NO KISS FOR THE DEVIL (Gavin & Palmer 5) (3 page)

As her
long-time agent, she knew he had grown to rely on her professional approach.
She never over-glossed a story, no matter what the circumstances, and always
stuck to the facts. It was something she had heard him lament on long and loud
about a couple of his other clients who could be relied on, as he’d put it
acidly, ‘to turn a cow-pat into a Fabergé egg – with trimmings.’

‘I don’t think
Palmer had seen Helen Bellamy for a while,’ she concluded, after describing the
crime scene. ‘A few months, maybe. But we need to find him and let him know
before anyone else does.’

Donald pursed
his lips. ‘He’s a big boy. He’ll know how to handle it.’

‘True. But a
thing like this?’ Frank Palmer was something of a contradiction. He was
probably the most irritatingly laid back man Riley had ever met, with a
tendency to under-play most situations like a sloth on Valium. But he was also
the most loyal and committed friend she’d ever encountered – and the toughest.
Show him a friend in peril, and it was like lighting the blue touch-paper.

The danger, she
reflected, was if the police treated him with even the remotest hint of
suspicion, based solely on the fact that he had once had a relationship with
Helen Bellamy, or if they pushed him too hard in their questioning.

Donald grunted
and waved a vague hand. ‘I’ve called, but he’s not answering.’

‘He’s not on a
job through you, then?’ Riley knew that Donald Brask occasionally used Palmer
for the kind of specialist skills reporters didn’t possess. Palmer’s background
in the Special Investigations Branch of the Royal Military Police had trained
him in what Brask had once referred to as the dark arts – skills he had used to
good effect to help Riley in her work, where danger had threatened something
more concrete than a volley of abusive language or a threat of court action by
a disgruntled subject.

‘Not this time.
He must be on a surveillance job.’

As they were
both aware, when Palmer was on an assignment, he gave it his all – including
turning off his phone to avoid distractions. Whether performing
close-protection duties for a client or their family, or running surveillance
on a questionable employee or business contact, he simply dropped out of touch
until he was able to surface again. The ability to completely focus on their
needs was what made him so valued by his circle of clients.

‘What have you
got on at the moment?’ It was Donald’s signal to return to any work in hand.
Riley didn’t have to take on the assignments he passed her way, but when she
did, Donald could be every bit as engaged and committed as Palmer.

‘Not a lot.’
Donald knew exactly what she had on. He had a mind like one of his computers
and could keep track of several reporter clients and their assignments – and
give them any data backup they needed. As he liked to boast to editors when the
occasion demanded, he was as capable of doing in-depth research as any reporter
and better than most. ‘I’ve got two follow-up stories to look at,’ she added,
‘which you know about.’

He nodded.
‘And?’

‘They can
wait.’ She paused, wondering how to approach this one. ‘I had a job offer
yesterday. I was going to talk to you about it.’

Donald reached
for his coffee, an interested glimmer in his eye. He always delighted in
something new, and the bigger the better. If it was obscure, he loved the
challenge; if it involved people of note, he couldn’t wait to set the wolves
running. Getting a head start over the opposition was all part of the game, and
made his day that much brighter. ‘Do tell, sweetie. Is someone trying to poach
my ace reporter?’

She smiled. He
wasn’t joking. Donald believed in protecting his turf like an ill-bred alley
cat. ‘I don’t know yet. I’ll let you have full details as soon as I can.’

‘I’d appreciate
that. Did they give you an outline?’

‘It was an
email asking if I’d be interested in pitching to do a profile piece. It’s for a
business journal.’

‘Who’s the
subject?’

‘They didn’t
say. Someone big, though. The fee scale is better than good and syndication is
mine to deal with. It’s a rush job, apparently. I’ve got a meeting to discuss
it later today.’

Donald looked
sceptical. ‘If it’s a rush job, sweetie, then someone, somewhere, has dropped
it like a hot, flabby turd.’ He shook his jowls in disapproval. ‘Still, it’s up
to you. I wonder if anyone else was up for it? I could ask around, see who
might have turned it down.’ The suggestion that Riley might not have been first
in line for the assignment, or that she could be even mildly insulted by it,
didn’t seem to have occurred to him.

