by Eva Hudson
If Ingrid had arrived in a bad mood, she had left in a foul one. She was grateful her Ryde was parked outside.
“Hilton, Park Lane.” She pictured herself in the bar on the twenty-eighth floor, dousing the frustration Dr Ives had stirred up with a succession of vodka shots. Ordinarily she’d go for a run—it had been days since she’d slipped on her running shoes and pushed her body—but her running gear had been boxed up by the contractors at her apartment. A yearning for punishment, for the pain to exceed her fury, burned through her entire being, and ice-cold vodka would be her form of flagellation. The consolation was that she never had to see Dr Ives again.
She checked both phones. Natalya’s was dangerously low on juice again, but remarkably she didn’t have any messages. That never happened unless she was on a plane. She asked the driver for a lightning cable and charged it up from his USB socket.
“You’re not having a good day, are you?” the driver said.
“It’s a lot better than two days ago.”
The unmistakable thrum of a four-stroke engine made Ingrid look out the window as they rounded Highbury Corner, and she clocked a Triumph Tiger 800, her old bike. The rider wore a Harley jacket. There was something about mixing up bike brands that really annoyed her.
The taxi made progress south through Islington but got stuck on Rosebery Avenue as taxis jostled for position outside Sadler’s Wells, a theater famous for dance, before the end of the performance. The last time Ingrid had been inside the venue, she had seen a Sergei Polunin showcase. She realized, possibly for the first time, that she had enjoyed the cultural events she had attended as Natalya. She would miss them.
Outside, another Triumph Tiger glistened with rain under the streetlights. Then Ingrid spotted the Harley jacket. Her blood ran cold. How far back had they been when she’d seen the bike before? Highbury Corner, wasn’t it? What was that? A mile back? Two? The bike should be way ahead, having filtered through the jams. So why was it hugging her Ryde? She slid down in her seat and stared at the rider.
“Excuse me?” she asked the driver.
“Yes.” He was in his late twenties and, judging by his accent, had emigrated to the UK from somewhere in eastern Europe.
“How long has that motorcycle been tailing us? Near side, back two cars.”
He checked his wing mirror. “Dunno. They all look the same to me.”
“Can you turn left at the lights?”
“Not the way to Mayfair.”
“I know. I want to see if he follows.”
The driver sat a little straighter. “Really?”
“Yep, don’t use your indicators, just shift lanes as soon as you can and slip down Farringdon Road.”
He looked dubious, but checked his mirror again, waited for a gap and turned. Ingrid kept low but maintained visual contact with the bike. When it turned too, she stiffened. She hadn’t really expected it would. She hadn’t thought, despite the fire and the man in hospital, and despite what had happened to David Rennie, anyone seriously wanted to kill her. She had assumed she was being paranoid. Now she was in no doubt.
“What do you want me to do?” he asked, a trace of fear inflecting his voice.
“Drive normal. Don’t keep looking for him; don’t speed. Don’t give him a reason to think you know he’s following.” Staying low, Ingrid unbuckled her safety belt and studied the satnav screen. “Take the next left.”
“It’s the wrong way.”
“New plan. See that green square on the map?”
He glanced down at his satnav. “Yes.”
“Head toward it. It’s a park. When we get there, if you see a gate, stop. Don’t indicate, just stop. Okay?”
His Adam’s apple plunged as he swallowed hard before turning down a quiet side street lined with parked cars. Ingrid checked the mirror: the Triumph was still tailing them.
“Are these doors unlocked?” Ingrid asked.
“Yes.”
She threw her phone inside Rennie’s backpack and looped the straps over her shoulders. She shifted over to the curb side of the car and grasped the handle.
“The moment you stop, I’m going to jump out. When I’ve gone, just drive normally. He’s after me, not you.”
He nodded.
“It’s okay, I promise. Is that the park?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t slow down. Don’t make it look like you’re going to stop.”
