I scrambled up them, banging my shin on the edge of one in the process and slipping at the top, but I kept going because I could see her now at the end of the garden about fifteen yards away, clambering onto the roof of a shed that backed onto the fence, only just visible in the rain-lashed gloom.
I ran across the cobbles towards her, blinking the rain out of my eyes, knowing there was no way I could catch her before she disappeared down the other side. ‘Stop, please!’ I called as she scrambled across the roof. ‘I need that drive. It’s to save my fiancée.’
I slowed down and stopped, looking up at her with a pleading expression as she turned back towards me, and we stared at each other through the rain. And then her face softened and she reached into the pocket of her jeans, pulling something out and throwing it towards me.
I tried to catch it − even in the darkness, I could see it was the drive from this morning, still attached to the chain − but it flew over my head and landed somewhere behind me, clattering on the paving stones. I was down on my hands and knees in an instant, using the faint glow from the window of the ground-floor flat to locate it next to a plant pot.
The moment I had it in my hand, I felt a strange foreboding. Whatever was on this drive was extremely important to someone. Important enough to kill for. It also had something to do with the woman I loved, and I wasn’t at all sure I wanted to find out what.
Placing it round my neck, I turned round to see that Laura was gone.
And that was when I heard it. Loud and unmistakable, coming in my direction, only a few streets away.
A siren.
Ignoring my exhaustion, I ran back down the steps and into the flat. ‘I’ve got it, I’ve got it!’ I called out, racing into the living room.
But there was no Geeta. And no gunman either.
The room was empty.
44
Matt
If it wasn’t for the mess in the room − the glass on the floor, the sofa askew, the divot taken out of the wall where the gunman’s head had clocked it − I would have thought I’d been hallucinating the fight. It was hard to believe that, having taken the beating he had, the gunman himself was anything other than unconscious.
However, right now, all that was academic. Because the important thing was to get the hell out of there before I was discovered alone in the house of a witness to a murder, surrounded by signs of a struggle, and the police put two and two together and worked out that I was the suspect they were looking for.
Still pumped up with adrenaline, my face on fire from the shock of the blows I’d taken, I made a rapid decision to go out the front rather than the back. But as soon as I opened the door, I could hear the siren again, even closer now. It didn’t stop me. I raced up the steps – saw no police car or blue lights, but knew they’d be here any second – and took off down the street in the other direction, just as Geeta’s car pulled out of its parking spot, heading away from me.
I sprinted into the road waving my arms, hoping she’d see me.
She slowed down over a speed bump, and I got to within ten yards of her, but then she sped up again, taking a right turn, and I followed her, staying in the road, running as fast as I could now, knowing that if I was left out here alone there was no way I’d avoid arrest.
I knew why Geeta was leaving me here, of course. Because she believed what the gunman had said about me seducing Kate for money. Geeta and I had only split up a few months before I’d left on the travels that had led me to Sri Lanka and Kate, so it clearly hurt. And now she was making me pay for it.
I kept running. She kept driving. My lungs felt like they were about to burst, but fear kept me going. I could still hear the siren, although it no longer seemed to be moving, and I guessed they’d stopped outside Laura’s place.
And then, thank God, Geeta slowed the car right down and I ran round to the passenger side and half jumped, half climbed in, slamming the door shut as she accelerated once again.
‘Jesus,’ I panted. ‘Why did you do that?’ Even though I knew the answer.
She turned to me, her face alive with anger. ‘You lied to me, you bastard. You’ve lied to me all along. You were paid to get together with her. And don’t try to deny it. Because I know when you’re lying by now. God knows you’ve done it to me enough times.’
I didn’t say anything. I was still trying to get my breath back.
‘Well?’ Her eyes burned with fury, and I could understand why.
‘No,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t hired by anyone.’
‘And yet you had enough money to buy a ticket to Sri Lanka, intending to go round the world for a few months? I remember wondering at the time how you could afford it.’
