Chapter 1: Secrets

February 1978, age 22

“Good morning, comrade”, I toyed as I pulled off my prisoner’s hood.

Anatoly Volkov worked hard to get his eyes to focus on me. “Finnley. You have made terrible mistake.”

We had snatched him as he left home that morning, so I would forgive his threat. “Nothing to worry about, comrade. Bringing you here was necessary to facilitate a little chat, but you’re free to leave whenever you wish. My men will drive you wherever you wish to go. I’ll even compensate you for your time if you like?”

“And what if one of your men talk?”

“No chance. They’re a hand-picked bunch of lads. I trust them completely.”

He raised an eyebrow at the new possibilities that opened. “And what you wish talk about?”

“I want out”, I stated confidently. “And I have something that I think is valuable enough to trade for my freedom.”

Volkov barked out a laugh. “You will never be out, Finnley. KGB own you.”

I kept the confidence in my voice. “Well, why don’t you listen to what I have to say first, then decide. I was in America last week for a meeting about the Kingfisher heliplane. You’re familiar with it?”

“Da.”

“Well, I spent a great deal of time with the top engineer at Hughes Aerospace. The guy’s a genius, except when it comes to his finances it seems. He let something slip during our conversations, so I had my people investigate him — discreetly, of course, without knowing why. He’s in an awful lot of debt, which is only getting worse with all his loans, alimony and child support. Thing is, he’s one of their top minds, with access to everything the company does: military helicopters, missiles, satellites, spacecraft, you name it.”

I waited hopefully.

“You think this man would betray country for money?”

“No. No way. A Russian accent would scare him right off. But use someone with an American accent, perhaps saying they work for a rival company, that would be a different matter.”

I let him consider it.

“And his name?”

“No comrade”, I laughed nervously. “You don’t get that until I have your word that you’ll leave me alone.”

“I told you Finnley, KGB own you. But this is nice gift, will please my superiors. What was name?”

He was the one sat on a lone chair in the middle of an empty warehouse, and yet it was him interrogating me.

“If you’re not going to let me out of this nightmare, I have no reason to tell you. And he’s more valuable than me, much higher access.”

“Finnley, Finnley, Finnley — you value yourself too low. This man have access to aerospace, but you have aerospace and navy, eh?”

Exasperated, I exclaimed: “But I don’t! You think that because I own the company, I can walk into the Barrow yard and just ask to see the plans for nuclear submarines! They’d have me arrested, owner or not!”

“But you managed to get aircraft plans.”

“That’s different! I can fly an aircraft, and I’m in the bloody RAF! When I ask plane designers to show me their plans, they know I know what I’m talking about and that I have some sort of clearance. The same isn’t true with ships or subs.”

“But maybe someday. Who knows? KGB not throw away chance.”

I stood in sullen silence.

“The name?” he pressed.

“Will you at least try asking your bosses to back off?” There was a tinge of desperation in my voice.

“If this American prove useful, I ask.”

My shoulders slumped in defeat. “Martin Breuer.”

“Thank you, Finnley. This is very helpful.”

I pursed my lips, suspecting I’d handed the fucker a career boost. “There’s one other thing. Someone has been sending people to snoop around my hotels abroad. I assume it’s your lot. Please ask them to stop.”

“Why would we be interested in hotels?”

“You tell me”, I evaded.

“I know nothing of this, but I ask.” I acknowledged with a nod, but then a look crossed his face like a penny had dropped. “Do you have hotel in Ethiopia?”

Oh fucking shitting hell. I tried to answer casually, “No. Not exactly a tourist spot, is it? And no oil there; no airline route.”

“So you not know what your people doing there?”

I switched to a mystified look, hiding my concern. “I told you, we don’t have any operations in Ethiopia.”

He appraised me for a moment. “Soviet Union have nine men killed there in last four years.”

“How tragic”, I cracked. “Don’t expect me to mourn for agents of a nation that blackmails me.”

His eyes narrowed. “We believe your Cerberus killed them. Perhaps that is why you not mourn?”

I didn’t have to fake the shocked look on my face. If he knew what we’d been doing there, I was in trouble. Now I regretted his lack of hand-cuffs. I let out a pained whisper: “It can’t have been. I ... I want out. Why would I do something to antagonise you? I didn’t do this.”

