Now that Chloe was out in the open things moved along nicely at the house.

Angela more or less took control of Chloe’s metamorphosis from ‘yeah but you are a man aren’t you?’ into something more like ‘what are you doing on Friday?’ sort of appearance. She thinned his eyebrows a bit but not too much so that when Martin had to make an appearance it wouldn’t be obvious that the was a cross-dresser.

After some arm-twisting, Chloe and Angela ventured out into the big bad world together. At first, they went walking in the High Weald. For Angela this place was just about as far removed from central London as you could be and she began to feel at home for the first time in a very long time.

The walking trips became more and more frequent as the weeks and then months went by. Martin’s appearances became more and more infrequent. The space in his wardrobe for Martins’ clothes shrunk considerably as Chloe’s wardrobe grew by leaps and bounds thanks to the wonders of the Internet. Angela’s wardrobe also grew but Chloe didn’t mind paying for them.

As the saying goes, ‘All good things must come to an end’. For the couple, it did in a way that neither of them had expected.

One day in late summer they were walking along the promenade in Whitstable. Chloe was going to introduce Angela to the local shellfish when Martin’s phone rang. Normally, any calls received when they were out together but the ring-tone on this one made her say,

“Sorry, I have to take this call.”

“Hello?”

“There has? When did this occur?”

“Did the alerting work properly? Is everything shutdown?”

Chloe breathed a sigh of relief when she heard the answer.

“I guess the next step is to reset the keys?” asked Chloe.

“That’s ok. I can be there in about an hour traffic permitting. At the most Ninety minutes.”

“No, I’m not in the City. I’m out on the Kent Coast in near Margate,” was Chloe’s slightly evasive reply.

“Yes, I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

She hung up the phone with a very serious look on her face.

“What’s wrong?”

“There’s been a security breach at one of my customers. The master keys to several thousand ATM’s have been compromised.”

“That does not sound very good?” asked Angela.

“It isn’t. Close on two thousand Cash Machines all over the country have been shutdown.”

“Oh. That doesn’t sound too good?”

“That is rather an understatement,” said a very serious Chloe.

Then she added,

“Look Angela, I’m going to have to go and sort this out but I can’t afford the time to take you home before I go to the site to work on this. Time is of the essence.”

“That’s ok. I’ll come with you.”

“Are you sure?”

Angela giggled.

“Have you forgotten that you are not Martin?”

An expression of despair appeared on her face.

“Oh well, I guess the time has come for me to go public then? Not in the way I’d envisaged but needs must.”

A huge smile appeared on Angela’s face.

“Are you sure about this?”

“At this point in time, I don’t have any choice now do I?”

They hurried back to the car and set off towards London. Chloe drove with a determined expression on her face. Angela took this as a sign that idle chit-chat was not on the menu.

Their destination turned out to be a non-descript industrial unit not far from the Lakeside Shopping Centre. They arrived some 75 minutes after the call. There were three other cars parked outside.

“What is this place?” asked Angela.

“It is a Computer Data Centre for one of my customers.”

“But it says, ‘Douglas Material Services’ on the outside?”

“All part of keeping the place anonymous and very low key.”

“Do you want me to sit here? While you are doing whatever you need to do?”

“No, you’d better come inside. There’s a small office with a Coffee Machine you can use.”

“Where will you be?”

“Somewhere in the building.”

“Ok, you can’t say where. But couldn’t you do whatever you have to do from home?”

Chloe smiled.

“There are a few things that have to be done by people actually in front of the machine and this is one of them. Sort of like hitting the nuclear button. I have to observe the operations and make a report to the Board of Directors tomorrow.”

Once Angela was settled in the Office, Chloe went up to a security door and used both her thumb to gain access to the internals of the building.

With a final smile back at Angela, she went inside.

A couple of hours later Chloe and three men emerged. They all had stern expressions on their faces.

Angela asked Chloe, “Is everything ok?”

“The first part is done. Now we need to go to Warrington.”

“Warrington? Why?”

