The Spy's Daughter

by Adam Brookes

  “They found me. You know that, right? They will find us.”

  “No. No, they won’t,” said Mangan.

  Pearl looked at him. She seemed weirdly calm. Resigned? Mangan pointed at Patterson.

  “She’s really good at this stuff,” he said. “She’ll keep us safe.”

  “She looks kind of tough,” said Pearl.

  “None tougher,” said Mangan. But Patterson, buckling her seat belt, gave a dismissive little snort and shook her head.

  She got them out of the Tenderloin and took them west, down through Haight and Sunset, towards the ocean, watching her mirrors all the way. Pearl was silent, withdrawn. Mangan tried to watch, craning his neck, but could see nothing. She turned north, up through the park. Mangan opened the window for a moment, and the air was cool and smelled of eucalyptus. Patterson took them onto 101, and as they crossed the Golden Gate Bridge, Mangan looked across the Bay, the lights of the freighters flickering far out to sea. The horizon still held a last wash of pale blue, and the ships were tiny, dark insects beating out into the Pacific. No one spoke. Patterson held the wheel with both hands, tense, ready to react, her jaw clenched. Pearl seemed diminutive, blinking at the oncoming headlamps. Mangan wondered if she were in shock.

  Sausalito, Marin City, Strawberry.

  Patterson pulled off the highway and parked up in a side street for a while, a beautiful street full of mission-style houses in pastel colours, great profusions of flowers and lights twinkling through the vegetation, and ribbons of smell on the air—perfume, herbs. As they all sat in silence, waiting, watching, Mangan wondered how it would be to live in a place like this. He thought of the lives he hadn’t lived. Wouldn’t live.

  The motel was beyond San Rafael, next to the highway so they could get out quickly. Patterson paid for a room with cash, and Mangan realised he had ceded control to her almost completely.

  The room was decrepit, stained, smelling of mould. The door was flimsy and rattled in the jamb. Patterson left the lights off and drew the curtains. Pearl lay down on one of the beds, clutching her backpack as if it were a stuffed animal. Mangan went outside, lit a cigarette and inhaled, tried to stop shaking. Patterson came out.

  “Philip, you need to stay inside.”

  “Okay,” he managed.

  “I’m going out for some food.”

  Twenty minutes later, she came back with pizza, already cold, a layer of orange grease atop it. The three of them sat at the table and ate. Pearl only picked at it.

  “Pearl, do you have your father’s laptop with you?” said Mangan.

  She bridled. “I was wondering how long it would take to get to that.”

  “Do you know what’s on it?” said Patterson.

  “Everything, I think.”

  Mangan leaned forward.

  “Listen. I don’t give a shit about the contents of the laptop. But the people who are after you do.”

  “We can use it to bargain,” said Patterson.

  “They bargain? These people?” said Pearl.

  “Sometimes,” said Patterson. She stood up, went to the window, looked out. “Sometimes they do.”

  Mangan made them all tea from little sachets, and then they tried to sleep for a couple of hours. He lay in the darkness, listened to the girl’s laboured breathing, her muttering. Patterson lay like a statue.

  Mangan woke abruptly, disturbed not by noise but by some change in atmosphere, in emotional pressure. He sat up and blinked in the darkness. Patterson was by the window, her hand out for quiet. Pearl knelt on the bed, holding her backpack, rocking back and forth.

  “What is it?” he whispered.

  “Maybe nothing,” said Patterson.

  Pearl was shaking her head and started fumbling inside her backpack.

  He got up from the bed, walking in his socks over to where Patterson stood. She was absolutely rigid.

  “Pearl thinks she heard something.”

  Mangan looked out of the window, across the parking lot. It was empty, still.

  “I don’t hear anything,” he said.

  “No,” said Patterson.

  Mangan relaxed a little and perched on the edge of Pearl’s bed. The girl was still rooting around in her pack.

  Patterson went back to her bed, reached into her back pocket and took out her secure handheld. The screen came on, the silver glow throwing shadows on the wall.

  “Anything?” said Mangan.

