She follows the fourth SUV now at a distance and on a motorbike she’s procured to make it easier to go unnoticed.
The SUV heads from Central London and out towards Wembley. Neva stays back as far as she can until the car joins the North Circular. Then she speeds up and keeps the car in her sight.
They end up in Richmond. A small house on a little street not far from the park. All of which is familiar to Neva as she spent many months in the past hiding out in and around areas of London.
She speeds past the SUV as they park up, then she takes a turning at the end of the road and drives away. She dumps the bike a few streets away and then returns to continue her surveillance on foot. When she reaches the house, the SUVs have gone and another car sits conspicuously outside. Michael is nowhere to be seen, but she assumes he’s inside, tucked away, safe for another night.
Neva uses this opportunity to examine the other houses on the street, looking for either an empty property or one whose occupants have gone away but her luck isn’t in on either count. She turns her attention to the street behind this one instead, and the house that backs onto the one that Michael is in. She counts the number of houses that lead to Michael’s, then she goes to the next street and does the same. After that, and unobserved, she focuses her attention on this house. It’s a clone of the one Michael is in but, as Neva knows, the exterior won’t reflect the interior of the other house, as Michael’s one is likely to have security cameras everywhere and a panic room.
This house however is currently empty as, judging by the lack of lights on inside, no one is home yet. Making sure she isn’t observed, she slips into the small front garden and goes around the back, wending her way into the yard. As she’d hoped, it backs up onto the house Michael is in.
From the safety of the trees and bushes that divide the two gardens, along with a four-foot fence, Neva examines the safe house’s back garden and takes note of the motion sensor security lights at the back. She can see two cameras, moving as they pan the whole plot.
The lights come on as another security guard walks around the garden. He’s smoking a cigarette and Neva thinks this is more of an opportunity to take a break than a necessary breach check. But the light gives her the opportunity to see the back door and windows. It also confirms how difficult it will be to get to Michael here.
Neva hears a car pulling into the drive at the front of the house she’s in. She ducks back around the side, watching from the darkness as a man in his early 20s gets out and goes inside the house. Once he’s gone in, she hurries down the small drive and back onto the street unobserved.
Even though she’d easily found the safe house, Neva understands that the only way she can get to Michael is if she encourages him to ditch his security to meet her.
She turns on her phone and dials the last number she has for him, which was the burner phone that Ray had given him in the safe house that they’d shared together.
She pauses before pressing the call button. Will Michael still be angry with her? Or has he calmed down enough to hear her side? Neva mulls over again how she feels about Michael’s acceptance that she lied to him. In his shoes would she have thought the same about her? His lack of belief in her is a betrayal because trust was crucial between them. Neva has struggled with it ever since she divorced herself from the Network. But Michael had been some form of stability from the moment they met. If he agrees to meet her, she knows she can trust him. But will he trust her again? And if he doesn’t, how will she feel? Angry? Hurt? Disappointed? Neva will feel all of these emotions: they are a waterfall inside her now, hard to stop from flowing in and around her. Even harder to process. She’s afraid: another rejection from Michael will bring the delicate balance of her equilibrium crashing down once more. She doesn’t know how much more of her can break down before there’s nothing left.
Neva sighs. Remembering the connection they’d once shared, she makes the decision to risk his rebuff and calls the number. It is the bravest thing she’s ever done. Her heart leaps with adrenaline as the phone rings out then goes onto a messaging service. She’s both relieved and disappointed as she listens to Michael’s voice telling her to leave a message.
Chapter Forty
Jack
As Ben leaves for work Jack Harman wheels his mower to the house across the road. From there he has the perfect vantage point to watch the Charters’ house. Of course, he knows that this couple are not Brody and Mica Charter really. They are Mia and Ben Cusick and they are in an MI5 witness protection programme.
As Ben’s car drives from the street, another vehicle enters. It’s a black van, with tinted windows. But Jack notices the two men sat in the front. Black suited, with sunglasses, even though it’s a dull day. He knows immediately that they shouldn’t be here.
