‘We trusted him.’
‘Did he ever tell you why he was doing this, or mention any political motivation?’
‘Nothing political, and he said it was better we didn’t know. He made it clear that the mission could be dangerous, but his intention was not to hurt people.’
‘One last thing,’ said Boxer, as they arrived at the house. ‘Your motivation to co-operate. The hostages held here are my daughter and Mercy’s lover. The kidnap unit doesn’t know about either of them and Mercy wants to keep it that way. If we come out of this unhurt, you’ll walk, I guarantee it.’
He opened a wrought iron gate. They crossed a paved-over front garden to the door of a shabby Edwardian house.
‘Better I do the talking here,’ he said, and rang the bell, which made the sound of a gong in the depths. Feet made their way to the door, where they paused as someone checked through the peephole.
The door opened. An unsmiling, physically impressive man said nothing, waited. He had hair cut en brosse, blue eyes with long lashes, and biceps straining against the tight sleeves of his black T-shirt.
‘Punish the innocent,’ said Boxer.
The guy nodded, let them in. He tucked a Glock 17 back into a shoulder holster under his left arm as he led them down the hallway.
‘Fancy a cup of tea?’ he said, south London accent. ‘Before I show you around.’
‘Sure,’ said Boxer.
‘I’m Gav, by the way.’
‘Michael,’ said Boxer. ‘Mike.’
Gav put the kettle on, tea bags in the pot, laid out mugs, sugar, milk.
‘You come far?’
‘Just down the road, Lewisham,’ said Boxer, keeping to the story in case this was a vetting process. ‘Where are you off to?’
‘Wimbledon for tonight. Then I’m off early to Brize Norton to get a flight out to Afghanistan. Embassy security in Kabul.’
‘You on your own here?’
‘It was supposed to be just me and a single hostage, but there’s another one, young woman, mixed race, don’t know her name, and this bird Siobhan, who seems to be her chaperone. I haven’t seen anything of her, spends her whole time up there in the bedroom. Bit fucking weird, you ask me. My attitude has always been don’t get involved. You never know what you might have to do. Right?’
‘Right,’ said Louise.
He poured the tea, talked about Afghanistan, Iraq and a hair-raising job he’d done in Chechnya. He’d clearly been starved of company and wanted to chat. But he was boring and uninterested in what either of them had to say, except when he asked Boxer what weapon he was using. He was not impressed by the Beretta 92 Compact Rail. He didn’t say anything, but Boxer could tell he’d gone down in his estimation.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘I’ll just go for a piss and give you a tour of the facilities.’
After he’d left the room, Louise leaned over.
‘Be careful of him. All this friendliness is bullshit. He’s very watchful but unstable and he likes to use his gun.’
Boxer nodded, glad that she was conspiring with him, felt her come onside.
Gav took them round the downstairs rooms, where he pointed out the computer set-up and the email protocol.
‘Do you know any of these guys?’ asked Louise.
‘Nah,’ said Gav. ‘Just follow the instructions, take me money.’
He led them upstairs. Opened the door to a bedroom.
‘This is Marcus,’ he said.
Marcus Alleyne was lying on the bed, ankles crossed, sleeping mask over his eyes, wrists cuffed through the metal bed head. Calm.
‘And this,’ said Gav, holding up a key, ‘is for when Marcus wants to go to the toilet.’
‘What’s for dinner?’ asked Marcus.
‘You don’t need to ask,’ said Gav, handing Boxer the key.
‘Not frozen burgers again.’
‘We can do better than that,’ said Louise. ‘You up for a goat curry?’
‘Oh, finally a woman after my own heart.’
‘Please yourself,’ said Gav.
They backed out of the room.
‘Now you’re going to meet Siobhan,’ whispered Gav, pointing Louise to another door across the landing. She stretched out her hand to open it.
‘What’s that?’ said Joe, pointing at the chafe marks on her wrist.
