by Chris Ryan
The beam travelled quickly across the right-hand wall. It illuminated a face.
Danny tracked back, ready to fire.
He saw a seated figure, tied to a high-backed chair. Several revolutions of duct tape masked the lower part of the head. Eyes wide in terror. Hair matted to the forehead with sweat.
Buckingham.
He was rocking backwards, banging the chair against the wall. A desperate moaning came from his throat, muffled by the tape. Dazzled by Danny’s torch, he couldn’t know who had just walked in. The rocking became more desperate. The banging louder. The moaning more frenzied.
There was something on the floor surrounding Buckingham’s chair. Danny lowered the beam to light it up. He saw four blocks, about the same size as ordinary building bricks. Instantly he recognised the bright orange of Semtex plastic explosive. A wire led from one block to the other, the four of them forming a semicircle round the legs of the chair. Wired into one of the blocks was a small battery pack connected to a digital timer the size of cigarette packet. A detonator.
Taff’s words flashed through Danny’s mind. Don’t bother with Buckingham. He won’t be around to join you.
Instinct took over. Danny let the rifle fall and hang from his body as he strode the five metres between himself and Buckingham. The moans of terror grew more high-pitched – Buckingham sounded like a pig squealing before slaughter – but Danny ignored them as he lifted him, chair and all, out from among the explosives. Buckingham was heavier than his small frame suggested, and Danny’s muscles were burning by the time he had hauled the man and the chair out into the compound.
They were five metres from the house when the explosion came.
Danny heard it first: a seismic crack that stung his ears. Then the shock wave hit, throwing him forwards a good two metres. Buckingham flew from his arms, landing with a dull thud and then a crack that Danny hoped was the sound of a chair leg breaking, not a bone. Looking back, he saw the left side of the building collapse in on itself, sending up a great cloud of dust. He crawled over to where Buckingham was lying on his side. His eyes were scrunched shut and he was trying to scream. Danny pulled out his knife and with two swift slashes cut through the ropes that bound him to the chair. Then, without any thought for the pain it might cause him, he pulled away the duct tape coiled round Buckingham’s head. Clumps of his hair came off with the tape, and when his lips were finally exposed, his shrieks were shrill and womanish. Only when he realised it was Danny who had rescued him from the building did the screaming subside. But if Buckingham felt relief at seeing his SAS chaperone, Danny didn’t intend to let it last for long. He grabbed him by the front of his shirt and yanked him to his feet.
‘Talk!’ he roared over the noise of the flames crackling behind him.
‘I . . . I don’t know what you mean . . .’
‘You and Taff have been planning something. You’d better tell me what it is, Buckingham, otherwise you’re not walking out of here.’
‘You wouldn’t dare!’ Buckingham shouted.
Wouldn’t he? With the anger surging through him now, Danny wasn’t so sure. He swung Buckingham round so that he was facing the burning building and Danny was behind him. He wrapped his left arm around the man’s neck, tightly enough for the air supply to be slightly restricted. He could feel the heat of the fire against his forearm, but the rest of him, including his face, was shielded by Buckingham’s body.
Ten metres between them and the flames. Danny pushed him towards the blaze, halving that distance.
‘What have you been planning?’ he hissed in Buckingham’s ear.
‘Nothing,’ Buckingham croaked. ‘His men just tried to kill me . . . you saw . . . For God’s sake, man, it’s too hot . . .’
Danny pushed him another metre nearer the flames.
‘You know what I think?’ he said, sweat dripping from his body and his forearm scalding. ‘I think Taff’s double-crossed you in some way. He’s made a fool of you just like he’s made a fool of me. Now tell me what you were planning.’
When Buckingham didn’t respond, he pushed him forward another metre.
Every man has a breaking point. Buckingham reached his sooner than most might have done. As the intense heat began to sear his face, the words tumbled from his mouth as though they were buckets of water trying to douse the pain. ‘Sorgen!’ he shrieked. ‘They’re on their way to kill him!’
