The Invisible Amateur (2 page)

Mycroft picked up
on what he wasn't being told. Amelia's life had been traded for the
rest of the country, but he still didn't know exactly why. Why
would they want Amelia dead, and why would a woman who prided
herself in doing what was best for her citizens allow even one of
them to be sacrificed without their knowledge? Nothing about this
meeting was right, and he wouldn't be swayed from his task. It
would be even more difficult, but he couldn't allow this
arrangement to stand.

“I understand the
situation perfectly. Please reassure her majesty that I would never
endanger the citizens of London.”

“I'm sure she'll
be grateful to hear that. The alternative would be quite
distressing.” The butler stood and offered out his hand. Mycroft
took it. “For all of us.”

Ending the meeting
and taking back control of the moment, Mycroft walked away, back
down the hallways and corridors to where the car waited. He took
long strides, making it difficult for the shorter men to keep up
without quickening their paces. It seemed, for now, that these
little things would be his only victories.

By the time he was
sat back in his study he already knew exactly what he wanted to do.
From the moment the butler had explained, he'd known he had to stop
it. No matter what the missing factor in the agreement was, it
wasn't worth someone innocent dying. Mycroft would need to do two
things. Find out why the arrangement had been made, and protect
Amelia until he could prevent it from going ahead.

When he'd agreed
to teach Amelia he'd never expected to get far before she became
boring or too much of a liability, but she'd been anything but
dull. This was just another interesting development that he
couldn't have expected.

Although she'd
made him angry enough on several occasions to want to stop their
games, he'd found her impossible to ignore and she'd even proved
her own intelligence to be far better than average in a couple of
situations. Spotting a man as a threat to herself when not even
Mycroft had seen it coming, and helping solve several tasks of his
through her own knowledge, after he'd passed them to Sherlock, were
not easy achievements.

Most of the time,
he told himself he was still teaching her because of Mr Delra's
interest in her. She'd been battered at the hands of a kidnapper
because the tycoon had decided she was part of the threat to the
Russian and North Korean efforts. But it was more than that, and he
knew it. After so many years, he was taking an interest in the way
someone learnt. Within him, he knew there was the hope that she
could learn. That someone else might understand at least a small
fragment of his world.

Using the spare
phone normally reserved for contacting Amelia alone, Mycroft booked
a hotel and train tickets from Bath to London and paid with one of
his aliases. It took him only a few minutes. When he was done, he
sat back and smiled. It was only the first of many tasks before
him, but it was the most satisfying. Surprising people always gave
him a buzz of delight.

The rest would be
satisfying in another way. It was a game of wits. Who could
outsmart the other? Not once in his adult life had he lied. He'd
told the butler he'd always do what was necessary to protect the
citizens in London. Within twenty-four hours, that's exactly what
Amelia would be, and he would make sure nothing happened to
her.

After placing the
last decoration in its space in the box, Amelia stopped for a
moment and stared at them. The same routine, year after year. She
took the same items out at the beginning of December and put them
all away again a month later. In between, she was just as alone in
her flat, just as lost in her writing. Except this year she'd done
something different, more adventurous. She'd gone to the fitness
centre and learnt something new.

This was a new
year and full of the possibility of new adventures. Maybe next
Christmas wouldn't be spent alone or with a few neighbours. The
next might be in London, or perhaps even farther afield than that.
Wherever it was, she would make sure she had company, and
interesting company at that. Someone like Sebastian or Myron, if
not one or both of them.

After gazing at
the decorations in the box a little longer and trying to work out
how long she'd had some of them, she closed the flap and took it to
the spare room. It took a little effort to get it to the back at
the top of the wardrobe, but with some pushing and shoving while
standing on a chair, it slid back into its old spot.

When she came back
to the living room to do the same with the small fake Christmas
tree, she noticed a packet on her doormat. Amelia felt a familiar
tug in her stomach and the muscles down her back tensed in
expectation, but the moment soon passed. Her stalker had been dealt
with and she was safe.

The outside was
unmarked and there was no name. With two raised eyebrows, she
walked to the sofa and sat down to open it. Out fell a letter,
train tickets, two small knives and a pouch to keep them in.

Amelia,

When you have
finished reading this letter, destroy it along with the envelope
and never mention it to me or anyone else. The knife holster will
fit along the bottom of the corsets you wear and give you easy
access to use them. Tomorrow morning at eight you have an extra
lesson with Tom. He'll teach you everything you need to know.

I'm sure I
don't have to tell you that knives like these are illegal to carry.
I expect you to keep them concealed in public.

After your
lesson, you'll pack your bags for two weeks and go to the hotel
listed on the back of this letter. Memorise the address. If anyone
wonders why you're in London, tell them you are here for business –
doing research for a book you are ghost writing, all expenses paid,
and that you cannot talk about it.

In your hotel
room you will find further instructions. Do not be late.

M

For a minute
Amelia could only gape at the message. It seemed her adventure was
going to start sooner than she'd thought. Once she'd read the
letter again, she picked up the leather holster for the twin blades
and inspected them. The handles had grips that fit neatly in her
palms and the metal shone, reflecting the light at her.

She'd never held a
weapon before, and it felt strange now. It also seemed odd that
Myron would give them to her. He frowned upon any kind of illegal
activity; at least, Sebastian had told her Myron did. Without a
license to carry a weapon it was very illegal, and she didn't know
where someone would start trying to get a license for something
like these.

With the holster,
she noticed, were several sets of clips that could be sewn into
whatever garment they would attach to, and then the holster could
be moved to whatever corset she was wearing to sit neatly against
her back, underneath the material and hidden from sight.

