When Neva receives the note from Elbakitten, with the address where Annalise lives, I want to go there straight away and find Mia. Neva takes my arm and pulls me down onto the bed. She holds me in an uncharacteristic display of sensitivity.
‘No, Michael. No. Listen to me,’ she says as I try to pull away.
The smell of her hair is enticing and too distracting. I have to save my sister from the clutches of Annalise.
‘Annalise is no fool,’ Neva whispers in my ear. ‘The place will be surrounded by security.’
I feel her hot breath on my neck and I shudder. I’m torn between desire and resentment. As I stop fighting and start listening, I’ve never been so divided about anyone before. Neva brings out such emotion in me. Rage, anger, lust. I don’t want to resist her any longer. From the moment we met as children, and our fingers reached for each other, I’d belonged to Neva. That’s why I listen to her now and don’t rush away though every instinct makes me want to.
‘Then how will we get to Mia?’ I ask.
I nuzzle her neck. She takes a breath as she feels the change in my mood.
‘Recon,’ she says. ‘We have to check out the perimeter first. At a safe distance, because they’ll have security for miles around that place.’
Once she’s certain that I won’t just walk out, she lets me go. Now we are no longer touching I’m spiralling down into a pit of frustration.
‘Neva…’ I say.
I pull her back to me and kiss her. She allows it, and just when I think we are at the point of no return, she pushes me aside and gets up off the bed.
‘Let’s check this place out, shall we?’ she says.
She leaves me hanging and I’m thrown again by that sudden coldness that she puts on and takes off as though it’s a piece of clothing. It takes a minute for me to switch my libido off. I’m only human, after all.
I focus my energy on the idea that we may soon find Mia.
Neva opens her laptop. She Googles the château and vineyard: D’Aragon Wines are held in high regard, especially with local bars and restaurants. They operate a tasting house on the premises that’s open to the public, with tours of the winery included.
‘We’ve probably even had some of her wine since we’ve been here,’ Neva says, taking us back to the problem at hand.
She studies the location on Google Maps, zooming in to see three main buildings, one of which is the seventeenth-century château at the heart of the hundred or so acres of land. As Neva focuses on gaining information, I watch her, wondering what she is feeling about the prospect of coming face to face with her real mother. Though Neva has always suspected her mother gave her to the house, we have never discussed what she hopes will happen when this reunion occurs.
‘Do you know this place?’ I ask her as she frowns down at the still image.
‘I probably do, but I don’t recall it,’ Neva says.
She doesn’t need to say more. I suspect the first five years of her life were spent here until the Network took Neva. Was Annalise willing to let her child go? Or did she resent Beech’s power to take her away?
Neva continues to search around the perimeter of the château and vineyard, working out a possible access point to the place.
‘Look at this,’ she says.
She zooms in on an aerial shot of a courtyard.
‘One of the buildings has this as its centre. It looks like… an arena,’ she says.
‘This is a kill house?’ I ask.
‘Very likely,’ Neva says. ‘Which means there will be more than a few trained assassins on the complex.’
‘Come on,’ I say.
‘Where?’
‘We’ll go and hire a car and take a drive to the place. It’s open to the public, right?’ I say.
‘I need to change my look,’ she says. ‘And so do you. That bristle you’ve grown over the last few days will help.’
I run my hand over my chin and nod.
‘Different hair then?’ I ask.
‘Wait here. I’ll be back soon,’ she says. ‘Don’t go anywhere without me.’
I nod. My moment of insanity has passed and I know I can’t do this without Neva or a viable plan.
‘Don’t be long,’ I say.
Neva comes back a couple of hours later with wigs, make-up and clothing that will transform us both.
She makes me sit at the dressing table and then she cuts and changes the style of my hair, making it shorter at the sides than usual. She leaves the bristle on my face, and then hands me a pair of contact lenses. They are brown to cover my blue. I put them in my eyes and blink until they settle down. Then she gives me a bag containing new clothing. A pair of charcoal-coloured chinos and a black polo shirt. There is also a pair of brown leather loafers which are my size. I change as Neva sets about transforming herself.
She pulls on a brunette bobbed wig, and puts green lenses in her eyes, covered by a pair of metal-rimmed glasses. Her make-up is light and natural, browns around her eyes and a pale-pink lipstick to finish the look. These small touches make her look completely different.
The clothing she’s chosen is simple. A pair of jodhpurs, with a polo-neck shirt and a sleeveless padded tabard. Added to this look is a pair of low-heeled, brown leather boots which she pulls on over the jodhpurs.
‘We’re looking for wine to ship home to England to our country estate,’ she says.
And I realize our somewhat understated country look is exactly the image she was going for.
In another bag, Neva has a Glock 17, and several cartridges. I check the safety is on, and place the gun in the waistband of the chinos. I cover it with a jacket. Neva puts a knife in her boot, and a gun in the back of her jodhpurs. The tabard hides the bulge of the weapon.
Online I hire a car, opting for an Audi R8 V10 sportscar, reasoning that a couple with money wouldn’t drive a boring Fiat. When the hire company arrive with the car it’s bright red. It suits the image we are trying to put across.
Using Neva’s phone, I put the address into Maps and drive the car away from the hotel towards our destination.