She’d been looking forward to a peaceful dinner, a last supper if you like, with Fleur before she did what any mother in her position would do. I had to get her help, she thinks as she justifies what she’s done.
Doctors and orderlies would be here to take Fleur in the morning to a private clinic in Switzerland that Annalise has been funding for her own reasons for years. Her operatives are in charge, Fleur would be in safe hands. Maybe they could even help her. But one thing Annalise knows for certain: Fleur can’t be allowed to have her own agenda. Not now that Annalise is so close to her goals. Not now that Neva is due home.
Chapter Sixty-Four
Jewel
It’s as though Neva is calling her and they are playing once again that silly game of hide and seek that Neva always won. Neva always knew where to find Jewel. Now that same sixth sense pulls Jewel down the corridor, passing the numerous closed doors on the way, until she reaches the room at the end. Fae’s room. Mother had locked the door the day she left.
Jewel had believed that no one came in here. And then, years later, she’d seen Mother entering the room, locking the door behind her.
Jewel had crept to the door and listened. All was silent within. She thought perhaps this room was used for some secret only Mother knew. A secret she wanted to share.
When Mother had retired for the night, Jewel came back. She’d picked the lock and gone inside. That was when she learned how Mother really felt about her other daughter. That was when she knew that she had lost her Mother forever and it was all Fae’s – no, Neva’s – fault.
The whole room was a shrine given over to that lost child at first. Then it became a place where Mother celebrated Neva’s many successes, even as she left the rest of the room to rot. Jewel had never earned that same love and respect, no matter how hard she tried. Sometimes she felt she was a painful reminder of the favoured child, a runner-up prize. Second best. Though Jewel had pined for Fae at first, she’d grown to resent, and then hate, her missing sibling. Her departure had somehow stopped Mother from loving Jewel.
Jewel’s bitterness increased with time, spurred on from the moment when Mother had pitted them both against each other. Jewel had revisited the room often. She studied Neva’s many achievements as Mother had displayed them on the wall. The deaths were always so simple and clean, yet never rushed. Jewel took up the knife as her favoured weapon. She honed her use of it. Killed with it, emulating Neva to perfection.
Mother didn’t notice. Jewel’s fury grew.
Now, the moment of her ultimate retribution has arrived.
Neva is unconscious when Jewel enters the room. Jewel turns her over, sees the carpet-burn smudge on Neva’s cheek, signposting the suddenness of her collapse.
It is a dream come true that she is here, vulnerable, right in the place where Jewel can stage her perfectly. A present for Mother that she’ll have to accept.
Taking her by the wrists, Jewel pulls Neva towards the small bed. Then she goes to the door and closes it.
She pulls the rotting cotton sheet from the bed then rips it into strips. She ties Neva’s wrists to the footboard. Neva doesn’t wake as Jewel stretches her body along the floor. Her arms are pulled up and over her head in an uncomfortable position.
Jewel steps back. She tries to visualize what she wants to show Mother but the inspiration she’s had with previous kills evades her. She turns around in the room looking for the props. Her eyes fall on the teddy bear, a one-time favourite of Fae’s. Jewel blinks as she’s plummeted back again into childhood.
‘Your sister won’t be back,’ Mother had said.
‘But why? Where is she?’ Fleur had asked.
‘She doesn’t belong to us anymore.’
From the day she left everything changed.
Mother was cold to Fleur’s tears. If she ever cried over the loss of her daughter, Fleur never saw it. But sometimes she’d find Mother alone, a faraway look in her eyes that confirmed that Fleur had lost both sibling and parent on that one day.
Now Jewel looks at her sister and sees the entity that took away her mother’s love and turned Fleur into the killer that is Jewel.
She doesn’t regret who she’s become, for now it will give her the ultimate ascension.
She will prove she’s better than Neva.
‘Fleur?’
Jewel turns to look at Neva.
She observes the confused expression on Neva’s face and recognizes that she has yet to fully understand her plight.
