WarGod

by Steven Savile

  There was no turning back now. If this turned out to be nothing...if Tony Denison was merely trying to dodge a loan collector or the irate husband...well then, he’d be trading in his old pal Robin for Chicken Licken.

  Bollocks, he thought. I can live with that. “Tony Denison. He was my CO when I was in Kosovo. He thinks someone is trying to kill him. I was hoping Lethe could give me an idea of who.”

  “Brigadier Anthony Denison?”

  “I prefer to think of him as the toughest old bastard I’ve worked for—present company excepted.”

  The old man chuckled. “I make a point of knowing the people that work for me. Denison’s name shows up quite a lot in your dossier; commendation letters, recommendation for the Regiment, and so forth. Suffice it to say, if there is a threat to his safety, the full resources of Nonesuch are yours. Lethe is en route. When he arrives, I will direct him to commence Googling forthwith.”

  Frost rang off.

  He rounded the corner back onto Kensington High Street and proceeded along the pavement toward the otherwise inconspicuous storefront that bore the stylized siren logo. He scanned the street. The two watchers were still in place, exactly where he’d seen them last. No one else caught his eye.

  Two men outside... one more inside? That was how he would have done it. And some sort of proficiency on their side, that one should be much harder to spot.

  Frost stepped inside the coffee house.

  He checked out the menu board even as he took in the rest of the room with his peripheral vision. He wasn’t looking at individual faces but rather, like a real-world variation of a child’s find-what-doesn’t-belong puzzle, he was looking for what was wrong with the picture. There was no saying what the giveaway might be—the wrong kind of clothes, someone sitting alone, a pair of people more interested in looking around the room than in conversing with each other—and there was no guarantee that the signs, even if he caught them, would identify actual watchers.

  “What can I get you, sir?” chirped the girl behind the pastry case.

  Frost could play a part. He’d feign indecision, shrug, check out the various muffins, doughnuts, brownies and cinnamon swirls behind the glass, then check the menu one more time, making sure to scan left and right in the process before placing his order for a cappuccino.

  “Cappu—” He broke off mid-word—which wasn’t exactly subtle—as something he had glimpsed finally registered. Despite all his training and years of experience, despite the knowledge that an uncontrolled reaction might have fatal consequences, Frost very nearly did a double take.

  He caught himself before he could blow his cover, and kept his attention firmly on the girl and finishing his order. “No, hell, let’s go wild, make it a latte. Double shot.”

  The girl nodded, smile fixed in place and busied herself with the ritual coffee prep. Frost was angry with himself.

  If there were eyes in the room, he was made. They’d have to have been both deaf and blind not to catch his screw up. He was angry enough to punch something. And right now that anger was focussed squarely on his old commanding officer—who’d just made him look like a chump. He’d made Tony Denison as he’d scanned the room.

  Denison wasn’t alone.

  He was with a woman.

  Denison wasn’t exactly anonymous. Tall and lanky, stern face, a Roman nose; he was striking, and had an air of authority about him. He wore his black overcoat and a sharp off the rack suit underneath. He was at least ten years’ older than Frost but there wasn’t a trace of grey in his hair.

  But Frost was more interested in the woman.

  She was considerably younger than her companion, mid-twenties at a push. High Slavic cheekbones. Flaxen hair. Not exactly Tatler beautiful, but sexy in a high class hooker kind of way.

  His mind churned over the implications.

  His first thought was espionage. A honey-trap? But that was a bit elaborate for a retired brigadier. His second thought was much more ordinary, but still driven by sex.

  No wonder he didn’t want to talk about it over the phone.

  Frost took the paper cup with his double-shot latte from the end of the bar and headed for the door. He sipped from the tall cup as he moved, using the opportunity to risk a more thorough scan of the late night coffee drinkers. Old habits had him assigning each one a nickname based on some distinctive characteristic—a facial feature, hair length, an article of clothing. His gaze did not return to Denison.

