by J B Holman
‘Come on,’ said Sam, ‘get in the car.’
‘Do you mind if I sit in the back? I really need to lie down.’
‘Whatever!’ he said, in a loud whisper. ‘Just get in the fucking car!’
And that was it; in that one second, as she stepped into the back seat, their mutual fate was sealed.
Once clear of the danger zone, Sam exhaled deeply, threw the knife on the car floor and swore under his breath.
‘Jesus! That was a bit hairy. Hairier than a badger’s arse in winter.’
‘Oh my god. Yes it was, it was.’ The voice in the back was flustered, still in apparent panic. It was sounds more than words.
‘Bastards like that, they should be locked up and have their testicles put where their spectacles should be.’
‘You were very brave . . . like that lady said.’
‘Yes, I’ve been thinking about her . . .’
‘You saved me. I can’t thank you enough.’ They drove, in darkness, two strangers in the night. ‘Thank you. You’re an angel.’
Sam reflected on his last twenty-four hours and shook his head. ‘Yes, I am,’ he said at last, adding almost silently under his breath, ‘an angel of death.’
2
Fly Boy
In Whitehall, deep in the building across the way from No 10, rooms were dark, corridors were quiet, desks were empty and phones were silent. This was the home of the Special Security Service, the Prime Minister’s own protection and anti-terrorist force, and for the last twenty-four hours the building had been in embarrassment and turmoil. But now, at four minutes to eleven, only the Ops Room in the basement had life in it; and a single room on the fourth floor.
This was the Sceptre Room. It had long heavy drapes, tired wood panelling and high Westminster windows overlooking St James’ Park. Three men had arrived. Two chatted. The other, a dishevelled man in his fifties, sat in dower gloom at the far end of the table. His name was Brekkenfield, Head of Operations. He was not on form; he closed his eyes to the puerile banality.
‘No, said the old lady, you don’t spell it W-O-O-M or W-H-U-M, you spell it W–O–M-B,’ prattled Jai McReady, Head of IT and Encryption. ‘And then one of the African boys turns to her and says: Madame, I doubt you’ve ever heard a hippo fart, let alone know how to spell it.’
He burst into self-generated laughter. Brekkenfield shook his head in disapproval, muttering ‘Inappropriate’, under his breath. Hoy, the intended target of McReady’s story, smiled politely.
Hoy was Head of Investigations and still in his thirties; neat hair, good suit, no tie. Investigations was a small but prestigious department, and for him it was an invaluable two-year secondment in his fast track career in Special Branch. He’d done six years with the Met, two with the FBI, one in close protection and five more working his way up the ranks of OS-12. He’d been with SSS for just seven months and the Commander liked him.
Brekkenfield, the curmudgeon, didn’t like anyone at the moment. Operations was the largest and most powerful department within SSS. He had a history of controlling it with passion and a titanium fist, but tonight he was in mourning and just wanted to be in bed. He sat, detached from the younger two men. His skin was pale and flaccid, his jowls drooped and his spark had gone; that’s what three weeks in hospital would do even to the fittest of men. He had come out that morning under strict medical instructions to take a full month off.
The door opened. In strode the Commander. Tall, slim and gristly, a man of bone, muscle and discipline. Though in his early sixties, he was happier in fatigues than a suit and in Hereford or the Highlands than Westminster and Whitehall. His preference would be a bivouac in Iraq or a dugout in the Falklands rather than an office in London, but this was his duty and he would do it to the best of his abilities. His name was Storrington. He looked around the table.
‘Where’s Flyboy?’
‘Parking his jet, probably,’ said Jai, the jocular computer geek, ‘where every-one can see it. He thinks he’s so sophisticated. And what’s with the whole hand-shaking thing? We’re not French.’ Commander Storrington ignored the prattle, stood by the window and looked out, not for the missing man but at the night-shrouded world he was beholden to protect.
They sat waiting for Nickolas Morgan-Tenby. He’d been an RAF fast jet pilot many years before. He was not born double-barrelled, he added the hyphen himself; an affectation adopted by him and neglected by others. Big Ben struck eleven, the door opened. Tenby smiled and entered.
