Month: July 2024

“The Document” – the editor’s final draft – Day 11

This book has been sitting in the ‘to-be-done’ tray, so this month it is going to get the final revision.

And so it begins…

…

Some characters deserve more

…

I’ve decided to give a character that was meant to be only in the periphery, a larger role.

Characters seem to do that, demanding more from what was essentially a bit part.

But, not only in extending this part, they will be a little subplot that I didn’t initially consider but now will seamlessly fit in, and add some more meaning to what eventually happens.

Another hole, it seems, will be plugged.

Oddly enough it’s a few idioms that were running around in my head that brought this on.

Taken at face value

Never judge a book by its cover

A wolf in sheep’s clothing

And, of course,

In business to succeed you have to be ruthless.

It will probably not be the last character that will press for more lines…

Coming soon – “Strangers We’ve Become”, the sequel to “What Sets Us Apart”

Stranger’s We’ve Become, a sequel to What Sets Us Apart.

The blurb:

Is she or isn’t she, that is the question!

Susan has returned to David, but he is having difficulty dealing with the changes. Her time in captivity has changed her markedly, so much so that David decides to give her some time and space to re-adjust back into normal life.

But doubts about whether he chose the real Susan remain.

In the meantime, David has to deal with Susan’s new security chief, the discovery of her rebuilding a palace in Russia, evidence of an affair, and several attempts on his life. And, once again, David is drawn into another of Predergast’s games, one that could ultimately prove fatal.

From being reunited with the enigmatic Alisha, a strange visit to Susan’s country estate, to Russia and back, to a rescue mission in Nigeria, David soon discovers those whom he thought he could trust each has their own agenda, one that apparently doesn’t include him.

The Cover:

strangerscover9

Coming soon

 

In a word: Good

There is a TV show on at the moment called ‘The Good Place’.

It’s really the bad place which makes you wonder if there really is a ‘good place’.

This started me thinking.

How many people do you know, when you ask them how they are, they say ‘good’.

Can we see behind the facade that is their expression how they really feel?

And how many of us reveal our true feelings?

It seems to me there is an acceptable level of understanding that we take people at their word and move on from there.

And how many times when we suspect there is something wrong, we tend to overlook it in what is regarded as respect for that person?

What if something awful happened?

What if we could have prevented it?

What if we could have tried to gently probe deeper?

The problem is we seem to be too polite and there is nothing wrong with that.

But maybe, just maybe, the next time …

It’s just a thought.

 

The story behind the story – Echoes from the Past

The novel ‘Echoes from the past’ started out as a short story I wrote about 30 years ago, titled ‘The birthday’.

My idea was to take a normal person out of their comfort zone and led on a short but very frightening journey to a place where a surprise birthday party had been arranged.

Thus the very large man with a scar and a red tie was created.

So was the friend with the limousine who worked as a pilot.

So were the two women, Wendy and Angelina, who were Flight Attendants that the pilot friend asked to join the conspiracy.

I was going to rework the short story, then about ten pages long, into something a little more.

And like all re-writes, especially those I have anything to do with, it turned into a novel.

There was motivation.  I had told some colleagues at the place where I worked at the time that I liked writing, and they wanted a sample.  I was going to give them the re-worked short story.  Instead, I gave them ‘Echoes from the past’

Originally it was not set anywhere in particular.

But when considering a location, I had, at the time, recently been to New York in December, and visited Brooklyn and Queens, as well as a lot of New York itself.  We were there for New Years, and it was an experience I’ll never forget.

One evening we were out late, and finished up in Brooklyn Heights, near the waterfront, and there was rain and snow, it was cold and wet, and there were apartment buildings shimmering in the street light, and I thought, this is the place where my main character will live.

It had a very spooky atmosphere, the sort where ghosts would not be unexpected.  I felt more than one shiver go up and down my spine in the few minutes I was there.

I had taken notes, as I always do, of everywhere we went so I had a ready supply of locations I could use, changing the names in some cases.

