Hikers - The Collection (Complete Box Set of 5 Books)

by Lauren Algeo

  Marcus had a contact, Graham Proctor, who had a hand in putting together that team and had previously been a member of it himself. Brewer had asked Marcus to highlight how much they would benefit from someone more experienced. His friend had gladly sung his credentials to Graham – he was a bloody good ex-detective, he had over ten years of security experience, he still acted as a consultant, and he was sharp and driven. Graham had agreed to meet with him to see if he would be a suitable temporary addition to the team, on a consultant basis.

  ‘I still have no idea why you want this so badly,’ Marcus said. ‘I know the money is good – better than what I’m on. I’ve heard you can make up to £100,000 a year with all the overtime, but why would you want to? All those long hours and time spent travelling around. You should be winding down to an easy life, not starting something as stressful as this.’

  Brewer shrugged as casually as he could. ‘It’s just something I’ve always fancied doing. I’ve followed the security team in the media and I know I can bring something to them. It’s probably my last chance to do anything like this before I’m too old and I want to make a difference while I still can. It’s not like I’ll do it for long, Ellen would kill me.’ He gave a forced laugh. ‘I just want to help while I’m able to.’

  ‘Sounds more like a late mid-life crisis to me,’ Marcus smiled. ‘If it will make you happy though, and give you plenty of stories to tell the… umm, in your old age, then I guess it’s ok.’

  Brewer noticed the falter in Marcus’s words but didn’t acknowledge it. His friend had almost said ‘stories to tell the grandkids’, he was sure of it. There would never be any grandchildren for Brewer. It was a pain that he had come to terms with long ago.

  He sometimes wondered how different his life would have been if he and Karen had had a baby before she fell ill. That hiker might not have found him and he’d have a settled home life with family around him, maybe even a grandkid or two by now if they’d tried for a child earlier. It didn’t do to dwell on things that might have been. He did have a family – he had Ellen and Marcus and Trudy. Ella was like his niece. There was Mitch and his own little family. It might not have been traditional but he had been happy until this Daniel business.

  Brewer knew that Ellen thought of Lucy every day. She would have been in her mid-twenties now – her baby all grown up. Lucy might have been married and thinking about a family of her own. It wasn’t fair of him to mourn a child he’d never had when Ellen’s daughter had been so cruelly taken away from her. She’d had to suffer something that no parent should.

  ‘I promise, I’m not having any sort of crisis,’ was all he said to Marcus.

  The last two weeks had been unbelievably long and stressful. He and Ellen had both been having trouble sleeping and they were obsessed with checking the news. He bought every newspaper from the local shop in the mornings and they permanently had the news channel on.

  The coverage after Davenport’s death had been extensive then there was the funeral last week. Brewer had watched everything he could, looking out for glimpses of Daniel. He’d spotted the boy among the people streaming out of St. Paul’s after the service. He’d been with his parents and Brewer hadn’t been able to read the expression in his dark eyes. His face was neutral and there was no sign of grief there.

  Ellen had started a research board so they could keep track of the Connors family. They’d propped up the large corkboard in the dining room and it was covered in clippings from various articles and press photos. Brewer had pinned printed out biographies of the family to the side of the board too.

  They were due to move into Downing Street any day now and that was where Brewer needed to be. He glanced up at the clock on the wall of Marcus’s office, Graham would be arriving in five minutes and he needed to impress him. He had to get this job.

  ‘How did it go?’ Ellen appeared in the hallway the moment he opened the front door.

  Brewer couldn’t stop the grin from spreading across his face. ‘I don’t know for sure yet but it went perfectly, and Graham said he would recommend me to replace one of the more junior members of the team on a short-term contract.’

  Ellen gave a small squeal and hugged him tightly. ‘I knew you could do it.’

  ‘Fingers crossed.’ Brewer closed the front door behind him and followed her to the kitchen. ‘He’s a really nice bloke. We had a good chat about what I could offer and I gave my views on all the places where I think they could improve.’

