Keep Calm (41 page)

“I know that one. It's the same as mine, isn't it?” He pulled out his phone and showed it to her so she knew he wasn't lying.

“Oh, that's great. Can you help me set this up? Is there any way?” It was everything he could do to contain himself.

“Where can we go?” she wondered as she turned to the coffeehouse across the street. “Can we go over there, grab a table? Have a coffee? I'm buying.”

She's stunning
. That's all he could think about as they walked up to the corner and crossed at the crosswalk. Over and over to himself.
She's stunning, she smells amazing, her teeth are perfect, and she keeps touching my arm. Don't mess this up. Don't say too much. Don't let her smell your breath
.

*   *   *

LATER, AS SHE
and her father drove back in the rented car her mother had gotten using her fake passport, Trudy was quiet. Adam sensed she wasn't too happy to be involved with what they were doing.

“He seems like a nice boy.”

“He is.” She looked out the window of the compact car as they ambled north, up by Streatham Common, toward the city. She once again started thinking about the last few weeks. All she was doing was what Étienne had done to her. He and his crazy weirdo French mother had been using Trudy, and she was just doing the same to this little goofy kid with the acne and the big nose. She wondered if maybe Étienne felt the same way about her. Did he just pretend to find everything she said funny? Find her “adorable”? Was it all an act? Had she really been used that badly? She finally turned back to her father.

“Promise me again that we aren't going to hurt him.”

“Of course not, Trudy. We'll make his father worry, but we won't hurt him at all. I promise.”

“Okay. I mean it, though. I get why we have to do this, but I don't think it's fair if we just become like them.” He looked over at her and managed to smile.

“What?”

“You're growing up. I like it.”

*   *   *

THAT NIGHT, AS
Ryan was about to go to bed, his phone buzzed. It was Trudy—the angel. He had used his phone to make a test text that afternoon when he set her phone up, so she had his number. This wasn't a test, though. She was actually texting him now. He looked at the phone as if it were radioactive, worried that if he touched it she'd know, and he'd have touched it wrong.

“Thanks again for setting my phone up, Ryan. You're the best. See you tomorrow.”

Should he respond? Should he just keep cool? Be digitally aloof? No way. She texted him and he wanted her to know that he was there for her. Maybe she was just lonely enough that she'd want him to be her boyfriend while she was in Croydon.

“It's cool. I can help more. Do other things.”

Jesus. That sounds weird. Creepy
.

“To your phone. Not to you.”

Even stupider
, he thought.
I can't believe I sent that
. He mulled over what to text next, how to dig himself out of the hole he thought he was in. He almost went into a panic when his phone buzzed again.

“You're funny. That made me laugh.”

It was followed with an emoticon of a face giving a big red kiss. Then it buzzed again.

“See you tomorrow at the center.”

He didn't sleep a wink that night.

*   *   *

ADAM AND KATE
got into a spat over what he had brought Trudy into. They talked quietly on Adam's side of the connected duo of fuggy hotel rooms. He did his best to make his wife understand that they had no other choice. Things were speeding now to an inexorable conclusion. It was “us or them.” Jack Early needed to be coerced into helping him expose Georgia Turnbull and the others in order to clear Adam's name.

“I'm just worried she'll live with this forever, live with all of this forever.”

“I'm sure she will, Kate. There's no doubt of that. This is a nightmare, for all of us. It's pretty obvious, though, that if these people have their way, if they catch us, they'll do to us exactly what they did to Richard and to your father.” She turned her head into the ratty bedcover on the lumpy bed and covered her face so he wouldn't see the tears.

“I'm sorry, Kate, I don't mean to scare you, but I don't think we have a choice.”

*   *   *

ADAM, BILLY, AND
Trudy drove down to Croydon the next morning. Adam didn't bother to wake Kate to say good-bye. She was sleeping these days fifteen or sixteen hours at a time, cloaked in depression and fear-fueled self-pity. Adam couldn't fix that. He made a decision to steer straight ahead. Let her be. She was safe asleep in that rat hole of a hotel room.