Fifth Avenue near the Rockefeller center is amazing at first light, and late at night with the Seasonal decorations and lights.

The original main character was a shy and man of few friends, hence not expecting the surprise party.  I enhanced that shyness into purposely lonely because of an issue from his past that leaves him always looking over his shoulder and ready to move on at the slightest hint of trouble.  No friends, no relationships, just a very low profile.

Then I thought, what if he breaks the cardinal rule, and begins a relationship?

But it is also as much an exploration of a damaged soul, as it is the search for a normal life, without having any idea what normal was, and how the understanding of one person can sometimes make all the difference in what we may think or feel.

And, of course, I wanted a happy ending.

Except for the bad guys.

Get it here:  https://amzn.to/2CYKxu4

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The cinema of my dreams – It continued in London – Episode 28

A new mission

…

When we reached the hotel, the countess was met by a man whom I deduced was her brother-in-law.  I stood back because I got the feeling that the meeting was not expected and that his arrival was a shock, rather than a surprise, and not a good one.

I didn’t see her again that night, her personal assistant coming over to advise an urgent matter had come up and the countess was needed elsewhere. 

Nor did I see the Rodby’s who it seemed were diverted from coming to the hotel.  Rodby called and apologised on the countess’s behalf and left it at that.  I went home in the chauffeur-driven car; a small consolation afforded for my participation.

I also got the impression that a certain wife got a bollocking for interfering in matters that were not her concern.  She may have thought so, given their close relationship, she could ‘help’, but European families preferred to sort their own problems out in very definitive styles, something we did quite understand.

I doubted I would have been able to help.  That phrase, ‘lifelong enemy’ told me that another woman had eyes for the count, and her snafu was unexpected and unwanted.  The question was, did it have anything to do with the count’s death.  It was a stretch, but Rodby would not have made that small concession if she did not think either of us could be any assistance.

When I got home, I had a few drinks and put it all out of my mind.

…

Three days later I was sitting in the basement briefing room, after being taken down by Rodby and introduced to what he described as the two best researchers in the organisation.

Anthony Bird, and Alessia Lombardi.

And as a complete, but pleasant surprise, sitting at the other end of the table, looking as her cell phone, Cecilia.  Was her starring role over? Or was working for Rodby her day job?

She heard me come in, looked up, nodded, and then went back to her phone.  Rodby didn’t stay.  Nor had he mentioned at any time, from the moment I arrived outside his office, what this was about.

I sat next to her at the end of the table.

When Rodby left, she said, “We meet again.”

“For a retiree, it seems odd, unless you’ve also retired.”

“I tried.  A starring role wasn’t a good enough excuse.  Good thing they finished filming my scenes.”

“Can I expect to see it soon?”

“It was a pilot.  It’ll probably finish up on the cutting room floor.”

We looked at the two standing up at the front of the room, glaring at us.

Anothony said, “If you are finished?”

She threw her phone on the table and looked at him.  I shrugged.

“I suppose it’s too much to want this to be a guide to setting up a retirement plan.”

I guess not.

A photograph of the countess suddenly came up on the screen on the wall.  Anthony was starting the show, “You will know this woman as Countess Heidi von Burkhardt.  She is nominally the head of the international Burkehardt bank, with headquarters in Geneva, and principal branches in Berlin, Rome, Paris, Vienna, and a few other places.”

“A banker.  I must have missed that.  She doesn’t look like a banker.”

“She isn’t, she inherited the bank from her husband.”

Another photo appeared on the screen; a man I thought looked like a terrorist in an expensive suit.  He continued, “Alessandro Burkehardt, her late husband’s brother.  Claims he should own and run the bank, that it’s a family company that’s the purview of the male line of the Burkehardt family.  Actually, he wants everything she has, and then kick to the kerb for want of a better expression.”

Nice man.  He must be the lifelong enemy she had referred to.  Looking at him, he was not a man I would willingly challenge to a duel.

“I don’t think we’re here to discuss family squabbles.  Money will do that, but it’s not in our purview to settle those scores, is it?”

