Deception!

by Elizabeth Ducie

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Well, I read it, Michael, and it makes very interesting reading. Let’s just say Mercy already knew a fair bit of your story before you told us all about your time in Africa. And somehow, I don’t think you’d want this book to get into the wrong hands; the police for example. Or the British Foreign Office maybe.’

  ‘Are you trying to blackmail me?’

  ‘Blackmail’s such an ugly word, isn’t it? Let’s just say I think we could have a mutually beneficial conversation.’

  The silence was so palpable this time Charlie could almost hear Hawkins thinking. Finally she heard him inhale sharply and slowly.

  ‘Well you’d better come and see me, hadn’t you? Tonight? Eight o’clock.’ The thought was so ludicrous, Charlie actually laughed out loud.

  ‘Yeah, sure. I come and see you and there’s another unfortunate accident. I’d never be seen again.’

  ‘Rose, Rose, don’t be silly.’

  ‘Listen, Michael, we’re going to play this my way. Do you know the café in the park opposite the São Paulo Runners Club? I’m going for a run this afternoon, so I’ll meet you afterwards in the café; at about four. There’ll be plenty of people around and if I suspect any funny business, I’ll be screaming so loud, they’ll hear me in Downing Street.’

  The running track was empty as Charlie warmed up. She rolled her shoulders to loosen the tension, touched her toes, circled her arms forwards and backwards, then gripped her ear to aid balance while standing on one leg to stretch her hamstrings. Jogging on the spot, she set the timer and started running. The circuit was a kilometre long, circular and hilly in places, providing a varied challenge. At the point furthest from the clubhouse, it passed through a glade of trees. An old disused track marked the boundary of the field.

  On her first three laps, the track was empty. But the fourth time, there was a car parked under the trees. Charlie slowed her pace as she recognised the vehicle. She’d last seen it driving Michael Hawkins away from her the afternoon they flew back from Rio.

  Charlie felt, rather than saw, the figure stepping out from the trees into her path. She dodged to avoid his outstretched arm, but he was too quick for her. One hand reached out and grabbed her, twisting her shoulder viciously, while the other pushed the barrel of a gun into her ribs.

  ‘Shit, that hurts, Max. Let go!’ But the driver just grunted and shoved her towards the car. As they reached it, the back door swung open. Michael Hawkins was sitting in the opposite corner, with a cold smile on his face.

  ‘Get in, Rose. There’s no point in struggling. You wanted to talk, so here I am.’

  ‘I wanted to talk later, in the café. What are you doing here?’

  But Hawkins laughed.

  ‘I think you underestimated me, my dear. Why should I risk meeting you in a public place when we can talk much more comfortably here in private?’ Then the smile disappeared, to be replaced with a snarl. ‘Get in, now. I’m losing patience.’

  Max pushed Charlie forwards and she fell into the car. She grabbed hold of the bucket seat and pulled herself into it, as far away from Hawkins as she could be. He looked across her to the waiting driver.

  ‘Max, you stay out there. This won’t take long, and then we will be taking Ms Fitzpatrick for a little drive.’ Charlie shivered as the meaning of his words sank in. Max closed the door and walked a few feet away from the car. Charlie watched as he pulled a cigarette case from his pocket and lit up. Hawkins cleared his throat.

  ‘Right, now, Rose. Let’s not waste any time. Let me have the diary.’

  ‘Oh come on; do you really think I’d have it with me?’ she asked, trying to instil a note of bravado into her voice.

  ‘Yes, I do, my dear. Otherwise, how were you going to prove to me you have anything of real value?’

  ‘Well, yes, I’ve brought a copy certainly, but the original’s in a very safe place.’

  ‘And we can talk about that in a little while. But show me the copy, then.’ Charlie stared at him in disbelief. Could this man really be that stupid? She held out her hands, showing she was carrying nothing.

