Private Delhi Read online

  Contents

  About the Book

  About the Authors

  Also by James Patterson

  Title Page

  Part One: Killer

  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

  Part Two: Deliverer

  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

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Part Three: Martyr

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  Chapter 86

  Chapter 87

  Chapter 88

  Chapter 89

  Chapter 90

  Chapter 91

  Chapter 92

  Chapter 93

  Chapter 94

  Chapter 95

  Chapter 96

  Chapter 97

  Chapter 98

  Chapter 99

  Chapter 100

  Chapter 101

  Chapter 102

  Chapter 103

  Chapter 104

  Chapter 105

  Chapter 106

  Chapter 107

  Chapter 108

  Chapter 109

  Chapter 110

  Epilogue

  Chapter 111

  Chapter 112

  Extract from Cross the Line

  Copyright

  About the Book

  A murderer is on the streets. All of India is watching.

  Santosh Wagh quit his job as head of Private India after harrowing events in Mumbai almost got him killed. But Jack Morgan, global head of the world’s finest investigation agency, needs him back. Jack is setting up a new office in Delhi, and Santosh is the only person he can trust.

  Still battling his demons, Santosh accepts, and it’s not long before the agency takes on a case that could make or break them. Plastic barrels containing dissolved human remains have been found in the basement of a house in an upmarket area of South Delhi. But this isn’t just any house, this property belongs to the state government.

  With the crime scene in lockdown and information suppressed by the authorities, delving too deep could make Santosh a target to be eliminated.

  About the Authors

  JAMES PATTERSON is one of the best-known and biggest-selling writers of all time. His books have sold in excess of 325 million copies worldwide and he has been the most borrowed author in UK libraries for the past nine years in a row. He is the author of some of the most popular series of the past two decades – the Alex Cross, Women’s Murder Club, Detective Michael Bennett and Private novels – and he has written many other number one bestsellers including romance novels and stand-alone thrillers.

  James is passionate about encouraging children to read. Inspired by his own son who was a reluctant reader, he also writes a range of books for young readers including the Middle School, I Funny, Treasure Hunters, House of Robots, Confessions and Maximum Ride series. James is the proud sponsor of the World Book Day Award and has donated millions in grants to independent bookshops. He lives in Florida with his wife and son.

  Find out more at www.jamespatterson.co.uk

  ASHWIN SANGHI is counted among India’s highest-selling English fiction authors. He has written four bestselling novels – The Rozabal Line, Chanakya’s Chant, The Krishna Key and The Sialkot Saga – and co-authored the No. 1 bestseller Private India with James Patterson. Ashwin lives in India with his wife and son.

  Also by James Patterson

  PRIVATE NOVELS

  Private (with Maxine Paetro)

  Private London (with Mark Pearson)

  Private Games (with Mark Sullivan)

  Private: No. 1 Suspect (with Maxine Paetro)

  Private Berlin (with Mark Sullivan)

  Private Down Under (with Michael White)

  Private L.A. (with Mark Sullivan)

  Private India (with Ashwin Sanghi)

  Private Vegas (with Maxine Paetro)

  Private Sydney (with Kathryn Fox)

  Private Paris (with Mark Sullivan)

  The Games (with Mark Sullivan)

  A list of more titles by James Patterson is printed at the back of this book

  PART ONE

  KILLER

  Chapter 1

  THE KILLER EMPTIED the final bag of ice into the bath and shut off the cold tap.

  With the tub full he stood back to admire his handiwork, watching his breath bloom. Winter in Delhi, it was cold, but the temperature in the small bathroom was even lower than outside and falling fast, just the way he wanted it.

  From outside came the sound of footsteps on the stairs and the killer moved quickly. His victim was early but that was fine, he was prepared, and in a heartbeat he left the bathroom and crossed the front room of the apartment, scooping his hypodermic syringe from a table as he passed. A scratching sound announced the key in the lock and the victim opened the door.

  The killer attacked from behind, grabbing the victim, pulling him into the room, and smothering a cry of surprise with one gloved hand. He used the syringe and for a second the victim struggled, then went limp. The killer let him drop to the carpet, checked the corridor outside, and then kicked the door shut. He bent to the victim and began to undress him.

  Ten minutes later the victim awoke, naked and gasping in the bath. The bathroom light was off and his eyes hadn’t yet adjusted to the gloom but he heard the clicking of the ice cubes and knew instantly where he was. His arms had been hoisted overhead, handcuffed to the taps; submerged in the ice, his feet and knees were bound. As he began to struggle he heard someone enter the room and then a gloved hand pushed his head beneath the cubes. He inhaled icy water, feeling his airways fill and his heart constrict with the shock of the sudden cold. When the hand al
lowed him back to the surface, his coughs and splutters were punctuated by the violent chattering of his teeth.

