Slow Burn (2010)

by Conrad Jones

  “I can`t see it Alec. Those people have mega-bucks, and they can reach out across the globe. Nowhere would be safe to hide if they wanted you dead. I think they would put Shah`s head on a stick if they wanted him.”

  “Does the name, Einstein mean anything to you?” Will knew it was a long shot.

  “Einstein? That means nothing to me, Will.”

  “Have you got any plans to revenge Kenny Richards, Lenny?” Alec sat forward. The last thing they wanted now was a turf war in the city. It was clear that Shah had made enemies outside of the city`s crime world.

  “I am too long in the tooth to be playing games like that, Superintendent. If someone out there is taking on Malik Shah, then it would be advisable to keep out of the way. I`ll let them blow the shit out of each other and see what bits and pieces are worth picking up when they`ve finished.”

  “Thank you for your time, Lenny, and if you hear anything give me a call?”

  “Oh, you`ll be the first to know, Alec,” Lenny raised his hand as he stood up. They shook hands. A mischievous grin crossed his face. “There is one other thing.”

  “What is it?” Alec raised his eyebrows.

  “There`s an old leather warehouse on the docks, near Panama street,” Lenny nodded. “You might want to have a look at it. Rumour has it Shah`s lot use it for interviewing clients, if you know what I mean.”

  “Thanks, Lenny, we`ll do that.”

  CHAPTER 39

  Present day/ Ransom

  Ashwan Pindar packed three kilos of crack cocaine into a small holdall. He placed the holdall into a black suitcase and zipped it up. The smell of eight hundred thousand pounds in mixed notes wafted up to him. The odour was a mixture of paper and sweat. His hands were shaking as he stood the case on its wheels. He checked the screen of the mobile phone that had been sent to him that morning. He was released from the cells without questioning, and he returned home for a change of clothes and to smooth things over with his wife. She wasn’t returning his calls or replying to his text messages. The police swooped on his home and checked out all their vehicles and phones for explosive devices. Malik was going ballistic. Omar, Rasim and the others were assassinated and he was feeling vulnerable.

  Ash switched on his laptop and checked his e-mails and the kidnappers had made contact. He followed their orders and drove to a lay-by a few miles from his home. In a litter bin he found the mobile phone and a set of instructions. The signal bar was full, as was the battery power, but there was no message yet.

  “Anything?” Malik Shah asked angrily. His face was like thunder. He was sitting on the edge of long pine table, swinging his legs back and forth. A Mac-10 machinegun lay on the tabletop, next to him. He picked it up and stared at it in his hand. The weapon was compact, but deadly. Its matt black finish belied its lethal potential, making it look toy-like. Far from a toy, it was capable of firing nine hundred, nine millimetre bullets a minute.

  “Nothing,” Ashwan shook his head. He felt his trouser pocket through the material, wallet, keys, and phone. He had checked them every five minutes for the last two hours. They hadn`t moved, but he checked them anyway. “I`m nervous, Malik. Who is doing this to us? It must be someone that we know. Who would ask for three kilos of gear unless they knew us?”

  “We`ll be behind you every step of the way. There is no way they`ll get their hands on that money or the drugs until Mamood is safe, and sound. Once he is, they`re fucking fish food.”

  “What if they spot you tailing me?”

  “They will not.”

  “What if they do?”

  “Shut the fuck up, Ashwan!” Malik was on the edge. The sustained attack on his business interests had him seriously rattled. He was clueless as to who the perpetrators were. Someone was stalking him and Ashwan, someone dangerous and deadly.

  Ashwan looked down at the suitcase and frowned. Eight hundred thousand pounds was not a substantial amount of money, compared to the safe return of his only son. Malik had put up the money, and he had acquired the drugs from their own dealers. He had taken over the whole ransom operation, much to Ashwan`s concern. Malik was making this a personal vendetta. Ash just wanted his son back unharmed. It was rare for Malik to become physically involved, but the murders of Rasim and the other directors forced his hand. They had worked together since their school days, and now there was only Ashwan and himself left alive. He wasn’t going to wait around for the killers to get them. It was time to take this war to them. They had demanded money and drugs for the safe return of Mamood, and that required them collecting the ransom. When they did his men would be there waiting.

