Wolf in Shadow-eARC

by John Lambshead

  Rhian began to get pangs of doubt. She had summoned Max because she did not see why he should not clear up the mess he had made for Gary. She was bloody angry at the time and not thinking. She hadn’t wanted to start a war. Now she had cooled off a tad, she wondered whether she should have warned off Parkes herself. She mentally shook her head. Warn off Parkes herself? What was she thinking of? Rhian didn’t warn people off, let alone East End gangsters. Something was happening to her.

  “I don’t want any deaths,” she said.

  “Sure,” Max said easily.

  Too easily, Rhian regarded him with deep suspicion. “I mean it.”

  “I know,” Max replied, cheerfully.

  He appeared to be looking forward to the evening’s entertainment. Rhian dreaded the whole business and just wanted to get it done. Max checked his satnav and turned off the main road.

  “We can’t be there yet?” Rhian asked.

  “Shortcut,” Max replied. “The traffic will be hellish at the Fairwater Roundabout.”

  The traffic was bloody awful anyway. It always was in London. The city was a conglomerate of small towns and cities that had spread out to touch, and the road system had grown organically from tracks designed for local traffic. The local traffic at the time of building consisted primarily of pedestrians and horses. The only routes that could be said to be at all car-friendly were the radial highways to the provinces: the A1 to the north, the A2 to the Channel, the A3 to the south coast, and the A4 to the west.

  Max threaded the powerful motor quickly through the crush, making the most of its superb handling and brakes. He was an aggressive driver, other motorists backing down rather than contest a gap.

  “Have you ever heard the phrase Bloody Minded Wanker?” Rhian asked.

  “Who do you think started it?” Max replied, flashing a grin at her.

  They arrived outside a yard surrounded by high walls that failed to hide a hill of piled-up rusting car bodies in one corner. Max parked outside and they looked the place over from the car. A sign announced they were at Charlie Parkes Security Services & Scrap Metal Dealership. Despite the hour, the gates were open.

  “It seems we are expected,” Max said.

  He laughed and drove straight in.

  “It’s good of you to see us so quickly,” Jameson said. “And at this late hour.”

  “Not at all, I often work late on operationalization issues. So, you’re a Special Branch Commander,” said Shternberg. “Presumably you want face-time to progress disambiguation of security outcomes?”

  Jameson blinked. Karla gazed at Shternberg the way a patent officer looks at the latest design for a perpetual motion machine.

  The man was not quite what Jameson had expected. Shternberg was tall and well-built, with the toned body that comes from time in the gym or enthusiastic tennis. He had bright blue eyes, a pale complexion, and a shock of blond hair that was short-cut at the sides but stood up on top. He looked more Nordic than East European.

  His grasp of the English language was perfect, in its way, and accentless. This immediately marked him out as overseas. Everybody in the British Isles had an accent that gave away their initial social class and the region within which they grew up. His voice was cold and precise, like a foreign actor that had learned to speak with an all-purpose “English” accent. Unfortunately, someone had also taught Shternberg Master of Business Administration-speak.

  He leaned back in an expensive executive chair in front of a modern desk that was all chrome and polished wood. The top looked like a parking lot at an English seaside town in January—large, black and empty. A wireless flat screen and keyboard sat at one edge beside a small metallic arrangement of pipes and leaves in silver and gold. Jameson wondered whether it was an executive toy or a piece of modern art.

  The other chairs in the office were low so that Shternberg looked down on his guests. Jameson considered whether this was some cunning ploy to intimidate or simply an expression of the man’s overweening sense of superiority. Jameson suspected the latter, and his suspicion rapidly hardened.

  “My knighthood, of course. Presumably you are here to discuss security measures for my safety.”

  Shternberg spoke slowly, like a man explaining something to a small and exceptionally retarded child. Jameson had only been in the man’s company for a minute and already he despised him. Special Branch would be more concerned with the safety of Her Majesty than some narcissistic jumped-up money lender. Shternberg’s false assumption did explain why he and Karla had got past the botoxed deceptionist in Shternburg’s outer office so easily. Receptionists existed to receive visitors and usher them into the presence of the Great Man. Deceptionists served the opposite function.

