by Zoe Sharp
At one point we passed a huge billboard carrying the information that the New Hampshire Sweepstake lottery prize was now up to $365 million. I saw Simone’s head turn to look and caught the merest suggestion of a smile on her face.
She and Lucas talked in the front seats as we drove, their voices too quiet for me to be able to easily follow the conversation without craning forwards, at which point Ella, realising she was being ignored by all the adults, became even more vocal. Eventually, I abandoned all my efforts at eavesdropping and gave her my full attention, which she liked much better.
After about an hour and a half, Lucas suggested a rest stop at the New Hampshire border, at which point I could cheerfully have kissed him. That changed with the sudden fear that I was going to be the one who was expected to take Ella to the toilet. Fortunately, it was Ella herself who insisted that she wanted her mummy to take her.
I went with them, as a matter of course. In front of Ella, Simone didn’t say much other than to tell me that she was genuinely enjoying Lucas’s company. I bit back the comment that it was in his interests to make sure she did and just nodded. By the look on Simone’s face, it was not a satisfactory response.
We were halfway back across the snow-strewn parking area when my mobile rang. I stopped in order to dig it out of my inside pocket, watching while Simone and Ella carried on back towards the Range Rover. It was too cold for them to linger, even if they’d wanted to.
‘Charlie? It’s Frances Neagley. You wanted to talk with me?’
‘Yeah, thanks for getting back to me.’ I said. I paused, partly to let the two of them get further ahead of me, so they were out of earshot, and partly because I wasn’t sure where to launch in. ‘So, you’ve dispensed with your bodyguard?’
She was quiet for a moment and I could almost imagine her looking round, as though to check the man from Armstrong’s was still with her. ‘I haven’t,’ she said.
‘Oh.’ My turn to pause. ‘But you spoke to Greg Lucas about your partner? He rang you, right? Before he made contact with Simone?’
‘He’s made contact?’ she said and her voice came out both tense and baffled. ‘When?’
‘Yesterday.’ Out of the corner of my eye I saw Simone open the rear door of the Range Rover and lift Ella onto her booster cushion on the back seat. ‘He showed up at the hotel.’ I tried to remember the exact wording. Had Lucas actually said he’d spoken to Neagley? I scanned my memory. Maybe not, but he’d certainly given that impression.
Simone had finished buckling Ella into her seat now and I started walking towards the car. She had already climbed into the passenger seat as I did so, and I saw the brake lights flare as Lucas shifted the transmission out of park.
‘Lucas said that when O’Halloran didn’t get back in touch with him after their meeting, he’d tried to call him,’ I said quickly, breaking into a jog. ‘I assumed you thought he was on the level or you wouldn’t have passed on the details.’
‘Charlie, I didn’t pass on anything,’ Neagley said, sounding anguished now. ‘I haven’t spoken to the guy. Not a word. I don’t know how he found your client, but it wasn’t through me.’
Suddenly, the Range Rover swung out of its parking space. I abandoned the call, slamming the phone shut as I slipped and slithered across the icy surface that separated me from my principals. I didn’t even have the breath to curse. I could only watch as the big car picked up speed away from me between the rows of other vehicles. I made a mental note of the plate, the call I was going to have to make to the police already formulating in my head.
At the end of the row, the Range Rover’s brake lights came on and I put on a burst of speed in the vain hope I might still catch them, skidding on the icy ground. A moment later, they had pulled away again and for a second it looked like Lucas was heading straight for the exit. Then he swung round in a big lazy semicircle and headed back down the next row, towards me. I cut through the line of cars and practically threw myself in front of him. As it was, he had to hit the brakes hard enough for Simone’s head to snap forwards in the passenger seat. She looked startled, with the first beginnings of annoyance on her features.
My gaze swapped across to Greg Lucas but the way the light reflected on the glass meant I couldn’t see his features clearly.
