The accident man sc-1

by Tom Cain

  Only that last question had been asked with any undercurrent, Yuri barely bothering to disguise the implication that more than information was at stake. Still, she had not been mistreated. The chalet staff had treated her with a distant familiarity, more like an occasional guest than a prisoner. She had been served the same food as everyone else, been allowed to drink the same wine.

  But all the while she'd known it couldn't stay this way forever. Sooner or later, Yuri Zhukovski's patience would run out. He'd want answers to darker, deeper questions and he wouldn't care how much he had to do to her to get them. Sooner or later, he would grow bored of simple conversation and resort to the physical methods that would tell him what he needed to know.

  Yuri was operating under intense pressure, that much was obvious. A crisis was brewing somewhere in the vast web of corporations that formed his business empire. He had spent hours shut away in his study calling his most senior associates and negotiating with clients, while Alix was left under Kursk's icy supervision, his eyes following her every movement with an unbroken, implacable hatred, not just for her personally (though that was enough) but for everything she represented.

  Whenever Yuri emerged to continue his interrogation, she could see the stress that gripped him in the grinding tension of his jaw and the obsessive clenching and releasing of his fists. She would pay for that tension, she was certain. He would let it loose on her.

  Eventually she had been ordered upstairs and left by herself in a heavily shuttered room until he was ready to deal with her. She had little idea how long she had spent trying to prepare for what was bound to come. It might have been one hour, it might just as easily have been three. Time seemed to move at a different speed in that velvety darkness.

  And then she heard footsteps in the hallway outside. She knew what they meant. She took a deep breath, forcing herself to stay calm, focusing on her pounding heart and slowing her pulse as she let her breath go. She must stay still now, stay silent. There would be screaming enough in the hours to come.

  60

  Magnus Leclerc had been given a number to call in case of emergency. He'd been told it was very unlikely that anyone would complain about the phoney money transfer. But just in case, there were people who'd want to know about it. And they'd be very grateful for the information.

  It wasn't easy to summon up the courage. He'd had a lot to think about.

  If he were exposed, as Vandervart had threatened, it would destroy his marriage. The more he thought about it, the less that looked like a problem. He'd be rid of Marthe for good, and the only thing he felt about that was relief.

  He'd lose his job too, of course, and the status that came with it. There'd be a certain amount of humiliation, even mockery, to be endured. But underneath, he knew, plenty of his banking peers would be thinking that they'd have liked a crack at the bombshell in the white lingerie. They'd say old Magnus was a sly old dog, didn't know he had it in him. He'd be back in business within months.

  Or maybe not. Maybe he'd just give them all the finger and fly away to the Cayman Islands. He'd spent years quietly saving, skimming, and pocketing money. He could spend the rest of his life on a beach if he felt like it.

  Put it like that, and there didn't seem much to be lost by talking. But what if he kept his mouth shut?

  There was a reason Vandervart had wanted Malgrave's number. He obviously wanted his money, by any means necessary. That would mean big, big trouble. Sooner or later, people would work out that Leclerc had been the root cause of that trouble. And they wouldn't be happy. He did not like to think how they would react. On the other hand, Vandervart would not stop at sending a few videos to the media if he felt he had been betrayed.

  Leclerc spent a sleepless night in the spare room, then went into work still unsure of his next move. Finally, he dialed two numbers. One was the number Malgrave had given him.

  A woman's voice answered. "Consortium. How can I help you?"

  He was put through to a man who spoke in a courtly English accent. The man thanked Leclerc profusely for his information, then asked him where he could be contacted later in the day, "just in case we need to ask you any further questions, check the details of what this man Vandervart was after, that sort of thing."

  Leclerc was eager to be as helpful as possible. He provided his phone numbers and his home address. He wanted the man to appreciate how sorry he was about the Vandervart problem. He would do everything he could to make up for his carelessness. The man was most understanding. "I sympathize with you, monsieur," he said. "You have been through a terrible ordeal. Anyone would have reacted the same way."

  When he put down the phone, Leclerc was sweating. He wiped his forehead and loosened his tie. Then he called a second number. It belonged to a travel agent. He asked for the earliest flight to Miami. The agent booked him first class on the next morning's British Airways flight to London, Heathrow, connecting there with the lunchtime departure for Miami. Leclerc used his company credit card.

  He went home that evening after work and tried to act normally. The arguments were no worse than usual, the silences between them no more deafening. They were sitting in the living room after dinner, Leclerc lying back in his leather recliner watching a badly dubbed American cop show on TV, when the doorbell rang.

  He grabbed the remote control and turned the sound down on the TV. The bell rang three more times, harder and more insistently. "Go and answer it," he ordered Serge, a sullen, gangly boy of seventeen who was the younger of his two children. The kid remained motionless in his chair, letting everyone know how much he resented this intrusion into his busy schedule of sitting around, before hauling himself to his feet. He slammed the door as he left the room and stalked into the entrance hall.

  Leclerc craned his head in the direction of the front door. He heard it open. He heard his son say, "Who-?" Then he heard a cracking sound like a cross between a bat hitting a ball and an eggshell cracking against a bowl. Next came the muffled thud of something heavy flopping down onto the floor.

