The Angel (23 page)

Chapter Forty-Nine

T
here was a corridor on the other side of the door. She
followed
it deeper into the house. She had decided that if she were questioned, she would say that she was looking for the bathroom and had lost her way. That seemed like it would be a legitimate situation for her to find herself in, especially if she pretended to be a little drunk.

The corridor was long, and as she walked, the noise of the party faded away behind her. Pope had shown her the architect’s plans for the property, and she had studied the satellite images from Google Maps as she was preparing for her visit. She knew that it was comprised of two large four-storey wings that were joined by the single-storey span that she was passing through. The corridor, which was more like a hallway, was glassed on both sides. The first door she passed had been marked with a sign that
indicated
it was the bathroom. That was annoying. It would be difficult to argue that she had missed it. She passed a cream sofa, a low glass table and a selection of vases and standard lamps. The open windows showed out onto a rock garden on the left and a view to the lake on the right. They were uncovered and made her feel particularly vulnerable.

She reached the end of the hallway. There were two large glass doors, and beyond them, a second vast living room. She saw a huge circular sofa, pieces of confusing modern art, an enormous television fixed to the wall and another spiral staircase in the centre that wound around a second clear glass lift shaft. There was a table with a fruit bowl. A bottle of wine and a corkscrew had been left on the table next to the bowl.

There was no one inside the room.

She opened the door and went inside.

It really was vast. She hadn’t been able to see quite how big from the other side of the doors, but now that she was inside, she saw that the ceiling reached up to the third floor, thirty feet above the ground. There was a pool outside, the water lit from beneath with a series of twinkling lights. She paused, listening. She could hear the muffled bass from the party, but nothing more.

She went further inside.

There was a door to the north.

She crossed the room, paused at the door and then, when she was satisfied that the room beyond was empty, opened it.

There was a noisy clatter from inside as something toppled over.

She clenched her teeth, her stomach tight with tension, and waited. Nothing. The noise from the party would be helpful to her now. She waited a little longer, then went inside.

It was a smaller room, but still big. There was enough space for a large desk, a roller chair and several large bookcases. There was an overturned lamp on the floor. She had knocked it over
when s
he opened the door. It looked like the room was used as a study.
She foun
d what she was looking for on the desk: a PC tower.

She crossed the room and was at the desk, ready to move the PC, when she heard someone behind her.

‘Excuse me?’

She froze. She turned and saw a well-dressed middle-aged woman.

What?

She recognised her: it was Jasmin al-Khawari, Khalil’s mother. The woman was wearing an abaya cinched by a belt featuring an oversized buckle and studded with Swarovski crystals. Her face, immaculately made up and bearing the signs of surgical intervention, was haughty and unfriendly.

What was she doing here?

She was supposed to be in Paris.

Khalil must have been mistaken, or his mother had changed her plans without telling him.

She guessed that he was about to find himself in a world of trouble.

That would be true for her, too, unless she was quick on
her fe
et.

‘I thought I heard something,’ the woman said with no attempt to mask her distaste for her. ‘You little
kafirs
running amok in
my ho
use.’

‘I’m here for the party,’ she said.

The woman’s eyes narrowed. ‘What are you doing in here, then?’

Isabella twisted her mouth into an awkward smile. ‘I’m sorry. I’m a bit lost.’

‘What are you looking for?’

‘The bathroom.’

‘Well, this
obviously
isn’t the bathroom.’

‘No, I can see that. I’m really very sorry. If you could show me where it is . . .’

Isabella took a step towards the door, but Jasmin stepped across to the side so that she was blocking it. Her lip curled with distaste as she asked, ‘Do you think I’m an idiot?’

‘No, I—’

Recognition bloomed on her face. ‘I remember you,’ she said. ‘You were the little bitch who was with Khalil.’

‘You’re overreacting, Mrs al-Khawari. You—’

The woman lunged forward and gripped Isabella around the bicep. ‘I’m not.’

‘Let go! You’re hurting me.’

‘No, I won’t let go. You know what I think? I think you came in here to steal something. That’s what you are, isn’t it? A thief?
A nas
ty, ungrateful little
kafir
thief.’

Isabella jerked her arm and managed to free it from Jasmin’s grip. The woman lost her balance and stumbled against the wall. Her face became clouded with fury, and before Isabella could
raise he
r hands to defend herself, she slapped her hard in the face. The blow was sharp and stinging, and as Isabella put her hand to her cheek, she could feel the hot blood rushing to the surface.

They paused there for a moment, staring at each other. The woman’s eyes were hot with anger.

‘You little
bitch
!’

Jasmin came at her, reaching for her arm again.

Isabella reacted. It wasn’t a question of panic; her training was much better than that. It was a hard-wired response, a reaction
rendered
automatic by hours of repetition. Her mother had taught her that in moments like this, instances of threat, there could be no equivocation. No second-guessing. The most effective self-defence requires an expression of force that either incapacitates the antagonist or makes it very clear that further aggression will be more trouble than it is worth. Her Krav Maga instructor had reinforced the message.

