Wheel of Fire

Seventeen

That same morning Bella Fairbrother had been woken in her Mount Somerset hotel room by the ring of her mobile phone. She was still half asleep when she answered. She had, after all, been awake half the night fretting about what her next course of action should be, and had only finally dropped off a couple of hours earlier.

‘It’s Jimmy,’ said her caller.

Jimmy. Jimmy Martins, the recently appointed acting chairman of Fairbrother’s. Bella could see the time at the top of her screen. It was just before seven a.m.

‘I’m sorry to call so early,’ he continued. ‘But I’m afraid this can’t wait. I’ve been up all night going through the figures. It’s even worse than we thought...’

Bella tried to shake herself into full wakefulness. It wasn’t worse than she thought, that was for sure. But Jimmy Martins didn’t know the half of it. He had always been her father’s stooge. He was still a stooge, which was why Bella had pressed the board to offer him the chair, and him to take it, if only on a temporary basis. Bella did feel at least a tad guilty about that, unlike her father, to whom guilt had always been a stranger. She let Martins carry on talking.

‘The bank seems to be operating by osmosis,’ he went on. ‘There is just no substance to anything. I had no idea how bad things were. And I spent most of yesterday dodging the financial press, Bella. They’re on to it.’

‘I’ve told you, Jimmy, once I’ve got hold of the will and all the paperwork, we can start unravelling the various trusts that will now come into fruition following my father’s death. You know how it works. How it’s always worked. Upon the death of the oldest surviving Fairbrother these trusts automatically yield huge bonuses, but remain ongoing for future generations—’

‘My God, you mean you aren’t even in possession of the will yet, nor all those other papers?’ interrupted Martins.

He sounded as desperate as Bella was beginning to feel. But, on a kind of autopilot, she behaved as she always did, doing her best both to sound assertive and to conceal her own feelings.

‘Everything is in hand, Jimmy,’ she said, knowing only too well how far that was from the truth.

‘We don’t have much time,’ replied Martins. ‘The bank is a mirage. And the news is clearly out. The shares are going through the floor. Look, Bella, your father died in a fire. How long will it be before he is officially declared dead, before a death certificate is issued? It could be weeks. Months even. I don’t know if we can hold on that long.’

‘Of course, we can. Fairbrother’s has gone through worse than this in three centuries of trading. You just have to hold your nerve, Jimmy.’

‘You sound disconcertingly like your father at times,’ responded Martins. ‘Look, there’s more. There are all sorts of irregularities in the figures. Particularly concerning pensions. I’ve been looking into not only the Fairbrother International pension funds, but also those of some of the subsidiaries. All too often the sums just don’t add up. Did you know about this, Bella?’

‘Of course not. I came off the board of Fairbrother’s over a year ago, remember, Jimmy...’

‘If I’m right about this, something has been going on for a lot longer than a year, Bella. These funds have been tampered with, I’m almost sure of it.’

‘Jimmy, you must be mistaken,’ said Bella, hoping she sounded more convincing than she felt. ‘My father would never countenance anything untoward concerning pension funds. Apart from the terrible betrayal of trust, he would have known just how catastrophic it could prove, not just for the bank but right across all the Fairbrother business interests. I think everyone involved with administering pensions learned that from the Robert Maxwell debacle.’

‘It depends how desperate someone is, and I am beginning to suspect that your father was very desperate indeed,’ said Martins.

Bella leaned back against the pillows, and briefly closed her eyes, so wishing that the entire scenario in which she had, she now realised, so unwisely allowed herself to become embroiled, would just disappear. And that included, at that moment, Jimmy Martins, who had absolutely no idea of the true extent of her father’s desperation. For a moment, she had no words. Neither did he have any idea that the whole lot of them, including the board, might be indirectly involved in crimes far greater than embezzlement.

Mercifully she didn’t have to say anything. Martins was continuing to speak.

‘Look, to be frank, all of us on the board knew things weren’t quite how they should be, and obviously it was public knowledge that our share prices were well below par. But that is the case with many big companies nowadays, and I think we all believed that your father would find a way through, as he always had. I suppose we could be accused of having had our heads in the sand. But Sir John was a brilliant businessman, of course. Quite exceptional. Even after he became ill, and ultimately ceased to come into the offices, he continued to run the show. Well, you know what he was like.’