  “No, I was not aware that you are on the next honors list. Congratulations.”

  “Thank you.”

  “For what will you be awarded a knighthood?” Jameson asked, politely.

  The real answer to that was a massive “campaign contribution” to a prominent politician or one of the major political parties. “Campaign contribution” was the accepted political speak for a backhander. Under Prime Minister David Lloyd George, the selling of honors by politicians had become such a scandal that the scam was made illegal, not that making something illegal ever changed anything. Politicians just had to find some fig-leaf of respectability to cover up the real reason for the award.

  “Services to education,” Shternberg replied, smugly.

  Jameson did not reply and let the pause in the conversation drag out. He had interrogated many suspects, from IRA terrorists to magic-using crooks. Silence was the interrogator’s weapon. The subject became more and more stressed until the urge to speak was overwhelming. You could learn so much about how a subject chose to break the silence. It could tell you what they most wanted to hide and what they feared you knew.

  Shternberg said nothing, just waited with a half-smile, his hands flat on the desk. This suggested to Jameson that he was a pro. Jameson wondered who had trained the man: the Ukranian SZRU, Estonian KAPO, Latvian SAB, Lithuanian VSD—the list of potential sponsors was endless. Shternberg was so polished that his instructors could even have been the best of the best, the lads from Lubyanka Square. The good ole boys of the Russian FSB evolved out of the KGB. A new name, but customers got the same old friendly service, as the old joke goes.

  “I want to ask you about Fethers,” Jameson finally said.

  Tactic two for an interrogator was the shock approach. Drop your best factoid to imply that you know more than you do. He watched Shternberg closely and was rewarded with a flicker in his eyes. Only a slight flicker, gone in a microsecond, but it was nevertheless suggestive. Not that it proved Shternberg summoned daemons, of course.

  “Fethers, Fethers—is that a person or a company?” Shternberg said.

  “He was arranging a bailout for Go-Girls,” Jameson said.

  “Indeed?”

  “Until he was killed.”

  “Oh,” Shternberg said with utter disinterest. “Now you mention it, perhaps I do recall the name being brought up in a mind-share at the bank. I believe he was a potential duck shuffler.”

  “Duck shuffler?” Jameson asked.

  “Duck shuffler,” Shternberg repeated, tracing out a straight line in the air with his hands. “You know, you get all your ducks for a deal nicely in a row and then someone upsets the apple cart.”

  “The apples knocking over the ducks,” Jameson said, the surreal image floating across his mind’s eye.

  “Precisely,” Shternberg said, with a mirthless smile.

  “So Fether’s death was convenient?” Jameson asked.

  “Moderately so,” Shternberg replied. “I doubt he had the bandwidth to seriously disturb our battle-rhythm.”

  “What made a bankrupt retail chain worth having?” Jameson asked.

  “Go-Girls own a number of their own shops in key high-street sites.”

  “So you’ll asset-strip the company by selling the premises?” J
ameson asked.

  “We will certainly leverage our investment across the business units to realize their capital value,” Shternberg replied.

  “You will still be left with a bankrupt retail chain.”

  “The paradigm is to bucketize the components to core competencies, while right-sizing the administrative resources to reinforce the net-net.”

  “You mean fire the admin staff to cut costs?”

  “You’ve a talent for succinctness.”

  Shternberg smiled, not the type of smile to encourage small children. The expression one imagined was what one might see on the snout of a great white upon encountering a surfer, or a game-show host faced with a contestant whose hearing aid has failed.

  “The technical services will be bangalored, the empty suits downsized, and half the sales staff promoted to customers.”

  Jameson translated that as farming out the IT jobs to the third world, and firing the management and most of the shop employees.

  “Further traction can be gained by pencil-whipping the accounts with creatalytics.”

  Or cooking the books, in other words.

  “Before selling off the rump of the business as a going concern.”

  “And I suppose profits are considered capital gains rather than income, so you will be paying a lower rate of tax than your secretary on your profits.”

