on Muslim immigration, Michael had broken all contact with her. And it was only after the vote had been won – or lost, depending on your perspective – that she’d learned that John had been filtering more than she thought. Including his own opinions.
She approached the door, raising her hand to knock. It opened before she reached it, her presence being recorded by the cameras high above her. Once inside she stood in the lobby, waiting. Who would Catherine send to greet her?
After a few moments the aide from earlier appeared. He nodded at her and turned on his heel. He looked irritated.
Jennifer followed, pushing down her unease at being in a Tory Downing Street. It all looked the same; tasteful wallpaper, thick, hard-wearing carpets, antique furniture. Some of the pictures were different from Michael’s choices, less modern. Jennifer leaned in to one she recognised, a Vermeer. She wondered how much the art collection in government buildings, particularly this one, was worth. Did it impress people?
They came to a door and the aide knocked.
“Come in.” Catherine’s voice.
The room was less grand than Jennifer had been expecting. The pictures on the walls weren’t old masters, but simple sketches of rural scenes. They looked almost like they’d been done by a child.
The desk was large, placed in front of a tall window, a modern swivel chair behind it and two smaller in front. Catherine sat typing on a laptop.
Jennifer took one of the chairs. Catherine continued to type. Jennifer watched her, smiling. She had all day; she wasn’t going to be ruffled by this display of superiority.
After a few moments Catherine closed the laptop and looked at Jennifer. She gave her a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. There were dark circles beneath them and in the poor light she looked older.
She looked past Jennifer at the aide. “Turn on the light please, Sam.”
An ornate chandelier above them lit up. Now it felt cosy in here instead of dull.
“Do you want me to stay?” the aide asked.
“No. I’ll call you when I’m done. Five minutes, tops.”
Jennifer heard the door behind her close.
Catherine leaned back in her chair, looking not at Jennifer but at the paperwork on her desk. She leaned forwards and gathered it into a neat pile, tucking it out of sight under the laptop. Jennifer watched all this, listening to the hush of the room. A mahogany clock ticked on the wall to one side. Voices could be heard through the window. Jennifer tried to remember her route here; were they at the front of the building, or the back? The back, surely. For security reasons.
Catherine took a deep breath and stood up. She smoothed her hands on her skirt – she’d put on weight – and rounded the desk, perching in front of Jennifer. Jennifer looked up at her.
“I don’t know what you think I can do,” she said.
Jennifer stood up and stepped behind her chair, gripping its back with her hands.
“It’s just you and me here,” she said. “Can we cut the dance?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Samir is still in detention somewhere. He may even have been deported for all I know.”
“No. You’d have had a letter. Or your husband would, while you were away.” Catherine narrowed her eyes. “Just how did you get out, anyway?”
“I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you that.”
“Try me.”
“I had a second Celebration. I passed.”
“How? You were planning on lying your way out, if I remember right. You wouldn’t have got away with it.”
“I didn’t lie. I told the truth. I told them what they wanted to hear.”
“I don’t imagine it’s the same thing.”
Jennifer shrugged. “Must have been. I’m here, aren’t I?”
Catherine would know everything about her release. She’d have seen a transcript of her Celebration. She’d know that it had been led by Meena Ashgar, not her own counsellor. She wondered what had happened to him. She wondered if Meena had been telling her the truth, when they’d spoken before her release.
“Anyway,” Jennifer said. “I need your help on two counts. Firstly Samir. He did nothing wrong. I met—”
She stopped herself. She wasn’t about to tell Catherine that Meena had been Samir’s girlfriend. That she was the reason he’d been arrested.
Or should she? Who should she trust, Meena or Catherine?
She looked down. Her grip on the chair was tight and her knuckles pale. She took a deep breath.
“Samir needs to be released. He at least needs to be granted the right to appeal.”
“That’s not part of the process with terrorist crimes, and you know it.”
“Samir isn’t a terrorist. And you know that. Otherwise you wouldn’t have warned me that he was under suspicion. You wouldn’t have given me the chance to hide him.”
“You didn’t do a very good job of that, did you? He fled your flat as soon as he got the chance.”
Jennifer’s chest tightened. Stay calm, she told herself.
“Can we not go over old ground, please? I just want your assurance that he’ll get an appeal hearing. A fair, open one.”
“I can’t do that.”
Jennifer ignored her; of course she could.
