Hot Pursuit
Gemma Fox

To my friends and family – you know who you are – but most of all to my youngest son Sam for putting up with a mother who hasn’t got a proper job.

‘The name of a man is a numbing blow from which he never recovers.’

Marshall McLuhan.

Table of Contents

Cover Page

Title Page

Dedication

Epigraph

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

Copyright

About the Publisher

1

‘Oh my God, oh my God. I think the baby’s coming. I want to push. Oh no, oh God, it can’t be – oh, oh…’ squealed the woman, desperately trying to grit her teeth and hold on tight to her dignity.

Bernie Fielding stood his paint kettle down on the grey civil-service carpet and sighed.

‘No, yer don’t. Come on now, love, don’t get yourself in a state. You’ll be all right. Breathe, pant. I know what I’m talking about. I was in the Falklands, me. Paramedic, yomped into Goose Green, Iran, Iraq – you just want to take it steady, darlin’ – it’s probably only wind. Do you want me to go and get you something? A nice glass of water – what about a pillow?’

As he turned, the large ginger-haired woman dropped down onto her haunches and bit the desk, while droplets of sweat glistened and rolled slowly into the rising swell of her ample cleavage. She groaned and then as Bernie watched very, very elegantly rolled backwards onto the floor as the contraction passed, her floral pink sundress tight as clingfilm across her creamy-white flesh. She looked like a Homes & Gardens beach ball.

‘Ring Linda in security, will you?’ she hissed between tortured breaths and clenched teeth, waving wildly towards the phone. ‘Or Anthea in Human Resources. Oh, my God, I think there’s another one coming. I thought that it was a false alarm; the baby isn’t due for another fortnight…Oh my Godddddddd.’

The woman’s face contorted into a hideous snarling mask while Bernie stared, overwhelmed, at the switchboard beside her computer. One little light flashed and then another, and another. It looked like some bizarre children’s puzzle. It was no good; he had no idea which key to press. He looked down at the woman, desperately clutching her distended Laura Ashley abdomen – it was obvious that she wasn’t going to be any help at all. Bernie stepped over her with some care, and opened the office door.

Outside in the corridor, a fey-looking boy in a cheap blue suit was busy pushing a trolley along the linoleum. Bernie beckoned him over.

‘S’cuse me, mate, but there’s a woman in here having a baby. I really think that you ought to go and get someone to give her a hand.’ He glanced back over his shoulder as the woman heaved herself over onto her side, panting furiously, her face flame red with effort and exertion. ‘And you’d better make it snappy.’

The boy’s face turned ashen. ‘What? Really? Who? Not Ms Hargreaves? Oh my goodness, oh my…Wait here, I’ll go and fetch someone.’ He looked down at his watch. ‘God, it’s nearly lunchtime, everyone will be leaving soon – His last words were snatched away as Ms Hargreaves let out an unearthly screech and the terrified boy broke into a run.

Bernie leant back against the wall; all in all it had been a funny sort of morning so far. He had been roped in by a friend with a painting and decorating business to help him with a little job, cash in hand, no names, no pack drill – a bit of easy money – and Bernie most definitely needed the money. He had had a couple of bad years, when nothing had gone right. The Inland Revenue were after him, national insurance, VAT, the bank, the finance company, two ex-wives – not to mention the council-tax people and the bloody rent man: in fact you name it and they had Bernie’s name top of the list.

He thought his mate was taking the piss when they’d turned up in the works van at this place out on the Colmore Road, and that maybe he’d been set up. It was obvious, though there were no signs up outside, that the offices were government. The whole place reeked of tax returns and little men in grey suits with beady eyes hunched over columns of figures that didn’t quite add up. Just pulling into the car park had made him feel a bit queasy, but it had been okay – until now.

Ms Hargreaves wailed again.

Within a few seconds two middle-aged women in suits appeared, bustling down the corridor pursued by the boy, whose complexion had turned from grey to bright crimson.

‘In my opinion it’s best if we get her downstairs to First Aid,’ said one woman, elbowing her way past Bernie.

‘Shouldn’t we leave her where she is, Audrey? If we could just get her into the recovery position – I don’t think you should move a casualty –’ ‘But that is exactly my point, Lucinda, she isn’t a casualty is she? She is in labour –’

‘But I read –’

On the floor between them Ms Hargreaves let out a terrifying grunt as the women rolled her over onto her back and the boy slammed the trolley into the newly painted skirting board where, by some unspoken consensus, it was decided it would make a superb impromptu stretcher. One suited woman peered at Bernie from behind her wire-rimmed spectacles, then glanced down at his paint-splattered overalls.

‘Just keep an eye on the office, will you. Don’t touch anything. I’ll send someone up to – to –’

‘Oh, please hurry,’ snorted Ms Hargreaves, easing herself onto the trolley. ‘I don’t think I can hang on very much longer. I want to push –’

Seconds later there was an unpleasant wet sound and a great tidal wave of steaming liquid swamped the pile of manila folders on the trolley. The boy looked as if he might faint. Manfully, one woman braced herself behind the handles of the trolley and guided it and Ms Hargreaves back out into the corridor. She glared furiously at the boy.

‘Get a grip, Hemmingway; it’s all perfectly natural. Run downstairs and keep an eye out for the ambulance.’

After they vanished through the swing doors Bernie blew his lips out thoughtfully and stepped back into Ms Hargreaves’ office. Keep an eye on things they’d said. He pushed the door to and lit a cigarette in spite of the little notice on Ms Hargreaves’ desk thanking him not to. The clock ticked; the computer hummed. He ran his fingers idly across the contents of the in-tray. Shouldn’t be long before someone showed up, always assuming they’d remembered to tell anyone he was there. Bernie sighed and looked around the spartan interior of the little office before glancing out of the window.

Below him, outside the main doors, Ms Hargreaves was struggling to get off the trolley while the two women were doing their level best to ensure she stayed on it. The boy was throwing up into a bin, while from somewhere in the distance Bernie could just make out the wail of an ambulance siren. He puffed again, lowering himself into the swivel chair.

Despite Bernie’s initial apprehension and the distinct sense that he was walking into an ambush, the ample Ms Hargreaves had barely given Bernie a second look when he’d opened her office door first thing that morning and waved the paint pot in her direction. She had grunted on and off for most of the morning, but not at him.

Bernie put his feet up on her desk, thinking that he should be painting, really – as the boy had so rightly pointed out, it was almost lunchtime. He stubbed out his roll-up in Ms Hargreaves’ pot-pourri and glanced without much interest at the computer screen. Probably a requisition order for park benches and paving slabs.

The screen swirled with random dots until he moved the mouse. Instantly it cleared and an animated cartoon character ran across it on what appeared to be some sort of title page. Below the little bearded sprite the text read:

‘RUN STILTSKIN…?’

The words flashed enticingly. Bernie glanced over his shoulder into the empty office. Why the hell not? Who would ever know? Maybe he could top her best score.

He’d had a nice little PC until the bailiffs had been round to repossess it. Bernie clicked the mouse and the picture on the screen unfolded like an origami flower to an altogether more official-looking document. He leant closer to read the closely spaced lines of text and then grinned with pure delight. Maybe there was a God after all.

Very, very slowly, Bernie Fielding unpeeled himself from Ms Hargreaves’ ergonomically designed vinyl chair and closed the door of her office. He took the bentwood coat stand from against the wall and wedged it tight up under the door handle.

‘Bingo,’ he whispered as he sat down again, and typed his full name, address, and date of birth into the spaces provided.

Downstairs in another part of the building, Nick Lucas took a seat and the cup of coffee the woman offered him. He smiled his thanks. She nodded and screwed her mouth up into a little moue of professional pleasantness that may or may not have been a smile, Nick really wasn’t certain and didn’t intend pushing to find out. She had jet-black hair, pulled back like curtains off her angular face, and looked as if she had been constructed from white chamois leather stretched tight over a wire coat-hanger.

‘Now,’ said the woman in a soft Scots accent, turning the computer screen so that he couldn’t see what she was typing, ‘it’s all very simple. We will be getting your new details through any minute…oh, here they come.’

Beside her, a printer spluttered into life and started to dart back and forth across a roll of white paper.

Nick coughed nervously and took a sip of coffee. It tasted like sweet tar. ‘I’m still not sure about this, Ms Crow…’ he began. To say that the name suited her was going way beyond stating the obvious. ‘I know that you said that it would all be fine, but I –’

Before he could spill his fears and anxieties out all over the grey institutional carpet, Ms Crow nailed him with her icy blue stare, strangling his confidence into an unmanly falsetto, and then rolled her eyes and pursed her lips again. ‘I’m sorry? Did you say something?’ she growled.

Nick swallowed hard. ‘I’m worried about this – I mean, will I be safe? With this Stiltskin thing; will I be all right?’

Her face rearranged itself back into what passed for a smile. ‘We’ve been through all this before, Mr Lucas, our witness relocation plan is extremely secure. We operate one of the premier services in the world. Our record speaks for itself. A complete new identity at the press of a button.’ She pressed a button on her keyboard to emphasise the point.

‘Just don’t audition for Blind Date, and I’d steer well clear of Big Brother if I were you,’ said a distinguished-looking, thick-set man stepping into the office. He sounded cheerful in a brisk nononsense way.

Nick got to his feet. ‘And you are?’

‘Coleman, Danny Coleman. Senior liaison officer on the Stiltskin team. You’re high priority, Mr Lucas; trust me, you’ll be just fine. Ms Crow here is my assistant. My right-hand woman. I don’t know what we’d do without her.’ He smiled, and extended a hand to take Nick’s. ‘From now on, whatever you want, whatever you need, I’m your man.’

Nick noticed that the smile on Coleman’s face only warmed his mouth; his marble grey eyes remained resolutely cool. Nevertheless, Nick shook the man’s hand firmly and then said, ‘I’m still really not sure about all this.’

‘Everyone feels the same way,’ Coleman said. ‘Don’t you worry, believe me, it’ll be just fine.’

Ms Crow got up from the keyboard to let Coleman take her place. Nick tried to look relaxed but knew he was failing miserably.

‘So who am I now?’ he tried with forced good humour.

Coleman looked up from the screen. ‘Just hang on a mo’, we’ll have to wait for this to finish the run.’ He glanced up at his assistant who was hovering by the door like a prim, Viyella-wrapped bird. ‘Ms Crow, if you’d like to go into the other office and get someone to transfer all this stuff onto Mr Lucas’s new documents, please?’

She screwed up her face again and left.

‘New documents?’ said Nick haltingly.

Coleman nodded. ‘Uh huh. It’s very simple – all the same documents you’ve got now only they’ll be in your new name. Passport, driver’s licence, national insurance number, credit cards, bank accounts. We can do them all from here but we’ll need some photos before we take you to your new address. You haven’t had any photos taken yet, have you?’

Nick shook his head.

‘Okay, well that won’t take too long, and it says here that you’re divorced; I’ll just buzz through and make sure they knock you up a decree absolute while they’re at it.’ Coleman grinned, the warmth once again only reaching the equator of his rotund features: his eyes stayed ice cold. ‘Never know when you might need it – and besides, a damned sight cheaper than the real thing, eh? As I said, if you have any problems all you have to do is phone in. It’s our job to see that the transition goes nice and smoothly. It normally doesn’t take our clients too long to adapt. Obviously these things aren’t always as simple as we’d like, but we’ve got all kind of experts on the payroll who can help if you have any problems. I think you’ll be fine once you’ve got yourself a proper home again, and a job, obviously – gives you a sense of belonging. What do you do?’

On the desk the printer ground to a whining halt and Danny Coleman tore off a sheet of paper.

‘I was a chef,’ said Nick, realising with a start that he had used the past tense, but Coleman seemed oblivious, his attention on the documents.

‘Oh really? Shouldn’t be too hard to find work then, we’ll sort out your certificates and some references,’ said Coleman, and then, ‘Here we are.’ He presented the printout to Nick Lucas. ‘Mr Bernard Fielding, this is your life. Or should I say, this is your new life.’

Nick took one look at the sheet of paper and felt sick.

In a little village, deep in the heart of rural Norfolk, Maggie Morgan slammed her ageing Golf into reverse and teased the car back up along the narrow lane that led to her cottage. It complained bitterly. Overhanging branches scratched the already scarred paintwork.

‘Sit down, Joe, I can’t see.’

‘You heard what Mum said,’ added Ben, dragging his little brother down into the footwell. Joe shrieked.

‘Oh for God’s sake, will you two stop it. I haven’t got the energy for this. Now both of you shut up and sit down.’ Her headache was making her even more ratty.

