Tango One (16 page)

“I better be going.”

Donovan handed him a folded piece of paper.

“Call me on this number. What about the bitch?”

“Vicky?”

“She is the bitch of the day, yes.”

Underwood looked uncomfortable.

“It's bad news, Den. Guess I'm a bit worried about being the bearer. They left yesterday.”

“To where?”

“Spain. Malaga.”

“No way.”

“Booked on a British Airways flight out of Heathrow. Sharkey left his car in the longterm car park. Left a deposit on his credit card.”

“No way they'd go to Spain. I know too many faces out there. And the car is too obvious. He wanted it found.”

“I'm just telling you what I was told.”

Donovan sat shaking his head.

“It'd make my life easier if they were there.” He made a gun with his hand and mimed firing two shots, then blew away imaginary gunsmoke.

“But they're too smart for that.” He grinned.

“At least Sharkey is.” He frowned, then leaned forward, his eyes narrowed.

“Luggage? They check in any luggage?”

“Hell, Den, how would I know that?”

“You ask. You say, did they check in, and if they did, did they have any luggage? How exactly did you get to be a detective, Dicko?”

“Funny handshake and a rolled-up trouser leg,” said Underwood.

Donovan didn't react to the joke. He spoke quickly, hunched forward, his eyes burning with a fierce intensity.

“It's the oldest trick in the book. Done it myself with Vicky a couple of times. You check in for an international flight. Tickets, passports and all. But you have another ticket for somewhere where they don't check passports. Dublin. Glasgow. The Channel Islands. You pass through Immigration, then you go and check in for your real flight. Tell them you were late so didn't have time to check in at the other side. No passports, ticket can be in any name. Providing you haven't checked in any luggage, the flight you didn't get on will depart on time, give or take, and they won't even take you off the manifest. They'll just reckon you're pissed in the bar or lost in Duty Free. Once you're in Jersey you get the Hovercraft to France. Or from Dublin you fly anywhere.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

“No maybe about it. They've flown the coop.” His upper lip curled back in a snarl.

“They think they're smart,” he whispered, almost to himself, 'but I'm smarter."

Underwood stood up. He smiled thinly.

“I am sorry about you and Vicky. Really.”

“I'll have the bitch, don't you worry.”

“Don't do anything .. . you know.” He shrugged, not wanting to say the words.

“She screwed him in my bed.”

“She's the mother of your child, Den. Any vengeance you wreak on her is going to affect Robbie.”

“You think he's not been affected already by what she's done?”

“Sure. He'll hate her for it, but at the end of the day she's still his mother. And you're still his dad. I know this isn't easy .. .”

“You know fuck all!” hissed Donovan, banging the flat of his hand down on the table, hard. Several heads turned in their direction, but shouted threats weren't an unusual occurrence in the pub and when it became clear that no one was about to be hit, the heads turned back.

“Just take it easy, that's all I'm saying. I know you, Den. Red rag to a bull, this'll be. Like the Italians say. Best eaten cold, yeah?”

Donovan nodded. He knew that Underwood had his best interests at heart.

“Just watch my back, Dicko,” he said.

“I'll cover the rest of the bases.”

Donovan went back to the hotel and showered and changed. He ate a steak and salad and drank a glass of white wine at an Italian restaurant on the Edgware Road, reading a copy of the Guardian but keeping a close eye on people walking by outside. He paid the bill and then spent five minutes walking around the underpass before rushing above ground and hailing a black cab. He got to Hampstead a full hour before he was due to meet the Spaniard. He walked through the village, doubling back several times and keeping an eye on reflections in the windows of the neat cottages until he was absolutely sure he hadn't been followed.

He walked out on to the Heath, his hands deep in the pockets of his leather bomber jacket. He wore black jeans and white Nikes and his New York Yankees baseball cap, and he looked like any other hopeful homosexual trawling for company.

Donovan went the long way around to the place where he'd arranged to meet Rojas, and lingered in a copse of beech trees until he saw the Spaniard walking purposefully along one of the many paths that crisscrossed the Heath. A middle-aged man in a fawn raincoat raised his eyebrows hopefully but Rojas just shook his head and walked on by.