The Beretta 92 Compact Rail was in Boxer’s hand, hanging down by his side as the door eased open. The bedroom was in darkness. When Louise didn’t reply, Joe lunged forward, grabbing her other wrist, and saw the chafe marks there too. He glanced at Boxer, saw there was something wrong in his eyes, and pulled Louise into the room, his left arm round her neck. He had the Glock 17 out and was pointing it at Amy on the bed, intuiting from the instant tension that this was something to do with the unknown hostage. Louise slashed on the light hoping to distract him.
‘No,’ shouted Siobhan, seeing the gun in Joe’s outstretched hand.
She threw herself across the room at the bed.
Joe fired, startled by the light and the sudden movement. The bullet thumped into Siobhan underneath her armpit. She fell over Amy, bounced back and ended up on the floor propped against the wall, her hand reaching for the hole in her side. Boxer swung the Beretta round on Gav, shot him through the temple. He went down, crumpling at the knees, dragging Louise with him.
Boxer shoved the gun in his pocket, knelt down and grabbed hold of Siobhan’s shoulders.
‘Look at me, concentrate, don’t go under.’
She looked up into his face, blinked once, desperate to comply, but a slow wince of pain crossed her mouth.
‘Oh shit,’ she said, eyes opening wide.
Blood surged from behind her teeth down her chin. She slumped to one side, eyes rolled back.
Amy, still with her wrist cuffed to the bed, came up on one elbow and looked down on Siobhan. She saw that she was dead, and was surprised as a rush of sadness shuddered through her.
Boxer felt for a neck pulse, dropped his head. Amy flung her free arm around his shoulders, buried her face in his neck. He hugged her to him, kissed her, stroked her back. Louise unlocked Gav’s arm from around her neck and got to her feet. She searched his pockets, found the other key, gave it to Boxer, who released Amy. He crossed the landing to Alleyne’s room, saw that he was suffering a paroxysm of fear and told him it was all OK. He flipped up the sleeping mask, unlocked the cuffs. Marcus grabbed hold of him, hugged him round the shoulders and wept.
‘Thought that was it, man,’ he said. ‘Thought I was done.’
Boxer patted his back, told him Mercy was outside and called her. He helped Amy downstairs, sat Louise down with her and opened the front door for Mercy.
Alleyne was shakily making his way downstairs, unused to being upright. Mercy’s car skidded into a parking place outside. She vaulted the front wall, pushed open the front door and saw him at the foot of the stairs; went straight to him, walked into his arms. They stayed like that for minutes, breathing each other in.
Boxer came into the hallway, shut the front door.
‘Amy’s in here,’ he said. ‘We need to talk.’
Mercy eased herself out of Alleyne’s arms, went into the living room and kissed and hugged Amy, who looked dazed and in a state of shock.
‘You’re going to be all right,’ said Mercy.
‘She took the bullet meant for me,’ said Amy.
‘Who did?’
‘Siobhan,’ said Amy, shaking her head, tears welling. ‘Why’d she do a thing like that?’
‘Instinct,’ said Boxer, bringing sweet tea in from the kitchen. ‘She saw Gav point the gun, felt responsible for you.’
‘We connected,’ said Amy, staring into space. ‘I thought she’d just been playing me, you know, to pull me in. But then she told me something and …’
She drifted off. Mercy brushed her tears away with her thumbs.
‘I think we should drive them to your place. I’ll get one of my doctor friends to come and look them over
,’ said Boxer.
‘What have we got here?’ said Mercy, back in professional mode.
‘Two dead bodies upstairs,’ said Boxer, and explained. ‘Let’s go in the kitchen.’
‘Have you got a story for me?’ asked Mercy. ‘Because I’m in no condition to think one up.’
‘This is what I’ve come up with so far,’ said Boxer. ‘One of your informers directed you to the Rylances’ house. You went there, overpowered them and took Michael Rylance’s weapon from him. They told you about the guy coming to pick up the phone. Rylance and the visitor tried to overpower you during the exchange and you had to shoot both of them.’
‘It’s a start, but even I can see the holes in that one,’ said Mercy. ‘Their body positions aren’t going to look right with just me as the shooter. And what about here?’
