by Conrad Jones
“Have you got anything solid to link Malik Shah to the sale of these weapons?” Chief Carlton asked calmly. His voice belied the anger inside him.
Agent Spence rolled his eyes skyward and let out a loud sigh. The police officers were not about to be fobbed off with half the truth. The director stood up and walked a few paces towards the wall before turning to speak.
“We had an informer in the witness protection scheme about two years ago. He was arrested by customs officers driving an articulated lorry onto a ferry sailing from Rotterdam to Hull.”
“You had an informer?” Alec prompted.
“Yes, he disappeared.”
“Disappeared?”
“Yes.”
“Is this like, give us a clue? We ask questions and you give us one word answers until we guess the truth?” Will chimed in.
Agent Spence coughed and looked into Alec’s steely blue eyes, ignoring the comment from Will.
“The lorry was loaded with crates of coffee grounds, and customs searched several of them. They impounded it when crack cocaine was discovered. An initial search of one of the crates uncovered ammunition, and the resulting searches found twenty kilos of crack, and eighteen MAC-10s.”
“The driver turned informer in return for what?” Alec pushed.
“Protection and a lighter sentence. He was terrified that his employers would kill him and his family,” Spence continued. “The driver was Asian, Pakistani origin, and he fingered Malik Shah as the brains behind the operation.”
“So what happened?” Will asked.
“We lost him.”
“How did you lose him?” Alec looked at Will. They swapped glances and then glared at the intelligence agent.
“We took his wife and two children into protective custody, and placed them into the witness programme. They were labelled Blogs 18 and 19. Two weeks into the programme the parents of Blogs 18 and the parents of Blogs 19 disappeared. Their homes were searched and we came up with nothing, two days later Blog 18 and his family disappeared. We haven’t been able to trace them since.”
“How could they disappear?” Alec asked frowning. He knew that Blogs were kept under strict supervision. They were virtually prisoners. “You said they were in custody.”
“Our operation was compromised.” Agent Spence folded his arms and sat back in his chair.
“Compromised?”
“Yes, compromised.”
“Would you like to elaborate on that, or do we have to speculate how you can lose a witness, his wife, his kids and his extended family?”
“The safe house was penetrated, and our agents were immobilised. The Blogs were kidnapped, assumed murdered.”
Alec and Will swapped glances again. Locating an informer in the witness protection programme, and then having the gall and knowhow to kidnap them, was not the work of amateurs. There were murmurs and hushed comments passed between the attendees around the table.
“How could their whereabouts be discovered?” Chief Carlton asked. He could feel his investigation slipping away from him with every new revelation. It was obvious that MI5 had been withholding vital information from them. He couldn’t decide whether it was now more likely that the Patels had been the target, or less. “Surely their whereabouts would be confidential information and not for, ‘general release’, as you so eloquently put it.”
The police officer’s sarcasm brought a smile to Alec’s lips, but it brought a look of disdain from the MI5 agent. There had been a serious breach of security within the agency, and it was a sore subject. Now it was out in the open, questions would be asked.
“We think that the driver or his wife may have contacted a family member by telephone, and they in turn gave their whereabouts to Shah’s gang.”
Alec looked at Will and he grimaced. The parents of Blog 18, and his in-laws, had disappeared from their homes. It was simple to conclude that they’d been kidnapped and tortured, before they finally parted with the whereabouts of their children and grandchildren. Malik Shah had a dreadful reputation amongst the Asian communities, and they would have been under no illusions as to what he would do to them if he found them. How much pain would a parent suffer before they could bear no more, and reveal the location of their children? It was impossible to imagine.
“We’re wasting our time here,” Superintendent Alec Ramsay stood up from the table and grinned at Agent Spence. He looked to the director.
“You knew we would be all over Malik Shah sooner rather than later, and you don’t want us spoiling your arms investigations, right?”
“Right.” The director knew better than to backtrack now. The cat was out of the bag.
“Why waste our time and insult our intelligence with this bullshit?”
“We have thousands of man hours invested in this.”
