On Borrowed Time

by Solomon Carter

  “Excuse me? Can you help me?” Confused, Eva looked at her. The woman had invaded her space, and she realised too late. It was her. The woman pressed up close against Eva and held a map in front of her, and at the same time, pressed the barrel of a pistol into her hip.

  She whispered. “Don’t move, or I will kill you right now. We’re going for a walk along the river. It’s such a lovely place for a long walk, don’t you think?”

  Eva breathed in hard and nodded. Now everything was down to her motley crew. She walked out to the street and winter sun splashed both their faces. She turned them towards the Maritime Museum, away from the hubbub of Greenwich. As they took their first few steps, Trevor was walking past, just a fat man munching on a chocolate bar. He ignored them in his designer shades. And just as they passed, Trevor leaned across and smashed his fist full on into the woman’s face. There were yelps of indignation and horror from passers-by, but the assassin fell without a sound.

  “Now, Ruskie!”

  Obstov nodded, and took Eva’s hand. They rounded a corner and he walked her into a shop full of naval gifts. The tourists inside parted as soon as they smelt Obstov. Obstov pushed Eva towards the back of the store. Over Obstov’s shoulder, she saw the big stranger walk slowly by, peering in. But she was hidden in the darkness at the back of the old shop. Next she saw a woman hurtle past across the road. Trevor followed close to the big man who passed the shop. They faced one another, and then they broke apart. The big man hurried across the road after the woman.

  They were safe for now. Obstov looked around. “I will follow them and report back as soon as I can.” It was a change of plan.

  “What? I thought Dan was going to—“

  “Not yet. They didn’t make me so I am a spare resource. I’ll go first, and then we can use the other teams if I am seen. I will tell them.”

  It was a sound idea and Eva found herself respecting the man in spite of his heinous stench.

  “Stay safe, Obstov.”

  “Of course. Of course. I will update you soon.”

  Obstov ran from the shop, pursuing the two strangers as they shifted towards the museum.

  “Trevor, I owe you a drink,” said Eva.

  “Aye. You do.”

  “Glad you agree, because I need a bloody big glass of Pinot Grigio. Come on. I’ll settle up now.”

  In the Gypsy Moth, with a pint of stout in front of the big man, and a large glass of very chilled white before her Eva caught up with Dan by phone.

  “We’re in pursuit. We have Obby’s location, but we’re staying back. Currently heading back towards the city.”

  “Right. When you have news, let me know,” said Eva,

  “You just sit pretty and enjoy your wine.”

  She waited a half hour, and just held off the temptation to down a second glass when Trevor bought himself a replacement beer. Then Dan’s call came through.

  “I thought I’d tell you myself, because maybe you’d believe it from me.”

  Eva stared at her empty glass and sat bolt upright. “Dan? What is it?”

  “Obstov followed the crew to an address in one of the glass towers near Canary Wharf. One of those palatial homes for exhibitionists. No walls just windows.”

  “Yes?”

  “Her accomplice stayed outside, but she took the lift to the top floor. Obstov is a wily old bastard. He managed to get access into the building opposite through the power of being a cantankerous and lying old pro. He already had a vague notion what he was going to see, so he couldn’t let up.”

  “What did he see, Dan?”

  “He saw her arrive in the penthouse apartment. Obby saw the bitch arguing with a man with a bald head and glasses. Straight after they argued, they kissed. Straight after that, she bends down and unzips his trousers and performs on him in front of the whole city skyline.”

  “Performs?”

  “I don’t mean a recital. I was being polite. She performed on him.”

  “Polite. Since when were you ever polite? Are you sure your Obstov got the right woman?”

  “One hundred per cent. But Obstov is out. He thinks he was spotted, and right now he is in serious danger.”

  “Spotted by who? Dan?”

  “By the people who work for the man in the penthouse…”

  “Dan?”

  “Okay, Eva. This is the thing. The man in the penthouse is Pyotr Dobcek. The man who replaced Victor Marka as top dog in White Star Gazet, the international logistics firm Marka used as a front”

  “No… way…”

  “It’s true, Eva. Pyotr Dobcek is behind the hits on you.”

  “I don’t believe lightning strikes the same place twice, Dan.”

  “This isn’t lightning. This is a strategic hit, just like you said before. Only we don’t quite know the strategy yet. But let me tell you, your assassin is very good at making up for her mistakes.”

  Eva could barely even speak. The assassin was under the control of Victor Marka’s successor? What did that even mean? First off it meant Eva Roberts was in incredible danger, the odds against her were staggering. She’d never seen this coming. And now Obstov’s words about the new hybrid war were ringing in her ears. She had dismissed Obstov as an oddball. Now, he was almost sounding logical. This was way out of control. She thought if she knew who pulled the strings she would feel better, safer. But she couldn’t have been any further from safety. She was terrified. She had to stay calm. She had to find a way out. She had to survive… but right now, most of all, Eva needed another glass of wine.

