Stealing People (12 page)

‘They’re very edgy,’ said Deacon.

‘About what?’

‘The Kinderman involvement, the expertise, and the possibility that one of their own is involved. You know, an ex-
CIA
guy or a contractor.’

‘I didn’t get the feeling there was going to be a free flow of intelligence coming from them.’

‘Nor did I,’ said Deacon. ‘So much for the special relationship. Did you register the silence when our allies were mentioned?’

‘Heard the mice farting.’

‘By the way, Mercy, are you all right?’ he asked, appearing squarely in her vision.

‘What do you mean?’ said Mercy, thinking this man missed nothing.

‘You just look a little … preoccupied, that’s all.’

‘Me?’ she said. ‘When I’m just about to embark on the biggest case of my career? Preoccupied? You’ve got to be kidding.’

‘Where are you?’ asked Mercy.

‘Knightsbridge,’ said Boxer. ‘What’s this number you’re calling me on?’

‘Disposable phone,’ said Mercy. ‘Can we meet? I’ll explain.’

‘Are you around here somewhere?’

‘I’m about to start a very complicated job in Belgravia.’

‘I thought—’

‘That’s why I want to talk,’ said Mercy. ‘Give me the name of a place and I’ll be there in ten.’

‘Gran Caffe on the corner of Basil Street and Hans Crescent.’

Boxer hung up, turned back from Knightsbridge tube station and went to the café. He ordered an espresso and called Amy.

‘Did you speak to your mother?’

‘Yes.’

‘And?’

‘I told her to come clean to her new boss.’

‘Where are you now?’

‘Islington. I went home, changed, packed a few things and I’m on my way back to look after Siobhan.’

‘Any news from her?’

‘I doubt she’s gone anywhere in her state.’

‘Be careful of Siobhan,’ said Boxer. ‘You seem fascinated and I can understand why, but she’s difficult, by which I mean economical with the truth. She’s also had the benefit of some training from her father, and I’ve just spoken to Simon Deacon, who tells me that Conrad’s long career has not always been pretty.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘There’s been some spying and it’s clear to me that some of those techniques have been passed on to Siobhan. He’s also been involved in the uglier side of interrogation,’ said Boxer. ‘I’ve spoken to Tanya, too. I know there’s no love lost between them, but I’ve seen and heard enough to know that Siobhan is at best unpredictable and at worst dangerous.’

‘All right,’ said Amy. ‘You’ve made your point. I’ll be careful.’

Boxer saw Mercy appear out of the crowds in front of Harrods. He hung up, ordered her a flat white.

‘What’s with all the secrecy?’ he asked. ‘And where’s George?’

‘Do you know Colonel Ryder Forsyth?’ asked Mercy, sitting down opposite, tearing her gloves off.

‘Colonel?’

‘Maybe, maybe not. Anyway, Ryder Forsyth … from your time in the Staffords.’

‘Yes, I know him,’ said Boxer. ‘But let’s start at the beginning, Mercy. As in … what the hell’s going on?’

‘I’m on a job,’ said Mercy.

‘You said it was complicated.’

‘It is. Kidnaps … lots of them, a whole series. And you know me. Got to keep the brain on the go.’

‘I just spoke to Amy. She said that she’d told you to come clean.’

‘I weighed it up and decided against,’ said Mercy. ‘What did Glider tell you?’

‘Not much. I don’t think he’s involved, if that’s what you mean. He’s promised me some leads,’ said Boxer. ‘But Mercy, let’s just talk this through. Your head’s not on straight.’

‘Tell me about Ryder Forsyth.’

‘We fought in the same unit in southern Iraq in the Gulf War.’

‘Was he an officer?’

‘Not then. He was an
NCO
. He annoyed people by always volunteering our unit for the most dangerous possible missions,’ said Boxer. ‘He applied for a commission afterwards and was made captain.’

‘Did you keep in touch?’

‘We weren’t friends but I knew about him. Simon Deacon kept up with him. He used Ryder when he was on the Africa desk then lost touch. I came across him through one of my American contacts and we worked together once in Colombia rescuing hostages from
FARC
rebels. I was the consultant and he did the gung-ho stuff.’

‘Was he any different to when you knew him in the Staffords?’