No answer.  Perhaps Rodby didn’t have anything else going on like a megalomanic trying to take over the world this week.

“Bear with us, it gets better.”

Another photo flashed up on the screen, that of a woman about the same age as the countess.

“Vittoria Romano.  Alessandro Burkehardt’s current squeeze and a very nasty piece of work.  She had already tried to kill the countess twice in twenty years.”

Beautiful but very deadly. 

Another photograph came up on the screen, the same woman, but in a photo with three others, two women, the countess, and Mrs Rodby.  And a teenager.  A girl that looked very much like…”

“Wasn’t that your ex back in Venice, what’s her name yes, Juliet Ambrose?”

Long before she became the disgraced doctor.  Long before any of them had become the old ladies there were now.

“This photograph was taken the week before the countess’s wedding.  The girl, as you say, has the name Juliet, but she, we now believe, was the illegitimate daughter of Vittoria Romano, and the Count.  It’s a very tangled web.

The words ‘lifelong enemy’ came back to me again.

Vittoria.  She had his baby, expected him to marry her, didn’t and like any other normal jilted lover, tried to kill the replacement.

“So just the normal complicated Italian aristocratic family secrets fuelling an equally normal feud.”

“Which you two are going to uncomplicate.  But first, you must find the countess.  She has, as far as we’re aware, not left the country, and hasn’t been seen since she left the hotel shortly after coming home from the Opera.  You were there, I believe.”

“I escorted her to the hotel, and when we arrived, she was intercepted by someone who looked a lot like Alessandro Burkhardt.”

“Most likely Fabio Burkehardt.  He had an altercation with the check-in staff over a lost booking, and shortly after that, she checked out.  A half hour later the surveillance team lost her.  We have her last known location and direction she was heading.”

Alessia came down with two folders and gave one to me and one to Cecilia.

“Everything we have on the relatives, those in the country at the moment, possible locations she could be staying, or being held, and background on the family’s issues.  There’s a list of properties overseas where she may have gone, but we have no active record of her leaving.”

“Planes or ferries are not the only means,” I said.  “Does she or any one of the family own a yacht?”

“She does, but it’s moored at Antibes.  It hasn’t moved for over a month.

“I’m assuming Alfie is out there and will be the go-between?”

“Yes.  Oh, and one more thing.  There’s a bit of an urgency to this because if the countess is not in Geneva in five days’ time to sign the transfer documents, passing complete ownership of everything the Count possessed, she forfeits it to the eldest brother.”

“Doesn’t point a finger at him at all does it,” Cecilia muttered.

Anthony switched off the projector and put all the papers into a folder.  “The clock’s ticking.  Daily reports to the Chief are mandatory.”

© Charles Heath 2023

An excerpt from “Strangers We’ve Become” – Coming Soon

I wandered back to my villa.

It was in darkness.  I was sure I had left several lights on, especially over the door so I could see to unlock it.

I looked up and saw the globe was broken.

Instant alert.

I went to the first hiding spot for the gun, and it wasn’t there.  I went to the backup and it wasn’t there either.  Someone had found my carefully hidden stash of weapons and removed them.

Who?

There were four hiding spots and all were empty.  Someone had removed the weapons.  That could only mean one possibility.

I had a visitor, not necessarily here for a social call.

But, of course, being the well-trained agent I’d once been and not one to be caught unawares, I crossed over to my neighbor and relieved him of a weapon that, if found, would require a lot of explaining.

Suitably armed, it was time to return the surprise.

There were three entrances to the villa, the front door, the back door, and a rather strange escape hatch.  One of the more interesting attractions of the villa I’d rented was its heritage.  It was built in the late 1700s, by a man who was, by all accounts, a thief.  It had a hidden underground room which had been in the past a vault but was now a wine cellar, and it had an escape hatch by which the man could come and go undetected, particularly if there was a mob outside the door baying for his blood.