  ‘I’m in the middle of my run at the moment. On my own. I’m meant to be meeting you afterwards. Why would I bring anything with me?’ Hawkins stared at her silently, and then his eyes dropped from her face to the small key fastened with a safety pin to the waistband of her joggers. A locker key with a tiny number tag attached to it. Charlie moved her arm to cover the key, but it was too late. Hawkins smiled slowly and held out his hand. Charlie unpinned the key and passed it to him. She briefly considered jabbing the open pin into his outstretched palm, but figured that would only enrage him and bring the encounter with Max even closer.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘We’ll visit your locker in a little while. Now, about the original; you have two choices. You either tell me where it is and we go and get it now. Or I hand you over to Max who, believe me, will very much enjoy extracting the information from you.’

  ‘Either way, you’re planning to kill me, aren’t you?’

  ‘Oh, most certainly, Rose dear, but one way will be much quicker and less painful than the other.’

  Charlie bit her lip, screwed her eyes up like a child waiting for a surprise and then exhaled noisily.

  ‘Okay, Michael,’ she said. ‘You win. I’ll give you the diary—but you can’t blame a girl for trying. When I heard your story out on the boat, especially the part about you being that Civil Service bigwig who disappeared, I saw my chance to make a bit of money.’ She shook her head. ‘But I guess I was wrong.’ She grinned and held out her hand: ‘Well played, Michael—or should I call you Sir Fredrick? Tell me, do you miss your days in the International Health Forum. You certainly had a great team working for you, didn’t you?’

  Hawkins was slipping her locker key into his wallet and taking no notice of her outstretched hand. But at her words, his head shot up and he stared at her, the colour draining from his face.

  ‘Jones! Suzanne Jones! She had a picture of you on her desk! That’s why your face was so familiar.’ Charlie bowed to him; there was no point in hiding any longer.

  ‘Charlie Jones, elder sister, protector and partner in crime, Sir Fredrick. Pleased to meet you.’

  ‘I stopped being Sir Fredrick when I left England, Ms Jones! And I really can’t say I’m pleased to meet you!’

  Hawkins rolled down the window.

  ‘Max, come here. Now!’

  Then, several things happened at once.

  The door on Charlie’s side opened, someone grabbed her arm and pulled her out of the car. She stumbled and almost fell over the prone body of Max, which was lying on the edge of the running track. A figure, tall and well-built, jumped into the car in her place. A large figure, moving much faster than his size suggested, jumped into the front seat. Doors slammed, the engine started and as the car raced away, Charlie heard Hawkins give an enraged scream, rapidly silenced.

  She took several deep breaths and then turned to the man standing over Max’s body.

  ‘You cut that a bit fine, Felix. I was beginning to think I really was on my own.’

  ‘Never fear, Charlie, you were completely safe. But I wanted to make sure we had enough on tape to prove his identity.’ Felix put his arm around her shoulder. ‘Come on, time for you to get changed. We need to find out how Suzanne’s been getting on.’

  CHAPTER 40

  Suzanne was waiting in the shadows outside the huge office building when the young woman with the flame-coloured curls came through the revolving door at precisely one-thirty pm.

  ‘Still a creature of habit then, Megan?’ she said, falling into step beside Nigel Atkinson’s Irish PA. ‘Lunch in the sunshine and a stroll around the shops before heading back?’

  Megan jumped at the sound of her voice and stopped walking; then her face broke into a grin as she reached over to give Suzanne a hug.

  ‘Hey, Suzanne, good to see you. But what are you doing
here? Nigel said he’d had you run out of Brazil. I thought you were back in the UK?’

  ‘Well, I was, but let’s just say some more information came up and I needed to be back here.’ Then she took the other woman by the arm and started walking her down the street. ‘Look, can we go somewhere a little less public? I need to talk to you.’

  Ten minutes later, the two women were installed in a booth at the back of a coffee bar off the main drag. Megan told Suzanne it was packed in the evenings, but tended to be quieter at lunchtime. They ordered drinks and snacks, then Megan turned to Suzanne.

  ‘Okay, shoot. What did you want to tell me?’ She paused and pulled a rueful face. ‘Although why I should even be talking to you after the stunt you pulled, I’m not sure.’

  ‘Yes, I’m really sorry about that,’ said Suzanne, ‘and especially about having to deceive you, but when you hear what I’ve got to say, I hope you’ll agree it was worth it.’

