wiser.
Maybe Oliver was right.
Forty-Seven
The interruption caused by Oliver’s departure appeared to have made
no impact on Valentin’s confidence, or on his apparent delusion that
he and Felton were operating on equal terms.
'I suggest we go to your office, where we can talk privately.’
You suggest? Actually, Valentin, I think there’s one thing we’d better
establish right now. You have no status here. None at all.’ Felton
tapped his chest. 'This is my agenda, and you’re going to follow it.
I’ve been waiting a long time for this moment. I intend to enjoy it’
The put-down was delivered with such scorn that Joe feared
Valentin’s temper would erupt, and get him killed. But Liam eased
the tension with a question of his own.
'How long, exactly?’
Yuri approached me within a few days of the plan’s conception. I
knew about this even before you did.’
Liam nodded, as if he’d thought as much. 'I guess you offered him
a better deal?’
'It could hardly be worse, could it? I knew the hit Valentin had
taken in the credit crunch, and Yuri knew it too. All he had to do
was pose a simple question. Why run the risk of something going
wrong when he could jump ship and guarantee himself a fat profit?
Very wisely, he chose the latter course and began feeding me every
little detail of your grandiose dream.’
Another hateful glare from Yuri as he saw that he had Joe’s attention.
Felton picked up on it and nodded sharply at Yuri, as if in reply
to some unspoken query.
'Soon,’ he murmured. 'Now, moving on.’
He gulped the last of his champagne, handed the glass to one of
his men, and took something from his pocket: a small electronic gadget
of some kind.
'Let’s review the outcome of your meeting, shall we? See if we can
make some progress?’
With a sickly smile, Felton pressed a button on the device and the
voice of a ghost filled the room.
Oliver couldn’t walk straight. He kept stumbling and bumping into
the walls as he was escorted along the corridor, while the guard’s
disdain burned like acid on his skin.
He probably thought Oliver was drunk, but it wasn’t alcohol that
had destabilised him. It was shock. Shock, fury, bitterness, humiliation:
a cocktail of emotions more potent than any drug on earth.
His home, Terror’s Reach, represented no more than an elaborate
trap, designed to lure Valentin and Priya and Liam into a position
where his father had absolute control over them. Those who’d lost
their lives in the process were merely collateral damage.
Oliver assessed his own situation. Did his father truly care that he
hadn’t gone to Oxford as planned? As he thought about it, he began
to suspect that his father had known he was here. His sister was bound
to have reported back after their conversation this afternoon.
By then, of course, Valentin had already launched his ill-fated
scheme. It would have been far less satisfying for his father to have
brought everything to a halt at that stage. He pictured Dad receiving
the news that his troublesome offspring was refusing to budge from
the family home. The resultant decision must have taken all of a
nanosecond: proceed as planned.
'Fuck him,’ said Oliver.
The guard didn’t respond; just gave him the sort of searching look
that meant: not right in the head. Oliver laughed.
He stopped outside his bedroom door, where the guard conjured
up a key. Oliver kept the door locked at all times, and only he knew
the whereabouts of the spare key.
He patted his pockets. Realised they had frisked him thoroughly in
the garage and found the key. So maybe they didn’t know about the
spare. That was promising . . .
'You’re locking me in?’ he asked, faking incredulity.
'I am. I’m sure it’ll not be for long.’ The guard had a soft Scottish
accent. He opened the door and stood back, ushering Oliver inside
like a rather brusque hotel proprietor.
'Aye,’ said the guard. 'What’s your point?’
The voice on the recorder was McWhirter’s. He sounded worried.
Turned out he had every right to be, Joe thought.
I don’t like it, Valentin. When you propose a deal like this you should
do it from a position of strength.
Felton hit the pause button and tutted. 'Wise words, Valentin. Your
man deserved better than he got.’
Next came Valentin himself, quiet and assured: And we are. This
is a greedy man we have here.
The setting was clearly nautical. Joe could hear the background
hum of a powerful engine and the distant cry of gulls. In the end,
Valentin’s obsession with eavesdropping had proved futile. The bug
had been planted by Yuri – the very man he employed to sweep for
them.
The conversation moved on. McWhirter, yet to be mollified, asked: Do you think he can bring Felton on board?
Valentin: I am sure of it. Another very greedy man.
Felton paused again.
“I’m a greedy man? Well, yes, I can’t deny that. I won’t go all Gordon
Gekko on you, but I’m sure there’s a consensus in this room as to the
benefits of market capitalism. Even amongst its more recent adherents,’
he added, with a cheerful nod at the two Ukrainians.
He resumed the tape. They heard McWhirter say: But what about
finance? We are going to need Felton’s capital
Then a big sigh of frustration from the South African. Joe appreciated
it better than most. He’d also been in situations where Valentin
had refused to heed his professional advice.
