Hot Pursuit (6 page)

Bernie grinned. It suited him fine; this way he
wouldn’t have to try and make up some plausible story for the last best time he’d had; and after the bottle of wine they’d drunk since arriving back at the caravan he’d forgotten his poor dead wife’s name anyway. At the door to the bedroom, while looking back at him over one large creamy-white shoulder, Stella said, ‘Although maybe I ought to go home; I haven’t got a towel or a toothbrush with me.’

‘Don’t worry, sweetie. I’m sure I can find you something,’ he said, flicking off the lights.

‘Thank you,’ Stella murmured, sounding genuinely touched.

Bernie grinned. He couldn’t give a stuff whether she brushed her teeth or not.

It might be very late, but in his office Danny Coleman was still seated at his desk, caught in a jaundiced arc of lamplight and staring fixedly at the computer screen wondering what the hell was going on.

He was in two minds over what to do; there were all manner of protocols in place within Stiltskin for a variety of situations, but not this one. In theory Nick Lucas’s cover had been compromised, but how and when and by whom? Should Coleman arrange for a Stiltskin recovery team to go in and pick him up, bring him in? Was he in any immediate danger? Or could the joins be papered over and things left as they were?

Coleman turned a pen between his fingers, still staring at the screen. At this stage he was reluctant to draw attention to Nick Lucas by renaming and moving him. Some part of him still hoped that Bernie Fielding might turn out to be a secure identity after all. Change always made ripples, and ripples, however small, always showed up on the surface. And changes made too hastily – well there was no telling how big those ripples might get if there was a knee-jerk reaction to the Nick Lucas situation. That was the official line from the guys upstairs.

Coleman puffed out his cheeks thoughtfully; maybe if Lucas just moved area, he mused, doodling on his phone pad, all the while instinctively knowing that there was no way the answer was ever going to be that simple.

Something was horribly wrong, something was leaking somewhere. His superiors had suspected it for some time. But how, and where? In his gut Coleman knew that things would only get worse, probably much worse before they got any better. The problem with the whole Nick Lucas thing was that it didn’t fit into any pattern that made sense. Stiltskin had never coughed up a real person before. Coleman ran his fingers back through his thinning hair and looked at Nick’s call as it had been transcribed alongside the details of the new identity that had been set up for him.

Surely it made more sense for anyone who had
infiltrated the system to just expose Nick Lucas and shoot him, rather than put him into a house with a real family. Or perhaps he was meant to be linked to…Coleman glanced down at the notes to check the names…Maggie Morgan, or Bernie Fielding, but why, for God’s sake? He made a mental note to run the pair of them through the computer to see if anything came up. Unless they weren’t after Nick Lucas at all but had bigger plans pinned up on the drawing board. Perhaps someone wanted to compromise the whole relocation procedure and Nick Lucas was involved purely by chance.

Trouble was that Coleman couldn’t get any kind of handle on how that was possible from this piece of nonsense. He closed his eyes, trying to glimpse the big picture, but any connections totally eluded him. He’d get Ms Crow to take a look at the data trail to see if they could find out what had gone wrong, but from where he was sitting this didn’t feel like a leak, it felt more like a total cock-up. Coleman pulled a nasal spray from his inside pocket, squeezed once, twice, sniffing hard as he did, waiting for the moist chemical hit to clear his sinuses and from there his head. First thing in the morning he’d get Ms Crow on the case, and meanwhile he just hoped that the wheel didn’t come off.

The cold splintery taste of the nasal spray ran down the back of his throat and flooded his taste buds.

‘I reckon you’re addicted to them things, you know, Mr Coleman,’ said the security guard, pushing the door to Coleman’s office open a little wider. ‘They rot your nostrils you know, burn through the septum – that little bit in the middle – you’ll end up with a snout like a pillar-box. Saw it in the paper.’

‘That’s cocaine, George; you had too many years on the force, you think everything’s bad for you.’

The older man smiled. ‘In my experience, if you enjoy it, it most probably is. I was about to lock this floor up for the night –’ There was a question hidden in the statement.