  Shternberg made another disturbing movement with his mouth that could be construed as a grin if one was feeling charitable. Jameson was not inclined to be.

  “Oh dear, surely you are not that vanilla, Commander Jameson. Only little people pay taxes. Greyfriars is owned by my wife, who lives in Monaco, and I’m non-dom so I’ve no tax liability at all.”

  Non-dom stood for non-domiciled and was a special status originally offered to attract foreign plutocrats to live in London without officially living in the United Kingdom, taxwise. They paid tax only on money acquired in Britain, which did not include earnings laundered through offshore tax havens like Monaco. The arrangement was so convenient that British nationals who were rich enough were now arranging non-dom status. One generous non-dom British benefactor to a political party had even become ennobled and taken a seat in the House of Lords. Jameson recalled that he voted to up the rate of tax on British citizens—the non non-dom ones, that is.

  Jameson paid fifty percent income tax on the top end of his civil-service salary, so he was presumably classed as one of the little people.

  “That does not seem very fair or equitable,” Jameson said softly.

  Shternberg tilted back his head and laughed out loud.

  “You don’t make money with all that kumbaya stuff. Wealth creators like me must be above the morality of the common herd.”

  Jameson opened his mouth to point out that vulture capitalists like Shternberg created wealth only for themselves, but the man talked over him.

  “You know what drives the financial markets, Commander, fear—fear and greed, but mostly fear. Look up the Fear Index on the Vix, the Chicago Board Options Exchange Volatility Index.”

  He rotated the swivel chair.

  “Well, you’ve used up your time allotment. Unlike you state employees, I’ve work still to do. If you need to dialogue with me again, contact my secretary, but I warn you that my availability is limited.”

  Shternberg leaned forward and turned to the computer screen, completely ignoring Jameson and Karla is if they had ceased to exist.

  Jameson got up to go. He kept his face impassive at the rudeness. He was damned if he would give Shternberg the satisfaction of a response, but inside he was seething. Karla, of course, felt what he felt. She walked up to Shternberg’s desk. He continued to ignore her so she leaned over and tapped it with her nails, making a metallic click. Shternberg glanced up and Karla smiled at him. He rocked back in his chair, eyes wide.

  “Thank you for your cooperation, sir,” Jameson said.

  They left the office, ignored by the minimal staff that Greyfriars employed. Jameson waited until they were out on the street before talking.

  “I suppose, he was human?” Jameson asked.

  “I think so,” Karla replied. “He smelt human and not a magic user.”

  “I suppose” Jameson said. “It rather depends on your definition of human. In my opinion, the man is a bloody psychopath.”

  CHAPTER 14

  NIGHT OF THE WOLF

  Security lights snapped on from various directions, bathing the yard in harsh light. Through the glare, Rhian could just make out figures closing the gates behind the BMW. Max slipped the car in neutral and coasted to a stop in front of the Portakabin office at the far end of the yard. Car scrap and trucks formed mazes of metal on each side.

  “Ding, ding, everybody out,” Max said.

  His eyes glittered. He is enjoying every moment of this, Rhian thought. Somehow his buoyant mood lifted her out of her anger and she found herself smiling back.

  “Let’s give them a scare,” she said, jumping out.

  “A scare, right,” he said.

  The BMW doors closed with solid thumps that would have brought a round of applause from the workers in the Bayerische Motoren Werke.

  “There’s at least two hiding on the right and another bunch in among the scrap metal on the left,” Max said.

  Charlie strutted out of the Portakabin, followed by a goon.

  “We’re shut,” he said.

  “You’ll be shut permanently if you don’t keep your nose out of my affairs,” Max said. “You stay clear of the Dirty Duck in future and all who sail in her. Got it?”

  “It’s called the Black Swan,” Rhian said.

  Rhian caught flickers of movement to their flanks. Charlie’s goons must be closing in. Why didn’t Max just get on with it? He stood, legs apart, head back, right hand in the pocket of his long black mac. Charlie Parkes squared up to him, smiling humorlessly.

