Moving on through the dining room Quartano encountered another team principal. He introduced his party to the Afrikaner Eugene Van Der Vaal, team boss of Massarella.
Dr Chen shook hands.
‘You don’t want to be wasting your money on Ptarmigan,’ said Van Der Vaal without levity, his guttural Boerish accent giving his comments a barbed and abrasive edge.
Straker likened Van Der Vaal, with his closely-shaved head and broad physique, to a rugby prop forward. His brutish expression added to the look. Word had it that he never smiled – let alone laughed – unless it was at someone else’s expense.
‘Britain is old world,’ said Van Der Vaal. ‘Tired, complacent and of the past.’
Straker was getting a first-hand feel for why the team bosses might have been referred to en masse as “the Piranha Club”. Quartano’s composure, however, did not waver for a second. ‘That’s very interesting,’ he said to the Massarella man. Turning to his guest, he said: ‘And yet, Dr Chen, isn’t it strange that all of Mr Van Der Vaal’s key team members – Massarella’s COO, designer, and both race engineers – happen to be British.’
Dr Chen’s face broke into a smile. This, perhaps, was a bit more like it. ‘We Chinese, Mr Valley, have an old saying for someone who says one thing … and does another…’
It was Quartano’s, Nazar’s, and Straker’s turn to smile.
Reaching their table, Straker and Quartano were left alone for a moment while Nazar escorted Dr Chen to find a lavatory. The tycoon, certain they could not be overheard, turned and asked discreetly: ‘How are you holding up, Matt?’
Straker shook his head. ‘Fine,’ he said dismissively.
Quartano looked at him carefully, almost intently.
Straker found himself turning away. ‘Incidentally,’ he said, looking back towards one of their encounters on the way in, ‘talking of Massarella – Ollie Treadwell said he had written to them this morning about their diffuser. What does writing to mean, exactly?’
Quartano smiled and raised an eyebrow, inhaling deeply. ‘This is a funny – and I mean funny-peculiar – sport. It’s best to remember that, in reality, Matt, F1’s more or less – no, I’d say largely – about rules. The interpretation of rules.’
‘Largely?’
‘Without the rules – or the Formula – a Grand Prix car could easily do over three hundred miles an hour and pull so much G-force round the corners that the drivers would actually black out. Modern cars are not primarily limited by physics or the laws of nature. They’re limited by arbitrary, man-made rules. Interpretation of those rules, therefore, is everything.’
‘Doesn’t that make the limits rather subjective?’
‘Oh, completely. Because of this, a number of teams have signed the equivalent of non-aggression pacts. Massarella’s signed one with nearly every team, including Ptarmigan. If either party believes the other is pushing the rules for unfair advantage, these agreements are meant to encourage resolution of a dispute between themselves – bilaterally – before anyone runs off to the FIA to bad mouth the other in public.’
‘Do they do any good?’
‘Hardly. They’re like signing an NDA – they’re more about declaring an intent than a legal bond.’
‘How many times do they get exercised?’
‘Between us and the other teams – never.’
‘So what’s with Massarella’s diffuser? Why’ve we thought it significant?’
‘No idea. And I’d be quite sure it isn’t. If it is, then, what the hell, the FIA stewards in Parc Fermé will pick it up.’
‘So why bother write to them at all?’
Quartano’s lived-in face broke into a contended, mischievous smile. ‘Massarella never stop whingeing, sniping and causing trouble. We use their stupid pact to yank their chain from time to time.’
Dr Chen returned and was introduced by Quartano to the other guests at their table before a fanfare heralded the Prince’s arrival into the dining room.
Straker’s pang of conscience, over not being able to justify his presence in the luxury of Monaco – let alone his concern about how this assignment could use his particular skills – was about to be shattered.
SIX
During coffee and port Straker was distracted by his phone vibrating. Looking down at the screen he saw a message from Andy Backhouse:
Can you come to HQ urgently? Something you need to see…
Straker showed this to Quartano, who, reading the message, encouraged him to go.
