Operation Certain Death

by Kim Hughes

  The van was parked to the left side of the house. ‘Rick’ had backed it in. Nobody overlooked the driveway, apart from one house at the rear, and he had never seen any movement or lights on in that particular dwelling. He was as private as he could be in the suburbs of this city.

  He climbed inside, pulled the shutter back down and switched on the internal lights. He began untying the panels from the wooden slats that lined the van.

  When they had taught him to build the Viper at the bomb-making school in Kandahar, they had called it a Harvey. He had no idea why. He had asked the Iranian who ran the course where the name had come from. He said something about a giant rabbit in a movie, but the bomb-maker thought he was lying. Anyway, when they first deployed it against the Americans, he had re-named it, using the term the Americans had used for their mission against Taliban sites in the Daychopan district of Zabul province. That action was called Operation Mountain Viper. He had shortened it to Maar. Viper. After the device had been used in attacks in Kabul and Herat and the Americans had listened to the chatter about the bomb and translated the name, the Viper became something for the unbelievers to fear across Afghanistan.

  In the back of the Transit van, the bomb-maker uncovered and laid out the panels. The man had done well. Each sheet of shiny metal was a composite. They had been expertly cut and glued together like a sandwich. A layer of metal, then a thin rubber filling, and another layer of metal. This would be the casing for the bombs. The inner and outer tinplate would be made live, with only the insulating layer between them preventing a circuit being completed.

  One classic way to render a bomb harmless was to flood it with water. Which meant drilling a hole through the side or top to insert a hose. If anyone tried such a procedure on this bomb, the metal drill would pierce the rubber and act as a bridge between the two layers of metal. A current would flow. It would cause the main charge to explode.

  It was just one of many little tricks he would incorporate. The Viper had many, many ways to bite.

  * * *

  As he knelt next to his grandmother, head on her arm, Riley reflected on how much he owed Henry and Barbara. His grandparents had always done their best to look after him. They had sent him to boarding school, which he had hated – he had eventually persuaded them that he belonged at a comprehensive – although in retrospect it might have been the best option for him in the long run. His father didn’t want him, and it was increasingly clear that his mother, despite her protestations, was incapable of prolonged caring. So, he had shuttled between his grandparents and, when she had been consumed by guilt and remorse at her mothering skills, Rachel. She didn’t have the breakdown until after he joined the army – in some moments of lucidity she blamed his decision to enlist for her mental fragility. He didn’t buy it. She got to her final destination all on her own. Helped along by a river of booze and God knows what else. And through it all, his grandparents had been the only safe haven he could rely on.

  Riley started as he felt the hand on his head. ‘Dominic? Is that you?’

  He leapt back and to his feet. She was stirring, coming back from the dead. Her eyes were fully open now. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Me? What the hell are you doing locked down here? I thought you were dead! Is that blood? Are you hurt?’

  He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket – a habit Barbara had drilled into him as a young man, as she despised paper tissues – and dabbed at the red streak at the corner of her mouth.

  ‘Blood? No, I don’t think so. That’s wine.’ She pointed to the wound on her temple. ‘This is real. I foolishly tried to fight back and ended up bashing myself on the frame upstairs.’

  ‘Here.’ He handed her the handkerchief and she pressed it against the gash. It came away with old blood only.

  ‘That’s not too bad. Stopped bleeding. Probably leave a mark. I’ll claim it was a sabre gash I picked up in Mongolia.’ She gave a little chuckle.

  ‘I’ll get you to hospital. It needs a steri-strip.’

  ‘Oh, don’t fuss, Dominic. It’ll be fine. I thought while I was down here, I might as well try a bottle of the Château Martet.’ She pointed to an empty glass next to the monitor. Beside it, Riley noted with some alarm, was a compact Walther pistol.

  ‘No wonder the bang didn’t wake you.’

  ‘Bang?’

  ‘It would have woken the dead. I had to blow the door to get in. Some damage to the woodwork, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Tsk, don’t worry about that. And you could set off a nuclear device and the sound wouldn’t get past that door on the stairs. The BBC installed that. Back when the BBC had men in brown coats to do such things. Did you find Henry?’