‘And if you’d asked me, I’d have told you. I borrowed some, and I made some more from selling most of my stuff. What he was saying was bullshit, I promise you.’
I sat back in the seat, still panting, too tired to argue, but calming down as Geeta turned the car into the traffic on a main road with no sign of any flashing blue lights behind us. My face was beginning to hurt as the adrenaline faded, and I used my sleeve to clean up the blood around my nose.
She was watching me closely. ‘Do you swear on your unborn child’s life that you weren’t hired to meet her?’
I didn’t hesitate. ‘I swear it.’
‘If you’re lying about this, or anything else, then I’ll fucking kill you myself. Do you understand that?’
I nodded. ‘I understand, and I’m not.’
We were silent for a few moments, then something occurred to me. ‘I can’t work out how the hell the gunman found us. He definitely didn’t follow me to your place. There was a tracker on the rental car but the undercover guy removed it.’
‘Maybe they used me to find you.’
I looked at her. ‘What do you mean?’
‘The man in the photo on Laura’s phone. The one Piers met today to sell the flash drive to. It wasn’t a good photo of him, but that was the man I met at the Landmark Hotel. The one who hired me to set you up.’
‘Jesus. I was thinking the man today must be Kate’s kidnapper. Because the kidnapper knew about the meeting; he knew what time Piers left and when he’d be getting home. And most importantly, he knew that the drive he’d handed over wasn’t the original, so he had to have been there when it was delivered. So why on earth was he setting me up in a honey trap? I don’t understand it.’
‘Neither do I,’ said Geeta. ‘This is the kind of mystery I spent my whole career wishing I could get involved with.’
‘Except this time my pregnant fiancée’s life is at stake.’
She looked at me. ‘Do you really love her?’
I took a deep breath. ‘I know I’m flaky, I know I’m fickle. And I know I haven’t always been truthful. But yes, I love her.’ I looked at my watch. ‘And right now, according to the kidnapper, she’s got less than three hours to live.’
‘Did you get the drive from Laura?’
I nodded and showed it to her.
‘That’s what he wants, isn’t it? In return for her life? Whatever’s on it is the key to everything.’
‘It looks that way,’ I said, feeling a weight begin to sink down on my shoulders. Because I knew what Geeta would say next.
And she did. ‘Then we’d better take a look at it.’
45
Sir Hugh Roper
Put bluntly, the meeting with Tom had been a disaster, and had left me in a foul mood. I was no further forward in locating Kate, and at this point, so near to the end of my life, it was painful to see at close quarters how much my son truly hated me.
My mood wasn’t helped by a call from Edward, that pain-in-the-arse stepson of mine, who seemed to have an uncanny knack of phoning at the exact times I least wanted to speak with him, like he had some kind of app for it. He apologised for being pushy earlier in the day, and before I’d even had a chance to accept his apology, he’d opened fire with a spiel about the costings for the Rickmansworth project, specifically
the prices our boutique kitchen designers were charging. Like I gave a fuck. He wanted me to put pressure on their MD, Mike ‘the Prowler’ Fowler, who was a personal friend and former golf buddy of mine, to drop their prices by ten per cent, which I knew for a fact ‘the Prowler’ would never do. I felt like telling Edward just to fuck off and sort it out himself, but I couldn’t tolerate yet another falling-out right now. So instead I said I’d see what I could do and ended the call before the bastard could blather on about something else.
I’d got Jonathan to drive me round the streets of the West End so that I didn’t have to go home. It gave me time to think while I sat in comfort and watched people milling about under the bright lights of a city where I’d spent plenty of nights eating in the best restaurants, attending parties, drinking, having fun. Good times. But it all felt like such a long time ago now.
I tried Thomson’s number twice, but he wasn’t answering, which frustrated me still further, and then, as we were driving down Old Street, meandering towards the City − the place where I’d had some of my greatest triumphs − my phone rang.
I didn’t recognise the number but decided that, given the circumstances, it was worth taking the call.
