Keep Calm (29 page)

The blood work had come back on the body from the ditched rental car. It had been found, sadly, two days earlier, not an eighth of a mile from here. It belonged to Richard Desmond Lyle, Tatum's wife's boyfriend from years back. Two .30-caliber bullets straight into his forehead had felled Mr. Lyle. It had taken time to run his blood, which had no matches, until the connection was made from his calling the cell phones of Kate Tatum and Gordon Thompson, and his place near Paddington was gone through and DNA samples had been collected. Memorabilia had been found linking Lyle to Tatum's wife. Richard Lyle had lived a clean life as far as the law was concerned.

His wasn't an easy trail to walk back. The mill house wasn't even in his name; it was in the name of an aunt, a Penelope Ann Jordan.

Forensics estimated that Mr. Lyle had been dead almost four days. The way that the body was hidden, away from the house, told Steel that Tatum hadn't done the killing. If Tatum had killed Richard Lyle, he would have hid the body on the property and laid low. There would be no point in moving on. This remote country shack would have been a perfect place to sit tight. Someone else did this, someone who was also on Tatum's trail, someone who had gotten there before Steel had.

She was guessing that the Tatums left right after Lyle was killed, which meant that she was at least four days behind. Why else would Tatum have placed his own wallet on the dead man if he wasn't trying to purchase time? Scheming to confuse the next group to come along? The former police detective knew better than to stay around after Mr. Lyle's killing.

A large, faded bloodstain was found seeped into the center of the brick courtyard. It was sampled, logged, and sent to the Yard. Steel was certain it was from Richard Lyle. He had been killed there in the courtyard. Shotgun shells were found in the motor court and in the ditch heading out to the road. Tatum had stood his ground somehow, run whoever killed Lyle off, then hid Lyle's body in the rental car and taken another car, leaving immediately with his family.

Steel phoned Edwina Wells and had her put someone on finding out what kind of car Richard Lyle drove. Again, nothing came up. She then had them find out what kind of car the aunt drove. Finally, within twenty minutes, there was a vehicle worth tracking: a 1969 Volvo, registered to Lyle's aunt. Tire tracks coming into and out of the garage seemed to suggest that the Volvo had been there recently. DPG shot a loud flare through the system. Somewhere in Britain, someone would have seen that old Volvo.

Steel slowly walked the road and found another spent shell in the grizzled brush off to the side. As she called the others, she saw something else—a steady dripping trail of blood that had seeped deep into the road and soil, coming off the vine-covered stone gate by the side of the road. She overturned four more spent shells, all leading to scattered bits of broken taillights on and off the asphalt. She found a battered piece of metal that she deduced was once the keyhole to the lock on the trunk of a car. She paced the road, saw it all in her mind, second by second, like a flipbook at a gum shop. Tatum had hit one of them. He had hit the car twice, a third time, maybe. One of them would have a bullet wound. That would help. So would piecing together the taillight and lock for a make and a model. Tire marks squealing out in a long line of desperation raced away from the area around the broken taillights like a junkyard dog whose foot had been stepped on, then kicked with a steel boot in the head. The tire tracks told Steel that the car more or less tried to leap away.

Tatum. He had sent them running for their lives. Of course the family had to leave. He was sure they'd be back.

Steel knew who the men that killed Richard Lyle were. She saw them there in the courtyard, as if she were watching overhead as they snuffed out Lyle's life four mornings earlier. They were Heaton's men, the men who were in her bedroom. She knew firsthand that they could sneak up in the cloak of night and make the pitch-black even darker still. She would play it out in her mind with a near-perfect clarity, the stumpy redhead and the lanky baldy, driving away up the road, sweaty wide eyes, shotgun sober, silently praying that they made it out of Tatum's range before the backside of one of their heads exploded.

She smiled to herself. It would all lead back to Heaton. She was sure of it now. It was time to sit Georgia and the others down—time to draft warrants.