“There is another system that is the backup to this one there that needs to be reset in the same way as we have just done here.”

Angela looked at her watch and said,

“At this time of day? That is going to take hours and hours.”

Chloe looked outside. The three men were obviously waiting for her.

“We are flying. There is a plane waiting for us at London City Airport.”

“What about me? You are going to be gone for hours?”

“You could come with us?”

“Me? I’m hardly dressed for going on a trip?”

Chloe laughed.

“Neither of us are but we need to get a move on. The flight Plan has been filed and the plane needs to get airborne ASAP.”

Chloe took Angela’s hand and they left the building.

As Chloe introduced Angela to the men, she stared at one of them. She recognised him from her past. She desperately tried not to show that she’d remembered him. He just smiled at her when she was introduced.

They piled into two of the cars and headed down the A13 towards London and the City Airport.

The experience of flying in a private jet was new to Angela but the men weren’t saying much. They all had stern looks on their face. She took the hint and kept quiet. The ‘event’ whatever it was, was serious.

They landed at Liverpool John Lennon some forty minutes after take-off. Two cars were waiting for them. These whisked the party along the M62 to another anonymous building on another almost identikit industrial estate.

The men disappeared into the building leaving Angela alone in the car with one of the drivers. He wasn’t especially chatty so she gave up and waited for the men to return.

This time, they were gone less than thirty minutes. Then it was back in the cars, back to the airport and back to London. By the time they got back to the first building and Chloe’s car.

As they drew away, Chloe asked,

“Is it all done?”

“Yes. Now they can start rolling out the new keys to all the ATM’s. The Security Admins will be in for a long night. Each one could take around 20 minutes to update.”

“Don’t you have to be involved in this?”

“Thankfully no, I don’t. I’ll be working into the night as well writing a report. It should only take a few hours.”

Angela hesitated a bit before asking.

“The man with the broad pinstripe suit? Who was he?”

“Why? Do you know him?”

“Yes,” replied Angela somewhat reluctantly.

“Oh.”

“His name is Alexander Stewart. He’s the company Financial Director.”

“It wasn’t that when I knew him. He was introduced to me as Jim Pascoe.”

“How long ago was this?”

She thought for a few seconds before answering.

“Three and bit years.”

Chloe thought for a bit.

“Thanks for that. I’ll do some digging. I’ve never liked him. Perhaps there really is more to him than meets the eye.”

It was very late by the time they got home. Angela prepared a few sandwiches for Chloe before going to bed. Sleep didn’t come easily for her. Her past might well have caught up on her. Chloe knew most of the bad bits but she’d left out a few of the really bad things she’d had to do before she got on the road to recovery.

Things didn’t look much better in the morning. Angela came downstairs to find Chloe fast asleep at her desk. She tiptoed past her and into the kitchen where she sat down and wept. It was looking like she’d have to leave a place that had grown upon her these past months.

Eventually, she got herself together and started making some Coffee and while that was brewing, she began to prepare breakfast hopefully not making too much noise.

She’d nearly finished when she noticed a movement out of the corner of her eye. It was Chloe.

“Good morning, Angela,” she said sleepily.

Angela smiled.

“You look like death warmed up. Why don’t you go and take a quick shower? You’ll feel a lot better.”

Chloe smiled back at her. She just nodded her head and disappeared.

Half an hour later, Chloe returned looking a lot better.

“I bet you are hungry?” suggested Angela as she sat down.

“Just a bit.”

“What time did you finish?”

“I think it was close to five.”

“You poor thing, you must be exhausted?”

“Nothing a few hours in bed wouldn’t cure.”

Angela dished up a hearty breakfast and sat down at the table with Chloe.

“Aren’t you eating?”

“Later,” came her simple reply.

When Chloe had finished eating, she sat back nursing a cup of Coffee in one hand.

“I think I found out the source of the problems. I have to thank you for the idea.”

“Me? What did I say?”

“You suggested that Mr Alexander Stewart might not be all he appeared to be.”

A beaming smile spread across Angela’s face.

