The Apocalypse Fire (Ava Curzon Trilogy Book 2)

by Dominic Selwood

  “What did Durov want?” There was genuine concern in his voice now.

  “Seriously?” She looked at him directly. “If what I get up to is important to you, then you could’ve been at the Palazzo Malta with me yesterday, instead of…” She allowed the thought to trail off. It did not need saying.

  He sat back in his seat and looked away.

  Ava stared out of the window, instantly aware that she had to pull herself together. She did not like the way she was reacting. It was out of character, and she needed to get a grip on herself. If she had wanted Ferguson, she should have done something about it years ago. This was not his fault. It was not Mary’s either. In fact, she liked Mary – she was an impressive operator.

  She watched the bright white clouds gleaming below them, and knew she needed to sort this out in her head.

  She allowed her mind to wander to Ferguson, and to what exactly it was that was bothering her.

  She had thought about letting something happen between them – more times than she wanted to admit.

  But it never seemed straightforward.

  Years earlier, at university, an earnest – and, in hindsight, somewhat tedious – boyfriend had told her that she was cold. He laid out a whole theory about the invisible damage her mother had done by walking out while she was so young, and how not having a mother around had affected Ava’s emotional makeup.

  Ava had told him bluntly that he did not know what he was talking about, and the relationship had quietly died. But what he said had stung her – because he had been half right. She did not suffer from deep-seated abandonment issues. But what she had carried into adulthood was a profound sense of quite how much the break-up of her parents’ relationship had hurt her father. And that was not something she ever wanted to do to anyone.

  She watched the vapour trail of another plane in the distance, and realized that the situation was ridiculous. If she had not begun a relationship with Ferguson years ago because she was uneasy about the prospect of one day causing unhappiness, then being short with him now was absurd.

  She needed to reassess her thinking – and that now meant moving on. If Ferguson and Mary were an item, she had no right to get in the way.

  And anyway, after all this time, she could not blame him for having moved on.

  “Why Jerusalem?” Ferguson’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “How do you know the icon’s there?”

  Ava pulled herself out of her reverie, relieved to be able to focus on the job in hand again.

  She had stumbled across the missing piece of the puzzle while in the Vatican Library.

  “I saw a map of crusader Jerusalem in one of the books. On the map, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was called the Anastasis – the resurrection. I looked it up, and apparently that’s always been its name in the Orthodox tradition, ever since it was built in the fourth century.”

  “Makes sense,” he nodded. “So Rasputin would’ve known it as the Anastasis.”

  “And also, CITY OF SAINT PETER now fits, because it also means Jerusalem.”

  “Not Saint Petersburg?” He frowned.

  She shook her head. “I don’t think so. Not in this case. After Jesus’s death, Saint Peter became bishop of Antioch, then pope of Rome. But before then, in the dark days immediately after the crucifixion, Peter had a special status in Jerusalem. The Bible says that James – who was Jesus’s brother – led the group, assisted by Peter and John. But it also indicates that Peter was the real power behind the scenes. It says people deferred to him. He was even arrested by the Jewish religious police and dragged before the Sanhedrin to answer for the early Christians and their schismatic split from mainstream Judaism.”

  “So, the clues are nothing to do with Russia, then,” Ferguson replied.

  Ava shook her head. “What we’re looking for is down there.” She pointed out of the window at the approaching Israeli shoreline. “I’m certain of it.”

  Chapter 43

  Ben Gurion Airport

  Near Tel Aviv

  The State of Israel

  WHEN THE PLANE eventually landed just outside Tel Aviv, Ava and Ferguson disembarked quickly, and headed into the most secure airport terminal in the world. As usual, it was awash with some of the heaviest security Ava had encountered anywhere on the planet.

  At passport control, she answered the repetitive questions patiently and politely, fully aware that the profiling of each passenger passing through was a key element of the infamous and intensive security procedures.

