Black Ops: The 12th Spider Shepherd Thriller

by Leather, Stephen

  ‘How about this?’ said Sharpe. ‘We go with you to where the drugs are, we take a look and if the gear is good, we get the money to you.’

  The Turk chuckled and opened the bottom drawer of his desk. He pulled out a Glock and waved it in the air, thankfully with his finger outside the trigger guard. ‘How about this?’ he said. ‘You go and get your money as a show of good faith. You give me your money and I’ll go and get the drugs.’

  ‘So you’ll be using our cash for the buy?’

  ‘What’s the problem with that?’

  ‘The problem is that if it’s our money then we should be handling the buy.’

  The Turk pointed the gun at Sharpe and used it to punctuate his words. ‘You bring me the money and we’ll talk. Otherwise …’ He gestured at the door with the gun. ‘Go fuck yourself.’

  ‘How about this?’ said Sharpe, unfazed by the weapon being waved around. ‘We bring the money and you take us to see your supplier. We all shake hands and from then on you take two grand for every kilo we buy.’

  ‘As I said, my Scottish friend, bring the cash and we’ll talk.’

  Sharpe opened his mouth to speak but realised there was nothing he could say that would move things on. He stood up and nodded. ‘We’ll be seeing you.’

  ‘I hope so,’ said the Turk, waving his gun at the door. ‘But I won’t be holding my breath.’

  Sharpe and Shepherd left the office and went downstairs. Sharpe opened the door and stepped out on to the pavement. ‘See, I told you it wouldn’t be easy,’ he said. ‘Do you mind if I get a kebab?’

  ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘I’m hungry. At least this way we walk away with something.’

  Shepherd shook his head and waved at the entrance to the kebab shop. ‘Knock yourself out.’

  Sharpe grinned. ‘Do you want one?’

  Shepherd laughed despite himself. ‘Yeah, go on.’

  Button’s phone buzzed. It was an internal call. She picked up the receiver. It was Liz Calder.

  ‘I’ve had a good look at that passport,’ she said. ‘You said you didn’t want a memo.’

  ‘That’s right, Liz. Can you pop up now?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  In less than five minutes, the young officer was sitting opposite Button. This time her yellow legal pad was full of handwritten notes. She handed the photocopy back to Button.

  ‘Right, so yes, your suspicions were correct. This is not a regular passport. In fact it was only issued last week, despite the date.’ She shifted in her seat and looked uncomfortable. ‘You’re not going to like this unfortunately. Please don’t shoot the messenger.’

  ‘Cut to the chase, Liz, please.’

  ‘Long story short, it’s an MI6 legend.’

  The news hit Button like a punch to the solar plexus and she gasped. It was the last thing she had expected to hear.

  ‘I know,’ said Calder. ‘It was the last thing I expected. And you were right. Pretty much everything connected to Peter Parkinson is flagged. That wasn’t a problem, it just took me some time to find back doors. Okay, so there is no birth certificate, no police file, no tax records. There is no paperwork to go with the passport, it was just issued. I have an old school friend who works at the Passport Office and she was able to run a check for me. She said it came from high up in the Home Office. It’s a genuine passport but can’t be renewed. There are credit cards all issued on the same day as the passport but appearing to have been in effect for several years. Ditto a driving licence. It even has a few penalty points for speeding, which is a nice touch. The driving licence uses the same photograph as the passport, which frankly is a tad lazy. That was my first clue that this was a legend. Then I looked at the credit and debit cards and realised they used a bank that Six often uses.’

  ‘So it’s circumstantial.’

  Calder shifted uncomfortably in her seat. ‘I’m afraid not. I have another friend, from my university days, who’s over at Six. On the very QT I gave her the name and asked for a simple yes or no, would I be correct if I assumed it was one of theirs and she said yes. I know that perhaps I shouldn’t have done that but I wanted to know for sure.’

  ‘Not a problem, Liz.’

  ‘She won’t say anything, and really all she did was confirm something I already suspected.’

  ‘And other than that conversation, nothing else links back to you?’

