Red Wolves

by Adam Hamdy

  ‘Come on,’ On Wei said. He got out of the car and led Echo and Brigitte inside.

  The block reminded Brigitte of a hospital. It was a simple, functional building with stark lines, bare painted walls, linoleum floors and harsh strip lights. On Wei took them through the block and up to the top floor. There were no obvious signs of security – no guards and no cameras. Either the occupants were supremely confident or they used other, more discreet measures.

  Finally, On Wei stopped outside a set of double doors and knocked.

  ‘Enter,’ a voice said in Mandarin, and On Wei led them inside.

  The meeting room was dominated by a large mahogany table that seated eighteen. Only three of the large leather chairs were occupied, the first by a man who looked about Brigitte’s age. His black hair fell just over his ears, and was styled with a neat parting. He wore a dark-blue Zhongshan suit which hung loose, robbing his body of any definitive shape, but his lean face and hungry eyes suggested that beneath the traditional garb he was fit and strong.

  The man next to him was older; late fifties perhaps. He wore a tailored suit and woven silk tie that could have been made in Savile Row and wouldn’t have looked out of place in any corporate boardroom, but the long scar that ran from his chin to his right ear suggested he wasn’t executive material. Brigitte recognized it as the echo of a knife wound, and wondered how he’d survived such a serious injury. The ragged, heavily stitched line split his chubby cheek in two and made it seem as though he had a second, ugly smile. His hair was cropped close, revealing his skull, and his hands and neck were covered in intricate tattoos, which Brigitte guessed continued beneath his immaculate clothes. The older man remained in his chair, but the younger one stood and moved slowly around the table, walking behind the third seated figure. Brigitte stopped herself from giving any hint of recognition. The third man was the older prisoner who’d escaped from Al Aqarab prison. He eyed her carefully and his expression gave nothing away.

  ‘Chloe Duval,’ the man with two smiles said. ‘It seems we have paid you for something you have not delivered.’

  ‘I delivered,’ Brigitte said. ‘Your people screwed up.’

  The younger man scowled. Brigitte was conscious he was getting closer.

  ‘From what I understand, they have paid the price,’ Two Smiles remarked. ‘Still, we are out a considerable sum.’

  ‘Who’s this we? Qingdao Consumer Products? The government? Who are you?’ Brigitte asked.

  ‘We are patriots,’ Two Smiles replied. ‘People who believe China is a sleeping giant that must be awakened to take its place at the very highest tables. It must no longer be reactive. It must shape world affairs.’ He paused. ‘We are the Red Wolves.’

  The westerner who’d escaped from Al Aqarab leaned over to whisper something to Two Smiles, and he nodded at the younger man, who lunged at Brigitte. He was fast, and even if she’d tried to defend herself, she doubted she’d have been able to stop him. He plunged a syringe into her neck and injected a clear liquid.

  The world blurred in an instant, and Brigitte stumbled against the table.

  ‘What was . . .’ she slurred.

  ‘Something that will help us have an honest conversation,’ Two Smiles replied.

  His face grew in size and split in two, and the world morphed into a trippy kaleidoscope of shapes and colours.

  They’re going to interrogate me, Brigitte thought before she blacked out.

  Chapter 49

  ‘Do you want to tell me what happened?’ Pearce asked as they stepped out of the elevator.

  Leila was exhausted and deeply unsettled. She’d messed up and two men had paid the ultimate price for her carelessness. ‘There’s not much to tell. Two unidentified males were watching the house from the place opposite,’ she replied, crossing the large room to put the rucksack and Peli case next to her desk. ‘They came for me and I defended myself.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Lyly. I should have gone.’

  ‘Don’t make me out to be a victim, Scott. I took care of myself. I’m just annoyed we missed an opportunity for intel.’

  ‘Come on, Lyly, it’s me,’ Pearce said reassuringly. ‘We’ve been through fire together. You don’t have to get defensive.’

  ‘I messed up,’ she said. ‘If I hadn’t been so complacent . . .’ She glanced away.

