Terry Neale - Jo-el

“ There’s a pocket inside her handbag, load of crap in there. Remove the bug from the plastic and switch it on, little black slider on the side, the battery is good. There’s a micro SD card in place, it will record up to sixty hours. You’ll have to get it back to listen to it.”

“It doesn’t transmit?”

“Not powerful enough, too small. Wouldn’t work anyway underground.”

Pippa’s handbag was in the bedroom, I found the pocket, switched on the bug and drop it inside. There wasn’t a zipper but a small piece of Velcro held the pocket shut.

“Now you need to ditch the bitch.” Sally at her most eloquent.

I went back to the kitchen and kissed Pippa on the cheek. “I need to go to London.”

“What’s up?”

“The Home Secretary wants to meet me.” I smiled, “they appear a little more grateful than your lot.”

“Yea, I’m sorry about that, they’ll come around.”

“You can stay here, the keys for the car are on the mantelpiece.”

“Will you be long?” Pippa, didn’t look comfortable.

“Gosh, I don’t know, no more than a couple of hours.”

Sally piped in, “She doesn’t know what to do, the two-faced shit.”

Pippa beamed at me, her expression pleading. “Can you take Billy and me back to DC?”

“Is that wise?”

“Oh yea, Joey, play the bitch!”

“I think I’d like to visit my father.”

“Are they still watching her condo?”

“Of course.”

“Pippa, won’t they arrest you as soon as they know you’re there?”

“They want you, Jo-el, not me.” She stood up put her arms around me and pressed her cheek against mine.

“Oh, please, I think I’m going to barf.”

“Sally, shush a minute.”

“Whatever you want,” I said.

“I’ll be fine, Jo-el really. Anyway, you can rescue me,” she kissed me lightly on the lips and grinned.

“Where’s your father?”

“He’s in Maryland, my mom’s in India right now, he’s lonely.”

“Okay, I guess you should get Billy ready.

I took Pippa and Billy back to their condo and bounced home to San Francisco. The weather outside was a vast improvement to the Outer Banks. I made coffee and settled onto my sofa. This was more comfortable. “Sally.” I shouted at nothing in particular.

Sally appeared, dressed in black. Black pants, black, silk top with long black sleeves, very menacing. I smiled.

“You rang?” She acted delighted, but her expression was deadly serious.

“What’s happening?”

“With the brown bitch?”

“No, oh, don’t be so nasty, it’s only been ten minutes.”

“Might have only been ten minutes, but she’s on her way to Langley in a chauffeured car. She’s already spoken to Alberton and told him about Rodanthe. There’s a Delta team heading down there by helicopter, out of Norfolk.”

I straightened up and glared at Sally. “You’re kidding?”

“No, Joey-boy I’m not.”

“I left some stuff there.”

“Better go get it.”

“Shit! How long have I got?”

“Not long, they’ve alerted the local police. They are maybe two minutes away. The helicopter is thirty-five minutes out.”

“Bounce me.”

I picked up my bottle of Black Label from the kitchen and my toiletries from the bathroom. As I searched around I realized I didn’t need the balance of the food I’d bought and there weren’t any clothes. Then it dawned on me that I’d touched just about everything in the cottage. All the cans of food, the bottles in the trash and the glasses. God knew what else? “Sally, help, fingerprints.” I screamed into the air. Sally was suddenly standing in the kitchen. “What do I do?” Then I thought of the rental car and just then I heard a police siren, moments later two squad cars were outside the front door. I couldn’t believe how the shit had hit the fan so damn fast. “Did I have gloves on?” I didn’t even know.

Sally was shaking her head. “Blew that one, Joey. Amazing the risk you guys will take to get laid.”

“I can’t have them finding my prints,” I exclaimed.

“First, let’s get you out, I have an idea.”

Sally bounced me back to San Francisco. I began to fret. “What are they doing?”

“The police are waiting in their car, just watching.” Sally placed a disc monitor in the air, showing the cottage and the two police cars by the curb. My rental car was in the driveway. “You better sit down Jo-el.”

I was taken aback by her serious tone, I sat down gingerly, wondering what she was going to do.

“No fingerprints, right? Whatever!”

I sensed this was going to get ugly, but what choice did I have? I nodded my agreement at Sally. A devilish grin caught the corner of her mouth. She was watching the monitor, also.

Suddenly my rental car exploded. The shock flung me back into the sofa, my hair stood on end and my whole body sprang a leak. Sweat began to pour from my forehead down into my eyes. My right foot whipped up and kicked the coffee table and the remnants of my drink flew into the air and landed on the carpet. I wiped my eyes on the back of my sleeve and choked.

“What the hell!”

Before I’d finished the last word, the cottage caught fire in a cloud of flames. It was spontaneous combustion. Unbelievable. “What the hell did you do?”

Sally didn’t answer at first, we continued to watch the monitor. The two police cars had moved away from the curb, obviously their occupants were okay. I thanked God for that. Killing police officers was not on any agenda I carried.

“I pierced the car fuel tank and all the fuel lines, then just added a spark,” she grinned. “Piece of cake! In the cottage I ripped holes in every gas line and the propane tank in the backyard. Add a flame and hey-presto.” She raised her hands in the air and laughed. “Sweet, huh!”

I continued to watch the flaming mess that was once a cottage in Rodanthe. The sound of fire engines was now audible. My brain raced around in circles trying to think of anyway that the forensics people could find a trace of Dave Murphy. I was at a loss.

“Can they find out it was me,” I stammered at Sally.

Sally went over to the armchair and sat down. She crossed her legs and placed her hands together on her knee. The image of the burning cottage and car filled the room. “Well Jo-el, the FBI and CIA and Homeland Security will know it was you. Bit too obvious with your former girlfriend blabbing her mouth. Whether they share that information with the local police, I don’t know, but honestly I doubt it, bit too difficult to explain.”

She was right. Pippa had already told Alberton where she had been. But what would the repercussions be? They wanted to arrest me for a myriad of crimes, destruction of property was just another for the list.

“You’ll have to dump the cash-card. I’ve changed the address on Steve Braces’ account back to his original address and erased everything pertaining to you. They’ll find out who rented the car but I can’t see a link. I’ve had a better idea for getting cash.” She smirked again. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. I was thinking about the little old lady in Durham, whose cottage I’d just burnt to the ground.

I cleaned up the coffee stains and made another cup. I was calming down, but upset. Every turn I made was wrong. I couldn’t trust anyone and I was bewildered by the attitude shown toward me. I thought I was a good thing for the world, why did they think I was so evil?

“Alberton showed his hand,” I said to Sally. “Why did he do that? He might have been able to play the ‘Pippa’ card a while longer?”