‘Good evening, Sir Hugh,’ said a growling male voice, which unfortunately I recognised immediately.
‘DCI Cameron Doyle,’ I answered, only just managing to keep the contempt from my voice. ‘What do you want?’
‘I want to talk to you about your daughter, Kate. I understand she’s gone missing.’
I tensed involuntarily. ‘Who gave you that information?’
‘That’s not the question I’d have expected you to ask.’
‘Because whoever it was is wrong. My daughter is fine. I spoke to her yesterday.’
I’d been considering getting the police involved in this incident for a while now, especially as we were no closer to finding Kate, but the one person I didn’t wish to discuss it with was Cameron Doyle, a man who’d spent his career determined to destroy mine. He’d tried to tie me to various serious crimes he believed I’d committed, including the attempted murder of Kate and the murder of her then boyfriend, David Griffiths. And he almost certainly had an underhand motive for calling now.
‘Why don’t you give me her number so I can ring her and put my mind at rest?’ he said, with typical slyness in his voice.
‘I don’t give a fuck about putting your mind at rest, Doyle.’
‘Your daughter’s in danger and you don’t seem to be too worried about it. Which is a surprise to me, given that you’ve already lost one child.’
I was tempted to cut the call, but I needed to know where he was getting his information. ‘How do you know my daughter’s in danger?’
‘We have reason to believe she was kidnapped last night. During the course of that kidnap, a woman we suspect was a private detective employed by you was killed. We’ve just fished that woman’s body out of the River Thames two miles south of the cottage where your daughter and her fiancé have been staying for the past week, and her car’s been recovered thirty metres from your daughter’s rental cottage . . .’
As he droned on in that supercilious way of his, I tried to work out how on earth he knew all this. Only a handful of people were aware of the existence of the PI. Me, Burns, Thomson and possibly Obote, the bodyguard who’d absconded with Matt Walters. Perhaps that was why Obote had run off. He was a police informant. Or worse, an undercover copper working for Doyle.
But I’ve been around far too long to walk into this particular trap. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ I said, trying to determine how much Doyle had on me.
It didn’t take long to find out.
‘My understanding is that you offered a sizeable payment to one of your bodyguards, Clint Thomson, to threaten to kill Kate’s fiancé, Matt Walters, if he didn’t reveal her whereabouts as you were, and presumably still are, convinced that he’s involved in her disappearance. And please don’t bother repeating that you don’t know what I’m talking about, because we both know you do. And if your daughter’s in danger, I suggest you cooperate with us right now.’
But cooperating with Doyle wasn’t going to get Kate back and would just lead me into a lot of trouble. I needed to contain the situation, and the best way to do that was to get off the phone fast.
‘If you’re worried about Kate, I suggest you talk to Walters.’
‘We would, but we can’t find him. Do you know where he is?’
‘I’m afraid I don’t. Goodnight, DCI Doyle.’
I cut the call, then put a block on the number so he couldn’t reach me again. I wondered if they’d got Thomson. I hadn’t spoken to him in over two hours and, if they had him, it was possible he’d talk and implicate me. But clearly he hadn’t done so yet, otherwise I’d have been arrested.
I sat back in my seat and closed my eyes. It was all beginning to fall apart.
When I’d first married Diana, and Tom was born, I’d genuinely thought it was the beginning of a family dynasty. I’d wanted him to be part of a thriving business that stretched forward into time, becoming the most successful building company in the UK. And look how it had turned out. All the money I’d made had brought me nothing of use. I was dying. My precious daughter Alana was long dead. My son was an utter waste of space who’d spent a lifetime specialising in disloyalty and hadn’t even managed to provide me with an heir. The only flesh and blood I had left was Kate, and now she too was gone. And someone in what I would almost laughably call my inner circle had taken her. But who? Tom and Diana had both denied it vehemently, and yet they were the obvious suspects.
