Chapter 14
Chapter 14
Fearghas killed the headlights. Streetlights provided enough light for him to safely navigate the road. He sped down the street, passing 10 Downing, and rounded the corner where Catya had said the limousine had turned, praying they’d catch up.
“Damn,” he muttered.
The street was empty.
“Keep going,” Catya urged. “They can’t be far ahead. We just have to find the road they turned onto. Go!”
Fearghas slammed his foot onto the accelerator, sending the rental car shooting forward.
He slowed at the first cross street they came to. He looked right; Catya looked left.
“Nothing on the left,” Catya reported.
“Nothing right.” Fearghas hit the gas pedal again.
At the next cross street, Fearghas glanced left. Taillights glowed red as a vehicle slowed to make a turn several blocks down the lane.
“Lights on the right,” Fearghas said.
“None to the left,” Catya said.
Fearghas was already turning right. He pressed his foot onto the accelerator and sped to the road where he’d last seen the red taillights.
He slowed as he approached the street, eased up to the corner and turned off the car.
The limousine had pulled up to the curb. A man dressed in dark clothing, with a cap pulled low over his forehead, stepped out of the shadows and leaned close to the vehicle.
“Get the listening device—” Fearghas started.
Catya had the device in her hand and aimed at the limousine and the man before Fearghas could finish his sentence. She settled the headset over her ears and switched it on.
For the first few seconds, she fiddled with the volume and adjusted her aim. Then she froze, a frown denting her brow.
“What are they saying?” Fearghas asked.
“I... I... don’t know.” Her eyes narrowed. “But I recognize that voice.”
“You recognize the voice?” Fearghas’s gaze went from her to the man leaning against the car and back. “Who is it?”
“I think it’s the voice of the man who killed my parents.” She shoved the listening device at Fearghas and ripped the headset off. “If it’s him... I’m going to kill the bastard.”
She had her hand on the door handle, about to yank it open, when Fearghas grabbed her arm.
“Don’t do anything,” he said. “That man might be the guy who killed your parents, but he’s talking to a man in that limousine I think could be the Deputy Prime Minister. If you go all Terminator on him, we might never get to the crux of what’s happening, and all the people involved.”
Catya’s nostrils flared. “I can’t let him get away with what he did.”
“And we won’t let him get away with it. But we have to know all the players.”
Catya released the door handle.
“Get the camera,” Fearghas ordered as he slipped the headset over his ears and pointed the listening device at the man leaning against the car.
The man had a gravelly voice with a hint of a Cockney accent, made even more difficult to understand by the distance and static in the device.
Fearghas increased the volume.
The guy on the street was saying, “... said he’d be a minute...” He shoved his hands into his pockets and shrugged. “I don’t know. Ask him. I’m just the messenger.”
Catya raised the camera with the long-range lens and focused on the man beside the limousine. She snapped several shots. “What’s he saying?”
“I think they’re waiting on someone,” Fearghas said. “I can’t hear the man inside the vehicle, just the one standing in the street.”
“None of them can be traced back to us,” the gravel-voiced guy said. “We took care of your guy before we left Bruges. Yeah. The bitch got away. Didn’t have time to go back and take care of her.” The man turned toward the building behind him, giving Catya a better angle of his face.
She snapped more pictures.
“Here he comes now,” the gravel-voiced man said and stepped back as another guy dressed in dark pants, a black jacket and a dark flat cap descended a set of stairs.
As he passed the gravel-voiced man, he murmured, “Get off the street before anyone sees you.”
“Ain’t no one out this time of the night,” the gravel-voiced man protested.
“Just go,” the other man said and climbed into the limousine.
As soon as the door closed, the vehicle pulled away, leaving the other man standing on the sidewalk, grumbling. He shot a finger at the disappearing limousine, turned and walked toward the end of the street where Fearghas and Catya sat in the car.
They couldn’t drive away without drawing attention to themselves.
“Duck,” Fearghas shoved the listening device to the floor between his legs and leaned low over the console, his fingers wrapping around the gun in the shoulder holster beneath his jacket.
Catya laid the camera on the floor and bent double.
Fearghas held his breath, listening to the sound of footsteps getting closer.
The footsteps stopped.
His hand tightening around the pistol grip, Fearghas got ready to spring up and shoot if he had to.