“Fine, send us whatever files you’re willing to share and leave it alone. We are looking for perpetrators of a bombing. Malik Shah’s machineguns don’t interest me for now, they’re your problem.” Alec turned to the Police Chief. “This information changes the dynamics of the bombing completely. It is now more likely that the perpetrators are targeting Shah’s foreign activities, which makes it an international incident, rather than a domestic one. We’ll need all the information that you have on Shah, and we’ll take it from here.”
The room remained in shocked silence as Alec and Will left the room. The Major Investigation Team’s investigation into the bombing took precedence over all other departments. Chief Carlton knew that there was little point in protesting, he glared at Agent Spence with contempt. The MI5 agent smoothed his hand over his grey hair and shrugged his shoulders. Following the bombing, it was only a matter of time before the truth came out. Now they would have to hand over all their information for the MIT to investigate, and that would mean that heads would roll somewhere within the agency. He just hoped that when the axe fell, it would be way above him.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Sarah – School Days
Sarah Bernstein was six months pregnant, and feeling like a beached whale. None of her trendy clothes would go near her anymore, and the ones that did only emphasised the growing bump at her middle. Her father hadn’t looked her in the eye, never mind spoken to her, since the pre-trial hearing, and her mother just cried all the time. To make matters worse her hormones were all over the place, she was vomiting every day, and she felt like screaming. Sarah’s allegations of sexual assault weren’t taken seriously when her sexual history came to the fore, and the rape charges were eventually dropped. The police and the Crown Prosecution Services decided that the timing of Richard Bernstein remarkably remembering who attacked him was no coincidence, and the charges of grievous bodily harm and malicious wounding with intent against Malik Shah and his gang were thrown out of court. The defence lawyers argued that he was accusing them because of what had happened to his sister, and the Crown Prosecution Service decided that a jury would never give a guilty verdict.
The police investigations came to nothing, causing the Bernstein family more embarrassment and shame in the Jewish community. Mr Bernstein couldn’t cope. Behind the scenes, he was arranging for Sarah to be taken to Israel to give birth to her child. He planned to place her with extended family in the homeland until Sarah and the baby were old enough not to cause raised eyebrows and fuel wagging tongues. That was the reason for her mother’s tears. She would lose her daughter and her granddaughter in one sweep. Sarah had got wind of the plan and she was feeling as low as she had ever been. Israel was not her home, and it never would be. She was Jewish, not Israeli. The school decided that it was best if she and Richard didn’t attend, and social services tried to locate places at neighbouring schools for them until the whole thing had blown over, whenever that would be. Sarah didn’t think it would be anytime soon. A couple of her old friends kept in contact, but their phone calls were becoming less frequent as pressure from their parents to cut ties with her began to bite. The rest of her friends cut contact completely, some be
cause she was pregnant, the others because she had made rape allegations against the coolest guys at school. The majority of her friends and acquaintances knew full well that she was sleeping with Malik, and that she had done sexual favours for the others. No one believed that she had been drugged and raped by the gang. She felt lost and alone.
Sarah was alone in her room on her Holly Hobbie quilt, writing down her feelings in her padded diary. The diary had the same character on the front of it as her bed covers. Beatrix Potter characters stared down from the pine-framed pictures that had suddenly reappeared on her wall. Her father had ripped down her Duran Duran and Spandau Ballet posters and replaced them with her childhood favourites, as if it might bring back her innocence. She felt like she was in a bad dream. Sarah felt isolated and afraid, afraid that things would never be the same again. Her unborn baby kicked, and reminded her that this was no dream. She placed her hand on her belly and a tear ran from her eye. She wondered what was to become of her and her baby when a pebble rattled her window. The noise made her jump, and she held her breath and waited. Five seconds went by before another clunk sounded. She held her breath again and looked at the door, waiting for her father to burst in, but he didn’t. She tiptoed to the window and peered around the curtain, her heart beating like a drum in her chest. It took a few seconds for her eyes to adjust to the darkness outside, and she cupped her hand against the glass so that she could see who was there. There was a black Ford Capri parked across the road from her house. The lights were switched off but she could see that the engine was running; fumes were pumping from the exhaust pipe. A movement closer to the house caught her eye.
