by Tom Wood
The killer, watching from nearby, would have seen Victor enter the hotel. If he did not see the explosion soon he might work out what had happened. Victor couldn’t allow that. He unplugged the TV, cut the lead from the back of the set, and stripped off the plug, leaving him with three feet of cable. He unplugged the room’s phone and moved it closer to the door. He then tore off the phone’s plastic exterior and attached the wires at the end of the TV cable leading to those inside the phone. The other end he attached to the detonator after carefully removing the original wires. When everything was secure, he plugged the phone into the socket next to the TV.
When the phone rang, the electricity passing through its wires would blow the detonating charge. The plastic explosive would follow. Victor quickly gathered his things and left. He didn’t have time to waste.
He had a call to make.
Even in the middle of the night the various bars and cafés that lined the street were still open and busy, Cypriots and tourists having a good time. Reed sat at a table outside one of the least-raucous establishments, quietly sipping from a tall glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. He had a book on the table before him that he hadn’t read but that helped explain his unsociable presence. He knew the waitress still wondered why he had been sitting there most of the evening, but this time tomorrow Reed would be back in England enjoying a large glass of Hennessy Ellipse Cognac.
From where he sat he could see the dark rectangle that was the window to Tesseract’s room. Reed’s pulse was three beats per minute higher than normal as he waited for the big bang. He was expecting it soon since only minutes earlier he had watched Tesseract arrive back at the hotel. That he had no other name to call his prey caused a small measure of annoyance to Reed. Rebecca Sumner had been unable to tell him despite his considerable efforts to convince her to. In the end he believed her that Tesseract had refused to tell her his real name. Which was fitting he supposed. Men like Tesseract, like himself, did not have real names.
He had asked her other things as well. How old was he? What was his history, his training, his background? Reed liked to have such information about his targets, and even more so when a target was a fellow professional killer of obvious, if in no way comparable, skill. The dossier his employers had provided on Tesseract was woefully inadequate, and Reed took no pleasure in killing people he felt he did not properly know. Alas, she had not been able to tell him anything aside from the barest of details, nothing of significance he had not already known. She had not lied. People never lied to Reed. He was most persuasive.
The shockwave ruffled his shirt and made his ears pop. Glass rained down on the street. Bricks punched through windshields of parked cars. Flames spewed from the blasted-out windows. Thick smoke billowed into the night sky.
Reed closed his eyes and pictured the delicious moment when the light switch would have been flicked and the flesh stripped from Tesseract’s obliterated bones. It would have been quite a sight, Reed was sure, even if he had never been comfortable using bombs. They went against his doctrine as an assassin. They were too obvious, too indiscriminant, with too much chance of collateral damage. They were the weapon of a terrorist, not a contract killer of unparalleled ability.
The initial stunned silence that followed the blast was quickly replaced by hysteria. Another one of the deplorable side effects of explosive devices. They had a nasty habit of upsetting bystanders. Around him everyone was on their feet, staring, pointing, some screaming. He was pleased to see that the falling debris had injured no one on the street, though if anyone was unfortunate enough to be walking past the room’s door when the bomb went off, they would have been disintegrated. At least they would have died instantaneously. No suffering. That mattered to Reed. The adjacent room would also be demolished, but there had been no guests next door. Reed had checked first. He never killed innocents unless it was unavoidable. He was a professional, not a psychopath.
It had been just enough C-4 to guarantee ripping Tesseract into countless unrecognizable chunks and sufficient accelerant to make certain both sets of remains were incinerated. That had been the unmovable stipulation from the client. He wanted absolutely no traces. With limited time and resources, and with an accomplished adversary to consider, Reed had no choice but to use explosives and fire to make the bodies unidentifiable.
Reed took a moment to finish his drink before standing. There was no way Tesseract could have survived a blast of such magnitude, so Reed’s work was complete and another worthy scalp added to his already-impressive résumé. It was lamentable that it was such a good trap that his prey would never have known he had walked straight into it. The Englishman collected the book and the newspaper and left an especially generous tip.
He made his way through the shocked crowds outside the hotel, walking slowly, enjoying the warm night air in a charming city, unaware he was not the only person on the street unconcerned by the blast.
SIXTY-SIX
Arlington, Virginia, U.S.A.
Friday
12:30 EST
Ferguson sat chewing quietly at a corner table in the lounge of his gentleman’s club. He was enjoying his favorite meal, a steak tartare accompanied by a large glass of Burgundy. He had his phone switched to silent so that he could eat his food without interruption. Growing older Ferguson had discovered he preferred to do more and more things alone. Too much of his life had been spent in the company of idiots for him to waste his remaining years. He particularly liked to eat by himself without having to chat business or banalities between swallows.
His phone flashed, but Ferguson ignored it. The club was mostly empty, just a handful of retirement-age men like himself spread throughout the grand mahogany-paneled room. There was a huge real fire roaring in the marble fireplace set into one wall. The club was his personal retreat, and he had been frequenting it for nearly two decades watching the other faces grow older, the waistlines wider, and the conversation quieter.