‘But he started it,’ whined Ben, as the car crunched over the weed-fringed gravel.

‘I don’t care who started it – just be quiet.’ She glared at them crossly in the rear-view mirror. ‘Ben, can you nip round and open the boot and help get the cases out, please? I’ll go and open up. Joe, don’t just sit there, honey. You can go and tell Mrs Eliot that we’re home safe and sound and see if she got the milk in.’

As the boys clambered out of the car Maggie eased herself out of the driving seat. It felt so nice to be home. She was so tired that her body ached right through to her bones. She stretched and looked around. The little pantiled cottage basked like a big ginger cat in the summer sunshine; the climbing rose over the door weighed heavy with scented creamy-pink flowers. It looked wonderful, so why was her fickle mind so eager to point out that the lawn desperately needed cutting and the bay hedge ought to be trimmed back?

Maggie grimaced. This was what the summer holidays were for. No marking or lesson planning for a few weeks; just the kids and the house. The hedge and the lawn and all the other jobs on the list would get done another day in some glorious unspecified mañana. Once she’d got the mower fixed and found the hedge trimmer, obviously. Maggie sighed. There were days when doing it all alone seemed like a cruel joke. In quiet moments on holiday Maggie had yearned for a change. She pined for a little excitement.

She groaned and headed inside. The drive back up from Somerset had taken forever and, roses or no roses, excitement or no excitement, if she didn’t have a decent cup of tea and a pee soon she might just die.

Joe, who had just turned six, trotted round from the next door neighbour’s carrying two pints of milk in his arms. He grinned, as behind him their elderly neighbour followed.

‘Nice to see you’re home, Maggie. Nothing very much has happened while you’ve been away. Did you have a good holiday? Joe looks like he caught the sun – look at his hair, all bleached blond at the front.’ The old lady ruffled it affectionately.

Maggie smiled, taking the milk from Joe. ‘It was wonderful, exactly what we needed; lots of sun, sea, and sleep. Everything been all right here?’

Mrs Eliot nodded. ‘Oh yes, fine. No problems at all. Oh, and the gasman turned up to mend your boiler at long last. I gave him the keys like you said.’

Maggie smiled. ‘And not before time. Great, look, I’m just going to get in and get things sorted out. I’ll pop round later and tell you all about the holiday.’ She nodded towards the boys. ‘The kids have bought you a little present.’

The elderly woman smiled. ‘How lovely. I got their postcard, it was nice of them to think of me. I’ve put it on the mantelpiece; pride of place. You’ll have to come and have a look, boys.’

Ben, with a red face, hefted one of the suitcases up onto the front step.

‘Why did you have to tell her that?’ he hissed as Mrs Eliot made her way back inside. ‘You bought her that vase.’ At nine he was beginning to see himself as the man of the house.

‘Shush. Here, let me have that. You go and help Joe with the black bags; and be careful, they’ve got all the blankets from the beach hut in them – they’ll be heavy,’ she called as Ben headed back down the path. Maggie slipped the key into the lock and pushed open the door with her foot.

Inside the hallway it was still and cool. Maggie let out a sigh of relief. She always enjoyed the first few seconds when she arrived home, when the house seemed slightly unfamiliar and she could view it with new eyes; except that this time the sensation lingered a second or two longer than usual. There was something wrong, something out of kilter that Maggie couldn’t quite put her finger on. The two boys, bearing black bags, pushed in behind her and dropped them on the flagstone floor.

Ben picked up the milk. ‘Is it all right if I have some cereal, I’m starving.’

‘Of course, love, there should be some in the cupboard. Can you put the kettle on while you’re in the kitchen?’

Joe bolted upstairs to add his new holiday dinosaur to the collection on his bedroom windowsill. Still the strange feeling remained. Maggie shook her head. It was probably just that she was exhausted; the traffic on the way home had been terrible.

Ben came out of the kitchen as she piled the rest of the bags up in the hall.

‘Mum,’ he said accusingly, holding out a box towards her. ‘Somebody’s been eating my cereal.’

A split second later Joe glared at her over the banister. ‘And somebody’s been sleeping in my bed,’ he said before vanishing.

Maggie laughed and threw her handbag onto the hall stand.

‘Oh my God,’ she said, clutching her chest theatrically. ‘Don’t tell me. We’ve accidentally wandered into a police reconstruction of Goldilocks and the Three Bears.’

As she spoke, the door to the study opened very, very slowly and a tall, rangy man wrapped in a bath towel stepped, dripping, into the hall.

‘Who the hell are you?’ he said, clutching the skimpy towel tight around his belly.

Maggie blinked, once, twice, strangling the scream that threatened. ‘I’m sorry?’ she mumbled. Her first thoughts were muddled; this couldn’t be happening. Next come shock, then fear, then surprise; a startled, bright, primary palette of emotions.

‘What are you doing in my house?’ he barked furiously.

Maggie settled on outrage, an unfamiliar scarlet glow, and looked round for something to defend herself and the boys with. Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion, everything sharp and clear and crisp.

Across the hall the man’s face contorted, and his body, already wound tight, hunched as if he meant to spring. ‘I said –’ he began.

‘I heard what you said,’ Maggie snapped, easing herself towards the hall stand. Her heart began to tango under her tee shirt. She could hear the reverberation in her ears as if reassuring her she was still alive and well. But for how long? She was acutely aware that Ben’s baseball bat stood amongst the umbrellas no more than an arm’s length away.

‘Well?’ demanded the man, the colour rising on his face and chest.

Maggie nodded towards her eldest son. ‘Quickly, love, go into the kitchen and phone the police,’ she called, and, as the man turned to watch Ben scurry away, she lunged forward. Grabbing the bat, she hefted it up to shoulder height.

The man took a step back, lifting one hand to ward her off, as Maggie settled into a batter’s stance.

‘For God’s sake,’ he yelped, as she took a practise swing in his direction, his other hand still clutching at the towel. ‘Are you mad? You nearly hit me with that. And there’s no point ringing the police.’

What did he mean? Was he going to kill them? Had he cut off the phone lines? Maggie narrowed her eyes, wondering just how hard she would have to hit him to subdue him. ‘I don’t know who you are, or what you want, but this is my house –’ She swung the bat again. ‘And I want you out. Now.’

Ben appeared in the doorway with the phone and began to tap in the number.

‘There has to have been some sort of mistake’ the man said, his voice still tight. ‘They brought me here.’

‘They? Who’s they? Little green men?’ Maggie said, more aggressively now, the adrenaline coursing through her veins like molten lava. She gestured towards the door. ‘Come on. Out.’

‘What?’ he said.

‘You heard me,’ she said, sidestepping towards the front door.

‘What? Like this?’ He sounded incredulous.

Maggie nodded. Once he was out she could lock the door, and throw his clothes out of a window. Let the police sort him out. Ideas spiralled through her mind like crows.

‘Here Mum,’ said Ben, waving the phone at her.

‘I’ve already told you, there’s no point ringing the police,’ the man protested.

Maggie felt another little plume of fear rising, her stomach contracting sharply as her fingers tightened around the hickory shaft.

‘Why not?’ she said, licking bone-dry lips, watching his every move. ‘Did you cut the wires?’

He sighed and ran his fingers back through his wet hair. ‘No, of course I didn’t cut the wires – don’t be so melodramatic. It’s just that the police know that I’m here already, they were the ones who brought me here in the first place,’ he said quietly. ‘How many burglars do you know who break in to take a shower, for God’s sake?’

Joe thundered halfway down the stairs two at a time and then froze when he spotted their unexpected guest. Maggie shooed him towards the kitchen. ‘Keep back, Joe. It’s all right – don’t worry. He’s just leaving.’

The man groaned. There was a look of total disbelief on his face. ‘Look, I’m not going to hurt anyone. There has to have been some sort of mix-up somewhere –’

Maggie balanced herself on the balls of her feet. She was ready for him if he made a move. ‘So what are you doing in my house?’

‘As far as I was – am – concerned, this is my house. The lady next door gave me the key –’ He waved towards Mrs Eliot’s house.

Maggie suddenly understood. ‘That’s because she thought you were the gasman.’

The man looked hurt. ‘She said that she was expecting me.’

Maggie swung the head of the bat back and forth speculatively. ‘She was – at least she was expecting someone from the gas board. It’s taken them six weeks to get around to repairing my boiler, although actually – unless you are the gasman, they still haven’t made it.’ The bat was getting heavy. ‘Now, can you explain what’s going on?’

‘They’ve never been the same since they were privatised,’ he said.

‘That wasn’t what I meant and you know it,’ Maggie hissed. She was having trouble sustaining her sense of outrage.

The man looked down at his damp belly. ‘Would you mind very much if I just nipped back upstairs and got dressed? I was getting out of the shower when the car pulled up and as I wasn’t expecting anyone I came down to see who it was.’

‘And then I opened the door?’

‘Yes – I thought I’d better hide. I wasn’t sure who you were. I won’t be a minute –’

Maggie watched him turn and hurry upstairs still clutching one of her best fluffy white towels around his midriff. He wasn’t the only one who wasn’t sure who was who.

Ben, still carrying the cordless phone, looked at her from the kitchen doorway. ‘Do you still want me to ring the police, Mum?’

Maggie shook her head, feeling vaguely ridiculous standing in the hall brandishing a baseball bat, all wound up and ready to go.

‘No, love – just go into the kitchen and make us some tea, will you?’

‘Oh, go on, Mum, let me, please,’ Ben whined. ‘I know the number and everything.’

‘No,’ Maggie snapped.

Standing beside Ben, Joe pulled a face. ‘You told Mrs Eliot that you were going to go round hers for tea. You promised and she’s got chocolate biscuits.’

Maggie sighed. ‘I did, didn’t I? Just nip across the garden and tell her the gasman is still here and I’ll try and get round later if I can. And then come straight back.’

It didn’t take the honorary gasman more than ten minutes to reappear, dressed in faded jeans and a sun-bleached blue cotton shirt. Maggie couldn’t help but notice that his shirt had four odd buttons. One wasn’t sewn on in quite the right place, revealing an interesting glimpse of tanned, hairy chest. His feet were bare, his dark hair slick and damp. He was still rolling up his sleeves as he loped into the kitchen.

‘Now,’ she said, across the kitchen table, still holding the baseball bat as she handed him a mug. ‘How about we take this from the beginning? Is tea all right?’ she asked, thawing slightly.

The man looked uncomfortable but pulled out a chair. ‘Tea’s fine. I don’t know what to say really.’ He bit his lip thoughtfully. ‘As far as I’m concerned this was – my new start,’ he said. ‘I belong here. I don’t understand what’s happened. This is my place –’

Maggie tucked the bat under her arm and opened the biscuit tin. There was a two-week-old Jammy Dodger and a half-eaten Wagon Wheel inside.

‘No,’ she said firmly, closing the lid and looking up to meet his gaze. ‘That’s where you’re wrong. You don’t belong here. If you belonged here I’m quite certain I would have remembered. Tell you what, let’s start with something simple, shall we? How about you tell me your name?’

He pulled another face and then said, ‘Hang on a minute,’ extricated a wallet from the back pocket of his jeans and opened it. ‘Oh yes,’ he said brightly, taking out a driving licence and handing it to her. ‘There we are, I’m Bernie Fielding.’

Maggie suddenly felt dizzy, as if somehow she had managed to wander into a waking dream – or perhaps a nightmare.

‘No,’ she said again, but more firmly this time. ‘That isn’t true either. You see, I was married to Bernie Fielding for eight years and believe me, unless he’s had a personality transplant and a lot of plastic surgery you are most definitely not him.’

The man glanced back into the hall, where Ben was watching him with all the concentration of a trained sniper. ‘Bloody hell – the boys, your boys, I mean, are they my boys, too?’

Maggie took a long pull on her tea. ‘No, that’s something else I’m sure I would have remembered, and no, before you ask, they’re not Bernie’s either. I married Bernie when I was eighteen, which seems like a very long time ago now. I’ve been married again since then.’

‘Oh my God, this is a total bloody disaster,’ said the man uneasily, clambering to his feet, his colour draining rapidly. ‘Where is he? Is he parking the car, walking the dog? On his way home from work? Oh my God. Bloody hell, this is such a mess.’

Maggie waved the bat in his direction, encouraging him back to his seat. ‘Relax, I’ve got the most terrible taste in men. I asked him to leave a couple of years ago and, surprise, surprise, he did.’

The man ran his fingers back through his dark wavy, still damp-hair. ‘Thank God for that.’

