by LJ Ross
Again, Anna stared at him, drinking in the moment. He was not a man given to wasting words, nor volunteering conversation unless he could help it but, in the quiet space of his grandchild’s nursery, he let down his guard.
“I always think Ryan’s are the colour of the North Sea, in a storm,” she said.
Charles smiled at that. “Yes, that’s a good analogy,” he agreed. “It suits his temperament, too, wouldn’t you say?”
“Perhaps,” she admitted. “His waters run deep, but they’re mostly placid until something really angers him—usually injustice of some kind.”
Charles thought about his son’s strong moral yardstick, and was proud.
“Ryan has great self-control,” he said. “I don’t know whether he learned that from me, his mother, or his schooling, but I suppose it helps him with his work to be somewhat detached.”
“Did that help you?”
He looked up, mildly embarrassed. “Me?”
“Yes, with your work. I can only imagine how stressful that might have been, at times. It must have helped to develop a sense of detachment.”
Charles looked back down at the baby, who had now finished her milk and promptly fallen asleep in a ‘milk coma’. Without having to be told, he raised her to his shoulder and began rubbing slow circles on her back as he thought of the assassination attempts, the security breaches, the fear he’d lived with almost every day that his work for Her Majesty’s government would jeopardise his family’s safety.
It had been a relief to turn his back on it all, and retire; except, now it seemed that the baton of fear had been passed to his son.
“I did what I had to do,” he said, at length. “I was brought up to respect duty, obligation and a chain of command. There were protocols and strict security measures I had to abide by, or else risk catastrophic consequences, but it meant sacrificing moments such as these.”
Would he do it all over again? Charles wondered.
An impossible question to answer.
Almost as difficult as the question now facing his son.
CHAPTER 15
Tuesday 8th December
The following morning, Ryan left Anna and the baby sleeping soundly and made his way downstairs well before dawn, expecting to find that he had the kitchen to himself.
However, on this occasion, he was not alone.
Charles had been up since four, unable to sleep. He didn’t need to be an intelligent man to understand that Ryan’s trip to Yorkshire had been significant. Quite rightly, Ryan hadn’t disclosed any details of the incident he and Phillips had attended, but when Charles had seen the late-evening reporting of a murder at Crayke College and then taken the trouble to do a basic online search, it didn’t take too much of a mental leap to understand the possibility of a connection between the ancient Benedictine monastery that had been founded by St. Cuthbert, many centuries ago, and the problem of Cuthbert’s cross having been falsified in Durham. A murder in each place was an unlikely coincidence and, if there was a connection, it meant that Ryan had been right, all along.
The perpetrator was still at large.
“Dad? You’re up early.”
Ryan entered the kitchen and moved directly to the coffee machine.
“It’s a nice time of day,” Charles said. “When it’s still dark outside and the rest of the world is sleeping, it gives one a chance to think.”
There were few people who used the word ‘one’ as a personal descriptor, nowadays, Ryan thought, but it seemed to suit his father.
“How was your trip, yesterday?”
Ryan took a gulp of coffee before answering, then cast his eyes to the ceiling, where all was quiet. He thought briefly of trying to fob him off, but Charles Ryan was not a man who was easily fooled and, frankly, he respected his father too much to lie to him.
“There was another torture killing,” he said, and relied upon his father’s honour not to repeat the details of what he was about to disclose. If you couldn’t trust a man who’d worked in military intelligence to keep a secret, there were few that you could trust. “A monk by the name of Father Jacob Jamieson. They found him dead at Crayke College, and North Yorkshire CID asked if we’d go and take a look to see if there were any similarities.”
“And were there?”
“Yes,” Ryan answered shortly. “But, most damning of all was the man’s connection with St. Cuthbert. He was a leading authority, you see.”
“Therefore, the question becomes, what was the man’s connection with your case in Durham?” Charles surmised.
“Exactly,” Ryan said, and finished his coffee in two gulps before re-filling his cup. “Would you like one?”
Charles shook his head.
“More worrying than the possibility of a connection is the fact that our perpetrator is active again,” Ryan explained, though he hardly needed to. It was comforting to offload his fears to a man who, he knew, was likely to have lived through and survived much worse.
“And, you still believe this person—or group—has killed before, to protect themselves?”
Ryan gave a jerky nod. “More than once.”
“If it’s the same person, they’ll find out you were in Yorkshire,” Charles said. “There’s a chance they’ll come after you.”
“Yes,” Ryan said, tonelessly, staring out of the kitchen window at the blackened landscape outside.
Charles moved a step closer, his hand itching to rest on his son’s shoulder.
“You know what needs to happen,” he said, clasping his hands behind his back instead. “You need to divide the unit.”
The unit, Ryan thought, with a sad smile. So prosaic a word to describe his family, and reason for being.
“I know,” he said softly. “Anna and Emma should go back down to Devon with you and Mum. It’s the best thing for them, now.”
“Good,” Charles said. “We can leave this afternoon.”
“I need to speak to Anna about it, first. She’ll take some persuading.”