  Riley shook his head. ‘No. No sign. And the car has gone. Your BMW.’

  She frowned. ‘I thought so.’

  ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘All in good time. Let’s get upstairs. I need coffee.’

  ‘Grandma!’

  She struggled to her feet and caught her breath before speaking. There was an uncharacteristic quiver in her voice. ‘I fear Henry has been kidnapped.’

  THIRTY-FOUR

  Despite having made a sizeable dent in the bottle of Bordeaux, Barbara was only marginally more unsteady on her feet than usual, so it was relatively easy to get her upstairs and on to an armchair. Riley made a pot of strong coffee and two cheese sandwiches. He polished off one in double-quick time, realising he still hadn’t eaten much in the past forty-eight hours. Hardly anything since breakfast with Charlie, before he had gone to the hotel to pick up his gear.

  As he wolfed down the sandwich, Riley wondered how Ruby and Izzy were getting on. Scooby had told him they had been to the hall, but when there was no answer, the minders had decided to pull out and re-group. Perhaps they would come back. The two bodyguards probably had other ideas. No matter, Scooby had assured him the two women were top PPOs, so he could relax on that score. He would make sure he intersected with them once he had sorted out the situation with his grandfather.

  What was worrying was what O’Donnell had told him, the pair who had turned up at his place, offering inducements for him to go back into the bomb-making business. The Irishman had refused their blandishments, or so he claimed. Actually, he believed O’Donnell. He had never been motivated by money. But now, months later, the recruiters had obviously found someone who would take their cash and who knew their acetone from their ethyl azide. And that someone had wired his car with explosives.

  And, lest you forget, almost killed your daughter.

  I haven’t forgotten.

  Riley pulled himself back into the moment and the job at hand. While Barbara finished her coffee and pecked, bird-like, at her sandwich, he went back downstairs and fetched the pistol he had spotted next to the empty wine glass. It might come in handy. It felt both flimsy yet solid, the lightness giving it the feel of a toy, but the action was reassuringly positive. It had also been fired recently – he could still smell the faint residue of a discharge – and subsequently cleaned and oiled. Given its probable muzzle velocity he could see why she hadn’t tried to use it to shoot the lock off the door – she would be in serious danger of being hit by a ricochet off the steel casing of the lock.

  Back in the drawing room, he poured himself a second cup of coffee, sat opposite her and asked: ‘Okay, feeling better?’

  ‘Much, thank you.’

  He took a deep breath. Time to start over. ‘What the hell happened here? Who has Grandpa? Is he at risk?

  ‘The answer to the last pair of questions is – I really don’t know,’ said Barbara, her hand shaking just a little as she brought the cup to her lips. ‘At least, not very much. He must have broken in at some point during the evening or night.’

  ‘The conservatory,’ Riley said. ‘There’s a broken pane. It’s been repaired. I suspect so you wouldn’t notice it on your evening rounds.’

  ‘Henry’s evening rounds. He has always locked up. And he always said we needed a sturdier lock o
n those French doors. But that means he was here all night. It was the early hours when he came into our bedroom.’

  ‘Who is this “he”? Did you know him?’

  ‘I knew who he was. Henry had actually met him before. Years ago.’

  He waited for her to continue, but she simply took more coffee. Blood from a stone, he thought. ‘Maybe you’d best start from the beginning.’

  ‘Of course. Not much to tell.’ She went through the man telling her to get dressed, then locking her in the cellar while he and Henry ‘had a discussion’.

  ‘What about?’

  She gave a thin smile.

  ‘Grandma, I have signed the Official Secrets Act, you know.’

  ‘Oh, Barbara, please. I thought we got over Grandma years ago.’ Riley nodded, knowing he couldn’t make the change to informality. ‘I don’t know what they talked about. But I do happen to be au fait with the bare outlines of the background.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I think it is too dangerous for you to know.’