  The figure loomed over him, a shadow in the darkened bathroom. “You’ll feel it in your toes and fingertips first,” he said. “Tingling. Then numbness. That’s your body redirecting resources to protect the vital organs. Clever thing, the body, it can adapt quickly. If you were an Inuit, an Aborigine, even a Tibetan Buddhist monk, then withstanding this kind of cold would be simple for you, but you’re not those things, you’re …”

  The killer moved into view. In his hand was the victim’s name badge, taken from his shirt. “Rahul,” he read, and then tossed it into the bath. “Oh, I do apologize. I’m sure you know all about the effects of cold on the human body. You know all about the slow shutting down of the various functions, how the brain dies before the heart.”

  “Who are you?” managed Rahul. He squinted. “Do I know you?” The attacker’s voice was familiar somehow.

  “I don’t know,” said the attacker. “Do you?” He perched on the edge of the bath and Rahul could see he wore all black, including a black balaclava. Opaque surgical gloves seemed to shine dully in the gloom, giving him the appearance of an evil mime.

  “You’re wondering why I’m here,” said the man, as though reading his thoughts. He smiled and removed from his pocket a tiny little tool that he showed to Rahul. “Are you familiar with a procedure called enucleation?”

  Chapter 2

  JACK MORGAN ENJOYED risk. Why else would he be standing outside this door at 4 a.m., barely daring to breathe as he used a tiny lubricating spray on the lock and then went to work with his pick, nudging interior tumblers into place?

  But not blind risk.

  Again, that was the reason the owner of the world-renowned Private investigation agency had arrived in Delhi two days earlier than his official schedule predicted, and more discreetly than usual. It was because he liked his risk with a little forethought.

  He liked calculated risk.

  He slid into the darkened apartment like a shadow. From his pocket he took a rubber doorstop, closed the front door as far as he could without making a sound, and then wedged it.

  Next he listened. For close to five minutes Jack stood in silence by the door, letting his eyes adjust and taking in the scant furniture—a sofa, a television, an upturned packing crate for a coffee table—but more than anything, listening—listening to the noise that emanated from the bedroom.

  What he heard was the sound of a man enduring a fitful sleep, a man who mewled with the pain of nightmares.

  Jack trod noiselessly through the apartment. In the kitchen he opened the fridge door and peered inside. Nothing. Back in the front room he went to the upturned crate.

  On it stood a bottle of whisky. Johnnie Walker.

  Oh, Santosh, thought Jack to himself. Tell me you haven’t.

  From the bedroom the sound of Santosh Wagh’s nightmares increased, so Jack Morgan finished his work and let himself out of the apartment and into the chill Delhi morning.

  Chapter 3

  IN THE UPMARKET area of Greater Kailash in South Delhi, in a row of homes, a young couple stood at the gate of an abandoned house.

  “This is it,” said the boy, his breath fogging in Delhi’s winter air.

  “Are you sure?” asked the girl at his side.

  “Sure I’m sure,” he replied. “C’mon, let’s go inside.”

  They climbed over the gate easily and made their way through overgrown grass to the front door. Padlocked. But the boy used a pick to crack the lock in less than two minutes. Not bad for an amateur, he thought to himself.

  He went to open the door, but it wouldn’t budge.

  “What’s wrong?” asked the girl. She was shivering and cold and desperately wishing they’d decided to go to the cinema instead of opting to make out here.

  The boy was puzzled. “I thought it was unlocked …”

  “What do we do now, then?’’ said the girl.

  Like all young men governed by their libido, the boy wasn’t about to give up easily. Yes, it was cold, but he’d come armed with a blanket and the garden was sufficiently overgrown to screen them from the street.

  “We don’t need to go inside. Let’s just stay out here,” the boy suggested.

  “But it’s so cold,” she gasped.

  “We’ll soon warm each other up,” he assured her, leading her to an area close to the front of the house. The grass was damp but he covered it with the blanket from his backpack, and the foliage not only screened them but also protected them from the chill breeze. She tried to imagine that they had found themselves a secret garden, and when he produced a spliff, it sealed the deal.

  They sat and spent some minutes in relaxed, agreeable silence as they smoked the spliff, listening to the muted sounds of the city drifting to them through the trees. Then they lay down and began kissing. In a few moments they were making love, cocooned in weed-induced sexual bliss.

  “What’s that?” she said.