‘I certainly do,’ said Bella, with more than a little feeling.

‘Yes. Of course, you do.’

He paused, and Bella thought she could hear him taking a deep breath before he spoke again.

‘The thing is, Bella, and I’ve been considering this all night, in view of everything I have now learned, I do not feel I can continue as acting chairman of Fairbrother’s. I intend to offer my resignation to the board later today. Out of respect for both you and your father, I wanted you to be the first to know—’

Bella sat bolt upright in bed. She no longer felt sleepy.

‘For God’s sake, Jimmy, you mustn’t do that,’ she said, aware that her voice was much louder than she had intended, but unable to do anything about it. ‘You can’t do that. You really can’t. It was only two days ago that you accepted the appointment. Nothing has changed since then.’

‘Actually Bella, everything has changed. I now know so much more about the dire state the business is in, and also, I have a fair idea of the extent of highly dubious business practice which has led to this. There are other concerns too, of course, the fire which killed your father could be arson, and the man the police were looking for in connection with it has died in suspicious circumstances. I really cannot continue—’

Bella interrupted there, deliberately ignoring the last part of what Jimmy Martins had been trying to say.

‘Jimmy, look, once the trust funds have been realised we should be able to effectively settle any financial irregularities,’ she began. ‘I can assure you that would always be my intention. And there are billions involved here.’

‘I’m not prepared to wait, Bella. The risk is too great. As chairman, albeit recently elected acting chairman, I am technically responsible for the whole awful mess. But it was not of my doing, and I am not prepared to carry that responsibility now that I have learned the extent of the—’

Bella tried again. ‘All right, Jimmy,’ she said. ‘I do understand. But will you at least wait until I have collated all the information I have gathered over the last couple of days, and until we can have a face-to-face meeting.’

‘Well, I don’t know...’

‘Jimmy, I am sure you don’t wish to be seen to have presided over the fall of Fairbrother’s. Look, I’m planning to come back to London today. Can we meet early tomorrow morning?’

‘I’m not sure I can afford to wait that long. Can’t you make it this afternoon?’

‘Well, late afternoon perhaps. I could come to the office at, say, five? I have other meetings first which could have a really positive bearing on the situation.’

‘I just don’t know, Bella—’ responded Jimmy.

‘Yes, you do,’ Bella interrupted. ‘Please trust me. You owe it to this family, surely, after all these years.’

Jimmy Martins seemed to take a very long time to answer. ‘All right,’ he said eventually. ‘Five p.m. this afternoon it is. But I have to tell you, Bella, I really do not think there is anything you could possibly say that might make me change my mind.’

‘Look, at this stage I just want to thank you for the opportunity to attempt to do so,’ said Bella, before ending the call.

She climbed out of bed, reached for her hotel issue towelling dressing gown, and sat down on the couch by the window, holding her aching head in both hands.

She had once read some words of wisdom that would stay with her always, and indeed had often comforted her in bad times. If you feel like committing suicide, wait until tomorrow.

Part of the thinking behind that, she’d always assumed, was that tomorrow never came.

Her tomorrow, however, had arrived with a vengeance. She was in a corner she could see no way out of. The events of the previous night had shocked her to the core.

She hadn’t exactly lied to Jimmy Martins. There were no meetings in her diary for that day, but she was seriously considering arranging at least one. Although that certainly was unlikely to have the positive influence she had promised the acting chairman. She’d merely said the first thing that came into her head in order to stall the man — perhaps only delaying the inevitable, but at least giving herself time to think. If she took the course of action she was considering, it would be she who would prematurely pull the plug on Fairbrother’s, not Jimmy Martins.

Bella was no saint, nor had she ever been. She was probably one of the toughest businesswomen in the world, certainly one of the toughest in international banking.

