Tracers

by Adrian Magson

  ‘You must have got to know him very well,’ said Harry.

  ‘I suppose. I was told to stay detached, but it wasn’t that simple.’

  ‘Would he have followed your instructions on security matters?’

  She nodded. ‘When we were alone, yes. I couldn’t tell him what to do with the others around, though. Apart from being unacceptable because I was a woman, it would have blown my cover. I had regular one-on-one review sessions with him about what to do if there was an attack and the guards were overcome. He thought it was all a bit unlikely, but he never questioned it. It was for his benefit and survival, after all.’

  ‘How was it,’ said Harry carefully, ‘that Rafa’i had your mobile number? The one he wrote on the wall.’

  She thought back, then said, ‘He asked me for it one day. We’d been talking about London and England, and he said if he ever came to the UK, and I was back here, he’d give me a call. I didn’t think anything of it because it was never going to happen. I mean, we were hardly in the same social circle, right? Anyway, I gave it to him because I couldn’t see any reason not to. It was one of the few normal things to happen. Everything else was . . . unreal.’

  ‘Has he tried to call?’ Harry queried.

  ‘No. Why would he?’

  ‘Because he clearly intended to. Why else write the number down?’

  ‘I can’t answer that.’

  ‘Maybe he was psyching himself up,’ suggested Rik. ‘Remember, he might have thought you were dead, too.’

  ‘Or that you’d got out in the nick of time,’ said Harry. When Joanne looked sharply at him, he added, ‘Think about it: your trusted bodyguard leaves your side for an unscheduled meeting and suddenly the world comes crashing in around your ears. In a situation like that, what would you think?’

  She didn’t say anything.

  ‘Would you recognize him among a crowd?’

  ‘Of course. Why?’

  ‘Because you might have to if you ever want to live a normal life.’

  Her eyes grew wide at the thought, and the silence in the room lengthened. Then she said, ‘How do you plan to make that happen?’

  Harry stood up. ‘There’s only one way. You’re going to help us find him.’ He glanced across at Rik. ‘I’ll go out and check the street.’

  Dog was surprised when he saw Harry Tate appear at the front of the building, and slid down in his seat. He was sure the man wouldn’t see him, not from there. But he didn’t want to take the chance of light flashing off his face and giving away his position.

  He watched Tate stroll by on the other side and wondered what had made the former MI5 man come out here. Maybe he suspected someone was close by. He was beginning to think that Jennings had made a mistake using this man. He was already causing problems and plainly had highly developed instincts for survival. Dog was certain he’d done nothing to blow his cover, but the only sure-fire thing in his line of work was that fate had a talent for proving you wrong.

  He switched his gaze to his wing mirrors and watched Tate stop and turn, his figure outlined by the garish neon of a store window further along the street. Then he began to retrace his steps, head turning to scan the shadows.

  Dog gave a cold smile, recognizing the signs. This one’s a hunter. He knows what he’s doing. He slid his hand into his jacket pocket and touched the comforting shape of his knife. He drew it out and snicked open the blade, laying it alongside his leg.

  Tate walked by, unaware of his presence. Dog felt the thrill of the chase skimming through his veins. He waited until Tate was thirty yards away, then opened the car door and slipped out, closing it again without a sound. The interior light stayed off; he’d removed the bulb earlier.

  Dog hadn’t stalked anyone this way in a long while, and enjoyed the renewed rush of excitement it brought him. It made him feel almost light-headed. The sounds and smells were heightened, the slight metallic tang of dampness was sharp in the air, and the distant rumble of late traffic carried an almost startling clarity. He breathed easily, padding along in his quarry’s wake, his rubber-soled shoes leaving no sound for Tate to pick up on.

  He ran his thumb along the top of the knife blade. This wasn’t part of his brief, not yet. But sometimes opportunity presented itself, a once-and-only fruit for the picking that was too good to pass up. He picked up his pace, sticking close to the buildings, his breathing coming faster as he closed in on his target.

  Then a car swung round the corner behind him and lit up the street with the glare of its headlights. Shit!

