‘They’ve caught me once already.’
‘It’s our last chance,’ Ayşe said. ‘You have to get in there and take note of anything and everything you can.’
İkmen would have been lying if he’d said that he wasn’t scared. He was terrified. People like Ahmet Ülker pulled out other people’s fingernails, burned them with red-hot irons. But he just smiled and said, ‘Of course.’
A young businessman absorbed in eating a prawn sandwich barrelled into İkmen, spilling some tiny crustaceans down the front of his jacket, and then continued on his way without a word.
‘Charming!’ Ayşe called out after him as he went mindlessly about his business. She took a handkerchief out of her bag and gave it to İkmen and said in Turkish, ‘Ever wondered why you bother?’
Chapter 18
* * *
Ahmet Ülker returned home to his vast mansion on The Bishops Avenue just as his wife Maxine was putting their dinner in the oven.
‘Pizza all right for you tonight, babe?’ she said as he walked into the kitchen.
Lazy bitch! All she ever did was heat up pizzas and put ready meals into the microwave. But Ahmet smiled. ‘Yes, that’s fine,’ he said.
‘Take about ten minutes.’
‘Oh.’ He took his jacket off and put it on to the back of one of the kitchen chairs. ‘Just enough time for a very quick quickie . . .’
She looked at him and smiled. ‘You naughty boy!’ She moved provocatively across the vast kitchen towards him, her arms outstretched. ‘Upstairs or . . .’
‘No, let’s do it here,’ Ahmet said. He moved to meet her and wrapped his arms round her waist.
‘Amongst all the fitted units and extra virgin olive oil?’ She smirked. ‘How kinky!’
Even though she was common, Maxine was beautiful and Ahmet enjoyed running his hands across her breasts, putting his tongue into her thick-lipped mouth. But she had done this, and more besides, with that bloody awful Ali Reza. Nutcase! If only he wasn’t such an athletic young man. That hurt.
Ahmet brought his hands up to Maxine’s neck and said, ‘You’ve always been a very good lay, Maxine. I’m just a little disappointed that you failed to keep your favours exclusively between us.’
His fingers started to press her throat a little and Maxine’s eyes widened. ‘What?’
‘Ali Reza,’ Ahmet said, and he began to squeeze in earnest. ‘I suppose I should have expected it when I married you. You are a whore, after all.’
‘But—’
‘I saw you sucking him off!’ Ahmet roared. ‘In our bed! He was here today too, wasn’t he? Saying goodbye!’
Maxine’s eyes were wide and beginning to turn red as the blood supply to her head began to cease. She was bent backwards over the kitchen table, gagging but speechless.
‘You shouldn’t have done that,’ Ahmet said as he tightened his grip still harder. ‘You shouldn’t have fucked other men and you should, my dear, have learned to cook. I could have forgiven at least part of it had you just occasionally provided me with a decent home-cooked meal.’
Maxine’s head lolled back and her tongue stuck out of her mouth. Ahmet held her for a second, looked at her tenderly and then let her lifeless body drop to the floor. He showed no emotion whatsoever as he walked over to the oven to switch it off. Later, when he’d watched the news on the TV, he went back into the kitchen, took the pizza out of the oven and threw it into the garden. Then he made a telephone call. He didn’t give his dead wife’s body a second glance.
Ayşe didn’t know many of the other officers in the room. There was Terry Springer of course and Inspector Riley to whom she had been ‘loaned’ by Greater Manchester Police. The others she knew only a little, like Inspector Carla Fratelli, a uniformed officer, who was standing beside Riley next to the board upon which photographs and details about the upcoming operation were displayed. Apart from Fratelli there was Superintendent Williams, their overall boss, and DC Ball. He was the one who called Minster Court the Fortress of Darkness. He was about Ayşe’s own age and, she suspected, fancied her a little. As she sat down next to a uniformed officer she didn’t know at all, DC Ball winked across the room at her. Ayşe lowered her head, but she smiled as she did so.
‘OK,’ Riley said as he rapped on the table in front of him to get everyone’s attention. ‘Tomorrow.’
