State of Fear

by Tim Ayliffe

  ‘Can I give you a bell later?’ Bailey said. ‘Got a bit on my plate.’

  Annie squinted her eyes, sizing up whether he was trying to blow her off.

  ‘You look tired.’

  ‘So people keep telling me. I can never sleep on planes.’

  ‘You haven’t been to a meeting in a while.’

  ‘Been in London, remember?’

  ‘For two months?’

  ‘Not really my thing, those meetings. You know that.’

  Bailey hated sitting in a room full of strangers. Listening to a room full of problems. He hated how everybody in the circle had to have their say. Even the ones who didn’t want to be there. Like the rich kid whose parents kept bailing him out of prison and threatening to cut off his trust fund if he didn’t attend AA. And the bloke who said that he didn’t have a problem and that he was only coming because his wife had threatened to divorce him.

  The twelve steps also irritated Bailey, especially the religious stuff. How could a guy who had turned water into wine at a piss-up two thousand years ago end up being the patron saint of Alcoholics Anonymous?

  He’d told that joke at his first AA meeting and Annie had been the only person who’d laughed. It was enough for Bailey. They might not have seen each other for the best part of twenty years, but anyone who got his humour would probably understand the rest of him. Once Annie and Bailey started catching up, he had no more use for the meetings.

  ‘And I’ve got you now, Annie,’ Bailey said. ‘No need for the church hall anymore.’

  She smiled. ‘Yes, you do.’

  ‘And I’m not blowing you off. I just don’t have time today.’

  ‘Tonight?’

  ‘I’ll give you a ring.’

  CHAPTER 9

  The road leading to Bronte Beach was so steep that it was like dropping out of the sky. The brakes on Bailey’s old Corolla squealed all the way to the bottom.

  He found a parking spot opposite the short strip of restaurants and cafés, then fed the meter an exorbitant amount of gold coins. It was stinking hot for April. Knowing that his rusty old piece of junk was in the very low-risk category for car theft, he left the window open so that it wouldn’t be a sauna when he got back.

  As far as he could tell, he was the only guy at the beach wearing Blundstone boots and a flannelette shirt. Actually, he was one of the only people wearing much in the way of clothing at all.

  People were dripping with money around here, and those who didn’t have any liked to pretend that they did. The old guy in the linen pants with the young blonde clutching his arm looked like the real deal. So did the middle-aged woman in lycra leggings walking a snow-white pair of poodles. Everybody else looked the same. Tanned twenty-somethings with most of their bodies on show. People who worked the type of jobs that funded a lifestyle, not a life. Good luck to them.

  Bailey picked up a couple of coffees and headed across the grass towards the sand. Bronte was less than three hundred metres long, so it was easy to spot the large man standing on the rocks under the northern headland. It was Ronnie Johnson’s favourite fishing spot, where he liked to throw in his line at least a few times a week.

  Bailey took his time dragging his feet through the sand, giving him longer to check out the morning sunbathers paying homage to the sky; their skin, tight and taut, glistening with oil. It was even slower going on the sand because he hadn’t bothered to remove his boots. At least the rubber soles made it easier when he was clambering over the rocks to Ronnie’s spot below the cliff.

  ‘Caught anything, old boy?’

  Ronnie was crouched over, baiting his hook. Bailey had no idea whether his old friend had seen him coming. He usually did. After almost four decades as an intelligence agent, there wasn’t much that Ronnie Johnson didn’t see coming.

  ‘Few bites, bubba.’ Ronnie was concentrating on the hook and didn’t look up. ‘The big one’s out there. Bream, maybe even whiting, if I get lucky. Dinner for us, tonight.’

  ‘Yeah, sure.’ Bailey said. ‘I might take a couple of steaks out of the freezer, just in case.’

  Ronnie stood up. Six foot four, with a barrel chest and arms like canons, he was an imposing figure. Even if he was pushing sixty.

  ‘You need to have faith, bubba. This is what I do for a living, now. Remember? I’m getting good.’

  ‘So you keep saying. I’ll only believe you’re retired when I’m looking down on your grave.’

  ‘No offence, but I hope it’s the other way round.’ Ronnie winked at him. ‘By the way, that AA girl came around asking about you last night.’

