Whatever suspicions Tom had of Jennifer’s motives, he knew that it was risky for him to stay out in the open. The sound of an approaching siren made his mind up for him. He jogged over to the cab and climbed in. Jennifer stepped in after him and slammed the door shut.
“Are you okay?” she asked breathlessly, folding down the seat opposite him. Tom looked past her to the taxi driver sitting behind his plastic screen.
“I think you met Max yesterday. Don’t worry, he’s one of our people here. The taxi just helps us blend in a little.”
Max winked at Tom in his rearview mirror and Tom recognized him as one of Jennifer’s minders from the day before. The square-jawed driver with his blond crew cut and thick muscular neck could hardly have looked less like a London cabbie if he had tried.
But then the cab was obviously not standard issue, either. The windows were clearly bulletproof; the bodywork — judging from the meaty clunk made by the closing door — armor-plated and in all likelihood cork-lined as well for sound insulation. Most noticeable of all, the usual diesel whine had been replaced by the throaty roar of a transplanted V8 to cope with the extra weight.
“No, I’m not okay,” said Tom, taking in Jennifer’s packed bag on the floor next to her, clothes poking out from the zipper fastening. “Why are you here? What’s going on?”
For the first time since he had met her, Jennifer looked uncomfortable, sad, even.
“I’m sorry about Harry. We should never have got him involved.”
“You can apologize later. Just tell me what happened.”
She paused before answering.
“About forty-five minutes after you left, three men broke into the house and attacked us. They shot him, shot him right in front of me.”
“Shot him?… And you? How come you got away?” His voice was loaded with suspicion.
“I don’t know. I tried to help him. Tried to fight them off. But there were too many of them. They were armed. They knocked me out and when I came round there was no sign of Harry, just blood all over the hall floor. But I smelled burning and followed the blood trail to the basement. They’d set fire to him. They shot him, dragged him to the basement and set fire to him.”
“Shit.” Tom bit his lower lip, his brain feverishly conjuring up an image of Renwick’s charred and twisted corpse before immediately straining to banish the ghoulish scene from his mind. Harry was gone. Harry, who had always been there, who had been more of a father to him than his own father. His grief struck him like a sudden wave, leaving him disorientated and gasping for breath, uncertain whether to swim up or down to get back to the surface. Even so, he wouldn’t allow himself to cry, not in front of her. Not in front of anyone.
“Then I called Max here to come and fetch me. He called the cops after we’d left.”
The taxi crossed the river and made its way past the poured concrete mass of the South Bank and the delicate steel web of the Millennium Wheel, its now stationary pods shining like pearls in the morning sun.
“How did you know where to find me?”
“We’ve had people here following you for several days. They were watching you last night to make sure you didn’t disappear or make a move for the coin. Luckily, one of them saw you jumping out that window.”
“Where’s the coin now?” he asked, his throat swollen.
“Gone.” Jennifer’s voice was hollow and she turned her head to stare out the window as she answered. “It was the only thing they took. It’s what they came for.”
“You mean it was some sort of professional hit?”
“Looks that way.”
“But how did they even know it was there?”
“Two possible explanations. One, that I was followed there by someone who knew I had the coin on me. Two, that someone else tipped them off. We know you didn’t make any calls on your cell or from home last night so that puts you in the clear.”
“So you think that Harry—”
“We’re analyzing his phone records.” There was a pause until Jennifer spoke again, regret in her voice. “Look, Kirk, I don’t know how to tell you this, but we ran some checks on Harry Renwick last night. There was no rich relative, no inheritance.”
“What are you saying?” Tom was instantly on the defensive.
“Think about it. Those paintings, that huge place. He must have paid for it all somehow. Maybe he just got greedy?”
Tom bit his lip. He refused to believe it. Harry on the take? It just didn’t make sense.
“And whoever murdered Harry and stole the coin made it look like you did it. When I went back to the kitchen I saw that they’d removed my place setting and just left yours and his. I guess they just had to look for the lipstick.”
“Why?”
“That’s what I want to know.” Jennifer’s eyes glinted with determination. “I guess you make a pretty convincing suspect.”
Tom nodded, reliving that morning’s events in his head.
“You should have seen Clarke’s face when he came to arrest me.”
“Clarke?”
“A cop. Been trying to nail me for years. He must have thought he’d finally hit the jackpot.”
There were a few moments’ silence as Tom’s mind raced over everything he had just heard.
“So let me get this straight,” he said eventually. “You’ve got people who can prove that Harry was alive when I left him, that I didn’t move from my place all night long and that I didn’t call anyone.”
“Uh-huh.” Jennifer nodded.
“So what do you want? What’s the catch?”
“Did you steal those coins, Kirk?” Her eyes searched his out as she asked the question. Tom returned her gaze unblinkingly and answered in a firm, confident voice.
“No. Before last night I’d never even heard of them. I wish I still hadn’t.”
She nodded and Tom sensed that she was wrestling with a decision that she didn’t really want to make. The cab had reached Vauxhall, and the glass-and-stone castellated mass of the M15 building dragged past them.
“The catch is that if I help you, you have to help me.”
“What do you mean?” asked Tom warily.
Jennifer sat back in her seat and again gazed out the window as she spoke.
“That coin was one of five stolen from Fort Knox three weeks ago.”
“Fort Knox!” Tom interrupted. “Christ! How did they do that?”
“That’s not important right now. What is important is that one of them turned up in Paris two weeks later. The same coin I showed you last night and which I’ve now lost. So we think the other coins are in Europe, too, possibly being sold to a private collector. The question is, if you didn’t steal them, who do you think did?”
Tom looked away from her angrily.
“I’m no snitch.”
“What about Harry?”
“What about Harry? What’s he got to do with it?”
“You think the Fort Knox job and his murder are unrelated? My money says that whoever stole the coins, somehow lost one, found out that Harry had it, and killed him to get it back. Help me find who was behind this job and you’ll be helping catch Harry’s killers.”
Tom was silent as he considered what she had just said.
“I’ve got to go to Paris,” she continued. “I’ve got a meeting set up with Van Simson this afternoon. Afterward, I want to have a look around. It’s where the coin was found. You know the city, understand the way things work over there. I’m talking about a couple of days of your time at most.”
“You’re kidding, right.” He almost laughed his question.
“Why not?”
“Are you crazy? For a million different reasons. You think I trust you guys? I got screwed over once. I’m not falling for the same trick again.”