by David Caris
‘Heard about it, or heard it? You saw it, didn’t you? You were over there, across the bridge looking back this way. Police saw you cross the bridge shortly before the attack. Same height, cap and windbreaker.’
‘I think you’ve got me confused with someone else.’
‘I’m not with the police. And you’re definitely not in any kind of trouble. I just need information.’
Kovac’s mind ran back to the business card on the rug just inside his doorway, the one that had been stapled to a single A4 flyer. There had been a photo of the twelve-year-old boy on that flyer. The one with the boy smiling, his arms draped over his friends’ shoulders. Kovac hadn’t read the bio but he did recall an appeal for information. Was this his “London Accommodation Pathfinder”?
The woman said: ‘My name’s Zoe Joannou-Clark. I’m a council worker.’
Kovac studied her face. A brunette with paper-white skin. Not pretty exactly, but young and alert. The sort of girl who topped the class in everything and was fed up with everyone else mucking around. The intense, lonely type.
‘I’ve been putting out flyers. I’ve been door-knocking. And I’ve been coming out here every morning, hoping you’d repeat your morning jog so I can –’
‘The police can’t do that?’
A strange look crossed her face. She was suddenly sheepish maybe? ‘No, they do. But…’ Her phone must have buzzed because she pulled it from her pocket, turned it to glance at the screen, then shut it off and pocketed it again.
‘But?’ Kovac prompted.
‘They’re not as invested in this one specific case as I am.’
‘And how do you think I can help?’
‘I think you can help me identify his killers.’
Kovac liked her accent, but not what she was saying. He casually scanned the park and river, but they were definitely alone. ‘I read about it like everyone else. But I wasn’t here and I didn’t see anything.’ He moved to step around her. He had said enough. Anything more and he risked getting caught in a lie.
‘Wait a second, just give me a second.’ Zoe stepped sideways, blocking his path. ‘Can I get your name at least? Your address and a few details?’ She pulled out the phone again and raised it, as if intending to take a photo. Kovac slapped it down, startling her. She almost dropped it, fumbling.
She took a few wary steps back. Her face was transformed. There was fear now, but also a new excitement, as if Kovac had inadvertently confirmed some deep suspicion.
‘Listen,’ he said, raising his hands in a show of innocence, ‘I’m sorry that the kid got shot. I am. But I don’t know you. And like I’ve said already, I can’t help you. So don’t go sticking some camera in my face.’
The path was clear now, so Kovac started putting distance between himself and Zoe. She went for her backpack, and something about the movement triggered an alert in Kovac’s reptilian brain. His hand instinctively went to the bottom of his windbreaker.
He half-turned back, and her head swiveled at just the wrong moment. She straightened in surprise, pulling her hand from the bag. It was empty. She had just been rearranging things and zipping up. ‘You have a gun,’ she said, nodding to his hand as it quickly released the bottom of his windbreaker. ‘Why would you have a gun?’
Kovac said nothing. He squinted at her, then checked their surroundings again.
Definitely alone.
Chapter 29
Zoe finally seemed to realize this too.
She said: ‘Actually, I think I’m confused. I think I have this all wrong. I’m sorry for wasting your time. I shouldn’t have listened to him, he was a kid.’
She picked up the backpack, placing it on one shoulder. It was still half unzipped. She turned and attempted a retreat.
Kovac knew she was baiting him. She wanted him to ask what the boy had said. She was testing his interest. And it was working. He couldn’t shrug the feeling he would be passing up on useful intel if he let her walk.
‘I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. I shouldn’t have bothered you.’ She rushed the words. She didn’t even glance back at him. She kept her head down in a show of submission and quickened her pace, hurrying away. ‘I didn’t think this through. It’s none of my business.’
Kovac didn’t want to pull a gun on a stranger in a London park but –
Screw it.
He raised his windbreaker and pulled his Glock from its holster. He racked the slide. There was already a round in the chamber, and this round spun out into the grass as a new round slid in. A bullet wasted in terms of ammunition, but it served a purpose. It created a distinct noise that stopped Zoe dead in her tracks.