“And?”

“He is a mystery. But I have enough to go to the CEO and start a formal investigation.”

Then Chloe asked,

“How did you come to know Mr Stewart or Pascoe?”

“He was a client of mine. I say client, several of us shall we say entertained him and a few of his friends on several occasions in a former life, before I escaped and went on the streets.”

Chloe knew that Angela was not proud of her past and had very reluctantly told Martin about it a month or so before.

“Oh, I see,” said Chloe.

“The problem is, if he recognised me then you could be in trouble.”

“Trouble how?”

Angela sighed.

“All of our, shall I say, encounters were arranged by my former Pimp. He will more than likely get to hear about it and will come looking for me. He does not like his girls leaving. I ran away after taking a bit of a beating from a client. I also took close to a grand in earnings with me. He’ll want that back with interest plus a considerable sum in lost earnings for the time since I legged it.”

Chloe knew a lot about Angela’s background but this worried her.

“Do you think he’ll come looking for you here?”

“This is bit off his patch but quite possibly, yes he will. He probably thinks he still owns me.”

“Then we will have to take precautions then won’t we?”

“What do you mean?”

“Let me worry about that. Is there any way you can find out if your old pimp knows about your new life? What’s his name by the way?”

“Vladimir Putin.”

Chloe almost fell off her chair laughing.

“This is no laughing matter!” exclaimed Angela.

“I’m sorry. But…”

“Yeah. The story is that he knew the real one back in Russia as they served in the KGB together before the fall of Communism. He came over here in 1992 and changed his name soon after long before the real Mr Putin became famous.”

“Do you know what it was before?”

“Yeah, he keeps a Russian passport in his old name. I got a chance to see it one day. It’s Igor Ivanovitch.”

“Can you reach out to anyone to see if you have been busted?”

“Yes but…”

“I know it will cost me some money.”

“No but I’ll need another phone. One that can’t be traced.”

Chloe smiled.

“No need for that. I’ll setup a call for you. It will be totally un-traceable, you can count on that.”

“Are you sure? He’s got all sorts of connections.”

“I’m sure. This is what I do for a living remember.”

An hour later, Angela joined Chloe in her office. Chloe handed Angela a headset complete with microphone.

“Right, what’s the number?”

Angela wrote it down on a slip of paper.

“Good. If the person we are calling has caller ID, they’ll see a number in Moscow. The general number for the Kremlin to be exact.” said Chloe as she rapidly punched in a series of numbers into his keyboard.

“It’s ringing,” said Angela.

Chloe picked up an earpiece to listen in on the call.

After a few rings, it was answered.

“Hello Sam, this is Francesca,” said Angela using her ‘working girl’ name.

“Hi Fran. Back in the land of the living then? We heard that you were back last night.”

“Not exactly back but I take it Vlad is on the warpath?”

“Yeah, he took a call around ten last night. Then he went ballistic. If you can get out of wherever you are then I’d get going. He’s not a happy Russian. More like an angry Russian Bear. I hear the south pole is good at this time of year. If you could go, I’d get on a plane now.”

“Thanks Sam, that’s what I needed to know. You take care now."

Chloe disconnected the call on the computer.

“Well? It is as we feared,” said Angela.

“In that case, I’d like you to go and get a few things together and put them in a small bag. Make it look like you left in a real hurry, drawers left open, clothes strewn about in a mess. Then go to Babs. She’ll take you to a safe house.”

“Safe house?”

“Babs and Jo, are as you know solicitors. Their main business is representing young Gay, Lesbian and Trans people who have to run away or are being abused at home. They have at least one safe house where they put their clients up until they can get the legal things like guardianship sorted out.”

“I didn’t know.”

“They like to keep their business close to their chests so to speak. Not everyone would understand.”

Angela was flabbergasted.

“But…”

“That’s between us ok. They really prefer to be known as ‘that lesbian couple who live in Orchard View’ and keep a low profile.”

“I get it. I’ll keep quiet,” then she added,

“So I go to this safe house what happens then?”