  Suzanne told Megan about Damien’s original approach, his suspicions about Super Fit, and their plan to trick Nigel Atkinson into letting her see around the factory.

  ‘And I have to admit, apart from that locked room and the old guy’s suspicious behaviour, I didn’t find anything of concern.’ Suzanne shook her head. ‘Quite the opposite, in fact. The place was just too clean, too high-tech for a supposed health drink.’ Then she brought Megan up to date with the investigations she and Damien had carried out since they left Brazil. ‘But there’s no proof as yet. So you see, I really need to get inside that factory again. And that’s where I thought you could help me.’

  But Megan held up her hands and pushed her chair back from the table.

  ‘No way, José! I nearly lost my job last time. Nigel already blames me for introducing you to him. There’s no way I’m going to be able to get you back in there.’

  ‘Not during the day, certainly. Charlie and I are hoping to get in at night. What can you tell me about the security systems?’

  ‘Oh, come on; who do you think you are? James Bond?’ Megan was shaking her head again. Suzanne put a hand on her arm and smiled gently.

  ‘Yes, I know it sounds far-fetched, but we honestly can’t think of any other way of getting the proof we need. Megan, people are dying, we’re sure of that. And we’re pretty sure your company is to blame. We really need your help.’

  Megan stirred her coffee in silence for a long time, then looking up at Suzanne she gave a crooked smile.

  ‘You really believe Super Fit is dangerous, don’t you? This isn’t another con?’

  ‘Yes, Megan, I do; and yes, it’s a con; but it’s Nigel who’s doing the conning.’

  Suzanne held her breath as Megan remained silent again, then finally, the Irish woman nodded her head.

  ‘Okay, Suzanne, I’ll tell you what you need to know. But it’s not going to be easy.’

  ‘So the security guard’s not going to be a problem,’ Suzanne told Charlie later that evening after she’d reassured herself that her sister was unharmed by her encounter with Michael Hawkins. ‘If we wait until tomorrow evening, there’s only one on duty for the whole building and most of the time, he’s sitting watching television in his little office.’

  ‘And what about cameras?’

  ‘Megan’s going to switch the factory ones off before she leaves. She’ll tell the guard they’ve malfunctioned and can’t be repaired until the following day. So he won’t be expecting to see anything on those screens.’

  ‘And we can get into the factory without having to go through the offices?’

  ‘Yes, there’s an entrance around the back, where the lorries go in and out. It’s on a quiet side road with nothing but warehouses on the other side, so we should be able to park there and slip in without being seen. Good of Felix to offer to drive, isn’t it?’

  Felix had wanted to come with the sisters, but Charlie persuaded him she knew what she was doing and that two people would be in and out faster than three. She had finally agreed to let him drive them there, and knew that would make their getaway quicker and easier than if they had to try and navigate the back streets of São Paulo themselves.

  ‘And Megan’s given you the codes for the gate and the factory doors. So that just leaves the locked room itself.’

  ‘Yes, that’s a pain, but apparently Rufus has a thing about modern technology; thinks ‘they’ can tell where we are all the time and insists on an old-fashioned lock and key for that one room.’

  ‘And he keeps the key in his lab coat pocket, in his locker? How bizarre.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’ Suzanne shrugged. ‘Hardly the most secure of locations. But it just means we need to visit the changing room first. Shouldn’t add much time.’

  ‘Right then,’ said Charlie, staring at the map Megan had drawn on a napkin and ticking a list off on her fingers: ‘Three minutes from the gate to cross the factory yard and get in via the warehouse. Two minutes to the changing room; another couple to find the locker, break in and get the key. Then three minutes to the locked room. Allow five minutes to search and find the samples. And another four to get out again. We should be able to do the whole thing in less than twenty minutes.’

  ‘So tell Felix to collect us at eleven-thirty pm. We should be back at the hotel and in bed before one am if nothing goes wrong on the way.’

  ‘Wrong? What could possibly go wrong, sis?’ said Charlie with a grin. ‘I have done this before, you know.’

  ‘Yes,’ replied her sister, ‘that’s what I’m afraid of!’