“And I want to know where Rita Gurumurthy is.”
“Who?”
“I met her in the centre. They beat her and took her away somewhere. She disappeared. I want to know she’s safe.”
Catherine shook her head. “Any other ugly ducklings you’ve taken under your wing? That you want me to help out?”
“What’s happened to you, Catherine?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“You used to be one of the good ones. You weren’t like Trask. But now here you are, sitting at his old desk and carrying on with all his policies. Worse.”
Catherine shrugged. “It’s the reality of government. Surely you know all about that. You did when you used Hayley Price’s death to advance your own career.”
Hayley Price had been a prisoner at Bronzefield when Jennifer was prisons minister. She’d killed herself in custody, almost causing Jennifer to lose her job. Jennifer had rescued the situation with a heartfelt speech in the Commons.
“I learned from Hayley’s death. I made changes to the way prisons were run. Made sure it didn’t happen again.”
“Did you no harm, though.”
Catherine looked at her watch. She walked back round the desk, sitting in her chair and opening the laptop again.
“Your five minutes are up, I’m afraid. I wish you and your family all the best, but I’m sure you understand how inappropriate it would be for me to—”
“Do you have any decency left?”
A frown. “I have no idea what you’re—”
“We’re friends, Catherine. Were, maybe. I could damage you, but I won’t. Because I respect you and I don’t want to ruin you. Afford me the same respect at least.”
“You have no idea.”
“I do.”
Catherine neared Jennifer, her eyes hard. “You’re nothing now. No power, nothing. You can’t touch me.”
Jennifer could feel her chest rising and falling. Did she dare mention the note? Could she bluff?
“Now, if you don’t mind,” Catherine said. A door opened and a woman walked in, someone Jennifer hadn’t seen before. She watched Catherine, waiting for instructions.
Jennifer swallowed. She couldn’t do it. “I’ll call you. You’ll change your mind.”
Catherine gave her a condescending smile. “Good to see you again. Please, give my regards to your husband.”
Jennifer let herself be guided out, not sure if she was more angry at Catherine or herself.
Chapter Seventeen
Steve started sitting in on Mark’s one-to-ones. He didn’t want the other inmates to know Mark was spying on them for him. He didn’t want him telling his counsellor.
It clearly rattled Mark’s counsellor, Dr Higgs. He would lick his lips and scratch his protruding chin while he talked Mark through the six steps. As if Mark needed reminding. He’d been one of the very first doctors recruited to a centre, and knew this better than anyone.
It didn’t help him get through the program though. No one was telling him precisely what it was he was here for, which made even Step One a challenge. Maybe they wanted him to incriminate someone else. Jennifer, most likely. He didn’t want to do that.
He wondered if her Celebration had gone ahead without him. Was she back in prison now?
Dr Higgs was late today. Mark sat outside his office, waiting. He had a story ready for Steve, something one of the men on his group had said. Something that would send Steve down a blind alley but ultimately come to nothing. He wondered if he was in there already, with the counsellor.
Instead of in the basement like Burcot Park, the offices here were on the first floor, at the back. They were smaller than his office had been, but had proper windows, looking out over the fenced yard behind the centre where inmates were allowed to exercise for forty minutes each morning. Sometimes he heard activity down there, unfamiliar voices. He longed to walk to the window and check – just to have the freedom to get up and investigate something that intrigued him. But his counsellor would pin him to his chair with his eyes and continue with the one-to-one.
He heard a door close and looked up. He sighed. It was Steve. Coming out of his own office, at the far end of the corridor. He turned back to the door and spoke to someone inside. Mark watched, glad of the distraction.
Steve turned towards him. He smiled, a wide grin that stank of insincerity. He waved.
Mark shrugged and didn’t wave back.
Steve beckoned.
Mark looked at his counsellor’s door again; maybe it was him inside Steve’s office. He thought of the rare occasions that he’d escorted patients to Yonda’s office, or rather the occasions when he’d got the orderlies to do it for him.
It normally meant Celebration. And if he was being put forward, then he was being set up to fail.
He stood and rubbed his hands on the legs of his jeans. It was cold here at the back of the building, where the sun never seemed to penetrate.
He started walking. Steve beckoned again, more emphatically. Mark picked up his pace, just a little.
When he reached the door, Steve put an arm on his shoulder and gave him the sort of smile you’d reserve for an old friend. Mark shuddered.
