Джеймс Паттерсон - Revenge

There was absolute silence in the bedroom. Shelley took in the news, not knowing what to think or how to react, certain only that what he’d just learned was an obscenity. For a moment or so, before he tamped it down, what rose to the surface was a desire for vengeance so clean and bright and pure that he could almost touch it.

And of course he understood the Drakes and their need for prairie justice. He understood it perfectly.

“So that’s what Bennett and Gurney are doing for you, is it?” he said. “Giving you information that’s only going to make your grieving worse?”

“They’re telling us the bloody truth, man!” exploded Drake.

“Or telling you things that you as parents don’t need to hear.”

“Oh, you’re talking out of your arse, Shelley. You don’t have kids, do you?” He made it sound like an insult. “If you did, and you had a daughter and she killed herself, I guarantee you’d want to know exactly what happened to her. You’d want to know why she killed herself. You’d need to know. And, having found out what we now know, are you honestly telling me that you wouldn’t go after the people responsible?”

“I wouldn’t,” Shelley lied. “It would solve nothing.”

“Fucking bollocks!”

“Language, Guy,” chided Susie. “Not in here. Anywhere but here.”

“Sorry, love,” said Drake, “but this just isn’t on. He comes breaking into our house, that much I can just about take, even if he is demanding answers to questions he has no right to ask. But standing there and lying to our faces? That’s an insult to our intelligence, and to her memory. So now I’m going to ask you to leave, Shelley—get out of my bloody house, before I pick up that phone. And don’t you bloody well come back here. Ever. Do I make myself clear?”

“Guy . . .” started Susie weakly.

“You’ve made yourself perfectly clear,” said Shelley.

He felt no anger or animosity toward Drake. If anything, what he felt was even more sadness, even more sympathy. “I’ll leave you. And I suppose you’re right, it’s better to know the truth, even if you don’t like it, rather than be kept in the dark. I can understand that. But you also have to know when to leave well alone. You have to know when you’re out of your depth.”

“Yeah, well, I’ll let you know if I need my water wings, Shelley. In the meantime I’ll thank you to sling your hook before you upset Susie any further.”

Before he turned to go, Shelley looked across at Susie, wondering whether to appeal to her better nature. But all he saw on her face was desolation.

Then, just as he reached the door, she spoke up. “Help us, David” was all she said.

Shelley stopped.

“Susie,” started Drake, “have you gone—”

“Help us, David,” she repeated. “Instead of standing in judgment, help us.”

His shoulders rose and fell. All of a sudden he felt very tired. He felt all that pain in the room, and knew that his own was there, too. But the other thing he knew was that to pursue revenge would only add to that pain.

“I’m sorry,” he told her, and left.

CHAPTER 19

IT WAS THE following afternoon when the Shelleys’ doorbell rang. There on the step stood an uncomfortable-looking Lloyd Bennett, who seemed to have left something behind in Berkshire. At the Drakes’ he’d been every inch the commander in front of his men. Now he wore the fish-out-of-water look of an awkward suitor.

“I come in peace,” he said with a lopsided smile.

Shelley eyed him up and down suspiciously. “You’re not about to give me a bunch of flowers, are you?”

“No flowers,” said Bennett, inclining his head so that he peered at Shelley over the top of his glasses. “Just a chat, one soldier to another, about this Drake business.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t think you wanted to talk about football,” sighed Shelley, standing aside. “You’d better come in.” He called up the stairs, “Luce, we have a visitor. You want to join us?”

“Be down in a sec, hon,” she said.

If Bennett disapproved of Lucy sitting in, he made no sign. Instead he stood in their small lounge with his hands in his pockets, squinting at photographs and looking at the bookshelves while Shelley busied himself making coffee.

Bennett was still studying the pictures when Shelley reappeared with a cafetière and three mugs. He didn’t need to ask Bennett how he took his coffee. Like all those who’d spent time in the field, he’d take it black, no sugar.

“Dog,” said Bennett simply. He pointed to a photograph of Lucy and Frankie that rested on the mantelpiece, and then looked around the room. “But no sign of a dog. Do I take it he’s no longer with us?”

“Frankie. Somebody shot him.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” There was a pause during which Bennett seemed to ruminate, looking at the coffeepot as Shelley set it down. “And what did you do to the person who killed Frankie?”

“I killed the bloke. Look, I know where this is going, Bennett, I know exactly what you’re going to say, but the circumstances are totally different.”

“But still.”

“‘But still’ what?”

“There are certain impulses that can’t be denied.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. Whatever, things are a whole lot different where the Drakes are concerned. They have more to lose and they’re much more likely to lose it.”

Lucy appeared and Bennett acknowledged her with a smile. “Lucy Shelley, I presume?” He raised a finger, slightly theatrically. “No, let’s do that again, I mean the legendary Lucy Shelley of the 22nd. It’s an honor.” He spread his hands. “Just a shame I couldn’t have met Cookie for the full set.”

Shelley cleared his throat, and Lucy shifted awkwardly.

Bennett acknowledged their loss with a tip of the head. “I mean, you three. Bloody hell. I don’t use the word legend lightly, you know. It’s only in the last couple of years that them upstairs even admitted you exist. The only three-man patrol in all of special forces? The top blades of the 22nd for twenty years.” He looked at Lucy. “Not to mention the SRR.”

Lucy grinned. She wasn’t immune to a bit of flattery, especially when it concerned her military record.

The three of them sat down to drink coffee, and Shelley was taken by the sense of how surreal a situation this was: three ex–special forces, God knows what kind of body count between them, reminiscing over coffee in the cozy front room of a terraced house in London.

“Why are you here?” he said at last.

Bennett placed his coffee cup on the table and then raised his eyes to look first at Lucy and then at Shelley. “I know what happened last night.”

Shelley shrugged. “Then you’ll know I’m out. I gave Susie my answer then.”

“I’m here to ask you to reconsider.”

Shelley pulled a disbelieving face. “Oh, come on. You don’t want me on board, looking over your shoulder.”

“Really? What makes you say that?”

“Because . . . look, I don’t mean to be rude, but instinct tells me you’re one kind of animal and I’m another, and you don’t put us in a pen together.”

Bennett nodded, eyes going from Shelley to Lucy as he picked up his coffee for a sip and once again replaced the cup on the table. “Because of the Circuit?”

Shelley sat back and folded his arms. “Maybe,” he said. From the corner of his eye he caught Lucy’s amused look. She’d never really understood his antipathy to the Circuit. He wasn’t sure he fully understood it himself. But when he met blokes like Johnson and Gurney it all came flooding back.

“I see,” said Bennett with a wry smile. “Look, we’re not all bad news on the Circuit, you know. You watch the news, you see some reporter doing a stand-up in a war zone, who do you think is escorting that reporter? Who gets them in there and keeps them safe? Who’s supporting the troops on the ground? Who’s providing protection for the workers trying to build an infrastructure? Circuit guys. Guys like me.”