by Mandy Baggot
She folded her arms across her chest and tried to look as defiant as she could. It was a hard look to pull off when her heart was breaking in half.
‘Flynn, start CPR. Give it five minutes, then call it in,’ the soldier relented.
‘I’ll help.’ Autumn dropped to her knees beside Nathan.
‘That I can’t allow. We need to get you safe,’ the soldier ordered. He took hold of Autumn’s arm and dragged her back up to her feet.
‘Please, I just want to be with him,’ she pleaded, watching as the other soldier removed his mask and began the routine of resuscitation.
‘There’s nothing you can do. I doubt there’s anything anyone can do,’ he told her bluntly.
*
The helicopter had been hovering, confirming their location and liaising with the team on the ground. A van had been waiting outside the warehouse she’d been held in, to escort her to Secret Service headquarters. Since she’d arrived, she’d lost count of the number of times she had heard the words ‘de-brief,’ ‘operation,’ and ‘target.’ For her to lose count was one thing, for her not to care she had lost count was something else entirely.
The room they had put her in had a view of the London Eye, just like her apartment. It was farther along the river, but the sights were all there, laid out before her. The Thames, the Houses of Parliament, they were places of significance, but what she really wanted to catch sight of was the motel she had stayed in with Nathan, and the Marisson. Those places were important to her now. Nathan was important, and no one had even mentioned his name since she’d been brought here. She wanted to hear that he was alive, that he was in hospital recovering, that she could see him.
She hadn’t spoken to anyone, not one word, since she had been brought into the offices. She was tired, her throat was dry through a mixture of dehydration and anxiety, and she didn’t see what good talking would do. She had nothing to say. What was there to say?
The door to the room opened, but she didn’t raise her head. It was probably the exceedingly irritating woman who had headed in an hour or so ago. She’d been wearing an Audrey Dupont skirt. Autumn had noticed, and the realization had sickened her. Now, she’d gladly clean her keyboard with the designer skirt she had worried about creasing just days ago. It was immaterial, and it had taken a bodyguard from Hull to teach her what she should have known already.
‘Claire.’
The voice was male and vaguely familiar, but it took her a second to realize exactly who had come into the room. Her head jerked up, attentive at last, and she looked at her father for the first time in seventeen years.
The numbness fell away, and she crumpled before him. The whole trauma of the past week overrode her, and she reached across the table for him, clutching at his hands and letting the anguish pour out.
Through her tears, she could see the man she had missed for so long. The man she remembered as such an important figure in her childhood. The man who had provided her with all those most cherished memories.
The years had aged him. He was no longer the thirty-something from her photos. His once thick, auburn hair was lighter now, receding and flecked with gray at the edges. He had lines etched into his forehead, and a scar on his chin she didn’t remember, but those eyes, the eyes that mirrored hers, hadn’t altered at all.
‘Oh, Claire, I am so sorry,’ Rick spoke. He took his hands from hers and rested them on top of her head as she curled into the table.
She cried, and he let her until she had nothing left to give. Her breathing eventually calmed, and once she had raised her body from the table, he passed her a handkerchief. Not a Kleenex from a box, but a proper, old-fashioned, gentleman’s handkerchief, like the one he’d used to wipe ice cream off her face years ago.
‘If there had been any other way, believe me, I would have taken it,’ Rick said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Pretending to be dead, living a lie, moving from country to country in hiding. I was trying to do what was right for everyone, but I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t please everyone. I ended up pleasing no one and hurting those that mattered to me. Like you and your mother.’
Autumn shrugged. She knew it was an inappropriate response, but she didn’t know what else to do or say. She knew nothing about what he’d done, who he was, what he’d been through. She had judged her mother for keeping the secret, but how could she sit in judgment on a man she adored, who had lived half his life on the run?
‘Your mother and I agreed back then that it was better for you to believe I was dead than to get caught up in a web of deceit. You were only ten. You wouldn’t have been able to understand, and I couldn’t ask you to keep a secret that big. Just imagine having to trot out a lie to friends, to teachers, to boyfriends. We did what we thought was right at the time,’ Rick told her.
‘I missed you… every day,’ Autumn admitted, sniffing into the handkerchief.
‘And I missed you. You’ll never know how much,’ he said.
His voice was thick with sentiment, and Autumn squeezed his hands a little tighter. Then her heart lurched in her chest and she looked at him with widened eyes.
‘How’s Nathan? Which hospital did they take him to? If they didn’t take him to New Hall, could you get him moved? I’ll pay, make sure he gets a private room,’ Autumn said in a rush.
She felt, rather than saw, her father suck in a mouthful of air. He didn’t let go of her hands, but he dropped his eyes from hers momentarily. She started to count when he didn’t reply, and didn’t even try to stop herself from mouthing the words.
‘I’m sorry, Claire,’ Rick finally said.
‘What does that mean?’
‘You were close to him?’
‘I won’t believe he’s gone. I won’t,’ she stated, holding her breath and the tears in.
‘He was a good man. We worked together, you know, years ago, when he first joined the unit.’
‘I loved him… I love him,’ Autumn told.
