The Wreckage

by Michael Robotham

  He approaches the house from the north side, pauses at the front door, listening. There are voices upstairs. Male and female. American.

  Glancing along the hallway, he can see as far as the kitchen where a milk carton lies in a shiny puddle. His fingers slide inside his jacket, finding the butt of the Glock. Four paces. He’s at the bottom of the stairs, looking up, listening.

  He climbs, putting as little weight as possible on each step. Eyes up. He can no longer hear their voices, but can feel their presence. He reaches the landing. The main bedroom is on the left, second bedroom on the far right, a bathroom in between. There is a man squatting in the doorway, examining something. A woman is standing beside him, silhouetted against the haze of white light. Both of them turn in unison, looking down the barrel of the Glock.

  “Stand up! Hands against the wall!”

  “You got this all wrong,” says Luca.

  “Shut up!”

  Ruiz kicks Luca’s legs apart, using one hand to pat him down-shoulders, chest, back, right leg, left leg.

  “Are you a policeman?” asks Daniela.

  Ruiz ignores her. “Where’s Bridget Lindop?”

  “I don’t know,” says Luca.

  “What are you doing in her house?”

  “We were looking for her. I’m a journalist.”

  “What paper?”

  “ Financial Herald.”

  Ruiz pushes Daniela hard against the wall.

  “I didn’t think British police officers carried guns,” she says.

  “That’s an urban myth.”

  She lowers her arms. “I don’t think you’re a policeman at all.”

  “You want to test that theory?”

  She’s a ballbreaker, thinks Ruiz, either crazy-brave or stupid. Her off-sider is more diplomatic. He’s explaining how he found the back door open and thought Miss Lindop might be hurt.

  “She’s been gone a while. Her cat hasn’t been fed.”

  Elizabeth calls from below. “Is everything all right?”

  “I told you to wait in the car,” says Ruiz.

  “I heard you talking.”

  Elizabeth has reached the landing. “Who are they?”

  “They broke in.”

  “I didn’t break in,” says Luca. “I’m a reporter.” He takes a moment to recognize Elizabeth-the missing banker’s wife, heavily pregnant. He’s seen her photograph and watched her media appeal. “We were looking for Bridget Lindop. If you call Keith Gooding at the paper he’ll vouch for us.”

  That name again.

  Ruiz and Elizabeth exchange a glance. At that moment her uterus contracts and she hollows out her cheeks in a whistling intake of breath. Eyes shut, she exhales in shallow puffs, trying to ease the pain.

  Daniela glares at Ruiz like he’s personally responsible for making a pregnant woman climb the stairs.

  “When are you due?”

  “A few weeks.”

  “You should sit down.”

  Luca points to the broken door. “Someone was locked inside and had to break out.”

  Ruiz runs his finger over the splintered frame. It was kicked open. Someone strong did this. A man. A prisoner.

  20

  LONDON

  Are you going to hypnotize me?”

  “No.”

  “Then why do I have to lie down?”

  “I just want you to be comfortable.”

  Holly is dressed in a thin floral-print cotton dress, machine faded, which clings to her body like wet tissue paper. She looks at the bed, which is covered with an old lady bedspread.

  “Lie down, close your eyes and relax,” says Joe.

  She shoots him a look. “You better not try anything.”

  “I’m going to sit over here by the window. I won’t leave this chair.”

  Holly stares at the ceiling, which has water stains and a cracked plaster rosette.

  “So what is this called if it’s not hypnosis?”

  “A cognitive interview.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I’m going to take you back to the night you met Richard North. I’m going to ask you lots of questions. Some things you won’t remember. Some things will come back to you.”

  “I’ve already told Vincent…”

  “We’re going to do it again.”

  “I’m hungry.”

  “You’ve just eaten.”

  Joe O’Loughlin takes a seat. The window provides some breeze and he can hear birds in the trees. He begins as he always does, by setting the scene-the bar on that Friday night. Where was she sitting? What was she drinking? Who else was around her? He has a nice voice, thinks Holly. Kind eyes. But he asks too many questions.