  He and Ellen had made detailed observations of the team in preparation for the meeting and outlined a proposed system they hoped would impress enough for Brewer to get a job that technically wasn’t available. They’d specified that he would only be there temporarily as more of a consultant.

  ‘We had a coffee in the canteen afterwards with Marcus too and got on great. I think he bought into everything we planned,’ he said. ‘We just need to hope that he redistributes this other guy and gets me in instead.’

  ‘I’m sure he will.’ Ellen looked confident but Brewer still had a knot of apprehension in his stomach.

  Getting in was only part of the plan. Although he wasn’t intending to keep the job for long, he still had to do it while he was there. The role was going to be tough. He had to join a team of highly trained bodyguards and tell them all their shortcomings, which wasn’t likely to win him any friends. He would then have to travel around and actually protect Connors when all he wanted to do was get to Daniel. His opportunities to get close would be brief and he would need to figure out a way to get Daniel on his own.

  They still needed to get hold of insulin to use on the boy and he’d have to smuggle it around with eagle-eyed professionals watching his every move. It was daunting however they had no other option.

  Ellen made him a cup of tea while he changed out of his restricting suit. He felt much better once he was in a casual navy jumper and jeans. He sat on the sofa and Ellen passed him a steaming mug.

  ‘Mitch called again today,’ she said, taking a seat in the armchair beside the sofa. ‘I told him we’d call him back when you got home from work. I think he could hear in my voice that something is wrong.’

  ‘I guess we’ll have to tell him,’ Brewer sighed.

  They’d been avoiding Mitch for a few days. He’d sent them an email to arrange a Skype chat and followed it up with two calls. They’d pretended they had a really busy couple of days ahead but they couldn’t put him off any longer.

  ‘At least we can tell him we have a plan,’ Ellen shrugged. ‘He won’t need to worry when he realises that we’re already taking care of it.’

  Brewer nodded. ‘We’ll tell him that I’ve got the security job – he doesn’t need to know that we’re still waiting to find out.’

  They drank their teas in silence then Ellen fetched the laptop to make the Skype call. It was Wednesday lunchtime in Philadelphia but Mitch had told her he would be working from home all afternoon. They sat side-by-side on the sofa and waited nervously for him to answer. Ellen’s hand crept into Brewer’s and he gave it a reassuring squeeze.

  ‘I’ll do it,’ he said quietly.

  A second later Mitch’s beaming face filled the screen.

  ‘About time!’ he exclaimed. ‘I’ve been trying to catch you guys for days.’

  Brewer cleared his throat. ‘Sorry, we’ve been, uhh, busy.’

  ‘Too much wine celebrating your birthday, eh?’ Mitch wiggled his eyebrows. ‘I bet hangovers last weeks at your age!’

  Ellen forced a laugh and it sounded false to Brewer.

  ‘Listen, Mitch,’ he started, struggling to find the right words.

  ‘Hang on, I have to get something out before I burst!’ Mitch was clearly excited about something.

  Brewer’s stomach plummeted even before Mitch leaned to the side and held a photo up to the screen. He heard Ellen suck in a breath as she took in the baby scan picture. There was a tiny body nestled in the grainy black and white image.

  ‘Carmen is pregnant!’ M
itch grinned. ‘We knew when we spoke a few weeks ago but wanted to wait until the scan to tell everyone. I’m hoping for a girl this time.’

  ‘Congratulations.’ Brewer plastered a smile on his face but it made his cheeks ache.

  ‘That’s wonderful news.’ Ellen’s enthusiasm was stilted.

  Mitch leaned closer to peer at their image on his screen. They saw his eyes narrow in confusion as he registered their obvious discomfort.

  ‘What’s going on?’ he demanded. ‘I thought you’d be happy about the news but you look shocked. Ellen your face is really pale.’

  ‘We are happy for you, honestly,’ Brewer said. ‘We just have a lot on our plate and there’s something important that we need to talk to you about.’

  ‘What’s wrong? Is someone sick?’ Mitch frowned. ‘Shall I get Carmen?’

