She follows the girl and the other woman back to a hotel. It’s a lot nicer than the hostel the girl is staying in and she seems wowed by it as they enter the reception.
Neva follows them inside and gets in the lift as well. The woman takes the girl up to the third floor of the hotel. Neva exits behind them, and watches to see what room they go to. She passes them and pretends to look for her key for another room down the corridor. When they’ve gone into the room, she heads back downstairs and goes to the bar. There she asks for a bottle of Champagne, two glasses and a bucket of ice. She pays cash and takes them with her.
Back in the lift, Neva returns to the third floor. She makes her way to the service closet, picks the lock and goes inside. As she hoped, she finds one of the maid-service uniforms on a coat hanger. From her purse she removes face wipes and takes all of the make-up off her face as well as the fake septum ring. She removes the black wig, brushes her hair, and ties it up into a messy bun. Then she changes into the uniform.
She pops the cork of the Champagne and pours some of it away. From her bag she removes a flask and she pours some of its contents into the Champagne bottle.
Carrying the Champagne in the ice bucket, and the two glasses, she goes to the door of the woman’s room and knocks. She’s banking on them being too drunk and stoned to question why the bottle is already open, or the fact that she’s in a cleaner’s uniform and not a waitress’s.
‘Compliments of the manager,’ Neva says holding out the bucket when the woman answers. She sways in the doorway; her pupils are dilated and Neva’s assumption of the partying that’s happening in the room is correct.
‘Wow! That’s kind of him,’ slurs the woman. She takes the bucket and glasses from Neva.
‘Look what I got us,’ the woman says. ‘Champagne!’
Neva smiles as the door closes.
The sedative will take a while to work but Neva is patient. She goes back to the service closet and changes back into her own clothing. Then she waits.
It’s two in the morning before she enters the bedroom. Although all is quiet, the lamps are still on in the room. It looks as though they collapsed unconscious after downing the Champagne. Good.
Neva picks up the girl’s discarded purse and rifles through it. As she knew would be the case, her passport is there. It’s not the sort of item you leave in a hostel while you go out drinking.
Neva opens the passport and learns the girl’s name for the first time. She’s Adrienne Margaret Renfall. A very sophisticated name for what appears to be a rebellious student. She checks on Adrienne and the woman; they are unconscious and probably will be for hours. But Neva needs them to be unaware of the passport theft until she has reached London. She ponders giving them another dose of the drug because it’s uncertain how long they will be under for.
In the bathroom she finds a line of cocaine on a small mirror. She brings it into the bedroom and places it on the woman’s side of the bed. Hopefully the party will continue when they both wake up.
She takes out the flask again from her purse, and puts a few drops of the sedative in two glasses of water, which she places at each side of the bed as a precaution. A known side effect of the drug is thirst. She hopes this will send the pair of them back off when they come round and drink the water. But it feels like she’s leaving everything to chance: something she doesn’t like to do.
She contemplates killing them. The old her wouldn’t have a problem with that, but the new her does: neither of these women deserve to die.
No. The best guarantee of her exit from Amsterdam and return to the United Kingdom is for her to get there as soon as possible.
She opens Adrienne’s handbag again and takes out her credit card. Then she goes online on her burner phone and books the earliest flight she can find to London. She finds one at 8am to Luton. She hopes that this will give her enough time before Adrienne raises any alarm that her passport has been stolen and her card has been used fraudulently.
Neva places the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign on the door. By then it is almost three in the morning.
She goes back to her apartment near the river. Changing her clothes, she then chops the long black wig down into the razor-cut style that the girl wears.
Once Neva’s done this, she takes her time applying the make-up, copying Adrienne’s look from some pictures she’d snapped of her on her phone.
When she’s ready she packs a small overnight case with her laptop and a few essentials, as well as some English cash. At 5:30am she makes her way to the airport.
When she arrives at Luton, Neva abandons Adrienne’s passport and her disguise in the airport toilet once she’s through customs. Then she starts using her Dutch identity and cards again.
With her natural, strawberry-blonde hair scraped back into a ponytail, she makes her way into Central London via train to St Pancras. While she’s travelling, she books herself a last-minute hotel in Soho because she needs a base to work from.
The journey from Luton only takes thirty-three minutes and so Neva is soon leaving the station, keeping her head down, and avoiding all of the cameras there that she knows about. Outside she joins the black-cab taxi-rank queue.
When she reaches the front of the line, she approaches the next black cab and tells the driver her destination. He gives her an odd look through his rear-view mirror as she climbs into the back. As they pull away the driver starts to ask her questions about her trip. Neva is deliberately vague in her answers.
‘Look… be careful who you talk to here,’ the taxi driver says. ‘There’s been a few murders.’
‘Really?’ Neva says, speaking with a Dutch accent.
‘Yeah. Girls who… look a bit like you, to be honest,’ he says. ‘It’s why I’m asking what you’re doing here. I saw on the news that an Irish girl might have been groomed by the killer first…’
As they stop at some traffic lights, he passes her a newspaper through the screen between them. ‘Front page,’ he says.