Coleman nodded and stretched, feeling tired bones grate and rub in his back and shoulders. ‘Right-o, I’m on my way then. I know when I’m not wanted.’

‘Me, too,’ said the security man. ‘That’s why I’m out here on the bloody night shift, and not tucked up safe and sound in front of the TV or in me bed. Now I’m retired my missus can’t abide me being under her feet messing the place up.’ He sniffed. ‘Working on something important are you?’ The man spoke casually, his gaze apparently without any real intention drawn towards the neat rows of names and addresses currently displayed on Coleman’s machine.

Coleman smiled indulgently and then, unhurriedly, leant forward and switched his terminal off
before getting stiffly to his feet. ‘No, George, just another bloody glitch in the admin, too many light bulbs and toilet rolls again, you know how it is.’

The old man laughed. ‘I’ll have to start taking more home, then.’

Stiffly Coleman got to his feet and pulled on his jacket. The trouble with a leak was that everyone got wet.

Maggie Morgan couldn’t sleep either. Uneasy now the night had fallen. She had wedged a chair up under the handle of her bedroom door and then thought better of it. What if the man currently tucked up in the back bedroom was waiting until everyone was asleep and then got up and attacked the boys and she couldn’t get to them fast enough? Maybe she should have them in her bed, or maybe she should have gone and slept in theirs.

‘Or maybe you should go and get in with him,’ whispered a wicked little voice somewhere in the back of her head. ‘
What? What did I say
?’ the voice protested when Maggie growled at it. ‘I only meant then at least you would know for certain exactly where he was.’ There was a pause and then the voice added, ‘And what he was doing.’

Maggie blushed and pulled the duvet up over her head while her brain continued to torment her. ‘He’s good-looking in a nicely rumpled kind of way; and let’s face it, it’s been a long, long time, Maggie. Think about it. How many times
have you said if only someone nice would turn up, just drop into your life. He’s a gift. It would be a terrible shame – rude even – to turn him down. He’s like manna from heaven. It’s fate, he was delivered right to your door – into your hall, for God’s sake, what more do you want?’

Maggie groaned, rolled over and glanced again at the bedside clock with eyes that felt as if they had been back filled with fine sand and wood ash. It was nearly half past two in the morning. What had seemed reasonable two or three hours earlier – Nick Lucas’s heartfelt plea to stay for a couple of days until he could get himself sorted out – now seemed like taking the pen from the devil and signing her soul away.

It was totally crazy. Madness. Maggie knew absolutely nothing about the man. She had no idea who he was or what he was or where he came from; his story could be a complete fabrication. If only she had thought of those things earlier – like when she had met the other Bernie Fielding – her life might have turned out very differently. Talking of which, why
was
he using Bernie’s name, of all names? Maybe the voices in
his
head had told him to do it. What if Nick Lucas was really an axe murderer, what if he had escaped from an asylum or worse? Maggie’s mind, ever helpful, scurried around the dusty corners of her skull trying to come up with something worse, much worse.

Finally conceding defeat, Maggie sat up. Outside in the garden the wind had steadily begun to rise, bringing with it the promise of a summer storm. The ropes on the swing hummed out the harmonies. Maggie grimaced, resisting the temptation to put her fingers in her ears as a gust whined melodramatically in and out of the chimney pots; trust Mother Nature to cash in on her paranoia.

In the distance through the windows she saw the first white-hot glow of lightning illuminate the night sky, followed moments later by a drum roll of thunder and then something, somewhere close by, creaked.

Maggie shuddered and then held her breath. She had been straining so hard to pick out the sounds of Nick Lucas creeping across the landing carrying a carving knife, drooling, his eyes wide and vacant, that she had given herself a terrible headache. And now she really could hear something. There it was again, louder now.

Cold and nervous and wrapped tight with unspeakable fear and panic, Maggie crept out of bed, tiptoed across the bedroom floor and pressed her ear to the door. There. There it was again, something low and ominous rattling right there on the periphery of her hearing. Was it bare feet creeping across the floorboards? Or the sound of a door creaking murderously on its hinges?

