MERCENARY a gripping, action-packed thriller (Johnny Silver Thriller Book 1)

by PAUL BENNETT

  MERCENARY

  A gripping action-packed thriller

  PAUL BENNETT

  Johnny Silver Thriller 1

  Revised edition 2020

  Joffe Books, London

  © Paul Bennett

  First published in Great Britain 2010

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental. The spelling used is British English except where fidelity to the author’s rendering of accent or dialect supersedes this. The right of Paul Bennett to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

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  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  ALSO BY PAUL BENNETT

  A SELECTION OF BOOKS YOU MAY ENJOY

  PROLOGUE

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  Mbele Diamond Mine, Lunda Norte, Angola. Five years ago.

  ‘Where are the diamonds?’ the Russian said.

  He was short and stocky, his upper body overly developed in relation to his legs and producing a simian appearance. His round face was topped by a mop of hair the colour of steel and dominated by cold grey eyes emphasized by a long scar pointing like an arrow from the corner of his mouth to just below his left eye. Like his tracksuited underlings, he looked like a common hood; if indeed they were mercenaries, then they were in the category of rabid dogs of war rather than that of soldiers of fortune. He repeated the question. His voice, heavily accented and with the typical deep and morose tone of a Muscovite, reverberated off the wooden walls of the hut.

  Four men – a Texan, a South African, a Pole and a Jamaican – were hanging like pigs on a spit, their hands and feet tied around the beams supporting the low roof, their naked bodies, dotted with cigarette burns, dangling down towards the concrete floor. None of the men spoke. They had heard the question many times before and each time had given the only answer possible. ‘What diamonds?’

  The hut was quiet, the only sounds were the controlled breathing of the torturers, the low groans of the four prisoners, the drone of indecisive flies flitting from wound to wound and the soft plop of blood dripping from the leg of the Jamaican who had been hamstrung with a switchblade for spitting in the eye of the Russian. The air was thick with the acrid smoke from black-tobacco cigarettes and the unmistakable odour of fear, sweat and burnt flesh.

  The Russian sighed, waved his hand towards the flat iron sitting on top of the cast-iron stove and then pointed at the South African. An underling gave a twisted smile, picked up the iron, walked quickly across the room to preserve the heat and pressed it hard against the back of the tall blond man.

  There was a long wailing scream. It filled the hut and travelled out in a seismic shock wave, causing the two guards outside the door to jump and the remainder of the invading force in the mess hall at the other end of the compound to pause momentarily in the lifting of beer bottles to lips.

  Time seemed to pass in slow motion. Still the iron was held in place. Flesh sizzled, causing bile to rise in the throats of the other prisoners.

  The South African, mercifully, lost consciousness.

  ‘Now, I ask you again,’ the Russian said to the other three, ‘where are the diamonds?’

  ‘If we knew,’ the Texan drawled, his teeth gritted against the throbbing pain from the soles of his feet and his genitals where they had been repeatedly beaten by a thick flat stick, ‘don’t you think we would have told you by now?’

  ‘Then where is Gordini?’ the Russian said, changing tack. ‘Where is your leader?’

  ‘Dead under a bush somewhere,’ the Pole grunted. ‘Your men shot him when they attacked us. He was hit five times. Maybe more.’

  ‘Yet he still managed to get away.’ The Russian’s thick eyebrows turned down in thought. ‘Does Gordini have the diamonds?’

  ‘Jesus Christ!’ the Texan shouted. ‘How many times do we have to tell you? We don’t know nothing about no diamonds.’

  The Russian held out a hand, pointing his index finger at the pile of Kalashnikovs leaning against the wall and snapping two fingers. One of the guns was snatched up and pressed into his hand. He turned it round and drove the butt hard into the Texan’s ribs. The sharp crack was as audible as it was painful.

  ‘The manager of the mine says otherwise,’ the Russian said. ‘Or, should I say, said otherwise. Five thousand carats missing from the safe, he told me. And I believe him. He was not as stubborn nor as strong as you. He squealed like a pig at the end.’ He gave a deep bellowing laugh and shrugged his shoulders. ‘If there are no diamonds, then I lose nothing by shooting you all. Think about that.’