“Then who?” came back in a harsh tone.

I closed my eyes to think. “You’re absolutely certain it was us?”

“Too many coincidences for wrong place, wrong time.”

I rubbed my temples. “I don’t understand. We don’t have any interests in East Africa. It makes no sense for us to be knocking people off over there.”

“Perhaps you ‘knock people off’ for someone else, yes? Americans?”

“Hardly! They tried to kill me a few years back.”

He raised a surprised eyebrow. “When was this?”

“Just after the Lockheed corruption scandal. The CIA, or maybe some rogue element in Langley, decided I was a threat to their national security because I took a swing at one of their big defence contractors in my newspaper. Two of their men ended up in the mortuary after trying to snatch me.”

“This was blamed on Lockheed, yes?”

I nodded. “A convenient fall-guy. It wasn’t them. They had a few bad apples that caused their scandal, but their board isn’t made up of idiots or crooks, so they cleaned house pretty quickly.”

He was silent for a moment, processing my revelation. Planting the idea of bad blood between myself and the CIA was a contingency that had been well planned.

Anatoly eventually pulled his questioning back on track. “A favour for British government then?”

I opened my mouth to answer, then gave the appearance of hesitating and constructing a careful, somewhat evasive answer. “Cerberus is a corporate security and intelligence gathering organisation. They are extremely effective, and that gives us a competitive edge. But they’re not assassins!”

“They have many trained killers, lots of ex-army. And we know your men were in Addis Ababa. Who could have sent them?”

How the sodding hell could I turn this around? I muttered to myself, “Well it didn’t come across my desk, and I doubt Dan would have okayed this. He’s too by-the-book. It must have been Ed.”

“Sir Tedbury-Smith? The man from Foreign Office?”

I nodded, glumly. We would have to up Ed’s personal security.

“I think this man need to have little accident, yes? Replace him with someone we like better.”

“That would be risky”, I cautioned. “He has a lot of security, and he’s well connected. If something happens to him, MI5 will be all over us. Please don’t do anything that could end up exposing me.”

He seemed to consider that.

“If others use your Cerberus for espionage, we wish it also. For this, we need replace Sir Tedbury-Smith so they not know who they work for.”

Oh Christ. “No, you don’t need to do that. You have me. I own the company so I can go over his head, talk to our people in the field directly and order secrecy. It won’t be my first time hiding a job from Ed. You tell me what you need in the usual way, and I’ll sort it.”

An evil smile crept across the Russian’s face. “You have hotel in West Berlin?”

I swallowed hard and nodded.

“I call Moscow and let you know. This meeting was unexpected, Finnley, but useful. Very useful.”

He had no idea just how useful. I could really have done with a stiff drink. Getting into my car, I told Torrin, “Radio base. Request an urgent meeting with Trooper and Silver-Spoon at the Watershed, ASAP.”

I was deep in thought the whole drive home. The house was deserted when I got there, so I turned right, walking down the corridor to the mysterious lift with no floor buttons. Once the door closed, I spoke the password, and the controller at the other end of the intercom began taking me downward, past the basement, through the hole excavated in the foundation and into the new bunker, codename Watershed.

The underground complex wasn’t huge, but it was state-of-the-art and plush. The entrance was through a tunnel to a sturdy blast door which looked like something from a bank vault. Then inside, there was a operations centre that looked like the bridge of the Enterprise, and various smaller rooms either side.

It would take a while for Dan and Ed to make the journey from central London, so I visited the kitchen and made myself a hot drink — all mod-cons in my bunker — then started making detailed notes while my memories were fresh. When my visitors eventually arrived, I led them to the conference room. The moment the soundproof door was closed, Dan asked, “Mission successful?”

“Child’s play! You can tell the CIA that their man at Hughes should expect a visit in the very near future.”

Ed was almost giddy. Setting up the new double-agent at Hughes had taken a lot of work. “Excellent! Always useful to have the yanks owe us favours!”

“Yeah, but that’s not why I called you in”, I clarified. “I dangled the hotels as bait as planned, but it took him about two seconds to connect them to Cerberus, and then Ethiopia. They’ve somehow linked us to their nine dead agents, and they want payback.”

