Chapter 3

First of all, neither Ed nor I ever figured out what pringle wearing Met cunt got the bright idea of sending Anne and Holly right back straight to their own home, the moment after I delivered Holly into the happy arms of the tact-team. The damned DCI, Superintendent or Commissioner responsible needs their bollocks or coonts kicked, repeatedly. If this wasn't quite obvious enough to the bad guys where Anne was, they'd even stationed a constable right outside her front door! Bloody brilliant!

Alfie, or perhaps even Ollie, now had her whereabouts posted and nearly lit-up with neon lights. Maybe they'd decide that she was too hot to touch now ... but more likely they'd consider some more extreme measures to close up this particular loose end.

This possibility became a certainty in my mind when Alfie's body was found in a deserted Southwark alleyway a few hours later. The dumbfuck had been shot in the front of the head once and twice again in the back of the head just to make sure. No loose ends ... Ollie was going to clean house on this particular little fringe bit of the operation. He seemed to be a smart man and would figure that since Anne had been the gang's partybird for quite awhile, that she might know more than was healthy for her.

In actuality, Anne knew little more than what we had already surmised; Alfie was a very small fish in a big crime pond. He fenced swag mostly to a few bigger middlemen, distributed the odd drug or two for his friends, pimped a few slappers in his dumpy third-rate club, and bagged up the odd dollybird for gifting over to Ollie in return for a bundle of the old-ready, if they needed the quid. Anne had been his virtual prisoner for several years, submissively spreading her minge for the quicktime trade, the local punters, or his lads or their chav friends, all in the hopes of keeping her daughter safe until the day that she could escape. She'd heard rumors that girls that pissed off Alfie got sent to his mate Ollie ... and never returned. She'd also heard rumors that some girls that were sent out of the country, ending up in Muslim North Africa for prostitution or destined for some harem, but these were just that, rumors, innuendo and hearsay.

It wasn't all that great of a reunion, especially after a wait of nearly twenty years.

At thirty-six years old, she was still as beautiful as a girl barely into her mid-twenties. No wonder Alfie still wanted her even though their were young birds half of her age to be readily had. My old flame still had it ... and in spades. The long golden honey hair still casually caressed her face and back and I wanted desperately the opportunity to do the same. Her eyes had changed a little; they were still the same violet blue but they were sadder now, and the only part of her face that revealed her true age. Leslie, who was a similarly pretty woman of about the same age but with darker hair and features, appeared quite ready for a complete nervous breakdown, and would have liked nothing better than to beat all of us out of her home with a broomstick or a fireplace poker. Frankly I didn't blame her one bit!

My first love did indeed remember me ... clearly and vividly, but I could tell that this was not the time for old friends to get reacquainted. I casually mentioned that I just happened to be in town on business and had just finally tracked down one of her old previous addresses and had just come to pay a friendly call, but this particular innocent undercover act didn't fool anyone. They'd seen Ed's MI:5 badge, and a Chief Superintendent from Scotland Yard had called me 'Sir', and with considerable deference. No one had mentioned 'The Company' yet, but the women could probably smell 'government spook' even upwind.

Off and on there were as many as nine of us at one time all crammed around the small kitchen dining in Anne and Leslie's flat all of that evening. The two women, both scared half out of their minds and desperately holding each other's hand in a death-grip. No male ex-lovers wanted today, thank you very much! Ed and I tried slowly and with extreme gentleness to drag anything useful from Anne's very unwilling memory, while various bigwigs from the Yard, MI:5 and 6, not to mention a rotating horde of Met female constables, constantly trying to comfort the victims, or offer us tea and biscuits every three minutes until even jolly Ed was considering doing them some severe bodily harm.