It now gave me the means to enter the villa without my visitors being alerted, unless, of course, they were near the vicinity of the doorway inside the villa, but that possibility was unlikely.  It was not where anyone could anticipate or expect a doorway to be.

The secret entrance was at the rear of the villa behind a large copse, two camouflaged wooden doors built into the ground.  I move aside some of the branches that covered them and lifted one side.  After I’d discovered the doors and rusty hinges, I’d oiled and cleaned them, and cleared the passageway of cobwebs and fallen rocks.  It had a mildew smell, but nothing would get rid of that.  I’d left torches at either end so I could see.

I closed the door after me, and went quietly down the steps, enveloped in darkness till I switched on the torch.  I traversed the short passage which turned ninety degrees about halfway to the door at the other end.  I carried the key to this door on the keyring, found it and opened the door.  It too had been oiled and swung open soundlessly.

I stepped in the darkness and closed the door.

I was on the lower level under the kitchen, now the wine cellar, the ‘door’ doubling as a set of shelves which had very little on them, less to fall and alert anyone in the villa.

Silence, an eerie silence.

I took the steps up to the kitchen, stopping when my head was level with the floor, checking to see if anyone was waiting.  There wasn’t.  It seemed to me to be an unlikely spot for an ambush.

I’d already considered the possibility of someone coming after me, especially because it had been Bespalov I’d killed, and I was sure he had friends, all equally as mad as he was.  Equally, I’d also considered it nigh on impossible for anyone to find out it was me who killed him because the only people who knew that were Prendergast, Alisha, a few others in the Department, and Susan.

That raised the question of who told them where I was.

If I was the man I used to be, my first suspect would be Susan.  The departure this morning, and now this was too coincidental.  But I was not that man.

Or was I?

I reached the start of the passageway that led from the kitchen to the front door and peered into the semi-darkness.  My eyes had got used to the dark, and it was no longer an inky void.  Fragments of light leaked in around the door from outside and through the edge of the window curtains where they didn’t fit properly.  A bone of contention upstairs in the morning, when first light shone and invariably woke me up hours before I wanted to.

Still nothing.

I took a moment to consider how I would approach the visitor’s job.  I would get a plan of the villa in my head, all entrances, where a target could be led to or attacked where there would be no escape.

Coming in the front door.  If I was not expecting anything, I’d just open the door and walk-in.  One shot would be all that was required.

Contract complete.

I sidled quietly up the passage staying close to the wall, edging closer to the front door.  There was an alcove where the shooter could be waiting.  It was an ideal spot to wait.

Crunch.

I stepped on some nutshells.

Not my nutshells.

I felt it before I heard it.  The bullet with my name on it.

And how the shooter missed, from point-blank range, and hit me in the arm, I had no idea.  I fired off two shots before a second shot from the shooter went wide and hit the door with a loud thwack.

I saw a red dot wavering as it honed in on me and I fell to the floor, stretching out, looking up where the origin of the light was coming and pulled the trigger three times, evenly spaced, and a second later I heard the sound of a body falling down the stairs and stopping at the bottom, not very far from me.

Two assassins.

I’d not expected that.

The assassin by the door was dead, a lucky shot on my part.  The second was still breathing.

I checked the body for any weapons and found a second gun and two knives.  Armed to the teeth!

I pulled off the balaclava; a man, early thirties, definitely Italian.  I was expecting a Russian.

I slapped his face, waking him up.  Blood was leaking from several slashes on his face when his head had hit the stairs on the way down.  The awkward angle of his arms and legs told me there were broken bones, probably a lot worse internally.  He was not long for this earth.

“Who employed you?”

He looked at me with dead eyes, a pursed mouth, perhaps a smile.  “Not today my friend.  You have made a very bad enemy.”  He coughed and blood poured out of his mouth.  “There will be more …”

Friends of Bespalov, no doubt.

I would have to leave.  Two unexplainable bodies, I’d have a hard time explaining my way out of this mess.  I dragged the two bodies into the lounge, clearing the passageway just in case someone had heard anything.

