Nikki Owen - Spider in the Corner of the Room

I shoot one more look at the skyline and, for the first time, I realise that I am gazing through a window without bars. ‘Can…can you call them now?’

He smiles, pauses. ‘Yes, of course.’ He strides over to his desk and picks up the phone.

‘I’ll get dressed,’ I say.

When I emerge from the bathroom, Balthus has finished his call and I am wearing a clean blouse and trousers.

‘All done,’ he says. ‘They have a couple of new counsellors who have just started. They come highly recommended and have worked with people with Asperger’s before. You’ll have to sign up to a radical kind of therapy, but it gets great reviews.’

‘Who is the therapist?’

‘They couldn’t confirm, given the last-minute nature of my request. You’ll find out when you get there. I’ve booked you in for first thing tomorrow. Is that okay?’

I hesitate. ‘Yes.’

Balthus smiles. ‘Good.’ He walks across to the kitchen, picks up a knife and slices into some more bread. ‘I think counselling could be just what you need.’

Kurt holds the gun to my head. ‘I’m sorry to have to do this, Maria, but I really do need you to move.’

‘Why?’ I snap, the tension rolling out, the outrage, the injustice. ‘Fucking, why?’ I stop, heaving, exhausted by every inch of it all. I wipe spit from my mouth, raise my eyes. The gun loosens a little. ‘Did I kill him?’

For a moment, I think Kurt is going to yell at me, but instead he frowns, takes a step back. The gun drops to his side. ‘No,’ he says after a moment. ‘You didn’t kill him.’

My mouth drops open, a reflex, shocked. Relief washes over me, surging like the ocean. I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill Father O’Donnell. I step back a little, stumble, the thought overwhelming me, the year of pain and uncertainty dropping away, leaving me exhausted, worn. Broken. ‘Who?’ I say after a second. ‘Who killed him?’

Kurt leans back against the wall. ‘This was when the Project was still connected to MI5.’ He pauses. ‘Your handler at the university in Salamanca was reporting changes in your biomechanical structure. Your cognitive responses were increasing. So we needed you here, nearer, in the UK so we could monitor you more closely. And, of course, we knew you were eager to find Father Reznik, so London was an easy option. We knew you’d come here.’

‘So you…’ I stall, not wanting to say it, not wanting to admit what they did, how they lied, schemed, cajoled. ‘You implied Father Reznik had family in London? You set up the cosmetic surgery secondment at St James’s, here?’

‘We made sure your boss was your new handler, as you figured out.’ He scratches his head. ‘All was well until we got first wind of the potential NSA scandal.’

Balthus groans. I look at him-dark blood sticks like tar to the road. I turn back to Kurt. ‘What has the NSA got to do with the murder?’

‘I don’t know if I can-’

‘Tell me!’ I yell, spit flying out. ‘Look what you have done to me! Look how you have lied, how this Project has lied.’ I stop, gulp in a breath. ‘This is my life. My life. You owe this to me. You fucking owe it to me.’

Seconds pass. His eyes flicker shut then open, directing them straight at me. ‘You want to know? You want to know why you matter? Why we did what we had to do to keep things safe, to keep the fucking world safe?’

I remain very still. A phrase swims into my head. ‘For the greater good,’ I say to myself. ‘Killing is easy for the greater good.’

‘You remember the Project training mantra?’ A soda can blows in the wind, lifts up, then clatters to the ground. ‘Okay, look. When the NSA Prism thing blew up, the government got scared, began intelligence-committee investigations into all of MI5’s activity. They were going to pull apart everything, all operations. MI5 were shit scared they’d have their own NSA-style fuck-up. That’s when they gave the order for Callidus to lay low, for you to be placed somewhere safe, where no one could touch you-find you-until it all blew over.’

It dawns on me, like a new day. ‘In prison. You put me in prison so I could be out of the way.’ I stop, nearly laugh at the audacity of it, almost admiring their intricate planning. ‘And, in prison, I could not escape. You had me securely where you wanted me to be.’

‘It was the obvious answer. A high-security facility without any extra effort on our part. All we needed was a reason to get you in there. A nun was all it took.’

‘Sister Mary.’ I slap my hand to my mouth. I was right. I was right about her in the retrial. She was lying. She was MI5.

‘She attended the hospital-St James’s-befriended you, persuaded you to volunteer at the convent. We knew you had struck up a friendship with your handler, Father-’

‘Reznik,’ I say, my voice sounding faraway, dreamlike.

Kurt’s gun swings against his thigh. ‘It was the ideal motive. You liked him, he left you. We could fashion a seething hatred from that. We lifted the Croc you donated to the convent and, because of the blood blister, we had your DNA. Then we staged the murder.’

Murder. My stomach lurches at the word. They staged it, they killed him, made it look as if I did it. As if I killed Father O’Donnell.

‘Our officer waited until the right time and staged the crime scene. I helped; it was a tough job.’ He blows out some air. ‘The priest was stronger than we thought, so it took two of us to string him out, slice him up, pierce through his neck. All a bit dramatic, but it had to be done, had to look…vengeful. A lot was at stake.’

I swallow, eyes damp, head throbbing. ‘But the DVD store owner…’

‘We paid him. He was taking a hit at the time. Drugs. So we paid him to say what we needed-that he saw you. Then I went to the hospital, waited until you had finished your night-time geriatric visits, and took the CCTV tape.’

I look up. ‘But the CCTV tape was uncovered.’

‘That was me.’

‘But…’ I trail off. I know the answer now, but cannot say it.

‘At first, the idea was to hide the CCTV so you would be convicted, which you were, then reveal the tape, get you out once MI5 knew they were in the clear.’

I keep my eyes on the floor, on Balthus’s blood now seeping past me. ‘But NSA happened.’

‘Yes. The service was under too much scrutiny. The NSA scandal would not die down. MI5 were sure the Project would be uncovered and they couldn’t risk that. So that made you a threat to them. And they had to eliminate the threat. They told me to destroy the CCTV.’ He stops. ‘And they told our two undercover officers in Goldmouth who were watching you, to kill you.’

My eyes go wide. ‘Dr Andersson and Mickie Croft.’

‘Yes.’

They all lied. The fact strikes me like a jab to the ribs as, ahead, the breeze lifts the soda can up once more. I watch it briefly rise until the wind throws it to the ground, unwanted, trash.

‘You recall I mentioned my brother to you,’ Kurt says now, unexpectedly.

‘Y-yes.’

‘When MI5 wanted to pull the Project, I couldn’t let that happen. I knew how close we were, with you, to being able to use intelligence, computers-all of it-to stop the terrorists in their tracks.’ He looks at the gun. ‘So I left MI5 and stayed with Callidus, committed to keep it going.’

My brain, through the fog, connects, puts the pieces together. ‘You put Bobbie Reynolds in prison to protect me.’

‘A cover, yes. And we sped up the appeal process to get you out, away from MI5, fast. So you see? We are on the same side.’

‘Maria!’ I spin round. Balthus is trying to drag himself forward. I drop to help him.

‘Stop!’ Kurt shouts. He points his gun at Balthus. Balthus thuds back down.