Zero 22, p.15
Zero 22, page 15
part #8 of Danny Black Series
Mind on the job.
He took a seat in a position where he could keep an eye on Bethany as well as all his exit routes. There was the way he’d come in, two doors leading to the male and female lavatories, and a further corridor at the far end of the bar, leading away from it. One of the bartenders approached. Danny ordered a bottle of water. It came accompanied by a plate of nibbles, a small wallet of hotel-branded matches and an eye-watering bill. Danny put some notes down to pay and pocketed the matches. It was ingrained behaviour for him to take possession of any object that might come in useful at some point in the future.
He found it hard to imagine somewhere he would feel more out of place. The same couldn’t be said for Bethany. She looked as if she belonged here. And she looked stunning. Danny did what he needed to do to quell his discomfort. Back in Hereford, the CO had told Danny that they had intelligence about the General’s routine: that he was in the habit of coming to the bar for a cocktail at 18.00 hrs every evening. But what if he broke his routine? What if he didn’t turn up? Plan B would mean that Bethany had to go looking for him. That could get interesting.
For now, all they could do was stand by. He sipped his drink, surveyed the exit routes, kept Bethany in his peripheral vision, and waited.
THIRTEEN
The room was silent. Alice felt uncomfortable, sitting here with these two older men. They’d been in and out for the past four hours, one person always remaining, waiting for the call from Number 10. Now all three of them were back in the room together. She checked the time. Twenty past four. Sturrock was moisturising his hands again. Stark seemed to be making a special effort not to watch the procedure, but the slick, greasy sound was impossible to ignore. Alice’s boss removed his spectacles and made an attempt to clean them with his tie. When he put them back on, they were no less dirty, but Sturrock had finished moisturising his hands, so the process had served its purpose.
‘Peppermint, Alan?’ Stark offered. Sturrock shook his head bad-temperedly. He obviously wasn’t handling the pressure well.
The gravity of the situation was obvious. For Sturrock and Stark, the two top guys in the building, to be running this operation themselves: that was unusual. Unprecedented, so far as Alice knew. They were clearly nervous, in their own ways. When the speaker on one of the tablets burst into life again, Sturrock visibly started. Alice recognised from earlier the voice on the line to Number 10. ‘You have a green light to proceed. Repeat, you have a green light to proceed.’
Sturrock stood up immediately. ‘Tell Hereford it’s a go,’ he said to Stark. ‘And keep me updated.’
He left the room without another word. Stark gave Alice a thin smile. ‘Let’s see what Messrs Rostropovic and Poliakov have to say for themselves, shall we?’ he said, and he popped another mint into his mouth.
Cunningham’s phone rang while the SAS men were still poring over the plans of the building. He put it to his ear for only a few seconds before killing the line. ‘Hereford,’ he told the others. ‘It’s a go.’
The five SAS men went silently to work. Cunningham, Hobbs and Moore pulled black balaclavas over their heads and performed one last routine check of their personal weapons. Hunter and Parsons approached the manager. He was sweating profusely, clutching his hands and blinking a couple of times every second. Hunter had two options: to scare him into compliance or to try to calm him down. He knew Cunningham would default to the former strategy. Hunter didn’t think that would be the right call. The more nervous the manager looked, the more suspicious the oligarch’s bodyguards would be. These wouldn’t be goons. Rostropovic sounded to Hunter like a guy who could afford the best. And that meant ex-SF, probably. Hunter put one hand on the manager’s shoulder and gave him a reassuring smile. ‘It’s going to be fine, buddy,’ he said. ‘We do this kind of thing every day of the week. So long as you do what we say, it’ll be a walk in the park.’
The manager gave him an ‘I hope you’re right’ kind of smile. Over his shoulder, Hunter saw Cunningham raise an eyebrow. He ignored it. ‘Take me to the service lift,’ Hunter said. He picked up the canvas bag of engineer’s tools.