‘Rylance had already told you he was meeting Gav, one of the other kidnappers, in this house at 16.00.’
‘Why?’
‘Gav’s leaving for Afghanistan in the morning and Siobhan needs help with some logistics. You turn up with the code word and are admitted.’
‘But I’m not a white male called Michael Rylance. I’m a black woman. He’d know that.’
‘All right, then we have to stage a break-in. The fact is, once you know about Siobhan being here, you’re desperate to talk to her. Since you heard about her in the Savoy, you think she’s the link to Conrad Jensen. There’s a confusing situation, which we’ll have to choreograph, and Gav tries to shoot you but kills Siobhan by accident. You shoot Gav.’
‘Not much better,’ said Mercy. ‘And what about Louise? She knows everything.’
‘The thing about Louise,’ said Boxer, ‘is that if you want an outside chance of holding on to your job, you’re going to have to let her disappear into the night.’
The truck set off from New Scotland Yard, heading for Victoria Embankment. It made a small detour, during which the driver dropped his own phone and picked up another from the roof of a parked car. The truck continued past Westminster Abbey, the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben, following the river going east.
DCS Hines sat in the communications centre in Vauxhall, looking at the signals being sent from the tracking devices on the truck. Dusk came and went as teams of plain-clothes officers in unmarked cars stationed themselves all around the capital. They were being fed the signals via the communications centre.
There was also a microphone in the cab of the truck, which was sending back voice signals from the driver, who was being called by the kidnap gang at regular intervals, giving him new sets of directions each time. One moment he was due to head north from Blackfriars Bridge, the next they asked him to cross the bridge and go south of the river to Waterloo, Southwark and Borough before re-crossing the river over London Bridge. The driver repeated the instructions each time so that the communications centre had a double check on his position.
As the truck neared London Bridge, the driver was asked to turn right and continue to Tower Bridge. After crossing the river and going around the Tower of London, he was directed on to Lower Thames Street, heading back the way he’d just come. The traffic was getting heavier, rush hour was building. The truck was grinding slowly forward under a railway bridge that took trains into Cannon Street station. Just after the turning to Southwark Bridge, the driver was told to take a left turn down a cul-de-sac and pull up.
From the dark recesses of the dead end came a man in a black balaclava, who got into the cab. He held a silenced pistol to the driver’s head and ran a scanner over the dashboard, which located the microphone. He ripped it out. In the meantime, four men climbed on to the back of the truck and scanned the money, while two others ran scanners along the sides and underneath. The process took three minutes. The men disappeared, leaving the driver shaken.
A minute later, Ryder Forsyth, who was in Wilton Place watching developments on screen via a link to the communications centre, received a call.
‘Ryder,’ said the voice, ‘we told you not to put tracking devices on the truck or in the money and you’ve done both. We also warned you of the consequences. Lots will now be drawn and one of the hostages killed.’
‘Wait.’
‘We told you. We were absolutely clear.’
‘I know you were and I appreciate that. Whoever put those devices on that truck did not advise me or the hostages’ parents.’
‘But they knew the consequences of their actions. We were clear. It was in an email that went to the communications centre so that everybody would have seen it,’ said the voice. ‘We located one of the devices in the money and it was a state-of-the-art super-thin undetectable CIA appliance. Except that, unfortunately for you, every tracking device has to emit some electronic signal, however small, and we have the technology to pick it up.’
‘It was done without our knowledge. Had we known, we would have—’
‘Ryder. It doesn’t matter. Whoever did it knew what they were doing and what would happen. We’re drawing lots.’
‘Look, how about this? I will talk to the people who did this. I will make sure that all tracking devices are immediately removed. I will get names. They will never work again.’
‘I don’t think you understand, Ryder. We had an agreement. That agreement has been broken. We have kept our word throughout. When we told you we were going to do something, we did it. When you complied with our wishes, we stopped. You were told of the consequences.’
‘What would it take for you not to kill one of the hostages?’
Silence.
