Vendetta
A Maggie Black Thriller
Jack McSporran
Copyright © 2017 by Inked Entertainment Ltd
All rights reserved.
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
ISBN: 978-1-912382-00-2
This book is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is fictionalized or coincidental.
For my parents, David and Debbie.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 1
Warsaw, Poland
23 July
Maggie Black watched her target from across the street.
She sat by Sigismund’s Column while Jason Stroud enjoyed an alfresco dinner in Castle Square. Two men with ties to his shady dealings joined him, laughing and joking with each other before they got around to talking business.
Jason wouldn’t be laughing for long.
Maggie had been tailing Stroud for three days now, and the man had yet to notice her. It was easy to spy on over-confident men who thought they were too smart to be found out. Jason carried on with his life while she followed him, ignorant to the fact that his days were numbered.
Night approached Old Town as the summer sun began its descent. Lights blinked on around the square, illuminating the historic castle from the ground up and giving the quaint area a warm glow.
The Krolewski Restaurant and Pub, situated across from the castle, was Jason’s favorite spot; he’d dined there every night on Maggie’s watch. A man like him should know better. Being predictable could get you killed.
The square around them was crowded. Tourists milled through, taking photos of the brightly colored buildings and gawking at the difference between Old Town and the modern metropolis they stepped in from. Locals weaved between the tourists as they headed home for the evening, while lovers linked arms and strolled off towards the Vistula river.
A horse-drawn carriage passed Maggie, clip-clopping over the cobbled roads.
Maggie’s phone vibrated an hour and a half into her watch. She dug it out of her pocket and checked the screen. Bishop wouldn’t call while she was out on assignment unless something was wrong. She had to take it.
“Bishop?”
“I need you to come in,” said her boss.
Maggie got up from her bench by the monument and moved away from prying ears. “When?”
“Tonight.”
“I’m not done here.” She checked over her shoulder and found Jason settling his bill.
“Then wrap things up. It’s urgent.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I’ll explain when you get here.”
Maggie sighed. “I’ll be there soon.”
As she hung up, a car approached and pulled up outside the restaurant. Jason bid his dinner guests farewell and got into the back of the sleek Lexus. Maggie glanced around, hand reaching to her back where she concealed her gun. It was too crowded. Too many witnesses.
With Jason inside, the black car took off and headed down the street, leaving Maggie and Old Town behind.
Shit.
Maggie raced around the corner to where she’d parked her rental. She hopped onto the motorbike and secured her helmet to conceal her identity. Rush jobs could lead to mistakes, and she wasn’t taking any chances. Making sure her long blond hair was hidden, she flicked the kickstand away and put the key into ignition.
The engine of the Suzuki GSX-R1000R roared to life. Pulling back the throttle, Maggie planted a foot on the ground and spun the bike in the right direction before taking off.
Jason was out of sight by the time she returned to the main square, but it didn’t matter. He was a man of habit. He’d return to his apartment and remain there for at least an hour before heading out for a night on the town.
Thanks to the layout of the city’s roads, this would force his driver to circle back, going down Miodowa and eventually rounding into Aleja Solidarności, one of the main roads that veined through the city.
The road to Castle Square acted as an overpass to Aleja Solidarności, and Maggie crossed the street, peering over the edge of the bridge and down to the two-way traffic below. It was the perfect place.
Maggie swung right and took a short cut, bumping her way down the adjoining staircase to the road below. Pedestrians yelped and dodged out of the way as she careened down the steps, standing up from the bike’s seat to avoid her teeth rattling with the impact.
At the bottom, Maggie waited at the mouth of the underpass for the right moment. The timing needed to be perfect.
Minutes passed like hours, and doubt crept into Maggie’s brain. Perhaps Stroud decided to switch up his usual schedule. He’d just met with two of his business partners, after all. Something could have changed his plans.
His next shipment of unsuspecting workers could be ready. Jason frequently smuggled Polish citizens into the UK, all under the false pretense of promised employment. Instead, he’d use them for slave labor when they arrived.
The authorities had discovered Stroud’s not-so-little operation in the West Midlands a couple weeks ago and planned a raid for the following night. They couldn’t allow his ‘business venture’ to continue. Three bodies had already been found, poor workers deemed useless after falling ill, thanks to malnutrition and the horrendous conditions in Stroud’s factories. Each received a bullet to the head as payment for their services.
Maggie’s employer had sent her to return the favor.
She narrowed her eyes to get a better look down the tunnel. A black car entered from the opposite end and headed her way.
Revving the engine, she held off for the right moment.
Three. Two.
