Hot Blood (18 page)

‘The buyer says he’ll give us three days,’ said the solicitor. ‘Seventy-two hours.’

‘Now he’s setting deadlines?’ said Shepherd, exasperated. ‘This is extortion. He’s deliberately putting me under pressure hoping I’ll crack.’

‘I dare say that the buyer of his property has set the same deadline,’ said the solicitor.

‘I know, I know,’ said Shepherd. He ran his hand through his hair. ‘Let me think about it. I’ll get back to you.’

He ended the call and tapped in his mother-in-law’s number. She answered in her usually crisp manner, but when she realised it was him she was immediately chatting away: ‘Daniel, I’m so glad you called. The headmistress wants to confirm Liam’s start date, and I said he’d be with them next Monday. I’ve already bought his uniform but he’ll need white plimsolls and I wasn’t sure what size to get.’

‘Moira, there’s been a hitch . . .’ He explained what had happened.

‘Oh, Daniel,’ she said. She was the only person who used Shepherd’s full name and had never called him anything else, even though he’d asked her to call him Dan. To his friends and colleagues, Shepherd was either Spider or Dan. His wife had called him Dan. Or ‘lover’. Even Moira’s husband, Tom, called him Dan. But to Moira he had always been Daniel and always would be, just as trainers would always be plimsolls. ‘Look, if it’s a problem with the financing, Tom and I can tide you over. Tom would talk to his bank. I’m sure they’d agree a bridging loan.’

‘Really, it’s okay,’ said Shepherd.

‘Whatever happened to honesty and decency?’ asked his mother-in-law. ‘A man’s word used to be his bond.’

‘It’s every man for himself, these days,’ said Shepherd.

‘Well, it shouldn’t be. They agreed to buy your house for a price and now they’re going back on it. You should be able to sue them.’

‘Sadly, the law’s on their side,’ said Shepherd.

‘Then the law’s wrong,’ said Moira.

‘No argument there,’ said Shepherd. ‘Look, it’s not the end of the world.’

‘You’re still moving, aren’t you?’ said his mother-in-law. Shepherd could hear the apprehension in her voice. He knew how much she wanted Liam close by. Since Sue had died, Moira and Tom had seen their grandson mainly during school holidays and for the occasional weekend. Shepherd knew that they deserved more. Sue had been their only child and Liam was their only grandchild. He was all they had left of her, and Shepherd was determined that Liam would be a bigger part of their life in future.

‘Of course we are,’ said Shepherd. ‘I’ll talk to my bank about a bridging loan, but if they won’t play ball I might have to pull out of the house I’m buying in Hereford.’

‘Oh, Daniel . . .’

‘It’s okay, really. Worst possible scenario, Liam can come and stay with you again.’

‘I hope you don’t mean that’s the worst possible scenario,’ said Moira.

‘I’m sorry, that’s not what I meant,’ said Shepherd. ‘I meant if I can’t sort it out, it would be great if he could stay with you for a while.’

‘Of course,’ said Moira. ‘His room is here whenever he needs it.’

‘Thanks,’ said Shepherd.

‘What about Katra?’

‘If the house sale falls through, she can stay in Ealing. I’ll stay there too. It might work out, Moira, but if it doesn’t I want Liam settled in his new school as soon as possible. I know the headmistress moved heaven and earth to get him in mid-term.’

‘Is everything else okay, Daniel?’ she asked.

‘Everything’s fine,’ he said.

‘You sound a bit stressed, that’s all.’

‘It’s been a stressful week.’

Richard Yokely was watching the flat-screen computer monitor with Marion Cooke, one of the CIA’s top video analysts, whom he had known for almost a decade. This video was a little less than two minutes long and only one man spoke; he wore a ski mask and brandished a Kalashnikov. It was the seventh time they had viewed it. Now Cooke sat back and exhaled through pursed lips. ‘Not much of a plot,’ she said. ‘I’ll give it both thumbs down.’

‘Anything on the ringleader?’

She looked pained. ‘My Arabic’s good but I’m not a linguistics expert so I can’t even tell you his nationality. But I’ll run it past our guys and we’ll get it nailed down. I can cross-check it with voices on file and I’ll let you know if we get a match.’

‘The banner?’

‘“The Holy Martyrs of Islam. Death to the Infidels.” The sort of rhetoric we usually see in this sort of thing.’

‘Can you cross-check it with previous videos? Use of language, handwriting – I need to know if they have links to other fundamentalist groups.’

