Blonde Fury (14 page)

If she needed any further corroboration of her suspicions about him being involved in the arenas, she had it now. She had to get out – and fast.

Mumbling
an apology to her client she sprang
to her feet, pushing her chair back more violently than she meant to. Its feet screeched on the polished wood floor and then it fell over
with a loud crash that cut through the all the noise of the whips and the conversations
. Heads turned and Sophie fled in panic, cursing herself for her stupidity. She couldn’t have attracted more attention had she tried. Tottering on her heels she raced up the stairs as best she could and tore them off before heading out into the night and looking for a taxi. Just as she had made it to the curtains, she had seen the man she recognised turn towards the
racket
she had made. Had she seen a flash of recognition on his face? Or had it been her fevered imagination? There was no way to tell, all that mattered was to get away as fast as possible. The chill of the pavement struck through her stockinged feet as she ran towards a cab, hearing her tight skirt tear
and not caring a fig.

She gabbled the address of the flat to the driver and threw herself into the back, turning to look behind her as it pulled away. A man’s figure had emerged from the hotel and as he heard her cab pull away he turned and ran towards it. Sophie turned away and ducked down but he must have seen her blonde hair, she told herself and screamed at the driver to go faster.

Brian kept his eyes fixed on the retreating cab as he ran towards another one and dived in, pointing at its retreating rear lights and using all the French he knew to tell the driver to follow them. The man smiled and said he had always wanted to be told to; ‘follow that cab’ and they set off in pursuit.

He sat back and tried to regain his breath. The Cage was a famous stopping off point for those in the world of the arenas. He was on his way back from the Middle East and an evening with friends in The Cage would have transformed a stopover into a very pleasant interlude. But now!

He sat forward, staring at the kaleidoscope of lights as his driver tried t
o tail just one set among
a myriad
lights – and
he
was doing a goo
d job, Brian noted. With just the
tiniest bit of luck he could net – or at least get a decent tail on - Sophie Suarez herself, the greatest prize in the arena world. Her trail had gone stone cold after that fateful night in London but now there was a fighting chance that The Lodge and the CSL stable could steal a march on everyone else and get her back where she belonged.

Ahead of them Sophie’s cab had pulled in but his was in the outer lane and a truck pulled up beside them, preventing his driver from following. Pulling a wad of notes out and throwing them to the driver with garbled thanks, Brian hurled himself out into the traffic and dodged and wove his way to the pavement. He just caught a glimpse of the tall blonde disappearing into a building and spr
inted after her. But when he reached
the door he was sure she’d entered, he groaned in despair. It was divided into flats – but he pus
hed into the lobby in the hope
that there might be a lift. There was, but it was empty. The girl had obviously realised it could be used to trace her and she had used the stairs. Brian listened intently, but of course she had abandoned her shoes back at the hotel, so there would be no telltale clicking of heels on the marble steps. But she was only just ahead of him so if she had avoided the lift
maybe that meant she was confident she could get to her flat ahead of him, so maybe she was only on the first or second floor. It wasn’t much but it was all he had. He set off up the stairs trying to listen out for doors opening and closing. When he got to the first floor he groaned again. At the far end of the corridor there was another set of stairs. She could have just used this building to pass through and even now she could be in a totally different one. His shoulders slumped in defeat but he trudged up another floor in the
vague hope he might hear or see
something…anything.

On the third floor
, preparing to give it up
he heard the lift coming up and stop. The doors sighed open and an expensively dressed, handsome,
black
haired woman stepped out, giving a slight start when she saw him.

Brian decided that there was nothing left to lose.

“Do you know where a tall blonde haired girl lives, please? I think she has a flat here but I don’t know which one.”

The woman raised one eyebrow sceptically and took out her phone. “Concierge or police,” she said. “Which one?”

“No, it’s ok, really. I’m a friend,” he said desperately as she unlocked the keypad.

The eyebrow arched higher.

Brian realised that he could be in quite serious trouble. The arenas were becoming more and more legitimate but they were still viewed with hostility by some elements of some authorities. And if he was taken in, his explanations of why he was in this building would certainly give his competitors a clue as to Sophie’s whereabouts. Honesty was about the only resort left him.

He held his hands up. “Alright. I’m not a friend, but there’s a lot of people looking for her and I’m her best hope. If you know her, please help me find her
before any of the others do
.” Well, he told himself, he honestly believed he was her best hope.

“I might know who you mean, but I’ll need to know a lot more about you, buster,” she said.

Brian managed a grin, his hopes rising again. “Look, I’m really sorry about this,” he gestured to his unkempt appearance and skewed bow tie. “Will you let me buy you a drink and I’ll tell you what this is all about. Then if you don’t want to tell me any
thing
about who I’m looking for; fine. I’ll go and leave you in peace. Deal?”

The woman thought for a moment. “Deal,” she said. “There’s a bar just along the street
stays open late.”

Brian relaxed just a little. “Her name’s Sophie,” he said and caught a flicker in the woman’s eyes.
Mentally he rolled his sleeves up, there was work to do here but he was certain that he was still on the trail.

