Kill Chain

by Meg Gardiner

  I walked to the window and looked down at the green grass and gray stone in the courtyard. I glanced at my watch, then at Jax. “We have ninety minutes. The flash drive?”

  Jax grabbed a winter coat from the wardrobe and tossed a few items of clothing on the bed. Georgie loosened her tie and reached for a hanger. She hesitated.

  “Come on, Miss Thing. Don’t dawdle.” Jax was packing clothes in the rucksack. She paused and pressed her fingers to her temple as though fighting off a bout of pain.

  Georgie looked around the room, perplexed. “My other uniform.”

  I said, “Can I help with something?”

  “Where is it?” She was suddenly serious. “It was here. We have to hang them in the wardrobe. If it’s lying on the floor I’ll get demerited.”

  Down in the courtyard, movement caught my eye. I froze. “Your spare uniform is gone?”

  In the shadows of the courtyard, one girl had stayed behind when the others went back inside after recess. She had waist-length black hair and nonregulation Nikes. She was walking slowly along the outside of the school building, looking in the classroom windows.

  Jesus Christ. “Jax. They’re here.”

  We rushed from the room with Jax hanging onto Georgie with her right hand and holding her rucksack in the crook of her left arm, eyes sweeping the hall.

  Face fraught, Georgie said, “Mum, what’s going on?”

  “Where’s the back way out of the school?”

  Georgie gaped at her. “What’s the matter?”

  “Where?”

  Fright seeped into her eyes. “Behind the dorm, past the sports pitch there’s a path to an old gate.”

  We ran down the stairs. At the bottom I grabbed the miniature statue of Maria Auxiliadora. Without breaking stride I cracked it against the stairway banister, shattering off the bottom. Holding it like a broken bottle, I strode alongside Jax down a hallway to the back exit. She kept a grip on Georgie. Her head swiveled at each doorway.

  “Mum, what’s happening?”

  “No questions, Georgia. Do exactly as I say.”

  I glanced behind us. With everybody in class, we were the only ones around.

  “We have to warn Sister Cillian,” I said.

  “No time.” She paused at the exit, threw open the door, and looked around. “Clear. Move.”

  She pulled Georgie outside. I held back. On the wall inside the door was a fire alarm. I threw my elbow against it, breaking the glass, and pulled the switch. The air filled with the shriek of the alarm.

  Jax glared at me. “Move. Now.”

  We ran across a small playing field and found the path, overgrown with nettles. The gate was eighty yards down, bolted and rusty and veined with ivy, but unlocked. Jax handed the rucksack to Georgie and began muscling the bolt on the latch. It was stuck stiff with rust.

  “Where’s the flash drive?” I said.

  Georgie glanced at Jax, back at me, and then her gaze lengthened, past my shoulder. Her eyes jumped. The hair on the back of my neck stood up.

  I turned and saw the gremlinish figure of Shiver slide into view at the far end of the path. The school uniform looked monstrous. Her sick eyes were pinned on Georgie.

  Shouting with effort, Jax slammed loose the rusted bolt and yanked the gate open.

  Georgie pointed at Shiver. “Mum, who’s that?”

  Jax shot me a look, nothing but shards. “Take her.”

  I pushed Georgie through the gate. Jax came behind us, pulling it closed.

  “Keep her with you,” she said. “Don’t let her out of your sight.”

  “Of course.”

  “What’s going on?” Georgie said. “Who is that?”

  “Don’t let the authorities get her. None of them, ever. Take her with you; get her to the U.S.” She glanced at the gate. Reaching into her pocket, she produced a key. She slapped it into my palm. “You have to get the final flash drive. That’s the only way you can get her out of the U.K. and keep her with you.”

  “Where is it?”

  “Once you get to the States you’ll know who to trust.”

  “Where’s the flash drive?”

  “Georgie knows.” She turned to her daughter. “Code Black. Go with Kit. I’ll find you.”

  Georgie’s face blanched. “No—Mum.”

  I pulled on Georgie’s arm but she fought me, a little tiger, trying to break away. Jax dug her fingernails into her arm.

  “Don’t look. Run.”

