The Pretender's Gold Read online

  THE PRETENDER’S GOLD

  Scott Mariani

  Copyright

  Published by AVON

  A Division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2020

  Copyright © Scott Mariani 2020

  Cover design by Henry Steadman © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2020

  Cover photographs: Stone window © Evelina Kremsdorf / Arcangel Images; Figure © Mark Owen / Trevillion Images; Landscape © Shutterstock.com

  Scott Mariani asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Source ISBN: 9780008236014

  Ebook Edition © May 2020 ISBN: 9780008236021

  Version: 2020-04-08

  Discover the series you can’t put down …

  ‘If you like your conspiracies twisty, your action bone-jarring, and your heroes impossibly dashing, then look no farther – the Ben Hope series is exactly what you need’

  Mark Dawson

  ‘Deadly conspiracies, bone-crunching action and a tormented hero with a heart … Scott Mariani packs a real punch’

  Andy McDermott

  ‘James Bond meets Jason Bourne meets The Da Vinci Code’

  J. L. Carrell

  ‘Non-stop action – this book delivers’

  Steve Berry

  ‘Full of authentic detail and heart-stopping action – a real thrill ride’

  Ed Macy

  ‘Scott Mariani is an awesome writer’

  Chris Kuzneski

  ‘Packed with dark intrigue, danger around every corner, bullets flying, sexual tension, and an endless assault of nasty villains … everything a thriller should be and more’

  Joe Moore

  ‘If you’ve got a pulse, you’ll love Scott Mariani; if you haven’t, then maybe you crossed Ben Hope’

  Simon Toyne

  ‘The action comes thick and fast and is choreographed with Mariani’s trademark skill and authenticity. The modern master of mayhem’

  Shots Magazine

  ‘Fans of Dan Brown will love this’

  Closer

  ‘Edge-of-the-seat excitement … I am hooked on this series’

  5* Reader Review

  ‘Gripping adventure, superbly written’

  5* Reader Review

  ‘Cinematic style, fast pace and, above all, fabulous characters’

  5* Reader Review

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Praise

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Epilogue

  Keep Reading …

  About the Author

  By the same author

  About the Publisher

  PROLOGUE

  Loch Ardaich

  Scottish Highlands

  ‘Can you believe this crap?’ Ross Campbell muttered to himself as he stared through his rainy van windscreen at the narrow rural road ahead, winding onward for endless miles into the murk. The December cold and rain were showing absolutely no sign of letting up, and he had the prospect of a good soaking to look forward to when he reached his remote destination.

  What a bummer. What a drag. Of course, this job would have to land on him on the dreichest, dreariest and most depressing day imaginable. Today of all days, marking exactly twelve months since Katrina had left him to run off with that rich bastard cosmetic dentist from Inverness.

  Ross strongly felt that he should instead be slouched in his armchair at home, nursing his smouldering resentment in front of the TV with a few bottles of Broughton’s Old Jock at his elbow. Yes, he was still feeling sorry for himself. Yes, he was taking it badly and allowing his chronic anger to get the better of him. And anyone who had a problem with that better keep their opinion to themselves. Got that, pal?

  But however Ross felt he should be spending this miserable winter’s afternoon, his duties as partner in the firm of McCulloch & Campbell, Chartered Building Surveyors, obliged him to be here. His task: to scout and assess the western perimeter of the development site within the Loch Ardaich pine forest, right out in the sticks thirty miles north of Fort William. Like it hadn’t already been scouted and assessed a dozen times already, but what was the point of complaining?

  The closer he got to his destination, the more aggressively the rain lashed his windscreen. The road narrowed to a single-track lane in places as it followed an endless series of S-bends along the forested shores of Loch Ardaich. The heather-covered hills rose high all around, their tops shrouded in mist and cloud. Now and then he passed a lonely cottage or the deserted ruins of an old stone bothy. On a clear day you could sometimes spot an osprey circling over the waters of the loch, or even an eagle; and it wasn’t uncommon for a red deer to suddenly burst from cover and leap across the road right in the path of oncoming traffic, scaring the wits out of the inattentive motorist. Ross had lived here all his life, though, and for him the scenery and fauna of the remote western Highlands that drew thousands of visitors each year from all around the world held little wonder or fascination.

