Passenger 13

by Scott Mariani

  Without the least sound, not the crack of a twig, the three-man team stalked out into the long grass of the meadow and converged on the cottage, virtually invisible in their black assault vests and ski-masks. The infra-red night vision goggles they wore were the latest military issue. They were professionals at what they did, were thoroughly familiar with the nature of the target and would take no chances – but the observation of his behaviour since re-entering the country showed that he was entirely off his guard. The three men had been watching him earlier that day from leafy cover as he wandered unsuspecting through the woods, and they might have picked him off if it hadn’t been for the proximity of the public footpath and the risk of being seen.

  Now, under cover of night, was the time.

  The team reached the fence at the rear of the cottage and silently climbed over into the garden. Without a word they split up: the team leader skirted around the stone wall to the front entrance; the second man crept towards the back door, and the third leaped, cat-like, up the grassy bank at the side of the house, where the corner of the thatched roof dipped low enough to jump across to. He landed lightly on the thatch, signalled to his colleagues and made his way stealthily towards the point their careful planning had told them was directly above the target’s bedroom.

  The back door snicked open with the barest sound and a black-clad figure stepped inside the hallway. The assassin paused a moment, listening keenly for any sound. The cottage was utterly silent. Through his goggles, its pitch-dark interior was lit up green and as clear as day.

  He sniffed the air, caught the scent of tobacco smoke and whisky, and smiled to himself. They’d all seen the way the target had been knocking back the booze that evening. He’d be fast asleep now, dead to the world.

  The assassin padded across the hallway towards the stairs. Raised the toe of his combat boot to the bottom tread, gently testing it with his weight in case it creaked. But the staircase was solid oak, soundly built, and didn’t make a squeak. He climbed the next step, then the next. Halfway up the staircase, he could see the bedroom door through the turned oak banister rails. He silently pushed off the safety catch of his weapon with a gloved finger. Climbed another step.

  And crashed downwards feet-first through the staircase, letting out a grunt of shock and surprise as it gave way under him with a crackling rending of wood. He dropped his weapon and lashed out with both hands to save himself, but there was nothing he could do to avoid falling straight down into the space below. He landed heavily on his back, whacking his head against something solid. He was in an under-stairs cupboard.

  The door was bolted from the outside.

  And the cupboard was filled with coils of barbed wire.

  * * *

  At the sounds of confusion and panic in his radio earpiece, the second assassin reacted instantly without trying to guess what had happened to his team member. That could wait until later. Slashing though the last layer of thatch with his combat dagger he kicked his way through to the inside. His boots connected with the thick bedroom ceiling beam. He leaped quickly down to the floor, and before the huddled shape of the man under the bedclothes ten feet away had had any chance to awaken or make a move, he’d emptied half a magazine of 9mm copper-jacketed bullets into it, filling the bedroom with the muffled chatter of the machine carbine and the tinkle of spent shell cases on the bare floorboards. The bullets ripped through the thin sheets. Blood spattered green in the night-vision goggles.

  The sleeper hadn’t stood a chance. Maybe if the silly bastard had laid off the whisky, the killer thought as he stepped quickly through the drifting gunsmoke and whisked away the bedcovers to put a final three-shot burst through Ben Hope’s brain.

  In the half-second that it took him to register the large, bleeding lump of raw beef and the cushions arranged under the sheets to look like the shape of a man, the wardrobe door had burst open behind him. The assassin whirled around – straight into the chopping double-handed swing of the cricket bat. It caught him across the temple with a resounding crunch of well-seasoned willow against bone, and he hit the floor in a coma.

  Ben tossed the bat away and snatched up the fallen MP5. With a hard stamp of his heel he crushed the assassin’s windpipe. Then he was across the room, through the bedroom door and out on the dark landing. He flew down the stairs, avoiding the gaping hole where he’d half-sawn through the oak treads earlier that day.

  The man trapped inside the under-stairs cupboard was struggling furiously and crying out in panic. Ben unbolted the door and shone the tactical light beam of the MP5 in the guy’s face. He was helplessly enmeshed in the barbed wire, thrashing to get free, the black combat clothing lacerated and bloody. Ben flipped the select-fire switch on his weapon to single shots. Put two in the man’s chest and a third between his eyes. The thrashing stopped instantly.

