by RJ Bailey
‘OK.’ He meant ways of solving my problem. Solutions might be a better word, but the Colonel had always dealt in ‘scenarios’. They varied from a single paragraph to a full-blown dossier complete with PowerPoint presentation. I was inclining towards the former. It would be cheaper, for one thing.
‘How much money do you have?’ Now that’s more like it, I thought. It’s just business to him, sentimentality be damned.
‘I’m good for a few scenarios.’
‘No, you’ll need more than that. A lot more.’
‘What for, exactly?’
‘You can’t face Leka without suitable provision.’
That sounded expensive. I opened my virtual wallet. ‘What do you suggest?’
‘Oktane.’
There was a sound in my head like water going down a drain. I think it was actually cash flowing out of my bank account. Oktane did not come cheap.
As soon as I ended the call, Adam came up and gingerly put his arms around me. I could smell the faint aroma of cheap cement on him. It’ll never catch on as an aftershave. He squeaked a little as he squeezed me.
‘You get those ribs checked as soon as you get home,’ I said.
‘Yes, Nurse Ratched.’
I could talk. I still had what I hoped was just a pulled muscle in my shoulder from my table-flinging practice and yanking the wheel of the Dacia.
He pecked me on the cheek and released me from his grip. ‘I don’t know how to thank you. If you hadn’t been there . . .’
‘But we were.’ Who knew, if he hadn’t been there, I might not have met Saban and got my leverage. ‘Maybe it was all meant to be,’ I said.
He looked surprised. ‘You believe in that sort of thing? Kismet?’
‘No.’ But sometimes I am tempted to give it just a little credence. As in: sometimes life is just fucking weird. ‘And don’t worry about the Sayonara stuff. As I said, Freddie has a vivid imagination. I think you might have tipped someone off in Tirana that you were doing more than just researching that actor of yours.’
‘Or I was just unlucky. Mistaken identity.’
‘There’s always that.’ I wasn’t convinced. If I were Adam Bryant I wouldn’t head back to Albania in a hurry. If at all.
As we spoke, he pulled out his passport and a business card fluttered to the floor. He scooped it up and slotted it away. ‘Hold on,’ I said.
I logged on to the airport Wi-Fi and googled his full name.
‘I’ve got to—’
‘Hold your horses.’ The page loaded. ‘You wrote a book called The Shame Road?’
‘I did, yes.’
‘About sex slaves.’
‘Sex trafficking, yes.’
‘And that article about sex workers in Romania. It was a finalist in the Features Journalism section of the British Journalism Awards?’
‘Yes, but—’
I held up the screen to show him. ‘Someone just had to do a search on you. Someone you gave your card to, perhaps. And once they had seen the top two entries in this list, they’d begin to think that maybe you were interested in more than Anthony whatsit.’
‘Quayle.’
‘Whatever. You see what I mean, though? Isn’t there someone’s razor that deals with this sort of thing?’
‘Occam’s razor,’ he said. ‘The simplest solution is usually the right one.’
‘There you go. You were rumbled somewhere along the line and some calls were made to let people know that a nosy journalist with an interest in people-trafficking was coming up the mountain.’
He looked a little disappointed that it could be something so prosaic. ‘I guess so. But the people I gave my cards to were harmless old men.’
‘No such thing,’ I said. ‘You should know that.’
‘I should. Look, I’d better . . .’
‘Yup, off you go. Take it easy, eh? And good luck with your story. And remember: no names.’
‘I remember. No names, no pack drill, whatever that means. Or you’ll hunt me down and hurt me.’
‘Not me. Freddie.’
‘Sold.’ He mimed zipping his mouth. ‘Look, if there’s anything I can ever do. To repay you.’ He fished in his pocket and passed me the card that had fallen on the floor. I handled it gingerly. I’d had a bad time with business cards of late. Not all are what they seem. ‘Although, I can’t imagine what that might be.’
‘You never know,’ I said. I held out my hand and we shook.
‘I still don’t fully understand what you are up to next.’
