A car started at the front of the house and faded away down the drive. Riley chewed her lip. It looked like they were off. There might not be a better time to do it.
She pushed through the branches until she was clear of the overhang. Seconds later she was running across the lawn, body hunched and expecting any second to hear a warning shout. She hit the back of the villa and ducked down, her breathing harsh and loud. That’s it, she promised herself; when this is all over, I’m joining a gym. All this work and no play’s turning me into a soft pudding.
She pressed her ear against the brickwork and listened. Apart from the hum of an electric motor there was nothing. She crept along the rear wall, peered round the corner… and ducked back as voices sounded nearby.
Something scraped behind her. She began to rise but found a powerful hand pressing down on her shoulder. Another hand clamped over her mouth.
“Easy,” Mitcheson hissed in her ear. He held onto her until she subsided, then let her go.
“Where’s Palmer?” Riley whispered, spinning round. Her heart was thumping in her chest and a wave of nausea threatened to rise in her stomach. “Is he okay?”
He placed a finger against her lips. “No time. We’re off to the airport. Lottie’s taking a private plane back to England. Ray’s body’s inside. Gary’s going too, with Palmer as insurance. He’s been sedated to stop him kicking off en route. The rest of us are following by scheduled flight to Heathrow this evening.”
“And the drugs?” Riley’s face was centimetres away from his, and she could smell his aftershave, see her reflection in his eyes. Something told her this man couldn’t lie this close up to her. She hoped it wasn’t wishful thinking.
He hesitated for a moment, then said: “They’re strapped to Palmer’s body.”
“What? They’re going to take him through customs like that?”
“No. They’ve filed a flight plan to Luton for customs purposes, but she’s paid the pilot for a last minute diversion to Rickmansworth, claiming engine trouble. Less likely they’ll be searched there, especially with a coffin on board. In any case, they’re counting on enough time to get Palmer out of the plane and away before anyone arrives.”
Someone called Mitcheson’s name from the front of the building. He clamped his hand back on Riley’s mouth but she angrily pushed his fingers away. “Where are they taking Palmer?”
“Horton Road commercial estate, West Drayton. Unit twenty-four. Once they’re in the UK they’ll have no further use for him. I’ll try to stop it but I can’t promise anything.”
As he stood, Riley put a warning hand on his arm. “Wait. There’s something you should know.”
He frowned. “What is it?”
“The police in the UK know you’re coming. Not you personally, but they’ll be waiting for the plane at Rickmansworth.”
He blinked. “How do they know that?”
“Lucky guess.”
“Christ. That’s not good. Okay. I’ll see if I can get them to go in somewhere else, although if Palmer’s caught it’ll be pretty obvious he’s not doing it voluntarily. Anything else?”
“There was another car along the coast where Palmer got picked up. It’s either the Moroccans or the Spanish police. They could be on their way here already.”
He nodded. “We haven’t got long, then. Thanks for the warning.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Whatever I can for Palmer, I promise. You keep your head down. Take care.” With a brief touch on her arm, he was gone.
Chapter 44
Riley shivered as a vicious wind cut across the top level of Terminal One car park at Heathrow, bringing a faint sting of rain on her cheeks. Dark clouds had brought the evening in earlier than usual, a brutal contrast to the heat and light of Spain.
She’d been hoping to go out to Rickmansworth to try to intercept Lottie Grossman’s plane, but in the end knew there was too high a risk of missing them. They would have already arrived and Palmer would be long gone by now, spirited away before he was spotted. On the off chance, she’d called the airfield and asked if the Grossman Cessna had returned, but the woman on the other end had been guarded about flight movements.
In the end, with daylight making it too risky to hang around a trading estate too long, she decided to wait at Heathrow for the Malaga flight to arrive and follow Mitcheson and the others to their destination. She was praying nothing would happen to Palmer until the group was together.
She checked her watch. Nearly time to go. She hurried down to the ground floor and found a quiet spot away from the noise. Brask answered on the first ring. As soon as Riley left the villa at Moharras, she’d called and told him what was happening. He had promised to get whatever official interest he could. Now he sounded less than hopeful.
“I’ve bent every ear I can, sweetie,” he said, “but there seems to be a marked reluctance to do anything. The only thing in our favour is there aren’t customs facilities at Rickmansworth to clear the body, so Grossman must be planning to just drop in and take a punt on getting it through without being spotted. However, that may be the official view — I don’t know what the uniformed pinheads may be planning on the quiet, of course. For all I know they may be getting together the massed ranks of the Metropolitan Police Band and Customs amp; Excise and descending on Heathrow and Rickmansworth even as we speak.”
“If they are, they’re being bloody quiet about it,” Riley replied. “The trouble is, I’m only guessing Mitcheson’s flight number, and all Rickmansworth would say was they weren’t expecting Grossman’s plane, anyway.”
Brask breathed sympathetically down the phone. “Well, there’s nothing more I can do. Sorry. The best I can offer is some muscle at the commercial place your friend Mitcheson mentioned. It’ll probably take Palmer and the others some time to get through formalities, so I doubt they’ll be out of the airport for a while yet.”
Riley shook her head. “Forget it. These men won’t think twice about cutting their losses; if they spot a bunch of security guards armed with nothing more lethal than fists and rubber torches, there’ll be a bloodbath.”
Brask said nothing and the line hummed with static. Riley hung up, feeling suddenly helpless and cut adrift, and wondering where Palmer was.
Frank Palmer was feeling sick. He was lying on a seat in the rear of a transit van that smelled of paint, and the constant bumping and swaying wasn’t helping. For some reason he couldn’t work out, his body felt as if it was on fire and perspiration was streaming down his face into his collar.
Unable to lift his head, all Palmer could see was the floor of the van a few inches away and the wooden legs of the bench seat he was lying on. The floor was scuffed and bare and showed signs of rough use. Movement showed a man’s leg and foot, but there was no conversation to show how many people were in the vehicle with him.
He tried to crane his head round to see more, but his muscles wouldn’t respond. His body wanted to lay down and go back to sleep, yet his instincts were screaming at him to get a grip and start running around before it was too late.
A hand grasped his chin and forced him upright, and he found himself staring through the front window of the vehicle at a busy motorway. It looked familiar and was obviously England, but his brain couldn’t yet make the right connections to tell him where he might be.
He was sitting behind the passenger seat and the driver was reaching back to examine him. Gary? Doug? Howie? It was Gary… he remembered the boyish face handing him a glass of orange to drink in the house. That was when he’d felt tired and fallen asleep. Spiked it, the bastard.