At the arrival of the van, Jack stops mowing the lawn and takes a sip from the water bottle he has in a pouch attached to his belt. The driver of the van glances at him. Then he carries on past the Charters’ house and off to another street.
Jack watches it go. He stows his water bottle away and resumes his mowing. When he’s finished the front of this house, Jack moves onto the next. That’s when he notices the van has returned. He leaves the mower inside the gate of the next house, and taking cover behind one of the cars parked on the street, he watches the van stop outside the Charters’ house.
The side of the van opens and another man gets out. The passenger in the front joins him. They are wearing identical black suits. Jack observes that they both have an earpiece in their left ears. One of the men waits by the open van, while the other goes and knocks on the door.
Mia opens the door and looks at him. Then she follows the man back to the van, leaving her front door wide open. She walks slowly as though her feet are heavy.
Realizing something is wrong, Jack comes out of his hiding place and crosses the road. He walks towards the van.
The driver watches him as he approaches.
‘Mrs Charter. Is everything all right?’ he says.
Mia doesn’t look at him. She’s like a sleepwalker, unaware of her surroundings. She moves to the side door as though she is going to climb into the back of the van.
‘Mrs Charter! No!’ Jack shouts.
He hurries towards them. The man waiting by the open door turns as Jack reaches them. Before the man has time to react Jack kicks him hard in the testicles as his first attack. The first man goes down, screaming in pain.
Jack grabs Mia’s arm and pulls her back from the van.
‘Go inside with your baby,’ Jack says.
Mia doesn’t move.
The second man circles Jack and then attacks. Jack fights back with expert skill. They exchange blows using a variety of fighting techniques while Mia watches through dull, emotionless eyes. Jack is strong and a trained fighter but as he starts to overcome the second man, the driver of the van gets out and joins in. Jack is now fighting off two men. Even so, he holds his own, kicking and punching at the two men alternately. He almost wins too.
Recovering from the kick he’d received, the first man pulls himself off the floor. He watches as his colleagues begin to overpower Jack. Then he goes and takes Mia’s arm and leads her back to the van.
‘Run Mia!’ Jack yells. He receives a hard punch in the face that stuns him. The second man sweeps his feet from under him. Jack lands hard on the ground. The second man and the driver deliver kicks and blows to his side to keep him down. All Jack can do is try to defend himself.
The blows stop raining down and winded, Jack is helpless as he watches Mia get in the van. The three men stop hitting him and hurry into the van, leaving Jack on the ground outside the house.
They drive away.
When he can breathe again, Jack pulls himself up from the pavement. He takes out his mobile phone to call in the incident. His first real job with MI5 has been a failure. But he was only supposed to watch and observe, none of them thought that Mia and Ben’s position was compromised. As he dials the number, Jack
begins to wonder how they’ve been found when their location was known to so few people. It suggests to him that someone must have betrayed them. Someone in MI5. There can be no other explanation.
He hears the baby crying now inside, and as he reports to Ray Martin, giving the licence plate of the van, he goes inside to make sure the child is all right. After all, she’s just as much in his care as Mia was.
‘At least they didn’t take the kid,’ Ray says. ‘That’s something.’
Ben returns with a security detail in tow a few minutes later. They pour into the house to find Jack feeding Freya with a bottle of expressed milk he’d found in the fridge.
‘She was screaming the place down,’ Jack says.
‘What the fuck happened?’ Ben asks. He takes Freya from Jack’s arms and holds her to him as though he’s afraid someone will come back and take her away too. He can see the tears still wet on her cheeks and he kisses her forehead as he soothes his daughter.
‘Your wife went with them willingly,’ Jack explains. ‘She didn’t even try to escape when I gave her the chance.’
‘That’s impossible,’ says Ben. ‘She wouldn’t…’
‘She looked like she was hypnotized,’ Jack says. ‘I’m sorry. I let you down. I tried to fight them off but there were three of them and they were all as trained as I am.’
