The man at the desk nodded.
"Den Donovan."
"I know who you are," said PM. Standing behind PM was a black man well over six feet tall dressed in a black suit and grey T-shirt. He had shoulder-length dreadlocks and a goatee beard.
Donovan smiled amiably.
"Charlie and Pvicky said I should swing by. Pay my respects."
"What happened to my money, Den?"
"Your money paid for the coke, and the coke is sitting in one of The Queen's warehouses," said Donovan. He walked over to a sofa and sat down.
"It's swings and roundabouts. A percentage of deals go wrong. You have to live with that. Build it into your price."
"That don't answer my question."
"If you want to know why the deal went wrong, you're asking the wrong person."
"Someone grassed."
"Probably."
"And it was your deal."
"I set it up, yes, but these things grow. More people get involved.
The more people get involved, the greater the risk."
PM slammed his hand down on to the desk.
"Fuck the risk. I want my money back."
"We all lost on this deal, PM."
PM reached into a drawer and pulled out a massive handgun, a black metal block with an inch-long barrel and an extra-long clip. Donovan recognised the weapon. It was a Mac-io machine gun. Lethal at short range, but unpredictable. It was a spray-and-pray weapon. Spray the bullets around and pray you hit something.
"PM, you pull the trigger on that and there's gonna be bullets flying all around the room."
"Yeah, but first one's gonna be in your gut."
"You know they pull to the right, yeah? To the right and up."
"So I'll aim left and low."
The man with the dreadlocks took a step forward. He fixed Donovan with a cold stare.
"You got any suggestion as to how we can get our money back?" he asked. The fact that he was the only one other than PM to open his mouth meant he was probably the one called Bunny, PM's adviser.
"You have to write it off. You can put that thing against my head and threaten to blow my brains out all you want, but I don't have your money. We're all in the same boat: you, me, Packy, Charlie, the Colombians who supplied the stuff."
"When things go wrong, there's always someone at fault."
"Agreed, but I didn't fuck up. Neither did Charlie and Pvicky. The Colombians are experts. It was either bad luck or someone new to the equation."
"You pointing the finger at us?" asked Bunny.
"There's no point in trying to apportion blame," said Donovan.
"We have to move on."
"And how do we do that?" asked Bunny.
PM seemed to relax a little. He put the gun back in the drawer, then leaned back and swung his feet up on the desk. He clicked his fingers at one of his men and the man fetched him a bottle of beer.
"I can cut you in on another deal. Heroin."
"Price?"
"Ten thousand a key."
PM drank his beer as Bunny rattled off quick fire questions.
"Source?"
"Afghan. Pure."
"Delivered where?"
"UK. South of England."
"Specifically."
"An airfield."
"You're flying it in?"
"That's the idea."
Bunny leaned forward and whispered into PM's ear. PM nodded as he listened but kept his eyes fixed stonily on Donovan's face.
"How much?" asked PM, when Bunny had finished whispering.
"Up to you."
"We'll go eight a key. And we'll take two hundred."
"Eight? I said ten."
"Yeah, but you owe us for the coke deal. And I figure if you're letting us in at ten, you're getting it for three or four, right?"
Donovan didn't say anything. He was paying the Russians three thousand dollars a kilo, about two thousand pounds. Even letting the Yardies in at eight grand he was still making a profit of three hundred per cent.
"I'd be cutting my throat at eight, PM. Nine."
"Eight five."
Donovan hesitated, then nodded.
"Eight five it is. You're sure you can move two hundred?"
PM's eyes hardened.
"You think we're smalltime, huh?"
"Two hundred is a lot, that's all."
"We can move it."
"That's great. I'll get Charlie to arrange the money with you."
Donovan stood up.
"One thing," said PM coldly.
"This gets fucked up, so do you. Bad luck twice in a row ain't no bad luck. I'll be pointing more than my finger. Clear?"
"Clear, PM."
The man with wraparound sunglasses opened the door and the pounding music billowed into the room.
"You drive here?" asked Bunny.
"Cab," said Donovan.
"Was worried about losing the CD player."
Bunny laughed throatily.
"I'll walk you down, fix you up with a ride."
Donovan nodded his thanks, and Bunny followed him down the stairs and out on to the street.
"Thanks for taking the heat off me," Donovan said to Bunny.
"The safety was on," said Bunny.
"Yeah, I saw that."
"Figured you did."
They walked slowly down the road, talking in quiet voices.
"Couldn't ask everything I wanted to know without cutting across the man, but this Afghan gear, where's it coming from?" asked Bunny.
"The easy answer to that is Afghanistan, but that's not what you mean, right?"
"Ain't no way you're flying it out of Afghanistan. There's opium there, but the processing is done outside. Pakistan. Or Turkey maybe."
"My contacts are in Turkey."
"And you're flying it direct?"
Donovan nodded.
"That's a long flight," said Bunny.
"I've got a big plane."
"Two thousand miles and some."
"Like I said, I've got a big plane. Let me ask you something. Has PM got the weight to move two hundred keys?"
"We wholesale some already. He's got dealers all over north London and contacts south that'll buy up any surplus. He can move it."
Donovan nodded. Then this could be the start of a beautiful friendship."
Bunny smiled thinly.
"We'll see about that. It's a bit premature to start emunerating any KFC ready meals. When do you tell us where we collect?"
"Day of delivery."
"Which will be when?" asked Bunny.
"Assuming all the money is in play, within the next twenty-four hours, probably three days."
"That quick?"
"The Turkish end is all ready to go. Charlie'll get the details to you."
Bunny shook his head.
"No, we deal with you on this one. No discussion."
Donovan wanted to argue, but it was clear from Bunny's tone that there was nothing he could say that would get him to change his mind.
"Okay," said Donovan.
"You call me direct when you've got the money. It's going to be electronic transfer through SWIFT. No used notes in suitcases."
"Not a problem. We have money in the system."
Donovan gave him the number of one of his mobiles.
"Call this from a landline. Don't identify yourself, just give me the number but transpose the last two digits. I'll call you back from a call box."
There was a squeal of brakes from a car in the street. Donovan whirled around. A large Mercedes had pulled up opposite them. The front passenger window was open and something was thrust through the opening.
Donovan cursed. It was a gun. A big gun. He'd been so involved in the conversation with Bunny that he hadn't been aware of the car driving down the street. The gun jerked and there was a loud series of muffled bangs. Bullets thwacked into the wall of the house behind Donovan. He felt an arm across the back of his neck, pulling him down.
It was Bunny.
"Down, man, get down!" Bunny yelled.
Bullets were hitting the concrete pavement all around Donovan. Now there were two guns spewing out bullets. Bunny grabbed Donovan's jacket collar and hauled him behind a black Wrangler Jeep just as its windows shattered into a thousand glass cubes.
Donovan looked up at Bunny. The West Indian was crouched over him.
"Stay down, man!" Bunny yelled.
The Jeep crashed to one side as its tyres were ripped apart by the gunfire. Puffs of dust exploded on the brick walls of the terraced houses, and glass was shattering everywhere. Bullets whizzed all around them.
Donovan looked back at the house they'd just left. Two West Indians had pulled handguns from inside their coats and were blasting away at the Mercedes. The Mercedes leaped forward and then braked again. Now the gunmen had a clear shot at Bunny and Donovan around the side of the Jeep.
"Bunny, watch out!" Donovan yelled.
Bunny whirled around just as one of the machine guns burst into life.
Bullets thwacked into the front of the Jeep, shattering its headlights.
Two bullets slammed into Bunny's chest and he fell back on to Donovan.
More West Indians ran out of the house brandishing guns. One of the men had a Mac-io like PM's and he fired a burst at the Mercedes, thudding holes into its boot. The Mercedes sped off.
Donovan crawled out from under Bunny, expecting to see his chest a bloody pulp. Instead Bunny was rubbing his chest and scowling.
"Bastards," he said.
He sat up.
"You okay?" he asked Donovan.
"Am I okay? What the fuck do you mean, am I okay?"
Donovan got to his feet and helped Bunny up. Haifa dozen of Bunny's crew came running up.
Why aren't you…" asked Donovan, his whole body shaking.
"Dead?" asked Bunny. He lifted up his shirt and showed Donovan a white Kevlar bullet-proof vest.
"Pretty much compulsory in Harlesden these days," he said.
"You should get one."
"I don't think you'll catch me around here again," said Donovan. He clapped Bunny on the shoulder.
"I owe you, mate. I'm like a fucking elephant, I won't forget this."
"We're not home free yet," said Bunny, looking around. In the distance they could hear sirens and there were shouts from the house. Doors were opening all along the street.
"The Operation Trident boys'll be on their way. They move fast on black-on-black shootings before any witnesses disappear into the woodwork. We've got to move. Come on."
Bunny headed down the street, away from the house. Donovan followed him. Donovan knew that Bunny was wrong about it being a black-on-black attack. As the car had been driven away, Donovan had seen a face he recognised in the back seat. Jesus Rodriguez.
Louise shuffled the playing cards and laid them out on the coffee table. She'd been playing patience for more than two hours, half concentrating on the cards, half watching the television with the sound muted.
The door to the spare bedroom opened and Robbie appeared, rubbing his eyes.
"I can't sleep," he said.
"Do you want a drink? Cocoa or something?"
Robbie nodded and sat down on the sofa. Louise went through to the kitchenette and put a pan of milk on to boil.
"That's patience," said Robbie, pointing at the cards.
That's right."
"You know you can play it on computer. It comes with Windows."
"I know. But I haven't got a computer here."
"Everyone's got a home computer these days," said Robbie.
"Not me. Besides, I like the feel of the cards. It's relaxing. That's why people play patience."
"It's boring."
"Yeah, you're right. But it gives you something to do with your hands."
Louise stirred cocoa powder into the hot milk, then poured the cocoa into a mug.
She gave the mug to Robbie and sat down next to him.
"Thanks," he said. He took a sip.
"How do you know my dad?" he asked.
Louise shrugged.
"He helped me when I needed help."
"You didn't know him when my mum was around, did you?"
Louise shook her head.
"I only met him a few days ago. When he came back from the Caribbean."
She reached over and stroked his hair.
"Why, are you worried that I might have taken him away from your mum?"
"No way!" said Robbie vehemently.
"She was the one having the affair."
"Because I didn't meet your dad until after your mum left. Cross my heart."
"She didn't leave," said Robbie.
"She ran away."
"I'm sorry."
"It doesn't matter." He took another sip of cocoa.
"You know your dad loves you, don't you? That's why he brought you here. So that you'd be safe."
"He said some people were after him. Do you know who they are?"
"No. He didn't tell me. He just said he needed somewhere for you to stay."
"He never says anything about what he does. It's like it's all some big secret."
Louise gathered up the cards and shuffled them slowly.
"You're lucky to have a dad," she said.
"It's not luck. It's biology."
"I mean to have a father who's around. My dad died when I was a kid.
Younger than you."
Robbie put his mug on to the coffee table and wiped his mouth.
"So your mum took care of you, did she?"
"Sort of. For a while. Then she married again." Louise shuddered at the memory of her stepfather.
"That's why I left home."
"Your stepfather didn't like you?"
"Oh, he liked me all right. He liked me too much. Couldn't keep his bloody hands off me."
Robbie looked away, embarrassed.
Louise reached over and put a hand on his leg.
"I'm sorry, Robbie. Bad memories." She forced a smile.
"Do you want to play cards? Until you feel sleepy?"
"Okay. What do you want to play?"
"Guest's choice."
"Blackjack."
Louise frowned.
"You're sure?"
"Yeah," said Robbie eagerly.
"Can we play for money?"
Louise looked at him through narrowed eyes.
"Am I being hustled here?"
"Do you want a beer?" asked Bunny, opening the door to a small fridge.
"Yeah, cheers," said Donovan.
The two men were in a room five minutes walk away from the shooting, above a minicab office. They'd hurried through the office with Bunny nodding a greeting to two big jamaicans who'd been sitting on a plastic sofa and a West Indian in a Rasta hat who was talking nineteen-to-the-dozen into a microphone. Bunny had taken Donovan up a flight of stairs and through a door on which had been tacked a sign saying "Management Only."
Bunny tossed Donovan a can of lager and sat down behind a cheap teak veneer desk.
"We'll hang out here for a while, till things quieten down. Just in case someone gives your description to Five-O."
"I thought we all looked the same."
Bunny flashed Donovan a tight smile and popped the tab on his can of beer.
Donovan looked around the room. There was worn lino on the floor and a bare minimum of furniture. The desk, two chairs, and a filing cabinet.
Sheets of hardboard had been nailed over the window and the only light came from a single naked bulb in the centre of the ceiling.
"Nice place you've got here," he said.
"It serves its purpose."
"The taxi firm is yours?"
"None of it's mine, PM's the top man."
"Yeah, right," said Donovan. He took a long gulp of beer.
"You use the taxi business to clean your cash?"
"Some. But it makes money, too. Try getting a black cab in London anytime after nine. Especially if you want to come out this way. We can pretty much charge what we want. We even pay tax."
Bunny leaned back in his chair and unbuttoned his shirt. He examined his Kevlar vest.
"You were lucky," said Donovan.
"The way they were spraying bullets, you could have got hit in the head."
"Firing from a car, they'd be lucky to hit anything. They've been watching too many movies."
Donovan took another drink from his can.
"How long have you been with PM?" he asked.
"Three years, thereabouts."
"Not thought about setting up on your own? Or joining a bigger operation?"
"Why? You recruiting?"
"You've got your head screwed on, seems you'd make more working for yourself than helping PM up the slippery pole."
Bunny shrugged.
"I do okay."
"You're holding his hand," said Donovan.
"Don't let him hear you say that, he's young but he's hard."
Donovan raised his can in salute.
"No offence, Bunny," he said.
"I was just making an observation."
"I'm happy with the way things are, Den. But if you were to make me an offer…" Bunny left the sentence hanging.
"You'd be an asset, that's for sure. I've not met many who throw themselves in front of a bullet for me."
"That's not the way it went down, and you know it," laughed Bunny.
"I practically fell on top of you."
"Whatever," said Donovan.
"The simple fact is that if it wasn't for you and that vest, I'd be lying on the street in a pool of blood. Seriously, Bunny, if I was going to be in this for the long haul I'd make you an offer, but after this Turkish deal, I'm out of the game."
"For good?"
Donovan grinned.
"For as long as the money holds out. And that'll be for a long, long time. I've got a boy needs looking after. Robbie. Nine years old."
"Your son?"
Donovan nodded.
"His mum's done a runner so I'm going to be a single parent. For a while at least. You got kids, Bunny?"
Bunny shook his head.
"Married?"
Another shake of the head. Donovan kicked himself mentally. Underwood had said that Bunny was gay. He'd clean forgotten but Bunny was a big man, well-muscled and hard-faced, and there wasn't the slightest thing about him that was in the least bit effeminate.
"Yeah, well considering how unlucky I've been in the marital stakes, you're probably well out of it," said Donovan, He sipped his beer.
"What about the drugs game, Bunny? You see a future in it for you?"
"Long term, the only future's prison, right? You've got to quit while you're ahead. Make your stash, get it in legit businesses, then leave the dirty stuff behind. It's always been that way. Half the land in this country is owned by the descendants of robber barons of the Middle Ages. In a hundred years time, drugs money will have become old money and no one will remember where it came from. Take your son. Nine, you said? You'll put him in a good school, a top university, then you'll have enough money to set him up in whatever he wants to do. His children will be another step removed, and eventually it'll all be clean and no one will care."
"So long as we don't get caught."
Bunny grinned and raised his can of beer.
"Here's to not getting caught!"
Donovan grinned. He leaned over and clinked his can against Bunny's.
Donovan stayed in the office with Bunny for the best part of an hour, then Bunny arranged for a minicab to run Donovan home. Donovan decided to go to his house in Kensington rather than disturbing Louise. He had the cab drop him half a mile from the house and he went in through the communal gardens and the back door.
He showered and had a whisky, and then put his mobiles on charge on the bedside table before diving under the quilt. He was asleep within minutes.
When Donovan woke up it was light and a pop song was playing. He rolled over and groped for whichever mobile was ringing, cursing his son. He'd told Robbie several times not to mess with the phones. They were too important to be played with.