  ‘The two conversations, Passport Office and Six, but they were just chats and there’s nothing official. All the database trawling was done through proxies, overseas mainly. There’s zero trail back to me.’ She looked down at her legal pad, opened it and pulled out several photocopied sheets. ‘I’ve got credit card details that show he bought a return ticket to Berlin, business class. And a booking at a Berlin hotel.’ She gave the sheets to Button.

  Calder looked pained and Button realised there was still something troubling her. ‘Is there a problem, Liz?’

  Calder pulled a face. ‘Well, I know you asked me to check out the passport, and the date of birth, and so on. The thing is, I thought I’d run the photograph through our facial recognition system.’

  ‘That was very enterprising of you.’

  ‘And I got a hit.’

  ‘Yes. I’m sure you did. Don’t worry, Liz, I think I know where this is going.’

  ‘So you know it’s Dan Shepherd, an MI5 officer? I mean, his file is above my security clearance so other than the fact that he works for us I have no information.’

  Button nodded. ‘I did know, yes. And you did an excellent job, I must congratulate you on that. But now I’m going to have to ask you to forget it all. I’ll take it from here.’

  ‘Has something bad happened?’ asked Liz quickly. She grimaced and held up a hand. ‘I’m sorry, of course, I’ll wipe it from my memory. And other than my pad here, I have no notes.’ She ripped off the top half dozen pages from her pad and placed them on Button’s desk. ‘I’m sorry if I did something wrong by, you know …’

  Button flashed the young officer an encouraging smile. ‘You didn’t do anything wrong, Liz. The opposite, in fact. I wouldn’t have given you the assignment if I hadn’t wanted it done thoroughly. You’ve done brilliantly. Just leave it with me now.’

  Calder still looked uncomfortable but she nodded and stood up. She dropped her legal pad, apologised, bent down to pick it up, apologised again and hurried out of the office, closing the door behind her.

  Button sat back in the chair and studied the photocopy of the passport. Peter Parkinson. MI6 legend. What the hell was Shepherd doing with an MI6-issued passport? And why had he flown to Berlin? To see Alex Harper? And who had killed the two Russians? Had Shepherd gone rogue? She dismissed the thought immediately. He wasn’t the type. Shepherd was the original straight shooter, a man with a moral code so firmly defined that at times it was a hindrance. Shepherd rarely broke the rules and on the few occasions he did, there was always a good reason for it. So what was he up to now? And who at MI6 was pulling his strings?

  As usual, Harper took a long run through the streets surrounding the hotel early in the morning. Except where an op prevented it, the morning run had been an unbreakable habit of his since he’d joined the paras all those years before. He loved the stillness and the emptiness of the streets as dawn was breaking, and the coolness of the air. He ran the first five miles at a steady pace, his long strides eating up the ground, then ran the last mile flat out, finishing drenched in sweat and with his chest heaving. Back at the hotel, he showered, and was just drinking a cup of coffee when his mobile beeped to let him know he’d received a text message. It was from Button. Short and to the point, as always. YOU HAVE MAIL. He walked along the street to a Turkish-run newsagent and general store, with a couple of elderly computers in the back room, available for hire by the half-hour. When he checked the drafts folder, there was a message from Button: I NEED YOU IN LONDON TODAY. REPEAT TODAY. LET ME KNOW YOUR LOCATION WHEN YOU GET HERE.

  He frowned. Button would no
t normally intervene in an operation once she had set it up and briefed him, preferring to keep a safe distance metaphorically and literally until the job was done. The fact that she wanted to see him at this critical stage suggested either that she had concerns or had unsettling intelligence to share. Or it was connected to Shepherd’s trip to Berlin. If the latter, Harper knew he was in big trouble.

  He phoned Maggie May and told her that he’d be unavailable for the next twelve hours but that she could keep in touch via text messages. Then he drove his bike to the airport and caught the first flight back to London. He usually travelled via Ireland but he figured that his MI5 Müller legend and passport would mean he could enter and leave through Heathrow without being compromised.

  Harper had booked into a different hotel to the one he’d used during his last visit to London, but it was also in King’s Cross, had no phone in the room and a shower cubicle that hadn’t been cleaned in a year or so. But none of that mattered to him, all that mattered was that he wasn’t asked for ID when he checked in and could pay in cash. There was a grubby plastic kettle and sachets of coffee and Coffee-Mate so he made himself a coffee while he waited for Charlotte Button to arrive.