Even the remotest possibility of suicide had never crossed her mind before. But it might have been a serious consideration on that awful morning, were it not for her daughter. Kim had been brought up without a father, in the lap of luxury, yes, but by a mother who was all too often preoccupied with her career. Nonetheless Bella loved her daughter dearly, and one thing she could not do was leave her alone. Neither was she at all sure that she could allow Kim to grow up without having a mother whom she could respect. A mother who, ultimately, had tried to do the right thing. Albeit probably too little too late.

However, she might still be wrong in her judgement of the situation she found herself in. And she could end up putting her own future and that of the bank in jeopardy for no good reason. It was the kind of dilemma she had never, in her most nightmarish dreams, imagined having to face.

In spite of everything that had happened, including the events of the last few days, Bella had an intense pride in, and loyalty to, her family and the family business. She had often made it clear she would do anything to protect Fairbrother’s and ensure the future of the bank. She had also always retained huge professional respect, if nothing else, for her father. And it was all of those factors which had combined to lead her to her present lamentable circumstances.

It seemed not to be true, after all, that she would do anything for Fairbrother’s. She had a limit. And she suspected she had reached it. Actually, she may have progressed beyond it. She believed she was partially responsible for three deaths. Three murders. She did not know for certain that there had been three murders, of course, neither did she know if she could be held legally responsible — and in fact she suspected that she could not be, not yet anyway. But her involvement in the complex sequence of events which had led to the fire at Blackdown, and to those three deaths, could surely be proven. In any case, even if she faced neither prosecution nor any other form of restitution, she would have to live with that possibility.

She checked her watch. It was still only 7.30 a.m.. Too early to reasonably make the phone call she found herself pondering. In any case, once she had made that call, she would be setting in motion a chain of unstoppable procedures which could lead irrevocably to her own downfall and that of the bank. She decided to have a long hot shower in an attempt to clear her beleaguered head.

An hour and a half later, showered, dressed, and sitting again on the couch by the window, this time drinking strong coffee and picking at a room-service breakfast, she found that, whilst her head was a little clearer, she remained no less troubled. Should she make that phone call, or not? If she did, there would be no going back. That was for certain.

She switched on the TV, the regional news programme. The lead item was a break in at The Gatehouse at Blackdown Manor. Armed intruders had been seen on the premises. Police were anxious to locate the householder, Mrs Janice Grey, who was missing.

Bella recoiled in shock. The bulletin indicated that the incident had occurred during the night, just a few hours after she had made her phone call from the public box on Whiteball Hill.

Without giving herself any more time to think she picked up her phone and dialled David Vogel’s mobile number.

He answered at once, as seemed to be his wont, in spite of the early hour, for which Bella apologised.

‘Don’t apologise, Miss Fairbrother,’ responded Vogel. ‘I’m running a murder inquiry. There is no early.’

‘Uh right,’ continued Bella. ‘Look, I’ve just seen a news bulletin about a break-in at the Gatehouse. It says Mrs Grey is missing, I was wondering—’

‘She’s safe, Miss Fairbrother,’ said Vogel. ‘She was found soon after daybreak. I believe a media statement is being prepared.’

Bella found herself overcome with relief. She wasn’t sure if she could deal with another death, whoever was responsible.

‘I’m very glad, Mr Vogel,’ she said. ‘Look, I was hoping you might have time to meet up today. I have some information for you, something I would like to discuss with you which I feel I can no longer keep to myself. It’s quite important.’

‘Well, of course,’ replied Vogel. ‘Can you give me any indication of what it might be about?’

‘No, no I can’t,’ said Bella quickly. ‘I need to see you. Face to face. It’s all too, too...’ She paused, searching for the right words. ‘Delicate,’ she finished, rather lamely, she thought.

‘And I sense that it’s urgent?’

‘Yes. It is. Most urgent, I suspect.’

‘I see. Where are you, Miss Fairbrother? Are you still in Somerset?’

Bella replied that she was.

Vogel and Saslow were by then well on their way to London, just ten minutes or so from the junction between the M5 and the M4. Their journey had already been delayed by The Gatehouse incident. Vogel was eager to meet up with Nobby Clarke at Brentford and share details of their investigations.

