Disorder (Sam Keddie thriller series Book 1) (13 page)

Chapter 35

Penrith, Lake District

The distant hum of heavy traffic suggested their next step, reminding Sam that the motorway was nearby. He’d peeled off it just the night before. A lift to London seemed a better idea than the train. If the local police decided to come looking for them, the railway station and any train heading south were obvious places to start.

  Sam was keen to avoid wandering around the town centre, and asked the man working in the laundry if he’d call them a minicab. He looked them up and down suspiciously, then offered to drive them himself. For a fiver.

   They were dropped in the car park of a service station by the motorway. An hour later, just as Eleanor was losing faith that they’d ever escape Penrith, Sam negotiated a lift with a group of climbers who, for a small donation towards diesel, were only too happy to give the couple whose car – and contents – had been stolen in the Lakes a lift back to London.

   Sam and Eleanor sat opposite each other in the rear of the mini bus, wedged in between rucksacks packed to bursting point. Towards the front, the other passengers dozed. 

   ‘We’ve got a problem,’ said Sam, his voice hushed. He didn’t want the driver overhearing.

   Eleanor was tying her hair back, pulling the dense locks away from her fine features. She looked at him and he was momentarily caught on the back foot – by her flushed cheeks, the dark intensity of her eyes.

   ‘Besides the fact we’re being hunted by a group of homicidal maniacs?’

   She flashed him a smile and Sam had to smile back, the thoughts in his head now amplified.

   ‘Besides that,’ said Sam. ‘If we’re to leave the country – and that’s a big “if” – we  need to get our passports.’

   ‘And in all likelihood, our homes are being watched.’

   ‘Exactly.’

   Eleanor cupped her face in her hands, then drew them slowly away, massaging the skin back to life. She tipped her head from side to side, wincing with discomfort as she exercised a stiff neck.

   She looked at Sam again. He wondered whether his face was reddening. ‘I’ve got an idea,’ she said.

*

They reached Stoke Newington late in the afternoon. They first visited a sports shop on the high street. Sam bought a hoodie, which he put on. Outside the shop, they parted ways, Eleanor heading for a café and Sam for his house, the protests from his leg and head dulled by the painkillers he’d taken as they’d reached the outskirts of London.

   Despite feeling confident his features were obscured, the adrenaline was still racing through his system. Since their near-death experience in the Lakes, it was as if they both felt bolder – reckless even – but now that he was potentially approaching one of their pursuers, he felt vulnerable and exposed.

   The streets around his house were, as usual, jammed with parked cars. Sam kept his head down, inspecting each vehicle in turn. He was looking for one facing the property, one from which a decent view of his front door could be enjoyed.

   He’d passed his front door and was about to turn down a side street when he spotted the car on the opposite side of the road. Sam felt his heart leap in his chest. Behind the wheel was the stocky man who’d paid him that threatening visit days ago. The man was on the phone, looking away from Sam. He seemed to be barking into the mobile, a finger prodding the air angrily. Sam passed the car, then walked as casually as his pounding heart would allow back towards the café where Eleanor was waiting.

  A little later, Sam retraced his steps, stopping before he reached his street and positioning himself behind a tree where he had a partial view of the car and its driver.

   It took longer than he’d expected, and for a moment he wondered whether Eleanor’s call had worked, but suddenly there was a roar of engines and two squad cars emerged from a westerly direction and stopped adjacent to his pursuer’s vehicle.

   There was an exchange, which quickly became heated as the man’s temper flared, and then he got out of his vehicle and into the back of one of the squad cars.

   Sam watched the cars move off, marvelling at how Eleanor’s tale – the concerned mother who’d noticed a man taking pictures of children – had worked.

   With the cars gone, Sam wasted no time, moving down the side street and round the corner to his front door.

   From the outside, the house looked untouched. Inside, it was a different story. The consulting room was in the worst state, with case notes pulled from filing cabinets and scattered everywhere. Other damage was more gratuitous. His Yeats print had been ripped from the wall, as had his certificate of accreditation. Both lay in a pile of splintered wood and broken glass. In the living room, chairs were upended and cushions slashed, the floor scattered with thousands of small feathers. Books had been pulled from the book cases and left in a pile, as if someone was planning to come back and use them to start a bonfire.