  I tossed Jax the broken statue, wrapped an arm around Georgie’s waist and ran. She didn’t resist. I glanced back. Jax was reaching for the knife strapped to her calf.

  Holding tight to Georgie, I ran out onto a street behind the school. I heard sirens in the distance.

  Georgie’s shoulders hunched. “My mum . . . I don’t want to go . . . we have to help my mum.”

  I kept running. Our taxi was out in front of the school, but I didn’t know if Shiver had backup watching the front entrance or whether the police were on their way. I only knew we couldn’t get caught. I needed Georgie to be tough.

  “That woman on the path wants to hurt you. Your mom is keeping her from doing that. And you have to do something for your mom.”

  “What?”

  “Run like hell.”

  Down the block we raced, past bare trees and parked cars. A small white police car screamed past my view, blue lights flashing, headed for the front of the school. From another direction, a second siren was approaching. I vectored away from both of them, dashing along the sidewalk. Behind us, I heard the gate being thrown open.

  “Faster,” I said.

  Georgie shifted into a higher gear, keeping pace with me.

  Jax was hosed. She was fighting for Georgie, but she was already badly hurt. She would either be dead or under arrest in a matter of minutes. She wasn’t going to show up on the next corner, brushing dust from her impeccable wool suit. Wasn’t going to walk out of this one. That left me.

  I scanned the terrain, looking for cover, for safety, for a path to freedom. And realized—“Georgie, where can we go to hide?”

  She looked frantic for a moment, and pointed down the street. At the end was a brick wall with a gate leading into a park.

  “Through there.”

  Ahead, the sidewalk was blocked by construction scaffolding. I dodged between cars and ran down the middle of the narrow street. Range Rovers and Jaguars and builders’ pickups were parked bumper-to-bumper along the curb, and I felt as though I were running through a couloir, looking for a chute at the bottom.

  Breathlessly Georgie said, “We’re running away from the police.”

  “Yes.”

  She shot me a hot look. “This is Code Black for real, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah. It’s for real.”

  Her face set. I knew I couldn’t risk dishonesty with her.

  “I don’t know what she told you about Code Black,” I said.

  “Get away. Don’t go to anybody unless Mum says it’s okay. Not even the police.” She eyed me again. “Unless Mum told me they’re a friend, like you. Only go to Sister Cillian or . . .” Her chest hupped, but she fought it down. She was trying to be a big girl, to follow Code Black rules. “Get to Mum’s solicitors.”

  “Who?”

  “Goodhew Waites. Jeremy Goodhew from Goodhew Waites. She made me memorize it. I have his number in my mobile phone.”

  “Call him.”

  She grabbed for her backpack. “And fallback if I can’t get to him is White City.”

  At the corner, a car turned into the street, heading toward us, swinging wide.

  “What’s at White—Jesus.” I tossed her toward the parked cars. “Climb over.”

  She scrambled onto the hood of a car, and I made to do the same, hoping the driver would pull back to the correct side of the—Oh, crap.

  He veered sharply to the right. I jumped but he was coming straight at me. Even as I heard screeching brakes I knew it was too late. I was in the air when it hi
t me.

  The sound was awful, a deep thud that was me bouncing off the grille of the car. I hit the ground flat on my back in the middle of the road.

  I saw sky. It didn’t hurt. Oh, hell, was my neck broken?

  Then it hurt.

  Bad, pounding through me. I saw car tires and bare tree branches and wisteria. Stunned, head thundering, all the breath knocked out of me. I heard sirens, and wailing, and that was Georgie.

  Don’t lie here. Get up, Delaney. I saw Georgie on the hood of the parked car, mouth wide, and I couldn’t stay here. Move. I heard an almost physical voice saying, Get off your ass; come on, Delaney.

  I rolled over and crawled, my head ringing, taking stock of the fact that my arms could grab, my legs could move, I could stand, could see Georgie staring at me.

  “Go,” I said.

  “Delaney.”

  She looked at the car that had hit me, more confused than ever. It was idling in the street, and somebody was shouting at me. Police sirens were echoing off the old brick buildings. Slowly, blankly, I turned my head to look at the car.

  What was P. J. Blackburn doing behind the wheel?

