Margaret Truman's Allied in Danger Read online

  “The security firm?”

  “That’s right. He said that Trevor had been killed by rebels. He called them ‘savages,’ which I suppose they are if they slaughtered a peaceful young man just doing his job. Trevor was an easy target for those rebels who are fighting XCAL’s rape of their land, sucking out the oil and raking in millions in profits while the native population starves. What a bloody evil world.”

  “Must have been a tough call to take,” Brixton offered.

  “Like a knife to the gut.”

  “I didn’t learn about my kid’s murder from a phone call,” Brixton said. “I was there with her when some young Muslim woman blew herself up and killed a dozen other people, including Janet.”

  “How did you—?”

  “Avoid getting killed, too? I’d walked out of the café just before it happened and tried to get Janet to come with me. I had a feeling, you know, a hunch that something wasn’t right. Janet stayed behind for a moment.” Brixton swallowed hard. “I wish it had been me.” He downed what was left in his glass.

  “At least you know what really happened to your daughter,” Portland said.

  “You don’t buy that your son was killed by rebels?”

  “I had to buy it,” said Portland. “I had no information to counter it.” He paused. “But I’ve never fully accepted it.”

  They were silent.

  “Another drink?” Portland asked.

  “No. You have dinner plans?”

  “No. You? You have a missus?”

  Brixton managed a laugh. “I have what they call a ‘significant other.’ What yahoo came up with that term? At the moment we’re on the outs. She’s gone back to New York.”

  “Sorry.”

  “It happens. Yeah, let’s grab dinner. You can tell me what the CIA is teaching you about fighting terrorists.”

  “So far nothing I didn’t already know,” Portland said. “Dinner sounds good.”

  Their friendship was cemented that night over drinks and food, and lots of talk about their parallel experiences. Both worked in risky businesses that put their lives on the line, and often resulted in wondering when the next check would arrive. Both had lost a precious child under barbaric circumstances. And both were divorced men.

  Brixton’s ex-wife, Marylee, had come into his life when he was a uniformed cop in Washington years earlier, and had delivered two daughters during their brief fling as a married couple. Portland’s former wife, Elizabeth, who had almost single-handedly raised his son, Trevor, as his stepmother despite her abbreviated marriage to Portland, was now a top lawyer at a prestigious Washington law firm with offices around the world. Ironically, she was the lead attorney for the firm’s biggest client, XCAL, the same multi-national oil company that had employed the security firm whose CEO had broken the news of Trevor’s death to his father.

  Lots in common.

  CHAPTER

  3

  As Brixton sat in his car awaiting the Brit’s emergence from the terminal on a chilly, overcast day he reflected back on that chance meeting with David Portland.

  During Portland’s initial two weeks in Washington he and Brixton had often gotten together, and by the time Portland departed for London a solid friendship had been forged. Brixton was delighted when Portland called a month later to announce that he had been hired as part of the security force at the British Embassy and would soon be moving to D.C.

  But David Portland wasn’t the only one whose life had taken a new turn. Much had changed in Brixton’s life, too.

  Flo Combes had returned from New York and they’d settled back into their apartment, determined to make the relationship work this time. So far it had. Brixton had gone into business as a licensed private investigator thanks to Mac Smith’s urging. Things were good, although for Brixton Washington, D.C., would always be a sump of double-dealing and lies, crawling with politicians whose only motivation was to stay in power and get rich in the bargain. Mac and Annabel Smith, and Flo, had learned to never bring up politics with him, especially Congress. When they did they were met with what had become almost a mantra: “Congressional approval ranks even lower than root canals, colonoscopies, and cockroaches,” he would spout. “Hell, they just manage to beat out the Ebola virus, Lindsay Lohan, and North Korea.” But they decided that his curmudgeonly views, as skewed as they might be at times, were part of his charm.

  He’d also found a kindred spirit in David Portland, whose views of politics in Great Britain weren’t any more sanguine.