  He turned to his henchmen.

  ‘I grow impatient,’ he said. ‘I am going to the mess hall for a drink. Fetch me when one of them decides to speak. Shoot them one by one. Start with the filthy Pole.’

  He strode from the hut.

  Eight men unenthusiastically picked up their Kalashnikov AKMs and watched him go. A debate ensued about whether they should all fire together or draw lots to select one of their number. After smoking a cigarette, they chose the former. The Pole made an effort to control his bowels and bladder – at this range, a volley of the steel-cored bullets would cut him in half. Eight pairs of eyes turned towards the Pole, raised their guns and took aim.

  ‘Wait,’ the Pole said quickly in Russian, ‘I’ll tell you where Gordini is.’

  They laughed scornfully. They should have realized the Pole would be the first to break.

  ‘Gordini is—’ the Pole began.

  ‘Behind you,’ came a voice.

  Gordini stood in the doorway. His shirt was covered in blood – most, but not all, of it his own. His left arm hung down uselessly, his right held a Uzi with a silencer. Aiming at bellies rather than chests so as not to hit any of his comrades, he swung the gun from left to right, spraying bullets all the time. Bodies fell to the floor, its surface quickly turning red as separate streams of blood coalesced first into rivers and then into a flood plain.

  Gordini stepped over to his friends, kicking guns out of the reach of those who were still breathing as he made slow progress across the hut. Placing the Uzi on the floor, he took a long knife from the utility belt around his waist, sliced through the ropes holding the Texan’s feet and, when they were safely on the floor, cut the bonds around the wrists. Together they freed the Pole, then the Jamaican and, lastly, the semi-conscious South African.

  The four men found the
ir clothes and dressed hurriedly, the Texan wincing from the stabbing pain from his ribs, the South African needing help and groaning as the rough material of his shirt touched his raw back. While they were doing this, Gordini issued orders in a low voice. He detailed the Jamaican and South African to the supply truck – they could lie on their bellies in the back and guard their rear. The Texan was firstly to hide the bodies of the two guards who had been on duty outside and then to collect passports, visas and as much of their kit as he could carry. The Pole was to find medical supplies and water, rations too, if possible, but they could live without food for a while. The four men gathered up the Kalashnikovs and magazines of spare ammunition.

  ‘What about the others?’ the Texan asked.

  ‘There are no others,’ Gordini said. ‘All twenty are dead. It’s just us five left out of the whole outfit.’

  The Pole swore in his native language. ‘Russians!’ he said, spitting on the floor. ‘What did we ever do to them?’

  Gordini shrugged, his eyes narrowing from the resulting pain in his left shoulder. He didn’t know whether the Pole’s words were a comment on their current situation, or something that went back into the tragic history of his homeland. Now wasn’t the time to find out which.

  ‘On the count of three,’ Gordini said, ‘all fire one round.’

  The loud co-ordinated gunfire was heard in the mess hall. One down, three to go, thought the Russian.

  ‘OK,’ Gordini said. ‘From now on, not a sound. Meet me at the truck in five minutes.’

  It was a sorry group that staggered and limped out of the hut to their respective destinations in the compound. Gordini headed for the armoury. He found some smoke grenades and stuffed as many as he could into the deep pockets of his combat trousers. Into the utility belt he slipped three spare magazines for the Uzi. He would have liked to have taken the Browning M2 heavy machine-gun to set up in the back of the truck, but he only had one useful arm and the silenced Uzi had to take priority – the Russian might have posted more guards by now.

  From the armoury Gordini ran across the compound, keeping low to the ground. He stopped at the first of the fleet of jeeps the Russians had arrived in, lifted the hood and propped it open. With his knife he cut the lead that ran to the distributor cap. One by one he immobilized the other vehicles.

