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  Paul Bassett Davies worked in experimental theatre before moving to television and radio, where he wrote for some of the biggest names in British comedy. He also wrote his own radio sitcom, and scripted several radio plays.

  He wrote the screenplay for the 2005 feature animation, The Magic Roundabout, and has written and produced music videos with Kate Bush and Ken Russell. He was the vocalist and lyricist for the punk band, Shoes for Industry.

  He is the author of three previous novels – Utter Folly, Dead Writers in Rehab and Please Do Not Ask for Mercy as a Refusal Often Offends – as well as a collection of short stories, The Glade and Other Stories.

  Other books by Paul Bassett Davies

  Utter Folly

  Dead Writers in Rehab

  Please Do Not Ask for Mercy as a Refusal Often Offends

  The Glade and Other Stories

  Published in 2021

  by Lightning Books Ltd

  Imprint of Eye Books Ltd

  29A Barrow Street

  Much Wenlock

  Shropshire

  TF13 6EN

  www.lightning-books.com

  Copyright © Paul Bassett Davies 2021

  Cover by Nell Wood

  The moral right of the author has been asserted. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Printed by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon CR0 4YY

  ISBN: 9781785632655

  Violence is not completely fatal

  until it ceases to disturb us

  Thomas Merton

  Contents

  PROLOGUE

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  THANKS

  PREVIOUS NOVEL

  PROLOGUE

  The image is blurred.

  Adam crouches down a little more, and brings his face closer to the camera. His features spring into focus as he speaks: ‘Is this good, Chris?’

  A woman’s voice: ‘Just a moment.’ The image sharpens. ‘OK, all good.’

  ‘Great. We only get one take for this gig.’

  ‘Don’t fuck up, then.’

  Adam smiles. ‘I won’t, if you won’t.’

  ‘Deal. Are you ready to go?’

  Adam checks his watch and turns to his right. ‘OK for you, Alex?’

  ‘I’m good,’ says an unseen voice.

  ‘Let’s do it.’

  ‘We’re rolling,’ Chris says.

  ‘Sound?’

  ‘Sound. And…action.’

  Adam speaks directly into the camera. His voice is low and urgent, but steady: ‘In a few minutes I’ll be meeting Enver again. Having come to trust me over the last three weeks, he now believes I’m going to introduce him to Mr Jones, the man who wants to buy the fifteen-year-old Slovakian girl called Nadia. Enver thinks his new customer runs a chain of brothels, where Nadia will be pimped out to men, perhaps as many as twenty a day. In reality, “Mr Jones” is this man beside me, Alex Burnside…’

  The camera pans left to take in a burly man hunched down beside Adam, squashed up against him uncomfortably in the cramped surveillance van. Alex nods curtly, and the camera pans back to Adam, who continues: ‘…who served with a British special forces unit before becoming a private security consultant. The men we’re dealing with can be very violent. We’ve already seen how they treat the women and girls they smuggle into the country, including Nadia, who has been helping us with such incredible bravery. We now intend to free her, and expose Enver’s operation. Let’s hope everything goes to plan.’

  Adam stops speaking and continues looking into camera.

  ‘It’s good for me,’ Chris says, ‘and…we’re still rolling.’

  ‘Let’s go,’ Adam says.

  ‘Wait, let me switch audio source. OK; test it.’

  Adam pats his chest, producing a loud THUD from the microphone concealed under his shirt.

  ‘Say something,’ Chris says.

  ‘See you on the other side.’

  ‘Good for sound. Break a leg.’

  Adam and Alex turn around awkwardly, unable to stand upright. Adam opens the back doors of the van and daylight floods in.

  The shot swings around. There’s a glimpse of Chris’s hand as she flips open a spyhole in the van’s side panel and places the camera up against it. The focus and exposure are adjusted, and now Adam and Alex are walking away from the van, between two rows of big trucks. The sound is picked up by Adam’s concealed microphone as the two men walk almost to the end of the canyon formed by the parked vehicles. They wait.

  ‘Here they come,’ Adam whispers. His amplified voice sounds weirdly close, given that he and Alex are a hundred yards away now, at the far end of the commercial vehicle parking lot. The ceaseless flow of traffic on an unseen motorway, somewhere nearby, sounds like the sea.

  A large black BMW glides into view, swings slowly into the canyon between the trucks and stops a few yards from Adam and Alex. The front door on the passenger side opens and a man with a thin face gets out. He strides around the back of the car and opens the rear passenger door on the driver’s side. A squat, shaven-headed man emerges, and raises a hand to Adam with a smile. Meanwhile the driver steps out of the car and stands motionless beside it, his hands clasped in front of him. He’s big.

  The squat man reaches back into the car, making a beckoning gesture with his hand, palm downwards in the European way. After a moment a girl emerges. Hair in pigtails, short skirt. She looks pale, but she seems steady enough as she stands beside the squat man. Even though she’s clearly very young she’s nearly as tall as him. He puts an arm around her waist and walks her to Adam. He extends his free hand.

