The Deadly Game(4)

‘Pierce Randall are still looking for the books,’ blurted out Jake.

Pierce Randall, the powerful international legal firm, with a client list that included dictators, organised crime around the globe, as well as governments and multinational companies.

Gareth hesitated, then he nodded slightly. ‘We are dealing with Pierce Randall,’ he said. ‘They know the rules of the game. At this moment, you are the wild card, the unstable element. I hope I don’t need to remind you that unstable elements cannot be tolerated in an orderly world.’

In other words, stop or we’ll kill you. You and Lauren, thought Jake in horror as he decoded Gareth’s outwardly bland words. It would be done in an untraceable manner. An unfortunate and tragic accident.

‘Do I make myself clear?’ asked Gareth.

Jake hesitated, then he nodded.

‘Yes,’ he said.

Gareth’s happy smile returned to his face.

‘Good,’ he purred. ‘Then we have an understanding?’

‘Yes.’ Jake nodded again.





Chapter 3




Jake caught the bus home. It was crowded and slower than the tube, but after his experience a few months ago, when a would-be assassin had almost succeeded in pushing him under a tube train, he felt safer. He still didn’t know who had been behind that attempt on his life. He suspected Gareth’s secret service people, but it didn’t make sense. Not now, now that Gareth knew about Jake’s interests in the secret library, and Jake knew about Gareth being the person responsible for keeping the books hidden and the truth about them hushed up.

He thought about Lauren, far away in New Zealand, exiled. Never able to return. Unless he could find a way to force the government to change their mind. And there was only one way to get them to do that, and that was to get the whole business of the Order of Malichea and the books out into the public arena. End the secrecy. Once it was out in the open, they wouldn’t have the same hold over Lauren. OK, there was the murder charge. But Jake still felt that was a bluff. For one thing, it wasn’t murder, Lauren had killed Parsons in self-defence. For another, if they prosecuted her, it would bring out a lot of stuff they’d prefer to keep hidden: like the secret experiments at the government research laboratory from where Jake and Lauren had taken the one book he’d seen.

Jake thought about contacting Pierce Randall, offering to work with them. They had at least one of the old books; Alex Munro, the chief executive at Pierce Randall had told Jake so himself. But Jake also knew that Pierce Randall weren’t interested in finding the books for ‘the common good’, as Munro had claimed. The international law firm wanted the books for their clients for the money they would make, for the power they would bring: to be able to hold governments and companies to ransom, to destroy and remake national economics, to use the scientific information as weapons.

No, Pierce Randall would be the wrong direction. They wouldn’t help him gain Lauren’s freedom.

The bus pulled up at his stop in Finsbury Park, and he walked to the small block of flats where he lived. As he walked, he cast glances around, looking for anyone suspicious, anyone who might be keeping a watch on him. It had become a habit of his, ever since he had become involved with the Order of Malichea.

I have to stop worrying, he told himself. Gareth and his men know about me. They’re keeping watch on me. Pierce Randall aren’t interested in me if I don’t have one of the books. No one’s after me. I’m safe.

But he didn’t feel it. Sometimes, he thought he’d never feel safe again. That was another reason to get the whole business of the Order of Malichea and the hidden library out into the open. No one would touch him or Lauren once it was out there.

He opened the door of his flat, picked up the mail from the doormat, walked into his kitchen, and stopped dead. A large envelope was lying on his kitchen table. He knew it hadn’t been there when he’d left. Someone had been in his flat and put it there. They hadn’t broken in, the lock on his front door was undamaged. He looked at the windows. All of them were shut, and locked, exactly as he’d left them. And no one had keys to his flat except him.

He approached the table warily. The envelope looked bulky. It had his name, Jake Wells, printed on it.

Warning bells sounded in his brain. His mind went back to the site in Bedfordshire, when he’d seen that digger driver dig up one of the books, open it, and then the man’s whole body had been consumed by a mass of writhing vegetation within seconds. Was there something like that in this envelope? Some booby trap, waiting for him to open it, and fall victim? Jake wondered if he should plunge the envelope into a sink full of water as a safety precaution, just in case. But then he reflected that whatever was inside the envelope might be more dangerous when it came into contact with water.