‘Can I take a comfort break, too?’ I said.
JoJo turned and stared at me. ‘Is that a joke? You a funny man?’
‘No. It’s just that I have a thing about pissing my pants.’
He didn’t say anything for a few moments, and I wondered if this was as far as we were going. Why else would they have pulled so far off the road if it wasn’t to dump me here where nobody would find me?
I began to psyche myself ready for whatever might happen next. They and the rest of the snatch squad had been too practiced so far to have given me even a hint of a chance to do anything, and I didn’t see these three relaxing any time soon. But when the next minute looks like being your last, you begin to think in terms of all-or-nothing, because doing nothing is not an option.
‘Let him out.’ JoJo turned and jumped out, while Hirohito opened his door and dragged me roughly across the seat so I could swing my legs out and stand up.
The air here was still very warm, trapped between rocks which were acting like storage heaters. The driver had walked off a few yards to relieve himself, while the other two stood watching me. JoJo was holding a semi-automatic by his side.
I held up my cuffed wrists. ‘It would make things easier if I wasn’t wearing these.’
‘Forget it.’ He pointed with the gun to a large jumble of rocks piled nearby. ‘Get on with it. Hurry.’
I nodded and walked over to where he had pointed. A faint breeze was being channelled between the rocks and brushing my face, and I could hear the cry of goats in the distance, and high overhead the drone of an aircraft. If this was where they were going to do it, there were worse places in the world to go.
I did what I had to, which required some major concentration, then turned to head back. JoJo hadn’t moved, but was staring at me and scowling. He said, ‘You have been to Djib before, no?’
‘Me? No.’ The last thing I was about to do was admit anything, especially that I’d been in the country previously. Somewhere there might be a record and they’d only have to find it and they would know who I was. As desperate as things looked right now, I preferred to keep my identity secret for as long as possible. ‘Do you have any water?’
He didn’t answer but gave me a searching look, so I walked back to the car and climbed in. Logic told me I was safe inside the vehicle; if they had intended to kill me outside, they would have done it the moment I walked away.
JoJo stuck his head in after me. ‘So what’s so special about you, Portman? Are you a traitor or something? Somebody’s got the hots for you sure enough, you know that? What’s this hard drive you’re supposed to have?’
I braced myself for another jab from his handgun, but it didn’t come. ‘Like I told the other crew, you must have me confused with someone else.’ He didn’t even blink. ‘But what say you take me back to my hotel and we’ll forget all about it? Put it down to an honest mistake.’
The driver re-joined us, zipping his pants, and stood ready to take over while one of the others took a break. ‘Alors, on fait ca ou non?’ he said, and pulled a pistol from under his shirt. Are we doing this or not?
Maybe he had a hot date and didn’t want to miss out on some action. Whatever the reason, it confirmed to me that this was a one-way trip.
‘No. Not yet. We wait.’ JoJo shook his head and walked away, muttering under his breath, so I sat back and did the same while Hirohito played statue and watched me. The brief exchange between the other two had given me a bit more information: they had snatched me without knowing the full picture and were now awaiting instructions from somebody higher up the food chain.
Moments later JoJo took a cell phone from his pocket and answered it. He listened for a few seconds, spoke briefly, then cut the connection.
Five minutes later we were off again, bumping back onto the road and putting on speed until we reached a turning north and a wind-battered sign saying ARTA. Hirohito hadn’t bothered replacing the hood and now I knew time was running out. They were no longer concerned about keeping me subdued and disorientated because it no longer mattered.
They’d had orders to end it.
Ironically, just as I realised where we were.
I’d been up this same road a few times. About ten miles further up in the hills from here there was a barrier manned by an armed guard whose sole job was to turn back unauthorised visitors. The reason was simple: the Legion had a facility on the coast near here where they put trainees and invited guests through their own special kind of hell. I’d been up there with the rest of my group before the Lameuve incident, and had vivid memories of lots of water-based exercises under the rough command of French instructors, doing their best to break us down. It hadn’t worked, and it was a place I hadn’t planned on seeing again, ever.
As we drove up a narrow canyon between rocks, the driver switched on his lights but seemed unconcerned about where the road stopped and the long drop down the hill began. It had been a feature of the legionnaire drivers to take visitors up and down this stretch of road at breakneck speed to test their nerves. Sitting in the back of an open truck and seeing that drop go by so close had been no joke, and this was as bad. But for me it confirmed the origins of these three men.
JoJo turned at one point and said, ‘You know where is this hard drive? Last chance.’
I shook my head. ‘No. As I already told your American pal, I have no idea what you’re talking about.’
He turned away, shaking his head, leaving me to go over memories of the landscape up here. The road was narrow and twisting, with a steady climb through bare, rocky hills, with a few passing places where vehicles could squeeze by as long as both drivers held their nerve. I figured the driver was probably familiar with it, but even so, the higher we got the more he had to concentrate and work hard through the gears to control the vehicle on the rocky surface, especially in the fading light. Off to the right the ground fell away sharply, leaving us looking out over a dark void, and I hoped he didn’t get cocky and take us over the edge.