Conversations straggled to an end and people coughed, cleared their throats and sat down. Once all the shuffling was over, Inspectors Riley and Fratelli stood at opposite sides of the board and Riley said, ‘We are anticipating a terrorist attack, possibly of a suicidal nature, on a target or targets on Mark Lane, EC3.’
‘As we all know,’ Fratelli continued, ‘this man,’ she pointed at a photograph of Ahmet Ülker, ‘is currently in league with a radical cleric known as Ayatollah Hadi Nourazar. Now we don’t have any photographs of this person at the moment. He is sixty years old, was born in Isfahan, Iran. He is a known agitator across the Middle East and was deported from Egypt in nineteen ninety-seven but he has no history of involvement in terrorism. Not popular in his own country—’
‘If I may interrupt,’ Riley said with a smile at Fratelli. ‘Intelligence just in today is that Nourazar is not just disliked in Iran, he is officially forbidden from going back there. Too radical and off message, they want nothing to do with him or his followers who call themselves the Brothers of the Light. There is a further dimension to this and that concerns this man.’ He pointed at a picture of Ali Reza Hajizadeh. ‘Radicalised at Birmingham University, and implicated in the making of a bomb that accidentally killed one of his revolutionary brothers, Ali Reza Hajizadeh is twenty-eight. Born just after the Islamic Revolution in nineteen seventy-nine, he too was born in Isfahan and, like Nourazar, he comes from a family that prospered under the Shah. Hajizadeh’s family fled to the UK in nineteen eighty-nine and his parents remain very anti-Islamic Republic. Ali Reza currently lives in Stoke Newington and associates with various radical elements there, as well as with our favourite gangster, Mr Ahmet Ülker. For the last three years Ali Reza has lived in the Rize Guest House on Leswin Road, Stoke Newington, which is owned by a friend of Ülker’s, a Mr Yigit. Now the man we currently have inside Ülker’s Hackney Wick operations has told us that Ülker’s right-hand man, Derek Harrison, has been given a room in the guest house, which he will be leaving tomorrow morning with Ali Reza Hajizadeh. What they’re doing and where they’re going we don’t know. But what we do know is that Ayatollah Nourazar is in this country and has been seen at the Hackney Wick factory of Ahmet Ülker. We don’t know whether Nourazar and Ali Reza know each other but because of their backgrounds it is possible.’
Fratelli cleared her throat and then took over. ‘Evidence from our colleagues in İstanbul leads us to suspect that an attack upon a target or targets in Mark Lane will take place tomorrow,’ she said. ‘Nourazar until recently was in İstanbul and was radicalising a young Afghan boy who was to have made a suicide hit upon Mark Lane. İstanbul believes this was done with the agreement of Ahmet Ülker. But the Afghan boy died when the İstanbul police raided Ülker’s factory over there and we believe that Ali Reza Hajizadeh has taken his place. A suicide attack would be right up his ideological street. At the moment two of my officers are watching the Rize Guest House, particularly the movements of Harrison and Hajizadeh. Our mole, who is working as a security guard at Ülker’s Hackney Wick place, has gone to work as usual. At present we are watching Ülker’s factories, his Bishops Avenue place, his grotty flat in Dalston, the Leswin Road property and a flat on Evering Road, Hackney, which is the current abode of your friend and mine, Wesley Simpson.’
Everyone in the room except Ayşe groaned.
‘Yes, I know Wes is a pain in the arse, screaming police brutality every time he is arrested,’ Fratelli continued. ‘But for all his faults Wesley isn’t a violent person. He’s everyone’s favourite getaway driver, he never goes tooled up, whatever is happening. Violence isn’t his thing. But according to our source
at Hackney Wick, Wes has been driving vans full of counterfeit drugs for Ülker and so we can’t discount the possibility of Mr Simpson being involved in some car-based capacity tomorrow. It is my firm belief, however, that Wesley is entirely ignorant of what may be happening on Mark Lane. In fact, if it does all kick off and Wes is in the vicinity, I can see him bolting.’
