The Dead Lie Down (Adam Lennox Thrillers: Book One) (33 page)

She took a step to the windowsill and without warning launched herself through
the opening and into the darkness. Adam was already moving across the room after
her, when an ear-splitting scream of agony rent the quiet of the night before it
was cut off as abruptly as it had started.

Adam peered out of the window. Anna's body was stretched across the old metal
railings that surrounded the border below the window. Her neck was obviously
broken, the shafts of two of the rusty spikes had pierced her throat and her
abdomen. Her body, like a rag doll, lay limp across the remainder, still and
lifeless eyes staring upwards at him as if making some sort of mute
accusation.

Adam sank to the floor and his gun dropped onto the wooden boards. Moments later
he went downstairs and cut Bel down. He cradled her gently in his arms and they
sank into the largest armchair.

"Is it over?" she murmured.

"Yes, it's over," he replied.

And that's how DCI Ford found them when he arrived ten minutes
later.

Chapter 44

Life in the office appeared to have returned to normal, whatever that meant.
Gerry, far from suffering from his ordeal, seemed to have been energised by
it.

"You realise now that you owe me one enormous favour," he revealed, sitting
opposite Adam in the guest chair. Adam appeared not to notice, you can do that
when you're the boss and get away with it, or so he thought.

Gerry frowned. "You're doing it again."

"Doing what?" enquired Adam coming back into the present.

"That thing you do. That reverie thing where your body's present but the rest of
you is off sunning itself on a beach or something."

Adam smiled and took his feet off the desk. "It's called meditation Gerry,
outside your sphere I'm afraid."

"Nuts," concluded Gerry. "People don't meditate in the middle of a
conversation."

"It takes practise I admit," conceded Adam, "but I like to think I'm at least a
brown belt. What happened in regard to our friend the elephant?"

"All seems resolved," declared Gerry. "The zoo appear satisfied that the animals
suffered no long term ill effects, and they report an increase in visitors since
the video appeared on the web. It's still going the rounds of office e-mails
apparently by the way, only just dropped to number two in the charts."

"And our friend Stan?"

"Appears happy that the publicity was achieved one way or another. The cosmetic
range seems to have taken off satisfactorily, but he's still looking for a
partial refund on the shoot."

"Let him look."

Gerry looked at Adam a little more closely and his voice took on a serious note,
something that always tended to unnerve Adam.

"How are you after recent events?"

Adam steepled his fingers, that well worn, stalling for time but looking
thoughtful pose. "I'm fine. Finding it slightly difficult to concentrate on
business but otherwise back to normal."

Gerry thought the distracted demeanour said otherwise but held his peace.

"Well I have work to do, people to see, bookies to pay etcetera, etcetera," he
declared, and getting out of the chair grabbed his coat and left the office in
one smooth action.

Clare yelled "Bye" to the disappearing back as Adam came out into the main
office. She was in lilac, a trouser suit designed for the elegant. It didn't do
anything for her.

Adam punched the familiar sequence of buttons on the coffee machine but it
steadfastly refused to dish out anything.

"You have to hit it twice, front bottom left," announced Clare.

Adam glanced in her direction but unquestioningly followed instructions. Coffee
was duly dispensed.

"That's changed recently," he said.

"It's not the only thing," replied Clare mysteriously.

"Meaning what?" asked Adam.

"You. 'Back to normal'?" she shook her head. "You've changed."

"You shouldn't listen in to other people's conversations, it's rude," he
accused.

He took a sip of coffee and burnt his lip. Stalling was becoming an art form. He
feigned disinterest but curiosity very quickly got the better of him.

"So, you think I've changed, what, in the past three weeks?"

"Definitely," she declared.

Adam perched on the edge of her desk. "I'm intrigued, go on."

Clare ignored him, jotted some notes on a piece of paper, stapled two more
together and filed them carefully in the third drawer down in the filing cabinet
behind her. Two could play at the stalling game.