Then the footsteps started again, getting closer until they passed on the sidewalk beside the car and continued, fading away.
Fearghas rose enough to peer through the rear window. The man continued walking until he reached a motorcycle parked on the sidewalk. He slung a leg over the seat, fired up the engine and drove back toward them.
“Stay down,” Fearghas said and hunkered low in the car until the motorcycle drove past.
As soon as it did, Fearghas sat up and looked for a license plate on the back of the bike. There wasn’t one.
Catya sat up and laid the camera across her lap. “No license plate?”
“No,” he said. “Did you get some shots of the new guy?”
“I did.”
“Send them to my phone. I’ll get Dmytro and Swede working on identifying them through facial recognition software.”
Catya did as he requested.
Once Fearghas sent the photos to Dmytro and Swede, he started the engine.
“Why didn’t you follow the man on the motorcycle?” Catya asked.
“I thought about it,” Fearghas said. “But he might have caught on to the fact he was being followed. I don’t want anyone to know we’re here and spying on them. Not until we get a better idea of all the players in this game. The fact that the Deputy Prime Minister is conversing with the man who could have been the one who killed your parents makes me wonder how deep the rot has spread in the government and what’s motivating those involved.”
“Money,” Catya said. “Money motivates everything.”
“Shall we head back to Cassandra’s flat and continue our stakeout?”
“We already know she’s in bed with the Deputy Prime Minister,” Catya said. “From the familiarity my parent’s killer displayed with the DPM, I’d say he’s in up to his eyebrows.”
“We really need to know what they’re up to and why it was so important to get that disk back.”
Catya nodded. “Why it was important enough to kill for.”
Fearghas drove back to Cassandra’s flat and parked in the street a block away.
“It’ll be daylight soon. You might as well get some sleep. I’ll keep watch.”
“What about you?” she asked. “You need rest.”
“I’ll get it later when the others take over,” he said.
“Then I’ll do the same,” she said and rested the camera on her lap, flipping back through the photos she’d taken. “I hope facial recognition software can use these images. Their faces were shadowed much of the time.” She played with one image, enlarging it and zooming in on the mystery man’s face. She held up the camera for Fearghas to see. “Does he look familiar?”
Fearghas studied the face and shook his head. “No.”
“If we could get into Cassandra Miles’s home and locate the disk, do you think she might have decrypted the data? What if she has more information on her computer that might help us?”
Fearghas tilted his head, considering her suggestion. “It might be worth a try.”
“We could go in, posing as a cleaning service or maintenance crew.”
Fearghas smiled and touched her cheek. “You’re amazing the way you change into different people so quickly and blend into the background.”
She shrugged. “To be a good spy, you have to be able to hide in plain sight.”
“Which you’ve mastered.” He brushed his thumb over her bottom lip.
“Being able to disappear has kept me alive all these years.” She leaned into his palm and pressed her lips to his lifeline. “It’s easy to disappear when you’re alone.”
“Being alone is also very...” he leaned over the console and brushed his mouth across hers, “... lonely.”
She licked her bottom lip where his had been a second ago. “Relationships make you vulnerable.”
He cupped the back of her head and pressed a kiss to the tip of her nose. “Is that such a bad thing?”
“It is if the one you love becomes a target or leverage to get to you,” she whispered. “Don’t do this.”
“Do what?” he breathed against her ear. “This?” He caught her earlobe between his teeth and nibbled gently.
“Yes. That,” she said, breathily.
“Or this?” He placed feather-soft kisses along the line of her jaw, angling toward her mouth.
Catya moaned, turned her head and captured his mouth with hers, her hands encircling the back of his head to pull him closer.
Fearghas barely felt the console digging into his ribs or notice the awkward twist of his neck as he plundered her mouth in a kiss that reminded him how much he’d missed her.
When he had to come up for air, his breathing was ragged and his groin so tight, he couldn’t have moved if he’d tried.
Catya touched fingers to her lips, her forehead puckering. “You make it even harder for me to walk away.”
“Then don’t,” he said. “Never walk away from me again, and you’ll make me the happiest man.”
She shook her head. “I can’t.”
“Or you’ll put me in danger?” He took her hands in his. “I’m willing to accept the risk.”
“I’m not.” She squeezed his hands. “I could never forgive myself if someone hurt you because of me.”