   Sam went straight upstairs to his bedroom, concerned that his pursuers had turned it over as efficiently as downstairs and, in doing so, discovered the place where he hid his passport.

   The chest of drawers to the right of his bed had been searched, the contents pulled out and dumped on the floor. But not all the drawers had been fully removed. Sam eased out the bottom one, revealing a cavity below, and a metal box. He unlocked it. Inside, sitting on a pile of old bank statements and other papers, was his passport.

   Minutes later, carrying a bag stuffed with some clothes, Sam was back on the high street with Eleanor.

   By late evening, they were in Haywards Heath, outside a modern house in a cul-de-sac. A car was parked in the drive and, though the curtains were drawn, the lights were clearly on inside. Eleanor pressed the doorbell.

   A moment later a short, round woman with tight blond curls answered the door. Wendy Scott’s carer, Jill, greeted Eleanor with a hug and then a barrage of questions about where she’d been, and how much her mother needed her, what with the funeral coming up at the weekend and so much to arrange –.

   ‘I’m fine,’ said Eleanor, cutting her off. ‘And I’ll be home soon to sort things out. But I need your help first.’

   Eleanor’s reassurances, delivered in an even tone, seemed to calm the woman.

   ‘Where are my manners?’ said Jill. ‘Come in, come in.’

   Seated in the living room shortly after, steaming mugs of tea before them, Eleanor explained the purpose of her visit. She had an overseas trip to make – ‘an urgent one that’s just come up’ – and she needed her passport.

   ‘The thing is, Jill, I’d fetch it myself but I don’t want to upset Mum by rushing in and out.’

   Sam watched as Jill smiled and nodded, accepting Eleanor’s lie. God, he thought, she’s good at this.

   ‘I’m sure you’re right,’ said Jill. ‘Listen, I don’t want to upset you any more, but she’s all over the place at the moment. Crying one minute, slapping the arms of her chair the next.’

   Sam saw Eleanor’s eyes glass with tears.

   ‘’Course I’ll get your passport, love,’ said the carer. ‘And I won’t mention your trip either.’

   Jill shot them both a look. ‘Listen, you two look exhausted. Do you need to stay? I’ve got a spare room.’

   Neither Sam nor Eleanor had got that far in their planning. Sam was exhausted and looking at Eleanor, at the bags under her eyes, could see she was too. If they headed back to London, it would only be to find another anonymous and quite possibly nasty bed & breakfast where they could pay in cash.

   ‘We should probably –’ began Eleanor.

   ‘We’d love to,’ interjected Sam.

   An hour or so later, Sam watched Eleanor as she emerged from the bathroom. The lights were out and she appeared as a silhouette, illuminated by the glow from the street outside. Long bare legs, breasts outlined in the cotton of an oversized t-shirt.

   There were two beds in the room but, without hesitation, she climbed in next to him.

   She moved closer to Sam, reaching out for his face in the darkness, tracing her fingers gently down his cheek.

   ‘I don’t feel scared tonight,’ she said.

   ‘Me neither,’ Sam said. ‘I think it’s the painkillers. I might take a few tomorrow.’

   She leaned into him, kissing his cheek just to the side of his mouth. She was soon fast asleep.

   Sam lay awake, his mind working overtime. The truth was, he did feel scared. Hearing her slow breathing next to him, it was impossible not to dwell on his feelings for her, the attraction that had been growing, he now realised, from the moment they’d met. The fear he felt was based on one thing – a certainty that, sooner or later, Eleanor would be torn from him.

Chapter 36

Earl’s Court, London

The walls of the travel agency were lined with shallow shelves, each one filled with holiday brochures – cruises in the Caribbean and the Med, trips to Disneyland in Florida, long-haul holidays in the Far East, romantic city breaks in Europe. The world they represented – one of care-free relaxation – now appeared to Sam like a parallel universe.

   He and Eleanor sat with their backs to the window that faced the street. Sam kept turning to look outside. Despite a new theory about their pursuers that had been gathering weight since their experience in Stoke Newington, he felt defenceless and exposed, and knew those feelings would only increase as the day wore on.

   They had bought tickets for a flight leaving early that afternoon to Marrakesh. The sales assistant had disappeared to print them off. Eleanor turned to Sam.

   ‘This feels like madness,’ she said, her voice low, all traces of last night’s composure gone. ‘Our details have just been entered on to a system. We’re visible again. Christ, they found us in the Lakes when we’d been really careful. What chance do we have now?’