I’d already tested the cuffs but they were tight and offered no room for manoeuvre. Whatever I did was going to have to be two-handed. Against three armed men, the odds weren’t great.
Up ahead I could see we were approaching a sharp bend in the road, with a spill of rocks and shale jutting out just before it where there had been a recent landslide. We were going to have to go round it and there wasn’t a lot of room. The driver muttered under his breath and JoJo told him to take it slow, throwing a look at the drop on his side. For once, Hirohito took his eyes off me and hissed through his teeth. He was clearly thinking the same as the rest of us: the bottom, wherever it lay, was a long way down.
The engine was whining in low gear and I could hear pieces of stone snapping away under the tyres and bouncing beneath the bodywork like a jackhammer. The interior of the vehicle was thick with the smell of hot oil, metal and sweat, and the front of the hood was wavering as the left-side front wheels touched the landslide and lifted, giving us a birds-eye view of what was the deep gulley below. If we went over, none of us would walk away from it.
I looked down at the door lock. The button was up. They’d forgotten a basic rule: always secure the prisoner so he can’t kick off or throw himself out of the vehicle.
Their first mistake. Breathe easy.
The rear left-hand wheel lifted as it touched a large stone, throwing a lot of the vehicle’s weight outwards, until the back end shifted into what felt like an irreversible slide. For a second the car teetered right on the edge, the outer wheel dropping alarmingly as the unstable ground began to give way.
‘Allez, putain!’ JoJo swore, and banged his hand on the dashboard. Hirohito joined in, screaming something in Japanese and moving across the seat towards me away from the drop.
The driver did the only thing he could, which was to slam his foot down and hope to launch the car clear of the edge before the rear wheels slipped all the way over. For a second nothing happened, just the roar of the engine and the clatte
r of dirt and stones being fired into the underside of the bodywork by the spinning tyres. But it worked. With a sudden burst of speed, we bumped over the layer of stones and hit firm ground, and the Land Cruiser shot forward towards a wide turn in the road – and a solid wall of rock.
It seemed to take the driver by surprise. He still had his foot on the pedal and was pressed back in his seat by the momentum, his arms straight on the wheel as he focussed on getting us back on the road. Sitting directly behind him and free to move, I could feel the heat from his shoulders and see the flush of stress across the back of his neck.
Their second mistake. Get ready.
I lifted my hands and placed them on the back of the driver’s seat. If Hirohito noticed he didn’t say anything; I think he was still living that dizzying drop into darkness. It put me well within touching distance of the man in charge of the car.
Their third mistake. Go.
As we approached the rock wall, I clenched my hands and slammed them into the side of the driver’s neck. The cuffs connected first just behind his ear and he let go of the wheel and slumped sideways, his foot slipping off the gas. The car immediately lost speed. It was the best chance I was going to get and I swung my fists the other way and connected with Hirohito’s nose as he tried to grab me. The double fisted blow knocked him back against the door. But he was made of tough stuff and shook his head, spraying blood across the seats, and tried to make a knuckle-strike to my throat. Wrong move. I snapped my arms back, blocking the strike and drove my elbow into his face, pushing with my other hand for extra power. He gave a grunt and his head lolled back, out of the game.
JoJo was caught on the hop. He started turning in his seat and bringing up his gun, aiming at me through the seat back, so I grabbed Hirohito by the shirt and dragged him across in front of me just as JoJo pulled the trigger. The gunshot was deafening. Amid the burst of fabric thrown up by the blast, and the flicker of flame as it caught fire, I felt Hirohito’s body jump with the impact. Before JoJo could fire again, I pushed Hirohito away and shouldered the door open, hitting the ground on my feet but rolling with the momentum with my arms over my head. I came up on my feet, groggy but mobile, just as the Land Cruiser hit the rock wall with a loud crunch and the engine stalled.
I didn’t need to look round to know that there was nowhere for me to run. If I tried, JoJo would shoot me in the back and there was no way he could miss. I had to disarm him now or I’d never leave this place alive. I ran towards the car just as the front passenger door opened and he almost fell out, a splash of blood showing on his forehead where he’d impacted with something inside the vehicle. But no gun.
I launched myself at him as he got to his feet and turned to face me, shoulder-charging him into the vee of the door hinges. He roared with pain and tried to push me off, but this was going to be a one-way fight and I wasn’t about to lose. Besides, I knew what he’d had planned for me and that was sufficient to channel every ounce of aggression I could muster.
I grabbed the door and slammed it against his body, then again, and he finally slumped to the ground and lay still.
Inside the car Hirohito and the driver were unmoving. The driver’s eyes were open but he wasn’t breathing, and the position of his body against the wheel told me he’d taken a fatal hit. Hirohito’s eyes were fluttering but he’d been hit in the mid-section and I doubted he would last long. I pulled him and the driver from the car, and rolled all three of them off the side of the road into the gulley. It was no worse than what they had been planning for me and I didn’t have any regrets. Then I jumped behind the wheel and started the engine, and taking great care, turned to face back down the hill.
ELEVEN
Lunnberg was about to leave his room in the Hotel Kempinski for a progress meeting with Victor Petrus when his phone buzzed quietly. It was his comms and research specialist, Paula Cruz, calling from Washington.
