Authors: Elena Forbes
34
Tartaglia watched Anna walk along Edith Grove and turn the corner. She had been keen to cut their conversation short, which wasn’t surprising. But the urgency in her tone made him suspicious and he decided to follow her and see where she was going. Leaving the bike in her front garden, he ran down the street and into the Fulham Road. He caught sight of her a little way ahead on the far side of the road, walking quickly as though in a hurry. She passed the entrance to the Brompton Cemetery and Stamford Bridge and Chelsea Football stadium, and seemed to be heading towards Fulham Broadway and the tube. A little further along, she stopped outside a shop and he ducked into a doorway, watching as she felt in her bag for keys, unlocked the door and went inside. The shop looked disused, the window dirty and shielded from the street by blinds. It was impossible to see inside. He was wondering what to do, if he should go and take a closer look, when he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket and saw Donovan’s name on the screen.
‘Oh Mark, I’ve been trying to call you,’ she said breathlessly when he answered. ‘Where have you been?’
‘On my bike. I can’t talk now.’
‘You’ve got to listen.’ In a rushed tone, she proceeded to tell him about her visit to Danielle’s grandmother. ‘But don’t worry. When I couldn’t get hold of you, I called Carolyn. She’ll put someone onto tracing the father right away.’
‘Good,’ he said distractedly.
‘There’s something else, something you should know. It’s about that journalist, Anna Paget . . .’
‘What is it?’
‘I don’t know how to put this, Mark . . .’
His stomach clenched. She was trying to go carefully with him and he realised at once that she knew. How, he had no idea, but it was enough that she knew. ‘Say whatever you’ve got to say,’ he said softly.
‘Well, her name’s not Anna—’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Her real name’s Amber. She was Danielle Henderson’s best friend.’
She said something else but he didn’t take it in. He clicked off his phone and leaned back against the wall feeling sick; images, thoughts, fragments of conversations from the last couple of days streaming through his mind. How stupid he had been in so many ways, but there was no point worrying about that now. There was still so much he didn’t understand. Blindly he walked into the light and crossed the road, oblivious to the oncoming traffic. He rang the bell then hammered on the door. ‘Anna, open up. I know you’re in there.’
He continued to bludgeon the door with his fist until finally he saw the blind flutter and heard the turn of the lock. The door opened a fraction and she peered out. He shoved his boot in the gap and pushed it open.
‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing,’ she shouted. ‘You can’t just force your way in here.’
‘Yes I can.’ He slammed the door behind him, blocking the exit. He looked around, but there was nobody else there.
‘Get out.’
‘Not until you tell me about Danielle Henderson. And I hear your real name’s Amber, not Anna. Is everything you’ve told me a lie?’
Her eyes widened a fraction and she swallowed hard, backing away from him as though she was afraid he was going to hit her. ‘What’s it to you?’ she said quietly. ‘Nobody’s called me that in a long time.’
‘Was it all a lie?’
‘No. Now, please can you go.’
‘Not until I know the truth.’
‘Can we do this somewhere else? We can go back to my flat, if you like.’
‘It’s too late for that. I’m calling for a car.’
As he put his hand in his pocket, she grabbed his arm. ‘Wait, Mark. Please. I’ll tell you what you want. Just the two of us, now. Danni was my best friend. When she disappeared, I had to find out what had happened to her. That’s all.’
He hesitated. He knew he should take her to the station, but what if she decided not to cooperate? He needed to get the full story out of her now otherwise they might lose precious time.
‘You’d better make it quick. Tell me about the party. You were there, weren’t you?’
She let go of his arm and walked over to the sofa, where she sat down, hugging her knees into her chest. ‘Paul asked me. He told me to come along and bring anyone I wanted. It was a Friday, I remember, and Danni and I decided to bunk off from school. My mum was in London and there was nobody home, so we went back to my place to change. We then hitched a lift together. To cut a long story short, I was dancing with some guy when Danni came over to say she was going off to the lake to have a swim. She tried to persuade me to go too, but I didn’t fancy it at the time. She had some bloke in tow but I never saw him properly. I guess I wasn’t paying much attention. I went swimming in the lake later on with some other people but I didn’t see her. Much, much later I went to sleep on an old sofa in the house. Next thing I knew it was light. I went back down to the lake where I’d left some of my clothes and that’s when I saw the five of them gathered around talking. I didn’t know their names then, but they had a rowing boat and they were all arguing about something. None of it made any sense at the time. I left them to it and went to look for Danni, but I couldn’t find her. I just assumed she’d gone home and I cadged a lift back to Bristol with some bloke. To be honest, I thought she’d gone off with someone.’