‘We want Wesley Simpson watched because if he does twig that violence might be involved we may be able to use him,’ Riley said. ‘Where the ayatollah is at the moment, we don’t know. We believe he and a group of his followers are actually living in the factories at Hackney Wick. These factories are, as we’ve said before, also under surveillance but we’re having to keep our distance and rely upon our man on the inside. We don’t want to spook anyone and blow the whole thing before it’s even started. Our aim in all this is firstly to protect the public and secondly to catch this lot red-handed if we can.’ He looked over at Ayşe and smiled. ‘Now, as some of you may know, Sergeant Kudu from Greater Manchester has been embedded with the Turkish community in Stoke Newington for some months. Sergeant Kudu and our own Terry Springer have been liaising with our man undercover. Ayşe, I believe you have some input with regard to cultural issues.’
Ayşe told them how unusual it seemed for a Sunni Muslim, Ahmet Ülker, to be actively promoting the cause of a Shi’a cleric like Ayatollah Nourazar. ‘Although we know that gangsters and terrorists are often in league with one another these days,’ she said, ‘this rarely happens across the Sunni/Shi’a divide. To give you a for instance, Iran as a nation is violently opposed to the Sunni forces of the Taliban in Afghanistan. It is well-known now that Iran at one time was even prepared to do a deal with the west in order to halt the spread of the Taliban and their ideology. Personally, I am very suspicious of this so-called ayatollah. It is my belief that there is some business reason behind Ülker’s alliance with this cleric. The ayatollah may not be what he appears to be.’
‘You think he might just be playing like a role? As a cleric?’ DC Ball said.
‘I think it’s possible,’ Ayşe said. She looked around the room. She was the only Muslim at the briefing. The only other ‘ethnic’ present, a DC Banerjee, was a Hindu. ‘If this ayatollah is an inspiring speaker, he will be able to influence disaffected young people and get them to do things for him,’ she said. ‘Nourazar is educated and was once part of the elite that controlled Iran under the Shah. I doubt his motives are simply religious fervour.’
‘Thank you, Ayşe,’ said Riley. ‘Our colleagues in İstanbul are of the opinion that the boy who blew himself up at Ülker’s factory there was targeted by Nourazar because he was sick and vulnerable and because of his anti-Taliban leanings. Nourazar would nevertheless have considered the Sunni boy one of the “enemy”. The ayatollah “converted” him while at the same time marking him for death. Neat.’
‘Sir, what about Ülker’s Hackney Wick factories?’ DC Banerjee asked. ‘When can we close them down?’
A ripple of approval for what Banerjee had said went around the room. Riley looked first at Fratelli before he said, ‘Look, I know you’re all—’
‘Sir, there are sick, dying people in those places,’ Banerjee said. ‘We can’t—’
‘I know you all want to get stuck in to the factories and, believe me, you will,’ Riley said. ‘But first we have to be sure that we avert any terrorist attack on our city and secondly we must get both Ülker and this ayatollah sewn up good and proper. We’ve got to catch these bastards and their henchmen at it. Ülker particularly is a clever bugger. Yacoubian Industries, his company, is officially “run” by his wife Maxine. Even a half-dead lawyer could get him out of that one. Only when we know we have Ülker, his people and any information we can get on the shady business partners our embedded man has heard him allude to will we be able to move in on Hackney Wick. But move in we shall, ladies and gents, believe me.’
‘To that end,’ Fratelli continued, ‘we’d like you, Sergeant Kudu, to remain in situ in Stoke Newington in support of our undercover officer. Our team watching the factories will be ready to move in when authorisation is given by myself, Inspector Riley or Silver Commander who in this case will be the assistant commissioner.’ She turned to Terry Springer. ‘You’ve been on for too many double shifts lately, Terry. Get yourself home now. You have to rest.’
Terry Springer nodded gratefully.
‘This is a big operation,’ Riley said. ‘Our activities will be coordinated centrally by Gold and Silver command which will operate from here at the Yard. Inspector Fratelli, Superintendent Williams and myself will be designated Bronze commanders. We will be based at the scene in Minster Court. We’ll be supported by a CO19 unit and also counter-terrorism security advisers. At the end of this briefing you will all be allocated your various tasks, be they working undercover at the scene or staking out one or other of our suspects or suspect locations. What started out as an investigation into a slave master with some possible other operations overseas has become something much more threatening. I can’t stress, ladies and gents, just how vital it is that we all take care of ourselves and our colleagues.’
Ayşe, who wasn’t even designated to be at the scene, felt a shudder run down her spine.
