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CHAPTER THREE

Laura made tea while Sarah Cole sat miserably in her office clutching the Hakimi file to her chest and picking nervously at a corner of it. Sarah’s dark hair was greasy and her eyes were tired and puffy. She put the file down on her lap, took a Hobnob from the packet in front of her and nibbled at it.

‘Oh my God, it’s such a mess!’ she said.

Laura set two mugs of tea down on the desk and pulled round a chair so she could sit next to Sarah.

‘Don’t worry; I’m sure it can be sorted out.’

Sarah shook her head. ‘There’s no way. Have a look; you’ll see what I mean.’ She handed the file to Laura and took one of the mugs. Her lower lip trembled and she put it back on the desk.

‘The thing is, it’s not my fault. She should have told me,’ Sarah said defiantly, screwing her mouth into a scowl.

Laura opened the file and began to read and Sarah hoped that with all her experience and all the successful cases she had under her belt, Laura just might be able to come up with a solution. She picked up the mug again, dunked the biscuit, and watched as a lump of it broke off and disappeared under the surface of the tea. That was just typical, she thought, of her luck and her life these days.

Her eyes went to the photo on Laura’s desk. A summer’s day somewhere on the South Downs with Laura standing beside a horse, her husband Joe next to her, his arm around her waist. Joe looked outrageously gorgeous with his bright blue eyes and the cleft in his chin. It was a picture that made her wince and hate the world for being so unfair. Sarah’s long-term partner, Andrew, had left her eighteen months ago and moved in with one of her best friends.

Laura remembered the Hakimi case because Sarah had asked her about it at the beginning. It was a situation she had dealt with several times before and she’d been happy to advise how to handle it. That advice had been fine; the mistake had come later, with an awful result.

‘The boy is in Tunisia!’ she exclaimed in dismay before she could stop herself.

‘I know. It’s hopeless, isn’t it? We’ll never get him back from there.’

‘It makes it a bit tricky but not impossible,’ Laura replied with a supportive smile, and carried on reading. Sarah took another Hobnob from the packet. She had put on two stone since Andrew left.

It was a wretched story. When Mary Hakimi, née Walters, had left her Tunisian husband she knew very well there was a chance he might abduct their ten-year-old son, Ahmed, and take him to Tunis. She had done all she could to prevent it, even waiting patiently in her car outside her husband’s house while Ahmed was visiting his father. More than a year ago, she’d come to Morrison Kemp solicitors for help, and Sarah had got a court order stopping Mr Hakimi obtaining a passport for the boy.

Last Friday, Ahmed had met his father after school and disappeared. Mary Hakimi had been frantic and had called the police but, she thought, at least they can’t have left the country. She rang Sarah who assured her that was the case and that the boy would be traced.

And then yesterday, Mrs Hakimi found out Ahmed was in Tunisia. She had rung the Passport Agency and discovered that a passport for him had been issued to her husband the previous month.

‘No,’ she had sobbed down the phone, ‘no, no, please, that can’t be right. You’re not allowed to do that. You must have made a mistake.’

There had been a mistake but it wasn’t the Passport Agency’s, it was Sarah Cole’s. When the twelve-month court order expired, Sarah had forgotten to ask for it to be renewed. The only protection Mrs Hakimi had in place against her husband’s threat of abduction had disappeared.

It was the worst possible situation, Laura knew. Tunisia had not signed the Hague Convention on Child Abduction and that made getting Ahmed back extremely difficult. If he’d been taken to a country which had signed, there was a fairly straightforward process to follow because those countries were required to order his return to the place where he usually lived, in this case England, and an English court would then decide the matter.

But those rules didn’t apply in Tunisia. Mary Hakimi’s only option would be to start custody proceedings in the Tunisian courts under Tunisian law. It would have different priorities and traditions, she would not be on the scene, she would have to communicate with her lawyers from a distance, probably the proceedings would be lengthy and expensive with every chance of failure.

Sarah brushed biscuit crumbs from her black skirt, got up from her chair and walked over to the window. Laura’s office was on the first floor and Sarah looked down onto Black Lion Street, a busy road in the heart of Brighton’s Lanes – the old town full of narrow passages housing shops, restaurants and bars. A strong wind was blowing off the sea, buffeting shoppers and office workers taking an early lunch hour. Sarah watched them, twisting her hands in agitation.

‘She’s coming in soon. Will you see her for me?’

‘Who’s coming in?’ Laura glanced up from the file with a sinking heart. Sarah turned back from the window with a pleading, hunted look in her eyes.

‘Mary Hakimi. I can’t face her. Not today.’

Laura sighed heavily. Her head was throbbing and she felt exhausted. She hadn’t slept much last night. She’d told the police what little she could about the lunatic who’d tried to kill her. They’d written it down, asked a lot of questions which she couldn’t answer and then got out a breathalyser. She’d been outraged, though heaven knows why – she was a solicitor after all and knew the form. Joe had made a big fuss, stomped around, but she’d still had to take the test. She was under the limit, luckily, despite the two glasses of wine she’d drunk earlier with Sarah. When they got home, Joe made her some food, cleaned her wound, cheered her up, but all night long that terrifying chase had played in her head.