Holly, after a very brief appearance shortly after I arrived, disappeared into her room and stayed there. I didn't blame her for that either, not one little bit. Still after awhile of listening to Anne repeat her story for about the eighth time while her lover was blatantly eye-balling the kitchen knives in a hint to drive us out, I decided to make myself scarce for awhile. The 'Ace Tomato Company' and 'Universal Exports' cover identities had worn tissue thin hours ago. I decided that before I left for the night, I'd at least like to check on Holly one last time but she didn't seem to be in her room. After checking with a few constables who swore that the girl had never left her room even once, I chuckled and decided that Anne had borne a fairly sharp witted young lady!

A more than casual search of her bedroom revealed that there was really no place the girl could have hidden herself. She was tall for her age but slender, and probably could have curled herself up in a space not much larger than a half-dollar, but I was an old hand and experienced at finding secret hidey-holes and with a few trivial clues I knew right where she was at. Holly had hidden herself behind a loose wall panel, inside the wall of the flat behind her wardrobe. There was just a slight wrinkle of the floor rug underneath the wardrobe, making it just slick enough that the slim girl could pull the wardrobe almost but not quite back into place as she closed the wall panel.

Clever going! I had to laugh with approval ... the smart young lady had lived around dangerous company for long enough to know how to protect herself a little. When threatened, like her pet turtle on the shelf by her bedroom window, she pulled into her protective shell.

"Hello Holly? This is Leonard, a very old friend of your mother's from the time that she was just a young woman not very much older than you are now. We met earlier this afternoon, down in the sewers, an experience which I am very sure that you mostly eagerly like to completely forget. The wardrobe trick is very nice but it leaves an obvious wrinkle in the rug as you can't from inside the wall panel, pull the wardrobe quite flush with the wall. Try a very strong wire coat hanger next time and see if that will do the trick."

There was several minutes of silence, so I gave it one last try.

"Well, I just came in to say goodnight Holly and that I hope things will be happier for you soon. Your mom and her friend are going to need your love and support because she has been through a very bad time."

"It's all her own fault!" A sharp muffled cry sounded out from inside of the wall behind the wardrobe. "She knew Alfie was a bad man but she let him ruin her life anyway! Stupid coont!"

"That's no way to talk about your own mother ... beside, you really need to forgive her for what she did, because she did it all, everything, to help protect you and keep you safe. That's what mothers do ... protect their children, even if it means that bad things will happen to them as a result."

"Bollocks! Alfie was going to take me away from her and send me to a man that would pimp me just like Alfie pimped mom! If Leslie hadn't hid me then, I'd have disappeared and no one would have ever found me!"

"Which is exactly why, when your mother learned of this, that she escaped from him and Leslie helped to hide you both! She needed to make sure that you were in fact safe, before she could reappear again to fight and to protect and keep you safe. I really wish I'd had such a mother that would have fought, even at the very real risk of death to love you and keep you protected from harm.

"Maybe..." A tiny whispering voice sniffled from it hiding place.

"I don't expect you to understand today, but don't ever forget for a moment that your mum lived a life of hell so that you could be safe, or as very nearly so as was possible at them time. You can hold a little grudge if you need to, but you need to hug her and tell her that you in fact love her ... that is the comfort that she needs right now more than anything else in the world. Much than more policewomen, endless cups of tea, or even old friends from America."

"Are you from Texas? I hear that everyone there has horses and big ranches and girls get to grow up to be cowgirls and snog handsome tall and strong cowboys! Do you have a horse?" She asked with intense interest, the sniffles now quite forgotten for the moment.

"Sorry no, but my father was born in Oklahoma and was half-Cherokee Indian. I got to ride horses often as boy, but while away at summer camp. At the moment I live in a tiny apartment in Virginia that's even smaller than your mum's flat."

"Oh..." She said in a rather small and disappointed tone of voice.

"But," I quickly added, "I have a friend who has a big ranch and he lets me ... and my very special friends, ride his horses whenever I come visit him. If your mum would like to pay me a visit sometime later when things settle down, I'd be happy to teach you how to ride, either Western or English saddle style ... if you'll now come out for just a moment and give me a hug goodnight. I've had rather a rough day too."