  CHAPTER 41

  A dog barked as two figures in black crept along the street at the back of the Sunshine Supplements factory. Suzanne froze.

  ‘Megan didn’t say anything about dogs,’ she whispered.

  ‘That’s not here; they’re across the road,’ hissed Charlie. ‘Come on, let’s get on with it.’ Megan had told Suzanne the heavy main gates were operated from within the warehouse and couldn’t be opened from the outside, except by Nigel Atkinson who had a remote control in his car. But to the left, a small pedestrian gate was fitted into the wall. This could be opened from either side by anyone with the correct code. Charlie reached up and keyed in the number Megan had given them. The sisters both heaved sighs of relief when there was a click and the gate swung open. ‘Step one complete.’

  ‘I was so worried they might have changed the number,’ said Suzanne.

  The factory was laid out around a large goods yard. Stacks of empty chemical drums provided long shadows across the moonlit expanse. The sisters slipped from one pool of dark to another and soon reached the pedestrian door next to the huge roller shutters on the warehouse. Charlie keyed the number in. Nothing happened. She tried again. Again nothing.

  ‘Are you sure Megan said to use the same number on both keypads?’ she asked Suzanne.

  ‘Positive. She said there’s only one code across the whole factory, because people kept getting mixed up and locking themselves out of the system when they had multiple codes.’

  ‘Well, it’s not working!’

  ‘It must be!’

  ‘Well, it’s not!’ Charlie was hitting keys again. ‘I’ve tried it three times.’

  ‘Maybe it’s a bit sticky. When Nigel took me around, he had trouble with one of the doors, had to key it in three times. And he...,’ she paused and thought hard, ‘I think he had to hit clear before it worked.’

  ‘Clear? Where’s that?’ The women hadn’t switched a torch on, scared that the security guard might be looking out of a window at just the wrong moment. ‘Oh, for goodness sake, where’s the torch?’ She pulled a pencil light out of her pocket and clicked it on briefly, shielding the beam with her arm. ‘Right, there it is. Let’s try that.’

  The light went out, and Suzanne heard yet another series of clicks as Charlie keyed the number in once more and this time, there was a final, louder click as the door swung open. They were inside.

  ‘It’s this way,’ said Suzanne, visualising the layout fro
m her visit with Nigel. Within less than a minute, they were in the changing room, a closed area with no windows. ‘Okay you can switch the light on now.’

  They quickly located locker number 37, which Megan had told them belonged to Rufus Armstrong Jenkins. It was locked with a cheap padlock which lasted no time at all against Charlie’s lock pick. It snapped with a crack and clattered onto the tiled floor. In the silent building, the noise seemed deafening and the two women froze. Charlie clicked off the torch and they stood in silence, straining to hear. But there was no-one and nothing to be heard. As Charlie switched the light back on, Suzanne pulled open the locked door and then shrank back in disgust.

  ‘Yuck! Smells like something’s died in here,’ she said. The locker was stuffed full of clothes, old jumpers, jackets and a grubby white lab coat. The shelf was overflowing with books, used pizza boxes and paper bags. ‘Good thing I’m wearing gloves.’ She reached in and grabbed the lab coat. ‘Here it is,’ she said, pulling a large, ornate key from the pocket.’ She shoved the lab coat back in the locker and pushed the door shut. But the contents were overflowing and it swung back open again.

  ‘Leave it, sis,’ said Charlie, ‘there’s no time for being tidy.’

  The women crept out of the changing room and along the corridor, past the windows into the packing hall. Last time Suzanne had been here, it was a hive of activity, with machines and operators working together to fill the sachets of Super Fit. Now it was dark and empty. Moonlight flooded through the windows on the outside walls, giving enough light for them to see where they were going.

  ‘This is it,’ said Suzanne, stopping in front of the small green door labelled Private. She turned the key, and the door opened inwards. Charlie flashed the torch around the room. It was about four metres square and one of the side walls was packed from floor to ceiling with cupboards, while the other was covered by dark curtaining material. In the centre was a standard laboratory bench with sink, gas taps and shelving full of bottles. There was a strong fusty smell in the air. On the back wall, there was a row of windows just below ceiling level. Charlie pointed to them.