Eventually she sat back down and after a slight hesitation picked up a pencil
and waved it at him, as if to add weight to her words.

"Before this, you didn't seem to care too much about anything at all. You went
through life on auto pilot," she pronounced. "You'd been like it since Fran
died. Passion had gone, you didn't invest in life, you just trod water. If you
hadn't, you and Bel would have been an item long ago."

Her last statement took him by surprise and he laughed involuntarily.

"See," said Clare pointing at him. "QED. You wouldn't have done that four weeks
ago."

Adam didn't comment so she continued. "How is Bel?"

"I spoke to her the day before yesterday." Replied Adam. "She seemed well,
recovered, bouncy even, enjoying her convalescence apparently."

"That's good. It's been three weeks, you'd expect it." She didn't ask the
question they had been avoiding all week. "Go and see her."

"They said recovery would be quicker if she didn't have reminders around."

Clare wielded the pencil again. "Go and see her."

"Maybe."

At that point the outer door opened without warning and Adam was on his feet
fast enough to frighten Clare. Maybe his nerves were still slightly taut.

DCI Ford stood in the doorway, and then eyed the coffee machine. Adam raised an
eyebrow.

"Clare, can you give Detective Chief Inspector Ford instructions on how to use
the coffee machine." Adam walked over to his own office where Ford joined him
shortly, Clare having taken pity on him and poured him a coffee herself.

The two of them had had several debriefs since the night that Anna Low died and
had come to a level of agreement on how to keep Adam's name out of the
affair.

Ford took a swig of his drink and scowled. "Decaff."

"The healthy option, Inspector."

"Never saw the point of it myself."

Adam smiled despite himself. "What can I do for you today?" he asked.

Ford hesitated. "You should have told me what you were up to, you and your
friends."

"Ah." said Adam.

"Ah indeed," declared Ford with an injured expression. "Interpol have been
talking to us and it appears you are not quite what you seem. Something to do
with NATO Intelligence or suchlike."

"Sorry, need to know basis." He endeavoured to change the subject. "How are you
getting on with Brad, or should I call him Greg?"

"He appears to have accepted his fate and is co-operating nicely. We can roll up
a few villains connected with the arms business. He'll go down for aiding and
abetting on the smuggling, and GBH with intent and we'll make sure he ends up in
the US."

"Travis recovered then?"

"Not quite recovered. He may never work again but I understand that he's being
taken care of."

"We'll go and see him soon, it's the least we can do."

Ford didn't seem to tie that quite together but obviously decided to let it go
anyway.

"Tell me," he said. "It's been bothering me. How did you manage to be caught up
in so many tangled situations?"

Adam grinned. "Beats me. But the only thing that should worry you, is if they
discover that you released a prime murder suspect on the word of a serial killer
and disgraced CIA agent."

Ford took a moment before it twigged but it brought a smile to his face and they
shook hands before he left.

Clare came through from the office with his mobile and handed it to him. He
checked the display and took a deep breath.

A
female foreign voice merely said. "Crypto 5927+2".

He pulled another phone from his desk drawer, a secure phone scrambled using
crypto keys.

He dialled in the numbers and the call reconnected to another line at the other
end.

"Erikson?" he asked.

"Most people call me sir," came the dry reply.

"How are things, sir?" Adam complied, emphasising the final word.

"Could be better, could be a lot worse. With the information we got from Lake we
managed to roll up most of the arms route before they could close it down. An
eastern bloc country hoping to join the EU has some explaining to do."

"How's Mitch?"

"Lieutenant-Colonel Mitchell is well on the road to recovery and should be back
in circulation within the month. I understand your friend Miss Trent is making
good progress."

Adam frowned slightly. "I believe so but.."

Erikson cut him off. "On the subject of our friend O'Rourke. Against my better
judgement it's been decided that he is too instrumental to the Irish peace
process to be implicated in anything at this stage."

There was a pause. "So we're going to let him off?" accused Adam.