‘Good. You’re awake.’
Chapter Sixty-Five
Michael
Gun in hand, I turn right and start to walk down the corridor to begin my search of the château. A door opens ahead of me and someone steps out into the corridor. There is nowhere I can go.
I am face to face with Annalise.
‘I did not expect you,’ she says as though I’m a surprise guest in her house and not an invader of it.
‘I’m sure you didn’t. Where is my sister?’ I say.
‘Of course. I should have known that you would throw away everything to come for her. How did you find us?’
‘You’re not as anonymous as you think you are,’ I say. ‘But when Neva’s source told us about this place, I knew you’d be here. This was your parents’ house wasn’t it?’
Annalise’s expression tells Michael all he needs to know about her parents even though she tries to hide her emotions under a frown.
‘Where is she?’ I say, pointing my Glock directly at her.
Annalise shakes her head.
A slow smile plays on her lips as she looks at me.
‘You won’t kill me, Michael. You had the chance when Subra had you under her control. I’ve brought Mia up to speed with who and what she is. I suspect she will be rather annoyed with you for keeping her in the dark. Especially when she takes over the Network.’
‘What are you talking about?’ I say. ‘Mia would never…’
‘I’ve made an alliance with her. If you’ve any sense, you’ll do the same,’ Annalise says.
I don’t want to believe her but there’s a nagging memory in the back of my head. Something that Beech had told me, months ago, in the English kill house. How only a Beech can take control of the Network. I hadn’t thought about it since. I’d been dealing with all the information my mind had had to absorb once I’d been activated and now, Annalise’s words take me back to that fateful conversation.
Beech was calm as he spoke those special words that made sure he had me fully in control.
‘You’re my heir, Michael,’ he said. ‘But, in the event that you are dead, or compromised, Mia will be activated. Now, let me warn you about Annalise…’
Beech’s words ring in my head as I watch Annalise. She’s going to try to blindside me. She wants to get to Neva, and I remember why. Neva can be compromised. Tracey and Annalise were working together and they’d really done a number on her. But how Beech had known all this, I couldn’t remember.
‘You have to kill Neva,’ Beech had said after he triggered me.
And I’d been going to, until the door opened and I’d come face to face with her. I couldn’t do it. I’d remembered too much. I knew she was the little girl that held my hand when I was scared and who shared this horrible experience with me. The connection we’d had from the beginning had led me to her over a year ago in a busy London street. I’d been there for her, just as she had been for me.
‘Where’s Neva?’ Annalise asks and the sharpness in her voice focuses me back on her.
‘She’s looking for Mia, and probably you too, to take her revenge on you,’ I say. ‘You deserve it for what you’ve done to her.’
‘She’s alone? Here?’ Annalise’s face shows concern as the assassin façade drops away.
‘Fleur,’ she says. ‘I have to find Fleur!’
‘You’re not going anywhere until I find Mia.’
‘Mia’s gone. She’s probably already on my jet flying back to London!’ Annalise says. �
�Look, we can deal with your hatred of me another time. I have to find my daughters.’
The reason for Annalise’s concern occurs to me: she’s worried that Neva will hurt her twin.
‘Don’t worry, I doubt Neva will kill her. It’s you she wants revenge on,’ I say.
Annalise’s irritation slips away as her eyes dart past me.
‘It’s Fae – Neva – I’m concerned for, not Fleur,’ she says.
‘Why would you care? You gave her away to be made into a murderer,’ I say.
‘You can judge me all you want when… Look, Michael. This is serious. You’ve been investigating some murders, haven’t you? The victims all looked like Neva, didn’t they?’
‘What do you know about that?’ I ask.
‘I don’t know, but I suspect… We have to find them both. Now!’
‘You’re really worried, aren’t you?’ I say.
Annalise hurries towards me and taken by the sincerity of her alarm, I let her pass me as she heads towards the stairs. She stops at the top, looking down the landing that Neva had taken.
