He’d mentioned the strange sight of Forever Flowers almost in passing at the end of their one-hour meeting.
“Seems like Ashton and Maide haven’t got anything better to do but look at bloody flower websites. Talk about fiddling while Rome burns.”
Godley smirked but Pedro’s face was stern. He ringed around the occurrence.
“Do you know the name of the website?” asked Pedro, his pen poised.
“Yes, I do. It was Forever Flowers. You know those terribly corny sites with balloons and love hearts in the corners? Must be a coincidence, both of them looking. Obviously trying to impress the women in their lives. Clearly been naughty boys.”
Pedro wrote down the name.
“Thank you, Godley. You may have delivered more than you know.”
Godley didn’t realize at the time, but his horticulture coincidence turned out to be the biggest revelation to Al Nadir, and more importantly, to Sabena Sanantoni.
His throwaway words resulted in taking away the lives of three people: Kinley, Angie and little Lotte.
Chapter 83
23 March, 2017
Sam rested back in the leather seats and sipped his gin and tonic. God, he felt bad about leaving Ellie. He knew she was bright, but this was a whole new world for her. It wasn’t something you could learn overnight. That’s why he’d given her the gun. He hoped he’d done the right thing.
Her handling of it had been excellent. She’d always been a rapid assimilator of anything, and her understanding was very quick tonight, despite how stressed she was. She would know what to do if the time ever came to use it. He prayed to God that day would never come. But like any good agent, he had to be prepared and know when to act. All he had done was give Ellie the tools to secure survival. Her survival was everything to him.
He pulled aside the curtains and looked outside. People milled around on the streets. Saturday night was erupting in a blaze of neon lights, speeding cars and scantily-clad clubbers. The car weaved its way through the drugged-up throng. Sam watched people having fun. Pure envy stabbed him, not because he wanted to run around acting crazy, but because they had the freedom to do so. If he had his time over, he would have turned down Maide’s offer. He would never have made that decision had he foreseen the consequences.
All the time Ellie had been blinded to the truth, everything had been acceptable. He had arranged with MI6 that, should anything happen to him on a mission, Ellie would be told nothing of his life as an agent. His life cover was substantial. Ellie would have been comfortable. Thinking back on this arrangement, Sam despised himself. Although it placed both of them in danger, revealing the truth to Ellie had been cathartic, like he was released from something that’d been suffocating him for over a decade. But he knew the truth had been difficult for Ellie to accept, and he knew that the events of the past twenty-four hours had almost resulted in him losing her.
Sam loved Ellie so much, but he couldn’t even carry her photo with him, for fear it may fall into hostile hands. Imagining Ellie, her bright smile, her sensual smoky, blue eyes, and her voice that constantly reflected strength and kindness, made him feel whole.
Sam snapped open his eyes and picked up his mobile.
“Hello.”
“Hello, sweetness.”
“Oh, Sam. I couldn’t see the caller ID. Are you ok?”
“It’s like Stevie Wonder sang, ‘I just called to say I love you.’”
“Oh, darling.” Ellie was choked. “I love you too.”
“I’ll call you when I arrive. It may be early in the morning. Is that ok?”
“Call whenever you want. I’ll be waiting.”
“Love you, sweetness.”
“Love you too.”
Sam felt better for talking to Ellie; she made everything real in his world of unreality.
Chapter 84
Godley brought himself back to the present. He stopped his pride at scoring big time for Al Nadir ruining the next few minutes of his life. It would’ve happened if he’d kept Sabena Sanantoni waiting on the phone any longer.
“Are you there? Concentrate, alright! We have reason to believe there are changes a-foot. Anything to vindicate this rumor?”
He listened to Sabena’s crisp, efficient tones and imagined her as a cool, ice maiden in a white leather bikini brandishing a silver riding crop. The vision was very sudden and graphic. He had to shake his head to maintain control of the current situation.
“I believe this is a misnomer,” Godley replied. “Put out in desperation to create misinformation and smokescreens. It will be the initial location.”
