The Whisper of Stars (2 page)

<
Logan following. I have good visual.
>

‘Target is traveling southbound on Hay’s Mews,’ Cole reported to the team. ‘The vehicle has been programmed to her office address. Logan has visual.’

On two previous occasions, Victoria Harvey had made long, unscheduled stops near Green Park before continuing to her office. MI6 suspected she might be meeting the handler responsible for her mind relocation. Jen had seen the results of mind rejection and it wasn’t pretty. Mrs Harvey was probably buying antirejection drugs. If that proved true, the strike team was to move in and make the arrest.

The target vehicle, heading east, reached Piccadilly, paused for a few seconds and then joined the frenzied blur of traffic. Jen timed her entrance carefully and slipped in amongst the jostling transportation. Vehicles ebbed and flowed in balletic unison, occasionally darting like fish across lanes. Jen reminded herself to breathe. They stopped briefly at Piccadilly Circus to watch a sea of people cross the street.

<
Mac, you there?
> Jen asked. It was a transitory moment of calm.

‘Yeah, I’m here, Jen. Nice day for a ride, eh?’

The traffic lurched forward as if starting a race, each vehicle reaching and then settling into its natural place in the pack.

<
I’m almost enjoying it,
> Jen thought, accelerating hard into a small gap in front of a bus full of schoolchildren. Their eyes were on her, but she had no time to acknowledge them. The chase continued across Haymarket before joining the Strand. They were now heading northeast toward Mrs Harvey’s office. Jen felt a twinge of disappointment. Perhaps it wasn’t going to happen today.

Cole spoke. ‘Logan, traffic is heavy up ahead. Try and get closer if you can.’

Easy for you to say,
Jen thought to herself, leaning, accelerating and pushing into the impossibly tight spaces between vehicles.

Cole’s voice again. ‘She’s just made a stop at Adam Street. It’s close to the office, but…’ There was a brief pause. ‘Hang on, vehicle’s on the move again.’

As Jen approached the turn for Adam Street, she saw the target vehicle. It was empty.

<
Target has exited the vehicle,
> she informed Cole, eyes narrowing.

She pulled in, dismounted and started a facial recognition scan, adrenalin through the roof, eyes darting everywhere. This was one of those times when she wished the Government had been successful passing mandatory tracking chip legislation. The Central Transport System moved millions of people; the fact that they had to rely on old-fashioned methods to find one of them was ridiculous. They needed to actually
see
this woman?

‘Still nothing,’ Cole said.

Jen imagined him scanning local camera feeds on his array of monitors.
Needle in a haystack,
she said to herself.

‘Nearest tube station?’ Jen shouted, frustrated with her lack of movement.

‘Presuming she isn’t going to Covent Garden, then it’s Arches or Embankment,’ Cole replied.

Jen processed the options. Embankment also included a sublevel tube. The fastest route appeared, a luminous overlay in her vision. It was a seven-minute drive, four on her bike. She thought about Mrs Harvey, scanned the map, looked up and made her decision.

She likes to walk.

‘Logan proceeding on foot to Embankment,’ she said, pushing her way through the crowds towards Victoria Embankment Gardens.

‘Is Logan always like this?’ she heard Cole ask. He had forgotten to mute his microphone.

‘Not always,’ McArthur answered. ‘But generally. Yes.’

Jen smiled, then launched herself up onto the bonnet of a parked car and vaulted over the tall iron railings that surrounded Embankment Gardens. She landed, rolled and was up and running towards the tube station. She darted through trees, dappled by golden sunlight, until she came to a clearing. To her left she could see Waterloo Bridge and the River Thames, the sun sparkling on its silvery surface like a thousand excited bulbs. She turned right and continued running along Victoria Embankment, passing the pier towards the station. Her breath was controlled, her fitness paying off.

‘Just picked the target up at Embankment,’ said Cole. ‘Logan, she’s just ahead of you.’

Victoria Harvey appeared in her retinal display, fifty metres from where she stood. Jen smiled again. Her intuition had been right.

Chapter 3

Jen arrived at the station entrance and considered the various options highlighted in her retinal display. She couldn’t see the target.

<
Old tube or Sublevel?
> she asked, flicking her attention left and right.

