Identity Found

by Ray Green

  The astonishment on the faces of the two men confirmed that he had caught them completely by surprise.

  ‘What the fuck …?’ exclaimed the man on the left, his gravelly voice heavily accented.

  ‘Stay right there, hands where I can see them,’ shouted James.

  Both men raised their hands in the air, the surprise written across their faces now giving way to fear. ‘What’s this about … who are you?’ said the same man.

  ‘Shut up … I’ll ask the questions. Which one of you is Mohammed Bashara?’

  The other one replied, his voice tremulous. ‘I am, but how do you know—’

  James cut him off. ‘Stand up … slowly … keep your hands where I can see them.’

  He did so. He was a short man – perhaps five feet six inches – with a rounded face and a short, black beard.

  ‘Keep still,’ said James, transferring the gun to his right hand while retrieving the folded piece of paper from his pocket with his left. With some difficulty he managed to unfold the paper, single handed, and examine the image of Mohammed Bashara, most-wanted terrorist. The gaunt face stared back at him from the page; the close-set eyes, the hooked nose … none of these features bore any resemblance to those of the frightened-looking face of the man standing opposite. The clincher was in the notes alongside the photograph: height six feet three inches. This was not the man standing in front of him.

  James turned his attention to the other man. ‘You,’ he said gesturing towards him with the muzzle of the gun, ‘stand up as well … slowly.’ The other man rose cautiously to his feet. He was hardly any taller than the first man, and also bore no resemblance to the image of the terrorist from the FBI list. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘I am his brother … Ahmed. But who are you … why are you here? What do you want? We don’t have any money if that’s what you—’

  ‘Quiet!’ snapped James. ‘What’s the significance of the dates July nineteenth and twentieth?’

  The two of them glanced nervously at each other, apparently reluctant to reply.

  ‘Well?’ insisted James, panning the gun from one to the other in turn.

  The one who had said he was Mohammed finally responded. ‘It’s the G7 summit at Camp David.’

  So, even if he wasn’t the wanted terrorist on the FBI list, he had more or less admitted that he and his brother were planning something at the summit.

  ‘Why do you just happen to know that, huh? What are you planning?’

  His brother, who seemed to be the more confident of the two, spoke again. ‘We have a perfect right to demonstrate against capitalist greed and exploitation. Muslim brothers and sisters have been oppressed for far too long.’

  ‘Demonstrate? What do you mean?’

  ‘You must know – otherwise why did you ask us about the dates?’

  ‘Well, why don’t you tell me anyway?’ growled James.

  The man raised his eyebrows, shook his head slightly, and emitted an exasperated-sounding sigh. The bastard didn’t show any signs of fear now, considering he was staring down the barrel of a gun. ‘There are big demonstrations planned. Obviously, no-one will be able to get close to Camp David itself, but there’ll be a big turnout in Thurmont. That’s where we’re going … and quite a few of our Muslim brothers from here in New York are going to be there too.’

  ‘You’re planning to join a demonstration?’

  ‘I just told you that. Are you not listening?’

  My god, this guy’s got some nerve, thought James. He jerked the gun more forcefully towards the man.

  ‘You sure that’s all it is … a demonstration?’

  ‘Look, let me show you,’ he said, lowering his hands and pointing toward the pile of poles propped up in the corner.

  ‘Slowly,’ said James, lifting the gun a little for emphasis. He turned his attention to the other man. ‘You go with him, I want to be able to see you both.’

  The two of them moved slowly towards where the wooden poles were propped in the corner of the room. But they didn’t actually touch the poles; instead, the one called Ahmed went to bend down alongside them; he would have been obscured from James’s sight by the sofa.

  ‘Wait,’ said James, ‘stand still … keep your hands where I can see them.’

  He moved around the sofa, so that he could keep the two of them properly in sight.

  ‘OK?’ said Ahmed, holding his hands forward in plain view.

  ‘Go ahead.’

