Louder Than Words Page 21

  Her dad had eaten earlier, but he was definitely up for a helping of the chicken fajitas wafting a delicious scent through the kitchen. He sat with us at the big table when Josie served up.

  ‘Dad,’ she said when he was happily tucking into a chicken wrap loaded with salsa, sour cream and guacamole, ‘how do you find out who lives at an address?’

  ‘How do the police find out?’ he asked after swallowing his mouthful.

  ‘No, the public. Like me. How would I find out who lived somewhere?’

  A slow frown developed. ‘Now why would you be wanting to know that?’

  Josie hesitated, just enough to make it look like this wasn’t planned. ‘It’s Rafi’s brother. She’s worried about him.’

  I nearly shot off my chair. What was she going to say? He was a policeman – I didn’t want Silas getting in trouble.

  ‘He’s got this girlfriend. And honestly, Dad, she’s dodgy as anything. We think she’s cheating on him so we . . . we, er . . . followed her today. Oh, don’t look at me like that! Really, she is messing him around. She went to a house where another guy lives and she stayed there. Silas thinks she’s round at a girlfriend’s and she so isn’t. We just wondered if we could find out. He’s so into her that he won’t believe us unless we present him with the facts. Please, Dad. Rafi’s really worried about him, aren’t you?’

  I tried to look worried and pleading as I nodded in response to the question. This was one time I was thankful I couldn’t speak because I wouldn’t want to have to lie to him. I didn’t know how Josie was managing it.

  ‘And say you’re right, what if you give Rafi’s brother this boy’s details and he goes round there and thumps him? He could get himself into trouble!’

  Josie shook her head and I quickly copied. ‘Silas isn’t like that. We’re only doing it so he believes us. He won’t make trouble.’

  Her dad stared hard at her for a moment. ‘OK, Baby D, we’ll do a trade-off. I tell you that, but only public-access stuff, mind – don’t you be asking me for classified because you know you won’t get it!’

  ‘Of course, Dad,’ Josie protested.

  ‘So I tell you then, right after you tell me just why it is that your other friends don’t come round here any more, why you never talk about them, and what that useless waste-of-space boyfriend you were trying to hide from me has got to do with it.’

  I have never seen anyone looked as shocked as Josie did then.

  ‘You know about Lloyd?’

  Her dad took another bite of his fajita and chewed on it frustratingly slowly before he answered. ‘Yes, I know you were seeing him for a while. And that you stopped, just as I knew you would.’

  ‘And you weren’t mad at me?’

  ‘Mad? I was furious. But then I thought to myself, what kind of father am I if my daughter has to hide things from me like that? And maybe it was time to trust that my daughter is the girl I thought she was and let her see for herself what that boy is. It looks like I trust you more than you trust me, Baby D.’

  Josie’s eyes filled up. ‘Daddy?’

  ‘But know this, sweetheart. If he’s hurt you, I’m going to . . .’ He stopped and smiled at her. ‘Well, you don’t need to know that part. So what happened?’

  I gulped. There were no words to describe how glad I was that I was not Josie right then.

  ‘I split up with Lloyd,’ Josie said miserably, ‘because you’re right – he is a waste of space. Then he got mean and spread rumours about me. And my so-called friends stopped talking to me.’

  Her father’s face suffused with anger.

  ‘Rafi’s brother made him stop. That’s why me and Josie have to help Silas now. Because I owe him, Dad.’

  ‘And these girls who were your friends – they’re still not talking to you?’

  ‘Oh, them, yeah – they tried to be friends again. Like they never did all that horrible stuff when Lloyd was spreading the rumours. But I don’t want to know, Dad. They’re pathetic. Real friends don’t act like that. They did me a favour really. They taught me that it’s not how many friends you have that counts, but how good they are.’