As he picked up the phone that was ringing, he realised that it was his son's. Robbie must have put his phone on the sideboard in Louise's flat next to Donovan's and he'd picked it up by mistake. Whoever was calling had blocked their ID. Donovan pressed the green button and held the phone to his ear.
For several seconds there was silence, then a voice.
"Robbie?" It was Vicky.
"Robbie?" She sounded close to tears.
"Robbie, talk to me."
Donovan wanted to cut the connection, but he couldn't bring himself to press the red button. He sat up in bed and looked at the clock on the bedside table. It was seven o'clock in the morning.
Vicky sobbed.
"Oh Robbie, I'm so sorry."
"He's asleep," said Donovan.
"Den. Oh God."
"What do you want, Vicky?"
"I want to talk to Robbie."
"Like I said, he's in bed." Donovan didn't want to tell her that Robbie wasn't sleeping at the house. And he certainly didn't want to tell her about Louise.
There was a long silence, broken only by Vicky's sniffling.
"I'm sorry, Den," she said eventually.
"Not sorry enough," he said.
"Not yet."
"Please don't be like that, Den."
"After what you did? I think I've earned the right to be any way I want."
"I didn't mean it to be this way, Den. I was lonely. You left me on my own too long."
"I was making a living. I was paying for your bloody house, your car, your holidays, your shopping trips. You never had to work a day in your life, Vicky. Not one fucking day. And I paid for that."
"So you own me, is that it? You paid for the clothes on my back, so I have to be the quiet little wifey sitting at home, grateful for your odd appearance?"
"We talked about it. You knew my situation. I was Tango One. Most wanted."
"Well, at least you were number one at something, because you were a lousy husband and a lousy father."
"Fuck you," said Donovan. He pressed the red button but instantly regretted it. He stared at the phone's readout, hoping that she'd call back, but she didn't.
He began idly to flick through the phone's menu. He flicked through the message section. Robbie had a stack of saved messages. Donovan grinned as he read them. Probably girlfriends. Idle chit-chat.
Childish jibes at teachers. Stupid jokes. Then Donovan froze.
"I'M BACK. COME HOME NOW -DAD." The message had been sent when Donovan had been on the beach in St. Kitts, talking to Carlos Rodriguez. That was why Robbie had gone rushing home from school and found Vicky in bed with Sharkey.
The message had been sent from aUK mobile. Donovan didn't recognise the number, but there was something familiar about it. He tapped out the number and put the receiver to his ear. The phone was switched off and there was no answering service.
Donovan looked at the digits on the phone's readout, deep creases across his brow. Where had he seen that number before? He rolled out of bed and pulled his wallet out of his trouser pocket. He flipped it open. The Tesco receipt was sticking out of one of the credit card slots. He slowly slid it out and looked at the telephone number he'd written on it. The number that the Spaniard had given him. The numbers matched. Donovan cursed. It had been Stewart Sharkey who'd sent the text message to Robbie. He'd wanted to be caught in bed with Vicky. It had all been planned.
Another phone rang. The landline. Donovan went over and looked at the eavesdropping detector. The green light was on. No one was listening in on the line. Maybe it was Vicky, calling back on the house phone.
He picked up the receiver.
"We have to meet," said a voice. A man. English.
"Who is this?" asked Donovan.
"I know what you're doing and I need to talk to you," said the voice.
"Yeah, right. How old do you think I am? Twelve?"
"It's about Stewart Sharkey."
"What about him?"
"What do you think? Do you want your money back, or not?"
Donovan hesitated for a few seconds, then sighed.
"Where?"
"Camden Market. In four hours."
"You've got to be joking." Camden Market on a Saturday morning had to be one of the most crowded places on the planet.
"Safety in numbers," said the man.
"You know you are being watched? A bedroom across the street. And a British Telecom van. I wouldn't want you bringing any strangers to the party."
"I'll make sure I'm clean," said Donovan.
"How will I find you?"
"I'll find you," said the man. The line went dead.
Donovan caught a black cab to Oxford Street and spent fifteen minutes in the Virgin Megastore looking for tails. The record store's clientele was mainly young and scruffy, so police and Customs agents would find it harder to blend. He spotted two definites and a possible.
He left the store, dived into another black cab and had it drive him to Maida Vale and drop him on the south side of the Regents Canal opposite the Paddington Stop, the place where he'd watched for the arrival of Macfadyen and Jordan. He paid off the driver and dashed across the footbridge and ran along Blomfield Road to Jason's, a restaurant with a sideline running narrow boat trips along the canal. The route terminated at Camden Market. Donovan had timed it so that he arrived just as a boat was preparing to leave.
He bought a ticket and climbed aboard. There were almost twenty passengers on the boat, mainly tourists. It was a pretty trip, cruising by the vast mansions of Little Venice and through Regents Park, but Donovan was barely aware of the passing scenery. His mind was racing, trying to work out who had called him. It wasn't the Colombians, that was certain. They wouldn't want him in a crowded place like Camden Market. Ideally they'd want him alone and tied to a chair. Why the market? Safety in numbers, the man had said. But safety for who? For Donovan? Or for the caller? He adjusted the Velcro collar under his wristwatch. The personal RF detector was already switched on.
They arrived at Camden and the grey-haired boatman jumped out and secured the narrow boat then announced that they'd be returning in forty-five minutes and that passengers should be back by then if they intended returning to Little Venice.
Donovan walked through the market. It was packed with tourists and teenagers in shabby clothing. There were shops and stalls everywhere selling New Age rubbish, handmade pottery, secondhand clothes, incense, posters, CDs, T-shirts with smart-arse slogans. Donovan couldn't see a single thing he'd ever want to buy, but figured that Robbie would probably have had a great time. Donovan scanned the faces around him.
It would be impossible to spot a tail. There were just too many people milling around, and at times he was shoulder to shoulder with shoppers.
It was crazy, thought Donovan. It was the last place in the world he'd choose for a meeting.
Suddenly there was a man standing in front of him. A face that Donovan recognised. A short man with thinning, sandy hair and a cocksure smile on his face.
"Long time, no see, Donovan," said the man.
"Gregg Hathaway," said Donovan, shaking his head.
"Can't say this is a pleasant surprise."
The two men stood with their feet shoulder-width apart, like boxers eyeing each other up at the weigh-in. People were having to flow around them like a river parting around rocks.
Donovan moved his left hand forward, closer to Hathaway, but the detector on his belt stayed resolutely quiet. Hathaway's own left hand also moved and Donovan glanced down. He saw a thin strip of Velcro under the man's watchband and smiled.
"State of the art," said Hathaway, smiling too.
"The difference is, the taxpayer paid for mine."
"Still with Customs, then?" asked Donovan. He edged a little closer to Hathaway and moved his hand again. No reaction from the bleeper. If Hathaway hadn't come wired, then what did he want? A chat about old times? They really were old times, because it had been more than ten years since Donovan had seen him.
Hathaway patted his right knee.
"Not much of a future for me in Customs and Excise after you put a bullet in my leg."
"Sorry to hear that," said Donovan. He looked around. Was he about to be arrested, was that it? Had Hathaway brought him to Camden Market so that he could be grabbed in the crowd? There was certainly no way that Donovan could run, there were just too many people.
"I'm here on my own, Donovan," said Hathaway. He was wearing a dark blue duffel coat with the hood up, brown trousers and brown, scuffed Timberland boots. He looked like a train spotter thought Donovan, and he blended perfectly into the crowds around him.
"What's this about?"
"Let's walk."
Hathaway turned to his right and started walking towards the canal.
Donovan went with him, trying to keep close to the man's side, but it was difficult with there being so many people. Donovan's detector vibrated and he jerked. He looked around. Hathaway was also looking left and right, a frown on his face. They both saw the man at the same time. Long hair, sallow complexion, tattered jeans and a camouflage combat jacket covered in badges. Donovan smiled and so did Hathaway as the same thought went through their minds. An undercover drugs officer. As easy to spot as a nun in a brothel. As the man walked away from them, their beepers stopped vibrating.
Hathaway led Donovan through a shop-lined courtyard to a small coffee shop with several outside tables. Two American tourists were just leaving and Donovan and Hathaway grabbed their table. Hathaway ordered two coffees from a young waitress who had half her head shaved.
All the other tables were occupied, so when Hathaway spoke it was in little more than a whisper.
"You've done well over the years," he said.
Donovan shrugged. He knew Hathaway wasn't bugged, but that didn't mean he was going to say anything that was even remotely incriminating.
Donovan was there to listen, to find out what Hathaway wanted. He continued to scan the crowds for familiar body shapes and clothing, but he knew that it would be impossible to spot any watchers. There were just too many people.
"Relax, I came alone, Donovan," said Hathaway.
"I've as much to lose being seen talking with you as you have."
"I'm just soaking up the atmosphere, Gregg," said Donovan.
"Who are you with, then, if it's not Customs?"
"A different bunch," said Hathaway.
"People who don't mind so much that I can't run the hundred metres in twelve seconds any more."
"What do you want, an apology? You should be grateful, mate. I've done a lot worse."
"Oh, I know you have, Donovan. In some ways I got off lightly. I mean sure, I lost my job and my wife, but at least you didn't tie me to a chair and cut me to bits while you videotaped it."
Their coffees arrived and the two men sat in silence until the waitress moved away again.
"You've never cared about the rights and wrongs of drugs, have you?" asked Hathaway, keeping his voice low.
"You said you had information about Sharkey. Or was that just to get me here?"
Hathaway sipped his coffee. He grimaced.
"This taste like real coffee to you? Tastes instant to me."
"Coffee's coffee," said Donovan.
"I'm interested in your thought processes, that's all. It's not that you don't have a sense of right and wrong, is it? You know the difference. You just don't care. Am I right?"
Donovan leaned across the table towards Hathaway.
"Does anyone really care?" he whispered.
"I mean, really care. And at the end of the day, does it really matter?"
Hathaway met Donovan's stare and shrugged.
"I don't know. I think that's the question I'm asking myself "My mum was a good person," said Donovan.
"Really good. Do anything for anybody. My father walked out on her when I was six. Just didn't come back from work one day. He was last seen at the bus station and that was it. Did she deserve it? Did she fuck. Few years later she met up with man number two, a right piece of work. Friday night recreation for him was getting pissed in the pub and then knocking her around. She never fought back, never shouted, just suffered in silence. You'd think he'd have mellowed, but it just made him worse. So did what goes around come around? Of course it didn't. She got cancer and died a horrible death. I still remember her screaming. He pissed off, and me and my sister were put in care.
Do I know what's right and what's wrong? Damn right I do. Do I care?"
Donovan smiled thinly and shook his head.
"So what do you want, Gregg?
"The morality of selling drugs isn't a problem for you, is it? That's rhetorical. No need for you to answer."
"I know what rhetorical means, you patronising cripple."
Hathaway looked genuinely hurt.
"There's no need to be offensive, Donovan," he said.
"I didn't mean to be patronising."
"Fine, then I didn't mean to be offensive. Can we get on with whatever it is you want?"
"I guess my point is that the whole moral status of what we both do is a very grey area. Always has been. Tobacco and alcohol kill millions more than drugs, but they're controlled by public companies so they're okay. Legitimate. You take the cocoa plant and make chocolate. That's legal. Extract cocaine and it's illegal. You take a naturally growing plant, dry the leaves, wrap them up in paper and sell them to millions.
Legal. Take another plant, extract the sap, process it into something you can smoke, heroin, and that's illegal. No morality, just the powers that be making decisions about what people can and cannot do.
But you understand that better than me, don't you?"
"About drugs?"
"About morality. You know none of it really matters, right? It's just a game. Someone else sets the rules, we choose which side we want to be on, and we play the game. I chase you. You try to get away. Cops and robbers. Cowboys and Indians. And at the end of the day there's never going to be a winner. The game just goes on, right?"
Donovan shrugged.
"Maybe," he said. He couldn't see where the conversation was going. He wanted to scream at Hathaway, to grab the man by the throat and shake him until he told him what it was he wanted.
"See, it doesn't really matter which side you're on, does it? You choose your side then you play the game. It's like when we were kids.
Didn't really matter if you were a cop or a robber. A cowboy or an Indian."
"I'm going," said Donovan. He started to get to his feet, but Hathaway held up his hand.
"I'm almost done," he said.
Donovan sat down again.
"I want you to understand what it is you taught me when you put that bullet in my leg all those years ago. You taught me that it doesn't matter which side you're on, all that matters is how you play the game.
And for that, I want to shake your hand."
Hathaway reached out his right hand. Donovan looked down at it, frowning. The fingernails were bitten to the quick. He slowly put out his own hand and shook. As their hands made contact he felt something hard in Hathaway's palm. Donovan realised it was a folded piece of paper. He tried to pull his hand away but Hathaway tightened his grip like a vice.
"You're trying to set me up," hissed Donovan. That's what this had all been about. Hathaway was planting drugs on him. Donovan looked around frantically, expecting to see police closing in on him.
"Don't be stupid, Donovan," soothed Hathaway.
"Why would I plant a two-quid wrap on you? You deal in thousands of kilos. It's going to be all or nothing." He slowly shook Donovan's hand, then eased his grip. Donovan felt the paper pressing against his own palm.
"Take it," said Hathaway.
Donovan pulled his hand away. He opened the piece of paper. There was a typewritten address on it in capital letters. An address in the South of France.
"Sharkey's there," said Hathaway softly.
"How do you know that?"
"Tracked his phone. Easy peasy when you work for the good guys. I know you have your ways, but our ways are more efficient. Unlimited resources, so long as you have access. And I've got access."
"And what do you want? A drink?"
Hathaway looked scornfully at Donovan.
"How much would you give me? A few grand. This isn't about a few grand. Besides, you seem to have forgotten that you're pretty much broke at the moment."
"If it's not about a bung, then what is it about?" asked Donovan.
Hathaway grinned and tapped the side of his nose.
"Need to know, Donovan. All in good time. At the moment, just don't look this gift horse in the mouth. You go and get your money, then we'll talk again."
Donovan looked at the address again.
"Is she still with him?" he asked.
"I gather so." Hathaway stood up, grunting as he put his weight on his right leg.
"Bitch."
"You've got to learn to live and let live," said Hathaway, rubbing his right knee.
Donovan slipped the piece of paper into his pocket.
"Maybe next time we should meet at the National," said Hathaway.
Donovan stiffened. He knew about his meeting with Louise?
Hathaway smiled at his discomfort.
"Word to the wise," he said.
"You might be able to shake off the cops by whizzing around the Underground, but all we do is sit and watch you via a link to the Transport Police's CCTV control room. We don't need to put people down after you. We just watch you on TV and wait for you to surface." He threw Donovan a sloppy salute.
"Catch you later, yeah?" Hathaway turned and walked away, dragging his right leg slightly. He edged into the shopping crowds and within seconds Donovan had lost sight of him.
Stewart Sharkey pulled the wide brim of his hat low over his eyes and waved at the waiter. He ordered an omelette and a cafe latte and a bottle of good wine in fluent French, then settled back and scanned the front page of Le Monde. He'd have preferred to have read one of the British tabloids, but it was important to maintain his cover. So far as anyone knew, he was French, a Parisian businessman taking a well-earned break from the heat of the capital. When he and Vicky were out, she had to keep her mouth shut, because even if she tried to speak French it was glaringly obvious that she was English. Meals outside the apartment were taken in silence unless there was no one within earshot, and even then conversation was limited to snatched whisperings. Frankly, Sharkey preferred to dine alone.
There was little in the newspaper about what was happening back in the UK. Like the English, the French were extremely parochial about their news. He turned to the sports pages. At least the French appreciated English soccer.
Sharkey heard chair legs scrape against the flagstones and he lowered his paper. A man in his thirties grunted and lowered himself into a chair at the table next to Sharkey's. The man ordered a coffee and lit a small cigar. Sharkey went back to reading the paper.
"Checking the currency rates?" said a voice. Sharkey lowered his paper again. The man at the next table tapped ash into a glass ashtray and nodded at the paper.
"Seeing how many francs you get to the pound." The man spoke English, but with an accent, and not French.