“And I choose to live with that risk rather than live without you.” He raised her hands to his lips. “I choose you.” Before she could protest, he went on. “I chose you in Moscow. I chose you in Scotland when the Roxburgh mansion exploded. I chose you in Athens, and I chose you in Bruges. I always have and always will choose you. Risk be damned.”
“I can’t,” she said, pulling her hands free of his. “You deserve a better life than one with me.”
Catya turned away as she gazed out the front windshield, frowning.
The sun had yet to tip over the horizon, but the gray light of pre-dawn grew lighter in the sky.
Even frowning, Catya was the most beautiful woman Fearghas had ever met. The frown only made her look fierce, which she was. It was the trait he loved most about her. How could he convince her to stay with him?
“Catya, there is no better life for me than one with you.”
Her frown deepened. Not the reaction he’d hoped for.
“You’re the only?—”
She held up a hand to silence him. “There’s a woman leaving Casandra’s flat.” She glanced at her watch and back at the woman descending the stairs. “It’s too early to go to the shops or a beauty salon.”
Fearghas studied the woman wearing a cream-colored pencil skirt that clung to her hips, thighs and calves. She pulled the lapels of a matching overcoat up to her chin as she stood on the sidewalk.
A white Mercedes sedan spun up beside her. The driver didn’t get out to open the door for her. Instead, Cassandra opened her own door and slid into the passenger seat.
Fearghas started to shift into gear to follow.
Catya laid a hand on his arm. “We can follow or check out her home while she’s gone.”
He hesitated for a moment. “She probably has a security system.”
Catya gave him a secretive smile. “I can be very disarming when I set my mind to it.”
He chuckled, immediately turned on by her sexy innuendo. “I bet you can.”
“So?”
“We’re breaking into her flat.” He shifted into gear. “Let me park away from here.”
He found a place to park two blocks away. In the blurry pre-dawn light, they hurried back to Cassandra’s flat and slipped around to the rear of the set of connecting flats.
Fearghas counted the number of flats until he arrived at the gate leading into the tiny garden off the back of Cassandra’s unit.
He looked for security cameras, finding none on the back corners or over the back door.
Catya pointed to the only tree in the garden. It grew up past the rooftop, the branches shading a patio paved with stone, one of which was fairly close to the balcony on the second floor. “I can climb up and unlock it from the inside.”
Fearghas shook his head. “I’ll do it.” When she gave him a stubborn glare, he reasoned, “I’m taller, have a longer stride and more upper body strength.” He grinned. “But you can give me a boost.”
Catya rolled her eyes and cupped her hands. He stepped into them, reached up to the lowest branch and pulled himself up. He quickly climbed to a branch that came within four feet of the balcony.
Fearghas leaped from the branch to the balcony, the toe of one foot catching between two wrought iron rails, his hands gripping the top rail.
Almost immediately, his toe slipped from its perch.
Fearghas fell, catching himself by hooking his arms over the rail. He swung his leg up over the top and rolled onto the balcony. He pushed to his hands and knees and stood, giving Catya a thumbs up.
She stared up at him with a hand pressed to her chest. “I won’t have to worry about someone killing you,” she said in a harsh whisper. “You’re going to do it all by yourself.”
Fearghas shook his head and tried the handle of one of the French doors. It was locked, but the lock between the two sides of the door was loose. He gripped both handles and gave them a sharp yank.
The doors opened without breaking the lock or the door.
He stepped into a sitting room with a modern white leather sofa, a glass-topped coffee table and two glass-topped end tables. The floor was a gray hardwood with a fluffy black shag area rug in front of the white sofa.
Fearghas tread lightly through the room in case Cassandra Miles didn’t live alone. Three doors led off the sitting room. The door to the right was open to a large bedroom with a huge bed in the center. The one to the left was an office with an ebony desk and a white leather office chair. He went on to the door directly across from the French doors, finding that it led to a landing that overlooked a living area on the floor below.
Fearghas entered the only other room on that floor to discover a guest bedroom decorated in seafoam green and white. The bed was neatly made as if ready for a guest to drop in at any time.
Knowing Catya would be impatiently waiting for him to let her in, Fearghas glanced over the landing railing to the living area below, searching for interior cameras.
When he didn’t see any, he descended the stairs to the main level, found a hallway to the rear of the townhouse and unlocked the back door.
