The Dead Lie Down (Adam Lennox Thrillers: Book One) (7 page)

Only when Adam was satisfied that they were not being followed did he take the
accelerator off the floor, not that the Landrover was made for speed anyway. At
Yoxford he turned onto the London road and grabbing his phone speed dialled the
office. Whilst he was waiting for an answer he took his first glance at Anna who
seemed to be extremely focussed on the road ahead but not showing any
significant alarm. This was probably an everyday occurrence for a New
Yorker.

"Adam?" Gerry's voice came through indistinctly due to the lousy mobile
reception and the roar of the Landrover's engine.

"Gerry. Listen to me. Phone the fire brigade and the Suffolk police. Tell them
that there is a car on fire outside my cottage. Tell them that I'll contact them
later. I'm on my way into London."

"
Adam? What's going on?"

"I don't know but it's not good. Get in touch with Bel. Get her to come over to
the flat. Do whatever you have to do to get her there. She's in some kind of
danger and it has something to do with Bartletts. Get her out of circulation at
all costs."

"Consider it done. Are you coming straight here?"

"Yes, as soon as I can, but I'm in the Landrover."

"Okay is there anything else you need?"

"Not at the moment. I'm still trying to gather my thoughts and make sense of
it."

"All right, keep in touch." A good man in a crisis, Fleet Street training.

"Thanks."

Adam put the phone down and concentrated on keeping the Landrover in a straight
line, not easy at the speed he was doing. He really must get the tracking
checked one of these days.

"Are you going to tell me anything?"

Adam had almost forgotten that Anna was in the car but glanced at her now.

"I haven't a clue what is going on and that is the truth. The car was sabotaged,
the phone call was to warn me that worse things would happen if I didn't keep my
mouth shut."

"About what."

"That's the strange thing. They didn't say, as if they expected me to know
automatically."

"And Bel, whoever she is?"

"A friend. She was implicated as well but I don't know how. Or why."

They settled back into silence for twenty minutes before the phone rang again.
Adam paused to note the caller's number before picking up.

"Gerry?"

"I can't get hold of Bel anywhere. She's not at home. She's not at Bartlett's
and she's not answering her mobile."

Adam swore under his breath, "Keep trying."

Adam considered that the day that had started out so promisingly appeared to
have taken a nosedive and wished he could turn back the clock. His mind started
to turn over the phone conversation and its implications. He tossed around the
possibilities in his mind. If it had something to do with John Bartlett's
current problems then he could understand the reference, albeit obliquely, to
John's father 'old man Bartlett', but what really bothered Adam was the other
reference. What on earth did it have to do with Fran's accident?

Chapter 9

Bel walked through St Paul's churchyard oblivious to the noise around her and
the people brushing past. The trees were well into leaf now, throwing shadows
across the ground like camouflage. The gravestones that survived the onslaught
of human ingress lay, as islands of grey in a sea of green grass, protected by
signs proclaiming the direst consequences should footwear stray from the path.
The aroma of freshly mown grass filled the air. Bel always had a burning itch to
defy the signs but something ultimately held her back from taking the step. She
was a conformist at heart she conceded.

This late in the morning the City workers were outnumbered by the tourists,
cameras around their necks. An elderly Japanese gentleman, viewfinder glued to
his glasses, video camera whirring, capturing the dome of the cathedral as if it
was likely to suddenly move and take everyone by surprise.

Bel had been disconcerted by the events of the past twenty-four hours and the
discomfort had grown into disquiet. Normally she would have expected her mood to
have lightened this morning, normality returning to her surroundings, but on
this occasion the opposite had been true.

She
turned into London Wall, her coat flapping as she now strode purposefully in
the direction of the city, creating her own breeze that caught her hair, as if
walking fast would somehow purge her mind of concerns and stress. She had been
more affected by seeing Adam than she would have expected. Although they hadn't
met for a month or two they normally made sure that they met regularly and their
situation hadn't changed. He had seemed slightly more troubled than usual, more
distant, and that worried her. Adam had been an anchor in shaky times and she
didn't like her anchors moving.

