Avenger

by Chris Allen

  “She was an analyst but that’s not the half of it. She’s a graduate of Johns Hopkins University – international studies, specializing in human trafficking. After college she joined the United Nations Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking, deployed to all of their key centers out here – China, Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam; you name it. After that she was with the Rapid Response Unit for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. From OHCHR she got snapped up by Interpol and worked as a criminal analyst in the Washington office. All that time she’s been involved with Johns Hopkins in a thing called the Protection Project – it’s not-for-profit, human rights, that kind of stuff. She’s no dummy and, so far, she’s doing well on this job.”

  Sutherland was obviously impressed by her. Morgan wasn’t convinced.

  “She sounds like an academic, not an operator,” he said. “One of those typical UN types – deploy to the Third World, earn a packet, but never set foot outside your fucking air conditioning. How did the boss find her?”

  “He attended a human rights conference that this Protection Project was hosting. Reigns made a presentation and impressed the hell out of him. Before you know it, here she is – our latest recruit in the field on her first solo job.”

  “Sounds like tokenism if you ask me. The old man’s getting soft and we end up babysitting,” Morgan replied sourly. After some final adjustments to his tactical equipment, he picked up his coffee cup and dropped into a chair within the room’s large bay window. Victoria Harbour and the Hong Kong skyline stretched out behind him, with the CMA CGM Jules Verne, one of the largest container ships in the world, in view.

  “Jesus! What’s got into you, bud? Sounds like you’ve got an issue with this girl and you haven’t even met her yet.”

  “Don’t worry about me, Dave,” Morgan replied, annoyed. He drank some coffee. “I just want to get through this one and take some down time. That’s all. The sooner it’s done the better.”

  “OK, well, trust me when I tell you, you’ve got nothing to worry about with Reigns. She’s good.”

  “If you say so. When do we start moving?”

  “We could get a call any minute. You all set?”

  “I’m all set,” replied Morgan, sensing unease in Sutherland’s tone.

  “How much do you know?”

  “Not much,” Morgan replied truthfully. “I received a mission summary from headquarters and read it inflight, but it was just the headline stuff.”

  At this point, all Morgan knew was that he and Sutherland were on standby to extract Reigns, potentially under hostile circumstances if things went south. Morgan and Sutherland had been dispatched together on similar missions before. They were a good team and General Davenport used them as his primary extraction team, as and when required. So, other than it being hazardous, Morgan knew next to nothing about Reigns’ operation here, or who they might be up against if they had to get her out in a hurry.

  “We’re currently in the middle of phase one of a major operation. This bit is all about finding a guy named Wu Ming. He’s a big-time crime figure in this part of Asia – drugs, weapons, prostitution, protection, you name it. The guy is a master at establishing legitimate businesses as smokescreens for his illegal activities while remaining a ghost. He’s been getting away with it for years.”

  “Why haven’t HKPD done anything before now?”

  “They’ve been trying but he’s too well connected. One of those guys who everyone knows is neck deep in bad shit, but somehow never gets his hands dirty in public. They haven’t been able to pin anything on him. He’s believed to be heavily into the slave trade, although HKPD couldn’t prove it, but that all changed when his name suddenly came up in a global human trafficking investigation being coordinated by the UN and Interpol which, as you know, includes your last job, Operation Usalama.

  “Basically, the Hong Kong cops were working with Interpol on some recent leads into a trafficking ring operating throughout Asia, and out of nowhere they had a breakthrough. Until recently, Wu Ming had only been suspected of playing a role in moving migrant labor in and out of Hong Kong, but then a former Kowloon business associate of his moved to the US and ended up charged with migrant smuggling violations by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, for illegally employing a foreign national in domestic duties. When ICE traced the background of the victim, a Filipino, it turned out she had originally entered the forced-labor cycle as a prostitute in a brothel known to be run by—”

  “Wu Ming?” said Morgan.

  “Correct. And that’s what brought him to the attention of the international authorities, and eventually us.”

