Hunting for Caracas

by Anthony Fox

  The man opposite Luque’s bench, who looked well into his late eighties, stood up and walked away from the table, leaving Luque to sit alone. An old woman approached a group of players from across the park and singled one out that stood with his back to Luque. The player wore a blood-red fedora, the shadow of it covering his face.

  The old woman said a few words to the player and Luque knew she was informing him that Luque wasn’t followed. This happened every time.

  Despite his inside knowledge, Luque hadn’t noticed the old woman behind him. But that was the point. Old people in society were overlooked, ignored and consistently underestimated, making them invaluable to the right situations. And these weren’t regular men and women. Each one former military, whether it be air force pilots, infantry, frontline medics, EOD (explosive ordnance disposal) engineers and the like. Each a survivor of modern warfare. Afghanistan, Iraq or Syria, the Mexican drug war, Somali or Sierra Leone civil wars, Gaza, the Falklands, perhaps some even the last sent to Vietnam in the seventies. The list was endless. Eventually either the wars ended or your time was up. Then you were abandoned. No big payoff. No job. Each one shamelessly long forgotten by the countries they’d given everything to defend.

  The player with the red fedora nodded and placed a gentle hand on the woman’s shoulder. He came over and sat opposite Luque. The sun began to fade and a light breeze cooled the air.

  ‘Beunos tardes, viejo amigo,’ said Caracas in his low, smooth voice. The red fedora dipped low, making it so Luque could barely see even the outline of the features on the face. It did not matter to him. It was a face Luque knew better than his own. For this was the face that came to him in his sleep. The face of his dreams. The face of his nightmares.

  46

  Somewhere near Feldkirch, Austria.

  Assia looked up at the small window in her room that faced out onto the street. The window neither opened nor was big enough to fit through even if it had. Laying back on the bed, she was reaching under her mattress when there was a knock on her door. Assia quickly straightened back up and called out. Grandad poked his head in and told her he was going to get them something to eat. At the mention of food, Assia became aware of the empty feeling in her stomach. She said in a dispassionate voice that she was happy with whatever he was having. He turned to leave.

  ‘Grandad,’ she called out, surprised at her own outburst. It was the first time she’d addressed him, and it felt ridiculous to call him that. He paused in the doorway and turned to face her. He smiled, and his face filled with a boyishness that suddenly made her think of Charlie, even though they looked nothing alike. She quickly pushed the thought from her mind. She only allowed herself to think of Charlie when she was alone.

  ‘Why are you called that? Why does Matthews call you Grandad?’

  He smiled again. ‘Wondered when you were going to ask that one,’ he responded. He asked for permission to sit on the end of her bed and then perched himself there, keeping a respectful distance.

  ‘I know it’s odd when someone like Matthews, more than twice my age, calls me Grandad. Truth is, it’s been my name so long I don’t notice any more. I’ll give you the short version. I grew up in an orphanage as the only Indian boy, and I’m deaf in one ear and all but blind in one eye, and it turned out that made me undesirable. So as boys came and went, I stayed.’

  Assia was close to asking the obvious question: how he’d become half blind and half deaf at such a young age? However, she bit it back at the last moment.

  ‘Years ticked by,’ Grandad continued, ‘and I grew into a teenager, when all the others were no older than seven or eight. One day we’re working away, scrubbing the floors of the hall. As always I, being the oldest at about thirteen, was telling the others what to do when one of them suggested cheekily I should be called Dad. Then one of the younger boys, even cheekier still, said I was far too old to be their Dad. He was only a young kid and like most of us never knew his own parents, and didn’t fully understand the idea of family. He asked what was older than a Dad, and another boy told him it would be a Grandad. When he asked what a Grandad was they told him it was an old man with a long, grey beard and a big belly who was head of the family. They all laughed at the thought of me with a grey beard and a fat stomach, but agreed I was certainly the head of our own little family, and the name Grandad has pretty much stuck ever since.’

