‘I’m not running away, Rebecca. I’m no coward. If Haddad shows up here we can have it out mano-a-mano.’
‘Dad, Haddad’s not going to turn up in person. He is a coward. He’ll send his henchmen and they don’t play by Queensberry Rules.’
‘I was in the SAS, remember.’ He snapped the lid of the tackle box shut and put it in the canvas bag, picked up the bag and the rod, and stood. ‘I can take care of myself.’
‘I don’t doubt it, but what if there’s three of them? Five? Ten?’
‘Did Matthew Fairchild ever tell you how I saved his life in Iraq?’
‘This isn’t the time for—’
‘Rebecca! Listen, will you? This is important!’ The temper was characteristic of her father, but there was a waver to his voice that Silva hadn’t heard before. She paused and nodded. He continued. ‘We were deep in the southern desert, exfilling from a vantage point where we’d been calling in air strikes on Iraqi Scud positions. Our hide had been compromised so we had to make a swift getaway. Fairchild was bringing up the rear when he was hit. I told the rest of the guys to head on and create a diversion while I went back for him. When I got to Fairchild it was obvious he wasn’t going anywhere fast. He’d taken a round in the knee. He told me to leave him a pistol and go, but I wasn’t having it. I got him to play dead and I scrambled up a nearby hill and hid in a gulley. About five minutes later the first of the Iraqis came round the corner. Fairchild stayed still and I allowed the soldiers to get up close. Then I opened fire. There were nine of them and I took out seven, while Fairchild got two. When I got back down to him I realised three of the Iraqis were still alive. According to the Geneva Convention they were now off-limits, but that was utter crap. If we’d left them they might have been able to attract the attention of other nearby patrols. They’d have been able to point out the direction we went.’ Her father paused and there was only the sound of a light wind brushing the rushes, a gentle lapping of little wavelets against the side of the jetty. ‘I shot them, Rebecca, one by one, and that still haunts me to this day.’
‘Dad.’ Silva moved forward. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d shown her father anything other than cursory affection, but now she wanted to tell him she loved him and cared for him.
‘No!’ Her father held up a hand. He had tears in his eyes. ‘The point is we do what is necessary to help those we care about. Right and wrong don’t come into it.’
Silva stood a pace away. Was her father saying he loved her, cared about her? ‘I don’t understand.’
‘The best chance for you is if I remain put. When they discover you’re not in Plymouth they’ll come looking here. Let’s see what kind of state they’re in after that.’
Silva nodded but she wondered if her father had slipped over into fantasy, if this wasn’t some attempt to return to a time when he was younger and fitter and a world of possibilities still lay before him.
‘Itchy’s here, Dad.’ Silva changed the subject. Her father had always liked Itchy. ‘We’ll stay over if that’s OK? Be off in the morning.’
‘Itchy?’ There was a flicker of annoyance, as if he was cross she hadn’t told him this important news straight away. The emotion of a moment ago was gone. ‘Why ever didn’t you say so, Rebecca?’
With that her father was off down the pontoon and heading for the house, shouting for Mrs Collins to bring cold beers and some of those dry-roasted peanuts they’d stocked up on at Christmas. It was all Silva could do to trot after him and wonder what it was with father–daughter relationships.
Chapter Twenty-Six
After a boozy dinner where her father and Itchy vied to tell the tallest army stories, Silva retired to one of the attic guest rooms. She lay on the bed and thought about her promise to Itchy that they’d go on the offensive. Quite how they were going to do so she had no idea. Their only chance of escaping from Haddad’s wrath would be to expose him and his dealings with the Hopes. If she could get the information her mother had discovered out into the media, then public pressure would force governments – UK, US and Saudi – to act.
She tried to sleep, but the problem wouldn’t go away and her mind was a maelstrom of competing ideas, none of which offered a solution. She wondered how her mother might have approached the problem. As a journalist she’d have gathered evidence and collated it, each piece adding to the case she would make in the story. But did Silva have all the evidence yet?
Hidden secrets.
It came to her then. The postcard of Chichester Harbour her mother had left for her.
She climbed out of bed. Her leather jacket lay over the back of a chair and the postcard was still inside one of the zip pockets. She pulled it out.
18 August
Dear Rebecca, remember the beach we used to go to here? West something or other wasn’t it? Those were happy times, good memories, a place with buried treasure and hidden secrets to be passed on from one generation to the next. I so enjoyed the many times we visited. I definitely Hope you did too. Love always and forever, Mum.
She realised with a start that the eighteenth of August was tomorrow. She reached for her phone and pulled up a map