She faced her internal dilemma once again. She wanted to see Adam but the seeing
always caused pain. Why, why, why? Why us? Why anyone?

Since
the first time they had met and subsequently when Adam had fallen for Fran, Bel
had struggled to maintain a balanced relationship with the two people she loved
most in the world, whilst watching them grow closer and then ultimately step
into marriage. There had been a period then where things had been stable, and
they had fallen into a contented equilibrium of close friends and married
couple. Good times. Fran's accident had washed all that into oblivion overnight
and replaced it in Bel's mind with a maelstrom of confused thoughts and
feelings that steadfastly refused to budge. For a time she had attempted to blot
out the pain with alcohol, until her wine bill made her realise she had to make
a change. Seeing Adam just seemed to bring back the pain and test her
resolve.

Her growing frustration was interrupted by her mobile. She looked at the number,
no name, no number. She answered as she always did in these cases, trying to
give nothing away until she'd established the caller's identity.

"Hello?"

"Miss Trent." It wasn't a question but a statement and already the voice had a
tone that Bel didn't like. She contemplated hanging up but her anger was looking
for an outlet. She stopped dead in her tracks almost knocking over someone
walking behind her.

"Who is this?"

"Just call me a friend Miss Trent. I've got a concern for your safety, do you
understand me?" The question was a rhetorical one so he continued. "You're in
danger of getting involved in things you don't understand and that would be bad
for your health, I think. Forget anything you've heard in the last twenty-four
hours and ignorance will be your greatest protection. You know, 'ignorance is
bliss'. Anyway a quiet warning to you. Stay away from Adam Lennox. He's a
dangerous one that one, and mixing with him is likely as not going to bring you
to harm. Do you understand what I'm saying to you?"

Bel's voice went very quiet. "What's this got to do with Adam?"

"Ah now there's is a very good question. What does it have to do with Adam?
That's something you'd best not take the trouble to find out because it's him
that is going to be in trouble very soon." He stopped there as if he imagined it
being a dramatic point.

"What do you mean?" she demanded her voice rising in pitch and volume.

"Just what I say Miss Trent, just what I say. Stay away from Lennox for both
your sakes." The voice was calm and controlled and provoked Bel. Her boiling
point had been reached and the vent finally exploded.

"Who are you? What the hell do you want?" she shouted into the phone. No
response. "Sod you whoever you are. I don't give a shit and I'm not going to be
dictated to by you. If you think you're trying to do me a favour then think
again. Get off my bloody phone and go crawl back into your hole before the sun
comes up and turns you into stone."

She stopped, surprised at the ferocity of her response and running momentarily
out of vocabulary.

The caller hesitated. "What, like the stone standing next to you perhaps?"

She
twisted her head round and registered the stone gatepost beside her. Listening
to the phone over her laboured breathing she suddenly realised that the line was
already dead.

She looked around almost expecting the speaker to approach out of nowhere but no
one in the throng appeared to show any interest in her or her outburst, except
for one small man in an overcoat who seemed to leer at her in a most unseemly
fashion. Hello London.

And it was then she noticed him.

An unremarkable individual in black sweatshirt, denim jeans and trainers with
close-cropped hair, leaning against a lamppost fifty feet away. As their eyes
met he smiled. Bel felt her blood run cold and her pulse skip a beat. He lifted
a mobile phone in salute and with his other hand mimicked the action of a
gun.

She scanned the street assessing various exits. Strangely this was a situation
that was not unfamiliar to her. Years ago she had been plagued by a stalker
admirer who would tail her wherever she went. She had become extremely practised
at evasion tactics.

She looked back and saw him move away from the lamppost. She took off across the
road and turned right onto the pavement, weaving her way through the pedestrians.
Advice from previous occasions came back to her. Stay in a public place; make
sure there's a way out, look out for opportunities to disappear suddenly from
view.

