Wicked Game

by Matt Johnson

  But, there were questions, things I wanted to ask of my former CO. Why had he gone to such lengths to kill his wife’s lovers? Why not simply do it himself? Why all the melodrama, the meetings, the abduction attempts? It didn’t make sense. Why had he involved Arab and Irish terrorists? Had he been trying to distance himself from the murders so that he wouldn’t get caught? I had no idea. Truth was, I would probably never find out.

  The more I thought about what had been going on, the angrier I became. Like all innocent people accused of something they haven’t done, I wanted that fact known. I wanted to tell Monaghan about me. Wanted to tell him I had never touched Victoria. Wanted to tell him how a little girl had nearly lost her dad because of a stupid rumour. I slammed my hands onto the steering wheel, in frustration. I wanted to tell Monaghan just how much I hated him.

  As I continued the journey home and my temper subsided, I realised that I hadn’t given a thought to the surveillance Grahamslaw had revealed. Now, although I looked, I still saw nothing. They were obviously very good.

  Quite what made me do it I don’t know but, suddenly, almost for a laugh, I did a U-turn on the A10 and, as I passed the oncoming cars, I waved at the drivers. It was stupid, but it gave me a perverse pleasure to make them think I had sussed them, even if I hadn’t.

  When I arrived at the cottage, there were two cars in the drive, a Volvo belonging to Jenny’s mother and Kevin’s Audi.

  I stepped from my car just as the cottage door flew open. Jenny ran straight at me. She screamed out my name and threw her arms around my neck. The tears on her cheeks were still fresh, her eyes red and sore. She held me so tight that I could hardly breathe.

  As I held her, Kevin appeared in the doorway. I looked toward him and managed a weak smile. Like an idiot I realised I should have called earlier. They would have been sat here all this time, thinking the worst and waiting for the call to say that I had been arrested, or worse.

  With Kevin’s help, I led Jenny into the kitchen. The kettle was already boiled. In silence, Kevin made tea and put a hot mug into her trembling hands. She was unable to utter a word that made any sense.

  I didn’t know how to start. Jenny grasped her drink in one hand and gripped my hand with the other.

  ‘Where’ve you been, boss?’ Kevin finally asked.

  ‘Monaghan’s club.’

  ‘I got here not long after you’d left. Jenny’s told me that you thought that car bomb was me. Did you kill him?’

  ‘No. No, I didn’t.’ I looked down.

  Jenny gasped. ‘Oh, thank God, thank God. I tried to ring you … you’d switched off your phone.’

  ‘I got your text message.’

  ‘It stopped you?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ I said.

  ‘What happened?’ Kevin asked.

  I paused for a moment, calibrating my words. I gripped Jenny’s hand and looked up at Kevin.

  ‘Grahamslaw was at the club waiting for me. The car-bomb victim was Monaghan.’

  Kevin was momentarily struck dumb. He fell back against the kitchen counter. ‘But who, how?’ he asked as he found his tongue. ‘I don’t get it … if he was the one trying to kill us … who killed him?’

  ‘He certainly wasn’t expecting to get killed. He had a false passport and plane tickets in his car when he died. There was stuff about you and his wife as well, letters, that sort of thing.’

  ‘So, he was about to do a runner?’

  ‘He had the ROSE files, Kev. Not only that, they weren’t army files. They were our police files. All that stuff about files being stolen from Castlederg was bollocks. Whatever was stolen, it wasn’t anything to do with us.’

  ‘So everything Monaghan told us was crap. Fuckin’ bastard.’ Kevin banged his hands on the surface behind him.

  ‘Everything. Remember when we were supposed to grab Yildrim? Monaghan was going to join us at the safe house? I reckon he was going to kill the Arab and then pin it on us. Yildrim was the only one who could point the finger at him.’

  ‘So Yildrim killed him first. And everything else was bullshit? Monaghan probably wasn’t even in MI5!’ Kevin’s anger was building.

  ‘I’m not sure, but that may explain why he couldn’t tell us if the kid from the embassy was still in prison or not.’

