The Ice House

by John Connor

  Only now she had a daughter they were trying to kill. So it wasn’t going to be like last time, because it couldn’t be. Ten years ago she had collapsed, mentally and physically. But this time she had to keep going, find Rebecca. She had to keep the causation clear in her head. She had chosen none of this – not now, not ten years ago. It had come to her and she had reacted, without any real choice or freedom. This time Molina had made the choices, despite her repeatedly trying to give him a way out.

  His car was down in the reservoir waters now, submerged. From where she was she couldn’t see it at all, but still had doubts about whether it would be visible from a police helicopter. The reservoir – made by damming and flooding a vast shallow valley system – could not be that deep. But it would have to do. About three kilometres back, on the main road, she had passed a bus stop, which meant there were people living round here somewhere, but she hadn’t seen them. The land all around was sandy scrub, desolate, throughout most of the year more like a desert. There were trees and bushes nearer to the reservoir but out beyond that you were beginning to get into the immense, parched, flat interior of Spain.

  The bus stop was a back-up, but things would be desperate if it came to having to catch a public bus. She had killed a police­man. She assumed the body would be discovered sometime today, maybe already had been. It depended who knew what Molina had been up to. She assumed there would be some kind of major hunt for her. So the window for being able to get on a public bus without being detected was pretty small.

  She would have preferred to have stuck to the coast, to the heavily populated areas. More police there, but more places to hide also, harder to find people. But she hadn’t been thinking clearly five hours ago, fleeing from Molina’s hut. Her main fear had been that Zaikov’s people were on their way there to kill her. She had to put distance between herself and that place. So she had driven inland without planning anything, intent only on getting away.

  Her phone wouldn’t work, because the chip had been removed. Maybe the chip had been somewhere else on Molina’s body, maybe she could have found it if she’d forced herself to be calmer, but by the time she had pulled over – still in darkness – and got out her phone to try Rebecca again, there had been no possibility of going back to the hut to check. Which had only left Molina’s phone. She had called Rebecca using that, got a message, in Spanish, saying the number could not be reached. That was enough to convince her. She needed help, needed it very badly – and there was only one way she could think to achieve that.

  She called the emergency number she had memorised two years ago, at the meeting with Michael Rugojev. It wasn’t in any phone memory, it wasn’t written anywhere. It was in her head only, as he had requested. She had learned it carefully but still feared a digit might be wrong, or he might have changed it. But it had been answered immediately. Not by Michael, but by someone speaking Russian. She had told them who she was and what was happening. In poor English, they had said they would call back.

  Within ten minutes the phone had rung and she was giving the details again – again, not to Michael himself. Whoever it was this time had told her to drive here, get rid of the car and phone and wait. They would send someone. They had given her a car registration plate to watch out for.

  That was over four hours ago now. She had found this place using the car satnav, then rolled the car off the bluff and found a thick growth of bushes near the road, pushed her way into them to wait. She could see the cliff edge – the drop was only about ten metres at this point, straight into the water – see the road as it twisted along the edge of the reservoir before disappearing into the rain.

  She had kept the phones and, whilst waiting, taken a closer look at Molina’s. It had to be a phone he had got just to contact Zaikov, she decided. There were no numbers in the memory and he had – according to the call log – called only one number over the last two days. No calls had come into the phone. The number he had been calling – the number he had called when he had stepped outside the hut to get them to come for her – was there in the log. So she could call it.

  She had tried hard to think that idea through, rationally, working out what could go wrong, what she might achieve or give away. She couldn’t see any additional danger that would come of it. They wanted her – to kill her, no doubt about that – but they wanted her, so why wouldn’t they speak directly to her?

  But it hadn’t worked out so easy. Crouching in the bushes before the rain started, she had keyed the number – it looked like an ordinary Spanish mobile number – and for a long time it had just rung. But the second time someone picked up, or she thought they did. The sky turning grey above her, she had listened intently to the silence at the other end, holding her breath. She wanted them to speak first, to hear the voice, in case she recognised it. But no one said anything. She cut the connection and waited ten minutes, to see if they would try her, but nothing happened.

  So she tried again. This time they picked up at once. She waited again, ear pressed tight to the speaker hole. She imagined she could hear him breathing. She assumed it would be a man, because the chances of a woman being involved in this kind of thing seemed slim. The man called Carl, maybe. She wanted to scream something at him. She managed to control the urge for what seemed like minutes, then finally, she could stand it no longer. She spoke. But the voice that came out of her mouth was surprisingly cold: ‘You have my daughter. What do you want?’ she said. She listened for a response, repeated the question, but could hear no reaction at all. There was someone there though, she knew there was someone there, because moments later the connection was cut.

  She had rung back again, immediately, again speaking the question quite calmly, or at least hoping it sounded that way. This time he spoke back. ‘Where is Molina?’ he asked, in Spanish. It was good Spanish, no foreign accent.

  ‘Not here,’ she said. ‘Where’s my daughter?’

  ‘Let me speak to Señor Molina.’

  Did that mean they didn’t know he was dead yet?

  ‘Molina isn’t here,’ she said. ‘I’m here. Deal with me direct. Where’s my daughter?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ the voice said, then the line was cut again.

