She hesitated outside the room, shaking, her mouth so dry she could hardly swallow. Steve where are you? she whispered silently. Almost in the same instant she heard something. Again, she tensed, not knowing what direction it had come from, disoriented by her recent fright and the musty closeness of the narrow corridor. Again came the sound. Someone was whistling. And she could smell cigarette smoke, fresh, as if someone was smoking quite nearby. She crept down towards the end of the corridor. Now she could see that the corridor she was in ended at a T-intersection and the sound she’d heard seemed to be coming from around the corner to the right. Gemma crept to the end of the wall and peered around. Another corridor, but this time, she could see a small table and chair halfway down the hall beside another doorway. A cigarette was smoking itself to death on an ashtray on the table. She moved quickly and silently towards the table and the door just beyond it. She heard the sound of a man cursing and in that second she knew it was Steve’s voice. Keeping a lookout for the owner of the cigarette, Gemma ducked into the room.
Steve was standing in front of a mirror, shaving.
‘Steve! What are you doing?’ she said. ‘What the hell’s going on?’
Steve put the razor down and wiped his face with the towel around his neck. He turned to her, his eyes raised casually to a point above her head.
‘You shouldn’t be here,’ he said in a low, toneless voice.
‘I saw you,’ she said. ‘I thought you were nearly dead.’
She looked around. The room they stood in looked very different from what she remembered. It had a bed and desk and through a sliding door, Gemma could see a small shower recess. It reminded Gemma of the self-contained units of hospitals or hotels where staff sometimes stay overnight. Gemma stood in shocked silence. Steve seemed perfectly at home here in the monster’s lair, whistling and shaving as if everything was quite normal.
‘That’s a camera up there,’ Steve said, pointing the razor at the top of the doorway. ‘They’ll be on their way down now. You shouldn’t have come in here. It was crazy.’
Behind his words, Gemma could hear the boots thudding upstairs.
‘Steve,’ she whispered. ‘Tell me it isn’t true. Tell me what I’m thinking isn’t true. Please.’
She was almost in tears. Now she could hear the shouting and the thudding getting closer and closer.
‘Gems, I’d like to be able to help you,’ Steve said, ‘but really there’s nothing I can do.’
‘You bastard!’ she cried. ‘You’ve done a deal with Fayed, haven’t you!’
He frowned. ‘I hope you’re not armed.’ He darted forward and as she dropped her hip and reached behind her for the weapon, he had her wrist in a crushing hold.
‘Drop it,’ he whispered. ‘Now.’
He wrenched the Glock from her fingers. Gemma stared in disbelief, her crushed hand helpless as he shoved the gun out of sight and turned back to the mirror. The footsteps thudded closer. Although it was useless, she looked around but there was nowhere to hide.
‘I can’t believe this is happening,’ she said. ‘I can’t believe that you could do this. I put my life on the line to come in and get you out of here. And you just—’ She was beyond words, beyond heartbreak.
Steve shrugged and affected a rueful look. ‘You shouldn’t have,’ he said. ‘I told you to stay away. I thought I made it very clear the other day at Lorraine’s.’
Gemma felt one last desperate surge of hope, that Steve was still true to her, and just playing for time.
‘Steve,’ she whispered. ‘Tell me what’s going on.’
But before he could answer, two huge men burst into the room and Gemma was grabbed, fingers bruising into her upper arms. She felt all the fight go out of her. It wasn’t just the overwhelming odds; it was the final blow—the defection of the man she’d loved and been faithful to, in her fashion, for years. All the while, Steve continued to shave, whistling as he did, barely looking around when a voice shouted down the corridor and George Fayed materialised at the doorway, smaller than he’d appeared on television.
‘Let’s have a look at what we’ve got here,’ he said, his voice aggressively Australian in its accents.
He wore a silver-grey bespoke suit and his heavy eyebrows hid eyes that Gemma couldn’t read in the dim light of the underground corridor. She stared defiantly at him, determined not to reveal how scared she was feeling, how her heart was breaking over her faithless man.
‘Let’s see what a licensed private investigator looks like. Of the female variety.’ He said the last words with withering contempt.