  ‘And I was a mug and always have been.’ Kevin shook his head and looked at the floor. ‘All this for a quick shag with the CO’s wife.’

  Jenny listened in awe. She hadn’t touched her tea. It was time for me to give her my undivided attention.

  I followed Kevin out of the front door and onto the drive. His shoulders were slumped and he had a forlorn look on his face.

  ‘So what do we do now?’ he asked.

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘SO13 aren’t idiots, boss. If they hadn’t worked it out already, you turning up at Monaghan’s club will have made it quite clear that it was us at Alma House and in the taxi they chased.’

  I thought for a moment. ‘Yes … you’re right. For now, all we can do is make it hard for them. Hide the kit … and do it well. Give your skin a forensic scrub to get rid of any gun residue. In the meantime, I’ll have a think about what we can say to them.’

  ‘I’m surprised they didn’t nick you at the club.’

  ‘So am I,’ I said. ‘And that might mean they don’t plan to.’

  ‘And what about this Arab you say was Monaghan’s link man?’

  ‘Well, if what Grahamslaw told me is right, he now has no reason to hang around. Both he and Costello will have lost their paymaster.’

  ‘So, it’s over.’

  ‘I guess.’

  Kevin offered me his hand. ‘Thanks, boss.’

  As I walked my old friend back to his car, I noticed that the familiar spring to his step had returned.

  And yet, as I watched his car disappear into the distance, I knew that our problems were far from over. We may have survived the threat to our lives, but persuading the ‘powers that be’ to forgive our questionable methods was going to be a very different kind of challenge.

  I turned and walked slowly back towards the cottage to face the music. Jenny would be waiting, and I knew that she would have many questions of her own.

  Chapter 86

  Costello brought the car to a halt and switched the engine off.

  The lane was deserted. He checked his map.

  ‘This is the place?’ asked Yildrim.

  ‘This is it.’

  ‘Where is his house?’

  ‘Along the lane, about two hundred yards.’

  ‘It is being watched. Pull back about half a mile. I will need time before dark to work out where the police have hidden their spies.’

  Costello re-started the car, reversed into the gateway to a field and turned back in the direction from where they had driven.

  The Iranian hadn’t spoken during the whole journey from Enfield. With only a couple of minutes to go before they parted company, Costello figured now was the time to try and get answers to some questions.

  ‘Something’s been bothering me,’ he said, as they sped along between the greens and browns of the late-summer hedges.

  ‘What might that be, Declan?’ Yildrim asked, so calmly they could have been discussing dinner plans.

  Costello kept the speed of the car high. Something had to thaw this man’s coolness. ‘When we met last,’ he asked over the sound of the engine, ‘the police turned up just a few moments later. It’s like they knew where to find us … and the latest target, you left it very late to change it from one copper to the other one. Is something else going wrong that I should know about?’

  Yildrim shrugged as he glanced out of the passenger window. ‘Nothing is wrong. As to the target, it is my choice when, not yours. As to the police, I am known to them. They have been following me since I arrived in the country,’ he said, dismissively.

  Costello slammed his hand on the steering wheel. It angered him to think that the Iranian had shown such a casual regard to
the dangers of being compromised. ‘You knew you were being tailed? You knew … and you still took a risk?’

  ‘Do not worry. You are not the only one able to monitor the police. I knew when they were close and we needed to be gone.’

  Costello eased off on the accelerator and the car slowed. ‘Jesus. You’re either real good or totally crazy. How do we know they haven’t followed you tonight?’

  ‘They haven’t, trust me. I have taken new precautions to make sure that I am now free to do what I came here to do.’

  ‘To kill this copper you mean? The one that we missed?’

  ‘Yes. In some ways I am glad that you didn’t succeed in killing him.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘I would have been denied the … the pleasure.’ Yildrim hesitated over his words, seemingly searching for the best way to describe his motivation.

  Costello glanced across at his passenger in time to see a curious, sadistic grin fading from his face. ‘Keeping your hand in, I suppose?’ he asked.

