Dead Secret

by Peter Kozmar

  “I’ll need to look into this further,” the Commissioner sounded alarmed, the call had caught him off guard.

  “You know from my reputation, I’ll make one hell of a splash in the media and sue you too.”

  “Crimes were committed and I’m sure my officers are being thorough.”

  “Self-defense by a man asked personally by you, to assist the police in the investigation of a multiple homicide?” Bowers paused for theatrical effect before pressing the point home, “What would your officers have done if it was a police officer who’d killed the gunman? Would he have been charged or given a medal?”

  A long silence followed.

  “You know I can’t answer that,” the Commissioner replied. He sounded annoyed.

  “It’s getting late. Mr. Flint has just finished the meal I had to bring him and I don’t believe he should spend another minute here.”

  “Mr. Bowers, thank you for bringing this to my attention. I’ll speak with Inspector Copeland and the team. Stay there and make yourselves comfortable for a while.”

  “Thank you Commissioner,” Bowers ended the call and he pocketed his cell phone, “let’s see what happens over the next few minutes.”

  “He knew Copeland is leading the investigation.”

  “Of course he did. Something this big will be on his radar. The Commissioner will have been briefed and he’ll have received regular updates,” Bowers replied.

  Andy started eating the banana, then paused as he spoke, “What do you think will happen?”

  Alex pointed to the door, “They’ll walk through there and say you can leave for the night. They’ll keep you under caution and ask you not to leave the country while they figure out what to do. I believe they’ll drop the charges against you and put out a story saying that gunman killed two people before ending his own life. They’ll say they aren’t looking for anyone else.”

  “Let’s see, I can only live in hope.” Andy felt the fatigue return. The day’s events and the long interrogation had taken its toll on him. As he yawned he placed his hand over his mouth.

  “It is late and we will get you out of here tonight.”

  A few moments later the door opened, Copeland and Jackson walked into the room and faced Alex. Copeland spoke, “We will be releasing your client for the night. He has been cautioned, but not booked in. Your client is to surrender his passport and isn’t allowed to leave the country until decisions are made on how we are to proceed.”

  “I don’t have my passport on me, it’s back in my hotel,” Andy replied.

  “You can drop it off at the Central Police Station tomorrow morning, I’ll be there to receive it,” Copeland instructed.

  “Okay.”

  “Don’t get too comfortable. We may bring you in for further questioning, so make sure you have Mr. Bowers’s number on speed dial.”

  “Understood.”

  Bowers closed his large black leather case and spoke to Copeland, “If there is nothing more tonight, I’d like to take my client back to his hotel.”

  “Sergeant Jackson show these gentlemen out,” Copeland instructed.

  The two men stood and followed Jackson out of the room. Andy looked at his watch, ten twenty-five pm, it had been a long day. The station was still busy with officers carrying back-packs, tablet computers or food, others were talking on their cell phones. None made eye contact with him.

  Jackson opened the main station door for them to leave, “Good night gentlemen. Have a safe journey back to Wellington. We’ll be seeing you soon.”

  “Thanks, Officer,” replied Andy.

  As the two men strode away from the brightly lit police station, two familiar faces stepped out of the shadows from the side of a black Range Rover, “Vladim, Dortman, it’s good to see you both. Thank you for securing the services of Mr. Bowers. I’m sure I’d still be in there without his timely intervention.”

  “I think Mr. Flint would have been processed, given a few hours in the cells before more formal questioning. Within twenty-four hours he’d be in front of a judge and it would be downhill from there.”

  Vladim shook Bowers’s hand, “Thank you for giving up your evening at such short notice. I appreciate you missed a night at the theatre with your wife. I’ll make up for your sacrifice. So please apologize to Mrs. Bowers on my behalf. I’ll have you both flown on my private jet to Fiji where I’ll have one of my yachts available for your exclusive use.”

  “That’s generous Mr. Martirossian, but neither of us sail.”

  “The Jewel of Odessa is one hundred and fifteen meters long and has a crew of sixteen, which includes a chef and a masseuse. You’ll not be sailing. You’ll just need to decide where you’d like to go, what you’d like for dinner and what time you want your massage.”

  Alex looked flustered at not appreciating the scale of Vladim’s offer.

  Vladim turned to Andy, grabbed him by the shoulders, pulled him tight and wrapped his arms around him, “It’s great to see you my old friend. I’m deeply sorry about Mark. I know you and Mark were getting to know each other and had many plans. It’s a tragedy. A real tragedy.” Vladim released Andy from his grip and continued, “Anything you need, just say it.”

  Tears welled in his eyes. He wiped them away and stepped back from Vladim. “Thank you,” his voice cracked with emotion, his brief words struggled to come out.

  “Okay, let’s go,” Vladim turned to Bowers, “I can’t thank you enough for helping my friend.”

  “Not a problem. Good night.” Bowers had a spring in his step as strode over to a silver Jaguar sports car and placed his leather case in the trunk. He climbed in and fired up its powerful engine, without a pause he drove out of the car park and onto the highway.