  ‘You’re many things, but complacent isn’t one of them. Human, maybe?’

  Leila sighed and reached into her pocket for her phone, which she connected to her laptop. She opened the photos folder and looked through the images she’d taken of the dead men.

  ‘I saw them come out of the house opposite when I planted the camera,’ Pearce said. ‘I thought they were drunks.’

  ‘They weren’t,’ Leila replied. ‘I can run an image search to find out who they really were. I got prints too. That should give us something at least.’

  The sound of rush-hour traffic, muffled by the huge windows, rose from the street and filled the silence.

  ‘I’m sorry, Scott,’ she offered.

  ‘It’s OK,’ he said. ‘I had my own run-in today. Ziad Malek went to a community centre in Riverton Heights. He met with some guys.’ Pearce handed her the surveillance glasses. ‘I got faces, vehicle registrations, business names. There’s a group of guys who come out of a book shop at the end of the footage. They’re our priority. See what you can find out.’

  ‘Sure.’ Leila sensed there was more to come, and Pearce’s hesitation didn’t signal anything good.

  ‘Then I followed Malek into the city,’ he said at last. ‘He got into a fight. Looked like something personal. I had to step in. He almost beat a guy to death. I helped him escape and we got talking. I asked him for a job.’

  Leila was stunned. Making contact with the subject of surveillance seriously reduced their options. Malek could identify Pearce now.

  ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ he said. ‘But we were never going to break this from the outside.’

  ‘We don’t have the support for undercover work,’ Leila said. ‘I can’t keep you safe on my own.’ She still had nightmares about Pearce’s abduction during the Black Thirteen investigation.

  ‘I know,’ he conceded. ‘It’s a risk I’m prepared to take. I’m seeing him tomorrow night. It would be good to have some understanding of who these people are and what we’re up against.’

  ‘I’ll do what I can,’ Leila replied. ‘I’m also going to take a listen to the two bugs I managed to plant in the house before I had to cut out.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Pearce said. He touched her shoulder gently. ‘I couldn’t do this without you.’

  As Leila nodded, her laptop sounded a notification alert and she switched to a secure, anonymous messaging account. The address was only known to her, Pearce and Wollerton and was to be used only in case of emergency.

  ‘It’s from Kyle,’ she said, studying the coded message. ‘He says, “Brigitte compromised. Tried to kidnap me. On my way. Be careful.” ’

  Chapter 50

  Wollerton arrived at the airport after walking most of the night and immediately went to the men’s room to wash away the filth and fatigue. He emerged looking more like a normal traveller and went to the Hainan ticket desk where he was tested for coronavirus. When he was confirmed negative, he booked a flight to London using a false passport and credit card in the name of John Tucker. Brigitte had provided the identity so he knew there was a risk it would be flagged. Even after the payment cleared and the helpful representative gave him his boarding pass, Wollerton wasn’t able to shake the ominous feeling the police or people far more sinister were circling, and might seize him at any moment. He passed through security and found a pay-by-the-minute Internet terminal in the departure lounge, which he used to send a warning to Leila and Pearce.

  He wandered around the airport, marvelling at the luxury goods adverts and shops that were a sign of just how much wealth now flowed through China. When his gate was announced, he made his way to border control.
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  Wollerton shifted uneasily as he waited in line. This was the final check before he could get to his flight. He looked at the row of stern-faced men and women, wearing surgical masks, sealed in the tiny booths, each studying the documents of early morning travellers. Most of the passengers manifested the nervous concern of the innocent and the fear of authority that came with it. Wollerton tried to emulate it. He didn’t want to appear too casual, but at the same time he had to keep a lid on the corrosive anxiety that threatened to overwhelm him.

  The woman in front of him was waved forward, and as she approached the booth directly opposite, the knot in Wollerton’s stomach tightened. He was next in line. If Brigitte had given up his false identity this was where he’d find out. The border official’s computer would be connected to police and intelligence systems and when the John Tucker passport was scanned, it would flag any problem immediately.