Maggie sniffed. ‘I know. I don’t understand what I ever saw in him,’ she said, and then, smiling, continued briskly, ‘Right, I’m going to get the kids some crisps and fruit out of the car. Then I’m going to park them in front of the TV, and while I’m away –’ she glanced at her watch ‘– that gives you about five minutes. I’d like you to come up with a persuasive and, if possible, plausible argument for exactly what you’re doing in my house and why I shouldn’t call the law and have you dragged out of here.’

Maggie picked up her car keys. ‘Oh, and it had better be good, Ben’s still got the mobile phone with him. One squeak from me and the Old Bill will be round here before you can pack your shower gel.’

‘Actually, I think I’ve probably been using yours. I thought it was really odd that the house had so many personal things in it. I was going to get some boxes, pack it all away – the policeman said I should just chuck out what I didn’t want.’

Maggie shivered, wondering what might have happened to her possessions if she had been gone another week.

Meanwhile, in a small sub-post office in an Oxfordshire village, the real Bernie Fielding was busy pushing a large pile of envelopes across the counter.

The woman smiled up at him. ‘Wedding?’

Bernie, dragged away from an entirely different train of thought, peered at her.

‘Sorry? What? Whose wedding?’ he said.

The envelopes contained a bevy of application forms for all the documents he’d need for his new identity, everything from a birth certificate through to a duplicate driving licence and American Express card. Numbers and account details all courtesy of Stiltskin. Courtesy of Stiltskin, James Cook also had a very healthy bank balance. Bernie had already been to the bank in Banbury to pick up his temporary cheque book and some cash.

‘Yours?’ she asked, nodding down at the thick bundle over the top of her horn-rimmed spectacles. ‘Or are you throwing a party?’

Bernie sighed. God save him from women with tongues.

‘Change of address actually. Can I have a dozen, er…’ he peered at the handful of change he had in his hand. ‘Second class, please.’

The woman opened the stamp book and counted them out.

‘Not local, are you?’

Bernie puffed thoughtfully and looked at his inquisitor. She had a great tumble of teased blonde hair, while behind the horn-rims, rather attractive fiery conker-brown eyes watched him with barely concealed curiosity. What the hell, he had nothing to hide, at least not now he didn’t.

Bernie warmed up his smile a degree or two. ‘No, actually I’ve just moved onto the caravan site at the back of the Old Dairy.’ He saw the fleeting glint of disapproval in her eyes as he plummeted earthwards in her estimation.

‘Although,’ he added hastily, clawing himself back from the brink of social-security oblivion, ‘it’s only temporary, obviously, just until I can find myself a decent house to buy. I was pipped at the post for the last one – I’ve already sold mine and needed somewhere to stay fast, you know how it is. I’ve been to see several others but…’ Bernie hesitated, tangled up in the strings of his own lie. He backtracked, wondering if he was finally losing his touch. He really needed to concentrate more.

Over the counter the woman was watching him wriggle like a cat watches a baby bird that’s fallen from the nest.

‘To be perfectly honest I haven’t seen anything else that’s quite me yet. You need to like the feel of a place – feel like it could be home – you know what I’m saying? One man’s inglenook is another man’s naff old fireplace.’ The lie dropped down a gear and accelerated away so fast that Bernie could barely keep up with it.

‘And besides, I’m looking for something a little bit special, double garage for the BMW and my four-by-four, obviously. Stables would be nice; livery is so expensive. But there’s just nothing on the market at the moment that really takes my fancy. Trouble is I have to move around a lot with my job and I’ve always hated hotels. I was going to rent a house, but all the fuss –’ Bernie lifted his hands to imply some enormous complex puzzle that he hadn’t the time to unravel. ‘Whereas I could just walk into a caravan, no problem, pay the deposit pick up the key and wham bam, thank you, ma’am – there we are, in like Flynn. And they’re fun, aren’t they – caravans?’

Bernie knew he was waffling but he didn’t seem able to stem the flow. ‘My new contract starts next week, so it all fell into place. Hadn’t got time to hang about. Nice secure little number, three years…bloody good salary.’ Lungs empty, right down to the red line Bernie hastily drew in a long, calming breath.

Thoughtfully, Conker-eyes tipped her head on one side and looked him up and down.

‘Sounds interesting,’ she said in a low voice. ‘My name’s Stella; Stella Ramsey.’ She left a little breathy pause at the end of the introduction, a pause that invited a wild variety of possibilities.

Bernie coughed. ‘I’m new to this area, I was really hoping to find someone to show me all the sights.’

Stella smiled lazily. ‘There’s not a lot to see in Renham, to be honest.’

He grinned. ‘Well, how about we go out for a little drink instead, then?’

She lifted her eyebrows. ‘The local pub is a right dump.’

He leant on the counter, enjoying the show of token resistance. ‘Well, in that case, perhaps you’d like to show me another one, somewhere…’ he hesitated, ‘somewhere nice, tasteful, and expensive. I’ve always had very expensive tastes.’

Conker-eyes ran her tongue around the end of her well-chewed Biro. ‘Oh, have you?’ she said slyly. ‘Well, in that case, there’s always the Lark and Buzzard over at Highwell. They do a lovely chilli con carne, chicken in a basket, tikka marsala – very international cuisine, is the Lark.’

Bernie grinned, feeling a nice little buzz in the bottom of his belly as their eyes met. ‘Really? I don’t suppose I could tempt you to show me where this place is, could I? Only I’m at a loose end this evening –’

This time she hesitated, batting long eyelashes coquettishly. ‘But I don’t even know your name.’

Bernie smiled, pausing long enough to check that he remembered his new name before wheeling out a well-worn 007 impression. ‘Cook,’ he said, in a very poor imitation of Sean Connery, ‘James Cook.’

Conker-eyes blushed furiously. ‘Well, Mr James Cook, in that case, what time do you want to pick me up?’ she asked.

Bernie glanced up at the clock above the counter. ‘Shall we say about eight?’

She nodded. ‘Why not? I’ll meet you out the front.’

Bernie smiled, and without another word made his way to the door, opened it and lifted his hand in salute. As the shop bell rang to announce his departure, Stella Ramsey was licking his stamps and putting them on the envelopes that would secure all the things he needed for his new life. Her tongue was very, very pink.

In Maggie Morgan’s kitchen, the new Bernie Fielding, alias Nick Lucas, was watching with fascination as the woman who had burst into what he had truly believed was his new life and new home, went about cooking him and the boys supper. As she worked, the two lads ran a relay race of surveillance between the cottage kitchen and the sitting room.

Maggie had set the baseball bat down alongside the chopping board and was busily hacking an onion into uneven lumps with a large kitchen knife.

‘So, you can have some supper with us,’ she was saying, ‘and then you can go home.’

Nick sighed. ‘I’ve already explained to you, I can’t go home. I haven’t got anywhere else to go.’

She turned towards him, waving her knife like a conductor’s baton. He flinched. ‘You haven’t explained anything, and what you have told me is total baloney. What sort of an idiot do you take me for? You didn’t get here by magic, you came from somewhere. And everyone has somewhere they can go, even if they don’t want to. A sofa, a friend’s floor – back to their parents.’ She crushed a couple of cloves of garlic under the heel of the knife and shuffled them into the pan. ‘This just isn’t good enough. It won’t do. I need an explanation.’

Nick shook his head. ‘I can’t tell you anything else.’

‘What do you mean, you can’t tell me? Why not? How about name, rank and serial number? Me Maggie – you?’

He looked at her again. She was still smiling despite a sense of growing frustration. Casually dressed in a grey tee shirt and jeans, thick dark hair pushed back behind her ears, baseball bat within easy reach, Maggie almost looked as if she was enjoying herself.

‘You’re funny – I can’t imagine my ex-,’ Nick began and then stopped, an instant before he coughed his ex-wife’s name out onto the kitchen table. It stuck in his throat, a cold, grief-stricken, misery-laden lump. The pain caught him unaware, like cramp.

Maggie pushed her fringe back off her face and took a tomato out of one of the carrier bags on the work surface. ‘So,’ she said casually, ‘you were married, then?’

Nick reddened furiously. ‘Yes – but I’m divorced now – about a year.’

Maggie nodded. ‘Right. And so how does that relate to my finding you naked in my hall, exactly?’

‘It doesn’t. What I was going to say was are you always this unflappable? I can’t imagine my ex being – being so – so –.’ He couldn’t think of a word to end the sentence but fortunately for him Maggie could.

‘Accommodating? Calm under fire? My mother calls it robust good humour but trust me, it only lasts for so long and then poof –’ she gestured an explosion, ‘– it goes, just like that, to be replaced by raging fury.’

Nick sighed. ‘Look, Maggie, I am sorry about this – can’t you just pretend that I’m Bernie Fielding?’ he said miserably. ‘It would make life so much simpler.’

Maggie grimaced, plunging the knife deep into the heart of an innocent-looking red pepper. ‘No, I’m afraid that’s one of the things I most definitely can’t do. I’ve spent God knows how many years trying to persuade myself that all men aren’t Bernie Fielding. Why don’t you just give in gracefully and tell me what the hell’s going on here and then we can call you a cab. How hard can it be? How about we start with your real name –’

Nick groaned. ‘I can’t tell you – the thing is, if I could tell you that then I could tell you everything else. It’s just not possible. You have to believe me, there is a very good explanation for all this. I just can’t tell you about it.’ It sounded lame even to him.

‘Nice try,’ Maggie said. Instead of concentrating on de-seeding the pepper she was watching his face as he spoke.

‘Careful,’ said Nick anxiously. ‘You’ll cut yourself. Look, I’m good with food, would you like me to do that for you?’ he asked.

Maggie looked down thoughtfully at the long thin knife-blade and then slowly back at him. ‘Very kind but I think I can manage, thank you. Besides, you still haven’t answered my question.’

Nick sighed. There had to have been some kind of mistake. Surely Bernie Fielding wasn’t supposed to be a real person? Unless of course he was dead. ‘Is Bernie still alive?’ he asked hopefully.

Maggie lifted her eyebrows. ‘As far as I know, although after a night up the pub it was sometimes extremely difficult to tell. Except for the snoring and the scratching, obviously.’

‘Okay, okay – so what does he do?’

‘Bernie?’ Maggie wiped her hand across the chopping board guiding the great heap of mangled vegetables into a big saucepan and then looked skyward as if trying to frame a thought. ‘Gynaecology,’ she said, slamming the pan down onto the stove and lighting the gas. ‘He was always very good with his hands was Bernie.’

Nick felt his colour draining away. ‘Oh my God, are you saying that Bernie Fielding is a doctor?’

Maggie shook her head. ‘No, unfortunately not – just a keen amateur, which was a shame because we could have done with the money.’

Nick stared at her and then reddened as comprehension dawned. ‘God, I’m so sorry – I thought – sorry –’ he stammered.

Maggie waved the remark away. ‘What? It’s not your fault, is it? I’m assuming you’ve just got his name and not his moral outlook? What is it you know about food?’

‘Food? Oh, right, well I used to run a restaurant, before –’ said Nick, struggling to regain his composure. ‘Before all this happened.’

‘There, see, now we’re getting somewhere. It wasn’t all that painful, was it? And how about now?’

‘Now? Now I’m – I’m on holiday,’ he stalled.

Maggie snorted. ‘Don’t be silly. You can’t be on the run and be on holiday.’

‘I’m not exactly on the run, I’m…’ Nick squirmed. He couldn’t see how the hell he could go on with this and so he raised his arms in surrender. ‘Okay – the things I’m about to tell you are secret but under the circumstances I don’t see what else I can do. My real name is Nick Lucas and I’m in a witness protection and relocation programme. Bernie Fielding is, was, supposed to be my new name, my new assumed identity. The thing is there has to have been some sort of mix up, because I’m certain that I’m supposed to have a ficticious identity, not take over the tail end of somebody else’s life. The only problem is I’m not sure what I can do to sort out any of this at the moment. I genuinely haven’t got anywhere else to go – at least not straight away. I thought I’d ring the number they gave me –’

Maggie grinned, slapping the lid on the pan with a flourish.

‘You don’t hold up very well under pressure, do you?’ she said, pouring them both a glass of wine.

2

There had to have been some kind of mistake, except of course that that was impossible. Stiltskin didn’t make mistakes. In the neat, well-ordered, air-conditioned government offices deep in the bowels of Colmore Road the clerk tapped at the keyboard of the computer keeping one eye on the door.