‘You didn’t let anyone down, Jack. You kept my daughter safe. That’s a major result under the circumstances,’ Ben says. ‘You’re a fucking hero in my eyes.’
‘Can I do anything else to help?’ Jack asks. His eyes tear up slightly, but he hides it with an awkward rub of a hand over his face.
‘Ray is on his way. He’ll need to question you. I’ll get a medic here to look at your injuries.’
‘I’m bruised but it’s not as bad as it looks,’ Jack says.
‘Either way, let’s get you checked out. We aren’t the Network, Jack. We look after our assets.’
Jack nods. ‘Can I go and wash my face?’ he asks.
‘Sure. Bathroom is in the hallway.’
Jack goes out of the living room, leaving Ben holding his daughter. In the small bathroom he looks at his bruised and battered face in the mirror. He barely feels the injuries. He’s had worse when he was in the hands of the Network. Jack was grateful that MI5 had rescued him several months ago from a mansion in Alderley Edge, where he’d spent the last ten years being turned into an assassin. Being in the house had been hell and up until that point he’d never believed he could be free of the Network. But once they’d taken him from there Jack had volunteered to work for MI5 instead.
Retraining had taken him past his seventeenth birthday and after much therapy, Ray had finally trusted him with something important. Jack had been willing to help protect Mia and Freya. He never wanted any child to go through what he’d been through. And now, Mia has been taken by the Network. Jack feels sick at the thought of them controlling her, and using her for their own ends.
He washes the dried blood from his face and examines his bruises again. I deserve every one of them for failing Mia, he thinks. Jack shakes his head. No, that isn’t true. He had done his best and his best was good enough for MI5 – even if it wouldn’t have been for the Network.
Jack counts himself lucky again that he’d been found that day. Another week and he’d have been shipped away to start his career as a killer for the Network. And then, he’d never have freed himself from them. No one ever did.
Chapter Forty-One
Michael
I wake up that morning to find a missed call on the old burner phone that I’ve been keeping in the hope that Neva will contact me. There’s no message on the answering service and so I send a text to the number asking who they are. Then I put the phone back down at the side of the bed. A few minutes later it vibrates as another call comes in from the same number. I answer it.
‘Michael?’
It’s Neva. The sound of her voice, after all of these weeks, takes my breath away. I can’t fall for her tricks again. She can’t be trusted. She played me, I remind myself. But I’m not really prepared for how hearing from her makes me feel.
‘What do you want?’ I ask, making my voice sound hard.
I resist the urge to ask her how she is. It’s as if the last few weeks haven’t happened, and I hadn’t seen Granger accuse her of murdering Angela Carter. I wish I could unhear, unsee, unfeel all of those terrible moments of doubt and betrayal.
Neva sighs down the phone. I can almost visualize her, hesitant to speak, ready perhaps to tell me something that can change my mind about her. I ache for any excuse, any explanation.
‘Mia isn’t safe,’ she says. ‘They are coming for her.’
‘She’s in witness protection. Even the Network can’t find her,’ I say.
‘They’ve known all along where she is. I told you. There’s a mole in Archive.’
‘Neva, don’t lie to me. I have no intention of falling for your rubbish again,’ I say even though I know she’s right. Didn’t the bugging prove she hadn’t lied about this?
I feel tired and old then, as if I’ve given her every drop of my energy and she’s thrown it away, along with my feelings for her. Despite my attempt at sounding hardened to her, I yearn for her to redeem herself. I take a breath after realizing I’d been holding it too long. Tell me what I need to hear, I think. Tell me something that makes me believe in you again.
‘Michael. Please. I’m not lying. Meet me face to face and I’ll prove it. I have information from a very trusted source. The woman who tried to kidnap you for the Network was called Kritta. I bet you’d remember her voice. She was German, wasn’t she?’