‘He’d been through a lot. He was a recovered alcoholic. And when running the security on a film shoot in Ecuador, he ended up having an affair with a famous and married American actress, which ended badly for both of them. He’d also had a triple bypass and a hip replacement and had lost an eye, which he covered with a black patch in those days. He’s that sort of person. Never does anything by halves. But what’s Ryder Forsyth got to do with anything?’

‘He’s the consultant on one of the kidnaps,’ said Mercy.

‘But he’s freelance. Since when did the Met … ?’

‘It’s no different to how you and I ended up working together on the D’Cruz case,’ said Mercy. ‘Forsyth’s kidnap is the most important one, politically speaking. So I’m acting as his personal special investigations unit and co-ordinating all the other SI teams.’

‘Don’t do it, Mercy. Come clean and get out now while you still can without hurting anybody.’

‘As soon as I know why they’re holding Marcus, I’ll make my final decision.’

‘You’ll be in too deep by then and you know it. They’ll make sure you won’t be able to extricate yourself. It’s a set-up. It’s been planned.’

‘We don’t know anything until we know it.’

‘Have the gang holding Marcus been in touch again?’

Silence.

‘I’ll take that as a yes,’ said Boxer. ‘Tell me.’

More silence as Mercy stared hard out of the window.

‘Another threat?’ asked Boxer.

‘They’re watching me,’ said Mercy. ‘They must have seen me with Amy because they said she’d be next if I talked.’

‘This is out of control,’ said Boxer. ‘You can’t go into a job with this background music. Who is Ryder Forsyth working for?’

‘Strictly P and C?’

‘Of course, you don’t even have to ask.’

‘I do, because it’s the Kinderman Corporation. The
CEO
’s daughter has been kidnapped.’

‘There’ll be money in that, political pressure and Christ knows what else.’

‘Money’s all they’ve asked for … so far. Not a ransom, but … expenses.’

‘Expenses?’

‘Twenty-five million’s worth.’

‘Is Forsyth employed directly by Kinderman or through a private security company?’

‘I think it’s direct. They have a history.’

‘Find out for me.’

She suddenly reached across the table and grabbed his hands, looked long and hard into his face.

‘You want me to do something for you, I can tell.’

She dropped her forehead down on to the union of their hands.

‘I can’t ask you to do this,’ she said, whispering into the tabletop.

‘Look at me,’ said Boxer. ‘You can ask me anything you want and I’ll do it for you. You know that.’

‘If I find the people holding Marcus, will you … deal with them?’

‘
Deal
with them?’ he asked, frowning.

‘They’ve threatened Marcus, they’ve threatened Amy and they’ve threatened to break me … crush my bones and crumple my heart, to use their words.’

‘And you think this is a better way to proceed than through the legal channels of the Met?’

‘They’re watching me. I don’t know how. They must have someone on the inside. They knew I was the unit’s top investigator.’

‘And that you would be given the Kinderman job.’

‘It’s even bigger than the Kinderman job. There’ve been five kidnaps and six victims. We don’t know what it’s about. I’ve just had a meeting at Thames House and they’ve no idea … any of them MI5, MI6, JIC, not one of them,’ said Mercy. ‘All I know is that if I deviate from the gang’s line, at the very least Marcus will die.’

‘You can’t be seen to be behaving strangely.’

‘And that’s the point … you can.’

‘What exactly did you mean by
deal
with them?’ said Boxer. ‘And why would you think I’m the man to do that for you?’

‘I know you have a gun, which you keep under the floorboards in your flat,’ said Mercy. ‘And no, I wasn’t snooping. Amy told Marcus years ago. So she knows, too.’

‘Amy?’ said Boxer, nodding, things making sense, remembering his mother telling him how Amy had gone through her flat when she’d been left alone there. ‘I’ve never had to use it, you know.’

‘I knew what you were going to do to El Osito in Madrid.’

Silence as he recalled the baseball bat blows to the Colombian’s knees and the more lethal one he’d planned to the man’s head.

‘Makepeace asked me what that was all about. I told him you were alone and under particularly stressful circumstances,’ said Mercy. ‘What I didn’t tell him was that in your shoes I’d have done the same.’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘What am I doing now?’ said Mercy.

‘There’s one big difference.’

‘No, I don’t think so. I’ve found enough anger to step over a moral boundary,’ she said. ‘It surprised me. I don’t know where it’s come from. Do you?’

More silence from Boxer as he held her hands and stared out of the window, the layers of the past stacking up in his mind and the sense of equilibrium he’d felt stabilising his life only hours ago spinning out of control.

