Wolf

  ‘Suicide?’

  ‘Nothing to suggest that. No sightings of the car. No one here in the office is interested – she’s not a vulnerable person – but I was just trawling through the database this morning and this popped out at me because she lives so close to where Kable killed those teenagers. Rose Cottage in Litton – not a million miles away from the crime scene.’

  ‘You said she’s divorced?’

  ‘Yes. Her ex is in Wincanton. He hasn’t heard from her, but he says he wouldn’t expect to.’

  ‘Has Ginny got a dog?’

  ‘A dog? Um – don’t think so. Hang on.’ She hums and haws at the other end of the line as she reads through the report. ‘No – doesn’t say anything about dogs. Says here: daughter questioned, no dependants, no pets.’

  Caffery glances in the rear-view mirror and sees Bear watching him seriously from the front seat. ‘You sure?’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  ‘OK,’ he says. ‘Do me a favour, will you? Call the local station and double-check that. If she’s a dog owner, let me know, yeah?’

  ‘I’ll call you in ten.’

  ‘No – I’m going into a meeting. Just send me a text.’

  ‘It’s OK, I can wait until you’re out of your meeting.’

  ‘Just the text, OK? And only if this woman is a dog owner. Right?’

  There’s a slight hesitation. Then Paluzzi says, her voice downcast, ‘Fine. I hope you have a nice day. The superintendent is still on an amber, looking likely for a green later this week if you hold out.’

  They finish the call and Caffery sits for a moment, looking distantly out of the window at the sun on Columbus’s HQ. He’s sure he went to a Rose Cottage during his tour of the Litton area, but he can’t picture it for the moment. There were so many cottages, and they all seemed to have roses growing round the porches. That area is teeming with people. And any one of them could be Bear’s owner.

  ‘Ginny?’ He tips back his head and looks at Bear’s reflection. ‘Know anyone called Ginny?’ Bear wags her tail. Opens her mouth. She thinks Caffery’s asking her if she wants a walk. He smiles wearily. ‘Later. I swear, later.’

  He drops his hands on the steering wheel and forces himself to look sideways at the sparkling football stadium of a headquarters. Columbus Systems. So bloody big it’s got its own signposted exit on the dual carriageway and its own sports centre. This is just the hub – the company has almost ten thousand employees worldwide. Like every search he’s done since he agreed to find Bear’s owner, before he even starts he knows he’s on to a loser.

  ‘Still,’ he tells Bear as he swings out of the car, ‘nothing ventured, nothing gained. You stay here and keep the seats warm.’

  Gauntlet Systems

  IN THE BEDROOM Oliver gingerly touches the places on his neck where he is bruised. Honey has hands like pincers. Like iron rods. He is trained in the way that most of the men in Gauntlet’s security division are trained. They’re predominantly ex-military – many of them pulled from the ranks of the Foreign Legion, which might have polished up its image recently, but to Oliver’s thinking is still a sinkpot for all the world’s desperados. The ones who come out of the Legion have less regard for humanity than they did when they went in.

  But they are not invincible. As Oliver has proved.

  It is afternoon now. He has been here for hours and no one has been up to see him. Downstairs the men have been arguing in angry whispers. They are thrown into disarray by Oliver’s phone call and are trying to work out how to get themselves out of this trap. Because Oliver might be tied up right now, but he has gained the upper hand by identifying them.

  All it took was one sentence from Honey when he referred to Minnet Kable waiting for them in a cave like that. And Oliver knew.

  He has always been open with his clients about the inspiration for his torpedo system – arms manufacturers are not the sort of people to get squeamish over the murder of two teenagers, they’ve seen much, much worse. In fact, they seem to relish hearing the genesis of his system, a personally profound experience of the couple being wounded by one blow translated into the professional inspiration behind the Wolf. What he’s never mentioned was exactly how Minnet Kable approached the teenage couple that night. No one knows for sure what happened, and there has never been any suggestion Kable hid in the cave waiting for Hugo and Sophie. There’s no evidence he even knew of the cave’s existence, and the idea he waited there to ambush them is a detail Oliver invented once. And once only.

