Wherever Joe Mason picked up his gloves, that was home. Wherever he went, he always returned to the boxing gym, even if he had to build one himself.
And that’s what he’d done. Since finding the Vatican’s Book of Secrets and then chasing the Amori’s hidden Creed halfway around the world, Sally had taken the team under her wing, employing them under the name Quest Investigations. Now they searched for and guarded relics across the globe, and they’d started to build an enviable reputation, helped somewhat by the recent discovery of the Ark of the Covenant beneath Edinburgh Castle. A month had passed since then.
Mason pulled on a pair of boxing gloves. The new set-up was makeshift, but then so was he, he reflected. A work in progress, moving slowly, day by day. There was a heavy punchbag hanging in the centre of Sally’s dusty garage, a pair of focus mitts on a bench nearby for when Roxy or one of the others wanted to join, benches and weights for warming up, and a leather speed bag attached to a nearby rafter. Mason tried to use the facilities every day. He didn’t need to; he was a powerful, strong but wiry man with blond hair, blue eyes and one of those young-looking faces that was often underestimated, not showing the ravages that life invariably brought.
The boxing calmed him. It was the only home he’d known for years.
That was until the new team – now known as Quest Investigations – formed unexpectedly around him. Before meeting them, Mason had been struggling desperately, trying to live with a mistake he’d made years ago – a mistake that had cost two lives, his marriage and given birth to a lifetime of guilt. Now, just over three months later, that burden was lighter, easier, though it would never disappear and nor would he want it to.
The train of thought brought his team to mind. Roxy, at thirty-three, was a free-spirited, straight-talking woman who struggled with her own demons and, more than anyone, had helped talk Mason into a better place. She was a hard-hitting rum-soaked woman who was recruited at the tender age of eighteen to work for an organisation similar to the CIA but more shadowy, an organisation that took out foreign operatives on far-off shores. Quaid, just over fifty, was an ex-British-army officer grown tired of advancing politicians’ agendas. He had a craggy face with lustrous black hair and greying sideburns leaving people to wonder if he used dye up top. Sally, twenty-eight, was herself a stubborn brunette, who’d been born into money and then rebelled against it, and against her father, until his death just a few months ago. This rebellion had made her live off the grid for a while despite gaining major qualifications and working harder than anyone else at university. Now Sally worked from his old house, trying to do better than he ever did with her large inheritance. And then there was Hassell, a man who fought his memories every day, every hour. Hassell was an ex-New-York cop who’d fallen into criminal ways after his girlfriend was murdered and ended up unknowingly working for years for the man who’d murdered her. Hassell had killed the man, but there was no overcoming that kind of guilt. Hassell was stocky with short, dark hair and, at twenty-seven, was considered the ‘baby’ of the team.
Mason himself was ex-army and ex-MI5. He’d been working at a private security firm when he’d taken a job at the Vatican that had introduced him to Sally Rusk. That was just a few months ago. Now here he was, boxing in her garage, in the old rambling house that had been her father’s, looking at a new life.
Mason started punching the bag, jab, cross and then jab, jab, cross and, after he’d warmed up, started introducing hooks and uppercuts. He moved easily across the floor, kicking up whorls of dust with his trainer-clad feet. The discipline overcame him, masking his wider thoughts under a cloud of concentration. Life was good in the bag’s vicinity – it was simple and direct and all-embracing. He spent an hour working out and only stopped when he heard the approach of footsteps behind him.
‘Hey,’ it was Roxy Banks.
Mason breathed deeply and turned. Roxy was raven-haired, six foot two and hard around the edges, always struggling to find the softness of youth that she believed the agency had stripped from her in her teens. It was an ongoing struggle for the feisty American.
‘How ya doin’?’ Mason said.
‘You taking the piss out of my accent again? That’s gonna get you and me some sparring time, bud.’
‘I wasn’t,’ Mason said, trying not to laugh. ‘Hey, good work on the last job.’
‘Flattery’s gonna get you nowhere,’ she started gruffly, and then relented. ‘But, hey, I guess I came through pretty well in the end.’
The last job, just last week, had seen them transporting an ancient vase from one country to another, staying one step ahead of a pursuing team who were nowhere near their equal. Roxy had spotted their tail at every turn. The job before that had entailed protecting an exhibition over the course of three nights, along with two other security teams in sun-drenched Miami. Roxy had barely changed out of her bikini the whole time they were there, but she had still got the job done, still spotted the only threat that presented itself during the whole three days.
‘We’ve certainly put ourselves on the map since Edinburgh,’ he said.
‘Yeah. Four jobs in four weeks,’ she said, and then added: ‘At least,’ with a frown.
Mason started unstrapping his gloves, certain he was going to get nothing else done today. ‘How’s Sally coping?’
‘Oh, you’ll know that better than me, babyface.’
Mason narrowed his eyes at her. The nickname wasn’t entirely welcome and reminded him of ribbings he’d taken as far back as high school and the army. ‘Is it my fault I always look this fresh?’ he said lightly.