  At the same moment, no doubt alerted by instinct, Tate began to turn his head.

  Dog threw himself into the doorway of a charity shop, rolling into a ball. The car drove by, and Dog pulled his legs up to his chest, adopting the stance of a rough sleeper. The light washed over him, penetrating every crevice of the doorway, but if the occupants of the car had noticed him, they evidently saw nothing to be alarmed about.

  Dog waited, knowing his opportunity had gone, and let out his breath in a long, bitter flow of disappointment. So close.

  There would be another time, he told himself. Very soon.

  THIRTY-ONE

  After a fitful night’s sleep, with Harry on the sofa and Rik giving Joanne his bed in favour of a sleeping bag in one corner, the two men shared coffee in the kitchen and discussed their next moves.

  ‘We may have a problem,’ Rik announced quietly. They could hear the shower hissing from the bathroom and both men were keen to do nothing to alarm Joanne.

  ‘Only one?’ Harry muttered. ‘I call that a good start.’

  Rik gestured towards the front window. ‘I looked out there during the night, about three. We had a watcher. Bloke in a car down the street. He moved, otherwise I wouldn’t have seen him. When I checked half an hour later, he’d gone.’

  Harry took a bite of toast. ‘Could be we’ve popped up on somebody’s radar.’ He explained about the man he’d seen before, sitting in a car tucked behind a market van. ‘I thought he was a local cop or a public health inspector. Now I’m not so sure.’

  ‘You think somebody’s on us?’ Rik looked surprised.

  ‘I’m only guessing. It could be a coincidence. But the man I saw was definitely watching somebody.’

  ‘Joanne?’

  ‘Or Silverman . . . Rafa’i – whatever his name is. Bound to be. After what she told us, nothing would surprise me.’

  ‘What do we do?’

  ‘Talk to Jennings. He got us on to this situation. He’ll have to get us out.’

  ‘And Joanne?’

  ‘What about me?’ The shower had stopped but the fan was still running in the background. Joanne was standing in the doorway, her hair still damp. It was clear she had been listening, although they didn’t know for how long.

  She looked tired but determined, and was fully dressed and ready to go, with her rucksack in one hand. The side of her jacket bulged out with the weight of her handgun.

  Rik told her about the watcher during the night. ‘It’s possible someone made a connection with us going to your place. If it’s the person who killed your friend, they’ll have worked out by now that they made a mistake and got the wrong person.’

  Joanne frowned. ‘But they might not know I’m here. I should leave.’

  Harry scowled at her. ‘Forget it. We don’t know who it is yet. He could be totally unconnected. If he pops up again, we can go out and ask him. We’re just discussing possibilities.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Like what to do with you in the meantime.’ He explained about Jennings, and how the lawyer’s office would be the logical place to start. ‘Problem is, we don’t know who got him to hire us in the first place. It obviously wasn’t the Israelis, but that still leaves a big field of possibilities. Finding Silverman was just one of three jobs; we just handled the tracing bit. Like Silverman, the other two seemed fairly ordinary, but they both ended up dead.’ He paused. ‘There’s still no reason to suggest the other two were conn
ected with Silverman, but they could have been a useful smokescreen.’

  Joanne frowned. ‘What for?’

  ‘To cover something they didn’t want anyone to see. The first two jobs could have been slush; real enough, but testing the water. Silverman was the one they were really after.’

  Rik glanced at him. ‘You reckon?’

  ‘I was thinking about it last night.’ Harry looked at Joanne. ‘Normally, when we locate a runner we call it in and wait for instructions. We don’t get involved further. Our job is to confirm the find first. Then we verify the location and bug out, leaving it for someone like the cops to handle. But these jobs were different. With the first one, a man named Matuq, I called it in and was told to stand by for instructions. I saw muzzle-flashes coming from the house, and when I went back he was dead. With the second, Param, he asked for some time so he could write to his parents and explain what he’d done. We called it in and when we went to check he hadn’t bunked off, he was dead, too.’

