Wednesday, February 4 (early hours)
They drove back in silence, Dan resting the hood just over her eyes and again trying hard to guess at what direction they were taking before giving up and letting her thoughts run free. There was so much going on, too much to think about, but she needed to prioritize, and for now, Cox had to come first.
She knew she’d need to go and check out the gun emplacement up on the hill, knew where it was and had vague memories of how the old armories up there looked, though they’d been completely redone and modernized as a tourist attraction in the years since she’d been there. But first she needed to get hold of John and get Cox into custody.
Jimmy’s words about her father had seemed cruel and pointless, and yet Jimmy didn’t come across as a man who wasted words.
Dan couldn’t stop thinking about what he’d said and what she’d seen. Thinking about William Knight, inhumanely treated and tortured, she just couldn’t reconcile anything like that with what she knew about her father, nor could she focus on it now.
He was a hard soldier, anyone who knew him knew that, but he was also known and well liked for being fair and open-minded, for supporting his troops, and for going the extra mile for those he loved and respected. The implication that he could have any part in something remotely like what she’d seen seemed out of the question. And yet there was something in Jimmy’s eyes when he spoke, something that made her believe his words were about more than spite.
She also couldn’t stop images of William Knight from flashing across her mind, sometimes making her flinch as though she were seeing them in a nightmare, a monster revealing itself to her, running at her from the darkness of her closed eyes, though she was wide awake.
His skin like faded yellow leather, his bones pushing against it like tent poles under a canvas. His mouth was cavernous, his teeth gone, and the burns and the bruises …
She shook herself.
This had to stop.
Knight deserved to suffer for what he’d done; Dan knew she wouldn’t have questioned that, but what he was enduring wasn’t justice, it was torture, plain and simple, and she knew she wouldn’t be able to let that go. Had it been Hamilton, she’d need to stop that, too.
Finally, the one thought that kept pushing to the front of her mind was worse still.
Hamilton had said he’d help her—help her—not the NCA.
She’d been so preoccupied with his nonsense that she’d failed to really pick up on what that might mean.
He’d helped her, but not to answer the question she’d wanted to ask but had refused to. He’d known what she was working on and knew enough to direct her to Knight. He’d also known, or perhaps only guessed, that Knight was still alive, but he’d at one point known where Knight was, and that made Dan want to look more closely at the links Jimmy “the Teeth” Nash had with the Royal Navy. It also made her want to tear Hamilton’s prison apart, because someone was talking to him, passing information, and it was accurate, private, and up-to-date.
“You can take that off now,” said Marcus, speaking for the first time since he’d asked her to put the hood back on.
Dan stripped the hood back and dropped it onto the floor behind her seat.
They were back on the motorway, past Portsmouth and moving toward the turnoff for her home.
They stopped outside the entrance to Dan’s parking area, just behind the trees that prevented her from seeing her front door. It also prevented any of her neighbors who might be up at this time of day from seeing the car.
He gently touched her arm to stop her from getting out.
“What?” she said.
He seemed to be sizing her up. He didn’t look angry or aggressive, he actually looked, if Dan hadn’t known what he was complicit in, apologetic.
“Do you understand what happened tonight?” he asked.
“Your boss made it pretty clear,” Dan said, staring straight back at him.
He looked genuinely pained.
“You wanted this, Dan. It wasn’t going to happen, but there was something at stake that mattered to the decision makers, and so what you wanted was gifted to you.”
“And I shouldn’t complain about it?” she said. “If you want to fight with pigs, then you should expect to get covered in shit?”
He laughed at that.
“Very few people have ever seen what you’ve seen tonight. The ones who have seen it had no idea what they were seeing, but not one person who’s entered that room has ever really needed to be threatened. Not one person’s ever needed to be told that they must not speak about it to anyone, friend or family.”
There was a silence between them, and Dan held his stare.
“How can you be involved in that?” Dan asked, suddenly desperate to know. “You seem like a good person, how do you allow yourself to be complicit in what we just saw?”
He looked away, out the window into the semidarkness between the dim streetlights.
The light framed his face and Dan recognized again that he was handsome, and yet he was dirtier than some of the scumbags she’d pulled off the streets, the ones that came looking like villains, filthy and spitting angry.
“Good people do bad things, Dan, and bad people do good things. If you tot it all up at the end of each day, and you genuinely believe that, on balance, you’ve done more good than bad, and if you keep doing that every single day, then over a lifetime, you can do an awful lot of bad, bad things, and yet still be a good person. The world doesn’t work in absolutes.”
“Are you talking about something my dad did?” said Dan, moving her head so she could see his eyes.
“I wasn’t, actually, no. But a man like your dad, who accomplished some of the things he did—you can’t do that and be a ‘good person’ in a binary sense. I believe Taz is a good man, I can see now that he did a great job raising you, but sometimes the end has to justify the means. It takes a great person to see the greater good.”
“And what end does captivity, repeated rape, and torture serve?”
“It doesn’t. Someone once told me that there’s money, power, love, and revenge, and that all evil in mankind is linked to one of them. What’s happening to that person, that’s all revenge.”
“And power,” said Dan.
“Yeah, maybe some of that, too.”
Marcus reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet, and took out a card.
“Here, this is my personal number. Call me anytime.”
Dan looked at it, not willing to take it, but he continued to hold it out.
“Why would I do that?” she asked.
“If the time ever comes that you need to call me, then you’ll know why.”
He smiled and placed the card on Dan’s leg. Then he turned to get out of the car.
“Why were you near my house the other night?” asked Dan.
He stopped and turned to look at her.
“How did Jimmy know my sister was pregnant when it’s the first time he’s met me?”
“Jimmy makes it his business to know lots of things.”
“Does he make it his business to send his minions to where I live?”
Marcus laughed, then looked serious.
“You know why he’s interested in you. If it’s not clear yet, think it through. You’ve got my number, but some things need to be figured out alone. Come on, let’s get you inside.”
“I can see myself in,” she said.
“Sure, but I’ll come with you anyway,” he said, and walked round the car to open the door for her. “I gave you my word you’d be safe.”
“And how long’s your word valid for?”
He walked beside her down the hill toward her front door.
“I never break my word, ever,” he said.