‘If he hadn’t made that break for it, we might not have been able to save you, we might have been too late. I’ll always be indebted to him for that,’ Rick said.
‘He can’t be dead, he just can’t be. I won’t believe it.’
Her whole chest felt like it was lined with lead. The dad she hadn’t set eyes on for seventeen years sat opposite her, yet she didn’t feel it. She needed Nathan. She wanted Nathan. He had become her everything. He was going to be her new future. Where did she go from here?
‘I haven’t got long, Claire,’ Rick told her, his voice breaking through her thoughts.
‘What?’
‘I can’t stay here. I have to tell the government everything I know about As-Wana and the life I’ve been leading during the last month. Then I have to leave again. Things weren’t safe for me under the assumed name I’ve been using most recently. I had to disappear and lie low. The British weren’t sure whether I was being loyal to them. I think they thought I’d defected.’
Autumn wiped her eyes again. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said.
What was he saying to her? She’d just got him back, yet he was going to leave her again. Then who would she have? Blu-Daddy and Nathan were dead. Her father may as well be because he couldn’t be with her. Who else was there? Her mother? No, Alison had never had time for her before. Why would that change? She didn’t want to be alone. She’d spent most of her life alone. She didn’t want that anymore.
‘I have to get a new identity, and I have more work to do. I didn’t defect, Claire. I believe in truth and honor, and I will always work to defend my country, but I can’t do it here. I can’t do it with you and your mother. It would put you at too much risk, and that’s the very last thing I want.’
Truth and honor. Where had she heard that before? From Nathan’s lips. The lips that had kissed her so roughly, sought out every part of her, inside and out. She felt sick and panicked, overwhelmed by nausea.
‘Claire,’ Rick said as he reached for her hands.
‘I don’t want you to go, Daddy. Please,’ she begged, ‘don’t leave me again.’
Forty-One
She didn’t know how long he’d held her. He’d moved around the table and knelt beside her and cradled her against his body, rocking her slowly as she sobbed. But then, when her crying had subsided, he had kissed her, and then he’d left. She would never see him again.
She was exhausted, wrung out, and emotionally drained. She just wanted to lie down somewhere, go to sleep, then when she woke up, she wanted all that had happened to be nothing more than a terrible dream.
How long were they going to keep her here? She’d been debriefed now. After her father had left, she’d told the woman in the Audrey Dupont skirt everything she knew about what had happened. The names of the terrorists, what they looked like—at least what she could remember before the hood went on—what had happened, how she’d been treated, what they’d said, how they had beaten Nathan. No one had said his name. No one apart from her father had acknowledged what had happened to him. It was like he hadn’t existed, that he had been some figment of her imagination.
The door opened again, and she moved in her chair until she felt the back of it firm against her shoulder blades. She raised her eyes to see who it was. Her mother.
Autumn dropped her eyes again and clasped her hands together, counting each finger in turn.
Alison put a file on the table then sat in the chair next to her, the chair Rick had brought round to sit in and comfort her. It was too close. Unnaturally close for her mother.
‘I won’t ask any stupid questions,’ she said. ‘I expect you’ve had enough of those from that Priya girl. I have no idea how she got a job here. Actually, no, I take that back. Given her glossy black hair and figure, I know exactly how she got a job here.’ She adjusted her skirt and crossed her legs.
Autumn raised her eyes to meet her mother’s. She had no energy left to feel anything for her. She felt paralyzed.
‘You should come and live with me. I was thinking about altering the second bedroom anyway. It’s been over a year since it was last decorated. We can have a look at some designs together. I was thinking of taupe, but maybe you have another idea.’ Alison played nervously with her hands in an action that almost mirrored Autumn.
‘Live with you?’ The words came out in a hoarse voice, only just audible.
‘Yes, well, I know all about what that awful PA did to you, and that terrible boyfriend of yours, DJ Doggy, or whatever he was called. Cheating on you, plotting to kidnap you for money. They’re being held by the police, being charged with organizing your record producer’s murder.’
A glimmer of gladness washed over her brain, just enough to make her care slightly more about what her mother was talking about. ‘Have they caught the man that shot him?’ Autumn whispered.
‘Not yet, but it’s only a matter of time before your ex-friends start giving up names. They are going to be doing some time in prison. There’s no doubt about that.’
Autumn managed a nod then let out a chesty cough. When was her last drink? She had turned down coffee earlier, and the bottle of water on the table was empty. Suddenly, her throat felt as dry as sandpaper.
‘Shall I get you a drink? Have you eaten? I tell you, the service in this place has gone downhill. And you’re not even a suspect! I expect the suspects are on their third martini by now,’ Alison continued.
‘I saw Dad,’ Autumn said, tears welling up in her eyes.
‘I know, I saw him, too.’
Alison took hold of her hands and held them in hers.
‘We won’t see him again, will we?’ Autumn asked.
‘No. Not unless there’s another “situation”, and I hope there won’t be.’
Autumn could see her mother was holding in her feelings like the consummate professional politician, but the sentiment was there all the same, bubbling up inside her, threatening to expose her as a human being.
‘It must have been hard for you,’ Autumn said.