I waited a beat, then walked down the side of the car and snatched the rear door open, scrambling in through the gap. By the time Simone and Lucas looked round, I’d already half-launched myself between the front seats, fist clenched ready to strike at the man’s throat. I knew I could take out his voicebox with my left hand and yank the gear lever back into neutral with my right before he had a chance to pick up enough speed for the resulting accident to do us any damage. He would make very little noise as he died, and Ella – seated directly behind him – wouldn’t see enough to traumatise her too badly. Simone I’d worry about later.
Then Lucas swivelled in his seat and smiled at me.
‘Sorry, Charlie, I didn’t mean to scare ya,’ he said, sounding almost genuinely penitent. ‘I was just coming around to pick you up there.’
I pushed myself back into my seat slowly, uncurling my stiffened fingers and taking a deep breath to dilute the adrenalin that was coursing through my system. I checked his face carefully. Was it my imagination, or did the smile not quite reach his eyes?
‘Of course you were,’ I said softly, letting the double answer play out. ‘I never thought you were doing anything different.’
CHAPTER NINE
I didn’t get the opportunity to tell Simone about my conversation with Frances Neagley before we arrived at our destination, by which time I felt it was already too late. The only good thing was that Ella had nodded off soon after our last rest-stop and so I could give my full attention to our current situation.
Greg Lucas lived in a small town called North Conway in the White Mountains, about three hours north of Boston, and the contrast from the dark and serious city was marked. North Conway was picture-postcard pretty, for the most part, with clapboard houses painted a variety of pastel shades. Very few had garden fences separating them, adding to the friendly feel, like there was no need to keep out strangers. Like nothing bad could happen here.
Christmas fairy lights still decorated the shop fronts, even in early February. And there did seem to be a lot of shopping available, outlets mostly, boasting just about every famous name designer brand I’d ever heard of. When I remarked on this, Lucas smiled and explained there was no state sales tax in New Hampshire.
‘This time of year, people come to North Conway mainly to ski, but when they’re done on the slopes there’s plenty for them to spend their dollars on,’ he said, flashing a quick smile. ‘Keeps the wheels turning.’
He’d already told us, in broad terms, that he had a business dealing in military surplus supplies in the neighbouring town of Intervale. For once I didn’t have to probe further into that. Simone was curious enough about what the man who claimed to be her father did for a living to ask him enough questions of her own. She seemed calmer than she had done when we’d left Boston, but as she listened to Lucas’s explanations there was still a certain eagerness about her that concerned me.
He was, to my mind, still pretty vague about it. The way Lucas talked, you’d think all he handled was army boots and camouflage-coloured tents. But given his military background I couldn’t help but wonder what else he might be involved in. I was just wondering how to phrase a question when Simone beat me to it.
‘So, does that mean you sell guns?’ she asked. I glanced at her in surprise. Maybe she wasn’t quite as taken in by Lucas as I’d feared.
He frowned, slowing for a stoplight. ‘Not really,’ he answered, which was no answer at all. ‘I have them, of course.’ In the mirror I saw him flick his eyes sideways at her, as if to gauge her reaction. ‘It’s kind of a natural thing out here.’
Simone shook her head. ‘Not to me it isn’t,’ she said sharply. ‘I can’t stand them, and I won’t have them around Ella
.’
Lucas nodded seriously. ‘They’re all safely under lock and key, honey,’ he said mildly. ‘Don’t you worry about it.’
Simone didn’t reply to that, but I could tell by the way she’d turned her head away and was staring fixedly out of the window that his answer hadn’t entirely reassured her.
It was nearly one in the afternoon and the landscape was blisteringly white in the stark bright sunshine. We’d drive through enclosed forest sections, then suddenly there’d be a gap in the trees and you’d see distant snow-covered mountains. The scale of the place was overwhelming.
Lucas pointed out the local ski resort over to our right as we trundled down the seemingly never-ending main street. Mount Cranmore, he told us, adding that they had some nice easy nursery slopes there, for when Simone was thinking of getting Ella out on skis.
‘Oh, she’s much too young for that,’ Simone protested, glancing back at where her daughter lay sleeping alongside me.
