Sophie shook her head slowly. “No,” she muttered, “it’s not the same.” She sniffed and wiped the moisture from her eyes. She felt tears were threatening to come. “We are different, you and I – and not just because people can’t see me. You were lucky; you’ve had a mother’s love and a father’s closeness. All I’ve ever known of love is what our father has given me, and most of that has been part time – that’s all he could ever spare.”
“Our mother is a kind, loving person. She would have loved you had she known about you,” Meredith reasoned.
Sophie closed her eyes and fought the urge to tell her nine-year-old sister the truth, but how do you? How do you tell a child that their mother had carried out the shameful act of abandoning their sister in the delivery room? She couldn’t. Instead, Sophie just gave a reassuring smile and lied: “I guess you’re right.”
Stanley returned with a plate of food and a bottle of Dr Pepper shortly after; a slab of bread, a selection of cheese, meats (mostly ham but a little chicken), and fruit, together with a big family size bag of tangy cheese flavoured Doritos.
Both girls looked at Stanley, confounded by the amount of food he’d pilfered from the larder.
“I guess Slocum didn’t eat it all,” giggled Meredith.
“I don’t think any of this will get missed,” Stanley said. “If it does, we’ll just blame her.”
“Where was the old bat anyway?” asked Meredith.
Stanley shrugged. “I wasn’t looking for her. I think she was in the living room on the phone; probably making a long distance call on our parent’s phone bill. Probably Australia. I would.”
“Thanks Stanley, I think this will keep me going for a few hours.” Sophie started to feast, tearing chunks of bread and cheese and eating them unabashedly without a care. “I’m SO hungry,” unapologetic, she spoke with a mouth half-full. She opened the Doritos and pulled out a great, big, dirty handful of orange tortilla chips. Opening the Dr Pepper, she followed her mouthful of food down with a deep swig from the bottle. Meredith was glad to have taken off the glasses, excusing her from her sister’s loathsome eating manners.
The Dr Pepper was very gassy and it wasn’t long before Sophie apologised for emitting the longest, loudest belch a girl could ever expend.
Meredith and Stanley both laughed.
“Excuse me!” she sniggered. “Better that end than the other.” She followed it with a smaller burp, giggling. “So sorry!”
Chapter Seventeen
Cooper
The car was very nondescript, a small Ford KA, graphite-grey, parked at the start of the cul-de-sac between a VW Golf and a Vauxhall Zafira. The Ford looked ordinary, no different to any of the other town and family cars parked along either side of the road. This was how it was intended, a camouflage to allow maximum advantage of surprise − unlike the big black armoured SUVs favoured by the corporation and government agencies. A green Magic Tree air freshener dangled from the rear-view mirror, its fragrance long faded − as had its colour, now sun bleached.
The sole occupant of the KA looked like a leaflet distributor or a window cleaner, scruffily dressed in faded jeans, an off-white T-shirt and Converse trainers. He was young − early twenties − and clean shaven. His hair was swept back and slick with gel. In one hand he held a mobile phone to his ear, in the other a small, but powerful, pair of night vision/thermal signature binoculars. The man was looking through the twin eyepieces towards the house at the end of the cul-de-sac at the top of the hill. Having arrived over an hour earlier, his job was nearly done.
“I followed her into Seacrest to a house called Willoughby Rising. It’s a nice place at the top of a hill, big garden out back, a good view of the sea. A sort of well ta-do kinda place.” He spoke airily and cheerful. He was a man who enjoyed his job.
“I’m not looking to buy the place, Cooper,” the voice cut in testily, “is she there?”
The KA driver continued: “I can’t be sure, but I think so. It looks like our host’s hideout. A very good location with a good view of the approach.” He did nothing to mask his genuine admiration towards George Jennings’ choice of refuge.
