Ninety minutes into the job, James’ feet were starting to ache. He’d finished the last of the bathrooms, which was the part of the job he really hated. Getting blanked by his friends and losing his summer holiday was bad, but having to unblock a toilet full of turds and soggy bog roll was easily worst of all.
As James threw his disposable gloves and soggy cloths into the rubbish sack on his cart, he heard a tiny giggle. He knew it was Zara Asker’s eighteen-month-old son, Joshua, but that wasn’t how you played the game.
‘Boo,’ Joshua squealed as he jumped out from behind the cart.
James theatrically backed up to the wall. ‘You scared me! You horrible little monster.’
Joshua giggled as he hugged James’ leg. ‘Joshua monster. Grrrrrr.’
‘Did you escape from Mummy’s office again?’
Joshua beamed as James picked him off the floor. His blond fringe hung over his eyes and he wore striped dungarees with powdery brown marks all over them.
‘It looks like you decided to wear that chocolate bar,’ James said, as he carried the toddler up to the door of Zara’s office and knocked.
There were a few staff on campus that James liked, but Zara was his favourite. She always worked late and in the month James had been on cleaning duty, she’d got into the habit of making him a mug of tea part way through his shift. He usually drank it in Zara’s office while they had a quick chat.
James stepped through the door and put Joshua down on the carpet. He was disappointed to see that Zara had company.
‘I’d better get on,’ James said, turning back towards the door.
‘Actually James, have you got a minute?’ Zara asked.
James turned back and studied the woman facing Zara across her desk. She was in her early thirties, with long dark hair and a fit body.
‘Millie, this is James; the one I was talking about. James, this is Millie Kentner, one of your predecessors at CHERUB.’
James reached forward to shake her hand, but Joshua snatched James’ attention by bashing his boot with a toy car.
‘Look,’ Joshua demanded.
James smiled at him. ‘Is that a new car?’
Joshua grinned up at James as Zara explained the situation to Millie. ‘Ewart brings Joshua over here while he gives the baby her bath and gets her off to sleep. He’s supposed to be visiting Mummy for half an hour before he goes to bed, but James is his hero.’
Millie gave James a toothpaste advert grin. ‘Is that right, James?’
‘I guess,’ James shrugged, as he crouched down and took Joshua’s new Lamborghini for a test drive across the carpet.
Zara nodded. ‘From when Joshua first wakes up, all I hear is James, James, James. When you ask Joshua what he’s going to do, he makes all this stuff up. Yesterday he announced that he was going to go fishing with James. He must have seen it on TV, because Ewart’s never taken him fishing.’
‘So, James,’ Millie smirked, covering her mouth as though she didn’t want Zara to hear. ‘As one CHERUB to another, how’d you end up on cleaning detail?’
‘I got in a fight,’ James said awkwardly.
Zara smiled. ‘Well that’s not exactly true, is it James?’
‘I dunno, isn’t it?’
‘Get this,’ Zara grinned as she pointed at James. ‘The silly muppet got himself dumped by his girlfriend. So he storms out and thumps the first person he sees: a little scrap of an eleven-year-old kid.’
Millie put her hands over her mouth. ‘Oh my god,’ she smiled. ‘James, how could you? And you’re so sweet with Joshua.’
James felt awkward and dumb, even though he realised Millie was trying to be nice.
‘So, like I said,’ Zara interrupted, ‘young James has some very good mission experience, but right now he’s down in the dumps. His friends have all given him the boot. He’s lost his summer holiday and the only way he’ll get out of cleaning duty is if I send him on a mission.’
Millie nodded. ‘I’ll take whoever I can get. This is just a favour really. I can sort out accommodation and I doubt it will take any more than a month.’