Ferguson felt tired. He hadn’t been sleeping that well. He maintained a persona of utter calm, and for the vast majority of the time that calm was genuine, but there were occasions when his interior was not quite as steady as his exterior led people to believe. With so much at stake and playing so close to the line it was hardly surprising.
It almost defied belief that Tesseract had managed to stay alive so long. But, Ferguson reasoned, in his own past he had received his fair share of good fortune with operations, so he supposed it was only natural to have such bad luck with this one.
Ferguson placed another piece of uncooked meat into his mouth and chewed. He hoped that it was only a matter of time before Tesseract and Sumner were dead, and, once he no longer had to worry about some assassin who refused to die, he could look forward to a very rosy retirement. Just so long as he got his hands on that flash drive.
Sitting on the bottom of the seabed was at least a hundred million dollars worth of technology. Ferguson was so close to being rich beyond his wildest dreams he could taste it. So far he had simply been unlucky, that was all. Ferguson was sure of it. The tartare steak was difficult to swallow.
His phone flashed again, and Ferguson saw Sykes’s name on the screen. The gutless fool had been trying to get through to him all morning. It was obviously something important, or in Sykes’s mind important, but Ferguson wasn’t in the mood to hear about another screwup just yet.
If anything else went wrong, Ferguson would be having some more difficult nights. Should everything be wrapped up cleanly, there would still be all that came before it to tidy up too. Even if Alvarez ended up nowhere, Chambers and Procter wouldn’t simply let things lie. As much as Ferguson disliked them, Procter in particular, he was painfully aware that the fat fuck and anorexic bitch were shrewd and determined individuals.
With Procter’s great big nose sniffing around, Ferguson knew he was going to have to draw this thing to a resolution with absolutely no loose threads. Otherwise Procter would keep tugging away until the whole thing was pulled apart. The o
nly way to put the issue to bed was if someone took the heat for hiring Tesseract. There had to be a bad guy.
A conversation a few decibels on the wrong side of rude interrupted his thoughts. He looked up to see Sykes arguing with the maître d’. Ferguson sighed and gestured for Sykes to be allowed to pass.
Ferguson made a point of eating and not looking at him as Sykes took a seat opposite. A file dropped onto the table.
“Merry fucking Christmas.”
“I beg your pardon.”
Ferguson glanced upward to see Sykes’s smiling features. His face looked like it belonged in an ad for a range of male grooming products for the not-so young and not-so good-looking.
“Christmas has come early,” he announced. “It’s over.”
“What?”
“It’s over.” Sykes declared again
The sixty-seven-year-old heart inside Ferguson’s chest started to beat faster. “He’s dead?”
Sykes’s face stretched even further. “Blown to fucking smithereens.”
“Sumner?”
“Dead too. Reed got them both. There’s not enough left of either to identify. Nothing will come back to us. Ever.”
Goose bumps rose down Ferguson’s back. “Thank God,” he said, joining Sykes with a smile of his own. “That boy is worth every penny. I do hope Her Majesty appreciates his skills.” He paused for a moment to enjoy the sweet taste of victory. “I was almost concerned there for a moment.”
Sykes laughed. “You’re telling me. My heart’s been in my mouth for over a week.”
“Relief feels good, doesn’t it, Mr. Sykes?”
“Fuck, yeah. But it gets better.”
“He has the drive?” Ferguson asked, excitement in his voice.
Sykes nodded. He pointed at the file.
Ferguson raised his eyebrow and his forehead wrinkled. He reached for the file. “Already?”
Sykes nodded. “I’ve been trying to get hold of you for hours. I had plenty of time to sort it.”
Ferguson discreetly opened the file and glimpsed the sonar pictures inside. “Where is it?”
“About eighty miles off the coast of Tanga, Tanzania,” Sykes explained in a low voice.
The veteran CIA officer thought for a few moments. “You’ll need to be on the soonest possible flight out. I’ll think of some reason for you to visit the embassy on my behalf.”
The reluctance in Sykes’s face was obvious. “You want me to go personally?”
Ferguson nodded. “There have been far too many mistakes made on account of using third parties already. I need you there.” The subtle but flattering appeal worked instantly. Ferguson could see Sykes warming to the idea. He continued. “Take a couple of divers—some former SEALs based on the Continent shouldn’t be too hard to find.”
“I gathered a list of suitable personnel some time ago,” Sykes said with seeming nonchalance but lashings of thinly disguised smugness.
“Very good,” Ferguson said. “Plan for them to meet you there and brief them only when you’re on the boat. Enough money should allay any reservations they might have about agreeing to a mission before they have all the facts.”
“Okay.”
“And let’s make sure we know enough about them so that, should it be necessary, we can arrange for some unfortunate accidents to befall them, of the Reed variety.” Sykes nodded, but a little uncomfortably. “And once you have everything organized it’s time we started contacting potential buyers so we can make the sales as soon as possible. The longer we have those missiles in our possession, the more at risk we’ll be.”
“I’ll sort it.”
“Good man.”