Donovan smiled to himself. Rojas was a good-looking guy, and he was sure that half the trade on the Heath would get a hard-on at the mere sight of the man. He looked like a young Sacha Distel: soft brown eyes, glossy black hair and a perfect suntan. His looks were actually an acute disadvantage in his line of work he could never get too close to his quarry because heads, male and female, always turned when he was around. Donovan could imagine the eyewitness reports the police would get: “Yeah, he was the spitting image of Sacha Distel. In his prime.” That was why Rojas always killed at a distance. A rifle. A bomb. Poison. A third party.

Donovan waited until he was sure that Rojas was alone before whistling softly to attract his attention. Rojas waved and walked over the grass to the copse. He gave Donovan a bearhug and Donovan smelled garlic on his breath.

“Dennis, good to see you again.”

“Don't get over-emotional, Juan. I know you're going to be billing me for your time. Plus expenses. Plus plus.”

Rojas laughed heartily and put an arm around Donovan's shoulders.

“You still have your sense of humour, Dennis. I like that.”

Donovan narrowed his eyes.

“What have you heard?”

Rojas shrugged carelessly.

“I have heard that Marty Clare is in Noordsingel Detention Centre. And that the DBA want to put him in a cell with Noriega.”

“Bloody hell, Juan. I'm impressed.”

“It's a small world, my friend. So is it Marty you want taking care of?”

Donovan nodded.

“I hope you never get angry with me, Dennis.”

“But who would I hire to kill you, Juan? You're the best.”

“Bar none,” agreed the Spaniard.

“Bar none.”

“Soon as possible, yeah?”

“I took that for granted. My usual terms.”

“No discount?”

“Not even for you.”

They walked around the copse, their feet crunching in the undergrowth.

“There's something else.” Donovan told Rojas about his wife and his accountant and their departure through Heathrow. The Spaniard listened in silence, nodding thoughtfully from time to time.

“I want them found, Juan.” Donovan handed Rojas an envelope.

“There's their passport details, credit cards, phone numbers. They know I'll be looking for them and they'll be hiding.”

“I understand.”

“When you've found them, I need to talk to them.”

“You mean you want to be there when I .. .” Rojas left the sentence unfinished.

“I need some time alone with them. That's all.” Donovan wasn't prepared to tell the Spaniard about the missing sixty million dollars.

“You can finish up after I've gone.”

“Both of them?” asked Rojas, his face creased into a frown.

“Both of them,” repeated Donovan.

“Amigo, are you sure this is a wise course of action?” said Rojas.

“She is your wife. Business is business but your wife is personal. You punish her of course, but .. .” He shrugged and sighed.

“She fucked my accountant. In my house. In front of my kid.”

“And he should die. No question. But your wife .. .”

“She's not my wife any more, Juan.”

“The police will know.”

“They'll suspect.”

The Spaniard shrugged again, less expressively this time, more a gesture of acceptance. He could see that there was no point in arguing with Donovan. His mind was made up.

“Very well. You are the customer and the customer is always right.”

“Thank you.”

“Even when he is wrong.”

They shook hands, then Rojas reached around Donovan and gave him a second bone-crushing bearhug.

“Be careful, Dennis. And I say that from a business perspective, not from personal concern, you understand?”

Donovan grinned. He understood exactly.

The Spaniard winked and walked away across the grass and back to the path. Donovan watched him go until he was lost in the night then he turned and went in search of a taxi.

It was just after eleven o'clock when Mark Gardner got home. He dropped his bulging briefcase by the front door and tossed his coat on to a rack by the hall table.

“Don't ask!” he said, holding up a hand to silence her.

“But if Julie or Jenny ever express any interest in entering the advertising industry, take them out and shoot them, will you?”

Laura handed him a gin and tonic and went into the kitchen. Mark stood and walked through the archway that led through to a small conservatory. He flopped down on one of the rattan sofas and swung his feet carefully up on to the glass-topped coffee table. He sighed and sipped his gin and tonic as he looked out of the french windows. Scattered around the garden were knee-high mushroom-shaped concrete structures in which were embedded small lights. They'd been installed by the previous owner of the house, along with more than two dozen garden gnomes. The gnomes had moved out with the owner, but the mushroom lights had stayed, and while their friends constantly teased them for their lack of taste, Mark and Laura had grown to like the effect at night small pools of light that looked like miniature galaxies lost in the blackness of an ever-expanding universe.