Neva finds herself looking at the pictures of four women. The Irish girl the driver had mentioned had been visiting London for the first time. There was an older woman – a divorcee, a business woman and a livery stable owner. All of whom have nothing in common except for their physical appearance.
Neva speed reads the article and when they reach her destination, she thanks the driver, giving him an American-style tip of 20 per cent.
She registers at her accommodation. Then, because the driver knows the address, she immediately checks out. She goes on her app and finds alternative accommodation elsewhere. When she’s finally settled, she changes into jeans, T-shirt and trainers. She places a woollen hat over her hair to disguise her appearance and then she heads off, looking for all intents and purposes like a tourist. By then it’s late afternoon.
She makes her way to London Bridge and to the building where Michael works. At this point she isn’t sure how she’s going to get inside, but she knows she has to see Michael and try and talk to him face to face. For this reason, she plans to be around when he leaves work that night.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Jewel
She sees her next kill from a distance. A shining beacon of golden hair that glows in the sunlight. Jewel’s always detested the colour – how others rave about ‘strawberry’ blondes. There was a black-and-white movie once made called that. The Strawberry Blonde. Rita Hayworth starred in it, and the posters showed her with red hair, not the almost-blonde, not-quite-red colour strawberry is.
It is rare as a natural colour, Jewel knows that. But so many women choose to dye it in.
Perhaps this one erred more on the blonde and less on the red in truth. But finding that exact match was impossible. Jewel could only find close or near unless she came face to face with the original wearer and that only happened on one occasion. It was a bit of a shock being that close to her after so long. She hadn’t recognized Jewel, which was a relief because then her cover would have been blown. Jewel was certain that she
had not thought of her for a long time.
She hates her even now.
Fae they’d called her back then, later she’d become Neva. But Jewel had heard about the rename. It had happened after she’d been banished from the house. After she’d failed to prove she was the best. Then Jewel had been returned to Mother and her training had intensified as a punishment for that fiasco. Even now, she doesn’t understand why Mother had tried her out in the house. Maybe she had wanted to test her prodigy against someone she considered the best.
But for now, Jewel has escaped the clutches of the château and Mother. Money has given her that autonomy. Like Neva had done before her, Jewel has saved her payments, living frugally as she accumulated her own wealth. Money was power. Money was independence.
Mother had wanted it all for herself, of course. She sent Jewel after the Syrian heir, Tehrin. He was another mark in a list of many that Jewel had played and stolen from for the sake of building the Almunazama’s funds. Mother had spent years growing the conglomerate, hoping it would rival Beech’s Network and ultimately take over his assets. That was all until Beech’s death brought about the epiphany that Mother could take over the Network itself, merging the Almunazama with it to create an ultimate and unstoppable force.
Jewel had been working as an insider for Mother’s enemies. She’d whored for her but she was smart and observant: she’d learned a lot about their dealings as well as Mother’s. She’d taken it all on board. Hiding behind her calm veneer. Wearing the mask that Mother trusted. Until the time came for her to skip away. New identity. New life. Swiss bank full of the cash she’d skimmed off the top of the various thefts – bolstered up by the four million she’d obtained from Tehrin. It had been easy. And she deserved the money more than Mother did. She’d earned it.
But Mother hasn’t come after her. So far. This is a surprise. Perhaps Mother thinks she is still working for her under cover. Or perhaps she just doesn’t care. Whatever the reason, Jewel sees her new freedom as confirmation of the lies that Mother tells to all of her children. She doesn’t love us. We aren’t individuals. We are her personal army. Jewel is just one soldier among many. Not even worth chasing down when she goes AWOL. It’s all so disappointing.
Jewel brings her mind back to the latest victim. She’s a teacher at a primary school. Newly married. She reminds Jewel of an actress she once saw in a film – or a TV series. She can’t remember which because it’s not important. But she was pretty and perky and slender just like this one. Cassandra Clementine has that quality. Even her name sounds like it belongs to a film star. She’s way too beautiful to spend all day with annoying children. No, she needs to become something else. An icon. A saint.
A corpse.
Jewel watches Cassandra from a car across the road from the woman’s house. The husband left some time ago. Now, Cassandra comes out. She’s carrying a rucksack and a lunch box. She climbs into her car and drives away.
Jewel doesn’t follow. She already knows where Cassandra works. She gets out of her car and crosses the road.
On this street, several of the neighbours have cameras directed down their driveways. Jewel knows where all of them land. She’s already hacked them through their various Wi-Fi networks. Security, for those who understand how it works, is one of the simplest things to disable especially when your target has no idea it can be done. And most ordinary people have no clue about these sorts of things beyond believing they are safe once the systems are installed.
She walks up Cassandra’s drive, knowing that she isn’t being observed.
She enters the house with a clone key. She’d copied it from Cassandra during an open day at the primary school. Jewel had been there, pretending to look around with a view to sending her daughter. No one had questioned the fact that a 26-year-old had a child of 4. Half the mothers there were younger than her.