‘Do you?’ asked Mercy, eager to have the benefit of his experience in such extreme matters; worried, too, that he’d have no idea, that it might be something psychopathic in a man who’d been the first she’d ever loved.

‘I wanted to tell you something important,’ he said, stumbling through the nightmarish landscape of his subconscious. ‘Something that might help you understand. Isabel is pregnant.’

It stunned her. The impact of the news and its incomprehensible relationship to what they’d been talking about.

‘What does that mean?’

‘She’s going to have the baby.’

‘I know what being pregnant means,’ said Mercy. ‘When’s it due?’

‘All being well, May.’

‘Congratulations, but … what does that have to do with … with what we were talking about?’

‘That’s what it takes for a human being to morally transgress,’ said Boxer. ‘If any harm came to Isabel, I would not hesitate.’

A relief spread through her and she felt reconnected to the person she’d loved for more than twenty years. Her phone beeped and she looked at the text, said she had to leave.

‘Give me any leads you can get from Glider,’ she said, and kissed him on the cheek.

He watched her go, glad for the break, relieved that she hadn’t questioned him further, because it was a place he hadn’t visited for quite some time. In fact ever since he’d aimed that blow at El Osito’s accusing face, he’d managed to avoid answering the questions raised by the Colombian’s enquiring mind.

Amy knew the flat was empty the moment she opened the door. In the bedroom she found the duvet turned back and brownish stains on the pillow where Siobhan had dribbled in her sleep. She looked for a note. Nothing. She called Siobhan’s mobile and heard its ringtone elsewhere in the flat. She called her father, told him Siobhan had gone and not taken her mobile.

‘No sign of a break-in or a struggle?’

‘Difficult to say. The flat’s still a bit of a mess but the doors are intact and the locks were changed by your guy last night, so if they’d come back, they’d have had to bust the door down again.’

‘There’s nothing you can do, no way of contacting her. You’ll just have to sit tight and wait.’

‘Is that what you want me to do? There’s other stuff back at the office.’

‘I don’t want you to go back to the office,’ said Boxer. ‘Your mother didn’t come clean. After your meeting with her this morning, the gang made another threat in which you featured as the victim if she dared to talk to her colleagues. She thinks they’ve got someone on the inside. At least you’re not moving on normal lines. They’ll have difficulty finding you. So wait there and text me when Siobhan gets back.’

Amy started in the sitting room, worked her way methodically through the things that Siobhan had gathered up and thrown in the two suitcases. She sorted out the clothes that clearly belonged to Conrad Jensen, checked them, seams and all, for anything strange. She folded and packed his clothes into the Samsonite and went to work on Siobhan’s. Then she crawled around the room tilting back armchairs and the sofa, looking underneath. Nothing. She moved into the bedroom and collected Siobhan’s dirty clothes, stripped off the bloody pillowslip and tidied the bed. Underneath she found a small piece of paper with a UK mobile number on it.

‘Found what you’re looking for?’

Amy screwed the paper up in her fist, turned and sat on the floor looking up at Siobhan, who was in skinny black jeans and the multi-zipped leather jacket. Her hair covered her puffy eye. The only visible damage from the night’s attack was her bruised mouth, cut lip.

‘You recovered quickly,’ said Amy. ‘Where’ve you been?’

‘You’re not my mum,’ she said. ‘I go where the fuck I like.’

‘Without your phone?’

‘Too easy to track.’

‘So what were you doing that you didn’t want to be tracked?’ asked Amy. ‘If we’re working together, we’ve got to know your movements.’

‘I was out buying something a little stronger than paracetamol.’

‘Like?’

‘Percocet. Paracetamol but with some oxycodone thrown in,’ said Siobhan. ‘I went out like a cripple and I’ve come back healed.’

Amy sent a text to her father.

‘Reporting me to your superior?’

‘He’s trying to help you … if that’s what you want.’

Siobhan shrugged.

‘What the fuck does that mean?’

‘It means I’ve done what I’ve been told to do by Mark Rowlands. What else is there?’

‘Don’t you care about your father?’

‘D’you care about yours?’

‘Yes,’ said Amy, looking at her steadily.

‘Why? What did he ever do for you?’

‘He put himself in danger for me,’ said Amy. ‘I didn’t know him until that moment. What do you know about Conrad?’