  ‘Something like that, yes.’

  ‘So why not earlier? Why leave Finlay until now?’

  ‘There were … difficulties.’ Yildrim seemed to falter over his words now, as if he were being careful what he said. ‘They have now been sorted out.’

  Costello found the way that Yildrim talked in riddles infuriating. It was almost as if he were enjoying the ‘clue and guess’ game, as he hinted but wouldn’t reveal this recent change in approach to dealing with their targets.

  Just ahead, Costello spotted a small lay-by. ‘Will this do?’ he asked, bringing the car to a stop at the side of the road.

  ‘Perfect. Do not wait for me. Get on with your final job.’

  ‘After which I get paid?’

  ‘Correct. The money transfer is authorised. It will go through automatically even if I do not return from my mission.’

  ‘You make it seem like a military operation. What can be so hard about killing a simple cop?’

  ‘A simple cop? You surprise me, Declan. I imagined you would have wondered why we target these particular policemen?’

  ‘I had given it some thought, yes. Dominic reckoned there might be some kind of connection between you and them.’

  ‘Your friend is right, not that it will do him any good now.’

  From a bag sat in the passenger well, Yildrim produced a small machine pistol. Costello recognised it as an Uzi. He was familiar with the weapon. Of Israeli origin, its firepower, reliability and ease of access to ammunition made it a favourite of many terror groups. In the bottom of the bag sat several bottles of water and chocolate bars.

  ‘Christ, you mean business,’ said Costello.

  ‘It may be a long wait … Finlay is no ordinary cop,’ Yildrim answered, as he checked the weapon and slipped a spare magazine into his jacket pocket.

  ‘So what’s special about him … or is it something personal?’

  ‘It is personal. I want this man to suffer as I have suffered. I will kill his family and then him. It is … a debt … to old friends.’ Yildrim paused for a moment. He stared into space, his eyes distant and unfocussed. It was as if he was recalling something, an incident intimately remembered.

  ‘You ask if Finlay is special?’ he continued. ‘Yes, he is special. A special kind of man … a soldier, in fact. One who once specialised in killing.’

  ‘What, you mean he used to be a sniper or something?’

  Yildrim laughed. ‘No, not a sniper. Finlay and his friends were once SAS soldiers.’

  ‘Special Air Service?’ Costello’s voice climbed several octaves; he couldn’t disguise his alarm. The very mention of the three letters rang alarm bells.

  ‘Yes, from many years ago.’

  Costello sat silently for a moment while the gravity of the Iranian’s words sunk in. Many years previously, more than he cared to recall, a high-level meeting had been called amongst the Provisional leadership in Ulster. There had only been one topic: the response to the SAS deployment in the Province. He remembered the heated debate about how to meet the threat. Angry and belligerent voices wanted to engage the soldiers head-on, to attack them and drive them out. The more considered members warned of the risks that posed, of the dangers of taking on such a skilled and determined enemy who were prepared to meet fire with fire. Some IRA members had been soldiers, they knew what the SAS was capable of and they warned against singling the regiment out for attack. ‘Kill one and the others won’t rest until they find you’ was the warning Costello could still remember being screamed across the meeting room by a grey-haired ex-trooper. That advice had won the day, and for very good reason.

  And now, Costello had been duped into ignoring it.

  ‘You’ve had us attacking SAS soldiers?’ he said. ‘Jesus … I don’t believe it. Why didn’t you tell us?’

  ‘Would it have made a difference?’

  ‘You’re damn right it would.’ Costello felt his anger rising. What Yildrim had said meant that the final killing would no longer be the child’s play he had expected.

  ‘You would have asked for more money?’ said Yildrim.

  ‘You just don’t get it, do you? It’s not about the money. You don’t go singling out retired SAS soldiers without there being blowback. They look after their own; we’ll be marked men. Dominic won’t even be safe in prison.’

  ‘You consider them to be that dangerous?’

  ‘Too bloody right.’

  Costello tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. He could already feel his heart rate climbing as panicked thoughts about where he could hide and who he could trust raced through his mind.