‘RUN STILTSKIN…?’ flashed up on the screen again. She had already run it twice and something strange had happened. Very strange. It was her responsibility to do the back-up files on those people her department took under its protective wing. Normally it only took a few minutes, but she had been working on this one for the best part of half an hour.

First of all she’d needed to check up on the client’s new name and address. Except when she’d fed his name in, the computer kept coming up with two new names. Two sets of fictitious details scrolling merrily down the screen, side by side. Now, having repeated the process, the same unlikely combination of information rolled out again and again, like digital schizophrenia.

According to the notes that went with the case, Nick Lucas should have become James Cook. That was what was supposed to have happened, that was what she had expected to have happened, except that somewhere in the wiry underbelly of the computer on Colmore Road a third name had entered the equation: Bernie Fielding. It was all very odd. She had never come across anything like it before, even on the trouble-shooting training course she’d been on at Cheltenham.

Somehow, Bernie Fielding had become James Cook, and Nick Lucas had become Bernie Fielding.

The girl sniffed and glanced up at the office door, licked her lips and then stared at the screen. She’d only come in as a favour because the girl who usually worked on Stiltskin had shingles and no one else had the right security clearance.

Who would ever know? Surely one imaginary new life was much the same as any other? The girl looked over her shoulder to see if anyone else was looking. If her boss found out he’d make them stay behind to unravel what had happened and she’d booked up for ballroom-dancing lessons after work. An intensive five-night course, ‘Learn to Rhumba with Marj Cuthbertson’, accompanied by Barry Telling on his electric organ. She’d been looking forward to it for weeks.

One keystroke, that was all it would take. The girl took another look through the information. They’d printed up a whole new set of documents in the name of Bernie Fielding so that had to be the right one, didn’t it? There was even the docket to say he had been delivered to his new safe house. So why was it that James Cook’s bank account kept coming up as being active. She scrolled down. Very active by the look of it. Here was a computer error that loved shoes apparently. Bugger.

The girl hesitated, weighing up the options – one pearly-pink nail-polished finger hovering above the delete key as she wrestled with her thoughts. The tea lady opening the office door made her jump and before she had time to really consider what she was doing the girl pushed delete, and James Cook’s name vanished forever from Nick Lucas’s file.

Just like that. She hadn’t planned it exactly but it seemed that by an act of God, Nick Lucas was officially Bernie Fielding. She remembered him now – sexy-looking guy with dark wavy hair and big blue eyes. She bit her lip – he didn’t really look like a Bernie, but then again it was too late to change things now. Wasn’t it?

‘I thought you told me that you’d got a BMW?’ complained Stella tartly as she squeezed herself past Bernie’s guiding arm and into the passenger seat of a battered sunshine-yellow 2CV.

Bernie had reasoned that Ms Hargreaves was hardly likely to need her car for a few days, having just been whisked off in an ambulance to deliver her new infant. He’d found the keys in her desk drawer and cheerfully arranged – via Stiltskin – for the car to be re-registered in his name. His new name. As he whiled away the hours until he had to pick Stella up from the post office, Bernie had given the absence of the fictional BMW some thought – not that it normally took him much effort to come up with a plausible-sounding excuse.

He slipped in beside her and looked down, feigning grief.

‘I’m sorry, I suppose I should have told you earlier. My wife died last year.’ He spoke in a gruff monotone. ‘This was her runabout. I didn’t like to get rid of it – at least not yet. This car was like a pet to her. I try to give it a run out now and again. She would have wanted me to use it and it seemed – well – I wanted to take you out in it. She would want me to start over – and it felt right. “Bernie,” she used to say,’ he said, staring unseeing into the middle distance, ‘“I don’t want you moping around once I’m gone – I want you to get out and on with your life.”’ He looked at Stella to see how he was doing and then smiled bravely. ‘She was a good woman.’

Stella touched his hand. ‘Oh God, I’m so sorry, you poor, poor thing, you,’ she said softly. ‘You must think I’m ever so tactless, but why did she call you Bernie?’

He stiffened. Bugger, he was going to have to watch that. ‘Um – um – pet name,’ Bernie said after a bit of struggle. ‘She always reckoned I looked like that bloke out of Boys From the Black Stuff, you know – he reached around inside his memory discarding all manner of Bernards till he got to the right one. ‘Bernard Hill; the dark bloke with the moustache.’

Stella looked him up and down and nodded. ‘So you do, now that you come to mention it.’

Bernie sighed with relief. ‘God I miss her,’ he added as an afterthought, wiping away a phantom tear. ‘It’s all right. You had no way of knowing. But she loved this little car.’

Stella Ramsey’s eyes filled, too. ‘Oh, James.’ She was wearing a pink leather mini-skirt with matching high heels and a little sleeveless white cotton top, her bleached blonde hair sculptured in a great corona of curls and waves. For a postmistress she was an absolute cracker, Bernie thought.

Bernie brightened visibly. ‘Now, whereabouts did you say this pub is that you were going to take me to?’ he said, sliding his hand down over his back pocket to check he had his wallet.

‘James?’

It took Bernie a second or two to register that Stella meant him; he would really have to start thinking of himself as James Cook.

‘Yes?’ he said, relieved that Stella had taken his hesitancy for tearful reflection.

She leant closer, resting her hand very lightly on his thigh. ‘I want you to know that if you need to talk about your wife I perfectly understand. I mean, I don’t want you to feel you have to hold anything back. It’s good to talk about these things.’

Bernie nodded. ‘Thank you – not everyone understands. Her name was Maggie,’ he said unsteadily. ‘She was such a lovely girl…’ And as he spoke, the old Bernie Fielding faded slowly into oblivion to be replaced by James Anthony Cook; sensitive, caring widower.

While the old Bernie Fielding slipped seamlessly into his new persona and the new Bernie Fielding waited for Maggie Morgan to finish cooking the bolognaise sauce, an aircraft was landing at London Heathrow and out at Elstree a small television production company was busy finalising the details of its midweek schedule.

Aboard the aircraft two tall, good-looking, suntanned men in mirrored shades and expensive charcoal-grey suits waited for the cabin doors to open. Cain Vale tucked a newspaper into his flight bag.

‘What d’ya think then, Nimrod?’

Nimrod Brewster, sucking on a Minto, grinned the cool, even smile of a basking shark and glanced out of the window at the clear blue sky.

‘No problems, my son,’ he said in an undertone. ‘In. Out. We’ll be back in Marbella by teatime tomorra.’ He mimed a sharp-shooter’s draw with his index finger and then blew away a phantom wisp of smoke so real that he could almost smell the cordite. They had been offered a nice fat fee to cream a nobody. Nimrod would have done it for nothing if it wasn’t for the fact that he liked to maintain his professional status.

Cain cheered visibly. ‘Right, so in that case can I have the window seat on the way back?’

Nimrod considered for a moment or two. ‘I’ll toss you for it. Afterwards.’

‘All right. Where’s the business happening?’

Nimrod tapped the side of his nose conspiratorially. ‘You worry too much, Cain, we’ll know the details all in good time. It’s all arranged. We’ll be met at the hotel with the rest of the stuff – we already know the who, we just need to know the where and when.’

Nimrod patted the computer printout in his jacket pocket.

‘What’s his name again?’ asked Cain.

‘Nick Lucas.’

Cain nodded as if fixing the information somewhere deep in his mind.

‘Maybe we should ring him,’ said Nimrod with a sly grin. ‘Tell him he ought to kiss his ass goodbye while he still has the opportunity.’

Cain giggled.

Robbie Hughes, sitting in a darkened office in Elstree, had been chasing Bernie Fielding for a very long time – years, in fact. First as a researcher for the BBC and now as a presenter for Gotcha, a twice-weekly, prime-time, consumer TV programme. He had never had any problems filling the available airspace with the public’s worst fears. But for Robbie the hunt for Bernie Fielding had become something of a personal vendetta. He was Robbie’s very own Holy Grail.

The blinds in the upstairs office were closed to cut out the early evening sunlight. At the front of the room one of the younger researchers was busy showing everyone his latest PowerPoint presentation, pitching an idea to the show’s boss for his very own one-off special. A whole show devoted to one person, one topic, one major crime was the brass ring that everyone on the Gotcha team was aiming for. Their baby, broadcast to the nation.

The boy clicked onto the next image. ‘Potential here for some great visuals,’ he was saying as the camera panned around what looked like a normal suburban living room. There was a murmur from the assembled audience although Robbie wasn’t sure whether it was of agreement or boredom.

There was a glitch in the air conditioning and the room was unpleasantly warm. People were stripped down to shirtsleeves and strappy tops, sipping Evian, iced tea and coffee frappé, trying to ignore the growing miasma of antiperspirant battling with Mother Nature, while still looking cool and interested – after all, it might just be their turn next.

Robbie sat at the back, a little apart from the crowd as befitting his status as cohost, letting the puppies play. All of a certain age, four of them rotated the job as studio anchor – two old hacks, a female newscaster and him. If not in the studio the presenters would be out in the field just like the good old days. It was his turn today to ride shotgun on the Gotcha creative crèche to make sure there weren’t too many stories about fake designer tee shirts and imported DVDs.

Robbie had his own idea for a Gotcha special but now was not the time. He certainly had no intention of making his pitch in front of the children.

It had always seemed, in the great scheme of things, that he and Bernie Fielding had been destined to meet again and again – star-crossed consumer synchronicity. Bernie Fielding’s name, if not his face, had haunted Robbie night and day for years; an ever-present name amongst a flurry of other directors on a dozen dodgy letterheads, that signposted sharp practice, deceit and cheap Asian imports. It seemed to Robbie that Bernie saw himself as King-Con.

First it had been the floral sun-lounger that had nearly disembowelled Robbie on a south coast beach; Bernie’s company name was there on the instruction slip. Later there had been the conservatory that had spontaneously combusted when his mother-in-law turned on the spotlights. Robbie’s dodgy second-hand Merc that had turned out to be two cars welded together, his sons’ radiocontrolled exploding cars, his sister’s garden swing – Bernie Fielding had – it miraculously seemed – had a hand in them all.

And when, just before Christmas one year, Robbie Hughes’s wife had said she’d put a deposit down on a time-share villa in Tenerife as a surprise present, Robbie knew, even before he opened the phoney letter of receipt, whose name would be there up above the date. Oh yes, he had an idea for a special all right. Bernie might have been quiet for a while but Robbie’s senses were tingling; something was up and he planned to find out what. He was going to nail Bernie Fielding’s arse to the mast on prime-time TV – and he was going to do it soon.

3

While supper cooked, Nick Lucas nipped the phone between cheek and shoulder and hung on as instructed, waiting for someone, anyone, to talk to him.

‘Your call is currently in a queue,’ repeated a cool synthetic female voice. ‘All calls are being answered in strict rotation. If you would like to hold the line, one of our operators will be with you as soon as they are free…Your call is currently in a queue…’

Nick sighed with frustration and glanced out of the upstairs window in Maggie Morgan’s country cottage, wishing there was some way that it could still be his. Roses crept stealthily up over the sill, framing the view. The long summer’s day was fading fast into shades of old gold. Here and there, sunlight reflected off windows in houses on the far side of the common, tinting them with a fiery glow. Across the unkempt lawn a swing under an apple tree struggled to take advantage of the evening breeze. It was the most glorious summer’s evening.

Nick sighed again. Maybe it had been too good to be true after all. Hadn’t his first impression been that the house was too far from any where, too exposed to be safe? Even though Nick had been amazed and relieved when Coleman’s men dropped him off at the cottage, in the back of his mind, wasn’t there a part of him that would have felt safer in the anonymity of a city? He was used to London. He had wondered what would happen next, and now he knew.

‘…one of our operators will be with you as soon as they are free…’

Nick Lucas closed his eyes. His unguarded thoughts were fragmented and disordered; for months now there had been no peaceful place inside his head. But oddly, however disruptive and unexpected, there was a part of him that felt more comfortable now that Maggie and her kids were there with him. Nick had been uneasy about being alone after months and months of longing for his privacy. It had felt so odd to have a house to himself, and unnerving, too, almost as if he had been forgotten. Like everyone had moved on without him. For the last year or so Nick had had police protection twenty-four hours a day. Shifts of police officers coming and going, a stream of constantly changing faces who were sometimes there day after day for months but occasionally were there only for a few hours – whoever it was, there had always been someone close by.

Since he’d arrived at the cottage he’d toyed with the idea of buying a dog. It felt wonderful to be able to walk outside again, to amble down to the shops for a paper – but frightening, too, as if at any moment something terrible might happen. For what had to be the hundred-thousandth time Nick wondered if he would ever feel truly safe again.

