by Andy McNab
Dijani and Uran, and whoever else hadn’t yet come into view, had infiltrated a number of Frank’s companies. Why bother to build your own when someone else’s were already fit for purpose?
Frank had unearthed something, and didn’t like it. He didn’t like it so much they’d needed to kill him and his son. And then kill me too, for being there.
Lyubova had been keen to help.
Mr Lover Man had been forced to.
This still didn’t feel like a little local difficulty, though. GIGN and TIGRIS were the dog’s bollocks. They didn’t deploy for local difficulties.
I couldn’t shake the image of the iceberg out of my mind.
I wasn’t about to start believing every word the man in the back said, but three of his claims stuck with me.
You have more to fear than Putin …
You cannot escape the judgement of Allah …
Allah will welcome us to Paradise …
And Hesco was aiming to go through the second of the eight gates – for those who fought the Holy War.
That didn’t mean these fuckers were directly linked to the jihadist shit that was going down, but it felt like part of the same pattern.
And he’d gone rigid when I mentioned Italy.
I listened to the steady beat of the tyres on the motorway sections for a while, then powered up the windows and cut away from the big picture. Getting Stefan back was what the rest of tonight was about.
I took the Zürich exit off the main, carried on for fifteen Ks, hung a right, then a left and slowed as I approached the second of the three construction sites. Unless every alternate new build in the area featured the Adler eagle on its advertising, I was on target.
There were three double-decker Portakabins inside the gate. So far, so good. Only one of them was showing any illumination.
The artist’s impression on the hoarding promised a nine-storey apartment block next spring, complete with indoor pool, gym, twenty-four-hour concierge and young, good-looking residents relaxing between workouts on designer settees. And more to come the following summer.
As I drove past the Portakabins, I immediately spotted two bodies. Neither was Stefan. Hesco had said one, but why should I be pissed off about that? I was sure there were more lies heading my way.
There didn’t seem to be much construction going on above ground level yet, but a tower crane stood ready at the centre of the plot to swing its prefabricated sections into place. Sixty metres up, a pattern of red lights lined the boom, warning aircraft to keep their distance.
I took a right a K further on, past the third site. Only one of every ten streetlamps seemed to be connected to the grid there. My side of the road was lined with red-and-white-striped traffic cones and linked metal barriers covered with perforated orange plastic. Behind them was a freshly dug ditch, piles of cables and pipes and all the other shit required to take power and water to wherever it’s needed.
A parade of light industrial units with their own forecourts, all boarded up, ran along the opposite verge. I pulled over, parked in front of one and switched off the engine. We weren’t overlooked by massed ranks of inquisitive locals there. The whole area seemed to have been evacuated and earmarked for development.
About a hundred ahead, the tarmac curved to the left. I tucked the SIG underneath my jacket, shouldered the day sack and walked round the bend. Three pallets of breezeblocks stood at the front of the eighth lot I came to. I hid the sack beside the one nearest the perimeter wall and covered it with three empty cement bags. If the van had been pinged, and was no longer a safe option, I wouldn’t be totally fucked.
I screwed the suppressor on to the barrel of the SIG when I got back to it. After checking Hesco’s ties, I opened the toolbox and took his keys out of his briefcase. Then I climbed aboard him, sliced through the tape around his chin and uncovered his mouth.
He groaned as I pulled out the cloth and replaced it with the weapon’s suppressor. I jammed it down into his mouth until he gagged. Anyone in our business would know what that meant, no matter what state they were in.
‘OK. So here’s what we’re going to do.’
I explained that I was about to cut him loose, one set of ties at a time. I’d start with his neck, then free his arms, then his wrists. He was still mummified from the nose up, but I could see that he liked this idea a lot.
I turned the knife so that the blade bit into the plastic rather than his flesh, and sliced through it. He gasped in air like a bellows and raised his head a few centimetres off the floor.
When he’d settled, I cut through the restraints around his right bicep.
As I prepared to do the same to the ones securing that wrist, I moved the SIG to within three centimetres of the crook of his left arm, and took first pressure. Even in his weakened state, I knew he probably wouldn’t be able to stop himself trying to seize the initiative the first chance he got, whatever I said.
Up came the blade again.
And so did his hand.
Before it got halfway to where he thought the side of my head would be, I squeezed the trigger. There was a sound like a fist hitting a punch-bag and a neat hole appeared in the sleeve of his jacket. The exit wound was uglier.
Instead of clawing a big chunk out of me, Hesco gave a strangulated cry and tried to hold his shattered elbow together. Blood pooled on the plywood beneath it.
‘OK. This is the choice: either you stop fucking about, and let me patch up that mess, or you carry on and I’ll destroy your other elbow.’
His answer didn’t take long. ‘Patch … up.’
I pulled another five metres of cling-film off the roll, twisted it into a rope, looped one end around his right wrist, tied it off and bound it tightly enough to his neck to cramp his movement, but not so tightly that he couldn’t breathe. It left his undamaged elbow sticking up in the air. I tapped it with the butt of his pistol to remind him what was going to happen if he suddenly changed his mind.