  ‘She found me.’

  ‘Easy on the eye, that one.’ Ronnie smiled. ‘What does Detective Dexter think about her?’

  Alcoholics Anonymous may have been Sharon’s idea, but Bailey hadn’t told her about Annie Brooks. He didn’t see the point.

  ‘No issues there, mate.’

  Ronnie shrugged his big shoulders and turned back towards the water, squinting at the sun, his shadow stretching across the rocks to the scorched grass at the base of the cliff.

  ‘Bought you a coffee.’

  Ronnie took a sip and then handed the cup back to Bailey. ‘Hold it for me, bubba, while I work the magic.’

  He stepped closer to the edge of the water, dangling the rod back over his shoulder to his right. He checked Bailey, then swung his arm around, letting the hook sail into the sky above the waves until it plopped into the water around forty metres out.

  ‘Not bad. Maybe there’s a future for you outside the agency, after all?’

  ‘Thanks, bubba.’ Ronnie reached into his pocket and grabbed a cigar, wedging it in the corner of his mouth so that he could use his spare hand to spark it.

  ‘Light-up day, is it?’

  Ronnie was always giving up smoking. After a few puffs, he turned around with a big grin on his face. ‘Fish like the smell, my second lure.’ Turning back towards the water, he jiggled his rod. ‘How was London? Saw what happened on the news. How many attacks over there now? Eight? Ten?’

  ‘Who’s counting?’ Bailey said. ‘Lot of fear, though. It’s getting to the place.’

  ‘That’s what they want.’

  ‘Don’t have to tell me that,’ Bailey said. ‘Anyway, we need to talk.’

  ‘So, talk. I’ve got all the listening time in the world.’

  Bailey’s head darted from left to right to see if there was anyone else within earshot. There wasn’t. Unless you counted the guy on the paddle board fifty metres out, or the sand flies nipping at his neck.

  ‘It’s about Mustafa al-Baghdadi,’ Bailey said, eventually. ‘I spoke to him, on the phone.’

  Ronnie laughed and turned around with a pair of eyebrows that said stop bullshitting me.

  ‘I’m serious.’

  ‘Come on, bubba. What’d you really want to talk about?’

  Bailey stepped closer to where Ronnie had cast his line from the rock ledge, the waves crashing below.

  ‘I think he was behind what happened in London.’

  ‘This isn’t a joke, then?’

  ‘No, Ronnie. It’s not.’

  ‘London attacks? Doesn’t surprise me.’ Ronnie bent down and planted the rod between the rocks. He didn’t seem to care about his catch, anymore. ‘What’s it got to do with you?’

  ‘A lot, it seems.’

  ‘Like what? Apart from your unscheduled vacation with that mad son of a bitch.’

  Bailey let Ronnie’s last words float away in the salty air.

  ‘Did you really speak to him?’ Ronnie checked one last time.

  ‘Why would I make up a story like that?’

  ‘When?’

  Bailey looked at his watch. ‘About two hours ago, give or take.’

  ‘What’d he want?’

  Ronnie was sounding very interested for someone who was supposed to have been retired.

  ‘He told me he didn’t like my speech at Chatham House.’

  ‘Probably means you did a good
job, bubba.’ Ronnie blew a cloud of smoke at the water. ‘Can’t be the reason he called, though. Doesn’t add up.’

  ‘It wasn’t,’ Bailey said. ‘He was warning me.’

  ‘About what?’ Ronnie put his cigar back in his mouth. ‘He tell you he was planning something?’

  ‘That’s exactly what I’m telling you.’

  ‘Sorry, bubba. Not buying that one.’

  ‘I’m not asking you to buy anything.’ Bailey didn’t like being patronised. ‘Whatever it is he’s got cooking, it’s connected to me.’

  ‘Enlighten me.’

  ‘Remember Omar from Baghdad? The fixer that Gerald and I used in those early days?’

  Ronnie had been the CIA’s station chief in Baghdad when Bailey and Gerald were sent to cover the first Gulf War.

  ‘Yeah, I remember him.’

  ‘Well, he got refugee status and he’s an Australian citizen now. Lives in Sydney. His fifteen-year-old son’s gone missing. Omar thinks he’s been communicating with Islamic Nation over the net. Maybe even Mustafa himself.’