*   *   *

LESS THAN THREE
hours later Steel was presenting her identification at the stuffy little security box at Downing Street. She met in the Cabinet Room with Darling, Munroe, Burnlee, Edwina Wells, and several Scotland Yard detectives and the foreign secretary. They were waiting for the chancellor. She had been upstairs in the private residence after a long morning of meetings.

Up in her bedroom, Georgia changed once again for Steel. She redid her hair. What was it that made her do this? Every time she thought of Steel, she harshly judged her own clothing choices. She reminded herself how she dressed like an old woman already. She thought back to how easily Steel seemed to present herself, how her skirts just seemed to hang off her little body in a perfect drop. She had put on a light blue pantsuit, frustratingly combed her hair out for a third time, and was putting a little red on her cheeks when Early knocked and told her they were ready for her in the Cabinet Room.

The now daily meeting went as well as could be expected. They were starting to have a “gang that couldn't shoot straight” feeling as a group; Georgia could feel their confidence on the wane, especially Steel, who oddly seemed to have the most to lose, the most on the line. The ever-rigid Darling was calmer; he had a comfortable manner, as if it was only a matter of time before they found the Tatums and what was at the bottom of the box. Munroe was on edge, though, particularly at the suggestion that now was the time to release Tatum's image and name to the press.

“Until we know more about this man, about what his motives are, about who is behind him, I don't want to run off and blame an American because that's all every front page will say.
‘It's a Goddamn American!'
Believe me, we will hear from the White House on that, straight off,” Darling scoffed openly.

“And what if we do? It clearly is an American. That doesn't mean America. It means one American.” Burnlee wasn't on the same page. He stood up and faced the room.

“It won't end well if we look like we're rushing into calling this out on an American. I don't need to remind everyone in this room how dicey our relationships are with the US these days. We don't need to give the British people another reason to hate America unless we absolutely have to.”

Georgia weighed in now. “Should we at least let the White House know? Give them a window on this?”

“I don't think we can afford the time,” Steel said, agreeing with Darling. Tatum needed to be found. They weren't the only ones looking for him. Tea was served. Georgia pondered. She read through the reports, the file on the mill house, and the events in Kent. She sipped her tea as she read, and fiddled with her hair.

Davina sensed her apprehension. Going public would make it all very international. Adam Tatum from someplace as all-American as Michigan would change the fabric of the story in a profound way. The volume level would make everything harder to hear through, even if, yes, it would make it harder for Tatum to hide. Georgia had to think like a politician, like a head of state. Steel had a thought toward a compromise.

“Maybe we can buy you some time. Release the nonrelated story of the discovery of Lyle's death, his car, and the incident in Kent. Use the press from that to see if we can get the public to help us find the Volvo. It would give you the time to deal with the White House and the American embassy.” Georgia looked across the table. She wanted, once again, to wink, thank her, but knew to Darling and Burnlee and the others that it would look as if Steel had crossed a line and had dabbled in politics, in direct violation of her role as an investigator on a case of dire importance. She shot a darkened look across the table, as if the idea were distasteful at first, as if she, too, thought her tail had been stepped on.

Major Darling, however, liked the idea.

“I say yes. We need to go public, and we will soon. We can't hold this back much longer. I can promise you that in a blink the press will get on to Tatum and it'll make our one big problem several much bigger problems. Let's give Burnlee the day to deal with the White House, and let's get the public tracking that Volvo for us.”

It was time to speak of the elephant in the room. What was Heaton's involvement? How could it be possible? Steel tried to explain it as fact. She was sure that Heaton's men had murdered Richard Lyle. Other than the fact that the broken taillights and trunk lock were sure to be from a new model Mercedes, she had no evidence, but her gift, if she had one, was a God-given, highly developed sense of intuition.

Lyle had died in the center of the courtyard. The blood work on the broken bricks confirmed it: two bullets to his forehead from close range. He hadn't been running, hadn't been hiding. He was killed by either someone he knew or someone he didn't consider to be a threat. She was sure it was Heaton's two men.

Heaton was at the back of the theater of this entire shit show, watching with a proud smirk as all of the actors ran his lines. This wasn't detective work; this was just plain sense. The chancellor and the others had to see that. She wanted a warrant. She wanted to have him brought into the Yard for a proper sit-down. The home secretary led the side of the group that urged restraint.