  Ben turned away.

  If he’d done so a fraction of a second later, he’d have been dead. A line of bullet holes punched through the cupboard door right next to him. Ben felt the sting of splinters and a jarring bullet strike that knocked the machine carbine out of his hand and sent it spinning to the floor.

  No time to go after it. Gunfire ripped a line of holes in the wall after him as he dived across the hallway and crashed through into the living room. The third shooter had come in via the front door and now gave chase, flame bursting from the muzzle of his gun. He had the advantage of being able to see almost perfectly in the near-total darkness, but Ben was more familiar with the terrain. Darting into the kitchen he kicked over the sturdy table. Antique pine, knotty and age-hardened and more than two inches thick: Ben hurled himself behind it and felt the high-speed hammering impacts churning up the tabletop as the shooter released another flurry of full-auto fire.

  Then, suddenly, the room fell silent – the gunman’s weapon had shot itself empty. Ben didn’t intend to give him time to drop his spent magazine and slam in another from his belt pouch. He leaped out from behind the pockmarked table, reached down to his belt and drew out the slim carving knife he’d taken upstairs earlier that day and hidden in the wardrobe. When you knew you were expecting these kinds of visitors, you wanted to be as prepared as possible. His right hand was tingling violently from where the bullet had impacted against his weapon’s trigger guard, but he could flex his fingers and he knew he hadn’t been hurt.

  That could change at any moment, though.

  The shooter slung the empty gun behind him and ripped his combat dagger from his leg sheath. The two of them squared up to one other. All Ben could see was a moving patch of deeper black against the darkness of the room.

  The black shape suddenly rushed towards him. Ben sensed, rather than saw, the blade come slashing towards his throat, and dodged it at the last instant. The killer advanced two steps, waving his blade this way and that. Ben retreated.

  But now Ben had manoeuvred himself into exactly the position he wanted – right beside the double light switch on the wall. He flipped both switches on together.

  The sudden glare of light made the assassin’s night-vision goggles wash out and rendered him temporarily blind. Ben darted in, aiming the knife at the gap between the ski-mask and the bullet-proof, stab-proof vest he knew the guy would be wearing under his clothes. The assassin managed to tear off his goggles just in time to evade Ben’s thrust and counter with one of his own. The blades clashed. A brief furious exchange of strikes and blocks, and they backed off. Blood dripped from the assassin’s forearm, but not a lot of blood.

  The two men circled one another under the glare of the lights, each trying to anticipate the other’s next move. In a knife fight, cold steel against soft skin and flesh, there was no margin for error. Even a non-lethal cut to a major body part could produce enough of a sudden shock response to incapacitate you for a few critical moments. Then it was all over very quickly.

  Ben readied himself. The assassin’s blade came flashing towards him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Knightsbridge, Lond
on

  The pulsating buzz of the phone on the bedside table dragged Egerton Sinclair up from the depths of a dream that was instantly forgotten as he sat up in bed, fumbling for the lamp. He cursed at the time on the bedside clock.

  Sinclair carried three mobiles, and he kept them all close by at all times, whether he was at home in Surrey with his wife or here at the luxury apartment he used when he’d been working late or wanted to entertain a lady friend. Only one person in the world could be calling on the phone that was ringing at this moment. And if it was ringing, that meant there’d been complications. His heart began to beat strongly as he answered the call.

  ‘We got him,’ said the familiar voice on the other end. ‘It’s done.’

  The wave of relief Sinclair felt quickly gave way to irritation. ‘Then proceed according to plan. What are you calling me for at three in the bloody morning?’

  A pause. Then: ‘Ah, we have a problem.’

  Sinclair kicked his legs out from under the sheet and perched on the edge of the bed, waiting for more.

  ‘Hope wasn’t working alone,’ the voice said.

  That didn’t make any sense. ‘So deal with it,’ Sinclair told him. ‘Fast.’