He stared at her, wondering how much she had left out, how much she had distorted. ‘So the last time you saw her was when?’
‘I can’t remember. Quite early on, I think.’
‘But I thought you went there together?’
‘And your point is?’
‘You don’t think you should have looked after her? She was fourteen, for Christ’s sake.’
‘Nearly fifteen. And so was I. Anyway, I was her friend, not her keeper. Besides, there were so many people coming and going, it was impossible to know what was going on. How was I to know that something had happened?’
Callous though it seemed, her version tallied with what he had learned from Wade and Fleming and he decided to let it go for the moment. ‘Didn’t you think something was wrong when she didn’t go home?’
‘No. It wasn’t until I went to school on Monday that I found out she was missing.’
‘You didn’t think something might have happened at the party?’
‘No. I just thought she’d gone off to be with her dad. She often talked about wanting to live with him and not her mum.
She’d even said something about it that day. She told me she’d saved some money and was going to run off.’
‘Didn’t you think it was strange when she didn’t get in touch?’
She shrugged. ‘I did wonder, but I assumed they were abroad somewhere. Then I went off to London to get away from my dreadful mother and I moved in with Brian. Danni wouldn’t have known how to contact me. That bit was more or less as I told you, except I knew Brian before.’ He shook his head angrily. It didn’t matter any longer. ‘He was a friend of my mother’s,’ she continued. ‘Paget was his surname. Even though we weren’t married, I used it. I didn’t want to remember what I’d left behind and I changed my name to Anna. He preferred it too. He said my old name reminded him of my mother.’
‘How did you make the connection?’
‘I bumped into Colin, Danni’s dad, in a bar one day. I hadn’t seen him for years, but I recognised him immediately. He was back in London for a short while and when I learned that Danni wasn’t with him, that she was still missing, I worked it all back and realised something bad must have happened to her, either at the party or on her way home. Around about the same time, I read Joe’s book. There was so much that was similar about the setting and the friends, I had to find out what he knew. When I read the bit about the girl drowning and remembered the five of them by the lake that morning, it all started to make sense. I’m a journalist, you know. It’s what I do, put two and two together . . .’
‘Go on,’ he said sharply.
‘I then wrote to Joe, as I told you, and asked him if he would let me interview him. You know the rest.’ She got up, as though the conversation was over, and moved towards a small kitchen area at the back.
He grabbed hold of her arm. ‘Did you tell Colin Henderson what you’d learned?’
‘Maybe.’ She tried to pull away but he held her tight.
‘Did you tell him?’
‘OK. Yes, I did. He had a right to know.’
‘Jesus. You started all of this,’ he shouted, realising how it had all been set in motion. ‘Where’s he now?’
‘You’re hurting,’ she said, trying again to shake herself free.
‘You’re not going anywhere until I have some more answers. Where’s Colin Henderson?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘Yes, you do.’
‘I swear I had nothing to do with what he did.’
‘But you knew—’
She shook her head vigorously. ‘No. Not at first. But when Paul died, I realised there must be a connection, that it had to be him. But I’ve no idea where he is. Please believe me.’
She looked up at him with tears in her eyes. As he held her gaze, wondering how he had ever been crazy enough to have anything to do with her, he thought back again to what Angela Harper had said, the contradictions, all the things that didn’t add up. The expression ‘cut and shunt’ came to mind. Two separate things joined awkwardly together. It finally made sense and he saw her for what she was. Rage filled him.
‘You’ve been in all this together,’ he shouted, his face inches away from hers. ‘The emails, the choice of the dumpsites, it had to be two people. It’s the only explanation. Whether you pulled the trigger or not, you’re just as guilty.’ He pushed her away and she fell hard against a chair. He pulled his phone out of his pocket.
‘No,’ she shouted, getting up and grabbing hold of him. ‘Don’t call. I promise I had nothing to do with it. Please let me explain.’
He shook her off. ‘There’s nothing more to explain. Where’s Colin Henderson?’ As he said the name, he thought he heard a noise.
‘I swear I’ve no idea,’ she shouted. ‘I’m telling the truth.’
Again another sound, this time louder. He grabbed hold of her and clamped his hand over her mouth. ‘Shut up.’ She struggled and he pushed her down to the floor, holding her in an arm-lock with one hand, the other still tightly over her mouth. ‘If you move, I’ll break your arm.’ He was listening. He was sure he had heard something. The noise had come from somewhere in the house. Maybe below. Someone else was there.
35
‘Wake up,’ the voice shouted.
