Vampire "Unseen" (Vampire "Untitled" Trilogy Book 2) (26 page)

There could be police here. Be paranoid.

He took a taxi ride along the road, past Wendy’s guesthouse. He asked the driver to go slow. He scanned the parked cars looking for a plain van large enough for hiding cops. He saw nothing. He got out of the taxi at the far end of the road and took a seat in the window of a workman’s café with a view of the road. There was no activity. He saw a woman with a pushchair, some old people standing at a bus stop, young black kids wearing hoodies sauntering along when they should be in school.

He took a cup of tea whilst he watched the street. That was when he noticed the fingers of his right hand were trembling and his left hand had an automatic action like it was rolling a pill between thumb and forefinger. He looked at them, concentrated and brought the right hand completely under control. The left hand wanted to roll the pill as a compulsion and it took longer to make it stop.

“Can I do this?” he mumbled to himself.

As a challenge he thought about grabbing his knives and was astonished at how quickly his hands moved. They went under the jacket, cross handed, grabbed the handles and flicked the safety catches off the yoke in a split second. He did not withdraw the knives. In the action he bumped the table slightly, ripples moved back and forth across the cup of tea. His grip on the knives was sure and firm and any trembling vanished until he relaxed his hands. If there was trouble he would slash his way out of it.

He paid for the tea.

He left the café.

He formulated a strategy. If the police came when he approached the B&B he would enter the guesthouse, run through the kitchen and hope there was an exit to a back street. He remembered a saying from a forgotten commando book that said, ‘when under siege, always take the hard way out.’ If there was an ambush waiting he wouldn’t run into it. He would drag them out the hard way in a chase that involved climbing walls, navigating back alleys and avoiding his knives.

The bed and breakfast loomed close. He casually looked for curtain twitchers in the nearby properties. He didn’t look at the guesthouse until right on it, then sharply turned into the front door.

There was a man sitting in a chair by the empty reception desk. He was about forty, dressed in a suit that made him look one hundred percent like a policeman.

Paul shot a hand under his jacket and popped the press stud open. The man didn’t move but they started at one another for a few uncomfortable seconds.

“Afternoon,” the man said.

Paul waited a few more seconds. “Good afternoon,” he said with some strain. He forced himself to clip the press stud back into place and approached the desk.

The door leading to the guest rooms opened and a woman appeared. Paul flinched at the sight of her and again his arm tried to go under his jacket.

The man in the chair stood up. “Are you ready?” he asked the lady.

“Yes, sorry, I’ve got everything now.”

The couple moved together to the door. The man nodded at Paul on his way out. A simple acknowledgment to someone he didn’t wish to speak with.

Then he was alone. It was quiet. There was the smell of carpet and furniture polish in the air, a clean factory smell that he hadn’t noticed the last time he was here. He stood at the door and looked through the window into the street. He watched the couple walk away, he looked at all the houses opposite. There didn’t seem to be anyone waiting for him.

“Oh, Mr. Jay. You did come back.” The voice came before he even felt her presence. Behind the reception desk were a few small steps leading to a back office. Wendy was lifting herself up them.

“Hello. Can I have the room key, please.”

“Yes you can, you can. How was your trip?”

“Ahhh, you know, boring. Useful but boring.”

Wendy located a key from under the desk and handed it over. Paul was waiting for her to initiate conversation on a delivery.

“Wendy, did a letter or anything...”

“Oh, yes. I forgot. Just a moment. She left the key on the desk and turned to venture back into her mysterious office down the stairs. He listened to what sounded like an old filing cabinet drawer opening and closing. She returned with a simple A5 envelope. “This came by a chap on a motorbike for you.”

It was what it looked like. A courier service document.

“Brilliant. Thank you, Wendy.”

She put the packet on the desk beside the key. “So how long are you here this time, are you back to staying every night?”

“I think so, I may have to do one or two chores that might take me away so if you don’t see me for breakfast don’t worry.”

“Right you are then, my lovely.”

Paul paused for a second. He stared down at the room key and the packet. Somehow he felt if he touched them that would be the signal for a police raid.

