At the far end was another metal door, a large skinhead in a muscle shirt sitting on a wooden stool next to it, his beefy face expressionless. He was the kind of “soccer thug” whose ancestors had exploited the world and built Britain. Now the government hated and suppressed his breed, permitting Muslim thuggery to reign. A nation that attacked itself this way was a nation with a political autoimmune disease.
The skinhead’s face didn’t change as Jack approached. He merely extended a hand, palm up, and said, “Twenty quid.”
“Did a woman just go in here? Beautiful. Dark hair.”
“Twenty quid or sod off,” the guy told him.
Jack took a twenty-pound note from his jacket pocket and handed it to him. The guy inspected it in the dim light then got off his stool, stuffed the bill into his back pocket, and wordlessly reached for the doorknob.
“Take your pick,” he said.
As the door swung open, Jack was accosted by a wall of sound, the music slamming into him like a living force, so loud that his eardrums immediately began to throb in pain.
Beyond the doorway was a small brick warehouse filled with flashing lights and writhing bodies, moving to the beat of the music. Most of the dancers wore typical street clothes, but some of the woman had skirts so short with necklines so low they flirted with public indecency.
Not that Jack was complaining.
It was a good old-fashioned rave, and for a moment he wondered if he’d made a mistake. Surely this couldn’t be where the woman had gone—no good Muslim girl would be caught dead in a place like this.
But then, based on what he’d seen so far, Jack wasn’t entirely sure she was a good Muslim girl. And what was the alternative? There was no place else for her to have gone.
Jack moved inside, pushed past a couple in a clinch, then stepped onto the main floor and scanned the sea of bobbing heads for any sign of her. He was too jet-lagged to make more than a poor stab at dancing, doing only as much as it took to blend in. The strobe lights didn’t help much, and after a full minute of searching, he was convinced he’d lost her.
Had he missed something in the alleyway? Another door, maybe?
His question was answered a moment later. At the far side of the warehouse, on a raised platform that looked like an old loading dock, the woman emerged from a doorway. A cardboard sign marked TOILETS hung above it.
No longer wearing the shapeless dress she’d worn at al-Fida’s flat, she now sported clothes that could easily have been hiding beneath that dress—a dark pullover sweater and a pair of blue jeans. He had been right about the woman. Her body was spectacular.
She eased up to a rail along the edge of the loading platform and looked down at the dance floor. It was hard to see her face clearly in the intermittent light, but judging from the way she carried herself—no bobbing head, no shake of the shoulders to match the beat—Jack figured she had as much interest being in this place as he did.
She’d been standing there for less than a minute when a slender, curly-headed white guy sidled up next to her and smiled, making his best play.
Who could blame him? She was a knockout. She was also way out of his league.
Jack watched them, thinking he was about to see the guy go down in flames. But to his surprise the woman leaned toward Curly and whispered something into his ear.
Did she know him?
“There’s a problem. We need to talk.”
Curly’s smile disappeared as he listened attentively. Then he nodded and whispered back, gesturing toward another hallway at the back of the warehouse.
When he was done, the woman gave him a dismissive push then shoved away from the rail without another word. Curly lost himself in the crowd. She headed toward that hallway.
Jack didn’t waste any time. Threading his way through the crowd of dancers, he moved in her direction, reaching the far edge of the dance floor just as she disappeared from sight. He glanced toward the loading platform to see if Curly was still there, but the guy was long gone.
Then someone grabbed Jack’s arm.
He spun around, expecting to see Curly, but was surprised to find an attractive blonde in a black bustier and fishnet stockings smiling at him. The bustier barely contained her, and her eyes had the glassy, faraway look of the perpetually stoned.
“Hey, luv, where you going? Let’s dance.”
“Some other time,” he said, and pulled his arm free.
This time it was Jeremiah that came to mind: “For my people are foolish, they know me not; they are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge.”
Then he was up a short set of steps and heading into the hallway, which was dark because of a broken light fixture.
There was movement to his left and he hesitated when he saw two dark figures—then realized it was the clinching couple from the dance floor. They hadn’t bothered to find a motel room, their silhouettes moving rhythmically to the music.
He hurried past them and saw a door marked EXIT.
Pushing through, he found himself in another alley that ran the length of the building and then some, opening out to streets on either side. But there was no sign of the woman, and Jack was quickly coming to the conclusion that he wasn’t very good at this stalking thing.
Which way had she gone?
Making his choice—there was a faint floral scent in the air, possibly the hand lotion he had smelled earlier?—he went to his right and hurried toward the street, not slowing this time as he reached the mouth of the alley. Moving onto the sidewalk, he swiveled his head, glancing both ways, and was relieved to find her walking about a quarter of a block away to his left.
Dry skin, he thought gratefully. A woman’s vanity can be dangerously second nature.
As he moved out after her, she crossed the street again and disappeared into yet another alley.
What the hell was she up to?
