A Hard Woman to Kill (The DCI Hanlon Series)

by Alex Howard

  She had also started to shed her resentment at her colleagues and her new role at the MPU. McIntyre was so nice to be with, she was even starting to thaw Hanlon’s heart, and Mawson’s idealism was beginning to, if not exactly rub off, win her over more to his way of thinking. She had worked all her life in an aggressive, cynical environment, where it was a ‘them and us’ mentality typical not just of the police but anyone really who had dealings with the public en masse, the enemy being not just the criminal fraternity but the general public whose lack of appreciation of the police bordered upon the repellent. Nobody ever said thank you for a difficult job well done; it was always moan, moan, moan.

  Mawson was like a breath of fresh air. He genuinely enjoyed his job. He was a happy idealist, feeling that utopia was within our grasp. She appreciated the fact that he was genuinely free of cynicism. He could have gone far – she’d done some digging into his background – but he seemed perfectly happy with the backwater position he occupied. His hearts-and-minds policy was, she felt, possibly on the right track and, besides, any man who could shoot like that couldn’t be all bad.

  If it hadn’t been for Enver, all would be more than tolerable. Enver’s fate occupied her every thought that morning when she wasn’t concentrating on the range. To have missed him by a couple of hours when he was being held so close was horribly frustrating. The only good thing was that she knew he was still alive.

  It was an unsurmountable ‘but’. She had lost one friend and colleague through her own arrogance – Mark Whiteside, still in the limbo of his coma, awaiting without awareness the rapidly dawning day when his parents, his next of kin, would have their way and the life-mantaining machines would be turned off.

  She still felt bitterly guilty. Her larger-than-life colleague who had enjoyed his time on earth to the full, an almost Rabelaisian figure, brawling and shagging and drinking and laughing. She suspected she had lived vicariously through him and now he was gone – well, not fully gone but hanging on by his fingertips – she felt alone, embittered, increasingly violent in her moods, wanting to lash out so that others would be hurt as she had been. It was driving her to take even greater risks than she would usually so that she wouldn’t be able to think in the maelstrom of danger she created for herself.

  Enver’s disappearance wasn’t her responsibility, wasn’t her fault. It was Corrigan’s. But, to Hanlon, saving Enver had become her duty, as if she might be able to atone for Whiteside’s condition by rescuing this other life.

  She sat for a moment in the Audi and leaned her head on the steering wheel. Her existence was almost schizophrenic, torn in two by the Russian mafia and Myasnikov, in a struggle that should have been nothing to do with her at all. Oksana Taverner and Charlie Taverner, the latter missing, presumed dead at the hands of Belanov and Dimitri. Oksana waiting patiently in her luxurious home in Windsor, just a quarter of an hour’s drive away. Enver Demirel, missing, presumed still alive, in the hands of Belanov and Dimitri. Myasnikov and Anderson locked in a battle over ownership of a brothel and revenge. Sex and money and death. Selling women’s bodies it was not their right to sell, from buildings they had no right to own, taking lives they had no right to take. And both with high-placed sources in the institutions that existed to stop them flourishing.

  She thought of the framed yin and yang symbol in Mawson’s office, the diametrically opposed symbols of light and darkness that each contained a seed of the other.

  It was a fairly accurate depiction of the mess they were in.

  Hanlon felt a moment of despair at the scale of what she faced, then she flexed her fingers and the powerful muscles of her biceps. She tilted the sun visor down and looked at her face in the mirror. Her grey eyes looked back evenly at her.

  I’ve beaten you before, Belanov, she thought. And I’ve faced worse than you, Myasnikov, and I’m still alive. I’m a hard woman to kill.

  She got out of the car and heard a voice say, ‘DCI Hanlon?’

  It was Serg Surikov.

  From the window above, Shona McIntyre watched. She saw the tall Russian in his well-cut dark suit incline his head to the much shorter Hanlon. She saw Hanlon push her hair away from her face with a familiar impatient gesture and then point her hand at the red Audi. Its lights flashed as it locked, then she followed the Russian across the car park and the two of them got into a VW Golf that she guessed was the Russian’s hire car.