“David's a very connected man, and very public. To go after him now, without a shred of evidence that he's involved in any way other than one that's as distasteful to him as can be, is foolish. It would only get the pans pounding out there in exactly the way we don't want them to. It will turn this all into a lurid twenty-four-hour soap opera and will not bring us one beat closer to capturing our bomber. Yes, Tatum did work for him: it doesn't make David guilty. We've all known him for too many years to believe he would ever be involved with something like this.”

Georgia suggested a second compromise.

“I want to call him in. Right here. In the den. Sit with him as a fellow member of government. As a man of Britain. Ask him his assessment of the situation. Go from there. Major Darling, Sir Melvin, you'll both join with us. We three will take a measure of David's view on this. I can't think of another way. I agree with the home secretary. We can't go riding off toward him. He's done too much for this country, as has his family. He deserves the benefit of the doubt, and we will give it to him.”

Steel piped in with a request.

“I would like to sit in as well, please, Madam Chancellor. I need to hear his take, if it's at all possible.”

Burnlee answered for the room. “At this point, that would be a breach of Sir David's confidence. This will be a talk and nothing more, not an inquiry.” Everyone in the room knew what the HS was really saying. It wouldn't be the time for cheap theatrics, and that's what they would presumably get with Steel in the room.
A loose firecracker
. She'd labeled herself early on. The sit-down was above her pay grade. There was nothing she could do but nod in unpleasant acceptance. Georgia tried to soften the response.

“I will personally fill you in on every detail, Inspector Steel. You have my word. I understand your need to have this file, and I'll be sure you get it.”

“Thank you, ma'am. I appreciate that.” Georgia gave a friendly smile. She didn't care what Burnlee and the others thought about how much attention she did and didn't pay to Steel. She wanted Steel to know that the pushback was from the others and had nothing to do with her.

*   *   *

GORDON THOMPSON READ
the news of Richard Lyle's death in a copy of the
Daily Mail
someone had left behind at the Potted Cobbler, an old Tudor pub he regularly stopped at in Tewkesbury on his way to and from Heaton's stables where he'd been up feeding the dogs. The news of Richard's death, the police manhunt for his aunt's Volvo: it was too much for Gordon. He was well aware who had done this and knew what it meant.

It had been years since Gordon had cried—maybe as far back as when Helen, his vivacious wife, Kate's mother, had passed. Maybe it was when he realized once and for all that Kate was staying in America, that he was indeed a man alone. It had been that long. Yet now, here, he felt like bawling.

He blamed himself. He had done this; he had killed Richard Lyle. He had adored him, for years. Richard had become his link to Kate, who was his link to Helen, who was his last bond to his mother, his final connection to his father, now both gone so long that Gordon some days couldn't even remember what they sounded like or even looked like.

Richard had been one of the last people left alive whom Gordon cared about. He felt a woozy kind of weak as he left the Cobbler heading south. He tried to drive but couldn't. This was his fault. There was no one else to blame. He had been played by the same slick version of Satan that had been playing him since he was a child: David Heaton.

He stopped by the side of the narrow East Road, heading down just before it merged back with the Trinston Road leading to M45. He drove the car up onto a small grass embankment, toward a rolling, fenced-off blanket of green, got out, and walked in the crisp fresh air that was laced tightly with the acrid smell of fresh cow dung. He stumbled into the field through an ancient easement gate, trying like hell to keep breathing steadily.

Heaton had murdered Richard. He wasn't going to stop. Adam. Kate. The kids. Himself. They all would have to go the way of Richard. There was no one to turn to, either. The police? Gordon knew too well the folly of that.

The press? That would be his only option. It would take a beat, though. In the meantime, he'd have to find Kate and Adam before Heaton did. There was no way he would let Heaton harm his Kate. Trudy. Billy, that fantastic little grandson. No, he'd spend the rest of his life in jail first; he decided that then and there in that hay-strewn field in Tewkesbury.