‘…Your call is currently in a queue…’

‘Oh for God’s sake, come on,’ Nick muttered, tapping his fingers impatiently on the windowsill.

Finally, at the far end of the line there was a man’s voice – although not Coleman’s – and with that Nick tried to explain how his brand-new life had already turned sour.

‘So,’ Nick said, after a five-minute unbroken monologue, ‘I’m in the shit really. It’s complete madness. You promised that I would be safe here, but a whole family apparently lives here already – I mean what the hell’s going on? Would it be possible for me to talk to Danny Coleman?’

‘Ummm,’ said the disembodied voice thoughtfully after a second or two’s reflection. ‘I’m afraid not, your handler isn’t on duty at the moment but I’ll see to it that he gets a full briefing regarding your current situation. It’s all a bit odd, isn’t it, eh?’ The man sounded unreasonably cheerful. ‘We don’t usually get problems this early on. Not that we get many problems at all really,’ he added hastily. ‘It does sound very strange. But don’t you worry, just leave it with me and I’ll get back to you. A.S.A.P. My advice – if the woman who owns the house is agreeable – is to stay where you are for the time being, keep a low profile, and we’ll sort something out,’ and with that the man hung up.

‘My handler?’ snapped Nick into the empty, burring line. ‘What do you mean my bloody handler? And what do you mean you’ll sort something out? What about the family whose life I’ve just walked into, for God’s sake?’ he shouted angrily. ‘Not to mention your bloody fail-safe, extremely secure, sodding…low profile my arse.’ From the bottom of the stairs the younger of Maggie’s boys watched him suspiciously from behind big blue eyes. Nick reddened under his unflinching stare and struggled to control the great rip of fury nestling in his belly. He tried out a smile; the child didn’t move a muscle.

Wafting up the stairs came the rich smell of tomatoes, peppers, onions and garlic, all simmering away. The aroma made his mouth water, a sensation that took Nick totally by surprise. He took a longer, deeper breath, savouring the smell. It seemed like a long, long time since he had been truly hungry. God, how bad was that for a man who had made his living by cooking? Had he been so lost, so far away from himself…Nick stopped and let the sensation roll through him. Over the last few months his guts had been crocheted into a tight uneasy knot, so hunger, strangely enough, felt like a good omen. Dropping the receiver back into its cradle, Nick hurried downstairs. The little boy scuttled away from him before he was even halfway down.

By the time he reached the kitchen Nick’s new ready-made family were sitting around the table and turned to look at him as one as he crossed the threshold. He stopped mid-stride, uncomfortable under the gaze of the two small boys. Nick noticed that alongside the salad and the cutlery, Ben still had Maggie’s mobile phone close to hand.

Maggie, at the sink straining the spaghetti through a huge stainless-steel colander, nodded towards the nearest chair. ‘You’d better sit down, take the weight off your alibi. How did you get on?’

‘It didn’t go quite how I imagined, if that’s what you mean.’

Maggie laughed. At least she had disposed of the baseball bat. As Nick pulled out a chair Ben’s hand hovered over the phone like a gun fighter waiting to make a quick draw.

Maggie shook her head. ‘No, love. It’s all right. Why don’t you go and get some apple juice for you and Joe?’ she said gently. Ben sniffed imperiously, eyes not leaving Nick as he went to get the glasses out of the kitchen cupboard.

Fifteen minutes later Maggie mopped up the last of the pasta sauce from her plate with a rip of french bread. Ben and Joe, hunger having finally overcome suspicion, had eaten their supper with the unbridled passion of the young and were now preparing, very reluctantly, to go to bed.

‘Right,’ said Maggie to Nick, shovelling the last remnants of supper into her mouth as she got to her feet. ‘I want it all and I want it now. The whole sordid story. You can tell me all about it while I make us some coffee.’

Nick groaned. ‘Look, I’m sorry, Maggie, but I can’t – I’m not supposed to tell anybody. Not anything. Not a word,’ he added lamely, pushing his plate away. Despite Maggie’s cavalier approach to preparation the pasta sauce had been delicious and had tasted as good as it smelt. ‘You know too much already. If you knew any more you could be at risk, too.’

Maggie snorted, stacking the dirty crockery in the dishwasher. ‘So, dropping a complete stranger into my life with my ex-husband’s name wasn’t just a little bit risky, then?’

Nick puffed out his cheeks. ‘I’ve already said that I’m sorry, I don’t know what else to say to you – and I can’t explain how this has happened because I’ve got no idea. But don’t worry, the people who brought me here know now. I’m sure it’ll all be sorted out soon. They said that they would speak to Coleman, the man who’s dealing with my case, and get back in touch. A.S.A.P.’ Nick reddened. Said aloud it all sounded pretty pathetic.

Maggie lifted an eyebrow, observing his growing discomfort. The born-again Bernie Fielding was either very naïve or very desperate, although whichever it was, it was quite endearing; he probably still believed in the tooth fairy, too. As she studied him he pushed his fringe back up over his forehead and smiled. If he was a puppy in a pound no woman on earth could have resisted him bringing him home.

Maggie sighed. Her mother always said she was a soft touch.

‘I hope you’ll forgive me if I don’t look altogether convinced, Nick. What I mean is I’m not planning to hold my breath until the cavalry show up. I’ll make you up a bed in the spare room for tonight; Joe wants his bed back, and then tomorrow I’m afraid you’ll have to hit the road. Okay? Why did you sleep in Joe’s room anyway? You look more like a double-bed man to me.’ As she said it Maggie blushed and cursed the bit of her brain that let her say what she was thinking without considering the consequences.

But it’s true, protested her brain. Worse still, Nick Lucas looked like the kind of man that she had always hankered after but never quite found. He was tall, with broad shoulders, a strong gentle face – nice eyes. Beautiful hands too, kind of good looking in a lived-in way. Under other circumstances…Maggie stopped herself from thinking the whole thought and shook her brain into submission. These were not ‘other circumstances’ and being taken for a ride by a total stranger was just the kind of thing you warned your children about. Even so, her mystery guest most definitely had the air of a man who preferred not to sleep alone if he could possibly help it, the kind of man who liked life best if there was a woman in it.

Maggie took two mugs down off the shelf and then forced herself to concentrate on spooning coffee into the filter, hoping that he couldn’t read her mind.

‘What I meant to say is that as you’re quite tall, a double bed has to be more comfortable –’ Maggie continued, as smoothly as she could manage, attempting to cover her tracks. He had amazing blue eyes, the corners crosshatched with humour.

Maggie tightened her grip on the rogue thoughts that chattered busily through her mind, reminding herself that she didn’t know a thing about Nick Lucas except what he’d told her – which wasn’t much – and that he lied very badly, and that her track record was pretty terrible when it came to men. Her first impression of the real Bernie Fielding had been that he was a really nice man, too. It was a salutary thought, as effective as a cold shower.

Why was it exactly that Nick Lucas had turned up at her house with Bernie’s name? It wasn’t the first time that the idea had gone through her mind but it was the first time Maggie had let it settle. Why here, why now? Surely Bernie wasn’t big enough to have had a hand in this? In which case, why did every instinct tell her that this had the real Bernie Fielding’s paw-prints all over it?

Across the table Nick Lucas said nothing, staring blankly ahead as if collecting his thoughts. Finally he turned to look at her, lifting his hands to encompass the room. ‘I’ve already said that I’m sorry about all this. I don’t know what else to say to you. It’s totally crazy.’ He looked uncomfortable, as if he’d been caught out.

Maggie, chewing on the nub end of the French stick, said, ‘Just how crazy is that, then, Nick?’

He continued almost as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘Things like this shouldn’t happen to people like me. I used to run a great little restaurant, you know. Good food, reasonable prices, in an up-and-coming area. We were beginning to build a reputation, getting to be well-known locally. They even did a feature on us in the Evening Standard. It’s ridiculous – why did I think for a moment that this would come good?’ He sounded increasingly upset. ‘What the hell am I supposed to do now?’ As he spoke his gaze met Maggie’s, looking at her as if she might have the answers.

Maggie stood the coffeepot down between them on the kitchen table and slapped two mugs alongside it.

‘You could tell me what’s going on. Maybe I could help?’ Her tone was gentle and conspiratorial. ‘After all,’ she grinned mischievously, ‘we were married.’

Nick groaned and dropped his head into his hands.

She pushed a mug towards him. ‘Don’t worry, I’m good in a crisis. What was it exactly that you witnessed?’

Nick ran his fingers nervously through his hair. ‘To be honest I wish to God I knew. It seemed such a small thing really. As far as I was concerned they were just regular customers. Vegetarian lasagne, green salad, home-made game pie with vegetables of the day –’

‘I’m sorry?’ said Maggie, wondering if the bottle of Italian red that they’d shared over supper had confused the issue. ‘Are these the cryptic clues?’

Nick looked up. ‘No, no, that’s what the two of them always had when they came into my restaurant. Nice safe choices. They usually came in once, sometimes twice a week.’ He looked uneasy. ‘I thought they were just the sort of clientele we wanted, you know. Respectable, regular business customers. Nice, quiet, appreciative; something off the sweet trolley, two cappuccinos and they always tipped well – no fuss, never complained. Ideal customers.’

Maggie sniffed. ‘Whoa there. Hang on a minute. I think I’ve lost the plot here somewhere. You have been relocated, renamed, given a completely new identity, because of two nice regular respectable lunchtime diners? I don’t understand, Nick – I thought you must have seen something really – you know – awful, terrible.’ Maggie paused as the images of innumerable TV crime shows, police reconstructions and photo-fit pictures trickled through her mind in a gory slide show. ‘Messy, murderous, violent.’

Nick, still deep in thought, glanced up. ‘Sorry?’

‘What I’m saying is that I thought you must have seen something, you know, really ghastly to put you in so much danger that they needed to relocate you.’

He nodded. ‘Me, too, but it seems you don’t have to witness something messy for it to be dangerous. One morning two guys turned up at the restaurant with official-looking bits of paper and asked if I’d give my permission to have my regulars’ table bugged. I was totally amazed. My two nice tidy customers turned out to be up to their eyebrows in God knows what. The fraud squad had been on their trail for months trying to tie the pair of them together.’

‘So what was it?’ said Maggie leaning closer, while trying hard not to look too eager or too pleased with herself. She knew that she’d cracked it. She could tell by the look on Nick’s face that he’d made up his mind to tell her everything.

He shook his head. ‘To be perfectly honest I still don’t have any clear idea. Something to do with stocks and shares – some sort of international computer fraud, I think.’

Maggie stared at him, feeling totally deflated. ‘What? Is that it? But you were a witness, weren’t you?’

Nick nodded. ‘Uh huh, I suppose so, but not in a Perry Mason big courtroom drama kind of a way. All I had to do was to identify them as the two people in question, give a few details from my bookings diary. When they’d met, how often – and of course it was me who gave permission for the bug to be planted at their table in the first place –’

‘And they relocated you for that?’ Maggie knew she sounded slightly incredulous.

Nick’s face reddened. ‘Yes. The unfortunate thing was the two of them came from different sides of the tracks. One was a highly respected financier in the city of London and the other one was something very, very iffy in organised crime.’

There was a long pause. ‘And?’ prompted Maggie. It was like pulling teeth.

Nick sucked his bottom lip and slowly turned the coffee mug between his long fingers. ‘And after they were arrested the two of them tried to persuade me not to testify.’ His voice was low now and very controlled as he turned the mug around and around. ‘It got very nasty very quickly once they’d been picked up. They’re not the sort of people you mess with. They threatened to rearrange my anatomy so I could bear children, they firebombed my restaurant and filled my basement with raw sewage. Not them personally, of course, but their hired help.

By the time the case came to court they’d blown up my car, ruined my business, destroyed my marriage, terrorised my staff and driven me to breaking point.’ He sighed heavily. ‘The pair of them systematically destroyed everything I had built to try and stop me from taking the stand. The authorities extradited one of them to the States. The police had already decided by that time that I was at long-term risk from reprisals.’ He drained the dregs of his coffee. ‘So there we are, now you know, Maggie. That’s what I’m doing here.’

She stared at him, not quite sure, now that she had dragged the story out of him, what to say. ‘My God. So what happened to the two men?’

Nick shook his head, uncomprehendingly. ‘I don’t know what you mean. Which two men?’

Maggie looked heavenwards. Nice eyes but not too bright obviously. ‘The two men you gave evidence against? Your two regulars? Mr Vegetarian Lasagne and Mr Home-made Game Pie.’