  In the past, she would have requested to have the Israeli immigration stamp put onto a separate piece of paper so she could travel freely around the Middle East afterwards. But seeing as it was not her passport, she simply smiled as the guard inked the arrival stamp next to a random assortment of phoney holiday visas.

  Once through customs, the final set of doors slid back, and they emerged onto the arrivals concourse.

  It was bedlam.

  There were groups of adults and teenagers holding up signs in Hebrew, while others were waving blue-and-white Israeli flags as they welcomed arrivals off the plane. Scattered among them were groups of heavily armed soldiers and airport security teams with Malinois attack dogs.

  The scene was an incongruous mixture of joy and lethal force.

  As Ava headed into the crowds, she was suddenly aware of a woman approaching fast from the side.

  She tensed, before realizing it was Mary, who called out a hello to Ferguson.

  He waved back.

  Ava nodded amicably.

  Once out through the main doors and into the fresh air, Ava instinctively sensed her spirits rise as she felt the hot Middle Eastern sun on her face. After so many years in the region, anywhere from Israel to Iraq felt like her second home.

  “Keep smiling,” Mary instructed, as they headed towards the car park. “There’s surveillance everywhere here – cameras, plainclothes officers, and even unmanned combat vehicles.

  “Still,” she continued, as they passed through a patch of shade cast by overhanging metal sunscreens, “you’ll be grateful for these.” She unobtrusively handed them each a diminutive handgun. “Lots of people carry here, and it’s getting easier by the day while local tensions ramp up. Just keep them low-key. They’re not registered.”

  Ferguson glanced down at the distinctive weapon in his hand. “Taurus Curve.” He nodded appreciatively. “You’re spoiling us.”

  Ava was staring at Mary in amazement. “You’ve only been here a few hours. How on earth—”

  “It’s better you don’t ask,” Mary cut Ava off and shrugged. “The Church has had a presence on this soil for around two thousand years. A lot of regimes have come and gone. We’ve learned to look after ourselves.”

  Ava looked about at the high-security features all around them.

  She imagined the sense of siege had been similar for the Knights of Saint John and other medieval crusaders arriving from Europe. The only difference was, back then, the territory was a Christian country called Outremer – the Land Beyond the Sea.

  As she turned the corner of the building, someone collided with her, hard.

  She was suddenly back in the Paris Métro station – but this time she was ready.

  She spun round to confront the person, who had stopped dead in their tracks and was staring at her.

  To her shock, she recognized the face instantly.

  Uri.

  “You must have a death wish.” His voice was hard and aggressive.

  “Friend of yours?” Mary moved in beside Ava.

  “What a coincidence.” Ava glared at Uri. She had thought there was an outside chance he would be waiting for her. But it had still taken her by surprise.

  “Entering Israel on false papers is a serious offence.” He glanced from Ava to Mary. “You want to be more careful who you travel with.” He indicated Ava and Ferguson. “These two are dangerous.”

  “Time will tell.” Ferguson was smiling at Uri amiably, but Ava could see he was p
oised, absolutely still, ready, watching Uri’s every move. “Good to see you again.”

  The Mossad katsa focused back on Ava. “I thought I had been very clear. My organization is not happy with you.” He glanced at the passport and tickets in her hand. “Did you think that fake papers were going to keep you off the radar? There are facial recognition cameras all over this country.” He glared at her. “You’d better not be in Israel for anything to do with our Russian friend.”

  “I wouldn’t describe him as a friend, exactly,” Ava answered. “More of an acquaintance.”

  She did not buy his facial recognition camera story. Why would he have been looking out for her? Why today? On this flight?

  It was far more likely that someone had tipped him off.

  Before she could say anything else, he grabbed her by the arm. His grip was hard. “This time I won’t save your life.”

  She felt a surge of indignation.

  How dare he?

  “You’ve never saved my life.” Her voice was low and threatening. “And you need to take your hand off me.”

  It was not an idle threat.

  The tension with Ferguson, coupled with Uri’s sheer arrogance on the video call yesterday – and again now – was surfacing as hot anger.