Mark sank deep into the sofa and sniffed his gin and tonic. Bubbles were still bursting to the surface and he could feel the cold pinpricks on his nose. He knew that he was drinking more than normal, but his agency had recently acquired a batch of new clients and he was keen to make a good impression. A good impression meant longer hours, and longer hours meant he was finding it harder to wind down after work. Without a few strong gin and tonics, his mind would continue to race and he'd find it impossible to sleep. Too many and he'd wake up with a headache, but so far he'd been able to maintain a happy medium. He took another sip and sighed.

Something moved in the garden, something dark, something that was striding towards the french windows. A man. Mark jumped and his drink spilled over his chest. He cursed and scrambled to his feet, the glass shattering on the tiled floor of the conservatory.

“Are you okay?” Laura shouted from the kitchen.

Mark took a step back, away from the french windows. His feet crunched on broken glass. He put his hands up defensively even though the man was a good twenty feet away and on the other side of sheets of security glass.

“Stay where you are, Laura there's someone in the garden,” As usual, his wife did the exact opposite of what he asked and came running from the kitchen.

“Who is it?”

“Stay where you are!” he yelled.

Laura appeared in the archway, a tea towel in her hands. Mark looked around for something to use as a weapon and grabbed at a heavy brass vase that they'd bought while on holiday in Tunisia. He hefted it by the neck, swinging it like a club.

The man walked up to the window, his hand raised. He was wearing a leather bomber jacket and had a baseball cap pulled low over his eyes. Mark flinched, fearing that he was going to be shot, but the man's gesture turned into a wave, and when he pressed his face against the glass, Mark sighed with relief.

“It's Den!” said Laura.

“Yes, darling, I can see that now,” said Mark, sarcastically.

Donovan took off his baseball cap and gave Mark a thumbs-up.

“Surprise!” he mouthed.

Mark realised he was still swinging the brass vase and he grinned sheepishly. He put it back on its table and went to unlock the french windows.

Donovan stepped into the conservatory and shook Mark's hand.

“That was some welcome,” he said, nodding at the vase.

“Most people use the front door,” said Mark.

“In fact, our real friends usually phone first.”

Donovan slapped Mark on the back and then rushed over to hug his sister.

“He's still a moaning bugger, then?” he said.

“Like a broken record,” she said, hugging him tight.

“I did warn you about him before you got married.”

“Yes, you did,” laughed Laura.

“I am still here, you know,” said Mark. He knelt down and started picking up the pieces of broken glass.

Donovan moved to help him put the glass splinters on a copy of The Economist.

“Didn't mean to spook you, Mark. Sorry.”

“I wasn't spooked,” said Mark.

“You caught me by surprise, that's all.”

“I didn't want to come up the front path, just in case.”

“In case we're being watched?” asked Laura, sitting down.

“Who'd be watching us, Den?”

“I dunno, Sis. I don't know who knows I'm here. Better safe than sorry.”

Mark carefully lifted up the magazine and carried it out to the kitchen. Donovan went to sit next to his sister.

“When did you get back?” she asked.

“Yesterday. How is he?”

“He's okay. Cried his eyes out the first night, now he's sort of numb. Shock.”

Donovan shook his head, his lips tight.

“I'll swing for that bastard Sharkey. And her.”

“That's not going to help Robbie, is it?” She put a hand on his shoulder.

“What are you going to do, Den?”

Donovan shrugged.

“He's going to have to come back with me. I'll get him a new passport and we'll head off.”

“To the Caribbean?” she said, scornfully.

“You say that like it's a bad thing.”

“What about his school? His friends? Us?”

“It won't be for ever, Laura. There are schools there. He'll make friends. You and Mark can come out on holiday.”

Mark appeared at the door.

“What holiday?”

'I'm just saying, if Robbie and I go to Anguilla, you can come and stay."

Mark and Laura exchanged worried looks.

“What?” said Donovan.

“Nothing,” said Mark.

“Come on, spit it out.”

Mark hesitated, then took a deep breath.

“Look, it's none of my business, Den, but right now Robbie needs stability. Pulling him out of his environment and dumping him on a tropical island is going to be a hell of a shock to his system.”

“It's Anguilla. It's not Robinson Crusoe. We're not going to be fishing with safety pins and drinking from coconuts. It's more bloody civilised than this shithole called England, I can tell you.”