‘Yeah. I’d never heard of the Holy Martyrs of Islam before now.’

‘No one has,’ said Yokely, ‘but this is their second kidnapping and they haven’t made any mistakes so I’m assuming they’ve got experience.’

Cooke tapped the keyboard and zoomed in on the face of the man in the orange jumpsuit. ‘He’s a Brit, right?’

‘Yeah. Civilian contractor.’

Cooke pressed another button and the video began to play again, but this time the man’s face filled the screen. ‘You know what’s interesting?’ she mused.

‘Tell me,’ said Yokely.

‘He’s not afraid,’ said Cooke. ‘I’ve seen a few hostage videos and you can see the fear on their faces. Wide eyes, hyperventilating, shaking. This guy’s like a rock. And look at his eyes – he’s watching everything. He’s not at all scared.’

‘Ah,’ said Yokely. ‘Perhaps I understated his background. He was in special forces for a while.’

‘The SAS?’ She grinned. ‘Then, from what I’ve heard, his captors are the ones who should be worried.’

‘They don’t know what he was before,’ said Yokely. ‘So far as they’re concerned, he’s just a hired hand.’

‘Probably best,’ said Cooke.

‘What about the other men in the video?’

‘Can I see through the masks, you mean? Sadly, the technology isn’t there yet, Richard.’

‘You know what I mean, Marion.’

Cooke grinned. She started the video again and waited until the masked men standing in front of the banner were in view, then froze the picture. She pointed at the man on the left cradling one of the weapons. ‘Kalashnikov AK-47,’ she said. ‘Barrel length sixteen point three inches, overall length thirty-four point two five inches.’ Then she pointed at the second Kalashnikov. ‘This is the newer variant, the AK-74,’ she said. ‘See the bigger muzzle? Cuts down on the recoil. It’s a bit longer at thirty-seven inches overall but the barrel is around half an inch shorter. Using those numbers as a reference, I can get the height and body measurements of all the men in the video, plus a pretty close approximation of their weight.’

Yokely patted her shoulder. ‘Excellent,’ he said. ‘What else?’

‘You don’t ask much, do you?’ she said. She tapped on the keyboard again. The screen showed the full view of the video’s first frame: the five masked figures standing in front of the banner. ‘Do you know much about RPGs?’ she asked.

‘Just that they go bang and do a lot of damage,’ said Yokely.

Cooke froze the picture and zoomed in now on the man holding the RPG. ‘Funny things, RPGs,’ she said. ‘Most people think that it stands for rocket-propelled grenade but it actually stands for
ruchnoy protivotankovy granatomyot
. That translates as hand-held anti-tank grenade-launcher. But our military and most of our allies don’t use the word “grenade” to describe an anti-tank weapon. So RPG, strictly speaking, is only used to describe the Russian variant.’

‘So what
do
we call them?’

Cooke smiled. ‘Shoulder-launched missile weapon systems,’ she said. ‘Or shoulder-launched rockets. You see, under our definition, grenades can’t be self-propelled.’

‘Marion, you never cease to amaze me,’ said Yokely.

‘Sweet-talker,’ said Marion. She nodded at the screen. ‘This one is the guerrilla’s favourite,’ she said. ‘The RPG-7. It was RPG-7s that brought down the Blackhawk helicopters in Somalia. The Mujahideen used them in Afghanistan and Unita rebels had them in Angola. Now they’re all over Iraq.’

‘Any way of identifying it?’ asked Yokely.

Cooke went in close on the RPG. ‘I don’t see a serial number,’ she said. She frowned thoughtfully. ‘I’ve seen an RPG in another Iraqi video,’ she said. She rubbed the back of her neck. ‘When the hell was it? Not recently, that’s for sure.’ Her voice had dropped to a whisper and she closed her eyes. ‘Come on, Marion. Come on, come on.’

‘In my experience, you relax and you remember,’ said Yokely.

‘Please, Richard, don’t even think of offering me a massage.’

Yokely laughed. ‘I was thinking of getting you a coffee.’

‘Sure – caffeine. That’ll relax me.’

Mitchell dropped to the ground and did twenty rapid press-ups, then ten slow ones. He rolled on to his back and started doing brisk sit-ups. Fitness was crucial if he stood any chance of surviving the next few days. He would only get one opportunity and when it presented itself he would have to be ready to seize it with both hands.