“The less you know the better and even better for me to know nothing at all. What I don’t know, I can’t tell.”

“Like that is it? I thought that we didn’t have any secrets between us now?”

“It is not a secret but at the moment, what you don’t know, can’t hurt you. So when Vlad comes a knocking, I can say truthfully that I don’t know where you are.”

Angela couldn’t argue with that given her very suspect background.

“Go on, get going!” said Chloe.

Angela started to say something but stopped before she said something that she might regret. Instead, she stomped off upstairs to pack.

Twenty minutes later Chloe kissed a tearful Angela goodbye. She watched as Angela disappeared down the garden path towards their neighbour’s house.

Then Chloe burst into life and before long she’d disappeared and Martin was back. At the same time, he activated the hidden cameras that watched every room and importantly the grounds surrounding the house. These cameras had Infrared capability. The various data feeds were then sent over a hidden cable to a server farm in Scotland.

His next task was to make a call to an old army colleague of his. The call was brief and to the point. It ended after less than a minute with the person on the other end saying, ‘Understood Sir. We’ll be there within three hours.”

Finally, he sent a text message to another person. He received a reply less than five minutes later. With a small smile on his face he did a factory reset on the phone. It was backed up in the cloud but he wanted no evidence for any visitors to find and should the worst outcome he could imagine actually happen.

Then Martin waited for the first of his visitors to arrive.

Around midday, three men appeared at the back door to the house. Martin quickly let them in.

After greetings and pleasantries were exchanged as well as a brew of strong tea, they got down to planning the operation. Martin reckoned that it was highly unlikely that any unwelcome visitors would appear before darkness so the team had a few hours to get ready. Near the end of the discussions he said,

“Don’t be surprised if we have another visitor soon. Don’t worry, they are on our side but they weren’t ever here understood?”

None of the men argued. They knew the importance of ‘need to know’ and ‘know to need’ when it came to field operations.

The men were former colleagues of his from his days in the Army. Each of the three was assigned tasks and left to get on with it. The smallest, Pete naturally nicknamed ‘Titch’ was assigned to set up an Observation Point in the attic. The tiny window gave him good views of the road and the driveway leading to the house. The other two set up small camouflage bivvies on either side of the driveway leading to the house.

Then three men settled down to wait. This was something they were good at.

Martin meanwhile was sending the results of his investigations into Mr Stewart to the Company as well as to the Serious Fraud Office of the Met Police. He also tipped off a few of his more reliable journalist friends. These were the ones he could trust not to blab to all and sundry where they’d got the tip from.

With that done, Martin occupied himself by making sure all the windows and doors to the house were locked and the alarm system set. Finally, he started copying all his sensitive data to the secure server farm in Scotland. As his lawyer, Jo had details of how to access the data should the need arise. He sincerely hoped that he could manage the situation without… well getting kidnapped.

Just before 10pm, a black Mercedes SUV with blacked out windows swept into the drive. Three large men emerged.

Up in the attic, Titch spoke into the encrypted radio that the team were using to communicate.

“Target arrived. Three heavies all carrying concealed weapons doing obbo on the house. A fourth man is in the Vehicle.”

There were no replies from the other team members. Radio Silence was all part of their training.

Martin watched the men via the camera system. They’d come prepared as one of them had a night vision scope and was using it to scan the garden. Martin smiled because he’d done the same after it had gotten dark. His team were well dug in and knew that they’d find nothing. After a couple of minutes, one of them gave the ‘Ok’ to the man in the car and he emerged.

This was obviously the boss. Another very well built man. His broken nose and rugged features indicated that he was not a person you would want to meet in an alley on a dark night.

The four of them walked towards the house. One rang the bell.

‘At least they are being polite’, Martin said to himself as he got up out of his chair and walked towards the front door.

He opened it.

“Yes can I help you?”

The boss said,

“I think you have something of mine. I’m here to collect it.”

“What do you mean?” asked Martin feigning ignorance.

“Her! That bitch you were with yesterday when you were all tartied up yourself by all accounts!”

