The Society

by Karen Guyler

  He ranged through the TV channels. Terry apparently hadn’t worried about fitting in, his satellite choices were English only. BBC World News stopped Charles’ channel hopping. The flash from his past smiling at the camera as though he was the greatest statesman on the planet, Jed Carson. Beaming harder still as he climbed the steps to the open door on Airforce One, before giving the expected wave and disappearing inside.

  The shot panned back to the studio. “President Jed Carson leaving the USA yesterday on his way to Marrakech in Morocco, where the G20 leaders are meeting for a summit into technological advances to further progress for the human race.”

  Not just Africa or Morocco, but Marrakech. Charles had won the coin toss.

  “The programme commences with a dinner this evening,” the reporter went on, “hosted by Per Larsson, the Chairman of the Nobel Prize Committee. Much of the work being showcased here will be contenders for Nobel prizes next year.”

  Per was going to be there, Charles had won blackjack. The luck that had got Terry this riad was rubbing off on him. Lucky Riad Eight indeed.

  The screen split into two halves, on the left the rich warmth of an African sun, on the right the false cheeriness of LED lights in the London studio. “What’s on the agenda for the summit?” The couch-seated presenter asked.

  “This summit is an addition to the normal programme of G20 events and could be badged G40 because of the number of nations attending. Morocco was selected as host, given its recent advances in technology driving the extension of a reliable and safe water supply to its people.”

  “It would seem a perfect time, given the unrest happening in areas where the water is making people sick.” The studio presenter commented.

  “The water isn’t making people sick, you stupid woman.” Charles snapped the TV off.

  “Dad?”

  “Hey, sleepyhead. How are you feeling?”

  Lily rubbed at her eyes. “Hungry.”

  “Me too. How about we go out for breakfast?”

  “What about . . .” Her gaze swivelled to the balcony beyond the fluttering long curtains, to the courtyard below.

  “Don’t worry about that. The police will deal with it and we don’t need to be here while they do.”

  “You spoke to them?”

  “I know this isn’t the best start to our holiday, but. . .” he lost the rest of his words. There was nothing to say to make things better for Terry. “There’s a nice shower in the main bathroom, go freshen up and we’ll go out.”

  “Can I call Mum?”

  “I don’t know how to call her, her phone broke.”

  “Well, she’s at work, you said so.”

  “Of course, silly of me to forget.”

  How could he have her knowing where they were, about his brother? And he couldn’t have her challenging him about what happened at the airport, about leaving her behind, in Lily’s earshot.

  And Lily, what about her? Eva would want her back. He didn’t know if he could give her up; she was all he had left. Could he reunite with Eva? There was only that one meeting with Nancy that she’d seen. He could sweet-talk her again, but did he want to?

  “There’s a phone here, Dad.” Lily called him into the room Terry had used as an office.

  Charles dialled the 044 for the UK and keyed the zero at the start of the London phone number that international calls didn’t require. After the third time of it failing he suggested trying later. “Phones don’t maybe work as well here.”

  “What about my mobile? You still have it, don’t you?”

  “It’s not working, I don’t think you have international calls on it.”

  “Can’t we get them?”

  “When the phones are working, we can try. Now get washed up and let’s go eat. Mum will understand.”

  While Lily did as he asked, Charles woke up Terry’s PC.

  In his personal email account, he selected one of the oldest unsent drafts with the subject line ‘Your car insurance renewal’. Buried in the bumpf at the bottom amongst the insurance company’s details, he found the phone number. For what it was worth on this call, he blocked Terry’s number and dialled.

  He hadn’t even finished wondering whether the number would still be valid when it was answered.

  “CJ, it’s Charles Buchanan.”

  “No more favours, Charles. I know you were listening when I told you that.”

  “Last one, unless a locked door on a different continent is too much for you. It’s a tricky job, it has the potential to draw some real heat and a lot of fireworks afterwards, so it needs to be very untraceable. And obviously it’s not an unpaid favour, you can bill me.”