 
At last, the wire-mesh fence and main gates of the development site appeared ahead. The adverse weather conditions had kept most of the protesters away, but the diehards were still grimly hanging on. Ross gave a groan as he saw the small crowd huddled in their rain gear by the gates, ready to wave their sodden banners and scream abuse at any vehicles entering or leaving the fenced-off construction zone. Ross would have bet money that Geoffrey Watkins was among them. Come up all the way from England to stir up as much trouble as he could, Watkins was the most militant of the lot.

  Ross personally didn’t have a lot of time for the environmental nutters in general, though he had to admit they might have a point on this occasion. It had certainly been one of the more contentious projects his firm had been involved in, and he’d often wished that his senior partner, Ewan, hadn’t agreed to take it on. The plans for Highland Manor, an eighteen-hole championship golf course and gated community estate with million-pound homes for wealthy retirees, had attracted no small amount of anger from locals. Two hundred acres of ancient pine forest had been earmarked for destruction under the scheme, sparking furious resistance and attempted legal action by one of the larger and more organised ecowarrior groups. The environmentalists had lost their legal case in court months ago, but in spite of the ruling against them were still gamely doing all they could to disrupt the development. Their methods had been creative enough to cause protracted and extremely expensive delays. The company who’d initially landed the contract had been brought to a virtual standstill by the legion of protesters who had invaded the site, chained themselves to trees, lain in the path of bulldozers, harangued the foresters and generally made it impossible to get the excavations underway. When the company had built a scale-proof fence worthy of a prison compound and brought in security personnel to eject the protesters, the ecowarriors had simply sharpened up their game by sabotaging construction vehicles, slashing tyres and setting an awful lot of valuable machinery ablaze, until in the end the company execs had been forced to cut their losses and give up.

  Three more construction firms were now in competition to decide which lucky crew would take their place. All the while, persistent rumours abounded of a lot of dirty money changing hands and palms being greased for the project to be greenlit. If you believed the gossip, certain local officials were going to do well out of the deal – if and when it actually got completed. The situation was a mess.

  Ross was driving his company van, a little white Peugeot Bipper with the chartered surveyor firm’s logo proudly emblazoned on its side, a magnet for trouble. Not much wanting his vehicle to be attacked and pelted with missiles, he slipped away from the main gates and detoured around the site’s western perimeter to a small side entrance the protesters had, mercifully, chosen to leave unguarded today. He parked the van and listened to the rain pounding the roof. The ground was turning to slush out there, appalling even by the normal standards of a Scottish winter. Beyond the fence stood the thick, dark forest, ancient and forbidding. Local folklore held spooky old tales of bogles and sluaghs and other evil spirits and hobgoblins that lurked in the woods, preying on the hapless. What a load of shite, Ross thought, but he still didn’t much fancy having to venture inside.

  He changed into his wellies and tugged on his raincoat before getting out of the van, then took the plunge. Moments later, he’d undone the padlock holding the side gate and let himself through the fence, closing it behind him before setting off at a trudge towards the trees.

  The forest was very dense and hard to walk through, and Ross was certainly no hardened outdoorsman. He tripped and stumbled his way for nearly quarter of a mile using a GPS navigation device to orient him towards the western boundary. Without the GPS he’d soon have been hopelessly lost, probably doomed to wander for ever. Overhead the tall trees swayed in the wind and their branches clacked and clashed like the antlers of fighting stags in the rutting season. Deep, deep in the forest he swore out loud – who the hell could hear him, anyway – as he had to clamber over a slippery, moss-covered fallen trunk that blocked his path with no other way around except through a mass of brambles that would have stopped a tank. He cursed even more vehemently a few metres further on, when he was forced to negotiate a steep downward slope where part of the ground had been washed away by floods of rain, exposing tree roots and a great deal of rotted and richly odorous vegetable matter.

  Damn and blast. Why’d this have to happen to me? At least, if it was any consolation, the rain had stopped.

  He was halfway down the slippery incline when he lost his footing. He windmilled his arms to try to regain his balance, to no avail. Next thing he was tumbling and slithering through the gloopy mud, desperately grasping at roots in an attempt to halt his descent but unable to stop himself until he’d rolled and somersaulted all the way to the claggy, squelchy bottom.

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ he yelled as he managed to sit upright, caked from head to toe in wet, cloying, dripping, freezing cold filth that dripped from his fingers and matted his hair. ‘I don’t bloody believe it!’ Followed by a stream of much more profane invective.

  But then his words abruptly died in his mouth as a very strange and unexpected sight caught his eye.