She turned and stared at the gun. Kovac had it half raised, but now that she was facing him he lowered it slightly. He hoped the message was clear. Communicate, and you’ll be fine. ‘What did he say, Zoe?’
She slowly put the bag down and raised her hands.
‘Put them down,’ Kovac said.
She lowered them almost to her thighs.
‘What did he say?’
‘The boy?’
‘Yes, the boy.’
She looked around again, but it was just the water and low, fast-moving cloud. That and squirrels and birds. ‘A week before he died, he came to me. He was a great kid, but impressionable.’ She lowered her hands the last of the way, and her palms fell flat on her slacks. ‘He was desperate to get in with some kids who were on the edge of a gang. When you’re Christopher’s age, you just want to fit in, right? We all know how that feels. I worked with him, but only as part of my job. He knew what I thought of his friends, of the gang, but I was just some bureaucrat, some white woman who didn’t know his world.’ She paused, thinking for a moment, then added: ‘He did sometimes listen to me, though. Not all the time, but enough. I think he liked me. I was helping his mother with housing and she trusted me. Maybe because of that, he…’
‘He what?’
‘He told me this really strange story, which I thought was made up. It was about this boy, who lost his parents at a young age. His mother was Puerto Rican, the same as Christopher’s family. I think that’s why he connected with it the way he did.’
‘Keep going.’
‘Anyway, in this story, this boy, he joins a gang and becomes a killer – in New York.’ There was another shift in her expression. Some curiosity came back into her face, like she was interested to see how Kovac would react. ‘He’s really good at it, and somewhere along the line he starts doing it for money. For a lot of money. He becomes this shadowy assassin. Corporate, though. In one version of the story, he’s been a SEAL. In another, he’s Delta Force at some point. There’s some kind of military element, but –’ She paused, giving him a look that seemed to say “do you really want me to spell this out?”.
Kovac waited.
She rubbed nervously at her thighs.
‘Go on,’ he said, keeping his face implacable.
‘Christopher loved it. The last time I saw him, it was pretty much all he could talk about. He said that assassins were real and that an assassin made his way by killing other assassins.’
‘Made his way?’
‘Gains credibility, I guess. And I didn’t think anything of it. I mean, assassins…? C’mon. They’re in the C.I.A. maybe, but corporate? But then he comes to me with a stab vest and shows me a knife.’
‘For what?’
‘He told me there was an auction on the dark web – for this assassin’s identity. His boss was bidding. It freaked me out. Not the story, but the knife and stab vest. This is a kid we’re talking about. I told the police, and they hinted there was already some bigger investigation – which meant they couldn’t just step in and deal with it.’ She pointed. ‘Then Christopher gets murdered over there, with the exact same knife and stab vest. I mean, with the police watching. And all they could give me was a description of you and the vehicle.’ She swung her arm and pointed across the river, towards the boatsheds. ‘They were literally sitting in a car over there, wa
tching, and they couldn’t solve it.’
‘So you thought you’d dig a little?’
She glanced at the gun again. ‘I’ll drop it. I promised his Mum, that’s all. But I’ll drop it.’
‘You think it’s true?’
‘What?’
‘About the assassin?’
‘No. I think it’s something Anton Sanz told Christopher to get him to cooperate, to get him to do something he was too much of a coward to do himself.’
Kovac noted the name. Anton Sanz. ‘And what did this Anton guy want Christopher to do exactly?’
‘I don’t know. I figured he was just being used. To threaten somebody in a rival gang maybe, something like that. That’s why I told the police.’
Kovac put his pistol back in its holster without bothering to look for the missing round. He had everything he needed from Zoe Joannou-Clark, save for one thing. He started walking towards her. ‘Like I said, Zoe, I wasn’t here, I didn’t see it. I think you’re right to drop it, though. It’s dangerous being out here, especially at this hour.’
She took another few steps back. ‘Thank you. That’s good advice.’
‘Phone,’ Kovac said.