“Oh you must mean Angela. She’d not here. She left early today.”

The boss nodded and two of the men burst through the door into the house.

“You don’t mind if we look around do you?” asked Vladimir.

“No… No not at all.”

By now all four of the visitors were inside the house. Two went upstairs, the third heavy searched downstairs while Vladimir stood close to Martin.

After a couple of minutes, they returned and reported that she was gone.

“Where’s she gone?” asked Vlad.

“I don’t know. She wouldn’t say. She even refused to let me take her to the station. The last I saw of her was her running down the drive to catch the bus to Maidstone. That was around ten this morning.”

Vlad didn’t like this answer.

“I can see that we are on camera so I’ll keep this polite. You owe me Four Hundred Grand. That’s the loss I’ve suffered since she went walkabout. If you pay, then we are good. If you don’t then I’ll be back and I won’t be so…. So polite. Understand?”

Martin nodded that he understood.

The boss gave a nod.

“I’ll be in touch to arrange payment. I will send someone to collect the money in a few days.”

“A few days? I don’t have that sort of money?”

“Really? Your credit report says otherwise.”

“Most of it is tied up in long term securities. I can’t just sell them like that?”

The boss grinned. Martin had revised his opinion of him. He was a smart wily character.

“I’m sure you will find a way. It is my money after all.”

Then his face went serious.

“Otherwise…”

He drew an imaginary knife across his neck with an evil smile on his face.

Then they headed out the door and climbed into their vehicle.

As they disappeared down the drive, his earpiece crackled into life.

“Trackers installed. Sump holed. Over to you Sir.”

Another voice came online. It was ‘Titch’.

“They’ve stopped just up the road. One of the heavies has got out and is checking the car over with some device.”

Martin smiled. Just as he’d anticipated, in that they were looking for tracking devices. The ones his team had used were designed to remain dormant for up to an hour after activation for this very purpose. He wasn’t a security consultant for nothing.

“All ok. He’s got back in and… Sir. They are just sitting there.”

Martin unlocked a drawer in his office desk and pulled out a handheld device. He switched it on and started to wave it about.

He was looking for bugs. He didn’t find any in his office so he closed the door and picked up a pen from his desk. He spoke into it.

“Thanks Titch. Everyone stay in position.”

Ten minutes went by before Titch spoke again.

“They are pulling away.”

“Everyone stay in position. I need to check the house.”

Martin had learned to be careful. He went through this procedure every time anyone he didn’t trust came into the house.

By the time he’d finished, he’d found six of the little beggars. He left them alone and went back into his office.

He spoke into the pen.

“Ok guys you can stand down. I’ll call the boys in blue then you can get out of here. Titch, I’m afraid you’ll have to stay were you are for a few more hours. My visitors have left a few ears behind.”

The team would know what Martin meant by ‘ears’.

“No problem Sir.”

Martin sat down with a sigh. He picked up the phone and dialled ‘999’.

“Police please,” he said with a determined tone to his voice.

An hour later, a car pulled up at the house. Two men got out and walked up to the house. Martin met them at the door. He put a finger to his lips and stepped outside closing the door behind him.

Outside the three men exchanged introductions. The two visitors introduced themselves.

“DCI John Parker. This is my colleague DI Imran Khan.”

“Pleased to meet you.”

“We are from the Met Serious and Organised Crime Division.”

“We understand that you gave us a tip about Vladimir Putin,” said the senior officer.

“Yes. He was here earlier demanding that I pay him a lot of money otherwise I might not be long for this world.”

“About that… “

“Yes?”

“He’ll deny it.”

Martin smiled.

“I have it all recorded on video.”

“We’ll need all copies. For our investigation you understand.”

Martin started to look worried.

“Why? Why all copies?”

“To preserve the chain of evidence.”

“I can’t get it today.”

The two men looked at each other.

“We need them now.”

Martin began to realise that there was something wrong with these men. He wondered if they were actually Policemen.

“The recordings are a long way away.”

