The Trust (The Downlode Heroes Book 2)

by Mikey Campling

  “I guess someone made an effort,” he murmurs. The books are all from US authors, so maybe someone thought they’d make him feel at home. And it isn’t all bad; on the next shelf there are a few titles from Stephen King and John Grisham, so maybe he’ll be glad of them sooner or later.

  Hank makes a quick tour of the place and discovers the bathroom, which is small but neat and modern. He steps in and makes use of the sink, bathing his face with warm water and washing away the grime of a day that’s lasted forever. He takes a blue towel from the heated rail and dries his face, studying himself in the mirror. “You look like shit,” he tells his reflection, then he replaces the towel carefully and heads back into the bedroom.

  The double bed is already made up, with pale blue pillowcases and a matching quilt. Hank heaves a sigh, and when he sits down heavily on the edge of the bed, the mattress is good and firm. He kicks off his shoes and lies down, but a nagging thought won’t let him relax. What did I forget? he wonders. Oh man! I didn’t call Dad yet. He sits up and pulls out his old phone, but there’s no signal at all, so it looks like Kwan was right about that. “Your days are done, my friend,” he says, and he puts his phone on the nightstand. “It’s a damned shame.” His phone was scratched, slow and out of date, but it was good enough to get by, and it was solid, reliable. It never let him down. Until now.

  Time for a change, Hank thinks, and he reaches into the inside pocket of his jacket and takes the new phone out carefully. The display lights up, and the call icon appears on the home screen. “May as well give it a try,” he whispers, then he dials his home number, remembering to add the international code. A good thing I looked that up before I left.

  His dad answers on the second ring: “Hank?”

  “Hi, Dad. Yeah, it’s me. Just calling to let you know I got here. Everything’s OK.”

  There’s a noise on the line as if Mervin is letting out a sigh of relief. “Hey, how are you doing, son? Did you get there all right? Any problems?”

  Hank smiles to himself. “I’m fine, Dad. It’s all good. We got picked up right off the plane, and I’m in my room right now.”

  There’s a slight pause before his dad speaks. “I got to tell you, Hank, it’s good to hear your voice.”

  “How about you, Dad? Everything OK?”

  “Of course it is,” Mervin says gruffly. “Everything’s fine. I’m just glad you got there all right.” He pauses. “And it’s all good? They’re treating you all right?”

  “Sure, Dad. You won’t believe this—they gave us champagne when we got here. And all kinds of fancy food. And my room looks like a hotel or something.” And now it’s Hank’s turn to pause as the image of his room at home comes into his mind. “It’s all pretty impressive. And kind of strange too. I guess it’ll take a while to get used to everything.”

  “Oh, for sure. But there’s quite a bunch of folks starting at the same time, right? So you’ll soon make some new friends. You’re all in it together.”

  “I guess so. I met a few people from that day in Austin. And I was talking to a couple guys on the plane—they seem all right.”

  “Good, good. That’s real good to hear, Hank.”

  “Yeah. So far, so good.” Hank looks around the room, searching for something to say.

  “Did you get to take a look around the place? Did they give you a tour?”

  “Not really. It was dark by the time we got here. But we saw the inside of the old house—it’s like something out of a movie.”

  “All right,” Mervin says. “Maybe they’ll show you around in the morning.”

  “I guess so. We start work tomorrow, so I’ll find out soon enough.”

  “Sure.” Mervin pauses. “Don’t take this the wrong way, son, but don’t feel you have to talk. You sound beat.”

  “I am pretty tired. It’s been a long day.”

  “Fair enough, son. You go and get some rest. And we’ll talk again soon. Just take care of yourself, all right?”

  “I will. Thanks, Dad. Oh yeah, they gave me a new phone, so this is my new number. You can call me back anytime.”

  “All right, Hank. Good idea. But you go and get some sleep. Sounds like you need to be fresh in the morning, so I’ll say goodnight.”

  Hank smiles. “Goodnight, Dad. Talk soon.”

  “You bet,” Mervin says, and he ends the call.

