Читать книгу Hide Me - Ava McCarthy - Страница 14

Chapter 10

‘So you still told them no?’

‘Of course I told them no.’ Harry’s initial flash of pleasure at receiving Hunter’s call was definitely starting to wane. ‘Why would I do otherwise?’

‘Exactly. One dead hacker’s enough. No sense in offering up two, right?’

Harry swung her legs off the bed, biting back an unreasonable urge to bait him by saying she might still change her mind. She pictured him at his desk, the phone wedged into his shoulder, his sandy hair spiked up from shoving his hands through it. She flung aside the map she’d been studying when he’d called, then closed her eyes, relenting slightly. Hunter was only concerned for her safety, after all, and if she was honest, her frustrations had nothing to do with him.

It had been a couple of days since she’d talked to Zubiri. She’d left his office, thanking him for his time and firmly declining his proposition. Then she’d walked away, expecting to feel relieved, but instead she’d felt oddly empty.

Her gaze roamed her bland hotel room, sliding over its neutral tones of greys and creams. She felt aimless. Directionless. Soon she’d terminate her arrangement with Riva, and after that, she’d have nothing. No client, no assignment. No reason to stay on in San Sebastián. She fingered the map on the bed beside her, tracing the route she’d marked out in thick red pen. No professional reason, anyway.

‘Harry?’

‘Sorry, you’re right. It’s too risky, I’d be a fool to do it. But I can’t help feeling involved.’

‘Because you found McArdle’s body?’

Harry shrugged. ‘I’d just like to know what happened to him, that’s all.’

‘Your pal Zubiri doesn’t know?’

‘If he does, he hasn’t told me.’

She flashed on Zubiri’s slides: drug trafficking, armed robbery, Colombians, terrorists. Proceeds of $900 million. The scale of it was staggering, but in her humdrum hotel room, the whole thing seemed frankly unreal. She was tempted to relay everything she’d learned to Hunter, but she’d given Zubiri her word that their discussions would remain confidential. Though right now, she wasn’t sure she owed him anything.

Hunter cleared his throat. ‘Look, I know you told me not to go digging, but to hell with that. I went out on a limb and did it anyway. Hold on a second . . .’

She heard the quick snap of pages being turned, and imagined him frowning, his tie probably loosened and his collar undone in the manner of a man who couldn’t abide restrictions.

‘Got it,’ he said. ‘Okay, Stephen McArdle. You know his background: hacker from Belfast, paramilitary connections. Did you know he wanted out?’

‘After eighteen years?’

‘Word is, he was spooked. Turning paranoid. He knew too much about the organizations he worked for. Maybe someone back in Belfast thought so, too.’

Harry recalled what Zubiri had said: Try to leave and you end up dead in a ditch.

‘So you’re saying he was killed by paramilitaries? Which ones?’

‘Take your pick. He seemed to work for them all at one time or another.’

‘Where’d you hear this?’

‘I poked around. Stepped on a few toes, exceeded my jurisdiction.’

‘I thought you were meant to be keeping your nose clean.’

‘I am. But somehow, you keep getting in my way.’

Harry bit her lip. Hunter’s career had almost imploded the previous year after he’d had an affair with a suspect in a fraud case. He’d worked hard to toe the line ever since, but playing by the rules didn’t suit him any more than it did Harry. They’d knocked heads on the case that had taken Harry to Capetown, but he’d seemed inclined to trust her in spite of the lies she’d spun. That hadn’t played out well with his superiors.

He never spoke about the fraud case or the woman he’d slept with, and Harry often found herself wondering what she was like. Someone once said Hunter had a weakness for women who told lies. When she’d put it to him, the look he’d turned on her had been speculative and intense.

Pages crackled on the other end of the phone. He was probably rummaging through a jumble of files, his shirtsleeves rolled up on lightly tanned forearms. She’d told him more than once he should never have been a cop. A demolition expert, maybe, or a war correspondent. Something that required helmets and nerve and a healthy dose of rage. He hadn’t disagreed.

She smiled into the phone. ‘Thanks for digging, Hunter. I mean that. But don’t get your ass in a sling on my account.’

Hunter grunted, barely listening. His first name was Jack, but for some reason Harry never used it. That alone should have told her something about their arms-length relationship. If a relationship was even what they had. Sometimes she wondered if the electricity between them was mostly being generated by her.

‘I lucked out on Chavez,’ he said at last. ‘Couldn’t find anything on him. But I did get hold of some background on your client, Riva Mills. Seems she has a juvie record.’

‘So I’m told.’

Hunter clicked his tongue. ‘You have a real talent for picking crooked clients, you know that, Harry?’

‘Hey, don’t get too sanctimonious. Your track record for sound judgement’s no better than mine, remember?’

He let that one slide. ‘Her home life was no picnic. Mother moved around a lot, ended up in a place known as The Bottoms, some hard-knock neighbourhood along the Ohio River. Riva slept rough half the time, whenever the mother was on the rampage. Got picked up on a couple of minor charges.’ He paused to digest a little more. ‘Jesus. Mother sounds like one crazy bitch. Arrested for assaulting Riva with a meat mallet. Christ.’

Harry’s eyes widened. Could a mother really hate her daughter that much? At least with Miriam, it wasn’t hate. Indifference was more her style.

She recalled suddenly how she used to sit next to her mother as a child, watching her sister claim Miriam’s lap. Somehow, it was never Harry’s turn to be cuddled. But Amaranta was different. Mothered and motherly. She used to complain that Harry was no good at playing dolls, but the fact was, Harry didn’t know how. How could she mother a doll when she’d had no role model to copy?

She listened to Hunter whipping through his report, and wondered why she always pulled away from him. Her lessons about love had come from her mother, and she’d grown up confused about how it was meant to feel. As a child, love had seemed like something angry and cold. Something painful. The psychobabble would have you believe she preferred men who echoed her mother’s low opinion of her. Harry rolled her eyes. Not everything could be her bloody mother’s fault.

Hunter’s voice cut back in. ‘That’s as far as I’d got on Riva. But you don’t need this now anyway, do you?’

Harry picked at a fraying thread on her duvet. ‘I suppose not. But I’ve got a few more names. If you had the time, it might be interesting to find out about them.’

‘What for? You said you weren’t going to do it.’

‘And I’m not. You were right, one dead hacker’s enough. But it doesn’t stop me being curious.’

Hunter was silent. The line crackled with unspoken suspicion, and Harry rushed on, giving him the names of Chavez’s crew.

‘Zubiri doesn’t seem to know too much about them. I shouldn’t really tell you any more, but if you can find anything out, I’d be interested.’

The silence stretched on, like a taut rubber band straining to snap. Eventually, Hunter said,

‘How long will you be out there?’

Harry wound the fraying thread tightly around her thumb, choking off the circulation till her fingertip turned white.

‘Only a few more days.’ She glanced at the map on the bed beside her, eyeing the red-inked route. ‘There’s just something I need to do before I leave.’