‘Sir, you requested details on Marc Portman.’
‘Go ahead.’ Lunnberg sat down by the window to listen. It was probably too late to be concerned about Portman now, but you never learned anything by ignoring information.
‘Sir, he’s buried deep, even by Washington standards. The first people I spoke to had never heard of him. Then I picked up some gossip via a contact in the private contractor sector, and his name rang some bells. He’s good, apparently. Very good. He’s primarily a close protection specialist and has an impressive reputation among those who know of him.’
‘Jesus – a bodyguard?’ Lunnberg immediately began to lose interest. Contractors hired for protection duties were a dime a dozen. Many had specialist skills to sell such as Delta, Ranger or SEAL backgrounds, but a vast number did not, merely claiming experiences they had never gained. This Portman might have done that, and had played a good tune to sell himself into an assignment for the French in return for a good cash payment, no questions asked. God knows, the US intelligence community had used enough men like him over the years in conflict situations all over the globe.
‘He’s more than that, sir. A lot more.’
Lunnberg took a little more interest. Cruz sounded impressed, and that didn’t happen often. She must have picked up something worth knowing. ‘Tell me.’
‘Yes, sir. Nobody knows his full background, so a lot of what I’ve heard has to be taken at face value. But in my opinion and going on the people I spoke to, it’s pretty solid.’
‘I understand.’
‘The general feeling is that he’s highly regarded in Langley and other intel agencies, such as the UK’s MI6 and now France’s DGSE. But an interesting take on him came from a contact in the DEA, who said he’s a specialist in providing protection for undercover personnel. In short, he goes into a theatre of operation even deeper than they do and watches their backs to make sure they don’t get compromised or caught.’
‘Like our own Special Activities Division?’ Now Lunnberg was more intrigued. The CIA and its newer sister agency, for which he worked – at least nominally – the Defense Clandestine Service, had their own teams of ex-military specialists whose job was to reinforce operations in hostile areas. Indeed, some of his men came from a similar background.
‘Yes, sir. But he’s not a team player. Portman works absolutely solo so as not to compromise himself and stays below the radar. It’s why he’s been so successful according to my contacts. He’s thought to have worked in various hot areas such as Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Russia and Ukraine – where he rescued a State Department officer from extremists and brought him home.’ She paused, then added, ‘That was a CIA operation. He’s also worked in Somalia.’
Lunnberg stood up. He was beginning to get a feeling of unease the longer Cruz kept talking. He had no personal knowledge of specialists like Portman working inside Russia, although he guessed it must have happened over the years. That alone was bad enough. But what concerned him most was to learn that Portman knew Somalia. ‘Whereabouts?’
‘In the far south, sir, along the border with Kenya. The story is that he pulled a couple of British operatives out of a kidnap situation involving al-Shabaab and local pirates. He pretty much destroyed that operation and is rumoured to have killed the local leader, although that’s not been confirmed.’
‘Christ—’ Lunnberg’s voice was savage – ‘does he wear a cape as well?’
Cruz took a moment to reply, then said, ‘He’s also thought to have had special forces experience with the Foreign Legion … in Djibouti.’
‘What?’ Lunnberg sat forward. Christ, where was this going?
‘Yes, sir. I hear it might have been a training exchange, but I have no details on how long he was there. Please bear in mind, none of this comes from official files. But I have no reason to doubt my sources.’
‘I understand. That’s good work.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
Lunnberg ended the call. If he’d entertained any thoughts of talking to this Portman to find out more about why he was here and who else knew what his assignment
was, Cruz’s information had rendered it pointless. He’d encountered enough specialists like Portman in his time to know that any information they might impart would be difficult to obtain without resorting to force, of dubious value – and messy. If Portman wasn’t already dead, he soon would be, and would take any secrets he possessed to the grave.
He rang Petrus. ‘Meet me downstairs. We need to talk.’
Victor Petrus stared hard at Lunnberg, who he’d joined at a corner table away from other guests and just outside the spread of lights on the terrace of the Hotel Kempinski. He was wondering if he’d heard correctly. The American had revealed that instructions had been issued for Portman to be terminated.
‘Is that absolutely necessary?’ Petrus muttered. ‘He could have been useful in helping find the hard drive. He might even know where Masse left it.’
‘Doesn’t matter if he does or doesn’t. He’s a loose end and needs to be silenced.’ He flicked at a piece of lint on his knee. ‘A bit like another loose end that’s just come to my attention. Actually, two loose ends.’ His eyes glittered with some inner amusement, and Petrus felt a shiver of alarm go through him. He hadn’t known Lunnberg long but he had already deduced that the man rarely showed anything approaching levity unless it was at somebody else’s expense.
He was about to hear something bad. He could sense it.
‘I don’t follow.’
‘It seems your man Masse had a friend here in Djibouti. A Brit named Doney. Did you know that?’
‘No. How could I know all his friends? He probably had many – he’s been here a long time.’
‘Well, this one seems to have been a drinking buddy … and who knows what else.’ His lip curled and he added, ‘Was Masse married?’
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