  When he finally made it across the compound to the truck, Gordini passed the smoke grenades to the Jamaican and the South African. He wished them good luck and ran to the cab. The Texan was in the driving seat, taking short breaths and waiting for the order to start the ignition. The Pole took Gordini’s Uzi and slid across the bench seat as he climbed awkwardly inside.

  ‘Let’s go,’ Gordini said.

  The truck’s diesel engine coughed and spluttered geriatrically in the damp night air before eventually kicking into life. As they pulled away, the door of the mess hall opened. Armed men started to pour out. The Jamaican and the South African lobbed smoke grenades and immediately began firing. They didn’t bother aiming: the effective range of the Kalashnikov may technically be 300 metres, but over forty it was pot luck if and what you hit. Added to that, the Texan was zigzagging the truck violently in an evasive manoeuvre to avoid the hail of bullets coming blindly through the thick blue smoke.

  They smashed through the gates of the compound and headed along the dirt track from the mine. The Texan drove fast, avoiding potholes as best he could. Each time he hit one there was a chorus of painful groans as wounds were jolted against the hard surfaces of the truck. After three miles they reached the road that ran westward towards Malanje.

  Gordini lifted the canvas flap that separated the cab from the back of the truck.

  ‘What’s happening back there?’ he shouted, against the noise of the straining engine.

  ‘Nothing,’ the South African shouted back. ‘No pursuit.’

  ‘Then we have some breathing space,’ Gordini said. ‘Can you start patching us up?’ he said to the Pole.

  The Pole dug into his bergan and assembled a collection of different sized and shaped dressings, antiseptic, a roll of bandage for the Texan’s ribs and a rubber tourniquet for the Jamaican’s leg. ‘Morphine, anyone?’ he asked.

  ‘Not yet,’ said Gordini. ‘We need to keep our wits about us. Adrenaline will numb the pain for a while. After that, try to hang on as best you can, lads.’

  The Pole passed the tourniquet into the back of the truck and started to cut away at Gordini’s jacket. ‘This is not good,’ he said, examining the wounds that had torn most of the left shoulder to pieces.

  ‘Tell me something I don’t know.’

  ‘This is going to hurt,’ the Pole said, taking the top off the plastic bottle of antiseptic.

  ‘That’s something I don’t know?’ Gordini gritted his teeth. ‘What the hell was this all about?’ he said. ‘One moment we’re celebrating the end of this lousy contract because the mine has been taken over, and – Jesus Christ!’ the yellow liquid penetrated into the wounds with all the subtlety of a red-hot poker. ‘… And the next a bunch of Russians are spoiling our party by gunning down everyone in sight.’

  He slumped back into the seat, breathing hard.

  ‘And,’ the Texan said, ‘their leader kept asking us about diamonds missing from the safe. Five thousand carats.’

  A whistle escaped from Gordini’s lips. ‘That’s around two and a half million dollars. Three million, maybe, if they’re the best quality.’

  He fell silent.

  ‘What are you thinking?’ the Jamaican called from the back.

  ‘Three things,’ Gordini said. ‘One, if there are three million dollars’ worth of diamonds missing and they think we took them, which to them is the logical explanation, then they’ll come looking for us. They’ll hunt us down, sure as hell.’

  ‘Shit,’ said the Texan.

  ‘Two follows from one,’ Gordini said. ‘It’s time we got out of this damned country. Head for Zaire.’

  ‘Out of the frying pan and into the fire,’ the Texan said glumly.

  Gordini shrugged. ‘Quicker than going to the Congo.’

  ‘Rock and a hard place,’ the Texan said more glumly.

  ‘Who cares?’ the Pole asked. ‘We need proper medical attention and blood. Our best chance is the UN aid station just over the border.’ He turned to Gordini. ‘You said there were three things. What’s the third?

  ‘It’s time we got out of this damned business.’

  1

  The island of St Jude, Caribbean. The present.

  My name is Johnny Silver. That or thereabouts. Not the best name in the world – too many mental pictures of one-legged pirates with parrots perched on their shoulders – but it suits its purpose. It has that Hispaniola ring about it that is appropriate to where I live and what I now do, and, misleadingly, is unlikely to be a name anyone in their right mind would choose of their own free will.