  The kidnappers had told Ash to drive his Porsche until they contacted him. Malik and a small army of their men would take it in turn to follow him, reducing the risk of being spotted. Ashwan had no idea who had taken his son, or how many of them there would be at the ransom drop. What he did know, was there weren`t many outfits with the men and machineguns that Malik`s gang had. The kidnappers would be outnumbered, out gunned, surrounded, and dead five seconds after Mamood was released. At least that was Malik`s plan.

  Malik Shah was a cold man. His brutality stemmed from his contempt for humanity itself. As a teenager he systematically used and abused anyone that came near to him, girls, family and his friends. He surrounded himself with the strongest characters, and used them as a shield. Anyone who crossed him felt the wrath of his close-knit unit. Malik Shah and his gang left school at the time of one of the worst periods of recession and unemployment, to hit post war Britain. His older cousins, Imran and Ishmael, were already importing heroin into the country, via extended family in Pakistan. The cities of Manchester and Liverpool became battlegrounds as feuding crime families battled for turf. The eighties was the decade of the chemical generation as ecstasy became the social drug of choice, and drug taking became part of the club scene, and socially acceptable. Drug dealers became millionaires almost overnight. Malik was a natural leader, and as he matured, he rose through the ranks and took control of the business. He was brutal, and ruthless, taking out several of his older family members on his way to the top. As his wealth grew, so did the number of his enemies, although few dared to cross him.

  At the age of twenty-four, Malik and his cousins boarded a North Sea Ferry, headed for the Dutch port of Rotterdam. Imran carried a sports bag, which contained seventy five thousand pounds. They were planning to exchange it for tablets, at seventy- five pence each, which would be resold at twenty pounds a pop. The demand was enormous, and this deal would make them one of the richest crime syndicates in the country. Imran liked Malik because he was sharp. If given an area to look after, then he did it with an iron hand. Other drug dealers were dispatched without mercy and his profit margins were always top drawer. He demanded the respect of all those that worked with him, and he was feared by his enemies. With that in mind, Imran decided to take him on the trip to Holland, and Malik jumped at the opportunity. They travelled as foot passengers and the voyage was uneventful. Imran and Ishmael talked openly with their young cousin about their plans to offload the drugs when they returned to Britain. Half the haul was to be sold wholesale to two big crime families in London, and the remainder would be sold at hugely inflated prices to local dealers in the Liverpool and Manchester areas. They had no plans to retail the drugs themselves, which meant that Malik had no way of taking any profit from the deal. He raised the issue, and offered to take personal control of the resale of the tablets, but his cousins wanted the drugs gone quickly. Malik was both gutted, and offended by the plan. He began to think that his cousins were losing their backbones, and missing the opportunity to maximise the potential profit from the deal, by selling it on the streets themselves. Malik spent the rest of the crossing coming up with his own plan.

  The trio travelled in a hire car to a service station on the outskirts of Rotterdam, where they met a Hell`s Angel who went by the name of Grizzly. Malik could see why he was called that. He was a monster of a man, muscular arms completely sleeved in tattoos,
and his hands were the size of a gorilla`s. He wore a red bandana and mirrored sunglasses, black leather pants and a biker jacket with the Angel`s crest embroidered on the back. Imran handed the biker a brown envelope full of money, and in return, he received a leather satchel. Imran handed the satchel to Malik while the Hell`s Angel counted the cash. He opened the bag. Inside was an Uzi nine millimetre machine pistol, and three full clips of ammunition. Imran was taking out some insurance. It made sense, and it took away the hassle of smuggling weapons onto the ferry. Grizzly slipped the envelope into his scuffed leather jeans, and walked away without saying a word. The huge Dutch biker had Swastikas tattooed on his hands. He hated Asians, but he put his prejudice aside, as their money was the same colour as his and business was business.