I cut the ties around his left bicep and started to wrap the thing in cling-film. All I needed was for him to stop leaking so he could take me to the boy.
He wasn’t enjoying this process one bit. He was finally on receive, though. I got his best behaviour as I freed his left hand, untied his right and sat him up. I taped his wrists together behind his back. It would keep them where I wanted them. And would also mean that any attempt to free himself would rip the lid off another big can of pain. I kept the cling-film noose around his neck.
When we were ready to roll, I opened the rear door, sliced off the ties that still confined his ankles and tugged him out. He shuffled his arse towards me until his legs hung over the edge of the plywood and his feet touched the ground.
Keeping the SIG trained on him, I removed the noose and cut the rest of the tape away from his head. I might have been able to control him better if I’d left it in place, but it would be a nightmare directing his every step.
He sat there blinking for a couple of beats, took in the SIG, then his eyes bored into me. His chest heaved and he gobbed another mouthful of cherry-coloured phlegm in my direction. I didn’t look down to see where it landed.
‘You … cannot imagine … how much pain … you will be in.’
‘You know what? You’re the one without an elbow.’
I waved him up with my left hand.
‘Now, the boy.’
The SIG stayed where it was, zeroed in on his centre mass. I pocketed the second roll of gaffer tape and a fistful of cable ties, pushed the door shut and pressed the fob.
The indicators blinked, making Hesco’s uncertain steps seem even more uncertain. For a moment he reminded me of a Thunderbirds puppet. His knees didn’t seem able to carry his body weight. I thought he was going to crumble. Then he got his act together. He wasn’t totally stable, but he gradually managed to lengthen his stride.
On the way to the junction, I tried to put myself in his shoes. He probably assumed that I wouldn’t take his word for the number of security people s
tanding by, and that I’d be switched on. At the same time, he’d be hoping that I’d completely focus on getting Stefan back; that I’d believe he was there; that it was about to happen; that tunnel vision might leave me exposed. And maybe I did have tunnel vision – but what else could I do to get the little fucker back?
We turned left on to the road that led to where he had said the boy was located. The streetlamps were fully operational there, but widely spaced. I slipped the pistol under my jacket as I followed him closely enough to try to camouflage the fact that he was my prisoner, yet far enough away to stay out of range of a sudden reverse kick, however much I reckoned he wouldn’t have the strength to deliver it.
The traffic was light and intermittent. Two or three wagons sped past in the oncoming lane; only one came from behind us. None of them slowed as they went by.
I kept an eye out for a way into the site that wouldn’t channel us straight at the security detail. There was a pedestrian door set into the hoarding fifty metres short of the vehicle entrance, but none of the keys on Hesco’s ring worked their magic. We moved on to the main gate.
The floodlit strip immediately inside it reminded me of the area you couldn’t step into without getting hosed down in The Great Escape. I told him to keep his distance while I got busy with the padlock. The third key snapped it open, and by the time it did so, we had company.
A not-quite-matching pair of lads in blue uniforms and white hard hats emerged from the ground floor of the middle Portakabin. A night stick, a torch and a two-way hung from their belts. I couldn’t see anything that might go bang. The older and more hard-bitten of the two balled his fist and yelled at us. I assumed it was Schweizerdeutsch for ‘What the fuck are you doing here?’
I waved my left arm and gave them some reassuring Euro-waffle. They seemed to relax when the shouty one recognized Hesco, and got anxious again when they realized he had both hands fastened behind his back. But by then we were inside and I’d replaced the padlock and brought out the SIG and used it to help explain what I wanted us all to do next.
19
I shepherded the three of them into the Portakabin. It was starkly lit and furnished, cupboards and work tables bolted to the floor, and architectural blueprints spread out on every surface. No home comforts, apart from an electric kettle and a mini fridge, not even a flat-screen TV. And no Stefan.
I instructed Hesco to take the weight off his feet. As he perched his arse sideways on a straight-backed chair, I told the guards to remove their hard hats and put them down. The younger and more nervous of the two then raised his hand and tried to wipe the sweat off his forehead. His blond hair was dark with it, and plastered to his skin.
As three more sets of headlamps swept past the site entrance, I motioned to him to sort the venetian blinds. When he’d lowered and closed them all, I chucked him eight cable ties, miming what I wanted him to do.
Struggling to tear his gaze away from the SIG, he looped one tie through another like a figure of eight and used them to fasten Shouty’s wrists together behind his back.
‘Tighter.’ I raised the pistol and aimed it at his head.
He didn’t need me to translate.
He repeated the process on Shouty’s ankles, then his own.
Finally, he did the figure-of-eight trick with his own wrists. I moved behind him and pulled each tail until it bit, then sat the lads back to back and wound the tape around their chests and necks and a nearby metal table leg. Hesco decided to stand up halfway through the process. One look was all it took to remind him that his right elbow was next on my list of targets, then both knees. He sat down again.
When I’d finished, I knelt to one side of the guards. I’d seen this set-up a million times. Shouty looked like he’d been around the block, but he was all piss and wind. He wasn’t going to risk taking a round for what Adler paid him; he wasn’t going to go out of his way to help me either. The younger one looked like he was doing shift work to put himself through college.