  ‘Adam, my friend. Good to see you again. All OK with you?’

  ‘All good, Enver. This is my friend Mr Jones.’

  Enver turns to study Alex. He nods slowly. ‘Mr Jones. Shall we be on first-name terms, now we finally meet and do business?’

  Alex steps forward and offers his hand. ‘Charlie. Charlie Jones.’

  They shake hands.

  ‘OK, Charlie,’ Enver says, ‘now you meet Nadia.’

  He draws the girl close, cuddling her as he speaks to her in a coaxing, avuncular tone, his lips brushing against her hair.

  ‘Mr Charlie Jones is a fine English gentleman,’ he says, ‘and he will be very good to you if you are nice to him. He will buy you gifts, you know?’

  Enver winks at Alex, who reaches out to take Nadia by the hand. Enver gazes at him for a long moment before he removes his arm from around Nadia’s waist.

  Alex gently pulls her towards him, pivoting slightly as he does so, to place himself between her and the others. The move is casual but delibe
rate.

  ‘She is a good girl,’ Enver says to him. ‘Very clean. Fresh. No men yet.’

  Alex nods, and smiles blandly. His grip on Nadia’s hand is tight.

  Enver turns to Adam. ‘So, it’s good. You have the money, my friend?’

  ‘No.’

  Enver glances around. ‘Who has the money?’

  ‘There’s no money, Enver. I’m a journalist. You’re being filmed.’

  Enver moves closer to Adam. He speaks softly. ‘What are you saying, Adam?’

  ‘We’ve been filming you secretly since–’

  Enver cuts him off: ‘Give me the girl.’

  At the sound of Enver’s raised voice, his driver and the other man move forward swiftly. Adam shifts his balance and loosens his arms, ready to fight. Beside him, Alex plants himself squarely in front of Nadia, still holding her with one hand while with the other he whips a thin police-style baton from inside his coat and with a flick of his wrist extends it to its full length.

  ‘No,’ Adam says, ‘Nadia stays with us.’

  In a single fluid movement Enver produces a gun and raises it to point at Adam’s face, very close. Adam doesn’t flinch: ‘This is being filmed, Enver. You’ll get eight years or so, serve four, maybe get deported. Murder will get you life. Twenty years minimum.’

  Enver’s hand remains steady.

  Adam says, ‘That white van behind me? That’s where the team is. They’re calling the cops right now.’

  Enver’s eyes flick away from Adam’s face and, unnervingly, he looks directly into the camera for an instant without knowing it. He returns his gaze to Adam’s. He lowers the gun, takes a swift step back and shouts to his men: ‘We go!’

  Adam glances at the driver and the other man as they run back to the car. While he’s distracted, Enver raises the gun again and whips the barrel across Adam’s face.

  Adam staggers but doesn’t fall. Enver and his men jump back into the car, which reverses at high speed and clips the back edge of the last truck in the row as it swings around with a squeal of tyres and roars away.

  Adam turns to the camera, his hand clamped over his bleeding cheek. He grins and winces at the same time. ‘Tell me you got all that!’

  The image freezes.

  ***

  A thunder of applause.

  I glanced back up at my own image, huge on the screen behind me. Insufferable prick. That was what part of me thought, anyway. I looked out at the audience. The ballroom was filled with fifty round tables, each seating a dozen people, some of whom were now rising to their feet, presenting the others with the choice of joining the standing ovation or seeming ungenerous. To me. The person they were all there to honour and validate. And part of me loved it.

  I was aware that I cut a dashing figure, both up on the screen, where I looked tough and dishevelled – the wounded hero – and onstage, in a tuxedo that still fitted me as well as it did when I bought it, at the age of nineteen. That was two decades ago, and there was still no grey in my hair. Good posture, nice smile. I scrubbed up well, and I knew it. And part of me hated it. This isn’t meant to be about me, I thought, and immediately realised how stupid that thought was. Of course it was about me. I was the one receiving the bloody award, which was currently in the hands of a tall, elegant woman of sixty standing beside me in front of a microphone.

  ‘The footage we’ve just seen,’ she said, ‘like the rest of Adam’s remarkable work, speaks far more eloquently than anything more I could hope to say. I will simply end by telling you I’m certain that my late husband would have been the first to applaud this choice. And so it is with great pleasure that I present the Simon Draper Investigative Memorial Prize to Adam Budd.’

  Another explosion of applause. Those in the audience who were old hands at this game had wisely remained on their feet, to avoid repeating the awkwardness of deciding whether or not to offer another standing ovation.

  The woman – Lynn Draper – handed the award to me. It was an ugly, abstract collision of metal and glass, which might charitably be interpreted as symbolising a probing, penetrative spirit, expressed as a collection of spiky protrusions. I grasped the angular lump of kitsch in my hands, and Lynn leaned in to kiss me on the cheek. She whispered, ‘Simon would be proud.’

