To Kill a Grey Man (7 page)

Chapter 12

Mercenaries

Finally Keith Poole got a lead through some very heavy villains in Glasgow,
who told him there was a team of mercenaries that would also double as a hit
team for the right price.
 
He sent out a
message that he was interested in a meeting and within an hour he got a call on
his mobile.
 

A very dry voice obviously using a distortion machine said, “I hear
you want to talk to me.”

“Yes I do,” said Keith.

“Okay.
 
A meet will cost you
ten grand.
 
I will text you the bank
details.”

“No problem,” said Keith.

“One thing you need to get very clear in your mind,” the voice said.
 
“If we think you are being followed or if I
find out you are not who you say you are, you will be killed, there will be no
fucking around.
 
Do you still want to
meet?”

“Yes,” replied Keith.

“Okay.
 
Get a flight to Geneva
tomorrow and hire a car with a satellite navigation system,” instructed the
voice.

The next morning Keith was on an
Easyjet
flight from Gatwick to Geneva at 8.15 am.
 
As the flight was packed, he had paid extra to be in the front seat to
get off the flight quickly.

He walked directly to the Hertz desk and hired a black Mercedes E
class.
 
As he settled himself in the car
his phone text alert sounded.
 
He had
been sent a postcode and a name which he typed into the sat nav.
 
This took him out of Geneva on the motorway
towards Lausanne.
 
It was a beautiful day.
 
The sun was shining in a Simpson’s sky with
its soft white fluffy clouds and as he neared Lausanne he could see Lake Geneva
on his right with Mont Blanc in the background, quite a stunning sight.
 
Just before he got into the town, the sat
nav
took him to a nearly deserted car park by a supermarket
and he parked up in the centre where he could be clearly seen and he left the
engine running.

He sat there becoming more and more agitated.
 
His eyes constantly scanning for a contact.
 
As the time passed he wondered if something
had happened and the meeting was scrubbed.
 
Finally after nearly an hour he got another text, another postcode and
another name, “The Window on the Lake Hotel”.
 
He tapped the details into the sat
nav
and saw
it was thirty five miles away.
 
He drove
slowly and carefully all round the outside of Lausanne and then onto the
motorway, down a long hill with the lake constantly on his right.
 
At the bottom of the hill he came off the
motorway and followed a small road which after a number of turns eventually brought
him onto the coastal path around the large lake.
 
It was a small, narrow road with only one
lane on each side of the road, nowhere to pass and a top speed of thirty miles
an hour.
 
He could see how well chosen
this road was.
 
Most of the time it was
completely open, a large hill to the left and the lake to the right.
 
Anyone who wanted to observe his car could do
so at ease from the hill or one of the many boats without getting spotted
themselves.

After another five miles he passed the border into France which
consisted of a small booth and two parked police cars.
 
He was waved through without being asked to
stop.
 
Finally he arrived at the hotel and
he parked three hundred yards before it in a free public car park.

He got out of the car and decided not to take his briefcase with him.
 
He wanted to show he was unarmed and had
nothing to hide.
 
He was dressed in a
cream shirt and blue jeans which showed off his obviously massive muscled body
so he slipped on a loose fitting jacket to try make himself look more ordinary.
 
He knew from experience that his physique
could unsettle other men and the last thing he needed was a macho man contest.

He walked along and turned right into the hotel’s front garden.
 
It had a walled front and once through the
opening he could see that the place was a sun trap with tables and chairs set
out for drinks.
 
The hotel was lovely and
quaint, backing directly onto the lake with cut flowers in crystal vases
everywhere.
 
It was obviously very old
but it was in pristine condition.

He went through the door into reception which opened into a large
corridor with a reception desk on the right.
 
He was obviously expected as a pleasant looking middle-aged man in a
grey waistcoat and trousers with a white shirt and black bow tie waved him on.
 
He continued to walk through into a dining
room already laid out for dinner, then into a conservatory which was full of cane
and whicker furniture and highly patterned cushions.
 
It looked directly out on the lake and the
huge glass windows provided a stunning view right across the water to Lausanne.

A small neat man dressed in a blue business suit got up from a
window seat in the corner and came across towards Keith.
 
The rest of the place was empty.
 
The man shook Keith’s hand and smiled.

“Please take a seat,” he said in a well spoken Oxbridge accent.

Keith assumed at one time he must have been an officer as there was
something military about his manner and speech.
 
They walked back to the corner from which the man had come.
 
Keith went to sit in a chair to the right of
the man but the man gestured to him that he should sit opposite in a large sofa
type chair with a view of the lake.
 
“You
may call me Martin,” the man began.
 
“Please
sit perfectly still for a second would you.”

Keith looked down.
 
On his
shirt was a small round red light obviously from a sniper’s laser scope.
 
As he looked out he could see a large
pleasure cruiser and assumed the shooter must be aboard it.

