Double Identity

by Alison Morton

  ‘Wait.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Sit down. Please.’

  Evans parked herself on the plastic chair on the far side of the desk and folded her hands in her lap. She didn’t quite raise one eyebrow as she looked up. Mel had seen the same semi-insolent look on young soldiers’ faces the first time they met her.

  ‘Let’s get something straight,’ Mel started. ‘I don’t have time for passive-aggressive nonsense, so either you relax and work in a congenial professional way or I’ll ask your superintendent to assign me another assistant.’ Evans blinked. ‘Personally, I don’t mind which,’ Mel continued. ‘I’m here to do a job and that’s what I’ll do. If you can’t handle working with me, tough luck.’

  Evans looked away, then back at Mel, her face less assured.

  ‘Well?’ Mel said.

  ‘Sorry.’

  Mel waited. It usually only took a minute. It was two for Evans.

  ‘I find it difficult to work with somebody who is a murder suspect. But I’ll do as I’m told, I suppose.’

  ‘One, I’m not a murder suspect, and two, you’ll damn well follow the orders given to you by your superior officer.’ Merde. She’d gone too far. This wasn’t the military. Evans swallowed and looked cowed. Mel sat down behind the desk.

  ‘Look, Evans, we’re going to have to get past this. Let’s reboot. What’s your first name?’

  12

  Superintendent Fredericks’ welcome was smoother and friendlier, but her eyes were wary.

  ‘We are, of course, happy to host international colleagues. We’re all committed to catching criminals. My email states you are now an investigator with the executive department of the EIRS, a position equivalent to an inspector. Detective Constable Evans will assist you with protocols here and you will work together on the case. What are the leads you are proposing to follow?’

  ‘The priority is to find out how and why Gérard Rohlbert was killed,’ Mel said. ‘Director Stevenson has forwarded you a copy of my full statement, I believe.’

  Fredericks nodded.

  ‘We must look into every aspect of his background, contacts and activities,’ Mel continued. She looked away, then back at Fredericks. ‘I realise that I knew little about the business side of his life.’ Fredericks said nothing, but Mel felt uncomfortable under the policewoman’s gaze.

  ‘We now have the pathology report, ma’am,’ Joanna Evans piped up. ‘Along with alcohol, traces of a benzodiazepine were found in the deceased’s blood.’ She looked down at her file for the exact name of the chemical, but Fredericks waved her to continue. ‘In the pathologist’s opinion, he confirms that death was due to heart failure, but he finds no obvious or specific cause. He noted two puncture marks in the chest area but isn’t willing to speculate.’ She glanced at Mel. ‘We don’t currently have a suspect in the loop.’

  It didn’t take a genius to work that out, but Mel supposed they had to do their paperwork. Evans opened a second file and glanced at Mel.

  ‘Your tests also came back, Miss des Pittones.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘The same substance was present in your blood.’

  Fredericks gave Mel a disapproving look. Joanna studied her file.

  ‘Now wait a minute,’ Mel said. ‘Are you suggesting we’d taken the same drug? For recreation?’

  ‘Nobody is suggesting anything,’ Fredericks replied in a cold voice. ‘The drug in question is a perfectly legal sedative, if rarely prescribed medically. It couldn’t have been the cause of death alone – you are still here. But it is a coincidence and something to keep in mind.’

  ‘I can assure you—’

  Fredericks held up her hand.

  ‘Your course is booked starting next Monday,’ she said. ‘I suggest you concentrate on the case until then. You have five days to come up with some answers.’

  * * *

  At 8 a.m. the next morning, Mel stabbed her speed dial screen. Waiting for her call to be answered, she glanced round McCracken’s former office, now hers. Grey and hard like him. Evans sat opposite her, waiting.

  ‘Aimée?’ At last. ‘I’m in London and coming to see you at the embassy this morning. You’ve had the emailed instruction from Paris?’ A second’s pause. ‘Good. Then please make a gap in your schedule for me.’

