Secrets (32 page)

‘You don't have any idea about the combination?' Adam asked.

‘Electronic, changed at random intervals.'

Adam nodded. ‘I've got equipment that could do it, but you're right about the time.'

‘How many in the house?' Gregory asked.

‘Could be four, could be more. Could be just Clay. The dogs will be there, but Clay is unpredictable, that's the thing. Annie and I, we come and go pretty much as we please, but he'll be on his guard. He may well not trust even us.'

‘But he'll still let you in,' Gregory said. ‘If only out of curiosity.'

Nathan nodded slowly. ‘It could buy us more time,' he said.

‘Dogs?' Tariq said. ‘I'm not good with—'

‘Pets.' Annie assured him. ‘Two great lumps of Irish wolfhound. Soft as tripe.'

‘He'll be wondering why you left your husband,' Gregory said to Annie. ‘Nathan's watchers won't be the only ones around I don't reckon.'

He saw the look of panic cross Annie's face. Nathan took hold of her arms and turned her towards him. ‘I've got men on the ground, Annie, enough to take care of him. I promise you.' He cast a look in Gregory's direction that was at once thoughtful and reproving.

‘But Gregory is right. We walk up to the front door, just like normal. Once inside we assess the risk and Tariq and Adam make their way round to the rear. We'll get you in, one way or another right.'

‘It's a little ad hoc,' Adam objected.

‘And I think it'll have to be,' Nathan said. ‘Adam, I don't like flying blind any more than you do, but sometimes you just have to improvise.

‘We walk in through the front door. Maybe we owe him that.'

‘T
ell me about the boy who went to Molly's,' Gregory said. ‘Who he was.'

Nathan shrugged. They were, for the moment, in the lead car; Adam, Annie and Tariq followed on behind.

‘His name was Pavel,' Nathan said. ‘At least, that was what we knew him by. He was seventeen when Clay brought him into the country. He was mad as hell, belligerent; everyone was the enemy.'

‘His family?'

Nathan shrugged. ‘His mother was dead. Annie and I, well we always figured he looked like Clay.'

‘He sent his son after Molly?'

‘I don't know for sure. Look, the thing you have to understand is that Clay took care of us all, trained us, taught us what to do and how to do it. Made sure we could live
in
society as well as outside it. He wanted us to blend, because being invisible was how we could be most useful. Pavel could never blend. It was beyond him.

‘If Clay had brought him in before, when he was younger, he might have settled. But it's hard once you get them past a certain age. Everything gets frozen in place, somehow.'

‘You sound like an authority,' Gregory commented. ‘And very old.'

Nathan laughed at that. ‘I feel very old,' he said.

Equipped with radios, courtesy of Adam, with radio monitoring equipment, RF jammers, all from the same source, they moved forward, Tariq and Adam now on foot, Nathan and Annie pulled in at the side of the road, now both in the first car. Gregory was to be rear guard, following in the second car when they moved forward, but remaining on the road.

‘A one-man army,' Gregory joked.

It was still early, not much after dawn and the air was chill. Autumn was about to take hold, Adam thought. He led Tariq through the woods that backed the house. The grounds were high-walled with cameras at intervals. Nathan had told them there was a central control room, but also feeds to study and several other rooms. The camera positions alternated, one pointed into the grounds, the next out into the woods. All could be repositioned from the control room inside. They approached the wall between two camera positions, blindsiding the outward facing one. Adam was monitoring any radio traffic that might be coming from the house, but there was nothing. He had equipment with him that could have knocked out the cameras and the control room equipment. A simple EM pulse generator, crude, but powerful. It would knock out their radios as well, of course, and could not be guaranteed to put paid to the alarm. Nathan hadn't known if it was a make or break circuit, but logic dictated it would probably be the latter. Any break in the system would trigger a remote sensor and sound the alarm; it would not need the intervention of anyone in the house. Shutting down the system with the EM pulse would trigger that as effectively as cutting wires.

‘You any good at climbing trees?' Adam asked Tariq. ‘I'd like to get a look over that wall without getting too close.'