  Lady Gaga was playing on the sound system. Zac had never liked Lady Gaga. Said she was a wannabe Madonna. Then again, he didn’t like Madonna, who he called “that ridiculous old bag.” Lady Gaga had the better voice. Madonna was the better dancer.

  “I didn’t think he was going to notice me at first,” says Holly. “He was sitting at a corner of the bar, going through vodka like he had Smirnoff shares. I thought he might be gay.”

  “Why choose him?”

  “He looked rich… lonely. I like to watch them for a while-just to be sure.”

  “Sure of what?”

  She shrugs. “Sure they’re not rapists or psychos. I’m looking for the Good Samaritan, remember?”

  “So you can rob him?”

  Holly opens her eyes and looks at Joe scornfully. He marvels at how someone barely educated past fifteen can make him feel like he’s just stepped off the bus from Stupidville.

  “What was he doing?”

  “He looked like he was waiting for someone.”

  “Did he have anything in his hands?”

  “No… maybe.” She chews on the inside of her cheek. “He was writing something.”

  “What was he writing on?”

  “I didn’t see.”

  “With a pen or a pencil?”

  “A pen. He dropped it and I thought he was trying to look at my legs, but he just went back to writing. He only really noticed me when Zac and I kicked off.”

  “You started arguing?”

  “That was our shtick, you know. Our grift. That’s what Zac called it. We argued. He hit me. I cried.”

  “Someone else could have stepped in.”

  “We’ve been doing this for a while. I know how to position myself, so the mark is closest. I was just a few feet away when Zac hit me across the face. I went down, but this guy just didn’t react. I mean, Zac was standing over me and this guy was just staring straight through me like he was watching it all on TV and any moment he was going to reach for the remote and change the channel.”

  “What happened then?”

  “Zac calls me some names and storms out. I was sitting on the floor pretending to cry, thinking to myself, this guy must be really cold. What does a girl have to do to get his attention? Then he finally reacted.”

  “He came over.”

  “Yeah. He picked me up. Got some ice. Bought me a drink. He wanted to call the police, but I talked him out of it. Then I did the old, “My keys! My phone!” routine and started to cry again. He put his arm around me and I sort of leaned into him. That’s when I knew I’d hooked him, you know. Physical contact. You melt into a guy’s body and it triggers his protective instincts.”

  “Where were you sitting?”

  “At his table.”

  “What did you talk about?”

  Holly screws up her features. “It was odd.”

  “What was odd?”

  “He didn’t offer to let me use his phone. It was sitting on the table on top of a book.”

  “What sort of book?”

  “It had a dark cover.”

  “He’d been reading it?”

  She pauses, thinking. Then she opens her eyes and lifts her head, staring at Joe like he’s just performed a magic trick. “He’d been writing in it.”

  “A notebook
?”

  “Yeah. Must have been.”

  Holly is annoyed at herself for not remembering earlier. Joe doesn’t labor the point. He takes her through the encounter, minute by minute until she reaches a point in the story where they leave the bar.

  “What did he do with the notebook?”

  “How the fuck should I know?”

  “Was it still on the table?”

  “No…” She pauses. “He put it in his jacket pocket.”

  “Which pocket?”

  “Inside. Just here.”

  She puts her hand on her left breast.

  “I remember that jacket because Zac liked it so much.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When we were robbing his place, Zac was saying how much he liked the jacket. It was camel-colored, you know. Cashmere. Expensive. Zac had his share of problems, but he knew stuff about clothes. He had this dress uniform-he kept it after he left the army-and every button on that thing shone. It was kept like brand new, folded in tissue paper and stored in a special box.”

  Holly closes her eyes again and Joe takes her mind back to the house in Barnes. She has grown accustomed to describing scenes in detail, picturing them in her mind, not rushing the chronology of events, but slowing it down. Richard North had been quite drunk when they arrived at the house. He couldn’t get his key in the lock. She did it for him.

  “He still wanted to get into my pants. They’re all like that. They start off telling me I can use their phone and then they offer me the spare room and then they try for the big prize.”

