by Dawson, Mark
“You’re all culpable.”
“Control said you’d gone over to the other side. He said we had to bring you in and search your place. That’s it. What happened when we got there . . . fuck, I swear, I had no idea that was going to go down. It’s Chisholm. She was in charge. It’s . . .”
“I don’t really care, Duffy. It doesn’t make any difference to me what you say. You and the others ended my life. You killed my husband. You made sure I missed my daughter growing up. Instead of happy memories, all I have is bitterness and anger. What do you expect me to do? Give you a free pass? That’s right, Duffy, it was all a great big misunderstanding. Right? You were just following orders.”
“I was Number Eleven. I was green. I didn’t know the first thing about the Group, and I didn’t know what Control was planning to do.”
“So we should just let bygones be bygones. That’s right, yes?”
“I don’t expect you to . . .”
She struck him across the face with the barrel of the pistol. “Shut up.”
He hung his head, and, when he looked back up at her again, there was fresh blood soaked into his wild beard.
“You have one chance, Duffy. You and the others, you’ve all got a price to pay, and you’re going to pay it, but it’s Control I want. You tell me where I can find him, and I’ll make it quick and painless for you.”
“That’s not an appealing deal.”
“It’s the only one you’ve got.”
He squinted up at her. “He’s with us.”
“With Manage Risk?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“North Carolina. There’s a complex there.”
Beatrix knew all about Manage Risk’s American training facility. The company was headquartered there, and all of its staff passed through its proving grounds. “What does he do?”
“He’s on the board. Him and Jamie King, back in the day, they practically set the company up. Someone like him, with his contacts, can you imagine how valuable that is? No one’s ever asked how it grew so fast. That’s how. He had so much intelligence, before anyone else, and amazing contacts. He could pitch for business before the companies and the governments even knew they had a need for it. And look at it now. A multi-million dollar company.”
Beatrix felt the cough coming again. “How did you get involved?”
“When it was obvious that you’d found out what he’d been up to with the Russians, Control got spooked. He cleaned house and went straight to Carolina. Me and the other five all got reassigned out of the Group, and then, after a few months, he had us all meet him in New York and told us he had an idea. He was working with King, full-time, doing it properly, and he said we should work with him, too. We all said yes. Joyce worked in the nautical department. I came out to this hellhole.”
“What about English? Where’s he?”
“Coming after you. Control sent him here. He might be here already.”
Beatrix coughed. Three hacking rasps that subsided just as soon as they started. Faulkner looked across at her. “How much does he know about me?” she asked when she had recovered.
Duffy looked back at her with a new curiosity. “He knows about what you did to the three of them, to Spenser, Joyce and Chisholm. He knows you’re coming.”
“Get on your knees,” she said, but then she suddenly found herself short of breath. There was no cough this time, no tickle in the throat. It was a gasping emptiness that came on quickly, with no warning, and she felt the compulsion to breathe more quickly to compensate.
She started to choke.
Duffy didn’t kneel.
He looked at her with a glimmer of feral cunning.
A wolf smelling weakness.
“Are you alright?” Faulkner asked.
“Knees . . .”
It felt like she had liquid in her lungs. She tried to cough, but it didn’t help.
Faulkner took a step toward her. “Beatrix?”
She took a step back.
She didn’t want sympathy.
She didn’t need help.
Her arm dipped, her aim dropping from Duffy’s head to his chest.
Not now.
I have too much still to do.
She raised her arm again. It was a struggle.
“Come on, Rose!” Duffy protested. “I told you what you wanted to know.” They were just words, meaningless, ways to spin the time out as he assessed his odds.
She coughed again, wheezing, assailed now by a battering wave of fatigue. The gun felt very heavy in her hands. She had the urge to put it down, to just lay it on the ground.
Please.
Not now.
Just three more.
I’m only halfway done.
Faulkner put a hand on her shoulder. “Beatrix?”
Beatrix and Faulkner had both taken their eyes off Duffy for a moment.
A moment was all he needed.
He kicked down with his right foot and sent a spray of sand into their faces.
Beatrix was blinded, and as she raised her hands to her burning eyes, she dropped the Sig.
Duffy roared as he stretched his arms, hard enough to pop tendons as he stepped his feet over his wrists.
He burst out, barrelling into Faulkner and shoulder-charging him to the ground. He forced the assault rifle away to the side, and when Faulkner fired off a round, the bullets scattered harmlessly into the air. Duffy was big and fuelled by desperation, and Faulkner was blinded and had been taken by surprise. He squinted through the grit in his eyes as Duffy pinned his right arm beneath his right knee and then forced his left into a similarly constrained position. He prised the FN F2000 from Faulkner’s fingers, reversed it and used the stock to bludgeon him about the head. He grasped it between both taped hands, driving down into Faulkner’s face with all of his considerable strength.
One.
Two.
