Page 41 of The New Girl

Kensington, London

There are some men who walk a straight path to redemption and others, like Christopher Keller, who take the long road. He lived in a luxury maisonette in Queen’s Gate Terrace in Kensington. Its many rooms were largely empty of furnishings or decoration, evidence that his affair with Olivia Watson, a former fashion model who owned a successful modern art gallery in St. James’s, had ended. Olivia’s past was almost as complicated as Keller’s. Gabriel was the one common denominator.

“You didn’t do something foolish, did you?”

“Let me count the ways.” Keller smiled in spite of himself. He had bright blue eyes, sun-bleached hair, and a thick chin with a notch in the center. His mouth seemed permanently fixed in an ironic smile.

“What happened?”

“Olivia happened.”

“Meaning?”

“In case you haven’t noticed, she’s become quite the star of the London art world. Lots of glamorous photos in the papers. Lots of speculation about her mysterious love life. It got to the point where I couldn’t go out in public with her anymore.”

“Which understandably caused tension in your relationship.”

“Olivia isn’t exactly the stay-at-home type.”

“Neither are you, Christopher.”

A veteran of the elite Special Air Service, Keller had served under deep cover in Northern Ireland and fought in the first Gulf War. He had also performed services for a certain notable Corsican crime figure that might loosely be described as murder for hire. But all that was behind him. Thanks to Gabriel, Christopher Keller was a respectable officer of Her Majesty’s Secret Intelligence Service. He was restored.

He filled the electric teakettle with bottled water and flipped the power switch. The kitchen was on the ground floor of the old Georgian house. It looked like something from a design magazine. The granite counters were vast and tastefully lit, the gas stove was a Vulcan, the refrigerator was a stainless-steel Sub-Zero, and the island where Gabriel sat atop a tall stool had a sink and wine cooler. Through the windows he glimpsed the lower legs of pedestrians rushing along the pavement through the rain. It was only half past three but nearly dark. Gabriel had endured many English winters—he had once lived in a cottage by the sea in far West Cornwall—but rainy December afternoons in London always depressed him.

Keller opened a cabinet and reached for a box of Twinings—with his left arm, noted Gabriel, not his right.

“How is it?”

Keller placed a hand on his right clavicle. “That bullet did more damage than I thought. It’s taken a long time to heal.”

“That’s what happens when we get old.”

“You obviously speak from experience. Frankly, it’s all rather embarrassing. It seems I’m the only officer in MI6 history to have been shot by a colleague.”

“Rebecca wasn’t a colleague, she was a full colonel in the SVR. She told me she never thought of herself as an MI6 officer. She was a straight agent of penetration.”

“Just like her father.” Keller took down the box of tea and closed the cabinet without a sound. “I was beginning to think I was never going to see you again, not after the way things ended in Washington. Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised when Graham gave me permission to renew our friendship.”

“How much did he tell you?”

“Only that you’ve got yourself mixed up with Prince Chop Chop.”

“He’s a valuable asset in a troubled region.”

“Spoken like a true espiocrat. Once upon a time, you wouldn’t have soiled your hands with someone like him.”

“Did Graham tell you there was a child involved?”

Keller nodded. “He said you had a photo you wanted me to take a look at.”

Gabriel laid it on the countertop. A man sitting in a café, a woman at the next table.

“Where was it taken?”

Gabriel answered.

“Annecy? I remember it fondly.”