Zero 22, p.13
Zero 22, page 13
part #8 of Danny Black Series
‘It’s all yours,’ Danny said. He stepped back out of the bedroom and returned to his sentry position opposite the front door. He could hear voices in the corridor outside, and the creaking of floorboards somewhere in the building. But they faded soon enough, and now all he could hear was the sound of water against the shower curtain. The stream stopped. Bethany emerged into the hallway, body and hair wrapped in towels. ‘All yours,’ she said.
In the bathroom, Danny stripped and ran the water as hot as it would go. He stood under the shower and let the stinging hot torrent flood over him. He washed the grime from his scarred body and he let the water wash away his doubts as well. When he stepped out, dripping on to the bathroom floor, his head was back where he needed it to be. On the job.
He wrapped a towel round his waist and walked back into the bedroom. Bethany was dressed and was adding the finishing touches to her make-up. She looked incredible in her snugly fitting skirt and jacket, an inch of heel and her mouth just slightly plump with lipstick. Nobody would ever guess that in the last twenty-four hours she’d been incarcerated in a grim Portakabin, HALOed into the Jordanian desert and been at the sharp end of a firefight with heavily armed Palestinian smugglers.
‘You going to stand around half naked,’ she said, ‘or are you going to get dressed?’
She left the bedroom without waiting for a reply. Danny put on the suit that had been left for him. Normally he was a weddings- and funerals-only suit man. The jacket felt tight across his shoulders and it took him three attempts to get the knot of his tie right. Bethany entered again. She looked him up and down critically. Then she shook her head. ‘You’re supposed to be a journalist, not James Bond,’ she said. ‘Loosen your tie, undo that top button.’
Fair enough, Danny thought. Her attention to detail was good and fashion was hardly his strong point. He did as she said. She approached him, took his right hand and undid the button on his cuff. Up close she smelled good. Danny had to make a conscious effort not to allow her scent to put him off the rails.
‘You scrub up okay,’ she said, as she adjusted his collar.
‘I’ll take that as a compliment.
Bethany half smiled and Danny sensed that she was nervous. ‘You going to be alright?’ he asked.
‘Fine,’ she said. ‘Once we get going.’ She went to look out of the window. ‘I want to speak to my son,’ she said. ‘Before we leave. In case anything goes wrong.’
Danny hesitated. It wasn’t such a big thing to ask. He had a phone. He could put a call through to Hereford and make it happen. But what would a conversation with the boy do for Bethany’s state of mind? Would it focus her or upset her? Right now, she seemed to Danny to be in the zone. He didn’t want anything to mess with that. ‘They won’t do it,’ he said. ‘You know Sturrock.’
She turned and looked at him. There was a tightness around her eyes and Danny thought: does she know? Has she worked out that there’s no way MI6 would let her live, after what she was about to do for them?
The tightness eased. Bethany nodded. ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘I know Sturrock.’ Her voice was full of bitterness. ‘Alright then. If we’re going to do this, let’s do it.’ She gathered up her dirty clothes and stuffed them into one of the suitcases. Danny did the same.
Hamoud was spared his nightmares because sleep had been impossible. He was too excited, as excited as his children had been the night before, although he would never have admitted it. When they had finally gone to sleep, he and Rabia had fallen into bed. She slept instantly, exhausted from a hard day of cleaning other people’s houses. Hamoud lay awake, staring at the ceiling and enjoying the anticipation of their unexpected family holiday.
Now it was 6 a.m. and, as usual, he was up before everybody else. He had made himself a cup of weak tea and was sitting cross legged on the floor, as he had learned to do in his empty cell at Guantanamo. The Walt Disney World brochure was open in front of him. In his mind, he once again mapped the faces of his children onto the faces of the happy kids in the brochure. It warmed him even more than the tea, and for the first time in years, he felt a sense of calmness and optimism.
His tranquillity was broken by footsteps in the corridor outside. A knock on the door. Hamoud scrambled over to it, spilling his tea in the process. He opened the door. There, on the floor, was a FedEx package. He picked it up and looked at both sides. He’d never before received anything by FedEx and was surprised that nobody had asked him to sign for it. Perhaps they’d made a mistake. He wanted to call back the delivery person, but when he looked along the corridor there was nobody there.