   Sam placed a hand over one of Eleanor’s. ‘I’m coming to the conclusion that our pursuers aren’t as sophisticated as we thought.’

   He explained his thinking. If the people after them really had tentacles everywhere, then why had that man outside Sam’s house been apprehended? It suggested the police weren’t in on it.

   ‘Think about it,’ he continued. ‘If you wanted to keep a secret, how many people would you involve? I think this is a tight operation, run well below the radar.’

   Eleanor smiled, frowning at the same time. It was clear she only partially bought what Sam was saying. And of course this new theory was only moderately comforting to him. Eleanor was right, their pursuers had found them in the Lakes, and that was after they’d taken great pains to keep their movements hidden. Were these people simply one step ahead, all too aware of where he and Eleanor would look next? In which case, was it not wiser to just run? But then how long would they last before they were caught? No, there was only one course of action – the one they were taking.

   The sales assistant returned with their tickets and wished them a safe journey. Sam smiled back weakly.

   There were still a few hours to kill before check-in, so they crossed the road to an internet café to tackle the other task they’d set themselves.

   Nursing watery cappuccinos and occupying stools at the rear of the café with a good view of the street, they logged on to the DFID website. The home page featured a large image of grinning African schoolchildren and the headline: ‘Access to education for all finally a possibility?’ Above and below were a series of other tabs including one, Sam noticed, directing visitors to a page that paid tribute to Charles Scott. If Eleanor had noticed, she didn’t let on. She clicked instead on ‘Diary’ and a new page appeared, one that detailed the Minister’s most recent movements – or at least those the Government chose to publicly reveal.

   Some entries were rich in detail – the new Secretary of State’s address at a conference in Edinburgh on violence against women, which was accompanied by the conference timetable and his actual speech – while others were more skeletal.

   ‘Here,’ she said, her finger resting on the screen.

   Sam leaned in to read the entry.

  
Charles Scott, Secretary of State for International Development, attended a series of sustainability seminars in Marrakesh this month. The meetings, held at La Mamounia Hotel, aimed to capitalise on the region’s existing potential while drawing on British skills and expertise.

   ‘Is that it?’ he asked.

   ‘It’s what they call transparency,’ said Eleanor.

   ‘So we visit La Mamounia,’ Sam suggested.

   ‘And the Sofitel,’ said Eleanor, who had now moved on from the DFID site to a Google page listing Marrakesh hotels.

   ‘I was racking my brains this morning, trying to remember whether Dad had mentioned the hotel where he stayed. It was the Sofitel, I’m positive.’

   ‘Right,’ said Sam, ‘so we have two leads. All we need to do now is leave the country.’

*

Sam hated Heathrow at the best of times. Confronted now with the crowds, the low ceiling of steel beams and bright lighting, the multitude of signs and advertising messages, he could feel his chest constrict.

   He thought back to their near-death experience in the Lakes. Something that had been designed to appear an accident or, more to the point, not murder. He looked at the people before him. Any one of them could be a killer, ready to brush by, to administer a dose of some lethal chemical simply by touch, or the tiniest pin-prick. A dose inducing a death that appeared to be natural.

   He shook the thoughts from his head. This was no time for paranoia.

   Sam looked up at the departures board. Their flight was still on time, scheduled to leave in two hours. They took the escalator upstairs to Departures. Here, it was marginally calmer although Sam took no comfort in the lack of crowds. Exposed or surrounded, neither felt safe.

  They moved towards two policemen wearing flak jackets and carrying semi-automatic weapons, who stood either side of a thoroughfare that led to the desk they needed to reach.

   Eleanor’s sweating hand clutched his tightly. Sam cast a glance at one of the men as they passed. The man’s eyes looked through him, scanning the building for dangers that, it appeared, did not include him and Eleanor.

   They joined the line at check-in. In contrast to the other queues nearby, this one was short. Ahead of them were three North African men, dressed in suits and in the midst of an earnest discussion. In front of them, a family – the parents standing in silence, their teenage sons both engrossed in tablets. The stillness unnerved Sam.

   Moments later they reached the desk. The woman who took their passports and tickets displayed evident disinterest, only breaking into a sentence to confirm that Sam and Eleanor had no luggage to check in.

