Michael Robotham - The Wreckage

When North was offered a job at Mersey Fidelity, she fought against it. She didn’t care about the salary package or the bonuses. She had married to escape her family and now she was being dragged back into the vortex.

Since then she’d come to accept that she would have to share North with Mersey Fidelity and her family, particularly her father.

There is a knock on the door. Rowan appears. His pajamas are stuck to his thighs.

“Someone wet the bed.”

“Who?”

“The monster.”

“But there are no such things as monsters.”

“I think I saw him climbing out the window.”

“So he’s gone now?”

“Yes.”

The kitchen has a high ceiling and a scrubbed pine table and matching chairs. Rowan is drawing with crayons, a study of concentration. Polina is loading the dryer in the laundry. She’s wearing shorts, sandals and a pretty blouse.

“You are well this morning,” she says, making a question sound like a statement.

“I’m fine.”

“You will have something to eat. Orange juice? We have lots of juice.”

That’s because North isn’t here to drink it, thinks Elizabeth.

“Did you see him on Friday?” she asks.

“I beg your pardon?”

“North. Did you see him on Friday? He came home from work. He must have forgotten something.”

Polina chews on the soft inside of her cheek as if she’s trying to remember.

“I must have gone to the shops.”

“He was home for more than three hours.”

“How do you know?”

Elizabeth doesn’t want to explain about the private detective.

“He mentioned it,” she lies.

Polina’s eyes seem to glitter. “I must have been in and out. Perhaps he was working upstairs.”

She makes it sound so obvious. Problem sorted.

Mid-morning, late summer hazing the air, Elizabeth drives east along the river until the glass and chrome towers of Canary Wharf come into view, gleaming in the sunlight. This view of London could grace the cover of a science fiction novel, but it’s also a reminder of the 1980s, the decade that was brash, assertive and not very British at all. Margaret Thatcher. The Miners’ Strike. Heysel. Hillsborough. The IRA. Elizabeth had been a young girl but she remembers these events because her perfect childhood had seemed so often under threat.

The foyer of Mersey Fidelity is tiled in black Italian marble and has matching leather sofas. Rupert and Frank are behind the security desk. Elizabeth has known them for years-ever since she’d visit her father after school, trying to get money for chips or chocolate.

The receptionist is a new face, immune to her smile.

“I was hoping to see Mitchell Bach.”

“Do you have an appointment?”

“I’m his sister.”

She rings upstairs. Cups the phone.

“I’m afraid Mr. Bach is busy.”

“How long will he be?”

“Perhaps you could come back later or make an appointment.”

“I’ll wait.”

The receptionist punches the number again. Whispers. “No… yes… that’s right… she wants to wait… I see… OK.”

Addressing Elizabeth, “Someone is coming down to collect you.”

Felicity Stone, the head of public relations, is in her forties with blonde cropped hair and very white teeth, which are too large for her mouth. She is masculine looking. Businesslike. She presses Elizabeth’s right hand in both of hers for a fraction of a second before leaving it suspended in mid-air.

“We haven’t been introduced. I’m Felicity. What a terrible way to meet. How are you holding up? We’re all so concerned about North. I’m sure everything is going to be fine. I once had an uncle who went missing for a week and we found him in a homeless shelter in Manchester. Transient Global Amnesia, they called it-short-term memory loss. You’re so pregnant. You must want to sit down.”

A lift carries them to the upper floors. Miss Stone continues talking, as though worried about losing her turn. They cross a large open-plan office dotted with computer screens. The European Desk. Global Equities. Forex. Futures. The traders are cradling phones beneath their chins and staring at charts and numbers.

They arrive at Mitchell’s office. Miss Stone takes a seat and logs on to a computer screen.

“How long will Mitchell be?” asks Elizabeth.

“He’s a very busy man. He’s asked me to co-ordinate things. We’re liaising with the police, calling hospitals, checking passenger manifests… We’re most concerned about your welfare. I’ve arranged for you to have a full check-up. Dr. Shadrick is a Harley Street OB…”

“I have my own doctor.”

“Yes, but Dr. Shadrick is the best. I’ve made a provisional appointment for tomorrow at eleven, but change it if you need to.” Miss Stone taps at the keyboard again. “Where are you going to stay?”

“At the house.”

“By yourself?”

“I have Rowan and the nanny.”

“Mitchell has suggested you move in with your father.”

“I want to stay in Barnes.”

“Oh!”

“He is coming home, you know.”

“Who?”

“My husband.”

“Of course, I didn’t mean to suggest otherwise.” Miss Stone smiles apologetically. Her mobile is ringing. The sound is coming from a leather pouch clipped to her belt. Drawing it out like a gunslinger, she flips the phone open.

“Yes… No… I didn’t approve that… Nothing goes out unless I read it first… Tell them to wait… I don’t care what that arsehole wants, we’re not releasing a statement until we’re good and ready.”

Elizabeth tries not to look surprised by the language. Miss Stone closes the phone.

“Must dash. You’ll be all right on your own? Mitchell shouldn’t be long. Don’t answer the phone. The switchboard will pick it up.”

Alone now, Elizabeth gazes out the window looking west along the Thames to the Houses of Parliament just visible through the haze. Her feet hurt. The sofa is too low. Instead she sits in Mitchell’s desk chair. Two lights are blinking on his phone. Behind her on a bookcase is a leather-bound copy of the company history: the anniversary edition. A hundred years of Mersey Fidelity-the humble building society transformed into a global bank. Elizabeth knows the story. The history of the bank is almost her own family’s history.

Her father, Alistair Bach, had started working as a trainee bank teller in 1960 when Mersey Fidelity was a Liverpool-based building society giving respectable working-class folk the chance to buy their own homes. In the mid-eighties when “demutualization” became the buzzword and Thatcher’s Big Bang revolution set free the finance markets, Alistair Bach took advantage of the changes and turned the building society into a bank which could earn profits and pay dividends to shareholders, making the directors rich in the process. Bach became the youngest chief financial officer in the history of the FTSE 100 list of companies and Mersey Fidelity grew to become the fifth biggest retail and investment bank in the UK. He only stepped down as chairman in early 2007. By then Mitchell had been groomed for a senior position-a younger version of his father, cloned from the same stem cells-with a first-class mind and degrees from Cambridge and Harvard.

Elizabeth can feel Claudia stomping on her cervix. Up until a few days ago she was kicking up near her belly button, but now she’s lower down, pressing on her pelvis. Picking up the phone, Elizabeth punches North’s extension, knowing that his secretary will most likely pick up.

“Richard North’s office.”

“Hello, Bridget, it’s Elizabeth.” There is a pause. “I know you’re busy, but I’m in the building. Can we get a coffee?”

Another pause. “I’ve been told not to talk to anyone.”