The Minders

by John Marrs

  “Are you okay?” asked Nora, turning to see what was capturing his attention. He returned to her and Zimmerman vanished.

  “Just a bit of hay fever, I thought I was going to sneeze,” Bruno said. “Are you as hungry as I am?”

  She nodded and they made their way back to the blanket, where Bruno unpacked his contribution of fresh vegetables, packets of cold meats, salads, dips, and rustic breads. As they ate and talked, he kept to the subjects of school, Nora’s recent residential adventure, and life in the town. Bruno hadn’t appreciated just how much he missed normal conversation, and there were moments when he began to forget himself.

  “Can I take the dogs for a walk?” Nora asked.

  “Is your GPS on?” Watson replied, and Nora pushed the soft skin on the underside of her wrist until a small, pale green light illuminated. “Okay, well, don’t go too close to the water. Your chair can do many things but floating isn’t one of them.”

  Bruno watched as she set off with the two dogs on leads, then became alarmed when as she turned a corner, Zimmerman reappeared. From behind a tree, he waved at Bruno, then followed her.

  You’re not real, you’re not real.

  “Have you made a decision on which school you’re sending Louie to yet?” Watson asked.

  She remembered his name. It had been an age since he’d heard anyone else use it. And he found himself wanting to talk about his son. He explained Louie’s limitations and his abilities, the objects that made him smile, how he communicated without words, and what Louie had taught Bruno about himself. Twice he paused as his throat tightened.

  He hated himself for it but he was drawn to Watson. Bruno even allowed himself a moment to consider what kind of stepmother she might make if their circumstances were different.

  “I’d like to send him to the Oundle Academy but I think it might be out of our price range,” he continued.

  “It is expensive,” Watson agreed, and dipped a celery stick into a hummus pot. “I couldn’t have afforded it had . . .” Her voice trailed off. She was self-editing. But Bruno already knew how the sentence should end. It reminded him that he wasn’t here to make life easier for her by changing the subject, so he waited for her to finish. “. . . had my husband, Mark, not died,” she added.

  “I’m sorry. What happened to him?” he asked.

  “It was the day that driverless cars were hacked. The vehicle Mark was a Passenger inside crashed into the side of a bridge. Only he wasn’t alone, he was with another woman.”

  Bruno’s heart thrummed at her admission, and images repeated of Zoe and Watson’s husband having sex in the car they later died inside. He thought he might relish Watson’s pain; instead, there was no satisfaction to be gained by opening the old wound. Still, he pressed on.

  “Did you know about them?” he asked.

  Watson shook her head. “No. We’d grown apart, but then all couples go through highs and lows, don’t they? I assumed we’d get back on track eventually. I should have tried sooner.”

  “I assume that Nora doesn’t know the full story? I guess it’s not the kind of thing your daughter needs to hear.”

  “No, she doesn’t. And she’s not actually my biological daughter. She’s Mark’s daughter from his first marriage. Nora’s mum died soon after she was born, then Mark and I met when she was two. I never formally adopted her, but after Mark’s death, there was no question that she was going to remain with me. I would do anything to protect her and safeguard her future.”

  Bruno contained his surprise; it was why he hadn’t found a record of Watson having a daughter when he’d first investigated her.

  A gruff laugh caught him unawares. “Would you like me to locate a violinist?” Zimmerman’s Echo muttered in his ear. “I’m sure I can find one who’ll play ‘Cry Me a River’ while Nora drowns in it.”

  Bruno was relieved when Nora appeared, unharmed, with the dogs. But for the rest of their afternoon together, her parentage weighed heavy upon his shoulders. The fallout of his alternative plan for Watson would hurt her daughter equally, if not more.

  “Mummy, can Bruno and Oscar come for dinner at the weekend?” Nora asked. Bruno tried to hide his delight—it was a way into her home and just what he needed.

  Watson blushed. “I’m sure Bruno has better things to do.” She looked to him as if hoping he hadn’t.

  “Actually, no, I don’t,” he replied, his smile rare but genuine.

  Later, they set a time and as they packed up the remains of their picnic and walked slowly towards their cars, he imagined Louie was with them and holding his hand. He watched Watson help her daughter, and then Luna, into the car before entering his own and holding his key to his start button.

  But first, he reached for his phone to check again for ReadWell messages; he was puzzled by a small red flashing circle in the top-right corner of his screen. The phone was not supposed to accept any form of incoming communication.

  The frosty breath of several Echoes in the car’s rear seats grew colder and they shuffled closer, all curious to discover what the icon meant. Hesitantly, Bruno clicked on it and a video began to play.

  A woman stared at the camera, her mouth gagged as someone carved the name Sinéad into her forehead with a blade. And as the blood seeped down her cheeks, a silver instrument was raised two, perhaps three, centimetres from Sinéad’s skull, then a button released, and almost too fast for the eye to register, something inside it penetrated Sinéad’s crown. Sinéad’s eyes opened as wide as possible and never shut again. Bruno replayed the message twice more to assure himself this was genuine and that he had not started a descent into madness.

