Stolen Lives

by Jassy Mackenzie

  Jade felt her mouth fall open.

  “How do you know who I am?”

  “I found out. Asked some questions. I even watched you at home with your police detective friend one evening. I took photos of you, too.”

  Xavier’s teeth gleamed in the dim light.

  Jade swallowed as she remembered the three distinctive marks of the tripod, aimed directly at her window. That had been Xavier? But why?

  “Somebody asked about me at the hospital where I was born, as well. Was that you too?” she said.

  A small headshake. “No. Mathilde did that. We thought she would cause less suspicion.”

  “Why did you want information on me?”

  “Curiosity.”

  In response to Jade’s incredulous glance, he continued.

  “I knew your mother. Elise Delacourt. At one time, we were very close.”

  His words punched Jade’s breath out of her lungs more effectively than a boxer’s right hook.

  “How … how did you know her?” she asked, when she could speak again.

  “We worked together.” Xavier regarded her closely as he spoke. “She was one of us, a long time ago. Just like Mathilde.”

  Then he bent over and coughed up what was undeniably a large clot of blood.

  Jade’s mind was churning.

  Xavier was a criminal in the foulest sense of the word; a modern-day slaver whose preferred currency was the very lives of the victims he trafficked.

  She remembered the photo of her gentle, smiling mother, looking down with utter love at the baby in her arms.

  Elise Delacourt, a criminal?

  Impossible.

  “No.” Her denial was automatic, but as she spoke, it dawned on Jade just how very wrong she had been.

  Xavier Soumare and Mathilde Dupont were suspected traffickers only because of their association with Salimovic. The Scotland Yard detectives had assumed they were his accomplices. But it was now clear to her that the brothel owner had never even seen Mathilde, and had no close association with Xavier.

  Was it possible that the pair had not been following Salimovic in order to do business, but rather hunting him down in order to kill him?

  If that was true, then Xavier Soumare was not a trafficker at all, although he was undoubtedly a criminal. And, if he had worked with her mother in the past …

  With a sudden rush of understanding, Jade realised that if she wanted to find out who her mother had really been, she could look to only one person for the truth.

  Herself.

  54

  Edmonds stood at the top of the stairs leading down to the wine cellar. As the sun set, she had been listening to the sound of birds going to roost in the trees surrounding the villa.

  After the birdsong had gradually died away, the only sounds left were the harsh shrieks of metal on metal coming from the cellar below, where the safe-crackers, who had arrived two hours ago, were hard at work.

  Barak was leaning against a nearby wall. He stubbed out his cigarette and put the butt carefully in a plastic bag before lighting up a fresh one.

  It was a tricky safe. They’d had to knock away half the wall to get it loose, and now they were having to cut their way into it.

  “Well, I’ve got accommodation organised for us,” Richards said, closing his mobile phone. “Two rooms at a little place in the village.”

  “Thanks.”

  “The detectives were telling me that there’s a rather scenic waterfall a short way up the hill from here.” Richards shifted from foot to foot and Edmonds thought she heard an unfamiliar tone in his voice. Was it nervousness?

  “It’s a bit late now, and we’ll have a busy day tomorrow I’m sure, but I wondered if you’d like to take a walk up there with me? Before breakfast, perhaps? When I’m working in a foreign country I always try to walk somewhere. It gives you the feel of the place, you know.”

  Edmonds stared at Richards in surprise. She had the distinct impression that he was not just inviting her to do some exercise with him, but pretty much asking her on a date. And while taking a walk in the early morning to visit a waterfall might not be the most romantic proposition she’d ever had … well, now that she thought about it, it was certainly not unromantic. In fact, it sounded pretty good.

  Even so, Edmonds decided she should say no.

  The reasoning behind her decision was just too long and complicated, and she was getting tired of explaining it to prospective suitors. She’d had a disaster of a relationship a few years back. The man had hurt her, physically and mentally, and his abuse had left scars—scars of both types—that still hadn’t completely healed. Even three years down the line, romance and relationships had yet to re-enter her life plan.

  Seeing that Richards was already looking disappointed, she realised that her body language must have given her decision away.

  Which was why Edmonds was as surprised as anybody to hear herself say, “Thanks. I’d like that.”

  Richards blinked. Then an enormous smile spread across his face. Behind him, through a cloud of smoke, she could see the Cypriot detective nodding in solemn approval.

  “Great. That’s wonderful. You know, I didn’t think … I mean … ”

  At that point, Richards was interrupted. A shout from downstairs signalled that the safe was finally open.

  Edmonds hurried down the staircase and pulled on a pair of gloves in case any trace evidence could later be obtained from the items inside its thick steel shell. Then she knelt down on the cold concrete floor next to Barak. Down in the cellar the air was thick with the smell of scorched metal. The safe hadn’t given up its contents without a fight.

  Edmonds removed a few thick bundles of high-denomination notes. Money that she was no longer used to seeing because, since the introduction of the Euro, it had quickly disappeared from circulation. Swiss francs, lire, Deutschmarks. The bundles were old, with the peculiarly dirty smell that Edmonds always associated with money. Behind the money were five velvet pouches, each containing a sprinkling of gemstones. Edmonds guessed that the large, blue-white ones must be diamonds. The others, from their colour, were probably rubies and emeralds. In total, a small fortune. Conveniently portable assets. Edmonds was sure that selling just one bag would allow the criminals to live out their days in luxury.