Nick shook his head. ‘Oh no, you’ve got it wrong. It wasn’t two men I testified against, it was two women – and if they find me they’ll have me killed.’

Maggie swallowed hard. ‘Two women?’ she whispered.

Nick nodded.

‘Oh bugger,’ murmured Maggie, ‘You really are in trouble.’

Nimrod Brewster and Cain Vale had booked into the large anonymous hotel adjoining the airport. They had shed their suit jackets, turned on the TV and raided the mini-bar by the time their contact arrived. He was a man so undistinguished, so grey that he managed to render himself practically invisible. He stepped quietly into their hotel room and smiled without warmth.

‘All set then, are we, lads?’

Nimrod nodded and removed his mirrored shades to reveal the palest ice-blue eyes rimmed with piggy-white lashes. Outside, beyond the triple glazing, a silver jet rose noiselessly into the late evening sky.

‘Yeah, all fired up and ready to go. Brought everything we need, have yer?’ he asked, tucking his shades into the top pocket of his immaculately pressed shirt.

The man nodded and dropped a large manila envelope on one of the single beds.

‘There we are. Half now and half on completion, all expenses paid, as agreed. Oh and I thought you might like this.’ He pulled out a radio scanner and set it on the bed alongside the envelope. ‘You know how to use it?’

Nimrod nodded. ‘Nice touch. I always like to keep an ear out for the feds.’

The man paused and then looked at Nimrod thoughtfully as if weighing up just how much to tell him. ‘I want you to be especially careful with this one, Nimrod,’ he said in a low, unremarkable monotone.

‘Of course. We always are,’ said Nimrod, slightly affronted by the slur on his professionalism.

‘I know, I know, but just hear me out. Is your friend here with us?’ he said, stony-faced. Across the room Cain was stretched out on the other bed, his attention firmly fixed on the TV screen.

‘Don’t mind Cain, he loves all them crime reconstruction programmes, CCTV footage, anything like that, watches them all the time in case he sees someone we know. Saw his dad on there once. But when it comes down to the job, we’re there, you know that. Totally focused – one-hundred-and-ten per cent or nothing at all. It’s just that the planning side of it isn’t his forte.’ Nimrod’s tone was icy.

The little man nodded his head. ‘Sorry. I’m most certainly not implying that you’re normally careless. We wouldn’t have hired you if we thought that was the case.’ He paused. ‘It’s just that I think that somebody somewhere out there may already have got a sniff that something’s going down.’

Nimrod raised an eyebrow. He liked violence; he didn’t like unnecessary risks involving the law.

‘Yeah? What makes you say that, then?’

‘My clients are very insistent that Mr Lucas pays for his faux pas, and if you don’t take the hit someone else will, but what I’m saying is that if you don’t want it, it’s not too late to pull out.’ The man sucked his teeth, waiting for Nimrod’s reaction.

‘Go on,’ encouraged Nimrod. ‘Cough it up. We’re here now.’

‘My sources at Stiltskin have informed us that our friend, Mr Lucas, was all set to be relocated as one James Anthony Cook. Three days later and James Cook Esquire has vanished completely from their computer records only to reappear as one Mr Bernard Fielding.’

Nimrod nodded knowingly although he hadn’t got a clue what the man was going on about, his only real experience of computers involved creaming countless hoards of screaming aliens, but he did know when to keep schtum.

The little man continued. ‘My instincts tell me this may well be a complex double-bluff to throw us off the scent. I’m still convinced that James Cook is our man. The powers-that-be have just tried to dig him in a little bit deeper, added a soupçon more camouflage. Made it a little more difficult for anyone to find him. Maybe they suspect someone is hacking into their database, maybe they suspect a leak, who knows? One thing is for sure: if they knew for certain it was us then the likelihood is we would have been pulled in by now.’ He pointed towards the envelope on Nimrod’s bed. ‘We’ve already turned up several bank transactions in Banbury for our Mr Cook. New suit, good shoes –’ He grinned and tapped his nose. ‘Don’t ever doubt that Big Brother has his eye on you, lads.’

Nimrod grimaced. He sincerely hoped not; he had kneecapped his big brother back in ’86.

Across the room Cain was flicking through the channels while delicately stirring a maraschino cherry on a cocktail stick through the froth on the top of his Advocat snowball.

‘So, you’re saying that Nick Lucas is definitely now this James Cook bloke, then?’ Cain said slowly, suddenly looking up at their undistinguished visitor. ‘You’re certain? Only it could get very messy if you’ve got it wrong.’

The man sniffed, his smile opening up like an icy fissure.

‘Yes, absolutely. His new address is in the envelope, courtesy of the bank’s computer, then there’s photos, all the usual stuff that you need. He’s holed up in a caravan site near Banbury apparently, presumably sitting tight until they find him a house. So there we have it, lads. Your mission if you choose to accept it.’

Nimrod looked at Cain. For a moment their eyes met and Cain gave a barely perceivable nod.

Nimrod picked up the money. ‘Seems like the deal is on, then,’ he said.

‘Good,’ said their contact. ‘I knew you two wouldn’t let me down.’ He paused as he got to the door. ‘Ring me when it’s all over. And don’t blow it, lads. I don’t have to tell you that my clients are very influential people. Mr Lucas is to be made an example of. We can’t have people of their calibre being screwed over by some moronic little gimp in a pinny, now can we?’

Over the years Bernie Fielding had developed a sure-fire way to get women into bed; he led them to believe that he was impotent. It always worked like a charm. A few veiled references to things not being quite right. A murmur of regret at being unable to take a relationship any further. A tender plea not to get involved because he could never give a woman what they truly wanted or needed and could only bring them heartbreak and he was in like Flynn. It seemed that a plea for understanding and consideration brought out the Florence Nightingale in them all.

Women, he had realised early on in life, loved a challenge; loved to feel that they were special, different, needed. It didn’t take very much to have them thinking that perhaps they were that special someone, the one to provide the sexual elixir that would miraculously cure him of his tragic affliction – and of course, as it turned out, they always were.

Stella Conker-eyes was proving no exception. Snuggled up beside him in a quiet corner of the lounge bar in the Lark and Buzzard, compassion was her middle name. She had delicately teased out of him the full story of his poor dead wife, wiped away a tear as he spun her a long and complicated yarn with many thoughtful pauses – which Stella took to be grief, but which were actually Bernie trying to think up something heartrendingly tragic. It was only halfway through the evening and already Bernie had successfully wiped out his wife, the family Labrador and his sex drive. Not bad going for a slow night.

And now, after four large gin and lemons and something greasy in a basket, Stella’s little leather skirt was riding higher up her thighs than Bernie thought physically possible. Her dark eyes glistened as she leant towards him, her floral perfume so strong it was making his nose run.

‘Oh, James, you poor, poor man,’ she purred, easing herself closer still so that they were sitting thigh to thigh. ‘Life really hasn’t been very kind to you at all, has it? No wonder you’re always on the move. I can understand it. It must be so hard to put down roots after everything that’s happened; you’re afraid of getting hurt all over again, aren’t you?’

Bernie sighed theatrically. ‘Not everyone sees it like that. You’re a very perceptive woman, Stella,’ he said, damp-eyed. ‘You’ve made me realise just…’ he paused for added emphasis, ‘…just how empty and pointless my life has been for the past two years.’ He let his hand rest lightly on her knee.

Stella let out a strangled throaty sob. ‘Oh, James,’ she said softly and guided his head down into the cleft between her expansive breasts.

Bernie shivered, drinking in her warmth and the scent of her skin as she held him tight against her. Shit, the way he was going he’d have her knickers off before closing time.

Meanwhile, in the Gotcha production office, now that the creative kindergarten had all gone home, Robbie Hughes was pitching his story to the show’s producer. He had waited patiently for this moment. Bernie Fielding was far too important a pearl to be cast before the rest of the Gotcha swine. Robbie was hoping, if he played it right, that his boss would let him have that magic one-off special – a whole programme devoted to the machinations of Mr Bernie Fielding. She had given him ten minutes.

‘Double glazing,’ he said, stabbing a pile of brochures with one doughy finger. ‘Conservatories, pyramid selling, security alarms, pension plans, time-share. Jesus, what more do we want? What more do we need? He’s quiet at the moment – probably regrouping, going for the big one. I think now is the perfect time to get him. Bernie Fielding has been into every money-grabbing, stitch ‘em up cowboy con trick you can think of, and more besides. The man is a real menace, a social evil, he needs putting away. We have to put him away. We’ve got complaints, affidavits, reports, letters, photographs. We’ve got all the evidence we’ll ever need to nail him.’ Robbie picked up a letter at random from the pile. ‘Eighty-year-old pensioner lost her entire life savings in one of his pyramid scams. He took her for every penny she’d got and then backed over her cat in his Jag –’

His boss leant back in her swivel chair and peered for a moment or two at her long scarlettipped fingernails. He could sense that she was deliberating; Robbie held his breath.

‘We’ve been here before Robbie so I’ll cut right to the chase. This isn’t research; it’s a personal vendetta. It’s an obsession. A hobby gone bad. I have heard this damned story dozens of times. I’m sorry to disappoint you, Robbie, but it’s old news, darling. Stale. Let’s face it, these days everyone is bored shitless by all this sort of stuff. It would be different if you could prove that this guy had actually killed somebody. Even maiming is better than nothing –’

The smell of her perfume, the odour as memorable as sulphur, permeated the entire room. She picked up her pen and pointed at the rows of hessian-covered pin-boards that dominated the office walls. Each one was a précis of a story that they were currently working up for broadcast.

‘Organs. That’s really hot at the moment. Unwashed proles being hoicked in to have their tonsils out and waking up to find someone’s whipped out a kidney. Nineteen-year-old mother of four goes in to have her appendix out, wakes up with an eye gone – emotive stuff.’

She swivelled a little further round on her chair, pen aimed at the pin-boards like the staff of Moses. ‘What have we got – toxic teddies, some guy poisoning toddlers, that’s always a good angle. Family pets into fun furs, tabby tote bags. Dodgy doctors, a nun selling smack outside an orphanage. It’s all ground-breaking stuff. Pyramids are very passé, Robbie, very passé. Does your man do organs?’

Robbie looked down and closed the bulging dossier he had on Bernie Fielding.

‘Just give me a little bit longer,’ he said. ‘I’ll see what I can come up with.’

4

Once he had been dismissed Robbie hurried back downstairs to his own office. The lights were still on although the rest of the floor was in darkness. Inside his assistant looked up expectantly.

‘How did it go?’ she asked, and then the words and the smile faded as she saw Robbie’s expression. ‘Oh no. Was it that bad?’

Robbie threw out his chest and stapled on a happy face. ‘No, no, not at all. Don’t worry. Just a little set-back. It’s nothing that can’t be sorted out.’ He made an effort to sound brisk and businesslike. ‘What we need is to find the focus, the hook for one good Bernie Fielding special. Madam Upstairs was worried that the thrust of our programme was perhaps a little too broad – maybe even a little dated – but as I told her it’s nothing that can’t be put right with a bit of old-fashioned dedication, research and midnight oil. We just need to find out what Bernie’s up to now.’

Lesley smiled. ‘It sounds quite promising then?’

Robbie nodded. ‘Absolutely,’ he said, not quite meeting her eyes. ‘Now, I know it’s late, but I want to pull out everything that we’ve got on our Mr Fielding: old addresses, old haunts, old ties, any little clue that we can come up with as to where he is now and what he’s up to. This is all-out war. I want to get that bastard put away before Madam Upstairs decides to pull the plug on the whole bloody project. You know how fickle she can be at times,’ he added hastily in answer to Lesley’s startled expression. ‘I can’t believe that Bernie isn’t up to his old tricks somewhere. We just have to track him down and nail his hairy little arse to the mast, and we have to do it soon.’ There was just a hint of Winston Churchill in his delivery. As Robbie Hughes spoke he stared up at the pictures and notes on the pin-boards above his desk. Some had been there so long that they were brittle and yellow with age. He and Bernie Fielding went back a long, long way.

His entire office wall looked like the presentation of evidence for a serial killer. Passé; he’d show that bloody bitch passé. Still mumbling to himself Robbie started rummaging through the filing cabinets pulling out great wads of paper, photocopied sheets and all manner of advertising fliers. ‘Right, let’s see what we’ve got –’

‘Oh God, I love it when it’s like this, Robbie,’ said Lesley breathlessly, taking down a row of box files from one of the stationery cupboards. ‘It feels like we’re at war, you know – like we are really making a difference.’

‘But we do, Lesley, we do.’ Robbie smiled indulgently in her direction and opened the first of the box files.