  Once back outside, he walked to the nearest corner. The smoker was still leaning against the railings outside the Royal Garden. His partner was still at the bus stop. Frost pressed the button on the pedestrian crossing and waited for the Green Man. He took his mobile out of his pocket and rang Denison again.

  “Who’s the girl?”

  “Ronan, I—”

  Frost heard the reluctance and cut in brusquely. “Cut the crap, Tone. No I was going to tell you rubbish. I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s really going on. I’m going to ask you this once and you’re going to tell me the truth or I’m going to hang up and walk away and leave you to it. Is she the reason they’re after you?”

  “Not as such.” There was another pause, Denison trying to work out what he could and couldn’t say, and then he seemed to grasp what Frost was really asking. “Get your mind out of the gutter, man. It’s nothing like that. Honestly, I can’t explain it over an unsecure line. But no, I can assure you that Lili’s role in all of this is tangential at best. She is not the reason I am in trouble.”

  Lili. The name struck a dim and distant chord in Frost’s memory, buried way down deep, but he couldn’t connect it to anything concrete. It was just a name. There wasn’t time to press the issue. “Here’s what you’re going to do. In exactly sixty seconds, you and Lili need to get out of there. Don’t look like you’re in a hurry, but move with a purpose. Leave by the front door, and go east to the first crossing. Cross the street and head for the park gate. Got it?”

  “Sixty seconds,” Denison repeated.

  Frost hung up and made his way across the street, then headed for the bench with the watcher. He dropped down next to the man with an exaggerated sigh of weariness. The watcher offered a sympathetic nod and went back to his surveillance.

  Frost turned his attention to the storefront across the street, but unlike the man beside him, wasn’t caught off guard when the familiar figure of Tony Denison, accompanied by the blonde woman, strode through the door. The watcher reacted immediately, his body tensing in anticipation as he rose to his feet.

  “Careful,” Frost said. Not loud. More of a threat than a warning.

  And before the man could react, swept a foot out and took his feet out from under him. In the same motion, he flat-handed a shove between the man’s shoulder blades and sent him staggering face first onto the pavement.

  His head cracked loudly as it hit the kerb.

  There were half-a-dozen witnesses who would swear that the man had tripped and Frost had tried to catch him. The mind was funny that way; when confronted with a set of unexpected circumstances, people reached for the easiest, most palatable explanation. That was why eyewitness accounts rarely corresponded perfectly with the physical evidence. A would-be Good Samaritan came towards them, looking to offer what help they could.

  Frost wasn’t finished.

  “Hey, are you all right?” he asked, theatrically as he knelt and slipped a hand around the man’s neck. He felt the throb of a carotid pulse against his fingertips as he squeezed. Thirty seconds should do the trick.

  His other hand found the pistol tucked in the man’s belt at the small of his back. Proof enough he’d not gone soft. He tugged the man’s coat down to ensure that no one else saw the gun then looked up at the gathering crowd. “Did you see that? He just went down?”

  “Drunk,” a sallow-faced snotty-nosed member of the Green Wellie Brigade said dismissively.

  Frost nodded knowingly and stood. “Probably. Stay with him, would you? I’ll go for help.�
�

  And just like that, he was moving again, striding purposefully toward the park entrance and the second watcher. Denison and the woman—Lili—were only a few steps ahead of him on the other side of the thoroughfare.

  Frost slowed his pace and scanned the street in both directions. Aside from the man still making a show of casually smoking a filter-tip by the phone box beside the park gate, there was no sign of any back-up. That was either a very good sign, or quite possibly, a very bad one. Paranoia was a safer mind-set than blind optimism, so he assumed the worst even though there was no evidence to suggest he was dealing with professionals. Still, until he knew exactly what Denison was mixed up in, he was Mr Worst Case.

  The watcher noticed Denison and Lili crossing the street towards him.

  The momentary flicker of recognition as his eyes widened was followed by a poorly disguised effort to remain inconspicuous, even as he readied himself for action. It was almost comically bad.