I’ve always been a man able to make quick decisions, but I was in a genuine quandary here. If Kate was being held because her kidnapper suspected she was responsible for Alana’s death and hadn’t been telling the truth about it all these years, then they would spend time interrogating her. That was what I would have done. But she’d been taken sometime the previous night, which meant the interrogation would surely have finished by now. It was a question of what they did with her next. Ordinarily my bet would have been that they’d let her go − for all their flaws, I didn’t believe that either Diana or Tom was a killer. Except one of them had almost certainly been behind the previous attempt on Kate’s life, and though they might not be killers themselves, it was possible that they’d hired someone who was quite capable of doing their dirty work for them.
But what could I do? Calling the police wasn’t going to help Kate. If Tom and Diana were behind it, they wouldn’t admit to anything. And I could no longer rely on any of my own people to find her, even with the promise of almost unlimited money.
But I had to do something. I’m not the sort of man who waits for events to overtake him. I almost picked the phone up again then and there and called Doyle to ask for his help. Almost.
But I didn’t. In the end, I broke my own rule and did nothing.
And that’s something I bitterly regret.
46
DCI Cameron Doyle
By the time I called Roper that evening, we were building up a picture of what had happened. We knew from Obote that Kate was missing − either kidnapped or dead − and we’d tentatively identified the woman whose body we’d recovered from the Thames as thirty-three-year-old Caroline Seed. Even though she’d been carrying no ID, the car we believed she’d been using was traced back to a London-based firm of private detectives, who’d verified her name. The firm’s MD confirmed they had negotiated a private contract with Roper’s former head of security, Nigel Burns, to provide twenty-four-hour surveillance on Kate and her partner, Matt Walters. It was clear that someone had killed Ms Seed and abducted Kate, but the problem we had was that we couldn’t get hold of either Walters or Burns.
Which was why I’d taken the decision to call Roper and urge him to cooperate. And it would have saved lives if he had. But he’d chosen to deny all knowledge of Kate’s kidnap, and you can draw your own conclusions from that. My conclusi
on was, and still is, that he had other reasons for holding back. Perhaps he was the one who was actually behind the kidnap. I can’t say for sure, but he has as solid a motive as anyone else. It would be a way of finding out once and for all whether Kate had been responsible for Alana’s death. He was clearly ruthless enough. Whatever he’s been telling my colleagues, I know that Hugh Roper is a narcissistic psychopath who doesn’t have a decent bone in his body. This definitely wouldn’t have been beyond him.
We’re back in the interview room with Kate now, Wild and I, ready to resume her version of events, but before she begins, I chuck her another of what the Americans like to call curveballs.
‘So,’ I say, we’ve suspected for a long time that your father was the man behind the murder of your partner, David Griffiths. We don’t think he planned to hurt you, but what happened was that you came home unexpectedly and disturbed the killer, who had no choice but to try to silence you. Your father’s involvement must be something you’ve considered?’
Kate’s lawyer is on this like a shot, demanding to know what this has to do with anything, but I just give her my stock answer to such things: ‘We’re just trying to build up a picture, that’s all.’
The lawyer keeps complaining, but Kate hushes her with a hand and makes it clear that she’s willing to answer all our questions.
So I sit back and wait for her to start talking.
47
Kate
After my kidnapper had put me back in my bathroom cell, he’d driven off somewhere, leaving me chained, cuffed and blindfolded – and that was when I started to think very seriously about the people who could possibly be behind my kidnapping, knowing that it was almost certainly the same person who had been behind David’s murder.
The most obvious suspect was Diana, my father’s first wife. A hard-faced bitch who’d never believed my denials of responsibility for Alana’s death, and who I remembered staring at me with dagger eyes as I’d given evidence in the coroner’s court. She’d be ruthless enough to come after me, I was sure of that. Then there was Tom, Alana’s brother. He hadn’t been in the coroner’s court, and in truth I knew very little about him, other than that he and my father didn’t get on and hadn’t done for many years. He had to be a suspect too, but less of one than Diana.
Kill A Stranger: the twisting new thriller from the number one bestseller Page 19