  Patterson shook her head.

  “Nothing. We’re getting the silent treatment,” she said. “Don’t know what I was expecting.”

  Mangan turned to Pearl, who had gone very still.

  “Pearl, it’s okay.”

  She shook her head.

  “Really, there’s nothing there.”

  Pearl leaned forward and pushed something across the bed towards him. He looked down. In the gloom, he could barely make out what it was. He reached for it and found his fingers connecting with a stubby pistol. She fumbled in her pack again, and produced a spare clip and a box of ammunition.

  There was a moment of silence.

  “Well, aren’t you full of surprises?” said Patterson. But Pearl was kneeling, very still again, looking at the door. Mangan followed her gaze.

  And there it was, the faintest rattle of the ill-fitting door in its frame, and a tiny, fractional movement. The door was being tried, softly, from the other side. Mangan watched as the handle moved, ever so slowly, down a half an inch, an inch. He had a horrible, almost paralysing feeling of déjà vu.

  Patterson went to the bed, moving very quickly, very quietly. She gestured to them—shoes, things. She picked up the car key from the side table and gave it to Mangan. Mangan eased his feet into his shoes. Pearl put her backpack on and stood, slowly. Patterson took the Ruger from Mangan, eased the clip out, checked it, slipped the pistol into her waistband, and with astonishing speed scooped seven rounds out of the box and filled the second clip, the rounds slotting in with the metallic snick-snick. She leaned in to Mangan and whispered.

  “As soon as you see a chance, get out and run for the car. I’ll be right behind you. Okay?”

  “But—”

  “Okay?”

  “Okay,” he said.

  “You remember where the car is?”

  “It’s … it’s …”

  “It’s off to the right, in the corner of the lot.”

  “Yes, okay.”

  “You take Pearl and you run. Got it?”

  He nodded.

  The door handle was depressed now, and the door was creaking, as if someone were leaning against it from the outside. He watched Patterson move silently across the room and take up a position. She stood, poised on the balls of her feet, hands hanging loose by her side. The door rattled in its frame.

  Then silence. Mangan had hold of Pearl’s arm; he could feel her terror.

  And then the air ripped with the sound of wood splintering and the door was flying open and the room was filled with light which Mangan couldn’t explain or understand. But he saw Patterson kick and the door flew back on its hinges but wouldn’t shut because an arm, a torso was in the way, and there was a muffled grunt, and Patterson slammed the door shut on the arm a second time, and then she had hold of the figure’s head, an ear, and was slamming it against the door jamb, and then she was bundling the figure out of the room.

  And there was the gap.

  Mangan pulled Pearl across the room, but she was resisting, leaning back, too terrified to move. He could hear the sound of the fight outside the door, a cry—was it Patterson? He grabbed Pearl by the shoulders and propelled her to the door, hissing at her.

  “Move, Pearl. Now.”

  And then they were outside and the light was blinding, and he realised it came from a pair of headlamps trained on the door to their room. In his peripheral vision he saw Patterson. She was forcing the flailing figure back, and she seemed to be pushing him back onto a second man, and he saw her deliver a brutal knee to the flailing man’s crotch.
The man’s knees just went out and he was down, and then Patterson was leaping over him, out of the light and into shadow.

  Mangan staggered sideways looking for the darkness, but to the left—away from their car. Pearl was whimpering, but moving, and he tried to run and pull her along, his feet stuttering on the asphalt. Suddenly they were in darkness, but he’d been utterly blinded by the headlamps and couldn’t see anything in the dark and was disoriented. Where the hell was the car now?

  He changed direction and ran, Pearl keeping pace. He headed across the lot, towards street lamps, the highway, glanced back, trying to orient himself. An SUV was parked, its doors open, its headlamps lighting up the motel walls. He could make out shadowy figures, their urgent movements. Was Patterson still standing, or was that her on the ground, the others working on her?

  Dear God, where was the fucking car?

  “Use the clicker,” said Pearl.

  “What?” he said.

  “The remote key thing. Use it!” she said.