  ‘No, don’t get Carmen!’ Ellen cut him off abruptly.

  ‘Then what could it…?’ Mitch’s voice trailed off and Brewer saw his face physically drop as the possibility dawned on him.

  ‘Please don’t tell me it’s that,’ he whispered.

  Brewer was reminded of the scared young man he’d faced the Master with all those years ago.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he told Mitch. ‘We hoped it would never happen again… there is a child hiker here in London.’

  ‘But don’t worry,’ Ellen added quickly. ‘We have plans in motion to get rid of him.’

  Mitch stared quietly at his lap for a long moment before meeting their gaze via the camera. ‘How long have you known?’ His voice was much harder than it had been a minute ago.

  ‘Only a couple of weeks,’ Brewer told him. ‘We found out on the night of my birthday.’

  ‘And you didn’t think to tell me then?’ Mitch asked.

  ‘Of course we did,’ Ellen said softly. ‘We just didn’t want to burden you with this when you have so much going on, with Jayden and now the baby.’

  ‘That’s exactly why you should have told me!’ Mitch’s voice rose angrily. ‘It’s my job to protect them from things like this! Jesus, if they ever had to go through the stuff we did…’ He shook his head forcefully.

  ‘Mitch, we’re sorry,’ Brewer said. ‘We just wanted to get a plan in place before we dropped this on you, and we have now.’

  ‘Ok.’ Mitch’s taut face relaxed a little. ‘I get why you did it. I’m just shocked by the news, especially after the excitement of the baby.’

  ‘The timing is shit,’ Brewer agreed. ‘But we’ll have resolved this long before the baby arrives.’

  Mitch looked to his left then edged his seat closer to the computer. Brewer knew from their last visit that it was sat on a desk at the side of Mitch’s dining room.

  ‘Carmen is having a lie down. The morning sickness is rough this time,’ Mitch said. ‘You’d better tell me everything before she wakes up – I don’t want to panic her with this right now. How the hell did it happen?’

  Brewer took a deep breath and filled Mitch in on everything they’d learnt about Daniel – the moment they saw him on the live broadcast, how he’d forced the previous Prime Minister to kill himself, who his adoptive parents were, and their theory that he was one of the Grand’s descendants. Mitch listened quietly and Ellen could see how much the news had shaken him. They had all believed that this was over.

  ‘So I’ve got myself on Connors’ security team and I’m going to have access to Daniel very soon,’ Brewer rounded up the details with the little white lie they’d agreed to. ‘We just need to get some insulin and I can kill him swiftly.’

  ‘It sounds like a solid plan,’ Mitch nodded slowly. ‘Do you want me to fly over and help? I could bring some of my insulin?’

  ‘No, you stay there,’ Ellen told him adamantly. ‘Your family need you and there’s no reason to get dragged into this.’

  ‘Ok.’ Mitch chewed his lip reluctantly. ‘Well, if you do need me, just ask. I can courier some of my insulin over or something if you get stuck.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Brewer said. ‘We’ll keep you updated. I truly am sorry that we had to drop this on you.’

  ‘It’s not your fault.’ Mitch looked to the left again. ‘I think I can hear Carmen upstairs so I better go. Let me know when you start the job.’

  ‘I will,’ Brewer agreed.

  ‘And congratulations again,’ Ellen added.

  They hung up the call and she covered her face with a loud groan.

  ‘God, that was awful! How could we have told him that when he’s going to have a baby soon?’

  ‘We didn’t know about the baby and he deserved to be informed,’ Brewer shrugged.

  The day had left him feeling drained and he wanted nothing more than to pour himself a large measure of Jack Daniels and hide from the world.

  ‘Do you want another tea?’ he asked instead.

  ‘I need coffee.’ Ellen got to her feet. ‘I’ll make it.’

  Brewer checked the news on the laptop while she went to the kitchen. There wasn’t much going on, just a snippet about the Connors family moving into Downing Street that day. Daniel was in prime position now and Brewer had to get there as soon as possible.