With those words hanging in the air, Alison burst. Down went the hardened exterior, followed by an outpouring of grief that Autumn hadn’t been prepared for. Her mother sobbed, her mouth open, her eyes gushing with tears, her arms curled around her stomach as if she was holding herself together.
Autumn reached out to hold her shoulders. ‘Oh, Mother.’
Alison shook her head and tried to restore some of her composure, searching the pockets of her jacket for a tissue. Autumn put her hand out. In it was her father’s handkerchief. She pressed the cotton fabric into Alison’s hand.
‘I can’t imagine how hard it must have been for you,’ Autumn said. ‘The things I said before were mean and cruel. I was just thinking about myself because I thought everyone knew and I didn’t. But you’ve lived seventeen years without a husband.’
Alison only managed a nod and dabbed at her eyes with the handkerchief.
‘Why did you push me away?’ Autumn asked.
‘I shouldn’t have, but I didn’t know what else to do. When I found out your father had to go, I felt as if someone had cut my heart out. He was the only man I ever loved. He is the only man I’ll ever love. You were so young. I’d imagined raising you—perhaps another child, too—together as a family. I knew what he did, knew the risks if things went too far, but I just didn’t expect it. Suddenly, I was left on my own, and I also had to keep a huge secret from you and the rest of the world. I know what a terrible job I did, I held you at arm’s length because I was grieving for your father. I should have drawn you closer, protected you, not shut you out.’
Autumn shook her head. ‘I pushed you away, too, because I wanted him back. You couldn’t be him, so I didn’t want you. That was my child psychology, and I just continued it into adulthood.’
‘What he does, Autumn, is so valuable. That’s why I fell in love with him. He fights for what’s right. He fights against terrorism, for truth and honesty. He fights for people who can’t fight for themselves. He takes risks, and he goes into hiding because he’s the best at his job. He’s saved thousands of lives. He’ll continue to save thousands of lives, but he has to do that away from us, to protect us. That was why I didn’t want you pursuing a career in the music business to begin with. It was best if you grew up out of any spotlight. Despite faking his death, it was also important to avoid people ever knowing who your father really was.’
‘But I pushed and pushed, didn’t I? Flunked out of everything, and concentrated on driving you crazy writing music, sending CDs off, joining those singing groups, auditioning for musicals.’
‘We’d changed our names. I couldn’t order you not to choose the life you’d set your heart on. And, Autumn,’ Alison said, ‘you are so talented, so very, very talented.’
Her mother continued to hold her hands, stroking her thumbs across the back of them.
‘You never told me what you thought of my music,’ Autumn said.
‘I know.’
‘I never knew if you were proud of me. I thought all the awards were just publicity for you. You never really seemed interested in me.’
‘I am interested, Autumn. I just… lost sight of what was important. And, because I knew what it was like to lose someone so precious, I felt, if I got too close, I might lose you, too. I know how that sounds, but sometimes, we do very foolish things for self-preservation. I think I thought you were better off without my interference.’
‘I was so lonely,’ Autumn admitted.
‘Oh, Autumn,’ Alison said, reaching forward and pulling her daughter into her arms.
Autumn closed her eyes and sucked in the scent of her mother. It was a shot of expensive perfume and a wave of hair conditioning product, but it was the essence of her, and she had not been in such close quarters with it since before her father had left. A lone tear escaped and slithered down her cheek.
Alison drew herself away, dabbing at her eyes with the handkerchief. She sniffed and tried to recompose herself, then reached onto the table fo
r the file she’d brought in.
‘I really shouldn’t be doing this, Autumn,’ Alison started. She smoothed her hands over the thick wad of paper bound by a thin cardboard covering.
Autumn didn’t say anything. She had no clue what her mother was about to do, but she had had no idea her mother was going to behave like a normal person when she entered the room. Anything could happen.
‘I could lose my job if anyone finds out about this… but I thought it would be important to you.’ Alison hesitated for a moment, holding onto the file, then she passed it to Autumn.
The weight of the document sent her hands to her lap, and she struggled to contain all the papers within it.
‘I know I didn’t believe you, but there was so much going on, I suppose I didn’t have time to think about it. I was concerned for your safety. I couldn’t see anything else,’ Alison said.
Autumn opened the file and swallowed down a boulder of sentiment as she encountered a photo of Nathan. It was a head shot, and he was dressed in his army uniform, a cap on his head. He looked no different, maybe a few years younger, but apart from that, she was looking into the eyes of the man she loved. She touched the photo with the tips of her fingers, traced the line down the side of his face, stopping at his chin.
‘Everything you need to know about Scott Pemberton is in that file. I thought it might help somehow,’ Alison told her.
Autumn raised her head to regard her mother.
‘Scott,’ she whispered.
‘Yes, that was his real name.’
Autumn nodded, her fingers not leaving the photo.
‘I’ve had the cameras turned off in here, so you take as long as you like with the file. When you’re done, just press that button under the desk and call for me.’ Alison got to her feet.
Autumn looked back to the photo, drinking in everything about his face. The hazel eyes flecked with more gold than blue, the firm jaw, the full lips. They had such little time together, but the intensity of her feelings for him had not just taken her by surprise, they had overwhelmed her.