Paranoia was a strange, powerful affliction. One moment you could be entirely free of it. The next, it hit you with tidal force, crashing over you, taking your breath away. It was happening now. Hamoud had to grip the door frame to counteract his dizziness. Where was the delivery person? Why couldn’t he see him?
He drew some deep breaths. Calmed himself. Recognise this for what it is, he said. You are paranoid. You are worrying about problems that don’t exist. Perhaps the delivery person hadn’t waited for a signature because it was so early. He felt a little better, but the paranoia had not completely subsided.
Back inside the apartment, he carefully opened the package. It was all there. Plane reservations for that afternoon, in their names, from Cincinnati to Orlando. Their hotel booking and passes for the parks. Everything in order. So why did he still feel uneasy? He moved over to the window that overlooked the front of their apartment block. With one bony finger, he parted the curtains and peered out on to the road below. He saw his reflection faintly in the window. The grey-flecked beard. The prominent scar on his eye. He looked through it. He was searching for a FedEx van, but there was none. The road wasn’t busy this early in the morning, but on the opposite side he saw a black SUV parked up on the kerb. A man was hurrying across the road, away from the apartment block, towards it. When he reached the sidewalk, he stopped for a moment and looked back over his shoulder. He gazed upwards and Hamoud had the uncomfortable sensation that the man was staring directly at him. He guiltily let the curtain fall closed as an electric shock of anxiety buzzed through him. It was the same feeling that he used to get in the prison camp whenever he drew the attention of someone in authority. Hamoud didn’t like to be noticed.
He took several deep breaths to calm himself again. Then he returned to the bedroom, the tickets still in his hand. Rabia was half awake. When Hamoud perched on the edge of the bed, shoulders slumped, she sat up and reached out to stroke his back. ‘What is it, my love?’ she asked.
He almost didn’t say. He knew how the conversation was likely to evolve. She would say to him, ‘I think you have PTSD. I think you should see a doctor.’ But he didn’t want to see a doctor. He wanted to get better by himself. But he also wanted to share his concerns with his wife. He frowned at the tickets in his hand. ‘Something’s not right,’ he said. ‘Why would anybody send us to Walt Disney World? We’re not the sort of family this kind of thing happens to. It feels . . . it feels wrong.’ He didn’t mention the lack of a FedEx van or the man by the SUV.
‘Hamoud,’ said Rabia, her voice gentle and cajoling, ‘Hamoud, you need to stop assuming that nothing good will ever happen to you. The things in your past were terrible, but they are over now. God owes us a bit of luck. Perhaps this is the beginning of a change for us. Let’s just enjoy it while we can.’
He nodded and smiled at her as reassuringly as he could. But while she was in the shower, he found his phone and he dialled the same number he’d called when the offer had first dropped through his door.
‘Hello, Walt Disney World, where all your dreams come true!’
It was the same cheerful female voice as before. It struck Hamoud as a bit odd that he should have been put through to the same operator, but he told himself that it was hardly an impossibility. He stuttered his name. ‘I just wanted to check . . . to check that our all-expenses-paid trip . . . to check that it’s a real offer.’
‘Of course, sir. We’re looking forward to welcoming you at Walt Disney World.’
‘Um . . . don’t you need to check?’
‘Mr Al Asmar?’
‘That’s right.’
‘We’re looking forward to welcoming you! May I help you with anything else today?’
‘No,’ Hamoud said. ‘No. Nothing else.’
‘Then you have a good day,’ said the voice. Music played over the line. The Mickey Mouse song, its catchy refrain spelling out his name, sung by a choir of children, over and over again. A relentlessly cheerful tune, but somehow menacing to Hamoud as he looked from the door to the window, and heard his little ones moving around in their bedroom, the sound of his wife’s shower. His palms started itching again and he wanted to scratch them.