  ‘And when Harry tracked down Silverman,’ Rik added softly, ‘or Rafa’i, I should say, somebody nipped in quick and did the same thing. Only they missed the main man. Or took him with them.’

  ‘And then there was you.’ Harry looked at Joanne.

  ‘But I’m not a . . . what do you call them – a runner.’

  ‘But you’re connected to someone who was.’

  Joanne returned his stare. ‘Have you told this Jennings person that you’d found me?’

  ‘We had no reason not to. You were a useful lead. Sorry.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘We told him your address, he told us to leave it, job done. We went back instead. The rest you know.’

  She frowned, eyeing them both. ‘Why did you do that?’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Go back? Why did you go back to the flat?’

  The two men exchanged glances, before Harry said, ‘Instinct. It didn’t feel right, leaving it after all the chasing around. We wanted to see it through.’ He gave a cheesy smile. ‘We’re conscientious like that.’

  Her scepticism showed in the tilt of her head. ‘Right. You departed from procedure because you felt like it.’

  ‘We don’t follow any “procedure”. We work our own way. It’s called having a free will.’

  She nodded, accepting the logic. ‘Whatever. I owe you both. Thank you.’

  ‘So what does all this tell us?’ Harry asked of nobody in particular.

  ‘Someone’s been watching us all along.’ Rik’s reply was unequivocal.

  Harry agreed. He’d felt something on the way to South Acres; something strong enough to make him stop. And he’d been right. The biker at South Acres must have already been on his way in even as he was about to call Jennings. Yet the killer couldn’t possibly have known about the place unless he was watching Harry.

  ‘Makes you wonder who gave him the order to go in,’ Rik mused. ‘And what would have happened if you’d still been there.’

  Nobody answered. There was no need.

  ‘Come on,’ said Harry. ‘Time to go out and face the lions and tigers and bears.’ He went to the hallway and checked his gun, aware of Rik’s surprised look, then led them out of the flat and down the stairs.

  The lobby was deserted. They left through the rear on to a small car park where Rik had acquired parking rights. He unlocked the Audi and they climbed aboard.

  ‘Should I stay down?’ said Joanne, settling into the back. Her manner was calm and focussed, as if having some kind of plan and following orders had restored her equilibrium.

  Harry shook his head. ‘No point. If they’ve tracked us here, they’ll know you’re with us. It might push them into revealing themselves.’

  Rik drove hard through the traffic, staying on the move and repeatedly changing direction. It was uncomfortable knowing they might be intercepted at any moment, but Harry was counting on the volume of traffic in broad daylight being cover enough to get where they were going. Even so, he checked the mirrors constantly, watching for signs of unusual interest or a repeat sighting of the same car on their tail.

  ‘Biker,’ he muttered at one point. A dark green Kawasaki was edging up on the outside, the rider enveloped in anonymous black. Since the killer had used a bike at South Acres, it wasn’t unreasonable to expect the same means might be used here in heavy traffic. It was fast, manoeuvrable and difficult to identify, and would be virtually impossible to follow in the aftermath of a shooting.

  A metallic click sounded from the rear seat and he glanced back at Joanne. She had eased her handgun from her pocket and slid it under her thigh. He said nothing. For her, the response was as instinctive as breathing; it was what she’d been trained for.

  The bike pitched up hard on their tail, held position for a moment, then blew past in a growl of exhaust, slipping through a gap which barely seemed to exist and streaking ahead before swinging down a side street. By the time they drew level, it was out of sight, leaving a trace of blue smoke hanging in its wake.

  Thirty minutes later, Rik drew in to the kerb a hundred yards along from Jennings’ office. There were a few pedestrians about and plenty of vehicle traffic as drivers used the quieter back streets to avoid the usual jams along the Marylebone Road.

  Rik climbed out and wandered along the street to check the front door, then strolled back and got behind the wheel. ‘Nobody in yet,’ he reported.

  ‘So what’s the plan?’ Joanne asked.

  Harry unfolded a newspaper. ‘We wait and watch,’ he said. ‘If he’s not already here, he’ll be along shortly. Then we’ll have a chat.’