  James hadn’t previously seen the stack of hardboard sheets on the floor. Ahamed bent down, slowly, and picked up the one on top of the pile. He held it up for James to see. It was crudely painted with the words, ‘Justice for Muslim Brothers.’

  ‘OK?’ he said, waiting for James to nod his affirmation.

  He laid that sheet aside and picked up the next. It read, ‘Destroy the Corrupt Capitalist System.’

  ‘You see?’ said Ahmed. ‘They’re placards … we still have to fix them to the poles but they’re easier to transport like this. We’ll fix them to the poles when we get there.’

  A dead weight descended in James’s gut; had he really made a monumental mistake? Were these guys really just two angry men determined to exercise their democratic right to protest? He had fallen silent, and the other man had clearly picked up on the vibes, now growing even more in confidence.

  ‘So, who the fuck are you anyway? I don’t get the feeling you’re a cop. What right have you got to break into our apartment and threaten us like this?’ His flabby chin jutted forward defiantly as he spoke.

  James could hardly believe how bold this guy was, considering he was confronted with a loaded gun, but his own resolve had, by now, evaporated. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I think there’s been a bit of a misunderstanding here.’

  ‘No shit,’ said Ahmed.

  Mohammed cowered in the corner, hands still in the air, his frightened eyes pleading with his brother not to goad this armed intruder any further. But James knew he had screwed up, and now it was time to back out.

  ‘OK, I’m going now, but both of you need to stay put until I’m long gone. If either of you try to follow me, it will end very badly. Got it?’

  Mohammed nodded, his eyes bulging with fear. Ahmed just stared back, his expression cold and stony. James backed away, all the time keeping his gun trained on the two of them. He reached behind him to release the door catch and stepped through, before turning and heading down the stairs as fast as his feet would carry him.

  It wasn’t until he was back in the car and speeding away that the tension began to dissipate; it was replaced by a feeling of intense frustration.

  Fuck, fuck, fuck! Were they really back to square one now?

  Chapter 39

  James returned to the hotel feeling utterly deflated. He had been so sure they were on the brink of discovering why the young journalist had been murdered, helping to avert a potentially devastating terrorist attack on a gathering of the world’s most influential leaders. Now, it seemed, the whole thing with the dates and the names they had found in Julia’s notes was a massive red herring.

  But why had she written down those names and dates? Maybe she had gone down exactly the same blind alley as he, Juanita, and Kyle had. Maybe there was nothing sinister about Johnson Brothers or its employees. Maybe she hadn’t turned up anything big at all. But if so, why had one of the world’s most highly paid assassins been hired to kill her? None of it made sense.

  He held his key card up to the lock, which made a reassuring click as the red light turned to green.

  ‘Guys,’ he called out as he entered the room, ‘it looks like we’ve made a massive …’

  His words tailed off as he realised there was no-one there. The TV was on, but no-one was watching it. Maybe Juanita was in the bathroom, but if so, where was Kyle? He’d explicitly asked Kyle to stay with her while he was away from the hotel. The bathroom door was open and there was no-one inside.

  Maybe they had gone up to Kyle’s room, on the floor a
bove, for some reason. He stepped outside and went over to the elevators, which were almost directly opposite their room and pressed the call button. Damn! Three bloody elevators and not one of them anywhere near my floor. One of them appeared to be stuck on floor six, one was edging toward him just one floor at a time, and the last was moving away from him. Frustrated, he stabbed the button several more times, which made no difference whatsoever to the resolutely stationary first elevator or the painfully slothful progress of the second. He gave up and hurried towards the stairs, taking them two at a time.

  He knocked on the door of Kyle’s room. No response.

  He called out both their names. No response.

  He hammered on the door, calling out their names, louder this time. No response.

  The icy fingers of apprehension began to crawl through his mind.

  He made his way back to their own room. If they had gone out together for some reason, then surely, they would have left a note. He looked everywhere; there was no note.