  “Now, let’s get you back to the hotel.”

  Dortman took his position in the driver’s seat, Vladim sat in the back next to Andy. Andy looked down and realized he still wore the old boots from the hut. At this moment his feet felt sore and bruised, as though seeing his feet prompted the pain to return.

  The Range Rover moved slowly out of the car park. Andy looked up to a second-floor window where the well-illuminated figure of Inspector Copeland looked down on them, watching them leave. Copeland had a cell phone pressed firmly to his ear, from the look on his face his call wasn’t going well.

  CHAPTER 19

  Andy sat alone in his darkened hotel room. He couldn’t sleep as his mind played Mark’s final moments over and over. One instant Mark was smiling, talking and happy, the next, his body was falling to the ground, his brains spread over the wall. Andy watched the life spark in his son’s eyes fade to grey over and over like it was on a continuous loop, but with the same ending: Mark was dead.

  His thoughts tormented him as to what he could have done differently. What if he opened the door and not Mark? What if they’d left earlier and talked at the landing site and not at the hut? What would have happened if he’d gone with the pilot and they’d had a quick turnaround being back up in the mountain faster than him walking down? What if’s plagued his thoughts.

  Andy removed his cell phone and called his ex-wife. He waited patiently for the long-distance call to connect and for her to answer.

  “What do you want? Have you found my son?”

  “I’m sorry,” Andy’s voice cracked. An awkward silence filled the line for several seconds.

  “What? No … No. No. No. Tell me it’s not true.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You said you’d find him and bring him home safe. You said …”

  “I’m sorry. He was killed right in front of me. There was nothing I could do.”

  “You’re a liar!” she screamed, “You killed him. You and your poisonous, pathetic world.”

  “It wasn’t me. There was a gunman. He was after Mark. There was no warning. It was …” Andy was cut-off mid-sentence.

  “You! You killed our son.”

  Andy could hear her sobs. He started to cry too. He knew his decision to walk ha
d given the gunman time to reach the hut and kill Mark. If he’d acted differently, Mark would be alive. If he’d acted differently they would have cleared the area hours earlier. The realization he had been responsible for his son’s death crushed him. “I’m sorry.” Andy ended the call, he couldn’t take any more. He moved to the bed and sobbed uncontrollably until tiredness enveloped him and sleep temporarily took away his pain.

  It was still early when Andy woke. His watch read five forty-five. He felt tired and still had a dull head. He wanted a clear head for the day ahead. He rummaged through his suitcase and pulled out a pair of shorts, a tee-shirt and sneakers and dressed quickly. Andy left his room and took the elevator to the ground floor where he surprised the bored-looking receptionist who’d been watching a movie on his tablet computer.

  “Can I leave this with you?” Andy handed over his room key in its cardboard folder.

  “Sure.”

  Andy walked out of the hotel and into the chilled early morning air. He jogged slowly towards the waterfront. His mind quietened down as he thought about the plan for his day. He needed to surrender his passport, speak with Carter to hear what she had learnt and check in with Hobbs. He also needed to retrieve the memory stick.

  Andy headed slowly along the waterfront with the still water of the harbor to his left. He realized he couldn’t remember crossing Waterloo Quay, a main highway between the hotel and the waterfront. He didn’t know whether he’d waited at the lights or just crossed the road without thinking. He crossed a small footbridge which spanned a narrow channel connecting the harbor to a lagoon.

  He kept going, even though his chest burned, and his legs felt like lead. He picked up his pace as he passed a few early morning joggers and cyclists. He was soon clear of Te Papa and on the far side of Clyde Quay Wharf, with its expensive apartments, when he took the stone steps down towards the waters edge.

  He kept his mouth open and breathed deeply. It didn’t help with his effort to move his legs faster. He chose to stay near the water’s edge and run in front of a row of small multi-colored beach huts which faced the marina where several yachts gently swung on their moorings. The rising sun glinted off the beautifully clear, still water.

  Why did I walk down the mountain into the valley and not take the helicopter to the aerodrome to be fixed, I’d have been back out in no time. I knew the gunman was probably pursuing Mark. I knew the CIA were chasing Mark, wasn’t that important? Was I out in the bush to find Mark or was I out for a nice day walk? Didn’t Mark’s safety matter to me? After a few hundred meters Andy turned right and ran up the concrete steps to join the main parade along the waterfront.

  He turned left, away from the city and past a children’s beachfront play park. His thoughts became darker.

  I was responsible for Mark’s death. I killed him.

  He saw a set of steps leading down to the sandy beach and cleared them two at a time. He sprinted towards the inviting water. The sand sucked the energy from his legs as the soft going made his legs scream as cramp set in.

  The freezing sea sprayed and splashed his body as he ran deeper into the water.

  Its resistance quickly slowed Andy to a walk. He pushed on until waste deep.

  Tears streaked down his cheeks as he punched the water again and again with clenched fists. He looked skywards and screamed out loud with rage.

  The guilt.

  The pain.

  The rage.