“I’ve got someone to see you,” he said.
Mark looked from Steve to the door, which was closed now. Prisoners didn’t get visitors.
“Who?”
The smiled widened. “You’ll see.”
Mark waited for Steve to open the door. He didn’t.
“Now,” Steve said. He pinched his nose then inspected his finger. He frowned and flicked something to the floor. “This may come as a surprise to you. I need you to be on best behaviour. You’re representing Linchbourne now.”
Linchbourne. It had originally been set up as a prison, when Jennifer was prisons minister. It would have had a different name then.
“Who to?” he asked.
“Someone you know.”
For a brief moment he thought it might be Jennifer, somehow reinstated to her old role. But even if she was back in politics, her party were in Opposition.
Catherine Moore, Home Secretary? They’d met in Burcot Park, when she’d come to visit Jennifer. Would she want to speak to him, find out about the circumstances of Jennifer’s release, if she’d been released?
The door opened and a waft of heavy perfume leaked out.
Of course. He flexed his fingers and pulled on a smile. He passed Steve, who was holding the door for him.
“Yonda.”
She stood up. She was wearing a fuchsia dress with a matching jacket and purple heels. Next to her, on a low table, was a red handbag. Small, shiny. Expensive-looking.
“Mark. Good to see you.”
“Why are you here?”
She smiled and let her hand, which she’d been holding out in anticipation, drop.
“I need your help, Mark. With Jennifer Sinclair.”
Chapter Eighteen
“She said what?”
It was late. Jennifer’s train hadn’t got in till after ten. By the time she was home, Yusuf was preparing for bed and Hassan was fast asleep. She’d taken Yusuf to their room and recounted her conversation with Catherine.
“She told me I was nothing. She was so cold.”
“I’m sorry.” He stroked her cheek.
“I was wrong. You were right. As always.”
He cupped her face in his hand. She looked back into his eyes, thinking about how much she’d missed him in the centre.
“If you had the note…” he said.
“That’s not the point. I’m not doing it.”
“But she broke the Official Secrets Act.”
“To help us.”
He looked away, his hand falling to the duvet. “She’s not that person anymore.”
“She was my friend. We went through a lot together. The Milan bomb. Our plan to discredit Trask.”
“Which she reneged on.”
“Things changed. She had to do what she did.”
Yusuf scraped his fingers through his beard. “I can’t believe you’re
still saying that after everything she’s done.”
“Well, I’ve been proved wrong. That should make you happy.”
He moved his hand down to her shoulder, gripping it. “None of this makes me happy, love.”
She sank back. “Me neither. But maybe she’ll be scared I’ll expose her after all.” A pause. “Maybe she’ll help us.”
“Did she say she would?”
“No.”
“Right. Typical.”
Jennifer felt like a balloon about to deflate. She thought of the note Catherine had sent her, before Samir had disappeared. Before she’d been arrested. She couldn’t remember destroying it, despite Catherine’s instructions to do so. But she couldn’t find it.
“So what now?” asked Yusuf.
“I don’t know. We wait, I guess. Maybe she’ll at least tell me what’s happened to Rita.”
“Rita?”
“You know. From the centre. The one they beat up, and put in solitary confinement.”
“Why would Catherine Moore tell you where she is?”
“I asked her to.”
“What?”
“I asked her to. After I said I needed her to get Samir an appeal.”
Yusuf took his hand off her shoulder and put it on his own. He started rubbing the flesh. He was wearing a vest that Jennifer remembered from before. It was even more threadbare than she remembered.
“We need to focus on Samir,” he said, his voice tight.
“I know.” She put a hand on his knee. His thigh was warm through his pyjama bottoms. She felt the muscle tense.
“I want to help my friend too, though. I want to help all of them.”
Yusuf looked up at the ceiling. His eyes were red. “Please, love. I just want our boy back.”
“This isn’t like you. Think of all those constituents you’ve helped over the years. People who’ve managed to go into hiding or leave the country, thanks to you.”
“Maybe I got my priorities wrong.”
Jennifer stared at him. If Yusuf was this ground down that he only cared about his own family, then what help was there for anyone? People were becoming more insular. Her neighbours didn’t want to know her. The local party had made it clear they didn’t want her near them. People looked at her in the street like she was a threat. Even those who couldn’t possibly know who she’d been.
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