by Helena Maeve
Table of Contents
Legal Page
Title Page
Book Description
Trademarks Acknowledgement
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
New Excerpt
About the Author
Publisher Page
The Truth About the Liar
ISBN # 978-1-78430-940-4
©Copyright Helena Maeve 2015
Cover Art by Posh Gosh ©Copyright December 2015
Edited by Sue Meadows
Pride Publishing
This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Pride Publishing.
Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Pride Publishing. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.
The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.
Published in 2015 by Pride Publishing, Newland House, The Point, Weaver Road, Lincoln, LN6 3QN
Pride Publishing is a subsidiary of Totally Entwined Group Limited.
Shadow Play
THE TRUTH ABOUT THE LIAR
Helena Maeve
Book four in the Shadow Play series
When hunter becomes hunted, the lines between enemy and friend are easily blurred.
A hit man with a price on his head, Arthur’s days are numbered. He should be in MI6 custody, paying penance for shooting one of their agents and killing three others. He should be at the mercy of his South American employers, who paid him handsomely to liquidate a former associate only to be rewarded with failure.
He certainly shouldn’t be alive, in the care of a nefarious figure that even the SIS is wary of crossing.
En route to meet his unlikely benefactor in Egypt, Arthur is placed into the care of mysterious, subtly menacing Klaus. A man with a near-perfect reputation for delivering scalps, Klaus is not likely to facilitate Arthur’s escape. But Arthur knows how to handle tall, dark, unnervingly handsome threats. It shouldn’t take much to win Klaus over—even if it means that Arthur must plan his next move on his knees.
Trademarks Acknowledgement
The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:
Sturm der Liebe: Bavaria Film
Beretta A1: Beretta Holding
Audi: Audi AG
Tarmac: Tarmac Ltd.
Voldemort: J. K. Rowling
Mazda: Mazda Motor Corporation
Honda: Honda Motor Co., Limited
Dacia: Automobile Dacia S.A.
Ikea: Stichting INGKA Foundation
Wizard of Oz: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Coke: The Coca-Cola Company
Chapter One
“Or”—Jules ventured baldly—“I could just kill him.”
The note of optimism in her voice echoed loudly and clearly through the loft. Perhaps this time, her loyal service would be rewarded with that long awaited, cathartic gunshot.
Arthur flexed his aching hands, metal cuffs clinking uselessly against his thighs. Is this really necessary? He’d feigned disappointment when Jules tied him down again this morning, but he couldn’t blame her. He had tried to escape again last night.
And two days ago.
He simply couldn’t seem to behave himself.
That Jules’ patience had run out was obvious. Theirs was an old enmity, chiseled through long days in isolation, only each other’s unwelcome company to banish the silence.
It was little wonder that Jules had begun to think a dead charge was preferable to a living one.
Whatever answer she received from the voice on the other end of the call thinned her lips. She turned to the window, giving Arthur her skinny back, and the wide bell curve of her hips. Jules was neither tall nor broad. With her shaved head and fine wrists, she looked as if she would have been more at home in a yoga studio, telling her pupils when to breathe in and when to breathe out. If at all.
She should have been an easy opponent to take on, but Arthur still nursed a shattered, useless hand and a knee that was barely strong enough to hold his own weight. Perks of being shot. He resented his infirmity nearly as much as he’d resented relying on Jules these past four months. He felt like a pig being fed and cared for so he could be turned into pork.
At least that would have made sense. After all, he’d shot an MI6 asset. Deliberately. He had, as far as anyone knew, attempted to murder one of Jules’ friends. Twice.
And he had failed.
Arthur knew what came next.
Sooner or later, there would be retribution, whether from Jules and friends, MI6 or his former employers. No one liked loose ends left dangling in the wind, privy to too much information, steeped in too many behind-the-scenes scandals.
There was no way of fixing a gun with a crooked barrel, yet here he was—stuck in limbo, tied to a chair. A prisoner.
Again.
“The leg’s mostly healed, but I don’t know if—”
The voice on the other end of the line piped up again. Arthur strained to make out the inflection, perhaps even the gender of the speaker, but he couldn’t distinguish more than a low-level hum in the silence of the warehouse.
He’d heard of Robin, of course. Rumor had it he was supposed to be some sort of spy-turned-mercenary, turned unlikely ray of hope for their entire lawless breed.
Arthur pictured a six foot tall wrestler with tattoos climbing the sides of his neck and a latticework of scars crisscrossing his shoulder blades. Someone like that made sense, but knowing the types MI6 recruited, it didn’t seem likely.
Still, Robin, whoever he was, must have been scary to convince people like Jules to come around to his worldview.
Peaceful coexistence. Arthur tasted ash in his mouth at the comical idea.
“That’s one long trip,” Jules muttered, voice barely louder than a whisper. “No, I know, but… You think he’s willing?” The thwarted hope she’d offered earlier had become wary hesitation.