  “Did you know your wife came here, she wanted to contact The Society.”

  What was Eva playing at? If she found out—there’d be no reconciliation, even if he decided he wanted it. “Did she, contact them?”

  “I did, she’s finding out who killed Hunter Malone for them.”

  “She paid you?”

  “Not yet, she now owes me a favour.”

  Eva, what have you done? You don’t make open-ended promises with people like CJ. And having anything to do with The Society, she was playing with the devil.

  “I’ll bill you double. That work for you?” CJ was asking.

  “Yes.”

  “Glad we understand each other, now where’s the door?”

  50

  ‘I know more secrets than a Catholic priest’, the spook humour on the mug into which Eva poured her first coffee of the day must have been something else, it almost made her smile. She stared at the froth’s bubbles popping, trying to corral her thoughts into something more than panic. Knowing they’d flown to Marrakech hadn’t helped. If they were still there, Lily was one in a million people. And if Charles had moved them on, one in seven billion.

  “You’re looking better this morning, how are you doing?” Nora pulled Eva out of her reverie.

  Eva shrugged, slopping her now lukewarm coffee over her hand, over the laminate flooring she’d been staring at. She put the mug down and pulled off a piece of blue roll to mop up the puddle.

  “Another?” Nora asked.

  “I’m good.”

  “And I’m the boss.” she said.

  “Aren’t you?” Eva’s lips aimed for a smile but what she couldn’t quite manage, Nora made up for, hooting even louder than the noise of the coffee machine grinding the beans.

  “I’ll tell himself you said that.” She wiped at her eyes.

  “He’s aware, trust me.”

  Nora frothed the milk, the hissing steaming filling the silence with all the things Eva couldn’t bring herself to share because then she’d have to think about them. Nora jiggled the milk jug back and forth over the dark liquid in their mugs. “I can never make it pretty but as far as coffees go, best in the capital I’d say. Hmmm, what do you have here then?” she turned the mug anti-clockwise, back again. “Looks like the monster from the deep.” She rinsed the jug, wiped the machine down. “Lily will be fine, she’s with her dad, not a kidnapper or worse.” Nora studied her. “Ah, that’s why you’re worried. He doesn’t know, does he?”

  “Know?” Eva’s pretence melted away beneath Nora’s look. “How did you?”

  “She looks like him, doesn’t she, Vincent? In the video of her you showed me.”

  Eva could only nod, ridiculously close to tears. It was the first time she’d ever acknowledged to anyone else that Lily wasn’t Charles’ daughter. “I’m surprised you remember him.”

  “I remember everyone, especially the good ones.”

  “He was, wasn’t he?”

  Nora checked the biscuit tin. “Someone remembered, vegan cookies. Come.” Nora handed her a coffee and took her and the biscuits into the room Eva was using as an office. “Let’s take a minute. You want to talk about it?”

  Eva read and reread the inscription on the mug. Her secret was out. What would it hurt to give all of it away? “It was just after Charles dumped me. Vin
cent was exactly what I needed then, fun, a way to find me again.”

  “And then he got sent back to Belgium. You never told him?”

  How to summarise all the soul searching, the sleepless nights, trying to reconcile not telling Vincent, the wondering if Eva could be enough for her unborn baby. It had been a lot for a twenty-one-year-old to wrestle with. And while she struggled for the right thing to do, Lily arrived. A squalling whirlwind that made her whole, completed her life, filled her heart.

  “I didn’t know what to do, I, things were already so. . .”

  “You don’t have to justify your decisions to me.” Nora smiled at her. Were her daughters and grandchildren aware how lucky they were?

  Eva sipped the hot foam. “I should have told Charles the truth when he came back into my life, saying we should try again, but he was so happy when he met Lily, I couldn’t take that away from him. The timing was so close from when we split up, he never questioned that she wasn’t his. I thought he might have guessed when we tried for another baby and it didn’t happen but, if he did, he never said.” Eva sighed. “Ensam är stark, my father used to tell me that. Alone is strong.” She’d believed him until she’d been a single mum trying to juggle the hours the intelligence service demanded and then, once she inherited her father’s money, trying to set up Every Drop. “It makes me sound weak.”

