“What is it, darling?” said her Father..
“He’s dead.” She began to sob in earnest and her mum put her arms around her in comfort. Both Anne and John were also shocked. They had known Maurice from the years when Jackie and he had trained together.
“Something happened on the way to England?” asked John.
“No, no he died in Iceland,” she started crying louder. Tim picked Daniel up and sat him on his lap with his arms around him, stroking him gently, trying to keep him from panicking.
They all waited in silence as Jackie regained control and took a deep breath. “From what his sister can gather, he went on a trip on the glacier and the snow picked up. Visibility was down to a few yards and he just disappeared. They had search parties out but so far there has been nothing. He has been out on the glacier for over thirty six hours and they assume he has frozen to death.”
“That’s dreadful” said Anne and then lapsed into silence realising the inadequacy of her words.
“Surly with a sat nav in the vehicle they could trace it and could pinpoint within yards where he went missing and concentrate their search in that area. All he had to do was sit tight and wait?” said Tim.
“His sister asked that. It seems the sat nav had been stolen from the bus the previous night. They had to rely on the driver describing his route. They can find no trace of him, not even footprints.”
She sat looking into space and silence descended. John broke the silence.” Come on Daniel, big day tomorrow, let’s all get a move on.” Daniel got off Tim’s lap and picked up his suitcase containing his toys. Jackie had dropped off his clothes earlier. He would be staying at his Grandparent’s while she and Tim honeymooned.
All of Jackie’s wedding paraphernalia was already at her Mum’s, the dress, the Bride’s maid’s dresses, Daniel’s pageboy outfit and something borrowed, old and blue. Tim was left with the hired morning suits for him, Jeff Stiles, his best man, and the two ushers, friends from his Uni days.
Tim helped them to the car and kissed Jackie goodnight. The next time he would see her again would be at the Registry Office.
On his own, Tim felt deflated as he stared at all the stuff lying around the house. Tim had only meet Maurice once briefly, but it still affected his mood. He realised how brief life could be. He realised he needed to buck himself up. This was no way to approach the biggest day of is life. The door bell rang at that point, breaking into his melancholy.
Jeff Stiles came bounding in full of energy as usual. “How’s the condemned man?”
Chapter 8
Enrique Rojas was a very busy man today. The hippopotamuses were being delivered and he had taken charge to make sure they were settled in properly. He jumped out of the Jeep and made his way along the track leading to the large pool, that had been specially constructed with the retaining wall around it. This was a major step in the construction works he was having done in the grounds of the hacienda and a high point, the delivery of the first of the big animals.
Pablo Escobar the Colombian drug lord had built his zoo and Rojas considered him self bigger and better and so would have a bigger and better zoo. The hippos had become Escobar’s legacy after his death, forming into a herd, they had taken over the countryside north of Bogotá. No one knew what to do with them until Rojas sent a team to capture a dozen of them and bring them to Mexico. There had been reluctance among the authorities for their importation. Mexico had sufficient problems without hippos wondering around attacking people. Rojas had persuaded and bribed the authorities and he now had his private zoo license.
He watched with pride as they were unloaded and took to the artificial pool he had created. He already had ostriches, antelope and had acquired four elephants from a zoo going bust in the US. He wanted lions and giraffes. He was already negotiating for the lions. The lions were being bred in Africa purely for hunting and as such were not exactly wild but he decided that they would do.
Rojas with his Father’s death had free reign over the family fortune and he was spending it fast. He was determined to build a legacy and like Escobar go down in folk history. He was, of course, very unstable mentally and prone to extreme emotions. Laughing almost hysterically one minute, he could switch at the slightest provocation in to murderous rage. He was not like his Father, a sadist, but he was a sociopath. He saw himself as the only thing that mattered. He took want he wanted and only considered others as objects for him to use.
“Mr Trist is here,” said the driver of the Jeep, as he clicked off the mobile phone he had just been talking on.
“Who?”
“The DEA agent?”
“Those fuckers, what could they possibly want with me, do you think well apart from my balls?” he laughed.
His driver knew enough to laugh loudly at his bosses joke.
“He can wait. Tell them to feed him or give him a girl or boy to amuse him. I need to make sure my hippos are happy before we deal with the garbage.”
The driver phoned the message back to the Villa where Trist was waiting.
“Mr Rojas will be with you shortly,” Rojas’s butler said to Trist, “please follow me”
David Trist was feeling tired and hot. His flight had been on time and comfortable but the drive to the middle of nowhere to Rojas’s ranch had been long, uncomfortable and boring. Ofcourse Rojas never experienced the discomfort and tedium of the drive, as he had plane available, or a helicopter to ferry him about. There was a landing stripe a few hundred yards from the house with a hanger at the end, housing his planes and a helipad yards from the front door.
He had to admit that the house was imposing, if not in good taste, too much, too big and too glitzy, but each to his own thought Trist. He was shown into a large library, with floor to ceiling leather bound books. On inspection he saw that they were filed aesthetically. rather than by author or subject. Big books at the bottom getting smaller as they went higher up the shelves. He causally picked one up. It was just leather bound paper devoid of type. The books were fake, just decorative.