  The last item in the safe was a slim stack of documents held together by a rubber band. Old documents, their pages crisp and yellowed. Edmonds removed the band and unfolded them with great care, peering down at the printed words and wishing that she had a translator to help her, because some of them were in French. She carefully read each one through twice.

  “Richards, look here.”

  “What?” He was by her side in an instant, peering over her shoulder.

  “These documents … it looks like Xavier Soumare was adopted.”

  Edmonds’ head was spinning with the implications of what that might mean. “Look here. He was adopted by Mr Bernard Soumare, a doctor. Bernard is Amanita’s grandfather, so I was right about the connection between them. Xavier and Amanita are related.”

  With a small surge of relief, Edmonds realised she wouldn’t have to mention her earlier phone call at all now. “This document says he was a war orphan from Nigeria.”

  “Lost his parents in the Biafran conflict, I suppose,” Richards said. “I guess he must have seen his share of horrors during that time.”

  He sounded thoughtful, and Edmonds wondered whether he was trying to understand what might have made Xavier Soumare the criminal he was today.

  “According to this form, he took a new first name as well; a French name. Xavier is not his original forename. Trying to put his past behind him, do you think?”

  Edmonds didn’t know. She sat, breathing the scorched-smelling air, thinking about what Soumare might have suffered during the war, and how it had changed him.

  Or perhaps it hadn’t. Perhaps he had been evil all along.

  The next document revealed another one of Xavier Soumare’
s secrets.

  “Well, he didn’t give up his previous identity altogether,” Edmonds said. “This is a Nigerian passport, but it’s in his old name. Obesanjo Achebe. And he’s done a lot of travelling on it.”

  “Call Mackay,” Richards advised. “Ask him to run the name through the system and see what it comes up with. If that old passport’s been so well used, we might just find our man’s committed crimes using his Nigerian identity, too.”

  Edmonds and Richards were on their way to the guesthouse when Mackay called back.

  The name Obesanjo Achebe had hit paydirt. The Interpol computers were buzzing.

  Achebe was a dangerous man, a wanted criminal in seven different countries. He was infamous for fabricating plausible stories to get close to his targets, a couple of whom had been high-profile businessmen and government officials. He’d been assisted by a number of attractive female accomplices who, in turn, had also proved to be untraceable.

  And then he had disappeared.

  After committing a series of crimes throughout the 1970s and 80s, Achebe had gone to ground. Fallen right off the radar.

  Dead, the authorities had hoped.

  The only problem, as Mackay explained, was that he had never been under any suspicion of trafficking.

  All the crimes that Achebe was suspected of committing had been murders.

  55

  Xavier Soumare was no trafficker. He was an assassin.

  Jade stood, staring at his hunched form while her mind struggled to accept the impossible truth.

  The man in front of her, though elderly and sickly now, had worked as a hired killer.

  And so had her own mother.

  The code words that they used must have been crucial in tight situations. So critical that Elise Delacourt had held onto that part of her old life. She had taught them to her unwitting husband, who had later taught them to Jade.

  Or had Commissioner de Jong known the truth about his wife?

  Jade didn’t even want to think about that.

  She remembered the way she had felt when she’d aimed her gun at her first victim, the man who had murdered her father.

  It had been so easy to pull the trigger, to take him down. She hadn’t hesitated, not even for a split-second. Her hands had been rock-steady, her aim true. And as she’d watched her target collapse onto the pavement, she’d felt, for an instant, an emotion she could only describe as joy.

  Afterwards, she’d tried to convince herself that she’d been confused; that she could never have felt such hot, euphoric delight in taking the life of any human being, even one so evil.

  Now, Jade swallowed hard as she realised that Elise Delacourt had passed on more than her physical appearance to her daughter. And, although Jade had only ever taken the lives of murderers, her mother had done far worse.

  She had taken the life of whoever she’d been paid to kill.

  “I can’t believe this.” Jade shook her head, tears stinging her eyes. “She couldn’t have done that.”

  Xavier shrugged. Then he wiped his mouth with a trembling hand, leaving a bloody streak across his lips.

  In the silence that followed, Jade realised that Salimovic had stopped screaming. All she could hear from the house was an occasional low groan.

  “Did you kill Tamsin, too?” she asked.

  A nod. “It was quick. Better than she deserved. She didn’t suffer much.”

  “Who paid you to do it?”

  “This was not a paid job.” His voice was weak, breathy. He spoke in gasps. “Amanita is my brother’s child. He died last year.” Xavier pressed a finger to his chest. “Heart attack. He was a good man, a family man. My opposite, you could say. He and his father, Bernard, who adopted me when I was a boy, hated what I became. But when Amanita phoned to say she was a prisoner, Bernard begged me for two favours. To rescue the innocent girl, and to kill those who trafficked her.”