  ‘Can’t deal with it. I need to meet you.’

  Sinclair trusted his associate, based on a catalogue of jobs that had always gone without a hitch in the past, however sensitive or complex. The man’s edgy tone told him that something was definitely amiss – and it wasn’t the kind of matter they could chat about over the phone, no matter how secure the line. Sinclair cupped his forehead in his hand and screwed his eyes shut. ‘Are Ellis and Nash with you?’ he asked.

  ‘Ellis and Nash are down,’ the associate replied.

  Sinclair sprang up from the bed. ‘Roger that. The usual rendezvous point. Can you make it there in thirty minutes?’

  ‘Copy.’

  Sinclair threw on his clothes and rushed out of the apartment. Three floors below in the private car park, he climbed into his Jaguar Sovereign and took off with a nervous screech of tyres.

  Twenty-seven minutes later, Sinclair rolled the Jag to a halt under the arches of a crumbling Victorian bridge in a seedy district mainly frequented by crack dealers, well away from the eye of security cameras that haunted most of London. It was nearly quarter to four in the morning and he felt sick with fatigue and tension as he stepped out of the car and approached the black Audi A8 that was parked a few yards away under the gloom of the arch. His right hand was in his coat pocket, clutching the compact CZ 9mm pistol.

  He hardly even sensed the movement behind him before he was being slammed into the rough brickwork of the archway and felt the muzzle of a gun pressing into the base of his neck. A hand dived inside his coat pocket and tore the CZ from his grip.

  ‘Hope!’

  ‘I’d crack your skull with this,’ Ben said, grinding the muzzle of the MP5 harder into Sinclair’s neck, ‘but it’d mean having to drag you to the car myself. Get walking.’ He grabbed the MI6 agent by the collar and shoved him roughly towards the assassins’ Audi.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘Somewhere nice and peaceful where we can have another of our little chats.’ Ben opened the car boot and motioned at the occupant already inside.

  ‘I think you two know each other.’

  Sinclair stared at the trussed, gagged, struggling hit team leader. The man’s ski mask was crusted with blood from where Ben had smashed his nose before kicking the knife out of his hand. Some hired assassins were too valuable to have combat daggers stuck in them.

  ‘I told him I’d let him live if he delivered you to me,’ Ben said. ‘He was pretty quick to agree. You can argue about it on the way. In, please.’

  ‘You’ve got to be joking,’ Sinclair blustered. ‘I’m not—’ But before he could finish, Ben had bundled him into the boot with the other one and slammed the lid down on them.

  The Audi felt heavy at the back as Ben took off with his cargo.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  In the dead of night it didn’t take much over forty minutes to cut north-eastwards across the city to the wilds of Epping Forest. Ben steered off the main road onto a rough earth track that wound deep into the woods, and bumped and lurched over ruts for another mile and a half before he eventually stopped the car and killed the engine and lights. He climbed out into the moonlight that streamed down through the dark branches, and popped open the Audi’s boot. Sinclair peered out, looking ashen and more than just a little jostled about.

  Ben jerked his thumb. ‘End of the line.’ He kept the CZ pointed at the agent’s head as he scrambled out, then shoved him roughly against the side of the car.

  ‘You know you have no chance of getting away with this, don’t you?’ the MI6 agent muttered, his eyes glued to the pistol in Ben’s hand.

  ‘Maybe,’ Ben said. ‘Getting away with things is your department, after all.’ Keeping the gun trained on Sinclair, he reached into the car boot. The trussed-up team leader was grunting and straining against his bonds. Ben ignored him and hauled out the shovel he’d brought from Brecon.

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Sinclair said.

  Ben turned to face him. ‘You don’t know me, Sinclair. You just thought you did. I hope you all enjoyed the show.’

  ‘We had a deal. You agreed to go away.’

  ‘Linzi and Bev – were they on MI6’s payroll too? By the way, I wouldn’t have touched them with yours.’

  ‘You’re insane, Hope.’