‘When will she be here?’

‘One o’clock. I’d be soooo grateful.’

It flitted through Laura’s mind to make an excuse and say she had a lunch appointment. The last thing she felt like today was getting caught up in this. But then she thought of Mrs Hakimi desperate to get her son back and Sarah unable to help and determined not to be blamed.

‘All right, I’ll see her,’ Laura said. She closed the file, put it on the desk and wondered what on earth she could say to Mrs Hakimi. ‘Sorry, we made a mistake, sorry we ruined your life,’ was all that came into her mind.

Sarah blew out her cheeks in relief and flopped down again in the chair. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad after all, maybe she would get away without too much damage. If she didn’t have to see Mary Hakimi face to face, there was no danger she would admit anything or dig herself a bigger hole. She reached for a biscuit, then frowned at the packet and took her hand away. If she did get away with it, she would pull herself together. There would be no more errors and no more Hobnobs.

She slipped into default mode and started talking about Andrew. He wouldn’t be able to stand living with Mollie for much longer and then he’d come running back to her but she’d tell him to eff off, to start with anyway. Sarah was like a broken record on the subject and Laura knew better than to point out that eighteen months had gone by with no sign of the great man’s return and maybe she should move on.

‘When you first got the court order, did you tell Mary Hakimi she needed to remind you when it was running out?’ Laura asked without much hope.

‘No.’ Sarah looked at the floor then said quietly, ‘no one told me I had to.’

Laura ignored the implication that someone, Laura presumably, should have told her. She was a little hurt that Sarah should try to spread the blame but then Sarah was upset.

‘What about a note in the diary to say when the court order ran out?’ she asked.

It was all basic stuff drummed into trainees from Day One. If you got a court order you had to tell the client, in writing, that they were responsible for letting you know if and when it needed renewing. You needed to put everything in the diary so there was a clear reminder of what needed doing and when. It was routine procedure and part of that most sacred of legal traditions called ‘covering your back’.

Sarah crossed her arms defensively and said nothing.

Laura was not surprised Sarah had forgotten. It was soon after Andrew had left her and she had been close to a total breakdown. In another job, with a more sympathetic boss, she could have taken time off sick. As it was, she had battled on, but only just.

There had been other mistakes which Laura had sorted out. She wanted to help with this one, not just because she felt sorry for Sarah, but because she liked her. They had the same sense of humour and were allies in the vicious swirl of office politics. The problem was that this mistake was much more serious than any of the others had been, and much more difficult to put right.

‘What about Marcus? Does he know yet?’

‘God, no,’ Sarah said, horrified. ‘I was hoping he might not find out.’

Sarah was in a bad way if she could delude herself that an error like this would escape the attention of the firm’s senior partner. Surely the victim – Laura corrected herself – the client, would have been onto him already. If not, she certainly would be if she didn’t get satisfaction from this afternoon’s meeting.

Laura imagined what Marcus Morrison would say. She ought to tell him, she knew, before Mrs Hakimi arrived. She could hear the low angry hiss of his voice. He always hissed when he was annoyed or disgusted, one reason his colleagues had nicknamed him ‘the snake’. The other reason was his slipperiness. He never admitted to anything, never took any blame. He would have no sympathy whatsoever. This was the sort of mistake he would never have made and would never understand.

She tried to think what Morrison would do. What slippery manoeuvre would he come up with to get out of trouble, but nothing occurred to her. Sarah had been careless and there had been a terrible consequence. That was the truth of it. The only real solution was to somehow get the boy back.

Never apologize, never explain. Rule number one. They should have it inscribed over the entrance to Morrison Kemp, Laura thought. But she had to give Mrs Hakimi some explanation. Otherwise it was what it was – negligence – and Marcus Morrison would not tolerate that.

‘I suppose I may have mentioned it to her,’ Sarah said abruptly, ‘when the order was first granted, you know, sort of in passing.’

‘In passing?’

‘All right. I’m sure I told her. I remember now. I said it to her quite clearly, don’t forget you have to tell me if you need this renewed. OK? Is that OK, Laura?’

It wasn’t OK. Not at all. Sarah was lying and Laura knew she was lying, and in any case, it had to be in writing.

Without warning, the door to the office opened and Morrison appeared. He glided across to Laura’s desk and stood beside it, polished shoes neatly together. He had no intention of sitting down, it was easier to intimidate from above. He looked at them seated in front of him and frowned.

Morrison always made Laura uncomfortable, even at the best of times. She felt like he was constantly judging her and finding her wanting, that he thought she was rather lightweight. She tried hard to suppress the feeling because she suspected it was what he wanted her to feel and that his condescending manner was designed to get that very result. She had no reason to feel that way; she’d done a lot more in her career than Morrison ever had, but knowing that didn’t seem to make any difference. Worst of all, she sometimes tried to impress him and that made her furious with herself.

