Tim Heath Thriller Boxset

by Tim Heath

  “Hello Jessica Lawrence, it’s me, Robert.”

  Jessica went quiet, somewhat puzzled by the name he'd called her but knowing who it was calling.

  “Oh, did I say, Lawrence, I meant to say Ponter. Forgive me, my mistake.” It was clear to both that it was no such mistake, Jessica wondering why he’d made such a reference but happy that at last, he’d made contact again.

  “Where are you?” That was not the response Robert expected from her which quickly told him only one thing.

  “Oh, I see. They have you looking out for me, do they?” Robert smiled to himself.

  “No, I just mean you haven’t been around here much lately. I wanted to see you again, you know, maybe we could go for a drink?” Her act was surprisingly weak for someone so talented, and it didn’t fool Robert in the slightest.

  “Excellent, Jessica, and what would Tommy say about that? Or Brendan?”

  She sat there quietly for a moment before asking: “What do you want?”

  “I want to know about your boss, Brendan Charles, and anything you know about his boss.” There was only silence at the other end now. Robert continued: “You see, Jessica, Brendan hasn’t been telling you the truth all this time, and I have some answers for you.”

  “Brendan has been nothing but a father to me, and hell knows I needed one and that’s what he now is to me. So take your lies and whatever else you think you know and go somewhere else!”

  “Brendan’s a father to you? What does your daddy have to say about that then? I’d imagine that would be enough to make a man a little jealous?”

  Jessica went very quiet, clearly emotional now. Robert didn’t quite know what was going on. Jessica took a deep breath before speaking.

  “If you knew anything about me you’d know that my father died some years back and that Brendan was very helpful to me at the time. But you know nothing about me, so why am I even talking to you! Goodbye,” and she hung up, not able to hold the tears in any longer, sobbing quietly at her desk, the past just too painful to revisit.

  Robert sat there a little taken aback. Not that he’d done much recent research on Jessica but the last he knew was that her father was very much alive and still meant to be a part of things in her life. Something had changed, therefore, and that must imply Brendan or whoever had done something. Robert knew he’d missed his chance this time with her but for now, he needed to check the facts as best he could and see what happened. It wouldn’t be as easy now, but surely there would be something. He noted some things down on his pad to look into later, before again picking up the phone one last time. It had been ten minutes since he’d first called Tommy so he reckoned he had about five more minutes before the conversations would be listened to and no doubt some action attempted to stop him.

  This time dialling Brendan’s mobile phone, he waited quite a while before it was answered.

  “Hello, who is this?” Brendan said, rather aggressively, as he didn’t take many unknown calls on that telephone.

  “It’s Robert, Brendan. We need to talk!”

  “At last, the man of mystery. And what precisely do we have to talk about?”

  “The man you work for, your boss. Let’s start by talking about him shall we?” Brendan made some noise under his breath, apparently not impressed at all by what Robert had just said.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m the boss here!”

  “Come on Brendan, and this is me you’re talking to here. I know all about you.”

  “Yeah, you do, do you? Well, I’m learning a lot about you as well.” Robert took that as a cheap, but an empty threat.

  “Don’t you feel he’s clipped your wings rather?” Robert said. The question was worded in such a way that it was clear it was also a statement, and it took Brendan by surprise, leaving him speechless for a moment.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Well, after all, Brendan, you are quite able to run all these businesses yourself and yet you report everything back to him for his agreement, though you are more than capable. Don’t you ever wonder why he approached you in the first place?”

  Brendan was confused. The voice inside his head was desperate for answers, and he had indeed felt constrained and frustrated by the way he was now working and yet this was how it always had been. It was fear of the consequences that stopped him saying anything out of turn.

  “Look, Robert, if that’s your real name, I don’t know what you want, but I am not going to be intimidated by anyone, especially you!”

  “Relax, I’m not after you. I want to know about your boss.”

  “I said I don’t know what you mean! You call this number again, and you’ll live to regret it.”

  “Oh dear Brendan, what have you become? What has he done to you?” There was no response from the other side. Robert continued, feeling he was touching a nerve now.

  “What have you done for him? Maybe that’s the more relevant question here? Look, we’re going to have to meet someday, my friend, and then you’ll give me what I want to know. Until then, I’ll be seeing you.”

  With that Robert hung up, having said enough already. Again he was left feeling a little frustrated at not having got further. There was a lot of fear being shown by all involved. Maybe his approach had been wrong, but Robert couldn’t change what had gone before. His earlier encounters with Jessica at the Department of Information had now made him a perceived threat, and there was no way of knowing that things would have moved on in the way they did. Brendan’s boss was doing everything to stay hidden. He was apparently aware of Robert’s presence, and that had rattled his safe little cage enough for things to start getting serious.

  Planning his next move was crucial. It was while sitting there thinking, with the television on quietly in the background, that Robert suddenly realised he was looking at his picture on the screen.

