by Tom Barber
The address the ARU officers had been given by GCHQ was an apartment on the third floor of a building overlooking the park. The task force had moved through the lavish lobby, two of them staying downstairs to guard the exits whilst the rest had swiftly moved up the stairs in their riot gear. Opening the stairwell door, they crept down the third floor corridor, coming to a halt outside apartment 3F. F for Farha, Archer thought as he stood in line and waited. Beside him, one of the other officers, a man called Mason, crept forward, a shotgun in his hands. It was Benelli M3, loaded with a special breaching round, designed to take locks off doors.
The team collectively took a breath as he aimed the weapon at the door-handle.
He pulled the trigger.
There was a loud blast, and the lock on the front door exploded, splintering and disintegrating as it took the force of the shotgun shell. Deakins, the point man, slammed the door forward and out of the way. Together, the officers piled into the apartment.
Despite their rough entrance, the policemen moved smoothly, dispersing by the door and sweeping the apartment room-by-room in practiced formation. Each man was dressed in navy-blue overalls, the trousers tucked into black combat boots. Above a Glock 17 pistol clipped to their right thigh, a Kevlar tactical vest was zipped up tight around their torso holding spare magazines, tools, plastic hand-cuffs and a mobile phone. All of them save for Mason carried a Heckler and Koch MP5 sub-machine gun. Accurate and reliable, each weapon had a thirty-round magazine slotted into its base, two more tucked into slots on their tac vest. Ninety rounds in total. If the policemen needed more than that then they were in serious trouble. Then again, they always had the firepower of Mason’s shotgun to call upon if such a situation arose.
The officers had separated, searching and scouring every inch of the apartment. It was a large flat, with a spacious living area connected to two separate bedrooms and a bathroom. The place was finely decorated and immaculately clean, with the occasional ornamental structure placed as token decoration on stands and tables around the main room. The walls were painted lilac, with a soft cream carpet. Looking at the interior, one thing was for sure, Dominick Farha had a lot of money at his disposal.
But he wasn’t here. As they completed their search and with no sign of the suspect, the officers started to gather in the living room. Mac joined them, looking around with a grimace. There was no one home, the place was empty. He cursed.
‘Anything?’ he called, to the other officers in the flat.
Archer appeared from the bathroom. He shook his head.
‘Nothing, Mac. Looks like he’s packed his bags.’
Mac turned his attention to a brown-haired officer standing beside Archer in the doorway. His name was Porter, Mac’s right hand man. He did a lot of the jobs the other guys didn’t fancy, mundane tasks and errands, but for his troubles Porter had earned a hell of a lot of respect within the group. The task force had only been together less than a year, but it was almost a certainty that Porter would take over command whenever Mac retired. Professional, considerate and in his mid-thirties, Porter was known for two things. He never swore, and he never complained.
‘Port, get on the horn to Cobb. Let him know,’ said Mac.
Porter nodded. ‘Yes, Sarge.’
Turning, he disappeared out of sight as the rest of the team convened in the living room.
‘This doesn’t change anything, lads,’ Mac said. ‘Search around and find me something we can use. We still need to get this guy.’
The gathered group of policemen acknowledged this and separated, preparing to tear the apartment apart.
Somewhere there had to be a clue as to where the guy was.
In a semi-detached house nearby, an elderly lady was just beginning her morning routine. Since the sudden death of her husband the year before, she had taken great comfort in knowing roughly what was going to happen each and every day. Wake up. Run a hot bath. Get dressed. Feed Tigger. Make a cup of tea. Read the newspaper delivered to the porch. Routine, routine, routine. What was mundane to the younger generation was like a loyal friend to the old lady, unwavering and reliable.
Having added the right amount of milk to a mug of tea poured to the perfect level, she shuffled through to her living room and took her place in a comfy armchair by the window. Placing the mug carefully on a coaster on the table beside her, she leaned back with a sigh and looked outside. It was a bright but chilly December morning. Frost from the previous night had clamped itself to the edges and corners of the window pane, leaving tiny white whorls and swirling patterns like calligraphy. As she gazed outside, she noticed that the red rosebushes in the front garden hadn’t been pruned properly in the autumn. She frowned, she’d have to do that when the weather warmed up in the spring.
But she also noticed something else.
Something odd.
Across the street, a young teenage boy was pacing down the pavement in a hurry. He was so focused on getting somewhere, the lad didn’t seem to have noticed that the back of his coat had ridden up, catching on something jammed into the back of his waistband. Frowning again, the lady looked closer. She gasped. Even from this distance, she could see what the object was.
The youngster stopped outside a house across the street, and her suspicions were confirmed. Walking up and knocking on the front door, he reached behind him and pulled the black shape from his belt. She was stunned.
It was a gun.
She knew her duty. Without hesitation, she decided to break her routine, which was no minor thing. Forgetting her cup of tea, she pushed herself up from the armchair and moved to the other side of the window. Scooping up the receiver to a telephone sitting on the table, she dialled three numbers. Waited. The call connected as a voice arrived on the other end, asking a question through the receiver held to the woman’s ear. She answered.
‘Police, please.’