Sharkey formed his face into a pained frown, trying to make it clear that he wasn't looking for a conversation.
"I'm sorry, I don't speak English," he said in his perfect French.
"The pound. Is it better to hold the pound, do you think, or dollars?"
"I'm sorry, I have no interest in the currency markets," said Sharkey in French, raising the paper and flicking it to make a cracking sound.
The man leaned forward and blew smoke over the top of the newspaper.
"Are you sure about that, Mr. Sharkey? I would have thought that with sixty million stolen dollars, you'd be very interested."
There was another scraping sound behind Sharkey and he looked over his shoulder. Two men sat down at the table behind him. Big men with dark brown skins and thick moustaches, black sunglasses and flashy gold rings on their fingers. The black lenses of their sunglasses stared back at him impassively.
"Yes, they are with me, Mr. Sharkey."
Sharkey put down his paper.
"Who are you?" He glanced left _ and right, praying silently that there would be a gendarme close by. Officially, he had done nothing wrong and he had nothing to fear from the authorities.
"You don't know me, Mr. Sharkey. And please don't bother looking around for help." He reached into his pocket and brought out a small Taser stun gun.
"You know what this is, Mr. Sharkey?"
Sharkey nodded. It generated a high-voltage pulse that could disable a man in seconds, producing the equivalent of a massive heart attack or epileptic fit.
"There are two ways we can handle this," the man continued, an amiable smile on his face.
"I can press this against your neck and give you twenty thousand volts.
You go down, I announce that I am a doctor and my two friends behind you offer to transport you to hospital in their very roomy Mercedes Benz. You wake up in about ten minutes with a very bad headache."
Sharkey sighed.
"And the alternative?"
"I pay your bill and mine. We smile and walk to the car together." The man caressed the stun gun with his thumb.
"Which is it to be, Mr. Sharkey?"
"Whatever he is paying you, I will pay you ten times as much."
The man shook his head.
"Please do not embarrass yourself, Mr. Sharkey. We are all professionals here."
Sharkey closed his eyes. He could feel tears welling up and he blinked them away. He had come so close, so damn close. He pushed back his chair and stood up. He felt almost light headed and he knew that it was the endorphins kicking in, the body's protective mechanism swamping his system with chemicals. It was all over. Den Donovan had won and he had lost.
He forced himself to smile.
"Okay," he said.
"Let's go."
Vicky turned around in the shower, letting the water play over her face. She twisted the temperature control and gasped as the water turned icy cold. She ran her hands over her face, pulling back her hair. Sharkey kept telling her she'd have to dye it, but she didn't want to, she enjoyed being blonde. She'd agreed to cut her hair shorter and to wear a hat and dark glasses whenever she stepped outside, but that was as far as she was prepared to go.
As she turned off the shower she heard the door to the apartment open and close.
"Stewart? Is that you?" she called, then shook her head in annoyance.
Of course it was him. Who else would be letting themselves in with a key? She wrapped a towel around herself and checked her reflection in the mirror. There were dark patches under her eyes and her skin was dry and flaking. She needed a morning in a spa, being worked on by experts. A massage, a long soak, then a facial and a skin-toning session. A seaweed wrap, maybe. She needed pampering, but Sharkey was practically keeping her a prisoner in the apartment. Damn him. Damn him and damn Den Donovan. They were as bad as each other. They chased, they wooed, they pursued, then when Vicky finally opened up her heart to them, they walked all over her. Treated her like a possession, something to be owned and put on show. Vicky smiled sadly at her reflection. Except that Sharkey wasn't even able to put her on show. She was like a bird in a cage, available for him and him alone.
A secret possession.
She heard him walking into the bedroom.
"Did you forget something?" she called.
She opened the bathroom door, then jumped as she saw the man standing there, his arm outstretched to grab hold of the handle. Her mouth fell open and she took a deep breath, ready to scream, but before a sound left her throat a second man stepped from the side of the door and clamped a cloth over her mouth. Her nostrils were filled with a sickly-sweet odour and then the room started to swim. She felt the strength drain from her legs and everything went black.
Louise cooked lasagne and opened a bottle of red wine. Donovan sat down at the dining table as she heaped the pasta on to three plates.
"Robbie, there's salad in the fridge. Can you get it for me?"
"Sure," said Robbie, dashing off to the kitchen.
"He's a good kid," said Louise.
"He likes you," said Donovan, pouring wine into their glasses.
"It's mutual." Louise sat down next to him. She picked up her glass and clinked it against his.
"It's nice having you both here."
Robbie returned with a glass bowl filled with salad and put it on the table.
One of Donovan's phones started ringing. He pressed the green button.
It was the Spaniard.
"Hang on, Juan, let me get some privacy," said Donovan, standing up.
"It's a madhouse here."
"Well, thank you very much," said Louise.
Donovan grinned.
"I need to speak to this guy, sorry. I'll go outside."
Donovan left the apartment and hurried downstairs and out of the front door. He spoke to the Spaniard again as he walked along the side of the house to the garden.
"Yeah, sorry about that, Juan. How did it go?"
"Your money is back in your account," said the Spaniard.
Donovan pumped the air with his fist.
"Juan, you are a fucking star!"
"Yes, I know."
"You took your fee out first, right?"
"Of course I did, amigo. And my expenses."
"Whatever it cost, you are worth it, you dago bastard."
"I couldn't have done it without knowing where he was," said the Spaniard.
"A little bird told me," said Donovan.
"I can't say any more than that."
"Your little bird is very well informed," said the Spaniard.
"I myself could do with a little bird like that."
"How was Sharkey?"
"Co-operative. Eventually. It took several toes and three of his fingers, but he told us everything."
"Still alive?"
"Just."
"Make sure he's never found, Juan."
"Thy will be done. And your wife, amigo, what about your wife?"
Donovan walked to the far end of the garden. A couple of sparrows were squabbling over a bread crust that had been placed on a wooden bird table.
"Amigo? Your wife?"
Donovan closed his eyes.
"Have you hurt her?"
"Not yet. We have her restrained, but we haven't harmed her. I wanted to talk to you first. She is very afraid, amigo. If you wanted her to learn a lesson, I feel she has learned it."
"Did she see what you did to Sharkey?"
"No, but she was in the other room. She heard everything."
"Let me speak to her."
The phone went quiet. Donovan heard rustlings and muffled voices, then Vicky was on the line.
"Den…" she said.
"Den, I'm sorry. Really."
"I'm sure you are," said Donovan coldly.
"I didn't know how much he'd taken. I swear to God, I didn't. He told me he was just taking some of it, so you'd have to talk to us. I swear."
"He cleaned me out, Vicky. And a big chunk of the money didn't belong to me. It was promised to some Colombian guys. You've no idea what a spot you put me in."
"I didn't mean, to Den. Honest." She began crying again.
Donovan turned around. He looked up at the house.
Robbie was at one of the windows, looking down. Robbie waved and Donovan waved back.
"Sharkey wanted me dead, Vicky. Do you understand that? He knew that I owed that money to the Colombians, and he knew what they'd do to me when they didn't get it."
Vicky didn't say anything, she just kept sobbing into the phone.
"There's something else you don't know," continued Donovan.
"Sharkey wanted Robbie to find you in bed with him."
"No…" sobbed Vicky.
"It's true, Vicky. He sent him a text message. Pretended it was from me. He wanted to be caught. He wanted you to have to run away with him. He used you, Vicky. From day one."
"No…"
Robbie was still looking out of the window at Donovan. Donovan turned so that his back was to the house.
"From day one. He didn't love you, he didn't want you. He just wanted my money. And once he had that and I was out of the way, he was going to dump you."
"What are you going to do, Den? What are you going to do to me?"
"What do you think I should do, Vicky? After what you did to me, what do you think I should do?"
"I don't know," she sobbed.
"I'm sorry, Den. I swear to God, I'm so sorry. Please don't tell Robbie."
"Robbie already knows, remember?"
"About the money. I meant, about the money. And about this. Just tell him I went away."
"Vicky…"
"I'm sorry…" she said, then all Donovan could hear were sobs.
"Look, Vicky, don't cry. Okay? Just stop crying."
"I do love you. And I love Robbie."
"Vicky, stop. Please. Nothing's going to happen to you. I promise."
Vicky sniffed.
"What do you mean?"
"The men there. They won't hurt you. I promise."
"You're going to let me go?"
Donovan hesitated, wondering if he were doing the right thing.
"Yes," he said eventually.
"Oh, thank you, Den. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I'll never hurt you again, I promise. I'll never let you down again."
Donovan took a deep breath.
"You're not going to get the chance, Vicky. You're not to come near me again. Not within twenty miles. I'm not going to stop you coming back to England, because that's where your family are, but you don't come near me. Or Robbie."
"Den… please."
"I mean it, Vicky."
"But Robbie's my son. You're my family."
"The time for thinking about that was before you let him catch you in bed with Sharkey. We're not your family any more. Robbie and I are family. You walked out on us."
"Den, this isn't fair."
"Don't go there, Vicky. You're well behind in the fairness stakes. But I will let you see Robbie. On his birthday. On your birthday.
Christmas. I'll even throw in Mother's Day. When he's twelve he can decide how much time he spends with you. Do you understand?"
"Okay," she said, and sniffed again.
"Okay. If that's how it has to be."
"One other thing. You drop the injunction. Talk to your lawyer. I think he's going to be quite happy to lose you as a client after what he's been through. You give up all rights to Robbie. Go back on that and the men there will come looking for you again. They can bury you next to Sharkey. Are we clear on that?"
"Yes. I'll do what you say. And Den…"
"Yeah?"
"I really am sorry."
"Put the Spaniard back on."
There were more muffled voices and then Rojas was on the line.
"Are you okay, amigo?
"I'm fine, Juan." He took a deep breath.
"Let her go, yeah? Hold her until you've disposed of Sharkey, then let her go."
"That's a good decision, amigo."
"I hope so."
Donovan cut the connection and put the phone back in his pocket and went back into the house.
Louise and Robbie looked up as he walked back into the flat.
"Is something wrong, Dad?" asked Robbie.
"Nah, everything's fine," said Donovan, 'but I'm going to have to go out for a while." He nodded at Louise.
"Can I borrow your car?"
"Sure," said Louise. She stood up and picked up the keys from the sideboard.
"Can I help?"
"I've just got to do something."
"Be careful, yeah?"
Donovan laughed.
"Honest, it's nothing. I have to do something online, that's all."
Louise kissed him on the cheek. Donovan winked at Robbie over her shoulder.
"Look after her, okay?"
"Are you coming home tonight?" asked Robbie.
"I hope so."
Donovan went downstairs and climbed into Louise's Audi. He used one of the mobiles to call Fullerton.
"Jamie? I need a favour. You've got a computer, yeah?"
"Sure, Den. Come around. We need to talk anyway."
Fullerton gave Donovan the address of his flat. Donovan drove to Docklands and parked the Audi on a meter.
Fullerton met him at the lift.
"Thought you had a computer at your place," said Fullerton.
"I'm under surveillance, there's a chance they've tapped the phone line. Plus they've got gear these days that can read what's on a screen from outside the house."
"Bollocks," said Fullerton.
"Nah, it's true. My security guy was telling me about it." Fullerton led Donovan to his computer. It was already switched on and connected to the internet.
"It's based on the technology that the TV detector vans use to see what channel your TV is watching. It's just been developed so that it can read whatever information is on screen. Customs have had it for at least three years."
Donovan wasn't worried about using Fullerton's computer. Underwood had told him that the art dealer wasn't under surveillance and as always he was going to carry out all transactions via proxy servers that would leave no trail. Donovan tapped away on the keyboard. He logged on to the site of the Swiss bank into which Rojas had put the money he'd taken from Sharkey. Donovan grinned as he saw that there was just under fifty-five million dollars in the account.
"Yes!" he said.
"Good news?" asked Fullerton.
"I'm back in the black," he said.
"Glad to hear it."
To the tune of fifty-five million dollars. If you've got any of that shampoo around, now might be a good time to crack open a bottle."
Fullerton went off to the kitchen.
Donovan transferred ten million dollars to Carlos Rodriguez's account.
Legally and morally he figured he didn't owe the Colombian a penny, but after the attempted hit last night, it was clear that legality and morality currently didn't form part of Rodriguez's vocabulary. When he'd finished, he defragmented the disk and then sat down on one of the sofas.
Fullerton came back with an opened bottle of Krug champagne and two glasses. He poured champagne for the two of them and they clinked glasses.
"To crime," said Fullerton.
Donovan laughed and sipped his champagne.
"How much have you got so far, Jamie?" he asked.
"Five million, definite. Three from dealers, two from guys in the City who'll want the gear selling on."
"That's not a problem. You've got the cash in your account, yeah?"
Fullerton nodded.
"Offshore. It's well clean."
Donovan picked up a pen and started writing numbers down on a notepad.
Five million pounds from Fullerton. O'Brien in Dublin was in for five hundred kilos at twelve grand a kilo. He'd already sent six million pounds through to Donovan's account. Five million pounds had already come from Macfadyen and Jordan, and PM had sent through the one million seven hundred thousand pounds for his two hundred kilos. That made a total of just under eighteen million pounds. Almost twenty-six million dollars. More than enough.
"We're home and dry, Jamie," he said.
"We're over budget. Even without what I've got in my account. It's a done deal."
They clinked glasses again.
"How much have we got?"
"Twenty-six million US. Bit less maybe. Depends on the exchange rate."
"And for that we get how much?"
Donovan tapped his nose.
"That's for me to know."
"Oh come on, Den. If you can't trust me by now…"
"It's a lot, Jamie."
Fullerton dropped down on to a sofa and put his feet up on a coffee table.
"Bastard!" he said, only half joking.
Donovan took a long drink of champagne, then put his glass down by the keyboard.
"Okay, don't fucking sulk," he said.
"My guys are bringing in eight thousand kilos. For the money we've taken in, we've got to hand over about two thousand. That means profit for me is…"
"Six thousand kilos of high-grade Afghan heroin. Street value six hundred million pounds!"
"Nah, it's not as simple as that, Jamie. I'm not gonna be standing on street corners selling wraps. That's the only way you get a hundred grand a kilo. I'll have to sell it wholesale, and even if I could get top whack I wouldn't get more than twenty grand a kilo."
That's still a hundred and twenty million pounds, Den. Fuck me."
Donovan smiled at Fullerton's enthusiasm.
"If I were bringing in a few hundred kilos I could get twenty, but this consignment is just too big. I can hardly keep it in my loft and sell it bit by bit. I'm gonna have to sell it off to someone with a distribution network, and in the UK that means the Turks. The Turks buy their raw material at about the price I'm paying. Their expenses are that much higher than mine because they bring it overland, but that still works out at about eight thousand pounds a kilo by the time they get it into the UK. They're not going to pay me more than that.
Probably a fair bit less. If I'm lucky I'll get six grand a kilo."
"Six grand a kilo, six thousand kilos, that's still thirty-six million quid." Fullerton raised his glass to Donovan.
"I salute you, Den."
Donovan picked up his own glass and toasted Fullerton.
"Back at you, Jamie. And a chunk of that money is for you. Couldn't have done it without you."
"Nah," said Fullerton.
"You could have funded it yourself "Wasn't sure I'd be getting that money back, Jamie. That's an added bonus."
"Fifty-five million dollars is one hell of a bonus, Den."
The two men sipped their champagne.
"These guys who are bringing the gear in. You've used them before?"
Donovan shook his head.
"No, this is the first run. They're good guys, though. Russians."
Fullerton got up and refilled Donovan's glass.
"They were flying for the Army in Afghanistan," Donovan continued.
"Huge transporter planes, almost as big as jumbos. Ilyushins, they're called. The Russians used them to fly troops and cargo, up to forty thousand kilograms. Jamie, these things can carry battle tanks."
"So you're using the Russian Army to fly drugs halfway around the world?"
"Nah, they left the Army a few years back. They were working in Afghanistan when the Soviet empire fell apart. The Russians stopped paying their soldiers, and after six months with no salary they just took the planes. Flew two of them out of Afghanistan to Luxembourg.