Ed instantly reached for the phone. “Silver-Spoon. Urgent message to Ethiopia station: cover blown by hostile nation. Withdraw immediately.”

After a few words of confirmation, Dan asked me, “How did you play it?”

“I did the only thing I could think of, unfortunately: I denied all knowledge. Sorry, Ed, that puts you in the frame.”

He gave a dismissive wave. “No matter. Take us through the conversation. Try to remember every detail.”

I relayed the meeting almost verbatim, my defamation of the CIA making them smile. Complaining about the KGB’s fictional interest in our hotels had been part of an elaborate plan concocted by Ed and MI6: Operation Vantage. We wanted the KGB to start nosing around our hotels. There was nothing untoward for them to find, as we had suspended work for MI6 after the Americans worked out our cover. Instead, our guys were lying in wait to snoop on the snoopers, armed with long-lens cameras. If the KGB took the bait, they would expose hundreds of their spies across the globe.

When I got round to recounting Volkov’s question about West Berlin, Dan and Ed got excited.

“My God, this is even better than Vantage”, Ed exclaimed. “If Six handle this right, it could expose the entire KGB network on our side of the wall. Editor just tripled its scope.”

I took a more sober view. “This is getting seriously risky. Vantage was bad enough with the increased threat to our people. But now the Russians think we’re killing-off their agents, it’s a whole new level of risk.”

Dan tried to reassure me: “If our exposure were only in Ethiopia then yes, I’d be worried. But don’t you see that the hotel network has saved the day? They will never attack or expose us while they themselves want to make use of our people. It would be self-defeating. In fact, even without that, I would have said an aggressive move was unlikely while they consider you an asset.”

Ed added, “The KGB believing that I’m acting without your authorisation also gives some degree of protection. They would more likely move against me than the company at large. Did he specifically mention hotels?”

“No, only Ethiopia. And later Berlin.”

“Good. So Vantage is still a go. And anything extra from Berlin is a bonus.”

I was worried about letting the KGB get their claws into our people in Berlin. And I was still worried about retribution over Ethiopia. I would have to admit that I had enjoyed the adrenaline buzz from the danger and excitement of ‘interrogating’ Anatoly, but I had enough humanity to be concerned for my employees. When the inevitable moment came that the KGB no longer considered me an asset, the fallout would be a mess. “Is there any chance that their agent inside Marvel Tower has access to Cerberus files?”

“No”, was the only answer I got. They’d refused to tell me who it was accessing my desk drawer ever since they worked it out.

“Okay. And Ed, you’ll take extra precautions with your security?”

With a crooked smile, he answered, “Never fear, dear boy. I have a longstanding vow to keep myself alive long enough to dance on the graves of my ex-wives”, which reduced Dan and me to tears of laughter.

Re-entering the lift, I asked the operator back on the bridge to send me up to my living quarters. As I let my thoughts wander, I realised I had made a mistake by summoning Dan and Ed from Marvel Tower. That’s where Freya was. I had sacrificed a day working for the airline in a fruitless attempt to keep my morning adventure secret from Freya. I sighed, knowing that the woman who ran my life would give me a grilling about it the following day.

I had come to rely on Freya a great deal. Since the birth of my son, I had changed my work schedule again so that I now only flew on Wednesdays (alternating weeks, RAF and airline). The other days, I worked from my home office in the mornings and reserved my afternoons for playing with Brody. Nothing bar the most critical of meetings in central London or abroad would break that routine, and Freya was my gatekeeper.

I had lived in the mansion at Trent Park for three and a half years now and had come to feel pride and love for the place in a way that I never did the Wimbledon house. Caity was still in Wimbledon, which seemed to have become hers by default. After completing her A-Levels the previous summer, Caity had redecorated the place from top to bottom to put her stamp on it (with a little help from her friends, the ever-loyal Mrs O’Keef and our construction company). I was glad she was there, as it would have felt wrong for Grandpa’s house to sit empty.