The manager led him back out into the car park. The tyre screech of a departing vehicle faded away. Their footsteps echoed against the concrete walls as they walked across to a far corner of the space. Here, tucked away next to another fire exit, was the service lift. A sign read ‘Staff Only’. There was a single button next to the doors and beneath it was a keyhole. The manager produced a sizeable bunch of keys and selected one. He slotted it into the keyhole and turned it. Then he pressed the button to call the lift. Thirty seconds later, the doors opened and the empty car presented itself.
Hunter looked back across the car park. Parsons was standing outside the fire door, watching for his signal. Hunter double-checked there was nobody else around – it looked clear – then gave Parsons the thumbs up. ‘Keep the doors open,’ he told the manager, and he stepped inside the lift. There was enough space for twenty people inside. Its metal walls were scuffed where trolleys had bashed into them. Hunter looked up. As expected, there was a detachable panel in the ceiling. No latch. They just needed to push it up and they would be able to gain access to the top of the lift.
The others arrived: Cunningham, Hobbs and Moore in their civvies. Parsons in his BT uniform. They entered the lift. Moore gave Cunningham a leg up so that he could reach the ceiling panel. Cunningham lifted the panel up and moved it to one side. Then he hauled himself up through the hole and on to the top of the lift. Hunter helped Moore and Hobbs follow him up there. Within thirty seconds the three balaclavad men were out of sight, the detachable panel back in place. Hunter and Parsons were inside the lift alone. The manager was still standing nervously outside. ‘Okay, buddy,’ Hunter said. ‘Get inside. We can close the doors. Let’s take her up to the penthouse.’
The manager swallowed hard and blinked again. He removed the key, stepped into the lift and looked up. ‘Won’t they be crushed when we reach the top?’
Hunter shook his head. ‘There’s always headroom,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’
The manager inhaled deeply and pressed the button marked ‘P’.
Danny checked the time. 18.20 hrs. No sign of the General. He should have been here twenty minutes ago. He slowly sipped his water. The bar was filling up – there were thirty or forty people in here now – and Danny was anxious. Would they have to go looking for the guy? He still had line of sight to Bethany, but occasionally some hotel guests would get in the way and he’d lose visual contact. Each time that happened, he experienced a twinge of apprehension. Did he trust Bethany to go through with this, even if they found the General? He didn’t know.
Movement by the entrance at the end of the bar. Four men walked in. Three of them were in camouflage gear. The fourth wore civvies, but it was clear from his demeanour that he had authority over the others, who walked slightly behind him and with the faint stiffness of gait that Danny recognised as soldiers in the presence of their superior. Danny subtly examined the man in civvies. He was well built and had a deep perma-tan. Silver hair, twinkling eyes. A good-looking man, and a face Danny recognised not only from his target pack, but also from the CCTV still Sturrock and the others had shown him back in Hereford. In that still, the man had been wearing a straw trilby and flamboyant shirt. Here, he was more soberly dressed. His shirt was a pale pink which, to Danny, suggested his flamboyant nature hadn’t quite deserted him. A sport jacket. Chinos. For some reason, Danny found himself noticing the General’s shoes: expensive brown brogues, very shiny. The whole ensemble was a direct contrast to the camo gear of the soldiers surrounding him and elsewhere in and around the hotel. It was unmistakably General O’Brien, and he was unmistakably different to any top brass Danny had met before. At a glance, Danny could see that there was something unusually easy-going about him. He seemed relaxed, like a wealthy man on a golfing holiday. He turned to speak to his three men and clasped one of them on the shoulder – an unheard-of gesture in Danny’s world between men of such different ranks. The three men laughed at whatever it was he said, then left the room chatting to each other. The General remained at the bar, alone. He took a stool and sat with his back to Danny, who could see him raise a finger to attract the attention of one of the barmen and instinctively made a mental note that he was right-handed.
Danny glanced over at Bethany. She hadn’t moved. She didn’t even seem to have noticed the General’s arrival. Danny hoped she was just playing it cool.
