The King's Deception

He saw that she was surprised he knew that.

“I caused a lot of bother trying to arrest some people. But that’s nothing new for me.”

“Good. ’Cause I need some bother. Lots of it, in fact.”

* * *

Ian had not liked Malone’s refusal to allow him to go along. He was not accustomed to people telling him what to do. He made his own decisions. Not even Miss Mary gave him orders.

“This is all so unbelievable,” Tanya said. “So incredible. Imagine the historical implications.”

But he didn’t care about that.

He wanted to be where things were happening.

And that was Blackfriars station.

He sat on one of the chairs inside the hotel room.

“Are you hungry?” Miss Mary asked him.

He nodded.

“I can order you something.”

She stepped across the room to the phone. Her sister sat at the desk with the laptop. He bolted for the door and fled into the hall. The stairs seemed the best route down, so he headed for the lighted sign.

He heard the room door open and turned back.

Miss Mary stared at him with a look of concern.

He stopped and faced her.

She didn’t have to say a word. The watery gloss in her eyes told him what she was thinking.

That he should not go.

But her eyes also made clear that she was powerless to stop him.

“Be careful,” she said. “Be ever so careful.”

* * *

Gary followed Antrim onto the construction site. They wove a path through heavy equipment across the damp soil, dodging puddles from yesterday’s rain. A massive concrete shell lay inside one of the open trenches, twenty feet down, its damp walls being dried by the afternoon sun. Eventually, the entire structure would be covered with dirt. For now, though, its sides, roof, pipes, and cables were exposed, the rectangle stretching fifty yards toward the river, where it disappeared into the ground, beneath a section of closed-off street.

They climbed down into the wet trench, using one of the wooden ladders, and made their way toward a yawn in the earth that opened into a darkened chasm. He blinked the sun from his eyes and adjusted to the dim light. Concrete wall rose to his left, bare earth to his right, the path well traveled, the dirt here dry and compact beneath his sneakers.

Antrim stopped and signaled for quiet.

He heard nothing save for the rumble of the nearby traffic.

An opening in the wall could be seen ahead.

Antrim approached, glanced inside, then motioned for him to follow. They entered and saw that the exposed structure housed a rail line, the tracks in disrepair, rebar everywhere awaiting wet cement. Incandescent floodlights burned bright, illuminating the windowless space. He wondered how Antrim knew where to go, but assumed the email earlier in the café had provided the necessary information.

Antrim hopped up to another level from the dirt around the tracks and they crept deeper inside. The cool air smelled of wet mud and dry cement. More tripods with flood lamps lit the way. He estimated they were at least twenty feet underground, beneath the glass-fronted building overhead. They came to a wide-open space that funneled to shafts angling farther down into the ground.

“This foyer is where passengers will come down from above, then make their way to the tracks,” Antrim whispered.

Gary glanced into one of the down shafts. The next level was fifty feet beneath him. No steps or escalator were present. More lights burned below. Another wooden ladder, one of several propped in the shaft, allowed a way down.

“That’s where we have to go,” Antrim said.

* * *

Kathleen followed Malone as they exited the underground station and found the Embankment. The dome of St. Paul’s rose not far in the distance, the Thames less than fifty meters to their right, Blackfriars station straight ahead. Both of them still carried their weapons. Malone had stayed silent after he explained what he wanted her to do. She hadn’t argued. This was a trap, no other way to view it. To walk in unprepared would be foolhardy.

And even though Thomas Mathews held the superior position — since he seemed to know exactly where Blake Antrim would be — Malone had wisely demanded proof of Gary’s presence.

So they’d been waiting.

Malone’s phone vibrated, signaling an incoming email. He opened the message, which came with a video attachment.

They watched on the screen as Blake Antrim and Gary walked through what appeared to be a construction site. They were inside a windowless space, Antrim easing himself onto a ladder, disappearing downward.

Then Gary climbed onto the rungs and vanished.

The message contained in the email was concise.

PROOF ENOUGH?

She saw the concern in Malone’s face. But she also saw the frustration, as there was no way to know where the video had originated.

Best guess?

Blackfriar’s station. About a kilometer away.

They stood just outside the Inns of Court.

Back where it all started yesterday.

“Do what I asked,” Malone said.

And he walked off.

Fifty-eight