  Hank sits there for a moment, looking down at his phone. Maybe he should call someone else—anyone—just to hear a familiar voice. He could call his mom, but that might be difficult and complicated. When he last saw her, she didn’t argue or try to get him to stay, but she was certainly angry. Hank thought she was mad at him for leaving, but instead she blamed herself, as if she was somehow driving him away.

  I can’t deal with all that right now, he thinks. I’ll call her tomorrow, when I’m not so tired.

  He finds the messaging app and sends a quick text to his mom, so she’ll know he’s arrived safe and sound, then he figures out his new number and texts it to his dad, just to be sure he gets it. He flicks through the screens, checking out the apps, then he sets an alarm for seven in the morning, local time, before putting his new phone on the nightstand next to his old one.

  Time to turn in, he thinks. It isn’t late, but he’s exhausted, and when he stands up to go to the bathroom, his head spins. “Oh, man,” he murmurs, and he covers his mouth as he yawns. He stretches his shoulders then heads for the bathroom. But something on the desk catches his eye, and he stops. “What the hell’s that?” The slim, matte black box sits on the center of the desk, and Hank stares at it, thinking, Was that there when I came in? He blinks, rubs his eyes. The box can’t have just appeared, so he must have just missed it somehow, perhaps because its color blends in with the dark wood of the desk.

  He steps over to the desk and picks the box up. It’s made from cardboard but it’s unexpectedly heavy. He holds it in his palm for a moment. Should he open it now or leave it until the morning? There’s no way I can just leave it sitting there, he tells himself. This must be the welcome gift Angela talked about. And from the look and feel of it, it won’t be toothpaste and shampoo.

  Slowly, he lifts the lid. And there, nestling in a recess in the black foam padding, is a long, rectangular object with rounded ends, like an over-sized case for dark glasses. It’s made from brushed stainless steel, and when Hank takes the case from its padding, the metal is cold to the touch, and the whole thing is solid, built to last.

  Slowly, Hank runs his fingers over the case, looking for a catch or a button to release it. But there’s nothing, not even a seam that he can detect. “What the hell?” he whispers, and then his breath catches in his chest. Because, when he turns the case around in his hands, and the light shimmers across the smooth metal, he sees the single word polished into its lustrous surface: Agrippine.

  CHAPTER 33

  HANK WAKES UP WITH A START. It’s dark, and he turns from side to side thinking, Where the hell am I? But then he sees soft blue moonlight at the window. And he recognizes those drapes, doesn’t he? I’m at Northridge. In England.

  He runs his hands over his face, and the details of his long journey come flooding back: the last minute packing, the ride to the airport, the private jet, and then the ride through the forbidding countryside. The last thing he remembers is stripping down to his T-shirt and boxers and clambering into the bed.

  Now, he sits up and reaches out to the bedside lamp, touching it once to make it glow. His room is just as he left it when he went to sleep, so what could’ve woken him up? He strains his ears, but there’s nothing, not even the drone of distant traffic. He gets out of bed and walks to the window, carefully picking out a path around the unfamiliar furniture. He pushes the drapes aside and leans in close to the glass, but he can’t see the other buildings at all. His room must face away from Northridge House, toward the open moor, but the moonlight makes a mystery of the landscape. Against the swooping majesty of a steep rise, dark shapes blend into one another, meldi
ng with the shifting shadows. Hank lets out a slow breath, and a shiver runs across his skin even though his room is warm.

  The dark moorland is hard, pitiless. Brutal bare rock claws at the sky. Sinister, chaotic shadows lurk beneath the twisted trees. It’s an unforgiving place. A place not to venture alone or unprepared. It’s so quiet, Hank thinks, and a thrill of excitement stirs in his belly. He could climb that ridge, test himself, scramble over the rocks and push through the cold and the mud. This is no picture postcard, he tells himself. The moor is an untamed wilderness and its otherworldly stillness calls out to him, cloaking its true nature beneath a promise of peace. And not for the first time since he arrived at Northridge, Hank thinks, Dad would love it here.