  He picked up his phone from the arm of the chair, intending to call Marcus for any news, and saw that he had a missed call and a voicemail. He’d forgotten that his phone had been on silent since his earlier meeting.

  The voice message was from Graham, telling him that he was very impressed with their meeting and the SO1 team would love to have him on board for a short contract. He wanted Brewer to give him a call back as soon as possible to arrange the details.

  Brewer listened with a dry mouth. He’d thought he would be happy when he got the call to join them after all his effort – this was exactly what they needed to put the plan in motion – but all he felt was dread. It was real now. He was going to have to work for the Prime Minister and find a way to kill his hiker son. The pressure was firmly on him and he couldn’t mess this up, it would ruin too many lives if he did.

  ‘Scott, tea or coffee?’ Ellen poked her head around the door. She saw the phone in his hand and a look of hope flashed across her face. ‘News?’

  Brewer forced himself to smile. ‘I got it,’ he nodded. ‘I just need to call Graham back to officially sort the details.’

  Ellen’s whoop of joy pierced his heart – there was no going back now. He was in.

  Chapter 10

  Daniel crept silently along the corridor. He was directly above the room where his father was meeting with the heads of several banks. He ducked into a room on the right and closed the door behind him. It was set out as a living room although he had no idea who used it.

  Two pale-green sofas sat facing each other with a glass coffee table in the middle. There was an ornate, fake fireplace to the right and a wide window with floor-length olive drapes. Daniel took a seat on the second sofa so he could keep one eye on the door. He had a notepad and pen in his hand as a cover story but he didn’t really need one – everyone in the house was easy to manipulate.

  They’d moved to Downing Street the day before and everything had gone smoothly. They now lived in the private flat on the second floor of the large building, above No. 11 Downing Street. It had four bedrooms and large living areas. The downstairs floors of the building were used for meetings, events and conferences, and there seemed to be hundreds of people in there at any time.

  Daniel found that there were too many people to quickly pick through their minds and identify them. He couldn’t read the people two floors below him very well but he could isolate minds if they were directly beneath him and he focussed his attention on each individual.

  The living quarters in the flat were spacious, if not a little dated with flowery décor. Daniel had chosen Thomas’s room to stay in and his mother mistakenly thought it was a sign of how close they were. He’d been forced to talk to his ‘friend’ on the phone the night before when his mother had called Sara to see how they were coping.

  The conversation had been aw
kward, with poor Tommy close to tears for most of it. Daniel had wanted to burst out gleefully that he’d been behind Davenport’s theatrical death but he’d bitten his tongue and suffered the inane chat.

  Daniel opened the notepad on his lap and closed his eyes. His tutor was due to turn up in an hour for his first lesson in the new home and he wanted to gain all the information he could before then. He concentrated on the people in the busy conference room below him. Minds appeared to him like small bursts of energy. He could feel them as a physical presence that he needed to take hold of and ransack for what he wanted.

  The first mind he latched on to belonged to a young girl who was bringing tea and biscuits into the meeting. She didn’t like the way the men in there stared at her and she wanted to get away quickly. She was of no interest to Daniel and he pushed her mind away in seconds.

  A squeak from the door jolted him out of his meditative state. One of the maids came in with a duster and can of furniture polish. She stopped in surprise when she saw Daniel sitting on the sofa.

  ‘Sorry, I didn’t realise anyone was in here.’ She paused as she looked over him suspiciously. ‘Shouldn’t you be upstairs with your mother?’

  ‘No, I’m fine here,’ Daniel said firmly. He entered her mind swiftly to reiterate his words. ‘You’ve cleaned this room already,’ he whispered internally to her. ‘It’s empty. Move on.’

  Her face softened and she turned to leave the room immediately. Daniel knew his words had enough power – she would indeed think that she had cleaned the room and that it was vacant. He was far stronger than these meek, vulnerable people.

  He watched her walk out to the hallway and close the door behind her without a glance back. He closed his eyes again and focussed intently on the numerous minds below him.