  Then he saw it: Juanita’s purse lay on the floor alongside the bed, tipped on its side with many of the contents spilt onto the floor. She never went anywhere without her purse. The creeping doubt that something was wrong morphed into a smothering dread.

  What should he do? As he contemplated this question, the sounds from the TV playing in the background formed a meaningless hum: a sort of white noise which served only to interfere with his thought processes. But then two words jumped out of the aural miasma and penetrated his consciousness: ‘Kyle Richards’. He was immediately on the alert, but he had already missed much of the news report.

  He grabbed the TV remote from where it lay on one of the bedside cabinets and, with trembling fingers, rewound the live news report.

  ‘… and the Dow Jones continues to slide on the news that …’ He had rewound too far.

  Desperately trying to remain calm and gain control of his quivering fingers he edged forward until he reached the point he was looking for.

  ‘Police have confirmed that the body found in a dumpster near to Times Square was the victim of a brutal murder. The victim had been shot several times in the chest and head. He has been identified from his personal effects as one Kyle Richards, a resident of Miami Beach. Police are urging anyone who knew Mr Richards, and can shed some light on why he was in New York City, to come forward as soon as possible …’

  Oh Christ, what about Juanita? The scattered contents of Juanita’s purse suggested that she had been taken against her will – maybe Kyle too. If someone had abducted the two of them … The strength drained from his entire body, and he sank to his knees in shock.

  Chapter 40

  James just couldn’t accept that Juanita might have suffered the same fate as Kyle. His fevered mind began frantically searching for other possible outcomes.

  Maybe Juanita had evaded capture and they – whoever ‘they’ were – had only succeeded in abducting Kyle.

  Maybe the murdered man was not Kyle at all; after all, the report said that the body had been identified from ‘personal effects’. Someone could have planted Kyle’s things on the body of another victim, couldn’t they? But, if so, why?

  Maybe it was another person with the same name. Could there be two people named Kyle Richards, living in Miami Beach? Well, yes – he supposed that was quite possible, but if so, what were the chances that they would both be in New York City at the same time? Surely, very slim.

  Deep down, he knew he was clutching at straws.

  The strident chime of his cell phone pierced his brain; in a daze, he withdrew it from his pocket and looked at the caller I.D. It was a message from Juanita. Thank God!

  When he clicked on the message, he could not, at first, take in what he was seeing. It was a video clip: Juanita sat facing him, a gag pulled tightly between her teeth. Her hair was dishevelled and her makeup smudged across her cheeks. Her hands appeared to be tied behind the back of the chair. James stared fixedly at the screen, mesmerised.

  A man’s voice broke the spell: English accent, unmistakeably London. The man was out of shot but the timbre was cold and menacing.

  ‘Hello, James Connolly … or perhaps I should call you Stephen Lewis?’

  James’s blood froze: Stephen Lewis was a name he thought he had left behind more than a year ago when he had fled the shocking events in Miami. The only people who would know of that name were his erstwhile enemies from that appalling episode. And now, it seemed, one of them held Juanita captive.

  ‘I’ve been looking for you for a very long time,’ continued that ominous voice, slow and deliberate. ‘You’re a difficult man to track down.’

  James shook himself free of the trance which had gripped him. ‘Who are you … what do you want? Why are you—?’

  He realised he was trying to talk to a recording, as his question was cut short by the disembodied voice continuing its sinister monologue.

  ‘I expect you’re probably wondering who I am, huh? Well, you’ll probably know me best by my calling card … I think you may have seen it recently.’

  The chilling realisation hit him like an icy bolt. His heart skipped a beat, and the breath was literally sucked from his lungs. This was not just a bad guy; it was one of the world’s most feared assassins: a vicious, sadistic psychopath.

  ‘As you can see, I have your pretty girlfriend here …’ His tone changed as he addressed her directly. ‘Would you like to say something to your boyfriend, darlin’?’