“Yes.”
“There’s a gate,” Ingrid said. “You see it?”
“Yes.”
“Now!”
He slammed on the brakes and Ingrid yanked open the door. “Now go,” she said, slamming it shut behind her.
Ingrid dropped down onto the road and was at the gate in two strides. It was locked. She gripped the wet ironwork, climbed over and ran.
The only light inside the garden square came from the surrounding streetlamps, but Ingrid could make out a path. Behind her, she heard the motorcyclist kill his engine. Breathing hard, she propelled her body forward, her arms driving through the air, her feet slamming into the ground.
The gate rattled.
She snatched a look over her shoulder. He was climbing over, still wearing his helmet. She glanced left. Right. Nowhere to go. If you can’t hide, run.
She powered on, drawing cold air into her lungs. Footsteps were coming after her. The small park was deserted. No tramps on benches, no promenading sweethearts, no dealers offering wraps.
Trapped inside, Ingrid had no option but had to keep running. The moment she stopped moving forward to climb a fence would be the only opportunity he’d need. If he had a gun, that’s it. But running in leathers and a helmet isn’t easy, and she stretched away from him.
Ingrid darted left, down a narrow path leading to the groundskeeper’s store. She ducked down between bushes. If you can’t run, hide. She crouched down, out of the light, and tried to stay still. She listened as his footsteps thundered away from her, then stopped. She braced herself as they headed back toward her, one steel-capped thud at a time.
She daren’t turn to look in case her movement caught his eye. His pace slowed. He was in hunting mode. He was prowling, his boots splatting on the wet path. He took a step one way, then another step the other way. He’d lost her, but he wasn’t giving up.
Ingrid tried to think. What were her options? Barge at him from the bushes, push him over, and run? Or stay put and hope he gives up?
His footsteps were less thunderous but closer. Her heart pulsed so deeply it hurt. He’d found the path down to the wooden store. He approached. She counted his steps. One. Two. Three. Four. He stopped.
She daren’t breathe. She could see his boots, and there at mid-thigh, protruding from his gloved hand was the muzzle of a semiautomatic. Her flesh turned to ice. He didn’t move. Has he seen me?
Her throat was so dry she thought she might cough. She stared at his boots. There was a worn patch on the left one from changing gears. His leather jacket squeaked as he moved. With a helmet on, she reasoned, he would have to twist at the waist to get a full range of vision. The chin guard would make it difficult to look down. At least she hoped it would.
He rocked back and forward on his heels but did not move away. She needed to take a deep breath. She was feeling faint. She could feel cramp take hold of her ankle, tightening its grip. She couldn’t stay crouching any longer. She had to move.
He kept rocking. Back. Forward. Back. Forward. The muzzle caught the sodium glare of the streetlights. Back. Forward. Back. Then, finally, away.
She exhaled. He couldn’t hear her inside his helmet, so she took in another deep breath as his footfalls receded. She wiggled her toes, but stayed crouching. He was still in the park, patrolling. But his footsteps were quicker, less deliberate. He’ll give up soon.
He did another loop round the path, walking right past her, but his pace suggested impatience. He started speeding up. He began to run.
Ingrid concentrated as his footfalls faded. She craned her ne
ck to see him run toward the gate. She heard it rattle. And thirty seconds later he fired up the engine and rode off.
She winced as she stood up, the muscles in her calves screaming with the movement. The rain started to fall more heavily, but she wasn’t going to risk leaving. Not yet. She turned up her sheepskin collar and pressed herself against the wall of the store to shelter from the rain under the overhang of the roof. When she was sure he wasn’t coming back, she’d make her exit.
48
Ingrid staggered out of the elevators and along the hallway toward the bull pen. It was ten past ten and the only person still in the office was Abel the intern. Surrounded by Thanksgiving bunting, he cut a lonely figure. He stood up the moment he saw her.
“Agent Skyberg? You okay?”