Reregistered them and set up their own air freight company, subcontracting out to charities and relief agencies. If a charity wants to fly food or medicine into Africa or wherever, they call these guys. They're working out in Turkey at the moment, flying stuff out to the earthquake survivors."
"And Turkey is where they turn Afghanistan opium into heroin."
"Got it in one, Jamie. And it's mainly Russian chemists doing it. My mates have got contacts. We do in one hop what it takes the Turks weeks to do. They bring their gear overland, through God knows how many countries, and at every border there are palms to be greased."
Donovan put his glass down again.
"Right, let's get that money transferred into my pal's account, then we're off and running."
After he left Fuller-ton's flat, Donovan used an international calling card to phone Carlos Rodriguez in Colombia.
"I heard you were no longer with us, my friend."
"Not for the want of Jesus trying," said Donovan.
"If it makes you feel any better, I did soil a perfectly good pair of boxer shorts."
Rodriguez chuckled.
"What is it you want, Den?"
"I want you to call Jesus off," said Donovan.
"I've just transferred ten million dollars into your account."
"And you got that money from where, my friend?"
"My accountant. I found him."
"Congratulations. Ten million, you say?"
"Check for yourself, Carlos."
"I will, my friend. And if what you say is true, I will talk to my nephew."
"Thank you, Carlos."
"I am sorry for any unpleasantness."
"I understand, Carlos. If the positions had been reversed, I'd have been the one spraying you with bullets."
Donovan hung up. His next call was to a Turkish businessman who lived in a twelve-bedroom mansion overlooking Wimbledon Common. A while later he caught a black cab to Wimbledon and spent the best part of three hours with the man.
Donovan got back to Louise's flat just after midnight. He let himself in and smiled as he saw that she was asleep on the sofa, curled up around a cushion. A half-finished game of patience was laid out on the coffee table.
He went over to her and brushed her cheek. She murmured but didn't wake up. He leaned over her and blew gently in her ear.
"Wake up, sleepyhead."
She opened her eyes and squinted up at him.
"Oh, hi Den. Sorry- I was waiting up for you."
"You didn't have to. But thanks."
Louise sat up and rubbed her eyes sleepily.
"How's Robbie?" Donovan asked.
"He went to bed at ten," she said.
"Made me promise to get you to go and say goodnight when you get back.
What time is it?"
"Late. Go on, you go off to bed and I'll make up the sofa."
She stood up, then lost her balance and fell against him. He caught her, his hands instinctively slipping around her waist. She looked up at him, her mouth only inches from his, and before he knew what he was doing Donovan was kissing her. His tongue probed inside her mouth and she responded, grinding her hips against his, then just as quickly she pushed him away, gasping for breath.
"I'm sorry," said Donovan.
"It's okay," she said, brushing the hair from her eyes.
"No, that was stupid." He realised that he was still holding her around the waist and he released his grip, but she made no move to back away from him.
"After what you went through with that guy, the last thing you want is some man mauling you."
"It's not that, Den. Honest. And you're not just some man." She kissed him on the cheek, close to the mouth, then slid her hand around his neck and kissed him again, softly on the lips.
"When she broke away this time, it was slowly and with a soft caress along his cheek.
"It's just that with Robbie next door, and everything else. Now's just not the time." She gestured around the flat.
"And this isn't really the place. It wouldn't feel right. Do you understand?"
Donovan smiled.
"Sure. He's already caught one parent in the act."
"You know what I mean, though?"
"I know exactly what you mean. Now off to bed, I'm knackered."
"Everything's okay?"
Donovan nodded.
"Everything's just fine. Couldn't be better."
The shower was running when Tina got up so she made toast and coffee and had the table set by the time that Donovan came into the room.
"Robbie up yet?" he asked.
Tina shook her head. Donovan knocked on his son's bedroom door and shouted for him to get out of bed. He sat down at the table and bit into a piece of dry toast.
"Do you want to do something today?" he asked.
"Like what?"
"I don't know. Shopping. The zoo."
"The zoo?" laughed Tina.
"You know what I mean. Get Robbie out of the house."
"I'm going to have to go out for a while," said Tina.
"But in the afternoon, sure."
"Anything I can help you with?"
Tina shook her head.
"Shopping. Woman's stuff. I won't be long. How did it go yesterday?"
"Better than I'd hoped," said Donovan. He drank his coffee.
"I got the money back. The money my wife cleared out of my bank accounts."
"Den, that's great news. That's brilliant."
"It's better than a kick in the head. I've paid off the guys who were after me, so I'm almost free and clear."
"Almost?"
"Just one more deal."
Tina sat down at the table.
"Can't you stop now? You've got your money back."
"I've got to see this one thing through, Louise. Too many people will lose money if I pull out now."
Tina reached across the table and held his hand.
"Den…" she said.
The bedroom door opened and Tina pulled back her hand. Robbie walked out, dressed in a Simpsons T-shirt and jeans.
"Hey, just because it's Sunday doesn't mean you don't shower," said Donovan.
"Can't I have breakfast first?"
Donovan waved at him to sit at the table.
"Do you want me to cook?" asked Tina.
"I've got bacon and sausages."
"I'll do it," said Donovan.
"You go get your stuff."
Tina picked up her bag and left. She walked to the main road and caught a black cab to an Internet cafe. She kept glancing over her shoulder but knew that there was no reason for anyone to be following her. Donovan trusted her completely. Trusted her with his only son.
She paid the taxi driver and went inside the cafe. It was one she'd used several times before to file reports to Hathaway.
Tina sat at the computer terminal and lit a cigarette. Two schoolgirls at the next terminal were giggling to each other as they sent messages to a chat room, while a teenage boy at a machine in the corner kept looking around guiltily and turning his VDU so that no one else could see what he was looking at.
A waitress brought over a cappuccino and put it down next to Tina.
"Are you okay there?" she asked in a New Zealand accent.
"You know what you're doing?"
Tina forced a smile.
"Technically," she said.
"I'm sorry, but it is no-smoking here."
"Okay. Sorry." Tina took a long drag and prepared to stub it out.
"No worries," said the waitress.
"If no one complains, I don't care. I'm a twenty-a-day girl myself.
But if you see a sour-faced guy with acne, that's my boss, so get rid of it quick, yeah?"
"Thanks," said Tina gratefully. She waited until the waitress had gone before logging on to Hathaway's website. Over the past few days she'd heard enough one-sided telephone conversations to get a rough idea of what was going on. She'd heard Donovan talking to someone called Charlie, and they'd discussed Turks and a plane. He'd spoken to someone called PM about money being transferred, and she kept hearing him talking about 'gear' and 'heroin'.
Donovan was putting together a major deal and it was going to happen the following day. Tina wasn't sure where, though she'd heard Donovan say 'airfield' several times, so she'd assumed it was coming in by plane. As he'd said 'airfield' not 'airport', Tina thought that must be significant. It wasn't coming into Heathrow or Gatwick.
Tina began to type, then she hesitated. For the first time in three years of being undercover she felt guilty about what she was doing. She took no pleasure in betraying Den Donovan.
Donovan and Robbie were watching television when Louise arrived home.
"Get everything you wanted?" asked Donovan.
Louise held up a Safeway carrier bag.
"Do you still want to go out?" she asked.
"Dad said we could go to the Trocadero and play video games if it's okay with you," said Robbie excitedly.
"Fine by me," said Louise.
"Let me put this stuff away and we're out of here."
They drove to Central London in the Audi and spent the best part of two hours in the Trocadero, with Robbie rushing from machine to machine.
Several times Donovan caught Louise watching Robbie with a wistful look on her face.
"You never wanted children, Louise?" he asked.
"I'm not sure," she said.
"I thought all women had maternal instincts."
"Yeah, well you never met my mother," said Louise.
"My family situation isn't something I'd wish on any kid."
"Just because you had a rough time doesn't mean your kids will.
Sometimes we learn from the mistakes our parents make."
"Yeah, and sometimes we repeat them. I'm not sure if it's worth the risk."
They watched as Robbie went over to a racing video game and sat in its bucket seat, expertly guiding a computer-generated car through a series of sharp turns.
"I wouldn't mind kissing you again," said Donovan.
"Sometime."
Louise turned and looked at him, her eyebrows raised.
"Where did that come from?" she asked.
Donovan shrugged.
"I just wanted you to know, that's all. Things are a bit crazy just now, but in a few days everything will be sorted. Maybe then…"
"Maybe then what?"
"Bloody hell, Louise. Don't make me beg. I'm only asking for a date."
Louise laughed.
"We'll see."
"I'm serious."
"So am I," said Louise. She looked at him in silence, and then shook her head.
"What?" asked Donovan.
"I don't know. I just wish we'd met under different circumstances.
That I wasn't a dancer. That you weren't doing what you're doing. That we'd just met in a normal way. In a supermarket or in a pub."
"We met, and that's all that matters."
Louise looked as if she wanted to say something else but then she turned away and went over to stand behind Robbie. Donovan could see that something was troubling her, but he didn't want to press her.
She'd tell him eventually.
After Robbie had tired of playing video games they ate Chinese food in Chinatown and went home to spend the evening watching TV. Louise and Donovan drank a bottle of wine together. Donovan slept on the sofa, and this time there was no goodnight kiss from Louise.
Donovan walked into Tina's sitting room, his hair still wet from the shower. Tina was in the kitchenette, frying sausages.
"Good morning," she said.
"You want breakfast?"
"Just coffee," said Donovan.
Robbie was on the sofa in his pyjamas, watching cartoons.
"Hey, just because you're not going to school doesn't mean you can lie around half-naked all day."
"I'm not half naked," said Robbie.
"Get dressed. Now."
Robbie scowled and went off to the bedroom.
Tina handed Donovan a mug of coffee.
"Are you okay?" she asked.
"Sure. Why?"
"You keep frowning."
"Yeah? Sorry." He drank his coffee.
"I've got a busy day, that's all."
The landline rang and Tina answered it. She listened and frowned, then handed the phone to Donovan.
"It's for you," she said.
"No one knows I'm here," said Donovan.
"It's a man. He asked for you."
Donovan took the phone.
"Who is it?" he snapped.
"That's no way to talk to an old friend," said a voice.
"Who are you?"
"It's Hathaway, Donovan."
"How did you get this number?"
Hathaway chuckled.
"That's for me to know, Donovan. We need to meet."
"I'm busy."
"I know you're busy, Donovan. That's what we need to talk about.
You've got the money back from Sharkey, right? Now I've got more information for you. Information that you're going to want."
Donovan looked at his watch. It was nine o'clock. Heliad to be at the airfield at four o'clock in the afternoon, and it was a two-hour drive from London. He had time.
"You know Blom-field Road? Little Venice?"
"I know it, but since when have you been setting the venues?"
"I'm not going to Camden again. Little Venice is quiet, there are plenty of ways in and out, not too many people."
"Donovan, if I wanted to take you down, I'd have people outside your door right now. I just want to talk. The information I gave you last time was solid gold. What I have for you today is even better."
"There's a bridge over the canal, opposite a pub called the Paddington Stop. I'll see you there in four hours. One o'clock. I can't get there any earlier, I've got things to do."
"One o'clock is fine." The line went dead.
Donovan finished his coffee and went into the kitchenette.
"I'm going to have to go out."
"When will you be back?" asked Tina.
"I'm not sure. Late."
"How late?" pressed Tina.
"God, I don't know. Have I got a curfew now?"
"Don't go, Den. Please." Donovan smiled.
"I have to."
She put the frying pan by the sink.
"You're up to something, aren't you? You're working. I know you are."
Donovan reached up and brushed a stray lock of hair from her face.
"Best you don't know," he said.
"Is that how you treated Vicky? Kept her at a distance? Pushed her away?"
Donovan frowned.
"What's brought this on?" Tina hugged him and put her head against his chest.
"Just stay here. Let someone else take the risk, Den. Let's take Robbie out. Go somewhere. Have a day out."
Donovan put his hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes.
"What do you think's going on, Louise?" he asked.
She shrugged his hands away.
"I've heard you on the bloody phones, Den. I know what you're doing.
You're bringing gear in and today's the bloody day."
"Have you been spying on me?"
"Don't be stupid, Den. This is a small flat and your phones have been ringing red hot for the last twenty-four hours."
"I have to go."
Tina shook her head.
"No you don't. You don't have to go. You can walk away. Walk away from it all."
"We'll talk about it later," he said. Tears welled up in Tina's eyes.
"Louise, I'm sorry, I have to go."
"Damn you, Donovan!"
Donovan took a step back from her, genuinely surprised at the intensity of her reaction.
"I don't have time for this now, Louise. We'll talk about it later."
"And what if there isn't a later, Den?"
Donovan pressed a finger against her lips, then he leaned over, kissed her on the forehead, and hurried from the flat. Tina rushed after him but he closed the door without looking back.
She leaned against the door, her eyes filled with tears. She'd wanted to say more, but she couldn't. She couldn't tell him, because the truth was that she was betraying him. She was helping to set him up.
She wiped her eyes and sniffed. And who was the man who'd phoned?
Donovan always made and received calls on his mobiles, he never used her phone. There had been something vaguely familiar about the man's voice, but for the life of her Tina couldn't place it. Whoever it was, he'd unnerved Donovan.
Robbie came out of the bedroom. He stopped in the hallway when he saw Tina was crying.
"What's wrong?"
Tina shook her head.
"Nothing."
"He'll come back," he said.
"Don't worry."
Tina nodded and wiped her eyes again.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"It's not your fault," said Robbie.
"That's just the way he is."
"I know," she said.
She held out her arms and Robbie rushed towards her and hugged her.
"It'll be okay," he said soothingly.
Tina patted Robbie's head. She knew that it wasn't going to be okay.
It was going to be far from okay.
Donovan waited on the bridge, whistling softly to himself. He adjusted the Velcro band under his watch strap and then put a hand on the detector unit on his belt. Everything was going according to plan.
Jordan and Macfadyen had already left for the airfield. Donovan had called PM and told him where the plane was landing and what time to get there. And he'd arranged to meet Fullerton at Hyde Park Corner so that they could drive to the airfield together. The only fly in the ointment was Gregg Hathaway.
A narrow boat chugged underneath the bridge. A grey-haired woman in her seventies had her hand on the tiller and she gave Donovan a cheery wave as the boat went by. Donovan waved back.
He straightened up and saw Hathaway walking down Formosa Street, a laptop computer case hanging from one shoulder.
Hathaway was grinning as he walked to the middle of the bridge.
"Lovely day for it," he said cheerily.
"What is it you want?" asked Donovan.
"I want to be rich, happy, to be with somebody who loves me. Children would be nice. Pretty much what every man wants."
The detector on Donovan's belt remained still. Hathaway wasn't wearing a recording device or transmitter.
"You know what I mean," said Donovan.
Further down the canal a middle-aged angler threw a handful of ground bait into the water.
"I want to talk," said Hathaway.
"Try the Samaritans," said Donovan.
"I'll miss your sense of humour, Donovan." He looked at his wristwatch.
"Got somewhere to go?" asked Donovan.
"No, but you have, haven't you?"
"I'm tired of playing games, Hathaway. What do you want?"
Hathaway smiled without warmth.
"You didn't think twice before putting that bullet in my leg, did you?"
"I thought about killing you."
"I bet you did. Have you any idea how that bullet changed my life?"
"Got you a better job, didn't it?"
"I loved being in Customs, Den. Loved working undercover. I was bloody good at it."
Donovan flashed Hathaway a sarcastic smile.
"Clearly you weren't. If you'd been any good, I wouldn't have made you."
"Someone grassed me. One of your informers."
Donovan shook his head.
"You gave yourself away. I forget now what it was, but it was down to you. Some story you told. Some anecdote. You told it wrong. Told it like you'd memorised it. Like it was a script."
"Bullshit!"
"Why would I lie? To hurt you?" Donovan chuckled.
"We're beyond that, aren't we?"
"It was the job I'd always wanted. I was one of the good guys, fast track. Then you shot me and I'm in hospital for three months. And three months after that I'm sitting at a desk in human resources being told that there is no place for me in the leaner, meaner Customs and Excise. Thank you for your loyal service and good night."
"You got a pension, right? Disability?"