  “Evan, get in.”

  P.J. wasn’t talking, but trying to roll down his window and finally opening the door and climbing out. I put a hand to my head. Jesus, I knew he was angry at me, but to run me down with a car? In London? He raised his hands and said, “I couldn’t help it; I hit the clutch instead of the brakes.”

  Jesse was leaning out his window. “Evan, come on.”

  Georgie had gone cat-cautious, eyes wary, withdrawing from me. “Kit?”

  Jesse beckoned to her. “Georgia, you too. Hurry, Ev.”

  I stood up, and pain rang through my ribs. Georgie glared at Jesse, shoulders low, and then at me. Scrambling off the far side of the parked car, she took off into the park.

  Jesse opened his door. “Get in. Evan, come on. We’ll go get her.”

  He sounded astonished and pleading and angry. He looked past me. A police car was coming down the street. He looked overtly, too much, relieved.

  He saw that I’d caught his expression. I shook my head, gave him a last look, and ran after Georgie.

  27

  I ran toward the park. Ahead through the gate I caught flashes of Georgie’s maroon jacket and bouncing backpack. Behind me, horns honked, and I heard the sound of P.J. struggling with the clutch. What the hell were he and Jesse doing here? How did they know to show up at the Salesian school?

  My stride was off, my leg killing me. I drummed through the park gate. Gnarled trees rose all around, branches grasping like arthritic fingers. Brambles crowded the view. A maze of muddy trails veered through blackberry thickets in all directions. I knew the English liked their gardens with a tousled edge, but this was too much—the evil twin of the Hundred Acre Wood.

  My breath frosting the air, I ran, glancing down trails as they branched out, seeing an elderly couple sauntering arm in arm, and a mother with her toddler bundled up on a park bench. Holly trees loomed overhead, clawing arch-ways over the path. Fifty yards down the trail, I found a map.

  Holland Park. Damn, it was huge. Lawn, tennis courts, playing fields, restaurants, a freaking opera pavilion, these woods, and oh, great—a grassy knoll. Where Evil Piglet lies in wait for the presidential motorcade with his sniper rifle. My throat constricted. I couldn’t lose Georgie. If I lost her everything was shattered.

  And I couldn’t panic and blunder around aimlessly. Georgie knew the park and this neighborhood, and she had instructions. Code Black: Get away, call Jax’s solicitor. And when I had asked her where to go, she said, Through there. Which meant out the park on the west side.

  A dog walker ambled up the trail from that direction. I waved to him.

  “Did you see a girl in a maroon school uniform running past you?”

  “Yeah, down that way.”

  He pointed over his shoulder. I took off.

  Right before the girl ran through the gate into the park, Jesse looked out the back window and saw her check over her shoulder, one glance, dread plain on her face. She must believe she was on her own, abandoned to the wolves. The thought grabbed him by the base of the throat.

  He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Turn around. See if you can cut around the park and catch up with her.”

  P.J. shook his head. “You think she’ll get in this car? No way. She’s making tracks.”

  He was right. She had seen them crash into Evan. And she had seen Evan refuse to get in the car. She had no idea who they were, other than two strangers trying to hunt her down.

  His brother gripped the wheel, face crimson, waiting for him to say something. Something like, You ran over my girlfriend, you could have killed her, you could have—

  “We have to try,” Jesse said.

  P.J. put the car in gear and scanned the cramped street. “I can’t turn around here. I have to go around the block.”

  “Do it.”

  They revved past Victorian town houses with big stone windowsills and wisteria crawling across the walls, nearly scraping the BMWs and Volvo SUVs parked at the curb. In the distance, a fire truck sped across the view, siren wailing. Ahead of them a girl rounded the corner at a dead run, sprinting for the park. He did a double take. Had Georgia made a loop?

  No, it was another girl in the same school uniform. Her eyes were hot in a pale face, her black hair flying. Blood was streaked across her cheek. A chill fingered down his back.

  “She’s one of them.”

  “Who?” P.J. said.

  She raced past them toward the park gate. “Christ, it’s her. The freak from the hotel in Bangkok.”

  P.J. peered at him in open disbelief. “Bangkok? Jesse, you trippin’?”