You didn’t stop until the threat was neutralised, knocked out, disarmed or dead.

Isabella didn’t consider any of that, at least not consciously.

She just reacted.

She dropped her right foot a half pace backward, closed her fist and delivered a straight right-handed jab. Jasmin wasn’t expecting her to strike her; her guard was down, her avid hands clutching for her, and as Isabella transferred her weight through her core, leaning from back to front, the punch landed heavily on her chin.

It knocked the woman out instantly.

Her eyes rolled back into her head and her knees buckled. She toppled forward.

Isabella caught her and lowered her the rest of the way to th
e fl
oor.

She looked back to the door. Nothing. No sound, save the thud of the bass.

She had to move quickly.

Pope had taken position on the same vantage point from where he had originally scouted the big lakeside property. The place was lit up tonight, the lights blazing and the reflection glittering far out into the dark waters of the lake. He held his binoculars to his eyes and scanned the estate, left to right, looking for anything that might suggest difficulties. He saw nothing. The last coach bearing guests to the party had arrived twenty minutes ago, waiting for the
gates t
o open and then rolling down the driveway to the courtyard area. He watched as a handful of boys and girls, wearing not very much at all, stepped outside and disappeared into the house.

The property itself offered no additional information. Most of the windows were dark and others were covered. He could see oblongs of light that were cast by the picture windows that faced the lake, but those were angled away from him, and he couldn’t see inside from this position. He would have to go up onto the wall, maybe even get into the grounds themselves, before he could get the angle to see inside them.

Something caught his attention, and as he turned his head and looked out to the south-west, he saw a glow of light as a car from the direction of Geneva negotiated the turn of the lake. The car continued towards them and then, turning the bend so that they, too, were visible, came more cars. Pope counted ten. The road was usually quiet. He had only seen three cars since he had been up here. He brought the binoculars to his eyes, found the cars and tried to identify them. It was too dark, and the glare of the headlights was too bright.

‘Control, Nine,’ he said into his microphone. ‘I’ve got a
convoy
of vehicles approaching your position from the south-west. Be aware.’

‘Copy that.’

Chapter Fifty

J
asmin al-Khawari was breathing, in and out, her eyes closed.

Isabella hadn’t planned for this. She felt a flutter of panic. No, she said to herself. She had done the right thing. There was no other choice, not if she wanted to carry out Pope’s orders. But now? She had to do something. She couldn’t just leave Jasmin here. If she awoke and sounded the alarm before she had boarded the next bus out of the estate, she would be compromised. She started to breathe a little faster. Her pulse began to run. She concentrated on maintaining her calm.

Think, Isabella. Think.

There was a long electrical flex that connected the printer to the power. She pulled the jack from the socket at the back of the device, and removed the plug from the wall. Another flex supplied power to a standard lamp; she unplugged that, too. She took the two lengths of flex and made two loops. She took off Jasmin’s shoes and secured the first one around her ankles. Then, arranging her arms so that they were behind her back, she fastened the second noose around her wrists. She cinched it tight between her wrists so that the knot was below her thumb joint, too far away for her to reach with her fingers. She pulled until both were tight and then fastened the loops together with the woman’s belt. The windows were covered by thin curtains. She yanked on one of them, hard, and tore it down from the rail. She stuffed as much of the gauzy material into the woman’s mouth as she could, unplugged the mouse and knotted the cable around her head so that it held the fabric in place.

That would have to do.

She returned to the desk and carefully turned the tower around so that she could get to the cables behind it. She remembered Pope’s instructions and, working carefully, extracted the cable for the
keyboard
from the USB port. She opened her clutch and took out the lip gloss. She removed the small component and fitted it over the cable’s USB jack. It was the same utilitarian beige, and when it was fitted, only the seam between the original jack and the
extension
suggested that there was anything there. It was hidden behind the tower, too, and would have been difficult to spot even if it was visible.

She pushed the tower back against the wall, put the lip gloss back in her clutch and went outside.

Khalil was there.

She felt a sudden emptiness inside her stomach.

‘Khalil!’ she said. It wasn’t difficult to pretend to be surprised, but she played on it. ‘You surprised me.’

‘What are you doing?’

She would have to try it again and hope for a better outcome: ‘Looking for the bathroom.’

‘Really? You walked right by them. At the start of the corridor.’

‘I didn’t see them.’

‘That’s my father’s study.’

And your mother is tied up inside it.

She faked a laugh. ‘I can see that. Embarrassing.’

He looked at her for a long moment, and she couldn’t tell whether he believed her or not.

What if Jasmin woke up and made a noise?

What would she do then?

Khalil shook his head, and a sly smile passed across his face. ‘Never mind,’ he said. ‘I don’t care where you go. At least you’re on your own.’

She felt a stir of unease. She didn’t like the way he was looking at her. ‘The bathroom is back here? Could you show me?’