‘Right, well that’s a tad tricky,’ continued Vogel. ‘Unfortunately, I am on my way to London. There are inquiries I need to conduct in the city, primarily concerning the Greys, and what has happened to both of them. And there is also the post-mortem on George Grey later today. Are you sure you couldn’t at least give me the gist of what you have to say now, on the phone?’

‘No. No, I really can’t. But I’m also travelling back to London today. Indeed, I shall leave quite soon. I could meet you anywhere you like, after about one-ish probably.’

‘Or, I could get another MCIT detective over to you from Wellington straight away—’

‘No, Mr Vogel, I really want to see you,’ interrupted Bella.

She couldn’t quite explain why it had to be David Vogel that she talked to, but she had noticed his intelligent eyes and his thoughtful sensitive manner. She could not bear the thought of confiding in some clumsy plod.

‘OK, the post-mortem is at 1.30 p.m. We could meet as soon as I’ve seen all I need to. That should certainly be by about three, I would have thought, possibly earlier.’

‘Right. Where?’

‘Well, I shall be at the morgue at the West Middlesex hospital. Let me think. You won’t want to come there—’

‘Can you come to me?’ interrupted Bella. ‘I live in Chelsea Harbour. It’s the right side of town from Brentford. We could meet at my flat, then it won’t matter if you are unsure of the time.’

‘All right,’ said Vogel. ‘I shall try to make it by 3.30, but thank you for bearing with me.’

Bella was aware that would probably make her late for her meeting with Jimmy Martins. But, that appointment remained one she might ultimately not wish to keep. She gave Vogel her address and ended the call.

She then tried to return her attention to her breakfast, but had little appetite. Bella Fairbrother was extremely worried. She had no idea whether she was doing the right thing or not. But more and more, it seemed the only course of action she would be able to live with.

She abandoned her breakfast tray and headed for the bathroom to complete her morning routine. She hadn’t yet put on her make-up. Bella never liked to face the world without her make-up, and she had also come to believe over the years that her brain worked better once she was fully made up. On this occasion she didn’t think it would help, but she could only go through the motions.

She’d just opened the bathroom door when her room phone rang. She assumed it was room service or reception calling. Nonetheless, out of habit, she hurried to answer the call.

‘Hello, sis,’ said the still familiar voice of her only brother. ‘Fancy a visitor?’

‘Ah, so you are in the country...’ she began, then a thought occurred to her. ‘You’re calling on the hotel phone. How did you know I was here?’

‘How do you think,’ replied Freddie Fairbrother laconically. ‘Can I come up?’

‘What do you mean, come up? Where are you?’

‘I’m downstairs, Bella, speaking from the phone at reception.’

‘I don’t believe it. You’ve got a cheek after all this time. You could at least have let me know you were coming. OK. C’mon up. Room twenty-four.’

‘Trust me, you’re going to be pleased to see me.’

‘I’m sure,’ said Bella, who couldn’t actually have been less sure. She remained in some trepidation for the two or three minutes until Freddie knocked on her room door.

The man who stood in the corridor was older and, if anything, thinner. His sun-bleached white-blonde hair was certainly thinner, and he had a tan like old leather. He was wearing faded jeans, a slightly crumpled shirt beneath a well-worn leather bomber jacket; the same clothes, in fact, that he had worn for the flight from Australia. And they looked like that, too. All the same Freddie managed to remain vaguely attractive, in a frazzled sort of way.

He smiled his laconic smile. Familiar even after so long. It was the same old Freddie.

‘Christ, you look rough, sis,’ he said, by way of greeting.

She smiled back, a strained little smile. As children they had always indulged in rough banter, casually throwing insults at each other. But there had been a great affection between them all those years ago, until it had been pretty much destroyed by their massively bitter falling out. And Bella would never forget that awful time, as she was quite sure her brother wouldn’t, in spite of what she had always regarded as his carefully cultivated air of laissez faire.

That was history, of course. But could there now be any sort of future for either of them? In the last twenty-four hours Bella had more or less decided there could not be.

Nonetheless she stood back to usher her brother into her room.

‘I haven’t got my war-paint on, and, of course, there’s the little matter of twenty years having passed since we last saw each other,’ she said. ‘Oh, and you don’t look so hot yourself, by the way.’