He dared.

He picked them up.

He thanked Wendy again and went to his room, listening intently for her to make a phone call. There was nothing. There was nobody here. There was nobody looking for him.

In his room he sat on the edge of the bed and teased open the envelope. Out fell a brand new burgundy coloured passport. He flicked to the identity panel on the back inside cover. Alan Jay with his proud grey moustache and slicked back grey hair stared forward expressionless.

He’d won. He’d fucking done it.

----- X -----

Paul was standing outside the International Hotel in Victoria. There was much danger here and his hands trembled and his throat felt unnaturally dry. What the hell was he doing? What was he supposed to do next?

His eyes wandered over the building, a sixties remnant that looked like a car parking structure and operated like a bus station. Tourist coaches rumbled their engines, people pushed past pulling trolley bags, conversations in a multitude of languages.

The courtyard of the hotel was covered in an overhanging roof that supported a beige coloured tower of guest rooms. He walked around the building and discovered a car parking space underground, a faint smell of petrol came from the entrance. Paul could see a few high-end cars parked up. A horn beeped behind him that echoed back out from the garage, a man in a hotel uniform driving a silver Mercedes was waiting to enter the garage. Paul stepped aside and watched the car glide into the space.

Entering the lobby, Paul could see the hotel was designed for huge amounts of traffic. There were several conference rooms and he took a moment to blend in by reading from a display screen on the wall.

He walked around the lobby. He watched a tanned American man with silvery hair call a room from the concierge desk. He noticed the telephone. It had a digital display which showed the room number he was calling.

Paul spoke to one of the porters.

“Hi. Could you call a guest room for me? I don’t know the room number but the name is Latis, Corneliu Latis.” The porter typed the name into a computer to search. Paul scanned the lobby. Suitcases everywhere. Japanese people standing in a line to check in whilst perusing city maps. Bustle.

“There we are, Sir.” The porter handed over the telephone receiver and turned his attention to another guest seeking help.

The phone rang.

Paul didn’t want it answered.

All he wanted was to read the display.

2236 LATIS, COR

He discretely pressed the hook with his finger to end the call but remained holding the receiver. When the porter turned back to him after a minute or so, Paul put the receiver down and nodded an acknowledgement.

Two two three six. From outside Paul hadn’t imagined the building having twenty two floors, nor could he imagine a floor having over two hundred rooms. The number didn’t quite fit the hotel layout.

He took the elevator to the second floor and stepped out into a corridor of brown carpet, cream walls and dark brown doors. Everything had brass fixtures. Door handles, door numbers, wall lights. Brown and brass, stylish but subtle. The elevator doors slid closed behind him and the gentle sound of the departing carriage faded to leave nothing but the soft purr of air conditioning. He felt like he was trespassing. He was at a T-junction of corridors. A sign ahead of the elevators pointed the way. 201 to 216 to the left. 221 to 229 to the right. 231 to 239 straight ahead. He was frozen, unsure which way to go when a swing door opened to a maid pushing a trolley. “Good aff-noon, Sir,” she said with a heavy accent.

“Excuse me,” he said. “My friend is in a room here. He said to telephone the room I should dial two two three six.

“Room two three six?” she said pointing along a corridor.

“Is that the number, not two two three six.”

“For telephone make two first, then room number. Two three six.”

“Oh, I see,” Paul said. “Two is the prefix, then the room... OK, got it.”

He didn’t say thank you. She turned back to her trolley and left. Paul entered the corridor marked 231 to 239 and paused.

He could see room 236.

What the hell was he doing?

He had a passport. He had money. He had the means to escape.

Escape.

That had been the plan all along. Evade and escape. He had money, a passport, a new identity. What was he doing? Logic took over. He turned around and left feeling hot and uncomfortable. He pressed the button for the elevator praying that Corneliu Latis didn’t come out of the room behind him to stand by his side waiting for the lift.

----- X -----

There was a queue at Waterloo station. A train ticket to Paris was what he wanted, all they had that departed today was first class on a late evening train.

