by Tom Wood
Francesca was watching him through the rear view mirror while she gently massaged her throat.
Victor turned off the app, put the screen back into hibernation and held out the phone and the car keys in one palm.
She looked at him, suspicious of a trap. She was right to be cautious of him now she had an idea of what he was capable of, but at this particular moment there was nothing to fear.
He said, ‘Take them.’
Francesca twisted in her seat again and picked the keys out of his open hand, careful not to make contact with his skin. She snapped her hand away, then paused when he made no movement to grab at her, before taking back the phone. She looked at it suspiciously.
‘There’s nothing to be concerned about,’ he said. ‘I haven’t tampered with it.’
She didn’t believe him, but also didn’t know what he could have done to the phone in such a short time. She stared at his reflection as she slipped it into a pocket.
‘You shouldn’t be working for Leeson,’ Victor said.
‘Really? And why exactly shouldn’t I?’
‘You haven’t got what it takes for this kind of life.’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘What makes you say that?’
‘Because I know a little something about it.’
She spoke through tight lips. ‘What do you care?’
‘Who says I care?’
‘I can look after myself, all right?’
‘Like you did on the way here?’
‘Well, I’ll be ready next time, won’t I? Now I know there are assholes like you in the world.’
‘But that’s the problem,’ Victor said. ‘There are people even worse than me out there.’
She huffed. ‘I find that hard to believe.’
‘And that’s what will get you killed.’
She didn’t respond. She just stared at him.
He sat back and looked out of the side window. He wondered if the marksman was still in the same position or whether he had moved to another. Had their roles been reversed, Victor would have moved so that on its way to the exit the car would pass horizontally through his field of view, so if necessary he could shoot someone in the back seat with minimal risk to the driver.
‘There’s a flight leaving soon,’ he said. ‘I’d like to be on it.’
Francesca turned the ignition key and shuffled on the beaded seat cover to get comfortable. ‘Can I have the pistol back as well?’
‘That’s up to you. You can either have it back when we get to the airport, or you can have one of the bullets now.’
She frowned and released the handbrake.
TWENTY-ONE
Vienna, Austria
The flight arrived after midnight. On board were no more than half the passengers carried by the inward flight. Victor was one of the first off the plane. He walked briskly through baggage reclaim and found Janice Muir waiting for him at the bottom of the escalators, as Francesca had in Budapest. She looked tired.
‘Well?’ she said as he approached her.
‘Come with me.’ Victor didn’t stop. ‘I’m hungry.’
He ordered a sandwich at one of the many restaurants in the airport that were still open. There were only two other tables for the waitress to serve and she was delighted to have Victor’s custom. He asked for a coffee for Muir. She didn’t ask for one, but she looked like she could use it. She looked like she could use it via a drip.
As soon as the waitress had left them, Muir said, ‘What happened?’
‘I was picked up at the airport by one of the broker’s people. A woman, disguised as a taxi driver. She drove me where the broker was waiting. It was an interview, as expected. We only spoke for a few minutes, but he spent every one assessing me. We didn’t discuss a contract, however.’
‘Did you get a name?’
‘He introduced himself as Robert Leeson. The bogus taxi driver also supplied me with that name.’
‘Genuine?’
‘Absolutely not.’
‘How can you be so sure?’
‘He had a subordinate pick me up from the airport to make sure I didn’t have a weapon. We met on an empty area of wasteland. He had an ex-military meathead driving him around in a Rolls-Royce Phantom fitted out with top of the range armoured panelling and windows. A guy with a rifle covered me while I crossed between the taxi and the limousine. Someone that cautious does not give out his real name to a man like Kooi.’
Muir’s eyes widened. ‘Just who is this guy?’
‘A man of considerable means. I’m sure you can imagine an armoured Rolls-Royce limousine is beyond the buying power of any but the considerably wealthy. His watch was worth more than the Saab taxi that took me to meet him. His suit was from Savile Row in London and cost double what you take home in a month.’
Muir pursed her lips, a little insulted, but didn’t act on it. She said, ‘Describe him, other than his wealth.’
‘Average height and build. Late twenties. Brown hair. Blue eyes. His accent drifted between British and American, so he was born in one but spends most of his time in the other. His taste in clothes and cars might suggest he’s from the UK originally, but there’s no reason why he couldn’t have been born in the States but adopted the style of the British upper classes.’
‘Sub thirty doesn’t seem old enough to be doing what he’s doing.’
‘My eyesight is reliable,’ Victor said.
‘That’s not what I meant. I mean he’s younger than you or I, but he’s got himself in a position where he’s brokering contract killing. That’s some feat. I want to know how he managed it.’
‘The answer could be as simple as he’s good at what he does.’