Three.
He looked demonic.
Faulkner stopped struggling after the third blow.
His body spasmed, his leg twitching.
Beatrix threw herself at Duffy, knocking him off Faulkner’s body and driving him into the desert. The FN F2000 fell and was kicked away as they struggled. He rolled as they hit the ground, both of them wrestling to be on top. Duffy was twice Beatrix’s weight, and she was already weak from coughing. He rolled again, forcing her beneath him. They had fallen near her discarded pistol, and he reached for it, his fingertips brushing the muzzle and then fixing around it as he stretched out. Beatrix elbowed him in the face, but he absorbed the blow, moulding the grip into the palm of his right hand and slipping his index finger through the trigger guard.
There was no safety on the Sig; it just needed a firm squeeze of the trigger to shoot.
Beatrix wrapped the fingers of her right hand around his wrists and tried to keep the gun pointed away, but Duffy was heavier, stronger, and he had leverage on her. The taped hands were to his advantage now. He could use both arms.
He pushed the gun down on her until the muzzle was jammed up against her throat. Blood ran from his nose onto his beard and dripped onto Beatrix’s face.
He leered down at her. His eyes bulged with hatred.
Beatrix’s left hand broke away and swept across the desert floor.
“Want to know something?” Duffy said, grunting with the effort of holding her down.
Her questing fingers felt something, fastened around it.
“We all knew what we were doing that day. We were in on it. You had it coming to you, you sanctimonious . . .”
Beatrix crashed the rock in her left hand up against the right side of Duffy’s head.
A moment of stunned surprise replaced the loathing, and then that, too, winked out. His features slackened, and his eyes rolled up into his head.
Beatrix shoved him aside and scrambled clear.
She hurried to Faulkner. He was unmoving. She took his chin in her hand and turned his head so that she could look into his face. It was a bloody mess, his eyes puffed over and glassy.
She searched for a pulse.
Pointless.
There was a groan and then the sound of scrabbling away to her right.
“You . . . fucking . . . bitch.”
Duffy was on one knee, forcing himself upright, the pistol aimed at her.
He fired twice, both rounds missing by a solid yard.
Rose pulled out a throwing knife and, in the same motion, sent it spinning towards him.
The blade thudded into his right eye, and he jack-knifed from the waist, bent backwards with his arms splayed out as if he were embracing the moon.
He spasmed and then was still.
Beatrix fell to her knees. The enervating wave of lethargy rose up again, subsuming her, and she had to brace herself with both hands.
She coughed hard, a hacking rattle, and when she spat the phlegm out, it stained the sand with ribbons of blood.
She pressed down and got to her feet. She put one foot in front of the other, her boots disappearing into the loose sand, and slowly and methodically made her way back to the road.
Chapter Thirty-Three
She could have exfiltrated by retracing her way in with Faulkner, driving south across the border to Kuwait and then flying out from there. That route would mean she would be less likely to be detected and it would be much safer, but she was weak. She was frightened of how feeble she felt, and the prospect of that long drive was so daunting that she was not prepared to consider it. There were other options. She could find her way to Baghdad and fly out, or she could gamble and depart from Basra. In the end, ease won out. Basra was closest. She knew it was a risk, but it was one that she was prepared to take.
Because there were other benefits in that risk, too.
She was ready to lay some bait.
That was not to say that she was blasé about the dangers. She returned to the tailor’s shop and asked him to collect the things that she would need. He had a small flat above his shop, and he showed her up to it and told her she was welcome to stay for as long as she wanted. There was a tiny bathroom adjacent to the bedroom, and she stripped off and showered, washing the sand and the grime from her skin. That helped. She scrubbed her hair and hung her head, watching as the dirty water drained away.
She turned off the water, wrapped herself in a towel and got out. She sat down on the bed and took a moment. She was finding it difficult to breathe. She knew that dyspnea was a symptom of the cancer, one of the symptoms that was most usually suffered as the disease reached its conclusion. It felt as if she had liquid in her lungs that she couldn’t clear. She knew that there were medicines that would help alleviate it, but she would have to wait until she was back in Marrakech to see about that.
She took two Zomorph tablets, slugging them down with a glass of tepid water, and lay back on the bed for a moment. She had intended to wait there only until the shortness of breath was under control, but she slept as soon as she closed her eyes.
When she opened them again, it was dark outside.
The tailor must have heard her stir. He knocked softly on the door and brought her the things that she had requested. There was a small carry-on suitcase with a change of clothes inside. There was an envelope with a fake passport and a ticket to Casablanca.
“Is there anything else you need?”
“A taxi.”
“It’s alright. I will drive you.”
“Thanks.”
“Mr Pope has contacted me. He wants to know that you are alright.”
“I’m fine,” she said. “Did you tell him about Number Twelve?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
“He hopes that you are alright.”
She nodded, the fatigue buffeting her again.