‘Not late, am I?’ He shook hands round the table.
‘Bonjour,’ said Jai, to be met by the disapproving eyes of Storrington.
‘We lost our man yesterday and I want the killer. No smiles, no jokes, no leave and no excuses until I get him. Understood? Now, Brekkenfield, how are you?’
‘Alive and present, sir.’
Storrington scanned the room and surveyed his senior team, now sat sombre around a board table, as large as it was old. Brekkenfield was Navy and hard as nails; Tenby was Air Force and had achieved through charm; Storrington was Army through to the core; Hoy was constabulary and Jai was nothing, just a civvie-street technician. He needed them to work as a team. ‘This is a crisis. We need action and we need results. The police say it was ISIS. Do we agree?’
‘No, sir. It was not ISIS,’ said Hoy, as Head of Investigations.
‘Then what led the police to think it was?’
‘That would be me, sir,’ said Hoy. ‘I told them it was Al Akbar J’zeer, a known threat. They’ll get him. Good for public confidence.’
‘But it wasn’t him?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘So we’re back at square one. We need to know who did this.’
‘I do know who did it,’ continued Hoy.
‘You know?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Who?’
‘Eduard Foxx. That’s with a u and a double x.’
‘Edward Fox?’
‘Yes, sir, Eduard Foxx. Of course, that’s not his real name. That’s just the name he goes under.’
‘Why do I know that name?’ Hoy looked firmly at Tenby.
‘Because he works for us . . . for me. He’s one of my tacticians in the Tactical Planning Department. He’s one of my agents.’
‘Jesus Christ man! What’s the matter with you? We’ve got one of our own running rogue with a sniper rifle?’
‘We have the rifle,’ said Hoy.
‘Do we have the man?’
‘No, sir,’ said Brekkenfield from the gloom of his table end. ‘Two of our agents staked out his flat. One saw him enter the building, the other saw him enter his flat.’
‘Why didn’t they grab him?’
‘Because we didn’t want two dead agents. He killed eight prison guards when he was tied up in an Azerbaijani prison, and four policemen in Georgia - while sedated on drugs.’
‘So send in a team.’
‘We did, sir. We stormed his flat. It only has one door in and the same door out, but when we got there he was gone; cup of tea still steaming.’
‘How?’
‘Vanished into thin air.’
‘Really?’ It wasn’t a question that needed an answer. ‘What’s his real name?’
‘Dunno, sir.’
‘He works for us?’
‘Yes, sir,’ replied Brekkenfield.
‘Then look in his HR file!’
‘Did that,’ chimed in Hoy.
‘And?’
‘Nothing.’
‘What do you mean, nothing?’
‘There’s nothing in it. It’s wiped, gone, empty, clean. Nothing.’
Storrington threw a look at Jai the joker in the pack and asked him, ‘What about the Security Database, it has to be on that?’
‘No, he wiped that too,’ confessed Jai, no longer feeling the humour in life.
‘I thought that was impossible.’
‘So did we, sir. My team
encrypted all the files and made access impossible.’
‘So it is impossible?’
‘Apparently not.’
‘Back-up?’
‘Unfortunately not.’
Storrington gave a long withering look at the rapidly diminishing computer man. ‘So we have no computer records of any sort about Foxx; he’s wiped them all?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And no one in the whole building knows his real name?’
‘No, sir.’
‘So we lost him?’
‘Maybe. Maybe not,’ continued Hoy. ‘A transport bobby thinks he saw him boarding a train for Brighton. Well, he thinks he saw him, but well, you see . . .’
‘No, I don’t see. He’s gone. Find him. And when you do, kill him. . . . and do it fast, before any more innocent people get hurt. Meeting closed. Reconvene tomorrow 17.00 hours.
Brekkenfield, thank you. Stay home, we’ll keep you informed.
Hoy, in my office ten minutes.
Jai, clear your desk. Do it now. Security will escort you out.
You’re fired.’
Hoy sat in a darkened room, gazing through the night as he waited for his phone to connect. It rang. A sleepy voice answered.
‘Sorry, love, did I wake you?’