  He hurriedly logged on to the message board and discovered Ariel’s message. It didn’t take him long to decipher that it was a warning that the original recall message was fake. It had been a trap and now someone had murdered a Minder. And in doing so, they had also killed off his chance to be reunited early with Louie. Bruno slumped in his seat, deflated.

  It took no time at all before his disappointment manifested itself into anger and all he could picture were the faces of the six people who had separated father from son. He detested every last one of them. They had all deserved to die. And so did Watson.

  He glared at her car through his windscreen; it had still not pulled away. She was a sitting duck. He reached for the hammer in the glovebox and withdrew it, threw open the door, and climbed out. Fuck the new plan, this is going to end now, he thought. And with his grip firmly around the handle, he rushed towards her.

  CHAPTER 53

  FLICK, ALDEBURGH, SUFFOLK

  Within an hour of witnessing a recording of Sinéad’s murder, Flick fled Aldeburgh.

  Earlier that day, her shift behind the bar had been a welcome distraction from the fake recall notice. If she was incorrect and it had been genuine, it was the first day of a life lived on borrowed time. Her only comfort was that she wasn’t alone. Following the warning message, Minders using the Shakespearean character names Bassanio and Cominius indicated they too would not be returning.

  Suddenly it struck her that if the notice was real, then her funding should now be cut off. She poured herself a mineral water and tapped her credit card to pay for it—it was accepted. Now more than ever she was convinced the withdrawal request was a hoax. But who had infiltrated their clandestine world?

  “I’m taking my break,” she told landlord Mick and made her way to an empty table in the corner of the room. Flick gazed out of the window and towards the dark clouds over the sea and the rain lashing at the patio umbrellas. The weather was mirroring her own unrest, or perhaps, she feared, it was a warning of something worse to come.

  As if on cue, her phone vibrated. The screen displayed a red circle, something that hadn’t appeared before. Hesitantly, Flick scanned the pub to ensure privacy and pressed play. And her stomach churned as, seconds later, she witnessed the first Minder
captured, mutilated, and murdered.

  With no time to think twice, Flick slipped out of the pub, returned to the B&B to pick up her emergency rucksack, and breathed in the post-storm air as she hurried through the rear garden and towards a gate leading into an alley. But Grace caught her preflight. She eyed Flick up and down, and then looked at the backpack hanging from her shoulder.

  “Are you leaving?” she asked, and Flick nodded. “But I thought you were happy here?”

  “I am, I was,” Flick replied. “But it’s time to move on.”

  “Why?”

  “It . . . just is.”

  “You’re a terrible liar.” If only you knew, Flick thought. “Come back inside and maybe I can help.”

  “I can’t, I’m sorry.”

  “Is it Elijah? Has he done something to hurt you?”

  “It’s nothing like that.” Flick threw her arms around Grace. “I’ve transferred cash into your account to pay for my room up until the end of the summer so you won’t be out of pocket,” she said with a trembling voice. “Please look after yourself.” Then she turned her back on her friend, allowing the gate to close behind her.

  Flick tossed her backpack across the rear seats of a driverless robo-taxi service she had ordered which was waiting for her several streets away. And as it pulled away, she wept for the life she was leaving behind. There had always been a risk she might have to turn her back on it at a moment’s notice. But when that moment arrived, it hurt like hell. She thought of Elijah and their fledgling relationship. She would never get the opportunity to explain why she was leaving; her only hope was that Grace could persuade him he was blameless and convey the pain she’d witnessed in Flick as she left.

  Flashbacks of her pre-programme existence flooded her memory, of how she’d turned her back on the career and people she had loved because of who her DNA was linked to. Three years of misery had followed, of self-induced solitude and clinical depression. The thought of returning to that person and that life suddenly sparked something inside her.

  “No,” she said. “Not again.” She couldn’t allow herself to be swallowed up and spat out by the actions of others again. History was not going to repeat itself.

  Grace was sitting in the garden of the B&B when Flick opened the door. Her friend’s eyes were glistening. “Have you forgotten something?” she asked, and Flick shook her head. “Does that mean you’re staying?”

  “Yes,” Flick replied, and as she dropped her backpack to the floor, Grace offered her a tight hug before leading her into the kitchen.

  “What happened?” Grace asked for the second time that afternoon, and poured Flick a mug of tea from a pot.

  “I can’t tell you,” said Flick. “And please don’t ask me for details because I don’t want to lie to you.”

  “Has it got something to do with why you left London?”

  Flick nodded.

  “Are you in danger?”

  “Yes, I think I might be. And I’m scared that if I stay, I might put you and Elijah at risk.”

  “I can look after myself,” Grace said dismissively. But neither she nor Flick knew who they were up against.

  “If I’m to stay, I need you to tell me if anyone turns up here asking about me.”

  “Like who?”

  “That’s the problem. I genuinely don’t know.”

  Grace nodded. “I’ll ask others for help too.”

  “They’ll want to know why.”

  “Then I’ll tell them you have a psycho ex-boyfriend or something. You’re liked around here, you know. People in this town look out for their own.”

  With just those few reassuring words, Flick knew she had made the right decision to return. Whatever threat she faced, she stood a better chance of fighting back by being in a community than by standing alone.

  CHAPTER 54

  EMILIA

  Pull over,” demanded Emilia.

