Black Coke (16 page)

Nathan turned to one side and threw up.

North London, UK
11 April 2011

N
athan staggered to his feet. He couldn’t bear to look at the disfigured corpse of his sister in the bath. He wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve and stumbled into the lounge. His legs were shaking so much he could barely walk. He felt like he was in a dream. His eyes couldn’t seem to focus on anything. His body felt numb. He threw up again, all over the shattered glass on the carpet. He crumpled into the sofa.

His only sister.

Dead.

They must have been following Caitlin for days. They’d been tailing him in the library. They were probably out there waiting to see his reaction. He went to the window and parted the curtain slightly. A black Ford was pulling away a little too slowly on the other side of the road. As the car accelerated past, Nathan caught sight of the driver.

Amonite.

She had a black leather jacket and close cropped hair. She looked straight up at him, thin lips smiling. Furious energy surged through Nathan. He leapt down the stairs and onto Caledonian Road. Torrential rain pelted the pavement. He reached for his gun, but Amonite was already speeding off. He ran for his car, fumbling for the keys in his pocket, brushing a strand of long wet hair from his eyes. He threw himself into the driver’s seat. He was going to catch Amonite, and make her pay. Seconds later, he was speeding after her, down towards King’s Cross, narrowly missing pedestrians and cyclists.

Amonite was stuck in the bus lane up ahead, behind a double decker bus. Nathan skidded to a halt, jumped out and raced towards Amonite’s car, right hand going for his gun. The double decker bus was pulling away. Her car crept forward. He was a few metres away. She sped up. He sprinted, crashed into a young woman, who grabbed his jacket to stop herself falling. By the time he’d extricated himself, Amonite was driving faster than he could run.

He rushed back to his car. The vehicles behind were hooting. Three black cabs were in the bus lane between him and Amonite. The double decker slowed down again for the next bus stop. Nathan readied himself to leap out. But Amonite swerved out of the bus lane and through gaps in the other two lanes.

Nathan hit the gas. He couldn’t let Amonite escape. He twisted the steering wheel. A red car to his right slammed to a halt. It beeped its horn. He weaved past. Amonite was twenty metres ahead. She ran a red light and veered right, forcing vehicles coming the other way to swerve out of her path. Nathan was stuck behind a grey SUV that had stopped at the light.

He swore as Amonite tore down a side road.

The light went green. The SUV moved forward. Nathan eased round it and down the side road. He accelerated to sixty miles per hour.

Amonite was eighty metres away.

Then sixty.

Fifty…

She turned left. He followed.

The road was empty. Just parked cars on either side, pedestrians on the pavements. He looked up and down the roads leading off the one he was on. She’d vanished. He kept on driving until he was back on Euston Road. The traffic was at a standstill again. He shook his head to remove the images of Caitlin that were seeping into his mind.

The black Ford was up ahead, stuck between two cars.

He jumped out and pushed through the crowds on the pavement. He reached Amonite just as she was accelerating again. He pulled his gun, fired straight through the side window. Amonite must have seen him approaching in the mirror, because her car slammed to a halt just as the shot went off. The window shattered. Nathan spun round, both hands on his pistol.

The driver’s seat was empty.

Nathan ran round the car just in time to see Amonite weaving her way through the rows of vehicles that were now rushing past. He ran after her into the large red brick building of St Pancras International. The place was deserted, the shops all closed for the day, with only a few travellers hanging around outside the Eurostar terminal. Amonite was sprinting ahead. She glanced over her shoulder.

Their eyes met.

For a split second he was back in Ciudad Juárez, in the secret underground prison where she tortured her enemies. There was the same sinister look in her eyes. The same cold, calculating expression. The same murderous intent.

‘Stop or I’ll shoot!’ Nathan shouted, gun pointed.

Amonite dived round a corner. Nathan raced after her, his body in good shape from the months of living in the jungle. He slowed a fraction, then ducked and span round the corner, ready for an ambush.

She was nowhere to be seen. Nathan kept running. He came to an exit. He ran down the outside pavement to the front of the station, then went back in, criss-crossing the shopping area. He glanced up. CCTV cameras were everywhere.

He stepped out onto Euston Road. Sirens screamed. Flashing police cars frayed their way towards Nathan and Amonite’s abandoned cars. A young man was speaking to a policeman. He pointed at St Pancras.

It was time to disappear. Nathan hunched his shoulders and blended into the crowd of pedestrians walking towards King’s Cross. He snaked his way through the train station and out through a side exit. He walked past the glass office buildings of York Way towards his apartment. The sirens faded.

He didn’t have long. The cops would track his number plate, maybe even check the CCTVs. They’d come knocking on his door soon enough. Soca couldn’t vouch for him anymore.

He barged through the door to his apartment, frustration and anger mixing with grief and shock. He felt like tearing down the shelves in the hallway, smashing all the plates in the kitchen, shooting bullets through the windows. He’d failed his sister, let Amonite kill her in a horrific way. He didn’t deserve to live here.

He picked up Caitlin’s corpse from the bath, averting his gaze. He lay her on her bed. He closed her eyes and folded her hands on her tummy. He sat next to her, his hands trembling, his mind a jumbled mass of thoughts and feelings. Random memories from their childhood appeared from nowhere. How he used to help her with her homework. How she used to hook him up with girlfriends at school. The times of sorrow when Mum died in a car crash when they were teenagers. The times of laughter when Dad took them on holiday to Barcelona every year. Dad’s slow death from cancer. Caitlin’s battle with depression. Nathan remembered the other night, when they hit the town. He wished he’d spent more time with her.

But now she was dead. Ritually murdered by a Colombian drug cartel. And it was his fault.