“Are you alright?” he asked.
“I’m just tired,” she said. “I need to get home.”
The tailor left her alone again. She listened to the noises of the city outside the window: car horns, engines, a jet streaking across the sky. It was busy, and yet she felt utterly alone.
She took out her cellphone and dialled the only number that she carried in her memory.
Mohammed’s voice sounded very far away. “Hello?”
“It’s me.”
“It is good to hear your voice.” Like her, he was careful not to use names on an unshielded line. “How are you?”
“It’s done.”
“Very good. And you?”
“Tired. Very, very tired.”
“Where are you?”
“In theatre.”
“You can get out?”
“Yes,” she said. “Don’t worry.”
“Would you like to speak to your daughter?”
“Yes.”
There was a pause, a quick conversation conducted sotto voce, and then Isabella’s voice.
“Mummy?”
Beatrix felt a surge of emotion, and for a moment, her throat felt tight and choked.
“Mummy?”
“Hello, sweetheart.”
“Are you alright?”
“Yes. I’m fine.”
“I’ve been practising on the range. I’m getting better all the time.”
She winced, more remorse. “That’s good,” she said, substituting enthusiasm for the regret she felt.
“When are you coming home?”
“Today.”
“I’ve missed you, Mummy.”
“And I’ve missed you, sweetheart. I’ve missed you very, very much.”
“It’s nearly done though, isn’t it?”
“Nearly done,” she said, noticing that her hand was gripped tight around the phone. “Two more and that’s it.”
Connor English sat at the row of leather chairs in the departures lounge at Basra International and watched with a mixture of disbelief, wariness and elation as the woman he clearly recognised as Beatrix Rose went by. He had a picture of her from a decade ago on his phone, and he looked down to double-check that he was right. She had been younger then, obviously, but there was no mistaking the sharp cheekbones and the cobalt-blue eyes. She was wheeling a small suitcase behind her and had no other possessions with her apart from her boarding card, a bottle of water and a copy of the Chicago Tribune.
The disbelief was because he couldn’t believe she would have been so reckless as to exfil from out of an airport.
The wariness was because he knew exactly what she was capable of doing.
The elation was because now, maybe, he would be able to put an end to the threat that had been dogging his sleep ever since Oliver Spenser had been gunned down outside the dacha in the Russian steppes. Four down already and just two more to go. Him and Control.
Perhaps now he could put an end to the fear that he wouldn’t wake up or, if he did, that it would be with one of her knives pressed against his throat.
Because English had been in her house that afternoon almost a decade ago. He had been Number Nine then. He knew that his name was on the list she was methodically working through. He had not expected to be in a position where he might have the advantage of surprise over her. That was the prerogative of the hunter, not the hunted.
Now, though?
Now, he would.
He got up and followed her as she walked to her gate. She moved gingerly, as if in pain, although there was nothing visibly wrong with her, and when she stopped to gather her breath, he caught the reflection of her face in the window of a book store. She was grimacing in discomfort.
She continued on to Gate Fifteen and took a seat where she co
uld look out at the passengers circulating around the terminal. Inherent caution, tough to shake. English walked by, pretending to compare the information on his boarding card with the flight details displayed above the gate. He moved on another two gates and took a seat where he could keep an eye on her. He wanted to be sure that she got on the plane.
He took out his encrypted phone and dialled.
“Yes?”
“It’s me. I have her.”
“Where?” Control pressed impatiently.
“Basra. She’s at the airport.”
“What?”
“I know. I couldn’t believe it either.”
“What is she doing?”
“Your guess is as good as mine, sir. But she looks like she’s been through the mill. Moving very gingerly. Looks like she’s in pain.”
“Maybe Duffy . . .”
“Maybe,” English finished for him. Duffy was nowhere to be found, and Beatrix was in town. Joining those dots didn’t look too good for him, but maybe Control was right: maybe he had gone down swinging.
“Why would she leave from the airport? Surely she’d drive south?”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“So where’s she going?”
“I’m checking that.” English looked up. “Hold on.”
There was an announcement that Gate Fifteen was boarding. He watched as she hobbled to the desk and presented her boarding card. She disappeared into the air gate.
He got up and walked quickly to the gate to make sure that she hadn’t tried to elude him, maybe trying to escape onto the runway. He looked out of the windows, and there was no sign of her.
“Casablanca, sir,” he said. “She’s going to Casablanca.”
“Very good,” Control said. “Send me the flight details. There will be someone waiting for her at the other end. Wherever she’s been hiding, we’ll find her now. We’ll flush her out.” There was a pause, and all English could hear was the static on the line. “It’s nearly done,” Control said finally. “Nearly over.”
English looked out of the broad window to the 747 outside. Control had never been on an operation with Beatrix Rose before. He just selected the targets and sent his agents out to do his bidding.
But English had worked with her.
