First and Only (3 page)

‘Do you have them noted down?’
the caller asked.

‘Yes,’ replied Chatham. ‘But I
don’t see how they concern me. I deal in the political arena.’

‘Oh, you’re too modest, Mr
Chatham,’ the caller chided. ‘You deal in far more than that.’

Chatham remained silent. True,
his remit was largely political but the methods he used to achieve his ends had
more in common with a spymaster from the era of the Cold War. But Chatham was
not a high profile member of the security services. He worked behind the
scenes, the oil between the cogs of power. If Chatham was doing his job properly
then he should not be noticed at all. ‘That’s as maybe,’ he said. ‘But what is
it you want from me? Why this list of people? Do you have information?
Something that could help the British government?’

‘Not exactly.’

‘Then what?’ said Chatham with
growing exasperation. ‘What is it you want me to do?’

‘I want you to send them an
invitation.’

‘An invitation to what?’

‘I’m afraid that will have to
wait for another time.’

‘What do you mean,
another
time
?’ said Chatham, sensing that the caller was bringing their
conversation to a close.

‘We will speak again, Mr
Chatham,’ the caller said in a tone of certainty that Chatham found far from
reassuring. ‘For now, I think your colleague has some information for you.’

‘Wait!’ said Chatham as Stokes
reappeared in the doorway.

‘Goodbye, Mr Chatham. And once
again I am sorry for ruining your holiday.’

The caller hung up and the buzz
of the disconnected line was like the bewildered buzzing of Chatham’s mind. ‘
What
the hell had just happened? What the hell was all that about?
’ Slowly
Chatham lowered the handset from his ear. Then he looked up at Stokes whose
expression suggested that he had never seen his boss this unsettled before.
‘What have you got?’ asked Chatham in a voice that made his young aide shrink
behind the door.

Stokes hesitated.

‘Tell me you got something,’ said
Chatham. ‘The guy was on for ages, you must have got something!’

‘Yes, we got something,’ said
Stokes. ‘But you’re not going to like it.’

Richard Chatham leaned heavily on
his broad walnut desk. It seemed that one crisis was over but the next had only
just begun. Someone had done the unthinkable. They had successfully breached
one of the upper tiers of MI5 security. They had undermined the integrity of
the Blenheim Suite and they had ensured that he would be working every hour God
sent until he had some answers. He screwed up his face in frustrated anguish
and glanced at the black and white photo on his desk. Of all the questions
flooding through his mind there was one that stood out more starkly than all the
rest…

How the hell was he going to tell
his wife?

Chapter 3

Psimon’s hand shook as he lowered the mobile phone and
pressed the button to end the call. He had tried to sound calm and confident
while in truth he had felt sick with nerves. But that was it. That was the
first call, the crucial call that set everything else in motion. Now he just
had to see it through, if he could.

Reaching across the table he
picked up the padded envelope and dropped the mobile phone inside. He sealed
the envelope and turned it over to check the address.

Richard Chatham

International Liaison for
National Security

The Blenheim Suite

MI5

London

He hoped that Mr Chatham would be
relieved to get his phone back but he suspected its return would only add to
the sense of futility that the poor man was undoubtedly feeling. Still, he
could not suppress a wicked little smile at Chatham’s bewilderment. Putting the
package down he picked up a black marker and approached the far wall of his
spare room which was covered by a mass of notes, newspaper cuttings and
pictures, most of them concerning abductions and gruesome, unsolved murders.
There were photographs of individuals alongside travel schedules, maps and
obscure technical blueprints. And everything was covered with interconnecting
lines and arrows. It looked like the obsessive wall of a madman.

Psimon moved to the left-hand-side of the wall, where a small piece of
paper bore the words ‘
Richard Chatham MI5
’. He underlined the name and
gave it a self-satisfied little tick. Only one picture lay to the left of
Chatham’s name and Psimon brushed the photograph of his parents lightly with
his fingertips.

