by Anthony Fox
‘Oh,’ Theresa replied, like something awful had just happened.
‘I mean, they’re nice people. They just never wanted children. Then at forty-five, bam, they get a nasty surprise, and along we came.’
‘We?’ Alice, the Irish woman travelling with her husband, asked. ‘Together?’
‘Assia and her brother are twins,’ Charlie told the people around the table.
This time Assia glared at him. She hated people talking for her.
The mention of twins got the usual excited response from everyone.
‘That must have been wonderful for your parents, even if they didn’t want children before.’
‘I guess. Not really, though. They’re academics. Very smart. Not big on emotions. If it hadn’t been twins my guess is they’d have had an abortion.’
The word made people around the table shift awkwardly, and Assia groaned to herself.
Why are people so stupid? It’s just a word.
‘By the time Mum realised she was pregnant, the doctors could already tell it was twins. My guess is aborting twins seemed a bit too much, even for them.’
‘But having children is amazing, and twins are like birthing a miracle,’ said Alice.
Be nice.
‘Sure. Of course. I mean, you’re completely right. But any idiot can have a child. It’s the bit after that, being a good parent, which takes real strength. And the world is far too overpopulated as it is. I mean, if you think about it, if any of us don’t have children we’d be doing the world and the human race a huge favour.’
The silence that followed seemed to drift on and on. A few people made excuses about needing to be somewhere, and left. The others quickly changed the conversation to lighter, meaningless chatter. Assia left Charlie with them and went back to their room.
She showered and lay in bed wearing a pair of Charlie’s underpants and a white vest. All the lights were on and she was alone. Assia began to enjoy the peace and quiet.
They’d booked into a twin room in the hostel rather than take a couple of the bunk beds in the dorm room because Assia needed the peace, the quiet. She found herself more often gravitating towards their room and just sitting in the silence, sometimes reading, sometimes just staring at the walls, reflecting. Considering Assia was paying for the trip, Charlie didn’t complain one bit. After Thailand her parents gave Assia money from a savings fund they’d started when Assia and her brother were children. Guilt money, Assia knew, for letting her go off to Thailand at such a young age.
Today was a busy day beginning with visits to the Fraumunster, St Peter Kirche and Grossmunster buildings. There was a festival on this evening and from her bedroom Assia could now hear fireworks exploding from somewhere close by. She considered for a moment that she might head back out to the streets to watch, but she was enjoying her solitude.
An image kept flashing through Assia’s mind.
A woman’s jacket. At least, the back of the jacket the woman was wearing. Assia noticed the jacket and followed the woman for a few seconds, seeing it again and again, until the woman changed her direction and was lost in the crowds.
The jacket was khaki green and had a map of south-east Asia across the back of it. Above the image of the map was a sentence written in black: When I Die I Know I’m Going To Heaven – Because I’ve Already Been To Hell. Underneath the map, also in black, read the words Long Binh, Bien Hoa, Vietnam ’68 & ’69. The woman wearing it had only one arm and the right sleeve hung loose and empty down by her side.
Assia couldn’t help focusing on the jacket, reading the top sentence over and over until the woman was gone.
I know I’m going to heaven, because I’ve already been to hell.
Assia had planned to go to Vietnam after Thailand.
Eight months spent in a Thai prison. She was an eighteen-year-old girl a few weeks into the trip of a lifetime. Then in the blink of an eye she was locked away and forced to spend every day fighting for her life. After being released she’d gone home for a while, but it didn’t feel right. How to go back to a normal life after that? Back to your old life when you’d been forced to change so much? Returning to family and old friends was like having someone else’s memories. But Charlie didn’t treat her any differently. He was a good friend, and she’d convinced him to come away for a few summer months. This time Europe seemed a much safer option than south-east Asia.
For the first time on the trip Assia considered phoning her parents. She’d emailed her father a couple of times to let them know she was OK but hadn’t spoken to them yet. After a moment she decided to send them a text message instead. As always it took a while as she still struggled with her new phone. Then she called her twin, Brendan. She’d spoken to him every week since leaving England again and was disappointed when the call went through to his voicemail. Assia left him a quick message telling him she hoped he was out drinking with girls rather than working as usual, and hung up.
Getting up off the bed, Assia made her way over to the mirror on the wall. She looked at her reflection. She lifted her uneven, straight, bleached-blonde hair away from her face and ran her hands through it, taking a moment to enjoy how easily her fingers managed the task, and the smell of shampoo that floated by. Moving her head left and right, she inspected her brown skin. A brightness was returning to her weary face now. The big, dark circles under her eyes were beginning to recede a little and although she knew she looked old for nineteen, Assia smiled back at herself in the mirror.
‘When I die, I know I’m going to heaven,’ she said aloud to her reflection.
She looked at her watch. Still early. She walked over and dived on to her bed, grabbing her book from the bedside table and sitting back against the headboard. Happy in the peace and quiet.
11
Innsbruck, Austria.
‘So how many languages d’you speak?’ Paxman asked him after they’d finished talking with the taxi driver.
