The Bruise_Black Sky (27 page)

“And you? What about you?”

“He won’t ever know. I’m not on his radar—like you are.”

What other option did he have to keep Ben Rider-Mikkelsen safe? Nikolas nodded.

Squeezy proposed out loud, looking at Nikolas, but speaking for Ben’s benefit, “I’m gonna explore—see if I can find another way out.”

He slipped off, leaving them alone in the dark.

Nikolas sat alongside Ben, feeling as empty and cold as the old mine they were in. He turned his head. “How do you feel?”

Ben muttered, “Okay.”

“That’s one of your not really okays, yes?”

“It was just an accident. Santiago told me yesterday it happened all the time between him and Ollie.”

“I’m sure it did.” He wrapped his arms around Ben, pulling him onto his shoulder.

Ben was shivering slightly, which told Nikolas far more about how he was than his bravado.

He gave Ben a light kiss and ruffled the buzz-cut, pretending Ben had proper hair.

“So, tell me what you found. I guess we’ll be in here for a while.”

There was nothing to tell now. The problem was going away as they waited there. Somewhere, down in the tunnels, justice was being given to Oliver Whitestone and safety to Ben.

“I found the man who sent the pictures to you—it wasn’t a threat. It was a joke…a gift…a mistake. You can meet him if you want. He is oddly endearing.”
So far so good.

“So who pushed us off the mountain?”

Nikolas ventured a small laugh. It sounded totally authentic to him, but Ben was sometimes spooky about being able to tell if he was lying. “I actually think now that it
was
just an accident. I think we leapt to conclusions given the situation we were in. Another car went over yesterday exactly as we did apparently, trying to pass another car on that track.”

“What?”

“I read it in the paper.” He kissed Ben’s ear. “No one tried to kill you, Ben. Accidents sometimes do happen—just like Santiago said.” Sometimes your enemies made it so easy to lie.

Ben was fading. Injured, probably up since first light working, Nikolas could see him drifting off. There was a lack of coherence to Ben’s thought processes that made the story entirely accepted. Nikolas pulled Ben to lie in his lap, stroking his battered face. “Don’t go to sleep. I think you may be concussed.”

“I haven’t got my phone.”

This apparent non sequitur only confirmed Nikolas in his diagnosis, but he was willing to play along to keep Ben awake, so huffed, “Nowhere to put it in those shorts.”

“I mean, do you have yours? Call someone, let them know we’re in here?”

Nikolas dug out his phone and tapped it. Pretending it didn’t work wasn’t necessary. It didn’t. It had finally given up the ghost. He showed it confidently to Ben, but he barely glanced at it. Nikolas leant back against the rock wall and listened to the storm rage beyond the trailer.

He didn’t need Peyton’s information now anyway.

§§§

The storm claimed a hundred and thirty-five lives, but as with all disasters, no one but loved ones cared very much about the one hundred and thirty-four other residents of Louisiana it had taken, just the one, a star in a TV show. He died with a famous director’s ex-wife, but her name was quickly forgotten as well. There wasn’t any footage of her, and pictures sold stories, so the news was full of yet another tragic death to hit the
After the Wars
cast, because they had endless video of Santiago Molina as the awful, doomed slave Nalusa Falaya who had once been a marine called Eric Gibson and who had fought for his country in the wars until there had been no nation left to defend.

Eulogies revamped, yet again, Oliver Whitestone’s short history.
Finding Peace
, the new movie by Peter Cameron, was now shelved, they reported. Out of respect for this latest misfortune. As all the commentators pointed out, although they had been divorced, Gina Cameron was the mother of the director’s children, so Peter was grief-stricken.

It took twelve hours for them to find and then dig Nikolas, Ben and Squeezy out of the rubble. A trailer had been blown into the stairwell and jammed against the doors.

Another thirty hours passed until a list of the missing was posted—Santiago and Gina amongst them.

A few hours after that, the events unfurled. The salt mine was full of sinkholes. Gina Cameron and Santiago Molina were found at the bottom of one. In the dark, panicked, running from the fury of the storm, they’d apparently fallen…

It appeared as if Santiago had initially survived the fall, but died some hours after from his injuries. He had tried to climb out repeatedly, apparently. Gina had lived for a little time as well. They knew this because her lungs were full of water. The bottom of the sinkhole was flooded. She had drowned.