'Now there’s the rub,’ said Felton, looking pleased enough to burst.
'Poor Mr McWhirter couldn’t reconcile your blithe confidence with
the reality as he knew it. Whereas you assumed you’d have the capital
you needed to come in as an equal partner because you were going
to help yourself to what’s in there.’
He jabbed viciously in the direction of an en suite dressing room.
Valentin and Liam seemed to know what he was talking about. Joe
realised there must be another safe in there: one they’d been unable
to breach.
Felton’s face was reddening, his voice growing slow and deliberate,
as though he were tiptoeing through a whole minefield of fury.
'You wanted what was mine. That’s a common enough instinct, I
suppose. You were poor, relatively speaking, and I was rich. But you
of all people should have known better, Valentin. That’s not the way
it works. Not in business, nor in life.’
Felton eyed them all closely, making sure every word hit home.
'In the real world it’s the rich who steal from the poor. The strong take
from the weak. That’s a much safer bet. Try it the other way round and
it ends in tears. McWhirter’s the proof of that. So is my friend Travers.’
He turned and strode towards the dressing room. Perhaps he gave
a signal to his men, or perhaps this manoeuvre had been pr
earranged,
for the guards immediately roused the three prisoners, herding them
in Felton’s wake.
Joe caught Liam muttering to Valentin: 'Rubbing our fucking noses
in it. . .’
Felton tutted again as he inspected the dressing room. Dozens of
suits had been discarded on the floor and some of the wardrobes
vandalised. Expecting a show of anger, Joe was surprised when Felton
faced them, his air of bonhomie apparently restored.
'You’ll have to crowd around the doorway, but no further,’ he said.
'Step inside this room and my men will shoot. Is that clear?’
The warning was reinforced with the prod of an MP 5. All three
men had a guard stationed right behind them. Their guns were angled
downwards so they could fire without any risk of hitting Felton.
'Good. Now, I know how desperate you were to see inside the panic
room, so I’m going to grant your wish.’
Turning away, Felton concentrated on something concealed within
the wardrobe. Joe spotted an electronic keypad and what looked like
a biometric scanner, set into a steel door. There was a bleep, followed
by the clunk of retracting bolts, and the big heavy door rolled open.
Forty-Eight
Oliver was out of luck. They had found the second key. He’d kept it
taped to the underside of his computer keyboard, which didn’t seem
terribly ingenious now it was missing.
For a few minutes he slumped on the bed like a grounded teenager
and thought seriously about embracing defeat. After all, his father’s
dispute was with Valentin Nasenko. Providing Oliver kept his mouth
shut, there was no reason why he wouldn’t be spared.
As for Liam and his gang, they had treated him abominably. Why
should Oliver care what happened to them? Let his father annihilate
every last one.
But Priya . . . Even though her betrayal was the most painful, he
couldn’t shake off the feeling that he’d connected with her. Maybe
not at first, when she’d tricked her way into the house, but later, when
he had displayed the scars on his wrists. He’d seen something in her
face: an echo of his own torment.
Or was that completely fanciful? Was he kidding himself?
A spurt of anger propelled him to his feet. It was irrelevant what
Priya thought of him. This wasn’t about her. It was about himself,
and the way he had been treated.
He had to do something. Show them he wasn’t weak or impotent.
Perhaps try to break the door down? He examined it, tapped gently
on the wood with the pad of a finger. Solid timber. Even if he had
the brute strength, which he doubted, the noise would bring the guards
running. His father’s warning still rang in his mind.
These men aren’t here, and nothing they do tonight will be attributed
to them.
Oliver searched the room, regretting his lack of interest in sport. A
cricket bat would have made a useful weapon. Better still, a knife of
some sort.
He laughed out loud at the thought. As a physically inept coward,
even wielding a knife he would stand little chance against several
highly trained former soldiers armed with sub-machine guns.
In the bathroom Oliver discovered that his matches remained in
their hiding place. If he set fire to his bedding, could he sneak past
the guards in the ensuing chaos?
No. Too many of them. Anyway, his father might just leave him in
here and let him burn to death.
But he shoved them in his pocket all the same, hoping they would
provide a talismanic boost to his confidence. There was only one sure
way to escape from the room and Oliver knew it. He was just trying
to avoid thinking about it.
Because he was a physically inept coward.
But he was still determined to do it.
Felton stepped back from the wardrobe, directing the attention of his
audience to the open door with a theatrical sweep of his arm. Like a
cheesy quiz-show host, Joe thought, complete with a smile of gleeful
regret. Here’s what you could have won!