‘Did she…?’
I nod.
‘How long have you been on the property?’ she says.
‘Why?’ I ask.
‘We don’t have time to lose,’ she says. ‘She’ll be vulnerable and that’s when Fleur will press her advantage.’
I hear rising hysteria now in her voice and it translates over to my already taut nerves. Despite myself I’m pulled along by it. I don’t know Annalise, but somehow I believe she really is worried. Whether that is for Neva or Fleur, I just don’t know. And it doesn’t really matter. It’s enough to make me concerned for Neva either way.
In a matter of seconds I have to decide what I’m going to do. Do I believe her that Mia is no longer here? Do I believe that Neva is in danger – and knowing how resilient Neva is, that one is hard to believe. Or do I just kill Annalise now and end this once and for all?
‘Lead on and don’t try anything stupid,’ I say. ‘I’ll have no problem shooting you.’
Annalise glares at me, then turns and hurries off down the corridor. I follow, keeping my gun trained on her and my finger on the trigger. The killer in me rears again. One false move and I will happily put a bullet in her.
Chapter Sixty-Six
Neva
Neva’s head hurts as she opens her eyes. For a moment she can’t place where she is. Then the void begins to fill and her whole world twists and turns, threatening to overwhelm her once more. She’s Fae D’Aragon. She’s Neva. She’s both. A burst of more agonizing memory brings her back to consciousness. The irony of this recollection is not lost on her. It explains so much about her life. Mother had given her away, but she had also helped her. She’d worked with Tracey. They were both involved in Neva’s conditioning. Neva remembers it all.
She feels her mother’s arms around her, and accepts the cold caresses with the distance and unfeeling of the assassin she’s become. Fae is inside still but it’s far more complex than just having a dual personality, or being a sleeper. No – the sleeper is her ‘real’ self, trapped inside the killer of the Network Tracey and Annalise had made. She’s fragments of a whole that now merges into one cohesive being.
Her eyes fall on the back of a tall slender woman standing a few feet away. She searches her memory and the recollection returns with a painful vengeance.
‘Fleur?’
The woman turns, Neva knows now she’s right. It is her sister, fully grown. But she’s familiar. They’ve met recently and she can’t quite remember where. She feels that sense of disjointed confusion as her mind searches for the pieces of the puzzle, a jigsaw that slots together to bring all the details and knowledge into her control.
Fleur’s eyes are cold as she looks at Neva. This is not a happy reunion for either of them.
Neva’s arms ache and she realizes she’s in an unnatural position. She tugs at the bonds.
‘I’m not here to hurt you. We came for Mia,’ Neva says, remembering their mission. ‘Do you know who I am?’
‘You’re Neva,’ Fleur says.
‘Fleur… I…’
‘I’m Jewel now,’ she says.
Jewel. Neva remembers a Jewel. Yes. She remembers a war, an attempted coup to take over her reign in the house. Jewel had tried to undermine her – Neva had taught her a lesson. She’d triumphed over her. She sees the resentment that this caused, left inside Jewel all these years, festering like a pus-filled sore that is now ready to burst.
‘My sister… you were her and I didn’t recognize you. I’m sorry. I wasn’t myself… the house…’
Jewel gives a harsh laugh. ‘Your death is going to be beautiful, Neva. I think I’ll place the photograph of it in a frame, above your achievements.’
Neva looks at the wall and the kill photographs. She recalls them now, remembers once more entering the room just a short time ago and the agony of her psyche breaking down. This break, worse than the first, had taken torture to a whole new level. Neva craves revenge now for all that was done to her. All that she’s been forced to endure. She lapses back into her cold killer self as her default mechanism kicks in.
‘This is your work?’ she asks and her voice is calm. Her pulse is steady. She has expected her own demise for years, and her mortality holds no fear for her now. Instead, she feels alert. Strong. Ready.
‘Mine. Oh no. This is Mother’s doing. She’s been following your career all along.’