  Assia watched his face as he told the story. She thought it a bittersweet tale, even as Grandad made it sound like a happy memory.

  He got up to leave.

  ‘I’m glad you’re here, Assia,’ he said from the doorway, his voice soft and vulnerable. ‘I mean, I know you’re not. But I don’t meet many people, and you seem nice.’ He smiled shyly at her.

  Assia didn’t even consider responding. Her brain had momentarily emptied.

  He swiftly left the room, telling her he would organise some food.

  Assia leaned back against the headboard and composed herself. She was pleased to see he closed her bedroom door behind him and waited as his footsteps creaked on the floorboards as he moved away. After some hesitation she rolled in her bed and again reached under her mattress, her hand searching for the two items hidden there.

  That night, that awful night, had ended with her phoning Grandad through cries of pain from the injury to her knee, doing the best she could to describe the unbelievable events of the evening, and struggling to explain their location.

  Only later did she remember going through Matthews’ pockets to find his phone, first finding the one he’d taken from Charlie on the train. Charlie’s own phone. She didn’t know why she put it in her own pocket. However, later she was glad she had, as she saw Grandad immediately destroy all Matthews’ other phones as soon as they found each other. He’d searched Assia as well, but hadn’t done a thorough job, being shy and embarrassed about the whole thing and at the time also somewhat preoccupied.

  She’d driven back to the autobahn, driven through the pain. Then she turned all the car lights on and phoned Grandad again as instructed, better able to explain their location. She couldn’t say why she hid Charlie’s phone as she now pulled it out from underneath her mattress. Grandad had destroyed the other phones, but she wouldn’t let him take this one. It was the only thing of Charlie’s she had left.

  She also couldn’t explain, while parked by the autobahn, breathing through the pain of her dislocated knee, why she decided to search Matthews’ body more thoroughly. He’d lain there, unconscious from his wound by this point, as Assia went through his pockets and found a small music device hidden away, along with some earphones. The iPod was small and white, and it just seemed such an insignificant and normal object for him to have that she decided to keep it hidden from Grandad as well. She now grabbed the iPod, along with Charlie’s phone, from her hiding place under the mattress, and lay on the bed with them.

  Assia held the phone in her hand for a long moment. The first chance she had to look at it, once they were back at the apartment, she saw the battery was dead. The screen remained blank, and no matter how many times she tried, or how furiously she shook it, the device would not turn on. Just sixty seconds was all she needed, to contact her brother and tell him what had happened. But it was no good. After sitting and holding Charlie’s phone for a moment she felt tears welling up in her eyes and, angry at herself, telling herself she wasn’t weak, she was strong, she put the phone back under her mattress and turned her attention to the iPod.

  It looked like any other iPod – and, she figured, in a practical sense it was. But Assia knew other people’s devices were filled with music. Which is what she expected the first time she lay down to listen to this one. And apart from one single track, that’s exactly what it was. However, that track, that one single track hidden away in the middle of all those songs, was unique.

  Assia checked the battery as she put one of the earphones in and left the other out so she could listen out for Grandad. The battery on this was running low now, but when she�
��d found it the battery had been almost full.

  She turned the device on and moved through the tracks to the one she knew didn’t contain music, but instead the recorded thoughts of a proud, strong but tired male voice with a strange accent. The tone of the voice reminded Assia of a school teacher she once had.

  She got herself comfortable on the bed, pressed play, and again listened to the voice.

  If you’re listening to this, and I’m gone, then don’t feel sad, as I didn’t live a sad life. I’ve lived a full life of purpose and passion, and many would say it has already stretched out too far.

  May you all be as lucky as I have.

  However, your receipt of this means I’ve left important work unfinished. Your unwillingness to join me in hunting for Caracas means you don’t fully understand the danger we’re facing. But, my boy, Caracas MUST be stopped, and there’s no one better positioned to do so than you.

  It’s no longer your choice, but your duty.

  Remember, when you think you’re safe is when you’re at your most vulnerable.