  She wore an earpiece and was clutching a handheld device, glancing from it to the street ahead and back again.

  Jesse got his phone. “Find a cross street and double back around the block. Hurry.”

  Pummeling down a gravel path and out of the park through a wrought-iron gate, I found myself on a broad street graced with white mansions. I grabbed my side, fighting off a stitch in my ribs. I looked around and oh, thank God, there she was off to my right. Two hundred yards up the street, backpack bouncing, skinny arms pumping like a world-class sprinter, she was making for a T-intersection where this street ran into a main road.

  “Georgie,” I called.

  She didn’t hear. I ran past the angel-cake mansions decorated with chandeliers and Jeep Grand Cherokees. The cold air rasped into my lungs. Up at the distant corner, Georgie waited for a traffic light to turn green, ran across, and raced out of sight to the right, along a row of classy storefronts.

  My phone rang. I dug it from my pocket. “Jax?”

  “The Bangkok freak is on your tail,” Jesse said.

  The biting sunlight and icy air felt abruptly colder. “And Jax?”

  “No.”

  I clenched my hands, feeling my eyes sting. I glanced over my shoulder. “I don’t see her.”

  “She just ran into the park.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Heading through this neighborhood, trying to double back.”

  “Keep P.J. away from me.”

  I hit the T-intersection and pulled up sharply at a red light, remembering to look right for traffic. This was Holland Park Avenue. I caught sight of Georgie running along the tree-lined sidewalk on the far side of the road.

  “Georgie!” I yelled. She gave no sign of hearing me.

  On the phone, Jesse said, “Ev, we’re coming, but—” “Does the FBI know I’m here? Did you call the police?”

  “No.”

  He didn’t even hesitate. I knew he was telling me the truth. The man might sell me out, but he wouldn’t lie to me. The light changed and I ran across the street.

  “Then don’t. Jax said—” My voice caught. Jax might be dead. “Involving the police will be a disaster for Georgie.”

  There was no reply for a long moment. “All ri
ght.”

  Relief rolled across me. Sunshine streaked through the bare branches of the trees as I ran up the street.

  “The freak has some kind of tracking device,” Jesse said. “Watch yourself. P.J. and I will try to run interference.”

  “Yeah, interference, he’s damned good at that.”

  I ran with lopsided fatigue up the street past a French bakery. Past Daunt Books, which looked like a chapel where word lovers could stop and worship. Past a boutique where the clothes were twelve shades of black. Past a charming grocery, and I didn’t guess they sold squidsicles here in Holland Park. Past a butcher’s shop where—holy mother, what was that in the window? What kind of animal had internal organs that slimy?

  Past the Starbucks, and I saw where she was going. “She’s heading for the underground station.”

  She ran through the entrance that yawned under the blue sign and the red underground symbol.

  I said, “Georgie’s heading for a law firm called Goodhew Waites. I don’t know where it is, but I figure it’s downtown.”

  “I’ll find out.”

  The underground station was old and not quite elegant, with glazed tiles shining on the walls. I ducked inside. Past the entrance barriers were two elevators. The door to one was just closing.

  “Georgie,” I called.

  The door shut with no reply. Favoring my ribs, I jogged to the ticket window and put a twenty-pound note on the counter. “Do you have an all-day ticket, all stations, something like that?”

  “Travelcard,” the woman said, and punched her keyboard. She slid the ticket under the slot in the window. I pushed through the barriers and hit the call button for the elevators, thinking, Hurry.

  I glanced back out at the street, seeing pedestrians and traffic. Forget this. I took the stairs, running down an iron spiral staircase that was clattering and cold as hell.

  The phone line was still open. “I’m in the station. I haven’t seen Shiver.”

  “Ev, I’ll—”

  The walls of the station cut off the call.

  Jesse snapped his phone shut, looking at the map. “When we get up to Notting Hill Gate turn left.”

  Wrestling the car around a corner, P.J. nursed along a street where town houses were painted candy colors, sky blue and red and white. They were going in the wrong direction, away from the Holland Park tube station. The car accelerated, and P.J. put his left hand on the stick and shifted into second. They revved up to the corner. Cross traffic was moving fast.