‘You know you did,’ said a soft female voice, ‘but as Karl Marx said, It’s alright I had to get up to answer the phone anyway.’
‘Karl Marx?’
‘Maybe it was Groucho Marx, and on the subject of grouchy, why are you phoning me not cuddling me?’
‘It’s just a Stevie Wonder call.’
‘What?’
‘I just called to say I love you.’
‘You must be feeling guilty. What brought that on, my little Inspector Clouseau?’
‘I just had a meeting with the team and I looked round the room and felt lucky. Jai just got fired! Bing-bang-bosh and out of the door.’
‘Well, he always was a prat. What did he do?’
‘Long story, but the point is, Jai has no wife; Brekkenfield, who was looking half-dead poor guy, has a wife but separate lives; same house, but a thousand miles apart. The boss, well you know about his wife, and Tenby, he has a wife and she is lovely and all that, and a looker, but is as dim as a duck with no head; and I have you. You’re beautiful, loving, funny and smart. I’m a lucky guy.
‘What do you mean she is lovely and all that? So you think she is a looker?’ she said in mock jealousy, ignoring the Stevie Wonder of his call.
‘Clearly not up to your standards, but most men would consider she had a certain aesthetic appeal. Y’know if you like slim hips, long legs and a full set of curves,’ he said, teasing back. ‘But that’s Tenby all over. It’s all about appearance with him. He’s a superior son of a bitch. Gets a dumb wife, so he looks smarter. Last week, she asked him why they had to choose a new pope when the old one dies . . . why doesn’t his son take over! Then she thought the black smoke and the white smoke were from burning the old pope. Thing is, he tells these stories about her with pride, like he likes it. More than that, he tells them in front of her. Bad form. She doesn’t seem to mind, but makes him a bit of prick if you ask me.’
‘One hundred per cent prick. I wouldn’t go near him. A man of hidden shallows. I don’t know what she sees in him. He’s paunchy, rude and twice her age.’
‘Money; inherited just short of forty million. Oh, gotta go,’ said Hoy abruptly as his phone vibrated. ‘The boss is after me. We’ve got an incident in Brighton and . . . well, I’ll see you later.’
‘You do know the last train to London left over an hour ago, don’t you?’ said Sam.
‘I’ll wait for the milk train in the morning. It’s fine.’
‘Really? Because you look like a seventy-year-old scrotum after a ball-slapping party. When did you last sleep – or are you on drugs?’
‘No drugs, sir, but no sleep either.’
Sam took the main route to the station. There was a roadblock ahead. The police were checking cars. The dazed passenger watched from the back seat. Sam took a right and weaved his way through backstreets towards the station. Again, he saw blue lights ahead and avoided them.
‘You don’t like police then?’ The driver didn’t reply. He took a left to find another route. He circled the centre of Brighton – more police. There was no way to the station that was not impeded by the boys in blue. He turned and headed for his flat - five miles away in Hove. What to do with his passenger? He should never have rescued her. They both felt the awkwardness. They were both thinking: What now?
They drove. They talked.
‘Where did you learn to fight like that?’
‘In the forces.’
‘Are you still serving?’
‘No, but I loved it. I was happier than a boy who’d just touched his first vagina.’
‘So, why did you leave?’
‘Me and Her Majesty’s Government fell out over two bottles of Irish whiskey, one asshole of a colonel and the best punch I’ve ever thrown. I miss it, but I don’t regret teaching that arrogant bastard a lesson.’ He provided the full story. The detail made it no better and no more justifiable, not in anyone’s mind other than his.
‘Look, I am going up to London in the morning,’ he said, as he stopped the car outside his flat. ‘Tell you what, let’s go up now. How does that sound?’ It wasn’t a choice.
‘No, really, I couldn’t ask you to do that. Just drop me at the station. I’ll be fine.’
Sam’s tone changed. His whole countenance transformed from Samaritan to Samurai. This was not a discussion.
‘Don’t argue. You’ve seen what happens to people who argue with me.’
He smiled. It was a joke . . .
Probably.
