Two and a half thousand miles away, in a poky top-floor studio flat just off Edgware Road in London, Suze McArthur was half asleep on the sofa.
The sofa was covered with an embroidered ethnic throw that Suze had bought on a shopping trip with friends to Camden Market. The friends had long since deserted her for jobs and husbands and kids, no longer content with the world of student marches and protests. Suze would be thirty in just two months. The throw had adorned the sofas in the various bedsits she’d rented ever since college, her job as a midwife never allowing her to afford anything bigger.
In front of the sofa was a small wooden chest that doubled as a table, on which a patchouli joss stick had almost burned down to the end. Next to the joss stick was a Dictaphone loaded with a C90 cassette. There was only one picture on the wall — a slightly crumpled old X-Files poster showing Mulder and Scully, arms folded and back to back, looking down into the room. A TV was on in the corner and on top of the set there was a photograph: a picture of Suze with her arm around a much older lady sitting in a wheelchair, a pink hyacinth blooming in the background. The floor was covered with newspaper cuttings, and in one corner a lava lamp shone dimly.
Dramatic music from the TV, and Suze came to. Her last memory was of watching 100 Worst Serial Killers, some crap American rubbish. She looked at her watch. Half past eleven. The big-haired female presenter was standing outside a forbidding Victorian building. Slowly Suze tuned in to what she was saying.
‘ It is here, in Broadmoor psychiatric hospital in Berkshire, England, that the man known as the Yorkshire Ripper lives, and it is here that he will most probably die. ’
A familiar orange-backed picture of a black-haired man appeared on the screen.
‘ In 1981 Stuart Sutcliffe was convicted of the murder of thirteen women. The Ripper claimed during his trial that a voice in his head had instructed him to kill prostitutes, and that this was the voice of God. The Yorkshire Ripper is not the only serial killer to have made such claims. A significant number have made similar assertions that God… ’
Suze fumbled for the remote control and turned the TV off. She shivered. Some things were better not watched alone and in the dark. That included tales of serial killers and religious nuts. She remembered something she’d read a long time ago: the world is divided into good people and bad people. Good people will do good things, bad people will do bad things. But for good people to do bad things takes religion.
Good people. Bad people. Sometimes, she thought to herself, it was difficult to tell the difference.
She got down on her knees and starting collecting the clippings. A jumble of headlines that she’d read a hundred times before filled her mind. ‘profits soar… aerospace industry on upward trajectory.. management buyout boosts stocks’. When she had them in a pile, she placed them all back in the box file where they lived, and on the spine of which she had written two words in clear black marker pen: ‘grosvenor group’. She carried it to the other side of the room, where she slotted it into its place on a rickety Ikea bookshelf, next to an identical box file with a single word written on the side: ‘stratton’.
Her pretty face curled into an expression of dislike.
She went over to look out of the room’s one small window. From here she could see the street below — Wimbourne Terrace — and, above the opposite roofs, the A40 flyover, with plenty of cars travelling in either direction even at this time of night. She turned and looked back into the room, and her eyes fell on the Dictaphone.
Maybe she should take the tape to the press. Make it all public. But did she trust them? And would they believe her anyway, even with the evidence?
Suze shook her head. The truth was, she didn’t trust anybody. She had gone to such lengths to acquire the contents of that tape on the table — it made her feel sick, the memory of the danger in which she’d put herself — and now she wasn’t only afraid of its contents, she was afraid to do anything with it!
You’re fucking crazy. The words of the man with the limp who had caught her on the rooftop earlier that day rang in her head. She winced as she thought of the things she’d threatened him with. Shameful things.
Maybe he was right.
Maybe she was crazy.
Maybe these bastards had dragged her down with them.
Perhaps she should throw the tape away? Burn it. Forget she’d ever heard its contents and just get on with her life. Get herself a husband and some kids, like all her friends had. Like her mum had tried to persuade her to do for so many years, until her mind had started to wander.
But she knew she wasn’t going to do that. She knew what she’d heard. And even if she didn’t yet know the full story, she knew she had to do something to stop it.
Suze put the Dictaphone on the bookshelf alongside her research files, then found herself a blanket and snuggled up on the sofa again. She needed a clear head, and for a clear head she needed sleep.
Whether sleep would come, with all these thoughts spinning around in her mind, was a different matter entirely.
Chet drove.
His mind was racing. What the fuck had happened? Who was the intruder? Who had tried to kill him?
You’re going to tell me the name of the woman you spoke to outside the meeting room today. If you do that, you might live to see morning.
Suze McArthur. That pale-faced redhead with a stud in her nose and the smell of incense in her clothes had someone running scared. But who? And why?
He remembered what he’d overheard on the rooftop. Trust me, Prime Minister Stratton. This war is good to go… the Americans are all on board. The question is, how are you going to get it through…?
