Blood Ransom Read online

  At first I was just scared of what I was doing – running away and using fake ID to get on a plane, possibly to walk right into the hands of the very people who most wanted Rachel and me dead.

  And then, as I bit into my burger, I suddenly felt scared for Rachel, like something terrible had happened.

  I hoped it was all in my head.

  21

  Rachel

  I blinked, unable to breath, unable to move. My mind seemed to slow right down. I registered Paul, the guard, walking towards me . . . the frayed edge of his rugby shirt collar . . . the crunch of the stones under his feet.

  ‘Get inside,’ he snapped.

  I backed towards the house as Milo wheeled past me. Behind me I could hear him opening the front door.

  ‘Inside, Rachel,’ Paul barked.

  I stared at him, my legs threatening to give way.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I said. ‘Milo, where’s Daniel?’

  Milo said nothing, just wheeled himself inside.

  ‘Where’s Daniel?’ I repeated, more forcefully.

  ‘He’s not here,’ Milo muttered.

  Not here? ‘You mean Elijah doesn’t have him . . .? He’s not on the island . . . not about to be operated on?’

  ‘No. Now come inside.’

  I stumbled into the house after him. It was cold and dimly lit, with whitewashed walls, but I barely noticed.

  ‘Why did you trick me into coming here?’ My voice sounded hoarse as a terrifying stream of possibilities rushed through my head. ‘What are you going to do with me?’

  Paul came inside after us and shut the door. He grabbed my arm. ‘This way.’

  ‘I was just following orders,’ Milo muttered. He wheeled himself past me.

  I felt sick.

  ‘Whose orders?’ I called after him. ‘For God’s sake, Milo, you can’t do this. People will come looking for me . . . My parents . . . The police . . .’

  ‘Actually, they won’t,’ Milo said. ‘I took your purse and card from your bag before you got into the boot of the car. We left them on the jetty, so that it looked as if you’d drowned . . . deliberately . . .’

  ‘Killed myself?’ I couldn’t believe it. ‘No one’s going to accept that.’

  ‘They will,’ Milo went on. ‘There was an eyewitness . . .’

  ‘What?’ I thought back to the desolate patch of coastline where I’d smuggled myself onto the boat. ‘Who? How?’

  ‘I need to get her into her room,’ Paul said, his hand still gripping my arm.

  Milo nodded. ‘You’ll find out more in the morning, Rachel.’

  ‘No, wait!’

  But Paul was already pushing me along the corridor. We reached a door on the left and Paul opened it and shoved me inside.

  The door shut – then locked.

  I stood stock-still, trying to make sense of what had happened.

  I looked round the room. It was empty and painted a dirty off-white. There was no furniture apart from a narrow camp bed which was pushed against the far wall. No windows.

  I went over to the bed. The mattress was stained but a thick wool blanket had been laid on top of it.

  Milo had tricked me . . . had faked my death.

  Anger rose from deep inside me. How dare anyone do that?

  And why? It didn’t make sense.

  I wrapped the blanket around myself, my anger shot through with confusion. What was Milo playing at? Was Daniel really not here? And what about Elijah? Was he on the island?

  My heart seemed to shrink inside me as I thought it through. Faking my suicide meant that no one would know I’d been taken. Everyone would think I was dead. I imagined the shock for my parents . . . the pain that they and Theo and Lewis would feel when they heard the news. Surely they wouldn’t believe it? Would they?

  I closed my eyes as sheer terror gripped me. My hand closed on the tiny silver ‘t’ on the chain round my neck but, tonight, even that didn’t comfort me.

  I’d been betrayed and was locked up on an island for reasons I didn’t understand.

  No one knew I was here. No one even knew I was still alive.

  I was totally alone.

  22

  Theo

  My flight touched down just after noon – though it felt much earlier to me, still on US time.

  As I made my way through passport control at Edinburgh Airport, anxiety surged through me. What if the UK authorities realised I was using a fake passport? What if there was a picture of me on their files that would flash up next to my false identity? What if Lewis didn’t make contact?

  In the end, none of those things happened. I sailed through security in Edinburgh and there was a text from Lewis waiting when I switched on my phone.