Jack waited for a couple cars to pass, then followed. The way the alley was situated, there was very little light in there and he hesitated, once again wishing he had his .357 on his hip. Those years as an embedded reporter in Iraq had made firearms seem like part of a man. More often than not he was allowed to carry weapons in hairy situations. It was against the regs, but so was a lot of what happened in war. His third arm was an M249 light machine gun, fussy with sand but it took care of them; a Beretta M9 was his fourth hand, making up for a lack of stopping power with smooth, semiautomatic action that put a lot of those little balls into an enemy. Being unarmed felt like an unnatural state of being.
Plunging forward, he walked briskly, looking toward the other end of the alley. Jack didn’t see the woman. That was the first inkling he had that she was the cat and he was the mouse. But he had gone this far—
Halfway through, the building to his right gave way to a small car park—probably an employee lot. It was empty and lit only by a single incandescent bulb that burned over the building’s rear door. A faded sign under the bulb read CG & SONS FINE GARMENTS.
Had she gone in there?
Jack was about to move toward the door when a figure stepped from the shadows next to him and pressed the muzzle of a Browning Hi-Power 9mm to the side of his head.
He froze. Slowly, he shifted his gaze to her.
There was a gun at his skull, the safety probably off, an anxious and unsentimental finger on a hair trigger, yet he couldn’t help thinking she was even more mesmerizing up close and personal.
Ridiculous, but there it was.
Her face was a mask. Hardened. Unflinching. In these kinds of situations, it was best to let the person with the firepower do all the talking.
“Why are you following me?”
“I saw you at the club and—”
Gunmetal and perspiration produce a distinctive odor. It was in the air now and it overpowered the fading smell of aloe. The smart-aleck act was not going to buy him anything.
She pressed harder. She knew what she was doing. She didn’t lean into the gun like an angry street thug.
She knew he would feel the increased pressure against his skin, understand that it meant her center of gravity was off, realize that if he were willing to risk it he could step from the line of fire, pivot, grab her wrist, and hurl her off-balanced self against the wall. It was basic self-defense.
So much for the stuff you can’t do, he thought.
“Who do you work for and what do you want?” she demanded.
She was getting impatient but she wasn’t quite there. He had a little wiggle room. He hoped so; he was betting his life on it.
“I could ask you the same thing,” Jack said.
“Except you’re the one following me, remember? Although you’re not very good at it. I spotted you back at the train station.”
“That shows what you know.”
“What do you mean?”
“I had you way before that,” he said. “I was in Abdal al-Fida’s flat when you found him.”
That caught her off guard. Her dark eyes widened. “That’s impossible.”
“I was hiding in his closet. I saw that show you put on when you called the police. Pretty good performance as a grieving girlfriend.”
She pressed the Hi-Power against his temple—hard, like it was a drill bit. He’d pricked her pride. Now she was off balance.
“Did you kill him?”
Jack frowned. “Hell, no. I wanted to talk to the guy.”
“Why?”
“Because of what happened in San Francisco. I know al-Fida was behind it and I’m trying to find out who he works for.”
She considered this. “You’re a Yank.”
“Through and through.”
“Who are you?”
“A reporter,” Jack told her, just as squealing tires announced the arrival of a dark SUV in the alley. Its headlights washed across them. The woman flinched and Jack took his shot. He stepped sideways, simultaneously grabbing her wrist and twisting it away from her. Only she didn’t release her hold on the gun as he’d expected. She yelped and swung a fist toward him, landing a blow to the side of his head.
He stumbled sideways, caught off guard by her power.
Another SUV roared in from the opposite side, and the alley was soon flooded with men, automatic weapons in hand, heading straight for Jack and the woman. More surprised than hurt by her punch, Jack kicked her legs out from under her, grabbed the Browning with his right hand, then spun toward one of the approaching gunmen. He slammed the heel of his left hand into the gunman’s nose and the guy howled and went down as Jack raised the Browning. But before he could make use of it, three more men were grabbing hold of him. The butt of a rifle slammed into the back of his head and his cranium exploded in pain. The world went red and he stumbled as the men started pulling him exactly where he didn’t want to go—to the ground, where his chances of survival were nearly nil. You can’t grapple with men who are beating you.
He tried to fight, but there were too many of them. Then the rifle butt slammed him again, and the next thing Jack knew he was spiraling down a long black hole.
23
Jack awoke to the sound of screaming.
A woman’s screams of pain, the kind of pain that comes from teeth being extracted without Novocain, or fingers being cut off with wire clippers. Her high-pitched wails echoed mournfully down a long hallway.
Then they stopped, abruptly, followed by the sound of her sobs as she gasped for air.
Jack had a bag over his head—burlap, from the smell of it—and he had no idea where he was. He was sitting in a chair with a sagging wicker seat, his wrists tied to the slats that comprised the seatback. The chair was not bolted to the floor but even if he could hop it around, where would he go? His mouth tasted of blood, and his tongue was sore, which meant he’d managed to bite it during the struggle in the alleyway.
Worse yet, his head was throbbing and the room seemed to be spinning slowly. Around and around, like a Ferris wheel. He thought he might throw up.
But at least he was alive.
For now.
Listening to the woman sob. And he knew she wasn’t acting this time, a turn of events that surprised him.
Back in the alley he had thought she was with the gunmen—had attacked her because of it—but he’d obviously been wrong. And now that he knew better, this knowledge begged yet another question:
Had those gunmen been after him or her?