"Peanuts. Wife didn't like the idea of my being thrown on the scrap heap at twenty-four, so she went off in search of pastures new."
"Women, huh?" said Donovan sarcastically.
"What can you do with them?"
"You changed my life, Den. You didn't give me a choice, didn't consider the ramifications, you just went ahead and did it. Now I'm going to do the same to you."
"You're going to try to put me behind bars, is that it? You want me in prison?"
"I want your money."
Donovan's jaw dropped.
"All of it," added Hathaway.
"What do you mean, all of it?"
"All the money that you got back from Sharkey. I want it. And I want it now."
"You're out of your mind."
"I know everything, Donovan. I know about the plane, I know about the heroin. I know about Macfadyen and Jordan. I know about the airfield.
To use the vernacular, you are fucked. You have one way out. Only one. You give me the money. Do that and I'll let you go ahead with the Turkish deal."
Donovan shook his head in confusion.
"I know, bit of a shock to the system." Hathaway looked at his watch again.
"I reckon they'll still be loading the plane, don't you? Another hour before it gets into the air. There's probably no way you could reach them now. Even if you wanted to."
Donovan cursed. He turned to walk away, then stopped. He opened his mouth to speak but he was too confused to say anything. He closed his mouth and stared at Hathaway. He wanted to lash out, to kick the man to the ground and to keep kicking until he was unconscious. Or worse.
Hathaway smiled as if he could read Donovan's mind.
"Face it, Donovan, I've got you by the short and cur lies But look on the bright side: whatever you make from the Turkish deal you get to keep, so it's not as if I'm leaving you penniless."
Donovan shook his head.
"Why would I give you the money?"
"Because if you don't, you're going to prison. Possibly for the rest of your life. Eight thousand kilos of heroin, Donovan. Conspiracy to import. They'll throw away the key. Plus there's the Mexican deal.
The Beetles. Mexico is next door to the States, and Rodriguez has been shoving cocaine over the border like there's no tomorrow. I link you to Rodriguez and the DEA will want a piece of you."
"You've got fuck all. You've got fuck all and you know it."
"Excuse me, but I know where the plane is going to land. I know what's on the plane. I know where the plane is coming from. And I know who's paying for the consignment. Does it seem like I'm missing anything there?"
"Knowing is one thing, proving is another."
"I have proof," said Hathaway confidently.
Donovan paced up and down the bridge, shaking his head.
"Fine, you've got proof, but you've overplayed your hand. All I have to do is to walk away. I walk away from the deal and you've got nothing."
Hathaway smiled.
"Conspiracy doesn't depend on you taking delivery, Donovan. You put the deal together. That I can prove."
"Bollocks."
"I have people undercover. Close to you."
"Now I know you're lying."
"Your infallible sense of smell? You can always spot an undercover cop or Cussie? You always took pride in that particular skill, didn't you?
Well, I got people in under your radar, Donovan. Up close and personal."
Donovan stopped pacing and stared at Hathaway. Could he be telling the truth? Is that how he knew about the plane? But who? Who was the traitor? Who had betrayed him? Jordan and Macfadyen? Had they been turned when the Mexican deal went belly up? It had always struck Donovan as suspicious that Customs hadn't let the consignment run. Now he knew why. Jordan and Macfadyen had done a deal. Their freedom in exchange for Donovan's. They'd helped set him up.
"I know who it is," he said confidently.
Hathaway shook his head.
"No you don't," he said.
"I guarantee you don't."
"We'll see."
"The thing is, Donovan, you can't afford to be wrong, can you? You're wrong on this and you lose everything. You lose your money and you lose your freedom."
"I'll risk it." He turned to go.
"It isn't Ricky Jordan. And it isn't Charlie Macfadyen," said Hathaway quietly.
Donovan stopped.
"If it was them, you'd hardly tell me, would you?"
"Agreed, but I'm telling you it's not them. You have my word."
Donovan laughed out loud.
"Your word? Your fucking word? Now it's coming down to you crossing your heart like a bloody Cub Scout. Why should I believe a word you tell me?"
Hathaway patted the laptop computer case.
"Because I have proof."
Donovan stared at the computer case.
"What sort of proof?"
Hathaway looked at his watch again.
"We're going to have to start the ball rolling, Donovan. That plane is getting closer."
"What do you want?"
"I told you what I wanted. You got sixty million dollars from Sharkey.
I want it."
"I don't have sixty million. I owed ten million."
"To Rodriguez?"
Donovan nodded.
"Fifty million, then."
"I had to pay for the recovery of the money, plus there was the cash that Sharkey spent."
"Why don't you just tell me how much is left? And don't bother lying, because I can find out."
"Forty-five mill," said Donovan.
"That's what I want, then. Forty-five million dollars. That's the price of your freedom. The price of your life."
"So I give you forty-five million and you tell me who the undercover agent is?"
"Agents. Plural."
"And how do I give you the money? Used notes?"
"Sarcasm doesn't become you, Donovan." Hathaway tapped the case again.
"We do it online. Same way Sharkey took the money off you. Same way you got it back off Sharkey."
Donovan shook his head.
"Do I look like I was born yesterday? I transfer forty-five million to you, then you show me sheets of blank paper. Where does that leave me?"
"That's not how we'll do it. You transfer five million. I show you proof. You transfer more money. I show you more proof. At any point you can stop. But believe me, Donovan, you won't want to stop. The proof I'm offering is unequivocal."
"And what then? You give me the names, you give me the proof. What then?"
"I walk away."
"And the agents?"
Hathaway took a deep breath as if steadying himself for what he was to say next.
"You do what you have to do, Donovan."
"You know what that will be," said Donovan coldly. It wasn't a question.
"It's a game, Donovan. That's what you taught me. It's a game and there are winners and there are losers. I'm doing what I have to do to be a winner."
"You're a callous bastard, Hathaway."
"Well, gosh, Donovan. Sticks and stones. Are we going to do this or are you going to prison for twenty years?"
Donovan stared at Hathaway for several seconds, then he nodded slowly.
"Okay," he said quietly.
"Let's see what you have."
Gregov took his hands off the controls as the autopilot kicked in. He opened his flight case.
"What do you feel like?" he asked Peter.
Peter shrugged.
"Aerosmith?"
Gregov nodded appreciatively.
"Good choice." He took out a cassette and slotted it into the player and turned the volume all the way up. The cockpit was soon filled with pounding rock music. The two Russians jerked their heads in time with the beat.
Behind them, in the massive cargo bay, eight thousand kilos of heroin were loaded on to five wooden pallets. The heroin had begun life as opium harvested in the poppy fields of the eastern Afghanistan province of Nangarhar. The opium had been carried by camel over the border into Turkey where it had been processed into morphine and then into heroin by Russian chemists. Gregov had paid a thousand dollars a kilo for the heroin, a total of eight million dollars for the load, which meant that the one flight alone was going to generate a profit of sixteen million dollars.
"What are you going to do with your share?" shouted Gregov.
Peter shrugged.
"I don't know. What are you going to do?"
Gregov laughed sharply.
"I don't know. I'll think of something. One thing's for sure, I'm going to get laid a lot!"
Peter picked up a bottle of Johnnie Walker Black Label and took a swig.
"You get laid a lot anyway," he said, tossing the bottle over to Gregov.
Gregov drank from the bottle, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
"Yeah, but at least I won't have to screw the ugly ones any more."
The laptop screen flickered into life. Hathaway nodded at the bench.
"Take a pew, Donovan." Hathaway had set the computer up on one of the trestle tables on the terrace outside the Paddington Stop.
"I tell you what, get us a couple of beers, yeah? We should celebrate."
"I've nothing to celebrate yet," said Donovan. He went into the pub, bought two pints of lager and carried them back outside. Hathaway had placed his mobile phone next to the laptop and was connecting to the internet through the computer's infrared link. Donovan put the glasses on the table and sat down next to Hathaway.
"You haven't got a cigarette, have you?" asked Hathaway.
"I don't smoke," said Donovan.
"I gave up, but I could do with a smoke right now." He turned the laptop towards Donovan, then handed him a piece of paper on which was written the details of a numbered Swiss account.
"Five million," said Hathaway.
Donovan put his hands on the keyboard, then he paused. What if he was being conned? What if Hathaway was setting him up for something? He closed his eyes, his mind spinning. He was being rushed, pushed and shoved into doing something he wasn't comfortable with, but what choice did he have? If Hathaway did have undercover agents in play, then he was facing life behind bars.
"Five million," repeated Hathaway.
"We don't have all day."
Donovan made the transfer. Hathaway watched the screen intently. When he was satisfied that the money had been transferred, he opened a Velcroed document pocket on the side of the laptop case and took out an envelope. He handed it to Donovan.
"Cheap at half the price," he said.
Donovan opened the envelope. Inside was an application form to join the Metropolitan Police. It had been filled out in neat capital letters. Clifford Warren. Twenty-nine years old. An address in Harlesden. Donovan frowned. Clifford Warren? He didn't know anyone called Clifford Warren. There was something else in the envelope. A photograph and another sheet of paper, folded in half. Donovan slid them out. The photograph was a six-by-four head and shoulders shot of an unsmiling black man. Short hair. A square chin. A slightly flattened nose. Bunny. Donovan cursed.
He unfolded the sheet of paper. It was a print-out of an e-mail message. An e-mail to Hathaway detailing the flight from Turkey and when and where the plane was due to arrive in the UK.
"Like I said," murmured Hathaway, as if he were speaking in church, 'unequivocal proof He patted the computer case.
"For the next one, I'm going to need another fifteen million."
Donovan hesitated, but his fingers stayed on the keyboard.
"Getting rid of one is no good," whispered Hathaway.
"It's all or nothing, Donovan."
Donovan bit down on his lower lip, knowing that Hathaway was right and hating himself for it. He input the instructions to transfer the fifteen million dollars as Hathaway watched. Hathaway rubbed his chin.
He was breathing heavily and Donovan could feel the man's warm breath on his cheek with each exhalation.
When Donovan had finished, Hathaway handed him a second envelope. It contained another Metropolitan Police application form and a photograph. James Robert Fullerton.
"No fucking way," said Donovan under his breath.
"I'm afraid so," said Hathaway.
"I've seen him take drugs. He handles stolen gear."
"Deep cover," said Hathaway.
"Deep, deep cover."
There was another sheet of paper inside the envelope. Donovan opened it out. It was a print-out of an e-mail that Fullerton had sent to Hathaway, packed with details about the shipment of VW Beetles from Mexico.
"Funnily enough, I didn't hear a peep from him about the Turkish flight," said Hathaway.
"He's either playing his cards very close to his chest or he's going over to your side."
"Bastard," said Donovan. Donovan stared at the head and shoulders photograph of Jamie Fullerton.
"I trusted him," he said quietly.
"Of course you did," said Hathaway.
"Wouldn't be much point in him being undercover and you not trusting him, would there?"
Donovan tore up the photograph and threw the pieces on the floor.
"And last but not least… twenty-five million dollars," said Hathaway.
"Twenty-five million dollars and you get the third and final name."
"How do I know you're not bluffing? How I do know there aren't just two?"
"You have my word," said Hathaway.
"Have I told you anything yet that isn't true?"
Donovan glared at the man.
"You bastard," he hissed.
Hathaway grinned.
"Maybe, but I'm the bastard who's got the key to you staying out of prison. I've already got twenty million, Donovan. I could walk away now a happy man. Do you want me to do that?" Hathaway started to get up.
"No," said Donovan, quickly. He knew that Hathaway was right. He needed all three names. Two out of three wouldn't keep him out of prison.
Donovan made the transfer and Hathaway slid a third envelope across the table.
"And with that, I'll say goodbye," said Hathaway. He held out his hand.
"Thanks for everything," he said.
Donovan ignored Hathaway's outstretched hand.
"What are you going to do now?"
"I'm going to retire. Do all those things I've always wanted to do. I already have several identities fixed up and ready to go. That's the beauty of working for the good guys. I've got real passports. Real paperwork. All I have to do is to slot myself into a new life. A life where I have forty-five million dollars." He nodded at the envelope.
"Aren't you going to open it?"
Donovan shook his head. He didn't want Hathaway to see his reaction to the contents of the envelope. He had a horrible feeling that Hathaway had saved the best until last.
Hathaway stood up.
"In that case, I'll bid you adieu," he said. He closed up the laptop and put it back in its case.
"I hope you get cancer," said Donovan quietly.
"Don't get all bitter and twisted," said Hathaway, zipping the case closed.
"I've given you your freedom. I've given you the names of the bastards who were setting you up for a fall. There's no way we're going to be best friends, but I think a little appreciation is called for."
Donovan stared impassively at Hathaway but said nothing.
Hathaway shrugged.
"I guess I'll just have to settle for the money," he said, then turned and walked away towards Warwick Avenue Tube station.
Donovan waited until Hathaway had turned the corner before opening the envelope. He slid out the by-now familiar application to join the Metropolitan Police. Christina Louise Leigh. The photograph was upside down and he slowly turned it over. The girl in the picture had long blonde hair instead of a short brunette bob, but there was no doubt who she was. Donovan stared at the photograph in disbelief.
He stood up, still staring at the photograph. Louise? He'd trusted Louise with his only child. He'd let her into his life, shared his innermost thoughts with her. He'd let her in through his de fences and all the time it had been a lie. She was a cop. A fucking cop. Which meant that everything, every single thing, that she had told him had been a lie.
Bunny, Jamie and Louise. All of them traitors. All of them police officers. All of them working to put him away. And he'd trusted all three of them. How could he have been so stupid? Hathaway had been right: Donovan had prided himself on being able to spot undercover agents, of being able to read people and to see them for what they really were. How had he been so wrong with these three?
He walked back across the bridge and along the towpath. He almost felt as if his mind had separated from his body and he was watching himself walking by the side of the canal. His head was down and in his right hand he held the envelopes that Hathaway had given him.
A narrow boat painted in garish scarlet and green, was moored opposite the Paddington Stop. On its roof was a line of flower boxes filled with pansies of a dozen different hues and several brightly polished brass coal scuttles Donovan climbed on board the rear of the boat and tapped twice on the wooden door. It was opened by a woman in her late forties holding a clipboard and a stopwatch. She smiled and moved to the side to allow Donovan in.
Alex Knight was sitting in front of a bank of CCTV monitors. He took off a large pair of headphones and grinned at Donovan.
"Did you get it?" asked Donovan.
Knight had half a dozen long-range directional microphones and as many video cameras targeting the area. He had placed two men posing as anglers on the canal side, a man and woman inside the pub, two men in a flat overlooking the canal, and two teams on tower blocks close by.
There was also a camera and a directional microphone in a British Telecom van parked on Blomfield Road and two small radio-controlled cameras mounted on streetlights close to the bridge.
"Every word," said Alex.
"Sound and vision. I'll get it edited and boost the sound where necessary. Should have it done by this evening."
"Tomorrow morning should be okay," said Donovan.
"First thing."
Knight nodded at the envelopes in Donovan's hand.
"Bad news, huh?"
"I've had better," admitted Donovan.
"I couldn't help overhearing that being what you were paying for and all but he didn't take all your money, did he?"
"Most of it," said Donovan, 'but don't worry, I've enough put by to settle your account."
"Thought didn't even cross my mind, Den," said Knight with a grin.
Raymond Mackie threw open the door and waddled into the room. A dozen expectant faces looked up from around a polished oak table. The Head of Drugs Operations had called the meeting on the third floor of Custom House in Lower Thames Street at short notice. Very short notice. Heads of department had been given just twenty minutes to assemble and had been told that there were to be no excuses.
Mackie threw a manila file on to the table and lowered himself into the high-backed leather chair at the head of the table.
"No time for niceties, gentlemen," he said.
"And lady," he added, nodding at the one female member of the team.
"The wonder boys at Vauxhall Bridge have finally decided that they want to start sharing intelligence and have dropped a very hot potato into our laps. I got the call just half an hour ago, so I've no presentation materials and no written notes to hand out. Please listen carefully."
He paused for a couple of seconds to make sure that he had their undivided attention.
"A planeload of Afghanistan heroin is currently being airlifted from Turkey, en route to the UK. Eight thousand kilos."
Mackie let the amount sink in before repeating it.
