by Powell, Mark
‘What about logistics?’ Stowe asked.
‘I have contacts with the Indian National Security Force. Their boys are top. I will see what I can do. My hope is they can tool you up.’
‘Okay, excellent. We just need the location now … and hope to God Ying can hold out,’ McCabe said.
The hours ticked by. Four p.m. fi nally arrived, and the phone rang right on time. The room was now fi lled with members of Stowe’s intelligence team: Trent, McCabe and Sykes. As Stowe hit the button on the speaker phone, he announced, ‘Stowe here.’
This was initially followed by silence, then, ‘Okay, listen: I have been in contact with the group holding your operative. There is no deal to be struck.’ The woman was emotionless in her tone.
Stowe paused for a moment, obviously shaken by this news. ‘We need a location. Do you know where they are holding her?’
‘I do not have an exact location. I just know that they have her and that she is still in Mumbai, which is all I can tell you.’ The phone then went dead.
‘Damn it!’ Stowe thumped the table. ‘Okay, we need to know where this woman is in Mumbai. Sir, you have to get us more information.’
Stowe was now angry.
‘Stowe, I have told you, this is sensitive, and you think MI6 will give this woman up over some girl? We don’t even know if she is the woman you think you saw. It could be all coincidence.’
‘Hang on. The picture. Stowe, you took a picture, remember?’
McCabe blurted out.
‘Yes I did. I sent it back for analysis.’ Stowe then turned and looked at Ronnie, one of his team. ‘Well, Ronnie, what did you fi nd out?’
Stowe positioned the question.
‘I handed it to Trent.’ Ronnie then looked at Trent as if gesturing for confi rmation.
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‘Hmm, yes. Okay, I have it. Leave it with me.’ Trent almost looked guilty of something.
Stowe then focused his attention back on Trent. ‘Sir, if it does turn out to be her, we can certainly turn a blind eye. We just need Ying safe and sound. And, of course, the CD they claim she has. We just need her to show us where Ying is being held,’ Stowe contended.
‘Yes, yes, Stowe, I will see what I can do. But as I have said, no promises. I’m meeting Mike O’Connor later. He’s the new Head of Asia Operations for MI6. Let me see what he is prepared to offer.’
With that, Trent stood up and left the room. McCabe also stood up. ‘Come on, let’s get our heads down. I have a feeling it’s going to be a long week.’
Some hours later, as Trent walked back into the meeting room, he observed Stowe and McCabe stretched out on opposite sofas. ‘Nice to see you hard at it, gentlemen.’ McCabe jumped up fi rst.
‘Just getting some downtime, sir.’
‘Yes. Well, we will have you back to your bank soon as we can, McCabe.’
Not if I can help it, McCabe thought to himself. How could he go back to banking after tasting blood again.
‘The deal is this, so listen up,’ Trent said.
Stowe was now sitting up. ‘You will fi nd the Rain Angel located in the Old Taj Hotel, Mumbai.’ McCabe shot Stowe a glance; the same hotel where they had all stayed. ‘But there is a condition. And make no mistake, gentlemen. You must take her out; make it clean. This comes from the very top; no mistakes. Once we have the CD, and you must secure it, we can take down her associates, but she must not be left breathing, is that clear?’
‘Yes, sir, perfectly,’ Stowe responded.
‘MI6 will be on this operation with you. Not that I don’t trust the pair of you, but I want her dead, so don’t fuck it up. Now get out of here. A car will take you to Heathrow in ten minutes.’
‘Just one question, sir. So given this, you are confi rming it is her quantum breach 290709.indd 213
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then? She is involved?’ McCabe enquired.
Trent went pale. ‘Yes, it is her. I showed O’Connor that picture Stowe took. His face said it all.’
Stowe and McCabe both felt the adrenaline rush. No sooner had Trent fi nished, than they were already heading out the door.
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TWENTY-FIVE
As both Stowe and McCabe stepped out of the airport in Mumbai, McCabe coughed. The pollution had hit the back of his throat.