There was momentary silence, then: “Good work Cooper.” The voice at the end of the phone was sandpaper rough. “Bravo Team is en route to you as we speak − and I’m not far behind either. On their arrival I will give you your next orders. For now, just sit tight and keep watching. Let me know if anything changes. If the girl starts moving, keep your distance, but follow − do nothing to panic or alert her. This is the closest we’ve ever come to capturing her.”
The KA driver sighed. “Understood sir.”
“And Cooper – she’s very talented and dangerous. There’s no promotion or advancement in pay for heroics, just a hospital bed or pathologist’s meat counter.”
The news of Dominic Schilling came to mind, a man who, though two or three pay grades higher in status, through either ill-informed judgement or stupidity, was no longer in the game. Word had filtered through that the former marine’s charred remains had been found in his car a little earlier that day.
Still, good for me, Cooper thought, the voice in his head as cheery as his own; had Schilling not been barbecued inside his car, he’d be sitting here instead.
Before Cooper could reply further the mobile connection was lost, the call concluded. He tossed the HTC Smartphone to the passenger seat and continued to watch the house at the top of the hill through the binoculars. Occasional movement could be seen beyond the upstairs’ windows, a few silhouettes and shadows flitting just within view, but little else.
Patiently, he continued to monitor and observe, awaiting the arrival of Bravo Team. The sun was still hot despite its rapid descent down the sky, the early July afternoon nearing its end. Until that moment, Cooper hadn’t noticed how much he’d perspired and how sweaty his T-shirt looked. Were he to climb from the Ford KA, his appearance would certainly be noticed and probably commented upon, despite it being a natural look for someone so hot and uncomfortable. He raised his free arm and sniffed beneath his pit, ruffling his nose in disgust at the stale body odour and rueing the decision not to keep a can of Lynx in the glove compartment.
“I must remember to change when I get back to the office. Maybe a cool shower,” he muttered and returned his attention back to the house at the top of the hill.
Bravo Team wouldn’t arrive for another hour. Cooper was growing more and more bored by the second. Half an hour passed and he heard himself yawn. To keep awake he removed a chocolate bar from the glove compartment (and tore it open), taking his eyes off the house for a split second.
A door at the rear of Willoughby Rising opened and a woman, largely built, not very pleasant to look at and fairly old, trudged out falteringly. She stopped a short distance from the building’s exit and stood surveying the surrounding area, searching, her eyes penetrating every square foot within the vicinity, combing the land, looking for something. Or Someone...
What’s that she’s holding? Cooper asked himself. He twisted a knob on the binoculars, adjusting the focus and changing the setting from ‘thermal’ to ‘normal’; the images initially blurred, and then clarity; he gasped and jumped as from an electrical shock or a poke in the eye from a needle.
The woman was staring right back at him, a small telescopic lens − the sort attached to high-powered rifles − held to her eye. Defying her large frame and Cooper’s belief, the woman hastily disappeared back into the house.
“Darn it!” Cooper thumped the steering wheel. He thumped it a second time. He didn’t know for definite but he was sure he’d been sighted. He was positive in fact. “And who the HELL are you!” he wanted to know. At no time had he seen her face featured within the dossier of images of George Jennings’ known associates and cohorts.
His one chance, his greatest moment to shine, was all but over – h
e’d blown it. He dared a further look through the binoculars. No one was outside – yet, but inside, he could make out movement; hurried, urgent shambling. From his standpoint, the Jennings’ appeared to be readying themselves to move. His carelessness had alerted them of his presence and now the mission was in jeopardy. He had to do something; he had to think of something… something – anything – fast.
What would Schilling do?
Cooper knew the answer to that question, but by following in Dominic Schilling’s footsteps not only would he be contradicting a direct order from Tom Kaplan, but also run the risk of a comparable outcome to Dominic’s.
But what else could he do? They were so close to nabbing George Jennings’ daughter; so close to ending a two yearlong pursuit; so close to having the ultimate weapon in their possession, a weapon that would revolutionise modern warfare. With Sophie on side, the enemy quite literally wouldn’t see her coming.