“Can’t you get them over the internet?” asked the second officer.

Martin shook his head.

“No. The whole system was designed to be one way only. Security systems are my business.” he replied lying through his teeth.

“That makes things difficult. Very difficult indeed for us and even worse for you.”

As he said it, he pulled out his handcuffs. The second officer pulled out his expanding truncheon and flicked it into its operational position.

“You are going to have to come with us.”

“I’m not sure I should,” replied a nervous Martin.

“Oh but you must. We insist. Are we going to do this the easy way or the hard way?”

Martin took a step backwards away from the two men.

“I’m sorry but I have to stay here. Those men might be back.”

“Come on Sir. We can do this quietly or…”

The DI moved forward in an attempt to grab hold of Martin’s arm.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” came a voice from the darkness.

The two officers turned round and looked for the owner of the voice.

“Now Officers, if you really are the Polis, we can do this the easy way or the hard way. You two are nothing when compared to the Taleban or ISIS.”

“You! Whoever you are, are breaking the law by threatening two Police Officers.”

“Police Officers? My arse. From what I’ve heard so far, you are Officers only by name. If you ask me, you are in the pockets of that Russki who was here earlier.”

“I didn’t ask you. We are doing our duty. We have to take this man in for questioning.”

“Oh yeah, what’s the charge?”

“Withholding evidence.”

The voice let out a laugh.

“Is that the best you can do?”

The DCI had had enough.

“Who the fuck are you? Why don’t you show us your face?”

“No. That won’t be happening. I’m ok here with this pump action 12-Bore aimed at both of you. Each shell is loaded with shrapnel. Now who is going to win this exchange?”

“You won’t get away with this,” said the DCI angrily.

More laughter came from the shadows.

“Really? I’m already supposed to be dead. Helicopter crash in Scotland. Not a lot more to lose really.”

This quietened the two Officers. Martin took his chance and relieved them of their handcuffs. He slipped them on their owners and stepped away.

“Now Gentlemen,” said the voice.

“On your knees. We don’t want you going anywhere in a rush now do we?,” said the voice.

They complied without further complaint.

“Martin, why don’t you go and call the real Police?”

He looked for the source of the voice but like the Police Officers, he failed but that was par for the course for the owner.

As ordered he went inside and called the police from his office.

Once the call was over, he picked up the pen and spoke quietly,

“Titch, are you there?”

“Yes Boss. I saw what happened.”

“Can you see who the mystery voice belongs to?”

“Sorry Boss. There is a shape but they were totally cammed up.”

“Thanks Titch. Stay where you are.”

“Boss? I need to move soon or I’ll make a mess.”

Martin suppressed a laugh.

“Ok. Do it quietly and don’t flush the bog. Those bugs are still active and we don't know where they are sending the data.”

“Boss.”

Martin returned to the scene outside his front door. The two officers were still on their knees.

“The local Police are on their way.”

“You won’t get away with this,” said the second Officer.

“If I don’t, then neither will you,” replied a more confident Martin.

Two local Police Officers turned up a little later.

“Arrest this man. He’s had a gun trained on us for the past hour,” exclaimed one of the officers who were still on their knees.

“Really. I’ve no gun. There was a voice from the darkness that claimed to have a gun but I’ve no gun. I have the whole thing on video.”

“He’s lying!” exclaimed the second Officer.

“Really? Sergeant? If you’d like to accompany me into the house, I’ll be more than happy to show you.”

“I think that would be best.”

Martin showed the Sergeant into his office. Then he called up the outside video recording. He started it at the point where he went outside with the officer.

Five minutes later, the pair returned to the outside of the house.

“I can see no gun anywhere in the recording. I can see you try to arrest this man and then I can see you go down on your knees with your hands in handcuffs.”

“But….” Protested the first Officer.

“I will get a copy of the Video for our Forensics people. At the moment, I’m inclined to believe Martin. I have my doubts about you. Your presence in my area should have been notified to my station. As it wasn’t so I have to think that you are here unofficially. Until it is proved otherwise, you two are staying restrained.”

