‘Morning,’ he said mutedly as he smiled at Melissa and took a seat with the toast still in his mouth. Melissa peered over her sunglasses and put her paper down.
‘So, the beast awakens,’ she said. ‘Show me your eyes Casanova.’
‘Nope,’ he replied.
‘Bloody good job you have me to look after you,’ she said. ‘You were a walking disaster last night – I nearly slotted you.’
Sean laughed. ‘Fear not, someone will surely beat you to that with all these bastards after my neck. Looks like I’ll be putting myself back out there and amongst the thick of it in hours few.’ Sean grinned before sitting back to drink his tea, knowing what would come next.
‘Well,’ she said. ‘He’s been in touch then?’
‘Yep.’
‘Good,’ she replied. ‘Only two things from me then. Make sure you get me involved. As much as I love my French journalism, I need something juicier and more investigative to get into. And secondly, keep on your toes because once you start moving you’ll be leaving a footprint everywhere and those Russian bastards will be onto you like a rash. Only you could go and expose the deepest, most regarded female spy in Russian history – and the granddaughter of a brutal KGB assassin too. Fucking hell.’
Sean grinned, knowing how right he had been that she’d reply in exactly the manner he had expected. Eager as ever, Melissa had convinced Jack to have her ‘on the books’ for anything that involved deep research and areas of intelligence gathering that he needed kept secret from those in the not-so-secretive corridors of Thames House and Vauxhall Cross. Her investigative skills and global connections could be useful Jack had surmised.
‘All he’s said is that they have a problem and to make my way to the bolt-hole. He hasn’t given me a clue what it’s about.’
‘Well, I’m sure you’ll need somebody looking at this beyond the normal day-to-day intelligence collection. I’m not sitting here on my arse for weeks on end while you gallivant across the globe.’ They both chuckled. ‘At least you can test some of the plans that have been set up for us. I look forward to being your investigative source.’ She sat back, feeling smug knowing she’d get the call.
‘I’m sure you’ll hear from me, but you have to play by the rules my lady. You bloody well nearly got us both killed last time. Anyway, I’ll take the route that we agreed on and set up from there. I’d have thought the Russians would have better things to be getting on with without trying to take me out of the game, especially as they have all that trouble with that Novichok fiasco in Salisbury.’
‘Don’t you believe it,’ Melissa said. ‘Those bastards will always want retribution for Natalie being captured by you.’ They grimaced at the memory of the explosive journey and mayhem that had seen them arrive as new people in a new land with new jobs – even if their service to the Crown was only part-time.
Jack and The Court had provided two new homes in France for them, along with new passports, new backstories, new social clubs, new credit cards and a set of communication and escape plans. They had another safe house in Lyon, but their primary safe house, their bolt-hole, was based over the border in a small town called Viola in Piedmont, Italy. It would be here that Sean would transit through whenever making foreign journeys, and then onwards to the small and less busy Turin airport, which provided safer options for covert travel. The safe house was a remote wooden chalet in the hills above Viola set amongst the dramatic pine forests with restricted approach routes and covert cameras that Sean could monitor remotely for any unwanted visitors. Any surveillance footprint had to lead back to this neat chalet rather than their luxury home on the Cote d’Azur.
Chapter 5
South of France
Sean’s journey to the safe house in the cool early hours of the morning was uneventful except for a brief incident involving a small fallow deer rushing out from the conifer woods, before rooting itself to the spot in front of his Peugeot 3008 SUV. The enchanting scene of the young deer gazing into Sean’s headlights as dawn broke took on an even more bizarre note as two young stags began to fight behind her. Fleetingly, they sparred. Then they were gone, leaving nothing but a burst of dust from the ancient track and the sporadic low-lying fog rising gently across the steep valley road. Sean revved the motor, grappled with the wheelspin and thrust the vehicle up the tight track, glancing across to the open hillside where the elder stags sat protecting their herd.