  Riley laughed at that. ‘You do remember what I do for a living?’

  ‘Don’t be impertinent,’ she said, a coolness in her voice. ‘We had a visitor the other day… yesterday was it? Yes. Hector, I had the feeling he was checking how secure we are. By which I mean, trustworthy.’

  ‘Now that’s impertinent,’ said Riley.

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘But look, I can handle myself. It’s important I know the background if we are to find him.’

  ‘Can you fetch me some water? I feel a little parched. Wine and coffee, you know. The cheese was a little dry, too.’

  Riley went to the kitchen and returned with a pitcher of iced water and two glasses. ‘Tell me,’ he asked, pointing to the pistol he had left on the sidetable. ‘Why the gun?’

  ‘Well, if any harm came to Henry and that chap returned to let me out as he promised, I would kill him. If, on the other hand, I was left down there to rot, I would have drunk a lot more wine – there’s two bottles of Petrus left, you know, and a half-case of Grange – and killed myself.’

  So matter-of-fact, thought Riley, as if she were choosing between two different brands of tea.

  He sat down and watched her drink some of the water. A little colour returned to her cheeks. ‘Ready?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes. I find this very difficult to talk about. Years of conditioning, you know.’

  ‘I can imagine.’ His grandparents had only revealed they had been spies after he had completed his ATO course. Even then, it was all broad-brush strokes. It had explained a lot, though, filled in many of the gaps in his childhood where they had disappeared and left him in the chaotic clutches of his mother. He had resented that. But, in their world, Queen and Country always came first, he supposed. They always tried their best to make it up to him afterwards.

  ‘Even the name of the operation is secret. Very ill-advised name in my opinion. Bloody stupid, in fact. Not Henry’s doing. No wonder they are so nervous about people knowing it, even now.’

  ‘What was it?’

  She took a deep breath, as if steeling herself to jump from a great height. ‘Operation Homegrown.’

  Riley felt a stab of irritation. Obfuscation had been this woman’s stock in trade. She was having trouble giving him clarity, not helped by all the claret she had consumed.

  ‘You’re not really telling me who or what the guy who has taken Henry is.’

  ‘As I said, I had never actually met him before. Heard of him. Oh, I know what he was,’ she said airily. ‘And who. Henry knew him as Yousaf. Yousaf Ali. Although I do believe his real name is Joseph.’

  Riley was about to ask for more detail when he heard glass crack and shatter and the thump of something heavy landing on the carpet behind his grandmother. He just had time to yell at her to close her eyes, when a supernova bloomed in the room with the noise of a thousand galaxies exploding at once.

  * * *

  They stopped for breakfast once the sun was well up. They were in an anonymous blue Renault, the BMW having been ditched in favour of the French car. The man he had known as Yousaf had promised him no harm would come to himself or his wife, and Henry actually believed him. Or, at the very least, believed that he thought that. But the visitor – who had not only shaved off his beard but was also dressed in Western clothes now – was one of many worms in a can that certain sections of his old firm would rather never wriggled into daylight.

  ‘Are you going to tell me exactly what’s going on?’ he asked once more.

  ‘I told you, all in good time.’

  ‘At my age, you don’t have much time left. Good or bad, Yousaf. You owe me an explanation.’

  ‘And you’ll get one.’ He looked at Henry, his tone impatient. ‘Can you stop asking questions now. I have to see if we are being followed. I will tell you everything when we are in place.’

  Henry’s fieldcraft skills were a little rusty, but even so, he was fairly certain nobody was following them. Not physically, anyway. But the CCTV cameras on motorways and main thoroughfares would be searching the screens for a BMW, if they were looking for him at all. His car had been swapped for the Renault in a clearing off the B-road some three miles from Dunston Hall, which Henry knew for a fact was not covered by any surveillance systems.

  Maybe his lot hadn’t managed to tag Yousaf and had no idea where he was. But what about Five? That Muraski woman had been digging pretty hard, and she might well have his abductor on her radar. In which case, they might attempt a rescue. He hoped not. The man had a very serviceable Glock and rescue attempts could go either way for the ‘hostage’. Which, he supposed, was what he was. That or the ‘abductee’ in this whole strange and sorry mess.

