Pitch Black (Romantic Thriller, Completed)

Chapter 5

The flight to England was one of the more unpleasant ones I'd taken. Okay, I'll admit I'd been spoiled over the past few years, first with business class and then my own jet, but that was only so I could deal with my never-ending stream of calls and emails. On the other hand, I'd also taken military transport in some of the shittiest countries in the world, and half of those planes didn't even have seats, let alone trolley service.

So when I say it was bad, that meant the flight sucked.

When I booked my ticket, the only seat left was in the middle of a row of three, near the back. I spent the eight-hour flight wedged between a snoring salesman with a body odour problem and a stomach the size of the national debt, and a teenager who only stopped playing computer games long enough to throw up into a paper bag.

"Don't worry," he told me, after he'd puked for the third time. "It happens every time I fly."

Well, if it always happens, I've got a suggestion—don't eat a super-sized McDonald's in the departure lounge right before you get on the bloody plane. I'd seen him doing exactly that.

Between that pair, the toddler behind me who reckoned he was the new David Beckham, and the bachelor party in front that managed to drink the plane dry of vodka before we got halfway over the Atlantic, I'd had enough. I was seriously regretting not stuffing my gun into a diplomatic pouch and bringing it along.

By the time we landed, the entire cast of Riverdance was holding a rehearsal in my head. As I only had hand luggage, I avoided the crush at the baggage carousel and half crawled, half sleepwalked over to the railway station to catch the Heathrow Express into West London. Morning or not, all I wanted to do was sleep, so I checked into some dive of a hotel on a backstreet in Bayswater.

I slept for most of the day, but not well. Six times, the headboard in the next room banging against the adjoining wall woke me, accompanied by the wild cries of a woman faking an orgasm. Yes, all through the morning and early afternoon. It takes a special kind of desperate to pop out for a quick fuck along with your coffee and McMuffin, but I guess there's a market for everything.

Finding a hotel that didn't rent its rooms out by the hour jumped to the top of my to-do list.

By evening, I'd found a room smaller than my closet at home, having forked out an obscene amount of money for the privilege. At least I'd had lunch and stocked up on painkillers for my headache, as well as shopping for the essentials.

I spent the evening dying my hair, and also my eyebrows, careful not to use so much dye I ended up looking like Bert from Sesame Street. Once I was nice and mousey, I chopped the front bit into a fringe and checked myself out in the mirror. I looked bloody awful. Perfect.

Before I drifted off to sleep, I considered my options. Staying in London long term wasn't one of them—I knew too many people, plus there was CCTV everywhere. It would only be a matter of time before I ran into someone who recognised me.

I'd spent my life cultivating a long list of contacts. There was a standing joke among my friends that I could be out walking in the middle of the Amazon rainforest and a local tribesman would appear from behind a tree saying, "Hey, how are you? Long time no see!" Usually my number of acquaintances was useful, but now I found it a hindrance.

So, if not London, where should I go?

Europe brought the risk of another border crossing, and there would be too many people looking for me—my own team and fuck knew who else? That left the rest of the UK.

After I'd slept on it, I decided heading to the countryside would be my best plan. I'd find somewhere to hole up for a few weeks until my mind consented to shake hands with logic again.