Private Games (12 page)

For what seemed like the thousandth time since bolting from her office and fleeing home to her tidy little flat in Wapping, Farrell swallowed hard against a burning in her throat that would not leave her. She’d drunk water all afternoon, and taken a handful of antacid tablets. They had only helped a bit.

She’d been dealing with migraines since she was a child, however, and a prescription medicine had blunted the agony of the electric head-clamp, leaving a dull aching at the back of her skull.

Farrell tried to fight the urge to ease that feeling. Not only was it a bad idea, given the medicine she was on, but when she drank alcohol she tended to become another personality, an almost completely different one.

I’m not going there tonight, she thought before the image of an exotic woman sitting deep in the corner of a pink tufted couch flashed into her head. At that, the decision was made for her. Farrell got out of bed, padded to the kitchen, opened the freezer and took out a bottle of Grey Goose vodka.

Soon the classics professor was on her second Martini, the ache at the back of her head was gone, and she believed she’d erased the memory of the flute melody. It was a syrinx melody, actually. The syrinx or Pan pipes featured seven reeds bound side by side. Along with the lyre, the Pan pipes were one of the oldest musical instruments in the world. But their eerie, breathy tonality had been banned from the ancient Olympics because it sounded too funereal.

‘Who cares?’ Farrell grumbled, and then gulped at her drink. ‘To hell with the Olympics. To hell with Denton Marshall. To hell with the lot of them.’

Buzzing on the vodka now, becoming another person, Farrell vowed that with the migraine behind her she wasn’t going to dwell on loss or injustice, or oppression. It was Friday night in London. She had places to go. People to see.

The professor felt a thrill go through her that deepened into a hunger when she swayed down the hall, went into her bedroom closet and unzipped a garment bag hanging there.

Inside was a dramatic hip-hugging A-line black skirt slit provocatively up its right flank, and a sexy sleeveless maroon satin blouse designed to show plenty of abundant cleavage.

AT FIVE O’CLOCK
that Friday afternoon, Knight was in his kitchen making the twins dinner, resigned to the fact that he would not witness the opening ceremony of the Games live and in person.

Knight felt spent, anyway. All day long, from the moment Luke had awoken crying, he had been consumed by the needs of his children, his frustration with the nanny issue, and his inability to push the Cronus investigation forward.

Around noon, while the twins were playing, he had called his mother and asked her how she was holding up.

‘I slept two hours,’ she replied. ‘I’d nod off and all I could see in my dreams was Denton, and every time I’d feel such joy that I’d wake up and then face heartbreak all over again.’

‘God, how horrible, mother,’ said Knight, remembering the insomnia and anguish he’d suffered in the immediate weeks after the birth of the twins and Kate’s death. Many nights he’d thought he was going crazy.

He thought to change the conversation. ‘I forgot to tell you: Mike Lancer invited me as his guest to sit in the organising committee’s box for the opening ceremonies. If you find me a nanny, we can go together.’

‘I don’t know if I’m ready for that volume of pity quite yet. Besides, no memorial service has been planned. It would be unseemly for me to look as if I’m celebrating.’

‘The Olympics are part of Denton’s legacy,’ Knight reminded her. ‘You’d be honouring him. Besides, it would do you good to get out of the house and help me defend Denton’s reputation to one and all.’

‘I’ll consider it.’

‘And by the way: no nanny, no work on Denton’s murder investigation.’

‘I’m not a nincompoop, Peter!’ his mother snapped.

Then Amanda Knight hung up on her son.

Around three, when the children were napping, Knight reached Jack Morgan. Private’s owner was usually laid back and very cool, but even over the phone Knight could sense the pressure that Jack was under.

‘We’re doing everything we can to find a nanny,’ Knight said.

‘Good,’ Jack said. ‘Because we need you.’

‘Bollocks,’ Knight fumed after he’d hung up.

His doorbell rang at around five-thirty. Knight looked through the security peephole and saw his mother in stylish black slacks, shoes and blouse, grey pearl necklace and earrings. Dark sunglasses. He opened the door.