“It isn’t about persuading—”
“You’re right,” Ryan said, a bit sharply. “It’s a matter for discussion. Anna is my wife, and a free agent. I can do my utmost to convince her but, ultimately, the decision must be hers.”
“It isn’t a decision she’s qualified to take—”
“Anna isn’t some simpering little woman,” Ryan said, and his eyes flashed a warning. “She’s far more intelligent than either of us, and is perfectly capable of weighing up the risks of the situation.”
Charles hissed out a breath and turned away to pace to the window.
“I’m well aware of what you’ve found, in Anna,” he said, after a minute or two slipped by. “Anna is to you what your mother has been to me, all these years.”
Ryan scrubbed a hand over his face and let it fall away again.
“It isn’t that I haven’t considered the danger,” he said. “It’s all I’ve thought about, for nine solid months. Devon or Northumberland—it makes no difference, except that you’d be further away for me to be able to help, if need be.”
Charles looked into his son’s tired eyes and finally understood.
“Safety in numbers? In that case, let me do something else for you. Let me arrange for some private security—I still have all my old contacts.”
Ryan thought of the dark-suited men and women who’d followed them around when he’d been a boy, and barely held back a shiver. He’d hoped for a different life for his own family.
Yet, here they were.
“We can’t live that way,” he said. “There’s still no specific threat, no prime suspect we’re hunting. If we call in a security team now, there’s no telling how long they’d need to be here, watching our every move.”
Charles thought for a moment. “Where d’you keep your weapon, son?”
Ryan blinked.
“Your service revolver? Where do you keep it?”
It wasn’t regulation for a firearms officer to keep a police-owned weap
on at home, and Ryan wasn’t much of a fan of guns at the best of times. However, that didn’t mean he hadn’t taken it upon himself to purchase and register a rifle, ostensibly for use on the land.
“Under lock and key,” he replied.
Charles nodded. “Mine’s in a locked box in the boot of my car. Meet me there in a few minutes, and we’ll see how well you’ve kept your eye in.”
* * *
The first shot rang out as the sun rose, its fiery rays bursting across the Coquet Valley like rivers of molten gold as the world awakened. Father and son had removed themselves from the house, walking far out of sight and range of another living soul, to set up a makeshift shooting gallery in one of the fields that formed part of Ryan’s smallholding. Now, they stood side by side, two generations of Ryan men on a patch of ancient earth that had borne the heavy tread of soldiers’ footsteps hundreds of years before.
Charles emptied another five rounds, secured his rifle and then walked the hundred yards to the tree where he’d carved a circle with a cross in the middle.
The cross now bore six neat holes.
Satisfied, he walked back to where his son stood with a rifle in his hand, his tall body framed by the rising sun at his back. All his life, he’d wanted Max to be strong, to be self-sufficient…but now, as he stood there looking like all of those things, Charles realised he wanted something else, much more.
He wanted his son to be safe.
Keeping his head bowed until he was in command of himself once again, Charles covered the ground and went about the business of correcting Ryan’s stance.
“How long’s it been, since you fired a gun?”
“A couple of years,” Ryan said, honestly. “I was planning to head down to the range, to keep my certificate up to date—”
“Doesn’t matter,” Charles said. “It’s like riding a bicycle.”
Ryan wasn’t sure that was entirely the case, but he humoured his father and allowed his posture to be altered this way and that. Northumbria Police Constabulary preferred a Glock semi-automatic revolver as its service weapon of choice, but a rifle was a different kind of beast.
“Keep the butt of the weapon tucked into your shoulder,” he said. “Elbow nice and flat. Aim about half an inch above the cross, to get a bullseye.”
Ryan closed his mind to all else, unhooked the safety and rested his finger on the trigger of the bolt-action rifle. As he lowered his face to look through the sights there was not a sound other than the gentle whirring of insects in the brush, and the whisper of the wind as it whipped over the crusted earth.
Breathe, he told himself.
He pressed the trigger, and felt the thrust of the recoil hit his shoulder as the sound echoed around the valley and sent a small flock of birds squawking noisily into the sky.
“You’re a quarter of an inch too low,” his father murmured, raising a hand to shield his eyes against the sun.
Ryan raised an eyebrow.
“You can see that, from here?”
Charles gave him an enigmatic smile and, for a moment, it was as though he was looking in the mirror.
“You can’t?” he shot back, and flashed a sudden smile. “Maybe you need to make an appointment at Specsavers.”
Ryan paused in the act of reloading the rifle, wondering if he’d misheard.
“Did you just crack a joke?”
“Yes, son, I believe I did. Think you can take it?”
Ryan gave him a lopsided grin.
“I can take it, if you can—grandad.”
“That’s ‘His Excellency, The Former Ambassador, Grandad’, to the likes of you.”
It was only the truth, Ryan thought, and wondered what Phillips would do if he knew that was the formal title of an ambassador, which his father had been for seven years.
He’d probably transfer to the Diplomatic Service, that’s what he’d do.
“Yeah, well, don’t expect a tray of Ferrero Rocher any time soon.”
Charles laughed richly, enjoying himself despite the circumstances.