  GET A TAXI TO THE HUDSON HOTEL. I’LL MEET YOU OUTSIDE.

  I found the taxi rank and set off.

  After sunny Philadelphia, cloudy Edinburgh was a bit of a shock. The air was mild enough, but the sky seemed to press down on me, reminding me – now I was actually here – of the enormous task that lay ahead.

  I saw Lewis before he saw me – he was leaning against the wall of the hotel, in jeans, sunglasses and a leather jacket. He looked exactly the same as before, his hair cut in a short dark crop and that slight air of danger about him. Except, I realised, we were now the same height. Six foot exactly. Just a couple of inches shorter than Elijah though, as Elijah’s clone, I was presumably going to end up the same height as him.

  Lewis came over as I got out of the cab. ‘You’ve grown,’ he said.

  I shrugged. ‘Not any smarter,’ I said.

  Lewis grinned. ‘Good to see you, man. Was everything okay with the passport?’

  ‘Yeah, no problem.’

  Lewis nodded. ‘That guy’s brilliant – the best.’

  There was a slight pause.

  ‘You hungry?’

  ‘Starving – the breakfast on the plane was, like, a roll and some jam with two teaspoons of egg and bacon.’

  ‘Forget breakfast.’ Lewis laughed. ‘It’s lunchtime here.’

  We headed for a café across the road. Once we’d ordered our food, and I’d thanked Lewis for all his help getting me here, I asked him the all-important question:

  ‘So, what leads do you have on where Rachel might be?’

  ‘I don’t have any.’ He sighed, taking off his sunglasses and laying them on the table between us. ‘The police have totally bought this suicide thing. There’s even an eyewitness account of Rachel walking into the sea.’

  ‘I told you before, she wouldn’t have done that. Not in a million years.’

  Lewis looked up. His eyes were a bright blue against his tanned skin. ‘I know,’ he said.

  ‘Which means that eyewitness is lying and we need to find out why – and who for,’ I said.

  ‘I agree. The only trouble is that the inquest into Rachel’s death won’t be held until next week, which is the first time we’ll get to see the eyewitness.’

  ‘We can’t wait that long . . . anything could have happened to her by then!’

  ‘I agree,’ Lewis said with a groan, ‘but I’ve already been to the place where she was supposed to have killed herself. There are no clues – nothing for us to follow up at all. A few people apparently remember seeing her on the high street, but that’s it.’

  I shook my head. ‘Then we have to speak to her parents, find out what they know.’

  ‘After yesterday, that’s what I was thinking too, but we have to be careful. They won’t want to talk to us, especially me,’ Lewis cautioned. ‘We’re a reminder of the past – a threat to their safety.’

  ‘Tough.’ I gritted my teeth. ‘They’re the only option right now.’

  Two hours later, we reached the place where Rachel had been living in Roslinnon – a neat semi-detached house at the end of a long terrace.

  ‘I’ve been keeping an eye on her for months,’ Lewis explained as he parked his car. ‘After Mel . . .’ he hesitated, his voice growing bitter, ‘well, I reque
sted relocation to Edinburgh, so I could be near Rachel.’

  I nodded, trying not to feel jealous. I knew Rachel saw Lewis as a big brother, but it was still hard to think he’d been looking out for her all this time while I’d been stuck on the other side of the Atlantic.

  ‘How’ve you been getting money?’ I said, thinking about the cost of my false passport and ticket.

  ‘Security guard job,’ Lewis said. ‘The pay’s okay and I get plenty of time off.’

  He had to ring the doorbell of Mr and Mrs Smith’s house twice before anyone answered. In the end Mr Smith came to the door. He looked terrible – ashen-faced and dead-eyed.

  His mouth fell open when he saw us. ‘You. What the hell are you two doing here . . .?’

  ‘Rachel,’ I said.

  Mr Smith’s eyes widened. ‘How did you even find us?’

  ‘I’ve always known,’ Lewis explained quickly. ‘It was part of my deal with the FBI.’

  ‘Your deal!’ Mr Smith’s voice rose. ‘What the hell are you thinking, coming here?’