Freddie was still smiling. ‘I came more or less straight here from the airport,’ he said. ‘But I did stop to be given this. By a courier.’

He held up the calfskin briefcase he was carrying, offering it to Bella. She took it from him, glancing at him questioningly. Although she had a pretty good idea what he was going to tell her.

‘It contains, amongst other things, our father’s will,’ said Freddie.

‘I see. And, I assume you already know the crux of that will?’

‘Of course.’

‘Well, go on then.’

‘Pretty much as was agreed beforehand. Our father’s shareholding is split between us, sixty per cent to you and forty per cent to me, with the proviso that neither of us can sell those shares for a minimum of a twenty-year period. There are letters in there—’ he waved a hand at the briefcase — ‘from our father expressing his wish to the board that you are appointed chairman and chief executive. His wish, as you know, was that I should take no real active part, but that I should be appointed to the board more or less to enhance the Fairbrother presence and ensure Fairbrother family interests. There is also, I was told, everything in that briefcase that you will need to sort out the trust funds and rescue the bank.’

Bella shook her head in amazement, already beginning to feel as despairing of her brother’s lack of grasp of reality as she always had.

‘Just like that?’ she queried.

‘Well, it was always the plan, wasn’t it?’

‘It may have been better had our father trusted me a little more when he was running the bank, don’t you think?’ she asked. ‘And, the plan, Freddie, seems to have gone a little array, do you not think?’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘Freddie, three people have died, all of them probably murdered, that wasn’t part of any plan I agreed to. I assume you have some conception of that.’

‘Yes, but Bella, the old man only had months to live anyway, at the most. And George Grey had his own reasons for starting the fire. If he did start it...’

‘Of course, he bloody started it. And you really think that was his own idea, do you?’

‘Yes, I do. Of course, I do. It certainly had nothing to do with me, that was for sure.’

Bella found she was beginning to feel angry. She had to make a real effort to keep her voice level.

‘Freddie, I should have expected this from you,’ she said. ‘You always have believed only what you want to believe, and behaved exactly how you wanted to behave. Nothing has ever had anything to do with you, and nothing is ever your fault. You may have spent twenty years lotus eating, but you haven’t changed a bit, have you?’

Freddie shrugged. ‘Look, you get what you want, Bella, you get to run the show, and I get what I want, to live as if I run the show. I won’t interfere. You know that. I don’t see what the problem is.’

‘You never did, Freddie. Not even when you shagged your own father’s wife. Your stepmother, for God’s sake. You saw no problem, at all, did you?’

‘Ah, I might have guessed you’d bring that up. I was stoned. She was drunk. Shit happens. And Pa would probably never even have known about it if you hadn’t told him.’

‘That wasn’t the bloody point, Freddie. You were always stoned. And Antonia was always a slag. I didn’t care about her, but I cared a lot about you, whether you believe that or not. I did it for your own good, Freddie. I wanted you to get cleaned up.’

‘Yes, but it didn’t turn out that way, did it. Pa chucked us both out, me and Antonia. And he threatened to shop me to the police for dealing drugs unless I agreed to be banished to the Antipodean. But now, Bella, I am the prodigal son. Pa wanted me back in the fold. And you need me to help carry the board. You’re the whiz kid businesswoman. You know I’m speaking the truth.’

‘What I know, Freddie, is that this whole wretched scheme has spiralled out of control. I’m not countenancing murder. Triple murder. I just can’t. I have my daughter to consider.’

‘Oh come on, Bella, don’t claim the moral high ground, not with me. You’ve never been bloody Mother Theresa, that’s for sure. Now you have everything you’ve ever wanted within your grasp. All you need do is reach out for it. Just let’s stick to the plan, and we’ll all come out of it smelling of roses, you’ll see.’

‘Freddie, I’m not sure that I can stick to the plan. And you should listen to me. We’re already in very big trouble. I don’t intend to let it get any worse.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You’ll thank me for it one day.’

‘Like I thanked you for shopping me to our father?’

‘I know we used to ship our convicts to Australia, but I think modern Australia was probably preferable to jail, however modern, don’t you?’