‘We look a damn sight better than you,’ she said.
‘I patted her,’ said Steve, turning casually from his shaving. ‘She wasn’t carrying.’
The lie caused pieces of Gemma’s heart to stir.
‘I don’t like people breaking into my place,’ Fayed said, moving too close, sharp jabbing fingers feeling around her body. He stepped back, satisfied she was unarmed. ‘You have absolutely no right to be here. Even the police try to find some reason for their pathetic warrants.’
Gemma felt the grip on her arms relax a little. She looked across at Steve. He ignored her.
‘Apparently you thought this man was being held here against his will,’ said Fayed indicating Steve. ‘Does it look like that to you?’
Gemma said nothing.
‘Tell me. Does it?’
He let the silence answer as Steve completed his shaving, splashed his face with water, wiped it with the towel and then applied some cologne. The scent of it reached Gemma: it was the exotic fragrance she’d smelled on him in her bed.
‘So now I get it,’ said Fayed. His smile made his eyes look even colder. ‘You’re the ex-girlfriend.’ He stepped back, glancing across at Steve. ‘I’ve gotta say Lorraine’s a great improvement, mate.’
Gemma tightened her jaw and throat, determined not to let her heartbreak show. ‘I’m not here as this man’s ex-girlfriend,’ she said in as tough a voice as she could muster. ‘I’m here as part of an operation to bust you, Fayed. You’ve got no show at all.’
Gemma stared at Steve. As if reading her thoughts he turned to her. ‘I don’t live in your world anymore, Gemma,’ Steve said in a flat voice. ‘That world never did a damn thing for me.’
The grip on her arms became sharp as Fayed jerked his head and the bodyguard practically lifted Gemma out of the room and down the corridor, pushing her towards another doorway. Gemma struggled but it was useless. She could hear Steve’s footsteps behind them.
‘You know,’ said Fayed with the same cool display of contempt as before, ‘you’ve really made things very difficult for yourself. And for me. Those threats to call the police in here are quite distressing for me and my family. If they do come here, they’ll find nothing. I have interests in Indonesia who own houses where a woman like you can be put to work. For a while, at least. White women tend to age quickly in the tropics. Especially if they have a drug habit.’
‘No!’ said Gemma. ‘We had a deal. I called the police operation off.’
‘Shut up, bitch.’
‘You bastards!’Gemma screamed at them all, seething with helplessness.
Fayed gestured. ‘Medication for the lady, please. She’s getting overexcited.’
Gemma saw the largest bodyguard pull out a plastic packet. She stared harder. It was a loaded fit.
‘Give her a good whack,’ said Fayed. ‘Knock her out till I decide what’s the best thing to do with the interfering little moll.’
Her eyes pleaded with Steve’s impassive stare as she struggled against her captors.
‘You’re going to pay for this!’ she screamed. ‘People like you think you can get away with murder.’
She was lifted bodily, crushed in the hostile embrace of the bodyguard, thrown into a windowless
room just like one of the sacks that covered the floor. Still held in the same vice-like grip, Gemma could only watch while a tourniquet was applied to her arm and a brimming syringe held up before her. Please let the Naltrexone work, she prayed, as the man approached her, his face as impassive as fate. She shuddered as the needle stung its way into her arm. Something surged through her, a dark, alien energy. She felt her knees wobble and had only a glimpse of the stacked shelves as she fell and the light went out. The door was slammed shut, she heard it being locked and then she was left in the darkness.
Gemma lay there, stunned by everything that had happened in the last few minutes. She rolled over onto her stomach and cried. Steve was lost. Instead of just visiting the realms of hell, as the job required, bringing back the information he’d been entrusted with, he’d made the decision to take out citizenship.