  The night he sold the Wolf torpedo to Pietr Havilland.

  He remembers sitting in L’Escargot in Soho, Havilland shaking out his starched linen napkin, tucking it in, saying, So, Mr Anchor-Ferrers, people are saying great things about the Wolf …

  Havilland was a notoriously difficult sell. Oliver knew Gauntlet had poured millions into a remotely operated underwater housing, a type of garage where a projectile could wait patiently for its prey to pass. The Wolf had to work in concert with Gauntlet’s established system, so Oliver embellished his account of the murders to fit what Havilland wanted to hear. He painted a picture of Minnet Kable targeting the teenage couple in a local bar, stalking them until he discovered they often went to the Donkey Pitch together. Locked into their appearance, their sound, their smell, just like the Wolf, he had crouched in the cave until their individual signature passed by. The same way, Oliver explained to Havilland, he pictured the Wolf torpedo leaping from Gauntlet’s underwater housing.

  Only Gauntlet Systems has ever had this fabricated version of the murders. No other company. Ergo Honey and Molina are from Gauntlet. Oliver recognizes Molina not because he’s an actor or a politician, but from seeing him somewhere in the corridors of Gauntlet’s New York HQ.

  The literary agency will think nothing of the earlier phone call; they will simply assume he was cut off. If they try to call him back it will take time for anyone to realize things are amiss at The Turrets. But the name ‘Gauntlet’ has been delivered and the men downstairs now have a huge dilemma on their hands. Not to mention the fact that for some unaccountable reason police are circling the area. Perhaps someone other than the agency has already raised the alarm.

  In the kitchen the men’s voices are growing louder, more irate. Oliver knows there’s still an outside chance that they are angry and desperate enough to kill the family and make a run for it, but to do so would spell the end of their careers – and worse. They will be hunted down by Gauntlet and the police. The secret cameras have recorded almost everything that’s happened in the house, and Oliver has faith that John Bancroft, his detective, will pick up the baton now the name ‘Gauntlet’ has been delivered. Bancroft will make sure justice is done.

  He turns over the carpet, licks the tip of the pen to coax out the remaining ink, and begins to write.

  Pietr Havilland, of Gauntlet Systems is behind this. I worked with Gauntlet for six months during its period of greatest expansion. Its net worth increased exponentially for a full two years, resulting in global domination in its field. Havilland is rightly terrified of what I have written in my autobiography because he has been covering the immoral acts of his company for several years.

  There have been accidents during the development of Gauntlet’s underwater weapons programme. In particular, a trial run off the coast of Africa which ended in disaster and loss of life.

  Oliver is running out of room. He unpicks more of the rug hem and shifts position so he can write the date of that particular accident: May 2007. He adds Ncala Harbour, Mozambique. As he writes ‘Mozambique’, almost like a comment on the place, from downstairs comes the unmistakable noise of the buzzer on the electronic gates. He freezes, the pen held where it is, leaking a loud blue spot into the fabric. Slowly, slowly, he raises his head to the window. Once again the buzzer sounds. A small smile creeps on to his face.

  Out there, more than half a mile away, someone is at the gates, wanting to be admitted. It doesn’t sound as if they’re going to take no for an an
swer.

  Cheryl

  THERE’S A LINE from a song, Caffery can’t remember the title or the band, but as he’s walking through Columbus Systems’ offices, listening to the squeak of his feet on the polished marble floors, the song keeps going through his head. Something about waking up bleeding and drunk in a strange bed – about lunatic women driving you to despair. He thinks about Breanne. Was it him that pushed the button, or was it Breanne? And, if it was her, does that means she’s the crazy? Are women really nuts or is that just men’s neat little abdication of responsibility?

  But then he looks at the woman from Columbus’s human resources department, and quickly decides that sometimes, yes, women really are as mad as fish.