  ‘Then they taught you a good lesson.’ His face still held the remains of his anger though. ‘I wish this hadn’t happened, sweetheart. I know how much this must have hurt you for you not to tell me any of it. But you’ve come out stronger and better on the other side, I can see that.’ He held out his arms and she went for a hug. ‘Mum would be proud.’

  I breathed a sigh of relief.

  ‘In answer to your other question, there’s something called reverse directories online. If the boy’s family has a phone number, or is registered to vote, they’re probably in it. Do a search and you’ll find it straight away.’

  His anger seemed to have died now. All the same I wouldn’t want to be Lloyd if Josie’s dad ever came across him.

  Love makes fools of us all, big and little.

  (William Makepeace Thackeray)

  CHAPTER 53

  We ambushed Silas in the hall as he was about to go out. ‘We need to talk to you,’ Josie said, looking for a moment remarkably like her dad – all unquestionable authority.

  Silas looked at his watch. ‘I’ll be late.’

  ‘It won’t take long.’

  He sighed and went into the kitchen after me. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Rafi’s worried about you.’

  He looked baffled. ‘Why? I’m fine.’

  ‘She thinks you’re doing something stupid. Something Lara has got you into.’

  As soon as she said it, his whole body language changed, on the defensive, and I knew we were right. ‘I’m not doing anything stupid.’

  ‘Whose is that house you went to yesterday? We traced the address and it said no one lives there now. Is it Lara’s house?’

  ‘What’s it got to do with you?’ His brows snapped together in a glower.

  ‘Don’t take that tone with me,’ she bit back. ‘I had to lie to my dad to check that address and I hate lying to my dad. If I didn’t owe you, I wouldn’t have done it, but Rafi and I would quite like to keep your stupid arse safe even though you look like you’re doing everything you can to get it locked up in prison.’

  He was really jittery now, shuffling from foot to foot.

  ‘So it is Lara’s house?’

  ‘No, it’s not! Not that it’s anything to do with you.’

  Josie shook her head in disgust. ‘Have you even been to her house? Do you actually really and truly know anything about her?’

  ‘She likes her space and her privacy!’

  OK, so what Josie said had nettled him – she’d hit a sore spot for sure.

  She nodded. ‘Yeah, you keep telling yourself that. It’s all bull, Silas. She’s spinning you a line. She doesn’t love you.’

  He slammed out of the kitchen and the front door.

  Josie sank into a chair. ‘That was horrible. Did you see his face?’

  Destroyed was a good word to describe it.

  I texted her.

  ‘What next?’

 

  ‘I don’t know, Rafi. He does seem to love her an awful lot.’

  I shrugged with the complete lack of sympathy of someone who’s never been in love.

  ‘I hope so,’ she said drawing a pattern on the table with her finger. ‘I hated seeing him like that.’

  It was then I decided that, whether she knew it or not, Josie was a little bit in love with my brother after all.

  I saw pale kings and princes too,

  Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;

  They cried – ‘La Belle Dame sans Merci

  Hath thee in thrall!’

  (John Keats – ‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci’)

  CHAPTER 54

  Dear Dad,

  This is a really hard letter to write. Forgive me if I
can’t do it all at once. You’ll see why.

  Josie.

  Something she said about Lara, how she was bullshitting me. I can’t let it go.

  I went over to Dillon’s with Lara to launch the next stage of our mission. I didn’t say much on the journey and Lara didn’t prompt me to.

  Josie’s words were like a beetle burrowing into my brain. I played back every moment with Lara, every moment of certainty and every moment of doubt. I remembered that fear I used to have that she was using me to pull herself further into the inner circle of ActionX. It seemed a crazy suspicion, but not so strange when you knew how much that would matter to Lara.

  I glanced at her profile as she looked out of the train window, watching the houses speed by. We were close to our destination. She looked like a perfect porcelain doll, but the fragility was completely deceptive. She was as strong as steel wire and, like the wire, would never snap under pressure.

  We remained silent as we walked to Dillon’s house. What I would have called companionable silence before I now doubted – was it really indifference?