He didn’t answer. Instead, he sauntered forward. ‘I saw you come in,’ he said. He pointed down to her wrist. ‘Saw you had my watch on, too. You like it?’

She started to glance around, assessing her position in the room. ‘Yes. Very much. I really need the bathroom –’

‘It was expensive,’ he said. ‘You know that, right?’

She scanned for something that she could use as a weapon. ‘
I di
dn’t ask you for it.’

He reached out with his left hand and grabbed her elbow. He pulled her arm up on the pretext of looking at the watch. ‘Didn’t say no, though, did you?’

‘Khalil, you’re hurting me.’

‘Don’t tell me you’re like the others. They all think they can take what they want from me, no need to do anything in return. But it’s not like that, is it, Daisy? Not like that at all. Nothing’s for free. Everything has a price. You know that, right?’

He took her by surprise, taking her by the shoulders and pushing her backwards against the wall. He moved with her, pressing his body onto hers, his head dipping so that he could nuzzle her ear and the side of her neck. She wriggled, trying to slide away from him, but he took her wrists in his hands and pinned them above her head. He ground his groin against her pelvis, his breath coming in ragged pants. Isabella reacted instinctively, before she had time to think. She brought her knee up, the point crashing into his crotch. His mouth fell open, and he gasped. Isabella tingled with anger. He was doubled over.

He got to his feet, gasping for breath. He sobbed.

She hesitated.

He charged her, his shoulder catching her in the midriff and sending her back into the wall with a heavy thud. The back of her head cracked against something solid and her vision was cowled for a moment, long enough for Khalil to throw a right-handed punch that landed flush on her chin. The impact forced her jaw to close and her teeth sliced down into her tongue. She felt coppery blood in her mouth. She stumbled away even as Khalil closed, his fist raised again. She backed against an armchair, slid to the side and then, as he lumbered at her, tried to hop out of the way.

She was too dazed.

He wrapped his arms around her and, taking advantage of the momentum, brought her down onto a huge sofa and fell
atop he
r.

He straddled her, pinning her waist. She tried to slap him, but he caught her right wrist in his right hand. She tried to strike him with her weaker left, but she couldn’t reach. He brushed her blow aside and slapped her, hard, across the face.

‘Who do you think you are?’ he spat at her. ‘You know how lucky you are to even be invited here?’

‘Get . . . off . . . me . . .’ she said.

‘I don’t think so.’ He managed to catch her flailing left hand and pinned it, and her right, on either side of her head. ‘You need to learn some respect.’

He leaned down toward her face. She yanked her head to the side, his tongue sliding down across her cheek. She struggled again, but he had all the leverage, and she couldn’t move him. She felt warm blood in her mouth.

Pope was blind and frustrated. ‘Snow, report.’

The agent was hiding in the undergrowth diagonally opposite the gates to the al-Khawari estate.
‘I see them,’
he radioed.
‘Ten
vehicles
. They’re stopping. Shit.’

‘What’s going on?’

‘They’re police. Repeat, it’s the police. They’re opening the gate.
It’s so
me sort of bust.’

‘Are you compromised?’

‘No, but I will be if I stay here much longer. I’m pulling back.’

Pope acknowledged the message, lowered his binoculars and took his cell phone from his pocket. He dialled and put it to his ear.

‘Bloom here.’

Pope had briefed the spook earlier that evening that the operation would go ahead tonight. He had asked to be kept fully briefed.

‘It’s Control.’

‘Go ahead.’

‘Do you have any intelligence on a police raid on al-Khawari’s house?’

‘No,’ he said. ‘Not a thing. Why?’

‘There are ten police cars outside his front gate right now. And Angel is inside.’

‘I have no idea, Control. What police?’

‘Swiss.’

‘I’ll make some calls.’

Pope heard Snow’s voice in his other ear. ‘Hold the line, sir.’
He mut
ed the phone. ‘Control, Nine. What is it?’

‘They’re taking the gates down. And it gets more interesting. A man and a woman just got out of the car at the back of the line. They’re both wearing FBI windbreakers.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Positive. Clear as day.’

‘Where are you?’

‘Further back. I think I’m okay here.’

‘Keep watching.’ He took the phone off mute. ‘Sir, the FBI are here too. You need to find out what’s happening. I am badly unsighted here. Repeat, Angel is inside the property.’

‘I understand,’ Bloom said. ‘I’ll make a call and get back to you. Stay in position.’

Pope put the phone back into his pocket and brought the
binoculars
to his eyes again.

Snow spoke.
‘They’re through the gate.’

He was right. Pope watched as the first car turned off the road and onto the driveway. The other cars edged forward. Blue and red lights flashed from the police cars as they raced to the house. The car at the rear of the line was a dark sedan with tinted windows.

The FBI? What was going on?

Isabella.

There was nothing he could do to help her until Bloom got back with details of what was going on.

Until he did, she was on her own.