‘I arranged a nanny for the evening,’ Amanda said, and then stepped aside to reveal a very unhappy Gary Boss, resplendent in pedal-pusher khaki trousers, argyle socks, loafers, and a bow tie with barber-pole stripes.

His mother’s personal assistant sniffed at Knight as if he were the purveyor of all things distasteful, and said: ‘Do you know that I personally spoke with Nannies Incorporated, Fulham Nannies, the Sweet & Angelic Agency, and every other agency in the city? Quite the reputation, I’d say, Peter. So where are they? The little brutes? I’ll need to know their schedules, I suppose.’

‘They’re in the living room, watching the telly,’ Knight said. Then he looked at his mother as Boss disappeared inside. ‘Is he up for this?’

‘At triple his exorbitant hourly wage, I’m sure he’ll figure out a way,’ Amanda said, taking off her sunglasses to reveal puffy red eyes.

Knight ran up the stairs to his bedroom and changed quickly. When he came down he found the twins hiding behind the couch, eyeing Boss warily. His mother was nowhere to be seen.

‘Her highness is in the car,’ Boss said. ‘Waiting.’

‘I done one, Daddy,’ Luke said, patting the back of his nappy.

Why couldn’t he just use the loo?

‘Well, then,’ Knight said to Boss. ‘Their food is in the fridge in plastic containers. Just a bit of heating-up to do. Luke can have a taste of ice cream. Bella’s allergic, so digestive biscuits for her. Bath. Story. Bed by nine, and we’ll see you by midnight, I’d think.’

Knight went to his children and kissed them. ‘Mind Mr Boss, now. He’s your nanny for tonight.’

‘I done one, Daddy,’ Luke complained again.

‘Right,’ Knight said to Boss. ‘And Luke’s had a BM. You’ll need to change it straight away or you’ll be bathing him sooner rather than later.’

Boss became distressed. ‘Change a shitty nappy? Me?’

‘You’re the nanny now,’ Knight said, stifling a laugh as he left.

AS KNIGHT AND
his mother made their way to St Pancras Station and the high-speed train to Stratford and the Olympic Park, Professor Selena Farrell was feeling damn sexy, thank you very much.

Dusk was coming on in Soho. The air was sultry, she’d got vodka in her, and she was dressed to kill. Indeed, as she walked west from Tottenham Court Road towards Carlisle Street, the classics professor kept catching glimpses of herself in the shop windows she passed, and in the eyes of men and women who could not help but notice every sway of her hips and every bounce of her breasts in the skirt and sleeveless blouse that clung to her like second skins.

She wore alluring make-up, startling blue contact lenses, and the scarf was gone, revealing dark-dyed hair cut in swoops that framed her face and drew the eye to that little dark mole on her right jawline. But for the mole no one, not even her research assistant, would ever have recognised her.

Farrell loved feeling like this. Anonymous. Sexual. On the prowl.

When she was like this she was far from who she was in her everyday life, truly someone else. The illicitness of it all excited the professor yet again, empowered her yet again, and made her feel magnetic, hypnotic and, well, downright irresistible.

When she reached Carlisle Street, she found number four, its sign lit in pink neon, and entered. The Candy Club was the oldest and largest lesbian nightclub in London, and was Farrell’s favourite place to go when she needed to let off steam.

The professor headed towards the long bar on the ground floor and the many beautiful women milling around in it. A petite woman, quite exquisite in her loveliness, caught sight of Farrell, spun in her seat, mojito in hand, and threw her a knowing smile. ‘Syren St James!’

‘Nell,’ Farrell said, and kissed her on the cheek.

Nell put her hand on Farrell’s forearm and studied her outfit. ‘My, my, Syren. Look at you: more brilliant and delicious than ever. Where have you been lately? I haven’t seen you in almost a month.’

‘I was here the other night,’ Farrell said. ‘Before that I was in Paris. Working. A new project.’