  McIntyre watched as it drove out of the car park. She felt a surge of resentment against Hanlon. It simply wasn’t fair. First Mawson had taken her out shooting. OK, it was his day off, she knew that, and he could do what he wanted in his free time, and she was sure that her boss would have spent the time profitably discussing work with the DCI, but she hadn’t been invited. Not that she wanted to be, but still.

  Then one of the most attractive men she had ever seen in the flesh, as opposed to on film, had driven Hanlon off in his car.

  It definitely wasn’t fair. Equally, it wasn’t fair to blame Hanlon.

  McIntyre decided to have a quick pray, then a hot chocolate and a biscuit. That would cheer her up. Jesus, cocoa solids and sugar, a winning combination. She’d text Hanlon later. The underwater search people were getting irritated that she wasn’t returning their calls.

  Hanlon and Serg were in the bar of the Ibis Hotel near Heathrow, where Serg was staying. Thanatos normally put their senior staff somewhere more central and considerably more luxurious. Edward Li was at the Savoy. Not only was it regarded as a perk of the job, but it reassured clients. If they were staying at places like that, they must be worth every penny they were being paid.

  Serg, though, disliked ostentatious luxury. There was a streak of puritanism that ran deep in him as it did in his family. Poverty was a badge of honour. His grandfather, the Hero of the Soviet Union, had been a commissar in the Party, and had remained a shining beacon of probity unusual as the old idealism had withered and died under the tyranny of Stalin and his successors.

  Then Brezhnev had ruined the Hero of the Soviet Union medal by being awarded it, the highest honour the state could bestow, almost like the Victoria Cross, to celebrate his birthday. And he had accepted it. That’s what Serg couldn’t understand. He had accepted it. His own grandfather had been shot several times and destroyed a German platoon single-handedly in the hellhole of Stalingrad. Serg loathed the former president for demeaning his grandfather’s achievements. For mocking the bravery of others.

  The Party had betrayed the workers, betrayed Russia, become a corrupt institution of nest featherers, but the Surikovs gritted their teeth and kept the faith. Their juniors took bribes and had lifestyles far more opulent than they did.

  Serg Surikov’s grandfather had died in genteel, alcoholic poverty, surrounded by medals and photos of his dead friends. Serg Surikov’s father had been murdered by corrupt superiors to cover their tracks. Serg Surikov had a bleak future. He didn’t care. Serg, like Hanlon, wasn’t sensible. He was incorruptible.

  His nickname in Moscow was ‘the Angel’. Not because he was holy or religious; he had thrown someone implicated in his father’s death off a roof. They said if Serg came for you, you’d better grow wings, quick.

  ‘You said you had information for me regarding Charlie Taverner and this Myasnikov character,’ said Hanlon. She studied Serg thoughtfully as he drank his coffee. Like her colleagues, she automatically registered his good looks. Unlike her colleagues, she noticed the way he constantly scanned the room, continual risk assessment, the way he moved, the easy muscular grace, and the small signs of damage to his face, the scar between his eyes, the one to the left of his eyebrow, the kink in his nose where it had obviously been broken at some time, and the general air of good-humoured competence. She noticed the powerful muscles in his elegant wrists. The other women in the bar were looking surreptitiously not just at him but at her, to see what it was that this woman had to interest a man like him.

  ‘I do. I suggest we share, we pool, our respective knowledge.’ Serg’s accent
was extremely pleasant to listen to, she thought, although she wished he wouldn’t talk so much like a dictionary. ‘After all, we indubitably share a similar agenda. We both want similar things, do we not, DCI Hanlon?’

  Perhaps we do, thought Hanlon. Indubitably. His green eyes held hers. He knew she would not look away.

  Hanlon did not have the kind of face or figure that made her a traffic hazard, but Serg was keenly aware of her chiselled body and her hard, attractive face with that commanding gaze that he was looking into now.

  Serg liked climbing. He liked the challenge and the risk, and the woman opposite aroused similar feelings in him. She was wearing a white blouse under her jacket, and when she moved he could see the way her taut neck muscle stretched where it ran from below her ear to the trapezius muscle. Occasionally she would push her thick, coarse dark hair back with her long strong fingers.