And what a prize it was. Staring into the vault, Joe knew he would
never forget the sight that greeted him. For the others, the effect was even more powerful. Liam gasped when he saw it. Valentin groaned
as though he’d been kicked in the stomach.
The room was piled with gold. A huge stack of gold bars, almost
unreal in their size and quantity. In the muted light they shone with
a dull yellow gleam. They looked at once both magical and yet
somehow more ordinary than Joe would have expected. Plain metal
bricks that just happened to be worth a king’s ransom.
The bottom tier was formed of large 12.5-kilo ingots, arranged in
piles of a dozen. There were twenty piles that Joe could see, and
possibly more beyond his view. At least two hundred and forty in total.
He could scarcely begin to estimate their value.
The top tier was mostly one-kilo: neat rectangular slabs the size of
chocolate bars. Too many to count, but there had to be hundreds.
Along each side of the room, Joe could see sealed boxes and what
looked like artwork bundled in thick layers of bubble wrap. Some of
it may have been priceless, but it seemed almost insignificant in
comparison to the gold.
Felton waited in silence, allowing them all to absorb the sight and
in Liam and Valentin’s case, to reflect on their failure.
'How much is it worth?’ Joe asked.
'Including the art, about a hundred and fifty million.’ Felton
sounded vaguely dismissive. 'I’d like more, but liquidating assets and
moving into gold hasn’t been that easy lately. The trouble is, everyone’s
doing it.’
'Because of the recession?’
'Broadly speaking. I’ve always kept a healthy percentage of my wealth
in precious metals. Another problem is that some of it isn’t strictly kosher.’
A hollow laugh from Liam. 'You stole it?’
'Of course not. Just acquired it in somewhat unorthodox circumstances.
Usually as payment for services rendered, in parts of the world
where it’s wise to avoid regulatory interference.’
Joe snorted. 'And tax.’
'Absolutely. Paying tax is for muggles. It’s bad enough that I’ll lose
value on the bars that don’t have sound provenance.’
'It’s a tough life.’
'It certainly is,’ Felton agreed without a trace of irony. He turned
his attention to Valentin. 'Perhaps you can enlighten me on one thing.
How did you know about the gold?’
Valentin frowned. 'It was my maid.’
Felton appeared relieved. 'That’s what Yuri claimed. I wasn’t sure
whether to believe him.’
'She is friendly with one of the women who cleans for you. This
woman overheard a phone call. You were making arrangements to
store gold at home. She mentioned it to my maid, and Maria told me.’
'So we owe all this to the gossip of servants?’ Felton pretended to
be marvelling at the thought, but that theatrical air was back. He was
playing with them again. 'I had my reservations, but to be on the safe
side I dispensed with the cleaning woma
n in question.’
'“Dispensed”?’ Joe repeated.
'Well, the police will most likely treat it as a domestic burglary gone
wrong.’ Felton chuckled. 'I thought that would be rather fitting.’
Valentin scowled. 'Enough of these games. If you wish to kill us,
do it. If not, tell me what you want.’
Felton raised an admonitory finger. 'My agenda, Valentin.’
'Fuck your agenda.’
Liam told him to cool down. Felton agreed. 'If ever there was an
occasion to keep that famous temper in check, this is it.’
He produced the voice recorder and scrolled through its menu.
'Let’s have another reminder, shall we?’
He pressed play, and they heard Travers’s disdainful growl:
There are no boundaries with that guy. No proportionality. He just
doesn’t understand the concept. If you’re loyal to him, and he knows it,
there’s no better man to work with. But cross him and you’ve signed
your own death warrant.
In response, Valentin’s laugh was high and mocking and slightly
false, because even then he must have been aware of the high-wire
act he was attempting.
Felton cut off the tape.
“I’m disappointed in you, Valentin. You rejected some very good
advice there. So far you’ve shown yourself to be arrogant, and stupid,
and selfish.’ He gestured at Joe. 'Earlier today this man saved the lives
of your family. Have you expressed your gratitude to him? No. You’re
so caught up in your bid for survival, I bet you’ve hardly given it a
thought.’
He grinned, and Joe felt a twist of fear in his gut.
'In fact,’ Felton added slyly, 'I bet you don’t even have a clue where
they are right now.’
Forty-Nine
Oliver’s bedroom window was large enough to escape from, but it didn’t
lead anywhere. Just a twenty-foot drop onto a concrete path. He knew
the fall wouldn’t necessarily kill him, but it might shatter his ankles,
and then what would he do? Suffer yet more humiliation when his
father’s goons discovered him bleeding and broken on the path.
Instead, he opted to climb out of the little window in his bathroom.
It was a tight squeeze, even with the window shoved wide open. Made
worse because he had to go out backwards, head and shoulders first,
facing the room.
He managed it by climbing onto the toilet seat, then turned his