  ‘We’re certain she didn’t kill herself, Richard,’ Lewis said quickly. ‘Somebody’s covering up what really happened.’

  Mr Smith hesitated for a second. ‘You’d better come in.’ He stepped back to allow us to pass, then ushered us into the living room. With its rose-patterned wallpaper and polished wooden furniture, it looked like a cheaper, smaller version of the house I remembered visiting last year in South London, that first day I met Rachel.

  Mr Smith didn’t bother to sit down – or invite us to. He simply shut the living-room door and folded his arms.

  ‘Now, listen,’ he said, his voice terse. ‘I appreciate Rachel may have meant something to both of you, but there are still risks involved in us all being together. I also understand why you don’t want to believe she’s gone . . . especially that way, but there was an eyewitness and . . .’

  ‘Whoever he is, he’s lying,’ I said.

  Mr Smith shook his head helplessly. ‘My wife and I . . . we’ve been over it and over it . . . the government are certain that neither Elijah nor RAGE had any idea where Rachel was. Her . . . what she did, it’s the only logical explanation, no matter how much it hurts . . .’

  There was a pause as we all stood in awkward silence.

  ‘What makes you so sure Rachel would do something . . . like that,’ Lewis said gently.

  ‘She wasn’t getting on with her mother,’ Mr Smith said, heavily.

  Well, that was true. I thought back to the many times Rachel had complained online about how controlling her mum was.

  ‘Plus, she didn’t seem to have any appropriate interests – just this ridiculous obsession with self-defence . . . she’d been to a martial arts show just before she . . .’ He tailed off.

  Lewis and I exchanged glances. I knew he’d taught her some martial arts fight moves while the two of them had been preparing to rescue me from Elijah’s compound in Washington D.C. I didn’t much like the idea that Lewis had sparked off such a big interest. On the other hand, maybe having an in-depth knowledge of self-defence techniques might help keep Rachel safe.

  ‘She didn’t even seem to have any friends . . .’ Mr Smith went on, his forehead creased with a deep frown. ‘I mean, maybe a couple of girls at school . . . She saw one the day it happened, in the high street. The girl’s mother stopped to speak to her and apparently Rachel just ran past, saying “I can’t . . . I can’t . . .” Terribly agitated, the woman said.’ Mr Smith sighed. ‘That sums it up really – the last few years Rachel turned into such a loner. Things were bad back in London, then, after the . . . episode in Washington, she seemed stronger for a while – but recently she’s been more walled up in herself than ever. She’s stopped confiding in us . . . God, she must have felt she didn’t have anyone she could talk to.’

  ‘She had me.’ The words just blurted out.

  ‘You?’ Mr Smith looked at me, his eyes worn and strained behind his glasses.

  I could feel Lewis looking at me too. My face grew red as I explained.

  ‘Rachel and I met online every week. Don’t worry, we were careful. We used different internet cafés . . . different chat rooms . . . She told me stuff – about friends, home, school . . .’ I hesitated. ‘She told me lots of things and, yes, she was bored and annoyed with some of her life but she was happy too – and . . .’ I tailed off, not knowing how to express my certain feeling that Rachel would never have gone away without saying goodbye to me.

  Mr Smith was still staring at me, his mouth gaping open. Lewis went over and touched him on the shoulder.

  ‘We just want to look around for a minute or two, Richard. To see if we can spot anything that would give us a clue . . . just in case . . .’

  Mr Smith nodded slowly, his expression dazed. ‘The police already went through her things, but . . . well, all right. Just don’t make a noise. My wife . . . Rachel’s mother . . . she’s taken some tranquillisers – it’s the only way she’s getting any rest at all and . . .’ He tailed off.

  ‘We understand.’ Lewis lowered his sharp blue eyes. ‘This is the second time.’

  With a jolt, I registered what he was saying. I knew that Rachel had been cloned from her dead older sister, Rebecca. I’d never thought about it before, but that must mean that Mr and Mrs Smith had already gone through the death of one daughter.

  No wonder this apparent loss of Rachel was so unbearable.

  Mr Smith said nothing more, just led us up some stairs and towards Rachel’s bedroom. He stopped at the door. ‘I can’t go in there,’ he whispered, sagging slightly against the wall. ‘We haven’t touched anything. You go ahead.’

