‘I’m not going to tell him,’ she spits. ‘You think I am going to tell my husband about us? You think so, Alec? Is this what you would do? Show me what these men did to you. Show me the marks on your body.’
‘There are no marks.’
But she is tearing at my clothes, tugging at the buttons so that one of them falls loose and flies free of my shirt. It is quite dark in the room and her reaction to the bruising on my chest is not as awful as it might have been. She just bites her lip and juts out her chin, eyes stung by shock.
‘ Dios mio, que te han hecho? ’ Sofia arrives at an immediate decision, shaking her head. ‘You have to stop this thing now, Alec. These people are very serious. I do not want any more letters. I do not want any more photographs. I do not want them to hurt us. They will kill you next time, no? I want you to promise me that you will stop this.’
‘I promise you that I will stop this.’
And we are finished. It is over between us. I cannot see you any more.’
I suppose I am touched by the fact that she trips on these words, but a stubborn part of me won’t let her leave. I need her now, more than I have ever done, if only to be comforted by her. I cannot be alone any longer.
‘Don’t say that. Please don’t overreact. If I pull out of the deal they’ll leave us alone.’ I attempt to hug her, but she twists her body away from mine as if I am still hateful to her. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘Don’t touch me!’ She looks at me with such contempt. ‘You think I want to touch you after you involve me with this? You have never told me the truth about anything.’
But in the same movement she returns to me, placing her arms around my back so that I can pull her towards me. She is suddenly beautifully still, defeated, her face turned against my chest. Her hair smells so beautiful as she tries to find her breath. I kiss her head, breathing in the sweet caress of her forgiveness, saying, ‘ Lo siento, mi amor, lo siento. Por favor perdoname, ’ but wondering all the time if this woman is still playing me for a fool. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt you,’ I tell her. ‘I had no idea that they would threaten you.’
And she says, ‘I need you, Alec. I hate you. I cannot leave,’ and tilts her head to kiss me.
34. House of Games
I sleep for thirteen hours straight, beyond Sofia’s leaving, beyond check-out at the hotel. It is the middle of Tuesday afternoon by the time I wake up, as if from a coma, wrapped in a warm sweat of deep relaxation. For a long time I simply lie in bed staring at the bad paintings on the walls, enjoying a rare sensation of total restedness. Kitson asked me to call him with an update on the Sofia situation, but I run a bath first and order coffee and scrambled eggs from room service before dialling his number.
‘Best if you come direct to the safe house,’ he says, ‘the flat in Tetuan.’ He texts the address to my mobile.
Kitson’s team have set themselves up in a cramped apartment block in Barrio de la Ventilla, about two kilometres north-west of the Kia towers. I take the Line 10 metro two stops beyond Plaza de Castilla to Begona, where I hail a cab and instruct the driver to loop anticlockwise around the Parque de la Paz en route to Via Limite. There’s no surveillance problem, but I walk the last two blocks just to be certain and arrive a short time after five o’clock.
‘Sleep well?’ Kitson asks as he greets me at the door.
‘Like Sonny von Bulow,’ I reply, and he smiles, ushering me into the flat.
Four spooks – two men, two women – are gathered around a small Formica-topped table in the kitchen. I recognize two of them immediately: lead on Macduff, and the woman from the tyre garage near Moby Dick. All four look up from cups of tea and smile, as if at an old, familiar friend.
‘You’ll all recognize Alec Milius,’ Kitson says, and I’m not sure if this is just small talk or a dig at my counter- surveillance technique. Either way, I’m irritated by it; it makes me look second-rate. Macduff is the first to respond, rising from his seat to shake my hand.
‘Anthony,’ he says. ‘Good to meet you.’
I was expecting something altogether different, a voice to match the bustling military gent encountered at the Prado, but that was obviously cover. Anthony has a scrambled accent – Borders, at a guess – and is dressed in stonewashed jeans with a black Meat Loaf T-shirt. Tyre lady is next, too boxed in at her seat to be able to stand, but honouring me with a look of real admiration as she stretches to shake my hand.
‘Ellie,’ she says. ‘Ellie Cox.’
The other man is Geoff, the woman, Michelle. The latter is under thirty and on secondment from the Canadian SIS. Kitson mentioned running a team of eight, so the other four must be out tracking Buscon. I am offered tea, which I accept, and sit down on a low pine bench at the head of the table. To my surprise all of them look a little bored and washed-out, and there’s a strange end-of-term atmosphere to the gathering. If they are suspicious of me, they do not show it; if anything, they seem grateful to welcome a new face into their world, somebody unknown whom they can analyse and work out. Bottles of gin and mineral water and Cacique are lined up along a narrow shelf above Ellie’s head, with cans of baked beans, some Hob Nobs and a pot of Marmite peeking out of a cupboard near the cooker. Geoff has a British car magazine open on the table in front of him and spills a little milk on it as he pours my tea. Plates and mugs are drying on a metal rack beside the sink and behind me there’s a clothes horse swamped in laundry. It must be a tight squeeze living in here with four colleagues; they must get on each other’s nerves.
‘So you’re the ones I’ve been seeing in my rearview mirror?’ I ask, an unplanned joke that successfully breaks the ice.
‘No. That was just Anthony and Michelle,’ Kitson replies, and we chat amicably together for five minutes until he says, ‘Alec, come with me next door,’ and one by one they nod and quietly go back to their cups of tea. Geoff opens the car magazine, Ellie sighs and plays with her mobile phone, Macduff picks at his ears. It’s like the end of visiting hours in a hospital. I am led down a short corridor to a bedroom at the rear of the apartment with clear views over the distant Sierras. When we have both sat down in chairs next to a television by the window, Kitson takes out a pad and a piece of paper and asks what happened with Sofia.
‘She has nothing to do with it.’
He looks understandably suspicious, as if I’m protecting her. ‘Nothing?’
‘Nothing. It was a misunderstanding.’
‘Enlighten me.’
Once again I have to admit a professional failing to Kitson. This is becoming a habit.
‘Buscon must have spotted me following him back from the Irish Rover. He put some of his government friends on my tail and threatened Sofia when they found out about our affair.’
‘What do you mean, “government friends”?’
‘I don’t know for sure. Men involved in the dirty war. Guardia Civil, CESID, Mercenaries Are Us. Buscon left the package for Sofia under the name Abel Sellini. She picked it up thinking it was connected to her work and found this inside.’
I pass the note to Kitson. He has difficulty translating the Spanish, so I do it for him.
‘Can you be sure this is from Buscon?’
‘Who else could it be from?’
Kitson’s expression hints at infinite possibilities. He looks faintly annoyed, as if I have let him down one too many times. ‘So there’s a chance that they could still be following you?’
The logical sequence of events would certainly imply a serious threat to the integrity of his operation. If Buscon had me watched long term, there’s a risk that one or more of my meetings with Kitson was compromised.
‘They’re not following me,’ I assure him, with as much force and sincerity as I can muster. ‘I’ve been clean every time we’ve come into contact.’ Thankfully, Kitson seems to accept this.
‘And Sofia?’
‘She was very upset. I told her that the note was from some Russian property developers.’
‘Mafia?’