  “No more than the rest of us. Don’t we all want someone to share things with? Humans aren’t meant to be solitary creatures. Charles’ll look after Lily, Eva. He would, even if he knew.”

  But would he though? Eva didn’t recognise the Charles of this last week as the man she’d married, the man she thought she loved.

  “What are you going to do now?” Nora asked.

  Eva wanted to lay her head on the table, go back to sleep. “What can I do?”

  “You’re not helpless. Agents aren’t our best resource, you remember? And you’re not without anything you can use. So what are you waiting for?” Nora laid her hand on Eva’s. “You know what to do.”

  Eva nodded, she did, at least where to start.

  Addison Clarke’s Executive Assistant put Eva through to him and this time she didn’t get voicemail.

  “I was wondering when you might ring.”

  “Luke? You’re okay?”

  “Yeah, hard head. How’re you? Any news about your daughter? I heard you missed the flight too.”

  “I saw that you’d been hurt, I got off to make sure you were okay.”

  She heard a smile in his voice. “Your turn to be my knight.”

  “Not so much, I was—” Impossible to explain being picked up by the intelligence service. “It’s a long story. But you’re okay?”

  “I’m okay. How can I help?”

  “I wanted to ask Addison if his pilot knows where Charles was going in Marrakech. He has no ties there. . .” That she was aware of. “Does Addison hate me, for Charles taking the plane?”

  “Hate you, why? He said you could use the plane, the plane was used. No deal there.”

  “But you being knocked out?”

  “Now why would I tell him about that and ruin my macho image? Addison’s about to leave town, off to Marrakech for the summit on technology driving water safety as it happens. Seems like I can give you another lift.”

  51

  Luke waited for Eva on the tarmac by the hangar. “Let’s hope we go somewhere today.”

  Addison was sitting in one of the seats facing the direction of travel, every inch the man in charge of his destiny. Making it before he was Eva’s age would do that, she was sure, give anyone an unshakeable confidence. Now, at around fifty and, according to his official bio, in the prime of his life, he was keen to give back.

  “Addison, I can’t tell you how grateful I am. Sorry I’m so late.” No need to bother him with the trifles of Nora having to hurry a passport issue to Mach Ten.

  “It’s no problem, the summit doesn’t start until tomorrow and I’ll be there in plenty of time for the dinner. Sit yourself down.” Eva dropped into the seat next to him. “A drop of the good stuff always helps the flight I find. Stephanie.” He gestured at the air hostess who produced a tray holding a healthy measure of an excellent whisky Eva would guess in three crystal glasses. Luke buckled himself in opposite Addison and took one.

  “How do you two know each other?” Eva asked.

  “We have a mutual friend.” Luke held his glass up. “Cheers.”

  “Skol.” Eva replied automatically.

  “The Vikings did a fine toast.” Addison approved. He let her drink, watched her shudder before hitting her with the question. “So, Eva, tell me, what’s gone wrong at Every Drop?”

  “Apparently I trusted the wrong person.”

  “I wondered about your choice of Stuart Worthington for Chairman, but my position doesn’t give me permission to stick my nose in that far.”

  Eva wasn’t sure she was talking about Stuart. “This happened on my watch, any fallout is on me.”

  “You need to know the worst case because only then can you deal with it.” Addison was right.

  Running towards the bullets.

  “Is there time before take off to make a quick call?”

  He nodded his agreement.

  Luke handed her his smartphone.

  “Thanks, international okay?”

  “Go for it.”

  “Eva, are you going to brighten our Christmas?” Her godfather always sounded as though she’d made his day by calling.

  “I’m doing my best, Per.” If she found Lily. When, when she found Lily. “I’m on a plane, about to take off, but I wanted to ask you to explain it to me, the science of Charles’ submission, in layman’s terms.”