  Serg found her alarmingly attractive. ‘I believe we want the same things. I have my laptop upstairs,’ he said.

  ‘Do you now?’ said Hanlon, her dark, curved eyebrows raised in an ironic look. ‘I’m going to buy a drink,’ she said, standing up. ‘Do you want one?’

  ‘Another double espresso,’ he said. ‘They’ll bring it.’

  ‘I’d rather get it myself,’ said Hanlon. ‘That girl took ages last time. I’m not noted for my patience.’

  Serg watched as she walked to the bar and spoke to the barmaid, who turned and busied herself with the coffee machine. Hanlon checked her messages on her phone as she waited. He took his phone out and ran through his messages too.

  From the bar, Hanlon could see his head and face reflected in the mirror. He was ridiculously attractive. She had never found it hard to reach decisions and she reached one now. She studied her own reflection. Was she good-looking? She guessed she was. She knew that she had an intimidating reputation. Any man trying to make it with her would certainly need the courage of his convictions, and still they tried. She guessed she was worth it.

  She paid for the drinks and brought them back to the table. She took a sip of her cappuccino and watched as Serg drank his bitter double espresso in a single swallow.

  Serg said, ‘I’ll go and fetch the laptop. I’ll bring it down here.’

  Hanlon shook her head, her eyes compelling. ‘There’s no need. I’ll come upstairs with you.’

  There was a pause that to him seemed to fill eternity. He looked into her confident, grey eyes. ‘If you’re sure?’ said Serg quietly.

  Hanlon shrugged. ‘Like I told you,’ she said, ‘I’m not noted for my patience.’

  He could see the outline of her bra strap through the fabric of her blouse. Time seemed to stand still, holding its breath.

  Hanlon’s phone beeped as her phone rang. She glanced at the caller ID and turned it off.

  ‘Just an old colleague I know,’ she said to Serg. ‘It won’t be important.’ She stood up.

  ‘Coming?’ she asked.

  32

  Even Joad, ever the optimist, had to admit that the arrangements he’d made with Arkady Belanov hadn’t gone as well as they could have. He had expected Belanov and Dimitri to be both excited and delighted by this unlooked-for opportunity to capture Hanlon and finally be revenged, or get closure as people seemed to say these days. They had, after all, been moaning about little else for ages. They were men obsessed.

  Then too there was the unexpectedly good news of his discovery from friends in the Met that DI Enver Demirel was technically on holiday. His presence wouldn’t be missed. It rather looked as if his reappearance in their lives had been caused by some personal agenda rather than an official one.

  Instead he found the Russians cagey, nervous. Whenever Belanov’s mobile rang, both he and Dimitri squinted anxiously at the screen to see who the caller was.

  It’s Myasnikov, thought Joad, in a moment of clarity. They never told him any of this Hanlon business and they’re shitting themselves in case he finds out they’ve gone behind his back. They’re worried in case he goes apeshit on them, chops their heads off or something.

  ‘I spoke to Huss,’ said Joad reassuringly. ‘She believes every word I said and she’s pinning all her faith on Hanlon.’

  He spoke not just with the conviction and fluency of the practised liar; he was telling the truth. Sincerity poured from him.

  ‘Good,’ said Arkady. Having met Hanlon, he could understand how the myth of her invulnerability would have grown. But the higher you climbed, the harder you fell. When Huss discovered that her idol was dead, she would be shattered psychologically. It had been the same with the Chechen resistance fighters in the TransCaucasus. Take out a leader, you take out the followers.

  If people thought their families would suffer horribly, you could make them do almost everything. The only exceptions to the rule were the evil, who didn’t care, the stupid, who were incapable of risk evaluation, and the militantly religious who were confident in God’s ability to sort the whole thing out. Huss fell into none of these categories. She could be relied on. Arkady Belanov knew that Huss could be trusted to do nothing to harm them. She’d be far too frightened. Besides, thought Belanov, she was only a woman. She would be incapable of serious action. Hanlon, although she had the outward shape of a woman, was some sort of hideous banshee in human form. Not really female.