  She had let her breath out, felt it turn into a protracted high-pitched scream, saw herself banging her forehead off the branch nearest to her. ‘Give me my fucking daughter!’ she screamed. ‘Give me my daughter back!’ She broke into sobs. Then started howling. She had actually spoken to them, to him, to whoever it was Zaikov had hired. Had Rebecca been right there, with the fucker, as she was speaking? Had her daughter been able to hear her? Was it this Carl person? Was he working for Zaikov?

  But if so, why kill the policeman? It was too much to bear thinking about. She was more desperate than she had ever been. If Rugojev didn’t do what he had promised then she had no options at all that she could see, except to give herself in to the police and tell them everything. But how could she do that now? It wasn’t just that she had killed one of them. It was not knowing who Zaikov had bought off. The police couldn’t be trusted. She banged her fist off her head, wanting to feel the pain. Her nose started to bleed again.

  She was trying to find a tissue to wipe it when his phone buzzed with a message. She had let it fall onto the ground. She picked it up with shaking hands, got blood all over it, found some tissue in her pocket, wiped it, read a text written in English: She is alive. Seville at 8 p.m., or she’s dead. Come alone, or she’s dead. Tell no one, or she’s dead. No excuses. No more contact. She will live longer if you comply.

  She gasped. Read it again, and again. She had no thought of not complying. She wiped her eyes, stuffed a roll of tissue up her nose to stop the blood, and wished bitterly that she had not just slid the car into the water. Now she was going to have to persuade whoever Rugojev sent to get her to Seville.

  She heard a car decelerating, out in the rain somewhere, comin
g towards her. She had been waiting a long time and not a single vehicle had passed along the road. She shifted position so that she could see straight down the short slope in front of her. They had told her it would be a silver Audi RS5, that it would drive the entire perimeter road, going round the reservoir as many times as it took for her to spot it. She had no idea what an Audi RS5 looked like, but she had the car’s registration plate. She was running that through her mind now, as it came into view. It was travelling fast and was almost on a level with her before she could read the plate and recognise it.

  She pushed herself forwards at once, starting to run down the slope, shouting out. The car was past her and she thought the driver could not have noticed her, but saw the brake lights, suddenly glaring in the rain, then – as she got down to the road – heard the car reversing quickly, swerving around her, stopping. She ran to the passenger side and pulled open the door, leaned in. There was a young guy in the driver’s seat, in jeans and a light sweater, dark skin, dark eyes. ‘Julia?’ he asked, with a sort of smile. ‘I’m Drake. Get in.’

  He drove for half an hour without saying much to her, going very fast in the rain, headlights on full. She slumped in the passenger seat, waves of exhaustion making her head swim. She watched the signs appearing, tried to stay alert, to make sure he was doing what he had promised. He had told her that Michael Rugojev had instructed him to assist her, that he knew a great deal already. She had said she needed to get to Seville, that that was all she wanted him to do. The signs they passed seemed to suggest they were heading that way.

  ‘Did you do what they asked, with the car?’ he asked, at one point.

  ‘It’s in the reservoir.’

  ‘And the phone?’

  She looked at him. They had told her to leave the phone – Molina’s phone – in the car. ‘I need the phone,’ she said.

  He nodded, like that didn’t seem very significant, but she felt the car slowing immediately. He eased it into the side of the road, where there was some space. They were in the middle of some kind of irrigated farming zone, inland from the reservoir – everywhere there were low hills with low bushes growing in ordered rows, maybe olives. The rain had stopped, or they had left it behind. There were other cars on the road now, streaking past them. He stopped the car, engaged the handbrake, leaned back in the seat. ‘So they contacted you?’ he asked. He looked over at her.

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Otherwise why would you need the phone? I’m here to help you, Julia. I’m being paid to do that. I know how these things work. You have to ditch the phone – or at least take the chip out – because they will trace you using the phone. You understand?’ He spoke English with an accent, she thought. No doubt Drake wasn’t his real name. She had a sudden doubt about trusting him. Had she thought properly about it? Everything was a kind of blur in her head. She hadn’t slept, hadn’t eaten, her system had been repeatedly swamped with adrenalin. She wondered whether she was even capable of perceiving things clearly. This right now – this thing going on in this car with him – this seemed very unreal, like something she was watching, not something she was involved with.

  ‘I need to eat something, and to rest,’ she said.

  ‘Before the meet?’

  How was he guessing that? And why did he want to know about it? ‘Michael told you to help me?’ she asked.

  ‘That’s what I’m doing.’

  ‘Are you Spanish?’

  He frowned at her. ‘Why?’

  ‘Speak Spanish if you’re Spanish. I will understand. Your English has an accent.’

  ‘I’m from Croatia. My Spanish is poor, my English is better. We can speak Croatian if you like. I’m paid to help you. Do you want the help or not?’

  ‘I want to get to Seville.’

  ‘Why?’

  She shook her head. ‘Will you take me there?’

  ‘Yes. But your daughter isn’t there. She’s on her way to London.’

  She felt her stomach twist. ‘How would you know that?’