Muir nodded. ‘Maybe it’s a family business.’
‘Then it’s one he’s been involved in for a while. Kooi isn’t the first killer he’s dealt with like that.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘Because he wasn’t afraid of me in the least.’
‘But you said he had an ex-military bodyguard and a sniper as backup. They’re two good reasons not to be scared of you.’
‘I was in the back of the limousine with him for several minutes. The marksman couldn’t have seen me, let alone intervened, while I was sitting within a couple of feet of his boss and behind the best armoured glass money can buy. There was a partition between the rear compartment and the driver. I could have snapped Leeson’s neck before the driver even knew Leeson was in trouble.’
‘Well, when you put it like that…’
The waitress appeared with Muir’s coffee and a glass of iced water for Victor.
‘Thank you,’ he said.
She smiled and left.
Muir slurped her coffee, then said, ‘Tell me about the fake taxi driver.’
‘She said her name was Francesca Leone. I have reason to believe that name is more likely to be genuine than Leeson’s.’
Muir gave him a look. ‘Reason to believe?’
‘I can be very conducive to honesty.’
Muir raised her eyebrows briefly. She drank some more coffee. ‘Thanks, I needed this. What was the bodyguard like?’
‘Six feet tall. Two hundred pounds. Mid thirties. I didn’t get a name and I’m not sure of his accent.’
‘The guy with the rifle?’
‘I didn’t see him.’
‘Then how do you know he was there?’
‘Experience. The marksman presented a neat and easy way of bringing things to a close if Leeson hadn’t liked what he saw.’
‘So he must like you, otherwise we wouldn’t be talking here now. But I thought you said you didn’t speak about a contract?’
‘That’s correct.’
‘But he did like what he saw, yes?’
‘I believe so.’
Muir put down her coffee cup. ‘So what happened?’
‘He gave me a test.’
‘I take it you don’t mean a written multiple choice.’
‘He asked me to kill the driver
, Francesca.’
Muir sat back and stared at him, her eyes wide behind her glasses. ‘And did you?’
‘No.’
‘Why didn’t you?’
Victor said, ‘That’s not how I operate.’
‘You’re not supposed to operate like you, you’re supposed to be Kooi.’
‘Would you have preferred it if I had killed her?’
She hesitated, then ignored the question. ‘How did he react when you refused to comply?’
‘He attempted to persuade me to accept his offer. When I wouldn’t, he drew the meeting to a close.’
‘Shit.’
Victor sipped some water.
‘Sorry,’ Muir said. ‘Procter told me to watch my language around you.’
‘It’s okay.’
‘You said you didn’t discuss the contract. But maybe Francesca was the job.’
‘No, it was a test. Leeson didn’t need to have me fly in to do it. The marksman or the limousine driver could have killed her. He could have shot her himself. She wasn’t a hard target.’
‘Okay, but job or not, you didn’t kill her. So you failed the test. It doesn’t matter if he liked you before that point. If you aren’t going to follow his orders and kill when he asks, why would he hire you for anything else?’
‘I didn’t fail,’ Victor said.
Muir frowned. ‘Come on, I’m not judging you here. I didn’t expect you’d have to kill someone to get hired. That wasn’t part of the plan. Thank you for trying.’
‘I didn’t fail,’ he said again.
Muir stared at him.
‘Killing Francesca was the test,’ Victor explained. ‘But I never said if I had killed her I would have passed that test.’
‘I don’t understand. I must have missed something because you’ve lost me.’
‘Francesca was dressed in casual, shapeless clothes because she is an attractive woman. Beautiful, in fact. Leeson had her play down her appearance because someone who looks like that doesn’t spend their nights driving a cab. And that someone also isn’t an errand boy for a guy like Leeson who he’s going to kill for some unspecified spurious reasons.’
‘Why not? He could have used one of the other two guys as the taxi driver instead of her.’
Victor shook his head. ‘No, because he knew there was no way the meathead could pull off pretending to be a taxi driver. He couldn’t even hide being a psychopath for the eight seconds of contact I had with him. Either the marksman couldn’t either, or he’s by far the better shot and Leeson wanted him and only him behind the rifle. Francesca, though not the best choice to try and make a taxi driver because of her looks, was the only option.’
‘So you’re saying this Francesca is just so damn pretty that it’s impossible Leeson could actually want her dead?’
‘In short, yes. We’ve already established that Leeson is notably wealthy. He has the money and the contacts to have who he wants at his side. Francesca is at his side for a reason, and that reason is not her aptitude for field work.’
‘Okay, fine,’ Muir said, conceding. ‘So why ask you to kill her if he wanted you to say no?’