‘You do realize I'm physically inept,' Tariq reminded him. He shrugged. ‘I'll give it a go. Which tree do you have in mind?'

‘Try that one. It should give you a clear view, and the foliage should give you cover, if there's anyone looking out from the house.'

He gave Tariq a leg up to the first branch and then watched anxiously as the younger man hauled and puffed his way into the higher branches.

‘Did you never climb trees when you were a kid?'

‘I climbed on the climbing frame in the park. Where I lived there weren't that many trees to climb.'

Adam nodded. Fair point, he supposed. ‘Can you see anything yet?'

‘I need to be just a little higher.'

Adam's radio crackled. Nathan telling him that they were moving forward.

Adam acknowledged. ‘We're in position. I've got Tariq up a tree so we can get the lie of the land.'

As Nathan responded, he heard Annie giggle.

‘See anything?'

‘Yes. But I can't quite … Adam, Annie said there were dogs. Irish wolfhounds, right?'

‘Yes, but she also said they wouldn't bother us too much.'

‘Well this one won't. Adam, we've got a dead dog. Looks to me like someone blew its head half off.'

‘You sure.'

‘Of course I'm sure. It's dead and it's very bloody. Lying halfway between the wall and the house.'

‘Come down,' Adam snapped. He got back on the radio. ‘Something's wrong,' he said. ‘Nathan, don't go inside.'

‘I hear you,' Nathan said.

Tariq dropped down from the tree, his descent faster and even less elegant than the climb had been.

‘What now?' he asked.

‘We get the hell out of here, regroup and then figure out what to do next,' Adam said.

Together, they began to move back towards the road, less cautious now. Whatever was going on, Adam thought, keeping out of sight wasn't going to make a hell of a lot of difference.

‘What?'

Tariq didn't get to finish the question. There was a flash. The ground beneath their feet shook and grumbled and then the roar exploded outward from the house behind the wall. Tariq didn't need telling to hit the ground. He dived and Adam followed him, waiting for the sound to stop and the shaking to cease.

‘Nathan and Annie,' Tariq whispered.

F
or Bud, the past few days had been routine but not unpleasant. He liked being out of doors and Bob was an easy enough target to watch. It helped that Annie was in the house and that Bud knew there were three other watchers in the hills surrounding what had once been a small farm.

At night, he had kept watch using state-of-the-art night vision goggles that Nathan had provided. By day, Bob's routine was utterly predictable, walking the dogs, painting, the trip to the village. Annie accompanied her husband then and Bud had taken the opportunity to sleep for a couple of hours.

Since the night before, though, the mood had changed. Bud had been told to check in with Nathan every hour. Annie had left just past midnight and, though Bud didn't know what was going on, Nathan's increased state of anxiety had transmitted to Bud and he was now on full alert.

It was still very early. Dawn mist had begun to lift from the valley, but Bud knew it would be mid-morning before it completely burned away. He could fully understand why an artist would live in this place, in the rather plain, some would say ugly, whitewashed house, with it's funny little windows, none of which matched. It was a fabulous, almost mysterious location, tucked away, surrounded by trees and hills.

And it was a sod to defend, Bud added to himself.

Bob's studio was a large conservatory tagged on to and running the full length of the back of the house. It wasn't the prettiest of buildings, pent roof, UPVC, but it did the job, Bud supposed. He could see Bob working there, could see the work too, looking through his field glasses. It was all a bit mystical for Bud's taste, but each to his own. At least you could tell what it was.

Bob had walked the dogs at first light. Bud could tell there was something wrong with him just from the set of his shoulders and the fact he cut his walk short. He figured it was because Annie had gone. It must be nice, Bud thought, to love someone that much, though he supposed it hurt too and Bud wasn't too keen on emotional pain.

Bob was now in his studio, sifting through canvases, reinforcing the corners with card and wrapping them ready for transport to the gallery. He worked at a large table, laying stuff out carefully and methodically, but Bud, having watched the artist for a few days now, could see that he was distracted.