  Time passed, during which Harry concentrated on a crossword and Rik handed Joanne a folder of papers to hold on her knee. If anyone took an interest, they were three people waiting for an appointment. In an area flush with consultants, doctors and all manner of advisers behind silver and brass nameplates, it was a common enough sight and would go unnoticed.

  ‘When this is all over,’ Rik ventured after a lengthy silence, ‘we could have a drink.’ He turned his head to look at Joanne.

  She returned the look steadily, while Harry concentrated on his crossword. As chat-up lines went, he decided, it was less than slick.

  ‘I’ll bear it in mind,’ Joanne replied neutrally. ‘Thanks.’

  Harry frowned and tapped the newspaper with his pen. ‘Twenty down,’ he read carefully. ‘“Calm conversationalist”. What’s that? Ah – I know: Smooth talker.’

  Rik scowled and said nothing, ignoring the sudden shaking of Harry’s shoulders.

  ‘Heads up.’ Harry put the paper to one side.

  It was fifteen minutes into their watch and a taxi was pulling in to the kerb outside Jennings’ office. Two men got out. They crossed the pavement, the one leading the way tall and broad-shouldered, with heavy brows over a craggy face. He was dressed in a smart suit and dark coat and was lighting a cigarette. He pressed the buzzer on the entry-phone to the side of Jennings’ front door. There appeared to be no answer, so he banged on the door, disposing of the cigarette with an irritable flick of his wrist.

  The second man was younger, stocky and wore a plain suit with no coat. He hung back slightly, surveying the street with a casual, almost uninterested glance before turning to scan the front of the building.

  Harry recognized the second man’s function. He was a minder, checking out the scenery. ‘Jennings has got an official visitor.’

  ‘Did he see us?’ Joanne’s view of the men had been obscured by a lamp post.

  ‘I don’t think so. We’ll soon find out.’

  There was a gasp from the back seat. The two men looked round. Joanne had moved to get a better view of the men, and was now staring through the windscreen, her body rigid and all colour draining from her cheeks.

  ‘What’s up?’ said Harry.

  ‘That man,’ she said softly, her voice trembling slightly. ‘The one in the dark coat. I’ve seen him before.’

  They both turned back to study the man
. ‘Where?’

  ‘In Baghdad.’

  THIRTY-TWO

  Harry leaned forward. The man was now in profile. He looked bullish and determined. His colleague had his eyes on an approaching car cruising for a parking space. ‘Are you sure?’

  Joanne pulled her rucksack across the seat and took out the framed photograph she had been so keen to hang on to. Turning it over on her knee, she took out a small knife and slid the blade through the backing sheet. Ripping away a section of the dark paper, she revealed a small square of black plastic taped to the inside. It had one corner cut off and a golden oblong in the centre.

  ‘It’s a memory card from a camera.’ Harry looked at Joanne for confirmation, remembering what she had told them about taking photos in Baghdad. ‘Is this from where I think it’s from?’

  ‘Yes. Can you get me to a chemist? One with a digital photo printer? Then I’ll show you.’

  ‘What about those two?’ Rik queried, gesturing towards Jennings’ office. ‘And Jennings?’

  Harry thought about it. ‘They can keep. I think Jennings has skipped, anyway. Let’s check this out first.’

  Ten minutes later, the three of them were in a pharmacy just off Great Portland Street, huddled round the monitor of a customer-operated digital photo-lab. Joanne slid the memory card into a slot, then tapped the screen when the pop-up menu appeared. She waited until rows of photo thumbprints appeared, then selected one by touching the screen.

  ‘Who are they?’ Rik queried. He bent to peer at the row of pictures. Most of the shots appeared to have been taken in an area flooded with bright light, the backgrounds all suggesting sandstone and bare rendering. The picture quality of one or two looked poor, but others were crystal clear.

  ‘Just people,’ Joanne replied shortly. She selected the number of copies and then hit PRINT and waited before retrieving the card from the slot. ‘I could get arrested for doing this.’ She looked at them in turn with a wry smile. ‘But then, you two would know that, wouldn’t you?’