  The noise in his head.

  He wanted it to stop.

  Andy gave himself to the water. It washed over him and sucked him deeper. Sea water filled his lungs. His world became dark.

  The noise in his head stopped.

  For the first time since he’d arrived in Wellington he felt at peace ... slipping into oblivion.

  Then … nothing.

  CHAPTER 20

  Amy Carter arrived at her office unusually early, but only after long and difficult negotiations with her husband, Jason. He’d been even less sympathetic than usual following the incident in the Tararuas when she arrived home in the early hours. She looked at her watch and knew that in a few hours he would be making the school lunch, breakfasts and doing the school run in the morning rush hour.

  Amy ran Craig Jones’s driving license details through her query tools which were linked to multiple databases from across the globe including the UK. She frowned when it came back with an unexpected error, no record. Amy tried another approach and keyed in Jones’s credit card data. This came back with a live account, with a postal address in Oxfordshire, Southern England. Amy queried the hire car company’s database and found the home address Jones had provided to be the same as the one referenced by the credit card company.

  The license error was either a data entry error or a data corruption issue, both were plausible explanations. She looked through the files, which her team and the police had hurriedly prepared for her, and found what she was looking for: a copy of Jones’s passport. The police had recovered it from his safe at the Sofitel hotel.

  Amy keyed in Jones’s passport details. It came back with the same photograph as the driver’s license and the same address in Binsey, Oxfordshire, but something wasn’t right. She pulled up the data from the passport query on one screen and the data from the credit card company on her second screen. She switched between screens from one to the other and back. Then it struck her: each had a different date of birth.

  She had a hunch and made one more check to confirm her growing suspicion. “What was the date of issue?” Amy said to the empty room. Both the passport and the credit cards were issued on the same day, four months earlier. She looked at the issue date printed on the driver’s license.

  “What are the odds on that?” she mused to herself. The driver’s license shared the same date of issue as the other items.

  Amy wanted to see whether this was a co-incidence or not. She made another query. The response returned even stranger. Jones hadn’t held a passport prior to this one and the driver’s license query continued to return the error message.

  Amy accessed the Oxford County Council records and keyed in the address. The search results came back: Alan and Mary Fisher. They’d been resident at the address for over fifteen years. Amy searched for details on Alan Fisher:

  Alan Fisher was fifty-six years old and had been married to Mary, who was fifty-five, for over thirty-five years. They had three grown children: all women. Alan and Mary were grandparents to four-grandchildren: three girls and a boy. Alan and Mary were the only residents at the address. Alan had worked for various employers during his career. His most recent role, at a local garden center, had been for just over three years.

  Amy found Alan’s passport and driver’s license details and quickly pulled up photographs of him. He didn’t bare any resemblance to Jones. Just to be sure, she searched Alan’s social media and found photographs which matched Alan’s passport. There were lots of photographs and entries concerning grandkids, plants, flowers and visits to National Trust properties.

  Craig Jones continued to be an enigma. She keyed in his details into the search function on social media and was presented with six ‘Craig Jones’ in Oxfordshire. She checked each one and none of the photographs matched the Craig Jones whose details she held. Amy went back to Jones’s passport. For any passport to be issued, there would be an application. She stared at her screen and thought about what Jones’s application could tell her. With a first time passport there would be referees.

  With a few quick clicks she was looking at the electronic entry for Jones’s passport application. After a few minutes of reading she started to laugh. The screen showed the details of the two referees: the first was James T. Kirk, United Federation Space Command; and, the second was Guy Fawkes, The Houses of Parliament, Westminster, London. The Issuing Officer who processed and approved the application was Charles Francis Xavier from Department X.

  Amy stood and walked away from the screen to grab an instant coffee from the machine.


  CHAPTER 21

  A firm pair of hands gripped his arms and pull him up from the darkness.

  He sensed he was being dragged through the water and dropped heavily onto the beach.

  His neck was thrust back and strong blows directed to his chest.

  A mouth clasped over his and forced air into him, followed by more regular blows to his chest.

  He wasn’t sure what happened next, but later would remember vomiting, retching, coughing and lying in the sand.

  Andy heard a voice shout, but he had no strength to move or open his eyes. “Over here!” A familiar voice called out, but Andy couldn’t place it. His mind worked slowly as it tried to piece together what was happening.

  “Come on Andy!” The voice shouted again. His chest rose as another breath was forced into him. A different, yet familiar, voice joined them.

  “Is he alive?”

  I know those voices. I should know their names.

  “He’s not gone yet!”

  A German accent … Dortman?

  “Shall I call an ambulance?”

  A Russian accent ... Vladim?

  What are they doing here? It feels too real to be a dream.

  “Come on Andy … don’t give up … don’t let them win … you’re a fighter … fight this … we’re here … we will help … just come back … my friend,” Vladim urged between each breath.

  The chest compressions stopped. Andy vomited and started to cough.

  “He’s back!” That’s Dortman. What was he doing on the beach?

  Andy tried to sit up, but a firm hand stopped him.