Within a few minutes, a silver Mercedes pulled up and two men got out.
‘I’m Clarke and this is Walker. We’re from 6. We have been expecting you both.’ Clarke extended his hand to Stowe and they shook hands. As they got in the car and pulled away, Walker turned to Stowe. ‘The box on the seat is for you, courtesy of our diplomatic pouch from London.’
Stowe took hold of the box and opened it; two 9mm Sigs with clips, just what he needed.
‘Good. We have a lot to do, so let’s get on with it,’ Stowe replied, instantly taking charge.
Stowe then turned to McCabe. ‘This is going to be messy, I can feel it. Whatever happens, get Ying out alive, promise me?’
‘Of course. I care too, you know,’ McCabe replied. He was somewhat taken aback by Stowe’s plea. It was not often he so openly communicated his concern. The two of them sat in silence for the rest of the journey, both thinking about how the operation would go. But fi rst, they had an ‘Angel’ to catch.
Ying sat cold and shivering, her body feeling the effects of her captivity and torture. The room in which she had spent the past few days—or quantum breach 290709.indd 215
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was it weeks, as she had lost all sense of time—now stank of damp and her own urine. She felt fi lthy, her body black with the dirt from the room and being dragged up and down the steps. The grey suit she had worn when she had been abducted was a sodden mess, covered in dirt and worse.
Who were these animals who kept her like this? she thought. Her only hope now was that Stowe and McCabe would fi nd her, and more importantly, that they had not given up on her and were not, as the lady had informed her, ditching her.
Her mind kept wandering. Thoughts of her family and friends back in Singapore swirled around in her head. She had to fi ght to stay positive, fi ght to stop sobbing. She had to just hang on.
Ying realised that her energy and willpower were beginning to seriously wane. She felt emotionally drained; she began to feel very alone and depressed. Then, somewhere out of the recesses of her memory, she recalled a story her father had told her when she was only ten years old about her grandfather, a journalist during the World War II Japanese occupation of Singapore. He often worked for the British and Allied Forces, reporting news about World War II and the action across Southeast Asia to the Western world.
In retribution for the support given by Singapore’s Chinese to China in its struggle against Japan, all local Chinese males from the ages of 18 to 50 were required to report to registration camps. The Japanese military police arrested those suspected of being anti-Japanese, amongst them her grandfather. He was accused of being a spy for the British Empire; as such, he was taken prisoner and held in a small, poorly ventilated hut.
She recalled being told how he had been severely beaten with bamboo sticks and starved. His only source of water was often what he could collect from the odd rain shower. He used a thick rubbery leaf of a plant, picked from a bush he could just reach out of a small gap in the wall of his hut. The sun used to beat down on his hut and nearly boiled him to death.
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Her father, she remembered, deeply respected his father’s will to live, his inner strength that somehow enabled him to cling to life.
Whilst his body was beaten and bruised, he would no
t sacrifi ce his spirit to the Japanese. He survived the many months of torture by convincing his captors of his innocence, claiming that he had been forced to work for the British; which, of course, he hadn’t. He was fi nally released in May 1943.
Ying could not recall the relevance of the story her father had shared, but the memory of the story alone suddenly fi lled her with a surge of energy. She even started to feel physically stronger.
As the sound of familiar footsteps coming down the stone stairs hit her ears once again, she knew she had to try and hang on for one last time, dismiss the pain, maybe even use the pain as an adrenaline-inducing drug and fi ght for her life. She began to hate her captors; hatred that would fuel her will to survive. She learned some important things about herself: it surprised her just how strong her spirit was, just like her grandfather’s.
Finding herself once again tied to the chair, the bag forced over her head, the rope tied tight around her throat, she felt her eyes almost popping out as she gasped for air. It was like breathing through a wet blanket. The torture was designed that way, so the victims felt like they were drowning. The Rain Angel knew her craft, and her form of torture matched her name.
