SEVENTEEN
Kassim awoke in pain and confusion. Something was crawling over his foot. He jerked his legs up and looked around. He was in the stairwell of an abandoned building, moisture coating the walls and puddled across the floor, the air foetid.
He’d been dreaming, back in the hills, with flashes of blue sky over the mountain peaks and the broad, green-brown sweep of the slopes where villages clung to life like dried plants on rocks. Everything was peaceful: a dog barking, a child laughing, a buzzard riding the thermals. Then a helicopter gunship had streaked over the hill and a munitions truck had exploded. The driver had loomed suddenly in front of him, eyes pleading for help. But it wasn’t the driver any more; it was his mother, bony fingers reaching for him as the skin peeled back under the flames.
He shook his head, the dream receding, and remembered the previous evening.
He’d been rooted to the spot when the man he was stalking suddenly appeared before him. Carvalho was holding a vegetable knife, the blade covered with red tomato pulp. Close up, the man looked huge.
Kassim launched himself forward. But the Marine’s reaction was swift. Pivoting slightly, he launched a high back-kick which connected painfully with Kassim’s shoulder. Pain mushroomed down his arm as he went backwards, smashing into a coffee table. Barely managing to retain a grip on the screwdriver, he struggled to his feet. As he did so, Carvalho roared and launched himself at him, casting aside the puny vegetable knife and reaching for Kassim’s wrist.
Kassim was surprised the Marine didn’t just hit him with a piece of furniture – it would have ended things right there. Fortunately for him, Carvalho’s hands were filmed with cooking oil, and his grip on Kassim’s arm was momentary. It was the Marine’s big mistake.
Kassim lashed out with the screwdriver, laying open the skin of Carvalho’s forearm like butter. The Marine ignored it, then wiped his hands on his trousers before coming in low and fast, spinning sideways and connecting with a vicious side-kick.
Kassim gasped as the American’s boot sank into his ribs. There was a popping sound as a rib gave way, and the pain tore through him in waves. He sank to one knee, desperately waiting for the follow-up and hoping his adversary would decide to use his hands instead of those lethal feet.
Carvalho obliged and reached for Kassim’s arm. He was grinning as if sensing victory, and the intrusion was no longer the issue; now it was pure animal instinct, one man against another. The questions over what Kassim was doing there would come later.
Kassim gagged and sank further, and Carvalho took the arm holding the screwdriver in a vice-like grip. That was when Kassim gathered all his strength and lunged off the floor, snapping his arm free and driving the screwdriver towards the other man with all his weight behind it.
The shank went home, puncturing the Marine’s clothing and sinking in up to the handle. Carvalho looked startled, his mouth forming an ‘o’, before Kassim swept his legs away, dropping him to the floor with a crash.
Kassim bent over and rested his hand on his knees. The pain in his side was intense. He listened for sounds of alarm from the floor above, but if anyone had heard, they made no protest. At his feet Carvalho sighed wetly, his breathing constricted, and one knee came up for a moment before straightening out. Even as Kassim looked at him, the Marine coughed faintly one more time, then was gone.
Kassim cursed. It wasn’t how he had wanted it to go. He touched a bruise blossoming beneath his hairline behind his right ear. A small amount of blood was seeping out where he had struck the coffee table, and he felt a dull ache building across the back of his neck.
But he’d survived. Now he had to get away. First, though, he had to clean himself up; walking the streets with an obvious head wound would be a sure way of drawing attention to himself.
He bent and tugged the screwdriver free, then went to the kitchen sink and sluiced his face with water. He dried himself off and checked his appearance in a shaving mirror. Unless anyone noticed the cut on his head, he was merely another tired worker on his way home.
He sank to the floor, listening above the drumming of blood in his head. After a few moments’ rest, he stood up and looked around. Carvalho had been preparing a meal. Several tomatoes lay on a chopping board, some already sliced, and he gulped them down to quench his thirst. Nearby was a wallet. He opened it and saw notes, a driver’s licence and a cash card. He pocketed the money and licence, and was about to leave the cash card when he noticed that the licence had a four-digit number printed down the side in faint pencil. He added the card to his haul and tossed the wallet to one side.