‘Lucky you,’ Nell said. Then she turned conspiratorial and added, ‘You know, we could always leave and …’

‘Not tonight, lover,’ Farrell said gently. ‘I’ve already made plans.’

‘Pity,’ Nell sniffed. ‘Your “plan” here yet?’

‘Haven’t looked,’ Farrell replied.

‘Name?’

‘That’s a secret.’

‘Well,’ Nell said, miffed. ‘If your secret is a no-show, come back.’

Farrell blew Nell a kiss before setting off, feeling anticipation make her heart beat along with the dance music thudding up from the basement. She peered into the nooks and crannies of the ground floor before heading upstairs where she scanned the crowd gathered around the pink pool table. No luck.

Farrell was beginning to think she’d been stood up until she went to the basement where a femme kink performer was pole dancing to the riffs and dubs of a disc jockey named V. J. Wicked. Pink sofas lined the walls facing the stripper.

The professor spotted her quarry on one of those sofas in the far corner of the room, nursing a flute of champagne. With jet-black hair pulled back severely, she was elegantly attired in a black cocktail frock and a pill hat with a black lace veil that obscured the features of her face except for her dusky skin and ruby lips.

‘Hello, Marta,’ Farrell said, sliding into a chair beside her.

Marta took her attention off the dancer, smiled and replied in a soft East European accent. ‘I had faith I’d see you here, my sister.’

The professor smelled Marta’s perfume and was enthralled. ‘I couldn’t stay away.’

Marta ran her ruby fingernails over the back of Farrell’s hand. ‘Of course you couldn’t. Shall we let the games begin?’

BY SEVEN THAT
evening the world’s eyes had turned to five hundred-plus acres of decaying East London land that had been transformed into the city’s new Olympic Park, which featured a stadium packed with ninety thousand lucky fans, a teeming athletes’ village, and sleek modern venues for cycling, basketball, handball, swimming and diving.

These venues were all beautiful structures, but the media had chosen British sculptor Anish Kapoor’s
ArcelorMittal Orbit
as the park’s and, indeed, the Games’s signature design achievement. At three hundred and seventy-seven feet, the Orbit was taller than Big Ben, taller than the Statue of Liberty, and soared just outside the east flank of the stadium. The Orbit was rust red and featured massive hollow, steel arms that curved, twisted and wove together in a way that put Knight in mind of DNA helices gone mad. Near the top, the structure supported a circular observation deck and restaurant. Above the deck, another of those DNA helices was curved into a giant arch.

From his position high on the west side of the stadium, at the window of a lavish hospitality suite set aside for LOCOG, Knight trained his binoculars on the massive Olympic cauldron, which was set on a raised platform on the roof of the observation deck. He wondered how they were going to light it, and then found himself distracted by a BBC broadcaster on a nearby television screen saying that nearly four billion people were expected to tune in to the coverage of the opening ceremonies.

‘Peter?’ Jack Morgan said behind him. ‘There’s someone here who would like to talk to you.’

Knight lowered his binoculars and turned to find the owner of Private standing next to Marcus Morris, the chairman of LOCOG. Morris had been a popular Minister of Sport in a previous Labour government.

The two men shook hands.

‘An honour,’ Knight said as he shook Morris’s hand.

Morris said, ‘I need to hear from you exactly what Richard Guilder said before he died regarding Denton Marshall.’

Knight told him, finishing with, ‘The currency scam had nothing to do with the Olympics. It was greed on Guilder’s part. I’ll testify to that.’

Morris shook Knight’s hand again. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want there to be any hint of impropriety hanging over these Games. But it does nothing to make any of us feel any better about the loss of Denton. It’s a tragedy.’

‘In too many ways to count.’

‘Your mother seems to be holding up.’

Indeed, upon their arrival Amanda had been showered with sympathy and was now somewhere in the crowd behind them.

‘She’s a strong person, and when this Cronus maniac claimed that Denton was crooked she got angry, very angry. Not a good thing.’