Arthur perked up as she spun to face him, his smile dialed all the way up to you can’t hurt me. His senses pricked, just in case Jules decided to go off-script after all. It certainly wouldn’t be difficult. They both knew how to frame someone for murder, how to stage a suicide. And she wouldn’t even have to work hard to persuade Uncle—whoever Robin was, he hadn’t made the trip to look Arthur in the eye yet. He’d never know if suicide was actually murder.
“I see… All right, thanks.” Jules flipped her phone shut with a smooth gesture. “Looks like it’s your lucky day, kid.”
“We’re getting ice cream,” Arthur deadpanned.
Jules leveled a withering stare.
“I’m getting a pony?”
“You ever been to Cairo?”
Arthur shook his head.
“Then you’re doubly lucky.” Jules fished her carton of Chinese takeout from the rickety wooden slab that passed for a desk a
nd dining table, and occasionally a pillow, when Arthur’s one and only jailer stayed up too late.
Arthur’s mouth watered at the sight. He wasn’t hungry, precisely, but Jules didn’t let him eat his fill, either. It might not have been malicious—feeding him by hand was not the easiest task when he sought escape at every turn—but he hated her for it all the same.
“So…we’re going to Egypt?” Arthur prompted, spite thickening his voice.
Jules liked him to be quiet when she wasn’t asking him questions and the plastic gag around his neck was often employed to that purpose. Without the ball stretching his jaw wide, though, Arthur saw no reason to oblige. It was one sticking point among others, souring their relationship.
Jules hummed under her breath.
“When?” Why? He’d learned long ago that asking the questions he really wanted answered only exposed him to misery.
“Soon.”
Arthur rolled his eyes. “Is that what your boyfriend told you? You know, far be it from me to suggest that he doesn’t trust you, but—”
“Do I have to gag you again?” Jules snapped, soggy rice noodles drooping from her chopsticks.
She did it whenever he started singing. She didn’t seem to think he had a very good voice. Arthur’s ego smarted a little less with each humiliation. Mostly he bided his time until he could get Jules close enough to throttle her. His knee still pained him since the brace had come off and Jules had weaned him off analgesics over the past three weeks, but if he cleared the way first and disposed of his jailer, Arthur thought he might be able to run.
He might be able to disappear.
“Oh, stop,” Arthur wheedled. “We both know you’re gonna miss me. We’ve got a special connection, you and I. We’re birds of a—”
The knotted plastic ball came up between his teeth, still damp with his spit. Arthur bucked against its pull, but Jules was stronger and she had the use of both hands.
She tucked the gag in place and stepped back with a sneer. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“Yeh bsh,” he got out around the makeshift bit. It didn’t hurt so much as it humiliated him to be fettered like this. Four months in and he still hadn’t learned how to tolerate the indignity.
Unceremoniously, Jules turned up the volume on the boxy TV set to drown out his grumbling. Soon Arthur was competing with some grainy soap opera, the only kind of entertainment Jules seemed to watch regularly.
His grumbling went unanswered. The smell of day-old Chinese food sunk into his belly like a stone. He was hungry and pissed off. Most of all, though, he was sick of being someone’s prisoner. Patience. Your time will come. He’d done well to wait until his leg healed, but he could delay no longer. He didn’t need the use of his right hand to break Jules’ neck.
Cheesy commercial jingles assaulting his ears, Arthur glanced to the window. Light slanted through the arched, grimy windows. Another couple of hours and the sky would be dark, the loft plunged into shadow.
He would act tonight.
* * * *
“Haf pa be,” Arthur gritted out, words mangled by the gag stuffed into his mouth.
The clacking of fingers on keys arrested, briefly, a reassuring sign that Jules had registered the request. She wielded punishment more effectively than reward, but she had yet to leave him to sit in his own filth.
Arthur idly wondered if there was anything exploitable about that particular soft spot of hers.
Had she been imprisoned without bathroom privileges? Did she have ghastly recollections of prisons in some failed African state?
He thought better of asking once Jules pried the ball from his mouth. “Thank you.” He licked at chapped lips. His throat was scratchy when he spoke, voice rough like sandpaper.
“Save it,” Jules retorted, brusque and business-like. She unlocked the cuffs that held his injured arm first, rightly assuming he couldn’t use it to get far, then unholstered her pistol before doing the same for his left. “Let’s go.”
“Your bedside manner leaves something to be desired, you know.” Arthur rubbed at his wrist. “Has no one ever told you that you catch more flies with—?”
Jules dug the muzzle of the pistol into his right knee. “Do you want my finger to slip?”
A cold shiver ran down Arthur’s spine, the icy pull of memory tugging at him however much he might have wanted to pretend otherwise. Surprisingly, a gunshot to the knee hurt like hell. It could well be the worst pain he’d ever felt. He was in no rush to experience it again on account of running his mouth.