Sean’s bolt-hole was a wooden chalet set deep in the high Alpine hills above Viola located in the upper Val Mongia near the delightful foothills of Monte Bric Mindino. Known by its codeword, St Francis, the sanctuary was a place of respite and pleasure for Sean where he’d often spend time alone to continue his passion for drawing and painting. His favourite haunts for setting up his easel were in the village square as well as in the magnificent Chapel of San Giovanni and at the Rocca Dei Corvi or Sfinge, a natural rocky tower some ninety metres high, which was topped off by a Sphinx-like head.
Sean took the right-hand branch of the only fork on the kilometre-long track and headed to a promontory that provided a good view down the hillside to the chalet. He started his ritual of checking the security of St Francis and its immediate area before he ventured any closer. He scanned the area through his binoculars before walking through the woods and completing a full circuit around the chalet, which was perched on a small hillock deep in a conifer forest. He checked the vulnerable points and avenues of approach to the chalet before checking for any signs of ground disturbance and any unusual vehicle tracks.
Next, he took out his phone and punched in a password to a CCTV and security application to check for any alerts on the detection measures that he’d installed in and around the chalet. He checked the CCTV coverage from cameras that were placed high in the trees covering the two inward routes, then spent some time checking for any alerts that would have alarmed from the pressure mats he had placed inside the bolt-hole. Any intruder stepping on them would have triggered a silent alarm and produced a camera shot if they placed a foot on the key vulnerable points that he had guarded with sensors and active infrared beams. These would then send a secure text-message alert to his phone.
There were no alerts. No intrusions since he had last been here. He set off on a final walk around the chalet before entering via the back door located on a veranda overlooking the valley basin below.
Within five minutes he’d booted up his laptop, logged onto the dark web and sent Jack a message.
‘At St Francis – what’s next?’
He had travelled light. Just his mobile phone, a laptop and spare burner phone, a small rucksack with enough kit to see him through a few days and two thousand Euros, along with a French passport in the name of James Le Roux. He was poised but guarded. The treacherous world of espionage had caught him out too often to be too blasé about anything any more. He trusted no one, not even Jack. But he trusted him just enough to dip a toe in the water to see what might come at him.
A few transmissions later and all was set for a rendezvous with Jack at the top of a pine hill at 2pm in a felled clearing offering staggering views of the distant Alps.
It was 1.45pm in a warming sun. Sean sat on his rucksack and waited. He took a drink of water from his flask, hummed a tune and fiddled with his lighter, trying desperately not to spark up a cigarette. But he did anyway. He thrived on his work but needed a nicotine hit to keep his edge just at the right level. Without it he was snarky. With it, he felt he could deal with anything at any time. He put his lighter in his top pocket, checked his watch and then a few moments later heard the familiar sound of a distant helicopter and found himself trying to figure out which direction it was coming from. After years of operating with helicopter insertions and extractions, he still cursed himself that he could never quite work out the incoming direction until it was too late. Same again. Before he knew it, the Italian Forestry Commission helicopter had risen above the hillside from the valley and Sean was cowering for protection as the rotors caught
the loose wood shavings and small branches, blasting them fiercely across the high knoll.
Sean dropped to one knee, putting his hand across his face to shield his eyes before peering through his fingers to see Jack open the door and exit the helicopter. He watched Jack run towards him, bent over in a deep crouch, before giving a thumbs up to the pilot to indicate he could engage his gears and take off.
‘You really didn’t need to wear a suit you know Jack,’ Sean said sardonically, before shaking Jack’s hand. He watched the helicopter glide off towards the distant Gran Paradiso mountain.
Jack laughed. ‘I only have a few hours here, then it’s off to a rather boring meeting in Rome.’
‘I’m beginning to believe you don’t have any clothes other than suits, for God’s sake. Here, put this on, just in case any loggers see us down below.’ Sean threw his North Face waterproof to Jack before firing up the quad bike. ‘Hold tight, time for a bit of fun.’
‘What’s the job then?’ Sean asked, grabbing a couple of beers from the fridge and then placing them on the rustic wooden table in the lounge. ‘You flying in means there’s something big on the boil, eh?’