I wasn’t sure either. But with Oktane in the picture, it wasn’t going to be pretty. Or legal.
‘Best it stays that way. See you, Adam.’
‘Good luck. And thanks again,’ he said as he hurried off, raising a hand to Freddie.
She came over as he had his passport checked once more and disappeared through the gate.
‘Would you?’ Freddie asked.
‘What?’
‘Fuck him.’
‘Adam?’
‘No, the guy at the gate who looks like the love child of Joseph Stalin and Rosa Klebb. Of course, Adam. He has a pretty decent-sized cock.’
Despite myself, I let her draw me into her sordid little world. ‘Freddie, how the hell do you know that?’
‘I walked in on him in the shower while you were blabbing to the car-hire people. How was I to know the screen was transparent?’
‘I don’t know, probably because you scoped it out first.’
‘No, I didn’t. It was a pure accident.’
‘But you didn’t avert your eyes.’
‘How could I? It came at me like some fuckin’ anaconda. I had to pay full attention.’
I never really knew if Freddie was as horny as a promiscuous old goat most of the time, or she just liked winding my prudish – in her eyes – arse up. A mixture of the two, I suspected. ‘In your dreams.’
She gave an impish grin. ‘And I am very much looking forward to dreaming that one again. Coffee?’
I knew that even by the execrable standards of airport coffee, the little stall’s effort was going to be vile sludge. But I said, ‘Yes. Why not?’
As we waited for the girl to push the buttons on the machine, I sent Colonel d’Arcy a rough outline of our car ‘theft’, as it should appear on an official document.
Freddie asked, ‘What did the Colonel say when you spoke to him?’
‘He’s going to lay out some options,’ I said.
‘OK. Options we could do with.’
I sensed a weariness in her voice. I was still running on adrenaline from the mountain but Freddie’s shoulders had dropped, as if her tank was empty. It would happen to Adam, too. The moment he buckled up on that plane he would start feeling cold and hollow.
And then he’d remember what dead men looked like up close.
What a hail of 9mm bullets does to a human being.
Freddie and me, we’d seen a lot of that in our time, patched up plenty of broken bodies. We just added those new ones to the library of images we’d rather forget. Adam didn’t have that luxury. He didn’t have a library. I didn’t envy him for the nightmares he had to come.
‘Look, Freddie, you can butt out of all this now if you wish. Jesus, I wouldn’t blame you.’
‘Butt out?’ She took the coffees and we stepped away from the cart. I sipped something black and tar-like. ‘Why the hell would I do that?’
‘Because I nearly got you killed up some godforsaken mountain.’
‘I think we were pretty much at the bottom when it looked like we were going to die.’
I ignored that. ‘And the next part is mine. Neutralising Leka and going after Jess.’
‘That’s fine talk coming from my friend and partner.’
‘Friend, yes. Partner in what? Crime, you mean?’
‘No, the agency.’ Before I could ask what agency? she ploughed on. ‘Your suspension from the SIA, that’s up soon, right?’
I nodded. The protection industry�
�s professional body had canned me for kidnapping and threatening my old boss. Misdemeanours, really. ‘Two months and I can re-apply.’
‘Right, I was going to mention this anyway at some point. There was a piece in The Times—’
‘Wait, you’ve started reading The Times?’
‘No, I can’t actually read, I have a social worker who reads it out to me every day. Don’t be such a snob, just because some broadsheet journalist fancies you.’
‘Adam? Me?’ I felt myself blush for no good reason.
‘He hugged you. Not me. Gave you a smacker on the cheek. Not me. I got the limp handshake.’
‘Maybe it’s because I didn’t burst into the bathroom and start measuring his cock. Perhaps he was worried what the next step would be if he were to move any closer.’
‘Possibly,’ she conceded. ‘I might not have been able to resist finding out if my eyes had been deceiving me . . .’
‘The Times?’ I prompted, before she got out of hand.
‘Yes, The Times said that rich Americans are hiring bodyguards for their tours of Europe. In case of further terrorist outrages. It said female close protection is much in demand, a demand that agencies are struggling to fill.’