He ended the phone call. The song died. His children ran into the room, as excited as they had been before going to bed last night. They flung their arms round his neck, squealing with delight, and Hamoud didn’t have the heart not to join in with them. Rabia was right, he told himself. He needed to stop assuming that nothing good would ever happen to him. This was the beginning of a change for them. He would enjoy his good luck for as long as it lasted.
He would not be paranoid.
TWELVE
11.37 hrs. Hunter had rotated to the rear service entrance of the Mansion House. He was perched on the plastic bench of the bus stop that faced the apartment block. Rush hour was over and there were only three other people at the bus stop, all ignoring each other and staring at their phones. Hunter was watching the vehicles entering and leaving the service entrance. In particular, he was watching a Transit van with the Amazon logo on both sides as it drove down into the basement parking lot. He stepped away from the bus stop so he wouldn’t be heard by the other pedestrians, put his sleeve to his mouth and spoke over the team’s radio. ‘Cunningham and the others are here,’ he said. ‘Keep your positions. I’m moving in.’
Hunter headed across the street. A very narrow pavement followed the road leading into the underground car park. He walked along it, carefully scanning up ahead. When a green Mercedes overtook him on its way in, he instinctively made use of the side mirrors to check nobody was following him. It was clear.
The tyres of the Mercedes squeaked on the smooth floor as it drove to the far side and parked. Hunter loitered in the cover of a white Range Rover while he listened for the slamming of the Mercedes door to echo around the car park, and footsteps to fade. Only then did he approach the Transit van. It had parked next to a fire door with a no-entry sign. The driver – Hunter didn’t recognise him – looked straight ahead without even acknowledging Hunter’s presence. When Hunter reached the van the door opened, as if automatically. Dennis Cunningham appeared. There was no superfluous greeting. ‘Building manager’s name is Ravinder Singh,’ Cunningham said. ‘Indian laddie. Knows we’re coming. He should be waiting for us in reception.’
Hunter nodded his acknowledgement and closed the van door. He quickly crossed the car park, past the green Mercedes, towards a lift on the far side. Inside the lift, he hit the ground-floor button. As the lift ascended, he found himself examining the removable panel in the roof. Force of habit. He could just about reach it if he needed to.
The doors pinged open and Hunter stepped into the reception area. A large, airy, open space, with comfortable sofas and enormous indoor plants. Mirrors everywhere. Piped music. On the opposite side, Hunter saw the revolving doors he’d been watching earlier. There were ten or twelve people here – residents, Hunter reckoned, leaving and arriving – and he immediately identified the building manager. Singh wore a black suit and tie and stood by the reception desk, nervously clutching his hands and blinking frequently. He was looking round, as though searching for someone. When his gaze fell on Hunter, Hunter nodded. The manager swallowed hard, looked around again rather conspicuously, then approached. ‘Are you the gentleman I’m waiting for?’ he said. He was much taller than Hunter and spoke very precise English with an Indian accent.
‘We need a private space where we won’t be disturbed,’ Hunter said.
The manager was still clutching his hands. ‘Follow me please,’ he said. He called the lift and took them back down to the basement. He was blinking so often that Hunter assumed he must have something in his eye, but then decided it was a nervous tic. At first, he thought the manager was leading him to the Transit van, but it became apparent that he was heading for the no-entry fire door to its side. He lifted the security bar, opened the door and switched on some flickering overhead strip lights in the room beyond. The space was large but with a low ceiling. Concrete floor, breeze block walls and exposed piping in the roof wrapped in silver lagging. It was warm, and against one wall was some kind of boiler or heat-exchange pump, Hunter didn’t know which, rattling noisily. Boxes of cleaning products were piled up, along with a stash of orange traffic cones, barrels of water for dispensers and all manner of random stores required for keeping the Mansion House running. Most importantly, it was empty of personnel and it was private.
‘Stay there,’ Hunter told the manager. He returned to the Transit van, checked there was nobody in the car park to view them, and knocked on the back door. The door opened and, at a word from Cunningham, the others filed out, the Regiment guys carrying their flight cases. The driver stayed where he was. The Regiment team and the three police officers joined the manager in the boiler room. Hunter closed the door while Cunningham turned to the manager.
‘You’ve been briefed by our people?’