Time was short now and İkmen knew that he had to find out as much as he could as soon as he was able. And so when he saw Derek Harrison arrive at Hackney Wick with Ali Reza Hajizadeh at nearly midnight, he made a decision to go inside the factory. They turned up in Harrison’s BMW and were both carrying large sports bags. They didn’t say anything to İkmen as they passed him, but he was very aware of the grim stare that Harrison gave him just before he entered. It told him the Englishman still didn’t trust him at all. When they went inside, İkmen heard Ahmet Ülker greet them. Ülker didn’t always turn up for the night shift or even during the day much, but tonight İkmen had seen his car enter the building. He had to get inside and soon. But how?
Mustafa generally checked on him once an hour and so İkmen waited until he had been and gone before he made his move. The noise from the machines inside would easily cover the sound of the side door opening. The problem was whether anyone of any significance spotted him as he slid inside. A number of foremen oversaw the hell inside the factory, including Süleyman Elgiz who İkmen knew slightly from the Rize. If Elgiz saw him come inside, he could say he wanted a drink of water and Elgiz might believe him. If it was anyone else, there could be a problem. But İkmen couldn’t wait outside doing nothing forever. He looked through the cracks in the splintered wooden walls and decided that everyone he might be afraid of was in the office or at the other end of the building. He pulled the door open just enough to slot his thin body inside and then pulled it quickly shut behind him. The scene that met his eyes was almost as bad as the smell. Thin people hunched over antiquated sewing machines, their backs bent, revealing spines that rarely if ever lay down straight to rest. Blood and excrement stained the floor and the smell was overpowering. But as far as he could tell, none of the foremen were close by and no one had seen him. As quickly as he could, İkmen ran over to the small cubicle that constituted Ülker’s office and pressed himself hard against one of the side walls.
He stood very still, short of breath, trying not to breathe too hard lest someone hear him wheeze. Then he noticed that one of the machinists on the very last row of workers was looking at him. Black and probably somewhere in his middle age, the man stared at him with huge, wounded eyes. His face, which was emaciated and out of which teeth poked at strange and crazy angles, was one of the saddest things Çetin İkmen had ever seen. With trembling hands, İkmen put a finger up to his lips and shook his head. The man did not respond. All İkmen could hope was that he had seen and understood, and didn’t summon a foreman. The man turned back to his work and İkmen pressed his ear to the side of the little wooden office. The conversation in there was in English.
‘Derek, it isn’t about you!’ he heard Ülker’s raised voice say. ‘You do what you have to do to
help Ali, then you get out. End of story.’
‘Ahmet, this is the chance I’ve been waiting for,’ the Englishman countered. ‘To get even!’
‘With a tube station? Derek—’
‘Moorgate, a tube station, robbed me of my future. Now another station can pay for that,’ Harrison said.
Tube station? Why were they talking about tube stations? Not Mark Lane or even Fenchurch Street station. İkmen felt his body go cold. Oh Allah, they were going to hit the underground!
‘I want to see—’
‘Unless you want to die, you can’t stay to watch Ali detonate his device!’ Ülker said.
‘And anyway,’ Ali Reza said, ‘when I do what I do, I am doing it for the greater glory of Islam. You people forget that! That is why I am doing this, that is the point!’
‘Yes,’ Ülker said. ‘That is the point – or one of them.’ He paused for a moment. ‘That and what will follow on from Ali’s martyrdom.’
‘And you won’t count me in on that either!’ Derek Harrison roared. ‘You and your holy man have picked—’
‘Derek, your job is to get Ali in, help him with his equipment and then get out,’ Ülker said. ‘You must get away, Derek! I am giving you this opportunity because you are my friend. Once that station goes up, the police will be everywhere. I do not want you to get arrested, I do not want you to tell the police about me!’
‘I wouldn’t! Christ, you do know that, don’t you, Ahmet?’ Harrison said. ‘What do you take me for?’
‘What are you doing?’ The voice came from directly behind İkmen. But the words were in English and so he couldn’t react immediately.
‘Oi!’
İkmen took his ear away from the side of the office and turned. The man behind him looked Turkish, though he spoke in English. The main thing İkmen noticed about him was that he was pointing a gun at him.
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