  Hank’s eyes are growing accustomed to the dark, and now, over to the right, he can make out a series of silhouettes not far from his building: a row of shrubs, far too regular and neat to be wild. There must be a garden there. And as he watches, the branches sway in the wind, and he catches a glimpse of moonlight on still water: a pond, or a lake perhaps.

  And there’s something else.

  Hank holds his breath. There. Yes. There’s someone moving beyond the bushes. A lone figure flitting among the shadows, hurrying along, swathed in a long coat, shoulders hunched against the cold. It could be a man or a woman, Hank can’t be sure, but the person keeps stopping and looking around, unsure of the path. Hank thinks back to the man he spotted by the security barrier. This could be the same situation—some poor sap sent out on a lonely patrol in the middle of the night. But there’s something not quite right. A security guard would know exactly where he or she was going, but this person is furtive and hesitant as if they’re frightened, twitching at every sound.

  What is there to be frightened of? Hank asks himself. There are no bears or wolves in England, but perhaps this person is worried for a different reason; perhaps he or she is an intruder. Hank remembers Douglas’s words of warning: the secrets at Northridge are worth millions, and there are plenty of people who’ll do anything to get their hands on them.

  “Jesus Christ,” Hank whispers. “I should turn out the light.” What if the intruder should look his way? Surely Hank must be clearly visible, framed against his window. He pulls back from the cold glass, and as he moves, he loses sight of the figure. Hank hesitates. He ought to tell someone. He could dash back to the reception desk, or maybe it would be better if he stayed put and called someone on his phone. But maybe he’s overreacting. It’s probably nothing to worry about, he thinks. After all, the figure has completely disappeared, swallowed up by the hungry darkness.

  Hank narrows his eyes, searching the shadows, but there’s no sign of the person now. If I report it, what would I say? He saw someone creeping about and got spooked, that’s all. It’s not exactly a national emergency. Maybe it was just someone taking a walk to deal with insomnia, or perhaps a student sneaking out to meet a lover. At any rate, there wasn’t any immediate danger.

  “It can wait until morning,” Hank mutters, and he steps back from the window, letting the drapes fall back into place. He stretches his back and then checks the time on his new phone. It’s only just gone three o’clock in the morning local time, so it’s a long wait until breakfast. But he’s just not sleepy. He looks around the room, but he lets his eyes skip over the matte black box on his desk. He never figured out how to open the sleek metal case it contains, and he’s already expended more than enough mental energy on the damned thing. He really doesn’t want to start puzzling over it again.

  He tries to push his curiosity to one side, but his mind flashes back to the conversation he had with Angela when he arrived. The metal case must hold the gift she talked about, but who was it from? A mutual friend, Angela said. If it was from Stewart that was fine, but if it came from Agrippine, he shouldn’t accept it. He didn’t want anything from them. Not now, not ever.

  Forget it, he tells himself. I’ll deal with the damned thing in the morning. Maybe he’ll show it to Seb. But right now, he needs to rest. He wanders over to the bookcase and picks out The Brethren by Grisham, more or less at random, then he gets back into bed. The story is kind of interesting, but as he plows through the first few pages, his eyelids grow heavy. He shuts the book and puts it on the nightstand, then he turns out the light. The warmth of the bed relaxes his muscles, and almost immediately, he falls fast asleep.

  CHAPTER 34

  STEWART RUNS. He pumps his arms and breathes hard, pushing himself forward across the open moor. The early morning sky offers little in the way of light and it’s raining hard; the icy wind whips the freezing sleet horizontally into his face, stinging his cheeks, and making his eyes stream. There’s no path here, not even one of the narrow, ragged tracks left by the wandering sheep, and the rough, groping fingers of wet heather clutch at his legs and try to wrap themselves around his feet. But Stewart powers forward, ignoring the peat-black water seeping through his sodden shoes, and he barely notices the icy mud splashing up his legs as his feet find yet another puddle. Because none of this matters. All he can think about is Gordon’s phone call, and one part of it plays over and over in his mind: “Come quickly. You have to see this. It’s Marcus. We’ve found him.”