  She’s about thirty-five, with white-blond hair clipped very close to her head, long hooped earrings and no make-up, save a slash of red on her lips. She’s wearing a nose stud, a droopy floral dress and a boyfriend cardigan, her hands pushed into the pockets.

  ‘I know – I’m not your average human resources chick, am I?’

  He looks her up and down. ‘Usually it’s power suits and nude tights. Hair up, you know – heels.’

  ‘Sexy secretary? Not me though – because Daddy owns the company. I’d be unemployable anywhere else.’ She waves a hand around the office. ‘Everyone hates me, but I don’t care.’

  ‘Are you joking?’

  ‘Only partly. My father does own the company. But I could probably get a job somewhere else if I would toe the line with the clothes. And I don’t think the staff hate me – at least, they’ve never said it to my face.’ She gives a low laugh, and bends towards him, her hand next to her mouth. ‘But,’ she mutters, ‘if you hated the boss’s daughter, would you be retarded enough to say it to her face? I don’t think so. Oh, and before you go and say anything that’s going to totally piss me off, I’m gay. I’m a lesbian and I’m extremely politically correct – so you’d better use the right language around me because I get offended very easily and when I get offended Daddy gets offended and everyone’s unhappy.’

  ‘I’d never have guessed. You look so straight.’

  ‘You’re on thin ice.’

  ‘I know it. I’ll get to the point. You read my email?’

  ‘Several times. But that doesn’t mean I’ve got you an answer.’

  ‘OK.’ He folds his arms. Waits for a moment or two, trying to get the measure of this person. ‘But you’ve got a system, and even if you’re only here through nepotism I’m guessing you at least know how the computer works. So will you help me?’

  ‘Take your hand and guide you?’

  ‘Well, I would never put it like that – not with the PC axe dangling. So let’s say euphemistically. Yes, euphemistically, I’d like you to take my hand.’

  ‘I love that – cops using long words. It’s especially great when they use them in the right context.’

  Caffery notices a sign hanging above her desk that reads One cries because one is sad. I cry because others are stupid and that makes me sad. There has to be an easier way, he thinks. There really has to be.

  ‘Are we getting anywhere here, Cheryl? Are you going to help me?’

  ‘Have you got a warrant? That’s what I’m supposed to say. It’s what they all say in the police dramas. And then you’re supposed to pull something clever out of the hat – like that you know I’ve been faking work records, or that the Department of Work and Pensions would LOVE to hear about how five of my mates are employed as consultants when, spookily enough, they have absolutely no experience in the communications field and don’t even live in the country.’

  Caffery shakes his head, mystified. ‘I don’t get you – I just don’t get you. It’s a straight question. Are you going to help me or not?’

  ‘Yes. But only if you tell me about Malcolm Bliss.’

  He stares at her. Malcolm Bliss was a freak and a necrophiliac he brought to justice ten years ago in London. ‘Do what?’

  ‘As soon as I got your email I checked out who you are. You worked on the Birdman case, didn’t you?’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘There’s this girl, you see. She’s Ukrainian, new to the company, and I’m dying to impress her. She’s so clever – so, so clever, brain the size of a city, and just— Oh, you know, looks to die for. But she’s weird too.’ Cheryl smiles coyly, showing her perfect white teeth. ‘She’s an ambulance chaser. Spends all her time looking at car crashes and autopsy photos on the web. A real-crime fan. She eats stuff like this.’

  ‘What’s this got to do with me?’

  ‘Malcolm Bliss – she’s absolutely obsessed with what he did. She’s digging around, trying to find out all the gory details, but she’s totally convinced the investigators didn’t tell the whole story of what he did to those women. I thought you could, y’know, add some spice?’

  In 2000 Malcolm Bliss had mutilated and had sexual intercourse with the corpses of several women. Until now Caffery hasn’t completely realized how much the story is in the public domain. He’s not sure whether to be shaken by it or not. Especially by the fact this woman seems to be in the grip of a lascivious fascination about it.