‘They didn’t
say.’ Riley knew what was bugging him, and it wasn’t the possibly dubious
aspect of the assignment. There was very little Donald didn’t know about in the
reporting field, and the likelihood that a high-profile job had come up without
appearing on his radar was remote. But if there was one thing likely to sting
his professional pride, it was the idea that he might have ducked and missed
something newsworthy.

‘I was
thinking,’ she continued, before he could get all bitter and twisted. ‘In between
looking at this job, I might take a background look at Helen Bellamy.’

‘Why?’ Donald’s
tone lifted a notch. He looked at a clock set in a chunky piece of quartz on
the sideboard. ‘The nationals will have scoured off the best meat by now. Even
if the police get lucky and come up with anything, it’ll be old news by
tomorrow.’

Riley knew he
was right, but something else was bothering her. There had been an edge to DI
Pell’s demeanour which she couldn’t put a finger on.  It wasn’t as if he was
dealing with a random murder – the fact that he’d called her out to the murder
scene was an indication of that. Usually, the police preferred to keep the
press as far away as possible until they had something to say or unless they
needed media cooperation in turning up witnesses or locating a missing person.
She was pretty sure this wasn’t one of those cases. Pell had been too guarded,
and the more she thought about it, the more she felt he’d been holding back
something important. The answer might be staring her in the face.

And there was
the Palmer connection, which she couldn’t ignore, even if she’d wanted to.

‘I’ve got to do
something,’ she replied. ‘When Palmer finds out what happened, he’ll be all
over it like a tiger shark. I can help give him a head start.’

Donald nodded,
recognising the futility of arguing with her. She and Palmer worked well
together, each very capable in their separate disciplines. Palmer was tough and
resourceful, with all the directness his army training had given him. All were
elements which had proved useful in the past. He was also a first-class
investigator. Riley was equally direct in her own way – alarmingly so, with her
own personal safety often taking second place to a story – but she was steady
and relentless, even under pressure.

He was almost
envious of their relationship, and had sometimes wondered what would happen if
one suddenly found the other’s life at risk. This could be as close as he got
to finding out, without either of them being the victim. He felt almost sorry
for anyone who came under the spotlight for Helen Bellamy’s murder. Especially
if they came up against Frank Palmer.

‘How will you
handle it?’

‘I’ll see if I
can back-track her last assignments. Helen was really committed to her job.
Palmer once told me she’d left him sitting at a restaurant table to go
interview someone she was after. Maybe something she was working on went
horribly wrong.’

‘You don’t know
that. It could have been pure chance. It happens. Maybe she met up with the
wrong man.’

Riley shook her
head. ‘I don’t think so. The whole thing looked so…deliberate. She was working,
I’m sure of it.’

Donald gave a
lengthy sigh. She was probably right. Not all reporting jobs involved nice,
civilised interviews over glasses of wine or cups of tea.  There were times
when all the usual rules went right off the board. It took people with Riley’s
instincts to realise it. Then he remembered something. He rose from his chair.
‘Actually, I may be able to help you. I believe I have details of her last
couple of jobs.’

Riley was
surprised. ‘I didn’t know she worked through you.’

‘She didn’t.
She normally used a Brussels agency. But a couple of assignments came my way
with her name attached, so I agreed to use her.’ He waddled through to his
office, a large, converted sitting room full of computer equipment, printers,
scanners and telephones, which formed the hub of his agency. He ran his fingers
across a keyboard and gave a grunt of satisfaction as several lines of text
appeared on the adjacent monitor. He moved the mouse and a printer hummed into
life on a nearby shelf. He took out the single sheet of print and handed it to
her. It contained the name and address of a business magazine publisher near
Covent Garden. ‘The editor’s name is David Johnson. I’ll tell him you’re on the
way. He owes me a couple of favours. It could be a dead end, but it might turn
up something useful.’

‘What about
Frank?’ Riley folded the sheet of paper and slipped it into her pocket. ‘I’d
like to let him know about Helen before the police pile in on him.’

