The Killing (11 page)

James had his routine sorted. He’d start off by getting the cleaning cart out of its cupboard. It was a giant contraption with a dustbin built into one end that went up as high as his chin. There was a mop, bucket and Hoover clipped to the sides and a rack of shelves, which were stocked with cloths and cleaning sprays. The mission preparation building had a banana-shaped corridor running its entire length, with twenty offices and special equipment rooms off to the sides and the luxurious offices of the two senior mission controllers – Zara Asker and Dennis King – at opposite ends.

James started with King’s office because he was always out of the building by 5 p.m. The routine was the same in every room: empty the bins, pick up any dirty cups or plates, wipe any surfaces that weren’t covered with junk, vacuum the floor and finish off with a squirt of air freshener. It wasn’t exactly backbreaking, but it got boring when you had to do it every night. Plus, you had to be speedy if you wanted to get twenty offices done, clean and restock four bathrooms, vacuum the corridor and do the washing-up inside two hours. Even working flat out, James could never get through in much less than two and a quarter.

Ninety minutes into the job, James’ feet were starting to ache. He’d finished the last of the bathrooms, which was the part of the job he really hated. Getting blanked by his friends and losing his summer holiday was bad, but having to unblock a toilet full of
turds
and soggy bog roll was easily worst of all.

As James threw his disposable gloves and soggy cloths into the rubbish sack on his cart, he heard a tiny giggle. He knew it was Zara Asker’s eighteen-month-old son, Joshua, but that wasn’t how you played the game.

‘Boo,’ Joshua squealed as he jumped out from behind the cart.

James theatrically backed up to the wall. ‘You scared me!
You
horrible
 
little monster.’

Joshua giggled as he hugged James’ leg. ‘Joshua
monster.
Grrrrrr
.’

‘Did you escape from Mummy’s office again?’

Joshua beamed as James picked him off the floor. His blond fringe hung over his eyes and he wore striped dungarees with powdery brown marks all over them.

‘It looks like you decided to wear that chocolate bar,’ James said, as he carried the toddler up to the door of Zara’s office and knocked.

There were a few staff on campus that James liked, but Zara was his favourite. She always worked late and in the month James had been on cleaning duty, she’d got into the habit of making him a mug of tea part way through his shift. He usually drank it in Zara’s office while they had a quick chat.

James stepped through the door and put Joshua down on the carpet. He was disappointed to see that Zara had company.

‘I’d better get on,’ James said, turning back towards the door.

‘Actually James, have you got a minute?’ Zara asked.

James turned back and studied the woman facing Zara across her desk. She was in her early thirties, with long dark hair and a fit body.

‘Millie, this is James; the one I was talking about. James, this is Millie
Kentner
, one of your predecessors at CHERUB.’

James reached forward to shake her hand, but Joshua snatched James’ attention by bashing his boot with a toy car.

‘Look,’ Joshua demanded.

James smiled at him. ‘Is that a new car?’

Joshua grinned up at James as Zara explained the situation to Millie. ‘
Ewart
brings Joshua over here while he gives the baby her bath and gets her off to sleep. He’s supposed to be visiting Mummy for half an hour before he goes to bed, but James is his hero.’

Millie gave James a toothpaste advert grin. ‘Is that right, James?’

‘I guess,’ James shrugged, as he crouched down and took Joshua’s new Lamborghini for a test drive across the carpet.

Zara nodded. ‘From when Joshua first wakes up, all I hear is James, James, James. When you ask Joshua what he’s going to do, he makes all this stuff up. Yesterday he announced that he was going to go fishing with James. He must have seen it on TV, because
Ewart’s
never taken him fishing.’

‘So, James,’ Millie smirked, covering her mouth as though she didn’t want Zara to hear. ‘As one CHERUB to another, how’d you end up on cleaning detail?’

‘I got in a fight,’ James said awkwardly.

Zara smiled. ‘Well that’s not exactly true, is it James?’

‘I
dunno
, isn’t it?’

‘Get this,’ Zara grinned as she pointed at James. ‘The silly
muppet
got himself dumped by his girlfriend. So he storms out and thumps the first person he sees: a little scrap of an eleven-year-old kid.’

Millie put her hands over her mouth. ‘Oh my god,’ she smiled. ‘James, how could you? And you’re so sweet with Joshua.’

James felt awkward and dumb, even though he realised Millie was trying to be nice.

‘So, like I said,’ Zara interrupted, ‘young James has some very good mission experience, but right now he’s down in the dumps. His friends have all given him the boot. He’s lost his summer holiday and the only way he’ll get out of cleaning duty is if I send him on a mission.’

Millie nodded. ‘I’ll take whoever I can get. This is just a favour really. I can sort out accommodation and I doubt it will take any more than a month.’

Zara explained to James. ‘After retiring as a CHERUB agent, Millie joined the Metropolitan Police. She works as a community officer in east London and she’s having a few problems with one of the local villains. It’s textbook CHERUB stuff: move into the neighbourhood with another agent, hang out with the villain’s kids, try getting involved in his home life and business, etcetera, etcetera. I’ll have to type up a proper mission briefing and get ethics committee approval, but I assume you’re interested?’

James nodded enthusiastically. ‘I don’t care
 
what
 
the mission is if it means I don’t have to stick my hand down another toilet.’