  “You have got to be kidding me!” he said aloud to himself in disbelief.

  The report went on to say how he was a wanted man and asked anyone who had any information on him to call the number displayed on the screen. A substantial reward was available to anyone with information that led to his capture. The report showed how posters and signs had appeared overnight on bus-stops and shops all across the city, making him one of the most wanted men in the country. Then it was said that he was a possible suspect in the terrorist attack on the police station in the city yesterday, an attack that had killed twenty-two people including three prisoners.

  Robert switched off the television. It was another hard blow to take and would mean his movements now would be severely limited. It was unlikely though that anyone in the village would suspect anything and they were a tight-knit community anyway. The picture displayed on the television hadn’t been a great one, so that also gave him some hope.

  He’d rattled someone’s cage, and now it was becoming a war even to stay alive. However, it only confirmed that Robert was onto him. The last couple of days had dealt him some terrible hands, and yet he knew that much worse would be sure to follow.

  Nigel Gamble had just finished eating when he was informed of the telephone calls not long ago received by Tommy Lawrence, Jessica Ponter and Brendan Charles. He immediately called his team, asking them for the location of the phone calls. They had been trying to work out that very thing for twenty minutes, having picked up on them and expecting Nigel’s call any moment. They had, however, not been able to tell Nigel anything. Nigel let it pass, listened to all three conversations with interest and then hung up. If Robert had been able to make the calls and yet had not given his location away, it could only have meant that he had already known about the Genesis System and had, therefore, got himself the type of phone that could block its ID. And if he had known about the Genesis System to have gone to the trouble of obtaining the phone, then he would also have known that his conversation would be picked up, recorded and listened to. Therefore––Nigel smiling at the thought––this was Robert playing with him. Nigel knew what he was now g
etting into and it was in many ways a great relief to finally be able to hear the voice of the man, this man, the one whom Nigel had been searching for and hiding from for such a long time.

  There was a danger though that things would get out of hand, or more to the point, out of Nigel’s control. Robert hadn’t said much in any of the calls but what he had said would surely have put some questions into their minds. Nigel knew he had to speak to Brendan straight away, though he wouldn’t dare let on anything about the phone tap, it would only mean too many further questions and risk pushing Brendan further away from his trust. He would have to make it sound natural. And he did. He called him up, Brendan being a little surprised at how frequently they both were now speaking, and they talked about business and other such things for a little while. Nigel then went on to ask about any further developments regarding Robert. Brendan said he hadn’t heard anything but said his team were working around the clock to find something. He said nothing of the conversation he’d had with the man himself just some ten or twenty minutes before, which slightly frustrated Nigel, though he kept his feelings to himself. Nigel warned him that Robert would say and do anything to find some answers. He urged him not to speak to him, or meet with him and that he was dangerous. He tried his best at downplaying this last bit, but it only made Nigel sound like he was working too hard. And of course, this only made Brendan wonder more, having just had the phone call from Robert not half an hour ago. He couldn’t say anything to Nigel about this now though, having already deliberately stated that he had heard nothing. And if Nigel had listened to the call then Nigel would already know that Brendan had kept it from him. But to speak like this so close after that call and having had Nigel warning him as he had, only made it seem too much of a coincidence. Brendan had already seen all the posters about Robert, but he wasn’t sure who had leaked the link between Robert and the bombing to the press. Brendan, of course, knew the truth, but hadn’t been party to any of it and was shocked by how much damage it had done and the death toll it had caused.

  Brendan knew there was something that Nigel wasn’t telling him, but in his heart of hearts he knew it had always been the case, the feeling of being in the dark, of not knowing everything and at times it drove Brendan crazy. They continued their strange conversation, saying more to each other by what they didn’t say than by what they did.

  Nigel finished by warning him again not to meet with Robert before checking how things were going with Jessica and Tommy and instructing him to pull them both into line to make sure they listened to him; otherwise, Brendan would find he would only have problems from them. Feeling more put out than ever, Brendan bit his lip hard so as not to say the wrong thing. He was angry that yet again Nigel was telling him how to do his job, a job he could do perfectly well without his interference. He was starting to loathe the day he’d first agreed to work for Nigel. At the time it had promised so much security for his family, that it was impossible to turn down. Now, though, he felt just like a puppet. Still, his family were happy, they were well and had everything they wanted. That had become Brendan’s only motivation now, though throughout he always felt somewhat of a fraud, which was the particular reason why he kept work life and home life so distinctly separate.

  Nigel put the telephone down a little more frustrated than when he had picked it up, feeling hurt by the apparent betrayal of confidence that his right-hand man was now showing him after all that he’d done for him over the years. Nigel knew he also now needed to bring Brendan back in line and had precisely the right piece of information to do it. Sad that the day had come when he would have to use this against someone so close to him, Nigel knew that now he had no alternative, for fear of losing Brendan altogether. If Robert managed to turn Brendan, then Nigel would have a massive, but not a fatal setback. He wasn’t sure how much Brendan knew, but it was too risky to even think about. No, the time had come to do what was needed, and it gave Nigel that same feeling he’d always had for the last twenty years, the sense of power that he got from knowing something about someone that would make them do anything for him.

