Dead Men ss-5

by Stephen Leather

  ‘Because Billy was already at the summit,’ said Shepherd.

  O’Brien made a gun of his hand and pointed it at Shepherd. ‘Got it in one,’ he said. ‘Billy’d been jumping up and down to work up a sweat, so he was panting like crazy when the Seals came charging up. They couldn’t believe it. So they went hurtling down the far side, doing that strange grunting thing they do. Hoooh-hah!’

  ‘Hoooh-hah!’ echoed Jack and Billy.

  ‘By this time we’d put Jack on a motorbike and taken him by road to the far side of the hill. When they got there he waved and asked them what’d kept them.’ O’Brien slapped the table with the flat of his hand. ‘Now they were fighting mad. Sweating like pigs, aching all over, they turned around and went storming back up the hill. They got to the top in record time and, of course, Billy was there to meet them, sitting on a rock and having a brew.’

  ‘I offered them a cup but they said something very disrespectful about my mother and went hurtling down the hill,’ said Billy. ‘Hoooh-hah!’

  ‘They broke pretty much every record for the Fan Dance, but when they got to the bottom and found Jack stretched out on a lounger with a cocktail in his hand, they still didn’t get it. We never heard any more cracks about how superfit they were, and they went back to the States still scratching their heads.’

  The four men laughed and drained their glasses. O’Brien went to the bar and returned with fresh drinks. ‘Okay, here’s the story,’ said Shepherd. ‘I’ve been told that a Palestinian hitman’s got hold of my personal details. I don’t have a photograph or a description, just a name, Hassan Salih, which means nothing. He uses a whole raft of names.’

  ‘Raghead?’ said Billy.

  ‘Palestinian,’ said Shepherd, ‘but he has passports for all sorts of nationalities. Salih is a hitman, one of the best. He knows where I live and there’s an outside chance that he might come looking for me.’

  ‘There’s a contract out on you?’ asked Jack.

  Shepherd shook his head. ‘There’s a contract out on the woman I work for, but while he’s been sniffing around her he’s come up with my details.’

  ‘I’ve got to be honest. I don’t see it’ll be hard to spot a raghead in Hereford,’ said Jack.

  ‘I sure hope not,’ said Shepherd, ‘but I’d feel a lot happier if you two guys would babysit my boy until it’s all sorted.’

  ‘Not a problem,’ said Jack.

  ‘Plus he’s got a very sexy au pair,’ said O’Brien.

  Billy raised an eyebrow. ‘Has he now?’

  ‘Katra,’ said Shepherd. ‘She’s Slovenian.’

  ‘And as fit as a butcher’s dog,’ said O’Brien.

  ‘This gets better by the minute,’ said Jack. ‘Is she single?’

  ‘Please don’t take away my au pair,’ said Shepherd. ‘My home would fall apart without her. How are you guys fixed for guns?’

  ‘Not a problem,’ said Jack.

  ‘It’s an outside chance that anything will happen, but if it does the guy’s a pro and he’ll be tooled up.’

  ‘We’ll be carrying,’ said Billy.

  ‘Silencers would be a good idea,’ said Shepherd. ‘We’ve got neighbours.’

  ‘No hand grenades, then,’ said Jack, with a straight face.

  The men had another round of drinks, then drove to Shepherd’s house. Shepherd went with O’Brien while the Bradford twins followed in their black Range Rover.

  Liam was in the kitchen eating fish fingers and chips when Shepherd opened the front door. ‘Dad!’ he shouted, and hurtled down the hallway to hug his father. Shepherd picked him up and swung him around. Liam screwed up his face. ‘You smell of smoke.’

  ‘I’m sorry about that.’

  ‘Are you smoking?’

  ‘I have to, for a while. It’s part of my cover.’

  ‘Smoking gives you cancer.’

  ‘I know,’ said Shepherd. ‘Have you been behaving?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Liam.

  ‘That’s good, because I’ve a present for you in the car.’

  ‘What is it?’ asked Liam, excitedly.

  Shepherd put him down. ‘Say hello to your uncle Martin first.’

  ‘Hi, Uncle Martin,’ said Liam. ‘Are you staying, Dad? Can we go fishing tomorrow?’

  Shepherd ruffled his son’s hair. ‘Flying visit, Liam, I’m sorry.’

  Liam’s face fell. ‘It’s always a flying visit. When are you coming home?’

  ‘Just a few more days.’