Was that enough to persuade someone to make an attempt on his life? No way. Chet knew the decision to take out an individual like that was never made lightly — especially if the hit had to be carried out on home turf. Too many things could go wrong. Killing someone was easy; covering it up was more difficult. The conspiracy theorists loved the idea that the intelligence agencies would think nothing of assassinating suspected terrorists or troublesome members of the royal family, but that was bullshit.
And in any case, the woman in his flat had not been British. As he drove, Chet desperately tried to place her accent. ‘ Harah! ’ she had said. Chet was a first-class Regiment linguist, and he thought the word seemed familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it.
It was just past midnight when he turned off Euston Road to drive down Gower Street and into the West End. He parked his car in the NCP on Wardour Street, hid his rucksack underneath the passenger seat and limped through the maze of red neon, pubs and sex shops. A woman, comfortably in her forties and with too much make-up on, called to him from a doorway. ‘Looking for a bit of business, love?’
He put his head down.
‘Beggars can’t be choosers, darling!’ The woman’s voice had turned angry when she realised she was being ignored.
Chet carried on towards Trafalgar Square, and from there to Whitehall. He walked down the opposite side to number 132 and stood for a moment observing the entrance. He didn’t really know what he was looking for — maybe an unmarked van parked suspiciously nearby; individuals carrying out surveillance in the street. He knew the signs to look for and right now he saw none of them, so he crossed the road and made his way into the building.
The big, marble-floored atrium was entirely empty, with the exception of a solitary security guard on reception — different to the guy Chet had spoken to that morning. He had black skin and dreadlocks and was reading a copy of the Sun. He glanced up when Chet was a couple of metres from the reception.
Chet smiled at him. ‘Graveyard shift, mate?’
The guard put down his newspaper and Chet noticed that he’d been examining page 3. ‘You said it, brother,’ he sighed.
Chet looked around, then leaned in a bit closer. ‘I wondered if you could help me out with something.’
‘Ain’t no one here this time of night,’ the guard replied. ‘Except me, of course.’ He prodded the newspaper. ‘And Delightful Debs from Dagenham.’ He laughed, and Chet joined in.
‘Not looking for someone here. I’m looking for someone who was here,’ said Chet. ‘A chick.’
A broad grin crossed the guard’s face.
‘I did a little security job here this morning. The name’s Chet Freeman. Check your computer if you like.’
The guard shrugged and tapped at the keyboard of his terminal. ‘Yeah,’ he said after a moment. ‘I got you.’
‘So I got talking to this girl. Said her name was Suze. Cleaning lady. Redhead. Kind of…’ Chet made a gesture with his hands to indicate a shapely figure. ‘Should have got her number there and then, I guess…’
A troubled look came on to the guard’s face. ‘Ah, I don’t know, man. I’m not supposed to give that kind of information out. You know, home addresses and shit.’
‘Hey, course not. I understand. I was just thinking, you know, maybe a phone number… if you had it…’
He winked at the guard, who gave an amused shake of the head and replied, ‘I don’t know, brother. She must have been pretty cute for you to come chasing after her at this time of night.’
‘Yeah. Or maybe I’m just desperate.’
The guard laughed, then once more tapped on his keyboard. ‘Suze McArthur?’ he asked.
‘That’s my girl.’
‘She’s a temp. Only worked here yesterday.’ The guard scrawled a number on a yellow Post-It note and handed it to Chet. ‘Hope you get yourself some pussy, brother.’
Chet grinned. ‘You and me both, my friend.’
He turned and walked out of the building, the square of paper clasped firmly in his right hand.
It took him half an hour to get back to his car. It would have taken him less, but he went a roundabout way, down quiet side streets where he could look back and check he wasn’t being followed. By the time he’d got back to his vehicle, his leg was killing him — sharp, stabbing pains shooting from the stump up into the thigh, and a nagging soreness where flesh met prosthesis. It was a relief to sit behind the wheel. He drove out of the West End, pulling over on Tottenham Court Road to check he wasn’t being trailed, before heading to Aldenham Street in the maze between Camden and Euston Station. There were modern housing blocks on either side, but the street was deserted at this time of night and he parked in the gloom below a broken street lamp. He recovered his rucksack and removed one of the bulky mobile phones that he’d used to debug the offices earlier.
Seconds later he was dialling Suze’s number.
It rang six times.
Seven.
He was about to hang up when a voice came on the line. It was sleepy.
‘Hello?’
‘Suze McArthur?’
‘What… who is this?’ The girl sounded suspicious. Frightened.
‘Your friend from the roof.’
A pause.
‘How did you get my number?’ Her voice cracked slightly.
‘How did you get your hands on a laser listening device?’
Silence.