With a sigh of exhaustion he stepped back from the wall. What he really
needed now was sleep but he found himself hovering, his eyes drawn to a small
piece of fluorescent orange paper bearing a mobile telephone number and the
name ‘
Steve Brennus
’. This piece of paper lay at the centre of the wall
with numerous lines and arrows radiating from it. Pinned to the wall beside it
were a Virgin Airlines envelope and a receipt from a local florist for a
bouquet of flowers and a ‘large, stuffed Nemo’.

Psimon continued to stare at the
piece of paper, his hand aching as he gripped the marker in his fist. His heart
began to pound and beads of sweat stood out upon his brow. To acknowledge that
piece of paper was to acknowledge the very worst of all his fears.

‘Not just now,’ he breathed.

This deferment was enough and the
tension went out of his body. With a deep breath he turned away from the wall.
He put the marker back on the table and was about to leave the room when a
sense of overwhelming fear rose up inside him. An image sprang into his mind;
the image of a man standing bound and naked on the stone floor of a crudely
built chapel. A dark figure loomed over him. It was the dark figure of Lucifer.

Psimon’s face grew pale and fixed
with terror then his head was snatched back as if someone had hit him in the
face with something hard. With a choking cry he was sent reeling back against
the wall. He raised his hands as if to fend off another blow. ‘No! Please no…’
he gasped although he was completely alone in the room. Another invisible blow
smashed into the side of his knee and with an agonised grunt he fell to the
floor. ‘Not again! Please…’ He cowered against the wall, his trembling hands
still trying to shield his face.

The blows had ceased and Psimon
looked up as if someone were speaking to him. He began to cry, shaking his head
in hopeless denial. He knew what was coming next. His eyes grew wide with
horror then his body convulsed in agony as a spatter of lesions appeared on his
face.

He screamed as the burning began.

‘Yes!’ he cried. ‘Yes... I
confess!’ But it was too late. Even now he could feel the shroud closing around
his body. ‘No,’ he sobbed. ‘No…’ And then he spoke no more. His words were
choked off and his eyes began to bulge. The muscles in his face and neck
strained with desperate futility but the blackness was closing in around him,
his vision shrinking down to a dark, diminishing tunnel…

And then… as suddenly as it had
materialised, it was gone; the pain was gone.

Psimon drew a shuddering breath.
His entire body shook as he glanced around the room as if trying to convince
himself there was no one there. Finally he let out a tremulous sigh and leaned
back against the wall. He sat for a minute or two in shock then rose unsteadily
to his feet. With trembling fingers he plucked the small piece of orange paper
from the wall then, stumbling across the room, he collapsed into the chair at
the table beside the door. With one hand he wiped the tears from his face, with
the other he reached for his small black note book. His hands shook as he
turned to the page marked for today then he took out the thin pencil and
crossed out the name of Dr Marcus Bryant. Beneath it he wrote
, I’m sorry
.
He squeezed his eyes shut as a tight knot of guilt twisted inside him. Once
again Lucifer had taken a life and once again he had been unable to stop him.
He closed the notebook and stared at the small piece of orange paper.

 ‘No,’ he breathed. ‘I can’t do
this alone.’

Reaching inside his jacket he
took out his own mobile phone then he closed his eyes and took a few deep
breaths to compose himself. When he was ready he raised the phone and entered
the number. There was no need for him to check it; he knew the number by heart.

*

Steve Brennus stood in the front
room of his parents’ Welsh cottage, a mobile phone held to his ear. He dropped
a beautifully prepared business plan on the coffee table and slumped into the
armchair by the window as his accountant confirmed what he already knew.

He was screwed.

‘I’m sorry Steve. But they’ve
already extended the deadline twice... Unless you can come up with twelve
thousand pounds by next Thursday the bank will take possession of the house.’

Steve put a hand to his head.

‘I still can’t believe it’s all
gone?’ said his accountant after a pause. ‘Three hundred thousand pounds is an
awful lot to lose in one night.’

Steve snorted bitterly.
‘Apparently Christine’s brother has a gift for losing money.’

‘Have you spoken to her?’

‘No. Not since she phoned from
the hospital.’

There was an awkward silence.

‘They’ll want you back,’ said his
accountant. ‘They just need a bit of time.’

‘Sure,’ said Steve.

‘You should call her...’

‘No. She’ll call me when she’s
ready.’