Danny spun both himself and Buckingham round 180 degrees so that they were no longer facing the fire. With a tremendous effort that momentarily threw Danny off balance, Buckingham broke free and ran. Once he was ten metres from Danny, he fell to the ground and clutched at his face, screaming curses. Danny ignored them. ‘Why?’ he hissed.
‘That’s what this has all been about, you idiot!’ Buckingham shouted back. ‘Sorgen is Asu’s only serious contender in this war. If he comes to power, the French will have Syria sewn up, and we can’t afford that!’ He took a few deep breaths. ‘My job was to clear Sorgen’s assassination with Asu, then make sure that Sorgen and his commanders would all be in one place at one time. Then Taff and his men could go in and eliminate them.’
‘Jesus, Buckingham. I thought Sorgen was your friend.’
Buckingham shot him a poisonous look. ‘I thought Jack was yours.’
With great difficulty, Danny kept his cool.
‘Why did Taff try to kill you?’
‘I don’t bloody well know!’ Buckingham shrieked. ‘Because he’s a lunatic, I suppose. Like all you fucking animals!’
Danny started to pace up and down, trying to work out his next move. What was Taff up to? Was it really true that his old friend – his oldest friend – wasn’t the man he’d thought he was at all?
And if he was about to carry out Buckingham’s instructions to the letter, why had he felt the need to get him – not to mention Danny – out of the way?
Only one person could tell him that.
Taff.
Danny turned back to Buckingham.
‘Get up,’ he growled.
‘Where are we going?’
‘Get up!’
‘Not until you tell me where we’re going!’
Danny walked over and pulled Buckingham to his feet, holding him face to face as he spoke. ‘You and me are going to steal a vehicle,’ he said. ‘Then we’re going to locate Taff. And then we’re going to find out exactly what kind of fucked-up scheme you’ve got us involved in. And trust me, you piece of shit: if I find out you’ve told me any more lies, you’re going to wish you’d ended up being part of Taff’s firework display after all. Got it?’
Buckingham stared at him in terror. ‘It’s too dangerous,’ he whispered.
Danny had no time for the man’s pathetic hesitation. He pushed him towards the gate, then followed close behind, his rifle pointing at his back. ‘Move!’ he shouted. ‘Now!’
TWENTY-TWO
22.30 hrs.
They had started to arrive with the setting of the sun.
Clara had watched them from the entrance to her medical tent, and she hadn’t liked what she’d seen. Each of the seven pick-up trucks that were now parked in no particular order about twenty metres east of the main tent was heavily armed with a machine gun that looked, to Clara’s untrained eye, identical to the one that had been pointing at the sky since she’d arrived here. The men who emerged from the pick-ups looked no less threatening, with their assault rifles on show and heaven only knew what other weaponry. Without exception, each man wore a black scarf wound around his head to hide his features, with just his eyes and nose visible. Some of the pick-ups had brought two people, some three. In each instance, however, there was one man who was clearly of a higher rank than the others. As each vehicle arrived, Sorgen appeared at the entrance to his tent and greeted this man with a solemn embrace, before leading him inside.
‘Sorgen’s commanders,’ Basheba explained as she joined the watchful Clara. ‘It is rare for them all to be together. That is the last of them, I thin
k.’
Now, all Clara could see was the big tent glowing faintly in the darkness from the lights that were on inside, and the dark outlines of the pick-up trucks and their evil-looking weapons against the increasingly inky desert sky.
And another vehicle approaching from the distance.
‘Who is that?’ Basheba breathed by her side. ‘Who else is coming?’
But Clara, of course, couldn’t answer that. She could only watch, and wait.
The vehicle – it was a Land Rover – came to a halt about ten metres beyond the pick-ups of Sorgen’s commanders. Four men emerged. From this distance, Clara couldn’t make out their features, but she could see that they were holding assault rifles at an angle across their chests, and that they walked with a certain wary purpose. Only when they were halfway between the pick-ups and the tent did she see that these were the same men who had been there that very morning.
She heard Basheba give a low hiss, and shot her hand out and grabbed her wrist. ‘Stay where you are, Basheba. They’re armed. And anyway, the younger man, the one you said did it – he isn’t there.’
