On Borrowed Time

by Solomon Carter

  For now she would keep it simple. She would keep this Trevor guy at a distance, stay alive as long as she could, and work out a way to reach the assassin and whoever hired them. Eva had little time in which to succeed. She only had whatever time was left before they reached her and killed her first…

  Eight

  “Well this is the strangest meeting I’ve ever been a part of.”

  Eva made a face and swilled some of the vodka the Russian guys had poured for everyone around the table. As far as Dan knew Eva was pissed off for two reasons. She hated all this international intrigue, and secondly, she hated spirits. She had favoured a good dry white ever since he had known her. Apparently she now favoured it too much, but he hadn’t gone down the route of challenging her on that. Not yet. Maybe that was for after they survived.

  “Georgey. This is Trevor. Trevor is with us until we finish this business.”

  Trevor sat uncomfortably at the edge of the scratched up old dinner table, his chair pushed far out to accommodate his bulk, but also because Dan saw he looked like a fish out of water. He had a tumbler of Vodka – Stolly was the boys’ preference over the current French favourite – but Trevor had barely sipped it. He sat with his big hand over his knee, awkward, like he was about to stand up and leave. But he stayed put, ready for something and doing nothing.

  “Hello, Trevor.” Dan hadn’t had the chance to fill in Georgey and the boys yet about their compulsory guest. The curious look on Georgey’s face was priceless. The guy just could not put them together at all, and he was right.

  The other boys around the table were Brodski, and Obstov. Brodski was a Russian Pole, always an outsider to the Russians, and not well liked at home either. He had worked as a gadgets man on the periphery of the Russian security services, until a paranoid purge of potential double-agents after things started changing in Mother Russia – especially the crackdowns and wars in Chechnya, Ossetia, and now Ukraine. The whole ex-Soviet bloc was becoming like lava to walk on unless you were very close to the seat of power. Brodski got out after some strange people started tailing him through Moscow. He recognised them as Chechens. He reckoned he got out on the day they were due to pull the trigger. Obstov was a thinker and a wordsmith, not best suited to military tactics or hand to hand combat, but he could always think out of the box, and Dan valued that. Brodski had originally been one of the crazy nationalist Russians who wanted to restore the Russian monarchy, and he got used in Eastern European combat a few times, but his illusion about the present Russia came unstuck last year. Involved on the periphery of creating civil unrest in Kiev, Brodski saw scores of people die because of his actions and those of undercover comrades. The effect made him question everything, including his naïve political ideology. He needed out. And the only out was death – turning up dead in an unmarked grave – unless he ran to the West. He ran for his second chance, and here it was. Trying to redeem himself by fighting those sinister forces from afar.

  “So we know the mission here.”

  “To stop the hit on Eva,” said Georgey.

  “And to locate the source of the hit. They money behind the plot,” said Obstov.

  “Absolutely. And the best way to do that is to locate the assassin and track them back to their base of operations. If we do that, it’s odds on that we will locate who is organising all of this.”

  “That sounds great when you put it like that, but come on, finding the killer? As far as I’m concerned there’s no easy way to do that, apart from using me as bait. That’s not sounding good to me so far. This killer is an ace. It’s a fluke that I got this far.”

  “Bullshit. Drink the vodka until you start making sense. You took them on in the hotel the other night. You used your wits and you won. Remember that.”

  Eva took a gulp and grimaced, but the warmth of the booze felt good. She felt it was beginning to work already.

  “Trevor, the silent giant. What do you think?”

  The big man twisted his head left and right. He was wearing shades indoors, and Dan couldn’t tell whether he was stretching out his neck like gym boys sometimes did or if he was looking round the table.

  “My view?” he said with an Irish lilt.

  Dan nodded. “Your view. You’ve been around the block, right?”

  “Right. Miss Roberts here has escaped, what, three times now? That’s supposed to be luck is it? No. They’ll be mortified. If they were reporting to my boss on this, they would be lynched after three misses. Right now this killer will be desperate to top Miss Roberts, no offence. They will be ready to pull out all the stops. If we use her as bait, it could be game over, that’s my view.”