  “Sounds like getting Al Capone for tax evasion,” Morgan said. “The line of least resistance.”

  “Something like that, but whatever works, right?” replied Sutherland. “The chance to establish a link between a major organized crime figure in Asia and the movement of migrants around the world for the purposes of exploitation was sufficient to get all the agencies talking to each other. Before the general sent me out here with Reigns, he told me that he wants to direct the entire operation, from bottom to top. Like I said, this Wu Ming lead is the strongest anyone’s got into what is believed to be a global cartel, so we’re going for it. Our objective is to find Wu Ming, confirm his identity, and follow the trail from him to the next link in the chain, who, apparently, is the ultimate target.”

  “Do we have any idea who that is?” asked Morgan.

  “I gather the general has his sights on someone big, a woman known as the Night Witch. She’s in the system but only under her alias. You know, one of those Blue Notices with a silhouette instead of a photo.”

  “Night Witch?” Morgan scoffed. “Very fucking helpful.”

  Interpol Notices were urgent alerts published by the General Secretariat and dispatched to the law-enforcement networks of member nations. They covered a wide range of issues and were color-coded to alert authorities instantly to the specific basis of the alert. A Blue Notice was issued to authorize the collection of additional information about a person’s identity, location or activities in relation to a crime.

  “The chief’s had a rocket up his ass about human trafficking ever since his meeting with the UN Secretary General a couple of months back, and he’s had the Intel geeks working round the clock to come up with an actual identity for this Night Witch. Once they’re done it’ll be no surprise if you, me or Reigns get handed the UN Security Council Special Notice “For Intrepid Action,” containing the name of the general’s new favorite candidate for rendition. Meanwhile, while the geeks are tapping away at their keyboards, the primary focus here on the ground is to substantively prove that Wu Ming is connected to the people traffickers, ideally the Night Witch. Once that’s done then phase two will begin and things will get serious.”

  “You’ll follow the trail from him to this Witch?”

  “Exactly.”

  “And how does Reigns fit into all this?”

  “So far as the police department here is concerned, Reigns works for Interpol and has been sent to Hong Kong to liaise with a guy named Inspector Victor Lam regarding a trafficking investigation. That’s all we’ve given them. Lam is acknowledged as HKPD’s foremost expert on these Triad guys and is therefore the perfect choice to assist her.”

  “What do we know about him, and how did she get him to cooperate without telling his superiors what we’re really doing here?”

  “Like I said, she’s good. She’s been cultivating him as a potential asset for some time, long before she was sent here, building up rapport and trust, using her previous Interpol role as cover. She had to convince him to work for us covertly, running the operation as if it was one of his own while keeping the operational details secret from HKPD. He took some convincing. He’s a solid guy, a by-the-book kinda cop, but she’s a pretty tenacious woman. The short version is that he arranged for her to get a job with one of Wu Ming’s supposedly legitimate front companies – a factory here in Kowloon, s
pecializing in fake designer clothes, light manufacturing, that kind of thing. They needed a book-keeper. The timing was perfect – they had a tip-off about the vacancy from one of Lam’s informants.”

  “Let’s just hope all this effort leads somewhere,” Morgan said, feeling he was stuck on a never-ending rollercoaster. Despite his general sense of mission fatigue, he was eager to get moving; he didn’t handle sitting around waiting very well at all. “How has this thing been running while Reigns has been on the inside?”

  “Lam holds covert meets with her – pre-scheduled before she was infiltrated. I stay well clear of the play, but occasionally check in with him by phone in lots of veiled speech to get the latest info she has passed on … ambiguous chat about my ‘niece,’ ‘Grandfather’ … you know the drill. She’s been inside for over a month, and until yesterday there’s been nothing to report. I was starting to think we were wasting our time here but the general was adamant we should stay the course for at least three months before re-evaluating. Things have just changed.”

  “Changed, how?”

