Hunter Killer (51 page)

‘Bullshit.’

‘
You’re wrong. She slept her way to the top, you know . . . I heard she shagged half the Russian-speakers in London . . . the academics . . . you know how that lot have all been tapped up by MI6 . . .
’

Danny blinked. ‘What?’ he said, loosening his grip slightly.

Buckingham clearly thought he was getting somewhere. He nodded furiously. ‘
Fucked them all, just to get her first job at Moscow station . . .
’

All of a sudden, Danny let Buckingham go. The spook doubled over, clutching at his bruised neck. Danny’s mind was elsewhere. He was remembering a conversation he’d had, days previously, in the bowels of Paddington police station with DI Fletcher. Fletcher had been holding up a report on his desk. His words rang verbatim in Danny’s ears.
‘This poor fella, a Professor Gengerov, lectures at one of them universities up Bloomsbury way, cycling to work last Friday just as he has done every day for the last twenty years, some idiot knocks him off his bike and kills him stone dead. We haven’t even collected the witness statements yet.’

A hit and run on the same day as the first bombing. Hidden at the bottom of the pile while the police investigated more important things.

The warmth drained from Danny’s body. What if Buckingham
hadn’t
been heading towards the RV? What if he
had
been heading to Clara’s to get his end away?

Danny staggered back. Had he got everything so wrong? Had his strategy just collapsed around his ears?

No. It was impossible. Buckingham was messing with his head. The little shit was talking now, spitting bile, aggressive bullshit. Danny didn’t hear a word he said. His mind was spinning. He couldn’t get a single thought straight in his mind.

‘You’re bluffing!’ he heard himself shouting at Buckingham. He stepped angrily towards him, all the stress and tiredness of the past few days crashing over him. He wanted to hurt Buckingham. Badly. The fire was back in his blood again.

Buckingham shrank back.

‘
You’re fucking bluffing!
’ Danny roared again, raising his fists, ready to pummel the cunt to kingdom come.

His phone buzzed.

Not a text message. A phone call.

Danny froze. As the terrified Buckingham cowered once more against the side of the van, he pulled his phone out of his pocket.

It was Barker.

He accepted the call.

‘What is it?’ he growled.

‘Fuck’s sake!’ Barker sounded out of breath. ‘I’ve been trying to get hold of you.’

‘What’s the matter?’

‘Victoria Atkinson left home about twenty minutes ago. I’ve been tailing her, but I just
fucking
lost her because my arm’s in this
fucking
sling . . .’

Danny blinked. A sudden calmness came over him. Buckingham was scrambling away, running down the street. Danny didn’t follow.

‘She’s driving herself,’ Barker said, still breathless, still clearly pissed with himself. ‘A green Yaris. She’s in a fucking hurry, mucker. Ran three red lights before she even hit the river.’

Danny took a deep breath.

‘Last seen?’

A scrambled noise. Barker was breaking up.

‘Say again,’ Danny said.

Barker came back online. ‘Park Lane,’ he said. ‘Heading up to Marble Arch. I’m sorry, mucker – that’s where I lost her. I don’t know where she’s going . . .’

But Danny did. He killed the phone line and looked down the street. Buckingham had stopped about 20 metres away and was looking back, breathless.

Danny threw the leather shoulder bag into the gutter. There was the sound of glass breaking. He turned his back on Buckingham, who started shouting again. ‘You’ll bloody
pay
for it, Black. I’ll have you hung, drawn and bloody well
quartered
for this.’

But Danny wasn’t listening. He started jogging. His jog turned to a run. Moments later he was sprinting across the Edgware Road, then north, towards the dilapidated United Reform church where he had laid his trap.

He’d been following the wrong scent, but now he was back on track.

He had to get there first.

Twenty-six

Danny stopped at the corner of Station Way. He could see the United Reform church from this position. Thirty metres distant, the moon seeming to hang over it, bright and full. He watched carefully for a full minute, looking for anything suspicious.

Nothing.

His eyes scanned the vehicles parked along the road. They were all cars. No vans or trucks that would have rung alarm bells.

A couple of pedestrians walked up the street. But they didn’t look at the church, and soon disappeared.