Major Perry told Nikolas that her report would conclude accidental death. She suggested it was odd neither Gina nor Santiago had phones on them. But like a pizza burning in an oven, that detail wouldn’t go in her report.

As she muttered wearily to Nikolas, who knew policing could be bad and just at the same time?

§§§

Nikolas was still sporting his post-apocalyptic, messianic preacher facade as they strode into the first-class cabin for their return to London.

He drew a few stares, but he didn’t care. It suited his mood to have his face covered, to seem as if he’d been to hell and back.

Ben was gaunt and tired. Squeezy was just sleek and clearly very pleased with himself. Nikolas wondered, not for the first time, if he’d underestimated the man with the ridiculous name.

He’d underestimated Peyton. The fat man had come back to him within a few hours of his request. If his phone hadn’t broken, he’d have got the message.

Santiago Molina had flown into Wellington at eight on the evening that he and Ben had been pushed off the mountain.

At six, when they’d been lying in a snowdrift, bleeding, he’d been in first class, sipping champagne—Peyton Garic made up the champagne drinking, so he told Nikolas hastily, but it was a good detail.

Gina Cameron had been in California all week until she’d flown to New Orleans. No doubt. Airlines database don’t lie.

Nikolas wondered if pizzas and wake-up calls could. It was possible.

Had Oliver Whitestone had a genuine moment of despair at being alone with only pizza for company when the world thought his life must be so fabulous…?

Nikolas had deleted Peyton’s message.

But he’d left his beard.

It suited his mood.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Afterwards, Nikolas was never sure just how much the events in a salt mine in Louisiana affected his decisions on a hillside in Scotland. There was some connection, that was certain.

As they’d unpacked at home in Devon, his new phone had rung—the one Ben had given him for his birthday. Not many people had his new number yet, so he picked it up warily, frowning and then mouthing, “Philipa,” at Ben. He took the call over to one of the windows.

“Nikki?”

“Who else. This is my phone.”

“Don’t try to be funny.”

“When can I come and fetch Radulf?”

“That’s the thing. I’m still in Scotland, and you need to come here.”

Nikolas felt a small stab of something in his heart. He sensed Ben come to stand alongside him. Were they so joined now that Ben could sense his mood? Apparently not—as he’d possibly just murdered two innocent people, and Ben didn’t seem to get that at all.

“Radulf?”

“Oh, don’t be so silly. He’s fine. He’s wallowing in some bog as we speak. Rather you than me have him in the car after that. Look. The thing is, I need to see you. I can’t get away, obviously. You must come here. You can fetch the dog then as well.”

“Scotland?”

“It’s not the other side of the world!”

Nikolas sighed and clicked her off.

“What does she want to see you for?”

“You heard the same conversation I did. I don’t know.” He snagged Ben’s jacket as Ben tried to walk away. “I’m sorry. I’m tired. Jetlag does not get any easier when you’re old.”

§§§

Instead of relaxing or going riding—both of which he’d been looking forward to—Nikolas had Ben drive him to Exeter airport, and he caught another flight. As he told Ben, the sooner he got Radulf home, the sooner things could get back to normal. They might even be able to fit a few days in with Emmy and Babushka when they returned from their jaunt to Russia.

By his reckoning, which was a little wobbly now, Scotland was his sixth country in as many weeks.

Philipa had sent a car for him when he landed, so he arrived in some state at the ancestral family home.

She recoiled in horror when she saw him though. Fortunately, she’d instructed the driver to bring him to a hunting lodge on the estate and no one (meaning anyone in the family) saw him.

Nikolas was unconcerned at her disapprobation. They weren’t married anymore. He didn’t have to provide cover for anything she did.

And didn’t that get to the heart of the matter. Her opening question was, “Who knows, Nikki?”

For one moment, he’d thought about a salt mine, and a man desperately climbing the walls over and over to bring help to his drowning lover.

He waited. It was an effective tactic and also a respite from having to think.

“About you, Nikolas. Who else knows?”