In contrast to the lady’s home, the interior of the house across the street couldn’t have been more different. It was dimly lit, the air reeking of stale cigarette smoke. With the curtains drawn, the lights dim, three men sat at a kitchen table, playing cards. Two of them smoked cigarettes whilst the other munched on some breakfast cereal from a bowl. Several small bags of cocaine were scattered carelessly on the kitchen table amongst the cereal and cards. They were joined by a nine-millimetre pistol. The gun had been dumped on the table so that the barrel was currently aimed at one of the men’s chest, the safety catch on the weapon off. None of them seemed to have noticed.
The pistol was a Beretta. There was another one somewhere in the house, but they couldn’t find it anywhere. A third gun was leaning against the wall, within reach of one of the two men playing cards. It was a Remington 870 shotgun, twelve-gauge, a fearsomely powerful weapon. Some firearms had to be aimed carefully to have the desired effect, but the Remington wasn’t one of them. All a man had to do was aim at the central mass and pull the trigger. Whoever was unfortunate enough to be standing in front of it would be getting stuck back together with glue.
Suddenly, there was a knock on the door. The men looked at each other, they weren’t expecting a guest. The knocking continued. The guy sat closest to the shotgun lowered his cards, rising from his chair and taking the weapon from the wall. The other two men separated, one of them grabbed the pistol using an armchair as a screen, as the third man moved to the door. He crept up to it, and peered through the spy-hole. But in the same instant, he relaxed instantly, and turned to his two companions.
‘It’s your brother,’ he said to one of them.
As they put down the weapons, the man by the door opened it and turned without a greeting, walking back to the table and returning to his cereal. The man who’d snatched up the pistol frowned, as his younger brother appeared from the hallway.
‘What the hell are you doing here?’ he asked.
The boy didn’t respond. He was staring at the cocaine on the table.
‘Hey!’ Saqib shouted, grabbing his brother’s attention. ‘I asked
you what you’re doing here?’
The boy looked at him nervously.
‘I borrowed something. I thought I should bring it back,’ he said. He pulled out the missing Beretta from behind his back, placing it carefully on the armchair. His brother saw it and his eyes blazed with anger.
‘You little shit! Come here!’ he shouted, lunging at him, trying to grab his coat. But the boy had been expecting that reaction and already had a head-start. Before Saqib could reach him, he was almost out of the front door. He sprinted outside and ran off down the street, running to the corner and then fleeing out of sight.
Standing in the doorway, his brother squinted as his eyes adjusted to their first taste of the morning light. Across the street, he noticed an old lady standing in her front room, a phone to her ear, watching him. Nosy bitch, he thought. He glared at her for a moment, then turning on his heel, he slammed the door shut, rubbing his upper arms from the cold December morning air.
Back in Knightsbridge at Farha’s apartment, reinforcements had arrived. Cobb had been in touch with the CID, the Criminal Investigation Department, and they’d sent over a team of detectives who were accustomed to searching places like this for clues. Around them, the ARU officers were also still hard at work, examining everything they could find, searching every drawer, every shelf, every inch of the flat. They needed a lead on the guy. And no one was leaving until they got one.
Archer was sitting at a desk in the main living room with a view overlooking Hyde Park. He’d found a stack of papers tucked in the top drawer that he was currently rifling through. He’d been hopeful at first when he’d discovered them, but he soon found they were useless. Bank statements, in an account with a fake name. Receipts from hardware stores. There was even one from NEXT, a woman’s retail store, for a dress. That one seemed a bit bizarre, Archer thought.
Mac appeared in the doorway, finishing a conversation with a detective from the CID. He saw Archer behind the desk and approached him.
‘Anything, lad?’ he asked.
Archer shook his head.
‘Nothing we can use. Just some old receipts. I guess it counts as evidence, but it’s not telling us where the hell this guy is.’
Mac nodded as Chalky appeared from one of the bedrooms, overhearing the conversation.
‘Maybe he’s coming back?’ he suggested.
Across the room, Fox shook his head as he examined the contents on a wooden shelf. ‘His bags are packed, Chalk. There’s nothing here. He’s gone. He knew we were coming.’
Mac shook his head, cursing with frustration. Fox was right, they were too late to the party. Just then, Porter suddenly reappeared in the doorway, returning from a phone-call. ‘Mac, I just spoke with Nikki. The Met want us to check out a weapon sighting in the area.’
Mac snorted, shaking his head.
‘No way. Not going to happen. We just got here. Tell them to put someone else on it. We’re busy.’
‘I tried, Sarge. They said all the other suitable teams are in the south and east, conducting raids. We’re the only unit in the area. It’s our call.’
Mac sighed with frustration. Since the Firearms act was passed, whenever a live automatic or semi-automatic weapon was reported in the city it was the responsibility of an armed unit to go and retrieve it. He checked his watch.
‘Shit. Alright. Chalky, Arch, Port, we’re going,’ he ordered. ‘Let’s take care of it and get back here quick as we can.’ He turned to Deakins, who had just entered the room. ‘Deaks, take over 'til I get back.’