  Ten

  It was night, and Dan was with Georgiev and Brodski and the stakes were becoming increasingly high. Obstov was soon going to have to lay low for a good while or else he was going to end up smelling even worse, face down in a canal somewhere. He knew the drill. If anyone could go undercover, it was a severely paranoid Russian academic like Obstov. In the late morning, Obstov had reported seeing the female assassin conversing with Pyotr Dobcek. Dobcek and the assassin didn’t seem worried about being spotted, but people in Dobcek’s kingpin position always seemed to believe they were invincible. Dan had seen the female assassin close up back at Alex Galvan’s Essex home. She was physically neat and tidy, a brunette looker with a military bearing, someone you didn’t want to mess with if you could avoid it. Dan could only imagine the kind of awesome power which forced a hardened killer like this one to give a public blow job in view of the whole city. Then again, women seemed to find power seductive, even when the power was as malevolent as what lay behind Dobcek and White Star Gazet. Maybe she didn’t have a choice. Or maybe the kind of girl who carries out hits on the back of a motorbike was the type of girl who did whatever the hell she liked whenever she liked it. Whatever she was about, this girl and the people behind her had to be brought down. Dan’s companions were still in shock. They elected to ride in Dan’s old black Jag so they could work through what they’d learned together.

  “Obstov was right. This could be a kind of hybrid warfare.”

  “Out with it,” said Dan. He was tired and agitated. He loved a good conspiracy theory as much as the next man, but now they were stuck in the middle of it, Dan felt he needed to home in on the simple stuff and get that perfect, or a serious mistake was going to be made. And they had to avoid mistakes.

  “Okay. Like Obstov said, think of the UK as a corporation owned mostly by the Chinese. Like the United States actually. But there is another market which can only be determined by who is the strongest. This is a language Russia knows well. Strength and brutality. Russia is always strong, even when it is weak. The black market is the easiest way to take a country by stealth. The Chinese have taken the UK by legitimate means, through capitalism. China has literally beaten the west at their own game. But Russia can begin to take claim to territory by war in the black market. This is where legitimate capitalism can be beaten by intelligent crime.”

  “That sounds nothing like the hybrid war in Ukraine,” said Dan, tapping the steering wheel
with his thumb as he peered out into the quiet city night.

  “It’s different but it is still a hybrid war. Russia aims to fight this country and overcome it by destroying it from within. Victor Marka started this by trying to wipe out the enemies of the Russian state – a completely outrageous act on foreign soil. But he was also vying to dominate UK crime. We can assume his heir, Pyotr Dobcek has been appointed to do the same, and we know he has state backing. The man is little more than a civil servant in a sharp gangster suit.”

  “What’s your point, Georgey?”

  Brodski chimed in. “His point is that they are working to destabilise the UK through undermining those currently dominating the black market, and then they will dominate it for Russia. When Russia dominates the black market, they can hold this country to ransom in all kinds of ways. The gangsters are substitutes for Russian soldiers. This is a kind of war.”

  Dan wanted a clear head. He felt he was whistling Eva’s tune as he said, “Whether that’s true or not, we need to focus on what’s next. I don’t see how killing Eva is instrumental to any kind of hybrid war. I just want to take that killer bitch down before she strikes lucky.”

  “Dan,” Brodski spoke again. “Eva is just another domino in the bigger game.”

  “Fantastic. We’re playing dominoes now.”

  “Which means you should be optimistic. If we save Eva, they can find another domino.”

  “Nice. Brodski, can you please go and set your little trap before you talk me to sleep. Make sure it’s invisible, right?”

  “Of course.”

  “And you’re sure she will never see it?”

  “97% sure. This whole thing is an experiment, Dan. But it could work.”

  Dan nodded. Everyone here was an amateur, but they were doing the very best they could. They were parked on a side road near Leeburn Street. City Pinnacle was the name of the Docklands glass tower where Dobcek kept his London penthouse and soared up towards the clouds from the corner of Leeburn Street - not far from Canary Wharf Tower. At floor level by the side of the building was a double rack of bicycles and scooters all chained up by commuters, and there were two motorbikes. One was in orange, white and black, a distinctive sports motorbike. Dan recognised it immediately as belonging to the killer woman.

  Brodski was tall, though not as tall as Georgiev. Brodski was hollow shouldered and walked with a faint stoop. He crossed the road with his eyes roaming all over the place. For a former soldier, Dan had him down as a little spooked, but then again, he was about to do something Dan had only ever seen in the movies.

  Brodski merged into the shadows alongside the tower, and walked quickly toward the double rack of bikes. When he was close he pulled out a strip of adhesive tape. Already glued to one side was a small microphone. Brodski leaned over the bike, a devious shadow in the darkness, and planted the tape in the middle of the saddle. In the dark it disappeared from view. They had to hope it stayed that way. Dan held his breath, sharing Brodski’s tension as the man hastily turned back across the road toward the Jag. He got in the car and laughed.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “If all goes to plan that microphone is going to glue itself straight onto the killer’s ass.”

  “What?” Dan eyeballed him in the rear view mirror.

  “It’s the only place she is guaranteed to put enough contact and weight for the adhesive to stick to her clothing.”

  “You’re a pervert, aren’t you Brodski?”

  Brodski didn’t laugh anymore. But Georgiev did.