  Dear fucking Christ.

  He fumbled the key ring out of his pocket, thumbed the unlock button, looked around. Nothing.

  He did it again.

  And there, behind them, the flicker of orange as the car’s lights flashed. They turned, and ran, but there was someone there.

  And the someone was walking briskly, but calmly, to intercept them. Mangan slowed to a walk, and so did Pearl, and the someone was ahead of them, his hand up to stop them, and he was speaking.

  “Come on, guys. Hold up now, it’s over.” Male, speaking American English. It was too dark to make out his face.

  “Fuck you,” said Mangan briskly. “Get out of our way.” He took Pearl’s arm again and carried on walking.

  “Um, nope,” said the man. “I need you to stop now, and you’re just gonna come along with me.”

  Mangan was only feet from him now, and could see his face. He was a black man, well-built, in a sweatshirt and jeans. He had close-cropped hair and a little beard. The car was about thirty feet beyond him. Mangan kept moving, ready to push past, Pearl keeping up.

  “Sorry, dude,” said the man, and laid hold of Mangan’s upper arm with a grip of wrought iron. Mangan wrenched himself away and yelled, “Get off.” But the man still had hold of him and was walking with him towards the car, talking to him in a reasonable tone.

  “C’mon, man. You’re not going anywhere, so please just calm the fuck down and chill a little and let’s just take you and Pearl here over to talk to the boss lady, okay?” Mangan kept walking towards the car, the man pulling his arm to slow him. Pearl was looking at the ground. “C’mon, man, you’re being crazy now.”

  They were almost at the car and Mangan reached to open the door, got it open an inch or two, but the man stepped quickly in front of him and slammed it shut. Mangan stood there, breathing heavily, his stomach turning over, hands shaking.

  “Get out of the way.” He could feel his own voice quavering.

  The man made a regretful face and laughed knowingly.

  “C’mon, man.”

  Pearl had eased herself a few feet away from them and stood by the rear of the car, looking on, transfixed. Mangan thought she might be readying herself to run. But then he was aware of movement by his right ear, and the man was looking too, at a spot just next to Mangan’s head and the expression on his face changed from the faux regretful to the really quite seriously concerned. Mangan felt a flash of absurdity, as if he were at the centre of some comic scene, waiting for the reveal. He turned, slowly, and inches from his ear was the little Ruger. The hand holding it was glistening with what appeared to be blood. But it dawned on Mangan that the Ruger was pointed not at his own head. Rather it was being pointed over his shoulder at Mangan’s assailant.

  And the hand was attached to Patterson, and she was speaking, her voice unsteady, but determined.

  “Move away,” she was saying. “Move away now.”

  Mangan shifted his focus from the Ruger to Patterson’s face, and registered that it was a mess, blood coming from her nose and mouth and a swelling starting over her left eye. And then he looked over to the man by the car, and the man was raising his hands and was moving slowly, carefully away from Patterson towards the rear of the car, towards Pearl. And Mangan knew that behind his own fear and disorientation he was thinking quite clearly.

  “Wait,” he said. He stepped towards the man, who tried to back away from him. Mangan reached around behind him, searching.

  “What’re you doing, man? Get your hands off me,” the man said.

  “Shut up,” snapped Patterson.

  Mangan found a wallet, a set of keys, a phone. He took them.

  “Who sent you?”

  The man laughed.

  “Oh, man, you’re a kick. You think you on TV?” He chuckled again. Patterson stepped over to him and jammed the Ruger into his face, the tip of the barrel just under his nose.

  “Who are you working for?” she said.

  “Calm the fuck down, okay, I’m a contractor.”

  “Well, who is the bloody contract with, you idiot?” shouted Mangan.

  “Jeezus Christ. I don’t know, I just get instructions.”

  “What were the instructions?”

  “Pick you up. Deliver you and the girl.”

  “Deliver us where?”

  Patterson spoke. “Philip, we’ve got to go.”

  “Deliver us where?”

  “Just an address. In Oakland.”

  “What address? What boss lady? Is she there?”