He pulled out his phone and made a show of playing with it. In reality, he was simply swiping icons while surreptitiously keeping eyes on the room. A corner of his mind was analysing everything he’d seen. Something about the General didn’t seem right. The civvies, the easy-going nature. Danny had met top military guys like this before, and they were all the same: army through and through, straight as the barrel of an assault rifle and twice as threatening. But then it occurred to him that perhaps this easy-going nature was precisely the character trait that made him so suited to this job of brokering peace between warring factions. The world expected him to be the point man at talks that could cause or save any number of lives in the region. Sturrock expected him to be secretly planning to sabotage those talks, but this outward show of relaxation and friendliness was a good way of confirming his quiet self-confidence. Maybe he cultivated it to distract anyone and everyone from the truth.
Or maybe he just didn’t care about what he was doing. About the things he had done.
Danny remembered the Zero 22 patrol. His mates, dead within moments of the Russian ambush. The twisted hunks of metal smouldering on the wasteland of the bomb site. A bitter taste rose in the back of his throat. None of that would have happened had it not been for the man at the bar in front of him. His mates would still be alive. It was all Danny could do to stop himself rising from his chair and dealing with the bastard himself.
But he remained seated and sipped his water again. Bethany had stood up. She walked across the room, weaving her way around the tables, avoiding all eye contact with Danny. He was reminded once more what a skilful actress she was. Her body language had changed again. Her hips sashayed appealingly. A tendril of blonde hair tumbled across the side of her face. Her lips seemed somehow fuller than earlier. Hotel guests – male and female – watched her as she passed. Bethany approached the bar, but not the General. He still had his back to her and was being presented with a cocktail. As Danny reflected that this was the first time he’d ever seen a military man order anything other than a beer or a shot, Bethany continued walking along the bar. She sat next to another guy. He had dark skin and wore a business suit. Probably a local, Danny thought. There was an orange juice on the bar in front of him.
Bethany didn’t strike up a conversation. She gestured at one of the bartenders, but he was already hurrying to serve her. He leaned, in a deliberately nonchalant way, against the bar as he took her order. Bethany was plainly having the desired effect on the men around her. She ordered a drink and looked pointedly away. The bartender flinched at the rejection before pouring her a glass of champagne. By now, the local man in the suit had noticed her. He swivelled on his chair and started making conversation. There was no way Danny could hear what the guy was saying at this distance, but he could see Bethany’s reflection in the mirror behind the bar. It was a study in boredom. She was by some distance the most attractive woman of the fifteen or so in the room, but also the least accessible. A challenge to any alpha male in the vicinity.
Right now, there were two. The guy in the suit was leaning towards her. Danny could see him side on. The forced smile, the fast talking. Bethany remained unimpressed. When her champagne arrived, she idly traced her finger round the rim of the glass, apparently impervious to the guy’s charms. It didn’t seem to deter him. He leaned a little closer – Danny thought he might be at risk of falling from his stool – and stretched out one arm so that he was almost touching her. Bethany recoiled, but in such a way that made her seem superior rather than threatened. The guy took the hint and retracted his arm. But he was still leaning towards her, still chatting. Still clearly of the opinion that his luck might be in.
However, by now the General had noticed her.
Danny had to hand it to Bethany. She was playing this well. The first rule of a honeytrap was to make the target come to you. Make a clumsy approach and you do nothing but cause suspicion. Let the target think this is all their great idea and you’re halfway there. Especially if your target is an oversexed Yank with a highly developed sense of his own attractiveness. The General had picked up his cocktail in its delicate martini glass and was sauntering towards Bethany. Bethany was tracing the rim of her champagne glass again, pointedly ignoring the guy in the suit. As the General sat on the stool to her right, she made no attempt even to acknowledge him.
The arrival of the General had a strange effect on the man in the suit. Maybe he thought this broad-shouldered white guy was there to ensure Bethany wasn’t being hassled. Maybe one alpha male had seen off another. The man sat up straight again, made a big show of looking at his watch, then downed his orange juice and left the room.