“Your career is over. Don’t you realise who we work for?”

The Sergeant just smiled back.

“I’m due to retire next month so what do I care? Besides, I’m following protocol. If you two pan out when we get to the station, I’ll apologise and you can get on with your job. Until then…”

He nodded at his colleague. Between them, they escorted the first two officers into the back of their patrol car. Martin disappeared into the house.

By the time they’d done that, Martin had returned. He handed the sergeant a DVD with a copy of the Video of the incident outside the house.

“DCI Jacobs will be around in the morning to take a statement,” said the Sergeant as he accepted the DVD disk.

“Have you heard anything about a Black SUV?”

“Yes. It stopped for some reason in the middle of the Dartford Crossing Tunnel going north. Armed response are there trying to get the men to come out.”

Martin grinned.

“They ran out of oil.”

“How?”

Then he smiled,

“I’d better not ask. But my Inspector is very pleased. Apparently Mr Putin is a person of interest to us. We suspect him of people trafficking, prostitution and money laundering to name just a few crimes."

“Thanks Sergeant. Will we see you as usual at the Bull on Sunday? I’ll buy you a pint if you are amenable?”

“That will do very nicely Martin but, will we see the new you this time around?”

“You know? How?”

“You seem to have been frequenting the BlackBoys Inn a lot in recent weeks. My sister works behind the bar.”

Martin let out a big sigh.

“I guess it will be time for the new me to appear in the village. That will give the locals something to talk about.”

“Aye, it will that.”

After the Police Car drove off Martin looked around for whoever owned the voice. He found no one in his grounds then with a wry smile on his face, he went back inside the house.

He found Titch waiting for him.

“Time for a drink then Titch. I think we’ve earned it.”

“That will be fine boss. I’ll get the others to come in. I expect they could do with a brew.”

Then he added,

“I think the person in the darkness might have been a woman.”

“Why? How do you come to that conclusion?”

“Just from the way they moved.”

“Thanks for that.”

“You know who it was don’t you?”

Martin nodded his head.
“Well, they moved like a cat all right. One minute they were there and then they were gone.”

Then Titch seemed to have an epiphany.

“I get it. From what they said and the way they said it, they are like us aren’t they?”

Once again Martin nodded.

“Oh Fuck,” as Tiny realised who the person was.

“It was Captain Younger wasn’t it? She was the only one who could move like that.”

Martin just smiled.

“Don’t worry Boss, I’ll take that little secret to my grave.”

The captain had been close to being the first woman to be selected to be a member of the SAS. Both Martin and Tiny had been on the selection trials and both had wanted the captain to pass the selection test but she’d failed at almost the last hurdle when she’d broken her ankle. The now former Royal Marine Captain who’d reportedly died a year or so later in a Helicopter accident in Scotland. She would not want her presence at the house known to a wider audience.

Then Titch said,

“Boss, why don’t you get some shuteye? I’ll keep watch and get rid of those nasty little bugs for you.”

“Thanks Titch. You are a star.”

“As usual Boss, as usual.”

[The following day]

Martin rose feeling apprehensive about the day ahead. He’d have to go to the Police Station in Maidstone and give them a statement about the previous evenings event. He wondered how much of the truth would be acceptable.

As he made breakfast, he realised that the house felt empty. He’d found a note from Titch saying goodbye when he came downstairs. As he read it, he realised that this was the first day since Angela had come into his life that she wasn’t here with him. This was almost the same feeling he’d had when his ex-wife moved out. This time, he hoped that Angela would be back soon. She was a real gem. Despite him being fifteen years older than her, he felt that she wanted to stay. Well to stay with Chloe but that was not going to be a problem.

In the end, the visit to the Police Station was better then he’d hoped. One of the more senior Police Officers who been taking bribes from Vladimir and his gang had started blabbing. As a result, a lot of other Officers had been implicated including the two who’d visited Martin the previous night. This made the incident at the house pale into insignificance by comparison.

