“Look, it’s none of my business, and maybe things are not as cosy as they look just now, so you can tell me to butt out if you want. But I need to understand what has gone on here that makes it possible for you two to sit in the same room without killing one another.”
Dee explained the night’s events and Gil’s admissions, before accepting that she had been inconsiderate if not downright rude for not ensuring that she remained in contact. Steve was appeased but suggested that he and Dee should make tracks to his house, where his wife was going to prepare a Saturday morning brunch.
Gil didn’t have to ask whether she was invited; the look on Steve’s face when he looked at her was comment enough.
***
Dee followed Steve to his house in her hire car. The Chrysler was warm and comfortable and she started to drift. Shaking herself awake, she touched a button on the console which now housed her phone, and said ‘Home’ loudly. The phone started dialling the UK.
Josh did not sound unduly angry or worried when he spoke to her, and accepted Dee’s apology graciously before moving on to explain that Tom Vastrick had agreed that Dee needed some time off and that if Josh came to the US they could spend some time at his ranch. He told her he would be there by Wednesday evening. Dee was excited, but also a little annoyed that her husband had contacted her boss directly. It suggested that everyone believed her to be too closely involved in the case. When she examined her own behaviour through their eyes, she realised that they were right. She had been on a mission to track down and hurt, possibly even kill, Gil Davis. Perhaps she needed that break, after all.
***
The brunch was as delightful as it was tasty. Pancakes accompanied both sweet and savoury dishes, and a few of Steve’s buddies turned up, as did some of their church friends. Dee’s spirits were lifted higher than they had been for some time by the jollity and humour of her fellow brunchers. One of the guys attending moved through the group, leaving laughter in his wake. Dee thought he might be a stand up comedian. He wasn’t; he was a clergyman. She couldn’t help but wonder what his sermons must be like. When Reverend Casterton left her laughing about his experiences as an American student of Theology in Cambridge, his position at the kitchen counter was soon filled by Steve.
“Sorry about this morning, Dee. I was just so worried. I’m still convinced that Gillian Miles is capable of killing without a second thought, and that will be hugely dangerous here in the US where she has powerful protectors.”
“Oddly enough, I’m not so sure,” Dee observed. “She’s undoubtedly lost, she’s undoubtedly amoral, but somewhere inside that body is a kid who never grew up. I wanted to kill her when I turned up at her cabin yesterday, but now I just want to see her get treatment.” She paused as she swilled some fruit punch around in her glass. “I don’t buy the government trained killer thing; she killed long before anyone asked her to kill for them. She told me that it was self defence, plain and simple, when she killed the first time, but she sought the man out and she was carrying a rifle. It wasn’t just revenge. I don’t think she knows herself why she acts the way she does. She seems to operate on an instinct for self preservation.” Dee realised that the smile had slipped from her face. “Come on, Steve, I want to hear some more of those funny stories that have been circulating all morning.”
“Dee, don’t go near that woman again.” Steve was serious.
“I won’t. I think I can live with it now. I’m just going to chill out in the Hotel spa and watch old movies until Josh arrives.”
Chapter 6 9
Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, USA,
Monday 31 st January, 9am.
Katie’s security arrangements were quite straightforward, as she was living on campus for the first year of her course. Her accommodation was a simple dorm room on the first floor with a self contained kitchen area and bathroom. The single large room incorporated a bed and clothes storage on one wall, with a desk and study area on the opposite wall. TVs and music systems had to be accommodated in these small spaces and so students tended to have iPod docks and small flat TVs mounted on the wall opposite the bed. This was the arrangement Katie had inherited and maintained. The small kitchen area was equipped with a fridge under a counter, a toaster and kettle on the counter top and a microwave oven built in above. There was no oven or hotplate. The bathroom had a shower, W.C. and wash basin; if a bath was needed, the tub was down the hall. Any laundry had to be carried out in the basement at weekends, when there was usually a mad rush for machines.
Deanna Pope, her minder, was accommodated across the hallway in the same type of room. Katie could summon Deanna at any time with a single press of a preset key on her mobile phone. The college security desk in the entrance to the dorm block was already manned twenty four hours a day. This arrangement enabled Katie to enjoy a significant amount of freedom around campus without an oppressive security presence.
Katie’s room looked out over a beautifully maintained square of lawn with bare trees. The lawn was coated in frost this morning as Katie prepared for her Psychology lecture. Deanna tapped on the door at around nine, and the two young women walked down the stairs and out into the cold winter morning.
***
The routine walk around the main campus building was watched carefully by two men sitting in a minivan which carried a printed sheet in the windscreen showing a brown bear below the word BROWN and above “On Hire to Ladies Volleyball Team”.
The men were refreshed, having arrived in the US mid afternoon yesterday and sleeping from around 9pm to 6am. The journey from Heathrow had proven uneventful, as Barry had expected. They had sailed through passport control at both ends of the journey. Clearly, neither country had yet been made aware of Rob Donkin’s disappearance. Even if they had been made aware, an absconder who had yet to be formally tried would be unlikely to raise any alarm. Barry wasn’t playing the odds. He was well aware that in the UK every day hundreds of serious offenders fail to turn up for their court hearings, and many are never even pursued, as the police just do not have the manpower. To place them all on travel watch lists would be impractical.
The two men watched the girls enter the main building and then jumped out of the van and walked towards their rehearsed positions.
***
Katie pushed open the door to the lecture hall and allowed her friends to precede her, before nodding to Deanna who mouthed silently, “See you here after class.”
***
The cold weather and the full class schedule served to keep the grounds clear of students, and so Deanna’s journey back to the dorm room was quiet and uneventful until she rounded the corner of the old brick building. She then had twenty or so yards to cover before she could enjoy the warmth of the foyer and her morning coffee and chat with Jake on security.
An untidy, balding man with a purposeful stride huddled in a heavy overcoat, walked towards her. Deanna was immediately wary as she could not imagine why a man of his years would be leaving the girls’ dorm rooms so early in the morning.
“Excuse me, Miss, I think you may have dropped this?”
Deanna turned to look behind her, where a younger man was jogging up the path towards her, holding out a small bunch of keys. In a second she weighed up the situation. A young man in dark glasses on a murky morning was distracting her, whilst another man, out of place on campus, approached from behind.
Deanna withdrew her pepper spray, keeping it concealed in her hand, and turned to face the older man, who had made up a lot of ground in the few seconds she had been facing the other way. She lifted her hand and squirted him in the face with the spray. His hands flew to his face as he tried to protect his eyes. Deanna then turned to the boy, who now looked scared and who was beginning to back off. For a moment his panic and fear convinced her that she had overreacted, but by the time she considered the possibility a smooth fist sized rock crashed into her skull from behind. Deanna would be unconscious for an hour or two, and insensible for the rest of the day.