3
The Astra
The car was quiet, dark and cold. It smelt of earth and kitbags, but for now it was the cocoon that kept her safe. How had this happened to her? Yesterday life had worked. But, last night had been a nightmare. The club had been OK, she’d gone there because she didn’t have anywhere else to go, but it hadn’t ended well. She’d arrived alone and should’ve left alone. Mistake. Never trust a man with a head full of coke. And the alley – she hadn’t expected that, nor a guy to turn up out of nowhere and save her, then offer her a lift all the way to London. But he was hardly a hero - there was something not right about him, too anxious, conflicted, dangerous; and whiskey on his breath, but she was hardly in a position to argue.
She lay on the back seat of the car, head on bag, knees tucked up, dress pulled over cold shoeless feet, waiting obediently outside her saviour’s flat, wondering. Time slid by, sleep evaded her. She leant forward and flicked on the radio.
Easy listening slipped uneasily into her ears.
‘This is 99.2 BBC Brighton Rock. Thank you for listening. More of your soft rock favourites
after the news. Now over to Paddy McCarthy in the BBC Sussex newsroom.’
‘Two men are dead and one is in a serious condition after a senseless and violent attack in a backstreet in Brighton. Police reports indicate that the three men had been drinking in a nearby pub and were walking towards Brighton’s old town when they were savagely attacked in Raper’s Hide just under North Brighton Road. Cause of death is as yet unknown. Police are looking for a black or dark blue Vauxhall Astra and appealing for witnesses.
We will keep you up to date with more on this breaking story as we have it.’
‘Oh my god!’ she said out loud. She grabbed her bag and got out of the car, looked at her stockinged feet and got back in. Her man-shoes were in her bag, but she needed to think. No time. Get out, stay in. Then she saw him. The colossus, her driver, her so far saviour, was walking towards her. It was now or never. She got out of the car, ready to run or hide.
‘Get back in!’ said a voice that was six foot four tall.
‘No. I’m fine. I’ve changed my mind. I’ll walk. Thank you.’
‘Get – in – the – car.’ The voic
e was cold and steely and not to be disobeyed. ‘Now!’ Her saviour closed the door firmly behind her and got into the driver’s seat. There was a click as he engaged the child lock. The passenger was now a prisoner. ‘Just for your safety,’ he said as he started the engine, engaged first gear and pulled away. ‘You’ve been listening to the radio. So you heard the news then?’
‘No,’ she lied and crumbled, ‘I mean yes. Yes I did. I heard it. They’re dead. Those men are dead. You . . .’
‘Me? What makes you think I killed them? No, we’re in the clear, but we’d better leave Brighton for a while. Keep cool. We’re a team now. Get some sleep. Everything will be fine.’
‘But they’re dead. I mean . . . that’s bad. Really bad.’
‘But not my bad, not my problem. They’re scum; gay-bashing thugs. They deserved to die.’
There was silence from the back of the car – a long, heavy silence. She lay in thought. She lay in darkness. She lay at the mercy of a man called Sam, a good Samaritan, trapped by his kindness; too tired to run, too dire to stay. What to do?
‘You wanted to see me?’ said Hoy, to the towering figure of Commander Storrington.
‘Eduard Foxx: is he mad, in the pay of the Russians, converted to ISIS?’
‘None of those. I asked around. He’s an oddball, a one man operation, but not mad, not a communist and not easily swayed. According to everyone, he seems to be a stand-up guy.’
‘For an assassin.’
‘No, what I mean is everyone says he’s principled, a straight arrow. Is in the job because he signed up to the cause, believes in Britain and what it stands for. He acts alone, occasionally in a pair. He’s not a sheep, definitely not a follower. If he did it, and I’m sure he did, then it was because he believed it was right. The PM pissed off a lot of people, y’know, especially in the Security Community. His Brexit stance will leave us wide open. We’ll be outside Europol with no access to their intelligence, while opening up our military intelligence to them through the Defence Deal. Even I think it’s madness. The first role of a Prime Minister is defence of the realm. Palmer let us down. I guess Foxx sees him as an evil in our midst and felt he had to take action. If someone had shot Hitler in 1938, the world would have been a much better place.’