Zara explained to James. ‘After retiring as a CHERUB agent, Millie joined the Metropolitan Police. She works as a community officer in east London and she’s having a few problems with one of the local villains. It’s textbook CHERUB stuff: move into the neighbourhood with another agent, hang out with the villain’s kids, try getting involved in his home life and business, etcetera, etcetera. I’ll have to type up a proper mission briefing and get ethics committee approval, but I assume you’re interested?’
James nodded enthusiastically. ‘I don’t care what the mission is if it means I don’t have to stick my hand down another toilet.’
Zara smiled. ‘I thought you might say that.’
13. CLASSIFIED
**CLASSIFIED**
MISSION BRIEFING FOR JAMES ADAMS
THIS DOCUMENT IS PROTECTED WITH A RADIO
FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION TAG
ANY ATTEMPT TO REMOVE IT FROM THE MISSION
PREPARATION BUILDING WILL SET OFF AN ALARM
DO NOT PHOTOCOPY OR MAKE NOTES
MILLIE KENTNER
Millie Kentner was born in 1971. She served as a CHERUB agent from 1981–1988, retiring with a black shirt after eleven missions. Her role in the 1985 miners’ strike has been described as ‘One of the most outstanding performances by a CHERUB agent, ever’.
Millie left for Sussex University where she studied forensic science. In 1992 she joined the Metropolitan Police and her career was fast-tracked, enabling her to obtain the rank of Inspector within four years. Following this promotion, Millie transferred from the serious crime squad to a role in charge of a community-policing unit, covering the area of east London that includes the Palm Hill estate.
Palm Hill is still notorious for riots that took place there in 1981, but today the area has many affluent residents and crime is below the London average. Millie Kentner’s work with the Palm Hill community over the last nine years has been credited for much of this change. In 2002 she turned down the offer of promotion to Chief Inspector and the opportunity to head a London-wide taskforce designed to specifically target London’s crime black spots. She wanted to continue working in Palm Hill.
THE BROTHERS TARASOV
Leon and Nikola Tarasov were born somewhere in Russia in the early 1950s. Nikola was believed to be one year older than his brother, although their exact ages are uncertain. After serving in the Russian navy, both young men took jobs as fishermen.
In August 1975, their factory trawler suffered a dual engine failure while fishing for cod in the North Sea. Following a distress call, a British lifeboat safely evacuated all forty-two crewmembers with assistance from the Norwegian navy.
Upon landing in Britain, Leon and Nikola were among eight members of the crew who requested asylum. After government officials failed in their attempts to persuade the eight sailors to return home and avoid a diplomatic row with the USSR, the British government reluctantly accepted their asylum requests.
After failing to find work aboard a British fishing vessel, Leon and Nikola gravitated towards the small Russian community centred around Bow in east London. The brothers worked a string of undesirable jobs: driving mini-cabs, working in hotel kitchens and portering in hospitals. It is also believed they became increasingly involved in illegal activities. In 1979 Nikola was tried and convicted of stealing more than £2,000 in cash from a mini-cab office where he had worked the previous summer. He was sentenced to three months in prison.
PALM HILL RIOTS
Upon his release, Nikola declared himself homeless and broke, and was allocated a two-bedroom flat in a run-down section of the Palm Hill estate. Leon moved in with him and they continued much as before, earning their keep with a mixture of low-paid work, dodgy dealing and small-time criminal activity. But their financial status would be changed for ever by the Palm Hill riots.
On the night of 13 July 1981, the Palm Hill riots kick
ed off when police stopped and arrested a youth as he got out of a stolen car. Witnesses claimed that the arresting officers assaulted the youth as he was handcuffed and put into the back of a police car. An angry mob gathered, undoubtedly encouraged by a wave of urban violence that had spread across the country following the Brixton riots three months earlier. Bricks and bottles were thrown then the police car was surrounded. The officers were dragged out of their vehicles and beaten by the mob before they got a chance to radio for help.
As darkness fell, youths and police fought running battles in the streets and alleyways around the Palm Hill estate. More than twenty shops were looted, hundreds of windows smashed, cars vandalised and a block of sixty garages at the back of the estate was completely burned out. It took police more than eight hours to restore order.