“Took you long enough,” Catya groused. “Any cameras or a security system?”
Fearghas shook his head. “Surprisingly, no. Or at least not that I could tell.”
“Then let’s make this quick. I don’t want her housekeeper to arrive while we’re poking through her belongings.”
They went room by room on the ground level, starting with the laundry room, kitchen and then the living room with its two-story ceiling and sleek, stylish furniture. A short stack of mail was the only personal item lying around.
“Is it kind of sterile to you?” Catya asked.
Fearghas nodded. “That’s a good word for it. No photos of Cassandra or any family members, including the husband, who died several years ago. She has an office upstairs off the master suite. I ducked in, but not long enough to look around.”
They climbed the stairs and looked around the sitting room, studying a bookshelf against one wall filled with classic books and picture books of iconic places like Rome, Greece and Egypt.
Fearghas opened a few of the books to check for any items tucked inside.
When Catya wandered into the study, Fearghas followed.
A laptop lay on the desk.
Catya lifted it, inspecting the exterior first. She tapped the side, pointing at a specific port. “It has a place for a disk like the one we had.”
She opened the laptop.
The screen came up without requiring a password.
“No password?” Fearghas shook his head. “Anyone could get into it.”
Catya tapped several keys. “There should be someplace that shows the most recent files or documents opened.” After several more clicks, she found what she was looking for. “There.” She pointed to a line indicating a file had been opened from an external drive. “I bet that was the disk.”
Catya looked around the desk, opened drawers and practically stood on her head to look at the underside of the desk for any hidden compartments. “Unless she has a really good hiding place, it’s not here.”
Fearghas walked around the room, checking behind wall art for a secret safe, finding nothing. “If she didn’t want someone to break into her flat and steal it, she would have taken it with her and kept it on her person.”
“Or stored it in a safe deposit box in a bank,” Catya suggested.
“Or given it to someone else like the Deputy Prime Minister,” Fearghas said. “She has to be involved in this.”
A noise from somewhere below made Catya and Fearghas freeze.
Sounds of pans rattling came from the kitchen below.
“Cleaning staff?” Catya asked.
Fearghas nodded. “Probably. It’s time to leave.”
Catya tiptoed across the floor and into the sitting room, where she eased the door to the landing closed and twisted the lock in the doorknob.
Fearghas headed for the French doors, closed one side carefully, twisting the lock to the open position. As Catya stepped out onto the balcony, the sound of footsteps came from the staircase.
“Someone is coming,” he whispered to Catya.
She stared at the limb four feet from the balcony, gauging the leap it would take.
“I’ll go first,” Fearghas said. He stepped onto the wooden top rail and then leaped across, landed on the thick branch and dropped down to hug it until he had his balance secured.
Then he pushed to his feet and held out his hand toward Catya. She reached for it but came up about a foot short.
She glanced over her shoulder, shook her head and then flung herself across, hitting Fearghas hard enough to knock him backward. His back smacked against the tree trunk. For a moment, he held steady with Catya in his arms.
He glanced through the windows of the French door into the sitting room. The doorknob jiggled.
Fearghas switched places with Catya, leaning her against the tree trunk, and then dropped down to the next branch. He held up his arms.
“I’ve got this,” Catya said softly. “Keep going.”
Fearghas swung to the next limb and dropped the last six feet to the ground. As soon as he landed, he looked up in time to catch Catya as she dropped from the last limb.
She landed in his arms, kissed him on the lips and then dropped to the ground. “Let’s get out of here before whoever is in there looks out the back window.” Catya dashed for the back gate.
Fearghas followed, latching the gate quietly behind him. They hurried to where they’d parked the car.
As Fearghas settled behind the steering wheel, his cell phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and read the text, his heartbeat leaping into overdrive.
“What?” Catya said as she buckled her seatbelt.
He held out the phone with the text message.
Dmytro: Lucie cracked the code. She decrypted the data. And the photos you took of the guy who got into the Deputy Prime Minister’s car…? Hank showed them to Peter Atkins. He recognized him as his boss, Walter Sykes.
Catya’s lips pressed into a thin, tight line. “Sykes is the MI6 director. I thought he looked familiar, but I’ve only actually met him face-to-face once. He’s the man who sent me and Atkins to kill Gia Rosolino.”