Sylvia Drogan was Irish. She had a lovely soft accent, and Helen felt instantly comfortable. The head of International Missing Persons was stick thin and wore a chic navy suit, and she could have passed as French. Helen smelled tobacco smoke and figured this was Sylvia’s secret to her figure.
Peter Knowles excused himself, and Helen thanked him. Sylvia got straight to work.
‘It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’ll take you straight to the incident room we’re using for this. The Algerian authorities have been fantastically transparent and we have some good CCTV from the airport there. Here in France, we’ve been searching for vehicles seen leaving Le Bourget between two thirty p.m. and three p.m.,’ Sylvia said. ‘Can I get you a drink?’
‘I’ve just had one, thanks – I’m ready to get going.’
Chapter 14
Hakim had never had dirty nails before. He studied them carefully and picked out the dirt. It was greasy, and he was able to roll up each piece of grit with his thumb and forefinger and make it into a little ball and flick it across the room. He’d witnessed two sunsets since his capture and knew, therefore, that it was Tuesday. Today was his third day in captivity and his body ached for water. The room was about three metres square. It was carpeted badly and there were stains on the beige patterns. There was a wardrobe, which he’d searched carefully, but found empty. There was also a window that had shutters locked closed across it. With little else to explore, he’d spent most of his time curled up on the only bed in the room, on which was laid an odorous mattress, a sheet, a blanket but no pillow. He stopped picking his nails and concentrated his mind once more on the timeline of the last few days, so the details could be of use when he was finally found. He dare not think of any other outcome.
On Sunday, they’d travelled for well over three hours before he asked for a toilet stop. His driver had made a phone call and had pulled into a deserted rest area on the side of the road. The hood over his face was lifted off and the restraints on his wrists cut. The sunshine hurt his eyes. It was made clear to him that a weapon was loaded and inside the driver’s jacket. Hakim harboured no desire to run, he just needed to piss. That’s when he noticed the car behind him, which he’d suspected had been following them from the airport: driven by a man who’d spoken to his driver when the little girl was talking about the forest. That seemed a lifetime ago now.
Should he have run then? Should he have shouted at the mother for help?
He’d overheard the two drivers arguing as he was told to relieve himself in a bush, they had no change for a cubicle. A loan car drove past at high speed on the AutoRoute. Hakim, for a second, considered running after it but knew it would be suicidal to do so. The men who were bickering about whether or not to transfer Hakim to the other car, looked as though they wouldn’t hesitate to use lethal force.
That’s when he’d been told to get into the boot of the blue Peugeot.
The dark, tiny space made Hakim’s terror more acute and he remembered it now. But at least his hands were free and he wasn’t hooded for a second time. He’d ridden like that, rubbing his wrists, listening to the noise of the car, trying to overhear the conversations of the driver on his phone, and see daylight. He knew they’d hit another metropolis by the way the car stopped and started. Also, the driver’s annoyance with other motorists made him confident they’d arrived in another city. There were several options as to which city that could be: Grenoble, Lyon, Marseilles or even Nice. He knew they’d continued to drive south or even south-east, because he could see the sun’s rays filter into the boot through cracks. He was pretty confident that they were still in France.
The car had stopped and the boot had opened. He’d realised they were in a garage, and he’d been helped out of the car, stiff, thirsty and hot. The Range Rover wasn’t there and neither was its driver. He’d tried to keep his eyes from looking too hard at the driver of the Peugeot, but he couldn’t help staring at the gun pointing at him. It was a pistol and the man holding it looked as though he wasn’t afraid of using it. Hakim had seen plenty of amateurs holding guns, only for their hands to shake. This man’s hand was steady.
On his first morning, the door had opened and an old man came in carrying a tray. On it was a bottle of water and some pitta bread with a bowl of brown mush. The man didn’t speak, and he didn’t look at Hakim as he retreated from the room. He shut the door and Hakim grabbed the bottle, rushing to open it and gulp the contents. He sank it down in one go and the ecstasy was like nothing he’d ever come close to. He smelled the brown mush and recognised it as