It wasn’t really news, except for the nationality of the clients. We London-based PPOs got a lot from the Middle East, especially in summer, with Asia and Russia coming up on the rails. The USA, not so much. But with plenty of bad press about the situation in Europe, it was probably a comfort blanket for those who could afford it. If a waste of money. Foiling kidnap and robbery attempts we were good at. But there was no way an unarmed PPO was going to help against a rucksack bomb or a van mounting a pavement, unless you got lucky. I think a lot of vacationers would bristle at the restrictions needed to protect a client absolutely. Then again, a PPO team might be the new must-have accessory for any well-heeled American tourist: Darling, we had the most divine bodyguard . . .
Which might mean there was good money to be had while it lasted. But I kept quiet; Freddie obviously wasn’t finished.
‘So what if we set up an all-female agency? Nothing but women PPOs. Maybe we name it after a Greek goddess. Like Callipygos.’
‘Who’s she?’
‘I’m not sure, but it means “beautiful arse”, so count me in.’
‘Really? Is that the image an all-female agency wants to project? The receptionist picks up the phone and goes: “Beautiful Arse. How can I help you?” ’
She laughed at that. ‘OK. Maybe not. I did some research. Eos, the Morning Star, or Nemea, who breast-fed some monster—’
‘Or Wylde and Winter?’ I suggested, before she started reciting The Odyssey. Winter was Freddie’s married name, which she no longer used, having ditched the husband, but I quite liked the combo. ‘Or Winter and Wylde if you prefer.’
She moved her head from side to side, like a Bollywood dancer, thinking. ‘Well, we could toss for the order, but what about—’
She hadn’t finished before the crackly tannoy interrupted us. The accent was thicker than the coffee in my paper cup, but I got the message. ‘Would Miss Sam Wylde, Miss Sam Wylde, travelling on the Transavia flight to Paris, please return to passport control.’
NINE
Back at passport control, I was shunted between various hatchet-faced uniformed officials – some dressed as if auditioning for the SAS – before I ended up in a room smelling of eggs with someone in civilian clothes.
Nice civilian clothes.
Not Savile Row, but made by someone who knew what that once looked like.
The double-breasted jacket fell in the ‘English Drape’, which meant it gathered into vertical folds across the chest. Good for hiding guns, although I doubt the designer intended it for that purpose.
He sat opposite me at a rectangular desk, the varnish full of scratches and carved initials. There was even a swastika on there. No doubt, a comment by a previous interviewee on the techniques employed by his interrogators. Or maybe it was just an ill-advised doodle. The latter, I hoped.
His hands were well-manicured and moisturised, with no rings of any description. There was a very faint tattoo on one finger, but it was indistinct. He had fine, sharp features, slicked-back hair and green eyes that raked over me as he flicked at my passport with his left hand and turned my phone over with his right.
I tried to keep my breathing easy. Why had they pulled me and not Freddie? Or did they have her in another room right now? What did they actually have on me?
‘Miss Wylde,’ he said eventually. ‘I am Inspector Gazim. I shall be handling your case. Do you know why you are here?’
‘Because I have a plane to catch?’ I almost bit my lip. The same lip that everyone warned would get me killed one day. Or, in this case, thrown into an Albanian jail.
‘I think I’ll be the judge of that.’ He paused and looked down at the phone. Did he need a warrant to look at its contents? In Albania, I doubted it. But I’d have to tell him the code to unlock it first. Although, a couple of his combat-equipped pals outside could hold me while he held the screen to my face. Facial recognition had its flaws.
‘A car registered in your name has been discovered on the Gencian Road.’
‘Well, thank goodness it has been recovered. Where is the Gencian Road?’
He didn’t answer that one. ‘Recovered, yes. All in one piece? No.’
‘Had it been in an accident?’
‘It was – is – full of bullet holes.’
‘Bullet holes? Really?’ I made my mouth into an ‘O’ of surprise, like I couldn’t possibly imagine guns or gunfights ever entering my life. Luckily, our own weapons were at the bottom of the lake in Tirana’s Grand Park. I wouldn’t miss that jam-prone piece-of-shit Beretta anyway.