  “But I am bait already. This person is going to turn up and shoot at me again, as sure as eggs are eggs. If I stayed here, she would turn up here. So whether I like it or not I am bait. But if you use me I’m going to need to rely on you guys to protect me … while another bunch will have to lie in wait ready to follow her and stay out of sight.”

  “That’s about the size of it,” said Trevor.

  “Let’s be honest. It’ll save wasting time. If we pussyfoot around the fact I could end up dead just to spare my feelings, I’m going to end up dead a lot quicker.”

  Dan smiled at Eva. Maybe it was the vodka, but this was the Eva he loved and remembered. Tough, logical, practical and telling it like it is.

  They agreed the principle and poured another drink. It wasn’t long before conversation began to veer back towards Mother Russia, NATO, Ukraine and the latest spate of political assassinations back in Moscow. Trevor stopped talking and swished his drink in his glass. Moscow was further than Brian Gillespie’s coattails, so maybe he’d not heard of it. Dan saw a familiar irritation creeping across Eva’s face. She disliked the international stuff probably as much as Trevor didn’t understand it. But this was Georgey’s home, not theirs. Dan had to let the boys have their fun, just a little while longer. If it got too heated, he would say something before Eva did.

  But it seemed Eva wasn’t in the mood for patience.

  “The West was deluded. They believed this president was an evolution from Gorbachev to Yeltsin to someone increasingly pro-Western. As late as 2008 they wanted to believe that. Even after that, they pretended to themselves Russia wanted to be like them. But that was never the case.”

  Dan looked at Eva’s face. It was time to draw a halt. “Georgey.”

  “They play Poker with you Western countries. When they are losing, Russia’s Poker face looks friendly. When they are winning, their Poker face still looks friendly. But when they see something they value is under threat, they break the rules. You see their Poker face, but they are stealing all the money while you are busy reading their face. You see what is unfolding in Ukraine? It is unfolding across the West too, in a different way.”

  “Georgey. Another time, let’s leave it,” said Dan.

  But Obstov, with his thicker Russian accent, waded in. “Georgiev is right. The hybrid war. This is what we call the war in Ukraine. But what does it mean? It means this war is being denied. Here is the same. What is happening now, in this country, is a fight to dominate the economy and power of Great Britain. Here your industry is mortgaged to China. But the criminal economy- the black market is always available for a hostile takeover.”

  Dan looked at Eva and shrugged. He’d tried, but there was too much Stolichnaya under the bridge.

  “What we see here around us is the beginning of a new hybrid war. Russia has boots on the ground in terms of its gangsters. Given the right conditions, those soldiers can go to war and win for Russia.”

  “What are you saying, Obstov?” said Dan. The man was in deep rhetoric territory and Dan knew Eva was ready to go volcanic.

  “I am talking about these hits against Maggie Gillespie and now Eva. Who is to say these things are not all a part of it?”

  Eva looked at Dan. Her green eyes looked angry. Her cheeks were flushed. She tipped back the rest of her vodka, slammed the cup down on the table and stood
up. Big Trevor immediately followed suit, like a distorted mirror image.

  “That’s about all I want to hear about Mother Russia tonight,” said Eva.

  “Aye,” said Trevor, and polished off his own drink.

  “Eva, hang on.”

  “It’s okay, Dan. We all know what we’ve got to do tomorrow, don’t we?”

  “What?”

  “I need to be seen by the opposition so they can re-attempt their hit on me.”

  Dan said nothing. So far Eva had the attention of all the men at the table now. Obstov nodded.

  “Yes, I’m afraid so.”

  “I need both a support squad around me as I’m being spotted, to help protect me from the actual hit, and we need a follow up squad to pursue the hit squad back to their base. Agreed?”

  Dan made a grin which was more like a grimace. She was right, and she had cut to the chase.

  “Then all that needs to be done is for you guys to decide whether you’re on the protection squad or the chase squad, because as far as I can see, we’re going to do this thing tomorrow.”

  Dan nodded in approval. Eva still had all the bottle in the world and he admired her for it.