  They drove on twenty miles in silence. The reality of their predicament was sinking in. They were far from home, carrying a huge bundle of money, and looking to do a drug deal with people that they didn’t know, and couldn’t trust. The Uzi offered some reassurance, but not a lot. The meeting place was the exit road of another service station. Ishmael indicated and looked at Malik in the mirror.

  “We`re here, game on,” he said, trying to sound aloof, but failing miserably.

  Two men in a dark green Range Rover waited for them on the far corner of a large car park. Imran pulled the vehicle behind them, but before he could get out the driver signalled for them to follow the vehicle. The Range Rover drove at a steady pace for over half an hour, before turning onto a deserted farm track. The track was rutted and the vehicles bumped their way along it until they reached the farmhouse and outbuildings. The property was ramshackle and in disrepair, the windows were gaping black holes in a crumbling facade. Imran took a packet of Marlborough from his shirt pocket. He removed three, and handed them out to his cousins. Malik felt a rush of adrenalin as he inhaled the soothing smoke deep into his lungs.

  “Wait here,” Imran instructed, as he and Ishmael climbed out of the vehicle. “Keep the gun loaded and cover our backs.”

  Malik slammed a full clip into the breach, and it clicked home. He slipped the spares into his jacket pocket. Imran and Ishmael waited nervously for the men to exit their vehicle. When they did, Malik thought that they were Turks. Both men were dark haired and unshaven. They looked alike, and Malik thought that they could have been brothers. One of the men walked to the tailgate of the Range Rover, and opened it slowly. He took out a large rucksack and a silver twelve gauge Mossberg pump action shotgun. Malik was surprised that they didn’t have backup with them, and that the only weapon he could see was a weapon limited to five shots, before it needed to be reloaded. The Mossberg would do terrible damage to a human target with five shells, but it would be limited against multiple moving targets. The Uzi would fire a full clip in under four seconds, spraying a wide area and increasing the chances of a kill.

  The Turks approached his cousins, and they met cautiously halfway between their respective vehicles. Malik edged out of the hire car and stood behind the rear passenger door. Words were exchanged, but Malik couldn`t make out what was said. Imran opened the sports bag and showed the Turks the cash. The Turks responded by opening the rucksack. The man with the Mossberg looked nervous, and sweat was trickling from his temples, running down the side of his face. Malik could smell his fear. He stepped from behind the car door, raised the Uzi and pulled the trigger. The nine-millimetre machinegun bucked in his hand as it released its lethal load. Imran and Ishmael never knew who shot them. Bullets slammed into their backs smashing bones and tearing organs to shreds as they ricocheted around inside their ribcage. They dropped dead where they stood. One of the Turks took two rounds in the face, blasting the lower jaw and cheekbone from his skull. The other man was hit in the shoulder, and he tried to crawl away from the scene, digging his heels into the ground, his breaths coming in short gasps. Malik released the empty clip and slammed a full one into the Uzi. Malik walked over to the wounded Turk. He stood over him, looking into his eyes. His mouth opened, but no words came out. Malik pulled the trigger and emptied the magazine into his twitching body.

  The Uzi was red hot. Malik kneeled down next to Imran`s dead body. His eyes were wide open but there was no life in them. The light inside had been extinguished. Malik took the cigarettes from his cousin`s shirt pocket, and lit one as he surveyed the carnage around him. It took him ten minutes to strip the bodies of any valuables or identification, and he removed his jacket and tee shirt, leaving them on the front seat of the hire car while he worked. He put the bodies into the Range Rover, his cousins in the front, and the Turks in the back. Dragging them across the farmyard was difficult, and lifting them up into the vehicle was backbreaking but he managed to complete his gory task. When he finished, he was covered in blood and gore from head to toe. Malik tossed the weapons into the back seat with the dead Turks, and then he ripped the shirt from one of the bodies, stuffing it into the petrol filler pipe. He set fire to it and jogged back to his hire car.