Holly nearly exploded out of her hiding place and nearly crushed herself into my arms and put her head deep into my chest and had a good long sniffle. She was too tough of a girl to cry and I thought she might make a pretty darned good cowgirl someday.

"Are you really an old friend of my mother's?" She suspiciously inquired.

"Honest Injun!" I swore, reciting an old Cherokee oath I'd learned from my father, who didn't know more than a handful of words in the language. I'd learned a few more out of book, but I never met anyone from that side of the family tree. From what little I knew, they'd all gone 'modern' a long time ago.

"Are you and your friend some sorts of government agents or spies? That whole bit in the sewer was very James Bond." Heh, it didn't seem that anyone believed much of my weak-ass cover story.

"Sort of. Bond and his like all work for MI:6, the international group of spooks, and my employers work with them a lot sometimes, but I spend most of my life now looking into computer screens, drinking too much Mountain Dew soda and eating snack food out of ghastly vending machines! Honest, I'm on vacation and just came into town to say 'Hi' to your mum, but arrived just in time to help get you both out of trouble. I'm going to try and help her a little bit more, but I'm going to need you to be strong and try and keep your mum and Leslie safe for me for the next few days. Can you do that for me?" She nodded yes and gave me another clinching hug. One tough and smart girl, and if her eyes (same as her mums) were any indication, she was going to be beautiful heartbreaker of a looker in a few more years!

I bid Anne and Leslie goodnight now as well, and while I had hoped for a small hug I had to settle for a rather weak handshake while our eyes delved into each others. Oh yes, there were some old happy memories being stirred up now, but like her daughter, she seemed to think that my sudden long-overdue reappearance was far from a coincidence, and I now didn't object to her suspicion. I didn't believe in coincidences either, especially not in the counter-terrorism game, and my fallback story of a pestering guardian angel wasn't going to cut the mustard either, no matter how true it might be.

Ed and I called it quits for the night, and I went to my near skidrow hotel to ponder possibilities on that well worn-out bed all that long night, without sleep. I'd thought about making a midnight run back down the sewers to pay some of Ollie's henchmen a surprise nocturnal visit, but I decided that I ought to get some rest first. Well, I didn't ... I just couldn't shut my brain off at all, but by dawn's all too early light my solitary skull session had shuffled around a few more puzzle pieces into a vague sort of order.

I don't understand the good old-fashioned British 'fry-up' breakfast. I'd eaten dozens of unsavory and unlikely things for breakfast over the years, especially while undercover in various terrorist camps, but baked beans on toast is just plain disturbing! I asked the assclown that masqueraded as the fry chef at the local Taste-E-Bite if he could just find a couple of English muffins, some plain eggs without any ghastly sauce, or at least a toasted bagel or two for me, but he just glared at me. Fancy not being able to find an English muffin in England! Probably the same luck as finding french fries (chips) in Paris, except at a McDonalds.

Ed had kept the Home Office phones burning, and he'd tracked down a reasonable accurate (and accordingly highly classified) map of the sewers. Overlaying a satellite map of Southwark on top, and with a bit of dual-laptop queries into public and secret government databases, we tracked the ownership and alleged use of every single building that directly crossed the sewer path I had taken while rescuing Holly. We tagged every building and ended up with a long laundry list of over two dozen possible hideouts.

Scotland Yard had sent a pair of Detective Inspectors' down into the tunnel at first light, retracing my path, but at about the point I had dispatched the two kidnappers, they ran into an unexpected gunfight. Quite unarmed, they skedaddled at the first blasts from a pair of hidden gunmen armed with AK-47's, and neither of us blamed them. Ollie was a very smart cookie and knew that one of his underground routes had been compromised. While he had some of his gunsels guarding all of the approaches, he would be securing that underground secret entrance, and I was pretty sure that the right ladder entrance would no longer have that tell-tale white dot anymore. Just another plain entrance to the surface world, one of hundreds or maybe even thousands in the area. By the time the Yard could send the Army down there all trace of them would be gone, and soon!