  At least Tyler was pleased to see me. Dillon said he needed to speak to Lara about something, but would be up in a minute.

  I set the computer up and started work. This was the most dangerous thing I’d done so far. I was about to hack into the Ministry of Defence computer system and pull classified information for Dillon to leak. Not my original plan, but what Dillon wanted at this moment in time. It was a challenge – I wasn’t sure I could pull it off. Tyler tossed me a can of energy drink and sat down next to me, fascinated. ‘This is so amazing, man. You’re like a god on here. You can do anything you want.’

  I thought about what Jez said. How was this saving lives in Africa? Because unlike the rest of them, possibly Jez excepted, I didn’t buy into Dillon’s status like they did. I was here for Lara.

  And if Lara didn’t love me, why was I here?

  I thought I could wait forever when I didn’t have her. But once she was mine, to find out that perhaps she really wasn’t . . . I discovered that was a very different thing. My stomach churned at the thought.

  Still, here was Tyler encouraging me, and to block out the treacherous thoughts, I got on with the job.

  * * *

  While Josie’s dad was out at the gym, she and I were doing the unthinkable. Josie had tears rolling down her face as she unlocked the door to his study. She’d retrieved the spare key from its hiding place in the kitchen and the only other copy was on her dad’s key ring. I think it was having to put the gloves on that upset her the most, but of course it was essential we didn’t leave fingerprints. She opened his desk drawer – also locked, but she knew where this key was too.

  ‘He’d never believe I could do this,’ Josie said with a sniff. She tried to rub her eyes dry before opening the document wallet she’d pulled out. ‘If he’s got any info on the people Silas is hanging out with, it’ll be in here. This is all the stuff he’s working on at the moment that he takes back and forth from work with him.’

  This had been Josie’s idea – another reason she was so upset because the betrayal was completely her own. It wouldn’t have occurred to me that they might still be looking for people involved in the riot and that her dad might have information on that. But sure enough as she went through the pile of documents, she found a briefing sheet sent out to local forces about the operation to locate possible suspects. There were even some mugshots. I looked down the list in panic, breathing again only when I got to the bottom. But Josie was ahead of me. She pointed a trembling finger at a picture of a man with a goatee beard and a shock of shoulder-length hair. ‘Do you recognise him?’

  Yes, I recognised him.

  Josie looked up at me with horrified eyes. ‘I think that could be the guy who followed Lara and Silas into that house.’

  ‘I don’t know. It could be, but I didn’t see his face.’

  ‘I got a better look,’ Josie said. ‘He crashed right into me. It’s him, I know it is.’

  ‘Extract from Security Services file,’ she read. ‘Dillon Armstrong – leader of activist group ActionX. Wanted in connection with terrorist acts spanning six years. Appears to be largely non-violent, but is suspected of involvement in attack on PC Hensford in student riots against tuition fees. Prefers to orchestrate attacks from behind the scenes. Location currently unknown.’ She pushed the paper away. ‘Oh my God, Rafi, what is Silas doing? I never imagined it was this bad. We have to stop him before . . .’

  She didn’t have to say it. We had to stop him before it was his name and photo appearing on a sheet like this.

  * * *

  It was harder than I’d expected, Dad, and I wasn’t entirely sure the trail was completely clean. There’d been a moment there where I’d seriously messed up. My heart raced and beads of sweat gathered on my forehead as I fought to claw back from disaster. But I still don’t know if I managed it.

  Tyler held his breath beside me, not fully understanding what was going on, but knowing we were in trouble. He learned fast, did Tyler. He’d be able to help soon.

  ‘This is why you’re so good,’ Tyler said when the tension finally left my shoulders. ‘Because you’re so clinical about it. You don’t get caught up in how great you are to be able to do this. You just do.’

  ‘I screwed up there.’

  ‘Did you get it back?’

  ‘I don’t know. Mostly. But mostly isn’t always enough.’