“Maybe, but this is home. Anyway, I'm not arguing with you. Robbie's your son. End of story. What do you want to drink?”

“JD and soda,” said Donovan.

“You'll be lucky,” said Laura.

“You can have whisky and like it.”

Donovan grinned.

“Okay, but the good stuff, none of that Bells crap.”

Mark disappeared back into the sitting room.

“He's right, you know,” said Laura.

Donovan nodded.

“Yeah, I know, but the UK's just too hot for me now.” He rubbed his hands over his face.

“Shit.”

“What?”

“I've just remembered. Anguilla's probably not the safest place in the world for me now, either.”

“Why's that?”

Donovan flashed her a rueful smile.

“Small run-in with some Colombians.”

“Hell's bells, Den. And you want Robbie to get involved in that?”

“I'll get it sorted, don't worry.”

“You make sure you do, Den. I'm his godmother, don't forget, and that includes me being responsible for his moral upbringing.” She was only half joking.

“He can stay here, you know. As long as needs be. The kids love him. So do we.”

“I know, Laura, but I'm his father.”

“I know you don't want to hear this, but the fact that you were his father didn't stop you gallivanting off to the Caribbean for months at a time, did it?”

“Gallivanting?” grinned Donovan.

“You know what I mean.”

Mark returned with a tumbler of whisky and soda for Donovan and a fresh gin and tonic for himself. Laura flashed him a warning look. It was his third gin in less than an hour.

“The last one was spilt,” he said defensively and sat down on the sofa opposite them.

“Okay if I see him?” asked Donovan.

“Sure,” said Laura.

They stood up and Laura took Donovan upstairs. She pushed open the bedroom door and stood aside so that Donovan could see inside. Robbie was lying on his front, his head twisted away from the door so that all he could see was a mop of unruly brown hair on the pillow. He tiptoed over to the bunk bed and knelt down, then gently ruffled his son's hair.

Robbie stirred in his sleep, kicking his feet under the quilt.

“Don't worry, Robbie, I'm here now,” Donovan whispered. He felt a sudden flare of anger at Vicky and what she'd done. Betraying him was bad enough, but to let her son witness her betrayal, that was unforgivable.

He slipped out of the bedroom and Laura closed the door quietly. They went back downstairs and into the conservatory.

Donovan picked up his whisky and soda and paced up and down. Laura sat down next to Mark, her hand on his knee.

“Has she called?”

Laura nodded.

“Day before yesterday. She said she wanted to speak to him, but I said he was asleep and told her to call back today. She didn't.”

“She calls again, just hang up, yeah?”

Laura nodded.

Mark leaned forward, his hands cupping his gin and tonic.

“No offence, Den, but how much trouble are you in?”

Donovan smiled thinly. A very angry Colombian on his trail and sixty million dollars missing from his bank accounts. Quite a lot, really.

“I'll be okay,” he said.

“The police are going to be after you, aren't they?”

Donovan's smile widened. About the only good news he'd had so far had been from Dicko telling him that the police didn't have anything on him yet. He shook his head.

“They'll be watching me, but there's no warrant. And I'm not planning on being a naughty boy while I'm here, Mark. Cross my heart. I don't intend to be here more than a few days.”

“I wasn't being .. . you know .. .” said Mark. He tailed off, embarrassed.

“I know. It's okay.”

“It's just that we've got a business .. . obligations .. .”

“Mark!” protested Laura.

“Leave him alone!”

Donovan held up his hand to silence her.

“Laura, it's okay. Honest. I understand what he means. Mark, I'll be keeping my nose clean, I promise. And I'm really grateful for what you and Laura are doing for Robbie.”

Mark leaned over and clinked his glass against Donovan's. They toasted each other.

“I'm sorry, Den. Bit stressed, that's all.”

Donovan waved away his apology, then asked Laura if she'd had the locks changed. She went into the sitting room and came back with a set of gleaming new keys and a piece of paper on which she'd written the new code for the burglar alarm system. Donovan took them, drained his glass and then gave his sister a big hug.

“I'm off,” he said.

“I'll drop by and see Robbie tomorrow, yeah? And don't tell him I was here tonight, okay?”

Donovan shook hands with Mark, then left through the french windows, keeping in the shadows as he headed back down the garden.