He tipped his head to one side, considering the import of the question.

“Don’t look at me like that. You know why I’m asking—
they’ve
been asking.”

He didn’t need to ask who they were. He’d been…
they
. The department. Anonymous men who made these sorts of enquiries, wanting correct answers.

“It’s imperative that when the announcement is made, I’m seen only as an old family friend with an ex-husband who is the pillar of the establishment, too.”

“Whiter than white.”

“Yes. Whiter than white.”

“Perhaps you should have chosen your cover husband better.”

“Don’t play this game with me, Nikolas. I married an impeccable Danish diplomat—to all intents and purposes that is how you will be seen. But you told me who you were one night. I hope you remember that occasion. I do. Who else have you felt compelled to tell in similar circumstances?”

They both smirked at the same time and sat down, the tension broken. Nikolas combed his beard with his fingers. “No one knows for sure but you.”

Nikolas felt a shift in the air at this answer, pressure, as if the sky lowered, squeezing him.

“Ben does.”

Nikolas conceded this with a small nod. “Of course.” He pursed his lips and added, “But you know what will happen to you and
him
and all his inbred family if one hair on Benjamin Rider’s head is damaged. I give them due warning through you now. Please make sure they understand that.”

She looked away for a moment then acquiesced with a small, dismissive gesture. They understood each other on the subject of Ben Rider. “There is no one other than Ben who knows you are not Nikolas? When they investigate you, is there anyone who will hesitate to confirm that you are Nikolas Mikkelsen, Danish diplomat?”

Two names bounced around in his head.

They would hesitate.

If Philipa had asked this question only a week ago, he’d have told her their names, not concerned with their fate—glad, in fact, to have those fates so neatly taken care of for him.

But now?

Now he owed the universe two lives.

He felt like being forgiving. People made mistakes. He’d made a huge one, and he wanted to be forgiving. He wanted to be
forgiven
. “No. No one.”

“All right.” She leant back in her chair. “Now, I have a suite arranged for you. Tidy up, please.
Shave.
You’re coming to dinner. Someone wants to ask you all about Radulf. She’s taken a bit of a shine to him.”

§§§

Emilia and Babushka arrived home with a week left of Emmy’s holiday. They had been treated like royalty, so they had something in common with Radulf.

They didn’t know about the events that had transpired since they’d been away. Like most travellers, they assumed those left behind had somehow frozen in time, awaiting their return.

It was with some evident concern, therefore, that Emilia cornered Ben one day in the garage, where he was contemplating a ride on his bike.

“What’s wrong with Nikolas?”

Ben pursed his lips. “Nothing. Why?”

Emilia narrowed her eyes at him. “Seriously. I’m not a baby. You can tell me.”

“No,
seriously
, there’s nothing wrong…” He frowned. “Why? What’s happened?”

“I’ve just won a game of tennis.”

Ben’s look of worry deepened. “Oh. That’s not good.”

“No, exactly. Don’t you two—?”

“Em!”

“Talk! I was going to say talk! Sheesh!”

§§§

Ben tracked Nikolas down in the stable. He watched him for a while. He looked normal to Ben—awesomely beautiful. Sure, he’d been quiet since their return from the States, but he’d been busy—fetching Radulf, sorting everything he’d left so suddenly…Ben wasn’t too sure what Nikolas did, but it always seemed to keep him very occupied.

“I’ll come with you.”

Nikolas started.

That was new.

Ben had never known Nikolas to not sense his presence before.

They saddled up and walked the horses, side-by-side to the dry stone wall and then out onto the moors.

Could anyone have problems out here on these perfect moors? Ben didn’t think so. He breathed the scent of the September-bracken into his lungs. “Race?”

Nikolas glanced over. “Maybe later. Have you heard from Peter since we got back?”

“Yeah. Just a brief email. Why?”

“Did he mention the film?”

“He was torn up, Nik, totally wrecked. We couldn’t go on with it.”

“Do you think he will want to resurrect the idea?”

“Maybe. Eventually. I guess there was a lot of money invested in it.”

“Would you agree to continue, if he did?”

“Is that what you’re worried about? There was no threat, Nik. You said it yourself.”