He settled in a leather bound chair and was glad that the room was air conditioned. A young woman appeared carrying the drink he had ordered. She was a stunning girl with raven black hair. Her breasts clearly surgically enhanced were huge and forced themselves against the white flimsy silk of her blouse. Her skirt was more a belt rather than a garment and it showed, to the most advantage, her long, lithe shapely legs. Trist could not help but appreciate her beauty.
“Would you like to fuck me while you wait for Mr Rojas or I could suck your dick if you prefer?” she smiled provocatively.
Trist would very much like to have fucked her but he felt he should at least make an attempt at upholding the dignity of the DEA. “Perhaps later,” he said.
“Let me know,” she smiled back and left wiggling her hips. He watched he tight round bottom move side to side as she departed.
Trist was sick and tired of the DEA and the hypocritical Hackensack. As far as he could see, his boss sat on his fat arse and sucked up to whoever needed brown nosing to so he could keep his well paid cushy job. The so called war on drugs was little more than a scam, dragged out to say that something was being done to protect the American youth from the devastation wreaked on their lives, by the cheap crap flooding the streets from Columbia and Mexico. Most of the Governments whose economies were dependent on the drug trade, relied on drug money to keep them in power. If these Governments were not intentionally corrupt, most of the departments from law enforcement to procurement were.
The DEA was little better. Rather than risk failure or spend time and effort in infiltration and intelligence gathering, in a real attempt to seriously hurt the drugs trade, they would go for a quick fix, a headliner grabber.
Here he was again in the old manner attempting the quick fix, enjoying the hospitality of a murderer who was destroying the lives of Americans. He would probably get a deal with Rojas, why not? The DEA would knock out a few rival drug lords for Rojas and take the cred
it for the success, while clearly aiding and abetting the growth of Rojas’s grip on the American drug trade.
Trist was pissed off with it. It was always his neck on the line dealing with these homicidal maniacs and he knew if the dirty deals the DEA were involved in had a light shone on them, he would be dumped by Hackensack without a second thought. The DEA would deny all knowledge and accuse him of exceeding his authority, going rogue or being corrupt. If it did not go wrong, the Government and the DEA would take the credit for their marvellous work. To make matters worse not only was he risking his neck, feeling pissed off, he was up to his neck in gambling debts.
His wife had left him and feeling fed up, he had gone with a few friends to Las Vegas. It had been a relief from life’s daily shit. He had won at first and he liked it. The bug had bitten him, but all too soon he was in above his head. The pressure was increasing and the debts kept growing. He managed to do a few favours by pulling strings at the DEA and the debt would go down, but he would soon gamble it back up,
Trist’s contemplations were interrupted by Rojas’s arrival. “Welcome Mr. DEA,” he extended his hand. Trist stood up and shook it. “I trust you have been made welcome?”
“I have.”
“Let’s eat.” He followed Rojas through to an enormous dining room with an enormous dining table. They sat at opposite ends. Trist was glad he did not need spectacles, as he would need to have put them on to see Rojas in the distance.
The waiters were young women and topless. Rojas fondled the breasts throughout the meal and slide his hands under their skirts as they lent forward to serve. The girl who had served Trist his welcome drink was there and her breasts were even better than he had speculated. She made a point of maintaining eye contact and he could not help being aroused.
“Now what can I do for the DEA?” They were sat on the terrace overlooking the magnificent manicured gardens to the rear of the villa. The pool had the naked girls parked on Sun beds around its periphery. The girls brought their drinks to them and served them without any form of inhibition.
“We would like to offer you something you want.”
“And what is that?”
“Your Father’s killer,” he had Rojas full attention.
“I see and in return?”
“Information on your rivals, some big busts,”
Rojas thought for a while, “It has its appeal, but and it is a big but, I do not trust the DEA. “
Trist had little to say. He knew that once Hackensack had made his splash, Rojas would get his Father’s killer alright, but not in the way he expected. Annubis, the assassin, would be assigned to kill Rojas, squaring the circle and removing any link between the DEA and the drug Lord.
“I see from your expression that I am right not to trust. So how can we make this work for both of us? I think I may be able to help you on a personal level, Am I not right in that you may have a little problem with some people you owe money too?”
Trist knew this was a turning point. He knew in that instance that it was time to think of himself and stop being a pawn taking shit from the Hackensack’s of the World, who never got their hands dirty, but took all the rewards.
Trist waved the young dark haired girl over and watched as she walked naked towards him. She was beautiful. “I’ll have that fuck now,” he said to her.
Turning to Rojas “You are right in not trusting the DEA, you would meet your Father’s killer, but only when the DEA sent him to kill you. I think we can come to a much better arrangement that benefits the both of us?”
“Enjoy your fuck Mr Trist and I think I shall enjoy working with you,” said Rojas.