The blow knocked Alex’s head sideways, jolting him out of his stupor. He tried to call out but something was crammed tight in his mouth. Next thing he knew, he was sitting upright in a chair, hands pinned together behind his back, ankles clamped together. He felt someone’s breath on his face. He stayed still. He was blindfolded, that much he could tell. Even though his eyes were squeezed shut, he was aware of a light beyond, a source of heat shining at him.
‘If you’re ready to listen, nod your head.’ It was a man’s voice, deep and authoritative.
He was wondering whether to respond, when he heard a dis tant banging followed by shouting somewhere nearby. A minute later he heard voices, more clearly now, a man’s and a woman’s, coming from directly above him. The footsteps beside him moved away. He felt a draught as though a door had been opened. Through the thick fog in his mind, he struggled to make out what the voices were saying. His mind drifted back to the lake and to the girl. It was because of her, because of what someone had done to her that he was going to die.
He knew now that he wasn’t to blame. He hadn’t killed her. Somehow that part was finally clear. She was already dead when he found her in the water. Then he thought about the others, Joe, Paul, Danny and Tim. Had he missed something?
Had one of them played a part in her death? As though on the outside looking in, he again pictured the five of them by the lake arguing about what to do, about going to fetch her clothes from the boathouse. How had the discussion gone? He saw Joe sitting on the ground beside him, his face in his hands, wanting none of it; and Danny, standing close by and staring vacantly out across the lake as though on another planet, not saying a word. He saw himself, passively watching as Tim and Paul battled it out, with Joe lobbing in the occasional weary comment about calling the police. Where exactly had everyone been the night before? What had they been doing? And who was it who first had the idea of going to the boathouse to look for her things? It now seemed such an odd thing to suggest.
He felt as though he was grasping at something just out of reach – something that had been there all along. Then the answer came to him: there was one person who should have been there but was absent. At first it didn’t seem important, then he realised it was. As he sat in darkness thinking it all through, running through the implications of what was now clear, he heard more footsteps overhead and shouting, this time the woman’s voice, then the man’s again. He had no idea who they were but somehow he had to get help. He felt weak and numb. Using all the strength he could muster, he started to rock the chair backwards and forwards. He heard it creak, felt it give, then with a thud he fell sideways onto the floor, his shoulder taking his full weight. The lamp, or whatever it was that had been shining in his face, smashed to the floor beside him. He felt a sudden movement of air in the room. As the footsteps rushed towards him, he clenched in anticipation. A hand came down over his face, squeezing his mouth and nose until he thought he would suffocate. Something cold and hard was pressed against his temple.
*
‘Who’s down there?’ Tartaglia whispered, his face against hers.
With a squeal, she shook her head. Her eyes were wild and he saw tears.
‘Let’s go and find out, shall we?’
She shook her head even more violently, but he held her tight and marched her to the door. He kicked it open. The stairwell was dark and narrow. Leaning back against the wall for support, he held her tightly against him and started sideways down the stairs. She was still struggling, lashing out with her feet and trying to bite him. He knocked her head hard against the banisters. She gave a muffled moan and stopped fighting for a moment. At the bottom was a door. It was slightly ajar, with a faint red light coming through the gap.
‘What’s in there?’ he hissed into her ear, a few steps from the bottom. ‘Who’s there? Is it Henderson?’
She started to struggle again, trying to wrench herself free. Tired of her, curious to know what was in the room, he lifted her up and threw her towards the door. As she fell into the room, a single shot rang out. He dropped to the floor and flattened himself against the wall. He heard the sound of a door slamming somewhere in the room and a heavy bolt being drawn. Then there was silence.
He waited for a few moments, wondering what to do. He could see Anna lying on the ground just inside the room. She didn’t appear to be moving. Slowly, keeping as close to the wall as he could, he peered into the room. Henderson, or whoever it was, had gone. Anna was on the floor, face down. He knelt beside her and turned her over, feeling her pulse. She was alive, although she appeared to be unconscious. As far as he could tell, she wasn’t bleeding anywhere and he assumed she had been knocked out by her fall. She looked so small, so fragile, and for a moment his thoughts drifted back to the few hours they’d spent together. But such thoughts were pointless. The hideousness of what she had done was all that counted. He heard a noise from the far corner of the room, half sigh, half moan. He looked up, and in the strange red light saw a man, stripped to the waist, lying on his side on the floor, tied to a chair. He was groaning and straining against his ties as though in pain. Tartaglia took his keys out of his pocket and shone the little key ring torch at the man’s face. He was blindfolded and gagged and his face was covered in blood, but Tartaglia recognised the deep, unmistakable copper of Alex Fleming’s hair.
‘It’s Mark Tartaglia, Alex. The other man’s gone. Stay still and I’ll try and sort you out.’
