Love is a Stranger (16 page)

Ben turned to him, unable to read his expression. “I guess that’s up to you. You hold all the cards.”

Nikolas nodded. “I do.” He continued to smoke for a while then said without much change of tone from his comments about the passing scenery, “I once spent some years in a prison camp in Siberia. I learnt to play many games, most of which are not to be spoken of. But I learnt to play cards. One game was bridge, and it is a much better game, I discovered, than solitaire. It is a game where success is entirely dependent on trust and a deep understanding of your partner. Ben, you are my partner. If you think this job is compromised, we will not do it. I trust your judgement implicitly. But, please, do one thing for me before you decide. Meet the stepfather.” Ben was so incapacitated by shock at Nikolas’s words and at the fact that the other man had finally shared some part of his past that he couldn’t reply. He just nodded, bewildered. Nikolas smiled and patted his leg. “Come. I would hate for the damp to get into my joints.”

§§§

Ben lay awake long after Nikolas had fallen asleep, thinking. He was working out how he was going to return to the house to meet Felicity’s husband, but mostly he was thinking about Nikolas. He was the proverbial riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. Every time Ben thought he’d found the real Nikolas, that man he had found slipped away again into shadows and illusion. He was no longer the secretive head of a Black Ops department. He wasn’t a de facto member of the Royal Family, living the life of a phenomenally wealthy, landed aristocrat, and now he wasn’t, apparently, the man Ben thought he was beginning to know quite well.
Prison camp? Siberia? What the fuck?
Ben turned his head to study the sleeping man next to him. As if sensing the scrutiny, Nikolas turned in his sleep and flung an arm over Ben’s waist. Ben put his hand down and began to rub his thumb idly on the pale skin.

He was very curious to know what other games Nikolas had been forced to play in prison.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Ben solved the dilemma of getting to meet Felicity’s husband by the simple expedient of turning up again one night a few days later when he observed that they were all in. He gave Felicity a rueful grin and handed her a folder. It was from the modelling agency he had used in the past as a cover, and it appeared to seek models for a shoot in London who closely matched Felicity. Well it would, as Ben had given the agency her photo and had them draft the advert. She was surprised, flattered, and grateful, and with only the tiniest hesitation, which would have been missed by anyone not looking for it, she invited him in to meet her husband, Jeremy. When Ben followed her into the kitchen, Alice was at the table doing some homework, and Jeremy was bending over her shoulder, helping. Ben was introduced, and he disliked the man instantly. He was incredibly friendly and boisterous in his largesse, offering Ben drinks and talking almost non-stop about his job and the house. He didn’t seem at all put out by Ben’s considerably more glamorous presence, although being shorter, fatter, and balding, he could have been forgiven for resenting someone like Ben.

Ben took the offered seat at the kitchen table and a drink, and smiled at Alice. “What have you got for homework?”

She wrinkled her nose. “French.”

“You don’t like French? It’s the perfect language.” He pulled her book closer to take a look. She was about to show him the part she had to do, but Jeremy intervened, engrossing Ben for a moment then his stepdaughter once more.

Finally, Felicity came over, drinking steadily from a large glass of wine. “Go and have your bath, darling. If you are good, Dean will stay for supper, and you can speak with him again then.” Alice nodded obediently and left.

Felicity was clearly about to ask Ben if he could stay, when Jeremy said, “I’ll go and check she’s okay—leave you two alone to chat.” And it was then that Ben saw it. A glance on Jeremy’s face and Ben knew. He looked to Felicity and saw that she knew, too.

He stood quickly. “I’m sorry, I can’t stay. I only came to bring you the…” He made his way to the front door. He heard Felicity following him. She seemed about to speak, but he didn’t want to hear anything she had to say.

He didn’t go back home but headed into town to a bar he used to frequent when he was still in the service. It felt safe. He drank a couple of pints, thinking, and then made his decision. He returned to the house and waited outside in the dark until three a.m. It was the least alert time for the human body. He made his way up the side of the gravel drive on the grass and methodically went around checking windows. He wasn’t unduly surprised to find only a cheap lock fastening the patio doors to the kitchen. He broke in easily, and the dog even welcomed him with a wag and by dropping a rubber toy at his feet. He gave it a pat and went out into the corridor. All was silent. He found the study easily. There was a laptop on the desk. He checked for other computers, found none and left as silently as he’d arrived, computer under his arm.

Nikolas was asleep when he got home, so he took the opportunity to sit at the kitchen table and fire up the machine. He scanned folder after folder: work, family—nothing. Then he grabbed his phone and made a call. He heard a very confused, sleepy voice answer. “Hello? Who—?”

“Kate? It’s Ben. Ben Rider.”

“Ben? What’s wrong? Has—?”

“Nothing. I need your help.”

“At…four a.m.?”

“You know I’m not with the department anymore, Kate. I can’t use office hours. This has to be off the record.”

“What do you need?”

“I need you to examine a laptop computer. See what you can find on it.”

“What should I be looking for?”

“I—I don’t want to prejudice you. Just take a look, will you?”

“Okay. Bring it round. You know where I live.”

§§§

Kate met him at the front door, dressed and looking good. She made a sheepish excuse about getting to the office early, but Ben felt sure the effort was for him. They’d been close once. He wondered how much she knew about Nikolas and him. He handed her the computer. “I’m really grateful, Kate.”

She waved him off. “You know Sir Nikolas has asked me if I want to come work for him? He said you were working for him, too.”