  “What? No, she’s in the car.”

  “Philip.”

  “Is it Hopko?”

  “What? Who the hell is Hopko?”

  But Patterson raised her arm and brought the butt down hard on the bridge of the man’s nose, and he brought his hands to his face and staggered away, breathing hard and cursing into his cupped hands. Mangan felt a jolt of shock, revulsion, and Patterson saw it and turned away from him.

  “Move, Philip, for Christ’s sake,” she said. “There’ll be others. Now.”

  They drove fast, further to the north, and then turned off the highway and went west, towards the ocean. Mangan drove, Patterson tried to wash the blood off her face with a bottle of water and some tissues, and soon the front of the car was full of wads of used tissue paper, red and sodden.

  “Do you think you’re going to be all right?” said Mangan.

  She turned and stared at him, the one eye badly swollen now, and his whole heart moved and lurched.

  “Christ, I’m sorry,” he said.

  “So am I,” she said. There was no rancour in it. Regret, maybe.

  Pearl sat in the back, her knees drawn up, her eyes red. Mangan drove on. They barely spoke, and the sense of hopelessness in the car was palpable.

  “What are we going to do?” said Pearl finally. Her tone was flat.

  “We’re going to put some distance between us and them and then we’re going to figure it out,” said Mangan. And as he spoke he tried to muster a conviction he did not feel, and he knew its lack showed in his voice but it was the best he could do.

  “How, though?” said Patterson. “How did they get to us?”

  “You have a phone,” said Pearl quietly. “Or the traffic cameras, maybe. They’re inside the system.”

  “But—”

  Mangan spoke over her.

  “Or they were Hopko’s.”

  Silence for a beat.

  “What?” said Patterson.

  “Maybe they were Hopko’s.”

  “No, that’s absurd,” she said. “That’s …”

  “Unless it’s not.”

  He glanced over at her.

  “He said ‘the boss lady.’ He had to take us to ‘the boss lady.’”

  “No, no. He means Nicole, for Christ’s sake.”

  “You’ve been thinking the same thing, haven’t you?” he said.

  “What have I been thinking, Philip? Tell me.”

  He thought for a mo
ment, trying to get it straight.

  “That she’s using us against a Chinese network, and protecting that same Chinese network at the same time.”

  “I do not understand why she would do that.”

  Mangan thumped the wheel.

  “So why the hell doesn’t she want the Americans involved? Why not hand the whole bloody case to the FBI? Why does she want Pearl back so badly? Because …”

  There was another silence. Patterson sighed, then spoke.

  “Because she doesn’t want the Americans to roll up the network. She wants the network kept intact,” she said. “She wants Pearl and Pearl’s parents intact. She wants it all as it was.”

  “Go on,” said Mangan.

  “I don’t know. She’s protecting something.” She paused for a moment. Mangan could see she didn’t know whether to carry on.

  “Bit late for secrets now, sweetheart,” he said.

  “Don’t ‘sweetheart’ me.” She dabbed at her eye and spoke in a monotone. “I think she’s protecting an operation called BOTANY.”

  “Which is?”

  “I think it’s an agent in Beijing. A big one.”

  “But why would this agent—”

  “I don’t know, for God’s sake. But this American network is important somehow, it’s leverage or something. And it has to be protected. Maybe …”

  “Maybe what?”

  “Maybe if this network—Pearl, her parents, all the rest of it—gets rolled up, then BOTANY falls apart. And she loses whatever she has in the agent.”

  “Which means …”

  “Which means, Pearl must be brought back under control. Which means we are now the biggest threat to the network. We are the problem.”

  Mangan was silent for a full minute, the road winding into uplands in clear morning light. They were nearly at the coast. He felt jittery, wired, his thoughts coming hot and unfocused. Patterson was clearly exhausted and in a lot of pain.

  “I can’t do this any more,” Pearl said.

  Patterson turned around in her seat.

  “What does that mean?”

  There were tears on Pearl’s cheeks, and her face was puckered and raw.

  “They’ll find us again. They’ll find us again.”