Freddie was studying her anxiously. ‘I don’t like what you’re saying, sis. What are you up to? What are you going to do?’

‘I have an appointment later today to meet the detective inspector in charge of the police investigation. The murder investigation, Freddie. That is what I’m up to. He’s in London. I’m driving back to my place and meeting him there. Why don’t you come with me? If we leave now, you’d have time to have a shower and even grab some sleep before he comes. Freddie, we need to get out of this. None of it was our idea. You and I may both be able to avoid prosecution if we speak up now.’

‘Bella, we aren’t going to be prosecuted. We haven’t done anything wrong.’

‘Oh, I think we have, Freddie. We may not be guilty of murder, but we are certainly guilty of a conspiracy which has led to murder.’

‘I don’t see it like that, at all, sis.’

‘No more would you, Freddie.’

‘Look don’t do it. Please. You’ll ruin everything.’

‘You sound like a schoolboy, Freddie. Everything is already ruined. Until the fire, yes, we were involved in a conspiracy to save our family business, but in terms of human life we were just letting nature take its course. I’m not only being altruistic here. Once murder is suspected, a police investigation goes onto another level. A bit of business skulduggery, even pretty high-level fraud, is one thing. Murder is entirely another.’

Freddie sat down with a bump on the edge of the bed.

‘I didn’t think of it like that,’ he said. ‘I mean, the fire was caused by George Grey. That’s not down to us in any way. And he could have just fallen into the canal.’

‘So, you know the details, then, do you?’

‘Some of them.’

‘Come with me, Freddie.’

‘I dunno, sis. I’ve always been a coward. I don’t think I’m up to dealing with the police. I thought everything was going to be straightforward.’

‘Which is pretty naive, Freddie.’

‘That’s me then, I suppose, a naive schoolboy.’

‘I’m sorry, Freddie, I didn’t mean to have a go at you. I don’t want either of us to get any further embroiled in this, that’s all. It’s gone way beyond what we agreed to. You must see that.’

‘Yes, I do. Of course, I do.’

Freddie looked unusually thoughtful. ‘You really don’t think we’re going to get away with it, do you?’ he said glumly. ‘Not any of it. Not now. Not with three deaths.’

‘No, and anyone who thinks we will is barking mad. Which of course, I have always suspected to be the case...’

Bella thought of her phone call the previous evening. She was speaking the truth. The man who had been so casually dismissive of those three deaths, the man who had sent Freddie, armed with his briefcase full of vital papers, to find her, was surely mad.

‘You’re right,’ said Freddie suddenly. ‘You have to be.’ He sounded totally deflated. ‘I guess I was kidding myself.’

‘I guess we were all kidding ourselves. Look, I’m still extremely fond of you, Freddie. Come with me, now. Before it’s too late for us both.’

‘I can’t, Bella. I just can’t.’

Bella studied her brother with care, weighing up the man behind the easy charm. The eyes that rarely met yours, the weak mouth. Just like the boy she had once known so well.

‘OK. Well, I intend to leave soon. If you are not going to come with me, what are you going to do? I think at this stage you must be either with me or against me, Freddie.’

‘I’m with you, of course I’m with you,’ said Freddie. ‘You’ve totally convinced me. The whole thing is a disaster. Like I said, I was kidding myself as usual. So I guess there’s only one thing I can do. I’ve got a hire car outside. I’ll head straight back to Heathrow and catch the first available flight back to where I’ve just come from.’

‘You may not have your allowance for much longer. If you stay here I’ll make sure you’re provided for. You can move in with me in London, for as long as you like. Until we’ve sorted something out, anyway.’

‘You may be in jail, we may both be in jail.’

‘Perhaps. But if we speak up now, perhaps not. Neither of us expected anything like this to happen, after all. And we certainly didn’t have anything to do with it.’

‘No, I’ll go back,’ said Freddie quickly. ‘I have my house in Australia, well, more of a shack, but right on the beach. I like the life well enough. And I did get a welcome home present.’ He reached into the pocket of his jacket and produced a thick wad of fifty pound notes. ‘Fifty grand, a down payment apparently.’