  I pushed open the door, eager to see Rachel’s room. It was blue. Very blue. Blue blinds, blue duvet cover, blue walls. There was a wardrobe and a bookshelf and a desk. Two pictures of ballerinas hung from the wall above the bed.

  I looked round, disappointed. I’d hoped being here would give me a sense of Rachel, but this room was just like the rest of the house. This was Rachel’s mother’s version of a girl’s room. It didn’t tell me anything about Rachel herself.

  Lewis was examining the bookshelves. I went over – a few novels and textbooks and a whole shelf of martial arts books and pamphlets. Lewis picked one up and flicked through it.

  I turned my attention to the desk. It was as neat and tidy as everywhere else. A few tubes of cream and a couple of bits of make-up were stacked in the corner. It was all so middle-aged and formal – rather like the ballerina pictures on the opposite wall – and not at all like Rachel.

  At least, not the Rachel I knew . . .

  I fingered the two huge necklaces that lay across the desk. One was made of large brown and blue beads . . . the other of thick golden leaf shapes. They looked like the sort of thing Rachel’s mother would wear. I couldn’t imagine Rachel herself in either of them.

  What was that?

  A tiny hairgrip with a diamante arrow at the tip was nestling under one of the large golden leaves on the second necklace. It was much simpler and prettier than anything else on the desk.

  I picked it up. Rachel had worn this before . . . At her school disco and, later, in the cottage in Scotland.

  I glanced round. Lewis was opening the big drawers under Rachel’s bed, his back turned. I slipped the hairgrip into my pocket and turned back to the desk.

  It wasn’t much, but it was all that was here that truly reminded me of her.

  A few minutes later and Mr Smith came in. He kept his eyes fixed on me as he spoke, clearly not wanting to look at the reminders of Rachel in the room.

  ‘You’ll have to go now,’ he said. ‘My wife’s waking up.’

  Lewis nodded.

  ‘But we haven’t found anything yet,’ I said.

  ‘We can come back.’ Lewis turned to Mr Smith. ‘What can you tell us about the eyewitness who said he saw Rachel on the beach?’

  Mr Smith shrugged. ‘Local police took a statement. It was a man in his early twenties. He onl
y spoke to us for a moment – said how awful it had been not to be able to get to her in time . . . how sorry he was for us . . .’

  I exchanged looks with Lewis. ‘What was his name? What does he look like?’

  ‘Dean McRae,’ Mr Smith said. ‘Cropped red hair, squashed nose. A student, nothing special. He doesn’t live round here, he said he was just in the area for the weekend. Apparently he noticed Rachel at the martial arts show then, later, saw her again while he was driving along the coast, looking for a pub. She was in the distance, on the beach . . . then . . .’ Mr Smith’s mouth trembled.

  ‘Where does this guy live?’

  Mr Smith shrugged. ‘Glasgow somewhere.’

  ‘How many McRaes d’you think there are in the Glasgow phone book?’ I asked Lewis.

  But before he could answer, the bedroom door was flung open.

  Rachel’s mother appeared in the doorway, dressed in a floor-length satin dressing gown. Her hair was a mess, with grey roots showing, and her eyes were wild with fury.

  ‘What the hell is going on?’ she yelled, taking in first me, then Lewis. She turned to her husband. ‘What are they doing here?’

  Mr Smith started stammering out an answer, but Rachel’s mother was clearly beyond listening. I stared, transfixed by her mean, tight face with the skin stretched weirdly round her eyes.

  ‘Get out . . . get them out!’ she shrieked.

  Lewis grabbed my arm. ‘Come on.’

  We nodded goodbye to poor Mr Smith, then raced down the stairs and out of the house. We didn’t speak again for a while. Lewis drove fast and hard, hissing softly under his breath . . . lost in his own thoughts.

  I looked out of the window as we drove, watching the passing houses and trees and fields. Even though it was the height of summer here, everything seemed grey and lifeless.

  ‘At least we know who we’re looking for,’ Lewis said at last. ‘Even if finding him is going to take forever and max out our cash.’