GOVERNMENT GRANTS
In the aftermath of the riots, the government hatched a compensation scheme – because riots are not covered by insurance – and pledged to spend money regenerating Palm Hill.
Leon and Nikola Tarasov realised that this was a golden opportunity. The brothers had been dealing in second-hand cars and had lost five of them in the burned-out garage block. The government compensated the brothers generously for the cars; by some estimates they received more than four times what the cars were truly worth.
Unable to believe their luck, Leon and Nikola used the compensation money to buy the lease on a derelict pub and an adjoining plot of land at the edge of the Palm Hill estate. Using a mixture of government grants and subsidised redevelopment loans, they refurbished the pub and turned the land into a second-hand car dealership.
SMALL TIME
Although neither venture was wildly successful, the government money enabled the Tarasov brothers to wear suits and describe themselves as local businessmen to the TV crews who occasionally turned up to report on the aftermath of the riots.
Over the following years, the Tarasovs ran their businesses with a complete lack of respect for the law. They were investigated for unpaid taxes and on more than one occasion stolen car parts and vehicles were found on their lot. Another raid uncovered a cache of fake vehicle tax discs. Leon and Nikola claimed that the discs had been left behind by a former employee and were found not guilty by a jury after a three-day trial at Bow Crown Court.
Their pub, the King Of Russia, quickly became a notorious hang-out for petty criminals. It is known around Palm Hill as a place where you can easily buy drugs or stolen goods, drink after hours or settle in for an illegal all-night poker game.
THE TARASOV DYNASTY
Until recently, the Tarasov brothers led remarkably parallel lives. They both married in 1985 and spawned a son and daughter.
Leon married Sacha Arkady. Sonya was born in 1989 (now sixteen) and Maxim in 1991 (now thirteen and known as Max). Nikola married Paula Randall. Their children are Piotr, born in 1986 (now eighteen and known as Pete) and Liza who was born in 1990 (now aged fourteen).
Paula Tarasov left Nikola and her children in 2000 and remarried shortly afterwards. After a prolonged bout of ill health, Nikola Tarasov died of pneumonia in December 2003. Custody of his children was awarded to Leon, without any contest from the children’s mother.
Leon and Sacha currently share two adjoining flats on the Palm Hill estate with their son, daughter, niece and nephew.
MONEY
Leon Tarasov fell apart in the aftermath of his brother’s death. He drank heavily. The pub and car dealership were both in debt and there were rumours that Leon had run up a large gambling debt with a ‘serious’ underworld figure. Many believed that it was only a matter of time before Leon lost his businesses.
The Palm Hill police were among those relishing the imminent demise of Leon Tarasov. Tarasov had been a thorn in the side of the law, both through his own illegal activities and through the fact that his pub provided a hang-out for other criminals. An internal police memo described Leon Tarasov as: ‘A man keen to portray himself as a community leader, but in actuality Tarasov’s criminality is a cancer that undermines much good work done by others in the neighbourhood. Leon is believed to be heavily involved in local car crime and fencing stolen goods. He was suspected of running a protection racket amongst local shopkeepers for a number of years. More recently he has become involved in a violent turf war with a nearby community of travellers.’
But by the end of 2004 Tarasov’s luck had changed for the better. He’d caught up with payments on all his loans, purchased a new car and snapped up the lease on a pub at the north end of the Palm Hill estate. He spent a significant sum refurbishing this second pub, before renaming it the Queen Of Russia.
Over the past year, the joke around Palm Hill has been that Tarasov has either won the lottery or robbed a bank. Having established that Leon did not win the lottery, the police are anxious to find the real source of Tarasov’s newfound wealth.
THE CHERUB MISSION
Leon Tarasov has succeeded in avoiding anything other than a modest court fine in more than thirty years of dubious activity. He keeps his affairs close to his chest and all attempts at using police informants (grasses) and undercover operations have failed.