  “And you’ll make me, will you?” Charlie asked, spreading his hands to exaggerated effect. “You haven’t brought much in the way of backup.”

  A willy-waggling contest, Rhian thought. The mayhem couldn’t start until the right challenges had been delivered and rejected. Max was enjoying himself immensely, and so was the wolf. She was close to Rhian’s mind, watching through Rhian’s eyes, leaking her feelings into Rhian’s psyche.

  “Sure I have, I’ve brought Snow White,” Max said, indicating her with the back of his left hand. “She’ll be plenty backup just to sort out the local iron and his collection of mincing wooftahs.”

  Rhian was not entirely sure what an iron was, let alone a mincing wooftah, but from the jaw-dropping expression on Charlie Parkes face, she confidently assumed that it was uncomplimentary.

  Parkes’ mouth worked but no sound issued.

  “I would have let her give you a kicking on her own, but when one is a gentleman . . .” Max adopted a suitable expression and spread his hands to convey a sense of noblesse oblige.

  “Kill the bastard,” Parkes said, “but save the girl for me.”

  The goon behind Parkes stepped round him and leveled a shotgun. Max gave Rhian a hard shove to the shoulder that pushed her to the ground. The shotgun discharged both barrels in rapid succession. Flare and concussion punched past Rhian, and she had a flashback to the subway where she first met Max, a lifetime ago. She rolled onto her paws and surveyed the world through flat monochrome, like the image in a sniper’s night sight.

  Max moved to the right, out of the line of fire. He held a pistol in both hands, arms outstretched. Two sharp cracks and the goon with the shotgun went over backwards. No killing, Rhian thought, I wanted no deaths on my conscience. What was she doing here?

  The wolf growled and gave a cough that sounded like a laugh. Max changed aim but Parkes dropped out of sight into one of the pools of shadow.

  The wolf smelled people all round, smelled their tension, their fear, their lust to kill. Rhian and the wolf’s mind integrated smoothly. Frankie had worked a miracle with her magic, unpleasant though
it had been at the time. Rhian could not exactly control the wolf, but she could influence it emotionally. She could guide its choices. She conveyed her fear of guns to the wolf, so it bounded after Max into the shadows among the scrap.

  One of those transient tangential thoughts that the brain comes up with under stress floated across Rhian’s mind. If she could emotionally influence the wolf, could the wolf influence her? Had her personality changed since Frankie’s spell in the graveyard? Was she more aggressive than when she had been plain old Rhian? Would the old Rhian have fronted Charlie Parkes’ gang, or would she just have run?

  Max had his back to a half-crushed hatchback that had another perched unstably on top. He held his pistol close to his chest, barrel pointed skywards. She skidded to a stop beside him and he glanced down at her.

  “Heel,” he said, with a grin.

  She snarled at him.

  “You look quite dashing in a fur coat,” Max said, unmoved by her flash of teeth.

  The wolf heard two metallic clicks on the other side of the wrecks, which Rhian interpreted as a gangster pulling back the hammers on his shotgun. Max stuck three fingers under her nose, using them to count down. At zero he reached up and pushed the top hatchback, causing it to rock.

  Taking a firmer grip on the sub chassis, he lifted the wreck up before pushing it firmly away. Metal ripped and protested with grinding shrieks and the hatchback slid off its perch. It rolled over and tumbled down the other side. A man screamed but was abruptly silenced, like someone had turned off his microphone.

  The wolf jumped up on the first wreck in a single bound. It smelled fresh blood and leapt to the second car, finding a body pinned under the twisted metal.

  “Wayne, Wayne!”

  A gangster knelt by the corpse, trying ineffectually to pull it clear. He looked up wide-eyed when the wolf landed with a thud, and for a split moment they stared at each other. It could only have been a microsecond. To Rhian, it stretched out like the start of a summer holiday. The man broke the spell by reaching down for his shotgun.

  For the first time, the reality of what was about to happen sunk home. They were going to kill everybody in the yard. That was what Max had meant by solving the problem once and for all. Rhian shut down in shock and the wolf took over.