  Paradise is a very personal concept. But St Jude, with its turquoise waters, iridescent green coral reefs and long-fringed palm trees rising at forty-five degrees over the platinum sand, would have coincided with most people’s definition. My priority was haven rather than heaven, and in that respect St Jude was as near perfect as you could get. It is a tiny island, has one very expensive and very exclusive hotel, no airport, and is a two-hour boat trip from the nearest decent-sized centre of population. It is quiet, very quiet. And that is exactly how I like it. Just enough visitors to scratch a living from the beach bar, and little chance I would know any of them. Or, more to the point, that they would know me.

  Just another day in paradise. That’s how it started, Phil Collins fashion, but not how it ended – that was more Chris Rea, Road to Hell. It was a quarter to eleven on a typically hot sunny day. Bull Adams and I had completed our punishing daily routine of thirty minutes jogging along the beach and an hour-long swim back and were now sitting in cane chairs in the shade of the bar, sipping ice-cold beers and recuperating. I was in front of my laptop putting the finishin
g touches to my column of the Cyclops ‘hot share tips of the week’ page on The Wall Street Journal Internet site, Bull had his legs propped up on a chair and was gazing at his boat bobbing about lazily beside the jetty. There was the sweet smell of bougainvillaea in the air. All seemed right with the world. Then we heard the shouts.

  Even from a distance the group looked like trouble. Six men doing all they could, and more, to impress six young women. I narrowed my eyes and assessed their erratic progress along the beach. The women were huddled together, walking with swaying hips: the men were circling around them, engaged in a mock free-for-all fight among themselves, legs sweeping and arms slicing through the air in a series of badly executed karate moves copied from some second-rate TV series or dubbed Hong Kong movie. They were emitting a mixture of battle cries and high-pitched oriental shrieks designed to strike fear in the hearts of ordinary mortals. I gave a small sigh and decided to reserve judgement – no one knew better than I that it was often impossible to tell the good guys from the bad. Nevertheless, I moved my chair slightly to one side, so that I could check the article on the screen and still see the men at the same time. Reserving judgement is one thing; taking risks is an entirely different matter.

  ‘What do you reckon?’ Bull said.

  ‘It’s obvious,’ I said. ‘The women will want to spend the day fishing on your boat while the men drink themselves insensible at my bar.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he said, nodding his shaven head. ‘And what time does the Tequila Fairy arrive?’

  Bull stood up. He was six foot six, his body heavily muscled and black as night. As he took a short step into the sun his skin seemed to glisten. There was a chorus of girlish giggles from the women and an ominous jealous silence from the men. Bull ignored both and walked across to his boat, his right leg dragging in the sand. Each month it dragged a fraction less, but, like my shoulder, it would never recover fully.

  The group was twenty yards away by now. There was to be a wedding at the hotel tomorrow – it’s hard to keep anything secret on a small island – so I guessed that two of the number were the lucky bride and groom and the rest were along for the ride. The men, who had broken off from their Ninja dance and moved protectively closer to the girls, were dressed in bathing trunks that reached past their bony knees, and multicoloured short-sleeved shirts that only served to emphasize the whiteness of their skin. From their pallor, demeanour and what would definitely be a gargantuan final bill from the hotel, I marked them down as new-breed, barrow-boy traders in options, futures or derivatives, driven by money and adrenaline in equal proportions – a familiar and dangerous mixture. The women – three blondes, two brunettes and one with dark hair, all just about wearing skimpy bikinis in eye-dazzling colours, designer sunglasses perched on their heads, gold chains around ankles, lips glossed like freshly picked, dew-covered strawberries – well, I hardly noticed them. They formed a single file to walk up the narrow wooden jetty. There followed a short conversation and an exchange of money. The men would be after marlin and Bull could take them to the exact point in the sea where they ran thickest and fastest. If he wanted to. But that would depend on his opinion of their ability to be discreet – too much word-of-mouth recommendation can have its drawbacks.