Just in case anyone was outside at the time, I sat in the dark, at the foot of the stairs, and tried to breathe normally.  I was trying not to connect dots that led back to Susan, but the coincidence was worrying me.

A half-hour passed and I hadn’t moved.  Deep in thought, I’d forgotten about being shot, unaware that blood was running down my arm and dripping onto the floor.

Until I heard a knock on my front door.

Two thoughts, it was either the police, alerted by the neighbors, or it was the second wave, though why would they be knocking on the door?

I stood, and immediately felt a stabbing pain in my arm.  I took out a handkerchief and turned it into a makeshift tourniquet, then wrapped a kitchen towel around the wound.

If it was the police, this was going to be a difficult situation.  Holding the gun behind my back, I opened the door a fraction and looked out.

No police, just Maria.  I hoped she was not part of the next ‘wave’.

“You left your phone behind on the table.  I thought you might be looking for it.”  She held it out in front of her.

When I didn’t open the door any further, she looked at me quizzically, and then asked, “Is anything wrong?”

I was going to thank her for returning the phone, but I heard her breathe in sharply, and add, breathlessly, “You’re bleeding.”

I looked at my arm and realized it was visible through the door, and not only that, the towel was soaked in blood.

“You need to go away now.”

Should I tell her the truth?  It was probably too late, and if she was any sort of law-abiding citizen she would go straight to the police.

She showed no signs of leaving, just an unnerving curiosity.  “What happened?”

I ran through several explanations, but none seemed plausible.  I went with the truth.  “My past caught up with me.”

“You need someone to fix that before you pass out from blood loss.  It doesn’t look good.”

“I can fix it.  You need to leave.  It is not safe to be here with me.”

The pain in my arm was not getting any better, and the blood was starting to run down my arm again as the tourniquet loosened.  She was right, I needed it fixed sooner rather than later.

I opened the door and let her in.  It was a mistake, a huge mistake, and I would have to deal with the consequences.  Once inside, she turned on the light and saw the pool of blood just inside the door and the trail leading to the lounge.  She followed the trail and turned into the lounge, turned on the light, and no doubt saw the two dead men.

I expected her to scream.  She didn’t.

She gave me a good hard look, perhaps trying to see if I was dangerous.  Killing people wasn’t something you looked the other way about.  She would have to go to the police.

“What happened here?”

“I came home from the cafe and two men were waiting for me.  I used to work for the Government, but no longer.  I suspect these men were here to repay a debt.  I was lucky.”

“Not so much, looking at your arm.”

She came closer and inspected it.

“Sit down.”

She found another towel and wrapped it around the wound, retightening the tourniquet to stem the bleeding.

“Do you have medical supplies?”

I nodded.  “Upstairs.”  I had a medical kit, and on the road, I usually made my own running repairs.  Another old habit I hadn’t quite shaken off yet.

She went upstairs, rummaged, and then came back.  I wondered briefly what she would think of the unmade bed though I was not sure why it might interest her.

She helped me remove my shirt, and then cleaned the wound.  Fortunately, she didn’t have to remove a bullet.  It was a clean wound but it would require stitches.

When she’d finished she said, “Your friend said one day this might happen.”

No prizes for guessing who that friend was, and it didn’t please me that she had involved Maria.

“Alisha?”

“She didn’t tell me her name, but I think she cares a lot about you.  She said trouble has a way of finding you, gave me a phone and said to call her if something like this happened.”

“That was wrong of her to do that.”

“Perhaps, perhaps not.  Will you call her?”

“Yes.  I can’t stay here now.  You should go now.  Hopefully, by the time I leave in the morning, no one will ever know what happened here, especially you.”

She smiled.  “As you say, I was never here.”

…

© Charles Heath 2018-2022

strangerscover9

Searching for locations: Auckland, New Zealand – Another city that has a tower

Nearly every city has a high building, a tower, or a large Ferris wheel.