‘I let you escape today,’ he said finally. ‘You owe me. I want to know what you thought you were listening…’
‘I’m hanging up.’ Suze’s voice was wavering as she interrupted him.
‘Don’t you fucking dare.’
‘I’m hanging up…’ She sounded like a scared kid standing up to a bully. ‘I’m hanging up now.’
A click on the line, then silence.
‘Fuck’s sake,’ Chet muttered. He dialled the number again, but this time it rang out.
He chucked the phone on to the passenger seat, leaned back against the headrest and closed his eyes. He was dead beat. The beer, the scuffle at the flat, walking too far with his bad leg — it was all taking its toll. He ought to rest, but rest wasn’t on the menu. He’d be insane to go back home, but he needed somewhere to lie low. Where he couldn’t be found. Somewhere to get his head in order. With someone he could trust.
But as far as Chet was concerned, trustworthy people were as rare as a nun in a bikini. If Luke Mercer was in the country, Chet would already be on the way to Hereford. But he wasn’t, and in the absence of his old SAS mucker, there was only one other person he would even think of approaching. He picked up his phone and called a number that he knew by heart.
It rang for several seconds before a voice answered. ‘Who the hell
…?’
‘Doug, it’s me. Chet.’
A heavy sigh. ‘Jesus, Chet. What time is it?’
‘I don’t know — about 01.00? Listen, mate, I need a favour.’
‘Chet, this a wind-up? You been on the beers?’
‘No. Yes, but… look, can you meet me?’
A pause.
‘Now?’
‘Now. It’s important.’
‘Mate, I can’t. I’m out of town. Trains are done for the day. You never called — I went to the girlfriend’s place.’
Chet vaguely remembered Doug saying that his latest squeeze lived somewhere south of town. Mitcham Junction, was it?
‘Plus,’ Doug continued, ‘it’s one o’clock in the fucking morning.’
Chet cursed silently, his brain still racing.
‘Can you RV first thing?’
‘I guess…’
‘Clapham Junction. Platform 15 — one five — 06.30.’
‘Fine. Look, Chet, what the hell’s this all about?’
I wish I knew, Chet thought to himself.
‘06.30,’ he repeated. ‘Don’t be late.’
He hung up before Doug could reply.
Chet threw the phone down again and caught himself checking the rear-view mirror. Checking for what? He didn’t know, but he knew his heart was racing and his mouth was dry.
Fear? Damn right. But that didn’t mean he was going to succumb to it. He kept his gaze on the mirror, and prepared to sit it out till morning.
Suze McArthur stared at her phone like it was a snake. She was shaking. How had that guy tracked her down? Who was he working for?
A chill sickness welled up in her stomach. She found herself shivering, and felt as though all the strength had left her limbs. She pulled her blanket more tightly around her, but that did no good.
A noise in the corridor outside.
Suze heard herself gasp.
It was nothing, she told herself. She remembered being a child, terrified by strange sounds after her lights had been turned out. Her doctor father, when he was not away, would come in and smooth down her hair. ‘There’s no one here, princess,’ he’d whisper. ‘Just Mummy and Daddy, and we won’t let anything scare you. All you can hear is our old house creaking. That’s what happens at night.’
But there was nobody here to smooth her hair down now. Her father was dead, killed by a landmine in Angola when he was out there tending to sick children. Her mother couldn’t look after herself, let alone Suze.
Another noise. ‘It’s just the old house creaking,’ she whispered to herself.
The front door was locked. The windows too.
So why didn’t she feel safe?
It crossed her mind that she could go downstairs. Sometimes she picked up groceries for Vern and Dorothy, the sweet old couple who lived underneath her. She’d become friends with them. They were always on her case, telling her she should be settling down with a nice young man. A week ago they’d gone off on a cruise of the Norwegian fjords, and had left their key with Suze, just in case. But something prevented her even from moving, let alone venturing down the staircase in the middle of the night.
I should get out of here, she thought. Go somewhere else for a few days. Get my head straight.
That’s what she’d do. First thing in the morning. Pack a bag. Get out of London.
But morning seemed a long way off. She glanced over her shoulder at the front door. She had locked it, hadn’t she?
Another chill ran through her. She felt too scared to get up and check.
03.26 hrs.
Chet awoke suddenly.
It took him a few seconds to remember why he was sitting behind the wheel of his car in this dark side street, and he cursed himself for having dropped off. He was frozen. Somewhere in the distance he could hear a police siren. But this street was quiet.
Almost.
He squinted in the gloom. Through the windscreen he could see a figure up ahead. Twenty metres away, max, and walking towards him.
Instinctively, Chet felt his fingers creeping towards the ignition key. The figure was moving quickly. At fifteen metres, he could make out that it was a woman. Slim. He couldn’t see her face, not in the darkness.