The possible identity of Oliver, or 'Ollie' wasn't very useful either. That name didn't match any of the probable property owners of the dozens of buildings that we had flagged for further investigation. In his place, as a smart middleman, I'd live my life off of the grid too, keeping my assets hidden under dummy corporations or disposable bagmen. Of the 'Ollies' with even nominal criminal records that fit our profile, the Met computer churned out a listing of nearly three hundred names. With better search criteria, Ed was sure he could narrow it down to a dozen or two, in another week or so, but this wasn't going to be a slam-dunk. Ollie lived in the shadows, perhaps even under a fake identity with a squeaky clean record, and frankly I wasn't as optimistic as Ed was about our chances.

Last night Met had turned Alfie's place inside out and had come up with nadda. No convenient misplaced business cards with Ollie's disposable cell phone number, alas. Bollocks!

For now, we decided to leave Alfie's private club alone, but a Met stakeout was photographing everyone entering and leaving, and hopefully a wiretap was already set upon the normal business phone. They'd use disposable cells, of course, but maybe we'd be lucky and someone would get stupid. I wanted to let Alfie's remaining chums relax and think that they were safe, that no one knew about his club. Ed and I were going to save this little gem for an emergency, to be saved as a last resort if no other leads to Ollie came forward. I wasn't sure how much business Alfie did there with his middlemen crime organization superiors, and I frankly suspected that the two fish that had escaped from the raid out the back door were very small fry indeed, probably with absolutely no knowledge of Ollie at all. Still, it was the only unturned over leaf that we had and I was willing to wait a little while longer to see if it would grow us a flower.

After a significantly less ghastly lunch (I could live happily on a regular diet of fish and chips), we decided that since every other stone was being turned for unlikely clues, that we'd pay another visit to Anne and Leslie, and of course Holly, who hung around our kitchen table conversation for the majority of the afternoon.

Both women were only just slightly happier to see us today, and their protection detail now consisted of just a pair of constables, one outside the front door and the other one inside their flat. For some reason this disturbed me more than the gang infestation of last night.

"Look Anne..." I pleaded for at least the third time. "I'm abjectly sorry that I chose this particular time to reenter your life! I'm sure we both would have preferred a more peaceable and private meeting, and quite a few years earlier. I'm delighted that you've found happiness with Leslie ... cheers to you both – but from the moment I walked of the plane, I've been certain that something disturbingly unpleasant was about to happen, and that feeling is still there! Ok, some prat in a hidden corner has off'd your old douche-nozzle of an ex-boyfriend, and we'd probably all want to give the blaggard the Victoria Cross for doing it, except that I'm sure he sees you as his one remaining last loose end! Constables or not, this house isn't safe! Let me get you all into a hotel under an assumed name until we find this cockbite ... or even better, I think I can stash you all away in the American Embassy for a week or two. Hell, want a trip down to Brighton? It's all better and safer than staying here!"

I might as well have been trying to chat up Holly's wardrobe!

Three hours later, and with nothing but a screaming headache to show for my time and effort, we left the ladies to the tender mercies of their keepers and we shuffled off to Ed's favorite pub to get potted. He fed me dinner sometime that evening, but I can't say I remember where or what we ate.

We were banging it around in the wee hours of the morning in some flash nightclub when both of our cell phones went off at once and with a sinking and very sobering feeling my stomach I knew it was bad news even before I answered the call.

Exactly as I had feared, Ollie's thugs had paid an early morning visit to Anne's house and quietly knifed the male police constable stationed at the door, drug him quietly inside and then slit his throat, fairly expertly. A small bloodstain in the hall matched the relatively scarce bloodtype of the other female constable guarding the ladies inside. A photograph of the constable in question revealed her to be fairly young, very blonde, and quite Ollie's sort of type. So, PC Johnson was missing from the house, as was Anne and Leslie, and they hadn't run off to the local Taste-E-Bite for an early morning fry-up either.

Motherfucking mother of a fucking arsehole motherfucker! I bellowed, and Ed helped to augment my quite adequate collection of Brit obscenities.