  Portland’s return to Washington had been welcome news to Brixton. The private investigator had few people in his life whom he could label as close friends, and Portland had joined that short list.

  Brixton saw the Brit walk from the terminal carrying an overnight bag. He was surprised at how casually Portland was dressed. For some reason Brixton always thought of the British as being more formal—“a proper Brit”—obviously a cliché. Portland was dressed in low sand-colored sneakers, well-worn jeans, and a navy blue sweatshirt covered by a lightweight white Windbreaker. Brixton had always been impressed with Portland’s slim, fit physique, and watched as the Englishman walked with purpose and a bounce in his step as he nimbly skirted knots of people.

  Brixton got out of the car, waved, and yelled, “David! Over here!” Portland navigated traffic to reach him. They gave each other an awkward man hug before getting into Brixton’s Subaru and driving from the terminal.

  “Good flight?” Brixton asked.

  “I wouldn’t call it that,” said Portland. “The airlines squeeze every bloody seat they can into that cigar tube they call a plane and charge a king’s ransom for a bag of cashews. Other than that it was delightful.”

  Brixton laughed. David Portland matched Robert Brixton’s general view of things, including air travel.

  “And how is Lady Flo?” Portland asked.

  “She’s fine. The shop is doing well. She’s there now. Flo is good people. I don’t deserve her.”

  Portland patted Brixton on the shoulder. “I’d say she’s lucky to have you, chum.”

  Brixton didn’t know whether he agreed so didn’t respond. Instead, he asked during the ride into the District how Portland’s time in London had gone.

  “It went well, Robert. The meetings drag on forever, the higher-ups all wanting to hear themselves talk, but other than that it was productive.” He fell silent for a few minutes until he said, “A remarkable thing happened a few days ago. I was in a pub, a favorite of mine, when I encountered this Nigerian gentleman who—” He forced a laugh. “I’d prefer to go into all the gory details over a proper drink if it’s all the same to you.”

  “Suits me fine,” Brixton said. “Let’s swing by my place before I take you home. The Brixton Bar is always open.”

  He pulled into his apartment building’s underground parking garage and minutes later they were settled in the living room, a martini for Brixton, white wine for his guest. They touched the rims of their glasses. “Welcome back, David,” Brixton said.

  “I see that you’re still a martini aficionado,” Portland said.

  “As long as it’s made with gin, not vodka, is cold and dry, and shaken.”

  “A man of principles,” Portland said. “There are too few of them these days.”

  After tasting their drinks Brixton asked, “Time for me to hear the gory details?”

  Portland’s face turned grim as he reached into the pocket of his Windbreaker, removed a slender gem-encrusted bracelet from its pocket, and handed it to Brixton.

  “Beautiful,” Brixton commented as he turned it in his hands.

  “Yes, it is,” said Portland, “but its beauty is irrelevant. It’s what it means personally to me that matters.”

  Brixton’s cocked head said that he was waiting for more.

  “As I told you on the telephone, I was in a favorite pub of mine in London and…”

  CHAPTER

  4

  David Portland had enjoyed being back in Lond
on even though it was only for a few days of meetings at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He’d extended his trip for two days and spent his free time becoming reacquainted with the city he knew so well but that was changing, it seemed, every day. While he enjoyed living in Washington, D.C., and liked his job protecting the hundreds of men and women assigned to the embassy, London was home, and he absorbed as much of it as possible before flying back to his new, albeit temporary, life.

  He liked the comfortable familiarity of his small two-room London flat, as spare as it might be; his apartment just off the British Embassy grounds in Washington was decidedly more modern—“more American”—but his London digs represented a welcome change. He frequented favorite pubs for his meals; one not far from his flat was where he had dinner this night. He ordered what he usually did, steamed cockles and leeks, and bangers and mash, accompanied by a glass of Chardonnay, typical pub fare that suited his pedestrian palate. He contented himself with that single glass of wine, something that would have been unthinkable when he was in the midst of an alcoholic binge that started upon his learning of his son’s death. It had been a year since he’d emerged from that whiskey-fueled daze, two years since Trevor’s murder in the Niger Delta.