Danny could immediately see that the General was the more skilful player. He didn’t rush it. He didn’t appear too keen. Both he and Bethany had their backs to Danny, but so far as he could tell the General hadn’t yet initiated a conversation. Danny felt like he was in the presence of two predators slowly circling each other, waiting to go in for the kill. He stood up and headed to the gents. Bethany was handling this well and he didn’t want to draw attention to himself by sitting there staring at them for too long.
It was a long time since he’d taken a piss in a room this posh. An obsequious toilet attendant handed him a fresh towel once he’d washed his hands. Danny dropped a bank note in his dish – a failure to tip would make the attendant more likely to remember him – then returned to his seat in the bar. As he passed Bethany and the General, he could see they were talking. A slightly flirtatious smile played across Bethany’s lips, and O’Brien was leaning in towards her and waving one hand.
There had still been no eye contact between Danny and Bethany as he took his seat again. He sipped his drink, swiped his phone and, in the quiet of his mind, said to himself: ‘Contact made.’
Cunningham, Hobbs and Moore were crouched low on top of the lift. The shaft extended into the darkness above them. Dim service bulbs glowed every ten metres, but there was insufficient light to see to the top of the building. Three sets of cabling extended from the body of the lift up along the chute: the main cable and two security ones. At the front of the lift roof, housed in a grey panel, were a set of external controls for safety and servicing purposes. Cunningham hunkered down over them. There was an override switch, a red button to move the lift up and a green one to move it down. To the left, clipped to the side of the control panel, was a piece of apparatus: a half-metre long metal lever, somewhere between a key and a jemmy. This was to prise the lift doors open from inside if necessary.
In a moment, it would be necessary.
Time check: 16.30 hrs. There was a hiss and the lift started to rise. The movement up here, where there were points of reference along the lift shaft, seemed much faster than it ever did in the enclosed confines of the lift itself. They shot up. Every few seconds they passed the doors of each floor, light seeping in through the cracks. The grinding sound of the pulley system was surprisingly loud and grew in volume as they rose. As the top of the shaft came into view, Cunningham, despite having done this before, felt an irrational moment of fear that the lift wouldn’t stop in time and they would be crushed. But it did stop, rather suddenly. Cunningham felt his stomach lurch and he gripped on tightly. Three loud pings announced the lift’s arrival at the penthouse level. Cunningham listened for the sound of the doors opening.
Hunter and Parsons stood at the back of the lift, side by side, little and large. The manager stood in front of them, facing the doors, his hands behind his back. Hunter held the canvas bag of tools lightly in his right hand. He acutely felt the absence of a weapon, but that was necessary because he knew there was a good chance he was about to be searched.
Nobody spoke. The manager dug his fingernails into his palms and blinked several times.
‘Take it easy, buddy,’ Hunter said under his breath. ‘Don’t freak out.’
The doors slid open.
There were two guys standing in front of the lift. Burly. Flat noses. Thick necks. One, brown-haired with a white blotch on his face that looked like an old burn mark, the other, steely grey hair and several days’ stubble. They both wore black suits. Hunter immediately clocked the bulges under their jackets that indicated they were armed. The grey-haired guy started shouting. ‘Get out of lift! Get against wall!’ A rough, heavy voice, Russian or Eastern European. In a partnership like that, the first person to talk is the dominant one. Hunter made a mental note as he allowed a terrified expression to cross his face. He dropped the canvas bag as the manager emitted a weak moan of fear. He raised his palms in a ‘hey guys, take it easy’ gesture. Parsons, next to him, did the same.
The brown-haired guy entered the lift, grabbed Hunter, pulled him out and threw him hard against the opposite wall. Hunter winced in mock pain as he took in his surroundings. The service lift was at the end of a corridor. Turn left, you hit a wall. Turn right, the corridor extended for fifteen metres before opening out into a larger room. Here, Hunter could see the doors of the main lift, the edge of a painting on the wall next to it and a bright orange designer sofa. There was thick carpet on the floor, good for cushioning the sound of footsteps. ‘Mate,’ he said, breathless, timid, ‘I’m just here to look at your phone lines.’
