People could be listening, thought Jake. You’ve just confessed to killing someone! But it was self-defence. Manslaughter. Not even manslaughter. An accident. An accident and self-defence. She’d need a good lawyer. Pierce Randall.
I’ll be seeing them at five o’clock after all, he decided.
‘Why didn’t you phone me after it happened?’ he asked, hurt.
‘I didn’t want to phone anyone. I thought they might be bugging our phones, tracing me. But right now, I don’t know what to do or who to turn to. You’re the only one I can trust, apart from Robert. And Robert doesn’t know what’s been going on.’
‘We have to meet,’ said Jake.
‘No,’ said Lauren. ‘They’ll be watching you. If we meet, they’ll get me.’
‘There’s this firm of lawyers called Pierce Randall,’ he said. ‘They helped me. They’ll help you. Protect you. Come with me to meet them.’
‘No,’ said Lauren.
‘Who was Carl going to sell the book to?’ he asked.
‘I don’t know,’ she answered.
‘Whoever it was, if they get in touch with you, give them the book,’ said Jake. ‘That’s all they want. Give them the book and they’ll stop.’
‘No!’ said Lauren. ‘Not after all this! I killed someone I cared for, who I thought cared for me! If I just hand it over, what’s all this been about?’
‘It doesn’t matter what it’s been about,’ insisted Jake. ‘What matters is you stay alive. There’ll be other books. Give them this one.’
There was a pause, then Lauren said, ‘I haven’t got it. I’ve put it somewhere safe.’
‘Where?’
‘I have to go,’ said Lauren. ‘Go home, Jake. Go home. Stay safe.’
Then the line went dead. He dialled her number, but all he got was the usual mechanical voice informing him that ‘This person’s phone is switched off’, and telling him to leave a message.
He headed into his block of flats, and shuddered as he remembered the last time he’d walked in. The fear and panic he’d fought to keep under control as he entered his flat, and the shock at finding the dead man’s body. He knew he ought to feel as apprehensive about going back, but he didn’t. He felt battered and exhausted. If anyone leapt out at him now, he’d quite likely just say to them, ‘I haven’t got the book. I don’t know where it is. Now can you please leave?’
There was no one waiting for him on the stairs, nor on the landing outside his flat. The ‘scene of crime’ tape he’d presumed the police had fixed across his flat door had gone. Everything looked the same as before.
He turned his key in the lock, pushed the door open, and found himself treading on the post: junk mail, a few envelopes with what looked like bills, and a jiffy bag.
He picked up the jiffy bag, and felt his heart pound as he recognised Lauren’s writing on it. It couldn’t be. . . !
He opened the jiffy bag. Inside was the book they’d taken from the research lab. The one everyone was looking for. The one over which people had died. And now he was holding it in his hands.
Chapter 24
Jake sat in his living room, the book on the table in front of him. That was why Lauren had stressed for him to go home. She’d sent the book to the only place she thought was safe.
Jake’s mind was in a whirl. What should he do with it? Give it to Pierce Randall and let them take it into safe keeping? Give it to Penny Johnson? But how would either of those actions help Lauren?
He reached out and touched it, being careful not to disturb it too much in case it fell open, just in case there were any fungal spores still hidden among the pages. Not that it looked as if that would happen easily – it now had an elastic band holding it shut – but Jake was still cautious after what he’d seen happen before.
The book was encased in what looked to be a sort of oilskin or leather, black in colour. A symbol was embossed into the material. It was the same symbol Lauren had on her laptop, the seal of the Order of Malichea. And, etched into the material just beneath the symbol were the Roman numerals CCCLXVII. So this was book number 367, which meant there were at least another 366 books out there from the secret library, hidden.
I have to hang on to this book, Jake told himself. I have to hang on to it until I find out who’s chasing Lauren, and use it to stop them. I’ll give it to them to keep her safe, whether she wants me to or not. As he’d said to Lauren, there’d be other books to find; but there was only one Lauren. He had to protect her.
He got up and began pacing the room – he felt useless sitting down. He needed to be doing something. But what? As he walked past his window, he looked out, and saw a man leaning against a low wall on the other side of the street, reading a newspaper. Warning bells went off in Jake’s head. He was sure he’d noticed that same man when he’d arrived home, in the same place, by the low wall on the other side of the road opposite the entrance to his flats.