“Malik!” she exclaimed under her breath. Her heart fluttered like a butterfly. She had missed him so much; despite all that had happened, she loved him. She worshiped him. She would do anything that he asked her to do, and therein lay the problem. He waved from behind a weeping willow tree and pointed to the trunk. She could make out a white oblong against the bark, and she realised that it was an envelope. He had written her a letter, and pinned it to the tree, how romantic after everything that had gone on. Sarah could barely contain herself. She wanted to run outside and hold him, but she knew that it was impossible. Her father had placed her on a strict curfew, and she dare not provoke his wrath any further. The front door was locked and barred by seven-thirty every night. Malik waved again and ran down the drive to the waiting Capri. He climbed into the passenger seat, and the Ford screeched away. It travelled a hundred yards before the headlights came on, and then it disappeared around a bend and the road was silent once more.
Sarah stared at the envelope, and she dreamed of the wonderful things that it would contain. Her imagination went wild as she climbed back onto her bed. She clutched her diary to her chest and smiled. Malik had written her a letter and risked being confronted by her brothers and father to bring it to her. She loved him so much that it hurt inside, and yet she felt a warm glow deep in the pit of her stomach when she thought of him. Sarah opened her diary and slid the pen from the spine. ‘I LOVE MALIK, AND WOULD RATHER DIE THAN BE SENT TO ISRAEL.’ she wrote in capital letters, as if they would be more significant that way. She spent that night tossing and turning in fitful sleep, desperate to get her hands on the letter, never once thinking that it would be the last time she ever wrote in her diary. In fact, it was the last thing that she would ever write.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Bruce Mann – Present Day
Bruce Mann was more frightened than he had ever been before, and with good reason too. He was naked and tied to a wooden chair on the third floor of an old leather hide warehouse, somewhere near the river Mersey. He wasn’t sure exactly where, but he could smell the sea, and the sound of seagulls squawking drifted through the iron-framed windows. The windows were at least ten feet tall, and divided into eighteen squares by metal frames; many of the frames were empty and the stars twinkled against the inky black sky. The walls were rendered with thick grey plaster, big chunks of it missing, and the floors were bare wood planks, cracked and splintered by age. There was a dank, stale odour about the place. The stench of rotting animal flesh still lingered in the floorboards.
Bruce looked around and tried to fathom why he had been abducted and beaten. He remembered being hit hard from behind, and his attackers punched and kicked him unconscious, all the time asking questions about Malik Shah. His next recollection was being dragged roughly from the boot of a car, and then being manhandled up six sets of stairs separated by wide landings. He guessed two staircases joined each floor, hence he concluded that he was three floors up. Despite kicking and screaming for help all the way, no one had come to his aid. The building was empty. He knew that he was at the mercy of Malik Shah, alone, and devoid of any hope of rescue. Bruce didn’t know what he had done wrong, but he knew that he was in big trouble.
Bruce flexed his wrist painfully, a thick plastic cable tie cut into his flesh and his fingers felt swollen and numb. His thumbs ached badly, but they always did, ever since they’d been sliced off with a box cutter blade. That episode of his life was one that he promised himself he wouldn’t repeat, and yet here he was, up to his eyes in shit again. He had done his level best to avoid Ashwan Pindar and his boss Malik Shah, and he had no conceivable idea what he had done to offend them this time.
Hadn’t he kept a low profile since? Obviously not low enough, he thought. His head ached from a combination of inhaling exhaust fumes in the boot of the car, and because of the beating he had taken. There was congealed blood in his nostrils, and his bottom lip was swollen and bloody. Through the windows on the east, he could see the night sky was slowly lighting up on the horizon. The sun was coming up but it made little difference to the temperature inside the warehouse. He was shivering from the cold. Bruce knew that he had been left alone, bound and naked, so that he would have time to dwell on what was about to happen to him. He was going to be tortured, no doubt about that. What, exactly, it was that he was supposed to know was beyond him. Footsteps began to echo up the staircase from somewhere below. He took a deep breath and prayed that it would be quick.