  “Last night, Reigns activated her early-warning signal. We couldn’t send her in with one of our Gucci sat-phones with all the bells and whistles, so we came up with a standard, very simple digital distress flare – an eight-digit code: three-three-three-three-six-three-three-seven, which on a keypad corresponds to the word ‘defender’ – that she could tap out on the standard, albeit slightly enhanced, commercial cell phone she’s carrying. The code comes direct to me and, of course, the comms geeks back at headquarters in London.”

  “Meaning ‘Standby, something’s happened, and you may need to get me the fuck out of here?’” Morgan said.

  “Pretty much,” replied Sutherland. “She’ll probably need to extract within the next twenty-four hours. Now, she sent the code late last night, around eight pm. And if I know her, she sat on that decision for as long as she could before she decided to send it. That in turn prompted the general to pull you in from Tanzania. Hence, the late notice. I’m not expecting to hear anything from her again unless she actually needs to be extracted. Meanwhile, she has a scheduled meet with Inspector Lam at the Mong Kok Ladies’ Market this morning. It’s about twenty minutes’ drive from here, depending on traffic. If she shows as arranged at nine-thirty then all’s well. If not, Lam will contact me, and you and I will get our asses in the car, get into that goddamn sweatshop she’s been working in, find her and get her the hell outta there. Until then, we sit tight and wait.”

  “OK,” Morgan said, hoping they’d get the “all’s well” option rather than the alternative. He didn’t know how much fight he still had left in him.

  Sutherland’s cell phone buzzed. He checked the number. “It’s Lam,” he said to Morgan, then answered: “Go ahead.” Sutherland’s eyes remained fixed on Morgan as he listened.

  Morgan’s fists clenched and his right leg began to tap involuntarily as he watched Sutherland’s expression change from attentive to concerned. So, not the “all’s well” option then. Wordlessly, as Sutherland continued to listen, the two Intrepid agents left the room, heading for the hotel car park.

  CHAPTER 8

  Mong Kok Ladies’ Market

  Kowloon, Hong Kong

  Inspector Victor Lam sat chain smoking and drinking too much coffee. To any passerby, he was just an average middle-aged man, thin and unremarkable, with a thatch of gray-black hair, wearing a cheap dark blue suit, shiny from overuse and smelling of old tobacco. He sat balanced precariously on a rickety metal chair, shoulders hunched, outwardly unconcerned by anything going on in the vicinity. His appearance belied his mental state. He noticed everything.

  Lam’s eyes, hidden behind unfashionable sunglasses, were feverishly studying the scene before him. He’d been in the game long enough to know that there was never a time for complacency and his unexpected run-in with Chan that morning had unsettled him. Lam had seen too many friends and colleagues lose their lives as a result of a momentary lapse of attention and he wasn’t about to join them. Underestimating Chan and the power and reach of his associates would be a fool’s mistake. In circles inhabited by crooks and cops – and crooked cops like Chan – life was cheap. Killing was nothing more than a thrill for the apprentices of the criminal class in the Kowloon underworld and, for someone like Chan, arranging for some street kid to put a knife in Lam’s back would be no more significant than stubbing out the cigarette he’d helped himself to earlier. While Lam was in no hurry to die, the thing that had caused him the most anxiety about their encounter that morning was Chan’s reference to “his little girlfriend.” So, although to all outward appearance he was calm, Lam was at the very limit of his composure. The phrase “dead by lunch” kept playing over and over in his mind.

  Fat Freddy Chan, a chief superintendent of police. Christ! What a joke – a dangerous joke.

  Lam waited anxiously for the girl to appear. Their operation was blown, that was clear, and it was time to pull her out – but what if she didn’t show? What if Chan and his associates had already got to her? No, he wouldn’t contemplate it. That kind of thinking was bad for morale. Lam reassured himself that making the call to the Interpol contact and telling him about his run-in with Chan, emphasizing his superior’s exact words, had been the right thing to do. It wasn’t panic, it was a legitimate action because, despite his sloppy appearance and general uselessness as a police officer, Chan’s connection to the underworld made him dangerous. The Interpol man seemed to agree. His orders were clear – sit tight, Interpol officers were en route.