Maggie shot off like a bullet, the metallic blue bike whizzing through the busy traffic as she entered the tunnel.
Steering with one hand, Maggie reached behind for her Glock 19. She weaved into the next lane of the two-way traffic, narrowing the gap between her and the Lexus.
Cars filled the four lanes. Maggie swooped between them, running up the edge of her lane as the black Lexus approached.
Time seemed to slow as she drove towards them. Jason was sitting in the back, talking into his phone with no idea of what was about to happen.
Maggie raised her gun and aimed as she continued forward. Taking a deep breath, she held it and lined the shot.
She pulled the trigger and watched as the bullet reached its final resting place, buried deep into Jason Stroud’s temple. Blood spattered over the cracked window, and Maggie sped on forward.
The booming from the shot reverberated through the hollow tunnel.
Brakes screeched as drivers reacted to the noise and ran into the cars in front of them. But Maggie didn’t stop.
She had a plane to catch.
Chapter 2
London, Great Britain
It was almost midnight by the time Maggie reached King Street. The two-and-a-half-hour flight from Warsaw went by without issue, Stansted Airport busy as always.
She swiped her pass at the door and entered the five-story office building. To the outside world, Inked International was a global stationary supplier. To those in the know, it was the headquarters to a covert intelligence agency simply known as the Unit.
Strictly speaking, the Unit didn’t exist. Unlike the Secret Intelligence Service at Vauxhall Cross or MI5, everything about the Unit was underground. Only those with the highest clearance were privy to their inner workings.
Unlike their public counterparts, the Unit’s activities weren’t strictly legal. When the need arose to step outside the law for the greater good, Maggie and her colleagues shouldered the burden and did what others could not.
Jason Stroud wasn’t the first person Maggie had killed, and he wouldn’t be the last.
Maggie went inside the elevator and pushed the button for the top floor. Whatever prompted Bishop to call her in had to be time sensitive.
The cart stopped on her level and pinged, opening out onto a floor of offices. Bishop’s door was open, and he stood in the doorway waiting for her.
“Thanks for coming, Maggie.”
“Of course.”
“Tea?” he asked, closing the door behind her as she shrugged out her jacket.
Maggie took a seat at the conference table. A projector screened the contents of Bishop’s laptop onto the far wall. “I’m okay, thanks.”
Bishop sat across from her and took a sip of his fresh brew. He wore his usual uniform: an expensive yet subdued suit with a silk tie over a clean white shirt. An army man through and through, he kept his brown hair cropped at the sides despite leaving the military years ago. He became an agent long before Maggie’s birth, yet she bet the fifty-eight-year-old could still kick her twenty-seven-year-old arse. Bishop was one of the best, and he’d been her mentor ever since she was a teenager.
“Sorry about the short notice,” he said, pulling her from her thoughts. “I trust there were no problems wrapping things up in Warsaw?”
“It was a clean hit,” she assured him.
“Good, because something’s come up, and I need you on it.”
“What is it?”
Bishop tapped at his laptop and brought up an image on the projector. A man stared back at them with sharp eyes, his bronzed skin carved with age.
“This is Carlo Rossi. His family is one of two warring factions in the Italian region of Veneto.”
“The mafia?” Maggie suppressed the urge to talk like Don Corleone.
“Of a sort, yes. Carlo is the Rossi’s leader, and we’ve received intel from the Italian government that he’s currently in negotiations with one of the UK’s largest importers.”
“Drugs?” Maggie guessed. While people like Jason Stroud trafficked people, the mob were prolific in shifting narcotics.
Bishop nodded. “The Rossis are looking for international distribution for their cocaine and heroin. Things are bad enough here without their product reaching our shores.”
“Who’s the importer?”
“Peter West.” Bishop switched Carlo’s photo out for another. “We’ve been after him for some time now, but the bastard’s eluded us until now.”
Peter West was a dapper, though not handsome, man. He looked as if he’d rushed into middle age and forgot to bring his hair along with him; his bulbous nose and chiseled jaw competed for the starring role on his face.
“Where do I come in?” Maggie asked, committing both men to memory.
“The Italians have someone on the inside, an agent named Isabella Valentin. For the last six years, she’s worked her way up the organization and now serves as Carlo’s trusted personal assistant.”
“She must be good.” Organizations like the mafia weren’t trusting to outsiders. They liked to stick with their own and keep business in the family.
“One of their best, from what I’m told. She’s managed to secure you a meeting with Carlo, under the guise of Peter’s competition.”
“You mean Rebecca Sterling.” It had been a while since Maggie used Rebecca. Maggie now understood why Bishop called her in. The American drug lord was the ideal woman for the job.