  The border officer, a young woman with a long black ponytail and an unforgiving face, handed the passport back to the traveller and waved her on. She looked at Wollerton and signalled him to step forward.

  ‘Passport,’ she said flatly, as he reached the booth.

  ‘Oh, sorry,’ he replied, fumbling in his pockets. He handed over his passport and boarding pass. ‘There we go,’ he said with a smile.

  He got nothing but a stern look in reply. She took the documents and scanned them. The time she spent studying the screen seemed to last a thousand nerve-racking years. Wollerton felt sick, but he swallowed back a mouthful of bile and smiled again. Freya and Luke rose in his mind unbidden, and he fixed on the memory of his children’s sweet faces and prayed they would protect him from harm.

  ‘OK,’ she said, handing him his passport and boarding pass.

  ‘Thank you,’ Wollerton said, as he walked away.

  The tension melted, but he didn’t truly relax until he felt the undercarriage retract as the Airbus A330 rose into the sky.

  Chapter 51

  The beach was magnificent. It stretched north and south in a gentle crescent that vanished into the rose-blush horizon. The sun hadn’t crested the tree-covered hills, but it was well on its way, and cast a hazy light over the dewy landscape. Pearce stood near the shoreline and watched and waited.

  He’d helped Leila as much as he’d been able to the previous evening, but she liked to work alone and immersed herself in the digital world to such an extent that he often felt like an unwelcome distraction. Finally, exhaustion had forced him to crash in the early hours, but Leila had kept going, chunking data, running searches and trying to piece together the puzzle that confronted them. Pearce had risen in darkness at 4 a.m., and he’d discovered Leila slumped over her desk, sleeping where she’d collapsed. It was dedication unlike any he’d ever seen, and it was dangerous. She behaved like a machine, but she wasn’t one. He didn’t know how long she could keep it up before something broke. She’d made it clear she didn’t want to talk about the men she’d killed. She was working on identifying them. Functional, unemotional, practical, the machine kept working.

  Pearce had left the building and rode south to keep an appointment he’d made the moment they’d received Wollerton’s message. Pearce had chosen this beach in the Quinault Indian Nation, a large, sparsely populated region west of Seattle, because of its clear lines of sight in every direction. The sands were a couple of hundred yards wide and there was no road access. Getting here involved a twenty-minute hike along rough tracks, and the nearest road was the one that ran from a small parking area that lay in thick forest almost a mile away.

  Pearce checked his watch. It was coming up to six thirty when he saw a figure crest one of the nearby bluffs and stumble down the steep slope that led to the beach. The man was dressed in a flannel tracksuit and looked as though he was out for a dawn run. It was Robert Clifton, Huxley Blaine Carter’s intelligence advisor.

  ‘What the heck are we doing here?’ Clifton asked when he finally reached Pearce. A sheen of sweat glistened in the dawn light and he was out of breath. ‘My wife thought I was nuts when I said I was going for an early run. A run that involved a four-hour drive. What’s so damned urgent?’

  A four-hour drive would put him somewhere around Portland – potentially useful information for the future, Pearce thought.

  ‘Brigitte Attali might be compromised,’ he replied. ‘She might have been involved in an attempt to abduct Kyle.’

  ‘Shit. How reliable is this?’

  ‘Very,’ Pearce said, studying the man.

  ‘And you dragged me all the way out here to see if we’re behind it?’ Clifton asked.

  ‘Something like that.’

  ‘If she’s turned, we had nothing to do with it,’ Clifton said, putting his hands on his hips and casting his eyes at the ocean. ‘Shit. If, and it’s a big if, you’re right, this changes everything. She could give us all up. I’m going to need to confirm this independently.’

  ‘I know how it goes,’ Pearce assured him. ‘And so do you. We can’t trust you. Not for now. So this is going to be our last communication until we know exactly where everyone stands.’

  Clifton nodded. ‘Hux isn’t going to like this. He prides himself on being an exceptional judge of character.’

  ‘No such thing in this line of work. You know that.’