’You cannot hold out much longer, Ying. Now tell me or I will make it much worse for you.’ The woman was now clearly angry.
Ying forced the image of her grandfather into her head, took a deep breath and yelled, ‘Go to hell!’ Then, wondering where she managed to dig that out from, she slumped forward.
‘Hit her, damn it!’ the woman yelled back, as if she had fi nally lost some of her usual composure. Hajj stepped forward and belted Ying hard across the face with the back of his hand, sending her head sideways. Ying, her head now spinning, clenched her jaw as tightly as she could to try and avoid screaming.
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‘Again!’ the woman cried. Another hit followed, this time the full force of Hajj came in. Ying felt herself almost blacking out, choking from the blood that now started to run down the back of her throat.
Her nose was bleeding and her left eye closing.
‘Tell me, or I will have this animal beat you to a pulp. I’m your only hope, girl,’ she screamed.
Ying could hardly speak. Her head was now on fi re and she knew she was about to pass out.
As she regained her consciousness, not knowing if she had indeed passed out, the light started to blind her. She could taste the dried blood in her throat. The canvas bag had been taken off her head. As she started to lift her head, she heard the woman’s voice command: ‘Do not look at me. Keep your head down.’
Ying immediately looked back down to the fl oor.
‘Ying, I really want to help you. Sorry about that. Hajj can take things too far. But you have to tell me where the CD is.’ This time, the woman’s voice was soft and caring. Ying actually found herself warming to her. It must be because of her voice, she told herself. Ying then started to cry as a wave of emotion came over her.
After a few minutes, she calmed herself down; the woman was stroking her hair. ‘Okay, okay, I’ll tell you. Please, no more,’ Ying cried.
She then knew that she had to tell her. She could not hold out anymore.
‘It’s in my hotel room; I hid it there.’
As Ying started to lift her head and look up, a hard smack across the face followed. ‘I told you not to look at me! Blindfold her.’ The woman’s personality had switched back to a more aggressive nature. Ying then felt the darkness again. The woman started to laugh. ‘You think I care about you, stupid girl? This is not a game. So where in your hotel room, which room number?’
Ying had broken. ‘In the safe, in the safe! Room 309,’ she bleated.
Ying now felt a strange physiological change going on within: she found herself not caring. She had had enough.
‘The combination to the safe?’ The woman had now walked up to quantum breach 290709.indd 218
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Ying and was standing right by her ear.
‘I can’t remember,’ Ying replied.
‘Get the bag—and this time leave it on,’ the woman commanded.
As the bag was forced over her head once again, Ying felt the rope around her neck tighten to the point she could hardly breathe. Her lungs were now gasping for air. She started to lurch back in the chair and fi ght, trying to shake her head from side to side, her lungs now desperate for air. Sputtering, she tried to talk. The woman heard a gurgle of air and waved to Hajj. As the rope around her neck was loosened, Ying gasped in a lungful of stale air, then choked and spluttered. It took a few minutes before she could utter ‘66 … 9 … 88.’
With that, she passed out.
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TWENTY-SIX
As McCabe and Stowe once again walked back into the lobby of the Taj Hotel, they both agreed to meet back in the bar in 20 minutes.
As for ‘Sooty and Sweep’, the name Stowe had given the two MI6 offi cers, on account of their young looks and obnoxious nature, they had been sent off to the British High Commission to meet with members of the Indian National Security Service as well as a Singaporean doctor fl anked by two Singaporean offi cials who had been fl own in to make sure Ying was well taken care of, dead or alive.
McCabe had also received a call, letting him know that his two friends from Jakarta had arrived safely and were now being entertained at the High Commission. Things were beginning to come together. All they needed now was to fi nd Ying, no easy task in a city with a population of about 13 million people.
As the elegant lady with her pristine hair and carefully chosen attire stepped out of her black Mercedes and walked into the lobby of the Old Taj Hotel, her arrogance almost trumpeted her arrival. It was Stowe who spotted her fi rst; instinct had directed his attention at that precise moment. Stowe wasted no time at all: ‘McCabe. Target, six o’clock.’