Laura knew she looked younger than her thirty-four years. She had large, hazel eyes and smooth, youthful skin. To give herself gravitas, she wore her glossy black hair tied back in a utilitarian knot, and on occasion – and this was just such an occasion – she put on a pair of heavy spectacles she didn’t really need. Joe teased her about it and he was right to do so because it was pathetic, really it was, and what good did it do anyway? Whenever she met Morrison she still felt like an errant schoolgirl instead of the competent, experienced solicitor that she was.

Morrison saw the Hakimi file on her desk, pulled it casually towards him and tapped it lightly with his index finger. His small, calculating eyes fixed on her like a pair of pincers.

‘We have a problem,’ he hissed, ‘why wasn’t I told?’

There was something chilling about him, Laura thought. A quiet malevolence. She would have felt a whole lot happier if he’d shouted.

‘You mean Mrs Hakimi?’

‘I mean Mrs Hakimi. Tell me.’

His voice was almost a whisper, his eyebrows raised in interrogation. The little steel-grey eyes glinted behind his spectacles.

He must have known the story anyway, at least some of it, otherwise he wouldn’t be here. But she guessed he wanted to hear her tell it, wanted to put her on the spot.

She began, wondering how she was going to avoid dropping Sarah in it without appearing evasive and obstructive. She knew how ruthless Morrison was and she didn’t want to fall out with him. He was powerful, well connected and with a word or two, here and there, he could blight her career for ever.

She came to the tricky bit. Out of the corner of her eye she caught sight of that pleading look on Sarah’s face.

‘ … so you see the order wasn’t renewed because we were never told to renew it.’

‘And Mrs Hakimi knew she had to tell us, did she?’

Laura squirmed. ‘I believe so,’ she said, wishing immediately that she hadn’t used the phrase. It was what lawyers always said when they wanted to avoid a question.

‘You believe so. I think you’d better know so.’

‘Yes. So do I,’ she said, stupidly.

Morrison’s long, angular face leaned towards her. He reminded her of a bird of prey; a hawk, maybe, or more likely, a vulture.

‘You see I’ve had her brother on the phone and he claims that no one ever warned his sister that she had to notify us.’

Laura was silent. She hoped Sarah might help her out, but Sarah had been struck dumb.

‘You won’t be surprised to hear that he was extremely angry. Of course, I know we’d never be stupid enough to forget to warn her so I was able to inform him quite firmly that his sister must be mistaken.’ Morrison paused then very softly said, ‘I presume we have it in writing.’

Laura bit her lip and said, ‘Apparently it was more a sort of verbal warning.’

For the first time, Morrison addressed Sarah.

‘Would you mind leaving us for a moment.’

Sarah hesitated, torn between relief at the chance to escape Morrison’s grilling and fear about what might be said about her when she’d gone. He waited, silent, glaring at her, until she got up and left the room.

‘I’m sorry, Laura, you misunderstand,’ he said when they were alone. ‘That wasn’t a question. I wasn’t asking you if we had it in writing, I was telling you we had it in writing. Have I made myself clear?’

She felt alarm but not much surprise. He expected her to tell Mrs Hakimi that she’d been sent a letter setting out her responsibilities at the time the court order was first granted; he expected her, if necessary, to forge a copy of such a document and he expected her to say to Mrs Hakimi that what had happened was nobody’s fault but her own.

‘Yes, perfectly clear.’

‘Good.’ He waited a moment then said carelessly, ‘I want you to fire Sarah asap.’

This time Laura was shocked. ‘I can’t do that, Marcus,’ she protested. ‘I mean, why would I?’

‘Come on, we both know the answer to that. She is responsible for this fiasco. You’re a senior lawyer here and you know what’s happened, so there we are – get rid of her. This afternoon, I suggest.’

‘But that’s just not fair,’ she burst out. ‘You must see that, after all—’

The look on his face stopped her mid-sentence. More calmly she said, ‘Surely a written warning would be enough. She’s been going through a difficult time in her personal life and—’

‘Spare me the violins, please,’ Morrison interrupted, his mouth a thin line under his hawk nose.

‘It seems very harsh to fire her,’ Laura persisted. ‘Can’t we at least wait and see if this thing can be sorted out?’

‘You disappoint me, Laura. Seriously disappoint me. I thought you were ambitious, wanted to get on, wanted a partnership here. Isn’t that so?’

‘Yes, of course I do. Absolutely, it’s just that … ’

‘Then fire her. It’s not nice, I know, but it has to be done. She’s made a bad mistake, the sort of thing that could mean a large and embarrassing negligence claim if we don’t, ah, sort it out. You see that, don’t you?

‘Yes.’

‘You’ll have to toughen up a bit if you want to succeed in this firm.’

The schoolgirl had been suitably chastised. He started to move away then stopped.

‘Hurt yourself, have you?’ He was staring at the cut on her eyebrow. She’d hoped the thick spectacles would hide it but very little got past Morrison.

‘Oh, that.’ She attempted a laugh. ‘Just an accident.’

‘I hope it’s not too painful,’ he hissed.

Her body tensed. For one horrible moment she thought he might reach out and put his arm around her shoulders. But he didn’t. He wasn’t that sort of person. She relaxed – just a little.

Ten minutes later the phone on her desk rang. Mrs Hakimi, and her brother, had arrived in reception.