  “I’m sorry?” Bianca replied, her view fixed on a tablet as the autonomous car continued moving forward.

  “Pull the car over now.”

  “That won’t be happening.”

  “I swear to God, if you don’t, I’m going to break every window in here.”

  “Good luck with that. They’re bulletproof.”

  Emilia’s rage reached boiling point. She had been trapped inside the car for thirty minutes and all she could think about was Sinéad’s mutilated body. She had to get out of that vehicle as a matter of urgency.

  Bianca sighed and signalled to Adrian to touch the dashboard screen. The car slowed, eventually pulling into a lorry park. Emilia pushed at a button to release the door lock but it wouldn’t budge until Bianca pressed the override switch. It was another reminder of the control they had over her.

  Outside, Emilia placed both hands, palms forward, against the side of a rig and lowered her head, taking in deep breaths.

  “Emilia,” began Bianca, now standing behind her. “If there had been any other way—”

  Emilia didn’t think before she acted. She turned around at speed, raised her right fist, and caught Bianca clean in her nose. Her other fist collided with what should have been Bianca’s rib cage but was instead something solid that she assumed to be body armour. It gave Bianca an advantage so she punched Emilia in the stomach, landing two more kidney blows before Emilia collapsed to the floor. Emilia was down but she wasn’t out. She kicked her leg and caught Bianca in the ankle, causing her to cry out loud. She was pulling it back to repeat the action on the other ankle when she felt a pair of hands under her arms dragging her away across the asphalt. “Enough,” snapped Adrian.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing, you dumb bitch!” shouted Bianca. It was the first time Emilia had seen her ruffled.

  “You didn’t need to kill Sinéad!” Emilia yelled.

  Bianca pinched at her nostrils to stop the flow of blood. “She wasn’t going to tell you a thing no matter how much you begged her. We were wasting time.”

  “Or you were scared that if you told me everything, I wouldn’t help you find the other three.”

  “Oh, I know you’ll help us find the others if you want to see your goddamn family again.”

  “How do I know they’re even mine?” Emilia argued. “You could have deepfaked them.”

  “You knew they were your family the moment you saw them,” Bianca hit back. “You might not remember them but something buried inside you felt the wrench. I saw it in your eyes.”

  “And to carve Sinéad’s name into her forehead? Why?”

  “As a clear warning to the others that we are coming for them.”

  “But it’ll have the opposite effect. They’ll bury themselves deeper.”

  “Or by shaking the hive, we’ll see what flies out.”

  “I saw the wound in the top of her head. Your people did the same to Ted—why?”

  “You just need to do as you’re told and stop asking questions.”

  “Why do you call them Minders? What are they taking care of?”

  “Did you not just hear what I said? Stop asking questions or so help me God . . .”

  Only when Emilia calmed did Adrian release his grip. She clambered to her feet and wiped her moistening eyes. A male voice took her by surprise.

  “Everything all right?” a bearded man asked through the wound-down window of his truck. He stared only at her as Adrian and Bianca fell silent.

  “Yes, I’m fine,” Emilia said, but he didn’t seem convinced. “Thank you, though,” she added before his vehicle pulled away.

  She turned to Bianca. “I can’t do this; I can’t be responsible for anyone else’s death. I’m not a killer like you.”

  “You don’t have the first clue who you are,” she snapped. Adrian placed his hand on her arm as if advising her to stop. She ignored him. “But I promise you this. The next ti
me you get slap happy, I will shut your family down once and for all and I’ll make you watch.”

  Emilia needed time on her own to process what had happened. And she planned to keep quiet with what she knew about the surviving Minders until she was sure how to use it to her advantage and not theirs.

  “Bianca,” said Adrian suddenly, his finger held to his ear as if listening to something. Both women turned to see his irises darting in all directions as images appeared in his smart lens. “Based on the description Emilia gave us of the park she found herself in where the tunnel ended, field ops scoured the area and detected a handful of Victorian storm drains. Only one of them led under the streets and stopped at a specific building. We sent a team but it’s vacant. So they used cameras attached to neighbouring buildings to identify everyone who had entered and left in the last nine to twelve months, cross-referred them to their national identity cards, and then searched for those who’d gone off-grid. There were only four who had stopped using their bank accounts and store cards, cancelled utility bills, no longer shopped online, had not visited a doctor or dentist, stopped paying National Insurance, and so on. Sinéad was one of them. We have photos of the three others.”

  Damn it, thought Emilia. But at least they didn’t know where to find them. Not yet, anyway. And the sinister smirk that crept across Bianca’s bloody mouth indicated what would happen to the others when they were discovered.

  CHAPTER 55

  CHARLIE, MANCHESTER

  The wind’s bitter sting felt as if it were penetrating Charlie’s skin and biting his bones. He tasted it with his tongue as it parted his chattering lips and ruffled his hair. Yet its chill wasn’t harsh enough to make him uncomfortable.

  Instead, he removed his jacket, jumper, T-shirt, trainers, and underwear until he was completely naked, standing on the roof of Manchester’s tallest hotel. His body shivered, but his disconnect from fear and pain remained. He had to push forward.