Her fingers were trembling, her heart burning as she clicked the attachment. The customary warning came on: what would you like to do with this file? Janine selected open it. The loading bar appeared, a flash of blue as it processed the file and then the pixels filled the screen. A face. His face. Janine’s eyes scurried over the features; she forced herself to slow down, look steadily and make sure: the long, bony nose, the slightly mismatched eyes, the chiselled cheekbone and dimpled jaw of James Harper. A few years younger, with a lower hairline, but unmistakeably the same man.
She heard exclamations from Richard’s end, joined in with her own. ‘Shit! The cheeky bugger. Konrad Sulikov otherwise known as James Harper.’ And they’d released him! On bail, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out he’d make a run for it.
‘Airports!’ she instructed Richard. ‘Check the passenger manifests.’
‘His house?’
‘Send someone round, just to cover our backs, he won’t be there. Get a technician too – I bet that’s our scene. Come and get me.’ She rang off. She kissed Tom’s hair and told him to be good for Michael. She snapped shut the poppers on Charlotte’s babygro, scooped her up and took her into the back room where Michael was enjoying a game on the Xbox. ‘You have to watch her.’
‘Mum!’ He protested but he held his arms out anyway and Charlotte gave a little shriek of glee.
‘I’ve got my phone,’ she called as she pulled open the door, ‘send Tom up in half an hour.’
Richard reached her in record time.
Shap had just treated himself to a cold Guinness when his phone went.
‘He’s not going to show,’ Butchers told him.
‘How come?’
‘He’s the invisible man.’
‘If this is some sort of wind-up…’
‘It isn’t. We’re on our way to his place now. Boss wants you there pronto.’
‘Poland?’ Shap grabbed his glass and necked the top third.
‘Harper’s.’
‘You what?’
‘Now.’ Butchers cut him off.
Shap took to his feet and raced out of the building. Behind him the receptionist frowned in consternation. She was sure she hadn’t missed Mr Sulikov.
*****
‘The date of birth he gave us,’ Richard said as she climbed into the car, ‘you were right. That James William Harper died aged five, back in 1967.’
‘Stolen identity. So Harper was just a cover for Sulikov all along. When things got hairy in Poland he comes over here and lives as Harper for the duration.’
‘They’re checking the airports now. Promised me it wouldn’t take long.’