  Xavier made a coughing sound that Jade thought might have been an attempt at a laugh. “The police raid interrupted the rescue, but we knew she would be safe. Then we had to find her traffickers, and get close. Finding them was difficult. The killing … was the easy part.”

  With effort, Jade pulled her thoughts into focus. It was time for the question that was already causing her stomach to twist with anxiety. Xavier might not be a trafficker, but in order to get close to Salimovic, he and Mathilde had abducted an equally innocent boy.

  Jade prayed that the black man would give her the answer she needed.

  “Where is Kevin Patel?” she asked.

  Xavier cleared his throat.

  “The day is not over,” he said.

  Jade blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean you still have other business to finish here. I need you to do it for me, because I can’t … ” He gave a humourless smile, looked down at his bloody shirt. “I can’t do it.”

  “I have other business?” Jade stared at the black man. “I don’t understand.”

  Xavier propped himself onto his elbow.

  “Jade de Jong,” he said again. “You will understand. You’re a good detective, it seems. One of the best. Good instincts. Otherwise you wouldn’t be alive now.” He paused to gather breath. “Elise was good, too. The very best. I still miss her.”

  Jade found herself blinking furiously once again because her eyes had unexpectedly flooded with tears. In the silence, a cricket chirped.

  “I thought I did my last job many years ago,” Xavier said. “But then I was asked to do this one. The first I have ever done for honour, not for money. A chance to settle a debt that can never be fully paid. Au revoir, Jade.”

  Then, as fluid as a cat, he sat upright and turned his wrist to point the muzzle of the Colt at himself.

  “No!” Jade shouted, leaping forward in a desperate attempt to grab his arm. “Please, don’t … ”

  But before she could reach him Xavier had tipped back his head and placed the barrel in his mouth.

  The noise of the shot echoed off the faraway hills.

  David’s phone rang as he was climbing into the passenger seat of the unmarked. The first time he and Thembi had driven together, David had taken the wheel. After that eventful ride, Thembi had politely insisted that he do the driving. He’d come up with a variety of excuses so far, the most bizarre being that he was suffering from terrible car-sickness due to an ear-canal imbalance which could only be alleviated if he had an open window on his right side.

  “If you don’t mind, Sup, I’ll drive,” he said, sounding apologetic. “My left hip’s killing me, and for some reason, sitting in that passenger seat only makes it worse.”

  At any other time, David would have responded with a caustic remark.

  Right then he couldn’t have cared less who did the driving, or why.

  He nodded glumly, opened the passenger door, and heard the phone start to trill as he was about to get in.

  He clapped a hand to his pocket as the ringing caused reality to catch up with him in an unwelcome rush.

  Jade.

  With everything that had happened during the raid, he hadn’t had time to think about her at all. Now, anxiety came flooding back.

  Where was she? Was she all right?

  God, let nothing have happened to her. Surely, in one terrible night, he could not have lost both the people he loved the most?

  “If you don’t mind,” he said to Thembi. He pulled the phone out and moved away from the car, squinting down at the display.

  00.01 a.m. And the caller wasn’t Jade. It wasn’t a number he recognised at all.

  “Patel,” he snapped.

  “Mr David Patel?” The voice was middle-aged, female and worried. “It’s Sister Baloyi here, from the Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital in Soweto. I’m so sorry to call at this hour, but your wife said you’d only be available after midnight.”

  His wife? What on earth?

  David’s first thought was that the stress of Kevin’s disappearance had caused Naisha to have some ki
nd of breakdown.

  “What’s happened? Is she all right?”

  A pause. Then Sister Baloyi spoke again, sounding almost as confused as David.

  “Your wife was here earlier today. At least, she said she was your wife. A white woman with brown hair. She told us she was on the way to the airport to catch an international flight, but she was very worried because your son passed out after he came home from school. That’s why she brought him in.”

  “Kevin’s there?” The words burst out of David’s mouth. “Kevin’s at your hospital?”

  “Oh yes. He’s awake now, and he seems fine. He’s been asking for you. We’ve checked him out, scanned him and tested him. The doctors did notice slightly elevated levels of ghb in his bloodstream, so it’s possible that he might have got hold of some tablets while he was at school. We’d like him to spend the night here for observation just in case, but you are welcome to come and fetch him tomorrow. He’s in the high care ward, next door to the burns unit. Oh, and your wife said I must tell you she has already settled the bill in full. In fact, she made a generous donation to the hospital as well.” Sister Baloyi sounded pleased at being able to convey this good news.

  “Please, can I talk to him?” David said. “Is he well enough to talk? I need to speak to him now.”

  When he heard Kevin’s voice, David felt as if the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders.

  “Dad! Hey, Dad? It’s me. Are you there?”

  Kevin’s voice. High-pitched, upset, but unbearably real.

  David found he was so choked up that it took him a while before he could speak to his son with any coherence.

  56

  “Your work here is not done.”

  What had Xavier meant by that?

  Jade wondered for an uneasy moment whether this was why the assassin had alerted her to his presence, allowing her to duck and avoid his bullet, instead of simply shooting her first, and then Salimovic.

  Jade stared down at Xavier’s body, and a number of random thoughts passed through her mind.