Amelia inhaled and
exhaled slowly to try and calm the more rapid breathing that had
snuck up on her while inspecting the weapons, and then went back to
the letter. It wasn't mentioned but she had a feeling that
disobeying his commands or not getting them entirely accurate this
time might mean more than losing her teacher. He'd never been so
serious with her.

Over the next five
minutes she memorised the hotel address like he'd asked, saying it
out loud under her breath several times with her eyes closed to
check she remembered it. With shaking hands, she then took the
paper to the sink and set light to it. Once the message was gone,
she repeated the address again a few more times, as much to
convince herself that she would remember it as to help aid her
memory. If she forgot it now she would have a lot of trouble
working out where to go.

The rest of the
evening was spent working out the best place to sew and attach the
clips to several of her corset waistcoats so she could wear the
concealed knives while in London. She doubted Myron would have sent
them to her now if he didn't intend her to start using them right
away. It took her several hours, but by the time she was done she
stood in front of her full height mirror, wearing her best outfit
and having the satisfaction of knowing the knives were nestled
against her lower back. She couldn't see a difference, and only
knew they were there from the warm hardness pressed against
her.

As she'd been
instructed, she went along to her lesson in the morning and took
the small weapons with her. Tom said nothing about the oddness of
the extra lesson, but put her through the warm up routine with more
haste than usual, encouraging her to stretch a little further and
focus more than she ever had.

During her
lessons, there was usually light conversation. He was an
interesting man who had travelled much of the world and enjoyed
talking about the countries and cultures he'd experienced. Although
he never said one way or another, she suspected he only lived in
Bath now to teach her. His nomadic lifestyle and unattachment to
any woman made him a likely candidate for some kind of agent in the
British secret service. Either that or he owed Myron, because she
was his only pupil and he lived in Bath nearby, something not cheap
to do.

When she'd
stretched every muscle she knew of in her body, as well as a few
she hadn't known she had, he pulled two almost identical knives
from somewhere underneath his gi. He spent the next hour teaching
her how to disarm him without getting hurt. Then he spent another
hour on how to attack with her own blades and keep hold of them.
During most of the first hour her little blades went flying across
the dojo again and again and Tom grew more stony and silent. When
she was exhausted and covered in sweat, he stopped her and allowed
her to breathe.

“You need to bring
your reaction times up. At the moment, you're not flowing from one
move into another, and the hesitation in between each move is where
I can disarm you.”

She nodded. The
assessment was true. She was being so careful not to hurt him that
she was hesitant about which move to do.

“Practice
combining different moves into groups of attacks and parries. Try
to get used to holding them as well, building the strength in your
wrists. They need to be extensions of your arms. Part of you.”

“I'll try,” she
said, not sure what else to say. The seriousness of the lesson and
the letter the previous night were making her wary. She found
herself biting at the inside of her bottom lip, deep in thought,
wondering what could have caused this change, but neither Myron nor
Tom spoke of it.

“You should take
off your gi. A taxi to take you home will be here in five minutes,”
Tom said before she could ask him if something was wrong. He came
up to her and gave her a hug. “I'll see you when you get back. If
you see him, tell him I said hi, or sent my regards. Yes, tell him
I send my regards, that's the sort of way he'd say it.”

Amelia laughed,
relieved that Tom's normal sense of fun was still in there
somewhere.

“I'll tell him.
I'm sure I'll see him; I'm practically at his beck and call.”

“Aren't we all?
Now go on. He hates it if people are late.”

She gave him a wry
smile and hurried to the changing rooms to change tops and dry off
some of the sweat before the taxi arrived. Tom must know Myron
well.

As she got into
the taxi to head home and pack, she exhaled and tried to relax the
knot of tension building in her stomach. She couldn't decide if she
was in danger or not. This could just be the next stage of whatever
scheme Myron had devised to teach her, or it could be something
more real. Unless he told her himself, it would remain a mystery,
however. She hoped the instructions waiting for her at the hotel
made the situation clearer.

“See you in an
hour, love,” the driver said as he pulled up outside her front
door. “It's the station you'll be going to then, right?”

She nodded and
reached for her purse to pay the man for the journey. As he glanced
back at her in the rear view mirror, he noticed.

“It's already been
paid for, and the next one too.”

“Ah, brilliant,”
she replied and stuffed her purse back into her handbag. It seemed
Myron had thought of everything, except how long it took a
corset-wearing woman to change clothes. He'd given her an hour to
shower, dress and pack before being picked up again.

Having no time for
anything else, she hurried inside, dropped her handbag on the
coffee table on the way past and rushed around the flat to gather
everything she needed to finish her packing. Half an hour, later
she'd never been more grateful for being organised enough to pack
some of her clothing the night before.

She yanked off the
clothes she'd worn to the gym and got into the shower to have the
quickest wash she could manage. Rushed dressing wasn't something
she was used to either, but she did her best. No part of her wanted
to be late. She'd already angered Myron too many times.

When the taxi
driver beeped the horn to let her know he was back again, she
swore. Her hair was unbrushed and she'd only managed to dry it a
little. Her only solace was knowing everything else was ready.

After making sure
her hairbrush was in the top of her handbag, she yanked on her
boots and wheeled her case outside. The driver helped her put it in
the back and gave her a grin when he noticed her hair.

“Not quite enough
time, then, love?”

“Not when you like
to wear corsets,” she replied. He laughed but didn't ask her about
the odd wardrobe choice. Most people grew curious about anyone
choosing to wear such an old item of fashion, but Amelia wanted
time to think and observe. Myron had summoned her to London and
that meant she had to be on the watch and on her guard.