  In Stewart’s jacket pocket, tucked safely inside the waterproof coat he grabbed on the way out, his phone emits an electronic beep, then the automated voice from his GPS app says, “Head ten degrees south.” Without stopping, Stewart scans the horizon and alters his course, heading for an area of bare rocky ground. At first, the rock looks almost flat, but as he gets closer he can make out the linear crevices that divide the rock into a bizarre, parody of crazy paving. It’s a limestone pavement, a natural feature of the local landscape and much prized by geologists. But it’s a hideous thing to run across. The rain-smoothed limestone is slippery underfoot, and the treacherous, erratic clefts threaten to trip him at every step.

  Stewart grits his teeth and maintains his pace, his wet shoes slapping against the bare rock. Ahead, there’s a wider crevice, where the rock drops away vertically. It’s only a yard wide, and normally, he wouldn’t hesitate to run on and jump across. But his legs are tiring, and his footing uncertain. And he’s alone. If he falls now, even a minor injury will be dangerous.

  He jogs to a standstill and peers down into the cleft. The dripping rock walls drop vertically beneath him, disappearing into a yawning black chasm. “Jesus Christ!” Stewart scrapes his hand across his face, wiping the rain from his eyes, then he searches the bleak landscape ahead. Earlier, on the phone, Gordon told him that Marcus was in a shelter on the moor, and he sent the coordinates to Stewart, but there’s nothing out here, nothing even resembling a building. Stewart pulls out his phone, and bending over to use his body as a shield from the rain, he checks his map. “Gordon must’ve got it wrong,” he mutters. According to the coordinates, Marcus’s shelter is only 800 yards away, and the terrain is flat here; he should be able to see it.

  But Gordon is always so precise, so careful; he wouldn’t make such a basic mistake. Stewart looks back at his phone. If the coordinates are right, Gordon will be waiting for him about 800 yards to the south. And that means crossing the rift in the rocks. Stewart pockets his phone and runs his eyes along the crevice. The moor is riddled with cave systems, natural tunnels running deep into the earth; most of them are unmarked, some are unstable, and all of them are dangerous. But Stewart can’t spare the time to find a way around the crevice, and now that he’s prepared for it, the gap doesn’t look quite so difficult. He takes a few steps back and then sprints toward the rift. Planting his left foot carefully, he launches himself forward and clears the treacherous chasm easily, landing on both feet and bending his knees. His shoes slip a little on the wet stone, but he throws his weight forward and regains his balance. This is no time to be falling flat on his backside.

  He orients himself, fixing his eyes on a patch of rough grass to serve as a landmark, then he sets off again, covering the ground even faster after his brief rest. He must
be almost there, but there’s still no sign of Gordon, nor of the shelter he mentioned. So Stewart keeps running. He has no choice.

  But when he nears the grassy area, a dark figure emerges, rising up from the ground like a malignant vapor, and Stewart gasps, biting back a shout of surprise. The figure could be Gordon—it certainly looks like a man with Gordon’s build—but he can’t be sure. So Stewart doesn’t stop moving, doesn’t even slow down. His training kicks in, and he runs almost silently, planting his feet carefully, racing lightly over the uneven ground. He heads straight for the figure, weighing up his options. If it is Gordon or another member of the search party from Northridge, all will be well. Otherwise, Stewart will have to hit the interloper hard, taking him down before he has the chance to react.

  But the figure turns, using one hand to shield its eyes from the rain. Whoever it is, he’s seen Stewart; the man stands stock still, and his hand goes to his jacket. Is he reaching for a concealed weapon?

  Stewart surges forward, pouring every ounce of energy into a mad dash toward the dark figure. But the man raises his arm and calls out, “Stewart, over here!” And the voice is Gordon’s.

  Thank God for that, Stewart thinks. He slows his pace and recovers his breath as he jogs to Gordon’s side. “Gordon, where the hell did you spring from?”

  Gordon gives him an austere look. “You’re not going to like this. You’re not going to like this at all.” He points down toward the grass. “Come on. You’ll have to watch your step. There’s a metal rope ladder, but it’s narrow.”