Cassandra was the reception class teacher and she’d been warm and friendly. She’d left her house and car keys casually on the desk in her classroom. Jewel had taken them after Cassandra became distracted by another parent. Then she’d gone to the bathroom and pressed the house key into a ready prepared container of putty. After that, she returned the keys to the reception claiming she’d found them in the toilet.
Inside Cassandra’s house, Jewel disables the alarm system and walks in. It’s a character house, on an old street. Victorian and therefore big. The hallway is tiled in a tradition style that surprises Jewel – Cassandra appears modern in dress and behaviour.
Jewel walks around the house, admiring the character and looking at Cassandra and Ian’s life together. Very cosy. Very normal.
It makes Jewel angry. In fact, it makes her furious but she holds it all inside, determined her rage won’t leak out this time.
She goes upstairs and finds the couple’s bedroom. It is far different from the rest of the house. There’s a swan-style superking bed in the centre. The headboard is plush grey velvet with diamantes and seems decadent compared to the more ordinary furnishing downstairs. There’s a dressing table with a Hollywood-style mirror and two matching mirrored chests of drawers. When Jewel opens the drawers in them, she discovers one contains Cassandra’s lingerie, nightwear and sweats. The other is Ian’s underwear, socks and T-shirts. There’s an antique feel about the furniture, but all of these items are new and high end. It tells Jewel a lot about Cassandra and it matches the lifestyle Jewel thinks the woman should have.
Jewel knows that this stunning, expensive and beautiful room must be the stage where Cassandra will be set.
It will be many hours before Cassandra returns, she always leaves the school early on a Friday, and, like every other Friday, Ian will arrive home late after going for a drink with work colleagues. It all gives Jewel time to prepare the room.
In one of the other bedrooms, Jewel finds a free-standing antique mirror. She brings it into the master bedroom and positions it at the bottom of the bed. The bed is covered with a grey velvet duvet that seems to change colour in the light from the bedroom window and sometimes appears to have purple tones. But Jewel wants to see more colour on the future resting place of Cassandra Clementine. A beautiful death for a beautiful girl. She walks around the house looking for something that might work. Then she glances out of the window and into Cassandra’s back garden. Her eyes fall on the rose beds. Yellow, white, pink and purple roses are in full bloom.
She goes downstairs, opens the back door and slips outside into the garden. She looks at the roses then goes back inside the house for something to put them in. In the kitchen she searches through the drawers until she finds a canvas bag with washing pegs inside. She tips the pegs into the drawer and takes the bag outside. There she systematically pulls the heads off all of the roses.
As she turns back towards the house, she catches sight of an old woman looking into the garden from the upstairs window of the house next door. She goes back inside the house, and places the canvas bag on the kitchen counter top.
After that she goes next door.
When Jewel has dealt with the witness to her presence at Cassandra’s – a detail she barely thinks about because she doesn’t want it to distract her from her plans – she goes back into Cassandra’s house.
She takes the canvas bag upstairs and tears the petals off the rose heads, scattering them in a flow of colour and scent onto the bed.
It looks gorgeous when she’s finished and now, although she hasn’t decided exactly how she will display Cassandra, she is excited for her return. She tries to envisage the final piece of art, all blending in with that last flash of red. It’s going to be magnificent and this time she won’t lose her concentration.
For a moment she recalls Hilary’s death. It was not glorious. It was not well planned. Jewel had lost her cool too soon. She hadn’t even been planning on killing her there and then. It just happened. Afterwards she’d tried to regroup. Tried to turn the mess back into art. She’d done a reasonable job, considering.
Jewel turns her mind back to
Cassandra. How will she react when she sees the bed? Will she appreciate that Jewel is giving her a beautiful death? For surely someone as lovely as Cassandra must crave a magnificent end.
When she’s finished, Jewel sits in a chair by the bed, as she’s done in many hotel rooms. She switches on the television and finds a channel showing old movies while she waits. Not long now. Just a few hours. And then, Cassandra will belong to her.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Cassandra
Cassandra is tired as she pulls her car back into the driveway. It’s been a long week and she’s glad it’s the weekend. Now she’s looking forward to a quiet evening in, because Ian always eats out and goes for drinks with his work colleagues on Fridays. It’s the one night she enjoys to herself in the week, and it’s a good time to rest her mind so that she can enjoy the next two days off.
Half term is only a week away and Cassandra is looking forward to the time off the treadmill of the school year. Tired of concentrating, the reception children are already fractious, as they always are at this time of year. They need to be wild and free for a week, then there will be the final build-up to the summer holidays. Cassandra herself is as weary of this group of children as they are of her. There are always at least two children in every year group that test a teacher and Cassandra’s tolerance is lower by the end of the school year. The final week will be exhausting, especially as the headmistress doesn’t permit her teachers to put DVDs on until the last day.
Cassandra thinks about the class as she gets out of the car. She’ll be glad to see this particular group move up to year one. The new reception kids always take at least the first term before they grow in confidence enough to be difficult. It’s something of a reprieve that Cassandra enjoys year after year.
Kill a Spy: The House of Killers Page 16