The Secrets We Hide (The Four 2)

As Cassius trailed my mother, he was texting us via the speech recognition on his phone, keeping us updated.

Cass: Do you see this?

Me: Highnam? Do you think she’s headed to the Crown & Anchor again?

Cass: Bet she is. Duck I lost her.

Cass: Bloody autocorrect.

Cass: OK got the map up. I can see where she’s going.

There was silence as we watched the moving dot; then it suddenly stopped and started moving back in the direction it had come from.

Me: What’s going on?

Cass: She burned around.

Cass: Turned.

My phone rang, Cassius’ name flashing up on the screen.

“Thought it was easier to phone. Autocorrect’s a fucking joke on this voice recognition thing.” His voice came through the speaker, loud and clear over the muted hum of traffic around him.

“What’s going on, mate?” Weston leaned closer to the phone, keeping his eyes on the laptop screen.

“Dunno. She was driving, then pulled into a layby and turned around. Good thing I was stuck a few cars back so I could see her turning and follow her. We’re—hey, the docks are down here. Fuck, I’m gonna have to drive past; I’ll

go as slow as I can, but there’s a car right up my ass, flashing his lights at me. Bellend!” he shouted, making me jump. “What’s the fucking rush?”

“Chill, Cass.” West huffed out a laugh. “Keep your eyes on Christine.”

“Dickhead,” he muttered. “Not you, the driver behind me,” he added, after a pause. “Okay, she’s turning into the docks, she’s stopped…and I’m…okay, I’m past it now. There was a man leaning into her window—I only saw the back of his head, nothing special. He had a bit of a bald patch, I think, or it could’ve been the light. I don’t know really; I hardly saw him. I’ll turn around up here and drive back past, see if I can see anything else.”

We waited, hearing the sound of the indicator as he turned off the road and headed back in the opposite direction. His voice came through the speaker again, excitement in his tone. “I just saw her standing there with Littlefinger! I mean, Petr. She was showing him something on her phone, I think. Looked like it, anyway. Visual proof she’s still meeting up with him.”

“I wonder what they’re doing,” I mused aloud. “Can you turn back round?”

“Already on it. I don’t wanna risk going past too many times, though, otherwise someone might notice.”

Silence.

Then, “Fuck, fuck, fuck! I think Petr was watching me as I went past that time. His head turned and everything.”

“Shit, come back now.”

“I fucking am. Gonna ditch the car in the uni car park and pick mine up, then I’ll be home.” The phone went dead, and Weston and I stared at each other.

“I really hope that was just his paranoia. At least we’ve seen my mother with Petr, in person. So we know she must still be working with him, because he doesn’t work at the docks anymore, does he? There’d be no reason for him to be there unless it’s to do with her.”

Weston nodded. “Yeah. I’m adding this to our file, with times and dates.” He pulled up the login to his secure storage server and started tapping away on the keyboard.

While he was busy doing that, I tried to make myself useful by doing a Google image search on the Strelichevo sigil that had been on Vasily and Petr’s rings. I trawled through countless pages of search results, but nothing came up other than one site that Google auto-translated, and appeared to be someone’s travel blog. The writer referred to some kind of burial ground, accompanied by a grainy photo of the image on a set of iron gates. I bookmarked the site just in case, but it was only a few lines long.

Through a combination of useless directions, and my own ineptitude, I ended up outside this private burial ground early this morning, while trying to find the cemetery my great-grandmother was buried in. I snapped a photo of the gates, rather unusual and ornate in design, and exited the car to see if I could look around inside. Unfortunately, my attempt was thwarted by a large man carrying a gun, who told me I was trespassing on private property.

The blog then went on to describe, in tedious, rambling detail, the person’s journey through various deserted Belarusian roads and how he kept getting lost every few miles. Probably should have invested in a satnav.

Closing my browser with a sigh, I put my phone down and went to make a cup of tea while we waited for Cassius to return.