Deakins nodded, he was used to this situation. For operational ease, the task force had been split into two teams. Mac was the head of First Team, which was himself, Archer, Chalky and Porter. Deakins was in charge of the other five guys in Team Two, and therefore was the unofficial second-in-command in the squad. Archer rose from behind the desk and moved swiftly to the door, Chalky right behind him. They followed Porter outside into the corridor, heading downstairs to the car. Mac followed, but took one last look at the extravagant apartment behind him. He pictured the suspect’s face in his head.
Dominick Farha.
The leader of the cell. The target. The enemy.
‘Where the hell are you?’ he muttered.
He was just over ten miles away. In a hotel beside Heathrow Airport, the handsome dark-featured man stepped outside Room 418, freshly showered and dressed. He clicked the door shut and glanced either side of him, looking down the corridor. It was empty. He knew he was being paranoid, but this close to freedom, he couldn’t afford to make any stupid mistakes. Caution was his best friend right now. After the last few days, he couldn’t handle anything else going wrong.
When he’d realised the group had been compromised, the first thought in his mind had been to flee the country. In any other situation, he would have done exactly that. But however tempting the idea was, he’d quickly dismissed it. To stand before Henry with no results would be like signing his own death warrant. He was already in some drastically deep shit. To screw this whole operation up, after all this planning and preparation, would be like drying the concrete to his feet himself.
So, with sudden escape not an option, he’d been forced to consider the alternative. With every ounce of his being screaming at his common sense to leave, he’d calmed himself down. He’d contacted the cell by using two of them as couriers, and ordered the whole gang to meet at an empty warehouse on an industrial estate near the airport. Face to face meetings like this were seriously risky and dangerous at this point, but they didn’t have a choice. If they used phone or email, Farha knew the government’s security would be onto them in an instant.
Addressing the group, Dominick had emphasised that the sheer fact the British government knew of their plans meant nothing. He’d deliberately kept the list of targets a secret and wasn't going to reveal them until the very last minute, just in case of a problem like this. And at that moment, he was damn relieved he had. It was far too late to change them. He informed the team of the plan, each member of their role and the part they would play. All of them had agreed to their individual tasks without hesitation. Saying goodbye, they had turned their backs and departed, going their separate ways, knowing they would never see each other again.
Farha had stayed at the warehouse, watching everyone leave. He’d arranged a couple of safe-houses for some of them and told the rest not to go home, but he knew that he would be the one the police would be searching high and low for. Which gave him a dilemma. There was no way he could ever return to his apartment in Knightsbridge. A guy from a counter-terrorist task force would be there to open it for him, a sub-machine gun in his other hand. But similarly, he couldn’t move around the city. There was too much risk of being recognised and captured out on the street. So he’d wracked his brains, searching for the answer as to where the hell he could hide out until his escape on Saturday night. And then it had come to him, like a light-bulb going off in his brain.
A hotel by the airport.
It was organised mayhem here. There was an endless rotation of different faces and names in the building, so much so that he could blend in without a concern. He’d used a fake name to check in and had holed up in the room for the past twenty four hours, out of sight. This was the first time he’d risked stepping outside since he’d arrived. But he was surprised to feel calm and confident. There was no one about. The British government didn’t have a clue where he was. And he’d be out of the country before the clock struck midnight.
Pushing a pair of sunglasses up over his nose, he started to walk down the quiet corridor towards the elevators. Dressed in a smart three-piece suit, he looked like the typical businessman staying at the hotel, his hectic life momentarily grounded until he hopped on a flight to New York or on a layover to the Far East. Indeed, there was only one thing about Dominick Farha’s suave person which looked out of place that morning.
A large black holdall, slung over his shoulder.
‘Alright, here’s a bet. Ten quid says it�
��s a water pistol,’ offered Chalky, watching the street flash past his window in the back of the car. The four policemen were inside a black 4x4 Ford moving quickly through the streets, speeding towards the location where the weapon was sighted. Porter was behind the wheel, Mac beside him in the front passenger seat, with the two younger officers sat behind them. Archer heard this bold assumption and turned to his friend.
‘Deal.’
He offered his hand, to seal the terms. Chalky shook it.
‘Who called it in, Port?’ he asked.
‘Old lady across the street. Said she saw a kid take a handgun into a house,’ said Porter, swerving to avoid a car parked just too far into the road. Chalky grinned annoyingly at Archer.
‘Told you. Might as well pay me now, Arch. At least it'll make this little sojourn worthwhile.’
‘You making a point, Officer White?’ Mac growled from the front seat, as he inspected the MP5 resting on his lap.
‘Just that we’re meant to be a special unit, Sarge,’ he responded. ‘Armed response, counter-terrorism, that sort of thing. But here we are, going to pick up a Super Soaker from some twelve year old kid who made the heinous mistake of carrying it down the street.’
‘Have you considered that it might be a real gun?’ Archer asked.
‘How many kids are walking around carrying real handguns in London, Arch?’ his friend countered.
‘OK, so let me ask you something Chalky,’ said Mac. ‘Why did you apply to join this unit? It seems to me that you’re starting to complain about doing anything that actually involves police work.’