They were labelled by date with Bernie Fielding 1–5 along the spine. Lesley had stayed behind to lend him moral support. A couple of years out of university she was still a little overwhelmed by the whole set-up at Gotcha, and for some reason by Robbie Hughes in particular. Maybe because he had personally plucked her out of a backwater in the company to join his personal staff. Unconsciously, under her adoring limpid gaze Robbie puffed out his chest further.

‘That’s exactly what this is – war. It’s this kind of dedication that brings in the awards year after year: ITV viewers’ Community Service Award three years running, Senior Citizen’s ‘We’re Fighting Crime’ special award for five years on the trot, Senior Ladies’ Circle best programme award. This is the cutting edge, but we mustn’t get complacent. Oh no – we need to continue with the good work, we must track these con men down, sniff them out wherever they’re hiding. We have a duty to the people of this country.’ Robbie allowed himself the ghost of a smile and turned up the Winston Churchill just a smidgen. He pulled himself up to his full five-foot-two-and-a-half inches while holding tight to his lapel and tucking his elbow firmly into his side in his favourite ‘leader of men’ stance. Shame they weren’t filming him, really.

Lesley nodded enthusiastically – Robbie thought for one glorious moment she might actually burst into spontaneous applause, but no, she just blushed furiously and pushed her glasses back up onto the bridge of her nose with her index finger. It was an endearing little habit Lesley had, and sometimes when they were in bed together he noticed that she would do it even though she hadn’t got her glasses on and would then giggle self-consciously. Robbie smiled indulgently for a few seconds, coming over all soft and sentimental; what a precious little thing she was.

Lesley understood of course that Robbie would never leave his wife for her: he’d made that perfectly plain right from the very start. Robbie had decided that Lesley probably saw herself as the latest in a long line of valiant, self-sacrificing, much-overlooked women who attempted to sleep their way to the top and eventually settled for a place in the shadow of great men. The wind beneath his wings. Not that someone like Lesley was actually destined for the top, but even so he wasn’t the sort of man to disillusion a girl, particularly not one who was a natural blonde and so pleasantly perky and eager to please. No, Robbie Hughes was genuinely fond of Lesley, and she hadn’t said a word nor batted an eyelid when he’d slipped on her tights one night after work and suggested she might like to let him try on her shoes some time. Oh yes, as a personal assistant Lesley was perfect in lots of ways.

‘Would you like some coffee?’ she asked, as he opened up the first of the files. ‘It might help us to concentrate?’

‘Thanks, but no thanks. Not really a good idea, Lesley, not with my prostrate the way it is, I’d be up and down all night, but you have one by all means. We’re both in for a long hard session.’

She giggled although Robbie decided not to pick up on the double entendre; it wouldn’t do for them to get distracted when there was work to be done.

‘How about a mug of Cup-a-Soup instead, then?’ she suggested, padding over to the side table where the kettle, mugs and drinks were kept.

Robbie nodded, all the while surveying the notes he had piled on his desk. ‘Why not. I’ll have one of the ones with croutons. Now what we have to do is to imagine that we are big game hunters, Lesley. It’s important to understand our quarry if we stand any chance of catching him. So how do we find this man – where do we start?’ It was a rhetorical question and one that Robbie would try and work into the commentary if they ever managed to track Bernie Fielding to earth.

‘Let’s start with what we know, shall we? How about his background, his family?’

Waiting for the kettle to boil, Lesley gazed up at the ceiling and recited from memory, ‘Born 1952 to Shirley Elizabeth Fielding. His father Ernest Charles left when Bernard was just four years old, under a cloud of suspicion about his relationship with Lily Smith from the chip shop, to name just one of his numerous liaisons, and the whereabouts of the Glee Club Christmas money. Bernie left school at fifteen and has had various jobs since, including working on a market stall, delivery driver for Sunblessed, taxi driver and window cleaner – although he likes to tell people he was a paramedic in the Army or served undercover in the SAS. In 1972 he opened his first shop, importing cheap electrical goods, and he has been married twice; to Doreen Jean Parker in 1972, and in 1982 to Margaret Ann Morgan. Divorced twice, 1980 and 1990, a string of lovers and live-in girlfriends in between and on occasions at the same time, no children – or at least none that he pays maintenance for.’

Thoughtfully, Lesley stirred a heaped teaspoon of Nescafé into her mug, although her attention still seemed to be focused somewhere in the middle of the office ceiling. It disturbed Robbie a bit when she looked like that; it was as if Lesley could see something that he couldn’t, and then she turned and said thoughtfully, ‘You know, Robbie, if I’d have been married to Bernie Fielding I’d jump at the chance to stitch him up, once and for all. I mean I can’t see him playing straight with his wives any more than he did with any of the other punters.’

Robbie nodded. Lesley had picked up a certain streetwise patois since working at Gotcha, a little at odds with her nicely clipped Home Counties accent. She hadn’t quite got a real grasp of mockney yet but Robbie noticed with some pride that she was really giving it her best shot.

‘So you think we should start with his ex-wives, do you?’ he said hesitantly. It sounded a bit too close to home.

She nodded. ‘Uh huh, and previous lovers. I’ll go right back to the beginning, that way we won’t miss any potential leads; we’ve got lots of his old addresses on file. I’ll chase up all the Fieldings as well. I’ve got a copy of the electoral roll on the computer –’

Lesley handed him a mug of Cup-a-Soup and as she did Robbie engineered it so their fingertips touched for just an instant. She blushed deliciously, giggled and went to pick up another of the files.

‘It’s a real shame that we haven’t got a decent photo of him,’ she said, although Robbie could see that her mind – like his – had at least momentarily moved away from Bernie Fielding and onto something more carnal, more pressing, more immediate. They both knew that moral support wasn’t the only thing that Lesley had stayed behind for.

‘It is, isn’t it?’ he said in a low purr.

Eyes glittering like a feral cat, Robbie took the file out of her chubby little fingers and set it down alongside her coffee. A grainy press cutting of Bernie Fielding’s second marriage to some poor unsuspecting girl in Norfolk slipped out onto the desk top. The dots that made up the image were so blurred that it looked as if a giant hat was marrying an Afro with a Mexican bandito moustache. The clipping fluttered with surprising grace into the puddle around the bottom of Robbie’s mug and sucked up the liquid like a parched man, tinting the bride and groom a not unattractive sunbed beige.

Not that Robbie took a lot of notice. If they were going to pull an all-nighter what was half an hour between friends on the office couch? He picked up his digital camera from the desk and pointed it at her. ‘How about I get a few good close-up shots of you for the album?’ he purred, in what he liked to think was a deep, seductive tone.

‘Oh Robbie,’ Lesley giggled furiously as he leant closer and unbuttoned the top of her blouse. As she wriggled like a fish, he pulled her down onto his lap.

‘You are such an animal,’ she gasped, as Robbie focused the camera on her cleavage.

‘Why don’t you take the rest of your clothes off,’ he said. ‘Get yourself nice and comfortable?’

Lesley put her hand over the lens, while with the other hand she tried to undo his trousers. ‘No publicity,’ she whispered thickly as the buckle gave way.

In the small but snug sitting room of a residential caravan at the back of the Old Dairy in Renham, Stella Conker-eyes had pulled off a miracle comparable only to the raising of Lazarus; and so far she had managed it twice. Although it would have been a considerably more erotic encounter if she hadn’t cried the first time and kept telling Bernie what a dear, sweet man he was.

Not that Bernie had too many problems with the idea of being a charity case in this particular instance, although when she managed it a third time even he was surprised.

Holding her tight up against him in case she stopped her ministrations, Bernie said, ‘It’s been a long time since I’ve felt this – this relaxed and happy, Stella. It’s been a fantastic evening. You have no idea how good it’s been –’

‘Oh James,’ she whispered thickly.

Bernie froze for an instant, feeling as if he had caught her out in some act of betrayal until it struck him that he was, of course, now James Cook. He really had to get used to the idea, before his face gave him away, although fortunately for him, Stella wasn’t looking at his face at that particular moment.

On the drive home from the pub he had floated the idea of dropping in for a coffee.

‘Oh all right, then,’ Stella said with a giggle. ‘If you insist.’

Bernie, who, as he was driving had only had a pint of bitter and then gone on to orange juice and was as sober as a Methodist Minister, smiled. ‘Your place or mine?’

‘It’d better be yours. Mum will probably still be up. She’s a very light sleeper – get’s a lot of gyp with her back and her sciatica and her waterworks – and besides there’s the two West Highland whites, Nancy and Ronald, and that bloody parrot of hers. The row them three make if she isn’t awake when we get in she soon will be.’

Bernie nodded and turned off towards the caravan site. The night was dark and warm, the wind rustling through the treetops like indolent fingers.

‘Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t like animals,’ Stella was saying, her speech slurred with drink, ‘but them bloody little dogs make such a row, yap-yap-yapping, and the parrot is so messy, seed and bits everywhere. No, as soon Mum passes away, God bless her, or goes into a home, they’ll have to go.’

Bernie nodded. He knew better than to interrupt a woman when she was rambling. ‘Okay,’ he said when he was certain that she’d finished. ‘Although I have to warn you that the caravan’s a bit of a mess at the moment, but at least it’s nice and quiet and it is only temporary.’

Stella looked at him slyly and said that she quite understood that it was only temporary, and no, she didn’t mind the mess at all. No, really. It was fine, after all things would be different when he got his new house, wouldn’t they? Maybe she could drop by with a copy of the local paper later in the week; they had a big pull-out housing section at the back and she had always liked house-hunting.

So here they were, stretched out half-naked on the hearth rug in front of the gas fire, in the wee small hours. Stella moaned softly and crept up towards him.

‘Would you like to go to bed, James, only I’m getting terrible carpet burns on my knees.’

Bernie did his best to look tender and serene, although he did wonder just how much she could see without her glasses. ‘You know, Stella, this really is the best evening I’ve had in – in –’ he began, wondering what constituted a suitable measure of time.

Fortunately he was saved by Stella pressing her fingertips tightly to his lips. ‘Don’t. It’s perfectly all right. There really is no need to say anything, James,’ she murmured in a low throaty mewl. ‘Let’s not dwell on the past, this is not the time. Why don’t we just go to bed instead?’

Bernie grinned. It suited him fine; this way he wouldn’t have to try and make up some plausible story for the last best time he’d had; and after the bottle of wine they’d drunk since arriving back at the caravan he’d forgotten his poor dead wife’s name anyway. At the door to the bedroom, while looking back at him over one large creamy-white shoulder, Stella said, ‘Although maybe I ought to go home; I haven’t got a towel or a toothbrush with me.’

‘Don’t worry, sweetie. I’m sure I can find you something,’ he said, flicking off the lights.

‘Thank you,’ Stella murmured, sounding genuinely touched.

Bernie grinned. He couldn’t give a stuff whether she brushed her teeth or not.

It might be very late, but in his office Danny Coleman was still seated at his desk, caught in a jaundiced arc of lamplight and staring fixedly at the computer screen wondering what the hell was going on.

He was in two minds over what to do; there were all manner of protocols in place within Stiltskin for a variety of situations, but not this one. In theory Nick Lucas’s cover had been compromised, but how and when and by whom? Should Coleman arrange for a Stiltskin recovery team to go in and pick him up, bring him in? Was he in any immediate danger? Or could the joins be papered over and things left as they were?

Coleman turned a pen between his fingers, still staring at the screen. At this stage he was reluctant to draw attention to Nick Lucas by renaming and moving him. Some part of him still hoped that Bernie Fielding might turn out to be a secure identity after all. Change always made ripples, and ripples, however small, always showed up on the surface. And changes made too hastily – well there was no telling how big those ripples might get if there was a knee-jerk reaction to the Nick Lucas situation. That was the official line from the guys upstairs.

Coleman puffed out his cheeks thoughtfully; maybe if Lucas just moved area, he mused, doodling on his phone pad, all the while instinctively knowing that there was no way the answer was ever going to be that simple.

Something was horribly wrong, something was leaking somewhere. His superiors had suspected it for some time. But how, and where? In his gut Coleman knew that things would only get worse, probably much worse before they got any better. The problem with the whole Nick Lucas thing was that it didn’t fit into any pattern that made sense. Stiltskin had never coughed up a real person before. Coleman ran his fingers back through his thinning hair and looked at Nick’s call as it had been transcribed alongside the details of the new identity that had been set up for him.