  Uri was far stronger than her, and judging by his physique, he clearly kept in good condition. But she was furious enough to risk getting hurt if it meant she would have the satisfaction of taking him down a notch or two.

  He continued to stare at her coldly, then slowly released her arm, and stepped away. “I’m going to be keeping an eye on you.”

  “I look forward to it,” she retorted, the anger still simmering. She nodded at Ferguson, and set off in the direction of the car park, turning her back on Uri.

  His arrogance was insufferable.

  Keep his eye on her?

  She had no intention of leaving a trail for anyone to follow.

  Mary guided them to a black Hyundai Sonata, which beeped twice as she squeezed the key. “You two have history, or something?” she asked after a few moments’ silence as she steered the car out of the car park.

  Ava shook her head. “Our paths crossed once. And that was once too often for me.”

  Mary pointed at an open-backed United Nations truck up ahead. “Look – they get everywhere.” Inside were a dozen soldiers wearing Italian army uniforms and the blue berets of UN peacekeepers.

  Ava looked more closely, and – sure enough – under the Italian flags on the soldiers’ sleeves was the white eight-pointed cross of Malta on a red badge.

  “ACISMOM,” Mary explained. “The Army Corps of the Order of Malta. They serve alongside the regular Italian army. And here they are, in Israel, over a thousand years after they were founded in Jerusalem.”

  Mary slowed and filtered into the queue for the car park’s exit barrier.

  “Airport surveillance will have registered our licence plate.” Ava was looking about for cameras. “We’ll need to ditch this car.”

  Chapter 44

  Donetsk

  Donetsk People’s Republic (unrecognized)

  Ukraine

  BY THE BANKS of the Kalmius river, in a run-down northern quarter of Donetsk, Sergei Glinin looked down at the body in the car.

  The unbroken ring of livid bruising around the man’s neck did not leave much doubt about the cause of death.

  As chief of the city’s Security Department, Glinin had seen a lot of corpses.

  Ever since the regional unrest had kicked off a few years earlier, the city had been a warzone. Emotions ran high over the breakaway region’s rejection of Ukrainian identity and its new collaboration with Russia. Things were quieter now than at the height of the tension, but tanks and troops were still on the streets.

  Glinin had no interest in run-of-the-mill homicides. There were plenty of other people to deal with those. What mattered to him was the security of the fledgling republic – and that especially included the activity of any foreign intelligence agencies.

  He glanced at the nervous sergeant standing beside him. From what he had passed on to Glinin over the telephone an hour earlier, the corpse in the car was someone Glinin needed to know about.

  The victim was Zayd Jamoussi – a Tunisian national.

  The car was parked in an area well known for the after dark availability of sex and drugs, and Jamoussi was not the first – and would not be the last – to fall victim to the city’s vice trade.

  Glinin looked down at the body.

  Maybe it was an opportunistic robbery gone wrong? Perhaps Jamoussi was connected with drug gangs? Maybe he had upset a prostitute, and her pimp had intervened? Who knew? These things happened.

  But whatever it was, Jamoussi was not just another tourist.

  Before calling Glinin, the sergeant had run a check on the grey Renault Logan’s number plate, and quickly learned that Jamoussi was staying at the Radisson in the centre of town. He had gone round to the hotel, but there had been nothing interesting in Jamoussi’s light luggage. He had a few clothes, a tourist map, and a return ticket to Istanbul for that evening.

  It was only when the hotel staff had opened the safe in Jamoussi’s room that the sergeant had decided to call Glinin. He knew when something was above his pay grade. In this case, a murdered man whose safe contained a Russian military document headed ОСОБОЙ ВАЖНОСТИ – Top Secret (Special Importance) – followed by a list of dates and grid references, and marked in the top right corner with some kind of stamp in Hebrew.

  He had reached for the telephone immediately.

  While Glinin had made his way to the murder scene, one of the sergeant’s junior colleagues had been in the hotel manager’s overheated office, going through the split screens of CCTV footage. It had only taken him around twenty minutes to find something interesting.