"Eight thousand kilos. London street value, in the region of eight hundred million pounds. Guinness Book of Records time. The plane is a Russian-made Ilyushin 11-y6, not much smaller than a jumbo jet." Mackie looked at his watch.
"According to the wonder boys, it will be landing at an airfield in South-east England in about four hours. We're going to need SAS back-up on this rather than armed police, but I want as many of our senior people there as possible. I want this to be seen as a Customs operation, not a special forces job. Drugs has been and always will be a Customs priority and this is our chance to show what we can do."
A hand went up at the far end of the table.
Mackie smiled.
"If I can read your mind, the answer to your question is Den Donovan.
Tango One."
"Is that it?" asked Fullerton, his head on one side. Off in the distance was a faint throbbing sound.
"Maybe," said Donovan.
"Take it easy, Jamie. Relax. It'll be here when it's here."
Bunny and PM stood some distance away, deep in conversation.
"What do you think they're talking about?" asked Fullerton.
"Probably discussing when they should pull out their guns and blow us all away so that they can keep all the gear for themselves," said Donovan.
Fullerton's eyes widened and Donovan slapped him on the back.
"Joke, Jamie. Joke. Jordan and Macfadyen have given everybody a going-over with a metal detector: there's nobody here carrying so much as a pocket knife."
It was just after seven o'clock in the evening and dusk was settling in. The airfield was a former R.A.F base that had been declared surplus to requirements during a round of defence cutbacks in the early 'nineties. Until a more permanent use could be found for the facility, the Government had leased the property to a loose-knit group of European Union charities to use as their UK base. Its single runway was almost two thousand metres long. Along one side of the runway ran a line of metal storage sheds in which several charities and emergency aid groups stored equipment and supplies. Various logos were painted on the sliding doors of the sheds, including the insignia of the charity that was chartering the Russian plane. Beyond the sheds stood four large hangars which used to house R.A.F bombers.
Donovan and Fullerton were standing in front of the charity's shed next to half a dozen rented Transit vans, each with its own driver. Jordan and Macfadyen had supplied the drivers, all men whom they had used before and trusted.
Bunny and PM had brought five of their own men and two large trucks with the name of a laundry company on the sides. The backs of the trucks were already open in anticipation of the plane's arrival.
A Russian came up and nodded at Donovan. He'd introduced himself to Donovan when he'd opened the gates for the vans to drive on to the airfield, but the name seemed to contain four or five syllables and Donovan hadn't been able to remember it.
"Hiya, mate, how's it going?" asked Donovan.
"Plane is coming," said the Russian.
"I switch on lights."
"Great. Thanks."
The Russian walked off to wards the tower building, most of which had been converted to offices.
Donovan turned to Fullerton.
"What is his name?"
Fullerton shook his head. He didn't know either.
"What about the Turks? Where are they?"
"We'll meet up with them later."
"Not like Turks to be so trusting," said Fullerton.
"Bit of a racist statement, Jamie."
"You know what I mean. Consignment this size, you'd think they'd want to be here."
"It's all in hand, Jamie. Don't worry." Donovan slapped Fullerton on the back.
"Come on, cheer up. You're in the big time, now. That's what you wanted, isn't it?"
"Sure," said Fullerton. He smiled, but there was a worried look in his eyes.
"Of course it is. The big time."
Donovan glanced over at PM and Bunny. The two black men looked back at him impassively. Donovan grinned and gave them an exaggerated thumbs-up. PM's face broke into a smile but Bunny continued to stare at Donovan, stony faced.
The landing lights came on, two bright white stripes down either side of the runway.
Jordan and Macfadyen strolled over. They were wearing heavy jackets with designer labels.
"Are we on?" asked Jordan.
"Looks like it," said Donovan.
Fullerton scanned the skies.
"Which way is east?" he asked.
Donovan pointed off to their right.
"Over there." He narrowed his eyes.
"I think I see it."
"God, my heart's pounding," said Fullerton.
"Like I've run ten k."
One of Donovan's phones buzzed, and he pulled it out of his pocket.
He'd been sent a text message.
"Adrenalin," said Donovan.
"Nothing like it."
"Yeah, you're right. Better than a coke rush."
"Better than anything, because this rush comes with tens of millions of pounds of readies attached," said Donovan. He grinned.
"That's it. See it?" Donovan looked down at his mobile phone and scrolled through the text message.
"DEN IT'S A TRAP. RUN. LOUISE." He smiled to himself and deleted it.
Fullerton nodded.
"Yeah. Bloody hell, it's happening, it's actually happening."
Donovan put the phone back in his pocket. He shouted over to PM and Bunny and gestured at the sky.
"Here we go," he yelled at them.
"That's us."
Everybody was now staring up at the sky and pointing. The plane was at about five thousand feet, flying below an impenetrable layer of grey cloud. The engine noise was louder now, and the plane seemed to be descending quickly, as if in a hurry to get on the ground. The undercarriage and nose-heel dropped down and the flaps lowered. The plane was coming in straight to land. It had a large T-shaped tail unit with a high-set swept back wing on which were mounted four turbofan engines.
"Can you imagined if it crashed and burned?" said Fullerton.
"The whole of the south of England would be on a heroin buzz for weeks."
Donovan didn't reply. He just watched the approaching plane with a half smile on his lips.
"Come on," Donovan whispered to himself.
"Come to Daddy."
The flaps were lowered and the plane visibly slowed, then the nose came up and the wheels hit the concrete with a squeal and puffs of black smoke and then the plane was rolling by them. Donovan caught a glimpse of a grinning pilot through the windshield as the plane went by, but he couldn't tell if it was Gregov or Peter.
Fullerton began to jump up and down.
"We did it. We fucking we did it!" He punched the air, then turned and hugged Donovan.
"Fucking hell, Den, we did it."
Donovan patted Fullerton on the shoulder.
"Yeah," he said quietly.
"We did, didn't we?"
The giant transport plane turned off on to a taxiway and then turned again so that it rolled back towards them. Bunny and PM walked over, their hoods up on their black Puffa jackets.
"Okay, guys?" asked Donovan.
"Will be once I see the stuff," said PM.
"You okay, Bunny?" asked Donovan.
"Don't see you smiling."
"Like the man said, all we see now is a plane."
The plane slowed and then stopped, about a hundred yards away from where they were standing. The engines shut down one by one.
"Right, let's get the vans over there," said Donovan.
The engines of the Transit vans burst into life and Bunny motioned for his drivers to get into the laundry trucks. That was when all hell broke loose.
Three helicopters came in low from the west, swooping over the wire perimeter face and then breaking away from each other to land at different parts of the field. One hovered close to the tower building, and six men clothed in black, holding automatic weapons, jumped out. A second helicopter disgorged more armed men on the far side of the plane and they ran to surround it. The third helicopter landed at the end of the line of storage sheds. Another six armed men piled out and started running towards Donovan and his crew, guns at the ready, their boots pounding against the concrete.
"What the fuck's this?" hissed Fullerton.
Donovan said nothing. He didn't try to run and he didn't show any emotion other than a slight smile as he slowly raised his hands in the air.
An armoured Land-rover crashed through the gate in the perimeter fence and then turned sharply to the left, allowing a dozen faster vehicles to speed by. Half were police cars, blue lights flashing but sirens off, and half were dark saloons filled with big men in black jackets.
Two of the Transit vans roared off, but a burst of automatic fire ripped out the tyres of one, and the other was rammed against the wall of one of the sheds by a police car. Police officers surrounded the van and dragged out the stunned driver. Jordan and Macfadyen made a run for it, but both were rugby-tackled to the ground by police officers.
PM was about to run, but Bunny dropped a hand on his shoulder.
"Don't bother, bro. These are heavy people. Don't give them no excuse to get heavier."
PM nodded grimly, then slowly followed Donovan's example and raised his arms above his head. Bunny did the same.
The armed men in black surrounded Donovan and his men, swinging their weapons from side to side, their faces hidden behind respirators. They wore heavy black body armour over black uniforms.
"Fuck me, it's the SAS," whispered Fullerton.
"Just stay calm, Jamie," said Donovan.
"Hands in the air."
Men in black jackets with "CUSTOMS' written on the back in bright yellow piled out of the saloon cars and walked towards the plane.
SAS troopers were waving at the pilots to open the door at the front of the fuselage. To make sure they got the message, they fired a quick burst of gunfire over the top of the plane.
The door opened and one of the SAS troopers shouted clipped instructions to the pilots.
Hands started patting down Donovan. He looked to his left. It was a burly, unsmiling police sergeant.
"It's okay, I'm not armed," said Donovan.
"None of us is."
"Pity," said one of the SAS troopers, his voice muffled by the respirator.
"Fuck you," said PM.
"You wanna try something without all that hi-tech crap? Huh, probably isn't even a man inside that Robocop suit."
"Easy, PM," said Bunny.
The ramp at the back of the plane began to open.
"Open Sesame," whispered Donovan.
The sergeant finished searching Donovan and moved on to Fullerton.
Donovan slowly lowered his hands. No one stopped him.
The end of the ramp scraped against the concrete. The sergeant nodded at two young constables.
"Take him over there, lads," said the sergeant.
"Someone wants a word with him." The two police officers escorted Donovan to the back of the ramp, where an obese man wearing a black Customs jacket a size too small was waiting for him.
"Den Donovan," said the man, barely able to contain his glee.
"You've no idea what a pleasure it is finally to meet you. Raymond Mackie, Head of Drugs Operations, Customs and Excise."
"Yeah, I know who you are," said Donovan.
"They call you the Doughboy, don't they? Why is that? Can't just be because you're a fat bastard, can it?"
Mackie's eyes hardened.
"Up until today you were designated Tango One, Donovan, but as of this evening you're no longer a target, you're a prisoner. Come on, I can't wait to see what eight thousand kilos of heroin looks like."
Mackie strode up the ramp, breathing heavily, flanked by four young Customs officers wearing similar black nylon jackets. One of the police officers pushed Donovan in the small of the back.
"Okay, okay," said Donovan, glaring at the man. The officer was barely half Donovan's age.
"Be nice, yeah?"
Donovan followed Mackie and the Customs officers up the ramp into the cavernous interior of the plane. Two men in their twenties wearing stained khaki jumpsuits were sitting on two seats fixed to the fuselage. Other than the two men, the plane was empty.
One of the men waved at Mackie.
"We want claim political asylum. Okay?"
Mackie's jaw dropped.
"What?"
The other man punched his colleague on the shoulder.
"He make joke," he said to Mackie.
"My friend has big mouth. Make big joke."
Mackie looked around the vast space, five times the height of a man, his mouth still open in astonishment. The other Customs officers were equally surprised.
"What the hell's going on?" spluttered Mackie.
A door opened at the far end of the cargo area and Gregov stepped out carrying a white plastic carrier bag in one hand. He walked through the hold. Two SAS troopers, their weapons hanging from slings, followed him.
Gregov opened the carrier bag and took out two cartons of Marlboro cigarettes. He held them out to Mackie.
"I was going to declare them," he said.
"Honest I was." He winked at Donovan.
"Hiya, Den. Good to see you again."
Jamie Fullerton took a swig of his beer and plonked it down on the desk next to his computer. He stared at the screen and for the one hundredth time checked to see if he had e-mail. There were no new messages for him. Fullerton had sent a full report to Hathaway on what had happened at the airfield and had expected an immediate reply.
Hathaway must have known about the abortive raid at the airfield and must have realised by now that Fullerton had been there. Fullerton had said in his e-mail that Donovan had only told him about the flight at the last minute and that there hadn't been time to get a message to Hathaway.
Fullerton had been held in a cell for an hour, interrogated by two plainclothes detectives whose hearts clearly weren't in it, and then released. No laws had been broken, not the least because of Donovan's insistence that nobody carried a gun. They were all guests of the Russian aviation company, and the Ilyushin had filed a valid flight plan. It was suspicious, there was no getting away from that, two dozen men and a convoy of vans all waiting for an empty plane, but there was nothing illegal about it.
Fullerton had tried calling Donovan's mobile several times but it was switched off.
He took another drink of beer, then decided he needed something stronger. Something with a real buzz to it. He headed for the bathroom where he kept his coke. The door intercom buzzed as he walked down the hallway and he stopped to look at the CCTV monitor. It was Charlie Macfadyen.
Fullerton picked up the receiver.
"Charlie? What do you want?"
"We want a word about yesterday's fiasco," said Macfadyen, running a hand over his shaved head.
Fullerton buzzed him up. He went back to his computer and checked one final time but there were still no new messages. He shook his head, switched off the computer and picked up his beer bottle.
He had the door open for Macfadyen by the time the elevator reached his floor. Macfadyen wasn't alone. There were two men with him. Fullerton didn't know their names but he recognised them from the airfield they had been driving two of the rental vans.
"What's up, Charlie?" asked Fullerton, though he could see that Macfadyen was in no mood for polite conversation. Mac-fad yen mouth was a tight line and his eyes were as cold and dispassionate as a reptile's.
"Not much," said Macfadyen, walking into Fullerton's flat.
"You said you wanted a word?" said Fullerton. He still had the door open, but Macfadyen's companions made no move to walk inside.
"Yeah," said Macfadyen. He reached behind his back and pulled a large automatic from a holster clipped to his belt. He thrust the gun against Fullerton's chest.
"And the word is grass."
Bunny paced up and down his sitting room. He punched PM's number into his mobile phone, but for the hundredth time he went straight through to his message service. Where the hell was PM? And what the hell had gone wrong?
Had Donovan been tipped off? And if he had, why had he gone to the airfield? If he'd known that police and Customs were going to turn up with SAS back-up, why hadn't he just got on the first plane back to the Caribbean?
Bunny had been watching Donovan when the helicopters swooped over the perimeter fence. There'd been no panic in the man's eyes, no attempt to run, he just stood and watched the helicopters with an amused smile on his face.
The police had roughly searched Bunny and PM, practically kicked them to the ground before going through their clothing, and the next time he'd been able to catch a glimpse of Donovan he was being taken to the rear of the transport plane. Just before Bunny had been thrown into the back of a police van, he had seen Donovan being escorted up the ramp into the bowels of the giant plane. There had been no sign of tension on Donovan's face. Just a quiet, almost self-satisfied, smile.
It was as if he knew what was coming. As if it had all been planned.
They'd all been split up at the police station. Bunny had been asked if he wanted a lawyer but he'd just shaken his head. He'd given them his name and address and his date of birth, but other than that he'd remained resolutely silent. Without the drugs, there was no case. Even conspiracy to import wouldn't stand up, not with the plane arriving empty.
Two detectives had questioned him and then he'd been left in a cell for six hours. He hadn't seen PM again. As soon as he'd been released, Bunny had caught a cab home. He wanted to get on the internet and get a message to Hathaway, though there was no doubt in Bunny's mind that Hathaway already knew what had happened. He figured that he should stay put until PM got in touch, though. Two drug deals had turned to shit and PM would want to know why.
The doorbell rang and Bunny jerked as if he'd been stung. He hurried over to open the door, but not before making sure that the security chain was on.
It was Jordan. With three other men Bunny had last seen at the airfield.
"How's your luck, Bunny?" asked Jordan.
"I've had better days," said Bunny, wondering why Jordan had turned up on his doorstep.
"You here for a reason, or is this social?"
Jordan leaned forward so that his face filled the gap between the door and the frame.
"We think we know who the rotten apple is," whispered Jordan.
"You'll never guess."
Bunny unhitched the security chain and opened the door.
"Who is it?" he asked.
Jordan pushed Bunny in the chest with the flat of his hand, and he staggered back, his hands flailing out for balance. Jordan kept moving forward, pushing him again, harder this time. Bunny fell backwards over a coffee table and crashed to the floor. Jordan reached his right hand inside his jacket and pulled out a gun.
"It's you, scumbag!" roared Jordan, pointing the gun down at Bunny's surprised face.
Robbie walked out of the spare bedroom, rubbing his eyes sleepily. Tina was lying on the sofa, wrapped up in a bathrobe.
"Why aren't you in bed?" he asked.
"I was waiting for your dad," she said, sitting up and running a hand through her hair.
"He always stays out late," said Robbie, sitting on the sofa next to her.