Donald agreed.
‘He’d rather hear about it from you than some faceless copper plodding through
an address book. I’ll ring round, see if I can trace him. If I hear anything,
I’ll let you know.’

Riley left Donald’s
Finchley house and drove straight towards the West End, joining an already
growing stream of traffic. It was still early, but by the time she arrived at
Covent Garden, the business community would be buzzing. She still had no clear
plan in mind, no idea even as to why she was contemplating looking into this
other than as part of her instincts as an investigative reporter. All she knew
was, she needed to get the ball rolling. Whatever had happened to Helen
Bellamy, she had to do more than stand by and wonder. She knew Palmer would
feel the same.

Traffic soon
reduced her progress to a crawl, and she reached down and hit the speed-dial
key for Palmer’s mobile. A part of her was hoping he wouldn’t answer until she
had some information about Helen’s last job from the editor she was going to
see. Anything she could come up with might help, she tried to tell herself, no
matter how vague. Anything that would give them some direction – some hint as
to what had happened in Helen’s final hours.

She was almost
disappointed when Palmer picked up on the second ring. She felt even worse when
he drawled in a cheerful, mock-American accent down the line.

‘Frank Palmer.
A man for all seasons. I have the talent if you have the money. How may I help
you?’

*********

‘You’re late.’ Alex
Koutsatos, the proprietor of MailBox Services, a mail forwarding business,
waited impatiently on the doorstep of his shop as a delivery driver heaved a
large cardboard box out of his van and dumped it on the pavement. The van
usually arrived at six am, before most of the surrounding businesses were open
and Koutsatos still had the street more or less to himself. Now it was nearly
nine and he was already anxious. Too many around here were interested in other
people’s business. Deliveries often attracted attention, and attention was something
he and his customers preferred to avoid.

‘Mains burst in
Aldgate,’ the driver muttered shortly, and held out an electronic pad and
stylus for a signature.

Koutsatos
scribbled as directed and waved the driver away. He would have to leave the
main splitting up of the parcel until this evening now, when it was quiet.
Maybe even tomorrow. This was a bigger consignment than usual, and couldn’t be
rushed.

Of mixed
Armenian and Ukrainian parentage, Koutsatos had done many things in his life,
most of them confined to the darker recesses of his memory. Born in a charity
hospital in the northern Black Sea port of Odessa, his life had been at an
all-time low and his prospects zero, when he had been shown how to gain entry
to the UK. The papers, he had been assured, would pass the closest inspection –
for a while. As he had discovered later, this was because the original owner, a
predatory homosexual on holiday from Glasgow, was now buried in an unmarked
grave in Tangiers.

In return for
the freedom, independence and a home in London, Koutsatos had agreed to
eventually assume a Greek name and to set up a mail forwarding shop in the
capital. There was one major condition involved: he would be called on from
time to time to assist in the movement of papers, parcels and, just
occasionally, people.

Koutsatos
dragged the box inside the shop.  It was heavy and he was soon out of breath.
Fortunately, there were no customers around. He had just enough time to check
the contents and make sure the labels were included. He worked in silence,
using a lethal-looking fisherman’s knife to slice through the heavy-duty tape
and bindings. He found the packing list and made up five of the largest
bundles, putting them to one side. These would be collected by a motorcycle
courier for onward delivery to Heathrow. He never studied the contents of the
packages, and had never queried – out loud, at least – why they were so
important. But once, a careless slash of his knife had ripped into one of them,
and he had disposed of the damaged item carefully in the yard behind the shop,
in a small brazier.

Somehow, the
idea that a few magazines could be so important had never ceased to amaze him.

Ray Szulu stood
outside the Arrivals exit at Heathrow’s Terminal Four, holding a cardboard
sign. He was engaged in a silent battle of wits with a security guard in a suit
and a couple of armed policemen. He’d been hanging about for nearly an hour
now, waiting on a delayed flight, and was getting annoyed. Being stared at by a
couple of uniforms with guns wasn’t so much of a problem – he’d been there
before many times - but the pushy suit’s attitude was getting him down.