London had the London eye
Paris has the Eiffel tower
The Galata in Istanbul
The CN Tower in Toronto
The towers of San Gimignano
Pisa has a leaning tower

We’ve managed to see all of the above bar the Galata in Istanbul.  One day we might get there.

But, on this side of the world, there are two, the Sydney Tower, and the Sky Tower in Auckland, which we just visited recently.

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It’s not a tall tower, but it definitely gives great vies of Auckland, particularly to the north

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The mountain in the background at the top of the photo is of a volcano on Rangitoto Island.  When we were visiting, there were reports that it might become active again.

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To give a height perspective, it didn’t seem all that far down to the apartment building and gardens nearby.

“Sunday in New York”, a romantic adventure that’s not a walk in the park!

“Sunday in New York” is ultimately a story about trust, and what happens when a marriage is stretched to its limits.

When Harry Steele attends a lunch with his manager, Barclay, to discuss a promotion that any junior executive would accept in a heartbeat, it is the fact his wife, Alison, who previously professed her reservations about Barclay, also agreed to attend, that casts a small element of doubt in his mind.

From that moment, his life, in the company, in deciding what to do, his marriage, his very life, spirals out of control.

There is no one big factor that can prove Harry’s worst fears, that his marriage is over, just a number of small, interconnecting events, when piled on top of each other, points to a cataclysmic end to everything he had believed in.

Trust is lost firstly in his best friend and mentor, Andy, who only hints of impending disaster, Sasha, a woman whom he saved, and who appears to have motives of her own, and then in his wife, Alison, as he discovered piece by piece damning evidence she is about to leave him for another man.

Can we trust what we see with our eyes or trust what we hear?

Haven’t we all jumped to conclusions at least once in our lives?

Can Alison, a woman whose self-belief and confidence is about to be put to the ultimate test, find a way of proving their relationship is as strong as it has ever been?

As they say in the classics, read on!

Purchase:

http://tinyurl.com/Amazon-SundayInNewYork

“The Document” – the editor’s final draft – Day 9

This book has finally come back from the Editor, so this month it is going to get a second revision, a second draft for the editor, and beta readers.

And so it begins…

…

Real-life impinges on my writing time

…
Today is the day I pick up the grandchildren from school, cook dinner, and then take them home.

How does this affect the writing time, you ask.

It doesn’t help if you were up till 2:31 am the same morning and sleep in till after 10.

Still time before leaving at 2:30 pm to go to the school, you say.

Wrong.

Food to prepare, a potato bake, is simple to make, but it takes time to prepare, and cook.

Chicken schnitzels, cut the chicken, and crumb it, simple, but takes time.

Before you know it, it’s time to go, and the potato bake has been in for an hour so far.

Oh, and one child requires handmade chips, not the bought kind, and neither like store-bought schnitzels, so everything is handmade.

By the time the kids are back home, I’ve got the coffee from a drive-through cafe, it’s after 7:00 pm.

By the time I get to the computer to start, it’s after 11:00 pm

Tired.

My mind is blank.

Just write

Two and a half hours later, 1,697 words were edited. It feels like it’s still Gibberish, but it’s done.

Thank God tomorrow is another day

Or not.

It’s a mind-numbing shopping day!

“Echoes From The Past”, the past doesn’t necessarily stay there


What happens when your past finally catches up with you?

…

Christmas is just around the corner, a time to be with family. For Will Mason, an orphan since he was fourteen, it is a time for reflection on what his life could have been, and what it could be.

Until a chance encounter brings back to life the reasons for his twenty years of self-imposed exile from a life only normal people could have. From that moment Will’s life slowly starts to unravel and it’s obvious to him it’s time to move on.

This time, however, there is more at stake.

Will has broken his number one rule, don’t get involved.

With his nemesis, Eddie Jamieson, suddenly within reach, and a blossoming relationship with an office colleague, Maria, about to change everything, Will has to make a choice. Quietly leave, or finally, make a stand.

But as Will soon discovers, when other people are involved there is going to be terrible consequences no matter what choice he makes.

https://amzn.to/2CYKxu4

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