  Yousaf was a lot younger and stronger than him. He moved with a sinewy grace and his muscles had been hardened by the life he had chosen for himself. Trying to wrestle him or outrun him was out of the question. But another kind of opportunity would come along and Henry would take it.

  He normally lacked Barbara’s ruthlessness, but the man’s treatment of his wife – even if her colliding with the doorframe was more by accident than design – meant he would have no compunction about tackling Yousaf if he got the chance. Even though the cellar room was furnished with food, drink and lavatory facilities, she must be feeling very trapped by now and the thought crushed his chest with both anxiety and anger. He only hoped that, when the time came, his aim was as good as Barbara’s. The thought of his imprisoned wife made his mind turn to thoughts of escape, of overpowering Yousaf.

  Henry Clifford-Brown had boxed in his youth. Light heavyweight. Before he had bulked out. His most useful features were his long reach and the size of his hands. Although lacking in the combination of grace and danger that defined the best fighters he had come across, Henry was more than capable of catching a technically superior opponent off guard and flooring him. But he knew he had to pick his moment.

  He told Yousaf he was hungry and Yousaf, obviously in need of food too, turned off the M1 and stopped at a bright red café, emblazoned with the words Rita’s Truck Stop, next to a petrol station. Henry reckoned Yousaf had chosen Rita’s place because, unlike any service station, it would not have CCTV connected to the police or highways authority. The Formica forest inside was filled by lorry drivers, of both sexes, locals and company reps. Henry ordered a disappointing full English breakfast that acted as fuel and little else. The sausages, in particular, were egregious, gritty and greasy. But he ate them anyway. He knew he needed to keep his strength up. He turned his attention to the tea. Yousaf had settled on black coffee and a pastry. He finished both with indecent haste and was clearly impatient to be on his way.

  ‘Are you going to tell me where we are going?’ Henry asked.

  ‘Not yet. All in good time.’ His English was accented with traces of Pashto.

  ‘Why am I here?’ he asked, not for the first time.

  Yousaf thought for a while. ‘Very well. Because you know our destination. At least
, you know how to get there. I have no idea.’

  ‘Ah.’ Now he had more than an inkling of where they were heading. Why, that was another matter, to be drawn out of Yousaf during what was going to be a long, tiring drive. ‘I could simply sketch you a map, perhaps.’

  Yousaf laughed, something of a cackle. ‘No, you need to be there, Henry. You are part of the plan.’

  Henry didn’t like the sound of that. He was too old to be part of anybody’s plans. He finished his tea and nodded over to the door marked Truckin’ Men. ‘I shall have to use the facilities before we go. When you reach my age, you’ll understand the needs of an old man’s bladder.’

  Yousaf fixed him with a doleful gaze. ‘That’s one thing I won’t have to worry about, Henry,’ he said.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because I have no intention of reaching your age. Come on, let’s be going.’

  * * *

  Riley was hooded for the entire journey. He had only really started to re-connect with the world once he was in the van, or whatever was transporting him to parts unknown. They must have hooded him while his senses were scrambled. There was still a residual hum in his ears and his retinas were feeding him a light show worthy of New Year’s Eve. He didn’t actually recall being taken out of the house. Didn’t even know how many flash-bang grenades they had used. It was normally more than one, with a maximum of three in that sort of space. He could smell the acrid smoke they produced, taste it at the back of his throat. Nausea was trying to get a foothold, but he did his best to keep it at bay. Throwing up in a hood wasn’t a good idea.

  A quick survey of his body told him his wrists were bound with what felt like a plastic tie, then secured to a belt of some description so although he could sit more comfortably than if he had his hands behind his back, he couldn’t lift them to take off the hood. Straps around his forehead and neck secured him to the headrest of the seat, so he couldn’t bend down either. Someone had thought this through. All in all, it seemed rather OTT for a simple AWOL.