  Malik smoked another cigarette as he watched the material burn. It wasn’t long before the petrol tank exploded and the vehicle became a raging inferno. He had seventy five thousand pounds in cash, plus the drugs, and a selection of credit cards that he had found on the bodies. It would be the financial rock, upon which he would build his empire. Malik posted the drugs in several packages to himself, and he returned home as a foot passenger on another ferry. Within a month of returning home, he was the richest, most powerful drug dealer in the north of England. Ashwan and the others stayed loyal to him, and they prospered as the business grew.

  A knock on the kitchen door snapped Ashwan back to reality.

  “We`ve got a problem.” A huge fat man filled the doorway. His cheeks were flabby jowls, which joined his neck without the need for a chin. Indi Pindar was a cousin to Ashwan. He had a black sweater stretched over his massive bulk, dark sweat patches were spreading from beneath his armpits.

  “What is it?” Malik stood up from the table. He held the Mac-10 in both hands ready for action. Ashwan could see how tense his boss was, and that worried him.

  “We`ve got company outside,” Imran nodded toward the window. “We`re under surveillance.”

  Malik walked to the doorway and switched off the kitchen light. He went to the window and parted the venetian blinds with his fingers. Across the road, one hundred yards away, was a white transit van. Two men sat low in the front seats, and there was a dull glow from the rear of the vehicle. It was a surveillance unit with a sophisticated listening capability fitted to the back.

  Malik reached for the sink and put the plug into the hole, turning both taps full on. The he switched on the radio and turned it up full blast. Indi followed suit by waddling through every room in the house, switching on every television set and turning the volume up full on. Malik laughed as he looked through the blinds again. The two policemen in the front seats of the van were sat bolt upright. They twisted round to face the men in the rear of the vehicle, and a heated conversation was going on. The driver slammed the steering wheel with his fist, furious that they`d been spotted. There was little point in remaining there anymore, and he started the engine, switched on the lights and drove toward the house. The vehicle slowed slightly as it neared. Malik flicked on the light and waved through the blinds sarcastically. The surveillance officer returned the gesture by raising his middle finger. Malik Shah was too clever to be caught out by a clumsy operation like that, MI5 had been trying to catch him for years, and they couldn’t find a shred of evidence against him. His men were sharp, and on the ball. He had Electric Counter Measures in every house, and every vehicle. As soon as a listening device was aimed at them, they were informed of the fact.

  “What are those fuckers doing here tonight?” Ashwan hissed.

  “Probably looking for whoever dumped Bruce Mann on the town hall steps,” Malik laughed. Indi came back into the room, bringing the sickly sweet smell of body odour with him. “Have you checked everything?”

  “Yes, they`re go
ne,” Indi replied. His neck rippled as he spoke.

  “Are you sure?” Ash was flapping, rattled by the police presence. He didn’t want anything to interfere in getting Mamood back safely.

  The mobile phone beeped loudly, silencing the conversation. There was a message on the screen.

  HEAD EAST ON THE M62. ANYONE FOLLOWS YOU MAMOOD DIES. GOOD JOB THE POLICE SURVELLANCE TEAM LEFT OR HE WOULD ALREADY BE DEAD.

  “The bastards must be watching us!” Ash gasped. “They know about the police surveillance van being here.”

  Malik snatched the mobile phone from Ash and glared at the screen. It was becoming obvious that people they were dealing with were not amateurs. Malik wanted them dead, whatever the cost, and if that included Mamood being sacrificed then so be it.

  Chapter Forty

  The Dream

  Ashwan Pindar wiped sweat from his forehead. He clicked the windscreen wipers on as rain began to fall, blurring his vision. The headlights of oncoming vehicles were dazzling as he drove his Porsche. The radio was switched off, and engine noise filled the vehicle. The mobile phone in his hand beeped. Another set of instructions had arrived. He had been driving around in circles for nearly forty minutes now. Malik and his men were trying to second-guess where the kidnappers were sending him, sometimes following from a distance behind, while other vehicles sped ahead anticipating where the exchange would take place.