  The video feed showed that Jamoussi had only left his room twice since checking in. Once to visit a minimarket next door. Then later to go down to the hotel’s gym.

  As the young policeman stared at the grainy footage of the hotel’s fitness facilities, he noted that, in the gentlemen’s changing rooms, Jamoussi unhesitatingly took the third towel from the bottom of the fluffy pile on the bench. Intrigued, the policeman had scrubbed backwards in the footage. Sure enough, five minutes earlier, a wiry dark man could clearly be seen entering and placing something into that exact towel.

  A quick search of the hotel records had revealed that the dark man had checked in on an Israeli passport as Yehuda Hitzig. He had only stayed one night, and was now gone.

  Before leaving his office for the crime scene, Glinin had run Zayd Jamoussi and Yehuda Hitzig through the FSB mainframe database, and the results had been telephoned through to him as he was en route.

  Jamoussi was indeed Tunisian, and had flown in from Istanbul. He was firmly involved in the Syrian civil war as a known courier for one of the moderate groups in opposition to the government regime. Yehuda Hitzig, on the other hand, drew a blank. There was no one of that name reported anywhere. Not even on the airport or border control records entering or leaving the country.

  Glinin looked down at the dead body again, and then at the piece of paper from the hotel safe, now in his hand, safely sealed in a clear evidence bag.

  He exhaled slowly.

  He recognized a Russian military target list when he saw one. A quick grid reference check on his smartphone revealed that they were all in Syria.

  It was really going to hit the fan when he passed this up the line to Moscow.

  Worse, he was going to take some serious heat over it happening on his patch.

  He tucked the paper carefully into the pocket of his mac, and lit a cigarette.

  The whole business had Mossad’s fingerprints all over it.

  He inhaled the tobacco smoke deeply.

  At least he was not the only one who was going to get carpeted over this.

  With the mood Moscow was in at the moment, he would not be surprised if this tipped
the Kremlin over the edge into picking a fight with Israel, too.

  Chapter 45

  Route 1 (westbound)

  The State of Israel

  AS MARY DROVE out of the airport complex, Ferguson was sitting in the back seat.

  He spotted the blue Volvo first, four cars behind. He would not ordinarily have noticed it, except that it was one of the few cars leaving the airport with no passengers.

  “Uri’s tailing us,” Ferguson announced, once they had taken two turnings and the Volvo was still behind them.

  Ava’s heart sank.

  This was something she could do without. The last thing she needed was to wind up in a Mossad basement somewhere before she had even got to Jerusalem.

  “You would have thought he had better things to do,” Mary said distractedly, turning off the slip road and onto the highway. “Rumour has it the IDF have lost an M270 multiple launch rocket system.”

  “How do you lose an MLRS?” Ferguson sounded incredulous.

  “God knows.” Mary eased back into her seat as the car hit cruising speed on the highway. “Somewhere up in the Golan Heights, apparently. It’s the Wild West up there these days.”

  Ava was looking out of the window. The scenery around them was flat and grassy, with occasional fir trees and houses breaking up the identical view on either side of the road.

  “Where can we get another car?” Ava asked. “This one’s going to be in every law enforcement database in the country by nightfall.”

  “Nazareth,” Mary answered. “It’s about an hour and twenty minutes north of here, with friendly people who can help us.”

  Ava was looking at the map she had found in the glove compartment. “Meanwhile, let’s lose our tail. Head west on Route 1, direction Tel Aviv.”

  “Isn’t that the wrong way for Nazareth?” Mary sounded uncertain.

  “Exactly.” Ava turned the page to check all options.

  “Why Nazareth?” Ferguson asked from the back seat.

  “Home to Israel’s largest community of Christians,” Ava answered, unfolding the next section of the map. “The Christian communities here are ancient. After the Romans banished all Jews in AD 135, this country was effectively Roman, and its citizens converted to Christianity when it became the state religion of the Roman Empire. Despite the Muslim conquest in AD 638, there have been pockets of Christians here ever since.”