Maggie’s mind reached out through the darkness,
feeling its way around the sound to try and hear more clearly. And then all at once she knew exactly what it was and pulled back in disgust. It was someone snoring. A man, a grown man, snoring contentedly, curled up fast asleep, totally unaware of the storm or her spiralling terror.

Like water draining out of a bath, the tension trickled out of her shoulders and stomach. Exhausted now and on the edge of tears, Maggie stumbled back to bed and dragged the duvet up over her head. Typical that while she fretted and tossed and turned, the axe murderer down the corridor was sound asleep. It was instincts like that which had got her tangled up with the real Bernie Fielding in the first place. Outside, it began to rain furiously.

In the hotel near Heathrow, Nimrod was also tucked up in bed. ‘You gonna turn that bleeding TV off soon, then, are yer?’ he growled wearily. ‘Only we ought to make an early start in the morning, I want to miss the worst of the traffic. Makes me very tense getting snarled up in a jam and you know that I like to be calm. Zen; deep breaths, at one with all things.’

Turning his palms uppermost Nimrod pressed the thumb and index finger of each hand together to form a yoga-style circle gesture, although he drew the line at actually chanting in front of Cain who tended to laugh and pull faces.

Cain sniffed. ‘I won’t be long; I like this procelebrity fishing.’

‘Well at least turn the bloody sound down then and God help you if you can’t get up in the morning. When that alarm goes off I want you up; bright, sharp and on the ball – got that?’

Caught in the flickering light from the TV screen, Cain – sipping a piña colada – nodded just as someone from Slade pulled a fish the size of a corgi up over the side of a boat.

Nimrod groaned, closed his eyes and pulled the pillow over his head. Within minutes he was sound asleep.

While Robbie Hughes snored peacefully on the
Gotcha
office sofa Lesley poured over the telephone directories she’d brought up from the in-house library and busied herself making lists from the books and the database she’d pulled up on the computer, as well as from the Internet. Lesley had always been very good at cryptic clues and puzzles and games of logic – so far she had made all sorts of connections to all sorts of names on her list. First thing tomorrow she’d start ringing round to see how many more pieces she could slot into place. She liked puzzles. Maggie Morgan’s name was right up under Bernie’s mum and his first wife.

Lesley looked over at Robbie. His mouth was open, head thrown back, a little trail of drool
glistening on his chin. She smiled indulgently. He wasn’t an easy man to work with but then was anyone of his calibre?

Some days she saw Robbie Hughes as a natural leader; fiery, quixotic, one of life’s visionaries, while on others he struck her as a grumpy little man with an ego the size of an emerging African nation. She suspected, with a wisdom far beyond her years, that he most probably was a subtle combination of the two and that one side fuelled the other. Whichever it was, working with Robbie had to hold more of a future than answering phone calls from women worried about the brown mould on their pot plants on the family channel. Getting up from the desk, Lesley very carefully pulled a woolly blanket off one of the chairs and covered Robbie up. Couldn’t have him getting cold, now, could she?

‘So here we go, then. Photos, gloves, guns, Mintos.’ Nimrod, talking aloud to himself, ran through his mental checklist one more time, although he had been repeating it over and over in his head like a mantra for most of the morning. He and Cain had managed to get up early, showered, had a coffee, even fitted in fifty sit-ups. Life was sweet, the traffic was light and Nimrod had got everything on his list.

If anyone had ever asked Nimrod Brewster for his tips for success in the hit man business, they would have included a clear sense of purpose about what he was trying to achieve, good photos of the target, precise information, an accurate to-do list, a sharp suit, comfy shoes and a good selection of boiled sweets for the journey.

Tucked away under the CD player, the radio scanner that the Invisible Man had left them was
tuned into the police frequency. It burbled and bipped and peeped away in the background, snatches of police messages adding a rather piquant soundtrack to Nimrod’s thoughts.