  ‘Tell Huss we will call you in one hour and she can hear Enver Demirel, so she knows he is alive.’

  ‘That sounds good,’ said Joad approvingly. ‘And where are you keeping Demirel, so I can direct Hanlon there? I guess she’ll want to come tonight, to get her beloved colleague out of your clutches asap.’

  The two Russians looked at each other and spoke in their own language. Joad only understood ‘Heathrow’ and vor and ‘Friday night’. They seemed to be arguing about the times of Myasnikov’s flight. It was odd, thought Joad, listening to them, how certain things were expressed in English, lya, lya, lya ‘International Departures’, lya, lya, lya, ‘piece of piss’, lya, lya, lya, ‘keep his mouth shut’, lya, lya, lya. They stood out like rocks poking up from a stream of language he didn’t understand. They’d obviously been in the country too long. They were starting to get linguistically assimilated.

  ‘Not tonight,’ said Belanov finally. ‘Tomorrow night. Tell her tonight is extra security for vor. Vor wants to hear what policeman has to say, then Saturday morning he is scheduled for execution.’

  ‘That sounds fine,’ said Joad. ‘On Friday night, then, Hanlon will be walking into your hands. I’ll stress the point that your other contact in the force will know if Hanlon tells anyone, so she’ll come alone.’

  ‘You do that,’ said Arkady.

  ‘So where’s he being held?’ asked Joad encouragingly.

  ‘Tell her, here,’ said Belanov. ‘Then if she does tell people, there will be nothing for anyone to find. I’ll close the place for one night.’

  Shit, thought Joad. If he had been Belanov, he thought, he’d have done the same. Why compromise security when you didn’t have to. But he needed that farm address for tonight, or all bets were off.

  He ran a series of objections to Belanov’s plan rapidly through his brain. None seemed remotely plausible. Well, he thought, at least he had kept Enver Demirel alive for another twenty-four hours.

  He stood up and stretched and grinned affably at Belanov. It was one of Joad’s strengths that he knew when he was beaten.

  ‘Well, that all sounds fine, then. Get Dimitri to call me from wherever you’re keeping Enver in about an hour, let Huss know he’s still with us.’

  Arkady Belanov gave him a nasty smile. ‘For now, Ian, for now.’

  33

  Serg Surikov woke up in the place he most wanted to be in the world, dressed as he most wanted to be dressed, with the woman he most wanted to be with in the world. The Ibis Hotel, Heathrow, stark naked, and DCI Hanlon. He felt sleepy and relaxed. He stretched luxuriously, or tried to, but something was hampering his movements.

  He opened his eyes fully, consciousne
ss returning, and took stock of the situation. There was a chair in his hotel bedroom, a solid piece of construction, and he was tied to it. His arms to its arms; his legs to its legs. He glanced down at the thin cord that secured him. The knots were simple and wholly effective. Any struggle on his part would only tighten them. He looked up at Hanlon, fully clothed, sitting cross-legged on his bed in a perfect lotus pose. Her face was unfriendly, unsmiling.

  He could remember what had happened now. The walk from the hotel bar to his room, Hanlon leading the way, his eyes clamped on her perfect backside. Her hips had been swaying mesmerically. Maybe with anyone else he would have recognized the warning signs, a slight dimming of vision, a feeling of heaviness in his muscles, but he had been completely distracted. He’d had only one thought in his head. It had crossed his mind at the time that she had been setting a fast pace. Now he realized it had been to get him to his room before the drugs kicked in. She had pushed him down on the bed, removing his shoes with an enigmatic smile, and that’s all he could remember.

  ‘What did you use?’ he asked, out of professional curiosity.

  ‘Rohypnol,’ said Hanlon. ‘The rapist’s friend. Oh, and diazepam.’

  Serg nodded. That would explain the feeling he had at the back of his throat and the rear of his head, the hospital sensation of floating and relaxation that he associated with the times he had been professionally injured.

  His clothes were neatly laid out on the bed next to Hanlon. He nodded at them,

  ‘What were you doing? Seeing if I was wearing a wire, checking for concealed weapons? Or trying to make me feel more vulnerable?’