  “I’m guessing Trevor’s with me.”

  Trevor grinned. “Like your shadow, Miss.”

  Dan didn’t like the Traveller’s lopsided grin. One way or another, he was sure the situation with Trevor was going to end in a mess. The way Trevor was ogling Eva right now filled him with another kind of worry. But the man was beholden to Bad Boy Brian to protect her. The look Dan saw on his face told of danger if Brian changed his orders.

  “Trevor?” called Dan, as Eva got her stuff together. “Are you as good with a gun as you are at eating?”

  Trevor looked at Dan through his shades. There was no visible emotion.

  “I could shoot you dead before you could move a muscle, no trouble.”

  “But I’m sitting down and I’m unarmed. What about a moving target, someone who is armed and dangerous? And well trained. Are you any good?”

  “Miss Roberts is safe with me.”

  Dan stared hard at the big man, “She’d better be.”

  Eva didn’t complain. She knew Dan’s thinking inside out. They had always been a double act. Tomorrow one of them was the prey while one of them had to be on the follow up team. Neither would have been satisfied simply hearing about the opposition. They needed to see them for themselves. Right now, Dan reflected, it was just like the old days. Eva’s eyes or Dan’s eyes, when they were working as one unit, they amounted to the same thing. They trusted each other implicitly. But in order to be the eyes, Dan had to gamble and leave Eva with Trevor. Gillespie’s man was trouble. And soon the trouble was going to tell. Dan hoped the trouble would wait until after tomorrow. When the trouble came he would deal with it. But please, thought Dan, not tomorrow…

  Nine

  Georgiev’s flat was spacious but dilapidated and over-filled with second-hand furniture, which Eva guessed had been purchased from charity shops. Such was the life of a man without a country to call his own. She knew Georgiev’s income came from eking out a living as a translator, and from the donations of wealthier, and probably far safer Russian dissidents. Spacious as it was, Eva’s night had been far from comfortable. She’d slept on a single bed in the large spare room. From his close attention and sweat beaded brow Eva was initially worried that Trevor would try something, but instead he went to the neighbouring room and pulled out a director style chair to the doorway. He plonked the chair down by the door, then dropped his weight into it. Eva said nothing, went into the room and closed the door behind her. Much later, when the flat was quiet, the door opened. Moonlight from the window fell across Dan’s face as he entered the room. He saw Eva’s open eyes and smiled, then pointed to the floor, with a question mark somewhere etched on his face. Eva shifted over in the bed and made space for Dan. She was fully clothed, and so was he. Tonight was no night for passion, not with a twenty five stone Traveller gangster for security just outside the door.

  Daylight crashed into their lives and woke them up with a start. As soon as her eyes were open, Eva remembered today was another day she had to be ready to die. She got up, breezed past the unsleeping bulk of Trevor still in his director’s chair and went to the bathroom. She splashed cold water over her face and looked in the mirror.

  “Be brave, Eva. Just be brave.”

  The woman she saw was still pretty but frail and very tired. She summoned up as much of the feeling of strength as she could. That much would have to do. Then she went to the front room where all the talk of Mother Russia had taken place the night before. Obstov, Georgiev and Brodski were crashed out in various poses. Georgiev had fallen asleep in an actual red and white stripy deckchair purloined from some seaside adventure. Brodski was slumped in an armchair with his eyes closed, while Obstov was asleep on the sofa with his arms awkwardly tucked behind him. He snored the loudest of them all. Eva picked up an empty bottle of Stolichnaya and clanked it hard on the rubbish strewn dining table.

  “Wakey, wakey, comrades. It’s coffee time.”

  Eva waited while they struggled and roused, then she repeated the manoeuvre until she saw the whites of their eyes. In Obstov’s case, reds.

  “Wow. I’m so glad I’ve got people like you watching my back.”

  Obstov humphed but Eva didn’t let up. “Today’s the day, and I want to move soon. The quicker we get this potential death business over with, the quicker I can relax. But first of all, one of you Soviets will have to do the Starbucks run.”

  “I’ll do it. But one thing,” said Brodski.

  “What now?”