By the sink was a block of wood carrying several knives of different sizes. He selected a larger version of the vegetable knife and took a deep breath before stepping back across the room and bending over the man’s body.
He couldn’t speak to the man, but he could leave a message for others.
Twenty minutes later, he was several blocks from Carvalho’s apartment, walking at a deceptively fast pace. He felt very thirsty again, and recognized the after-effects of shock. He needed a sweet drink. He saw a coffee shop and ducked inside, where he ordered black tea and a glass of cold water. He took his drinks to the back of the room and poured copious amounts of sugar into the tea. The glucose would help settle his nerves. The shakes would come soon, as they always did. Once it was over, he could be on his way. The pain in his side was subsiding and he forced it to the back of his mind.
Above the counter a television gave out the evening’s news. Kassim watched as a familiar face appeared, smiling off-camera. The man turned to climb a set of steps into an aircraft, followed by two security guards. The news anchorman came back to remind viewers that they were witnessing UN Special Envoy Anton Kleeman departing for a series of important meetings in China, France and Great Britain.
Kassim watched with only vague interest. Kleeman’s face was in his binder, but the UN man was not important. Not right now.
He pulled his rucksack towards him, checking that the sharpened screwdriver was concealed. Then he took the binder from his pocket and tore out the page relating to Carvalho.
When he left the coffee shop thirty minutes later, the crumpled page went into a trash can at the end of the street. He walked until he saw an ATM, then took out Carvalho’s card and licence, and fed the card into the slot. When prompted, he keyed in the four-digit number. He had never owned a credit card, but something he’d learned in training was that people often wrote down the number required to access their account.
Seconds later, he was holding a sheaf of money in his hand.
He sat up. Light was filtering through the wrecked building, and with it the buzz of traffic. It was morning. He’d noticed the place the previous night, seeing a drunk slipping through a gap in some wood fencing around a development site. Beyond the fence the building rose high in the night sky, the window apertures empty of glass, with long, plastic rubbish tubes hanging from the gaps like the intestines of a gutted sheep. Cautiously, he’d eased through the gap in the fence.
The drunk had disappeared, muttering and cursing, unaware of Kassim’s presence. A sharp, feral smell of sweat mixed with alcohol drifted back to Kassim’s nose, unpleasant and alien.
Kassim had been so intent on not tripping, he’d missed the second man. There was a sudden movement in the dark, and he’d felt an arm wrap itself around his face. The pungent smell made his stomach heave. He was slammed against a wall, his face digging into the plaster and his ribs burning with pain.
‘No pass!’ a voice had grated in his ear, a spray of spit against his skin. ‘You ain’t got no fucking pass, you don’t come in without no fee!’
Kassim had tried to heave the man around, but it was like trying to move a tree. In the background another voice, distant and higher up, wanted to know what was happening.
‘Gotta intruder,’ the man breathed, voice barely loud enough to be heard, as though wanting to keep his find to himself. ‘Got a silent, tiptoeing intruder wants to take o
ur rights away. Think I’ll kill the sumbitch ’n take his rights, instead.’ There was a snick of metal and the man giggled, high-pitched and unnatural.
Kassim pushed against the wall, the muscles of his back contracting at the thought of the knife and furious at the idea of being stopped in his task, not by the police or the UN, but by one of New York’s dispossessed.
‘The fuck’s goin’ on down there?’ someone yelled, and a bottle exploded nearby, showering them with splinters. ‘Izzat you, Tuck – you fuck?’
The man behind Kassim hesitated. It was enough. Kassim heaved himself backwards, slamming his head into the man’s face, feeling bone and cartilage crumble. A grunt of pain and something metallic clinked on the floor in the darkness.
‘Tuck? Fuck you doin’, man?’