She couldn’t tell if the terrifying imbalance she was experiencing was because of emotional or drug overload. She stumbled around in the dark, feeling her way with her hands. She fell heavily over something and lay there a moment, overwhelmed by grief, anger and fear. She pulled herself up until she was half-lying, half-sitting across some of the sacks she’d noticed before the light went out. She waited, trying to determine how she felt, whether she was about to be whirled away on heroin’s outrageous ecstasy, or knocked out by sheer emotional pain. She became aware that the sacks she was sitting on seemed to contain some lumpy material but she couldn’t work out what it was, although it smelled strangely familiar. She felt her way to a clear piece of floor and sat down, shivering, wishing she’d worn warmer clothes. She wondered if there was a camera in here and if so whether it was one of the mysterious murky rooms she and Mike had already seen in the van. Would he recognise her human shape in the coloured blobs on his screen? She scrambled to her feet at sounds from the corridor. Running footsteps and shouts outside. The door suddenly rattled and Gemma dived to the floor and sprawled there, eyes closed, as the door opened. Voices yelled orders.
‘Get rid of her!’ Fayed’s yell pierced the melee. ‘Lock her up with the aura.’
Gemma shuddered at the words. What did he mean? Was ‘aura’ the code name of some death-ray? Being sealed up reminded her of ancient pharoahs, or desiccated vestal virgins mummified in tombs. She tried to control her breathing so that she might pass as unconscious. Breathing in deep also served to calm her. I’m supposed to be stupified, she thought. And it’s not far wrong. She was aware of someone coming in, nudging her body with a toe, then half-carrying, half-dragging her out of the room.
Gemma fluttered her eyelids to see. One of Fayed’s bodyguards was hauling her along towards the door, behind which Gemma knew snakes writhed. It took every ounce of willpower for her not to scream and struggle. She could at least hope that the door of that room would remain unlocked so she could escape. She stayed floppy, a posture made more realistic by the relief that surged through her as they passed the door to the snake room. Now the bodyguard hauled her out of the corridor and into the underground car park. The man let her slide to the ground and she heard the sound of a door being unlocked. He opened a doorway concealed in a recess in the bedrock and unnoticed by Gemma until now, near the workshop area. But before she’d finished working out how to dive sideways and roll towards the workshop area, the man had shoved her through the half-opened door and slammed it shut again.
All was silent. Despite the fact that they were underground in winter, the air here seemed sticky and humid. She groped around the walls to find she was in some sort of cellar carved out of rock. A repulsive stench filled her nostrils: the odour of rotting meat, made even more disgusting by the sickly warmth of her prison.
For a few moments she sat huddled against the wall, trying to make sense of her surroundings. Something moved in the murkiness, reminding Gemma again of the huge looming shape she’d seen on Mike’s screen. Her mouth went dry and this time she knew it wasn’t Naltrexone or heroin. It was terror. There is something in here with me, she realised. Despite the shock and pain of Steve’s cruel rejection and betrayal, her survival instincts sounded a desperate alarm. She froze, straining to see in the dark, to listen in the surrounding stillness. Nothing moved or made any sound and the stink was overwhelming. I’ve got to get out of here, a panicky inner voice screamed. Gemma recalled the areas covered by Fayed’s surveillance. This room had been shrouded in darkness, though a murky shape moved in it, like the backdrop to a nightmare. Despite her fear she seized on this thought. If we couldn’t see what was in here when Mike had it up on his screen, then I can’t be seen either, she thought. Fayed’s system can’t pick me up on the security monitors. Hope allayed her tension. I’ve got a chance of getting out of here, she realised. Carefully, she tried the door. It was locked. She felt around in her pockets for something, some weapon, some tool. But she knew Fayed’s locks would be sophisticated and her skills were far from advanced.
Her attention was diverted by a series of loud noises from above. Angie, is that you? Are you in? Gemma prayed. Then she went cold when she remembered that Steve was now an enemy. She quietened the confusing emotions this knowledge caused by listening intently to the growing uproar. The crashing sounds in the building around her were growing to a crescendo of thudding footsteps and shouting. Beyond the door that locked her in, she could hear cars revving up. Then the noises stopped. In the silence that followed Gemma jumped as she heard a terrible sound, a guttural coughing, coming from somewhere in the cellar. She froze. For a second, she imagined a huge carnivore, a powerful tiger, five times her weight and size. ‘Lock her up with the aura’, she’d heard Fayed yell. But he hadn’t been referring to a death-ray. Gemma recalled Fayed’s logo, the stylised golden lizard, and the name of his company, ‘Oradoro’. And it didn’t mean anything like El Dorado, the city of gold, she now realised. It meant ‘golden ora’ and the ora, she knew, was the huge carnivorous monitor lizard of Indonesia, the komodo dragon.