‘You must use cream,’ she said. ‘Anti-wrinkle lotion? What’s your secret, Joe?’
‘Fuck off, Roxy.’
The banter went downhill from there. Mason sighed with relief when Quaid and Hassell joined them.
‘Another job?’ Mason asked hopefully.
‘Three,’ Quaid told them. ‘Sally’s getting stressed that we’re having to pick and choose now.’
Mason laid his gloves on a nearby table. ‘Then let’s go help her.’
‘And how’s her training going?’ Hassell asked, looking down at the gloves.
Mason followed his gaze. ‘Pretty good. Of course, you can train someone in a garage, in a field, in a house, as much as you like. It’s real-time fieldwork that brings it all together.’
‘You mean hands on,’ Roxy said, yawning. ‘Down and dirty.’
Mason nodded. ‘You have your own specific way of expressing it,’ he said. ‘But yeah, like I said – real-time fieldwork.’
Hassell led them out of the garage into a bright, sunny morning. It was May in their corner of the country and spring had arrived, bringing with it the birds and the weeds and the flowers. Sally’s house was a rambling old mansion, covered in ivy at the front, its impressive facade quite dominating. There were tiny windows and a recessed front door and tall plant pots on either side of a winding drive that a gardener tended to most of the week. The grounds also needed his fair hand, stretching for over two acres. Mason gazed up at the sprawling old house and wondered what secrets it might contain. Sally’s dad had been a professor, a historian, and a walking register of ancient relics.
They entered the house and found Sally seated behind a pockmarked wooden desk in the study. The surface was littered with papers, a laptop was open and in use, a coffee mug was steaming at her side and her mobile phone was lighting up beside her with new messages. Sally didn’t know where to look first.
‘Breathe,’ Mason said.
‘Wish I had the time,’ Sally said. ‘I’m not sure working for a living is all it’s cracked up to be.’
Mason pulled up a chair and sat down next to her. ‘What can I do?’
Sally sat back, sighing. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘We have a job coming in from England. Another from Spain and a third from somewhere in Africa. All word-of-mouth contacts. We can’t take them all on.’
‘You don’t want to let anyone down,’ Quaid said. ‘I understand that.’
Mason looked at her. The tips of her dark hair were still coloured blue, but it was a far lighter tinge these days, signalling to Mason at least that her rebelliousness had softened considerably since the passing of her father.
‘Let’s break it down,’ he said. ‘Maybe we can fit more than one of them in.’
‘I’ve tried …’ Sally looked up at them. ‘But, let’s all have a go.’
‘You know I need to help people out,’ Quaid said. ‘It’s what gets me through the day.’ Quaid’s absolution for what he regarded to be the worst things he’d ever done whilst taking orders from the higher-ups in the army was to help as many innocents as he could. It was what he was doing when they found him in Bethlehem months ago, risking his life to bring better things to the needy.
‘The England job’s a two-nighter,’ Mason said. ‘We can crack that off and then … oh.’
‘You see?’ Sally said. ‘They all want us to start tomorrow night.’
‘Could we split our ranks?’ Hassell suggested.
‘A good shout,’ Mason said. ‘But the jobs require four-person teams at the minimum.’
‘Is this not a good problem to have?’ Roxy said then. ‘Too much work is better than not enough, I think.’
‘Quest Investigations needs to garner a strong reputation,’ Sally said. ‘Turning down jobs won’t help, no matter the reason, I’m afraid.’
‘I’m up for anything,’ Roxy said. ‘Keep moving forward, that’s what I say. So long as we’re doing good, I can progress too.’
Mason knew she was still concentrating on raising those barriers between this life and the last one. He said: ‘Choose a job. Send the other two a nicely worded message. Don’t apologise too strongly.’
Sally nodded. ‘Who’d have guessed we’d end up being so popular?’
Mason knew it was about hard work and results, and they’d achieved both in bucketfuls. The dangers they faced recovering the Book of Secrets and then the Creed were still fresh in his mind. Somehow though they’d escaped death, though not without a few war wounds. They all bore the scars of their adventures, some worse than others. His broken ribs, index fingers and black eye paled in significance to the broken arm, concussion and facial lacerations sustained by Hassell. Roxy had fared worse, suffering from scorching and puncture wounds and some skin torn from her face. But they had all healed, and they were all ready to go again.
Mason was growing with them. He’d stand by them now, part of a team, a position he’d never imagined he would see again after the events in Mosul that had taken two of his best friends away. Mason found he was dealing with it now by being part of that new team, by taking the others along with him and taking responsibility for them. Not that he needed to, he mused. They were all pretty competent in their own rights.
Sally chose a job and set about letting the other two enquiries down gently. Mason and the others read up on the new mission and decided what they needed to do, what equipment they would have to take, and started forming a plan of action. It was their way now, working together, moving together. Sally was coming into her own with the new business venture and with her training. They were all moving forward, leaning on each other and learning from each other. Mason would say he was in one of the best places of his life.
If only he’d known then how it was all about to change.