Kassim turned. Angry and in pain, he yanked the man towards him, no longer capable of stopping even had he wanted to. The man tried to pull away, sensing Kassim’s greater fury and strength. But it was too late. Kassim spun him round and took his head in his hands, feeling long greasy hair and an unshaven jaw. Wrapping his fingers in the man’s hair, he gave a ferocious jerk and heard a crunch as his neck snapped.
A scrape on the stairs warned him of more danger. Kassim turned and moved deeper into the building, searching for a hole in which to hide.
He found another stairwell, and a door leading out to a bare patch of ground. It was an escape route. He settled down just inside the doorway, exhausted, pulling sheets of cardboard packaging around him. It was enough to keep him dry. Within seconds he was asleep.
Now it was time to move. With daylight, the area might be flooded with police, searching every available inch of space. He had no idea how the New York police would react to the death of a soldier, but he had to assume the worst.
He had to leave.
He moved out of the building, picking his way carefully through the debris and builders’ rubble, not pausing to look back. He walked until he saw a coffee bar with computers on tables around the room. It was an internet café. In the back was a washroom. It wasn’t open yet but a couple of skinny youths were slouched outside, waiting for a fix of their favourite narcotic.
Kassim joined them. He needed the tickets and documents for the next two stages of his journey. He knew he could call on Remzi in person or phone him, but it was safer to use email. He would pick them up at a prearranged point away from the agency, since he didn’t trust the man to have kept himself secure. Then he would be on his way.
EIGHTEEN
Harry was at Newark, about to board a military flight for Columbus, Georgia, when his phone rang. It was Deane.
‘The police have confirmed the identity of the dead man: it’s Carvalho, the US Marine who was riding shotgun on convoys.’
‘What was he doing in New York?’
‘Attending a friend’s wedding and staying at an apartment on the Lower East Side. Early estimates say he was stabbed sometime last night. The scene-of-crime officer thinks it was some sort of shank. He’d also got the letters “UN” cut into his chest.’
A shank: a rough stabbing instrument with a sharpened point. The killer seemed to favour cold steel. Was that to ensure a silent kill or did it show a sadistic touch?
‘It’s the same man.’
‘Right. Forensics is still going over the scene and we’ll have copies of their report later, but they said the place was bust up, like after a fight. An ex-grunt down at the local precinct had served tours with the UN in Nicaragua. He saw the detail of the mutilation and figured we’d like a heads-up.’
‘I thought Carvalho went to Pristina with the convoy? Why would the killer target him?’
‘Maybe he switched duties with one of the others. No way of knowing. Whoever is doing this is going through the names he’s been fed by Demescu. He’s not stopping to ask where they were on the night – he’s taking them all out.’
‘You’d better warn the other guard in the UK,’ suggested Harry. ‘Just in case.’
‘Don’t worry, it’s being taken care of.’
‘Anything else?’
‘A local Vietnamese shopkeeper told them a man had been watching the place earlier. Thin, he said, dark-eyed but not black . . . and foreign.’
‘What made him say that?’
‘He said he looked too fit, unlike most Americans. One minute he was there, the next he’d disappeared. He thought he heard some noise coming from upstairs, but that’s not unusual in the area.’
Harry felt things were getting out of hand. He wondered how the killer had known of Carvalho’s movements. He soon got his answer.
‘As soon as you left we re-checked Demescu’s audit trail. In the last couple of days she made a point of accessing various military files, checking the whereabouts of the men on the list still serving. She was looking for changes of detail, postings, troop movements – anything that affected their locations. The only one relevant was the US Marine Corps database with details of Carvalho’s leave application. She did it minutes before she left, the same time she picked up on your assignment to the UN. I’m sorry, Harry, that was my fault: I’ve kept this quiet for the most part, but I had to make a record of your involvement with the UN to back up the firearms licence and the ID card. Demescu used a search engine to pull up your name. She’ll have seen the notes I made.’
The idea that whoever was behind Demescu and the killer now knew where he was gave Harry an uncomfortable feeling between the shoulder blades. He was accustomed to working in the shadows, not having his location on display like a fridge magnet. ‘What about Demescu?’ he asked. ‘Anything on her yet?’