  “Is that what Ruiz did?”

  Holly opens one eye. “Not exactly.”

  “What about Richard North?”

  “He was Mr. Hopeful. He said he had condoms, but couldn’t find them. I poured him a drink, which I spiked. He slobbered all over me and then passed out.”

  “Where?”

  “On the sofa downstairs. That’s when Zac arrived in a foul mood because it was raining and miserable on a bike. I searched upstairs. He took downstairs. Cash. Jewelry. Mobile phones. Nothing too big, because we had to carry it on the bike.”

  She describes the house, picking out colors and features, remembering the posters in the little boy’s bedroom and his bed shaped like a racing car. Joe doesn’t mention the coat again until Holly describes putting their possible haul on the floor of the hallway and deciding what to leave behind.

  “What about the jacket?”

  Holly purses her lips. “It was hanging over the banister.”

  “Did Zac take it?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t remember seeing it again.”

  Something bothers her. She falls silent, going over the events.

  “He went to the kitchen to get a plastic bag.”

  “Zac?”

  “He must have wanted to protect the jacket from the rain.” Holly opens her eyes. “He must have taken it with him, but I don’t remember seeing it again.”

  “Relax. Go back there… to the house… you’re in the hallway, deciding what to take…”

  “We were loading the panniers. I put on my coat. A helmet… We found a nice briefcase in the study. I had to carry it on my lap. Zac drove carefully. No point in taking risks. Being picked up by the cops would be silly.”

  “Where did you go?”

  “Back to the flat.”

  “Where did you park?”

  “Zac has this lockup around the corner. That’s where he leaves his bike.”

  “A lockup?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Where is the bike now?”

  Holly shrugs. “Still there, I guess.”

  Joe looks at the phone on the bedside table. First he’ll leave a message for Ruiz.

  “Come on,” he tells Holly.

  “Have we finished?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “To get a notebook.”

  21

  LONDON

  The Shelby Arms had been one of Ruiz’s favorite watering holes when he was running the Serious Crime Squad in West London. Back then it had been a dive with decent beer and passable grub. Now it’s a gastro-pub with a dozen different boutique beers on tap and cooling cabinets full of imported lagers. The menu has also been tarted up: a ham-and-cheese toasted sandwich is called a croque-monsieur. Potato and leek soup is vichyssoise.

  Elizabeth and Daniela are sitting opposite each other, sipping soda waters. Ruiz has ordered a Guinness and Luca the same, sipping it somewhat curiously but trying hard to win respect.

  Ruiz studies him, scratching an eyebrow, giving nothing away. The journalist is carrying scars, mental, not physical, but he’s a tough son-of-a-bitch. Daniela is interesting. She has a chill, scientific detachment. Dynamite between the sheets, he suspects. The cool ones often are. Why does he bring everything back to sex? Hard-ons of the mind.

  Through a picture window, he sees a line of schoolchildren wearing hats and holding hands. Two women teachers at either end, cajoling them to stay in line and “walk don’t run.” Advice for life.

  Now Luca begins talking, starting in Iraq with the bank robberies and missing reconstruction funds. He mentions an attack on the Finance Ministry, people dying. Friends. Cash smuggled across borders. Mersey Fidelity. The name Yahya Maluk seems to electrify Elizabeth.

  “I’ve met him,” she says. “I’ve been to his house. He lives in Mayfair.”

  Everyone is looking at her. “North visited Yahya Maluk the day before he disappeared. I asked Maluk about the meeting, but he denied it ever happened.”

  “How do you know they met?” asks Luca.

  “I saw the photographs.”

  Luca reaches into the pocket of his shirt and unfolds the photocopies that he made last night at the newspaper office. “Is that the man?”

  Elizabeth nods. “He’s on the board of Mersey Fidelity.”

  Luca puts another picture in front of Elizabeth.

  “What about this man?”

  Three men in uniform are standing behind Saddam Hussein. She places her fingers around the face of the man on the far right, framing his portrait.