“First class? Sure, why not,” Paul said with a smile. He had to go into the backpack and draw extra notes from a wad of money to pay. It was only five-thirty in the evening and the train didn’t depart until ten-thirty. There was extra security to board a cross-channel train but he had hours to spare. He was free.

Except for Latis.

Except for the stupid idea to interrogate him.

He was angry that he’d froze in the hotel. That wasn’t the behaviour of a bold man. He thought on it for a second and reconciled it as the behaviour of a cautious and sensible man, a man who was careful not to get caught.

Fuck that. They couldn’t catch him. If Corneliu Latis had appeared he would have sliced and diced him. So why was he afraid? There was no reason to be afraid, not of him, not of the man. It was something deeper… He was afraid of what he may discover.

Paul stood in the concourse. People milled around him, stores sold coffee and sandwiches, newsagents sold magazines, the departure board showed the train times, a giant video advert showed a tropical island beach holiday. Then amongst the people, far into the station, stood a naked man with marble white skin staring at Paul. Nobody else could see him. They walked around, avoiding, oblivious.

Paul made an immediate turn and avoided the creature, he walked stridently, confident, in control. The vampire was ahead of him. There would be no escaping this.

Best to do what it wants.

Paul approached the left luggage booth. His backpack was filled with banknotes and clothing. Enough money to live for a year. Only as he let go of the bag did he realise how fiercely he’d held on to it. The man ran an explosives detector over the bag and dropped it onto an x-ray machine for a final scan. He handed Paul a ticket to collect the bag later. He took the ticket and placed it in his wallet.

Paul stepped out of the station. The sky was growing dark and raindrops were visible in car headlights. Outside was cooler. People had their collars upturned and their shoulders hunched against the cold and wet, they carried bags and pulled trolley suitcases behind them, always missing the naked man standing in the street. He was always invisible to them, but Paul could see him. Paul let the cold air hit his face, feeling it give him energy. He crossed the road to escape the hubbub of the station. He raised his hand. “Taxi...” The indicator light popped and the cab pulled over. “International Hotel, Victoria,” he said.

----- X -----

Corneliu was trying and failing to relax. He was pacing the room partly out of boredom and partly nervous energy. He’d decided that he wanted to go home. He wanted to go back to Brasov and start putting his life in order. Where was his wife? Where were his children? How had he gotten to be a lonely middle aged man so bent out of shape? He was in a mode of introspection. It wasn’t unusual and would pass once he began drinking, he would care less after a few drinks, he would be calmer and more accepting. There was a bottle on the dressing table waiting to be opened but Noica had asked for a video call. The laptop was ready and connected awaiting the call. He wished Noica would call to get it over with. He needed the drink.

The room telephone rang.

“Hello, Cornel speaking.”

“Corneliu Latis?” the voice asked. It sounded distorted, deep and gravelled.

“Yes?” he replied.

“Mr. Latis, I have some information on Paul McGovern. I know where he is. I can take you there, but you need to come right now. Come to the lobby quickly. I’ll find you by the elevators.”

Corneliu almost jumped out of his skin. “Who is this?” he asked.

The line went dead.

“Hello... Hello...” He put the phone down. For a moment he was dumbstruck... then he exploded. He stuffed his mobile phone in his pocket and grabbed his coat. He would call Scotland Yard on the way. He was still pulling the coat around his shoulders as he rested his hand on the door handle. He pulled the electronic room key out of the power point by the light switch and threw the door open.

STAB.

A man pushed him backwards. There was explosive pain in his abdomen. He grabbed at it. A knife. He’d been stuck. The man was firm, wide, powerful. He pushed Cornel back into the room using a hand, holding the knife steady inside the wound to his guts.

“Jesus...” It was all Corneliu could say and it came out as a shriek.

The man walked him to the back of the room and pushed him into the armchair, withdrawing the knife. Cornel pulled at his shirt and grabbed the wound. Blood was spreading on his clothing.

“Please. Don’t...”

The lights went out.

Timed.