  Now all Lam could do was wait and pray that the girl arrived at the rendezvous on time and unharmed.

  With the disdain and cynicism that only a seasoned cop can muster, Lam took a moment to peruse his fellow citizens, crammed together in a corner of the market. He watched the various stall keepers and wondered what it would be like to only be concerned with selling souvenirs, or clothes, or fish. There was a young man painstakingly positioning dozens of pieces of imitation jewelry and fake designer watches across a table that looked like it was about to collapse under the weight of it all. He used the same care one would expect if they were the real thing. Beyond him, Lam saw a woman, older than the young man, fussing dutifully over colorfully embroidered ladies’ slippers, while another was coaxing some European tourists into buying a set of Chinese opera masks. Yet all these things were on the periphery of what he noticed.

  His observation cut through the minutiae of normal people’s lives, past the tedium of overspending tourists who waddled through the tight confines of the markets, struggling under the weight of their purchases. Lam saw straight through it all, to the secret drug deals, the standover men, the muggers and the thieves. They were all there in plain sight, right out in the open, alongside the tourists and stall keepers; local petty criminals honing their craft, together with the Triad try-outs striving to establish themselves in the junior hierarchy. Now, more than ever, he felt their number and proximity as if they were closing in around him. Were they? Fear flared in the pit of his stomach.

  Fuck, what a life, he mused, lamenting for a moment the path he’d chosen all those years ago. He stubbed out his cigarette and immediately lit another. Lam was a career cop – his background and upbringing made him a street cop. Born and raised in Hong Kong, he’d fought his way up from the streets of West Kowloon to the police academy and had been on the force for nearly thirty years. His rank was hard won, earning promotion through sergeant to inspector by actually solving crimes and locking up crooks. There were only two guys still left on the force from his class at the academy. One was Chan and the other was Assistant Commissioner Kwong. Meanwhile, Lam had been passed over for superintendent more times than he could remember. But that was the way he liked it. He was no careerist, never destined for the senior ranks. His place was here, on the street, being a real policeman. He couldn’t allow himself to be scared off by the likes of Fat Freddy Chan.

  He caught sight of a clock amid the clamor and act
ivity and rechecked his watch, praying that she’d be approaching any second now. If she was late, even by less than a minute, he’d have to presume the rendezvous had been compromised and abandon it. Today it was scheduled for 9.30am and, despite Chan’s unexpected visit, Lam had managed to get there ahead of time. He liked to be in place early so she could be sure that he’d be there, waiting for her.

  CHAPTER 9

  Dave Sutherland pushed the Range Rover hard along Princess Margaret Road, north toward Mong Kok.

  “Fuck!” he yelled. “She’s been sold out and we don’t even know if she’s still alive.”

  “And Lam was clear that the threat from this Chan guy was credible?”

  “A superintendent of police threatening that your contact will be dead by lunchtime’s pretty fucking credible, man.”

  “And we can’t call her?”

  “No, it would break protocol. All we can do is get as close as we can to the factory in Mong Kok and hope that she makes the meet with Lam in—” Sutherland checked his watch, “—thirteen minutes. If she doesn’t, then we’re going in.”

  Both men had discarded their jackets and were wearing the HKPD-issue police vests. They were hurtling at breakneck pace down the highway, weaving in and out of the three lanes crammed with vehicles, past advertising billboards covering high-density developments, and through the sweeping bend around King’s Park as they prepared to exit. They raced beneath a pedestrian overpass; a banner that read If You Drink, Don’t Drive in English and Chinese was lashed to the railings. On the left Morgan saw a Caltex and a Shell petrol station positioned end-to-end just ahead of a big blue sign that indicated they were fast approaching a sharp left turn to Ho Man Tin, a half-left toward Mong Kok or else straight ahead along Route 1 to Sha Tin. Double-decker buses just like those back in London were everywhere, and as they reached another bend in the road, Sutherland pulled into the far left-hand lane for Mong Kok, pushing the car into high revs.