“Get six straight bullseyes in the trunk of that tree, and I’ll serve you a tray myself,” he said.
“Is that a bet?”
“Mm hmm. I’ll even start calling you ‘Ryan’.”
His son paused, saw that he was quite serious, and raised the rifle again.
“You’re on.”
* * *
Anna awakened from another nightmare and scrambled out of bed to check the baby, who slept soundly in her cot. Skin clammy, heart hammering, she watched her daughter’s steady breathing for a few minutes, to calm herself, before sitting down shakily on the edge of the bed.
What is the matter with me? she wondered.
Was this post-natal depression?
She’d read about it, of course, so that she would be prepared for any eventuality, and it was true that some of what she was experiencing seemed to match the symptoms.
Bad sleep patterns
Night terrors
Weight loss
Inability to concentrate…
Yet, her mood in general remained as positive as it had always been. Despite any evidence to the contrary, Anna continued to believe the best in people, and felt overwhelming joy whenever she was with her daughter.
Well, except when Emma was screaming, she amended. She’d have to be barmy, or a masochist, to feel joyful about that.
Just then, she heard the front door open and close again with a soft click, followed by Ryan’s quiet tread on the stairs. A moment later, he appeared around the edge of the door.
“Morning,” he whispered, upon finding her awake. “Can I get you a coffee?”
She shook her head and tried to smile.
“No—no, thanks.”
Worried now, Ryan stepped fully into the room, tiptoeing past the baby to sit next to his wife. He brushed a strand of hair away from her face and then lowered his head to brush his lips against hers, tenderly, carefully, before drawing her into his arms.
“Your skin is cold,” she said, with her face pressed against his neck.
“I went for a walk with Dad,” he replied. “We had a few practice rounds with the rifle.”
Anna drew back to look into his eyes, finding them tired but clear. If anything, he seemed more alive, despite having been up at the crack of dawn, and she was glad to see it.
“How are you?” he pressed. “Did you have another nightmare?”
Anna nodded, wearily.
“It’s getting to be every night,” she said. “I’m exhausted with it.”
Ryan thought carefully about how to word his next question, for it had been playing on his mind for the last month or so, since her nightmares began.
“You know, I was reading about how hormones can affect a woman’s body post-partum,” he said. “Apparently, sometimes, there can be a bit of a delayed reaction and—ah—they can feel a bit less like themselves…”
Anna smiled. “I know,” she said. “I’ve thought about the possibility, myself, but I’m so grateful that you brought this up. It makes it easier for me to know that I can talk to you, even though you have so many other things going on. Thank you.”
“You don’t need to thank me, Anna. Loving you, caring for you…it’s as easy as breathing.”
Her lip wobbled a bit, but she reached for his cold hand and warmed it between her own.
“I don’t think it’s PND, but I’m keeping an eye on it,” she said. “If it gets worse, I’ll let you know.”
Ryan brought her fingers to his lips. “I may have a lot on at work, but none of it compares with you and Emma,” he said, deeply. “None of it, d’you hear? I’m never too busy to listen, Anna, and I want to help with the baby as much as I can.”
Right on cue, his daughter let out her first plaintive wail of the morning, and Anna batted her eyelids at him.
“You can change the first nappy, in that case.”
“I walked straight into that one.”
“You sure did—napp
ies and wipes are in the changing bag.”
CHAPTER 16
It would happen soon.
Mathieu Lareuse—street name, ‘Rodin’—had spent another uncomfortable night in the cells at Pentonville Prison. Whilst the surroundings were hardly salubrious, it wasn’t the standard of accommodation that had kept him from sleeping. Rather, it was the unsettling knowledge that he was going to be murdered.
Today or tomorrow—who could say?
The only thing he knew for certain was that it would happen, and it was likely to happen soon.
Lareuse had accepted his last commission on the understanding that he would take a little hiatus immediately afterwards, and he’d been true to his word on that score. He’d spent a very enjoyable three years living in Egypt, in an expansive villa directly overlooking the Nile, where he’d entertained a series of nubile young men on a casual basis. He’d sunbathed by day, and by night he had sailed his little felucca boat to one of the many hotel jetties for dinner or a nightcap. All with the comfortable knowledge that Egypt had no extradition treaty with the United Kingdom, nor with his native France.
Unfortunately, that lifestyle came with a cost, and he’d run short of the kind of money needed to fund the lifestyle to which he’d become accustomed.
He’d begun to think about re-entering the scene, when news reached him about Cuthbert’s Cross having been stolen, then recovered again. He’d laughed himself silly, at first; then, he’d been angry at the prospect of having undersold himself, to some considerable degree. For, if the police had recovered a forged cross, checked it and believed it to be real, then he was even better at his craft than he thought he was.
He’d flown back to the UK soon afterwards, with the vague idea of extorting more money from his former client.
Then, he’d heard about what happened to old Eddie Faber.
Fabergé to some.
Tortured, brutally murdered—and for what? He had to have known about the cross or found out about it, but not from him nor any of his acquaintances. There was nothing his client valued more than privacy; they’d been explicit about that, from the start, and every stage of producing the replica had been done in the strictest of confidence.