‘Well, that’s about the only welcome you’re getting, I’m afraid,’ said Bella. ‘If you want to go, then go. All you’ve done is make a very fleeting visit back to the UK after learning of your father’s death. I will tell the police that. And if you go now, your involvement will surely appear to be so slight it’s quite likely nobody will come after you. Not to the other side of the world, anyway. And even if they do, I don’t see how anything can be proven against you.’

‘Which leaves you taking the rap, sis.’

‘Not me alone. And I intend to make quite sure of that. I’m going to tell the police everything. I don’t see that I have any choice. That any of us have any choice. I thought there was nothing I wouldn’t do for Fairbrother’s. But I didn’t even consider murder might be on the agenda. I mean, that’s for gangsters and secret service agents. Not people like us.’

‘Are you sure we really are talking murder here, though?’

‘Honestly, Freddie, “talking murder here”? What sort of language is that? Anyway, the answer is yes. I thought we’d clarified that. Or are you still just being naïve?’

‘No. OK, sis. I told you. I realise you are right. Quite right. I don’t know what I was thinking about.’

‘Nothing new there then.’

The words were potentially harsh, but Bella softened them with a gentle smile. And she reached with one hand to lightly touch her brother’s cheek.

‘I have missed you, Freddie,’ she said.

‘And you’re going to have to miss me again,’ Freddie responded. ‘I’m heading for the airport. But I have a room booked here, so first I’m going to use it to clean up and have a kip for a couple of hours.’

‘Goodbye again, then,’ said Bella.

Freddie glanced at the briefcase, which lay, still unopened, on the sofa. ‘I should take that,’ he said. ‘Return it.’

Bella shook her head. ‘No, I’ll make sure it gets to the right people. The new acting chairman of the bank, and our father’s solicitor. They may still be able to salvage something.’

‘OK, whatever you say.’ Freddie stepped forward then, and enveloped her in a hug. ‘I’ve been wanting to do that ever since you opened the door,’ he said, smiling at her.

‘Me too,’ said Bella, realising, rather to her surprise, that she meant it. After all, Freddie was still the brother she had once so adored.

She found she was fighting back tears. Over the years she had occasionally dreamed of a reunion with him. But this reunion, in circumstances so shocking and potentially dangerous that they would almost certainly destroy both the Fairbrother family and the Fairbrother family business, was the stuff of nightmares.

‘See you in another couple of decades, then,’ said Freddie.

He stepped back. He wasn’t smiling any more. He looked sad, and vulnerable. Frightened even.

Well that was understandable. Bella was frightened too. Both of what she had already done, and what she was about to do.

Freddie took the lift down to reception and headed straight out to his car. He intended to fetch his bag and then try for an early check-in. He really did need to get some sleep before he did anything else. That part of what he had told his sister was the truth. There was, however, very little truth in any of the rest of it.

First he had a phone call to make. And he needed to make it immediately, before he had time to think about it any further. Freddie had never been able to carry the burden of responsibility. Any sort of responsibility. Unlike most of the rest of his family, past and present, he was a follower, not a leader. But he was not prepared to follow his sister along the path she had now chosen. He’d come home to England to retrieve his birthright. And now that the opportunity to do so was in reach, he found that it meant more to him than he’d ever realised.

He walked to a secluded corner of the car park. The hotel’s grounds stretched before him. He wasn’t quite sure, but he thought he could just see the beginning of the Blackdown Hills in the distance, the hills where he had grown up. He and his sister had been so close then. And Bella was right, of course, neither of them had ever agreed to the sequence of events which had now engulfed them. But, in Freddie’s opinion, there could be no going back. He wanted the future that he now felt was so nearly his. And, as far as he was concerned, people may have died, but there was no proof at all of deliberate intent to kill. Murder was something he preferred not to even think about. And Freddie Fairbrother had always been extremely good at dismissing from his mind almost anything which might concern or offend him.

He reached into the pocket of his jeans for his phone and called up a contact number. The recipient answered almost at once.

‘Make this quick, I told you not to call again on your own phone.’

‘I know. I’m sorry. I had to speak to you right away.’

‘Is something wrong?’

‘Yes, It’s Bella,’ Freddie began.