  I ducked in acknowledgement, very nearly head-butting Lynn as she moved in for a kiss on my other cheek, which I wasn’t expecting. We manoeuvred through the moment gracefully, and as Lynn hugged me I tried to prevent the award, which I was holding in front of me, from stabbing either of us in the belly.

  Lynn stepped away, and I placed the award on the lectern in front of me. I kept one hand curled around its narrow stem, mistrusting its stability.

  I leaned into the microphone and did my thing. I thanked each member of my team by name; I thanked the production company, and the BBC. I threw in the usual line about being flustered by this overwhelming honour, and hoping I hadn’t forgotten to acknowledge anyone as a result, although I was pretty sure I hadn’t. I paused and gazed out at the audience for a moment. The final part was important; I needed to get it right.

  ‘The only people left to thank,’ I said, ‘are those I can’t name in public. I’m very happy to tell you that our brave colleague, Nadia, who gave and risked so much to help us, is safe and well. But there are others – some of them helping us undercover – who are still trapped in the repugnant trade that Nadia’s courage has helped to expose. This award is for her, and for them – the extraordinary people whose inspiring spirit never ceases to humble me, and who will not, I truly hope, need to remain nameless for much longer.’

  I raised the award in a salute – dear god, it was heavy – and turned away. More applause, with some people cheering. I was acutely conscious of enjoying the warm glow of appreciation, even as I wanted to despise it. I wished I hadn’t said that stuff about being humbled. That must have sounded so fake.

  I followed a man with headphones and a clipboard to the steps at the side of the stage, and trotted down them and wove my way back towards our table, through a gauntlet of congratulations – smiling faces, thumps on the back, handshakes.

  As I neared our table I saw Maria coming towards me. I prepared myself for her embrace, but as she approached I saw concern in her expression. Without ceremony she elbowed aside a well-wisher, and grabbed my shoulder. She put her lips to my ear so she could be heard above the hubbub: ‘Come with me, something’s happened.’

  She took my hand and began to lead me towards the back of the auditorium, past our own table. I stopped her before we reached the doors.

  ‘What is it?’

  Maria held up my mobile phone. I’d left it with her when I went to the stage, having discovered that it spoiled the cut of my evening clothes when it was in my pocket.

  ‘It’s your mother,’ she said.

  I looked at her in astonishment. ‘On the phone?’

  Maria shook her head. She showed me the message on the screen.

  I stared at it for a long time. ‘Oh god,’ I said, ‘she’s gone.’

  The noise in the room around me became an abstract background, swelling and diminishing like waves crashing on a shoreline.

  one

  I gazed down into the swirling grey sea, keeping a firm grip on the railing as the tiny ferry bucked and plunged through the waves. The conditions had been described to me as bracing, rather than rough. If they were rough, I’d been told, I wouldn’t have been allowed on the deck.

  Another burst of spray hit my face. I raised my head to shake it off, and for a moment I visualised Maria standing beside me at the rail, her dark hair being whipped by the wind, chin raised defiantly. Would she have enjoyed being out here? I had to admit I didn’t know, even after almost three years together. And now it didn’t matter.

  We’d gone back to her place from the awards ceremony. She’d insisted that I shouldn’t be
alone, and I didn’t want to tell her I would have preferred to go back to my own flat by myself. She sensed it, though. She was getting good at that.

  We sat on Maria’s couch and she asked if I’d like to talk about my mother, and assured me she completely understood if I didn’t want to. All in good time, she said, and we could go straight to bed if I wanted to, and we could make love, or she would just hold me. Or not. Whatever worked for me.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, and gazed at the floor.

  She waited a moment, then stood up and left the room. Five minutes later she reappeared with a bottle of wine, poured two glasses, and sat down beside me again.

  ‘Did you expect it?’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘I hadn’t seen her for a while. We spoke on the phone about four months ago, but she didn’t say anything.’

  ‘Only seventy. That’s so young. And she didn’t tell you she was ill?’

  ‘She never told me anything. Nothing important, anyway.’

  Maria took my hand. ‘I’m so sorry, darling.’

  ‘My mother liked to surprise people.’

  She glanced at me with a frown, but relaxed when she saw I was smiling. I knew she found it hard to read my mood sometimes. That wasn’t her fault, especially at a moment like this, when I wasn’t sure of it myself. I wasn’t really feeling anything at all, to tell the truth, except a vague sense that something was over, like the end of a film or a concert. ‘It’s all right,’ I said, patting her knee, ‘don’t worry. We weren’t close.’

  ‘As you’ve mentioned before,’ Maria said, and refilled our glasses.

  We went to bed not long afterwards, mostly because I couldn’t think of anything else to do. In the morning we had coffee together, then I left.

  Four days later, I was sitting up in her bed, watching the patterns cast on the wall by the morning sunlight as the slender trees outside her window, dusted with green, swayed in a light breeze. I’d started to tell her about the inheritance, but now I was gazing at the play of shadows dappling the plasterwork.

  Maria nudged me. ‘Go on.’

  ‘Sorry, I was miles away. Yes, it’s a huge house, apparently. Totally derelict.’