Caity was in her first year of university, studying business at the London School of Economics. Needless to say, she’s massively smarter than me and destined to run the world, or at least the company. She’s the one in our family with the brains and ambition. Dan moved back into his old house down the driveway once Caity turned eighteen, and Uncle Will did the same, so she was now the only one actually living in the old house. But my sister was becoming quite a socialite, utterly the opposite of me, and I doubt she will ever lack for friends or visitors. Of course, I choose to believe that her visitors are all giggling girlies and that boys are never admitted, especially since her boyfriend Simon was booted off to uni several hundred miles away.

Ewan and I had stayed in close touch. I’d invited him to move from Wimbledon to Trent Park, but he declined. I eventually stopped worrying about him when he went and won a Paralympic medal in Toronto in ‘76 and promptly asked his home helper to marry him. They now had their own place over by the national sports centre at Crystal Palace.

And then there was my wife. Madi was a mystery to me, our marriage sometimes idyllic, sometimes tempestuous. I often seemed to say the wrong thing, causing either tears or tantrums which then set Brody off. And my habit of comforting Brody first in those situations seemed to annoy her all the more.

Brody was ten months old now and crawling everywhere. Take your eye off him for a second and whoosh — he was gone! Madi had decided early on that she didn’t enjoy her breasts being marauded for milk, so Brody became a bottle baby. I thought that was a little sad, but it also pleased me that I could get more involved with his feeding. I was a hands-on dad, nappies and all, and nanny Diana guarded him when I wasn’t around. My dear wife was number three in my son’s life when measured by direct contact time. I just couldn’t understand that. The hours I spent with Brody were bliss, and I wouldn’t miss them for the world. (Except the overnight feeds, obviously.)

Still, for all the difficulties in our marriage, the sex was always spectacular. At least, I thought so.

It was late morning on a school day as I emerged from the lift, so I knew Diana and Brody would be out at baby yoga, or baby music group or something like that. I strolled through the lower floor of our apartment to see if Madi was around to join me for lunch, but didn’t find her. Going upstairs to see if she was there, I heard what was going on in my bedroom before I even reached the top. I found myself rooted to the spot in shock, listening to the sounds of passion spilling down the corridor. There was no panic attack this time, and that in itself surprised me a little. Had my subconscious been expecting this? I felt numb, yes, and angry verging on murderous. But it was somehow, while unexpected, inevitable.

It took a lot of effort to get my legs working again to walk toward my bedroom door, which wasn’t even closed. If only I were at 30,000 feet flying over France, as planned. Ignorance would have been bliss. No. No, I needed to know. If nothing else, I had a morbid curiosity as to who it was boffing my wife. I stepped into the room and saw a bare arse bobbing up and down as its owner pumped in and out of the temptress below him. It looked amusingly ridiculous, and I caught all of us off-guard by bursting into laughter.

Eighteen-year-old Alex Pearson jumped off the bed like he’d jammed his dick in a live electric socket. He was one of our original boys in the house, having joined us at fourteen and currently in his last year of A-Levels. Discovering his identity killed my giggles, upsetting me more than anything else. But I refused to let my treacherous bride see me in a state of shock or desolation. I may have spent hours with this boy and treated him like family, but for now, he became the butt of my jokes.

“Bunking school, Alex? Tut, tut! Can you find your clothes, or shall I help you? Might be tricky jamming that thing back inside your trousers, but do try, there’s a good fellow.”

I waited as he scrambled to get dressed. I would never have believed that Alex would stab me in the back like this. He was a quiet one, and you know what they say about them, but I quickly decided that Madi was the instigator and seducer here. My anger toward her doubled with the realisation that she had risked, perhaps intentionally, damaging my relationship with the boy. Was that her motivation? And if so, was Alex the only boy whose loyalties she had lured away?

Alex wouldn’t meet my eyes as he tried to hurry past me, but I blocked his escape, deciding to confuse my wife even more by grabbing him in a man-hug. I whispered in his ear: “Go down to my kitchen and wait there. And don’t you dare do anything stupid like running away or hurting yourself. That would only hurt me more. Got it?”

He gave me a whimpering nod, then escaped the room with great dispatch.

Madison by this point had pulled on a robe and moved to her dressing table where she was sat brushing her hair. I perched on the rumpled bed and looked at her mirror image. “So how was your morning, dear?”

She glared at me. “Very pleasant, thank you.”

“Excellent. I’m so sorry if I brought it to a premature end.”