Still wearing black tie, Straker strode round Monte-Carlo harbour in the balmy evening humidity. Soothed by the gentle breeze off the Mediterranean, he made the Ptarmigan headquarters truck down by the waterfront twenty minutes later. Just before midnight.
From the outside, Straker could see little more than dim light through the smoked-glass windows. Inside, he found the lighting matched by the mood. Backhouse sat alone at the small meeting table. ‘Matt, thanks for coming. I need you to look at this.’
Backhouse held out his hand to offer Straker a tiny object. ‘Yesterday afternoon – in practice – Remy complained of a crackling radio. Our signal kept breaking up. It seriously affected our ability to make adjustments to Remy’s car. As a result, I went through all her radio circuitry. While I was lifting it all out, I found this.’
Straker squinted, given its modest size. ‘It looks like some kind of chip?’
‘It’s a transponder.’
‘Hang on … why do you say found? It’s not one of ours?’
‘Absolutely not.’
‘Where was it?’
‘Hidden in the foam lining of Remy’s helmet.’
Backhouse could not miss the change in Straker’s expression. There was suddenly a gleam in the hooded eyes.
‘I thought you encrypted your radio traffic,’ said Straker.
‘We do. But that wasn’t wired to our system – it wasn’t transmitting from her circuitry.’
‘You mean it was picking up her voice independently?’
‘Being halfway between her mouth and right earpiece – it would have been able to hear and relay her incoming traffic too.’
‘Somebody’s been listening in?’
‘But that’s not all,’ said Backhouse. ‘The reason we were looking at the radio circuitry in the first place was because Remy complained of radio crackle. Matt, the radio crackle was not a malfunction.’
Straker’s eyes widened. ‘You mean it was induced?’
Backhouse nodded slowly. ‘By that device.’
‘She was jammed?’
‘It disrupted her radio signal, yes. Yesterday afternoon we were jammed. Matt, if we are jammed in the race – preventing us from making tactical, ad hoc adjustments – it would be absolutely critical to our chances. It could be catastrophic.’
‘You’re saying, then, our communications were sabotaged?’
‘I am.’
Backhouse went on to say something else but Straker’s mind was whirring. ‘Hang on. Was this blanket jamming?’
‘Meaning?’
‘Was it constant or intermittent?’
‘Intermittent. On and off – come to think of it – whenever I talked.’
‘Only when you talked?’
‘Yep.’
‘So it was being activated deliberately each time.’
‘Seemed that way.’
Straker looked pensive. ‘Do we know if these people – whoever they are – have got other ways to do us harm?’
Backhouse’s face registered the sinister implications. He shook his head.
‘Then we’ve no idea if this is our only foreign body on either car,’ said Straker. ‘First off – and absolutely critically – we have got to double-check everything, before Remy or Helli get in them again.’
The Race Engineer nodded at the unpleasant corollary of Straker’s logic. ‘Of course. I’ll bring the guys back in right away.’
‘Don’t tell them why. No one’s to know there’s a sabotage thre
at. We’ve got to be careful who does know about this – it could cause suspicion and mistrust, and seriously damage team morale. Can you invent some other reason why the cars might need a total examination?’
‘I’ll come up with some paranoia about the FIA.’
‘Good. We’ve no time to lose.’
Backhouse, grabbing his phone, started ringing people, waking them up, calling them in from bars around town – down to the garage – to start going over both cars immediately. When he finished the call-out procedure he returned his attention to Straker. He could see the other was still deep in thought.
‘I take it you have no idea who’s behind this?’ Straker asked distantly, before looking up.
Backhouse shook his head emphatically.
‘Have you found the activation frequency of the bug?’ Straker asked.
‘Of its transmissions? Yes.’
‘No, I mean the frequency that activates the jamming signal.’