  Mel rolled her shoulders back and forth. The bed in the cheap tourist hotel hadn’t given her the best night’s sleep. She turned to Joanna Evans. ‘What’s your email address? I need to send you that list of Gérard’s friends and associates that McCracken wanted.’

  ‘Right, I’ll get on with analysing them and see if I can find any connections.’

  ‘What exactly would you be looking for?’ Mel asked, secretly pleased she wouldn’t have to pore over spreadsheets this would probably involve.

  ‘We’ll see if there are times, days and frequency of any contact. Anything really, however faint or strange. We’ve already got his phone.’

  Joanna picked up the slim smartphone, now without the initialled maroon leather cover Mel had given Gérard on his birthday two months ago. Mel swallowed hard. His phone had been almost an integral part of his body, welded to his hand much of the time.

  ‘We’ve kept it charged but there’s a problem with downloading all the information.’ Joanna looked at Mel, as if embarrassed.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Um, do you have the passcode?’

  ‘Don’t you have experts to crack that sort of thing?’

  ‘You know that officially the investigation’s been downgraded, so my request has gone to the back of the queue. We tried twice but it’ll lock up if we’re wrong again.’

  Mel gripped her cheap pen a little too firmly for its integrity, then relaxed. It wasn’t this poor girl’s fault.

  ‘Try 4321.’ Gérard had always laughed at her security concerns and was lazy enough not to have tried something more complicated.

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘No, but we’ll be here all year if we hang around waiting for your expert.’ Joanna hesitated, then tapped carefully at the screen. Gérard’s phone burst into life.

  * * *

  ‘You have gone up in the world.’ Aimée de Villiers handed Mel’s new ID card back to her.

  Mel looked down at it. ‘I go where the republic sends me.’

  ‘Spoken like a good little soldier,’ Aimée retorted.

  Mel ignored the sarcasm and nodded towards the sheet of paper in front of Aimée on the polished cherrywood table. ‘The email you received from the foreign ministry instructs you to give me every assistance, so tell me what you think Gérard was up to.’

  Aimée stared at Mel. She didn’t blink. Mel had seen that on prisoners during the Africa operation. They tried so hard to look nonchalant that by not blinking naturally they confirmed they were lying. God, there wasn’t anything on Gérard, was there? But Aimée stayed silent.

  ‘Very well.’ Mel stood. ‘I’ll talk to your head of station then.’

  ‘No!’ Aimée’s expression drew in.

  ‘Why not? Surely your resident intelligence officer would be aware of anything French businessmen were doing with dubious characters. But Gérard can’t possibly be known to them on that score.’

  Aimée stared at the table and clasped her hands together tightly. After a moment, she looked up.

  ‘Gérard messaged me after his first attempt to call me. He insisted he had something urgent to tell me, something he had come across during one of his deals. He said it was political, to do with the security of France, and he had to see me. I thought he was being dramatic.’ She untwisted her hands. ‘Mélisende, he was always exaggerating. Although he seemed to be doing well in his City job, his private deals weren’t always successful. I know Papa had to bail him out occasionally.’

  Mel didn’t move for a moment. What was Aimée talking about? Mel had seen statements of Gérard’s balances in his various accounts. He’d wanted to assure her they’d have enough money for a good life without touching any o
f hers. Odd.

  ‘I see,’ she said, not seeing anything at all. She stood. ‘I’ll still have to talk to your head of station, alone, but I’ll be discreet. Any scrap of information he might have could help us.’

  ‘Very well. You won’t mention the money thing, will you? Please.’

  ‘We’ll be talking about political and intelligence matters, so don’t worry, money won’t come into it.’

  Aimée glanced at her phone.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ Mel said.

  ‘I’m late for the meeting with the protection detail for tonight’s reception.’

  ‘Something big?’

  ‘For decision makers and influencers in the European security industry. It’s a networking event for government, providers and financiers. We even have a royal duke attending. Ironically, the security is a nightmare.’