"Sometimes all night. It used to drive Mum crazy."
"What about you? Didn't you worry?"
Robbie shrugged.
"He always comes back eventually. I guess."
"Suppose he didn't?" said Tina.
"Suppose one day he didn't come back? What would you do?"
"What do you mean?"
"You know. Suppose he went out and didn't come back? Stayed away for a long time?"
"You mean if he died?"
Tina pushed him and he pretended to fall off the sofa.
"No, I didn't mean if he died. Just if he couldn't come back. What would you do?"
Robbie sat up and leaned back against the sofa.
"Could I stay with you?"
"Maybe," said Tina quietly.
"Would you like that?"
"I don't want to go back to her. My mum. Not after what she did. I suppose I could stay with Aunty Laura and Uncle Mark, but I'd rather stay with you." He looked up at her.
"Is something wrong?"
Tina shook her head.
"No, everything's fine." She picked up her mobile and called Donovan's number again. It just rang out. No answer. No message service. She had no way of knowing if the phone was even working, or if he'd received the text message she'd sent.
"He always has it switched off," said Robbie.
"Don't worry."
They both heard the knock at the door and jumped. Robbie stood up and ran over to the door.
"Robbie, check first," shouted Tina.
"And use the chain."
There was the sound of a key being inserted in the lock and Tina opened her mouth to scream, but then Donovan opened the door.
"Den! It's you!" said Tina.
Donovan grinned and closed the door. He picked up Robbie and swung him around.
"How many keys have you given out, then?"
"But you knocked."
"I didn't want to walk in on anything, now did I?" said Donovan. He put Robbie down and pushed him towards the spare room.
"Get ready for school."
"What?"
"You heard. School."
"But you said ' "I've changed my mind," interrupted Donovan.
"Get ready." He grinned at Tina.
"Get your glad rags on, kid, let's go out and celebrate."
"Celebrate?"
"We did it, Louise. Wasn't as smooth as I'd hoped, but we did it." He took her in his arms and hugged her.
"Go on, get ready. We'll drop Robbie off at school and then there's some people I want you to meet."
"Den…"
Donovan put a finger against her lips.
"Later," he said.
"We can talk later."
He pushed her towards the bedroom. She wrapped the robe around herself and closed the door then leaned against it, her heart pounding. He knew. She was sure that he knew. Something had gone wrong, something had gone very wrong, and now he was going to make her pay.
Her mobile phone was on its charger on the dressing table and she fumbled for it. With trembling fingers she tapped out the number that Gregg Hathaway had given her three years earlier. Her lifeline.
She pressed the phone to her ear and listened as it rang out. It rang.
And rang. No one answered it. No answering service kicked in. It just rang. Tina took the phone away from her ear and stared at it in disbelief. How could that be? Hathaway had assured her that the phone would be manned seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day. Something must have gone wrong, but what? She called up directory enquiries and in a whispered voice asked for the main switchboard for the Metropolitan Police.
The number was answered by a brisk female voice.
"I want to speak to Assistant Commissioner Peter Latham," Tina said, cupping her hand over her mouth so that her voice wouldn't carry.
"I'm sorry, could you speak up, please," said the woman.
Tina went into her bathroom and turned on the cold tap.
"Assistant Commissioner Peter Latham, please," said Tina.
"He's no longer with the Metropolitan Police," said the woman.
"Can anyone else help?"
Tina felt suddenly dizzy and she held on to the sink for support.
"No, it has to be him," she said.
"How can I get hold of him?"
"Assistant Commissioner Latham retired two years ago on grounds of ill-health," said the woman.
"Pvight, but where he is now? This is very urgent. Life and death."
"I'm afraid he passed away six months after he retired," said the woman.
"Can I put you through to his successor's office?"
There was a knock at the bedroom door. Three quick taps.
"Louise?" asked Donovan.
"You okay in there?"
Tina switched off the phone.
"Yes, just going into the shower," she said, trying desperately to stop her voice from shaking.
She showered and dried herself, then tried Hathaway's number again.
There was still no answer.
She threw on a dress, put on lipstick and mascara, then gave her hair a quick brush. She stared at her reflection. She looked as guilty as hell. She tried to smile, but it was the smile of a terrified dog.
"It's okay," she whispered to herself.
"It's going to be okay." She took a deep breath.
"It's okay," she said more confidently.
"You can deal with this." Another deep breath, then she nodded to herself.
"I've been through worse than this and I've coped."
"Are you okay?" Donovan shouted again.
"I'll huff and I'll puff and blow the door down."
"All right, big bad wolf," replied Tina brightly.
"Here I come, ready or not."
She opened the bedroom door. Donovan nodded appreciatively.
"Looking good," he said.
"Why thank you, kind sir."
Robbie was putting his books into his backpack. He'd changed into his school uniform.
"I don't see why I have to go to school," he moaned.
"To get an education," said Donovan, ruffling his hair.
Robbie shook him away.
"First I'm not to go, then you say I'm to go, then you pull me out, now you tell me I've got to go back. That's hardly consistent."
"It's an inconsistent world," said Donovan.
"Isn't it, Louise?"
Tina nodded.
They drove to Robbie's school in the Audi roadster, Tina at the wheel and Robbie in the back. Several of Robbie's friends saw him getting out of the car, and that seemed to cheer him up. Donovan figured that there was probably more kudos arriving in a sports car than a Range Rover.
"I'll pick you up tonight," said Donovan.
"Yeah, I'll believe that when I see it," said Robbie ruefully, but he returned Donovan's wave before heading into school.
"Now what?" asked Tina.
"Now we go celebrate," said Donovan. He looked at his watch.
"Party time."
"It's half past eight in the morning."
"Now don't be a party-pooper, Louise," said Donovan.
"It's not every day I fly eight thousand kilos of gear around the world."
He gave Tina directions and settled back in his seat. She drove across London to St. John's Wood. Donovan told her where to park and climbed out of the car.
Tina locked the Audi, looking around.
"Here?" she said.
"Nah, here's where we lose our tail," said Donovan.
"I didn't see anyone following us," said Tina.
"Yeah, well, you wouldn't, not if they were any good," said Donovan.
"Come on. Home stretch."
"Tango One is out of the vehicle," said the detective into his handset.
"On foot. Repeat on foot."
"Go after him, Alpha Seven," crackled the speaker.
"Softly, softly, yeah?"
The detective nodded at the driver.
"Let's go."
The two plainclothes policemen got out of the saloon and walked quickly in the direction they'd seen Donovan and the girl heading.
"I've got a bad feeling about this," said the detective.
"He didn't know we were on his tail," said the driver.
"He didn't look around and she hardly checked her mirror."
"He knows," said the detective.
"He can smell us."
The driver grinned.
"You maybe, but I showered in the station."
Ahead of them they saw the girl's back disappearing down an alley.
"Who is she, anyway?"
"Lap dancer. She's been taking care of his kid."
"Nice tits."
"I'm sure she'll be chuffed at the compliment, coming from a connoisseur such as yourself. What the hell are they up to?"
"Going for a quickie in the open air?"
"At nine o'clock in the morning? I doubt it. Oh shit, I know what he's doing." The detective put his transceiver to his mouth.
"Alpha Seven, he's going to cross the canal on foot. We need cover on the south side of the canal. We're going to lose him."
The transceiver crackled.
"Affirmative, Alpha Seven."
The two men hurried down the alley. It branched left and right.
"This way," said the detective. The driver rushed after him.
The alley led to the canal towpath. A metal footbridge ran across the canal, barely twenty feet above the surface of the water. Donovan and the girl were already dashing down the steps on the far side. A car was waiting at the side of the road, its engine running.
The detective grabbed the driver's arm and pulled them back. There was nothing they could do on foot and there was no point in showing themselves.
"Tango One is getting into a blue saloon. Possibly a Vauxhall.
Registration number unknown. We've lost him. Repeat, we have lost Tango One."
"What do you mean "we", Alpha Seven?" crackled the transceiver.
"What's going on, Den?" asked Tina as the blue saloon accelerated away from the curb.
Donovan flashed her a smile.
"Gatecrashers," said Donovan.
"Can't be too careful." He leaned forward and patted Kim Fletcher on the shoulder.
"Nice one, Kim," he said.
"Did you get the other thing?"
Fletcher popped open the glove compartment and handed Donovan a video cassette.
"He said something about the early worm catching the bird."
Donovan stroked the matt black video cassette.
"What is it?" asked Tina.
"The entertainment," said Donovan. He patted her on the leg.
"Come on, Louise, cheer up. You're behaving like a right wet blanket."
Tina forced herself to smile.
"That's better," said Donovan.
He and Tina sat in silence as Fletcher drove through the morning traffic. He kept checking his mirrors and twice did a series of left turns to make sure that he wasn't being followed, then he drove east towards Docklands.
Tina stared out of the window with unseeing eyes, wondering where Donovan was taking her. And why. Did he know who she was? Or did he just suspect and wanted to interrogate her, to find out for sure? And if he was just suspicious, could she lie her way out of it? Or was she better just to confess all, tell him that she was a police officer? No one murdered a police officer in cold blood, not even Tango One.
Now that Fletcher had shaken off any tail, Tina knew that she was on her own. There would be no last-minute rescue, no cavalry charge over the hill. No one knew where she was or the trouble she was in. Why had no one answered the phone? Where was Hathaway? He'd promised her that there would always be someone at the end of the line. It was her get-out-of-jail-free card. Her lifeline. And the one time she'd needed it, it had failed her.
Fletcher indicated he was turning right. He used a small remote control unit to open a set of metal gates and then the car bobbed down into an underground car park. They parked close to an elevator. A balding man with a curved scar above his left ear and a black leather jacket was waiting by the elevator door.
Donovan hugged the man.
"Everything okay, Charlie?"
The man nodded. Donovan introduced him to Tina.
"Charlie Macfadyen," he said.
"One of the best."
"Pleased to meet you," said Tina.
"Everybody here?" Donovan asked Macfadyen.
"Just waiting for the guest of honour," said Macfadyen. He punched the elevator button and the door rattled open. The three men stepped to the side to allow Tina to walk in first. She felt her legs trembling but she kept her head up and her lips pressed tightly together. She walked into the lift and then turned to face them, feeling like a condemned prisoner about to be taken before the firing squad.
Macfadyen pressed the button for the top floor. The penthouse. The door rattled shut. Donovan hummed to himself as the lift rode upwards.
Macfadyen winked at Tina.
"All right, love?" he asked.
"Not scared of heights, are you?"
Tina shook her head. No, it wasn't heights that she was scared of.
The lift doors opened into a large airy hallway. At one end of the hallway was a window with a panoramic view of the Thames. Another man was waiting outside the door to the penthouse suite. He pushed the door open and grinned at Donovan.
"Okay, Den?"
"Perfect, Ricky," said Donovan.
"I don't think you've met my date, have you? Louise, this is Ricky.
Ricky Jordan."
Jordan stuck out his hand and Tina shook. Jordan grinned at her with amused eyes. They were toying with her, Tina knew. They were all toying with her like cats torturing an injured mouse.
"In you go, Louise," said Macfadyen.
Tina walked into the apartment. It was a large loft-style space with exposed brickwork and girders, and floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out on to the river. Three men were standing by the window, looking out and talking in hushed voices. They turned to look at her, their faces hard and unsmiling.
Tina looked to her right. Two men were tied to chairs, strips of insulation tape across their mouths. One of the men was black, the other white. Next to the two men was a third chair. Donovan gestured at it.
"Take a seat, Louise."
"I'm okay, thanks," she said.
Donovan's eyes hardened and he pointed at the chair.
"What's this about, Den?" she asked.
"You know what this about," he said.
"Now sit down or I'll have the boys tie you down."
Fletcher closed the door and stood with his back to it, his arms folded across his barrel-like chest.
Tina sat down. She looked across at the two bound and gagged men. The black man was staring straight ahead, his back rigid, his jaw tight.
The white man was looking around as if trying to find a way out. His face was bathed in sweat and the tape across his mouth moved in and out in time with his breathing.
Donovan stood in front of the white man. He held out a sheet of paper.
Tina looked across but couldn't see what it was.
"James Robert Fullerton," said Donovan. He dropped the sheet of paper on to Fullerton's lap, then stepped across to stand in front of the black man.
"Clifford Warren." Donovan held the sheet of paper a few inches in front of Warren's face. Tina could make out a crest on top of the sheet. The crest of the Metropolitan Police. Donovan placed the sheet of paper on Warren's lap.
He held out a third sheet in front of Tina. Her heart sank as she recognised it. It was her application to join the Met.
"Den…" she said, but Donovan put a finger against her lips.
"Don't speak," he said.
"Don't spoil the moment. If you say anything, I'll have them gag you, okay?"
Tina nodded.
"Good girl," he said.
"Christina Louise Leigh." He held out the sheet. Tina took it but didn't look at it.
Donovan took a few steps back, then slowly began to clap. He clapped for several seconds, a sarcastic smile on his face.
"I want to applaud the three of you," he said.
"You fooled me. You absolutely fooled me. I wouldn't have made any one of you as a narc, but then you're like no other narcs, are you?
You're not in any undercover unit with the Met or NCIS and your handler was a spook."
He smiled at the look of confusion on their faces.
"Didn't you know, Gregg Hathaway's a spook? MI6. You were being run by the Secret Intelligence Service."
"No, that's not right," protested Tina, but Donovan silenced her with a cold look.
"I've been trying to work out over the last twelve hours why you fooled me. Why I didn't spot you. I guess it's because you're none of you playing a part, are you? You are what you are. Even down to using your real names." He turned to look at Ricky Jordan.
"I mean, what undercover agent uses their own name, right?" Ricky nodded at Donovan. Donovan looked at Mac-fad yen who also nodded in agreement.
"See," said Donovan, 'it's not how it's normally done. Undercover cops and Cussies adopt a persona. They put on an act. But you, Jamie, you really are a drug-taking womaniser who deals in stolen art. Bunny, you're running with the guys you grew up with. You couldn't do that if you weren't one of them. They'd spot a fake a mile off. And Louise, you really are a lap dancer. And I think if we'd gone a bit further down the line, you'd have slept with me. I mean, is that above and beyond, or what?"
Donovan took the video cassette out of his jacket pocket and walked over to a wide-screen TV. He slotted the cassette into the video recorder.
"You were all playing yourselves, that's why I was fooled. You were real. But you were being used, every one of you. Whatever you thought you were doing, whatever noble cause you thought you were serving, Hathaway had his own agenda."
Donovan picked up a remote control unit and pressed 'play'. Alex Knight had done a great job with the sound, and he'd used close-ups wherever possible. There was no doubt who the two men on the bridge were, or what they were saying.
Jordan and Macfadyen watched the video with confused looks on their faces. All Donovan had told them was that Fullerton, Warren and Louise were undercover cops they didn't know who Hathaway was. As the video showed Hathaway and Donovan walking along the bridge to the pub, the sound quality went down and Knight had put subtitles along the bottom of the screen so that they could follow the conversation, but the sound improved once the two men were sitting at the trestle table and working on the laptop computer.
Louise looked over at Donovan, but he kept his eyes on the television screen.
When the tape came to an end, Donovan switched off the TV. Fuller-ton's eyes were wide and staring and his nostrils flared from the effort of breathing. His face had gone a deep crimson. Donovan walked over and ripped the insulation tape off his mouth. Fullerton gasped.
Warren had slumped in his chair. Donovan pulled the tape off his lips.
It came away with a tearing sound.
"Bit of a surprise that, hey, Bunny?" asked Donovan. He stood in front of the TV.
"Just in case anyone didn't quite follow what was going on there, Gregg Hathaway stung me for forty-five million dollars. In return, I got you. He sold you out. And as you saw on the tape, he was quite happy for me to kill all three of you." He grinned savagely.
"Any thoughts?"
Fullerton, Warren and Louise were all too stunned to say anything' You gave him the money?" asked Jordan in disbelief.
"You gave him forty-five million dollars?"
"What choice did I have, Ricky? I needed to know who the rotten apples were. Suppose it had been the Russians? Suppose there was no gear on the plane? Suppose it had been one of the Turks? I had to know who was bad so that I could see what was salvageable."
