‘The illicit benefits of IGF-1 are enormous,’ Cronus wrote. ‘Especially to a strength athlete like Teeter because it gives him the ability to build muscle faster, and recover faster from workouts.’
The letter had gone on to accuse two herbalists – one in Los Angeles and another in London – of being involved in Teeter’s elaborate deception.
Documents that accompanied the letter seemed to shore up Cronus’s claims. Four were receipts from the herbalists showing sales and delivery of red-deer velvet from New Zealand to the post-office box of an LA construction company that belonged to Teeter’s brother-in-law Philip. Other documents purported to show the results of independent cutting-edge tests on blood taken from Teeter.
‘They clearly note the presence of IGF-1 in Teeter’s system within the last four months,’ Cronus wrote before concluding. ‘And so this wilful cheat, Paul Teeter, had to be sacrificed to cleanse the Games and make them pure again.’
On the couch in the twins’ nursery, several hours after reading those words, Knight stared at the dim forms of his children, thinking, is this how you make the Olympics pure again? By murdering people? What kind of insane person thinks that way? And why?
Chapter 46
I ROAM THE city for hours after Teeter’s collapse on the global stage, secretly gloating over the vengeance we’ve taken, revelling in the proof of our superiority over the feeble efforts of Scotland Yard, MI5 and Private. They’ll never come close to finding my sisters or me.
Everywhere I go, even at this late hour, I see Londoners in shock and newspapers featuring a photo of the Jumbotron in the stadium and our message: Olympic Shame Exposed!
And the headlines: Death Stalks the Games!
Well, what did they think? That we’d simply let them continue to make a mockery of the ancient rites of sport? That we’d simply let them defile the precepts of fair competition, earned superiority, and immortal greatness?
Hardly.
And now Cronus and the Furies are on the lips of billions upon billions of people around the globe, uncatchable, able to kill at will, bent on exposing and eliminating the dark side of the world’s greatest sporting event.
Some fools are comparing us to the Palestinians who kidnapped and murdered Israelis during the 1972 summer Games in Munich. They keep describing us as terrorists with unknown political motives.
Those idiots aside, I feel as though the world is beginning to understand me and my sisters now. A thrill goes through me when I realise that people everywhere are sensing our greatness. They are questioning how it could be that such beings walk among them, holding the power of death over deceit and corruption, and making sacrifices in the name of all that is good and honourable.
In my mind I see the monsters that stoned me, the dead eyes of the Furies the night I slaughtered the Bosnians, and the shock on the faces of the broadcasters explaining Teeter’s death.
At last, I think, I’m making the monsters pay for what they did to me.
I’m thinking the same thing as dawn breaks and bathes the thin clouds over London in a deep red hue that makes them look like raised welts.
I knock on the side entrance of the house where the Furies live, and enter. Marta is the only one of the sisters still awake. Her dark agate eyes are shiny with tears and she hugs me joyfully, her happiness as burning as my own.
‘Like clockwork,’ she says, closing the door behind me. ‘Everything went off perfectly. Teagan got the bottle to the American, and then changed and slipped out before the chaos began, as if it were all fated.’
‘Didn’t you say the same thing when London got the Olympics?’ I ask. ‘Didn’t you say that when we found the corruption and the cheating, just like I said we would?’
‘It’s all true,’ Marta replies, her expression as fanatical as any martyr’s. ‘We are fated. We are superior.’
‘Yes, but make no mistake: they will hunt us now,’ I reply, sobering. ‘You said we were fine on all counts?’
‘All counts,’ Marta confirms, all business now.
‘The factory?’
‘Teagan made sure it’s sealed tight. No possibility of discovery.’
‘Your part?’ I ask.
‘Went off flawlessly.’
I nod. ‘Then it’s time we stay in the shadows. Let Scotland Yard, MI5 and Private operate on high alert long enough for them to tire, to imagine that we’re done, and allow themselves to let their guard down.’
‘According to plan,’ Marta says. Then she hesitates. ‘This Peter Knight – is he still a threat to us?’
I consider the question, and then say, ‘If there is one, it’s him.’
‘We found something, then. Knight has a weakness. A large one.’
Chapter 47
KNIGHT JERKED AWAKE in the twins’ nursery. His mobile was ringing. Sun flooded the room and blinded him. He groped for the phone and answered.
‘Farrell’s gone,’ Inspector Elaine Pottersfield said. ‘Not at her office. Not at her home.’
Knight sat up, still squinting, and said, ‘Did you search both of them?’
‘I can’t get a warrant until my lab corroborates the match that Hooligan got.’
‘Hooligan found something more last night in Cronus’s second letter.’
‘What?’ Pottersfield shouted. ‘What second letter?’
‘It’s already at your lab,’ Knight said. ‘But Hooligan picked up some skin cells in the envelope. He gave you half the sample.’
‘Goddamn it, Peter,’ Pottersfield cried. ‘Private must not analyse anything to do with this case without—’
‘That’s not my call, Elaine,’ Knight shot back. ‘It’s the Sun’s call. The paper is Private’s client!’
‘I don’t care who the—’
‘What about your end?’ Peter demanded. ‘I always seem to be giving you information.’
There was a pause before she said, ‘The big focus is on how Cronus managed to hack into the …’
Knight noticed that the twins weren’t in their cots and stopped listening. His attention shot to the clock. Ten a.m.! He hadn’t slept this late since before the twins were born.
‘Gotta go, Elaine! Kids,’ he said and hung up.
Every worrying thought that a parent could have sliced through him, and he lurched through the nursery door and out onto the landing above the staircase. What if they’ve fallen? What if they’ve mucked around with …?
He heard the television spewing coverage of the 400-metre freestyle relay swimming heats, and felt as if every muscle in his body had changed to rubber. He had to hold tight to the railings to get down to the first floor.
Luke and Isabel had pulled the cushions off the sofa and piled them on the floor. They were sitting on them like little Buddhas beside empty cereal and juice boxes. Knight thought he’d never seen anything so beautiful in his life.
He fed, changed and dressed them while tracking the broadcast coverage of Teeter’s murder. Scotland Yard and MI5 weren’t talking. Neither was F7, the company hired by LOCOG to run security and scanning at the Games.
But Mike Lancer was all over the news, assuring reporters that the Olympics were safe, defending his actions but taking full responsibility for the breaches in security. Shaken and yet resolved, Lancer vowed that Cronus would be stopped, captured, and brought to justice.