The angry features of the intruder in his flat flashed through his mind.
Ten metres. Chet started the engine and put the lights on full beam. The figure stopped, throwing her hands up to her face, alarmed by the sudden glare. When her hands moved away, Chet saw that her skin was elderly and wrinkled, her hair grey and her clothes old. She cast a fearful look in Chet’s direction, then turned heel and hurried off.
Just an old woman wandering the streets at night. Chet turned off the engine and the lights, aware of a damp patch of sweat against his back despite the coldness of the air. He cursed his paranoia. Of course nobody knew where he was.
He checked his watch. 03.28. Three hours till he RV’d with Doug. It couldn’t come soon enough.
06.23 hrs.
Early, but the main roads of London were already crammed with traffic. The bus drivers were beeping their horns in frustration at each other as their headlamps glowed in the semi-darkness.
Commuters were already hurrying into Clapham Junction in their suits and overcoats, beating the crowds as they gripped their briefcases and free sheets and paper cups from Starbucks with plastic lids. Their breath steamed in the cold morning air, and nobody seemed in any way interested in anyone else around them.
Certainly nobody gave Chet a second glance as he queued up to buy a ticket from the machine. He decided to use cash rather than his card — too easy to trace.
Ticket in hand, he walked along the covered walkway from which a number of flights of wide stairs led down to the platforms. The sound of trains arriving and departing was everywhere. Station announcements echoed over the Tannoy. Chet checked his watch. 06.29. Platform 15 was at the other end of the walkway. He limped towards it as commuters hurried past.
He was at the top of the steps leading down to Platform 15 when he heard the sound of a train coming into the station, its wheels making the familiar, rhythmic sound over the tracks, blotting out the sound of a station announcement; and he was just hauling himself down the steps when he heard a man scream.
Chet stopped. He could hear the train braking quickly, then there was shouting. He limped quickly to the top of the stairs, where he saw an already crowded platform. There was a commotion at the end of the platform from which the train had arrived and it sent a sick feeling through Chet’s body. ‘Get out of my way,’ he roared as he barged past a couple of commuters. ‘Move!’
The train had stopped now. Chet turned left, towards the front end. The other travellers were giving each other anxious looks, as if they didn’t know quite what to do; a few made angry remarks as Chet stormed through them.
He was alongside the front carriage when he heard a second scream. A woman. Hysterical. ‘Oh my God! Oh my God! ’
Chet continued to push his way through.
‘Someone help him,’ the woman sobbed.
He reached the edge of the platform and pulled the sobbing woman out of the way. There was a streak of blood on the front of the train, and through the windscreen glass he could see the driver with a horrified look on his face.
Chet stared down at the track. It was impossible to make out the features on the mangled body that lay there. The side of the face that was visible was just an oozing welt of gore. One arm was pinned behind the figure’s back in a gruesomely unnatural position, the shoulder joint and the elbow obviously snapped and splintered; the other arm was simply crushed.
But Chet didn’t need to see the face. All he needed to see was the prosthetic leg, almost identical to his own. It was still vaguely attached to Doug’s knee, but pointing out at a ninety-degree angle, and split about halfway down.
Dread and anger seeped through Chet’s bones in equal measure. He staggered back from the edge of the platform to allow two Transport Police officers to take his place. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, please step back from the platform,’ one said loudly. ‘Please step back — the emergency services need to come through.’
Chet hardly heard them. He pressed his back against a rail map on the platform wall as the chaos unfolded, trying to suppress the sickness, trying to think clearly.
Was his friend dead by coincidence? Like hell he was.
But with the possible exception of Doug’s girlfriend, nobody knew they were meeting. Nobody knew they were there.
Suddenly Chet felt his blood turn cold. He pulled his mobile phone out of his pocket and stared at it.
Somebody must have been listening in to their conversation.
He cursed himself for being so stupid, then quickly fumbled with the handset’s rear panel and removed the battery and SIM card so that the phone couldn’t be tracked. He stuffed the SIM card into his wallet; the phone he could dump when he found a bin.
Quickly he replayed in his head what he and his friend had said on the phone. Would any eavesdropper have known that Doug was an amputee too? Chet didn’t think so. And there was only one conclusion to draw from that…
‘ Jesus, mate,’ he whispered to himself. ‘ They were after me, not you. I’m so fucking sorry. ’
Then his skin prickled as another realisation hit him.
He’d made more than one call using this phone the night before.
A face rose in his mind. Red hair. A small silver stud in her pretty, turned-up nose.
Suze McArthur.
Chet stuffed the dismembered phone in his pocket and started to push his way hurriedly back along the platform. He had no idea where the young woman lived. He had no idea what she knew. But he had to get to her now. And fast.
Before someone else did.