  He had drunk half of it when there was a soft knock on the door. He opened it and let her in. She was wearing a long coat that looked as if it was cashmere and had a black leather Prada bag with gold zips on one shoulder. ‘Welcome to my humble abode,’ he said, and waved for her to come inside. She looked disdainfully around the room and decided the wooden chair by the window was the best place to sit. It was cold in the room and she left her coat on.

  ‘I’ve got the tracking details of the first consignment,’ he said, handing her a thumbdrive. ‘I know you don’t like me teaching you how to suck eggs but I’d leave it a week or two until the Paddys add the stuff to their existing caches.’

  She smiled coldly. ‘Thank you so much.’ She put the thumbdrive into her bag.

  ‘Is something wrong, Charlie?’ he asked, sitting on the bed.

  If anything her eyes got even colder as she looked at him. ‘I’m not sure where to start,’ she said. ‘Okay, let’s kick off with what happened at Letzlinger Heide.’

  Harper grimaced. ‘Yeah, we had a bit of a problem.’

  ‘Didn’t I make it crystal clear that you were to stay below the radar in Germany? There was a gunfight with German troops. Do you want to explain to me how that is staying below the radar?’

  ‘I shot out the tyres of a truck. That’s all. It wasn’t a gunfight.’

  ‘That’s not the point. The point is that you were supposed to maintain a low profile; now the Germans are worried that al-Qaeda are trying to steal a Katyusha. The shit has well and truly hit the fan.’

  ‘No one was trying to steal anything,’ said Harper. ‘The Paddys wanted to see one being fired. The best way to do that was to get them on a range.’

  ‘Alex, I can’t believe how bloody irresponsible you’ve been. The contract was to take out O’Brien and Walsh.’

  ‘And to hit them financially. And discredit their organisation.’

  ‘But nowhere in that brief were you told to go to war with the German Army.’

  ‘It was a bit of rough and tumble, Charlie. Really. Nothing to worry about.’

  ‘And I’m far from happy with this whole Katyusha business,’ she said. ‘Why not just offer them RPGs? A ground-to-air missile or two. Something small.’

  ‘Because a Katyusha is big money. Look, Charlie, they’re not going to get a Katyusha. Not out of the country, anyway. I’ll take their money and the Germans can take the weapons. It’ll all go to muddying the waters. No one’s going to know what’s going on or who’s involved. And O’Brien and Walsh will be collateral damage.’ He grinned. ‘It’s going to be fine, I promise.’

  ‘You say no one will know what’s going on. But Zelda Hoffmann does. She knows everything.’

  ‘I’ve known her for years.’

  ‘She’s an arms dealer who will apparently sell to anyone.’

  ‘That sort of goes with the turf,’ said Harper. ‘Arms dealers don’t tend to pick and choose their customers.’

  ‘That’s not true,’ said Button. ‘Any dealer would think long and hard before selling to al-Qaeda, for instance. In Europe and the States, anyway.’

  ‘They can buy from plenty of other sources,’ said Harper.

  ‘But there aren’t many dealers offering Katyushas. And Hoffmann was happy enough to agree to sell them to Irish tourists. What if she’s contacted by jihadists?’

  ‘I think that’s unlikely.’

  ‘Unlikely? I want a better guarantee than that, Alex.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘What do you mean, why?’

  Harper’s eyes narrowed. ‘That sounded like a threat.’

  ‘Hoffmann’s the threat. She’s not selling toys. A few Kalashnikovs, fine. But Katyushas? I’m sorry, that’s just not acceptable. Suppose al-Qaeda or ISIS got hold of one? Can you imagine the havoc they’d wreak?’

  ‘It’s no different to the New IRA getting one. It doesn’t really matter who is pulling the trigger, does it?’

  ‘Perhaps not, but it does matter where those rockets are aimed. And if Hoffmann is selling them to people who might use them in the UK – or anywhere in Europe – then she is an enemy of the state.’

  She stared at him as she let the words sink in. ‘You’re saying she’ll be killed?’ he said eventually.

  ‘If she starts selling rockets to UK jihadist groups, then I wouldn’t rule it out.’