  Ronnie stubbed his cigar into the rocks and picked up his fishing rod, slowly reeling it in.

  ‘And there’s something else,’ Bailey said. ‘Mustafa said something on the phone that’s been bothering me.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘He accused me of betraying him, said I’ve been working for you lot. What the hell could he mean by that?’

  Ronnie stopped reeling in his line. ‘There’s something that I haven’t told you, bubba.’

  Bailey’s heart skipped a beat, wondering where Ronnie was going.

  ‘Earlier this year, there was a security breach at the State Department. Thousands of secret files were stolen by Russian hackers and published by Wikileaks. Your name was mentioned in those files, bubba – as an intelligence source.’

  ‘A what?’ Bailey was angry. He was a journalist, not a spook. Or a source.

  ‘There’s a file on you, bubba. The information you gave us straight after your release. It’s out there.’

  Bailey had a vague memory of sitting in a room recounting to Ronnie and the other CIA people everything he could remember about his time in captivity. The people. Places. Conversations. Sounds. Smells. Anything that offered an insight into Mustafa al-Baghdadi and his terrorist outfit. Their motivations. How organised they were. What weapons they had. Anything. Everything.

  ‘What the fuck, Ronnie?’ Bailey tossed the dregs of his coffee on the rocks, crushing the paper cup in his hand. ‘What’s in the file?’

  ‘It was so long ago, I can’t even remember.’

  ‘Bullshit! You’re the one who interviewed me back in Baghdad. You know exactly what’s in that file!’

  Ronnie drained the rest of his coffee in one long gulp, throwing the empty cup into his tackle box.

  ‘I’m not bullshitting you, bubba. It’s been so long since I’ve seen that file, I’ve forgotten. Remember, we didn’t know much about Mustafa back then. He was just another fanatic.’

  Bailey didn’t know what to believe. Ronnie might be his friend, but the old spy had also mastered the art of lying. He always had an ulterior motive. Guys like Ronnie never ‘left’ the CIA, even when they were gone.

  ‘Yeah, well,’ Bailey spat out, ‘now he’s top of your government’s list of wanted terrorists, and for some bloody reason, he’s got it in for me.’

  ‘Guess you’re going to need my help, then, hey bubba?’

  Ronnie could be very useful. The tricky bastard had even saved Bailey’s life. More than once.

  ‘Are you offering?’

  ‘I’m offering.’

  Bailey knew the offer wasn’t being proffered out of the goodness of his heart. The chance to snare the world’s most wanted terrorist was exactly the type of catch that Ronnie was after.

  ‘We need to find the kid.’ Bailey was calming down. ‘And Ronnie?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Save me the trouble searching the Wikileaks dump. I want to see my file.’

  ‘I think I can manage that,’ Ronnie said. ‘What’s your plan with the kid?’

  ‘School’s out at three. Thought I might introduce myself to some of Tariq’s friends. Omar’s meeting me there.’

  ‘Hold on!’ Ronnie was distracted by a sudden weight on his line. ‘Here we go!’

  Moments later, something was bobbing in the waves in front of them. Unfortunately for Ronnie, it wasn’t a fish.

  He dangled the line over to Bailey, who took delight in unhooking the sodden shoe.

  ‘It’s a ten,’ Bailey said. ‘My size. Shame we don’t have more time; now you’re getting good you could catch me the other one.’

  CHAPTER 10

  Dexter

  All over the city, hulking concrete blocks had been dropped onto the pavement outside buildings and busy pedestrian areas. The government had put them there to stop terrorists from using vehicles as weapons against people. Berlin. London. Nice. Melbourne. It was a cheap way to kill people and the number of attacks was growing.

  Some footpaths had more bollards than others, like the one out the front of a grey, featureless building in the heart of the city on Goulburn Street. The home of the Australian Federal Police. Five concrete blocks had been put there to protect the hundreds of cops walking in and out of the foyer each day, including Detective Chief Inspector Sharon Dexter.

  Dexter had left work just after two o’clock that morning and she was about to walk back through the door six and a half hours later. She lived for the job. It gave her purpose, a reason to get moving each day. It was why she and Bailey were so good and bad for each other. Two sides of the same coin.