‘These others are just as bad. They watched it happen. They defended him.’
‘They’re armed, Basheba, and there are four of them. They’re going to watch out for each other. Look!’
Sure enough, two of them – the squat guy with shorter hair and the taller man with a shaved head and tattoos on his neck – had taken up position by the entrance to the tent while their companions entered. The guy with the shaved head looked over in their direction. A nasty leer crossed his face, so menacing that the two women almost involuntarily stepped inside the tent. Clara realised her pulse was raising, and a little voice in her head told her that their safety – hers and Basheba’s – depended on what was going on in the main tent. She had to find out, she decided. She had to eavesdrop.
Clearly, walking closer to the big tent to listen in was impossible, not with those brutal-looking men standing watch. But the medical tent was, after all, just a tent. Clara looked towards the back wall. There was nothing stopping her from clambering under the canvas and approaching the other tent from behind. Basheba saw what she was looking at. ‘What if they come?’ she said. Clara gave her hands a reassuring squeeze and made for the rear of the tent.
It had been erected with care. The lower edge of the canvas was pegged tightly to a groundsheet. It took a minute or so for Clara to loosen it sufficiently to wriggle out, but, with a final look back at a clearly anxious Basheba, that’s what she did.
The tent had been pitched close to the sandstone cliff. There was a gap of less than half a metre for Clara to squeeze along. It was dark, but the gentle glow of the main tent, fifteen metres away, gave her enough light to see her way. A minute later she was crouching by the back of the tent, straining hard to hear the conversation that was going on inside.
‘Nothing happens,’ said a voice – not Sorgen or any of his men, so Clara could only assume it was one of the newcomers – ‘until we see the money.’
‘Hugo Buckingham is dead?’ asked Sorgen quietly.
‘As a dodo. No bullets. If anyone finds his body, they’ll just put it down to an explosion. One of the many.’
‘Ah,’ Sorgen replied sadly. ‘He was once a good friend.’
‘I’d hate to see how you treat your enemies, pal.’
Sorgen ignored the comment, asking, ‘His bodyguard – the other young man?’
‘It’s dealt with, Sorgen. Where’s the money?’
‘Ah, the money,’ Sorgen said quietly. ‘I take it you have already levied a handsome charge on the British government for eliminating myself and my generals.’
‘Upfront, Sorgen, luckily for you. If it had been cash on delivery, we wouldn’t be having this little chat.’
‘And now we pay another fee for you to double-cross them.’
‘Why get paid once when you can get paid twice?’
‘You would make an excellent politician,’ said Sorgen with a rueful laugh. ‘Still, 750,000 dollars. It is quite a price, for such a small thing.’
‘It’s loose change for your French paymasters, boyo.’
‘They are your paymasters now.’
‘Today maybe. Tomorrow, who knows? Anyway, if it’s such a small thing, you should do it yourself.’
‘Delegation is the first rule of leadership, Mr Taff. A strange name, “Taff”. Where did you come by it?’
‘The money. Unless you want us to carry out the British government’s instructions and not the French.’
There was a significant pause. ‘Not yet,’ Sorgen said, and his bantering tone had changed to something more serious.
‘Don’t start messing me around, Sorgen,’ Taff replied, his voice low and menacing. ‘You’ll find that’s bad for your health.’
‘If I was quite so badly outnumbered as you, Mr Taff, I would be worried. But if your intention is to wipe out me and my men, I think you’ve rather – what is that delightful phrase? – missed the boat. However, I can assure you that I have every intention of letting you walk away with your suitcase of cash. But you must concede that, by your own admission, you are not entirely to be trusted. We are paying you a great deal of money to wipe that animal Asu and his commanders from the face of the earth. I’d be foolish to let you leave here without some kind of guarantee that you’re not simply going to disappear.’
Another pause.
‘What kind of guarantee,’ Taff said, ‘did you have in mind?’