‘We’re still looking. I don’t think we’ll see her again. She’s probably out of the country by now.’
‘Whoever was using her,’ said Harry, ‘must have thought burning an asset like that was worth it.’
‘Unless she was being coerced. We don’t know what her family situation is like back home. I’ve got people looking into that. If she thought she was going to be dropped once she completed her work, getting out while she still could would have been the better option.’
Harry agreed. ‘Any more news on the rape story?’
‘Some. A couple of UN interpreters in Mitrovica have picked up stories about a dead girl found years ago outside a KFOR compound. It blew over because of ethnic violence in the area . . . and what was another death among so many? But now it’s coming back. There’s still no hard information, but it’s beginning to take on a reality that’s hard to shift.’
‘The killings aren’t going to help,’ Harry said grimly.
‘Yeah. Paris, Brussels and now New York . . . maybe this guy’s just following his nose.’
‘I don’t believe that. He got his information on the CP team from Demescu. Find her and we might find out who else is involved. That might lead us to the killer.’
Deane sighed. ‘Yeah. I wish I knew where he was right now.’
‘On the move,’ said Harry. ‘I would be if it was me.’ He saw a man in crew uniform waving to him. ‘I’ve got to go. I’ll be in touch.’
‘OK. Listen, if you do go to Moscow to see Koslov, you might swing through Kosovo. Our man on the ground in Pristina is Archie Lubeszki. He can fill you in on any local background. At this stage every little bit helps. And Harry – ring me any time, you hear?’
Harry switched off his phone and followed the crewman on board his flight, a US Army Cessna UC-35. It was classed as a utility flight, and he’d got company in four senior officers, who all stopped talking the moment he walked aboard, their inbuilt antennae warning them of a civilian presence. He ignored them and sat down, closing his eyes. Over the years he’d developed the soldier’s facility of snatching sleep whenever the opportunity arose, and right now he needed to pack away as much as he could. He was going to need it.
Harry found the Holiday Inn a short car ride from Columbus airport. A large, 222-room building with conference facilities, fitness room and satellite television, it still managed to loo
k like a hundred other similar hotels.
He parked his rental car near the front entrance and walked into an air-conditioned chill. The lobby was full of men and women dressed in suits or blazers, with sharp creases and little jewellery, badges pinned to their chests.
Harry checked in, then skirted the mêlée and headed for the lobby bar. He needed a cold drink and to check the lay of the land. The bar already held a collection of serious drinkers – presumably colleagues of the group outside – and he found a spot away from the noisiest group. He ordered a beer and nodded towards the lobby. ‘Sales conference?’
‘Yes, sir.’ The bartender placed a beer in front of him. ‘You from out of town?’
‘New York,’ Harry said. ‘Down to see a friend.’
‘Uh-huh.’ The man nodded, as if being from New York explained it all.
‘My name’s Harry Tate. I’m here to see Carl Pendry.’
The man dunked a glass into a basin of water. ‘Carl? Yeah – I know Carl.’ He excused himself and moved along the bar to serve another customer, leaving Harry with the uncomfortable feeling that he’d breached some local code of conduct.
Moments later he sensed a movement nearby and detected a trace of perfume. He turned and found a young woman looking up at him.
‘Hi,’ she said brightly. ‘You’re Harry, right?’ She spoke with an attractive, soft drawl, and was small and slim, dressed in a dark trouser-suit and a frilly blouse. A mass of blonde hair topped a pert face with large, alert eyes.
‘Yes,’ he said, assuming she was a member of staff. Ten feet away the bartender was watching from the corner of his eye. ‘Is there a problem?’
‘Not at all,’ she replied. ‘You’ve come to see Carl.’
‘News travels fast.’
‘Only when it has to. I’m Gail Tranter. Carl’s a friend.’ She signalled to the bartender, miming a drink. ‘He asked me to meet you and make sure you were comfortable. He’s been delayed at the base, but he won’t be long. They have a lot of new arrivals to deal with.’
Retribution Page 9