The thousands of hours wasted on trying to catch Leon Tarasov have made the Palm Hill police increasingly reluctant to put any more effort into nailing him. Millie Kentner has become frustrated with her colleagues’ lack of enthusiasm and has asked if her old friends at CHERUB would be able to help out.
Two experienced CHERUB agents will move into a vacant flat on the same landing as the Tarasov family. The younger agent – James Adams, thirteen – will target Max and Liza. The older agent – Dave Moss, seventeen – will target Sonya and Pete.
Dave will pose as Dave Holmes, a young man who has recently been released from foster care. James will pose as his younger brother, who is still in care but who has been allowed to move in with him. Senior Mission Controller Zara Asker will organise the mission, while Millie Kentner will run the operation on a day-to-day basis.
MISSION OBJECTIVES
(1) To infiltrate the Tarasov family unit and try to obtain as much evidence as possible about criminal activity.
(2) To infiltrate Leon Tarasov’s business, in particular his car dealership which is believed to be the hub of his criminal activities.
(3) The main goal is to try and uncover the source of Leon Tarasov’s recent financial good fortune.
THE CHERUB ETHICS COMMITTEE ACCEPTED THIS MISSION BRIEFING WITHOUT RESERVATION.
This mission has been classified LOW RISK. Experienced agents will be allowed to operate without close supervision from a mission controller.
14. HOME
James and Dave drove to Palm Hill in a battered Ford Mondeo. It was a Saturday morning, the rear seats were folded down and the back of the car was packed up to the roof with stuff. The air conditioning was busted, so they fought the heat by hurtling along the motorway with the windows down and a jet of air turning their hairstyles crazy.
This was James’ second mission with Dave. The seventeen-year-old sat at the wheel, with longish blond hair, big blue eyes and a handsome face that seemed a year or two younger than the muscular body attached to it. James was heavier set, with a flatter nose, but it didn’t take any stretch of the imagination to believe that the two lads were brothers.
Dave was into old-school rock, and the journey passed with a mix of Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and The Who. James preferred more recent stuff, but by the time the CD was on its third spin, he was playing air guitar in the passenger seat.
It was early afternoon when they arrived at Palm Hill, pulling into a courtyard filled with a mix of shabby family saloons and more exotic fare, including BMWs and Audis belonging to the trendy young professionals who had begun purchasing flats on the better parts of the estate. The three-storey housing blocks surrounding the courtyard on all sides had recently been refurbished: brickwork cleaned, windows repainted and secure doors installed at the bottom of every stairwell.
As James
stepped out of the car and walked off the stiffness from a three-hour car journey, he glanced through the gap between two blocks and spotted the crates of empties stacked at the rear of the King Of Russia pub.
James and Dave grabbed a bag each from the back of the car and headed towards the stairs. As they walked up, James felt the mix of excitement and anxiety that you get at the start of every mission, but this time he was also glad to get away from campus. He didn’t want to be around when Lauren, Kerry and everyone else got back from the hostel with their golden tans and anecdotes about all the fun they’d had.
The flat was twenty metres along the first-floor balcony; four doors away from the two homes occupied by the Tarasovs. It had the musty smell of a place that hadn’t been aired in months. You could only guess at the original colour of the carpets and the previous owner’s taste in patterned wallpaper and plastic chandelier light fittings was pretty horrific.
‘Not much furniture,’ James said, as he stuck his head into a living-room containing a single sofa and a coffee table with a cracked glass top.
Dave nodded. ‘You read the briefing. Kids released from care get a three hundred quid grant for furniture. We can drive out to Ikea in the week and get beanbags and stuff, but nothing flash.’
James carried on inspecting. The kitchen and bathroom weren’t too horrible, but the main bedroom contained only a metal clothes rail and a brand new bed. It had flamingo pink carpet and flock wallpaper.
The Killing Page 8