Another uncomfortable pause.

‘Listen Steve,’ began his
accountant. ‘Jenny and I have got more shares. We could easily...’

‘No, Mike, really...’ said Steve.
‘You’ve already done more than enough.’

‘Don’t worry about that...
Things’ll work themselves out. You’ll see.’

Steve couldn’t bring himself to
answer. ‘I have to go...’ he said

‘Okay. You take care of yourself.
And call me if you need anything...’

Steve ended the call and put his
phone down on the coffee table. Looking through the rain-streaked window he
gazed at the vast, dim shapes of the Welsh mountains. Even on a dismal evening
like this they managed to look glorious, indomitable, like the Welsh spirit,
his mate Paddy would have said. He glanced at a photograph on the mantelpiece,
five hard-faced young men in combat fatigues, sitting together on a
sand-coloured Landover. Their uniforms bore no sign of the SAS regiment in
which they served but Christine had cut out a picture of the famous ‘winged
dagger’ and stuck it in the corner of the frame. Steve shook his head, a
nostalgic smile creeping onto his face.

Grabbing a bottle of water from
the coffee table he went to stand before the mantel piece. At the centre was a
picture of Steve with an attractive woman and a beautiful young girl. His smile
broadened but then his eyes closed and his face contorted with a frown of
regret. ‘What a fucking mess,’ he said softly to himself.

Shaking his head he took a
mouthful of water and placed the bottle on the mantel piece then he went to get
the rest of his things from the car. The rain was getting heavier so he grabbed
his father’s waxed-cotton jacket from the peg in the hall. His father had been
every bit as tall as Steve although not as solidly built. The jacket felt tight
but Steve liked to wear it when he came to the cottage. He found the smell
comforting.

In the living room Steve’s mobile
phone began to ring.

‘Christine,’ he breathed and some
of the weight seemed to lift from his face as he dashed back into the front
room of the cottage. His heart was suddenly racing but his face fell as he
picked up his phone. There was no sign of Christine’s name on the phone’s
screen and he did not recognise the caller’s number. With a heavy sigh he
pressed the button to accept the call. ‘Hello.’

‘Hello, Mr Brennus.’

The caller sounded shaken up and
for a moment Steve thought it was Christine’s brother, Paul, calling to
apologise for ruining his life. But no, this guy sounded younger.

‘Who is this?’ said Steve as he
shrugged himself into the waxed cotton jacket.

‘My name is Psimon and I would
like to employ your services.’

‘As what?’ asked Steve becoming
suddenly wary.

Psimon paused. ‘As a chaperon, I
suppose you might say.’

‘You mean bodyguard,’ said Steve
with annoyance. ‘You want a bodyguard.’

‘In a sense, yes.’

‘I’m not in the security business
anymore. Haven’t been for years. Besides, I’m not really trained for personal
protection. If you need a specialist I can…’

‘I don’t need an expert,’ said
Psimon. ‘I need you.’

‘
Thanks a lot!
’ thought
Steve. His thumb twitched to end the call but he was curious to know how this
guy had got hold of his number.

‘Who put you on to me?’ he asked.
‘How did you get this number?’

‘That’s not important,’ said
Psimon. ‘What’s important is that I need your help… and you need mine.’

Steve’s attention was now fully
engaged. ‘In what way can you help me?’

‘I will pay you three thousand
pounds a day for five days employment. Plus expenses,’ said Psimon.

Steve’s eyebrows lifted in
surprise. Fifteen thousand pounds was enough to prevent the bank foreclosing on
the house. However, going back into the field of personal security held no
appeal for him, and Christine would never approve. ‘Not interested,’ he said.

‘Are you sure?’ said Psimon.
‘Fifteen thousand pounds...’

‘Money isn’t everything.’

‘No... But the love of a wife and
daughter is.’

‘What the hell do you know about
my wife and daughter?’

‘I know that you didn’t mean to
hurt her,’ said Psimon. ‘And that they will miss you when you don’t come home.’

Steve spun round in the small
living room of the cottage. He was suddenly anxious, confused and furious. Was
this guy threatening him? He said he wanted to help. What the hell was going
on?