  47

  Girona, Spain.

  ‘Beunos tardes, mi primo de la muerte.’ Luque bowed his huge head a fraction as a sign of respect.

  ‘What news do you bring today?’

  Something about the voice made all of Luque’s hairs stand on end.

  ‘The man who killed Phil Connelly and our man at the apartment appear to be the same one,’ said Luque. ‘The same man that followed me to the barn. But we’ll know more when I can retrieve the camera.’

  In preparation for his rendezvous with Phil Connelly in the dark corner of the abandoned industrial estate, a camera had been discreetly hidden high up on the wall of the building opposite. Following Luque’s encounter at the barn, he returned to retrieve the camera and view the recording, only to find the police on the scene, examining Connelly’s dead body and the bag of money. Luque had quickly slipped away, but he would need to return for the camera when it was quiet.

  ‘The man from the barn, is he still alive?’ Caracas’s voice was low, yet it cut clearly through the noise of all that was going on around them.

  ‘I... I don’t know,’ Luque confessed. ‘He definitely took a bullet, but I’ve been unable to locate the body.’ His conspirator took this news in silence. Luque had to fight his desire to speak further, to explain himself. It wouldn’t help. It would only make matters worse for him.

  ‘What of all our information at the barn?’

  ‘Destroyed. The fire took hold quickly. Even if he’s alive, which he surely isn’t, there’s no way he could put anything together now. There isn’t time.’

  ‘Yet the fact he was able to track you to the barn means he already knows a great deal. You need to find him. If he’s dead, I want you to bring me his body. If he’s alive, he’ll be wounded and vulnerable.’

  Luque looked up at his primo. The dark skin was still hidden in the shadow of the fedora, but he did catch a flash of one emerald-green eye. Luque quickly diverted his own away.

  ‘He can’t know what’s to come,’ said Luque.

  ‘That doesn’t matter now. Jenkins is dead. While we wait to see what comes out of this mess, we’ll prepare again. How did the bomb work?’ asked Caracas.

  ‘Exactly as advertised,’ answered Luque quickly. ‘Strong enough to blow the wall and disarm those inside, but a controlled blast.’

  ‘Contact the bomber.’

  ‘As you wish.’ Luque paused a moment. ‘The man from the barn, do you believe it’s him? You know...’

  ‘The last of them? I think we have to assume it is. It’s either the plan he wanted, or me. Likely both.’

  ‘Why do you suspect so?’

  ‘Because otherwise, my old friend, you would already be dead. But you were just a stepping stone.’

  Luque tried to hide his indignation.

  Caracas had persuaded him to leave the arms trade in pursuit of greater goals. They had enough money. It was no longer about brokering deals with corrupt governments, they wanted to be in a position where they bent those and all governments to their will.

  They were ready to be at the very top of the ladder.

  ‘I still can’t understand how they got on to us in the first place,’ Luque wondered aloud.

  ‘It was McAuley who led them to Austria. We know that now.’

  Luque pictured the Spanish accountant they’d hidden away on the Costa Blanca. ‘He betrayed us?’

  ‘No, he was just foolish. And he’s been dealt with,’ said Caracas definitively, and Luque knew the topic was closed. McAuley’s punishment would have been final.

  The games continued on around the square as the two men spoke. A few people walked on by, but paid no attention to the old locals at their games and stone tables. The trees ceased to rustle, the dusk was warm and soothing. For the passing folk, this twilight in the gentle town must have seemed such a peaceful and happy time.

  48

  Somewhere near Feldkirch, Austria.

  The room had smelled of nothing in particular, a sign of its emptiness and lack of use. It had no newly decorated smells, no smells of neglect, yet he could remember it as strongly as any other room he’d ever been in. He also remembered the positions they’d sat in. In a circle, Kemi to his left and Nina to his right. Across from him, Phil Connelly and Robert Paxman next to each other.

  ‘Well, isn’t this nice?’ Paxman had said.