She pushed the door open to the Criminal Division office, and the lights flickered on automatically. Abel followed.
“What happened?” he asked. The alarm on his face made her realize just how bad she must look.
Ingrid, feeling dazed, didn’t know where to start. “I didn’t have anywhere else to go, so I came here.” If she was being followed, she felt more secure in a building protected by armed marines than the concierge at the Hilton.
She hung up her soaked sheepskin to reveal the rain had seeped through to her sweater.
“I’ll get you a cup of tea,” he said.
Ingrid threw him a stare.
“Coffee, then.”
“Thanks.”
She slumped down onto her chair and let out a sound like the low moan of a cello. Rain trickled down from her hair below her collar, making her shiver. Unseeing, her eyes fixed on the far wall, her head swaying with incomprehension. She closed her eyes and saw the curves of the gun illuminated by the streetlights. She had rarely been so close to certain death. She ran her fingers through her matted hair and was glad there wasn’t a mirror in the office in which she could see how closely her appearance matched her mood.
Abel came back in and put a mug of coffee in front of her. “Wasn’t sure if you took sugar. I figured not.”
He’d added milk. Never mind. “Good call.”
He had one of the nicest smiles Ingrid had seen in a long time.
“You should be going home, shouldn’t you?”
“I fly back to the US in a couple of hours. I’m getting a taxi straight from here.”
“Hope we haven’t scared you off.”
He grimaced. “I have a job with the incoming administration.”
Ingrid gave him a smile. “Well, all power to you, Abel. Hope it’s what you want.”
“Thanks. I’ll be here for another half hour if I can get you anything.”
She picked up the mug. One day, she thought to herself, I’m going to tell the grandkids about the time the future president brought me coffee.
“It’s quiet out there,” she said. Even in the middle of the night, the embassy was often busy with people working on investigations in different time zones.
“Think a lot of people have gone home for Thanksgiving,” Abel said. “Plus the CT team are all in the bunker.”
“The bunker?”
“Yeah, apparently there’s some conference room on the second floor that’s like the situation room. Loads of screens, mainline to the State Department, that sort of thing.”
“Oh, right.” How come Ingrid never heard the jargon? She’d gotten used to being ignored by her counterterrorism colleagues, but being left out still had the ability to snap at the ankles of her self-esteem.
“Apparently it’s got its own oxygen supply. It’s, like, totally bombproof or something.”
“I see.”
“You need anything else?”
“No, thank you. You’ve been very helpful.”
“A pleasure.”
Washington, DC, is going to kill you, she thought. Chew you up and spit you out for the cat to play with.
Ingrid plugged in Natalya’s phone and fired up her computer. A clutch of emails pinged into her inbox from Demir with arrangements for the morning. She clicked through them. Their subject lines all contained the phrase Operation Lariat. She clicked on the first email and scanned it. It was preparations for the intercept at Blackbushe airfield. She counted: she had to be there in less than twelve hours.
Demir would be landing at Blackbushe at nine fifteen. Leo Marx was due in at midday. She scanned his list of requirements, her gaze flickering haphazardly over the words before a realization seeped into her consciousness: to carry out the handover of the Picasso, she needed to exhume Natalya Vesnina.
“Oh, crap.” She threw a stress ball at the ceiling. It knocked over a pot of pencils on its way down.
Abel appeared at the threshold. “You need something else?”
Ingrid pulled a face. “A Donna Karan dress and a pair of Louboutin heels?”
“Seriously?”
“By about six in the morning, as I have to get out to some place in Buckinghamshire called Blackbushe.”
He crossed his arms and leaned nonchalantly against the door frame. “It is your lucky day.” He smiled.
She gestured to her bedraggled appearance.
He was still smiling. “I have your outfit.”
“You do?” Ingrid was incredulous.
“Well, I know where I can get those things for you. Should be about your size.”