  Marthe was the first to react. She leaped from her seat and was halfway to the door to the hallway when it opened and two men walked into the room. They had pump-action shotguns in their hands. There was blood on the butt of one of the guns.

  The first man through the door had fiery, spiky orange red hair. He almost collided with Marthe in the middle of the living room floor, barely breaking stride as he swung his knee into her midriff. Marthe bent double, soundlessly, the air knocked out of her, and he shoved her backward, sending her skittering into the wall.

  Leclerc's daughter, Amelie, a thin, plain young woman of nineteen, screamed. The second man, round-faced and full- lipped, punched her in the mouth to shut her up, then threw her across the room. She ended up in a heap next to her mother.

  No more than five seconds had passed since the men had entered the room. Leclerc was still stuck in his recliner, watching helplessly as his womenfolk were attacked. He struggled to his feet, his eyes widening as one of the men swung his shotgun around until it was pointing at his guts. The other had his weapon aimed at the two women, huddled together against the far wall.

  The two men glanced at each other. The red-haired man gave a quick, commanding jerk of his head. And then they both started firing.

  WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3

  61

  The cold front hit just after midnight, the weather changing as suddenly as the channels on a TV. One moment they were sailing smoothly toward their destination with a fresh, mild wind blowing on a beam reach from the west, directly across their northerly course; the next, the air was ten degrees colder and the wind had shifted forty-five degrees to the north, picked up speed, and filled with stinging rain that beat down with an incessant intensity.

  The angry new wind picked fights with everything it met. It drove into a sea that was flowing down the Channel on an ebb tide, piling the rolling swell into shorter, steeper waves that crashed into the boat, tossing it, bouncing it, dropping it like a toy.r />
  There was no point in all three of them staying on deck, so they agreed on a roster of two-hour watches. The course was set by auto helm. Whoever was topside simply had to keep an eye out, ready to override the system and take the helm if the need arose. Carver went first; Trench volunteered to go second. That way, Faulkner could take an uninterrupted break till it was time for his watch. He needed the rest. He'd spent well over twelve hours at the helm. By the time his watch was over, it would almost be dawn. They'd all get up then.

  Carver didn't expect any trouble during his time on duty. When he was standing in the cockpit, anyone wanting to attack him would have to climb up a ladder and through the hatch, coming out of the light into the darkness. Unless he fell asleep at the tiller, no one was going to overpower him that way. He'd be vulnerable only when he went back down below deck.

  At the end of his watch, Carver stepped up to the hatch, gripped the top, then swung his legs through, missing the ladder completely and jumping straight down into the cabin. He landed in a crouch on the heaving floor. Trench was sitting on the edge of the main table in the center of the cabin.

  "Bloody hell," he said coolly. "That was a bit dramatic." There was a mug in his hand. "Hot toddy," he said, holding it up appreciatively. "You should try some. We left some for you in a Thermos. It's in the galley."

  Trench nodded to his left, where Bobby Faulkner was stretched out on a settee. "Fast asleep. Poor chap was absolutely shattered."

  "Think I'll crash too," said Carver. "Anyway… your turn. Good luck. It's bloody cold and wet up there."

  Trench grimaced and went, "Brrrr…," just like any man about to go out into foul weather. He made his way past Carver and put his mug in the galley sink. He showed no outward signs of tension or even alertness, yet he never completely turned his back as he scuttled up the ladder and out into the cockpit, pulling the hatch closed behind him as he went.

  Carver let him go. Trench might just have been inviting an attack. And there was no guarantee Faulkner was really asleep. He didn't want to find himself fighting both men at once.

  He picked up the Thermos and poured himself a mug of toddy, savoring the steamy fumes of brandy, honey, lemon, and tea. But just as he was about to take the first sip, he was distracted by a clack of hard plastic from the cabin floor. There were two mugs down there, knocking into each other. Faulkner must have had a drink too.

  And now he was lying unconscious, passed out on the settee. Carver went over and shook him hard, but there was no response.

  Well, that settled one thing. It would be a straight fight, Trench against Carver, master against pupil. And by the time Bobby Faulkner awoke from his drugged stupor, only one of them would be alive to greet him.

  62

  The Scandwave Adventurer was longer than three football fields laid end to end. It weighed around one hundred thousand tons and it could carry over six thousand standard shipping containers at a speed of more than twenty- five knots. That made it around fourteen thousand times heavier than Faulkner's yacht and a little over three times as fast. The combination of size, weight, and speed also made it about as maneuverable as a runaway steam roller.

  Knowing all this, its designers had given their vessel every possible assistance. It had state-of-the-art radar, satellite tracking, and telecom equipment. The skipper knew the precise position of his ship on the surface of the globe. He could track every other ship for miles around. In shallow waters he could map the precise contours of the ocean floor beneath him, making it virtually impossible to run aground. As the men who managed the Scandwave Shipping Corporation regularly told themselves, no one needed experienced crew these days. The technology sailed the damn boat all by itself.