  ‘I don’t. Not personally. That’s what Mr Rugojev has told me to tell you. He has access to a network of information – people who work for other people, people who have access to computer systems, flight control information, telephone companies, bank accounts. The best information he can get at this time suggests she is on her way to London.’

  ‘How? On a plane?’

  ‘A private charter. He knows where it took off from, knows it is scheduled to land at Heathrow. He wants me to take you to London – or make sure you get there. Someone else will take over then.’

  ‘Can he stop it? Can he have people waiting for it?’

  ‘Not in the airport itself, I wouldn’t think. But he will handle it. He will want to make sure your daughter is above all safe, whatever course of action they choose.’

  She couldn’t handle it. She started to breathe quickly, felt the panic starting.

  ‘The people you spoke to – they told you to tell nobody the arrangements, right?’ he said. ‘That’s standard. But they’re not here, in this car, so they have no idea what you’re saying, what you’re telling me. So I suggest you tell me it all, everything that’s happened. Then after that I suggest we ignore whatever shit they fed you, because all it will lead to is you flat on the ground with a bullet in the back of the head. And meanwhile your daughter will be in London, with a man called Carl Bowman. That’s what Mr Rugojev is working on right now. This is a solvable situation. You understand? Almost anything is solvable if you throw enough money at it, and Mr Rugojev has no shortage of funds. So take deep breaths, think it over and stay calm. You’re on the run, you’re desperate, sure – but you’re not alone, not any more. And I can get you to London within five hours.’

  26

  He had only ten days left in London when it started. Afterwards, telling it to themselves, Liz would always say that it started the very first time she saw him, that something had passed between them in that moment, with her standing in her bathrobe in the stairwell, that the subsequent days were a nightmare of deception for her as she struggled to keep it from him, to give him no clue. But Carl could never bring himself to believe that, because he had seen nothing in her eyes but disdain.

  What he remembered as the start was the hours before they went out to the club, ten days before he was to leave, when she was getting ready to go out. She had told him during the afternoon that she was going to go to a club and had asked if he would insist on dragging along behind her. She hadn’t seemed too irritated by the prospect, so he had thought that perhaps by then she was getting used to him being there, though she still talked to him only infrequently, beyond the necessities.

  He had replied that that was what he’d been asked to do by Viktor – stick with her – so, yes, he would be coming. If she didn’t want that then she would have to contact Viktor. Then she had said, ‘Well you might as well enjoy it, then. You can come up to my room while I’m getting ready, keep me company – instead of being a freaky shadow lurking round the corner. Pretend you’re my girlfriend.’ He had frowned at that, not being sure what she meant. ‘And bring some wine,’ she’d added. ‘You look like you would never enjoy anything without a drink.’ Was that true, he wondered? It was not how he imagined himself.

  He had been asked to shadow her, to watch out for her, so the dynamic between them was peculiar. She occupied a tiny suite of two attic rooms on the top floor of the house, and as far as he knew then she was officially a minor member of Viktor’s staff – he had not asked her what else she might be. Whereas he had the use of Viktor’s rooms – the whole of the third floor – and he was family, clearly above her in some respect. He had access to Viktor’s funds too – a practically unlimited resource, relative to the things he needed – whilst she had only the wage Viktor gave her, he assumed, which might or might not include some extra remuneration for additional services. That was h
ow he thought of it, and it shamed him afterwards to recall that, though certainly her spending habits were frugal enough; in two weeks she hadn’t gone out during the evenings at all. But his having to follow her around, dutifully alert to some non-specific threat, as if he were the hired hand, the mere employee, skewed things and made it seem like she was the one in control.

  It was the first time he had been inside her room, that night, though he had thought about it often enough, wondered what it was like, what she had done with it in terms of furniture and decorations, what she did inside it when alone. It had become a bit of a habit during the long afternoon hours, when she was mostly up in the room, for him to sit down in the kitchen thinking about her. He sat in the kitchen instead of his own rooms because then he would see her if she emerged to go out, or get something to eat. There were ‘work’ reasons to do that, of course, and when he thought about her up there above him, moving around, listening to music, reading – whatever it was she did – it never strayed further than that. There was nothing obviously sexual about it. In fact, there was nothing sexual about the way he was reacting to her at all, at least nothing that he would recognise as sexual from the way these things had progressed with other women in his life. There was no thinking about getting into bed with her, or touching her, or kissing – thoughts of that type seemed like some kind of dirty betrayal of whatever it was he felt about her. But what exactly was that?

  It was obsessive, he knew that. It wasn’t normal for him to sit for hours on end wondering what she might be wearing as she read her book – throughout those three weeks, he remembered, she was reading the same book, something by a writer she had told him was South African. Or guessing whether she did little dances for herself when she had her music on. He couldn’t hear her music unless he went up to the landing below the room, but every time he had tried that there had been music and sometimes a noise of footsteps on the boards, rhythmically, as if she might very well be dancing with herself. She had told him she was into jazz but he had never heard any jazz coming out of the room. It was always pop or dance when he heard it. There was a current hit by Scooter that he heard often, though didn’t know its name – he hated Scooter.