  “Sure. It’s a two-step process,” Per parroted her own words back to her that she’d told Dr Chakrabarti and the paramedic who tended to the Oblov’s housekeeper. A two-step process like the poison primer and the antidote, like the compound applied to Every Drop’s pipes and whatever the saboteur had put in the water.

  “It’s an ingenious idea, with so many application possibilities,” Per was saying.

  “Did it come from the White House, the intel that he’d plagiarised the work?”

  “I can’t confirm that.”

  “But you can’t deny it either?”

  Per laughed, “You’re Mathias’ daughter. I’ll see you soon.”

  “You will, Lily and I will be there for Christmas.” Eva would find her.

  How, the thought hammered at her as the plane took off, Lily’s favourite part of the journey. To distract herself, Eva picked up one of the brochures Addison had discarded. The tap gushing water in shades of black and grey on the cover felt like a pointing finger.

  “Morocco’s done some interesting things that Every Drop might want to emulate.” Addison nodded at the one she was flicking through. “The Moroccan president is all over YouTube proving how safe their water is. He’s a thirsty man, if the publicity is believable. That’s part of the reason we’re going there, photo ops and all that. It’s a couple of years away, I’d guess, in terms of investment capability, but it’s worth thinking about it for long-term planning.”

  If Every Drop survived that long, if Nora’s team found nothing untoward in the accounts, if, if, if.

  To keep herself from throwing up, Eva read furiously. It had been her best defence against the bleakness that haunted her childhood after her father was gone. ‘Don’t be like him’, every time her mother snapped her favourite saying, Eva would fill her mind with the words on the page of whichever book she grabbed. ‘What are you crying for?’ That question made Eva shout them in her head. ‘He didn’t love us anyway. Look how he left us’, Eva silently screaming any written salve in a frenzy over and over to block out her mother’s hateful words. A pathetic plaster stuck over an amputation.

  Addison was right. It was impressive how Morocco was making strides to change from a desert state to one with water available for everyone. Rolling the tech they were in
stalling out worldwide would end the worst of the world’s water problems. Their sideways-thinking solutions were ingenious.

  “Do you want me to redress that?” Luke nodded at her forehead when she put the brochure down.

  She padded it with a soft touch. “I guess it probably needs changing.”

  They took the seats nearest the cockpit, leaving Addison to work undisturbed, turning them to the inside, facing each other.

  “How’s it looking?” Eva asked when Luke took off the dressing.

  “Like you took a fall. I’m no doctor but it seems to be healing okay, you might get away with just a small scar.” He cleaned up around her stitches with an antiseptic wipe. “You know you’re more than the sum of your parts.” Her gaze snapped up from her lap to hazel eyes, close to hers. “Just an observation. You’re more than Mathias Janssen’s daughter, CEO of Every Drop, Lily’s mum.” He laughed away the intensity. “Apparently I’m more than Luke Fox too, psychoanalyst or too much whisky at altitude. But while we’re being honest, I think you forget you’re Eva too. You should try putting that first.”

  She laughed it away. “So what do you do when you’re not psychoanalysing or working with Addison?”

  “Or practicing my Florence Nightingale?” He leant closer and whispered dramatically. “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”

  “How did I know you were going to say that?”

  “You want some company in Marrakech? Addison’s going to be busy at the summit. I’ve been here a couple of times. I speak the language, it might help.”

  “It may get. . .” What? She had no idea.

  “Sounds like just my type of thing.” He winked and then dabbed the clean dressing onto her forehead.

  As the plane began its descent, Eva glimpsed a snake of green, vibrant against the barrenness of the desert landscape. Stark white against the redness of the soil, a collection of what must have been mega-sized rocks precisely placed.

  “It says ‘God, country, king’” Luke translated.

  Squares of greenery interspersed amongst large tracts of desert that lined the approach to Menara Airport swelled to fill the landscape beneath them. The plane was heading towards a dense jumble of square buildings crowded as far as she could see. How could she find Lily in there?