Fleming stopped wriggling and after a couple of attempts, Tartaglia managed to heave him into an upright position. He undid the blindfold and the gag and Fleming gave a sigh of relief.
‘Are you OK?’ Tartaglia asked.
Coughing and clearing his throat, Fleming nodded.
Tartaglia took out a small pocket knife and sawed at the cable ties holding Fleming’s hands and feet until he was free. Fleming tried to stand up, but his legs wouldn’t hold him and he slid to the ground where he sat huddled against the wall.
‘Stay there,’ Tartaglia said. ‘I’m just going upstairs to call for help.’
Fleming gave him a lop-sided smile. ‘I’m not moving.’
‘Can I get you anything?’
‘A glass of water. And a fag, if you have one.’
Two hours later, Tartaglia stood outside the shop with Steele. She had just been dropped off and was walking up and down distractedly, talking on her phone. Fleming had been taken off to the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital up the road, to be patched up. Anna, too, had been taken to hospital, suffering from concussion. She had regained consciousness but was being kept in overnight for observation, under guard. The entire shop, which apparently had been leased by Colin Henderson, was now sealed off and being treated as a crime scene, with Tracy Jamieson and her team busy inside. The bullet that Henderson had fired into the air as he made his escape, as well as its casing, had been recovered and sent off to the lab for analysis, but nobody doubted that it had come from the same gun that killed Logan, Khan and Black. As for Henderson, there was no trace of him anywhere.
Steele finished her call and tucked her phone away in her bag. ‘That was Colonel Wykeham, Henderson’s former commanding officer,’ she said. ‘He’s just given me some very useful background on Henderson. He wasn’t just in the army. He was in the SAS and he served both in Northern Ireland and briefly out in Iraq during the first Gulf War. From what Wykeham said, he wasn’t a leading light.’
Tartaglia looked at her quizzically. ‘How do you mean?’
‘It’s bizarre, given everything he seems to have done, but the picture that comes across is one of failure, particularly in his eyes, which is what’s important. Apparently, ever since he joined the army straight out of school, his goal was to get into the SAS, but it wasn’t an easy ride for him once he was in. Wykeham described him as a loner, an outsider . . .’
‘I thought they’re all like that.’
‘I suppose it’s a matter of degree. He said Henderson wasn’t an aggressive, natural leader. Both his colleagues and his super iors saw him as not tough enough, and it didn’t help that he came from the Light Infantry when most of them were paras. I don’t understand the culture, but it sounds as though he was treated as a second-class citizen and bullied. There’s also a history of Henderson having been bullied and abused both at home and at school. What is important is that he saw himself as a failure.’
‘But he made it into the SAS. That’s more than most men would ever be capable of.’
She nodded. ‘He failed against a very high benchmark, but the point is it really got to him. It seems to have coloured everything he did, including what he’s doing now.’
‘But I thought you said he was out in Northern Ireland during the troubles. You don’t survive that unless you’re pretty tough.’
‘Apparently he was in a passive surveillance role, never front line. He didn’t shine in the first Gulf War, either. When he went back to Northern Ireland, he hooked up with a twenty-year-old Irish girl and his marriage fell apart. After that, when he came back to the UK, he worked as a staff instructor until he retired. Since then he’s been out in Africa and the Middle East, employed by a security company. He’s had a string of girlfriends over the years, he drinks a lot and he’s suffered from depression. His whole life has been blighted by the fact that in his eyes he’s never, until now, had a chance to prove himself. Wykeham said that he’s never killed anybody before and that the challenge would be for him to keep his head. Wykeham said he’d expect him to screw up sooner or later.’
‘Well, he hasn’t so far. Until now. How the hell are we going to catch him?’
‘We’re watching the ports and airports, but from what Wykeham says, he will have worked out his escape route well in advance and he may be long gone. With his surveillance background, he knows how to blend in and with his contacts overseas, he may easily be travelling on a false passport.’
‘How do they think he’s going to react now? Will he try and come after Fleming or Wade?’
‘They think not. Wykeham’s view is that now his cover’s blown, he’ll see it all as too risky and he’ll abort the mission.’
‘Abort the mission? That sounds very cold-blooded. Are you sure?’ He couldn’t hide his scepticism. Henderson was a man, not a robot and, more than anything, he was a father – a father bent on finding out the truth and exacting revenge. Surely emotion would still be the driving factor.
‘That’s what Wykeham says and he was adamant about it. In Colin Henderson’s eyes, the operation he’s been running has gone pear-shaped and his training and everything he’s learnt over the years will tell him to get out.’