“But what if it’s not? I can’t afford a fuck-up!”
“No, quite. That’s not what anyone would want,” replied Godley curtly. He never liked ladies to swear. It made them cheap and tacky. His vision of Sabena as the unapproachable ice queen splintered into pieces and what remained had her as a tough-talking streetwalker.
“So you’re going to do your job. Find out what’s happening, if the chatter is misdirection or new information,” snapped Sabena.
“That won’t be easy. Security is at its tightest, even for someone like me. I’ll only know hours before the start.”
“That’s not good enough,” rasped Sabena. “I need to know now. It’s what you’re there for. It’s what we fucking pay you for, you little shit. Just ask Ashton. He’ll tell you.”
“But what if he doesn’t?” whined Godley, ignoring the direct insult.
“Make him. You’re good at that. You’re his Mr. Fix-it. Otherwise, I’ll have to fix you.” Godley shivered slightly. Before he had a chance to reply, Sabena suddenly started giggling. “Oh, my darling, don’t worry. Just get the confirmation of exactly where the venue is and everybody’s happy.”
“Yes. Alright,” acquiesced Godley. He knew Sabena’s demented mood swings and attraction to sadistic violence. He never wanted to be in a situation where she was ‘fixing him’.
“Excellent. I knew we could rely on you. You’re such a sound man,” Sabena said breezily. “Naturally, you’ll be recompensed well for your troubles.”
Godley smiled to himself. ‘Recompensed well’, the phrase that made it easier for him to put up with Sabena’s foul mouth and psychotic behavior.
“I await your call, darling.” Sabena’s voice was breathy, reminiscent of a coy teenage girl. Unexpectedly, she flipped personality. Her laugh hit a shrill, determined pitch. “By tomorrow!”
Godley listened, but before he could protest, Sabena rung off.
Now he had spoken to her, Godley wondered when he would speak to him.
Chapter 85
The light above the screen in front of him flickered on. A satcomm transmission on a secure frequency was coming through. Sam sighed. This was his life; he’d better accept it. Sam depressed the button on his armrest and Justin Maide shivered onto the screen. His face was bellicose, a man facing war.
“I’m sending you the data you requested.”
Sam watched the status bar zoom across the screen as his laptop gorged up the bytes being transmitted. It flashed at one hundred percent. Sam turned back to the satcomm screen.
“All received, sir. What’s the latest from Langley?”
“They still believe the standard explosives story.”
“They don’t think it was anything else?” Sam was amazed by the CIA’s myopia.
“Why should they? There was no recognized signal for nano-bomb detonation at the time of the blast.”
“Have they scanned all frequencies?”
“Of course. That’s standard procedure. There have been a lot of signals we’ve not seen before. I’ve sent you all the monitoring files so you can review.” Maide stopped abruptly, half wanting to carry on, but not sure whether to.
Sam picked up on it. “Something else?”
“Yes. But it could make things difficult for Greene politically if we start poking.”
“Well, I’m not shy of a good poke.” Sam smirked. “Tell me, sir.”<
br />
“Greene’s team monitored a signal three days ago. They tracked it back to a garage, but when they arrived, the place was deserted. The signal appeared to have the same properties as a nano-bomb signal, but it was on a different frequency. Further deconstruction showed it wasn’t a nano-bomb signal at all. It had no internal carrier, so it couldn’t deliver anything.”
“Just dead hold?” suggested Sam.
“Exactly.” Maide nodded. “And they ignored it.”
“Big mistake. Not having an internal carrier didn’t mean it wasn’t connected to Kinley’s death.” Sam was suddenly deeply annoyed. There was much more to his friend’s demise than just C4. “What’s your take on this, sir?”
“I know anomalies make me nervous. Anything out of step, like that signal, puts me instantly on guard.”
Anomalies made Sam nervous too. “So Greene has closed the book on this?”
Maide scowled and nodded his head. “Seems that way.”