Someone said something to her—it sounded like English, but with the accent and echo he couldn’t be sure—and she responded. Her words were slurred and unintelligible from this distance. She sounded defiant, however, as if she were refusing to give in. Jack had no idea what they were doing to her, but he had a pretty good imagination and a very strong feeling he’d find out soon enough.
But before he could start feeling sorry for himself, the woman’s screams rang out again as she endured another round. Her wails increased in pitch and intensity and Jack strained against his bonds, wanting desperately to break free. He thought about those dark eyes filled with anguish, with pain. He didn’t know anything about her yet he wanted to help.
Her screams went on almost too long to bear—then suddenly she was silent. Eerily so. No sobs this time. No defiant words. Jack knew she had either passed out or was dead.
As he considered this, a metal door clanged down the hallway, opening, hitting a wall, then closing. Whoever had thrown it open wasn’t happy. Voices drifted toward him as two pairs of footsteps reverberated against the walls, moving in his direction. He wrestled with his bonds again, trying to loosen them, the rope cutting into his flesh, rubbing his wrists raw. There was nothing in the Krav Maga training manual to deal with this, except for the rubber-encased, bite-activated potassium cyanide pill that Mossad operatives carried between cheek and jaw like chewing tobacco. Which he didn’t have.
Then a door in front of him clanged open and a voice said, “Your girlfriend is a stubborn little tart, Mr. Hatfield. I’ve seen men twice her size break under half the stress.”
Jack would know that smarmy voice anywhere. It was Adam Swain.
A hand grabbed the burlap bag and yanked it from his head. Swain stood near the door and another man, an ape Jack recognized from the attack in the alley, tossed the bag aside. He stepped back, standing to Jack’s right. He was carrying a black baton.
They were in a cell of some kind, the cement floor filthy, a tattered mattress atop a rusty bed frame against one wall. The walls were mottled with peeling green paint, the room illuminated by a single work light attached to a portable battery.
Jack guessed that they were in an abandoned hospital of some kind. Judging by the reinforced doors, it was probably a psychiatric facility.
He felt gutted and he was scared. Not Iraq-scared, where the enemy just wanted to kill you. This was semipersonal. They were going to want him to talk. It was a strange sensation: a strange calm settled over him as he literally felt his ego and id go to opposite sides of his head, the first curious to see if the other would break. He felt his id manning up.
“Is she dead?” Jack asked.
Swain ignored the question. “You don’t look surprised to see me. You assumed we’d keep an eye on you?”
“Of course. I’m not stupid.”
“You almost fooled us in Tel Aviv with your little black hat routine. Very clever.”
“Apparently not,” Jack said.
Swain was flipping through the Israeli passport Jack had been carrying. He dropped it and smiled. “Don’t be too hard on yourself. We’re professionals, after all, and at least you tried.” He waved a hand. “And you’re here, aren’t you? In England. Which I’m sure the home secretary would be delighted to know.”
“What can I say? I like a challenge.”
“So I see,” Swain said. “But what about our agreement? I told you what would happen if you broke it.”
“Yeah, and I feel bad about that. I probably should’ve stuck around San Francisco so you could arrange a Dumpster death, or maybe toss me in a bathtub and slit my wrists
.”
Swain’s eyebrows went up. “You’re assuming that was us?”
“Who else?”
“I just found out about al-Fida myself. Terrible way to go. Not that I really give a toss.”
“I thought you said he was an asset. Was that a lie?”
Swain didn’t answer.
Jack pushed. “So, if you didn’t kill him, who did?”
Swain smiled again. “Not everything is black-and-white, Jack. There are politics to consider. Protocol. There’s a very delicate balance at work here, and a lot of people involved. Dealing with a mongrel like al-Fida is below my pay grade.”
“Should I be flattered?”
Swain shrugged. “I don’t give a damn.”
“What about Bob Copeland? Was he flattered?”
“He made the mistake of associating with the wrong people, just as you have.”
“So why don’t you kill me. Get it over with.”
Swain huffed a dry chuckle. “I’d think you would have figured it out by now, considering what you just heard. My job isn’t simply to eliminate a problem but to extract information and respond accordingly.”
He nodded to the other man, who tucked the baton into a loop on his belt and disappeared into the darkness behind the work light. Jack flexed his wrists again, trying to pull a Houdini, stretch the ropes just enough to slip free. He heard the voice of his deceased father admonishing him, “Don’t be a jack of all trades, Jack, and a master of none. Learn something well.” One thing Jack knew well was the art of the long struggle, the art of war.
Swain pointed a Glock at him. “You see, old boy, killing you quickly would defeat the whole purpose of this exercise.”
Jack’s heart started to accelerate. The show was over. Ego and id were merging again. He had no idea what they were about to do to him, but he had the feeling the next screams he heard would be his own.
The thug came back carrying a bucket full of water, and Jack felt dread sluice through him.
“Look,” he said to Swain, his heart about ready to burst through his chest. “I don’t know what kind of information you’re hoping to extract from me, but I’ve got nothing. I only came here on a hunch.”
Abuse of Power Page 19