Zara smiled. ‘I thought you might say that.’

**CLASSIFIED**

MISSION BRIEFING FOR JAMES ADAMS
THIS DOCUMENT IS PROTECTED WITH A RADIO
FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION TAG
 
ANY ATTEMPT TO REMOVE IT FROM THE MISSION
PREPARATION BUILDING WILL SET OFF AN ALARM
DO NOT PHOTOCOPY OR MAKE NOTES

M
ILLIE
 K
ENTNER

Millie
Kentner
was born in 1971. She served as a CHERUB agent from 1981–1988, retiring with a black shirt after eleven missions. Her role in the 1985 miners’ strike has been described as ‘One of the most outstanding performances by a CHERUB agent, ever’.

Millie left for Sussex University where she studied forensic science. In 1992 she joined the Metropolitan Police and her career was fast-tracked, enabling her to obtain the rank of Inspector within four years. Following this promotion, Millie transferred from the serious crime squad to a role in charge of a community-policing unit, covering the area of east London that includes the Palm Hill estate.

Palm Hill is still notorious for riots that took place there in 1981, but today the area has many affluent residents and crime is below the London average. Millie
Kentner’s
work with the Palm Hill community over the last nine years has been credited for much of this change. In 2002 she turned down the offer of promotion to Chief Inspector and the opportunity to head a London-wide taskforce designed to specifically target London’s crime black spots. She wanted to continue working in Palm Hill.

T
HE
 B
ROTHERS
 T
ARASOV

Leon and Nikola
Tarasov
were born somewhere in Russia in the early 1950s. Nikola was believed to be one year older than his brother, although their exact ages are uncertain. After serving in the Russian navy, both young men took jobs as fishermen.

In August 1975, their factory trawler suffered a dual engine failure while fishing for cod in the North Sea. Following a distress call, a British lifeboat safely evacuated all forty-two crewmembers with assistance from the Norwegian navy.

Upon landing in Britain, Leon and Nikola were among eight members of the crew who requested asylum. After government officials failed in their attempts to persuade the eight sailors to return home and avoid a diplomatic row with the USSR, the British government reluctantly accepted their asylum requests.

After failing to find work aboard a British fishing vessel, Leon and Nikola gravitated towards the small Russian community centred around Bow in east London. The brothers worked a string of undesirable jobs: driving mini-cabs, working in hotel kitchens and
portering
in hospitals. It is also believed they became increasingly involved in illegal activities. In 1979 Nikola was tried and convicted of stealing more than £2,000 in cash from a mini-cab office where he had worked the previous summer. He was sentenced to three months in prison.

P
ALM
 
HILL
 
RIOTS

Upon his release, Nikola declared himself homeless and broke, and was allocated a two-bedroom flat in a run-down section of the Palm Hill estate. Leon moved in with him and they continued much as before, earning their keep with a mixture of low-paid work, dodgy dealing and small-time criminal activity. But their financial status would be changed for ever by the Palm Hill riots.

On the night of 13 July 1981, the Palm Hill riots kicked off when police stopped and arrested a youth as he got out of a stolen car. Witnesses claimed that the arresting officers assaulted the youth as he was handcuffed and put into the back of a police car. An angry mob gathered, undoubtedly encouraged by a wave of urban violence that had spread across the country following the Brixton riots three months earlier. Bricks and bottles were thrown then the police car was surrounded. The officers were dragged out of their vehicles and beaten by the mob before they got a chance to radio for help.

As darkness fell, youths and police fought running battles in the streets and alleyways around the Palm Hill estate. More than twenty shops were looted, hundreds of windows smashed, cars vandalised and a block of sixty garages at the back of the estate was completely burned out. It took police more than eight hours to restore order.

G
OVERNMENT
 G
RANTS

In the aftermath of the riots, the government hatched a compensation scheme – because riots are not covered by insurance – and pledged to spend money regenerating Palm Hill.

Leon and Nikola
Tarasov
realised that this was a golden opportunity. The brothers had been dealing in second-hand cars and had lost five of them in the burned-out garage block. The government compensated the brothers generously for the cars; by some estimates they received more than four times what the cars were truly worth.

Unable to believe their luck, Leon and Nikola used the compensation money to buy the lease on a derelict pub and an adjoining plot of land at the edge of the Palm Hill estate. Using a mixture of government grants and subsidised redevelopment loans, they refurbished the pub and turned the land into a second-hand car dealership.

S
MALL
 T
IME

Although neither venture was wildly successful, the government money enabled the
Tarasov
brothers to wear suits and describe themselves as local businessmen to the TV crews who occasionally turned up to report on the aftermath of the riots.

Over the following years, the
Tarasovs
ran their businesses with a complete lack of respect for the law. They were investigated for unpaid taxes and on more than one occasion stolen car parts and vehicles were found on their lot. Another raid uncovered a cache of fake vehicle tax discs. Leon and Nikola claimed that the discs had been left behind by a former employee and were found not guilty by a jury after a three-day trial at Bow Crown Court.

Their pub, the King Of Russia, quickly became a notorious hang-out for petty criminals. It is known around Palm Hill as a place where you can easily buy drugs or stolen goods, drink after hours or settle in for an illegal all-night poker game.

T
HE
 T
ARASOV
 D
YNASTY