54
The hours passed drearily. Dan tried to occupy his mind by thinking about Isla’s operation which was scheduled for today, Aimee’s smile, Mischa’s hot-red cheeks from teething, but it didn’t lessen the endless pain.
When he heard a door open and a woman’s footsteps behind him, quick and light, he almost cried out in relief.
‘Untie him,’ she ordered.
Someone with a heavy tread came over to Dan. One of the men who’d snatched him, no doubt. Dan tried not to make a sound but couldn’t stop the involuntary groan when the man jerked his limbs to sever the ties.
‘Get him up.’
Dan rolled his head to see two men standing one on either side of him. Both wore balaclavas. They put their hands under his arms and heaved him upright but Dan couldn’t stand. He slumped to the floor. Lay quietly as he felt the blood rushing back into his arms and legs and feet, pumping and circulating normally again. Pins and needles fizzed on an industrial scale.
One of the men pushed at Dan with his foot. ‘Get the fuck up.’
Dan groaned in return.
He showed Dan his taser. ‘You want some more of this?’
Slowly, he shuffled to the wall and, with his palms against the damp brick, staggered upright. Stood swaying. It wasn’t difficult to pretend he was in a bad way.
The two men stood on either side of him. They were in what appeared to be a mechanic’s garage. Enough room for four vehicles. There was a pit in the middle of the floor and industrial-sized trolleys, tyres, shelves of tools lining two walls. Two plastic chairs stood to one side.
‘Sit.’
The woman pointed at one of the chairs. He sat gingerly, rotating his hands and feet to encourage his circulation.
‘I need some water,’ Dan said. His voice was raspy.
The woman clicked her fingers. One of the men walked to the corner of the garage, to a shelf containing a kettle, mugs, a jar of coffee, a big box of Tetley tea bags. He shoved a mug beneath a five-gallon water dispenser and turned the tap.
‘Two mugs,’ Dan said.
The man glanced at the woman. She said, ‘Do it.’
Dan gulped both down. Pushed them back. ‘More.’
After he’d drunk what he guessed to have been a litre of water, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and leaned back. Surveyed the woman opposite him.
Around five foot six, her figure was disguised by a heavy boiler suit. She also wore gloves and sneakers, and what raised his spirits further was that she wore a latex mask. With her men wearing balaclavas, he hoped they had every intention of letting him go, safe in the belief he’d never be able to identify them.
Her eyes were brown with little yellow flecks. Hazel. One man had blue-grey eyes, the other brown, which downturned at the edges.
‘Mr Forrester.’ Her tone was polite. ‘If you recall, you were told not to pursue the subject of flight EG220.’
He wondered which of the men had worn the latex mask when he’d delivered the note to his front door four days ago, reminding him that Jibran Bouzid’s hand reached beyond Morocco’s border.
‘Do you really want Naziha to die in that horrible way?’
She gave him a long look, one he couldn’t read.
‘He’s only a little boy,’ she went on. ‘And what about Khatabi’s daughter, Naima? Do you really want their lives cut short because you insisted on sticking your nose where it wasn’t wanted?’
Dan could picture Naziha’s bright expression, the way he hopped and danced down the street like a happy sparrow. Naima tapping her fingers on Khatabi’s car, waving her red-lacquered fingernails at the Commissaire. Her beautiful smile.
He didn’t answer.
‘Khatabi will never forgive you,’ she went on. ‘He’ll probably come over personally to kill you if we don’t do it first.’
As the water he’d drunk started to seep through his system, his head began to clear. Things began to make sense. Gerald Dunsfold, so-called science expert at BreatheZero, had called this woman to tell her Dan knew he was a fake. Jibran Bouzid, the Defence Minister who’d warned him off in Morocco, had obviously told her about Dan. Until now, Dan hadn’t connected TASS, which produced fake bomb detectors, with BreatheZero.
It was at that moment he realised that it was this woman’s fake devices that had almost got him killed in the plane crash. He stared into her eyes again, a burning rage inside his heart.
‘I take it you’re now producing fake anti-aerotoxicity masks,’ he said just as politely. ‘I can’t see you manufacturing anything that might be legitimate with your track record.’
Something flashed in the woman’s eyes. Malignant, cold.
‘You have no idea of the damage you’ve done.’
Good, Dan thought with satisfaction, but then his mind slipped to Lucy visiting the BreatheZero factory yesterday and he felt a surge of alarm. He hoped she was okay.
‘But we’re recouping with what you might call a salvage operation.’
Not so good, Dan amended, guessing that he was part of the salvage op.
‘What I want to know is: who else knows about our professor?’
Dan raced through the options. If he said nobody, then she could kill him and throw his body in the Thames and nobody would be any wiser. If he said several, she might want names so she could deal with them too.
‘Just two of us,’ he confessed.
Her eyes narrowed. ‘You and Lucy Davies?’
The shock of Lucy’s name made him flinch inside. He had to hope she hadn’t seen it.
‘No, me and my work colleague, Dennis Potton.’ If she rang his office asking for Dennis, whoever answered the phone would know Dan was in trouble. His paranoia in creating code names and code words throughout his world was proving a godsend.
‘You don’t know Lucy Davies?’
He allowed a crinkle to appear between his brows. ‘No, at least I don’t think so.’
‘You’re a remarkably good liar.’
He widened his eyes.
‘You were on that case together last year. I saw it on the news.’
Not for the first time, he hated the notoriety