  ‘You always say that, and it never is,’ said Liam. A crafty smile lit his face. ‘Can I have a dog?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘A dog. Can we get a dog? That way when you’re not here I can play with it.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Shepherd. ‘Hang on, what are you saying? If you get a dog, you won’t miss me so much.’

  ‘I’ll still miss you. But I’ll have something to play with. What sort can I have? A red setter?’

  ‘We’ll see,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘But I am definitely getting a dog?’

  ‘You’re starting to nag me now,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘I won’t nag if I know I’m getting a dog.’

  ‘Liam . . .’

  ‘Is that a yes? Yes, I’m getting a dog?’

  O’Brien grinned. ‘At times like this I’m glad I don’t have kids,’ he said.

  ‘You can have this one if you want,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Dad!’ Liam protested.

  ‘I’m joking,’ said Shepherd, and introduced the brothers. ‘This is Jack, and this Billy.’

  Liam’s mouth fell open. ‘Wow, you’re twins!’

  They faked astonishment. ‘We are?’ said Billy.

  ‘No way,’ said Jack. ‘I’m much better-looking.’

  ‘You’re the same,’ said Liam. ‘That’s so cool.’

  ‘Billy and Jack are going to be staying here for a few days,’ said Shepherd. ‘Just until I get back. Where’s Katra?’

  They heard footsteps and looked up to see her coming down the stairs in baggy grey cargo pants and a Nike sweatshirt. Her hair was tied back in a ponytail. She frowned when she saw the four men, but then her face brightened. ‘Dan!’ she said. ‘We weren’t expecting you today.’

  ‘It’s a flying visit,’ said Liam.

  ‘Do you all want coffee?’ asked Katra, and smiled when she recognised O’Brien. ‘Oh, hi, Martin,’ she said. ‘Long time no see.’

  O’Brien winked at her. Then Katra did a double-take. ‘They’re twins,’ Liam explained. ‘Jack and Billy.’

  ‘I’m Jack,’ said Billy.

  ‘I’m Billy,’ said Jack.

  ‘Leave the girl alone,’ warned O’Brien, ‘and drop the Tweedledum and Tweedledee routine.’ He grinned at Katra and cuffed Billy. ‘He’s Billy.’

  ‘How can you tell them apart?’ asked Katra.

  ‘Billy’s the ugly one,’ O’Brien told her.

  ‘Ignore them,’ said Shepherd. ‘Can you make us coffee while I show Billy and Jack around the house? Liam, finish your dinner.’

  Katra headed for the kitchen with Liam in tow. Billy and Jack watched her go.

  ‘Slovenian, huh?’ said Billy.

  ‘Pretty,’ said Jack.

  ‘Guys, please don’t even think about it,’ said Shepherd.

  Richard Yokely had set his cellphone to silent but it vibrated in his pocket to let him know he had received an SMS. He took it out and flipped it open. The message was from Dean Hepburn at the NSA. ‘Phone dead. Last location Little Venice, London.’

  Yokely closed his phone and cursed. So Salih had either removed the Sim card in his phone or destroyed it. Either way Yokely no longer had any way of tracking him.

  Salih stopped his rented Ford Mondeo under the railway bridge. A train rattled overhead and pigeons scattered. It was eleven o’clock and he was on time, but the road was deserted. Salih disliked tardiness. There was no excuse for it.

  The man he was there to meet was a Yardie thug called Co
ates. His nickname was ‘Fur’. Fur Coates. A stupid pun. Salih couldn’t understand the cavalier way the blacks treated their names, as if one’s name was a joke, something to be laughed at. Names like Ice T, P. Diddy and Snoop Doggy Dogg’. As far as Salih was concerned, names were chosen by parents, they were special, they had meaning, and they were not to be toyed with. Coates was a drug-dealer who also sold guns. Salih had not met him before but the man had sold several to Hakeem, good weapons at a fair price.

  A large black Mercedes with gold wheel rims drove up behind the Mondeo and halted next to him. Throbbing rap music vibrated through Salih’s seat. The tinted window rolled down and Salih winced as the music assaulted his eardrums. The driver had sunglasses pushed back on his head and a thick gold chain round his bull neck. He was holding the steering-wheel with two giant hands, each encrusted with chunky gold rings. A younger man was in the passenger seat, his eyes hidden behind wraparound sunglasses, lanky dreadlocks hanging around his shoulders. The driver jabbed a finger at Salih, then motioned that he should follow the Mercedes. The window rolled up and the Mercedes drove off.