  He reached out and raked in the dirt to uncover the rest of the shiny, glinting object whose corner was peeking up at him from the ground next to him. Something hard and small and thin and round, which he picked up and held up to look at more closely. As he wiped dirt off it, a stray beam of sunlight penetrated through the pine canopy above. It reflected off the object in his fingers, and it was as though someone had shone a golden light in his face. He gasped in astonishment.

  Then, moments later, he was finding more gold coins in the mud. Dirty, but perfect and beautiful. Six, seven, eight, nine, ten of them. The torrential rain flood that had washed away part of the bank must have disturbed them from their hiding place. How long had they lain undiscovered in this remote and little-travelled neck of the woods?

  Suddenly, Ross Campbell’s unlucky tumble and getting clarted up to his oxters in muck had become the best thing that had ever happened to him. As fast as he could stuff the coins into his coat and trouser pockets, more kept appearing all around. Within minutes he’d collected dozens of them. It was so incredible he was laughing and hooting to himself like a kid. When he’d loaded all he could carry into his pockets he struggled back up the slippery bank with his booty, vowing he’d return to dig up the hundreds more he was certain lay buried there.

  The journey back to the van seemed to take him about half the time. He was so dazed and ecstatic that he barely noticed the brambles and treacherous terrain, and didn’t think for a single moment about his filthy, wet clothes or the fact that under them he was soaked to the bone. Reaching the van, he piled into the driver’s seat and dug some of the coins from his pocket to re-examine more closely. They were old, really old. He was no expert, but he was certain they must be worth a ton of money. A bloody fortune, lying there in the mud for hundreds of years, just waiting for him to come and find it.

  Ross could hardly contain himself. The day’s task was almost completely forgotten. He’d just tell his business partner Ewan that the weather was too awful to get the job done, and promise to return as soon as possible. He had the exact location marked on his GPS device.

  In the meantime, he needed to get home as fast as he could. A hot shower and a cup of tea, before he caught his death. Then he’d spend the rest of the afternoon, and probably the evening, cleaning up, counting and re-counting his glorious loot. What might the coins be worth? Hundreds of pounds each? Thousands? The numbers escalated in his head until it made him dizzy. Fantasies were already forming. He could picture himself quitting his job, for a start, then getting out of this godforsaken shithole and making a bee-line for somewhere with warm sandy beaches, palm trees and beautiful bikini-clad girls, maybe never to return. Fuck Katrina and her dentist! He’d show them.

  He’d need to get the coins independently valued, of course. The intern
et would only tell him so much. But it would have to be discreet. And preferably done by an expert in another part of the UK, maybe in Edinburgh or London. Someone who’d never be told the precise location of the discovery. Nor would anyone else, certainly nobody local. As it seemed that he alone knew about this, he meant to keep it that way. The last thing Ross wanted was for others to come searching. And with the Loch Ardaich development project so conveniently put on hold, he’d have plenty of opportunity to come back here as often as he liked to hunt for more treasure.

  With a trembling hand Ross started up the van engine, then took off in a rush. He couldn’t wait to get home. This was, beyond a shadow of a doubt, the most wonderful and exciting day of his entire life.

  It would also prove to be one of the last. He didn’t know it yet, but he would never live to see his fantasies come true. Nor did he have any idea of the chain of events his strange discovery was about to set in motion.

  If Ross Campbell had not found the gold coins that had lain hidden all this time in the forest, people would not have been hurt or killed. None of the things that were about to happen would have taken place. And the men who were soon to be drawn into the web of danger would not have become involved.

  One man in particular. A man Ross Campbell would never meet.

  A man called Ben Hope.

  But Ross Campbell had found them, and now the storm was coming.

  Chapter 1

  Eleven days later, the clouds were gone and the sky was bright and blue. But none of the assembly who had gathered at the cemetery in the village of Kinlochardaich to watch the interment of the coffin was smiling.

  What an unspeakable tragedy. Ross Campbell had been a much-loved member of the community, even if he had been going through some personal ups and downs in the last year and not always the cheerful and carefree soul he’d once been. It was hard to keep secrets in this close-knit community, and everyone knew that his former long-term girlfriend, Katrina Wilson, was now living with someone else in Inverness. Then again, those who had spoken to Ross in the few days leading up to his untimely death reported that his mood had radically improved all of a sudden. For reasons that remained unclear he’d seemed strangely happy, even jubilant, as though he’d finally broken free of the emotional troubles that had plagued him since his relationship breakup. It seemed so ironic that, just as his life appeared to have turned a corner, he should fall victim to such an awful accident.