It took a full five minutes for the footsteps to reach the third floor. There were no voices, just the sound of multiple footfalls approaching. It felt like an eternity to Bruce and he screwed his eyes closed tight as warm urine ran down his legs, fear holding him in its merciless grip. There was a screech as a metal door opened. The door clanged shut and the noise echoed through the cavernous building. The footsteps were in the room and a stinging tear ran down Bruce’s cheek. He was more frightened than he had ever been.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Sarah Bernstein – School Days
Sarah waited patiently at the bus stop after school. It was cold and wet, and the wooden shelter smelled of stale urine inside. The other students had all gone, their number dwindling as a series of green double-deckers buses came and went. Her father would be livid that she had purposely missed her school bus, but she would cross that bridge when she came to it. She had to see Malik. The red public telephone box next to the bus shelter was smashed and vandalised, not that she could call Malik at his parents’ home anyway. He was an hour late.
Sarah had sneaked out of the house that morning to retrieve his letter from the tree while the rest of her family ate breakfast. Crumpled up in her school blazer, she had to wait until she arrived at school to read it. Sarah hoped that it would be full of romance and kisses, but it was not. The letter was short and to the point. Malik said that he needed to see her and that he would pick her up from the stipulated bus stop at four o’clock. It was ten minutes past five when his cousin’s black Capri pulled up. Rainwater sprayed from the tyres as it screeched to a halt. The Jam were blaring through the speakers as Malik opened the passenger door and climbed out. He smiled, but there was no warmth in it. His eyes appeared sullen and dark, his pupils dilated. Sarah knew that he was stoned before she said hello to him, and his cousin leered at her from the driver’s seat. Her heart sank.
>
“What you waiting for? Get in,” Malik tipped the passenger seat forward to allow her to climb in. His voice was thick and slurred. Sarah wasn’t convinced that it was a good idea. This was not what she had envisaged their meeting would be like. Sarah was hoping for hearts and flowers, promises of undying love, but they wasn’t forthcoming. “Get in.”
The rain intensified, and the wind blew through her school blazer and chilled her to the bone. That chill blast swayed her, and she decided to get in the car. She swallowed her pride and climbed into the Capri. Instead of climbing into the back with her Malik reset the front seat and climbed into it, leaving her in the back alone and confused. His cousin eyed her in the rear view mirror. He made her flesh crawl.
“I thought you wanted to talk.” Sarah sat forward so that she could see Malik’s face.
Malik lit a joint as he turned to face her. He blew the smoke towards her and the sickly smell of cannabis filled her nostrils. She had smoked it with Malik many times, enjoying the mellow high it gave them. He held it up to her. This was the last thing that she wanted but life had been so constricted lately; maybe a little fun was what she needed.
“Here, chill out, bitch.”
Sarah hated it when he called her that. He said it was a term of endearment, and that she should be grateful to be his bitch. She didn’t feel grateful right now, that was for sure. Sarah took the reefer and inhaled deeply as she slumped into the back seat. She looked out of the window and tears filled her eyes as she watched the rain run across the glass. How did things get so bad? Malik turned around to face her.
“Here,” he handed her an open tin of Coca-Cola. The cannabis resin mix was burning hot and drying her throat. She took the tin and gulped. It was warm and flat but it took the edge off her thirst. By the time she had finished the joint, the Rohypnol in the coke was starting to take effect. Her head felt thick and her limbs were beginning to numb. Sarah looked at Malik and he smiled. It turned into a sneer. Sarah remembered the feeling well, from the night she had been gang raped. Malik had slipped her the drug then, and he had done it again. Why would he do that to her now, after everything she had been through? she asked herself. She loved him, and his baby inside her, and she thought he loved her, in his own way. Sarah opened her mouth to scream but no sound came out. Her face contorted as the muscles tried to contract, but the drug was taking a hold. The Capri stopped at a red light and Sarah looked at the driver in the car next to her. She tried to plead for help with her eyes because her mouth wouldn’t work. The driver turned his attention back to the road as the lights changed to green, and she closed her eyes as her consciousness slipped away.