Not thinking a moment longer, Cooper climbed from the small, nondescript car, and jogged round to the boot. Popping the bonnet, he reached in and pulled from a dark green canvas holdall a Browning 9mm semi-automatic pistol, black in colour with a brown handgrip. Reaching further, he removed a pair of thermal imaging heat seeking goggles with head strap and flip up ocular attachments, a couple of thirteen round magazine clips for the Browning and a small plastic box, red in colour, which opened on a hinge and was fastened by a spring button catch. The magazine clips he placed into the pocket of his jeans, the goggles he would carry until he got to the house. The Browning itself, he slipped beneath the waistband at the front of his jeans, tucked beneath his loose hanging T-shirt. He studied the small red box for a moment before slipping it into the back pocket of his jeans.
Inside the box were a hypodermic needle and a small vial of Propofol, a drug commonly used by anaesthetists or medical professionals to induce sleep at the beginning of surgical procedures. Propofol was also infamous for being the cause of Michael Jackson’s cardiac arrest and subsequent death; Cooper solely intended it for use on Sophie, though only to subdue her for a short while until she was safely restrained. He couldn’t take any risks. He’d heard about how ineffective Alpha Team had been.
“Okay, I guess the party is going to have to start without you, Bravo Team,” he whispered beneath his breath as he slammed the car boot closed and started the short walk up the slight hill towards Willoughby Rising.
A woman in her early thirties walked towards him pushing a stroller, her child slouching down in the seat, a bag of sweets (Haribo jelly babies) in one hand, his other feeding a fistful of confectionary into his sticky mouth. Casually, Cooper walked past her, averting his eyes so not to make eye contact. The woman appraised him fleetingly then carried on, taking no further interest despite Cooper’s sweaty shirt and dishevelled appearance; her priority was getting home, getting her son his dinner, then getting him to bed. Evening was fast approaching.
At the top of the hill, Cooper stopped and peered back down the road towards the Ford KA, watched the back of the woman as she pushed her child around a corner out of sight, and then took a deep breath.
“Let’s do this,” he muttered, suddenly feeling bold, almost invincible. The speed of his steps increased with his heartbeat as he closed in on the house at the top of the hill, his right hand wrapping round the butt of the Browning in anticipation, appearing to any who looked as though he were clutching his stomach in pain, the illusion shattered upon a look at his face. A sinister grin stretched across his features, dark and menacing.
No one looked, and no one watched as he opened the gate and walked into the garden that belonged to Willoughby Rising.
Chapter Eighteen
George
A quarter-of-a-mile away from home, George pulled the car in hard to stop alongside a kerb a short distance from the entrance to a community sports’ centre. A van following close behind needed to brake decisively to avoid colliding, the driver blasting his horn and hand gesturing rudely his agitation.
George paid no notice, his mind and thoughts elsewhere. His mobile phone had just started playing the opening music to the Queen hit, The Show Must Go On, a ringtone he’d converted from a track he’d lifted off Innuendo, an mp3 album saved to his computer.
George accepted the call, ending Freddie Mercury’s singing. He waited mere seconds for the connection.
“Hello?”
“George? It’s Amanda,” the voice sounded hurried and breathy, as though the caller had been running. She sounded agitated.
“Mrs Slocum?”
“You told me to call you if I noticed anything or anyone strange around the neighbourhood, no matter how big or small.”
“Go on,” urged George, he peered over his shoulder to take a look at his son. Charlie was lying across the seat, sound asleep.
“I’ve seen someone strange. A gangly looking fellow is watching the house through binoculars from a car at the end of the street.”
“Have you seen him before?” asked George.
“No. In fact, he’s only been there a short time. He wasn’t there an hour ago – I’ve been deliberately carrying out perimeter checks and the way he’s scrutinising the place strikes me as rather suspicious. George, what do you want me to do?”
George thought for a moment. So much happening, so many things going off plan – it was just knowing what best to do – for himself, for his family, and for Sophie.