  The watcher made no move as the pair passed him, but as soon as they crossed into the park, he lurched into motion. Frost fell into step behind him, allowing the watcher to outpace just ever so slightly. The caution was unnecessary. The watcher had developed tunnel vision. He didn’t once look away from his quarry. With a copse of trees concealing them from view the watcher quickened his pace. Frost saw the man reach into the pocket of his coat, going for his gun.

  Before it was halfway clear, Frost exploded into action.

  He sprinted forward, the Browning drawn but kept low, discreet. The watcher was rigidly eyes-forward. His attention didn’t waver. Not even as Frost slammed the butt of the Browning into the back of his skull and took him down.

  Frost caught him under the arms and dragged him off the path. “Tony,” he rasped.

  Twenty metres up the path, Denison turned, his anxiety evident in every muscle of his body as he moved. Frost saw him heave a sigh of relief as he made the motionless form of the watcher. He took Lili’s hand and hurried back to where Frost waited.

  “You said there were two?”

  Frost nodded. “And now there are none. Let’s get you somewhere safe. I really want to know what the fuck’s going on.”

  Denison nodded, but Lili quickly jumped in. “There is no time for safe.” As Frost had expected, she had a thick Slavic accent. “We must get to Saint Albans tonight.”

  “Saint Albans?” Frost kept his gaze on Denison. “Planning a little vacation?”

  “No.”

  “So what’s there then?”

  “The answers to everything.”

  Before Frost could challenge Denison’s deliberately cryptic reply, something struck the ground at their feet, digging in with the severity of a hammer blow. It threw up a spray of dirt and grit.

  There was no report, meaning the gun was suppressed, but Frost didn’t need to hear the boom to recognise the impact of a bullet.

  Another bullet tore into the greenery.

  Frost was no stranger to violence. He’d grown up with the constant awareness of just how quickly a life could be snuffed out. He had come to cherish the surge of adrenaline that accompanied the explosions and incoming gunfire—and he’d learned to compartmentalize his reactions. There was no paralyzing fear, no moment of dumbfounded incomprehension at the realisation that someone was trying to kill him. His military experience had honed his ability to use the physical reaction to his advantage, and like most soldiers, he had an almost fatalistic view of combat; if one of those bullets was meant to end his life, so be it. Soldiers died. It was just what they did.

  Nevertheless, self-preservation remained the first order of business.

  He reacted instinctively, grabbing Denison with one hand and Lili with the other, pulling them toward the trees. Not that the foliage would offer much cover. As soon as they were down, Frost scanned the path behind them and glimpsed someone ducking behind another tree, this one about twenty metres away, further away from the tell-tale glow of the street lights.

  Then a flicker in the shadows caught in his peripheral vision: a second figure moving on the opposite side of the path.

  Breathing a curse, Frost leaned in close to the others. “When I start shooting, run.”

  “Where?”

  “Anyfuckingwhere. It doesn’t matter. Just as long as it’s away from the bloody bullets.”

  Denison gave a curt nod, and Frost saw the first glimmer of the old warhorse in his expression. He was going to need that if they were all going to walk out of the park tonight.

  One of their assailants made his move.

  Frost was ready.

  His Browning Hi-power thundered, shattering the relative quiet of the evening—it didn’t sound anything like a car backfiring on Kensington High Street but that was what bystanders would remember hearing—and two rounds smacked into a tree beside the assassin.

  Frost ducked back, keeping the bole of the tree between himself and the shooters.

  Denison and Lili were already sprinting across the grass—abandoning the path for the deeper darkness of the park.

  Staying low, he eased away from the tree and waited.

  A few seconds later, he heard the crunch of footsteps.

  The gunmen were following standard infantry tactics; one man covering the other while moving in a variation of leapfrog. Perfect for taking on an enemy in a static location, but while the two men bounded forward in stages, their real target was racing away. From the moment they’d set foot in the park Frost’s primary objective had been keeping Denison and Lili alive. If he could keep the gunmen occupied a few seconds longer, they’d be off their radar.

  Unless there are more of them, Mr Worst Case thought for him.