‘You never can start them too early,’ he said. ‘You’ll be amazed how soon she picks it up.’ There was something a little earnest about the way he spoke, as though he was looking for reassurance that they would be staying long enough for something like skiing lessons to be a possibility.
For some reason the thought unsettled me. We were passing a variety of restaurants and I grasped at the idea of getting Simone away from Lucas long enough to speak to her, especially somewhere safely public.
‘What about stopping for a bite of lunch?’ I suggested brightly.
‘I have lunch all set once we get to the house,’ Lucas said, and I suppressed a groan. ‘We’re only a couple minutes away now.’
He kept checking Simone’s face, I noticed, and his hands seemed to be gripping the steering wheel more tightly than was strictly necessary. His nervousness was making me twitchy. It had increased noticeably in the last few miles. What was at the house that he didn’t want Simone to see? Or what was going to happen once we got there?
I soon found out.
At first it looked like Lucas was taking us right to the ski slopes. We turned off the main street into a side road that quickly became residential. Big detached houses with the front driveways neatly cleared of snow, and basketball hoops above the garage doors. A number had American flags hanging limply from poles in their front gardens. Just about every house had a pick-up truck or a big fourwheel drive in front of it. Still, the snow must have been a couple of feet thick in places, so you actually needed the extra traction.
We crossed a railway line and turned left onto a street called Kearsage, then right onto Snowmobile. I kept glancing out of the rear window so I’d recognise them again from the other direction. Never get yourself into anywhere you can’t get out of. It was one of the first things I’d learnt.
I examined my options. In theory, when it came to Simone’s security I was in charge. Yes – technically – she was my employer, but if she was actively exposing herself to danger, I had the authority to override her decisions. It was a nice theory. Practice was another matter.
In practice, I couldn’t physically restrain her. One of Sean’s rules was that if a client constantly disregarded advice, we walked away from the job. Better that than put his team at risk doing something they knew was unnecessarily dangerous or taking the fall for their principal getting killed instead. Not, at this stage, that I felt there was any real danger involved here, and leaving Simone and Ella to cope on their own was not an option.
Besides anything else, the whole purpose of her visit to the US, as she’d pointed out, was to find and get to know her father. Even I had to admit that this trip to North Conway with him was a perfect opportunity for her to do that. The fact that I had reservations about him – albeit ones that I couldn’t turn into anything concrete – counted for nothing. Simone dismissed my cautious approach as an overreaction like the one she believed I’d had on Boston Common.
We seemed nearly at the base of the mountain now. I could see the lines of the ski-lifts rising above us, dotted with people taking advantage of the sunshine. Just when it looked like we were heading right for the ski lodge at the bottom of the mountain and were going to have to complete our journey by sleigh, Lucas made another right turn, past the tubing park and the Fitness Center that even boasted its own climbing wall. Another quarter of a mile further on, Lucas slowed and said in a tense voice to Simone, ‘Well, here we are.’
The house was impressive, even by American standards. What I would have called a one-and-a-half-storey building, with huge gables in the roof to show rooms on an upper floor. Directly in front of us was a three-car garage, with the house itself set back slightly to the left. A raised deck ran right the way round the outside, and there were steps leading up to it and the glass-panelled front door. The walls were covered in green shingles and darkstained clapboard. With the trees overhanging from all sides, it seemed a little dark and forbidding, but I suppose it was meant to blend.
Sitting behind her, I couldn’t see Simone’s face to judge her reaction, but she was leaning forwards slightly as we swung onto the cleared driveway, craning her neck to look at the place. I glanced at Ella, but she was still spark out, head lolling sideways against the bunched-up coat she was using as a pillow. It was only as Lucas pulled up in front of the garages and actually switched off the Range Rover’s engine that she snuffled into wakefulness, squinting in the bright sunlight, her hair all flattened on one side. Lucas, Simone, and I all climbed out. The cold took your breath away.