Sophie sobbed in panic as she struggled into jeans and pulled on a sweater. She had to go! Once they – either the arenas or the government, or both – knew she was in Paris, nowhere would be safe. And no one. She had to leave Martha before she got tangled up in all this. She grabbed an overnight bag and stuffed a few clothes and toiletries into it then headed into the kitchen to find note paper. She had to leave some kind of explanation.

On her second attempt she calmed her breathing enough to write legibly and scrawled a note to her lover, begging her forgiveness but her past had caught up with her and she didn’t want anything to happen to her, so she had to run and would be in touch just as soon as she could. It was melodramatic but no more than the truth. Turning out all the lights, she tiptoed to the door an
d very carefully opened it
a fraction. As far as she could see the coast was clear. Her trainers making no noise she made for the back stairs and went
down
to street level and hailed another taxi; this time for
Charles de Gaulle
. This time she was going to get right away. In the back of the taxi she took out the forged passport that had been printed for her a couple of months - and a lifetime - ago.

Chapter Six.

Huston was hot
despite the air conditioning
. Sophie could feel sweat trickling down her ribs inside the sweater she had pulled on in Paris
but slowly the
passport control
desk
was coming closer as the queue shuffled forwards patiently.

When she finally go
t to it the man seated at the desk
looked at her passport
once she had put her forefinger on the light pad
, flicked through its pages, held it under some kind of lamp
then gave it to his companion
and asked her to wait over by an office door.

“Why?” Sophie quavered
, watching the man disappear with her precious passport
. “Is…is there something wrong?”

“Ma’am, just wait there for a moment please,” the
first
man said and beckoned the next person in the queue. Sophie, her stomach churning with terror had to go and wait. Her eyes felt gritty as they always
did after a long fl
ight and she longed to get some clean clothes next to her skin. But if she could just get over this hurdle she could contact her lawyer in Switzerland and get herself a job and everything would be hunk
y
dory. Then she could contact Martha.

The office door opened and a man looked out.
Her heart sank as she took in the police uniform and the sheriff’s
star
on his broad chest.

“Mizz Stafford?” he drawled, putting an emphasis on the ‘Stafford’ that made Sophie aware that she was in deep trouble. With her knees trembling she followed him into the office and took the seat he offered in front of the desk. He sat behind it and looked at her passport lying there, the only thing on the desk.

He let the silence extend until Sophie’s nerves were screaming and then he sat back, clasping his hands across his belly.

“Now Mizz Stafford, or whatever your name really is, there’s some things you need to know.” He sat forwards, making her jump and took up the booklet. “Nine times outta ten you’d have got clean through with this. But we got a little arrangement with a local businessman and when we see a pretty girl
coming through we look extra hard.
The biometrics match okay but
I’m afraid there’s some differences in the watermarking
that mean this is a
forgery.
A good one, but a forgery.
It probably would have fooled anyone not trying to look real hard, but because of our arrangement, we did look real hard.
”

Sophie stared down at the desktop
, too horrified to feel anything except numb
ness
.
Her life seemed suddenly to have turned into a series
of nightmares from having been
one long erotic dream.

“Now trying to enter the country on a forged passport is pretty serious stuff – and our jails are a bit tougher than yours I reckon. But like I say we got an arrangement with a guy who might be able to offer you an alternative. Come with me.”

He stood up and came round the desk, then made her put her hands in front of her and cuffed them with
a plastic tie
. Then he led her out of the back door of the office, down some steps and out into the heat of the day, before he bundled her into the back of a patrol car. Dully, Sophie watched the gleaming towers and wide streets flash by as the sheriff carved his way arrogantly through the traffic and out into the country. They sped for miles along wide roads
and then along dusty side roads,
through small towns and past endless, huge pastures with herds of cattle quietly graz
ing. Neat white picket fences some
times lined the roads and sometimes tall trees. Then finally they came
to a gate in a high fence and written in wrought iron letters on the arch above the gates was the legend; ‘The Pretty Pony Ranch’. On either side of the lettering was an image of a rearing pony.

The sheriff chuckled as they drove in. “Mister Floyd, he’s got a real sense of humour on him!” he said as the car swept along a tree shaded drive for what seemed like miles before it came to an enormous, rambling and low ranch house.

The sheriff got out and helped Sophie out as well, then holding
her
tightly by her right arm he led her into the house. The vast hall
was decorated most strikingly with
the heads of various animals; stags, bison, boar, lion… whoever had been doing the shooting had been well travelled. But Sophie
didn’t have much time for looking around as she
was hustled into a huge office and behind
an ornate desk sat a tall
man with white
hair and a skin tanned so deeply
it looked like leather. The sheriff halted her halfway across the floor and stood behind her, holding her arms tightly by her sides.

“Well, well,” the man said, standing up and revealing himself to be
whiplash thin. “That is the pretti
est thing to have fallen into our net in a long, long time, Henry!”

Behind her she heard the sheriff laugh.

“Ain’t tha
t the truth! And she’s a limey as well
! They’ll be queuing up to drive her.”

The white haired man had come close and was examining Sophie with complete assurance, his eyes roaming over her body with blatant appreciation. She realised that whatever the deal was that was going to be put before her, it was going to involve access
to her body.

“I’m
Wilbur Beckington-Floyd, young lady,” the man said when he had finished examining her. “Come and sit down and I’ll tell you a bit more about what I propose.”