Hearing this with some surprise, McCabe very slowly looked around, his eyes now taking in the prey they were after: it was none other than the infamous Rain Angel. There she was, as if nothing was wrong with the world. Her shadow was another matter. There, walking about two yards behind her was a Middle Easterner who even by McCabe’s quantum breach 290709.indd 220
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standards was a brute of a man, his eyes busily scanning the lobby.
‘Her shadow is doing a recce,’ McCabe informed Stowe.
Hearing this, Stowe took a sip of his beer. ‘Okay, let’s move. But remember that she knows what we look like.’
McCabe swiftly moved in front of Stowe as they got up and started to head for the lift. They stopped as they both saw their quarry now standing at the check-in desk, which caused McCabe to ponder. ‘I wonder why they would stop at check-in. Trent seemed to infer she was already a guest.’
‘Checking her mail, who knows. Okay, McCabe, you follow her. I’ll wait down here.’
Meanwhile, the two targets moved away from the check-in desk and towards the lifts, McCabe carefully following. He paused as he saw them waiting for the lift to arrive. As the doors opened and he saw them step in, he moved forward. When the lift doors shut, he sprinted forward and waited for the next lift. His instincts were telling him that she would be heading for Ying’s room on the third fl oor. The feeling just seemed so strong; he had to go with his gut on this one. If he was wrong, at least he could head back down to the lobby and wait for them to reappear.
As the lift reached the third fl oor and the doors slid open, McCabe casually stepped out, turned to his left and paced down the narrow hallway. As he reached the corner of the hallway, he carefully stopped and peered around.
No sign, he thought. Then, as he got closer to Room 309, he drew out his Sig from the rear waistband of his jeans. After a few more pace
s, he quickly slid the Sig back inside his jacket; a guest had suddenly emerged from a nearby room. McCabe pretended to walk on past Room 309. Once the guest had vanished around the corner towards the lifts, he once again turned and drew out his Sig, his fi nger now placed on the trigger.
As he reached Ying’s room, McCabe placed his ear very carefully against the door. He could now just make out voices on the other side of quantum breach 290709.indd 221
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the door. Got you! he thought, pleased that his instincts were correct.
McCabe then heard the woman speak. ‘Damn her!’ followed by,
‘Come on let’s get back.’
He quickly paced up the hall heading away from the lift lobby and around the corner to the far side of where he had come from as the door to Room 309 opened.
Peering back around the corner, he could see the Rain Angel and her shadow walking towards the lift. The latter was carrying what looked like a laptop. McCabe took out his phone and hit speed-dial. Within seconds, Stowe answered.
‘Stowe, I found her. They’re on their way back down.’
‘Roger that,’ Stowe replied.
A few minutes later, McCabe swiftly emerged from the lift. ‘So where are they?’
‘Relax; they have only just headed out the entrance. Come on,’
Stowe said.
As the pair of them emerged from the hotel front entrance, they could see the Rain Angel stepping into a black Mercedes. Stowe waved frantically at a waiting taxi, which pulled up within seconds. They both jumped in. McCabe instructed the driver to follow the Mercedes as the pair of them automatically started checking their weapons.
‘I hope this bitch leads us right to her,’ Stowe said, his eyes intently focused on the rear of the car in front.
‘Yeah, let’s hope. Hey, tell you what: drop me here at the next corner.
I’ll head to the High Com and collect the two guys Sykes has given us.
I think we may need them. Call me the moment you arrive at wherever you’re heading. Stop here, driver,’ McCabe said.
‘Okay, agreed. I’ll also call my two MI6 friends. They can join you.’
As the taxi drew up at the traffi c lights, McCabe slid out the rear door and vanished. Stowe watched him blend into the crowd, and he was gone. The black Mercedes, only a few cars ahead, pulled away and then started to make an abrupt left turn.