“Can you get the kids ready to leave?” George had started the Peugeot’s engine and was once again moving.
“Yes, sure – but there is another thing George, I think he saw me.”
George cursed. “Amanda, I’m less than five minutes away, keep the kids safe until I get there. Do what you have to do, I don’t need to tell you your job, or how important it is that nothing happens to anyone in my family.” He was now unconsciously driving, preparing himself for whatever he was likely to face on arrival at Willoughby Rising. The mobile was on speakerphone. George continued to talk:
“Another thing, I need my black suitcase. You know the one I told you about. It’s already packed, it’s in my wardrobe.”
“Okay George. We’ll be ready.”
Taking a corner too fast, the tyres of the vehicle screeched loudly, startling passersby and a small dog tethered to a lamppost outside a corner shop, which started barking excitedly, its little mouth snapping viciously at an invisible aggressor.
Behind in the back seat, Charlie awoke with a start. His father’s driving had gone from careful smooth to fast erratic, and the jerky-jarring movements of the steering wheel had begun to throw him from one side of the car to another, jolting his broken arm. Had he been in his mother’s car, he’d have been strapped into the child’s seat, safe and secure. Unfortunately, his father didn’t have any child seats in his car – never needed them for the trips to and from his Chelsea home. The kids did all their travelling in the Prius.
Crying, Charlie started to complain: “Slow down daddy, you’re hurting my arm!” he sobbed.
“I’m sorry. Just hold on Charlie, we’re nearly there.”
Turning left at the next junction, George steered the car into the cul-de-sac, at the top of which stood Willoughby Rising, dominant and majestic on the immediate skyline, paying no attention to the cars that flanked the road, not noticing the Ford KA parked on the right at the bottom of the slight hill, and seeing nobody in the street, George floored the accelerator pedal and sped up to his family’s residence.
Bringing the 207 to a halt outside his house having already released his seatbelt, the engine still idling, George jumped out of the car. He turned hastily and peered through to the back where Charlie was sitting.
“Charlie, you wait here. I won’t be long.” He flung the door closed behind him and centrally locked it (two warbling bleeps accompanying it), not looking back as he hurried ahead, runnin
g up the three steps that ascended to the front of the property, taking the first two with one big stride. Charlie sat forward apprehensively, his face pressed against the glass watching his father hurry away.
At the top of the steps, George faltered, not sure of what he was doing. He couldn’t help thinking that perhaps he was about to enter a lion’s den armed with just a feather duster. Before he could contemplate his next move, from inside the house two sudden explosions cracked deafeningly, the double boom resounding around the cul-de-sac.
BANG! BANG!
Followed by three more:
BANG! BANG! BANG!
George instinctively dropped to the ground, and crawled towards the front door, shuffling beneath the window, out of view from any who may be peering out from inside. His heart was thumping, he felt sick with fear and worry for his children and for Mrs Slocum holed up inside, but then training from long ago kicked in.
Getting to the front door, he stood up and reached out to the door handle, flinching as the handle jerked down, out from his grasp before he’d managed to touch it. The front door was pulled open sharply and a dishevelled and rather bloody woman stood barring his path. She was holding a pistol, its barrel pointing harmlessly towards the ground.
“Amanda?” George gasped, alarmed and shocked at what faced him.
“Help… me… George,” she choked, blood trickled from her mouth and spattered out with each word she uttered; a little spraying George’s T shirt.
“He got me, George… I… I… I tried to stop him…” Slocum slipped to the floor at the threshold, her right hand clutching a spot on the front of her blouse that was bright red, a dark patch of crimson spreading.
“Where is ‘he’?”
Slocum shook her head. The gun slipped from her grasp and clattered loudly to the hallway floor. “I tried to stop him… he… he… he was too… fast.” She winced from the effort and the pain and closed her eyes, blinking back tears. “I’m sorry George, the agency taught me better…” she whispered and slumped over.
The Girl in the Mirror Page 16