  They went through the streets of Harlesden, past littered pavements and uncared-for houses, past shops with steel shutters down, walls covered with graffiti and tatty hip-hop posters. A police car rushed in the opposite direction, siren wailing.

  The Mercedes made a left turn and Salih followed. They drove past an off-licence with barred windows and a bookmaker’s with posters offering odds on Liverpool’s next European Cup game. A group of black teenagers in hooded sweatshirts and gleaming white training shoes looked enviously at the Mercedes, then glared at the Mondeo with undisguised contempt. One made a gun with his hand and pointed it at Salih as he went by.

  The Mercedes slowed, then drove down a narrow, unlit alley between two rows of terraced houses. It stopped and Salih parked a few yards behind it. He climbed out of his car. The passenger of the Mercedes walked over to him. ‘I’m gonna need to pat you down,’ he said, tossing his dreadlocks.

  Salih held out his arms to the sides. ‘Go ahead,’ he said.

  The man patted down his arms. ‘If I already had a gun, why would I want to buy one?’ asked Salih.

  ‘You might want to rip us off,’ said Dreadlocks. ‘Can’t trust anyone these days. You a friend of Hakeem?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Salih.

  ‘He’s one crazy Arab,’ said Dreadlocks, running his hands carefully up and down Salih’s legs. ‘One day I’m gonna pick up the Sun and read that he’s blown up a bus or something. You al-Qaeda?’

  ‘No, I’m not al-Qaeda.’

  ‘That Nine Eleven was something, wasn’t it?’

  ‘I suppose,’ said Salih.

  Dreadlocks straightened. ‘The black man should learn from you Arabs. No one listens to us, no one cares about the shit in our lives, but everyone’s bending down to make life better for you guys. Why? ’Cos they’re scared of you. And they’re not scared of us. You got the right attitude.’ He turned to the Mercedes. ‘He’s clean, Fur,’ he shouted.

  Coates popped the boot of the Mercedes and got out. He was a big man, well over six feet six inches tall, with muscled calves that suggested hours in the gym coupled with active steroid use. He cracked his knuckles as he walked, bowlegged, towards Salih.

  ‘You’re Coates?’ asked Salih.

  ‘That’s my name. Don’t wear it out.’ Coates opened the boot wide. There were three holdalls and a cardboard box inside. ‘Hakeem said you wanted a handgun. Untraceable.’

  ‘A Glock, if you have one.’

  ‘Glock 17, if you want it. But it’s not cheap.’

  ‘I don’t want a cheap weapon, I want a reliable one,’ said Salih. ‘And I want one that hasn’t been used.’

  ‘You’ve come to the right man,’ said Coates. He unzipped the middle holdall. ‘I know everything there is to know about guns,’ he said. ‘Everything and anything.’

  ‘Is that right?’ said Salih.

  ‘Ain’t nothin’ I don’t know about firepower,’ said Coates, pulling a Glock from the holdall and handing it to Salih.

  Salih took the gun and examined it. ‘You told Hakeem he could take a Glock on to an aeroplane because it’s made of plastic,’ he said.

  ‘That’s right,’ said Coates. ‘You can walk right through a metal detector. Damn thing won’t beep or shit.’

  ‘You are wrong,’ said Salih. ‘Only forty per cent of the Glock is plastic and there are more than enough metal parts to set off a detector. There’s the slide and the barrel, and that’s before you take into account the ammunition.’

  Coates pulled a face as if he had a bad taste in his mouth. ‘Seventeen nine-millimetre rounds in the clip,’ he said.

  ‘That much is true,’ said Salih. ‘That’s why they call it the Glock 17.’ He checked the action of the gun. ‘Do you have the suppressor?’

  Coates frowned. ‘Say what?’

  ‘The silencer,’ said Salih, patiently. ‘Hakeem should have told you that I wanted a silencer.’ Salih ejected the magazine. It was full. He slotted it back into the butt.

  ‘Yeah, man, ’course,’ said Coates. He reached into the holdall and pulled out a bulbous metal suppressor, which was almost as long as the gun itself.

  Salih took it and screwed it into the barrel of the Glock.

  ‘It’s good, yeah?’ said Coates.

  ‘It’s adequate,’ said Salih. ‘How much?’

  ‘The gun, the silencer and the seventeen in the clip, seven hundred.’

  ‘Has it been fired?’

  ‘No way, man,’ said Coates.

  ‘You are sure?’