She shrugged nonchalantly. “I was getting hungry anyway. Shall we have lunch?”

“Why don’t we wait a few minutes. I’d like to understand your ... unexpected tactic with today’s little rebellion.”

“Tactic, darling?”

“I’m sure you know what the word means. Did you see me arrive home and grab the first guy you could get your hands on?”

“Nothing so dramatic, darling. Alex has a convenient free period before lunch on Wednesdays, meaning he can slip home. This is a very beautiful stud-farm you’ve imprisoned me on, and I do so enjoy taking a ride on the studs when they mature.”

That hurt. And I took it to mean she was trying to provoke a divorce. “It’s so generous of you to take an interest in advancing the boys’ sex education. Sadly it’s a subject rather neglected at school. I was thinking about hiring-in a whore to take care of it, but now you’ve filled that role wonderfully. If you’ve been assisting others, might I enquire about potential legal problems? Ages of consent, duties of care, that sort of thing.”

She didn’t miss my insult, and replied in a purr of venom-laced civility, “Now I just knew you’d appreciate my efforts as mistress of the house. You do love those kids so, and I’d never dream of hurting them or breaking any laws. But then, I don’t work at your beloved orphanage, so I wouldn’t know about ‘duty of care’.”

My fingernails were digging into my palms to control my temper. “I’ve told you before, dear, that not all of the kids are orphans, so we don’t call it an orphanage. And you’ve never been a prisoner here. I know you don’t like having security, but you’re free to come and go as you please.”

“Then where’s my passport?”

“In the safe with our other important documents. If you want to take a trip, only say the word, and I’ll make the arrangements. You wouldn’t want to fly commercial, would you now.”

“Now that I think about it, it might be nice to take Brody to see his grandparents again.”

“Oh no, dear. Brody has his own routine that he’s settled into, with playgroup and Diana. We mustn’t wreck his routine.” I doubted she would take Brody and run off to the States, never to be seen again, but I wasn’t taking the chance.

“Diana who you’re so fond of. I hope you’re not being indiscreet with the nanny, darling?”

My anger was rising. “Absolutely not, dear. My parents instilled me with an acute sense of right and wrong. Corrupting innocents would take someone with fewer scruples than me.”

“Who says they’re innocent?!”

I stood abruptly, completely losing my cool. “Stop it! I don’t care whether you did this because you’re a nymphomaniac or because you were trying to hurt me or just to get my attention. If you’ve touched just one kid that’s underage, I will bury you! You’re playing a dangerous game. Maybe it’s postnatal depression, or maybe it’s resentment that our marriage is one of necessity. I think you resent me, and I fear you resent Brody, too. You may not believe this, but I’ve only ever wanted you to be happy here. I just don’t know how to achieve it!”

“You could give me adventure — excitement — freedom!”

I failed to hide my exasperation, shooting back, “So you want me to forget that I have four jobs, abandon our son and all the kids here and take you galavanting around the world on a tour of hedonistic extravagance!”

“What’s wrong with wanting to enjoy myself?”

“Nothing at all, so long as it’s compatible with my duties and responsibilities.”

“Maybe if you tried paying me more attention —”

“You wouldn’t have to seduce boys? If sex is your only path to happiness, then go ahead, screw anyone that’s legal so long as you’re discreet about it. I pity you.”

She stood to face off with me. “I don’t want your pity! But I’m glad we have an understanding. With so many delicious young men, it would be a shame not to taste them in their prime.”

“Careful, dear. Taunting me isn’t very smart. I’m not interested in sloppy seconds, so if I do throw you down and ravish you, I won’t be going in the front entrance! We both know we’re not love’s young dream, but what happens between the sheets has never been our problem. It’s just unfortunate that we don’t like each other very much. But I always thought you’d settle for spending my money.”

“Settle for what?! You won’t even let us have a joint account!”

“Only because I don’t want to go bankrupt! I’ve seen you go shopping!”

“You confiscate my passport, give me an allowance like a child, treat me as less important than our son or your other kids: is it any wonder I looked elsewhere for a real man.”

I smirked. “Last chance, dear.”

She glared at me, defiant.

Well, I suppose I should thank Anatoly Volkov for causing me to be home early. ‘Angry sex’ was a new and stimulating experience.