‘Five,’ said Connelly. ‘English, Spanish, German, French and Italian. Most of my training for the Special Forces was in Panama and Mexico so my dirty Spanish, as they call it, is pretty good. Then I was shipped out to DRC – the Democratic Republic of Congo. Got my French so good I had the accent of a local. Up till the dramas in the Middle East kicked off and they redirected all our resources there. That was a weird experience, not being able to speak the local language.’
Connelly stopped short of reminding Paxman that during his tour of the Middle East, moving between the borders of Pakistan and Iran, he was part of a mission that would make him a hero in the army, a status that encompassed two medals and a one-on-one meeting with the president.
Following that mission Connelly returned to America, took a step back and accepted a position at the Urban Warfare Training Division in Virginia as their lead instructor. Not long after his appointment, however, he left the army altogether, saying he’d accomplished all he wished to, with no desire to see any more of his friends die. He was granted an honourable discharge and moved into the private sector, firstly in the USA and then, again because of his excellent language skills, his work brought him to Europe. He’d crossed paths with Robert ‘Bob’ Paxman more than once over the years, but despite the fact that both were in the army special forces and for more than a few years now operated in the same areas of mercenary activity, Operation Matterhorn was the first time the two men had worked together.
‘Tell you what, though,’ Connelly continued. ‘It’s nice to break out the German here. Been a while.’
Connelly learned German from his father, who’d been born in Frankfurt and died from bowel cancer when Connelly was a teenager. To this day, whenever Connelly spoke German, he heard his father.
Once Kemi went back through the camera recording at the hotel she’d easily been able to pull the company name, ‘Taxi Harry’, from the side of the cab. After a lot more work she got the first four digits of the vehicle’s registration plate.
Connelly went with Paxman to the taxi company tha
t morning. They spotted the desired taxi cab, and followed it to where they felt they could confront the driver privately. A substantial bribe was all that was necessary to help the driver remember. He dropped a giant man fitting Luque’s description at a hotel in the centre of town the previous day.
‘Ja, Ich erinnere mich. He was like the superhero dad from the cartoon when he’s too big for his car, and all bunched up,’ commented the driver. ‘Did you see that movie? It’s funny. But I’d never tell that guy. He looked like he could rip my head off my shoulders.’
Connelly fanned out some more money and gave the driver a look that said, I don’t watch cartoons.
The driver remembered the drop-off because he’d got a coffee from one of his favourite places around the corner from the hotel.
The two Americans called Nina, who was using the airport hotel as an operations base with Matthews and Kemi, then they set off in pursuit.
12
As they drove, Connelly’s mind drifted over the information they’d collected which brought them here, searching for any holes in their reasoning, any clues they may have overlooked. He thought of the camera footage showing Luque leaving the airport. He thought how Nina had missed him the first time around. For a moment this placed his thoughts firmly on Nina Arrow herself.
Connelly pictured how her eyes narrowed when she was being mischievous. The way her smell drifted on to you when she came a little too close. Connelly had come to the easy conclusion that Nina was the sort of woman who’d grown up to feel confident rather than uncomfortable with her looks. Empowered rather than unsure.
Her problem is that she has the easy confidence of the type that hasn’t been earned.
He’d seen it in some of the young officers when he’d first gone out to Fort Drum in Jefferson County, New York, all those years ago. He suspected she was able to develop a sureness of character because she’d never been truly challenged, which was fine in many cases, but not in this profession. Her confidence was just an exterior, paper-thin, and potentially easy to expose.
After thirty minutes of traffic the satellite navigation system announced Connelly and Paxman had arrived at their destination. Swirling blue letters across the front of the building proclaimed it as the Grand Hotel Continental, just as the taxi driver said.
‘You know, there’s still a strong chance we’ll never bag Luque,’ Paxman said to Connelly as they sat across from each other in the car.
‘We’ll catch him,’ said Connelly confidently. ‘I’ll catch him.’
It didn’t take long for them to decide that Luque wasn’t at the hotel. For Connelly something about the place, and the whole situation, didn’t sit right.
Why, after Luque had gone to all the trouble of sneaking into the country, would he get a cab driver to drop him off directly outside the hotel he was hiding in?
After calling Nina, Matthews and Kemi back at base, the team discovered a car rental agency just over half a kilometre from the hotel, remembering the accountant, Patrick McAuley, had computer searches for trains and car rentals in the city.
Kemi hacked into the company server and checked the list of clients from the previous day. A familiar name popped up. A cover name Luque had used in the past.
Connelly hung up his phone, removed the SIM card, and dropped it into his coffee remains. He put the coffee in one bin and the phone in another. Then he and Paxman headed for the car rental agency.
This time, instead of a bribe, the two Americans impersonated a pair of police detectives chasing down a lead, first by calling ahead pretending to be from headquarters, then by Connelly presenting an official-looking identification badge, one of which he always carried for each of the languages he spoke – presents from a half-brother with access to such things.
They gave the woman behind the counter the name of the customer in question, along with his rental details which Kemi had pulled from the system and emailed to Paxman’s phone.
The phone call or the badges alone may not have been enough, but together with the rental details they seemed to put the woman at ease, and she was able to help.