He had loosened the screws and removed the socket from the wall. Two wires led to it, a red live one and a blue neutral. There was quite a bit of slack in them and he had been able to pull out almost two feet. The question was where he went from there. He lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling and taking deep breaths, feeling the burn in his abdomen.

He had no way of knowing if the socket was live. Even if it was it would almost certainly be on a different circuit from the lights. If he touched the two wires together there was a good chance he’d blow a fuse or throw a circuit breaker but that probably wouldn’t knock out the lights and even if it did he’d still be locked in the basement.

He started doing sit-ups again, this time slowly with his right leg crossed over the left. The wire was a weapon. He had at least two feet to play with, maybe more if he pulled it hard. He could use it as a garrotte, which would be a killing weapon. He could grab Kamil, wrap the wire round his neck and threaten to kill him unless he was released. Kamil was the leader but Mitchell didn’t know how committed the other men were to him. Threatening to kill Kamil might be his ticket out, but it might also be his death warrant.

He crossed his left leg over the right and started a new set of sit-ups.

If the socket was live he might be able to use the electricity in some way. If he had more wire he could run it over to the door and use the power to disable the men when they came into the room. But he didn’t have extra wire and even if he had he wasn’t sure there’d be enough current to electrocute his captors. There were so many uncertainties that it was laughable, but Mitchell was sure of one thing: he wouldn’t go down without a fight.

Yokely’s mobile phone rang and he took the call.

‘Tell me I’m a genius, Richard,’ said Marion Cooke.

‘You’re a genius,’ said Yokely.

‘The most wonderful analyst you’ve ever met.’

‘The most wonderful analyst I’ve ever met,’ he repeated.

‘And smarter than the average bear.’

‘Way smarter,’ said Yokely. ‘Is there something you want to tell me, Marion, or do you just need your ego stroked?’

‘I have a match on the RPG in the Mitchell video.’

‘No way,’ said Yokely.

‘Total way,’ said Cooke. ‘The same RPG was in a video that went online six months ago, but from a totally different group. They called themselves Islamic Followers of Truth. They kidnapped three Egyptian electricians and later released them. Word is that a ransom was paid but the Egyptian authorities denied it. The three men are back with their families and the Islamic Followers of Truth were never heard from again.’

‘So it’s good news, bad news?’ asked Yokely.

‘O ye of little faith,’ laughed Cooke. ‘It’s great news. The organisation, or whatever it was, vanished, but we have one of its members in custody. One Umar al-Tikriti.’

‘An illustrious name, indeed,’ said Yokely. Tikriti was Saddam Hussein’s family name, taken from Tikrit, the name of his home town.

‘No relation,’ said Cooke. ‘At least not a close one. Umar was pulled in after a mortar attack on the Green Zone three months ago. He was in the vicinity and chemical tests showed traces of explosives residue on his clothes. He is presently a guest at your old stamping ground, the Baghdad Central Detention Centre. Intel we have says he was a member of the Islamic Followers of Truth, though that came from an informant and Umar has denied it.’

‘Well, he would, wouldn’t he?’ said Yokely.

‘Exactly,’ said Cooke. ‘Seems to me, if you want to know who’s holding that RPG in the video, Umar is the man to talk to.’

‘Marion, you’re an angel,’ said Yokely.

‘I know.’

Three mobile phones in charging units were lined up on the bedside table. The middle one was ringing and Shepherd grabbed for it as he sat up. It was Richard Yokely. ‘You awake?’ asked the American.

Shepherd squinted at the digital clock behind the phones. ‘Richard, it’s three o’clock.’

‘So that’s a yes,’ said Yokely, cheerfully. ‘How do you fancy having a chat with someone who might know one of the guys in your friend’s video?’

‘Is this some sort of riddle?’ asked Shepherd.

‘There’s a car on its way,’ said Yokely. ‘Should be with you in half an hour.’

‘Where am I going?’

‘Oxfordshire,’ said the American. ‘But bring your passport to be on the safe side.’

Shepherd showered, then put on a denim shirt and black jeans. He took a brown leather jacket from the cupboard under the stairs and made himself a coffee.

Katra came into the kitchen, rubbing her eyes. She was wearing her bathrobe and had her hair tied up. ‘What’s happening?’ she asked.

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I have to go out. I’m not sure when I’ll be back.’

‘Is everything okay?’

‘Everything’s fine,’ said Shepherd. ‘You go back to bed.’ She headed for the stairs. ‘Oh, Katra, we’ve had a problem with the house sale. It might be that Liam has to stay with his grandparents until I get it sorted.’