From his pocket Martin pulled out a small rectangular device which
he pointed towards Keith.
 

Before he turned it on he said, “This detects any kind of surveillance
equipment.
 
If the light on this goes red
you are dead.
 
Now, do you want to go on
or leave while you have the
choice.
”

“I would like to go on,” replied Keith.
 
So Martin hit the button and the light stayed
green and the red dot on Keith’s chest disappeared, much to his relief.

Just then Keith heard a door open and he turned his head.
 
Two men walked in.
 
They looked more like the
mercs
Keith was after, both fit and muscled wearing T-shirts and jeans with arms
covered in tattoos.
 
They sat behind
Keith, one to his right and one to his left.

“These are my associates,” said Martin.
 
“They would like to listen in.
 
What is the job?”

“I want you to kill a man,” said Keith.
 
“It is, on the face of it, a simple operation
except for the person who I want you to hit is special.”

“Okay,” said Martin.
 
“More
details please.”

“This man lives alone but is a surveillance expert working for the
UK government.
 
I want you to storm his
house and kill him.
 
Use the maximum
force that you feel you need,” said Keith.

“Look,” explained Martin.
 
“We
are not spooks.
 
We do not work in that world.
 
If this guy is an expert, he will see us
coming and be prepared.
 
We would need to
get extensive background knowledge on how and where he lives, habits, etc, and
even then, if he is any good, it is more than likely he would spot us.”

“I understand,” said Keith.
 
“But we have two advantages.
 
One
is we know exactly the layout of his house and many of his habits from an
inside source so you will not need to go anywhere near him beforehand and two,
he is going blind or at least will be partially sighted so will not be able to
send off an alarm until it is too late.
 
It
could happen any time so we would need to set this up quickly.
 
The place where he is currently staying is
quiet and remote and immediately he loses his sight you will need to go in.”

“Okay,” said Martin.
 
“Sounds
a little better.
 
I will want to bring
along five men and you will need to set us up in a remote farmhouse or
something similar to the building the mark is staying at.
 
I will need plans of his place and two Land Rovers
with military number plates.
 
Can you
arrange that?”

“No problem,” said Keith.

“Now to price,” said Martin.
 
“And this is not open to haggling.
 
There will be five of us.
 
I want
£200,000 for me and £100,000 for each of my men, half now, half on completion,
£50,000 for travel and £50,000 for weapons and ammunition.
 
We need one week to prepare and for every day
after that, if we have to wait you will pay each one of us £10,000 for a period
of four weeks.
 
If we have not heard from
you by then, we will assume it is no longer safe for us to stay together and we
will disband and you will then pay us in full.
 
Is that clear?”

“Clear,” said Keith.
 

Martin handed him a phone.
 
“You
will only contact us by text using this phone.
 
I expect the money in the bank tomorrow and an address for our base by
the day after with the plans for the hit.
 
You will not contact me again until you are ready to give the go
ahead.
 
Any screw up your end will see
you dead.
 
Okay?”

“Okay,” said Keith.

They both rose and shook hands.
 
Keith nodded to the two guards behind him, who nodded back.
 
He then walked swiftly back through the hotel
to the Mercedes.
 
As he sat down, he could
feel the sweat on his back sticking to the leather seats.

After Keith Poole had left, Big Rob who had been sitting behind
Keith
listening
 
in
,
started to laugh.
 
“Fuck me, Martin.
 
You just raped that
wanker
.
 
For that kind of money we could have invaded
Angola!”

“I know,” said Martin dropping the Rupert accent and now talking in
his native London cockney.
 
“That’s what
worries me.
 
Who pays that kind of money
for one man.
 
We are going to have to be
very careful here boys, very careful.
 
This whole thing stinks.
 
One
thing for sure, I am not going to go in all guns blazing to a place I have
never seen or checked over no matter how much of a surveillance expert this
mark is.
 
Now, let’s get packed.
 
We have some travelling to do.”

.
  
.
  
.
  
.
  
.
  
.

Five days later John Sea gave Sir Thomas a call.
 
“Everything is in place,” he said.
 
“We are just waiting for the go from you.”

“Okay,” said Sir Thomas.
 
“Stand
by.”

On that same day, The Grey Man was struggling with another migraine.
 
He had only recently started to get them but they
were debilitating.
 
He was taking pain
killers like they were sweets and still the pain would not go away.
 
He called up Collins and then patched in
Surge on the conference call.

“Are you still under observation?” he asked.
 
They both confirmed that they were.
 

“Well, we have a problem then.
 
They have now sent someone to check on me.
 
Yesterday an army Land Rover went by with two
soldiers in it.
 
My auto surveillance
camera picked up the number plate and ran it through the system.
 
It was army surplus, no longer in service and
been sold to the public.
 
Over the next
few hours it circled my place stopping at various places where I assume, a long
range camera was being used.”