Nimrod slipped the envelope of photos out of the glove compartment of the undistinguished silver-grey hire car and took one final long hard look at Nick Lucas’s face, fixing the features in his mind.

Nimrod was good at his job, and when it was a hit, not a beating-up or a frightening or something just for fun – which to be frank, as he got older, Nimrod was less and less keen to be involved in – he prided himself on a certain swiftness of execution. These days he preferred to specialise. There was no mess, no unnecessary pain or fuss if he could possibly help it, just in and out and all over. Cool, steely, clinical. Nimrod saw himself as an emissary of death, not that he would ever say that to Cain, or any of his clients. He tugged his lapels straight. He was death’s personal postboy.

It was an easy drive – M25, M40 all the way – empty roads, good weather. Nimrod stretched. Beside him, Cain drove; he always drove just under the speed limit, carefully, considerately, with gear changes as smooth as oiled glass. Broadshouldered, newly shaved and dressed in their neat charcoal-grey suits and crisply tailored macs the two of them could easily pass for Mormons or
off-duty police officers. Invisible, low-key, discreet, that’s what Nimrod liked best. He made a mental note to add this to the checklist in case anyone ever asked him to appear on a
This is Your Life
Villains’ Special.

The little Oxfordshire village of Renham was still early-morning quiet, with just the odd car or two pulling out of driveways, exhaust fumes spiralling away in the new dawn air. Sunlight reflected on the morning dew, birds busy in the horse chestnut trees that sheltered the caravan site behind the Old Dairy. All in all it was a lovely morning.

‘So,’ Nimrod said, as they parked up under a tall hawthorn hedge close to the caravans; not so close as to draw any unwanted attention to themselves but not so far away that they had to cross a lot of open ground to reach their target. ‘Number fourteen, here we come. In, out, over and home in time for tea and buns.’

Cain pulled a face. ‘What, buns, for breakfast? I was hoping we could stop off for egg and bacon somewhere when we’re finished.’

‘It’s just a turn of phrase.’

Cain thought for a few seconds and then said, ‘Oh okay. So can I have the window seat when we go home, then?’

Nimrod pulled a face. ‘No. What the hell brought that up? It isn’t a done deal yet.’ He nodded towards the regimented row of vans.

‘Oh come on. How much trouble do you think one chef’s going to give us?’

Nimrod surreptitiously slipped a hand around his well-toned belly to check the butt of the gun concealed in the small of his back, tucked away neatly in its custom-built holster. Warmed by the heat of his body, he still liked to make sure it was there, always afraid – in the way of bad dreams – that one day he would reach for it and find it gone.

He took a deep breath to calm himself. Photos, gloves, guns, Mintoes. Today’s mantra.

‘I wasn’t talking about Mr Lucas, I was talking about the bloody window seat,’ said Nimrod. ‘Anyway, yer never know, I might fancy it.’ He shot his cuffs and then pulled his jacket straight.

‘The window seat? Oh, yeah right,’ snorted Cain. ‘You always say that but you hate looking out of the window. I’ve seen you with your eyes closed when we’re taking off, pretending to read the instructions on them cards. You don’t fool me for a minute.’

They were out of the car now and walking without apparent hurry through the crisp early morning light of a brand new summer’s day, every sense alive, sniffing the air like feral dogs.

‘But you promised,’ said Cain petulantly.

‘I did not promise,’ said Nimrod, all the while his eyes working over the little numbered plaques stuck into the verge beside each of the plots.

Just before they got to number fourteen the two men fell silent. They paused for an instant, other older animal senses picking up the smells, the sights and signs that couldn’t be explained in words, and that ordinary men, those not amongst life’s natural predators, might very easily miss. An instant later they moved off simultaneously in an unspoken agreement to get the job over and done with. It was time.

As he stepped over the knee-high fence surrounding plot fourteen, Nimrod took a deep cleansing breath; only the mad or those with no imagination would ever assume that this job was easy or simple, their senses blunted by one too many Hollywood blockbusters. The reality was hot and raw and fierce and terrifying, a moment of absolute power mixed with absolute dread.