‘How’re you doing, princess?’ Lucas asked Ella. Mistake. Even on my limited acquaintance with Ella I knew she always woke grumpy. Now, she scowled furiously at him and, showing an early feminine awareness of her appearance, hid her face in her mother’s shoulder as soon as she was unbuckled from her seat. Lucas seemed a little taken aback by the little girl’s response.
‘Don’t worry,’ Simone said apologetically, smiling at him. ‘She’s always like this.’ She seemed to have forgotten her earlier reservations.
‘OK, well, let’s get her inside and see about that food I promised,’ Lucas said, recovering.
We’d just reached the bottom of the steps when the front door opened and a woman came out onto the porch. She was medium height, the stiffness of her spine making her seem taller, with iron-grey hair pulled into a tight French pleat at the back of her head. She was wearing khaki trousers and a rust-coloured blouse with a kind of big floppy collar that might have been trying to soften down her rather severe features but only served to emphasise them. Nevertheless, she was smiling in welcome.
My first reaction was that she was Lucas’s housekeeper. She seemed older than he did and slightly out of step in both appearance and manner. It was Lucas himself who dispelled this myth, bounding lightly up the steps and planting a chaste kiss on the woman’s cheek before taking her arm and turning to face the three of us.
‘Simone, honey, I’d like you to meet Rosalind…my wife.’
I felt rather than saw Simone’s jaw sag. For a moment she said nothing at all, just stared blankly. Eventually, it was Rosalind who disentangled herself from her husband and came down the stairs to meet us. She stopped in front of Simone and smiled with every appearance of real affection at Ella.
‘I can see that Greg’s kind of dropped this on you,’ Rosalind said, flicking Lucas a reproachful glance. Her voice was low and husky, like she was a heavy smoker, although I smelt no tobacco on her clothes. ‘But it’s a pleasure to finally meet you,’ she said. She shrugged, the sudden uncertainty of the gesture at odds with her competent appearance. ‘I guess…well, I guess this makes me your stepmom.’
‘So how well did that go down?’ Sean asked.
‘Like a lead balloon,’ I said wryly. ‘Simone’s only just found Daddy – I think the idea of having to share him with anyone other than Ella came as a bit of a shock to her.’
I was closeted in the guest room I’d been allocated and had taken advantage of the momentary solitude to check in with Sean. I sat
on the bed alongside the giant teddy bear that Simone had bought for Ella in Boston.
I’d been right about the bear’s ominous demeanour. Ella had been so unsettled by its presence that, after the first night, she’d refused to sleep in the same room. Now she was sharing with Simone, that meant the bear was rooming with me. I’d privately named him Hannibal and already decided that he was spending the night in the closet so I wouldn’t wake up and find him looming over me.
Sean listened to my brief report on the situation without interruption, then said, ‘I can see why you’re not happy, but Simone is the client. Unless there’s a direct threat you can’t insist she pulls out of there, and a dodgy sense of humour doesn’t really count. Just watch for signs of that temper, though.’
‘I will. I just don’t think Simone’s asking nearly enough questions about this guy, and she doesn’t like it when I try and get straight answers out of him,’ I said. ‘There’s something that doesn’t quite ring true about him for me. And we still don’t really know how he managed to find us in Boston.’
‘Mm, that is a bit of a worrying one, I admit. I’ll check with the hotel, but I’d be very surprised if they’d given out any information. Madeleine stressed the need for discretion when she booked with them.’
‘Have you managed to find out anything more about him?’
‘Just that he had a mean streak and he liked to fight – on or off the battlefield. I get the feeling there’s a lot more they’re not saying about that, but I’ll keep digging.’
‘If he was a brawler, he was either very good or very lucky,’ I said, ‘because he’s picked up very little by way of scarring and if his nose was ever broken, he’s had it very well fixed.’
‘That’s not so unusual these days,’ Sean said. ‘Just as many men go in for cosmetic surgery as women.’
‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘But a photo would be good, so we’ve got visual confirmation that he is who we think he is, at least. I think this new phone’s got picture messaging, hasn’t it?’ I’d been slow to catch on to the technological age, but I suppose I was making up for lost time now.