Neva tests the bonds again; she can feel a slight give on the wooden bedpost she’s tied to. A hard tug might free her. She watches Jewel as she stalks around the room.
‘You’re my gift to Mother,’ Jewel says. ‘She’ll have to notice me then.’
Neva looks into her sister’s face and sees that her black pupils are dilated, threatening to take over the whole of her eye. There is darkness in there, but not the cold and calculated workings of a professional killer. There is something more, that leads Neva to wonder what Jewel has been through at the hands of her mother. Jewel is broken. But it’s more than that. A break can be recovered from, it’s more about establishing self and freedom. But not in Jewel’s case.
Even as Neva is struggling to bring the pieces of her own collapse back together, she feels Jewel’s anxiety. She senses the swirling void, the rage, the absolute abject loneliness that has brought this all to the fore. And more than anything else, she sees the pure insanity that might mean her once loved sister is now completely lost in a mind full of hate.
Chapter Sixty-Seven
Neva
As Jewel approaches, Neva sees a blade drop into her hand. She’s wearing an identical wrist holster to hers, and the knife is the same size and make as Neva’s own blade. She begins to work out how she can escape.
‘I could kill you now,’ Jewel says. ‘But I want you to see my work first.’
Jewel pushes the blade back into the holster, then goes to a dresser near the door and opens the top drawer. She retrieves a box and brings it to Neva.
‘I brought this here earlier today. Ready for you. Even though I didn’t expect you quite so soon. I suppose it was the man… pushing you to come and take Mother on. To rescue his sister.’
‘What do you know of Mia?’ Neva asks.
‘She will be a strong leader. Not like the… Michael. His compassion is his weakness,’ Jewel says.
Neva doesn’t respond: Michael’s empathy is a strength to her. Though of course, Jewel would never see that. She watches her now, wary of what she will do next, but waiting for the right moment to free herself and to bring down Jewel more dramatically than she did all those years ago when they were both children of the house.
Jewel opens the lid of the box and starts to lay photographs at Neva’s feet, and around her body as though she is creating a collage with Neva as the centrepiece. Neva sees the content of the photographs as Jewel lays them out beside her. They are all duplicates of the same five kills: all women in various bloody scenarios; wrists cut in a bath
; staked out on the floor; multiple stab wounds in a shower; a body wrapped in razor wire; another on a bed covered with petals. She recognizes that these were the women from news reports she’s seen.
Neva appreciates what is happening. Jewel was the killer of all these innocent victims and now she is being staged. The victims all looked like her: it makes sense why Jewel felt they had to die.
Neva tests the bonds and feels the width of the footboard spokes she’s tied to while simultaneously stretching her arms to relieve the cramping discomfort.
Once she’s placed the photographs around Neva, Jewel steps back. She studies her display. Then removing her phone from her pocket, she takes a photograph of Neva among them.
‘It’s not quite right,’ Jewel says.
She picks up the teddy and places it on the bed behind Neva.
Then she takes another picture.
‘Better.’
She stops to look through her phone. Then she frowns again.
‘I forgot this one,’ she says. ‘I didn’t get a chance to have a print made.’
She bends down and holds the phone out for Neva to see.
There’s a photograph of another victim: Janine is naked and tied to a bed in a hotel room. Her throat has been cut. On the wall behind her is written, presumably in Janine’s blood, ‘Our Beloved Daughter’. Neva’s expression remains cold. She doesn’t give Jewel the satisfaction of seeing her shocked or upset. But she feels a terrible regret that her friend has been killed and all because she doubled for her. A burst of emotion erupts inside her, breaking down the assassin training once again. Neva pushes back. She removes the image of Janine from her mind. She runs her mantra in its place instead. I am death…
‘I knew she’d see you in my smile. She was besotted with you. Just like Mother. I played with her for months in the hope she’d lead me to you. When she didn’t, I decided to save her for last. Her death was very satisfying.’
Kill a Spy: The House of Killers Page 29