‘Yes. Quite a number of them. Of course, we checked with the hire company and you were the renter.’ What he wasn’t mentioning were the dead bodies. It was possible the AK men had disposed of them, or the families had come and collected their fallen. ‘And now we find you leaving the country. What was your business here?’
‘Holiday. Walking holiday.’
His eyes flicked down to the passport and up again to me in the way all border officials and police are trained to do. I think the Gestapo first invented the ‘papers please scan’. Or maybe it was the Hollywood version of Nazis. Either way, it really caught on. ‘Yet, you have been here only a few days. It normally requires at least a week, or even two, to see our beautiful country.’
‘Your English is very good.’
He nodded, accepting the truth without explaining it. ‘Why the short visit?’
‘Well, the car was stolen, which was upsetting, and it rather ruined the holiday.’
‘But you didn’t report it stolen.’
‘I did. To the police station in Pulana.’
He gave me his weary-policeman smile. ‘There is no police station in Pulana.’
Fuck. Then something told me he was fishing. I had nothing to lose by spitting out the hook. I bristled a little. ‘Well, there was some sort of building full of cops who mostly ignored me.’
He nodded. ‘What I meant to say was, there is no permanently manned police station in Pulana. Four days a week. When did you report the vehicle stolen?’
‘Yesterday. We’d been for a walk around the town, which didn’t take long . . .’
He wasn’t ready for the details yet, which was a relief. I didn’t have any to give him.
‘What is it you do back in England, Miss Wylde?’
‘I’m a personal . . .’ Just the merest gulp as I swallowed the next word, which had tried to tag along. I hoped he hadn’t noticed. ‘Trainer.’
‘A what?’
‘A personal trainer. I help people get fit, lose weight, become toned.’ Release their inner selves, empower them, put them on the path to wellness. I’d had enough motivational gym sessions over the years to know the lingo, but I decided to spare him. ‘You have them here? Personal trainers?’
‘For the lazy elite, yes. Body gurus, we call them. But most people in Albania keep fit by working hard.’ He sniffed to emphasise the point. ‘Your final destination today?’
‘London.’
‘Yet, you have only a ticket to Paris.’
‘Sorry, we are stopping off in Paris for a few days. Sightseeing.’
‘And your companion will confirm everything you have told me?’
Be a bleedin’ miracle if she did, I thought, because I’ve been making all this up on the hoof. I considered claiming Freddie was a fantasist suffering from a form of amnesiac autism that made her an unreliable witness. But I thought better of it. ‘Of course she will.’
‘Will you excuse me for a moment? I have some calls to make.’
He rose, readjusted the line of his jacket and slipped my passport and phone into his right-hand pocket. He left, closed the door and I heard a bolt snick across.
I turned and surveyed the room. There was no camera I could spot. Maybe they didn’t want whatever happened in here on tape. The floor was covered in scuffed, marbled linoleum tiles, but I could see no signs of blood. Only spilled coffee and food. And I guessed some of the latter contained the eggs that now perfumed the air. Maybe I was just being paranoid about the inspector being a rubber-truncheon man. That was the Albania of thirty years ago. Or so I hoped.
The room’s only decoration was a poster in English: Welcome to the Land of the Eagle. The eagle in question was swooping over jagged peaks that rather queasily reminded me of where we had just seen men slaughtered. The bird had a crudely drawn bubble coming out of its mouth, containing something written in what I assumed was Albanian. Maybe it said: Better they were slaughtered than you.
How long until the flight left without me? It had been forty-five minutes to boarding when they had called me in. I reckoned half that time had now elapsed. I knew there was a vast reservoir of panic inside me that I had managed to keep a lid on. All this, this chasing around the toilet bowls of Europe, had one endgame: get to Bali and find Jess, my lovely daughter whose face I couldn’t quite visualise any more. Who, in the many months she had been gone, would have blossomed into a beautiful young woman. And I was missing it all, thanks to her fucking father, who took her from me.