  Mel suddenly remembered the blue van of Associated Security Group.

  ‘I’d like to come along to that.’

  ‘Sorry, no. We have a waiting list of nearly fifty. And people have been fighting to get onto that.’

  ‘I’m sure you can squeeze one more in. I promise not to eat or drink anything.’

  ‘No, and that’s final.’

  ‘I see. Well, you’d better toddle off to your meeting. But send in your intelligence officer and we’ll see what murky facts we can unearth between us.’

  ‘You are insufferable, Mélisende.’

  * * *

  ‘Did you get anything useful?’ Joanna Evans asked.

  Mel hugged the cup of tea between her hands and leant back in her chair. Useful wasn’t the word she’d have used to describe what she’d learnt at the embassy about Gérard. Unsettling would be better.

  ‘Aimée de Villiers was unaware of the amount of money Gérard was accumulating,’ she said after a moment. ‘He waved the statements under my nose once. I’ve jotted down the names of the banks I can remember, although I wasn’t taking much notice at the time. Have you got a book or file of bank logos? I might be able to identify some others.’

  ‘Of course. We can compel the banks to hand over records if it’s fraud. We have even more reason as we have a murder to investigate. I’ll draw up some requests immediately for those you know already.’ Evans stood, clutching her file.

  ‘Something else,’ Mel said. ‘Their head of station showed me their record on Gérard, a security file called a Fichier S. It didn’t have much inside, just his basic details and the fact he was Aimée’s brother, but the top sheet showed he was under casual surveillance by the French security services, the DGSE specifically.’

  ‘They were tracking him?’

  ‘Not continuously. I saw from the dates they’d run a check on him now and again. If nothing happens after two years, they usually archive the file. When I asked why they’d thought he should be watched in the first place, the intelligence officer looked shifty. To be honest, I was horrified. It means that if they really wanted to, they could watch his movements, even his social life, and if necessary, tap his phone and intercept his mail. I told the intelligence man to cut the crap and tell me. They think Gérard was mixing with some dubious characters on the fringe of the financial community, people the DGSE definitely have files on. He said he’ll send me a list. A list. What the hell was Gérard up to?’ Mel looked at Joanna. ‘That’ll give you another load of names to cross-check. I’m sure there won’t be anything to discover. Gérard would never have done anything against his country.’

  As soon as Joanna had left and closed the door, Mel looked down at her sheet of notes. Gérard was a successful City trader, educated and sharp. He was bound to have come across dishonourable as well as honourable people in that world, but Mel was a hundred per cent sure that he would have steered clear of the former.

  A little downhearted but determined to carry on and prove them all wrong about Gérard, she tapped a speed dial number in Brussels.

  ‘Klara? Can you put me through?’

  * * *

  That afternoon, Mel was studying a file of bank logos to trip her memory when the melodic ring of her phone cut through.

  ‘It’s Aimée.’ Her voice was arctic. She obviously hadn’t forgiven Mel for her insistence that morning.

  ‘Yes?’ Mel decided to be as terse.

  ‘Do you have a decent frock?’

  A frock? Why did Aimée use such old-fashioned words?

  ‘Tonight, the drinks reception,’ Aimée continued. ‘Be here at six.’ And she cut the line.

  Mel stared at her phone, then smiled. Patrick Stevenson really did have clout.

  * * *

  ‘You should always wear turquoise. It makes you look normal and attractive.’ Aimée looked her up and down.

  ‘Thanks, but dressing up isn’t really my thing.’ But Mel checked herself again in the ornate gold-framed mirror in the residence hallway. It was almost the twin of the one in the drawing room at Gérard’s parents’ home. Waiting for the senior Rohlberts to come down to dinner on her first visit there, Gérard had egged her on making silly faces in it. She swallowed hard and dragged her mind back to the present and to what his sister was saying.

  ‘Let me get your cover story right,’ Aimée said. ‘You’re unemployed, drifting, and thought I might be able to find you a job here. Why haven’t you used your father’s connections?’