I don’t answer, but I remember the woman well. She did have a German accent. An accent that Neva hadn’t heard when she’d surprised her, and me, in the stairwell and rescued me from her clutches. This at least I know is a truth.
‘I know you don’t trust me, but please just let me explain. Kritta was Mia’s mother, as Subra was yours.’
‘Go on,’ I say. Give me something to hold onto!
‘She was taken by my mother, Annalise. Annalise is now running the Network after she took out half of the committee using an assassin called Vasquez. I don’t have to be a genius to work out what Annalise wanted with Kritta. Like Subra, Kritta has the trigger words that will activate Mia. Which means that Annalise now has them. It won’t be long before they’ll make a move on Mia. And through her, they’ll make an attempt again on you.’
I think for a moment. My rational mind wants to believe this is a lie: everything Neva has said plays into my fears for Mia and my niece, Freya. I know the Network don’t give up their assets and both Mia and I belonged to them once. If I’m unwilling to belong to them, then they will kill me if they get the chance. It’s the only thing they can do. Thanks to Ray that chance has been denied them so far.
My regular phone rings then, and I see Ray’s number come up.
‘Just stay on the line,’ I say to Neva. ‘I have to take this.’
‘No. I’ll call you back in ten minutes,’ she hangs up, no doubt suspecting me of trying to trace her call.
I answer Ray’s call.
‘Michael. I’ve some bad news. The Network have taken Mia,’ Ray says.
‘Fuck! How did this happen? You said she was safe…’
‘I don’t know, but all I can say is we are interrogating everyone who had any access to that knowledge. We’ll find that mole if it’s the last thing we do,’ Ray says.
He explains the attack and Jack’s report of Mia going with them without putting up a fight. I see Mia in my mind’s eye and I know that she was trapped inside her own body and mind, unable to fight the commands they’d conditioned her to obey – as I had once been in the same position. I find it hard to imagine her leaving Freya alone in the house, regardless. This makes me once more aware of how strong the Network’s hold can be, especially if you don’t know how to fight them. I curse under my breath again. I should have warned her.
<
br /> ‘Did the vehicle plates show up anything?’ I ask.
Ray hesitates for a moment as though he’s afraid to tell me this part.
‘The van is registered to MI6,’ he confides.
‘What?’
‘I’m looking into who was using it, but honestly I’m expecting it to be a deliberate clone of one they have and not their actual van. It’ll be some kind of sick Network joke on us. The interesting thing is, they could have killed Jack, or pulled a gun on him but they didn’t. They tried to get out and away as clean as possible without casualties.’
‘I wonder why? That’s not their usual M.O. and Jack has seen them now. So, you’d think they’d have killed him rather than incapacitate him.’
‘I know,’ says Ray. ‘My first thought was he was in on it. But the security footage shows him genuinely putting up a fight and being overpowered. The kid is mortified. And so am I. I thought Mia was hidden, but it seems as though they knew where she was all along.’
‘It’s an inside job. Neva warned us about the mole and we didn’t believe her,’ I say.
‘I know. I should have listened to her, Mike. But this whole thing with Granger…’
‘What if Neva didn’t do it? What if Granger set her up, and then someone else silenced him? This mole perhaps,’ I suggest.
‘I know you want to believe in Neva. I get that. But Granger wasn’t lying. We polygraphed him. You know this,’ Ray says. ‘But I do accept that she probably didn’t kill him. I’m starting to realize it had to be one of our own. How else did the perp get through our security unseen?’
I don’t reply as Ray works out everything I’ve been suspecting for a while for himself. But I’d been too afraid to believe it because of my feelings for Neva.
‘Ben tells me Erik Steward at MI6 said they had eyes on Mia and Ben too. He’d argued it was for their own safety, but if there is a leak, maybe it’s in MI6 and not Archive,’ Ray tells me. ‘But I just don’t know. All I know is anyone could be involved. And we’re screwed if we can’t trust our own people.’
Kill a Spy: The House of Killers Page 19