He shrugged. Nonchalance was his only shield these days.
“Move,” Jules growled viciously.
She didn’t have to say it twice. Ponderously, Arthur climbed to his feet and staggered a little drunkenly. The change of altitude wasn’t so hard to navigate, but his knee had been reconstructed with metal, with little regard for his comfort. Occasionally, the rivets grazed various tender nerves, electricity discharged up his thigh like the icy point of a needle. He could milk that infirmity to his heart’s content.
It wasn’t as though it hadn’t cost him in the past. The first time he’d tried to run away, he’d kicked Jules’ legs from under her and stumbled three feet before collapsing into a heap on the loft floor.
His lip had swollen like a wasp sting where he’d bitten down to arrest a pained whimper.
The second, he’d made it to the metal sliding door of the loft before Jules had fired a warning shot ten inches from his head, then slammed her boot into his kneecap hard enough that his vision blurred.
For the third, Arthur dug his toes into the floor, shifted his weight forward and barreled into Jules like a human wrecking ball.
He might not have been operating at full capacity after four months of convalescence, but he had body mass on Jules. His center of gravity was lower.
He threw himself into the motion, catching Jules’ wrist with his good hand just as she made to press the trigger. The shot pinged off the cement floor and ricocheted, useless. It rang in his ears like a clap of thunder.
Thrown off balance, Jules slammed into the table with a twisted grimace. Arthur caught a brief glimpse of her expression, but his attention was swiftly divided.
He’d known that Jules was a trained fighter as soon as she’d sprung him out of Section jail, but he hadn’t known just how good she was until now. They struggled against each other like snarling animals. He bent her back hard enough to knock her skull into the table. She got a knee between them to push him off.
When that didn’t work, Jules freed her right fist and went for his face. Arthur shifted out of the way, still scrabbling for the gun. Her knuckles grazed his cheek. He chose wrong. It took more effort to arch out of the way than to surrender to the sobering pain of a good, honest blow.
He tried on the second punch, but it was no use. The hit caught him square in the jaw, pain exploding along the ridges of bone and fragile skin.
It still counted as a win as long as he got his fingertips around the grip of the pistol.
“Son of a bitch,” Jules swore, her voice thick with venom.
She struck him again, then a fourth time, slamming her fist into his temple hard enough that Arthur saw stars.
Dazed, he felt the gun slip from his hold. No, no, no.
Jules hooked a leg around his thigh and reversed their positions, using momentum to slot a vicious hand around his throat. She had fine-boned fingers and thin wrists, two fingers missing on her right fist, but she had no difficulty locking onto his windpipe and squeezing down.
Arthur’s eyes watered. He pulled back his fist.
The click of a gun at his temple stopped him short.
“This what you want?” Jules ground out, spittle flying from her twisted mouth.
Her skin was too dark for a rosy blush, but Arthur heard the ire in her voice. She was this close to losing her temper. One last push and—bang. Gray matter everywhere.
“Is it?” she bellowed.
Forcing air t
hrough the tight clutch of her fingers was nearly impossible, but Arthur managed it anyway.
“Yes.”
Jules’ face swam above him, hazier with each suffocated second.
Just a little more… He was so close to passing out from lack of oxygen. His lungs burned, face flaming with a mixture of panic and despair. Just a few seconds more… For one long, rapturous moment, Arthur thought that she might actually go through with it. He tasted freedom.
“You fucking coward,” Jules rasped, leaning in close and personal. “You don’t get to check out early.”
The pressure around his throat ceased abruptly. Jules staggered to her feet, gun hand wavering in a distracted arc. Her right foot came up off the floor.
Although he guessed what was coming, Arthur couldn’t move fast enough to cover his genitals. The toe of her boot missed his balls by a wide margin, slamming instead into the side of his injured, barely-healed knee.
Pain radiated in a warm surge. It was as if the blood in Arthur’s veins had decided to reverse course in a moment of confusion. He curled in on himself to guard against another kick, though Jules wasn’t in the habit of delivering cheap shots.
Her fingers came away bloody when she wiped a hand over the back of her skull.
Arthur would have laughed if he wasn’t so busy coughing and panting—perhaps even weeping a little bit. He should have slammed her down harder than that, cracked her skull wide open. Maybe next time.
Even as the thought kindled, he knew there would be no fourth attempt.
For one thing, Jules was too smart to come near him again. For another, a long shadow stretched over the bare cement floor, the angle all wrong for it to belong to Jules.
Aching and short of breath, Arthur craned his neck and forced his eyes to open.
“Robin mentioned you had a package for me,” the man said, addressing Jules but looking at Arthur. He was tall and dark like Jules, his honey-brown eyes gleaming in the low lamplight. When he spoke, the faint trace of a German accent thickened his consonants.