Sykes started to rise.
“Ah,” Ferguson began, “given this last week’s unfortunate events I think it would be wise if we cross off any Western buyers from the list.”
Sykes sat back down. “Excuse me?”
“To be on the safe side,” Ferguson assured. “It’s best if we sell the missiles outside of Europe or the continental U.S.”
“But the whole point was to sell them to the Pentagon. Our country will pay more than anyone by far.”
Ferguson took a sip of wine. “Things have changed,” he said. “It’s too risky now. It was always going to be extremely difficult to deal with our own country and remain undetected, and that was before that massacre in the middle of Paris went down. We have Alvarez sniffing around like a bloodhound and spreading suspicion that this whole thing might be an illegal op as it is. What do you think will happen when we send an invoice to the military? And if we sell them in Europe our people over here will hear about it pretty fucking quickly too. Best we stick to other parts of the world only, I think.”
“What other parts of the world? No North America, no Europe—Russia and China’s already got them—the only countries left who would want them are in the Middle East or North Korea.”
Ferguson took a sip of wine and nodded.
“Whoa, hold on a minute,” Sykes said, leaning forward. “Now you’re talking about selling arms to rogue states or fucking terrorists. That’s as good as painting a bull’s-eye on our nation’s back. Fuck that. I’m not having the sinking of one of our carrier fleets on my conscience. I’m no traitor; I love my country.”
Ferguson frowned. “Mr. Sykes, may I remind you those missiles can be used in anger against us already, whether we sell them or not. And, let me tell you, this planet would be far more stable if America loses some muscle mass.”
“That’s a rather unpatriotic view to take.”
“Try not to mistake your own lack of balls for patriotism, Mr. Sykes. I’ve spent my life fighting this country’s battles and had my blood spilled in the process, so don’t presume to lecture me on patriotism now.”
Sykes scoffed. “Spare me the hero speech.”
If they’d have been in private, Ferguson’s knuckles would have connected with Sykes’s excuse for a jaw.
“Hero speech?” Ferguson spat. “How dare you? I gave twenty-five years and my marriage to fighting the cold war so you could sit there sporting your polished veneers and designer face cream. This country is still alive because of men like me, men who went the extra mile just to shovel the shit no one else would go near.”
Sykes went to speak, but Ferguson cut him off. “But I’ve never considered myself a hero, not once, do you understand me? And I’ll tell you now, I went into that fight knowing I would have to wear my medals on the inside, that it would be whisky in place of parades and instead of a twenty-one-gun salute it would be being left to rot in some shitty corner of hell the average Joe didn’t even know existed. Keeping America safe has been my life, and it’s sucked me dry, consumed every waking moment of my life—of my existence.
“Then the cold war ends, and guess what happens? Hey, you’ve done it, you’ve won battle. It’s over. Your hand gets shook and your back gets patted and the thanks last as long as they take to give. And before long you’re forgotten, obsolete, a relic. You keep your job, but no one really wants you to do it anymore. Your expertise is worthless now because you actually won your fight. And what are you left with? No money. You got paid peanuts and didn’t care. You took the job because you loved your country. But what happens when you find your country doesn’t love you back? What do you have left?” He took a deep breath.
“I’ll tell you,” Ferguson said. “Nothing. That’s what. You’re surplus, a has-been. Old. You don’t speak Arabic; you speak Russian. What good are you now?”
Sykes’s shocked expression told Ferguson what he already knew, that he should have kept quiet. Ferguson grabbed his glass of Burgundy and took a big swallow.
“This isn’t about the money,” Sykes said eventually. “You were never going to sell those missiles to our military, were you? You want to get revenge. You want to get back at Uncle Sam for forgetting about you.”
Ferguson put his glass down. “That’s where you’re wrong. I don’t care enough about my country anymore to want revenge. This i
s about the money. I want to be reimbursed for all my years of loyal service when I did care.”
“Well, I’m not helping you do it if it means selling those missiles to fucking North Korea or worse.”
“That’s where you’re wrong again, Mr. Sykes. You’re going to do exactly as you’re ordered to the absolute best of your abilities. Do you know why? Because you’ve been party to multiple murders. American citizens are dead thanks to you, or had you forgotten? The only way out of this is through lethal injection.”
Sykes glared hard at Ferguson.
Ferguson drained the last of the wine. “Don’t look at me like that, Mr. Sykes. Once you’ve sold your soul to the devil you can’t then ask for it back.”
SIXTY-SEVEN
Nicosia, Cyprus
Saturday
02:59 CET
Exercise always cleared his head and focused his mind. The simple pleasure of physical exertion was one that most people did everything in their power to avoid. Reed could not understand that, but he could not understand most people anyway. He grunted. He had his toes resting on his room’s high bed to increase the resistance of his one-arm pushups. He breathed hard. Sweat dripped from his nose.
His Smartphone flashed, breaking his concentration and interrupting his rhythm. He squeezed his eyes shut to regain his focus, determined only to stop for death itself. Training was about beating his body with his mind, and with a body so perfectly honed it was never easy.