"The heroin," said Fullerton.
"What happened to the heroin?"
"It's exactly where it's supposed to be," said Donovan.
"Three thousand kilos is in Germany with our Turkish friends. Five hundred kilos is being driven up to Scotland to keep the smack heads in Edinburgh and Glasgow happy for the next six months or so. Another thousand kilos should be on the Holyhead ferry heading for Dublin. PM's got his, the Turks have got theirs, the price of a wrap in London is probably going to fall twenty per cent, but if the dealers are smart they'll hold back the bulk of it, ease it on to the market."
"But the plane was empty," said Warren.
"Of course it was," said Donovan.
"The Russians, their job is to get supplies into out-of-the-way places, places where there aren't mile-long runways. How do you think they do that, Bunny? You can't just land a fifty-metre four-engined jet plane on the side of a hill."
"Parachutes," whispered Fullerton.
"They dropped the gear."
"Precision-guided offset aerial parachute delivery, is what they call it," said Donovan.
"They can drop almost two thousand kilos from thirty thousand feet and land it to within three hundred feet of their target. The parachute has an airborne guidance unit and it homes in on a transmitter on the ground. They dropped two chutes over Germany and three about fifty miles east of the airfield."
"You bastard," said Fullerton.
"You set us all up. The business at the airfield, you knew the plane was coming in empty."
"I wanted to see what Hathaway would do," said Donovan.
"The deal was that he gave me you and let me bring the gear in. Seems like he thought he could have it both ways: get to keep my money and put me behind bars for twenty years. Oh yes, and have you three killed into the bargain. He'd be free and clear."
Jordan walked over.
"Are we going to do it, Den? Are we going to off them?"
"I'm thinking about it, Ricky."
"You can't kill us," said Fullerton.
"We're cops."
"That's the thing, Jamie. Are you? Are you really cops? Or are you grasses? There's a difference."
"We work for the Met."
Warren nodded.
"We're cops."
"You're cops if Hathaway stuck to whatever bargain it is that he offered you, but he doesn't seem to be a man of his word, does he?" He gestured at the video recorder.
"Do you want me to play it again for you?"
"We're on the Met's payroll," said Fullerton.
"We get a salary. Promotions. Shit, we even get overtime."
"I'm not saying you haven't been paid your thirty pieces of silver, Jamie. I'm just questioning whether or not Hathaway actually put you on their payroll. And if he did, maybe he's covered his tracks.
Wouldn't take much to delete all reference to you from the computers."
"Let's off' em said Jordan in his Liverpudlian whine. They fucked over the Mexico deal, didn't they?"
"Jamie, did, yeah. Hathaway showed me an e-mail he sent. Bunny didn't know about it and nor did Louise." Donovan nodded at Tina.
"Or is it Tina? Which do you prefer?"
"Either," said Tina.
"My mother called me Louise."
"Tina, Louise, who gives a fuck?" said Jordan.
"They're grasses. Let's do 'em."
"A couple of weeks ago and I'd have agreed with you, Ricky, but now I'm not so sure. We've got the gear, we're in the clear, and maybe they've seen the light."
"What do you mean?" said Macfadyen.
"They can't give evidence against us. They're all compromised. Any case based on their evidence is going to be laughed out of court. And after what Hathaway's done to them, I don't think they're going to be looking to continue their careers as undercover cops, or whatever it is they are. They're no threat to us."
"They cost us a bundle on that Mexican deal."
"Agreed, but they all played their part in putting together the Turkish thing. Couldn't have put the financing together so quickly without Jamie's help, and Bunny saved my life, for God's sake. And Louise, well, that's personal. But all three of them made a difference. Maybe not the difference that they were planning to make, but all's well that ends well, yeah?"
"I don't know about this, Den," said Macfadyen.
"Killing them doesn't do anything for us," said Donovan.
"It'd make me feel better," said Jordan.
"Yeah, well, that's something you're going to have to deal with, Ricky.
You don't take someone's life just to make yourself feel good. You do it because it serves a purpose, and I don't think that killing these three is going to make a blind bit of difference to our lives. Letting them live might, though."
Macfadyen and Jordan frowned. They exchanged a look, and Jordan shrugged.
"What are you talking about?" he asked.
"You're not making any sense."
Donovan nodded at Fullerton.
"Jamie here didn't grass up the Turkish deal. Why not, Jamie?"
Fullerton shook his head.
"I don't know."
"Yes, you do."
"I was confused. That's all. I wasn't sure."
"You wanted the deal to succeed, didn't you? You didn't want Hathaway to know about it because you wanted it to go ahead."
Fullerton nodded.
"Because of the money?"
Fullerton shook his head.
"It wasn't just the money. I don't know what it was."
"I do. For the kick. You wanted to see if you could do it. And you did, Jamie. You played the game and you won. We won. We made them look stupid and we made millions. How did that feel?"
"Yeah, it felt good. When that plane landed, it was like, better than a coke rush. And when the SAS piled in I was so freaked. I thought I'd lost everything. I thought Hathaway would hang me out to dry."
Fullerton stopped talking. He looked guiltily across at Warren and Louise, and fell silent.
"See what I mean?" Donovan said to Macfadyen and Jordan.
"You should use him. He's got a taste for it." Donovan grinned at Fullerton.
"What about it, Jamie? They stitched you up, why not show them what you can do on the other side of the fence? You're a natural."
Fullerton nodded slowly.
"Work with you, you mean?"
"Nah, I'm retiring, Jamie. For a few years at least. I've got things to do." He jerked a thumb at Macfadyen and Jordan.
"But Charlie and Ricky could do with your help. With me out of the game they'll need someone to hold their hands."
Donovan walked over to Warren. Warren stared up at him defiantly.
"And you, Bunny, what the hell were you thinking of? You know how cops hate blacks. Always have and always will. All that crap about institutional racism is just that. It's not the institution that's racist, it's the people. And you're not going to change the people with seminars and handbooks and codes of practice."
Warren shrugged.
"They were using you, that's all," said Donovan.
"They said I could make a difference. And I wanted to."
"A difference to what? To the drugs business? You think that putting me away would have stopped drugs getting into the country? All the cops and Customs do is regulate the price, Bunny. Supply and demand.
They increase the percentage of interceptions and the price goes up, that's all. The price goes up, we make more money, and the addicts on the street go out and rob a few more cars and houses to pay the extra."
Warren looked down, unwilling to meet Donovan's stare.
"Fuck it, Bunny, being an undercover cop isn't going to get drugs off the street. You want to do that, go be a social worker and make people's lives better so that they don't want drugs. Go be a businessman and create jobs so that people have got a reason to get up in the mornings. But don't kid yourself that playing cops and robbers is going to make a blind bit of difference to the drugs trade. It's here to stay, and everyone from the Government down knows that. The cops and Cussies know that. Do you have any idea how many of them are on the take, Bunny? From me personally? Hasn't the way Hathaway behaved shown you how corrupt the whole business is, their side and mine?"
Warren looked up defiantly.
"What is it you want me to say, Den? That I've been fucked over? Well, I have. I can see that."
"I want to know what you're going to do about it, Bunny."
"That's an impossible question to answer. I'm dead on the streets now.
PM'll be after my blood."
Donovan nodded.
"Maybe he doesn't know. No reason for Hathaway to have told him."
"Too many people know. Everyone in this room, for a start. It's not gonna stay a secret. I lied to him, man. Bigtime. He's never gonna forgive that."
Donovan shrugged.
"You might be surprised what people will forgive, Bunny. Besides, PM got his gear at a rock bottom price. It's pushed him a lot higher up the food chain and he's gonna need you to keep him on the straight and narrow."
Warren shook his head.
"Nah, not PM. I've made him look stupid and he ain't gonna stand for that. He's gonna want to show that he's on top of it. I'm gonna have to go."
"Go where?"
"Fuck you, man. I ain't telling you anything." He shook his head.
"I'll tell you one thing for free, though." He nodded with his chin at Fullerton.
"I ain't like him. I don't get no buzz from what I did. Drugs kill people. Kill people, kill communities, kill whole fucking countries.
And it ain't no good just saying if it wasn't you it'd be someone else.
It's got to stop somewhere. It might as well be you."
"So you've got what you wanted, Bunny. As of today, I'm out of it. But you know what? It won't make a shred of difference."
"You're really quitting?" asked Macfadyen.
"I've got all the money I need, Charlie," said Donovan.
"Even with what Hathaway took. It's all offshore, I'll get it well laundered and put into something legit. I've been telling my boy I sell cement. Might even do that." He grinned.
"Swap one powder for another."
"And what about me, Den?" asked Tina.
Donovan folded his arms.
"What about you, Louise? Are you going to apologise, say sorry for lying to me? You weren't the first woman to lie to me and I don't expect you'll be the last, but it would be nice to hear an apology."
"I'm sorry, Den."
"Yeah, I've been hearing that a lot lately."
"There's nothing I can say, is there?"
Donovan shook his head, his lips forming a tight line.
Tina crossed her legs and arms and stared at the floor.
"I saw the look on your face this morning. When you opened the door and I was there. You were relieved, weren't you?" said Donovan quietly.
"You thought I'd been pulled, and when you saw I hadn't been you were pleased."
Tina nodded but still didn't look up.
"And last night, when I was leaving, you tried to stop me going."
Tina nodded again.
"I wanted to tell you. I did, Den. But I couldn't."
"Because you're a cop?"
Tina sighed.
"Yes."
"Being a cop didn't stop you sending me that text message, did it?"
Macfadyen frowned.
"What text message?"
"It doesn't matter, Charlie."
"I didn't think you'd got it," said Tina.
"I got it," said Donovan.
"I didn't want you to go to prison," said Tina.
"I didn't want Robbie to be without his dad, I didn't want…"
"What?" asked Donovan.
Tina wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.
"Nothing."
Donovan stepped forward and put a hand on her shoulder. She rubbed the side of her head against his hand like a dog wanting its ear tickled.
"They used you, Tina. They treated you like a whore. they were worse than pimps because they pretended you were doing it for some greater good."
"I know," she said softly.
"Get yourself sorted out, Louise. You shouldn't let anyone use you like that. Least of all someone whose only aim was to sell you out."
She wiped her eyes again.
"I will."
"Then give me a call."
Tina looked up in surprise.
"What?"
Donovan mimed putting a phone to his ear.
"Phone me. Robbie'd like to see you."
Tina smiled gratefully.
"So that's it?" said Jordan.
"We're just going to let them go?"
Macfadyen sighed.
"Ricky, if you don't shut up, I'll shoot you myself "I'm just saying..
."
"Don't say," said Macfadyen.
"It's Den's call. Good on you, Den. Where are you going?"
"Home," said Donovan.
"I've got some soccer kit needs washing. And beds to make. Shopping to do." He grinned.
"A woman's work is never done, hey, lads?"
Three Months Later The rooster kicked out and the metal spur attached to its left claw ripped through the stomach of its adversary. Blood spattered across the sawdust and the crowd cheered and yelled. Fistfuls of pesos were waved in the air, but Hathaway doubted that anyone would be prepared to bet on the underdog. There were few comebacks in cock fighting It wasn't like with humans: bouts couldn't be fixed to hype up the entertainment value. The cocks went in, they fought, the better fighter won. Victory might come by virtue of being faster, or stronger or having more heart, but once one of the cocks was on top, death came quickly.
Hathaway had been to cockfights in Thailand, but he found them a lot less satisfactory because the Thais didn't fit spurs to the birds, so the bouts were longer and scrappier. Maybe it was because the Thais were Buddhists and didn't want to inflict unnecessary pain, but Hathaway thought the Roman Catholic Filipino way was actually kinder.
Kills were generally quicker and cleaner.
Hathaway wasn't a great fan of the Philippines, but it was the perfect place to hide, for a while at least. It was a country where pretty much anything could be had for a price, where security and privacy could easily be acquired, and where there were enough Westerners with shady pasts for yet another one to blend in with few questions asked.
The money was all stashed away offshore where it could never be found.
Hathaway had become an expert at tracing hidden money and he had put his skills to good effect. He had bought an isolated villa on the outskirts of Manila, made friends with the local police chief, and hired a dozen of the chiefs men as his personal bodyguards. He never went anywhere without at least four of them in attendance, and as he stood at the edge of the cock fighting pit all four were within fifty feet, enjoying the cockfight but keeping a watchful eye out for potential threats.
So far as Hathaway was concerned, there was only one potential threat Den Donovan. Hathaway had no illusions: at some point Donovan would be looking to get his money back. Donovan was still Tango One, however, and the powers that he would be doing everything they could to put him behind bars. It was just a matter of time.
The fact that the drugs hadn't been on the plane when it had landed had meant that Donovan had escaped prison that time, but his luck couldn't hold out for ever. The abortive drugs bust had actually helped Hathaway, in that it gave him a good reason for resigning. His direct superior had spent an hour trying to convince him to stay, and the head of Human Resources had offered to find him a non-operational role within the organisation, but Hathaway had continued to insist that he should take the blame for the debacle and had walked out. He hadn't even bothered to fill in his pension forms or empty his desk.
Of course, Hathaway would much have preferred for the drugs to have been on the plane and for Donovan to have been put away for twenty years, but sometimes not everything went to plan. Sometimes you had to go with the flow. Tango One would get sent down eventually, and if he didn't, Hathaway had more than enough money to have Donovan taken out of the equation by other methods. More permanent methods.
In the pit, the winning bird lashed out again and the weaker bird went down, blood streaming from its neck. Grim-faced men in straw hats were screaming for the stricken bird to get up and fight, but Hathaway knew that they were wasting their breath. It had been a mortal blow.
Hathaway didn't want to have to take out a contract on Donovan unless it was absolutely necessary. It wasn't that he had moral reservations about ordering the death of another man, especially a man like Donovan, but paying for an assassination left a trail that could be followed.
There were plenty of professionals around who could do the job, but if anything went wrong even the most professional of killers would give up the name of his employer in exchange for a reduced sentence. It wasn't a risk that Hathaway was prepared to take, not yet.
The owner of the winning bird stepped forward and picked it up, holding it high above his head to a series of rousing cheers from the men who'd won money on the fight, and boos and catcalls from those who'd lost.
A small boy ran out with a bucket and threw fresh sawdust down over the bloodstained parts of the ring, while one of the winning owner's assistants picked up the dead bird and carried it away. It was traditional for the winning owner to eat the losing bird.
Hathaway looked over his shoulder. There were more than five hundred men crammed into the warehouse around the ring. No women. Almost all the spectators were locals: Western sensibilities were often offended by the sight of two cocks doing what came naturally.
Hathaway stiffened as he noticed that one of the few Westerners around the arena was looking in his direction. He was a man in his thirties wearing a beige safari suit. There was something familiar about the man a vague tickle somewhere in Hathaway's memory suggested that they'd met some time in the past. Hathaway frowned. As a rule he had an almost infallible memory for faces. The man raised an eyebrow and nodded at Hathaway. Hathaway smiled instinctively, and nodded at the man. Was it a greeting from someone who recognised Hathaway, or just a nod of recognition between two outsiders?
Hathaway racked his memory. Male, mid-thirties, good looking, well built, two-day growth of beard. Ray-Ban sunglasses. Good teeth.
Hathaway's mental filing system drew a blank. Then Hathaway realised why the man seemed familiar and he smiled slowly. He was the spitting image of the French crooner. What was his name? Distel, that was it.
Sacha Distel. He was looking at a much younger version of Sacha Distel. Hathaway relaxed. The guy was probably mistakenly recognised all the time. Hathaway gave him a small wave, then turned to watch the next cocks being prepared for battle. The man in charge of Hathaway's security had seen the unspoken exchange and he looked across at Hathaway for guidance. Hathaway nodded at him and mouthed, "It's okay."
In the pit, a pot-bellied man with a battered straw hat was attaching shiny metal spurs to a bird with jet-black feathers. Hathaway looked over at the black bird's opponent. It was a totally white bird with a scarlet crop. Hathaway smiled. He liked white birds. It always made the bloodletting look that much more dramatic. He waved a handful of pesos at one of the bookmakers and placed a bet on the black bird.
Hathaway was feeling lucky.