  ‘If they can find us, we move.’ Dillon’s voice came from behind us, making us jump. ‘We’ve moved before.’ He walked over and looked down at me. ‘Do we need to move now?’

  I stared at the screen. ‘Possibly,’ I said after a while. ‘If you want to be sure.’

  Dillon shrugged. ‘But did you get what I wanted?’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ I said, still watching the screen, ‘I got that.’

  We heard Jez and Katrin come in downstairs and then shouting. We hurried down. Jez was angrier than I’d ever seen him.

  ‘What’s up?’ Dillon asked in alarm.

  In answer, Jez slapped an object down on to the sofa beside him. ‘That!’

  Dillon picked up a cellophane-wrapped plastic bag with writing on it. ‘Charity collection bag, Third World aid,’ he said. ‘What’s up with that?’

  Jez kicked a wooden chair, sending it crashing across the room. Lara scuttled out of the way as it nearly hit her.

  ‘Look again!’ Jez snapped.

  Dillon read the wrapper more carefully. ‘Oh!’ He looked up. ‘Yeah, I see what you mean.’

  Lara came over. ‘What is it?’

  ‘It looks like a charity bag, but when you read the small print it’s not. It’s a private company who put these out and then collect them exactly like the charities do, but then they sell the stuff on at a profit to people in underdeveloped countries.’

  ‘They even put this on the front to con you – look!’ Jez grabbed the bag and turned it over. And they read the message printed there: God will reward you for your goodness. ‘Scum!’

  Katrin came over from where she’d been hovering by the door. ‘These are the kind of people we should be after, Dillon. This is what we used to be about.’

  ‘I’ve got more on my mind than that at the moment,’ Dillon snapped. ‘Unless we get out of here, we might not be about anything so let’s cut the righteous anger and cover our backs, OK!’

  * * *

  Josie and I sat around miserably in my room, waiting for Silas to come back. ‘I can’t believe I had to steal from my own dad,’ she said, her eyes still red and puffy. ‘You wait till I see that brother of yours. I am uber mad at him right now.’

  I was pretty mad at him myself. What was he thinking? And however could you love someone so much that you could let them turn you into someone else? Because this was not my brother, it was not.

  I asked Josie.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she replied. ‘I’m the wrong person to ask because I’m still trying to understand how I let it
happen to me.’

 

  ‘Oh, Rafi, I do wish I knew. Or that there was someone I could ask. I can’t ask Dad because I’d have to tell him about Lloyd properly then. Or lie even more and I am not doing that.’ She sighed. ‘What I’m starting to think is there’s two kinds of love: good love and bad love. The good kind’s like Mum and Dad had – not all difficult and confusing. And the bad kind . . .’ She tailed off.

 

  ‘I honestly, honestly don’t know. It feels like it at the time. Or it feels like something so big I don’t know what else it could be. And sometimes you feel happy. But not like Dad describes with Mum.’ She held her hands up. ‘It’s just so confusing. How are you meant to know?’

 

  She looked back sadly at me. ‘Maybe you’re right.’

  * * *

  The way Dillon scrambled us out of ActionX’s HQ, I knew he’d done this before, maybe many times. He knew exactly how to get packed up in the minimum time frame. He got Katrin and Jez to work on locating a new base. ‘Surely we don’t actually have to go now?’ Lara asked.

  ‘You want to wait until they’re kicking the door down?’ Dillon demanded. ‘This is how I don’t get caught. I don’t take chances. Now the fewer people here, the faster me and Ty can move, so you two should go. I’ll text when we have a new safe place.’

  I suspected he already had one lined up. I suspected he always had one lined up.

  On the way home, I decided it was time to clear something up with Lara. Josie’s words were still eating at me, even after everything that had just happened. ‘I don’t want to go back to mine just yet. There’s some family drama going on there at the moment with my sister. Can I come and hang out at yours for a couple of hours?’

  I knew what the answer would be before she spoke. The shutters came down as soon as I asked the question.