  Portland had conquered his heavy drinking through willpower, eschewing friends’ suggestions that he seek help at the National Health Service or some private facility where he would be locked away for weeks at a time to listen to lectures on the virtues of sobriety from ex-drunks, and boring psychologists who would benefit from a proper drink now and then. It had seemed simple to him—just stop getting drunk!

  “You’ve stopped everything,” Elizabeth, his ex-wife, used to tell him in her best New England accent following Trevor’s death. “You’re dried up inside. You were always away. How many of Trevor’s birthdays did you miss, or forget, because you were somewhere else—killing people?”

  It was like a record of her greatest hits, the loving stepmother, mistress of all that was good and decent, self-righteousness personified. But although he railed against her accusations, especially when the whiskey shaped his words, he knew that she was right. If she intended to punish him for his son’s murder she needn’t have bothered. Trevor’s death possessed him like a malignancy; he had every reason to believe that it would kill him one day.

  That thought consumed him while he sipped his wine. As he did a large black fist and wrist jutting from the sleeve of a crinkled yellow leather jacket came to rest next to his plate. His eyes went to a multi-colored patch on the sleeve, the emblem of SureSafe, a security company for which he’d once worked, an experience that had not ended pleasantly. A second patch beneath it featured the outline of a country with “Nigeria” spelled out within it. Nigeria! Where Trevor had met his end. SureSafe! The global security firm that was supposed to have protected him.

  His focus shifted to the bracelet digging into the wrist’s flesh. It was distinctly feminine, crafted by a British silversmith with a light touch, Victorian in style.

  It couldn’t be.

  The gold, woven around small red and white precious stones like a snake, was brighter than its dull gray metal setting.

  Could there have been an exact replica of the bracelet that Trevor’s grandmother, Portland’s mother, had worn, commissioned by David’s father from a jewelry shop in Somerset? It was unique, a one-of-a-kind custom piece of jewelry handcrafted by a master artisan. It had to be the bracelet willed to Trevor by his grandmother.

  It had to be!

  Trevor had adored his grandmother, who’d brought up the boy until she’d died. Portland had deposited his young son with her while he traveled the world, and if he never succumbed to his guilt to the extent of staying home it was always with him. His mother’s death from cancer had been harrowing for Trevor. With his beloved grandmother gone and his father absent most of the time, he’d been packed up and shipped to America with his stepmother, Elizabeth, who’d entered the boy’s life after falling in love and marrying the handsome, globe-trotting David Portland.

  The cockles and sausage churned in his stomach as he looked at the profile of the bracelet’s wearer, whose deep voice ordered another round of whiskey with beer chasers. The stranger’s voice was not only deep; it was also loud; his manner was demanding.

  The man’s skin was ebony, his wide, pockmarked face gleaming as though automotive wax had been applied. He was over six feet tall and thickly muscled, his arrogant pose matching his voice. Even without the company patch Portland would have pegged him as a security type, tough, cold, and had probably killed a few.

  It took one to know one.

  The big man carried the beer glasses in hands the size of baseball mitts to the table he shared with two others, each as black and leathered as he was. He returned for the whiskeys.

  “Excuse me,” Portland said.

  The man turned and looked at Portland, who’d remained seated.

  “That bracelet you’re wearing,” Portland said. “Where did you get it?”

  “Why?” the man asked in his baritone.

  “I know that bracelet,” Portland said. “It—or one just like it—was especially made for my son’s grandmother. When she died—”

  The man turned away without a word and carried the whiskeys on a warped metal tray to his friends at the table. The three men talked loudly in an African language that Portland didn’t understand. They’d had plenty to drink; they’d passed over the line into drunkenness.