Despite that, he turned over copies of the videos recordings of the evening to the Chief Inspector at Maidstone. He kept other copies in a very safe place. He’d already sent instructions to Jo about how to get at them in the event of something happening to him in the future.

As Martin left Maidstone, he suddenly stopped his car. He sat for several minutes just looking into the distance. He’d risked a lot for Angela and had done it all without thinking about the consequences. He knew that he didn’t want to lose her and it was clear what he had to do to keep her in his life.

When he returned home, to his eternal relief, he found Angela waiting for him.

The surprise at her being there was magnified by what she was wearing or rather not wearing.

“Angela!”

“Shhhhh. Just enjoy this and you blame Jo for getting me all dolled up. We had a very long talk about you while we were in that safe house. I don’t know what happened here earlier but I do know one thing and that is, you did it for me. No one has ever done anything for me before. Now it is my turn to do something for you.”

She walked towards him on totteringly high heels. She was wearing thigh high leather boots, a leather micro-miniskirt and a black leather corset. Her makeup was… well for her since she came to live with Martin, totally over the top. Her outfit complimented her makeup right down to the opera style gloves adorned her hands.

She touched him gently as she walked around him. He realised that she was doing a dance of seduction so he let her carry on.

Gradually, she undressed him. Not a word was said but it was all by feeling, gesture and touch.

When he was naked, she started to touch the top of hit now erect penis.

She kissed it several times gently as the dance continued.

Then she wrapped her arms around him and came close.

I a single movement, she’d also wrapped her legs around his body and eased his penis into her vagina.

As he came inside her, she whispered in his ear,

“Yes, I’ll marry Chloe only when Martin is consigned to history once and for all. Martin is a front and from what I’ve seen recently, you are much happier now she’s out in the open so lets make it for good eh?”

Martin nodded and kissed her on the tip of her nose. This always seemed to arouse her.

“But….”

“It does not matter darling. You are here and safe and that is all that matters isn’t it? Besides, any more and I’d have to kill you. Understand?”

Chloe laughed at her use of words. She thought back to a former life and how it would have been Martin who would have spoken them.

Angela then squeezed his penis gently making it become hard again.

[Two days later]

Chloe and Angela walked hand in hand back from the pub. True to his promise, Chloe had bought the Sergeant and the rest of the patrons of the Pub, a beer, wine or whatever they were drinking to celebrate the ‘coming out’ of Chloe. Only two of the more ‘nethanderal’ locals objected to Chloe and stormed out of the pub in protest. The landlord, told the couple not to worry and banned the two objectors for a month.

Earlier in the day, Martin had signed a deed poll formally changing his name to Chloe Maria Foster. Jo had cracked open a bottle of Champagne to celebrate the event.

Both of them were quite tipsy by the time they arrived home late that night.

In the kitchen, the telephone answering machine light was blinking.

Almost absentmindedly Chloe pressed ‘Play’.

“Martin, this is Gerald Houseman. I am an Assistant to the Commissioner to the Metropolitan Police. We want to thank you for breaking the case. I am pleased to tell you that the Home Secretary has issued an order stripping this Mr Vladimir Putin of his British Citizenship. As we speak, he and his fellow Russians are about to be put on an aircraft chartered by the Russian Government. That flight is taking him to Moscow where he will be handed over to the Russian Police. We are given to understand that his namesake is eager to interview him. President Putin is currently in Eastern Siberia. It might be that the fake Mr Putin will be staying there for some time to come. Thank you again for your help.”

Chloe pressed replay and the two of them listened to the message again.When it had finished playing the second time, Angela literally dragged Chloe up the stairs. Neither of them was going to get a lot of sleep that night but for Chloe this was going to be very memorable because she was no longer being tormented by her very chequered past.

[The End]

[Authors note]
I started this story in 2003/2004 and was never really satisfied with it and the old ending until I recalled an incident that took place at a bank in Moscow ironically, in a building next to the former KGB HQ. That led me to this ending which I hope is a better way for Angela to get rid of her past once and for all.
Samantha