   The next challenge was security. Here the queues were longer, with every departure descending on this one part of the terminal. Sam stood protectively behind Eleanor, her back pressed into him. As the queue crept forward he was suddenly pushed from behind and turned to see an overweight man, his face glistening with sweat.

   ‘Sorry bud,’ the man said in a Midwestern accent. ‘Wasn’t looking where I was going.’

   They inched on, Sam now rigid with tension as he examined every person near them for signs of intent. He could feel his shirt clinging to his back and knew he needed to calm down if he was to pass through the next stage without drawing attention to himself.

   As they reached the head of the queue a security officer indicated to Eleanor that there was an opening to their right. When Sam tried to follow, the man raised the palm of his hand.

   ‘One at a time, sir.’

   Eleanor looked back, eyes wide with distress.

   Sam was now directed to his left. He placed his bag, keys and the phone that had been switched off for days into a tray and then moved through the scanner. To his right, he could see that Eleanor was one step ahead of him. She was now in discussion with a security officer, an older woman with tightly drawn-back grey hair. The woman wasn’t smiling.

   Sam, who’d paused, was now urged to move on. He collected his stuff from the tray and went to Eleanor.

   As he approached, he heard the tail-end of the conversation she was having, and felt his stomach relax.

   ‘It’s more than 100 millilitres,’ the security officer was saying, as she held a bottle of water in her hand. ‘We’re going to have to dispose of it.’

   ‘That’s fine,’ said Eleanor. ‘My mistake.’

   ‘Christ,’ whispered Eleanor, as they moved away. ‘When that woman called me over, I thought that was it.’

   ‘We need to calm down. The way we’re acting, we’re going to get arrested for looking like a pair of sweating terrorists.’

   Eleanor exhaled loudly. It was then, over her shoulder, that Sam saw a pair of security officers – the older woman who’d been talking to Eleanor and a younger man – walking at a pace in their direction.

   Eleanor noticed the expression on Sam’s face, and turned.

   ‘What do we do?’

   ‘We wait,’ said Sam. ‘There’s nowhere to run or hide here. Besides, if we do, we’ll certainly be arrested.’

   The two officers were now a few metres away. Sam felt like a small animal caught in the headlights of a fast-moving car, immobilised, yet keenly aware of impending danger.

   ‘Excuse me,’ said the female officer to Eleanor. Her face was flushed. ‘You forgot these.’

   She held out a plastic bag containing the items that Eleanor had put in the tray. Keys, a mobile, her passport, some coins.

   Eleanor gushed her thanks, a broad smile suggesting joy at being reunited with her belongings. But Sam knew it was an expression of something quite different – enormous relief that another moment of gut-wrenching fear had turned out to be a false alarm.

   ‘I almost prefer genuine danger,’ she said, as they walked through duty-free. ‘This is unbearable.’

   As they sat by their gate a little later, Sam sensed that Eleanor had now given up, no longer able to maintain the heightened vigilance they’d both shared since the start of the day. Her head rested on his shoulder, a hand on his forearm. Sam couldn’t let up. His eyes darted around the room, seeking out signs that any of the other passengers meant them harm.

   The flight, as the queue at check-in had suggested, was near empty. Sam counted around fifty passengers and not a single European among them. There were the three men and the family with teenage sons; an elegant couple in their fifties; a group of school children in their early teens, marshalled by a visibly irritated male teacher who kept barking at them to be quiet. As Sam studied each face in turn, he caught the eye of a small boy who was travelling with his parents. The child smiled at Sam and he found himself smiling back. His shoulders dropped.

   Perhaps his new theory was right. After all, would they have got this far if the people after them had access to the airport’s CCTV footage, or the Border Agency’s database?

   But even with this crumb of comfort, Sam couldn’t help questioning the sober mood of the room. Other than the immediate coverage of Scott’s death, Sam hadn’t given the news a thought since this business had started. He remembered a mention of riots in Marrakesh the day Scott’s suicide had broken. Was this what was troubling his fellow passengers? What united them in their dark mood?

   They were calling the flight. The families with children moved off first. The little boy, the one person in the room who seemed blissfully unaware of the tension, turned and waved at Sam. His face was full of excitement, the prospect of flying clearly an adventure. Sam nodded and waved back, even as he felt a deep sense of foreboding.