Gemma stared blindly into the darkness, rigid with terror, imagining the sudden pounce of the enormous reptile, being knocked to the floor, torn open. Oh God, she thought. I’ve got to get out of here.
She jumped to hear a sound behind her. The door was being unlocked. She spun around. A man stood outside the partly opened door and in the dim light behind him, Gemma could see it was Steve. She pressed back against the wall. My God, she thought, he’s come to kill me. I’m the only witness to his treason. Desperately, she tried to press herself further away from the entrance. Steve peered into the cellar, his eyes still unaccustomed to the dark, and Gemma stayed motionless. He hadn’t seen her.
‘Gemma,’ he called. ‘It’s me. Come on.’
She shrank back further into the gloom, wishing there were more recesses to hide her.
‘Hurry,’ he said. ‘You’ve got to get out of here.’ His eyes suddenly focused and she realised he’d seen her, flattened though she was against the projecting rock face.
‘Why?’ Gemma’s voice was a whispered scream. ‘What are you planning next?’
‘Gemma, come on! You’ve got to get out.’
‘So you can betray me again? Shoot me this time? With me out of the way, you can just go back to Ian Lovelock and your job. Tell them some bullshit, maybe even get decorated. You treacherous, two-faced bastard!’
‘Just come on!’ he yelled, lurching forward to grab her, ‘or we’re both dead. There’s a glass screen in here that operates just like in the banks,’ he said. ‘If it goes down and you’re still in here, you’ll die. Come out!’
‘Bullshit!’ she said, ducking backwards and avoiding his grasp.
Steve cursed and half-came into the cellar, his hand out, attempting to drag her out by force.
She fought with him. ‘I’ll take my chances with the reptiles,’ she said furiously. ‘They’d be more trustworthy than you.’
Gemma stopped struggling and measured up the distance. If she could get to the exit, s
he could still get out of this situation. There was another growl behind her and she twisted round, still held fast in Steve’s grip. It was too dark to make out anything in detail but her peripheral vision alerted her to movement somewhere in the murky darkness. She twisted back to face Steve, unable to see his features in the gloom.
‘Fayed’s sent you to deal with me, hasn’t he?’ she said. ‘You’re here to kill me. Otherwise why hasn’t anyone noticed that this door’s open?’
‘Christ, Gemma. There’s a full-scale joint raid happening up there. Fayed’s got other things on his mind just now,’ said Steve.
Gemma strained to listen. It now sounded as if all hell had broken loose. The entire building, right down to its footings and bedrock was throbbing with ground reverberation as the staccato chop of helicopters sounded. The bastard’s telling the truth about that, at least, she thought. This sounds big. Must be Federal, State and everything else.
‘Come on, woman. It’s like the fall of Saigon upstairs. Hurry while we can still get out of here alive.’
Gemma barely heard him. ‘I called off that raid because Fayed said he’d kill you.’ Her voice faltered. ‘I came in here to get you out. I risked my life for you,’ she said in a whisper.
‘Don’t waste it then,’ he said, ‘on being completely fucking stupid.’
She was irresolute.
‘If you don’t believe me, turn around,’ said Steve. ‘I’ve been trying not to stir it up, but take a look behind you.’
Gemma stood facing him. ‘No way am I going to make it easier for you,’ she said, barely able to speak for the tears. ‘If you’re going to shoot me, do it while I’m facing you.’
She saw his flank drop and his hand move towards his jacket. Gemma dived to the ground, rolling away, uselessly closing her eyes against the bullet. It didn’t come immediately. She opened her eyes to see that Steve was standing holding a powerful torch ahead of him so that light shone into the recesses of the sandstone area in which she’d been imprisoned. She was surprised to see no weapon. She followed the beam of light as Steve moved it around. For a few seconds, she couldn’t see anything except the reflections from the glass wall ahead that sealed off half the area in which she now stood. Adjusting to her focus, her vision penetrated the reflecting wall. Something moved in the darkness behind the glass.
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