‘Because Leeson wanted to see if Kooi was the kind of killer who would execute someone without the proper planning and prep work. That kind of man is reckless and unpredictable. He told me how much he valued reliability. He wants someone careful, he doesn’t want someone who is going to be impulsive and take undue risks, he doesn’t want someone who is going to rush in and make a mistake. There’s an old SAS saying, the six p’s: perfect planning prevents piss poor performance.’
‘I thought you didn’t swear.’
‘I was quoting.’
‘I agree it sounds plausible. But you can’t know for certain Leeson wanted you to decline.’
‘Of course,’ Victor agreed, ‘but I can make a logical deduction based on what I know. And while we’ve been talking I’ve been thinking back to the meeting because something has bothered me about Leeson’s security. I told you I thought there was a marksman covering me as a security precaution or in case Leeson didn’t like what he saw.’
‘That’s right.’
‘But there was only about twenty feet of ground between the two cars. That’s a very narrow killing zone if I was a danger, and Leeson’s Rolls was armoured. I could have used it as a tank, had it come to it. It would have made much more sense to have another man up close, sitting in the back with Leeson. So the marksman wasn’t there if I was trouble because Leeson never expected me to be.’
‘So the guy with the rifle was there if Leeson didn’t like you.’
‘Exactly, he was there in case I agreed to Leeson’s offer. Had I said yes to killing Francesca the marksman would have dropped me as I made my way to do it. He was there purely to protect Francesca. Leeson wasn’t taking any chances with her safety.’
‘So she’s his woman then, surely?’
‘Seems likely.’
‘But if you’re wrong about any of this then Leeson is going to vanish into the wind and hire some other killer to do his bidding. And all we’ve got is nothing but some descriptions and some names that are most likely bogus.’
‘We have a little more than that. Do you have a pen and paper?’
‘Sure.’
Muir fished a slim notebook and ballpoint from her inside jacket pocket and placed them on the table between them. The waitress reappeared with Victor’s sandwich.
Muir said, ‘Can I get another coffee?’
Victor took a bite from his sandwich and slid over to her the passport-sized photograph of Francesca he had peeled from the Budapest taxi driver’s licence belonging to Varina Theodorakis.
‘This is the woman who called herself Francesca Leone. The photograph looks exactly like her so it was taken very recently.’ He continued to eat with one hand while he wrote a series of numbers on a page of Muir’s notebook with the other. ‘This is the cell-phone number of the woman in the photograph. The phone was brand new, probably bought within the last twenty-four hours. She hadn’t bothered to take the screen’s protective film off. It’ll be a prepaid handset and SIM, as will be the phone that this number belongs to.’
He wrote another number beneath the first. ‘That’s the only number Francesca called. It’ll belong to either Leeson or his driver. Like Francesca’s, it’s no doubt a prepaid bought just for this meeting. But maybe they haven’t ditched them yet and if you’re quick you might be able to use GPS to track their locations. It’s a long shot, but worth the effort.’ He wrote down a series of numbers and letters and then another. ‘This first one is the licence plate number of the taxi that picked me up from the airport. It’s a genuine cab, so that will be a genuine plate. The second number is the Budapest city taxi licence of Varina Theodorakis, a Greek woman who the licence belonged to before Francesca Leone got hold of it. Either Theodorakis is a clueless victim of theft or she’s compliant and has information.’
He wrote down a sixth number. ‘That’s the serial number of the Makarov pistol Francesca was armed with. It’s at least thirty years old and it’ll be part of a batch commissioned before the collapse of the Soviet Union. Chances are you won’t be able to trace ownership, but you might get lucky because there wasn’t a single scratch in the paint and I could still smell packing grease, so it hasn’t been long out of the crate.’ He wrote down another long series of numbers and characters. ‘The site where I met Leeson was a demolished industrial complex approximately thirty minutes’ drive north from the airport. There’s likely no connection to the site and Leeson, but it was gated so either they broke in or had keys. I don’t know the area, but that’s the latitude and longitude of the location.’
Muir slid the notebook back to her side of the table, looked at it, then sat back, the white of her eyes obvious behind her glasses.
‘Procter told me you were good.’
TWENTY-TWO
Budapest, Hungary
The man who some people knew as Robert Leeson relaxed in the
back of the Rolls-Royce Phantom. He had removed his hand-crafted brown loafers and rested his feet on the chair opposite. The seating position that resulted was exceptionally comfortable. The window curtains were drawn and the partition between the compartment and the driver’s cab was closed to provide Leeson with the privacy he both required and relished. He lounged in darkness, cocooned and protected from the savagery of the world outside. The compartment was so well insulated that Leeson was barely aware of the fact he was inside a moving motor vehicle. The ride was wonderfully smooth. No jolts from the suspension. No vibration.