Backhouse looked blank. ‘Why would we? Better we’ve found it and got rid of it.’
Straker gently shook his head. ‘Do we know who put this there?’
‘No.’
‘Exactly. We’ve got to find out who’s behind this.’
Backhouse nodded tentatively, knowing he should agree, but he wasn’t quite sure how knowing the jamming frequency was linked to identifying the perpetrators.
‘Okay,’ said Straker, delicately handing the bug back to Backhouse. ‘Here’s what we’re going to do. I want you to find the activation frequency. Then, I want you to put this thing back exactly where you found it.’
SEVEN
Straker phoned Quartano immediately. It was ten to one in the morning. He was still at the charity dinner. Quartano was incandescent at the news.
‘Bloody Charlie. I don’t mind being beaten fair and square. To eavesdrop on our team is bad enough. But to try and sabotage us is something else. Outrageous.’
‘Charlie could well be the culprit,’ said Straker calmly. ‘She’d certainly be the most obvious choice – and most convenient – but we can’t be sure yet. If it was her, then we don’t know whether this was her only legacy, or whether she was working with someone else on the inside? One thing’s for certain: that bug could only have been planted by an insider. She’s out of the picture, now, and can’t do any more damage – so we’ll only know it was her if we don’t suffer any further incidents. But, we do know someone else is involved.’
‘How?’
‘From Backhouse’s description of the jamming yesterday, it wasn’t blanket. It sounds like somebody was manually activating the interference each time.’
Quartano grunted at the logic. ‘What’s your plan for combating this?’
‘To keep news and discussion of it as quiet as possible. We don’t want to give the saboteurs any warning that we know about them. I don’t want to frighten them off before we find out who they are – and we get the chance to nail them.’
‘Who knows about this so far?’
‘You, me and Backhouse. We’ll have to tell Tahm and the drivers.’
‘Okay, and you’ll also need to tell Treadwell.’
Straker hummed. ‘If you’re sure about him?’
Quartano grunted. ‘What else are you planning?’
Straker didn’t miss a beat. ‘Generally, heightened vigilance all round. I’ve suggested to Backhouse that we do a full examination of both cars before Qualifying – which is happening as we speak – but the guys have not been told why.’
‘Good.’
‘And my own priority,’ Straker went on, ‘is to set up a range of countermeasures – and to try and trace whoever operated that device.’
‘You can do that?’
‘Yes, sir. Ironically, we’re in luck the bug in Remy’s helmet is a jamming device. Had they simply been listening in, that bug would only have needed to be a transmitter and it would’ve been impossible for us to detect a receiver at the other end. Their eavesdropping could have been electronically passive.’
‘But being a jammer, they have to send out a signal, of course?’
‘Precisely. It’s because it is a jamming device – and requires a direct transmission by the operator to activate it – that we have a slim chance of being able to detect that signal and use it to find the saboteur.’
Quartano’s tone hardened. ‘Do what you have to, Matt, but find them.’
‘I’m going to need some Quartech surveillance kit.’
‘Whatever you want. Straker, find and stop the people who are sabotaging us. Don’t let these bastards do anything to risk that sponsorship and market access to China.’
For the second night running Straker got inadequate sleep.
His head was spinning. Not just with the sabotage developments, but with the realization that Charlotte Grant could have struck again. Surely the time had now come, he thought, to look at her phone. Sensitivities over invading her privacy were nothing more than an indulgence. After all, she was dead now. And a suspect.
Moving over to the safe in his hotel room, Straker unlocked the door, picked out the sleek black iPhone and made to turn it on. Try as he might, he couldn’t prevent images of Charlie appearing in his mind.
How that woman had beguiled him – professionally, in one sense, and sexually, in another. His encounter with her, at the time, had seemed so spontaneous. So innocent.