“The Director has made it clear: under no circumstance is the deal allowed to go through. You have clearance to do whatever’s necessary to stop it.” Bishop slid a manila folder across the table. “Everything else you need to know is in here.”
“When’s the meeting?”
“Tomorrow afternoon. You leave for Venice in the morning.”
Maggie got up from her chair. She had prep to do before her travels, and Rebecca needed to be ready before leaving the country. “Anything else?”
“Yes. You won’t be going alone.”
Maggie straightened. “There’s no need. I can do it myself.”
Relying on others could ruin a mission, or worse, and she wasn’t about to die thanks to someone else’s screw up. She’d proven herself more than capable over the years, and Bishop knew she did her best work alone.
“Nonsense,” Bishop said, dashing her hopes. “There’s no way someone like Rebecca would travel to Venice without a bodyguard by her side. Leon will join you.”
Leon Frost.
Maggie cleared her throat and wracked her brain for a good enough reason to object.
Bishop gave her a look. “I thought you’d be glad.”
“Things are…” Maggie searched for the right word. “Complicated.”
Complicated was an understatement.
“I’ve warned you before about allowing your personal life to interrupt your work.”
“It won’t,” she promised.
“Then it’s settled.” Bishop opened his door for her. “Go home and get some rest. You’re going to need it.”
Chapter 3
24 July
Maggie gave up on sleep and got up with a couple of hours to spare before she needed to head to the airport.
She padded through her riverside apartment and prepared a much-needed coffee. The rejuvenating liquid dripped through the filter, and Maggie stretched her stiff muscles while she waited, yawning her head off.
Sleep always eluded her the night before a new mission. The mixture of anticipation and dread was an uncomfortable combination, like wearing a ball gown to a shoot-out. Something Maggie knew a thing or two about.
A meow slipped in through the window in her living room, left open to contend with the humid heat that clung to the early morning air. The sun was making a guest appearance, stretching toward its perch high above the city. Summer was never a guarantee, the British seasons often quite happy to skip it altogether.
Maggie crossed the open floorplan and shimmied open the balcony. The murky waves of the River Thames below created a soothing song with its constant hum.
The impatient cat slinked in and weaved between her legs.
Scooping up Willow, Maggie headed back to the kitchen.
“You’re hungry, I presume?” she asked the stray, who purred at the attention and raised her head to allow Maggie to scratch under her jaw.
Willow jumped from her arms onto the counter and plopped under the cupboard where Maggie kept tins of tuna for her feline visitor. She opened one onto a little plate, filled a bowl with water, and left Willow to scarf it down.
Maggie slurped her black coffee and raided the fridge in search of her own breakfast. She sighed. All it contained was some expired milk and a pot of jam. She’d get something at the airport.
A suitcase sat by the front door, filled with clothes she wouldn’t choose to wear herself, the name on the tag not her own. Getting weapons through security wasn’t a worry. According to the file Bishop handed her, the Italian government would supply everything they needed when she arrived.
When they arrived.
Leon was out on a job when she’d left for Poland. For the last few months, they passed like ships in the
night, one leaving as the other returned home. It was the nature of their work, and one of the many things that caused problems in their on-again-off-again relationship.
They were most definitely in one of their off-again phases. Had been for a while. No matter how many times they tried, something got in the way. Maggie concluded a few months back that they just weren’t meant to be.
That didn’t stop her from missing him though. Lazy Sundays in bed watching films. His infectious smile. How he made her feel safe and secure in his arms, one of the only things that fought off her nightmares. Yet another hazard of her job.
The things she’d seen and done…
Maggie shook the thoughts away and returned to her bedroom. She sat at her dressing table to get ready. Her luggage from Warsaw remained unpacked by the bed, but like most things in her life, it would have to wait.
Each agent at the Unit had a wide range of skills, everything they needed to protect and serve Queen and country. Back in training, Maggie learned everything from languages and foreign etiquette, to mixed martial arts and weapons skills. Most students displayed an affinity for a particular field. For some it was tactics, for others logistics.
For Maggie, it was undercover work. Namely, adapting herself into someone else.
“Hey, I’m Rebecca,” she said, staring at herself in the mirror. The fake tan she’d applied the night before gave her pale skin the sun-kissed glow of someone who lived by the beach. The blond hair framing her vulpine features had to go.
Rebecca Sterling was one of many aliases Maggie had adopted during her time as an agent. For six years, she’d hopped from one country to the next, molding into different personas to infiltrate the criminal underworld and eliminate those within it.
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