  Trevor had been working in the oil-rich Niger Delta when he was killed. Did these men work there, too? Trevor’s death, the bracelet, the Nigerian, the questions, consumed Portland. The world at large had disappeared. There was now only the bracelet that filled his thoughts and emotions.

  He picked at a piece of his food but abandoned it. The pub’s owner noticed and asked whether he was unhappy with it. Portland shook his head. “It’s fine,” he mumbled. The owner continued wiping glasses, satisfied it was just Portland’s mood that evening.

  There really wasn’t any question about the bracelet, the gems glistening in the pub’s overhead lights, the gold 24-carat well worked, his father’s early anniversary present to the wife he adored. He had owned and managed a small factory in the Black Country. When he sold the firm he and his wife retired to Somerset, where they spent idle, pleasant days until he died, leaving his widow to eventually and willingly assume the responsibility of raising their grandson. When Trevor’s grandmother passed away it was Elizabeth who stepped in and took over his upbringing—until her decision to leave her enigmatic husband and take his son with her to America. Portland hadn’t objected. It was the best thing for Trevor and that was what counted, as painful as it was. Portland’s visits to America were infrequent, but he always made time to spend with his son and marveled at the strong, handsome young man he was becoming.

  The pub was filling up; the scent of food was heavy in the air. Although smoking was now banned, the once white ceiling tiles were tinted nicotine brown from years of cigarettes, pipes, and cigars. Portland watched out of the corner of his eye as the big Nigerian raised the whiskey tumbler and downed what was left in it. Portland decided to approach the man and again ask where he had gotten the bracelet. But as he prepared to leave his seat at the bar the big man wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, stood, and weaved in the direction of stairs leading up to the restrooms.

  Portland slipped off his barstool and fell in behind the unsteady swagger of the leather jacket, moving along the narrow corridor and up the flight of stairs. The man disappeared inside the men’s lavatory. Portland drew a deep breath and pushed open the door. The leather jacket was stretched across powerful shoulders as the Nigerian hunched over the urinal. Portland closed the door and entered silently.

  He had to do it. The man, whoever he was, wore the bracelet treasured by a dead young man whose beloved grandmother had let him touch it, play with it, slip it onto his slender wrist. Thoughts of those tender moments flooded Portland but were replaced by more pra
gmatic needs. He would ask the question again: Where did the man get the bracelet?

  The Nigerian’s posture dwarfed the urinal; he stared at the ceiling as he urinated. The restroom was small, a square box, three urinals, one closet, a hand dryer, two washbasins, a single window looking out over an alley into the February darkness.

  “Excuse me,” Portland said.

  The Nigerian turned his head and looked at Portland. “What the hell do you want, man?” he growled.

  “That bracelet you’re wearing,” Portland said. “It once belonged to my son. He lost it in Nigeria and—”

  Portland’s defiant stance, and the tone of his voice, triggered nerves in the man. His antenna went up and told him that he was about to be mugged by someone who wanted the bracelet on his wrist. He pulled the knife out of the leather jacket in a single move and lunged clumsily, his sneakers squeaking on the tiled floor. Portland caught the big arm above the wrist, pulled the knife hand toward him, and pushed his opponent off-balance. He stretched his arm away from the shoulder, twisting it so that the knife dropped to the floor, the noise of the shoulder being dislocated louder than the knife hitting the tiles. The man’s cry of pain was animal-like.

  Portland stamped on the African’s right foot and head-butted him as the man clutched his dislocated arm and slid down the wall, his eyes glaring at Portland, black and hating.

  Portland now operated purely on adrenaline. He picked up the knife and placed it at the man’s throat, just above the tight neckline of his white T-shirt. Simultaneously he removed the bracelet from the man’s wrist and dangled it in front of his eyes.

  “Where? How?” he demanded. “Where?” he snarled again. “How did you get this?”

  The African’s eyes were wide with fright. The knife pierced his skin.