San Francisco Night Read Free Page A

lives?”
    “I didn’t, but I do now. He was panicking when he called and for the first and only time he used his home phone. Up until that point he’d been using throwaway cellphones and all I had was his first name. I told him to get to the airport and when he didn’t turn up I got the number checked.” He handed Nightingale a photograph of a good-looking man in his mid twenties. “The address is on the back, plus the few details I have.”
    Nightingale turned the photograph over. “He was a banker?”
    Wainwright nodded.  “A high-flyer, he figured that Satanic power would help him fly higher.”
    “What do you think happened to him?”
    “His car’s still in the drive and there’s no sign of a struggle, so your guess is as good as mine.”
    “You went around?”
    “I sent someone.”
    “And these twelve Apostles. Is there any connection between them? Any link?”
    ‘”I don’t know,” said Wainwright. “Lee said he had recognized some of the people there but he wouldn’t give me any names until I pulled him out. I’ve arranged for any calls to the number he used to go straight to your cell.”
    The cockpit door opened and a middle-aged man in a white shirt with black and yellow epaulettes stepped into the cabin.
    “Sorry to interrupt, Mr. Wainwright,” he said. “We’re scheduled to take off in ten minutes, unless you want me to take a later slot?”
    “Ready when you are, Ed. My guest is just leaving. I’ll be in Rome for two days Jack, then I’ll check back with you.”
    The captain went back into the cockpit as Wainwright and Nightingale shook hands. Nightingale put the photograph and sheets of paper in his pocket. “I’ll be in touch,” he said.
    “The sooner the better,” said Wainwright. “You have to find what happened to those people and you have to make it stop. And, my friend, I don’t think you have a whole lot of time.”
     
 
 

CHAPTER 4
     
    They kept the children in separate rooms because that made it easier to control them. The rooms were in the basement at either end of a long corridor that could only be reached from a secret entrance hidden in a closet.  Three different construction firms had been hired to do the work, each believing that it was a wine cellar they were working on.
    The rooms were windowless but had been decorated with cartoon characters on the wall and SpongeBob SquarePants duvet covers and pillows on the bed. There were buckets in the rooms and each day they were given a bowl of water to wash in. Bathrooms had never been a possibility as that would have raised questions with the contractors. There was a CCTV camera in a glass dome in one corner of each room so that the children could be monitored at all times by their guardians upstairs. Each child had an X-box and a selection of games and a
DVD
player with stacks of DVDs, mainly cartoons.
    The doors were wood with bolts top and bottom, and totally soundproofed. Even if one of the children screamed nothing could be heard in the corridor, never mind upstairs. Not that the children did scream. They had both cried for a few hours when they were placed in the rooms but they soon got used to it.
    The boy was called Brett. He was ten years old, pale-skinned with ginger hair and a sprinkling of freckles across his nose. He was big for his age and used to being the top dog in his class. He was an only child and had the arrogance of a kid who was used to getting his own way. The first time John had unbolted the door to give the boy a Burger King meal, the boy had demanded to be released as he’d glared up at him with his hands on his hips. John had said nothing, just thrust the meal into the boy’s hands and slammed the door shut.
    The girl had been much more docile. Sharonda, her name was. Also ten years old, her skin the color of milk chocolate, her hair long and curly, tied back with a Barbie clip. She had stayed curled up on the bed for the first twenty-four hours, ignoring him when he’d brought