I shouldn’t have left Alex waiting for so long. He looked thoroughly miserable when I entered the kitchen. Sitting opposite him, I came to a decision.

“The British military has a useful habit that I think might be relevant today. When they have a problem that’s so bad that it could be ruinous, they simply choose not to notice it. Sometimes that’s easy, like an officer choosing to have selective amnesia. Sometimes it’s complex: they tweak, redefine, manipulate, change terms of reference, whatever is needed to build a firewall insulating them from the problem.”

We spent a moment trying to read each other’s faces. “My wife told me some things that may or may not be true. Part of me thinks she was exaggerating just to hurt me. I am not going to investigate. I’m not going to punish anyone. I’m not going to try and un-fog my vague recollection of seeing you somewhere in my apartment today. We all know you’re not allowed up here, so the logical conclusion is that you weren’t here. I am also going to work very hard to reinforce my relationships with all of the older boys, you included. We must have unbreakable bonds. Do you agree?”

He nodded instantly.

“Good. I have one question that needs answering, and I hope you can help me with it. Are there any boys under sixteen that I should be concerned about?”

He took a moment, then whispered, “I don’t think so.”

“Thank you. Now piss off so I can have my lunch. And if I hear that you’ve been bunking school or that your grades are down, I may decide that castration would have been a better idea after all.”

As was my custom, I ate dinner with the kids in their dining room that night. Madi wasn’t with me: she usually had a plate delivered upstairs, which was just as well. I studied the faces of the older boys as I ate my lasagna. I hated the thought that any of them had betrayed me. And the more I thought about it, the more I thought she was tricking me in a perverse attempt to sour my enthusiasm for sharing our home. I knew that some of the boys had girlfriends, and there was one that I thought was secretly gay. And yet, I wouldn’t have believed it of Alex till I saw it myself.

There were currently six boys aged 16/17, and another eight over-18s that had officially left the care system and moved into our newly built transition houses over by the stables. Some of those were finishing A-Levels before leaving for university. Others had entered the world of work. All knew that they had a home here whenever they needed it, and it was hard to imagine them risking that by pillaging my wife’s virtue.

At the end of the meal, I announced: “I need all the boys aged sixteen or over to remain, please. Everyone else, off you go.”

Alex looked horrified as the younger kids left, but I had made up my mind. “Right, guys. If any of you have plans for this weekend, cancel them. I have a treat for you all. We leave 8am Saturday. You’ll need warm clothes and an overnight bag.”

I ignored the questions that came in a muddled din, insisting it was a surprise.

I spent Thursday morning trying to flesh-out my plan of action, and failing badly. Much would depend on the boys’ reactions on the day.

On Friday, Dan came to the house for his now traditional end-of-week round-up. Most of it was incremental updates of things I already knew about, like the ongoing class action lawsuit against us by the chocolate companies. The story I had scribbled down on the beach in Sierra Leone had been fleshed out into a film script, shot and released. The chocolatiers tried to block its release, but an independently produced documentary into the horrors of forced labour in the African cocoa plantations put paid to that (which is why we funded it). So now they were suing us for defamation. So be it. It was free publicity for awards season.

In the meantime, my chocolate company, Terry’s, had launched its new Sierra bar, marketed as delicious chocolate, responsibly sourced from plantations in Sierra Leone that were certified as free of child labour. Because chocolate shouldn’t leave a bitter taste.

Our television network was going from strength to strength, and we had just joined the big boys by launching a daily soap opera. With the deliberately provocative title Holy Desires, it was set at an English cathedral where the residents of The Close (the walled and gated community immediately surrounding the cathedral) were the antithesis of the model Christians they should have been. The critics hated it, the Church called us sacrilegious, and the ratings were huge!

Then there was our running battle with the Labour government, which was, thankfully, drawing to an end. They had conceded defeat on nationalising our shipyards and aerospace factories, but then they tried persecuting us by taking licenses away from the airline and blocking Marvel’s merger with EMI. We cried foul and were now in a very polite state of open warfare. They had the “highest regard” for our companies, and we “respected the government’s right to regulate”. And behind closed doors, Maggie Thatcher was courting our support for the coming election.