She found the file for a Mr Diego Rodriguez. One they knew Luque had used before. Connelly asked if the woman herself was working yesterday. Did she remember the customer in question, he was over six and a half feet tall and powerfully built? Yes, she was working yesterday, and please don’t ask stupid questions. Of course she remembered the man. He was enormous. She added he had a bold head and a serious face. All cars in the shop were fitted with a GPS tracker to locate them if stolen. It didn’t take long for the woman to locate the car rented by Diego Rodriguez.
They stepped outside and Connelly called base with Paxman’s phone.
Nina answered. ‘Hello there.’
‘The car was driven straight to a town called Feldkirch. It’s still there now and hasn’t moved since last night.’
‘How far is it?’
‘Just shy of 160 Ks. Less than two hours’ driving.’
‘Can you spell the town?’
Connelly did.
They agreed that Connelly and Paxman should drive over there immediately.
It was in the city of Feldkirch where it happened.
13
Zurich, Switzerland.
Assia’s phone rang. Looking at the screen, she saw it was her brother, Brendan.
‘Hey, B.’
‘Hi Sis. This a good time?’
‘Sure. I’m just waiting for Charlie. He’s run back to the hostel. Forgot his wallet.’
‘Typical Charlie,’ said her brother. His tone told her he was smiling.
‘Yep.’
‘So how’s the trip going?’
‘Great. Zurich is funky once you start to learn your way around.’
She gave her twin a quick run-through of what they’d been up to since she’d last spoken to him.
‘Do you feel you’re getting what you need out of it?’
‘What do you mean?’ Assia asked. Although the familiarity of the question struck her. Brendan did always like to get deep and meaningful.
‘I mean after prison and everything, do you think this is going to help you find yourself?’
‘Come on, B. Don’t be a douchebag.’
She heard her brother laugh down the phone. ‘Sorry. It just makes me nervous you being away again. So how are the social interactions going?’
Assia thought before answering: ‘Mixed.’
‘Any random violence?’
‘Hey! That was only once, and she deserved it.’
‘She used to be your best friend.’
‘She called me a prison rat!’
Brendan laughed. ‘OK. Maybe she deserved it.’ He paused. ‘I know you’re not interested, but Mrs Read called about that job again.’
Now Assia realised this was what the call was about. Mrs Read was Brendan’s boss. When Assia came home after Thailand, before she’d come away with Charlie, the woman had offered Assia a PA job in the office where Brendan worked. Without an interview, and with a pretty shitty CV. And with a prison record. It was an extremely kind offer.
Assia politely but swiftly turned her down.
As Brendan went through the offer one last time, Assia thought about her brother and his life, the aims and goals he told her he had. She thought about her other friends’ lives. Nine to five, Monday to Friday, long-term partners, one or two already planning weddings and babies and a house to complete the package. By and large she decided they were as happy as people can be in their lives. But even after all of it, Assia knew she didn’t want that domestic kind of life for herself, at least not yet. She thought back to the Tolkien quote on the wall of the hostel in Zurich.
Not all those who wander are lost.
‘It’s just not what I want,’ she told her brother now.
They were both silent for a moment. Both waiting for the other to speak.
‘You’ve changed since Thailand, you know?’
‘Inevitable,’ Assia replied wi
stfully. ‘But I’m still me.’
‘I know. I just miss you. It’s hard finally having you back safe, only for you to run off again.’
Assia wanted to tell him to stop being a big girl, but she couldn’t help but smile at his words. ‘I’m not saying I’ll never come home, get a job and all that bollocks. Just not yet.’
Assia looked up.
‘B, Charlie’s coming. I should go.’
‘Fair enough. I’ll just carrying on missing you then. And I do get it. I’m guessing one good thing you get from prison, it makes you realise there’s no point in being alive unless you’re going to live a little.’
Assia smiled again as Charlie reached her, waving his wallet triumphantly in the air.
‘That’s it. I miss you too, B. Come and see me soon.’
‘You can count on it. See ya, Sis. Pleeease be safe.’
‘Always.’
14
Feldkirch, Austria.
Connelly and Paxman entered the state of Vorarlberg in Western Austria and arrived in Feldkirch in good time. They followed signs for the city centre. Driving around the outside of a small square they could see a castle high above them on a winding mountain road. They drove as far as the castle itself until signs directed the two men back the way they’d come.
In town they passed the area where the woman from the car rental agency said Luque’s vehicle would be, but couldn’t spot it. Connelly was in no doubt the car was hidden away as another precaution by the ultra-vigilant Luque. He looped the car back and this time pulled over just before the square outside an Italian restaurant named Floriani. Paxman told him he was desperate to take a leak and jumped out, walking into the restaurant.
Reclining in the seat a little, Connelly looked up at the castle high up on the hill over the town. The tourist signs referred to it as the Schattenburg Castle. Apparently it had been built over eight hundred years ago as the seat of the Earls of Monfort, whoever the hell they were. To Connelly, the castle, along with the cobbled streets and well-maintained brickwork in and around the city square, gave Feldkirch a charming and surprisingly tranquil feel. It appeared lightly populated and felt to him more like a town than a city.