  ‘You don’t know the half of it,’ Ben said. ‘But one thing I’m not is a fucking idiot. I never believed a word of your bullshit. I knew I could expect a little visit from your wet team the moment I got back to Brecon. I saw them even before they saw me. They left a trail like a rhinoceros.’

  ‘You have to believe me,’ Sinclair burst out. ‘Whoever was sent to kill you, it’s got nothing to do with us. I’ve never seen that man in my life before.’

  ‘That’s fine – then we don’t need him,’ Ben said. He pointed the CZ towards the open boot of the car and shot the team leader twice in the chest and once in the head. The gunshots shattered the stillness of the forest.

  ‘Why did you do that?’ Sinclair raged. ‘You said you’d let him live!’

  ‘I didn’t say for how long,’ Ben said. ‘Lie to me again and you’ll wish it had been you. Now, let’s go for a walk.’ He prodded Sinclair with the shovel.

  An owl hooted somewhere among the trees as Ben marched the MI6 agent deeper into the forest.

  ‘You’re up Shit Creek without a paddle, Hope,’ Sinclair muttered darkly.

  ‘And you’re in the middle of six thousand acres of woodland,’ Ben told him. ‘That’s plenty enough room for a man to disappear. Nobody’s going to hear you cry for help, so you’d better tell me the truth this time.’

  ‘I’ve already told you the truth, you stupid bugger.’

  ‘Like the part about the bomb capable of taking down a full-size airliner that went off inside a Trislander without blowing it into dust?’

  ‘But that’s what happened,’ Sinclair protested. ‘You must have seen the footage of the wreckage. It was completely destroyed.’

  ‘Yes, it was,’ Ben said. ‘But not until a few moments after Nick Chapman had managed to crash-land it in the sea. He had time to call his daughter before he died. His call to her is the reason she was murdered.’

  Sinclair stalled mid-stride and glanced back at Ben over his shoulder with a startled look that said very clearly, ‘How did you know that?’

  ‘I saw it happen,’ Ben replied to his unspoken question. ‘I’m sure you read the witness statement. Oscar Gillespie?’

  ‘That was you?’ Sinclair eyes flashed in the darkness.

  ‘Just one or two things I left out of it,’ Ben said. ‘For example, the fact that before she was killed, Hilary let me hear Nick’s last message to her. It doesn’t quite fit with your account, Sinclair. So I’ve decided to be generous and let y
ou have another go in case you remember things differently this time. You can stop there.’ They were deep among the trees, a long way from the car. ‘Now, get talking or get digging.’

  ‘What the hell do you mean, digging?’

  Ben lobbed the shovel on the ground, still pointing the pistol at Sinclair’s head. ‘What do you think I brought this along for, to make mud pies?’

  ‘You can’t do this.’

  ‘More and more people are opting for an ecological burial, Sinclair. You’d be doing your bit for the environment.’

  ‘If you’re going to kill me anyway, why should I talk to you?’

  ‘I’m not going to kill you, Sinclair. I’m just going to bury you alive and let nature take its course. Unless you tell me everything, right now.’

  Sinclair swallowed hard. ‘And if I do? You’ll let me go? No tricks?’

  ‘That depends on how convincing you are.’

  ‘All right. All right. I’ll tell you. There was some truth in what I said before. Larry Moss was one of our agents. And the CIC plane did go down because of him. But …’

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘But I lied about Moss making explosives. It was information that he was taking with him to London, nothing else.’

  ‘What information?’

  ‘Oh, Jesus …’

  ‘What information?’ Ben repeated.

  Sinclair swallowed hard. ‘It has to do with what happened in June. The Selfridges bombing.’

  Ben frowned. ‘Moss had information about the Selfridges bombing? Information for who? You mean his terrorist girlfriend and her gang carried it out?’

  ‘You don’t understand. Oh, God, they’ll crucify me …’

  ‘I’ll do worse if you don’t explain yourself pretty damn quick,’ Ben said.

  ‘There was no connection between Larry Moss and Al-Badr,’ Sinclair said. It wasn’t Muslim terrorists who blew up the ground floor of Selfridges in June.’

  ‘Then who did?’

  ‘We did,’ Sinclair said.