Cole had a possible match, but he explained it was taking multiple cameras and way too long. A transaction linked to the account of V.HARVEY appeared on his screen.

[London DTL: Embankment: c8.60].

‘Sublevel,’ he replied quickly. ‘She’s just bought a ticket.’

Jen pivoted and raced towards the SUBLEVEL signs, pushing her way through queues until she reached a giant lift already crammed with at least a hundred people. She squeezed in as a large semicircular door span closed and the lift dropped in a rapid descent. Jen worked her way through the faces she could see, but it was difficult to move without arousing suspicion, so she reluctantly stopped and waited.

‘Target is already on the platform,’ Cole informed her. ‘The next train is approaching.’

<
Understood.
> Jen composed herself, sending the thought as calmly as she could. There were other thoughts, laced with failure, but she kept those to herself. She exited the lift and broke through the mass of people to see a train waiting at the platform.

‘She’s on that train, Logan. Don’t miss it,’ Cole advised.

Jen cleared the platform in three strides and jumped, the doors closing behind her. The train levitated, departed and quickly accelerated. She only managed to advance three of the eight carriages by the time it reached Canary Wharf Station. On Cole’s instruction, she stepped onto the platform and discovered she had, completely by luck, gained an advantage. She was next to the only exit stairwell, so the target would have to pass her. A crowd of sombre faces trudged past.

<
Logan holding, awaiting visual on target.
>

Nothing. More faces.

Finally, as the wave of people thinned out she locked onto a confirmed identification. Victoria Harvey stood alone at the far end of the platform.

<
Confirmed visual on target. Canary Wharf substation, Platform 1.
>

Jen watched the target move out of sight into a nearby walkway tunnel and tried to anticipate her next move. Catch another train? Why? She might as well have stayed on the last one. She glanced up at the station clock. 8.27am. Would the target really meet her contact down here?

The lift opened and a fresh group of busy commuters spilled out, blocking Jen’s line of sight. Cole offered her a video feed from the platform camera and she accepted, reducing the transparency until it floated, ghostlike, at the top right of her vision. She waited and watched as Victoria Harvey glanced nervously around the platform. She appeared to be waiting for somebody.

<
Cole, do we have ears yet?
> Jen asked silently.

‘I’ve been trying, but there isn’t anything down there I can use. You might need to use a drone.’

Jen took a small bug-like device from her pocket and placed it on the palm of her hand. It flickered to life before floating silently and attaching itself to the tiled ceiling about fifteen feet from the target. The tiny drone inched closer, seen by no one. Jen turned her attention back to the target and was surprised to see that Mrs Harvey had started a conversation with an unknown male.

‘Logan?’ Cole said, tentatively.

<
I see him, but why can’t we hear him
? > she asked.

‘I’m working on it. Give me a few seconds.’

Jen scanned him. The man was Marcus Aldridge, an investment banker. Middle-aged, smartly dressed with a serious countenance – pretty much the same as half the people on the platform. In the distance she heard the rumble of another approaching train. If they decided to take this one, Jen wanted to be close. She walked slowly towards them.

McArthur this time: ‘Jen, it’s okay, this train doesn’t stop. Keep your distance. Let’s hear what they have to say.’

Jen’s relief was short-lived. Something wasn’t right. Even at this distance, it was obvious the conversation was turning into an altercation. Victoria Harvey was standing awkwardly and shouting.

‘How could you do this to me?’ Her words became a scream as the drone opened its audio channel. ‘You told me you loved me!’

Marcus Aldridge looked stunned, all colour sucked from his normally healthy-looking face. He was blinking and mumbling, shaking his head.

‘Listen, I’m sorry, but I… can I get someone to help you?’ he offered in desperation.

‘Sorry!’ She crumpled to the floor in apparent defeat, a discarded shoe next to her. ‘It’s been agony without you. Why are you acting as if you don’t know me?’

The crowd of people near them started to move away, leaving a circle of tension around the pair.

‘I… I… don’t…’ he mumbled, then asked, ‘How do you know my name?’

Jen was running now, praying she was wrong.

Not again. Not another one.