She took the next turning, ruing the lack of department stores to disappear
into, or toilets to hide in. She was still in open country, wide streets with
precious little cover, old buildings with immense facades towering above her.
She crossed the road again if only to give her better visibility of her pursuer.
She reached the pavement and glanced around, recognising him in an instant, and
judging that he hadn't gained any ground. So what was he doing? Was this just to
scare or was it a waiting game? Her brain seemed to be in overdrive now,
assessing her situation. She spotted a side street ahead and at the last minute
turned into it, flattening herself into a service doorway. She felt that
everyone within a hundred yards must be able to hear her heartbeat, and despite
trying to control her breathing it seemed to rasp from her lungs like a terminal
asthmatic.

He came at a leisurely pace and crossed the junction away from her. For a moment
she wondered whether he had missed her change of direction but he turned at the
last moment and smiled again, before drawing his finger slowly across his throat
in that well known mannerism.

She took off at the run this time. She was extremely fit by normal standards and
jogging was not a stranger to her but, she thought to herself, doing it in skirt
and heels was a handicap she wasn't used to.

It took her three changes of direction and two near traffic accidents to put her
in what she felt was a defensible position. Still running she swerved into an
alleyway and once again sought the cover of a service doorway, thanking the
powers that be that there wasn't a posse of office workers taking their smoking
break. She waited for the sound of running feet, praying that when they came
they would pass by and carry on.

They came. They did carry on, briefly, but within a few yards he stopped to take
stock of his surroundings, and turning, he saw her and smiled. She glanced left
and right, but left was a dead end and right he had covered. She waited.

He strolled towards her, hands in pockets, the smile never leaving his lips. She
tensed, anticipating an attack of some sort. He stopped within three feet and
took his hands out of his pockets before stepping towards her.

"Miss Trent," he said quietly, "you can run but you can't hide."

He reached out a hand towards her but before he could touch her, a foot
travelling as fast as she could propel it, caught him in the groin, causing him
to double over involuntarily before she took the edge of her hand and hit him
behind the ear. He slumped to the ground

She
was disappointed that he wasn't unconscious but satisfied that he was
definitely out of it for a while. She rubbed her hand and then shook it to dull
the pain.

"Every father should encourage his daughter to take up a martial art of some
sort," she declared to the still prone figure.

She walked away, increasing her pace. Pedestrian traffic thinned out as she
turned off the main thoroughfare. Now her feeling of pursuit disappeared but she
found herself turning around every few seconds to scan the street anyway.
Several times she nearly tripped before she was brought to a halt once again by
the mobile phone. She felt the anger rise up in her again only to subside when
Adam's name appeared in the display.

"Adam!"

Adam's voice was unusually abrupt to the point of rudeness. "Bel. Where the hell
are you?"

She caught the urgency in his voice. "What do you mean? I'm on Moorgate heading
back to Bartletts."

"Don't go anywhere near Bartletts. Come round to my office now. Don't stop for
anyone. Don't speak to anyone, do you understand?"

"No. Wait, what's going on Adam?" She was aware now of desperation creeping into
her voice, something she normally detested.

"I don't have time to argue. I'll explain when you get here but for the moment
you're in real danger so just do it." And with that he hung up.

She stared at the phone. He wasn't kidding she decided. Adam definitely had some
explaining to do.

Chapter 10

Adam put his office phone down but without hesitation dialled another number and
drummed his fingers on the desk waiting for the reply. Eventually the other end
picked up.

"Adam?"

Adam leant forward to the phone. "Mitch. I need cover."

"No problem." The accent was unmistakable now. Thick Glasgow. "When?"

"Now. Until I say stop."

"Done."

Now Adam felt that he could afford to sit back and allow himself a sigh of
relief as he ran his hands through his hair and closed his eyes.