  It took another hour and a half of driving in a loose circle around City Pinnacle before they saw some action. When they were just around the corner, the microphone picked up some noise. The receiver in Brodski’s hand hissed. “That’s her. She’s getting on the bike. We need to get back to Leeburn Street now.”

  Dan grinned. It was pressure time. He flung the old Jag around the corner, as the muffled sound of a motorbike engine kicked into life on the speaker. They sped over the limit down a lane with road humps, the old Jag clattering over each and jerking into the air. Twenty seconds later they hit Leeburn Street in time to see the red light of a motorbike tail light surge away from City Pinnacle.

  “That’s her,” said Brodski.

  “Now this is exciting,” said Georgiev.

  Dan pushed the Jag hard but stayed back. The bitch on the bike had advantages. As soon as they hit traffic, she was gone. They had to hope it was late enough that the streets would be clear. But at just gone ten pm, hope was slim. Beyond that, they had to hope the girl was headed somewhere nearby. Over distance she would lose them for certain.

  Ten minutes later they were flying through the Limehouse link tunnel, soon heading out towards Tower Hamlets. The bike was still up ahead, but was now turning off. They weren’t heading out to the sticks, but back into the urban jungle. Dan cut up a van in order to make a hasty exit, and the van horn howled. They pushed after the bike up an exit slip road, and pushed hard again to make the green light at the top. Another few minutes of driving through lights and jumping reds, and the Jag was still in touch with the bike, when they saw it suddenly jump up onto a pavement, and pull onto an area paved outside a row of shops. Above all of the shops was a brown and red brick residential area, a medium height block of flats with balconies. These weren’t shabby. This had to be Tower Hamlets’ answer to quality housing. Maybe it wasn’t the right answer, but here it was anyway. The woman was a shadow now, bounding up a steep set of steps between the shops. They caught sight of her on a walkway running along the roof of the shops. She wasn’t looking their way. She had no reason to be paranoid about being followed. In her world, her team had missed their target again, and Dan guessed she had resorted to pacifying Dobcek with a sexual favour. In the killer’s mind she would still be in charge. But that would soon change.

  “You want me to follow?” said Brodski.

  “No. If your James Bond gimmick works you won’t need to. Besides, Brodski I’ve seen you in action.”

  Brodski lifted the speaker high into the car and they gathered their ears around it. They heard the echoing clatter of the woman’s heels on the concrete floors of the walkways. She was out of sight now. Her footsteps halted. There was a door buzzer noise and a wait. A door clunked open and then voices.

  “What took you so long?” said a male voice. A London accent. He was British.

  “Pyotr wouldn’t leave me alone. He said it was my punishment.” It was a female voice, accented. It was the assassin.

  “Your punishment or mine?” said the male.

  “Mine most of all. I wanted to see you.”

  There were sounds of a long kiss, and the sound quality changed as the door closed.

  “She has a British boyfriend,” said Brodski.

  Dan was irritated. He wanted information. “Come on!” he hissed at the speaker. Soon enough, the kissing broke up.

  “Anna. Business first, then pleasure.”

  “Of course. If you think you can wait. I’m not so sure you can.”

  Their voices were distant. Maybe her clothes were already on the floor.

  Business first? What kind of business was going on?

  “Pyotr is unhappy I didn’t made the hit on the private detective yet. He complains my work is half done.”

  “Why?”

  “Look at my face. You see?”

  “A bruise? What happened?”

  “We attempted the hit again. She had protection. Either she anticipated our attack, or she has protection now. They were skilful. Maybe professional.”

  “How did Pyotr react? What is his instruction?”

  “He has no plan B. Dobcek wants his critical mass. The private detective must be killed. He gave me an ultimatum.”

  “Which is?”

  “Kill her or he will inform his superiors I have failed.”

  “If that happens, we can pull you out. I will advise my own superiors that your situation has become compromised.”

  “No.
”

  “Why not?”

  “Because whether your people believe that or not, I will be dead all the same. The private detective woman must die in order for me to live. It is simple, black and white. It is how it must be, or Dobcek will give me over, no matter how many times I let him have my body. He is a robot, nothing more, nothing less.”

  In the car Brodski turned abruptly to Dan. “Dan - this man is British spy. If I understand him correctly, he will allow this woman to kill Eva Roberts,” said Brodski.

  Dan shook his head vigorously. “Just shut up and listen.”

  “It doesn’t need to be like that, Anna. If Dobcek proves inflexible, his superiors will want to know. We can’t have our main man being too rigid in his approach. Being two dimensional can be a cause of failure. After all, nobody likes it when a workman blames his tools.”

  “You would go above Pyotr?”

  “Reporting on Pyotr is part of the great game, Anna. If he fails the test, you needn’t fall on your sword. Let Pyotr do it all by himself.”

  “Then what of the private detective woman?”

  “You must kill her if you can. But you needn’t die for Dobcek. I’ll see to that.”

  “You amaze me, Henry.”

  “Good. Now it’s your turn to amaze me.”

  The speaker filled with the noise of a passionate kiss, the ruffle of clothes, the sighs of lovers throwing themselves into their passion. Finally they wandered from the microphone, until minutes later, the speaker sounded with the dull groans and sweet screams of heated lust.