Jack poured a beer into a small glass, looking pretty unphased as normal. Sean watched Jack pull three pieces of paper from his inside jacket pocket and place them on the table, each folded in thirds. Sean sat opposite Jack and pushed a small jar of olives towards him, as if to say ‘your move first’. He watched Jack take a long drink of his beer and leant forward - poised.
‘It’s as bad as we ever thought,’ Jack began. ‘The Iranians have pretty much mobilised and we don’t know what’s coming next.’
‘Mobilised what?’ Sean asked, his curiosity piqued.
‘Their sleeper agents, and quite probably their hybrid-warfare plans.’
‘Christ, for a moment I thought you meant their entire military forces, tanks, air force, the lot.’
‘Well, this mobilisation is probably worse. There’s no doubting we can deal with them on a battlefield, but this is a mobilisation of their terrorist and sabotage arm, backed up with offensive cyber-capability – it really isn’t looking good at all.’
‘How do you know? Is this all the fallout from the President killing off the Iran nuclear deal?
‘Exactly right,’ Jack said, downing his beer. ‘I couldn’t have some water, could I?’
Sean sensed the stress level in Jack, despite knowing that he rarely showed it. He grabbed a carafe of water and poured some into two glasses. ‘Go on Jack – I can see the worry right there in your eyes.’
Jack smirked. ‘Put it this way: if I didn’t have a meeting later to try to scrape around for more intelligence I’d be staying and drinking plenty of red wine with you. It’s as high an alert as I’ve ever known in my entire career and D is demanding we go into overdrive and gather as much human intelligence as possible on their plans.’
‘Imminent strikes then?’ Sean suggested with a sigh. ‘What’s your thinking then? A cyber-strike on critical infrastructure or sabotage?’
‘I have no idea. Lots of people in the intelligence services thought it was all a myth that the Iranians had sleeper agents in the UK, but in The Court, we have collateral that they do. D is worried about that. Especially as the Russians may have coached them in this, and we’re not quite sure how much support they are giving to them. Now we have a number of incidents showing us that Department 15 is active in the UK too.’
‘Department 15? Who are they?’
‘Part of their Ministry of Intelligence and Security trained by Al Quds and Speznaz operators who could create havoc on European soil. Their specialism is assassination and terrorist attacks, of which we think there have been a few already.’
‘Hence the three pieces of paper Jack?’
‘Close Sean, but no cigar I’m afraid.’
‘OK, let’s get to the nub of this then Jack. What do you want me to do?’
‘Do you remember the Iranian woman you had a fling with?’
Sean sat bolt upright and looked behind him, throwing his head back in despair. ‘Jesus Christ Jack, is there nothing you don’t know about me?’
‘Very little Sean. But hey, treat this as it is. You are most probably the single best person within the entire UK intelligence service to get right in amongst what is happening right now. You never knew it at the time, but she is a high-grade MOIS intelligence agent, and a bloody dangerous woman.’
‘You can say that again Jack. Staggeringly dangerous. She messed with my mind and drove me insane.’
It was when Sean had been at his most vulnerable, and still a serving intelligence officer, that a stunning-looking Iranian woman had sat next to him on the Eurostar from Paris to London. A plant by the MOIS. And Sean was her target. Sean had been through hell after the death of his wife, Katy, the year before he was on that train and he was tumbling into deep hopelessness. The fling he had with an Iranian woman named Nadège was the launch pad for him being sacked from the service. A cold chill came over him as he remembered the wild parties, the crazy sex and the hold she had exerted over him at a dire time in his life. Deadly, he thought.
‘I need you to find her Sean. And I want you to turn her.’
‘You really are taking the piss now Jack. She fucked with my mind and nearly killed me off, never mind getting me sacked from the service. It was a short fling. I never even thought she’d been a spy. She was a model for fuck’s sake and I got properly suckered in by it all.’