  Pearce headed for the trail that would take him into the bluffs. His bike was parked just over the first rise. It wasn’t designed for motocross but at a push he could have used it to make a quick escape. But he didn’t need to. He’d come to gauge the extent of the rot and understand the threat they faced, and when he glanced over his shoulder at the former director of the NSA, Pearce didn’t see danger, he saw a man suddenly burdened. Clifton was pacing in a tight circle, speaking into a phone, running a hand through his hair, oblivious to the fact Pearce was watching him. He didn’t look like a man masterminding a double-cross, but as Pearce had told him, there was no such thing as a good judge of character in this game.

  They’d have to be careful.

  Chapter 52

  The sunlight woke Leila. There were no blinds or drapes over the huge windows and no way of blocking out light. Their sleeping areas were partitioned, but the dividers were only six feet high and didn’t reach the ceiling, which was probably why they’d been provided with sleep masks. But Leila had fallen asleep at her desk and wasn’t wearing one, which meant she was dazzled into consciousness by the reflection of the rising sun off a nearby mirrored building.

  She smacked her dry lips and tried to shake the dirty, raw feeling from behind her eyes. She knew it was hopeless. The sensation of burning fatigue was an almost constant companion and she doubted she’d live many days without it. Her dreams were a disturbing place, and she wanted to inhabit them as little as possible. Her most recent nightmare had been a kaleidoscope of her family’s deaths, mixed with the last moments of the two men she’d killed the previous day.

  She tried to stand, but the circulation to her legs had been cut off and she was instantly assailed by terrible pins and needles in her feet. She sucked in a deep breath and stretched her numb limbs. It took a few minutes, but she was finally able to stand without too much pain. She picked up her cane and tried to walk off the worst of the soreness. Distant ships crossed the bay as she tried to take her mind off the pain by reviewing what she’d been able to learn the previous night.

  Deni Salamov was a first-generation Chechen immigrant, rumoured to be a local crime boss. He owned the community centre Pearce had filmed, along with all the businesses in it. He had a twenty-year-old conviction for tax evasion, but nothing since. The young man with him was Rasul Salamov, his son, a flashy playboy with a penchant for fast cars. He had two Porsches, a Ferrari, a Lamborghini and a Ford GTO registered in his name. He owned Jefferson National Trucking, the company that employed Jake Lowell, the trucker who’d been murdered during the hijacking. Rasul had been ripped off, that much was clear, and it was possible he suspected Ziad. In the footage Pearce had shot, Ziad certainly looked lik
e a man who’d been summoned to answer questions. The woman Ziad had slapped was Essi Salamov, Deni’s daughter. She was a successful tax attorney with a mid-sized law firm. The man Ziad had beaten in the street was Jack Gray, the Salamovs’ corporate lawyer. Deni’s older companion at the bookstore was Abbas Idrisov, another first-generation immigrant and a veteran of the First Chechen War. He’d moved to the United States after the 1996 ceasefire agreement. Leila’s research revealed a sizeable Chechen community in Seattle, and according to news reports and police intelligence, a handful had become leading crime figures who were rumoured to play key roles in the drugs trade. Leila believed they’d found one of those leading figures in Deni Salamov. Everything about him, from his multitude of business interests to the three ex-convict heavies who walked him out of the bookshop – Osman Barayev, Ilman Kadyrov and Surkho Otarev – spoke to who he really was.

  For all her success analysing the Salamovs, Leila was troubled she hadn’t been able to identify the two men she’d killed. She was still running an image search, but so far it had drawn a blank. Admittedly it was running slow because of the security precautions she’d taken to ensure no one could trace the source of the photos of two dead men, but she would have expected something to have turned up by now.

  She walked over to her desk and woke the dormant laptop. She switched to the image search screen, but the programme still hadn’t yielded anything. Leila opened another window and switched on KOMO local television news. Something mindless to distract her while she had breakfast. A perfectly tanned, handsome anchor was interviewing a young reporter about rumours local celebrity Kitty Kingston was getting married. Kitty, a veteran of Dancing with the Stars, had caused a stir a few years back by endorsing Ron Sugg, an extreme right-wing politician.