  “I was never a Soviet. I was always a free Russian.”

  Eva shook her head. “You damn commies,”

  Brodski opened his mouth to comment, but noticed Eva’s smile just in time.

  Coffee with double shots all round got them moving. And now they were out, Eva hoped she didn’t ever smell as bad as Obstov. He smelt like a pub on the morning after a very busy night – before the cleaner had been in. Obstov was on her crew, but she could barely look at him because of the stench. Maybe she should have given them all time to shower. Correction, she should definitely have given Obby the time to shower. Eva dowsed herself in perfume and chewed freshmint gum, hoping that would be enough to cover her. The bait plan unfolded simply enough. First of all, she was to occupy a public space. They chose Greenwich as a venue for the fast routes in and out of town. Eva ordered a decaf mocha at the café and sat in the window tapping her phone, reading her texts and the news. She called the office, and made another call to Alabaster back in Rendon, to assure the firm she was still on the case. She was nothing of the sort, but if they were tracing her calls this gave the hit squad the chance to find her. They had the means. Twenty minutes later, and Eva knew the clock was ticking. The enemy would be with her soon and she began to feel the heat. She looked outside in the street towards her big guardian who was reading a paper and smoking cigarettes. Trevor liked sitting down, so he didn’t look altogether out of place idling on a street bench in Greenwich. A little further on, smoking as if his life depended on it, the thin and drawn Obstov stood at a bus stop. Nobody at the bus stop stood close to him. These two men were her crack protection unit. A fat guy who liked sitting down and a Russian Vodka sponge with an attitude problem. Wow. Her chances were less than fantastic. Much further on down the street, down the tree-lined road past the Maritime Museum, she saw Dan’s black Jag idling in a car park. For what it was worth, the crew were in place. It was now a half hour since she called Alabaster. It was time for a real coffee to kick start her brain, and then she would walk to reel in the enemy. This had to work or she was dead.

  With half a real coffee working through her system at ten seventeen on a Wednesday morning, Eva walked out of the coffee shop. Trevor looked past her. Obstov ignored her too. She looked down the street at the cars in the distance, took a breath and looked around. There were people everywhere
she looked, mainly students and foreign tourists of all ages and denominations. She sipped her coffee. How would the killers want this to go down? She looked around. She needed to give them a chance – she had to flirt with danger. She looked at Trevor, and made a slow sharp turn towards the vast cream columns which guarded the mouth of the indoor Greenwich Market. She looked into the vast cavern of the roofed market, and smelt the fresh cooked food, the garlic, the spice, and sweet chocolate smells pouring from within. She saw all the colours of the stalls, all aimed at people with an eye for a flash new tourist item. People milled around moving idly between stalls. This was a good place to kill someone – and an easy place to die. The killers would be hopeful of somewhere like this.

  Trevor and Obstov would have to keep up with her. Eva pressed into the appeal of the smells and the chatter of the market strollers. She passed an Indonesian food stall, and stall full of delicious looking powdered French pastries. She smiled at the stall holders and flashed her gaze across the crowd. The killers would think Eva imagined she was safe and beyond their reach now. They would believe she had gotten so complacent she could afford a leisurely stroll around the market.

  Eva snatched a glimpse ahead towards the public bar with the seating at the far end and the market stalls with the Dalek Art beside the handmade leather which looked like antique bondage gear. There were people walking around just like her – slowly looking around the objects. Directly ahead, at the far end of the cobbled courtyard, was another narrow exit which mirrored the one Eva had entered through. At the end of it, a broad silhouette filled the bright gap to the street. Yet as soon as she saw it, the shadow was gone. Her blood pressure surged and she turned. The danger was present. The killer could be anywhere. Eva looked left, and then right. The people near her were tourists. Young, dressed in sharp fashion clothing. She walked back towards the columns, and she looked left again. A woman in sunglasses was holding up a map, staring at it looking confused. She glanced back over her shoulder – there was no sign of anyone and she was almost outside. What had she been thinking? When she checked left again, beneath the shadows of the columns. The woman with the sunglasses suddenly filled her face.