Those who live by the sword shall die by the sword was another mantra that Nimrod Brewster had tucked away in one of those dark foetid little rooms behind his eyes. Some days the words were clearer and closer than others and they were never sharper or louder than when Nimrod was sprung and ready and waiting for the off.

In those last few seconds before the hit, when everything went into slow motion, when time stretched out into aeons, when every heartbeat hung in the air like a roll of thunder, he could see the words blazing in neon somewhere deep inside his skull. In and out, in and out, each breath rising
in his chest seemed to take a week to run its course.

The two of them took up positions either side of the caravan door. Pressing himself tight up against the bodywork, Nimrod gave an almost imperceptable nod and an instant later Cain slipped a jemmy bar down his sleeve and prised the flimsy metal door open. There was barely any noise, certainly no fuss, just a faint, satisfying thunk as the lock popped under the pressure. As it did there was the sensation of time rushing forward to meet them, catching them like elastic snapping back.

Silent as cats, despite their bulk, the two men sprung inside, filling the tiny space, covering each other’s backs with the guns that had appeared in their hands without any apparent effort like the dark doves of a malevolent magician.

Scanning left and right Nimrod’s senses burnt white-hot, the adrenaline rush shutting out everything except for the moment; it was pure Zen. His breath roared through his chest now, as loud as an express train, his pulse screaming in his ears.

The kitchen was clear; corridor, second bedroom, bathroom, too. The whole place smelt of frying and cheap perfume.

Cain pressed his ear to what had to be the master-bedroom door and with a quick glance at his partner kicked it open, covered by Nimrod,
who then strode inside, his gun ahead of him like some dark divining rod.

‘What the fuck,’ grunted a sleepy voice from under a duvet.

Later, Nimrod Brewster would say it was prescience that stopped him from opening fire there and then, although actually what did it was the sight of one large, perfect creamy-white breast framed by a greasy grey ruck of grubby duvet cover.

A fraction of a second later a woman with a mane of crunchy, scrunchy bleached-blonde hair sat up and having tried to focus on their faces, fumbled around on the bedside table for her glasses. ‘James, what on earth is going on?’ she mumbled thickly. ‘There’s a man in the room.’

As she spoke Cain whipped back the bedclothes.

Wrapped around the woman like the rind on a rasher of bacon was a long thin hairy man. His flesh was the colour of skimmed milk, with an infill of coarse dark curls that covered him like a moth-eaten pelt.

‘James Cook?’ Nimrod barked in the tone he copied from the armed-response unit that had called just often enough at his various homes to encourage him to move permanently to Spain.

‘Yeah, that’s right,’ said the man after a second or two, ‘I’m James Cook, what’s it to you?’ all the while scrabbling to pull the duvet back up
over what, it had to be said, was not the most impressive of bodies, while blinking and rubbing his eyes. ‘Who the hell are you anyway and what are you doing in my bedroom?’ The voice was thick and crusty with sleep.

Cain looked at Nimrod and sniffed, his gun already tucked back in its holster. ‘It’s not him, is it?’ he said.

Nimrod shook his head. ‘No.’

James Cook was nearly wide awake now and fast beginning to collect his thoughts. ‘What the fuck
is
going on here?’ he growled.

Nimrod slipped his gun away.

‘Gas board, Sir,’ he said. ‘There’s no need to panic. Someone rang in and reported a leak.’ And then before either of the figures in the bed could say another word Cain and Nimrod backed out of the room as quickly and quietly as mist, closing the door tight behind them.

‘Did that bloke have a gun?’ asked Bernie, totally bemused.

Stella slipped on her glasses and shook her head. ‘No, I don’t think so, it looked like it was some kind of detector thing to me. Although when they came to mine last year, they knocked. It must be a real emergency if they’re bursting straight into places.’