Nathan had no idea how long he sat there. A police car wailed past, jolting him back to reality. He went to his bedroom, the anger giving way to a chilled fury. His clothes were drenched and covered in blood. He changed into black combats, a black long sleeved t-shirt and a black sweater. He opened the cupboard and pushed away the piles of files in the bottom, revealing a small safe. He flipped the code. Inside were his false passport, the credit card to an untraceable offshore bank account, ten thousand dollars in cash, a lock picking kit and a Glock 17. He reached under the bed for the three clips of ammo he kept hidden there.

Caitlin’s last words to him ricocheted through his mind.

Why don’t they send someone else?

He stuffed everything into his rucksack, along with his spare clothes. He checked the apartment, but found nothing. Amonite was too professional to leave any clues.

You’re such a pain at times.

Something was missing. The black cube. It wasn’t on his desk, nor in his rucksack.

Amonite must have taken it.

He kissed Caitlin on the forehead. He covered her body with a blanket. Then he left the apartment, closing the door quietly behind him. He stumbled down the stairs, ignoring the questioning look of his young neighbours with their screaming children coming the other way. He delved back to the deepest recesses of his mind, to his past training. He’d sometimes used his military skills for Soca, but never to their full extent.

But now, Soca couldn’t help. He had to rely on himself. He had to avenge Caitlin’s death. Amonite had made a big mistake attacking him so personally.

This time, she would suffer.

Baranquilla, Colombia
11 April, 2011

‘B
oss, what happened?’

Elijah bolted upright. Where the hell was he?

‘Boss?’

Elijah rubbed his eyes. He was sitting on the bottom mattress of a bunkbed. A babyish face was bent over him, shifting in and out of focus. It had round eyes, a blunt nose and tufts of black hair surrounded by an aura of white light.

‘Jesus,’ Elijah mumbled.

‘Not Jesus.’ The baby face chuckled. ‘Patrice. You okay?’

‘Where am I?’

‘On the boat, boss. What happened?’

‘Can’t remember,’ Elijah muttered, wiping the sweat from his cheeks and leaning his back against the wall. The room was spinning.

Patrice gestured around him. ‘This place looks like a bomb just hit it.’

Saucepans, smashed plates, cups, cans of food, shirts, socks and various other items littered the floor. The bedsheets were ripped and hung off the bunkbed in ragged strips. One of the wooden chairs next to the table was tipped over and cracked.

‘I heard shouting.’ Patrice straightened up. ‘Then lots of banging.’

‘Give me a break.’ Elijah pushed Patrice away. ‘It was nothing.’

‘Cut down on the powder, boss.’

Elijah shrugged him off. Patrice could be so annoying. He clambered onto the deck, which was gleaming in the relentless afternoon sun. In the far distance were the high rises of Baranquilla, the largest industrial city and port on the Caribbean coast of Colombia. Elijah let out a deep sigh, reclined in a deck chair and gazed across the sea to the tropical forest sliding past. This was his luxury, ocean-faring yacht, bought with the proceeds of previous drug deals as the perfect drug smuggling vessel. He was king here. He could do what the hell he wanted on board. Something disturbing had happened in the cabin just beforehand, but he couldn’t remember, and he didn’t give a damn anyway.

‘Patrice!’ Elijah waved an imperious hand. ‘Get me a drink.’

‘You need to be in shape for the rendez-vous.’

‘I need a drink.’

‘Remember what happened last time.’

‘Get me a goddamn drink!’

Patrice returned with a tumbler of rum. Elijah grabbed his ass. It was firm and full, just as he liked it. He snaked his arm round Patrice’s waist and pulled him close. He felt Patrice tense.

‘Do you still love me?’ Elijah said.

Patrice handed the tumbler to Elijah.

‘I said do you still fucking love me?’

‘Yes, boss, I do.’ Patrice peeled away Elijah’s arm and went to the wheel.

Satisfied, Elijah lay back in his deck chair. He sipped the rum. They sped past a long stretch of beach. Rich Western tourists and their overweight children strolled around the sand, throwing frisbees, making sandcastles, and idling away their time.

Patrice pointed to their left. A white speed boat raced past in the distance, bumping over the waves.

‘Coast guard,’ he said.

‘Where the hell are these Colombians? Wasn’t the rendez-vous point around here?’

‘There they are.’ Patrice pointed to an inlet that led through to a lagoon, surrounded by palm trees and jungle vegetation.

Elijah strained his eyes. The drug was still playing tricks with his focus. He grabbed the binoculars hanging on the wall in front of him. A dark green go-fast boat with a row of high-speed motors was bobbing up and down a few hundred metres away. Two men were standing on it, looking in their direction.

Elijah nodded to Patrice, who killed the engine. Their boat slid through the lagoon before coming to a standstill, generating waves that upset the go-fast boat. The men struggled to retain their balance. Elijah smirked.

‘We’ve been looking for you everywhere,’ he yelled.

‘There was a delay,’ shouted the man closest to them. He had a short black beard and wavy hair. A large belly protruded from under his blue shirt. Behind him, the other man revealed an AK 47 he’d kept hidden behind his back. He looked mid-twenties, with short hair, a dark green t-shirt and brown combats. Both fixed Elijah with intense, vicious looks.

‘So?’ Elijah raised an eyebrow. ‘Are we going to stand around all day staring at each other like a bunch of school girls?’

The man with the beard nodded to the young one, who searched under a bench and pulled out a mask and a diving cylinder. He stripped to his underwear, revealing a hairless, muscular torso that set Elijah’s blood racing.

The young man jumped into the water and held out his hands. Beard reached under another bench and handed him a watertight plastic container, around one metre across, with snap-on clips. The young man dived under the water.