The car, a blue saloon, pulled into the drive and parked up. Bud watched, frowning. Usually visitors to the house drove right along the track and up to the front door. Bud would lose sight of them at the front of the house. A man got out and Bud studied him through the field glasses. The collar of his coat was turned up and Bud could not get a decent view. Alarm bells began to ring. Moving slowly, keeping the stranger in sight, Bud began to move off the hill.

Bob Taylor continued to work in his studio. Moments later, Bud saw him look up. The door to the conservatory opened. The man came through.

Bob turned and Bud, halfway down the hill, froze.

‘Fuck and shit and buggery!' The stranger had a gun and it was pointed straight at the man Bud was supposed to protect.

A small sound caused Bob to look up from his work. Just for a moment he was hopeful. ‘Annie?'

The door opened and the figure standing there was definitely not his wife.

‘I've come to tell you something,' Clay said. ‘It's about your wife. About someone needing to make funeral arrangements.'

‘Annie,' Bob whispered. ‘What the hell do you mean?'

‘I mean, she's dead.'

Bob was numbed, utterly. So much so that he almost forgot about the gun this man who had invaded his home was pointing at him. He dropped down into the nearest chair, utterly stunned.

‘I thought you might like to join her,' Clay said. He raised the gun, pointed it straight at Bob Taylor's head.

F
rom the road, Gregory had heard the blast, felt the ground shake him almost off his feet. A moment later and he was back in the car and heading up the drive. He could see the smoke rising from what was left of the house, debris still falling. Nathan's car standing in the middle of the drive, debris from the explosion all but covering it.

He skidded to a halt and saw, to his relief, Nathan and Annie emerge from what passed for cover behind the vehicle. Gregory glanced back as footsteps thundered on the gravel. Adam and Tariq running towards them.

‘What the hell happened?' Gregory demanded.

‘He wired the whole damned house,' Nathan said.

‘Something's wrong,' Adam said. ‘Nathan, don't go inside.'

‘I hear you.' He looked at Annie and motioned her back behind the car, then picked up a stone and hurled it through the nearest window.

The flash, the noise. Nathan had already hurled himself behind the car, crouched with Annie, clinging tight as the entire world seemed to go up in smoke.

B
ud had no time to think, no time to contact Nathan, no time for anything but to take the shot.

He saw Bob look up directly into the muzzle of the gun. He saw the finger tighten on the trigger, he saw the burst of skull and brain and blood and the man fall.

Bob was on his feet, staring in disbelief, first at the dead man and then at the broken glass shattered on the floor. Then at Bud, the man standing in his garden with yet another weapon.

Bud lowered his rifle, lying it on the ground and raising his hands.

‘It's OK,' he shouted, ‘I'm one of the good guys. It's all going to be OK.'

Bob crossed to the broken window and stared out at Bud.

‘He told me Annie had died. Annie!'

‘Let me come in,' Bud said quietly. ‘Let me make you some tea and I'll get hold of Nathan and we'll clear up the mess. He'll know all about Annie. You going to let me come inside?'

Bob nodded, dumbly. His face was white, Bud noted, even his lips were blue.

‘Sit down before you fall down,' Bud said. He made his way round to the front of the house and went inside. Nathan responded to his call a few moments later.

‘I've just shot someone at Annie's place,' Bud said. ‘There's a bit of a mess. Just tell me she's all right? I've got a man here falling to bits, thinking she's gone.'

A
lec opened his eyes. He still wasn't with it, Naomi realized, but the doctors said the prognosis was good. His parents had arrived and Liz had eventually gone. Naomi was deeply grateful to this woman she barely knew. There had been no word from Gregory, but she'd expected none.

‘That friend of yours,' Molly said when Naomi, trying to divide herself between the two patients, sat beside her bed, ‘he said he had my box. That he was looking after it.'

‘Then he is,' Naomi said. She really couldn't raise the energy to ask, ‘What box?' Naomi felt she didn't care any more.

Briefly, she sat down in the day room while the doctors fussed around Alec. She had relinquished her position to Alec's mother, figuring that a sighted woman would be able to make a better assessment of the professionals as they did whatever it was they had to do.