Surely it made more sense for anyone who had infiltrated the system to just expose Nick Lucas and shoot him, rather than put him into a house with a real family. Or perhaps he was meant to be linked to…Coleman glanced down at the notes to check the names…Maggie Morgan, or Bernie Fielding, but why, for God’s sake? He made a mental note to run the pair of them through the computer to see if anything came up. Unless they weren’t after Nick Lucas at all but had bigger plans pinned up on the drawing board. Perhaps someone wanted to compromise the whole relocation procedure and Nick Lucas was involved purely by chance.

Trouble was that Coleman couldn’t get any kind of handle on how that was possible from this piece of nonsense. He closed his eyes, trying to glimpse the big picture, but any connections totally eluded him. He’d get Ms Crow to take a look at the data trail to see if they could find out what had gone wrong, but from where he was sitting this didn’t feel like a leak, it felt more like a total cock-up. Coleman pulled a nasal spray from his inside pocket, squeezed once, twice, sniffing hard as he did, waiting for the moist chemical hit to clear his sinuses and from there his head. First thing in the morning he’d get Ms Crow on the case, and meanwhile he just hoped that the wheel didn’t come off.

The cold splintery taste of the nasal spray ran down the back of his throat and flooded his taste buds.

‘I reckon you’re addicted to them things, you know, Mr Coleman,’ said the security guard, pushing the door to Coleman’s office open a little wider. ‘They rot your nostrils you know, burn through the septum – that little bit in the middle – you’ll end up with a snout like a pillar-box. Saw it in the paper.’

‘That’s cocaine, George; you had too many years on the force, you think everything’s bad for you.’

The older man smiled. ‘In my experience, if you enjoy it, it most probably is. I was about to lock this floor up for the night –’ There was a question hidden in the statement.

Coleman nodded and stretched, feeling tired bones grate and rub in his back and shoulders. ‘Right-o, I’m on my way then. I know when I’m not wanted.’

‘Me, too,’ said the security man. ‘That’s why I’m out here on the bloody night shift, and not tucked up safe and sound in front of the TV or in me bed. Now I’m retired my missus can’t abide me being under her feet messing the place up.’ He sniffed. ‘Working on something important are you?’ The man spoke casually, his gaze apparently without any real intention drawn towards the neat rows of names and addresses currently displayed on Coleman’s machine.

Coleman smiled indulgently and then, unhurriedly, leant forward and switched his terminal off before getting stiffly to his feet. ‘No, George, just another bloody glitch in the admin, too many light bulbs and toilet rolls again, you know how it is.’

The old man laughed. ‘I’ll have to start taking more home, then.’

Stiffly Coleman got to his feet and pulled on his jacket. The trouble with a leak was that everyone got wet.

Maggie Morgan couldn’t sleep either. Uneasy now the night had fallen. She had wedged a chair up under the handle of her bedroom door and then thought better of it. What if the man currently tucked up in the back bedroom was waiting until everyone was asleep and then got up and attacked the boys and she couldn’t get to them fast enough? Maybe she should have them in her bed, or maybe she should have gone and slept in theirs.

‘Or maybe you should go and get in with him,’ whispered a wicked little voice somewhere in the back of her head. ‘What? What did I say?’ the voice protested when Maggie growled at it. ‘I only meant then at least you would know for certain exactly where he was.’ There was a pause and then the voice added, ‘And what he was doing.’

Maggie blushed and pulled the duvet up over her head while her brain continued to torment her. ‘He’s good-looking in a nicely rumpled kind of way; and let’s face it, it’s been a long, long time, Maggie. Think about it. How many times have you said if only someone nice would turn up, just drop into your life. He’s a gift. It would be a terrible shame – rude even – to turn him down. He’s like manna from heaven. It’s fate, he was delivered right to your door – into your hall, for God’s sake, what more do you want?’

Maggie groaned, rolled over and glanced again at the bedside clock with eyes that felt as if they had been back filled with fine sand and wood ash. It was nearly half past two in the morning. What had seemed reasonable two or three hours earlier – Nick Lucas’s heartfelt plea to stay for a couple of days until he could get himself sorted out – now seemed like taking the pen from the devil and signing her soul away.

It was totally crazy. Madness. Maggie knew absolutely nothing about the man. She had no idea who he was or what he was or where he came from; his story could be a complete fabrication. If only she had thought of those things earlier – like when she had met the other Bernie Fielding – her life might have turned out very differently. Talking of which, why was he using Bernie’s name, of all names? Maybe the voices in his head had told him to do it. What if Nick Lucas was really an axe murderer, what if he had escaped from an asylum or worse? Maggie’s mind, ever helpful, scurried around the dusty corners of her skull trying to come up with something worse, much worse.

Finally conceding defeat, Maggie sat up. Outside in the garden the wind had steadily begun to rise, bringing with it the promise of a summer storm. The ropes on the swing hummed out the harmonies. Maggie grimaced, resisting the temptation to put her fingers in her ears as a gust whined melodramatically in and out of the chimney pots; trust Mother Nature to cash in on her paranoia.

In the distance through the windows she saw the first white-hot glow of lightning illuminate the night sky, followed moments later by a drum roll of thunder and then something, somewhere close by, creaked.

Maggie shuddered and then held her breath. She had been straining so hard to pick out the sounds of Nick Lucas creeping across the landing carrying a carving knife, drooling, his eyes wide and vacant, that she had given herself a terrible headache. And now she really could hear something. There it was again, louder now.

Cold and nervous and wrapped tight with unspeakable fear and panic, Maggie crept out of bed, tiptoed across the bedroom floor and pressed her ear to the door. There. There it was again, something low and ominous rattling right there on the periphery of her hearing. Was it bare feet creeping across the floorboards? Or the sound of a door creaking murderously on its hinges?

Maggie’s mind reached out through the darkness, feeling its way around the sound to try and hear more clearly. And then all at once she knew exactly what it was and pulled back in disgust. It was someone snoring. A man, a grown man, snoring contentedly, curled up fast asleep, totally unaware of the storm or her spiralling terror.

Like water draining out of a bath, the tension trickled out of her shoulders and stomach. Exhausted now and on the edge of tears, Maggie stumbled back to bed and dragged the duvet up over her head. Typical that while she fretted and tossed and turned, the axe murderer down the corridor was sound asleep. It was instincts like that which had got her tangled up with the real Bernie Fielding in the first place. Outside, it began to rain furiously.

In the hotel near Heathrow, Nimrod was also tucked up in bed. ‘You gonna turn that bleeding TV off soon, then, are yer?’ he growled wearily. ‘Only we ought to make an early start in the morning, I want to miss the worst of the traffic. Makes me very tense getting snarled up in a jam and you know that I like to be calm. Zen; deep breaths, at one with all things.’

Turning his palms uppermost Nimrod pressed the thumb and index finger of each hand together to form a yoga-style circle gesture, although he drew the line at actually chanting in front of Cain who tended to laugh and pull faces.

Cain sniffed. ‘I won’t be long; I like this procelebrity fishing.’

‘Well at least turn the bloody sound down then and God help you if you can’t get up in the morning. When that alarm goes off I want you up; bright, sharp and on the ball – got that?’

Caught in the flickering light from the TV screen, Cain – sipping a piña colada – nodded just as someone from Slade pulled a fish the size of a corgi up over the side of a boat.

Nimrod groaned, closed his eyes and pulled the pillow over his head. Within minutes he was sound asleep.

While Robbie Hughes snored peacefully on the Gotcha office sofa Lesley poured over the telephone directories she’d brought up from the in-house library and busied herself making lists from the books and the database she’d pulled up on the computer, as well as from the Internet. Lesley had always been very good at cryptic clues and puzzles and games of logic – so far she had made all sorts of connections to all sorts of names on her list. First thing tomorrow she’d start ringing round to see how many more pieces she could slot into place. She liked puzzles. Maggie Morgan’s name was right up under Bernie’s mum and his first wife.

Lesley looked over at Robbie. His mouth was open, head thrown back, a little trail of drool glistening on his chin. She smiled indulgently. He wasn’t an easy man to work with but then was anyone of his calibre?

Some days she saw Robbie Hughes as a natural leader; fiery, quixotic, one of life’s visionaries, while on others he struck her as a grumpy little man with an ego the size of an emerging African nation. She suspected, with a wisdom far beyond her years, that he most probably was a subtle combination of the two and that one side fuelled the other. Whichever it was, working with Robbie had to hold more of a future than answering phone calls from women worried about the brown mould on their pot plants on the family channel. Getting up from the desk, Lesley very carefully pulled a woolly blanket off one of the chairs and covered Robbie up. Couldn’t have him getting cold, now, could she?

5

‘So here we go, then. Photos, gloves, guns, Mintos.’ Nimrod, talking aloud to himself, ran through his mental checklist one more time, although he had been repeating it over and over in his head like a mantra for most of the morning. He and Cain had managed to get up early, showered, had a coffee, even fitted in fifty sit-ups. Life was sweet, the traffic was light and Nimrod had got everything on his list.

If anyone had ever asked Nimrod Brewster for his tips for success in the hit man business, they would have included a clear sense of purpose about what he was trying to achieve, good photos of the target, precise information, an accurate to-do list, a sharp suit, comfy shoes and a good selection of boiled sweets for the journey.

Tucked away under the CD player, the radio scanner that the Invisible Man had left them was tuned into the police frequency. It burbled and bipped and peeped away in the background, snatches of police messages adding a rather piquant soundtrack to Nimrod’s thoughts.

Nimrod slipped the envelope of photos out of the glove compartment of the undistinguished silver-grey hire car and took one final long hard look at Nick Lucas’s face, fixing the features in his mind.

Nimrod was good at his job, and when it was a hit, not a beating-up or a frightening or something just for fun – which to be frank, as he got older, Nimrod was less and less keen to be involved in – he prided himself on a certain swiftness of execution. These days he preferred to specialise. There was no mess, no unnecessary pain or fuss if he could possibly help it, just in and out and all over. Cool, steely, clinical. Nimrod saw himself as an emissary of death, not that he would ever say that to Cain, or any of his clients. He tugged his lapels straight. He was death’s personal postboy.

It was an easy drive – M25, M40 all the way – empty roads, good weather. Nimrod stretched. Beside him, Cain drove; he always drove just under the speed limit, carefully, considerately, with gear changes as smooth as oiled glass. Broadshouldered, newly shaved and dressed in their neat charcoal-grey suits and crisply tailored macs the two of them could easily pass for Mormons or off-duty police officers. Invisible, low-key, discreet, that’s what Nimrod liked best. He made a mental note to add this to the checklist in case anyone ever asked him to appear on a This is Your Life Villains’ Special.

The little Oxfordshire village of Renham was still early-morning quiet, with just the odd car or two pulling out of driveways, exhaust fumes spiralling away in the new dawn air. Sunlight reflected on the morning dew, birds busy in the horse chestnut trees that sheltered the caravan site behind the Old Dairy. All in all it was a lovely morning.

‘So,’ Nimrod said, as they parked up under a tall hawthorn hedge close to the caravans; not so close as to draw any unwanted attention to themselves but not so far away that they had to cross a lot of open ground to reach their target. ‘Number fourteen, here we come. In, out, over and home in time for tea and buns.’

Cain pulled a face. ‘What, buns, for breakfast? I was hoping we could stop off for egg and bacon somewhere when we’re finished.’

‘It’s just a turn of phrase.’

Cain thought for a few seconds and then said, ‘Oh okay. So can I have the window seat when we go home, then?’

Nimrod pulled a face. ‘No. What the hell brought that up? It isn’t a done deal yet.’ He nodded towards the regimented row of vans.

‘Oh come on. How much trouble do you think one chef’s going to give us?’

Nimrod surreptitiously slipped a hand around his well-toned belly to check the butt of the gun concealed in the small of his back, tucked away neatly in its custom-built holster. Warmed by the heat of his body, he still liked to make sure it was there, always afraid – in the way of bad dreams – that one day he would reach for it and find it gone.

He took a deep breath to calm himself. Photos, gloves, guns, Mintoes. Today’s mantra.

‘I wasn’t talking about Mr Lucas, I was talking about the bloody window seat,’ said Nimrod. ‘Anyway, yer never know, I might fancy it.’ He shot his cuffs and then pulled his jacket straight.

‘The window seat? Oh, yeah right,’ snorted Cain. ‘You always say that but you hate looking out of the window. I’ve seen you with your eyes closed when we’re taking off, pretending to read the instructions on them cards. You don’t fool me for a minute.’

They were out of the car now and walking without apparent hurry through the crisp early morning light of a brand new summer’s day, every sense alive, sniffing the air like feral dogs.

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