Free Target by Simon Kernick Page A

same concerns about me now. I hadn't seen him for a few weeks so in his eyes it was entirely possible, I suppose, that I had relapsed.
    I knew he wanted to say something, so I beat him to it. 'Everything's been going fine in my life lately, Dom. This happened, I promise.' But I was conscious of the doubt in my voice.
    'I just don't understand it,' he said. 'Why would Jenny's dad say she was on holiday if she wasn't?'
    'What's he like, her dad?' I asked.
    'I only met him a couple of times. He was a nice guy.'
    'Is he rich?'
    'He runs his own business and I think he's quite well off, but nothing spectacular. I doubt if he clears more than a couple of hundred grand a year. Not enough to kidnap his daughter for.'
    It was a good point, and it closed another door for me, because now I had no obvious motive for Jenny's abduction. The nagging voice started in my ear again. Did it really happen, Rob? Are you sure you're not imagining it?
    'What are you going to do now, Rob?' asked Dom.
    'I don't know.' I sighed, unable to keep the sense of defeat out of my voice. 'Keep hassling my police contact, I guess. Get her to check the CCTV footage from Jenny's apartment block for any signs that it's been tampered with, because I know that it has been. Other than that, I don't know. I could try speaking to Maxwell, I suppose, see if he's got any ideas. You know, from a criminal's point of view.'
    'That sounds a bit desperate.'
    'It is,' I said wearily. 'But I'm beginning to run low on options.'
    'Are you OK, Rob? Maybe I should come back.'
    'Thanks, mate, but there's no point. Right now there's nothing you can do that I can't. You may as well stay where you are. I'll keep you posted.'
    He tried to insist but I could tell his heart wasn't really in it. I wondered whether he did actually believe my story or whether he thought I'd finally gone over the edge.
    Once I was off the phone I kept walking, enjoying being away from the city and its dangers, and it was gone six by the time I got back to the car. The shadows were lengthening as late afternoon turned into early evening, and the sunlight flickering through the beech trees took on a soft orange glow.
    The last time I was up here I'd been with Yvonne and Chloe. Chloe had only just started walking, and I'd held her hand most of the way. It had been a sunny day like this, but that was the only similarity. Things had been very different then. We'd been discussing our move to France. The house there had been bought, our flat in London had been sold for close to double what we'd paid for it five years earlier, and I was preparing to hand in my notice at work. We'd had money in the bank and a brilliant plan for security, success and happiness.
    I stood in silence for a long time, wondering how and why I'd let it all slip through my fingers, and wishing that I could have that time back again. I experienced a sudden, painful urge to phone and talk to Yvonne and Chloe. To chat to them about this and that and try to inject some semblance of normality back into my life. But they were on a walking holiday in northern Sweden with Nigel, out of mobile phone contact. Instead, I got back in the car and began the drive home, thinking I desperately needed something to cheer me up.
    Ramon might not have been everyone's cup of tea, but in the circumstances he'd do just fine.

Twelve
    Agent Mike Bolt sat staring at the piles of paperwork on his desk, feeling a mixture of anger and frustration. His job at SOCA was disrupting the activities of the couple of hundred Mr Bigs who ran organized crime in the UK, an industry that was worth an almost unbelievable forty billion dollars a year, but he was pragmatic enough to know it was a war he and his colleagues were never going to win. The enemy was far too superior in numbers and resources for that. But the important thing was not to lose it entirely. You had to be patient and keep chipping away at their defences. Sometimes you had to wait months for a result. Sometimes