  ‘Because I’ve had a huge row with him and flounced out.’

  ‘Nobody who knows you will accept that.’

  ‘But nobody here does know me. I’ve never mixed in diplomatic or business circles here. Mum’s family, my cousins and grandparents, are just ordinary people.’

  Aimée sniffed inelegantly through her upper-class nose. Mel’s skin coloured a slight pink, but she swallowed her reaction. Her mother may not have come from the top drawer like her father, but she had more heart and generosity of soul than Aimée would ever glimpse in herself. Aimée glanced at her watch.

  ‘We’d better get going. You can stand just behind me in the receiving line.’

  ‘If your chief spook is right, some of those flagged-up dubious characters will be here tonight.’ Mel put her hand on Aimée’s forearm. ‘Let’s stop sniping. I really appreciate the invitation.’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with me. I received a direct instruction from the foreign ministry to include you.’

  13

  In the grand salon at the French residence, background music played – a selection of light classics, soft jazz and instrumentals. The red and gold magnificence of the walls and ceiling-to-floor brocade curtains were almost intimidating, but the enormous Gobelin tapestry at the side depicting a hunting scene outshone everything.

  Mel stood by the door just behind Aimée as if she were the latter’s assistant. She noted names and watched faces of guests as they arrived. They smiled and expressed their happiness and honour at being invited, but many had hard eyes and started scanning the room the second they released Aimée’s hand.

  After a quarter of an hour, Aimée, sleek in severe navy with a simple but solid large link gold necklace, took Mel’s arm and propelled her into the centre of the room. A waiter materialised and both women reached for glasses of champagne.

  ‘Anybody here with connections to financing rather than security itself?’ Mel’s eyes flitted around the hundred or so guests deep into their networking.

  ‘Banks?’ Aimée asked.

  ‘No. Brokers, non-bank funders, that sort of thing.’ Mel didn’t know how to describe who she was looking for, but she knew she had to talk to people who could have touched Gérard’s area of work. She spotted the embassy head of station talking to a tall man with thick grey hair, but she couldn’t see his face. Aimée took Mel’s elbow none too gently and steered her towards a pair of dark-haired men, one tall, one medium height. The two men weren’t quite arguing, but their conversation was vigorous.

  ‘Messieurs, may I introduce a friend of mine, Mademoiselle des Pittones.’ Aimée was looking at one of them with her cool stare. ‘She
is interested in hearing all about the financing side of the security industry.’

  Mel mustered her best smile.

  ‘It must be such a costly business researching and developing security equipment,’ she started.

  ‘Niccolò Mestre,’ the taller one said and held his hand out. ‘This is Gavril Dalca. We were disputing a line of funding and whether it was completely legal. Gavril’s a lawyer, so very careful.’ He gave her the benefit of a smile manufactured by the very best dentists. ‘I think we’ll have to differ.’ He gave Dalca a rueful look. ‘Now, mademoiselle, what would you like to know?’

  ‘I’m really fact finding, educating myself,’ Mel said. ‘I’m not talking about digital security, cybersecurity or maritime security, but the personal security and protection area. If, theoretically, somebody wanted to set up his own security firm and had organised teams of personnel on the operating side standing by, how would he finance it until he had enough clients to cover initial costs? I’m talking a hundred personnel, plus transport and, er, equipment.’

  Mestre blinked. Mel paused, waiting for an answer, but neither man spoke.

  ‘Beyond getting a bank loan,’ she added. ‘Probably not a realistic option.’ She laughed, unsure whether they’d bite. She smiled her best smile and gave them an almost flirtatious look upwards. ‘What do you suggest?’

  Mestre raised his eyebrows slightly.

  ‘Try tapping the EU for job creation grants or loans.’

  ‘What? Are you serious?’ Mel was genuinely surprised.

  ‘Well, it’s worth a try although they have strict conditions.’

  ‘Aren’t there any other options?’

  The two men exchanged glances.