  Juanita strained to pull her head away as a man’s hand appeared in shot, reaching behind her to release the gag. As she shook herself free of the filthy rag, she struggled, for a moment, to find her voice. When she did, it was nothing more than a strangled croak.

  ‘Oh, I guess it was a bit tight, huh? Sorry ’bout that darlin’. Never mind, take your time … I’m sure lover boy will wait to hear what you’ve got to say.’

  Juanita worked her jaw from side to side until she was finally able to find a tremulous voice.

  ‘James … don’t listen to him. Please … he’s trying to—’ Her pleas gave way, abruptly, to an anguished scream, which pierced James’s heart as surely as any spear.

  The lighted cigarette which had been touched against her upper arm was pulled away and held right in front of the camera. Juanita’s scream had subsided to a series of ragged sobs, her shoulders heaving with each tormented breath.

  The man’s voice continued, calm and unhurried. ‘Now, as you can see, with just this simple implement’ – he twirled the lighted cigarette between his thumb and forefinger – ‘it is possible to inflict considerable pain.’

  ‘You bastard!’ screamed James, to no effect, as he was talking to a recording.

  ‘Now the way you can stop this,’ said the man, his tone casual, ‘is to come right over to the location which I’m about to text you. Now, if you should be foolish enough to call the police, or to come armed yourself – ’cos I know you’re pretty handy with guns – I’ll blow her pretty head off before you can get anywhere near her. Got it?’

  The cigarette, which had almost gone out, was withdrawn from shot, only to reappear a few seconds later, now glowing brightly just a few inches from the side of Juanita’s neck. Her eyes bulged in terror as she sought, in vain, to pull away. This time the glowing tip was not just touched against her; it was viciously ground into her skin, eliciting from her a bloodcurdling scream. James’s buttocks clenched as he tensed to prevent the involuntary release of urine which threatened to burst forth.

  ‘Oh dear,’ said the invisible man, holding the now-extinguished stub in front of the camera, ‘I do believe this one’s finished. Never mind, I have two more packs of twenty … so I’m not likely to run out anytime soon. See you soon, James Connolly … don’t take too long, or I might need to have a little more fun with your girlfriend here.’ The screen went blank.

  Chapter 41

  The location to which James had been summoned was a derelict warehouse in Brooklyn’s rundown waterfront area. Onc
e a bustling centre of commerce, this area was now a decaying monument to a bygone era. While much of Brooklyn’s waterfront had been earmarked for residential development, this particular stretch was still home to numerous dark, crumbling edifices from an industrial age.

  He had parked some distance away, so as to avoid announcing his arrival. Now he crouched behind a pile of wooden pallets around a hundred yards from the building where Juanita was supposedly being held, peeping around the edge as he surveyed his target.

  The warehouse was, like most of the others strung out along the waterfront, of redbrick construction. Although the bricks were badly blackened – probably from airborne pollution – the basic structure looked sound enough. The windows were a different matter though: just about every glass pane was shattered, and the metal frames badly rusted, with barely a vestige of the original, dark green paint still remaining. The large, metal goods door in the centre – invitingly part-open, James noticed – was in barely better condition.

  He had considered ignoring The Scorpion’s threats and calling the police, but they would not know just what sort of psychotic monster they were dealing with. He was in no doubt that this bastard would have no qualms about killing Juanita at the first signs of police intervention, and he was willing to bet that the assassin would have some pre-planned escape route in place. He’d managed to evade the authorities for many years, in spite of his brazen advertising of his exploits by means of his calling cards; James couldn’t imagine that he didn’t have his escape fully prepared in the event of the cops showing up.

  And then there was the not-insignificant fact that he and Juanita were both wanted in connection with the killings a year ago in Miami. So, even if the police were to succeed in rescuing Juanita, there would be a lot of awkward questions to answer afterwards. The truth about the events in Miami was so incredible that he doubted the police would believe what had really happened. And if they should be charged with murder, it was unlikely that a jury would believe them either.