‘What?’
‘The phone you used to photograph me. Give it to me – unlocked.’
She hesitated, then unlocked it with her fingertip and threw it to him. Kovac caught it and checked the texts. There were a lot of exchanges with a guy named Alex Bain, who wanted some kind of work from her. They were negotiating a price, which seemed odd for a council worker. Kovac scrolled a little. Nothing from a “Sanz” that he could see. Zoe had made a call late the previous evening to a Virat Kapoor, and calls to another individual who was entered just as a number. Kovac scrolled through some more texts about meeting up for coffee, about a haircut, and about overdue car registration, then checked for social media apps. There was only Facebook and it looked like it was a factory install, never activated. It wasn’t logged in.
He checked the gallery and found a blurred photo of his hand. So she had been trying to get a shot of him.
Why?
He deleted it, and decided to dig deeper. There were photos of other women about Zoe’s age – friends presumably – then a photo of a laptop.
Keeping one eye on Zoe, Kovac zoomed in on the laptop. It had a Tor browser window open. He realized it was possibly a still of the auction Zoe had alluded to, selling his real identity. He saw there was a small countdown timer on it, reading 73 hours, 14 seconds. It was frozen in time because this was just a photo. The text said, “Package 234.89.er.” 234.89.er was a clickable link. But of course Kovac couldn’t click on it because this was just a jpeg.
Adding to his frustration, the way the photo had been taken he couldn’t see a Windows date or time in the bottom right corner. For all he knew, the auction was over.
Or not.
There were bids in a crypto currency he didn’t recognize. “SeiCoin”.
He checked for the web address, but it had been blurred out. The names of the bidders had all been blurred out too, along with any other identifying features, including timestamps for each of the bids.
There were eight bids.
Kovac realized Zoe hadn’t taken this photo. It didn’t make sense for her to take it, then blur out the address. Someone had sent it to her, with the address blurred out in advance.
‘Who sent you the photo of the online auction, the one in the Tor browser?’
‘Christopher.’
‘You said you didn’t believe him.’
She nodded. ‘It’s not hard to mock up a fake auction in Photoshop. My guess is Sanz. He made up that story about an assassin and used it to manipulate Christopher. This was his “proof”.’
‘Who sent it to you, Zoe? The number’s blocked.’
‘I told you, Christopher.’
‘Who’s Alex Bain?’
She frowned, as if she couldn’t understand Kovac’s behavior, as if he had lost his mind. ‘My line manager – at the council offices.’
‘If he’s your boss, why negotiate a price?’ Kovac asked this as he opened a browser on Zoe’s phone and searched Alex Bain. He got hits for a British TV actor.
‘You’re negotiating a price with Bain here.’ He waggled the phone, then added “council” to his search. He got another muddled lot of results, many focusing on Coronation Street. Kovac flipped back to the text exchange.
‘For a house,’ Zoe said, as a rowing eight appeared under Putney Bridge and slowly made its way towards them.
Kovac took the gun out again but swapped it and phone, so there wasn’t any chance of the gun being seen from the river. ‘Call out, and you’ll kill yourself and the rowers.’
The boat passed by. Eight young women rowing, and a coxswain giving instruction via a headset and speakers. No one looked across at the man and woman in the park, and the coxswain called for a push. She started shouting at the eight rowers and they picked up the pace. The boat immediately lifted and pulled away, leaving giant ripples in the water.
Kovac went on searching the phone, as Zoe resumed explaining her negotiations with Bain: ‘For a relocation, not for me. I do that every day. That’s the job, my job. I arrange housing for people who need it, and that takes negotiation, money.’
‘And Virat Kapoor?’
‘A guy I’m dating. Jesus, what is this?’
‘Why no Facebook?’
‘It’s my work phone.’
‘And yet Virat’s in here?’
‘I don’t like carrying two phones.’
Kovac noted the indignation in her voice. It was genuine. ‘He’s ringing the work phone pretty late, don’t you think?’
‘I gave him my work number, okay?’
‘Why?’
