Second Shot

I glanced across the room to where Simone stood now, wrapped in turmoil and memories, clutching her cup with both hands like it was some kind of lifeline.

What were my own fears compared to theirs?

“Mine,” I said.

Five

The private investigator’s dead,” Sean said. Whatever else he added to that was drowned out by the PA system above me, announcing a final boarding call for all passengers for some charter flight to Malaga.

With scant regard for the possibility of brain tumors, I jammed my mobile phone hard up against the side of my head and stuck my finger into the other ear. It was only partially successful at damping down the outside noise.

“What?”

“The private investigator Simone hired to trace her father-guy called O’Halloran,” Sean explained, raising his voice beyond the tolerances of the phone’s tinny speaker, which buzzed painfully in my ear. “He died in a car accident last week.”

“When you say ‘accident,’ I assume that’s what it was?”

“As far as we know, yes,” Sean said. “I’ve spoken to his partner. They’re arranging for someone to collect the guy’s files and brief you. They’ll meet you when you land.”

“Great,” I muttered, unable to shake the uneasy feeling this latest news provoked.

It was just after nine the following morning and Simone, Ella and I were waiting at Heathrow for our flight to Boston. Madeleine was nothing if not efficient.

We’d spent the previous night in one of the big hotels near the airport, having braved the press pack to escape from the house around lunchtime. The hotel was part of a major chain that was used to celebrity guests and took a very dim view of letting journalists and photographers harass them unduly. The hotel also employed a number of rather large door staff who wouldn’t have looked out of place outside a town center nightclub and who had a definite no-nonsense reputation.

I’d made a point of going and chatting to them briefly once I had Si-mone and Ella safely tucked away in their room. I was polite and respectful and gave them as much information as I could about the situation.

In return for this professional courtesy, they’d promised to be extra vigilant, and proved it by firmly repelling the first paparazzi incursion shortly afterwards. The reporters had made a few more experimental forays, then retreated to lurk sulkily in the car park. I was pleased to note the rain had hardened into sleet as the light began to fade.

Madeleine, meanwhile, had been doing some furious coordination behind the scenes, setting up all our travel arrangements.

She had automatically assumed that Simone could afford-and would want-the best of everything. She’d reserved us seats in Virgin Upper Class for the transatlantic and rooms in the best hotel, overlooking Boston Harbor, for the open-ended duration of our stay Simone had flipped when she’d seen the cost.

Privately, I thought she was making a fuss about nothing, but I recognized it would be all too easy to develop a money-doesn’t-matter attitude that lasted right until it was all frittered away Eventually, Madeleine had talked her into sticking with the plans on the grounds that there wasn’t time to change them. Madeleine had also sneakily sent her an e-mail link to the hotel she’d selected. One look at the sumptuous rooms and the in-house health spa had Simone’s objections crumbling.

“One more thing,” Sean said now. “You might be interested to hear that I went and paid a visit to Matt yesterday afternoon.”

“Why?”

“I wanted to preempt any problems. There was a chance he could have kicked up a fuss about Simone taking his daughter out of the country without his agreement, and the law would have been on his side,” Sean said, his voice grim.

“Hell,” I said. “I never even considered that.”

“Mm, well, the guy’s seriously paranoid about Simone getting in contact with her father, let me put it that way.”

“So, is he going to make trouble?”

“No, he saw sense eventually,” Sean said, his tone dry. I had a pretty good idea of the form Sean’s persuasion would have taken. I could almost feel sorry for Matt. Then I remembered Simone’s anger, and Ella’s fright, and my sympathy faded somewhat. “He’s denying he had anything to do with the press invasion, by the way,” Sean went on, “and I think I might even believe him.”

My eyebrows went up. “Really?”

“He’s been borrowing a bed at his cousin’s place since he and Simone split, and the cousin turned up while I was there. I wouldn’t actually be surprised if he was the one, rather than Matt, who went to the papers.”

“Based on … what, exactly?”

“A feeling,” he said, and I heard the smile in his voice. “That and the fact that his cousin is possessor of a lot of nervous twitches, a permanent sniff, and a glass-topped coffee table with an interesting set of scratches on it. I get the impression he’s the type who might well have been tempted by the offer of some easy cash to dish the dirt.”

“He could just have a head cold and be particularly careless with his furniture,” I pointed out.