‘Do you believe in fate?’ Sorgen asked. There was no reply from Taff. ‘Well, if she exists, she has smiled upon us. Two days ago Asu’s daughter-in-law Basheba appeared at our humble camp.’
‘I know her,’ Taff said.
‘Then you know what a tiresome woman she is, and will have no problem helping her on her way to Paradise. You look shocked, Mr Taff. Don’t be. If Basheba had stayed with Asu, you would be eliminating her along with the others. I’m sure you understand, though, that if I have footage of you, or one of your men – I’m not an unreasonable man, you may delegate this convenient execution if you want – I have at least some small assurance that your loyalties do not really lie with my brother.’
Clara felt all the strength drain from her body. Her brain shrieked at her to run back to the other tent, to grab Basheba and help her escape. But her limbs wouldn’t obey those instructions.
‘Fine,’ Taff said. ‘Bring her here.’
‘Just one minute,’ Sorgen said. ‘We have another issue. Our French backers require some sort of evidence that your loyalty to them is not limited to taking their money and then carrying out the wishes of the British government regardless.’
Clara felt dizzy with nausea.
‘As luck would have it, fate has deposited a young British doctor on our doorstep. Perhaps you noticed her this morning. A pretty little thing. If we had more time, I’d be happy to allow you to have your way with her. As it is, I must insist that you also kill her for the camera.’
Clara pressed her hands to her lips, then turned and started stumbling back to the medical tent. She knew she had only seconds to get herself and the Syrian woman out of there, but it seemed to take an age to scramble back under the canvas wall, like she was stuck in a nightmare where she couldn’t escape some faceless pursuer.
‘Basheba!’ she hissed once she was inside. One of the wounded male patients had woken up, and Basheba was kneeling down beside him, one hand on his forehead. Clara ran towards her and pulled the surprised woman to her feet. She limped as Clara tugged her back towards the rear of the tent.
‘What are you doing?’ Basheba asked, clearly startled by Clara’s urgent behaviour.
‘They’re coming for us. We have to get out of here now?. . .’
Clara glanced towards the flap at the front of the tent. She thought she saw the canvas ripple as somebody touched it. She pushed Basheba down to the gap at the bottom of the tent, looking anxiously over her shoulder as the Syrian woman wriggled awkwardly ben
eath the canvas wall. She was startled as she saw a hand begin to draw the flap to one side, and she hurled herself through her emergency exit, into the tiny space between the tent and the cliff face.
And then she screamed.
Basheba was on her feet. Behind her, a foot taller, was the man with the shaved head and tattoos on his upper chest and throat. In one hand he held a clump of Basheba’s hair. In the other was a knife, with cruel-looking hooks pointing back towards the handle. The wickedly sharp point was pressed to the soft flesh of Basheba’s neck, and a thin bead of blood dribbled down her dark skin.
The man sneered. ‘Sorgen said you were worth having,’ he said. ‘Suppose a raghead like that would give his left nut for a taste of a white girl. Maybe I’d do you too, if there was nothing else on the menu.’ Clara took a terrified step backwards, but stopped and screamed again as the man yanked Basheba’s head back and made as if to slice through her throat. ‘Get to the front of the tents, bitch,’ he said. ‘If I get the feeling you’re about to run, I’ll start doing some halal butchery right now. Got it?’
Clara stared at him.
‘Got it?’
She nodded frantically and started retracing her steps towards the main tent. She turned left to follow the narrow passage between the two tents, Basheba and the man with the knife following her. Twenty seconds later they emerged in front of the main tent. The short, blond-haired man was there. He appraised himself of the situation at a glance. ‘Nice one, Skinner,’ he said, before pointing to the entrance to the tent. ‘In you go, ladies,’ he said. ‘They’re waiting for you.’
‘Please,’ Clara begged. ‘Let us go. I’ll do anything.’
The man called Skinner barked a short, ugly laugh. ‘Hear that, Hector? What’s it worth? A desert freebie?’
‘Only if you take the raghead,’ Hector said. And then, as if he’d been asked to explain himself, ‘Don’t wipe their fucking arses properly, do they?’