  In their place Frost would have wanted to keep the hit team simple. It was reasonable to assume they would work the same way. Always figure the enemy is better than you are. That was a great way to stay alive. The first attempt had been meant to look like a random street crime. This all-out assault smacked of desperation.

  He could work with that.

  Frost eased out from behind cover and sent a double-tap in the direction of the pair. He wasn’t trying to hit them. A gun battle in Kensington Park Garden was the last thing he wanted. And if the hit team had any sense, they would already be melting away into the shadows, disappearing before the police showed up. This wasn’t Fallujah. Gunshots didn’t go unnoticed.

  Without waiting to see their next move, Frost spun on his heel and ran, head down, moving fast, perpendicular to the path, aiming for the edge of the park. As he skirted the wrought iron barrier that blocked access to the main house, he stowed the Browning and took out his phone to call Denison.

  He heard his old friend’s laboured breathing over the line. “Ronan?”

  “Where are you?”

  “The Palace Gate exit. There are other people here. I think they heard the shots.”

  “That was the point. I think I bought us some breathing room, but you need to keep moving. There’s an Underground station a few streets south of here. Buy a ticket to Heathrow.”

  “The airport?” Frost heard Lili give a small huff of protest. “We can’t leave the country, Ronan,” Denison continued.

  “You’re not. It’s the fastest way out of here. Forty minutes on the Piccadilly Line, a car rental desk at the other end. I’ll make all the arrangements and be waiting for you by the Hertz desk. We’ll be in Saint Albans in a couple of hours.”

  “My car is at the Royal Garden. That’s just a street away.”

  “You need to start thinking, Tony.” Frost didn’t have the time or the inclination to coddle his old friend. “They attacked you in the car park. They know your car. Even if they think you’re too smart to go back for it, they’ll have left you a present. You want to be another car bomb statistic be my guest, but you asked for my help, so how about you do what I say? Take the Tube.”

  There was a pause and then a reluctant. “You’re right. We’ll see you there.”

  Frost pocketed the phone and took
a quick look around before heading toward the Palace Gate. Denison would do as instructed. He’d be long gone by the time Frost reached the park exit.

  It would be an hour before their paths crossed again. That gave Ronan Frost an hour to work out who was trying to kill Tony Denison and what was so important about Saint Albans. He walked back to the Monster.

  2 Uninvited

  2010 UTC

  “THIS IS YOU, no?” The old man thrust a piece of paper under the woman’s nose.

  She glanced at the scrap, her face screwing up intently as she tried to decipher the scrawl. She had been polite when he’d first spoken to her on the intercom, and had even ventured from her flat to explain the mistake face-to-face, but now her stiff upper lip unflappability was reaching breaking point. “No,” she said at last, her tone sharp. Condescending. She didn’t like the man in front of her. “That’s upstairs. I told you. I didn’t order any takeaway. You’ve got the wrong flat.”

  The old man took the paper back and stared at it. “I tried this, but no one answers. So I think, ‘Misha writes numbers wrong.’ So I ring you. Are you sure you don’t order this? Is pelmeni. Is very good. Trust me.”

  The woman shook her head and pushed the paper away. “Thank you,” she said tersely. “I am sure it is wonderful. But no. You’ll have to try upstairs again. I’m very sorry, but I can’t help you.”

  “No one answers,” the old man repeated. “I think Misha writes wrong address.”

  “I’m sorry. You need to talk to Misha.”

  The woman turned away and disappeared back into the building, avoiding eye contact as she hurried back to her first floor apartment.

  As the interior door closed, the old man’s mask of disappointment fell away, replaced by a satisfied smile. He gave the door a gentle nudge with his foot, having caught it before it could latch behind the woman, and entered the building.

  He immediately crossed to the stairwell and shuffled up the steps, clutching the white plastic bag full of Styrofoam food containers as though they contained the crown jewels. As soon as he reached the second floor landing however, he deposited the bag down the rubbish chute and straightened up from his hunched over posture, adding six inches to his height and taking a decade off his age in the process.