Those guys were solid. The threat was going to come from somewhere else.
I focused on the kid. ‘You speak English?’
He hesitated, so I let him take another long hard look down the barrel of the weapon.
‘Yes.’
‘What about the boy?’
His Adam’s apple rose and fell, but his expression told me he didn’t know what the fuck I was talking about.
I gestured at the digital clock on the wall: 01:45. ‘What time did you start your shift?’
‘Since forty-five minuten …’
‘Is there anyone else here?’
‘No.’ His Adam’s apple bulged. He’d have been shit at the poker table.
‘So you put the call out when we arrived.’ I took first pressure on the trigger. ‘How long will they be?’
His throat went so dry he just croaked. ‘Twenty minuten. No, maybe fifteen.’
I got up and walked across to Hesco.
‘So where the fuck is he?’
He opened his mouth, moistened his lips with his tongue, and said nothing.
I circled the chair and tapped the handle of the weapon on his shattered elbow. His torso went into spasm but he didn’t give more than a gasp.
‘Where?’
He turned his head. ‘I will … show you.’
He stood again, waited for me to nod, and made for the door. I didn’t believe a word this fucker said now, but I didn’t have a choice.
He still wasn’t too steady on his feet, but I wasn’t taking anything for granted. I followed him outside.
‘How many of your guys are with him?’
‘None.’ He flexed his neck muscles. I hoped it hurt like fuck. ‘He cannot escape.’
He headed away from the ribbon of light that ran along the front of the site and into the darkness at the heart of it. As my night vision started to kick in, I could see that the construction here had progressed further than it had appeared from the other side of the gate. The one-storey skeletons surrounding the base of the central block acted like a prefab maze for Hesco to lead me through.
Every shadow began to look like his friend. And my enemy. Or maybe that was just the way he wanted it to seem. I stayed two strides behind him, scanning the area, holding the muzzle of the SIG rock steady halfway down his spinal column. All I could hear was the crunch of sand and builder shit beneath our boots.
As we passed the footings of the crane, the silhouette of another blacked-out Portakabin emerged from the jumble of structures and heaps of building material beyond it. When we were less than ten metres away from its door I ordered Hesco to stop and go right, into the cover of a wall.
He gave a slight tilt of the head and did as he’d been told.
The wall was double-skinned, and chest high. I made him stand with his back to it, then take a step away, leaving his shoulders pressed against the breezeblock. His pinioned arms hung in the gap behind him. The pain was etched on his face.
I positioned myself two metres to his left and bent my knees so that only my eyes were above the top course. I scanned from one end of the Portakabin to the other. Long enough to know he was talking shit.
He shuffled his feet back towards the base of the wall and managed to lean away from it. ‘You can free my hands now, yes?’
‘I’ll free your hands when you free the boy. He’s not in the cabin, is he?’
‘No.’
‘So where?’
‘Close.’
I checked the Suunto and let him go ahead of me again. By the security guard’s calculation, I had twelve minutes before his reinforcements arrived. Or maybe seven.
He steered left, away from the Portakabin, towards a huge hole in the ground. It was at least fifty metres by fifty, lined with pleated metal plates. As we got closer, I saw massed ranks of steel pillars rising out of the freshly poured concrete two levels below us. Judging by the size of them, these were the foundations of the tower block.
Hesco stopped a couple of steps short of the edge
of the yawning space and glanced over my shoulder. It was only fleeting, no more than a twitch, but it told me the younger guard had been spot on. Still keeping my distance from him, I looked back in the direction of the main gate. I knew he was expecting reinforcements. Now he was hoping I might think I was already under threat.
As far as I could tell, there was no one there.
I turned and concentrated on the foundations instead. I quartered the entire area and saw nothing. No underground recess large enough to hide a child. Just moisture glistening on the pale grey surface of the concrete.
Hesco was shifting uneasily from one foot to the other.
For a split second I could see that he was torn between letting me know how much smarter he was than me, and carrying on with his charade. Then I caught sight of something beyond him, wedged behind the pleated tin at the corner of the pit. I walked over. Bent down. Lifted it out of the crack between earth and metal.
A paperback book.
I peered at the jacket. The artwork and the lettering took fucking ages to come into focus in the gloom, even though I’d been certain about what this was from the moment I’d spotted it.
The script was Cyrillic.
But I knew what it said.
Dostoevsky.
Crime and Punishment.
I took it across to Hesco.
He ignored me. He was now staring openly towards the gate. We could both hear a wagon travelling along the main, at speed.
He took a step forward and dropped his gaze to the base of the nearest steel pillar before finally giving me eye to eye. He was very pleased with himself indeed. ‘I told you … he couldn’t escape.’
I was the first to look away. I didn’t want to see his triumphant expression for a nanosecond longer than I had to. And I didn’t want him to have the satisfaction of knowing he’d got to me.
I tried not to picture the kid being dumped in there.
Watching the first load of liquid concrete spilling down the chute.