“Who was that masked man?” whispered Mark.

Laura put her arm around his waist.

“He's really pissed off, isn't he?” she said.

“Understatement of the year.”

“God, I hope he doesn't do anything stupid.”

“I think it's too late for that.” Mark put his arm around her shoulder and pulled her closer to him.

Donovan flagged down a black cab and had it drop him a quarter of a mile away from his house. He put his hands in the pockets of his bomber jacket and kept his head down as he walked along the pavement on the opposite side of the road to his house. He walked slowly but purposefully, his eyes scanning left and right under the peak of the baseball cap. There were no occupied cars, and no vans that could have concealed watchers. A young couple were leaning against a gate post devouring each other's tongues but they were way too young to be police. An old lady was walking a liver-coloured Cocker spaniel, whispering encouraging noises and holding a plastic bag to clean up after it.

Donovan checked out the houses opposite his own. There was nothing obvious, but if the surveillance was good then there wouldn't be. He walked on. At the end of the road he turned right. Donovan's house was in a block which formed one side of a square. All the houses backed on to a large garden, virtually a small park with trees and a playing field big enough for football, though the garden committee had banned all ball games. Dogs had also been forbidden to use the garden, and there was a string of rules which were rigidly enforced by the committee, including no music, no organised games, no shouting, no drinking, no smoking. Donovan had always wondered why they didn't just ban everyone from the garden and have done with it.

The garden could be entered from the back doors of the houses, but many of them had been converted into apartments, and those on the upper floors, considered as poor relations by the omnipotent garden committee, had to use a side entrance. One of the keys on the ring that Laura had given him opened the black wooden gate that led to the garden. Donovan stopped to tie his shoelaces, taking a quick look over his shoulder. A black cab drove by, its "For Hire' light on, but other than that the street was deserted. Donovan opened the gate and slipped inside.

He stood for a minute listening to the sound of his own breathing as his eyes became accustomed to the gloom. There were lights on in several of the houses, but most of the large garden area was in darkness. Donovan walked across the grass, looking from side to side to check that no one else was taking a late evening stroll. He was quite alone. For all he knew, the committee had probably issued an edict forbidding residents from using the garden after dark.

He walked quickly to his house. A flagstoned patio area was separated from the garden by a knee-high hedgerow and a small rockery, and as he walked across it a halogen security light came on automatically. There was nothing Donovan could do about the light but he took off his baseball cap. If any of the neighbours did happen to look out of the window, it would be better that they recognised him and didn't think that he was an intruder. As he unlocked the back door, the alarm system began to bleep. He closed the door and walked to the cupboard under the stairs and tapped out the four-digit number that Laura had given him. The alarm stopped bleeping. Donovan left the lights ofF just in case the house was under surveillance.

Donovan went into the kitchen and took a bottle of San Miguel out of the fridge. He opened it and drank from the bottle.

“Home sweet home,” he muttered to himself. It had never felt like home, not really. During the past three years he doubted if he'd spent more than eight weeks in the house. Vicky had bought all the furniture and furnishings, with the exception of the artwork, assisted by some gay designer she'd found in her health club. Donovan couldn't remember his name, but he could remember a close-cropped head, a gold earring and figure-hugging jeans with zips up either leg. He might have been a freak, but Donovan had to admit he'd done a terrific job with the house. Turns out he'd studied art at some redbrick university and he'd been impressed with Donovan's collection some of the rooms he'd designed around the paintings, much to Vicky's annoyance.

Donovan went into the study and checked the safe, even though Laura had already told him that it was empty. He stared at the bare metal shelves and cursed. He wondered if Sharkey had been with her when she'd emptied it. Vicky would have thought about the passport, and probably regarded the cash as hers, but would she have realised the significance of the Spar-buch passbooks in the manila envelope? Donovan doubted it, but Sharkey certainly would have known what the passbooks were, and what they were worth. Donovan slammed the safe door shut and put the painting back in place. He ran his fingers along the gilded frame and smiled to himself. Luckily Sharkey was as ignorant of art as Vicky. The oil painting of two yachts was more than a hundred years old, and together with its partner on the opposite wall was worth close to half a million dollars. They were by James Edward Buttersworth, an American painter who loved yachts and sunsets, and both were used to good effect in the two pictures.