  ‘Sure I’m sure,’ said Coates.

  Salih pointed the gun at the Yardie and pulled the trigger. It made a sound like a balloon bursting. Coates took a step back and his mouth opened in surprise. Blood trickled down his shirt. ‘It has now,’ said Salih. He pulled the trigger again and the second bullet ripped into the man’s chest. As Coates slumped, blood frothing from between his lips, Salih used his left hand to push him into the boot. Dreadlocks was fumbling for something inside his jacket, his mouth opening and closing in panic. Salih shot him twice in the head. Coates was thrashing around in the boot of the car and Salih put another two bullets into his head. He tucked the gun into his belt, lifted Dreadlocks in with Coates and slammed the boot.

  Hakeem had been keen to tell Salih about Coates when Salih had asked him about local gun suppliers. Coates sold good guns at fair prices, but he talked too much. Hakeem had heard that Coates had been telling his Yardie friends he’d been selling guns to Muslims, and Hakeem did not want that fact broadcast. He wanted Coates silenced, and Salih was more than happy enough to help. The street at the end of the alley was deserted. High overhead a jetliner flew towards Heathrow. Salih headed back to his car, unscrewing the still-warm silencer from the barrel of the Glock.

  Liam was in the garden, kicking a football against the back of the house. Shepherd went out and handed him a Carphone Warehouse carrier-bag. ‘I forgot to give you your present,’ he said.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Why don’t you look?’ said Shepherd.

  Liam opened the bag. ‘A Nokia!’

  ‘It’s the N73 music edition with a one-gigabyte memory chip,’ said Shepherd. ‘I’ve no idea what that means but the girl who sold it to me said it was what all the kids wanted, these days.’

  ‘Thanks, Dad!’

  ‘I’ve put my number in it so you can call or text me whenever you want, okay?’

  ‘Cool!’

  O’Brien appeared at the kitchen door. ‘We’d better be off, Spider.’

  ‘Coming,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Am I in trouble, Dad?’ asked Liam.

  ‘No, of course not. Why do you ask?’

  ‘Jack and Billy are bodyguards, aren’t they?’

  ‘They’re here to take care of you, that’s all.’

  ‘But that’s what Katra does.’

  Shepherd didn’t want to lie to his so
n, but he didn’t want to worry him either. ‘I just want to make sure you’re safe,’ he said.

  ‘Why wouldn’t I be safe?’

  ‘You are safe, Liam. It’s just I feel better knowing that Billy and Jack are here.’

  Liam looked at the ground. ‘You’re coming back, right?’

  ‘Of course I am.’ He bent down and hugged his son. ‘Everything’s okay, Liam, I promise.’ He kissed the boy’s cheek. He wanted to say more, but couldn’t think of the right words. He didn’t really expect whoever was after Charlotte Button or Richard Yokely to target his family, but if the killer had accessed Button’s phone records there was a possibility, no matter how remote, that he would identify Shepherd and where he lived. Billy and Jack were an insurance policy, nothing more. But that wasn’t something he could explain to a ten-year-old. ‘I’ll call you when I get to Belfast.’

  O’Brien drove Shepherd back to Birmingham airport. He kept slightly above the speed limit and moved out of the way whenever a sales rep with a deadline to meet hared by in a company car.

  ‘Thanks for fixing up the boys,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Where would you be if I wasn’t around to pull your nuts out of the fire?’ said O’Brien.

  ‘I’m not arguing,’ said Shepherd. ‘But I could do with another favour.’

  ‘Why am I not surprised?’

  ‘Charlotte Button’s going to need protecting.’

  O’Brien frowned. ‘I thought she was a big girl – former spook, right? She must know all about personal protection.’

  ‘She doesn’t know she’s in the firing line.’

  O’Brien’s frown deepened. ‘That makes no sense,’ he said.

  ‘Remember Yokely? The American we met in Baghdad?’

  ‘The secret spook? Guy with tassels on his shoes?’

  ‘Yeah. He tipped me off. Yokely doesn’t want to tell her. He reckons if she knows she’ll have to tell her bosses and they’ll have no choice other than to make her do a Salman Rushdie. That’ll be the end of her career and her family life.’

  ‘As opposed to what? The end of her life?’

  ‘It’s early days,’ said Shepherd. ‘This bastard Salih doesn’t know much about her yet. He’s still at the gathering-intel stage. And, like the twins said, he’s a Palestinian so he won’t be too difficult to spot.’