Second Shot

I would have liked to tail them into the store, but I had to admit it wasn’t practical. I still wasn’t moving anything like freely enough for covert surveillance. I would be needing a crutch to walk for a while, although my right arm was improving every day. Sean had brought me coffee in a polystyrene cup when we’d stopped for fuel, and I was able to hold it in my right hand while I drank, even if I’d had to get him to remove the plastic lid for me first.

And, besides anything else, there was always the fact that Ella would instantly recognize me-at least, I hoped she would. I’d now been away from her almost as long as I’d been with her. Children forget easily, I knew, but still I hoped that I hadn’t disappeared entirely from her consciousness. She certainly hadn’t disappeared from mine.

So, Sean and I sat in the car and waited for the three of them to come out. There was only one entrance and one exit, at opposite ends of the building, but Sean had positioned us so we could keep an eye on both of them. I knew from my own experience with Ella that she had opinions of her own about shopping that were likely to slow the proceedings down. We were prepared for a long wait.

At the moment, we still weren’t quite sure what we were waiting for, but people tend to fall into a routine in their daily lives and it didn’t do any harm to learn it. It beat sitting around in the apartment all day, that’s for sure.

Now, I shrugged. “I was thinking about work,” I said, half-truthfully answering his original question. “How long can you afford to be away from London?”

Sean gave me a shrug of his own, sipping his coffee. ‘As long as Harrington continues to pay me to be here instead,” he said. His eyes were on the flow of people and cars coming and going, constantly checking. “By the sounds of it, Madeleine’s coping without me with embarrassing ease.”

“But is that because she’s being her usual wildly efficient self, or because we’re just not picking up the business at the moment?” I persisted.

He pulled a face. “Well, we’re not quite down to pawning the family silver yet,” he said. He sighed and turned to face me. “We’re surviving, Charlie. Madeleine’s been chasing electronic security work and it’s starting to pay off, to the point where I feel I’m almost superfluous. But business has dropped off since we lost Simone-and Jakes — I won’t lie to you about that.”

“Does his boss, this guy Armstrong, blame.. us?” I wasn’t sure if I’d been about to say “you” or “me”-“us” was a compromise.

“Parker Armstrong knows the risks of the game as well as anyone. If he blamed us he’d hardly be helping Matt with the legal side of things. Besides,” Sean added with another shrug, “it certainly won’t do any harm if we can make some sense of what happened. Help quash the rumors.”

“What rumors —?” I began, stopping abruptly when Sean came upright fast in his seat, eyes narrowing. “What? What is it?”

“The dark blue Ford Taurus that’s just pulled in at the end of the next row,” he said. “Two guys just got out who don’t look like they’re here just for a bag of cookies.”

I followed his gaze and saw two big men, their bulk accentuated by their heavy winter clothing. The sun was bright today, but the wind was cutting. Both wore hats, pulled down low over their ears, and gloves. Nothing unusual about that. It was the way they did such a studiously casual appraisal of the car park, which had nothing casual about it, on their way into the store. It was the kind of action I’d seen Sean carry out a hundred times. Only I suspect he would have died rather than have been quite so obvious about it.

The men had their backs turned as they walked towards the giant building, but halfway there one of them turned to do another countersur-veillance sweep and I saw his face clearly for the first time.

“That’s one of Vaughan’s men,” I said. “In the green jacket. With the mustache. He’s one of the pair that grabbed me that night and took me for my nice little chat with Felix.”

“I’ll go in and keep an eye on them,” Sean said. He leaned over and unobtrusively slipped the reclaimed Beretta out of the glove compartment, then reached for his jacket from the backseat. “Stay here.”

I hadn’t been contemplating trying to join in on this one, but the fact that he felt he had to order me to sit and stay put like a disobedient puppy put my back up. “Yes, sirl” I muttered.

He just paused, halfway through shouldering his way into his jacket. “Charlie, we don’t have time for this. I’m not trying to treat you like a child, but, please, just stay put.”

“OK,” I said, with ill grace.

“Attagirl,” he said. ‘And if you’re very good I’ll buy you a Happy Meal on the way home.”

“Try it,” I said sweetly, “and I’ll throw up in my car seat before we get there.”