‘For if the other phone wasn’t answering. That okay with you? I work late. I worked late last night, anyway.’ She paused, as if hoping this explanation would satisfy Kovac. When he said nothing, she reluctantly added: That’s when he tends to call – late at night.’
Kovac threw the phone into the Themes. He nodded a final goodbye to Zoe, then holstered his pistol again and turned and resumed jogging.
He sent two squirrels scurrying for cover as he passed the site of Christopher’s execution and made his way up onto Putney Bridge. He only glanced back once, from a little over a quarter of the way across the bridge. He saw Zoe Joannou-Clark hadn’t moved. She was on her knees on the path, as if sobbing.
Chapter 30
Megan was on her phone as she served up breakfast for Kovac. He hadn’t actually expected breakfast, let alone hot eggs on toast, yet here it was. And complete with butter and hot coffee, no less.
A lot of these ingredients hadn’t been in the house last time he looked. He figured Megan had undertaken a morning excursion of her own.
She was focused on whoever was on the other end of the call. ‘Uh-huh,’ she said, pushing his plate across the table to him. ‘Uh-huh. No, I understand. Yep.’ She gestured for him to start eating, and turned away from him as she said: ‘Yes, but the thing I don’t understand is how she contributed to the coding team if she only joined the company ten days ago?’
There was another long pause, as Megan listened to what was presumably a complex explanation. It seemed to hit the mark, though, because she thanked whoever she was speaking to, hung up and sat down at the table.
Her own meal was just toast with a light coating of peanut butter. ‘How was your run?’
Kovac was still in his running gear, his sweat just beginning to turn cool on his skin. ‘Good. Who were you talking about just then? Griffin?’
‘Yeah. She lied to me. She’s a plant. She slipped into the company ten days ago. She was never involved in creating Aurelius. The software pre-dates her arrival.’
Kovac picked up his knife and fork. He cut off a corner of the toast and used it to burst the egg as he thought through the ramifications of this information. He said: ‘It’s already out in the world.’
‘W
hat is?’
‘The data. My identity. Some of it, anyway. Probably enough to put me in the crosshairs.’ He shoveled in the first mouthful, enjoying the taste of runny yolk and sour dough.
‘You mean your file?’
He nodded, shoveling in even more food. One taste and he was suddenly ravenous. ‘Details of my work as Kovac – for Curzon, for you.’ He swallowed so he could speak clearly. ‘Someone already knows, Megan. And I might be wrong, but I think they used an innocent, impressionable kid to try and catch me off guard.’ He stood and went to the trash. He fished out the flyer and un-scrunched it. Returning to the table, he passed it to her. ‘His name was Christopher Diaz.’
‘Was?’
‘He was killed.’
‘Your work?’
‘God no. It happened after he chickened out on killing me. I saw it. He was shot in the head.’
Kovac knew how it sounded. And he also knew protesting his innocence would make him sound even more guilty.
He went to eat more but realized talk of the boy had temporarily put the brakes on his appetite. He took a sip of coffee instead, looking to add caffeine to the endorphins from the run. ‘You sure about Griffin?’ he asked. ‘It’s not a glitch, a mistake? The hack has limited access to your own personnel data and presumably it’s –’
‘Juliette’s sure. She got the names and addresses of the rest of the coding team from HR, too. They started with us far more recently than Griffin suggested, and it’s not clear they were actually working on Aurelius – not even Griffin, for that matter – but they check out. Juliette’s going to text them through.’
‘By “check out”, you mean what then – you have at least some record of the names Griffin gave you having worked at Curzon?’
‘I guess, yeah.’ Megan took a sip of her own coffee, then took out her phone and placed another call. ‘The bodyguard Bishop gave me,’ she said by way of explanation to Kovac, as she waited for the call to connect. ‘I need to warn him we’re coming. He’s at the hospital with Griffin and Malone. We should’ve gone there last night, but I figured they wouldn’t let us in anyway.’
Kovac waited. He could hear it ringing, the sound small and brittle in the large room.