“So, we’re on our own on this.” Sam couldn’t remember how many times he’d repeated those words where the CIA was concerned.
“Looks like it. Greene finalized the report on the signal as innocent.”
“Innocent? It was hardly that to begin with!” shouted Sam, his ire rising as he learnt more about the stunning incompetence of his US colleagues.
“They’re putting it down to tech malfunction,” explained Maide.
“Was there anything from the scene that stuck out? Forensics was there first. Did their report identify anything unusual, however small or insignificant?” asked Sam.
Maide flicked through the forensic report again. “First on the scene described the hall area covered in a thin film of grey, silver dust. The investigator didn’t think much of it, as it was a bomb site, and later reports don’t mention any dust at all.”
Sam stared hard at the screen as he listened to the report. “Dust?” he repeated. Then his blood ran inexplicably cold at the four-letter word. He was transported back to Dubai, the dark building and Sabena’s shrill laugh as a man screamed in abject agony.
“Yes, Sam. Are you on to something?”
“Maybe, sir. Pull up my report on the nano-bomb mission five weeks ago.”
Maide brought up the report and sped read through it.
“Review the field surveillance section, sir,” said Sam. “The part about the dark building in Al Nadir’s enclosure.”
Maide read the section aloud. “Three persons. Two visible. One unidentified male. One identified female, Sabena Sanantoni. And one unknown person. Male unidentified covered in grey, silver dust, screaming and shaking.” Sam could still hear the man’s terrified howl in his ears; it was as if he was being electrocuted. “You think Kinley was attacked by dust?”
“Not by the dust but something in the dust,” stated Sam. Suddenly, everything fell into place. As the connections started to roll, Sam couldn’t stop. “Sir, it’s next gen nano-tech. You mentioned there had been a lot of signal activity this morning. It could be a long shot, but run a signals check around the time of the blast and cross correlate to find a match with any signals broadcast at the exact same time as I was at the building in Dubai.”
“That’s more a leap of faith than a long shot, Sam. But let’s give it a try.”
Maide turned to his IT surveillance whiz. Out of earshot, he issued him with the same instructions Sam had given. The whiz went to work immediately on checking signals for cross correlation points. Maide turned back to Sam.
“If what I saw was next gen nano, then they’ve been laughing at us all this time.”
Sam’s anger was justified. From the corner of his eye, Sam could still see Ricky falling back as he scrambled over the wall to survive. Bringing back the nano-bomb had come at a terrible price, but they thought they had the edge by acquiring it. Now, it seemed, all they had were goods past their sell-by date, earlier versions without the upgrades. Sam felt cheated.
The whiz pointed to his monitor screen. Maide nodded. “Sam, we do have a correlation. Identical wave patterns on both accounts.”
“That proves it, sir. They’ve gone to the next level. We can’t waste time. There must have been a point of origin. Track the signal back and get our US ‘friends’ to raid the location.”
“That won’t be easy.” The second he questioned Greene, Maide would start a political maelstrom.
“Nobody ever said our job was, sir.”
“Quite.”
Maide nudged back from the screen. Sam noticed the movement, and the edginess in Maide’s voice; he wanted removal from the task.
“Do you want me to broach it?”
“It would be better, don’t you think? Keep my powder and all that.”
Sam could see the relief in Maide’s face.
“No problem. Greene did wrong by closing the book so soon. He’ll have to eat a bit of humble pecan pie and like it.”
“Go easy Sam. They’re called friends for a reason.”
“Noted, sir.”
“But, do what you have to do. Kinley was a damn good man. See justice is done.”
“I intend to, sir.”
“Good luck and Godspeed, Sam.”
“Thank you sir. Goodbye.”
Chapter 86
Although the blast had only happened that morning, the CIA had sent their teams in and every aspect, it seemed, had been thoroughly processed. The courier company confirmed a scheduled delivery. According to the consignment note on their system, the parcel had been from Anna Bennoit at Sentury Selections, Cambridge, Massachusetts. But the courier who had delivered the parcel felt sure it had been from The Antique Toy Company.