‘Well, if it’s any consolation, we didn’t know until recently how high grade she is in the Iranian MOIS either. I have a Russian GRU source who has been running her as a double agent. Up to now we simply thought she was a lowly agent provocateur. But I’ve received verifiable information that she’s probably behind most of the British operations and a high-grade assassin too.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘There was a murder in Bosnia last month. A former mayor of Sarajevo. His best friend was a paid agent of ours and he told us how the Mayor was assassinated by Nadège and another woman. Both stunning females. Lulled to his death by beauty.’
‘OK. But where’s the link to the here and now? What's the link to the Iranian threat?’
Jack pointed to the pieces of paper.
Sean unfolded the first piece of paper that Jack had passed to him. It showed two photos of Nadège and a few paragraphs on her background. Sean read it in detail before glancing up to see Jack casually sitting back in his chair with his arms folded. Sean looked into Jack’s eyes, irritated by it all.
‘You really are taking the piss here Jack. What makes you think I can get her to turn? She’s an out-and-out murderer, has been for a while by the looks of it, and is motivated by her own narcissistic lifestyle I’d say. Wealthy, powerful and living the circuit with Britain’s elite.’
‘That’s what we all thought too. But I’ve been told by my source that she's been making mistakes and might be ripe for turning. I don’t know, but I want you to find out as much as you can about the current operations she’s running and get close to her. It could give us the intelligence we need to help stop the carnage that is being primed across Europe. My hunch is that only you can get close enough and it might take a while. But, in the meantime, you need to latch onto her and find out what she’s up to. Bring your team in as you need.’
‘She certainly seems to have kept a low profile for all these years having only just come to your attention.’
‘Yes, and we need to know more about her work. My source doesn’t have the full picture of what’s going on with her, but her direct connection to the Russians is worry enough for me. A lot of the information my source has given us has come second-hand. You know, GRU and SVR gossip and the like. Enough for snippets of information but not detailed intelligence – just broad information. I need you to get the detail. Hunt her down, connect with her again, use your skills and team to find out what she’s up to. And see if she might turn.’
‘For fuck’s sake Jack
. This is a non-starter,’ Sean said, annoyed by what seemed like a ludicrous mission. He scratched his unshaven jaw furiously. ‘It’s a suicide mission. She’ll know from the start who I am and what you’ve tasked me to do. Not a fucking hope mate. It’ll all go pear-shaped from the off.’
‘You’ll think of something Sean, I know you will. You always do. You had a connection with her. I seriously think she might turn if you play the right moves.’
‘Very fucking funny Jack.’
Sean was annoyed but studied Jack’s face quizzically. How the hell does he always know everything about my life, he thought? Sean stood up and walked to the back door leading to the veranda. He waved an arm and asked Jack to follow, grabbing a bottle of his finest red wine from the rack on the wall. Jack brought the glasses.
The view from the deck was stunning. A small trestle table with two canvas chairs gave a perfect line of sight straight down the Mongia valley, with coniferous forests looming large in the sky. Buzzards flew high above, circling for their prey. Another ruse, Sean thought casually. He was dipping his toe in and didn’t like what was coming at him.
Sean popped the bottle of wine, knowing Jack couldn’t resist a good red and that his stress levels were so highly primed now that he surely wouldn’t refuse. The sound of silence broken by the occasional twittering of birds was inspiring. They sat and drank, saying nothing for a good five minutes. Taking a moment in time. A lull before an impending storm. Both sensed the gravity of what was about to come.
‘I suppose,’ Sean began. ‘I suppose you have more than you’re telling me. What’s the hidden part? Whilst I trust you to a small degree Jack, you lot are a bunch of treacherous bastards and I need to make sure I’m not being set up for a fall again.’
‘Nothing hidden at all,’ Jack replied, pushing the second piece of paper across the table. ‘I don’t know enough myself to plot this one out yet. I need you to get me more. I haven’t got a clue on the extent of the sleeper threat. That’s why I need you to get me actionable intelligence that’s far clearer than I have right now – and something I can move on.’
The Kompromat Kill Page 5