  ‘You’ve as good as killed us yourself,’ he spat out. ‘We’re going to heaven now, and no doubt sooner that we’d planned for. They won’t rest until they find us.’

  ‘By us, I presume you include me?’ said Yildrim.

  ‘Of course. You can’t run from these guys.’

  ‘They are not supermen, Declan. They bleed like any other.’

  ‘You can kill the man but not the message. Back in the old country, we always knew that you took on the SAS at your peril.’

  ‘You forget, I can go back from where I came.’

  ‘To Pakistan, you mean? I told you when we first met that I knew you. You were one of Zubair’s men.’

  The more time that Costello had spent with Yildrim, the more he had remembered about him. It had been many years, but the way the Iranian liked to talk in riddles had stuck with Costello. They had first met in the early 1980s, at a training camp in Peshawar in the northern province of Pakistan. Costello had been sent by the IRA to learn about guerrilla tactics and explosives at the same time as his senior commanders were negotiating to buy weapons. The young Yildrim had been another student at the camp. He was part of a group being taught by a one-eyed veteran of the Afghan-Russian war, a man called Abu Zubair.

  Costello remembered that, as a young man, the Iranian had been very quiet and studious. Subject to some bullying by the other Muslims, he was forever being teased him about his inability to quote the Qur’an during religious studies. His response had been to tell stories to the others describing how he planned to become a significant man in the organisation. He had confused them by talking in hints and riddles, even then never expressing himself clearly, always hinting that he had a past.

  Then, after about two months of training, he had been transferred with others to fight with the Northern Alliance against the occupying Russian forces in Afghanistan. Costello hadn’t seen him again; not until this job.

  And now he had brought the threat of imminent death to both of them.

  ‘Yes. And I told you I remember you, too,’ said Yildrim, his voice flat and calm. ‘It was 1981. We did not see many Westerners in the camps.’

  ‘You went to Afghan, I was told.’

  ‘You were told right. Afghanistan for many years. Then back to Iran, then Kenya and Somalia. I have seen many places.’

  ‘So what’s the deal with the SAS? Wh
y them and why now?’

  ‘Why them is my business. Why now is because it was only recently that I was given the opportunity.’

  More riddles, thought Costello, shaking his head.

  Yildrim opened the car door, slipped the Uzi back into the bag and silently departed into the adjacent field.

  Costello watched him go. For a moment, it had crossed his mind to kill Yildrim there and then. If, as the Iranian claimed, the money transfer was going to go through regardless of what happened the next day, he could avoid the risk, pocket the cash and then disappear. But he didn’t trust the Iranian, didn’t trust him to fulfil the promise. The man was no fool. He had kept back the fact that the targets were former SAS soldiers because he knew Costello would have turned down the job. No doubt he had his reasons, just he would have reasons for keeping quiet on what was driving the mission. But one thing was certain: Costello could not assume the payment would be made without first taking care of the final policeman.

  And as to the Iranian’s motive, that was none of his business. What did trouble the Irishman was the challenge they both now faced. They would be taking on men who were alert to the danger. Cops, yes, but these were a special breed of cop. They knew how to fight, and they knew how to kill. And they were waiting.

  Chapter 87

  Costello had been waiting for more than two hours.

  The street was deserted. Cars were parked neatly outside all but a few of the houses. One of those was number 9, the house where the cop lived. The house where, in the front garden, Costello now waited. Shadows from the street lights concealed his presence from prying eyes.

  Costello checked his watch. It was getting late. There had been no word from Yildrim. By now, he would either be waiting for the Finlay family or he would have finished the job. That was fine, for him. Here, on a cold September evening, operating alone for the first time in many years, the Irishman felt scared.

  Costello thought back to the last time he had experienced a similar sensation. He remembered it well. It was the first time he had been called upon to plant a bomb. His hands had trembled so much as he primed the device that he had been forced to stop, walk away and return a few minutes later once he had composed himself. He cursed himself; he had overcome fear then, he would now.