  “That’s the other one.”

  “Are you absolutely sure?” asks Luca, glancing at Daniela.

  “I’m sure,” says Elizabeth.

  “What is it? Who is this guy?” asks Ruiz.

  Daniela answers, giving details of Mohammed Ibrahim Omar al-Muslit, the former Baath Party moneyman who helped Saddam Hussein steal billions from his own people.

  “He should be in Abu Ghraib, but he escaped four years ago.”

  “What’s he doing in London?”

  “That’s a very good question.”

  Ruiz silently places the details in context. A wanted war criminal, a terrorist-that could explain why the Americans are so interested.

  Luca continues. “We’ve established a link between money stolen in Iraq and Yahya Maluk. Through him we have a connection with Mersey Fidelity and Richard North. That’s why I wanted to talk to Bridget Lindop.”

  Sitting opposite, Elizabeth doesn’t leap to her husband’s defense by denying his involvement and arguing his innocence. Instead she remains quiet, gazing out the window at a sunlit afternoon that should be darker, stormier, less radiant. North was sleeping with the nanny. How prosaic of him, how cliched. Men can be so bloody predictable.

  “She’s a devout Catholic,” says Elizabeth, almost thinking out loud.

  “Who?” asks Ruiz.

  “Bridget Lindop-she goes to Mass every day.”

  Our Lady of Grace and St. Edward Church is a listed building with red-brick walls darkened by soot, exhaust fumes and the sins of the forgiven. An old woman is dusting the pews. Her skirt is tucked up in her apron revealing pale calves that are bulging with veins like a fleshy Rorschach test.

  She’s Polish. Ruiz speaks to her in German, asking after the priest. He’s in the presbytery. She fetches him, complaining about the interruption. Some people will find their own gr
ave too crowded.

  “Where did you learn to speak German?” asks Luca.

  “Where did you learn to speak Arabic?”

  “My mother.”

  “We both have one of those.”

  Daniela has gone to meet Keith Gooding and get the latest news on the search for Richard North. Police divers entered the river at first light, using sonar equipment in the zero visibility.

  A row of candles is burning beneath a statue, the wax almost glowing from within, creating flickering shadows on the skirts of the Virgin Mary.

  Ruiz leans back in a pew, feeling his muscles let go. High above his head there are dust motes drifting in a shaft of sunlight and a strand of web clings to a beam, moving back and forth as though the entire building is inhaling and exhaling.

  “Do you know any prayers?” asks Elizabeth, struggling to kneel.

  “I’ve forgotten the only prayer I ever learned as a kid,” says Ruiz. “That one about dying in your sleep.”

  “You’re scared of dying.”

  “Better than being scared of living.”

  Elizabeth lowers her eyes and clasps her hands. “What makes a man who has a woman who loves him risk it all?”

  “Are you asking me or Him?”

  “You.”

  Ruiz rubs his forehead. “Sometimes when a man feels bad about himself, he doesn’t want to be with a woman who looks at him with nothing but love. Instead he wants to lie on top of a woman who knows how nasty and shallow and faithless he can be… a woman who doesn’t put him on a pedestal or expect him to be a knight in shining armor… a woman who’s happy with the worst he can be.”

  The priest appears. Young. Frizzy-haired. Dressed in a multi-colored shirt with silver crosses on the collar, he looks like a Woodstock wannabe, forty years too late for the party.

  “I’m Father Michael,” he says, bowing slightly from the waist as though his spine is hinged on a spring. He notices Elizabeth’s pregnancy and is trying to place Luca and Ruiz in the picture as either a husband or a father.

  Elizabeth speaks. “I’m looking for Bridget Lindop. I know she comes here.”

  “What makes you sure she’s here now?”

  “Is she?”

  “I’m not in a position to discuss-”

  Elizabeth interrupts him. “I’m sorry, Father, but they found my husband’s car in a river last night. Some people think he’s dead. Some think he stole a lot of money. I have a little boy at home… a girl coming. Please don’t lie to me or treat me like an idiot.”