Straker met her seemingly by accident, or so he thought. He’d been out in Buhran for that first assignment with Quartech. It seemed like luck – luck that he should meet and enjoy talking with a beautiful woman by the poolside of his hotel. After chatting in the afternoon sun for some time, casually – easily – Straker and Charlotte arranged to have dinner.
They got on. Really got on. Straker was transfixed. She was punchy, intelligent, provocative, funny; she could talk about a host of different things, and seemed to have opinions on all of them. Not only that, she was physically captivating too: five eleven, slim, with the smoothest of tanned complexions, long dark hair and radiant grey eyes.
Even in that, their first evening together, Straker’s self-control had been sorely tested. There was palpable physical and sexual chemistry between them. Her body language – and tone – implied she was drawn to him, and why not? He was six two with a powerful and obviously fit physique, dark eyes, and a naturally severe expression that indicated confidence and purpose – but which, when he smiled, was transformed to unexpected openness and ready engagement.
Straker’s marriage, heavily strained at the time because of the aftermath of his rendition and torture, might have provided a justification of sorts, but he had not succumbed. For the rest of the night following that dinner, though, he had got no sleep, as he mulled, moped, and paced his hotel room thinking about this striking woman.
But that was until he was jolted and even panicked from holding such thoughts. His assignment – and very liberty – was threatened. It became dangerous enough for him to need to get out of that despotic country in a hurry. With all the concentration, urgency and tension that escaping involved, Straker found himself with more pressing matters to think about than a stunning woman he might have met by a pool.
Until – having managed to get out – a few evenings later, completely unannounced, she showed up on his doorstep in London. Straker’s wife, by then, had moved out, taking with her the last of the fidelity he felt he still owed her.
He and Charlotte Grant had had an amazing night together. Such passion, such excitement, such arousal – such technique.
And so, to Straker – Charlie and he having been lovers – rooting through her private messages was prompting severe levels of discomfort.
He looked down at her phone. It seemed chock-a-block with emails and texts, too many for him to take in right this minute. He would need to go through all the contents methodically later. Even so, he couldn’t help noticing two of the names – at the bottom of two texts – sent just a few days earlier:
Charlie, my darling. C
all me when you get in to Monte-Carlo. Can’t wait. Budge XX.
While the second one read:
I need a pit stop, my lover! Splash and dash, no? Adi.
Straker felt a consuming stab of jealousy. Charlotte Grant had been having intimate relations with other men. And how! And who! The Lambourn Formula 1 team boss and the Massarella Grand Prix driver, Adi Barrantes.
At the same time?
Straker forced himself to concentrate, not easy against his surge of adrenalin and mounting anger. He quickly skimmed through her phone’s contacts directory. He wanted to see what other names might be loaded in there, apart from the intimate and painful text messages from Lord Lambourn and the Massarella driver. Indeed there were many, mostly nicknames by the looks of things, but none of them meant anything to Straker. He quickly realized her phone was not going to be of any immediate help.
A little after two-thirty in the morning Straker took a shower, changed into working clothes, and made his way back down to the pit lane.
Walking in from the dark, the Ptarmigan garage – harshly lit by glaring fluorescent lights – was frenetic with activity. Backhouse had secured a special dispensation from the governing body for the team to work overnight. Both cars were being dismantled and their components thoroughly scrutinized, tested by their respective crews for any signs of damage or abnormality.
With all that in hand, Straker worked until daybreak – moving back and forth between the garage and the headquarters truck – to set up his own counter-espionage measures. The jamming device had been replaced in Sabatino’s helmet, and confirmed to be still serviceable. The same went for the team’s original radio circuitry. Now, though, Straker had advised for a second radio to be installed in both cars, but set on very different frequencies.
To establish the team’s other defences, a number of people were woken at godforsaken hours. Some of Quartech’s specialist military surveillance equipment, along with the necessary operating teams, was even flown out by chartered plane from England.
As all this was assembled and deployed, Straker was increasingly sure they were ready to fight back.
Driven Page 4