  “What’s what?” he asked, irritated.

  “That noise.” Then her senses sharpened. “It’s the ground. The ground is—”

  She didn’t get to finish her sentence. Suddenly it was as though the grass were trying to swallow them. Subsidence. A sinkhole. Something. Either way, the earth gave way beneath them, and the two lovebirds crashed through the lawn and into a nightmare beneath.

  Chapter 4

  DAZED, THE GIRL pulled herself to her hands and knees, coughing and gagging at a sudden stench, a mix of caustic chemicals and something else. Something truly stomach-turning.

  The floor was rough concrete. She was in a low-ceilinged basement. A gray patch of light in the ceiling indicated where they’d fallen through. Plasterboard, turf, and rotted wooden beams hung down as though in the aftermath of a storm.

  And pulling himself up back through the hole was her boyfriend.

  “Hey,” she called. “Where are you …?”

  But he was gone.

  Naked, wincing in pain, and consumed with a creeping sense of something being terribly, terribly wrong, the girl looked around, her eyesight adjusting to the gloom. She saw gas masks and coveralls hanging from pegs. A small chainsaw. Dotted around the concrete floor was a series of plastic barrels with some kind of toxic chemical fumes rising from each one. And even in her traumatized state she realized it was those fumes that had eroded the ceiling structure enough for it to collapse.

  And then she saw other things too. They seemed to appear out of the darkness. A table, like a butcher’s block, with a huge meat cleaver protruding from the bloodstained wood. And from the plastic barrels protruded hands and feet, the skin bubbling and burning as though being subjected to great heat.

  Bile rising, she knew what was happening here. She knew exactly what was happening here.

  Chapter 5

  A CHARNEL HOUSE, thought the Commissioner of Police, Rajesh Sharma, when he returned to the office the next day, with the stink of chemicals and decomposition clinging to him. Rarely had he been quite so grateful to leave a crime scene. Those poor bastards who’d had to stay.

  The call had come in at around eleven o’clock the night before. A neighbor had heard screaming, looked out, and seen a terrified young woman, her clothes in disarray, running away from the house.

  A short while later it was sealed off. The team had been inside for eight hours and would be there for many more days. They had determined the perp was using hydrofluoric acid to dissolve the bodies in plastic tubs. There was no way of counting how many, but say one for each barrel, that made eleven at least. Quite a death toll. What’s more, it didn’t take into account any corpses that might already have been disposed of.

  But here was the bit that had really taken Sharma by surprise: the house was owned by the Delhi state government.

  Mass murder. On government property. He would have to ensure the press did not get hold of this story; in fact, he’d have to make sure the news reached as few ear
s as possible.

  Sharma had washed his hands. He’d rubbed at his face. But he could still smell the corpses as he sat behind his desk at police headquarters and greeted his guest.

  The man who took a seat opposite was Nikhil Kumar, the Honorable Minister for Health and Family Welfare. Photoshoot-perfect, not a strand of jet-black hair out of place, Kumar wore simple khaki slacks, an Egyptian cotton shirt, a Canali blazer, and comfortable soft-leather loafers. His very presence made Sharma feel overweight and scruffy by comparison. Well, let’s face it, he was overweight and scruffy. But Kumar made him feel even more so.

  “What can I do for you, sir?” Sharma asked the minister. It paid to be courteous to ministers.

  “Thank you for seeing me at such short notice,” said Kumar.

  “I’m happy to help. What’s on your mind?”

  “I am given to understand that your men searched a house in Greater Kailash today. I was wondering if you could share some information regarding what you found.”

  Sharma tried not to let his irritation show as he considered his response. On the one hand he wanted to keep Kumar sweet; on the other, experience had taught him that it was always better to keep politicians out of police inquiries.

  “How about you tell me what your interest in this matter is?” he said. “And how you found out about it?”

  “As I’m sure you’re about to remind me, I have no jurisdiction with the police. You and I stand on the battlements of two opposing forts in the same city. But I have contacts, and I find out what I can. You want to prevent leaks, run a tighter ship.”

  Sharma chortled. “This is your way of buttering me up, is it, Minister? Coming into my office and criticizing the way I run my police force?”

  “Let me be frank with you,” said Kumar. “It may not be wise to delve too deeply into this case.”

  “Minister, we’ve got at least eleven potential murders here.” He was about to reveal he knew the building was owned by the state but stopped himself, deciding to keep his powder dry. “While I appreciate the need for discretion, we will be delving as deeply as we need to in order to discover the truth.”

  “Suffice to say that you would be adequately compensated,” said Kumar.