He would do what he had to do. He didn't need her approval anymore. He was waiting for her to admit that she was wrong, waiting for her to apologize for not believing him when he told her that he was in trouble, that he was worried about the whole trip, that he didn't want to go to Downing Street. For not trusting him when he told her the whole thing smelled bad and that her father was involved, but it wasn't Kate's way. She didn't accept blame. She was a permanent victim. It was always she who had been wronged, and nothing about the state of their sorry lives right now got in the way of that familiar pattern.
Let her fucking sleep
, he thought.
I have shit to do.

*   *   *

TRUDY SPENT THE
afternoon at the youth center. While she was there, doing her best to subtly further the friendship with Ryan, Adam spent the afternoon with Billy, waiting, killing time, having pizza, and playing arcade games. He tried to talk to his son, wanted to see where he was on all that was happening, but Billy wasn't taking the bait. He didn't want to talk. All of his answers were quick and clipped, brittle bricks in the sturdy barrier of noncommunication that he had erected around himself. Adam decided not to push. He could only imagine what must be going on in that poor little eight-year-old's mind. He couldn't help but think little Billy was actually holding up damn well.

He was proud of both of his kids. They may not have been wanting to say much, but the overriding emotion they were conveying, both of them, after the fear, was a protective desire to stand alongside their father, to do what they could to support him, to let him know they were there for him.

It was inside a yogurt shop in Croydon, while they were waiting for Trudy, sitting in plastic seats by the window, looking out onto the High Street, each slurping down a tub of frozen yogurt, that Billy finally started talking.

“Poppa's dead. Right, Dad? He's dead? Someone killed him up at that place in the woods, when you got bitten by dogs? Right?” Adam took a minute to answer. The subject up until then had been sidestepped. Kate had made the decision for them. She didn't want Billy to know. She felt he had enough on his plate to deal with. They had told him they were going to see him again once they were home. In fact, they had lied to him. He was now instantly done with that. He turned to his son.

“Yes, your Poppa is dead. That's true.”

“I'm never going to see him again?”

“You aren't. I'm sorry.”

“I didn't really know him that well.”

“No, but he was crazy about you, Billy.”

“The people who killed him, are they the ones that are trying to make people think you're bad?”

“Yes, the same people.”

“I wish that I could kill them myself, all of them. Shoot them.”

“I understand that.”

“I mean, how would they feel if someone had killed their Poppa? How would they feel, Dad?”

“I'm sure they wouldn't like that.” Billy let it all roll around in his head some more. He sat in saddened silence while he looked distantly out to the street. After a few more minutes, Adam got rid of their trash. They left the shop without talking, walking down to the car. He opened the rear passenger door for his son, made sure his seat belt was fastened, closed him in, and walked around to the driver's seat. As he sat in the car and fished for his keys, he looked into the rearview mirror to see and hear Billy bawling his eyes out. He waited quietly, with nothing to add. He decided it best to let his young son have a good cry.

*   *   *

THEY PICKED TRUDY
up around the corner just before dinnertime and drove back to London in the middle of rush-hour traffic. He had her text the Early kid once again as they crossed the Thames.

“Good seeing you today. My phone works great. You're a star!”

He had her throw in another gooey emoticon for good measure.

*   *   *

RYAN ENDURED DINNER
with his mom and two sisters in their tiny, newly redone West Croydon kitchen that night. He wanted to talk to someone about the girl, Trudy, the divine one. Her mom would just tell him not to waste his time. His sisters would giggle—they giggled at everything, especially things that Ryan felt strongly about—so he said nothing.

His father worked late, as usual. He had an important job. He was an important man, and now that his boss was the prime minister, he was even more vital. He didn't have the time to come home to have dinner with them, let alone the bandwidth to talk to Ryan about some girl whom he helped set up a stupid phone for. He decided he wouldn't mention Trudy to anyone. She would be his secret. He would eat dinner and go to his room in solitude and stare at his phone with a devotional hope that she would make it vibrate, praying that she would text some version of light into his lonely, drab, acne-scarred life.