Greene’s men took the system consignment note to be the accurate one, and reworked a rather crude and obvious anagram revealing the name of Sabena Sanantoni, second to the infamous Salim Al Douri himself.
Sam dialed into Morgan Greene’s vid-phone. As he waited for it to be answered, he realized just what a political pickle he was heading for. In basic terms, Greene and his team hadn’t done their job. They had taken the easy way out and swept further opportunities for investigation away.
A bad-tempered, dark-skinned man in his early sixties came online. “Yeah? What?” He then added a little more convivially, “Sam, hi. How are you? En route, I hope?”
Greene’s face took up the screen in a massive, powerful ensemble of arrogance and petulance. Sam felt his jet-black eyes drill into him as if he knew what he was going to say and was attempting to subvert him before Sam could strike. Sam swallowed.
“Yeah, I’m winging my way over. Did your people check on rogue signals at the time of the blast?”
“Of course. We’re not playing at this, Sam.”
Already Greene’s hackles were rising at the innocent question.
“Notice anything unusual?” Sam held back from divulging everything too quickly.
“No. Why? You got something?” Greene shuffled uncomfortably.
“Yes. It’s next gen nano-tech.”
“Explain.” Greene deliberately failed to react to the discovery.
“During the nano-bomb mission five weeks ago, and at the time of the blast today, the same rogue signal was broadcast. We’ve tracked the signal back to three possible originator locations. I need you to authorize a raid on each location. I’m sending you the locations now.”
Sam sent a live secure text to Greene as he spoke. Greene received the three locations and snorted.
“I can’t do that. Sorry, Sam. But that parcel was sent by Sabena Sanantoni. It was C4. No way was this a nano-bomb hit.”
“Read the mission report. I was there, Greene. I saw that man covered in grey, silver dust, the same grey, silver dust they found at the blast today. No one has looked into it, but I know it is next gen nano. Sabena was there in Dubai. She referenced Stein-Muller. Believe me, it’s not a long shot. We’ve already cross-correlated the two signals. It’s not a coincidence. Make the raid and you’ll score gold.”
Greene growled, �
��It was C4, Sam.”
Sam protested vehemently, but Greene was not interested.
“Are you absolutely sure it was a standard bomb?” asked Sam finally. Greene stared at Sam, annoyed he doubted his team’s judgement and capability.
“Sam, we’ve done all the checks. It was the Sanantoni SWALK, sealed with a loving kiss. End of story.”
“Yes, but-”
“No buts, Sam. We’re done on this one.”
“Isn’t our job to look at all possibilities? Can we afford to pigeonhole this? What if it is next gen nano? What if a new weapon is about to be released on an unsuspecting world, and we had a trailer of what is to come, and we did nothing about it? What does that make us?”
Greene moved uneasily, and then grunted, “You want me to authorize further resources for this?”
He spoke as if Sam asked for him to fork out for financing the raid from his own pocket.
“Well, you wouldn’t want anyone to say you hadn’t been thorough.”
Sam was persistent and determined. He wasn’t going to let Greene close and sweep things under the carpet. Greene’s face reddened as he acknowledged Sam’s blatant inference that the way he’d handled the investigation was less than perfect.
“I can’t sanction any raids, not with the evidence as it stands. There’s not enough.”
“Even with the signal correlation?”
“Still not enough, Sam.”
“Can you give me anything?”
Greene thought for a moment. The last thing he wanted was for his men to have missed something. It was his record and reputation at stake. He couldn’t be seen to have failed.
“What do you need?” asked Greene wearily.
Sam flashed a wry smile. He knew Greene would hedge his bets.
“Give me eyeballs at each of the locations.”
Greene nodded. “Ok Sam. But only for twenty-four hours. If nothing turns up, that’s it. It’s over.”
The Trusted Page 24