Chapter 9
It was the day of the wedding and Tim had not slept at all well. He was definitely having last minute jitters. He was taking on a lot of responsibility with Daniel. Not only was Tim becoming a husband, he was instantly becoming a Father. He was not sure if he was grown up enough to look after himself, let alone look after a young boy. He thought the difference was that, in the normal course of events, you had nine months to prepare yourself for the arrival of a child. The adjustment period, when you realised that your life was over as you knew it and the next eighteen to thirty years of your life, would no longer be yours.
He knew he loved Jackie and he loved Daniel, but the doubts still lingered as he got out of bed at six o’clock. He looked in the bathroom mirror. He did not like what looked back at him. Rough was the only way to describe it, like a man who had not had any sleep in the last twenty four hours, which was exactly how it was.
Stiles did not help,” Still time to do a runner,” he said cheerily as he fried bacon.
The smell of the fry up and the nerves combined, made Tim feel sick and he returned to the bathroom, but managed not to puke. He did not usually suffer from nerves, mind you he did not usually get married either.
There was a ring on the door bell and the two ushers turned up. They were Tim’s friends from Uni. They had sort of kept in touch on and off over the years. The odd wedding, birthday or party was where they came together every few years.
Geoff was a solicitor and practiced commercial law. He had therefore been of no use when Tim and his wife had been going through their divorce. Seeing him reminded him how quickly love can turn to resentment in a relationship. He put the thought out of his mind. Your Wedding Day was not the appropriate time to be contemplating divorce.
Tom was an accountant, like Jackie, but he had gone into commerce and worked for an insurance company, rather than pursue his career in the profession, as she was doing.
There was a lot of handshaking when they first arrived, followed by more warnings about the folly of getting married. This was further followed by a period of chaos and a lot of confusion as they tried getting into their morning dress. Things were too big, too small or back to front. Unlike normal clothing, formal weeding hire garments are designed to fit varying body shapes and sizes. This adaptability has the advantage for the hire company of allowing them to carry less stock. It does not have any advantages at all for the person trying to put the clothing on. For example the waistcoats, which only had fronts and no backs, could be pulled higher by tightening straps one way and pulled tighter by pulling straps another.
Geoff ‘s waistcoat had turned into what appeared to be a child’s bib, while Stiles had managed to attach is starched collar in such a manner as to turn himself into a vicar. Tim, in his nervousness had the wrong trousers, which were three sizes too big and prompted him to do a Charlie Chaplin impersonation.
Finally, with a great deal of messing about, they managed to get dressed. Tim was now feeling far more positive, helped by the banter and humour of his best man and his ushers. “I am ready,” he announced. “Insert the button holes.”
There was silence then a loud “fuck” from Stiles.
“You did pick up the button holes didn’t you? Tell me they are in the boot of your car?” said Tim
Stiles said nothing “For fuck’s sake,” said Tim.
In an instant they had gone from having plenty of time to arrive at the Registry Office on time, to not having enough time to get there at the appointed hour.
“Plan, a cunning plan, I have a plan,” said Tom
It was far from a plan. Tim and Stiles would drive off to the Florists and the two ushers would head for the Registry office to meet and seat. Hopefully, Tim would appear at the wedding in time with his button hole and the bridesmaid’s bouquets.
As they left, a postal van arrived with a parcel. They ran for their cars. “I need someone to sign for this,” said the posty as they passed him.
“No time now, I am getting married,” said Tim as he jumped into Stiles’ car.
The postman did some muttering and filled out the card saying he had been unable to deliver a parcel and where and when it could be collected.
“You do realise working for MI5 does not exempt you from the motoring laws of this Country don’t you?” said Tim, as Stiles raced his way across North Lon
don
“Well they sort of do,” said Stiles, “I am Deputy Director of MI5 and could technically declare this an emergency.”
“I am not sure I would like to test that theory in front of a Parliamentary Select Committee.”
“You are probably right,” he said but continued to speed anyway.
They arrived at Barnet Registry office with moments to spare. Being deputy director of MI5 did not exempt you from parking tickets when you were not on official business either. Stiles picked up a parking fine of one hundred and twenty pounds for parking in the wrong place, but Tim did get to his own wedding.
Jackie had rather a less eventful experience and arrived composed with her Father at her arm, followed by Daniel, looking as cute as a button in his tiny morning suit. The two Brides Maids completed the prossession as Tim waited nervously with Stiles to his right.
Neither of them could really remember the ceremony. It was just a blur. Tim remembered Jackie looking beautiful and Jackie remembered Tim stumbling over his vows. They kissed and they were man and wife.
The reception was full of good wishes, the odd drunk and the odd disagreement between family members. Tim had few guests. He was a little sad that both his parents had passed on. His Mum always liked a good wedding, while his Father held the cynical view that some poor fellow was giving away the rest of his life. Elaine, the head of MI5 was there with her husband, who was wheelchair bound and her son, Nicholas. She had bought herself another pair of totally impractical shoes, which she had to remove after walking nearly twenty yards.
The reception was over, in what seemed an instant and the car was waiting to take then to a hotel overnight, before they flew off on honeymoon the next day. “You have the tickets and passports?” said Jackie.
Of course he did not. In the dash to get to the florist, the travel documents were sitting on the side board in plain view so they would not be forgotten.
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