  ‘Maybe we should go around the room, a little ice-breaker. I’ll go first,’ said Connelly.

  He’d asserted himself from the off. Talking with poise to the strangers around the table and constantly flashing those perfectly straight, over-white teeth.

  After the two Americans they continued on to Kemi’s introduction, then Nina gave a brief description of herself.

  ‘So you’re a con artist. A hustler,’ said Paxman.

  ‘It’s a little more sophisticated than that,’ Nina replied. ‘I began life working for my family, learning the ropes. I outgrew my role there when I learned people treasure their secrets more than their diamonds. So I set out with a crew working out of London.’

  ‘And you sell information?’ enquired Paxman.

  She gave a crooked smile. ‘Well it is the most valuable commodity in the world. But we sell anything of value.’

  ‘Anything?’ Matthews said.

  Her only response to that was a flirtatious wink.

  ‘And where’s the rest of your crew now?’ Kemi asked.

  ‘We recently went our separate ways,’ she said. They all waited for more, but Nina was smart enough to play her cards close to her chest.

  ‘Then how did you end up with this gig?’ Connelly enquired.

  ‘I’ve been looking for something a little bigger,’ she purred at him.

  Paxman smiled, ‘Well sweetheart, I definitely think you’ve found it.’

  Nina’s face darkened and her voice thickened. ‘Don’t call me sweetheart.’ Then, like magic, her eyes opened wide and her face and voice lit up. ‘Unless you want to,’ and she fluttered her eyelashes.

  ‘Oh, man. This British woman is trouble,’ Paxman laughed.

  Matthews remembered looking at Connelly’s face at that moment. He was fixed on Nina and looking like he couldn’t decide whether to have her served to him for lunch or dinner. In that moment Matthews had taken an instant dislike to the man...

  He remembered that first day of Operation Matterhorn so clearly now. Fast forward to today and Phil Connelly was dead, killed by Matthews. He’d been unarmed. On the ground. And Matthews murdered him. And the others? They were in the apartment. He’d seen the destruction, seen the gunman, and now read the news reports.

  The previous night was the first time they mentioned Matthews and Assia, according to Grandad. Not by name, but a short clip from a street camera did show them leaving the scene, Assia being carried in Matthews’ arms. The reporter’s voice accompanying the news clip asked for any information regarding the two suspects. Matthews was covered
by his hood, but they’d enhanced a shot of Assia’s face from the side. Even if he was too wrapped up in his own thing to feel any guilt for Assia’s situation, Grandad wouldn’t let her predicament go unnoticed.

  ‘So how is the girl?’ Matthews asked from the bed in his gruff voice.

  ‘She’s angry. She’s all fire. But she’s nice. I feel like she tries to hide her niceness for some reason, though.’

  ‘I meant, how’s she physically?’

  ‘Oh,’ said Grandad, blushing. ‘It’s just her knee. That’ll heal soon enough according to the doc.’

  ‘Don’t get too attached to her. She’s in a lot of danger, and she’s an unknown quantity.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘Means Caracas will know she’s likely with us, ditto the White Wolf, if any of them know I’m still alive. Also the police. Perhaps she can stay while I heal, but to complete the mission we can’t waste time on her.’

  ‘But she needs our help.’

  ‘You don’t know the first thing about her.’

  Matthews asked if they’d heard anything back on the security check put through on Assia. As they were going to be stuck with her for a while, Matthews wanted to be sure the girl was who she said she was. Grandad asked Assia for her full name, date of birth, address and national insurance number. He and Matthews were waiting to hear back on the results from a friend, an old contact of Rudy’s, inside the British government.

  Grandad now checked his messages and found a report had come through. After reading the information he told Matthews something flagged up on Assia’s background check. Apparently she was in Thailand shortly before her trip around Europe. The report said she was originally issued a three-month visa, but stayed in Thailand for almost a year. Grandad read that any further information required more access. It could be nothing, but Matthews wanted their contact to chase it up.