  Dexter had been in her late thirties the first time they’d gotten together. Bailey had just moved home from the Middle East when he approached her in a bar. She hadn’t seen him in more than a decade but she recognised him instantly. Shaggy haircut. Unironed shirt. That gravelly voice wrapped inside a cheeky grin.

  ‘Buy you a drink, officer?’

  ‘It’s detective, now.’

  ‘How many fingers did you break to get that title?’

  Bailey had a good memory and an uncanny ability to get under her skin. In a good way.

  ‘Several,’ she said. ‘I’ve made it my thing. I can show you, if you like?’

  ‘How about I just get you that drink.’

  Dexter smiled as she remembered back over that first night together. And the one after, when Bailey turned up on her doorstep with a bunch of service station flowers in his hand. He was a bit hopeless and there was something about his eyes that told her that he needed fixing. Neither of those things had stopped her from falling in love with him.

  After stubbing a half-smoked cigarette into a concrete barrier, Dexter swiped her ID card at the entrance and headed for the elevators. She didn’t like that she was smoking again, although she had her reasons. The main one being that it gave her an opportunity to get away from her desk, where she was spending countless hours staring at computer screens, trawling through phone and email logs, monitoring hundreds of terrorist suspects, trying to separate the ones who talked about killing from those who were prepared to do it. Smoking had been keeping her sane.

  The Joint Counter Terrorism Team – or JCTT – was a sprawling taskforce made up of the Australian Federal Police, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, the New South Wales Crime Commission and state cops like Dexter.

  Dexter’s new job was just as lonely as her last one. It’s what happens when a cop takes down a corrupt police commissioner. You never finger one of your own. Corruption had tentacles. You never knew how far they reached. Dexter had been moved for her own safety. It just so happened that Dexter’s ‘move’ had ended up being a promotion. Well overdue, according to the deputy commissioner who had put her there. Whatever the reason, she was desperate to prove that she deserved every stripe on her shoulder. Not least because she was a woman.

  The top brass liked to boast that times had changed. But tha
t was bullshit. There were more blokes in charge than ever before. Dexter pretended that it didn’t bother her because her work spoke for itself. As long as she got the job done, respect would come. Mostly, she was right. The respect had come. She was the homicide detective who had spent decades locking up bad people. Murderers. Drug dealers. Even corrupt cops.

  She knew how to take punches and throw them too. She wasn’t interested in politics or climbing the greasy pole. Dexter was an old-fashioned cop, trained on the streets, driven by justice and a desire to stop people from doing bad things. Now her focus was terrorism.

  ‘Anything?’

  Dexter rattled the back of Nugget’s chair with her hand, causing him to jump. ‘Shit, boss!’

  ‘Anything interesting?’

  She leaned forward so that she could read the files that Nugget had been scanning on one of the three computer screens that were collectively beaming a big blue light on his face. Mostly transcripts of telephone calls and messages from people on the terrorism watch-list.

  ‘Not yet,’ Nugget said, without turning around. ‘Just going through the logs, seeing who our favourite nut jobs have been speaking to.’

  Detective Don Benson was a short, stocky, straight-talking bloke with a neck almost as wide as his head. It was why everyone called him Nugget.

  ‘Anyone in particular?’

  ‘No, boss,’ he said. ‘I’m only just getting started.’

  Despite being a chauvinistic arsehole, Nugget was good at his job. He was a typical hard-head copper who, like Dexter, had spent most of his career in Homicide and knew the mean streets better than any federal police or intelligence investigator.

  ‘Anything on the kid?’ Dexter had already put the word out about Tariq.

  ‘Not yet,’ Nugget said.

  ‘How about you guys?’ Dexter raised her voice so that the other members of her team could hear. ‘Michael? Kate?’

  Two young cops looked up from their computer screens, shaking their heads. ‘Nothing.’

  Dexter’s team was tasked with monitoring the terrorism watch-list. The problem was there were four hundred names on it. Police didn’t have the resources to track everyone. The 24-hour surveillance of one person would take twenty police officers. To monitor four hundred people would need eight thousand officers. Dexter’s team had to be selective, take a punt on people they believed were the most dangerous.