In the morning he was up at the crack of dawn. He had fallen asleep with the phone in his hand. She hadn't texted him at all that night. His father had just gotten in from a trip out to Chequers with Miss Turnbull and her entourage, which was most likely what had woken him. It was going to be a long day, waiting and wishing. His father having stumbled off to bed and his mother already headfirst into the laundry, he was given a handful of chores to do, a list of things to run out for, which he gladly took on as a diversion. Each and every moment and movement was wrapped and filtered by a guttural longing for his phone to buzz. It finally did.

He was on the High Street, just leaving a Toni and Guy hair salon where he'd picked up a set of brushes for his sisters. His list was completed and he was going to meet some friends at the pizza place just on the other side of the overpass.

“Do you want to come to our place and watch a movie on my iPad? My dad and my brother are going to Brighton for the day. I'm sooooo bored.”

The world changed for the boy. The color of life lit up with a vivid brilliance he'd never seen it have. The wind had a beautiful brace to it. The cars seemed to motor along in a synchronized melody. He was taller, it seemed—taller, firmer. He didn't feel the bumps and grinds on his face for the first time in a long while. This was how life was supposed to feel. His eyes teared up and his hands shook as he answered the text.

“Sure. I'd love to come over. What's the address
?
”

*   *   *

ADAM HAD A
long day ahead of him. It was a key day. Things had to work out or he would have no future. If today fizzled, all the days after would be more of this: more running, more hiding; more mildewed hotel rooms; more fear; more fright. And that was a best-case scenario. Today had to be successful.

He went and saw Beauregard McCalister at the Gloucester Studios. He waited for him to arrive, flagged his car at the gate, and hopped in alongside him. When Beau first saw Adam, he was relieved that he was alive, then was quickly perturbed that he had come back.

“I need help, Beau.”

“I told you I can't be involved. You're as hot as can be. Even with that shaved head and the goatee, you're still gonna get picked out, and if it's with me, I'm gonna pay for it.”

“I don't have a choice. I need help. Do you understand? I need help. Tonight. I need one of your stages.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You can have it all cleared out. Shut it down, send the guard home, but I need it. Tonight.” Beau looked over. He wasn't one to turn away a friend, not one in this much need, but this was insanity, a borderline lunatic rant.

“I need that set of the prime minister's office you have. I need it set up and lit on one of the stages. Build it, leave it lit. Walk away. That's all I want.”

“The prime minister's office? What in hell do you need that set for?”

“You said it was authentic. Detailed?”

“It is. It's a beauty. You'd never know it from the real thing.”

“Good. Leave it up and lit. I need it tonight. I'll never bother you again.” He and Beau locked eyes. Adam begged himself not to tear up. Beau saw it. It wasn't an act. He was at the end of his rope.

“I'm innocent, Beau. I'm an innocent man. More important, my wife and my kids are innocent. I'm the only one looking out for them. I have no choice here. I'm in serious danger. We all are. They killed Gordon, Kate's father. Murdered him in cold blood. I watched it happen. I can't get it out of my head. This is a nightmare. I'm living in a nightmare. I have to end it.” They both sat there in silence while Beau took it all in.

“I'll be back tonight. I need that set built and lit, Beau. I have to have it.”

He stepped out of the car and took the narrow walkway out to the street, turned up his collar, and hustled off. Beau clocked him in the rearview mirror. Once he was sure he was gone, he reached for his mobile and dialed. He took a deep breath, wasn't the least bit happy about what he was going to do.

“Henry, it's Beau. I need that prime minister's office set built on stage three. Now. Need it lit and set up for tonight. It's for a friend. It's a private deal. They've got their own crew, their own security. Just set it up and give the late shift the night off. With pay … It's for a friend, that's all I can tell you, Henry.” There was a pause as the man on the other side questioned the order. Beau chuckled. “No, it's not the Rolling Stones again. It's not a music video. I'd tell you this time, I made you that promise. It's someone big, but not them.”