  ‘That’s not going to happen,’ said Harper flatly. ‘Zelda and I go back a long way.’

  ‘You’re not the only contractor on my books,’ said Button. Her face stayed impassive for a few seconds, then it broke into what was meant as a reassuring smile. ‘But there’s no need for it to come to that. The ones the New IRA are buying can be taken off the market. We can pass on the intel to the Germans and they can pick up the rest.’

  ‘You mean grass her up?’ Harper shook his head in frustration. ‘She’s helping me, Charlie. Where’s your loyalty?’

  ‘She’s a threat,’ said Button.

  ‘She’s a friend. There’s no way I’m going to throw her to the wolves. And not only that, who would ever trust me again if they heard that I’d betrayed her? The sort of jobs I do for you, I need support and backup. Who’s going to help me if they know that at any point I could betray them?’ He stared at her for a while but there was no clue from her face what she was thinking. ‘How about this? I’ll have a word. I’ll put her straight. I’ll tell her she’s not to sell big stuff to jihadists. How’s that?’

  ‘This isn’t funny, Alex.’

  ‘I’m serious. You tell her what the ground rules are, I’ll pass them on. I’m assuming that selling to ISIS in Syria isn’t an issue. Or al-Qaeda in Africa? You’re worried about home turf, right?’

  ‘I’m worried about terrorist groups getting hold of weapons of mass destruction,’ she said.

  ‘Then you need to be looking at the Russians and the Chinese and our own defence industry,’ said Harper. ‘Half the terrorist groups going have got weapons made by us. You think the government doesn’t know that half the end-user certificates they see aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on? It was a French Exocet that sank the Sheffield in the Falklands War. And it was an Exocet that hit the USS Stark in the Iran–Iraq War killing thirty-seven Yanks and I didn’t see the Americans going to war with France.’

  ‘Zelda Hoffmann isn’t a state-sponsored defence firm, she’s selling dangerous hardware to terrorists who are a threat to the United Kingdom.’

  ‘Then I’ll get her to stop. Trust me.’

  Button sighed. ‘Fine. Just make sure she knows that she’s on our radar. Without telling her that you work for me, obviously.’

  ‘I’ll get it sorted, Charlie. I promise.’

  She nodded slowly and he sensed that something else was on her mind. He had a horrible feeling he knew what it was
but waited for her to say it. If he pre-empted her he’d only sound guilty, so he flashed her his most confident smile and stayed quiet.

  ‘Is there something you need to tell me, Alex?’ she said eventually.

  ‘What do you want to know, Charlie? I’m an open book, you know that.’

  Button’s eyes narrowed and then she nodded slowly. ‘I’m really not sure what to do about you,’ she said.

  Harper smiled easily. ‘Something has clearly upset you, Charlie,’ he said. ‘And it’s not just Zelda, obviously. So why don’t you come straight out with it?’

  ‘I know you saw Spider in Berlin,’ she said, her voice a low husky whisper. ‘What I don’t know is why you didn’t tell me.’

  The words hit him like a bucketful of ice-cold water but he just shrugged. ‘Nothing to tell,’ he said, his mind racing. Just how much did she know?

  ‘So you did see him?’

  Harper grimaced, realising that he’d just been played. She hadn’t known for sure, but his slip meant that now she did.

  ‘What do you want me to say, Charlie?’

  ‘I want to know what the hell’s going on. And I want it to come from you without me having to drag it out. You’re working for me and one of the things I expect from my employees is loyalty. Let me rephrase that. I don’t expect loyalty, I bloody well demand it. Now you don’t seem to realise the deep pit of shit you’ve fallen into, but trust me, the only way to dig yourself out of it is to tell me everything.’

  Harper stared at her in silence, trying to work out exactly what she knew. She’d already fooled him once.

  ‘Let me start with an easy one,’ she said. ‘Why was Spider in Berlin?’

  ‘He wasn’t there for you?’

  ‘I think we both know he wasn’t,’ said Button. ‘Now, I’m going to give you one last chance to come clean, but if you don’t, it’s going to get very messy from this point on.’

  Harper put up his hands, as if in surrender. ‘He wanted a chat. He called me up and asked for a meeting.’

  ‘He knew you were in Berlin?’