‘In a manner of speaking, sir,’ the manager said. He blinked several times and didn’t appear to know whether to look at Cunningham’s face or the hardware in his ops vest. ‘I have to say this is most irregular. The comfort and convenience of our tenants is my first—’
‘You need to do exactly what we tell you. You got that?’
The manager swallowed hard again and didn’t answer. Cunningham stepped up to him and repeated his question at half the volume. ‘You got that?’
The manager nodded nervously.
‘What’s the personnel set-up on the penthouse?’
The manager spoke hesitantly. ‘Mr Rostropovic is in town,’ he said. ‘He is very infrequently here, but when he is, he keeps himself to himself. He hardly leaves the apartment.’
‘Who does he have with him?’
‘Some guests, I believe. A family. He is of course not obliged to inform anybody whom he invites into his apartment. We are simply here to ensure our tenants—’
‘What about security?’
‘Mr Rostropovic takes his security arrangements extremely seriously,’ said the manager. ‘There are always two gentlemen guarding the corridor outside the penthouse apartment at any one time.’
‘Armed?’
The manager glanced uncomfortably at the police officers.
Cunningham took a step closer to him. ‘Listen here, laddie, the more we know about what’s waiting for us up there, the less chance you have of ending up like the inside of a haggis. Are they armed?’
The manager nodded. ‘Mr Rostropovic pays a small surcharge . . .’ he mumbled.
Cunningham gave him a bleak smile. ‘He slips you a backhander not tae mention the guns to the police?’ The manager looked away. ‘We’ve looked at the plans of the building. The penthouse has its own dedicated elevator, correct?’
‘Correct, sir.’ The manager seemed pleased that the conversation had taken a different turn. ‘Only Mr Rostropovic and those with whom he entrusts a key fob may use it.’
‘But the service elevator also goes tae the penthouse?’
‘Yes, sir. But that is not for public use.’
‘We’re not the public,’ Cunningham said. ‘You have a master key to get intae the penthouse itself?’
The manager looked reluctant to reply. ‘A key fob,’ he said. ‘It accesses all the rooms in the building.’
‘You have it on you?’
The manager nodded.
‘Hand it over.’
The manager looked from Cunningham to the others and back again. Realising he had no option, he took a fob from his top pocket and handed it over. ‘Sir,’ he said as Cunningham took the card, ‘I must inform you that both elevators sound a brief alarm when they reach the penthouse, to alert security that somebody is arriving. You understand?’
‘Aye,’ said Cunningham. ‘I understand.’ He turned to Hunter. ‘Your guys are still watching the exits?’
‘Yep,’ Hunter confirmed.
‘Keep them there. Our targets could leave at any time.’
‘Wish they fucking would,’ Hunter said. ‘Save us a job.’
‘I don’t think that’s likely.’ Cunningham pointed at one of the flight cases. ‘Your missus told me you like a bit of role play. There’s a couple of BT engineer uniforms in there. Get one of them on.’ He looked over at Parsons. ‘You too,’ he said.
Hunter didn’t much like the way Cunningham was curtly taking charge, but he knew better than to make a meal of it right now. He opened the flight case. It didn’t only contain BT uniforms. There was a canvas bag containing engineering equipment, a thick wodge of sturdy cable ties, three assault rifles nestled at the bottom of the case and several cardboard packs of ammo. The manager’s eyes widened when he saw the weaponry. Cunningham, Hobbs and Moore each took a weapon. Hunter took out the uniforms and handed the larger of the two to Parsons. Unembarrassed about changing in front of the others, they switched clothes. The uniforms were creased and had a faint hint of body odour. That was by design: fresh, neatly pressed uniforms were more likely to stand out.
‘Very fetching,’ Cunningham said. ‘Okay everyone, listen up. This is what we’re going tae do. You three –’ he pointed at the police officers – ‘stay down here. Once we’ve secured our targets, we’ll call you in tae process any family members. You –’ he pointed at the manager – ‘escort Hunter and Parsons tae the penthouse in the service lift. When the guards meet you there, tell them the guys are from BT and they need tae investigate a fault on the line in the penthouse.’