She looked at him. He was remarkably well-dressed now she thought about it. Those were handmade shoes. No doubt the pants were Fifth Avenue. Did he have a roommate with similarly good taste?
“The stores are all closed,” she said.
“Duh. No, last week I got sent down to the storage facility. Had to tag and record all the possessions that had come in from some surveillance operation. Mostly just designer clothes and household items.”
Warmth radiated across her chest. She smiled. “And there was a pair of Louboutins?”
“Yeah.”
“Were they a sort of purply-gray?”
He looked puzzled. “They were.”
Finally, something had gone her way. Ingrid strode over to him, gave him her best smile and kissed his cheek. “Abel, I really don’t know what we’re going to do without you.”
“Okay.” He sounded unsure.
“Do I need a retrieval code? How do I get my stuff?” Her energy levels had perked up.
“Ah, er, I think I have, like, a file number. Um, let me see if I can access it.” He strode out to the bull pen, woke up a computer and logged back on to the system. “So how come it was your clothes I was cataloging?” A 2-D egg timer rotated in the center of his screen.
“Strictly speaking, they’re not my clothes. They belong to an undercover alias I had to shut down.”
The egg timer kept spinning.
“What were you undercover as?”
“An art dealer.”
“Oh.” He sounded disappointed.
“What were you expecting?”
He looked sheepish. “I’d better not say.”
“You’d better not have been thinking high-class call girl.”
“Don’t I at least get a point for ‘high-class’?”
Before she could clip him round the ear, a message popped up on his screen. Server Access Denied.
“I guess my name has been taken off the system,” he said. “There might be something in a local folder.”
“Could you check?”
“Sure.”
Something buzzed. It wasn’t her phone. It was his. He checked it.
“My taxi’s here,” he said, looking apologetic. “I, um, I…”
“It’s okay,” she said. “Go. I’ve got it from here.”
“You sure?”
“Catch your flight.” She extended her hand.
“I’m sure if you went down to storage, you could just explain you need them,” he said, shifting himself into his tailored woolen coat.
“You’ve not worked here very long, have you? I’ll figure something out.”
He shook he
r hand and picked up his holdall. Hermès. Jeez, even the really rich kids did internships these days. He walked toward the elevators, then looked back. “I bet you look really hot in that Donna Karan.”
You too? Really? She flipped him the bird. Maybe he’d fit in just fine in DC.
Ingrid fired off an email to the team in storage, explaining she needed access to Natalya’s clothes. It was then that she remembered she already had a change of clothes. She checked her locker and found her gym gear. It didn’t smell too good, but at least it was dry. And comfortable enough to sleep in. If only she had a bed.
49
The door slammed, waking up Ingrid.
“What the heck, Ingrid?”
She blinked, taking a moment to work out where she was and why she was there.
“You’d better have a darn good explanation.” Marshall stood, overcoat open, with both hands on his hips, his office coming into focus behind him.
Ingrid sat up on his couch. “What time is it?”
“That’s not what I’m looking for, Agent.”
Ingrid pulled a face, stretching her cheeks and widening her eyes. “I left you messages,” she said, by way of explanation. She’d explained about the man with the gun and that she needed his authority to access items out of storage.
“And that’s why I’m here at seven in the morning.”
“I need your authority to get Natalya’s clothes out of storage. Abel was locked out of the system, and I couldn’t get the release code.” She yawned. “And besides, I didn’t have anywhere else to go.”
“You could have gotten yourself a hotel room.” He hung his coat up on an old-fashioned rack that would probably go for a fortune on eBay when they finally move to the new building. His shirt bore the crisp creases imprinted by his laundry service.
“Yeah, I could have done. But this saved time and—not sure if you’re aware of this—people have been trying to kill me a lot lately?”
Marshall grumbled something.
“And I feel safe here. So.”
He sat down at his desk and she caught a waft of his cologne. He smelled good. If she wasn’t so cross with him, she might tell him.