"That's not what I said Adam. The politicians have decided it's too dangerous."
There was a silent pause before Erikson continued. "Adam, if you hold the phone
any tighter you will crush it. It is expensive military property and you don't
want to have to replace it."

Adam looked down and realised that in his controlled anger and frustration the
phone was indeed at risk.

"It's not right. He's extremely dangerous."

"People that matter are well aware of O'Rourke's methods. I didn't promise
justice but let's face it, if everything operated in a totally just manner we'd
all..., what's the phrase you use. We'd all be in the soup."

"Yes sir."

"I'm sorry that you can't make any publicity out of this but I hope the business
prospers. And give my best to Miss Trent."

"Thank you," replied Adam a little tight lipped, and they hung up.

Adam looked at the far wall of his office where a publicity poster for a
previous general election implored him to 'Come Down off the Wall', and he made
a decision.

He always considered the estate to be looking at its best at this time of year.
The old oaks were in full leaf, spread across the rolling grassland like
sleeping sentinels, the hedgerows were full of birds getting in a second brood
of the year, grass was a luxuriant deep pile carpet. Despite his misgivings
about the place he knew he had a love for it that went deeper than his childhood
memories. He descended from the steps and turned down the track between copses
of beech and yew, deep in the heart of the estate. The shade gave a welcome
relief from the sun on one of those freak days of early summer when the
temperature climbed close to thirty degrees. His shirt stuck to his back and he
was doing no more than a leisurely stroll.

At the house they had said she would be down here by the river close to the
swimming hole where he had spent so much time as a kid. It had been his parents'
idea that Bel convalesced in the privacy and seclusion of the estate and she had
seemed happy to agree to the plan. After a short stay in hospital to dress her
many wounds, she had moved out here to be cosseted and pampered.

He hadn't seen her since he had left her in hospital. Medical opinion seemed to
feel that isolation from anything connected with the stress of her ordeal was a
good idea in the long run and he had acquiesced, despite the longing to be near
her. They had spoken occasionally on the phone but only briefly and
trivially.

Clare had been right, though he wouldn't have admitted it to her. Despite the
trauma of the weeks before he felt that something had been washed away. Perhaps
justice had been done for Fran and the past could be put to bed. He couldn't
help thinking that there was more to it than that but putting his finger on it
was proving a lot more elusive.

He finally turned the corner at the far end of the copse, the ground opened
up and fell away towards the river that meandered through the meadows as if
searching for a way out of the vast estates. By an enormous oak tree the river
spread out into a large deep pool as it turned a bend. On the far side of the
river swathes of tall rushes gave privacy to the perfect swimming hole.

He stopped, and shielding his eyes from the sun spotted Bel in the water,
swimming, only her head visible. Something in him smiled and he started down the
hill through the grass towards the river. He was within a hundred yards before
she spotted him, turning to come back across the pool. She stood up and revealed
the water to be only waist deep, waving her arms above her head in greeting. He
stopped, realising that she only had a tee shirt on, and that wet, revealing
everything and leaving little to the imagination.

As he approached the bank she called out. "Get your clothes off and come in, the
water's lovely." She laughed, an infectious laugh that bode well for her
recovery.

He stripped down to his boxer shorts and waded into the water, unable to keep
his eyes off her.

"You're staring," she accused him.

He smiled at the recall of a previous occasion. "Not staring, gazing, admiring."
The smile was returned.

"It's so good to see you," she said holding out both hands. She noticed some
reluctance. "It's all right. I'm fine, recovered. Your parents make excellent
therapists, even if they do play Scrabble far too competitively."

That made Adam laugh and released any final awkwardness.

"And you're healed?" he asked.

She bit her lip briefly and then pulled the wet tee-shirt off over her head.
"The doctors did a damn good job don't you think."

He gazed at her now naked body, perfectly healed with no scarring
whatsoever.

She noticed his dilemma. "The last time you saw me naked I was covered in blood
as well, and you were still willing to hug me even then," she mocked.