Bernie got out of bed, pulled on a tee shirt and – still a little muddled – retraced the intruders’
steps. There was no sign of them at all except that the caravan door-lock had been neatly sprung, and there was an indentation to one side that suggested force. Neatly done though, thought Bernie; the bailiffs who had broken into his last house had ripped the door clean off the hinges.

Barefoot, Bernie clambered down the steps onto the dewy grass. From somewhere close by he could hear the sound of a car engine firing up and driving away. He looked into the distance trying to work out what the hell had just happened and what it was he had missed. As Bernie mulled it over it struck him that surely the caravan site only had bottled gas. But before he could slot all the pieces together, Stella, in a low, dreamy, little-girl-lost voice, called, ‘Why don’t you come back to bed Jamesie. It feels ever so big and lonely and cold in here all on my own.’

‘But what about the post office?’ he said. ‘I thought you said you’d got to be –’ The words dried in his throat as he climbed back into the caravan.

She was standing in the open bedroom doorway, naked except for a sly smile and her horn-rimmed glasses. ‘I have, but it’s early yet,’ she purred. ‘I’ve got a couple of hours before I’ve got to go over and open up. Any ideas? Or are you too tired?’ she said, and then after a second or two added, ‘I mean, no pressure; if you don’t want to we could always just snuggle up and talk.
They say that’s the worst thing, don’t they? You know, the pressure to perform.’

For a few moments Bernie tried to work out what the hell she was talking about and then it came back to him: impotence. It seemed that Stella Ramsey was still on a one-woman mission to heal him.

‘Let’s just see what happens, shall we?’ he said in an undertone and followed her back into the bedroom, all thoughts of the gasmen receding under a tidal wave of lust.

‘So can I have the window seat, then?’

Nimrod looked across at Cain. ‘Can’t you think about anything else?’ he snapped, throwing his hands up in frustration. ‘How does this look on the score sheet, eh? What does it do for our reputation? One nil to the opposition. Bugger. How could we have got the wrong man?’

‘It could have been worse. At least we didn’t shoot him,’ said Cain, drawing a gloved finger across his throat miming mixed metaphors.

Nimrod nodded. ‘I suppose you’re right, it’s not our fault we got bad intelligence. Have you got any of those mint humbugs left over there in the door pocket?’

‘Uh huh.’ Cain nodded. ‘What are we going to do now, then?’ he asked, taking one and then passing Nimrod the packet.

‘Go back to the hotel I suppose. I’ll have to
phone our man to tell him that it was a no ball.’ Nimrod pulled the envelope out of the glove compartment just to check. He ran a gloved finger under the line of type: James Cook, number fourteen, The Old Dairy, Renham. He sighed; at the least they had got the wrong man and not the wrong address.

It was well after nine when Maggie Morgan finally woke up and for a moment, as she lay looking up at the cobwebs clinging to the coving above the wardrobe, she marvelled on just how amazing the human brain was. Amazing what it could come up with, really complex and ridiculous dreams, so detailed, so convinc—

‘Gooooooal-lazio!’ screamed Joe, the distant words cutting through her thoughts like a Stanley knife. ‘He shoots, he scores. Oh yes – did you see the curve on that? We are the champions – we are the champions,’ he sung at the top of his voice.

‘Oh come off it. That was offside,’ protested Ben. ‘Wasn’t that offside? Tell Joe it was offside.’

‘I’m not sure. How about we call it a draw, lads, and go in and get some breakfast?’ said a distinctive male voice that Maggie seemed to remember featuring rather heavily in last night’s ridiculous and extremely complex dream.

It was all coming back now. Maggie rolled over and clambered out of bed. Pulling on a dressing
gown she looked out of the bedroom window. There below her on the dew-damp, overgrown grass, in amongst the holiday washing, two boys were playing footie with someone who may or may not be a lunatic. It was a great way to start the day.

An instant later the phone rang and Maggie felt a strange flicker of relief, of at least being temporarily excused the dilemma of what to do with a good-looking lunatic and her children. Almost anything had to be better than that.

‘Hello?’