  So when the wind changed that night and the cold, biting rain came in from the north, the watchman posted on the exposed, narrow deck, high up in the icy air beside the bridge, did not stand up proud and tall, exposing himself to the bitter blast, because that was his duty and he was proud to do it. No, he sat right down, with his back against the deck's low steel wall, cupped his hands to make a tiny shelter from the wind, and lit a cigarette. He was damned if he was going to get cold and wet on the pittance they were paying him, when the rain was so heavy he could barely see the bow of his own ship, let alone anything farther out to sea. And besides, there was a guy who sat by the radar screen. Let him watch out for passing traffic.

  And so it was that the Scandwave Adventurer, bound from Rotterdam to Baltimore, sailed west down the English Channel, with its load of six thousand containers, while the Tamarisk, bound from Cherbourg to Poole, sailed due north, across the English Channel, with its load of three tired men. And neither had the faintest idea of the other's existence.

  63

  Part of Carver wanted to confront Trench and ask him what had really happened, why he'd acted the way he had. But even if the old bastard told the truth, he wouldn't say anything Carver couldn't work out for himself. Whoever had been hiring Carver for the past few years must have already put Trench on the payroll while he was still commanding the Service. It made sense. He was the perfect recruiting officer and Carver had been the perfect candidate for an assassin's job: capable, well-trained, and sufficiently angry and disillusioned to get his hands dirty for the right price.

  There was no point feeling sorry for himself. He'd been bought and paid for. Once he'd outlived his usefulness, Trench had planned to dispose of him, just like any other redundant piece of gear. It wouldn't be the first time Trench had sent men on suicide missions. Any commanding officer had to be willing to sacrifice lives for the greater good. Carver could moan all he liked about betrayal, he could play the wounded child wondering why Daddy was being so beastly, but Trench hadn't asked to be his surrogate father even if he'd been happy to exploit the feelings Carver projected onto him.

  In any case, Carver concluded, he'd spent his entire working life being paid to kill people. He wasn't in any position to complain if someone wanted to kill him.

  But he didn't have to let them get away with it.

  There was a deep pocket in Carver's waterproof jacket. It was sealed by a vertical zipper, and it ran right down the left side of his chest. In it were two plastic tubes a little less than a foot long. They were colored red at their base, then lightened via an orange band to a yellow top, decorated with a silhouette of an archer standing on top of a logo that read "Ikaros." At the bottom of the tube there was a red plastic tag.

  Carver took one out and moved to the side of the ladder. He reached up and pulled the hatch open with one hand, letting in a blast of spray-soaked air and the crashing, pounding noise of the storm. Then he lifted up his other hand, holding the tube horizontally, level with the deck outside. He pulled the tag. There was a sudden propulsive "Whoosh!" like a firework being launched, then a man's shout of alarm, the scrabble of ricochets on the side of the cockpit as the tube shot to and fro, and finally, less than a second later, the explosion of a distress flare.

  As thick red smoke roiled through the open hatch, Carver hurled himself up the ladder, through the opening, and into the hellish scarlet fog. Ahead of him he could just make out the outline of a man. He saw his arm being raised, then came the flame of muzzle flashes and the crackle of small-arms fire as Trench fired into the smoke, toward the hatch. Three rounds slammed into the wooden door frame, somehow missing Carver on their way, and then Carver crashed into Trench's midriff, pushing him backward onto the bench at the back of the cockpit.

  Carver drove his right fist as hard as he could into Trench's groin. His left hand reached out for Trench's right, driving it against the side of the cockpit in a desperate attempt to knock the pistol from his grasp. The two men were fighting the smoke as much as each other, almost as if they were underwater, unable to breathe, desperate for oxygen, lost in a primal struggle for survival.

  At last, Carver felt Trench's grip slacken on his gun. Ignoring Trench's desperate attempts to hit him with his free hand, and the swiping of the older man's legs, he forced h
is right hand between Trench's fingers to grab the handle of his gun. He caught hold of one of the loosened fingers and bent it back, making Trench cry out in agony as the lowest joint was dislocated.

  The gun fell to the deck and skittered away across the bucking, rain-slick surface.

  Carver scrambled to his feet, his chest heaving and eyes streaming with tears. Trench was sitting in front of him, holding his wounded hand, coughing and gasping for breath. The older man tried to get up, but Carver hit him twice, left and right to the face, putting the full power of his shoulders behind each punch. Then he grabbed a handful of Trench's gray hair and smashed his head against the wooden rim that ran around the top edge of the cockpit's perimeter, three savage blows that left Trench semiconscious and bleeding.

  Carver grabbed the front of Trench's jacket and hauled him into an upright position on the bench.

  "Sit on your hands," he commanded.

  Wincing with pain, Trench forced his hands under his thighs.

  The flare was still spewing out smoke, though the relentless gale was now blowing it away in a billowing red plume. For a second, the air around Carver cleared and he was able to drag some pure, clean sea air into his burning lungs.

  "Where is she?" he snarled.

  Trench looked at him through bleary, unfocused eyes. "Where's who?"

  Carver slapped him once, hard, to the side of the face.

  "Alexandra Petrova, that Russian girl of mine you were going on about. Big mistake, that. Gave yourself away. Now, where is she?"

  "Christ, her… I haven't a clue."

  This time Carver caught him with a backhander.