Legitimate intelligence agencies didn’t recruit random civilians for things like this, although Kaden understood why Alistair had picked him. He had the legitimacy of being a relatively well-known freelance journalist, but he didn’t feel comfortable doing this. Danny was a lawyer. Maybe Kaden needed to ask his advice. He checked the time. Just after midnight.Oh well.He fired off a text.Are you awake?
A moment later, the reply came.
Am now. What’s up?
Need to talk. Important. Call you in ten.
Kaden quickly dressed and slipped out of the house. He walked with a sense of purpose, as if he had a destination in mind, and kept an eye out in case anyone was following. Even feeling the need to do that made him anxious. But the streets were deserted and once he was around the corner, he took out his phone.
“Hi,” Danny said. “What’s up?”
“Lawyer-client privilege, okay?”
“Okay.”
“I need your advice.” Kaden kept his voice low. “I’ve been asked to do a day-in-the-life article about a government minister. I’ll tell you his name but you need to keep it quiet. I’m probably breaking the OSA by doing this but I need help.” He checked his surroundings again before he spoke again. “Eli Blake.”
“Finance minister. And?”
“The person who’s asked me to interview him works for maybe MI5 or MI6. Possibly neither. He wants me to leave a listening device in the guy’s office or home depending on where I do the interview.”
“Shhhhit. That’s not just unethical. It’s serious criminal territory. You could be charged, lose your career, even end up in prison.”
Kaden pressed his free hand against his forehead. “I figured as much.” He sighed. “Thing is, I don’t think the guy who’s asked me to do it is a foreign agent. I’ve written a book with him. He’s as English as they come.”
“Er… Kim Philby? Guy Burgess? Anthony Blunt? Ring any bells?”
Yes, those names rang bells. Members of the Cambridge Five, a ring of Soviet spies recruited at Cambridge University in the 1930s who passed thousands of classified documents to the Soviet Union.
“He’s made a good case for why he needs me to do this.”
“I’m sure he has. You want my advice. Don’t.”
“He’s offered to help Joe get the right to stay in the UK if I do and threatened that might not happen if I say no.”
“Christ, Kaden!” Danny let out a long breath on the other end of the line. “That’s coercion. If this guy is who he says he is, he’sabusing his position. If he isn’t, then you’re being manipulated by someone even more dangerous. What’s his name?”
Kaden glanced over his shoulder, instinctively checking the empty road again. “Alistair Bridger. So your advice is don’t do it?”
“My advice is absolutely don’t do it,” Danny said firmly. “You walk away. You document everything. And if you’re smart, you never speak to this man again without legal protection.”
Kaden was quiet for a moment. The cold night air bit through his jacket, and he shivered. “Can you look into both guys? Carefully. See if there’s a hint of anything bad? I’ve googled but that didn’t tell me anything.”
“I don’t know if I can find out more than you can, but I’ll try. Did he tell you what Blake is suspected of?”
“No. He just said it was something bad.”
“Hmm.”
“What if walking away isn’t an option?”
Danny didn’t answer immediately this time. When he did, his voice was lower. “Then you need to understand something very clearly. If you go through with it, you’re on your own. No court is going to look kindly on ‘I was pressured’ as a defence when you knowingly plant a bug in a government minister’s office.”
“I know.”
“And if this ties back to national security, this could get ugly, very fast.”
Another silence lengthened between them.