She could feel the ions crackling around her as the train approached the station, pushing a large pocket of warm air ahead of it. Victoria Harvey looked to be in pain, her eyes darting like a lost and confused animal. Her face stretched into a grimace, and then for a brief moment, as if a shocking revelation had overwhelmed her, was calm.

‘Of course,’ she sneered. ‘It’s that bitch. That twisted, selfish bitch. She’s taken you away from me. She’s poisoned you against me.’

Jen was running at full pace. ‘She’s splintering!’ she yelled, but her voice was swamped by the growling power of the approaching train.

‘She’s what?’ It was Cole’s voice. There was no response from McArthur.

Victoria Harvey began shaking uncontrollably, her perfectly symmetrical face now smeared with mascara, creased into a sickening grin. Marcus Aldridge began shouting for help, backing away from the woman.

Jen was still thirty feet away as the train flew past at impossible speed. She screamed through a pocket of nervous bystanders, bashing into a man and knocking him sideways, and just made it through to see Aldridge on the edge of the platform attempting to sidestep his assailant. Jen drew her weapon. Mrs Harvey was yelling, lips drawn over her teeth like a snarling wolf.

‘This is what happens when you promise someone the earth!’ she cried. ‘You promised me, Marcus! You told me you loved me.’

‘Don’t move. Stay where you are!’ Jen shouted.

The woman didn’t react.

‘Victoria!’ Jen shouted again.

She watched Mrs Harvey leap up and push Marcus Aldridge hard in the chest. He flew back and away from the platform, seeming to hover in the air for a second before disappearing in a sudden, sickening rush of steel. The terrible image of the train smashing his body was followed by a hiss of brakes and the screams of unfortunate witnesses. Mrs Harvey was on her knees, a look of simple confusion. Jen kept her gun trained on her, knowing that Marcus Aldridge’s terrified expression would stay with her forever – a horrifying mix of shock, disbelief and fear – and that Operation Penthouse had just become a lot more complicated.

Chapter 4

Nathan O’Brien glanced around the empty lounge, fresh magnolia paint covering memories of a life long gone. Notes were spread randomly around him, pieces of an elusive puzzle that remained just out of reach. He studied them, mumbling, looking for a connection he’d missed. His wife Katherine had been onto something, a story she believed would be the biggest of her career. It had become her obsession, and it had gotten her killed.

Nathan corrected himself.
Murdered.

He played her final message again, her voice cramping his stomach and tightening his throat. Kat was meeting a man she thought might have some answers. She told Nathan she loved him, that he shouldn’t worry. The message ended.

At first, Nathan thought he might be able to accept the official story. ‘Katherine O’Brien, investigative journalist for the
Montreal News
, tragically killed in mugging gone wrong.’
It was believable. That sort of thing happened. Just not to people like Kat. She was streetwise, capable and smart.

Nathan gathered his notes, each name, word and place memorised. He would burn them in the garden and then leave this place for good. A place where grief had owned him and days had threatened to stretch on forever.

He couldn’t say how, but he’d eventually crawled his way out of that all-consuming grief, a simple word nourishing him back from the edge.

Revenge
.

He would find those responsible and kill them. Gradually, the singular clarity of revenge became something more, something richer and deeper. He knew that retribution would only offer a brief respite from his pain. He needed to honour her somehow, finish her work, write the story – even it meant bringing down the whole house of cards. Then, and only then, would he would allow himself his sweet reward.

If revenge meant his own death, then so be it; he would have nothing left to live for.

A few years ago, all of this would have been impossible to imagine. He had been a lecturer in computer science and programming, a loving husband with a future stretching out in soft focus ahead of him. It had been a quiet life, and it had suited him just fine.

All that was blown away in a second.

The death threats had started a few months back. They scared him at first, but then he understood; it meant he must be close. They had helped him realise what he needed to do. If he was going to track them down, he needed to become a ghost.

He took one last look around the house, their once-happy home, wincing at the Sold sign on the front lawn. The money from the sale combined with their savings should be enough. It would have to be.

He played her final message again. How many times had he listened to it? A hundred? More? Her upbeat tone and excitement crushed his heart anew but also strengthened his resolve. He almost played it again, his mind hovering for an age, but managed, in the end, to delete it. He needed to move forward.