‘You wouldn’t be able to make it happen.’
‘Try me.’
‘We’re assuming that this decision to go ahead with tracking devices was a CIA-inspired action. Is that correct?’
‘I’d have to check.’
‘You find out who was responsible and we’ll start drawing lots.’
The phone went dead.
Ryder Forsyth knew immediately what he had to do. He called Hines.
‘They’re drawing lots to kill a hostage,’ he said. ‘Whose decision was it to retain the tracking devices when the kidnappers had expressly forbidden it?’
‘As far as I know it was a CIA decision in consultation with Ken Bass representing the parents. I did not agree with it.’
‘None of the other parents consented to any representative,’ said Forsyth, who asked for an immediate video conference call between Hines, Sutherland and himself.
He shouted down to Ken Bass, who was in the other living room, told him to get upstairs.
‘They found the tracking devices,’ said Forsyth. ‘We’re going to have a video conference call with Hines. You’ve got two minutes to get your story straight with Ray.’
Bass said nothing, went to the corner of the room and called Sutherland. He was back in two minutes to take part in the call.
‘Who ordered the tracking devices to be installed?’ said Forsyth.
Silence. The men stared into the cameras. Hines and Sutherland looked serious on the split screen.
‘They’re drawing lots to kill a hostage,’ said Forsyth. ‘I have to get back to them with who was responsible. Only then do I have a chance at negotiation.’
‘Like what?’ said Sutherland, aggressive. ‘Negotiate what with these guys?’
‘No, Ray, they have always been very clear. They told us precisely the consequences of such an action. I have a chance of reversing it, but only with the truth. I have to know who took that decision. They were CIA devices, so I know you supplied them. Was anybody consulted?’
‘No,’ said Bass.
‘Jeez, Ken, that’s such a crock.’
‘There was no consultation between you and me, Ray.’
‘I told you—’
‘But I did not agree to it with you,’ said Bass. ‘There was no formal agreement.’
‘But you knew,’ said Forsyth, ‘and you allowed the devices to be planted without consulting any of the other parents or me?’
‘I did no
t give permission. I was only told that these “undetectable devices” were available. Ray was well aware that I was not in any position to allow him to plant the devices.’
‘Did you assume that he was going to do it?’
‘There was no agreement.’
‘You’re not answering the question, Ken,’ said Forsyth. ‘I know these people by now. If we try to sell them some shit, they won’t tolerate it and somebody’s child will die. It could be yours. They’re drawing lots. Now. Do you understand me?’
‘I understand you perfectly. I reiterate that I was told of the availability of these undetectable devices, but I was not consulted and I did not give permission.’
‘This is such bullshit, Ken. I cannot believe you’re saying this,’ said Sutherland.
‘I’m only telling the truth.’
‘Look, buddy,’ said Sutherland, pointing into the camera, ‘you and the truth were never even in the same goddam room in the whole of your fuckin’ life.’
‘Calm down, Ray.’
‘I choose my words carefully,’ said Bass. ‘Your problem is you don’t listen.’
‘If we’re not going to get the precise truth, then we should agree on a statement that is acceptable to both of you and hope they’ll buy it,’ said Hines.
‘The problem with these guys,’ said Forsyth, ‘is they won’t buy anything.’
‘So tell them the CIA deployed the devices without consulting the parents,’ said Sutherland. ‘What they gonna do? Come after us? Fuck ’em.’
The video call ended. Forsyth sent an email to the kidnappers telling them what Sutherland had said. He sent Bass downstairs. The kidnappers called him back.
‘That took a long time to decide,’ said the voice. ‘Do the parents have a spokesperson or do you have to speak to each one individually?’
‘They’re all billionaires,’ said Forsyth. ‘None of them would consent to having a spokesperson.’
‘The CIA and the Kinderman Corporation have very close ties. I think it unlikely that the CIA would do anything without at least letting Ken Bass know.’
‘He says they didn’t and the CIA have confirmed that they planted the devices. They had the technology.’
Stealing People Page 31