Free Capital Punishment by Robert Wilson

probably better that you don’t know who I am,’ said the voice. ‘That way, you stay alive.’
    ‘You’ve forgotten about the return on your investment.’
    ‘There’s no return if I’m in jail. The moment I think, or even suspect, the game’s up, you’re finished, Alyshia,’ said the voice. ‘Your father took off from Mumbai some hours ago. He’ll be in London soon. We want to call him with a welcome gift, to show him that you’re alive and well. You should find it easier to give us something on your father than your mother.’
    The voice was right there. Her mother had nothing to hide:
vo-vó-voom
was the level of
her
family secrets. Her father was different. The trick was to select the secret that would be least damaging. But she also wanted to protect the personal things. The names they had for each other when it was just them in the room and they were talking, father to daughter. Why should these people know the sort of thing that not even her mother knew?
    ‘My father gives a lot of interviews. He used to be an actor. Whenever they asked him his favourite book, he would always give an Indian author’s name, because he said it was important to be patriotic. But really his favourite book of all time is
The Great Gatsby.
’
    ‘A very interesting character, Alyshia,’ said the voice. ‘I’m not surprised. Your father has always had tremendous powers of reinvention. So much so that nobody could ever possibly know him.’
     
    The flight from Lisbon landed late at Heathrow, around 11.30 a.m. Immigration was packed. While he was waiting, Boxer thought about working with Mercy. It had never happened before, although they had compared notes on cases. Despite their separation, they were still very close, and not just good friends, more like siblings. They knew each other better than lovers, which was probably why it hadn’t worked out on that front. But he did love her. More than anyone he’d met before or since. He felt nobody else saw what he saw in Mercy. Where strangers saw a tall, slim, erect, utterly driven cop, he saw the long limbs, the high cheekbones, the almond-shaped eyes and the rare but dazzling smile that showed the deeply buried sweetness of the heart within. He knew they would work well together, because they had that most indestructible of human connections: trust.
    He called her, thinking if she’d been given this job, she’d have left the course she was on and would now be at home with Amy. He needed to start repairing the damage.
    ‘Is that my new colleague?’ said Mercy, irony on full.
    ‘Who’d have thought it?’ said Boxer. ‘They told you anything yet?’
    ‘Not much. I’m getting a full briefing later today. All I know is that you’re the lead and I’m the supporting actress,’ she said.
    ‘You think this’ll work?’
    ‘Between you and me? Sure,’ said Mercy. ‘As for the rest, once Whitehall’s involved, the Home Sec and all that, who knows? We’re pawns, while the kings and queens do their little dance. How did you get the job?’
    ‘Martin Fox said the client asked for me by name.’
    ‘So who recommended you?’
    ‘He didn’t say.’
    ‘You should find out. It might tell us something if you were put up by someone like Simon Deacon, for instance.’
    ‘Simon?’ said Boxer, incredulous. ‘MI6 don’t go around recommending people and certainly not people like me.’
    ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
    ‘Look, just let me talk to Amy quickly.’
    ‘Yeah, very funny.’
    ‘Come on, Mercy, don’t mess me around. We parted on a bum note and I want to start patching...’
    He ran out to silence as things started dawning.
    ‘What do you mean by “parted”, Charlie?’ said Mercy. ‘She’s with
you
.’
    ‘Oh, shit.’
    ‘I gave her her passport so that she could go to Lisbon
with you
.’
    ‘She called me, said she had to revise for her exams and was going to stay at Karen’s,’ said Boxer. ‘And that she’d spoken to you about