  15

  Nigel Gamble, as he had called himself back then, was only twenty-one when he’d first stumbled out through the door into the city life that lay before him. He loved everything about that new world and the opportunities it now offered him. He had taken his name from the successes which came quickly. His initial recklessness in gambling saw him make huge winnings and in the process, he attracted the wrong sort of attention. Having made one million pounds within the first three weeks, he invested much of it in long-term savings making it out into another name as the beneficiary; he was to draw on it later when it had made massive amounts of interest. He had purchased some gaming companies, adopting the name Gamble in the process, and turned his knowledge from just winning bets to making much more significant profits from his businesses. Giving much more generous odds for some sure-fire winners drew in lots of activity, and when things went wrong for the punter, as Nigel knew they would, it meant for him, business was booming.

  After three years he decided to get out of the gambling industry altogether, not wanting to leave too much of a trail and sold up his now very successful companies for twenty-three million, quite a return on the relatively small investment he’d made not long before. Having done much research into people, technologies and businesses, he went down the line of recruiting the best people, cherry picking them from where they currently were and allowed them to develop naturally. They now did that, however, within his growing empire.

  Within a few years, he had established his own security agency, which had strong government links but which was entirely self-funded, as well as a head-hunting recruitment team to hire everyone he wanted. He’d also started purchasing some companies and at the time had lived in the centre of London, being reasonably involved in things, though always keeping a low profile.

  As the years went by, his wealth growing, Nigel became more concerned about losing everything and spent much of his time making himself disappear. Nigel started to build a secure network of men and women, including Brendan Charles, who could be trusted to take control of the day to day running of his now vast group.

  He’d purchased Ample Tech and used them as his outlet for new breakthrough technologies which he continually made available to them. They became huge, taking over or closing down most of their rivals. It was also a convenient way of getting Jessica Ponter into the fold and Brendan had done well at the time doing everything required of him.

  Nigel was also always thinking about his own safety, and it was as his own wealth shot through the billion pound bracket that he moved to his current estate. Nigel shifted everything with him, explicitly building an exclusive area of the house, which included the walled garden, to his own unique design so that he could be himself without fear of prying eyes. The builder Nigel used had been great, doing an excellent job. He had terminal cancer which made him the ideal candidate for Nigel’s private work. A tumour had killed the guy within three months of completion, a sudden shock to all concerned, apart from Nigel of course.

  After that, Nigel also got into state of the art weapons’ systems, which gave him strong and confident links with the military as well as into politics, though he stayed distant. By the time he had established a medical research institute and purchased two large oil companies, turning their unproductive sites into the last major oil fields left by finding vast amounts of previously undiscovered oil, he was the wealthiest man on the planet. That was not, however, a known fact, as so much of the group was in different names and few knew of his involvement, which was just the way he wanted it.

  The Oil Company, as the two merged firms had become, was now the market leader in research into alternative fuels and had already found a workable solution for when the last reserves of oil dried up. They had everything ready for when the time would come, planning to announce their findings to the world, news that would cripple the rest of the oil industry and all but do away with th
eir rivals’ businesses. The Oil Company was ready with all the answers to the world’s energy needs, and on its own, it was now worth around one trillion pounds, which would triple once the announcement was made in a few years. At present, there was quite a lot of oil remaining in their own reserves.

  Nigel kept things moving along. For him, profit came in short gains, hit-and-runs in which he got in, got as much profit in a short period as he could and then got out by selling up. It was using himself to his strengths but also made it an impossible maze for anyone trying to track him, due to the complicated path of takeovers, mergers, more takeovers and then sales. It would take someone months to work through, only again getting to another set of mergers and acquisitions.

  With the wealth in energy as well as the need for new technology and medical breakthrough, these areas of Nigel’s empire were his key areas going forward, his mainstays, his regular and significant sources of income. There had been many short-term purchases along the way, such as the betting shops, but the buying of Nottingham Forest had been something different altogether. He was partly looking to the long-term with the youth policy he wanted putting in place, but he was mostly just doing it for fun; little else carried much reward factor any more. So much of what he did, especially in the early days, was based on his knowledge of absolute success. In essence, though, Nigel Gamble, as he now was, was a thrill seeker at heart. He wasn’t the most business-minded man, which is why using the skills of people like Brendan Charles was essential. Nigel had matured a lot from the kid that he once had been, throwing his money around like it was going out of fashion and drawing very mixed reactions from those around him. Sure, he could get women, but that had never been much of a problem before his wealth, though they never stayed around for long. He also drew a crowd of angry people around him, eager for a piece of his action which is when he decided to get out of gambling altogether. That time also made him realise the importance of his own anonymity.