Ben didn’t know what to say. He knew Nik wanted someone who knew computers, but he hadn’t considered him poaching old department people. Other than him, of course. “Does he know about our history?”

Kate laughed. “I never found anything that Sir Nikolas didn’t know, so I assumed he did when he made me the offer. I mean, why me, otherwise?”

Why you either way?
It didn’t make much sense to Ben either.

“When do you need this computer checked by?”

“I need you to call in sick and do it today, Kate. It’s important.”

“Life and death important?”

Ben didn’t hesitate. “Someone’s, yes.”

“Okay. I’ll give you a bell if I find anything.”

Ben waited restlessly at home, drinking tea until he heard Nikolas moving about upstairs. He slid out with the dog, checking his mobile every few minutes.

Kate called mid-morning. He was at the canal. She didn’t say much, but she sounded upset. He drove to her apartment and took the dog with him so he didn’t have to return home and face a meeting with Nikolas. He didn’t know what he was thinking himself yet, let alone trying to explain his concerns to Nikolas. Kate was standing at the window overlooking the river when Ben let himself in. She kept her back to him but waved at the open laptop on the coffee table. “He’d tried to delete everything as he went along—history, photos, videos. But it was all there, of course. I got it back.”

She turned, her eyes puffy and red from crying. “Oh, Ben, this job…” He went to her and put his arms around her, his chin able to rest on the top of her head. It felt so familiar. And he didn’t feel a single spark of desire. It may have been the unfortunate circumstances, but he attributed it to Nikolas—Nikolas was to blame for most else in Ben’s life currently, after all. Eventually, he pulled away and went to the computer and clicked the retrieved folder she’d set up. He knew what he’d see before he saw it: thousands of images of girls, very few even as old as ten, being degraded, raped, and abused. Radulf came over and laid his head on Ben’s knee, and for one moment he tried to shield the dog from the screen. Then he realised what he was doing. He couldn’t even laugh at his own stupidity. He stroked the dog’s head, glad that he, at least, was spared the understanding of what he was seeing. “How did you know?”

Ben’s eyes rose wearily at Kate’s question, and he accepted a cup of tea. “I saw the look he gave his stepdaughter. She’s ten.” It had also been the fact that Jeremy had left him with Felicity so easily. Ben didn’t explain this; he didn’t like drawing attention to himself. No man, however, would leave someone who looked like Ben with his attractive wife. They just wouldn’t.

Kate was watching Ben’s expression. “Is she on there?”

“Not so far. I’ll have to…” Resigned, he carried on, photo after photo. Finally, he came to a set that was high definition and time stamped, clearly taken on the same camera—and all of Alice. They were of her swimming, some in her ballet uniform, one or two in the bath with silly shampoo hair, and none of these would have looked wrong at all seen in isolation, but with the other images, they told a depressing story. They told the exact one Ben had seen in the house: a predatory paedophile marrying a vulnerable woman for access to her daughter. Ben prayed these photos were proof that the man was in the early stages of grooming, just gaining the girl’s trust—which he clearly had, given her smiling, innocent expressions in the photos. But Ben had seen the look Jeremy had given Alice as she went up for her bath. A hunger, a need that he had seen on faces before. He had seen it on faces that were looking at
him
.

“What are you going to do?”

“Honestly, Kate? I don’t know. I—There is an opportunity for her to go to her father.”

“Do you think he suspects?”

Ben shrugged. “What would you do if it was your daughter and you suspected this? I’d fucking kill him. I wouldn’t hire someone to take her and sit back for weeks waiting.”

“Not everyone is like you, Ben. Maybe he doesn’t want to make a bad situation worse by accusing this man when he has no proof.”

Ben nodded thoughtfully. “So, I take her to her father—to safety. What about this man? What about Jeremy? He just gets to continue, maybe with another girl? And what about the mother? I’m sure she knows—or suspects anyway. Does she deserve to get away with it?”

“Ben, don’t be so hard on her. Maybe she’s trapped.”

“Bull. Shit. She’s a cun—” He stopped and kept his thoughts about Felicity to himself. “Thanks for this, Kate. I owe you, and I won’t forget. Anything you need, anytime, and you only have to call me.”

“Make me a cup of tea when I come to work with you?”

“You’re going to take the job?”

“I’m considering it. Sir Nikolas made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

Huh.
He’d made Ben one of those, too. And Ben hadn’t refused him once, but Ben was fairly sure Kate meant salary, and as far as Ben knew
he
wasn’t being paid at all.

“Cute dog, by the way.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

It was mid-afternoon. He’d done as Nikolas had asked and investigated the stepfather, and now everything had changed. Clearly, Nikolas had been privy to information that Ben hadn’t been given. This and the slight niggle that Kate had been offered a job—a well-paying job—without Ben being consulted (or paid himself), made Ben reluctant to return home just yet. On a whim, he continued driving out of London and onto the M4. He was still driving when he hit the M5 interchange and still motoring when he reached Exeter. Radulf was clearly fascinated by Devon. He’d pulled his head in on the motorway, his jowls in imminent danger of detaching, but now, winding around the narrow lanes, he had his face to the wind with grinning trails of saliva streaming out and messing the rear window. Ben smiled at him in the mirror. He was relieved that he could still smile.

He reached the cottage by early evening. Clicking his fingers to the dog for him to follow, he rang the bell. Tim answered the door. They hadn’t seen each other for almost two months, and the last time they had, Tim had still been suffering the physical effects of his beating from the Mafferty brothers. “We have phones in Devon, stranger. You could always call first, you know.” Tim grinned. “Don’t ever see that as an imposition.”