  ‘What Bliss did is nobody’s business. If there’s anything held back from the public it’s because the victims’ families deserve to be protected.’

  ‘Ahhh,’ she says with a smile. ‘But you do know. You know the details – the ones my girlfriend wants to know. You know everything about it – the way the bodies were, what he did to them.’

  Caffery turns his head to one side and scrutinizes her carefully. He’s met ghouls before – the ones who want to know all the details. Generally they are women, something he’s always found strange, but they’re never as forthright and blunt as Cheryl.

  ‘OK.’ At length he sits on the edge of the desk and folds his arms. ‘But this didn’t come from me.’

  ‘I never met you.’

  ‘What do you want to know?’

  ‘Did he have intercourse with them?’

  ‘Yes. We think so.’

  ‘And the bodies – were they mutilated?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Bliss carved a Celtic cross into their chests. He cut off their heads and there’s evidence to suggest he may have consumed them.’

  Cheryl sucks in a breath and blood flows rapidly into her face. He can’t tell if it’s shock or excitement.

  ‘And that’s all I can tell you. Enough?’

  She nods. He sees her swallow. ‘Yes, that’s enough.’

  ‘So you’ll help me?’

  She nods again, as if still absorbing what he’s said. ‘Yes, I’ll help. But I’m warning you – there’s no magic button. No database I can just hit search on.’

  ‘You’re not computerized?’

  ‘Yes, we’re …’ She swallows. Pushes her hair off her forehead and gathers herself. ‘Of course we’re computerized, but only going back ten years. Before that it’s all paper-based and honestly, you go into the archives and it’s like the final scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark – you know, where they put the Ark away in that warehouse and—’

  ‘I know. But he might still be working for you. In which case he’d be computerized by now.’

  ‘Uh huh,’ she says in the sort of sarcastic, exasperated tone that makes him sure the next word out of her mouth is going to be ‘duh’. ‘Ye-essss – I’m on to that, surprisingly. I’ve started a search. On that computer over there – see? I’m going through biogs looking for spouses named Matilda. There is one, but they got married this year and she’s twenty-five and he’s twenty-six and they live in Buenos Aires, so that doesn’t fit your spec. I’ve gone through all the CVs we’ve got online, looking for any that came out of the army. But it’s a waste of time; we only keep electronic copies of CVs for people who’ve joined in the last ten years. From what you’re saying, he’d have joined us in the late eighties?’

  ‘Yes, from the army. Signals. He knows about radio communication.’

&
nbsp; She smiles. ‘Never fear. There is a second way.’ She goes to a filing cabinet and picks up a wire tray loaded with paper. She brings it back and sets it on the desk with a loud whoomph. Dust flies off it. The paperwork is old and crumpled.

  Caffery’s heart sinks. ‘Intimidating.’

  ‘In the eighties we had a military division. If this “unnamed man” of yours came across from the army he’d have had some military skill set, or if he was techie but more comfortable working on a military application – which a lot of them are in the army; you know, they’re working with their own kind – then he’d have probably gone into that division. But we got rid of it in the nineties and lost a lot of staff back then. Dad got fed up with how it was lagging behind the civilian division. That’s the way with military stuff, you have to jump through so many hoops to prove stuff is bomb-proof before it goes. It always runs over time.’

  ‘Why do companies bother?’

  ‘The long time is a two-way street: stuff for the MoD always runs over, because once it runs over it brings in more money. The taxman picks up the bill, bless his heart – how much do we love him!’

  ‘So what happened to the military division?’

  ‘Every piece of paper in that pile is a company where staff who were let go in the nineties could have funnelled their way through to.’

  Caffery picks up the first few sheets and leafs through them. Some are letters, some invoices – each has a different letterhead. He puts them back on the pile, dismayed. There must be two to three hundred sheets of paper here. Days – weeks of work.