He checked the roof. No movement.

So far as he could tell, the location was unobserved.

He advanced 15 metres on the opposite side of the street to the church, then stopped by a bus stop. No shelter, not even a timetable, and no other passengers waiting.

A vehicle turned into Station Way from the south side. Headlamps on. As it passed, Danny saw it was a blue Golf. It continued to the far end of the road and disappeared.

Now a second car had appeared from the opposite direction. A Mini Cooper. It shot past Danny. As it reached the south end of Station Way it honked its horn loudly at a third vehicle that had swung its way carelessly into the road. The third car approached. It pulled up on to the kerb ten metres short of the church entrance. The driver killed the lights. Danny squinted, to see what kind of car it was.

Yaris. Green.

Suddenly the street seemed unnaturally quiet.

Danny inhaled slowly. He leaned against the bus stop and watched the Yaris from the corner of his eye.

A minute passed. Nobody emerged.

Suddenly, the clunking sound of a door opening. A figure climbed out. Short. Dumpy. She closed the door quietly behind her, but didn’t lock it. She had a large handbag from which she took something. Danny couldn’t see what it was, but by the way she covered her right hand with one side of her coat, he could tell it was most likely a weapon. Victoria Atkinson was armed.

Danny wasn’t.

She looked around, her body language nervous. And either she was unskilled in surveillance, or her nerves were getting the better of her, because she didn’t even seem to notice Danny loitering by the bus stop, staring at the pavement to hide his face.

She moved, checking over her shoulder with every step.

Ten seconds later, she was at the front door of the church. Danny had left it unlocked. She removed the firearm from inside her coat, pointed it in front of her, and stepped inside.

Danny didn’t hesitate. He ran, lightfooted, across the road, then approached the entrance to the church a little more slowly. His every sense was on high alert. If she reappeared, the shock of seeing him could very well cause her to discharge her firearm.

But she didn’t reappear. The door was slightly ajar. Wide enough for Danny to slip sideways through the gap.

It took a fraction of a second to take everything in.

A shard of moonlight cut into the church hall from the broken window at the far end. It illuminated Victoria Atkinson, who was standing in the middle of the hall. She was ten metres from Danny, her back towards him, and was staring at the mobile phone that was still on the floor where he had left it. Even though it was no longer raining outside, there was still a dripping sound from the far end. It echoed around the empty room.

Atkinson’s shoulder’s seemed hunched. Somehow exhausted. Even so, Danny could tell that she was holding out the weapon – a snubnose of some type – in front of her as she stared down at the mobile phone. She was a hunted animal, trapped in a corner. He needed to disarm her as quickly as possible.

He knew it wouldn’t be a problem.

He covered the distance in a couple of seconds. Only when he was five metres away did Atkinson become aware of someone else in the hall. She spun round, her gun hand wavering dangerously, shock and panic on her face. Danny plunged towards her, knocking the weapon from her hand before she had time to fire it. It clattered noisily as it went spinning across the floor, while Atkinson collapsed into an inelegant heap.

Danny stood over her. She looked up.

The colour drained from her face. Her eyes widened. Confusion.

Then she closed them.

‘I didn’t have a choice,’ she whispered.

‘Everyone has a choice,’ Danny said. His eyes flickered towards the gun. It was lying five metres away. He stepped over and picked it up. An S&W 9mm snubnose revolver. It seemed improbable that someone like Victoria even knew how to use it. But he wasn’t going to take the chance.

‘Get to your feet,’ he said.

Atkinson didn’t move. ‘If you’re going to kill me,’ she whispered, ‘please don’t do it here. Let me disappear. I don’t want my children to see my body.’

Danny felt a click of satisfaction. He knew that everyone had a pressure point. Atkinson had just artlessly revealed hers. He raised the snubnose and pointed it at her. ‘I’ll post your fucking corpse through their bedroom window if you don’t start talking.’

She stared at him in horror. ‘I
didn’t
have a choice,’ she whispered.

Silence. Just the drip-dripping of water. And outside, the sound of a car passing. Danny stepped towards the mobile phone and pulled the battery from the back. Then he flung it back to the floor. It clattered noisily. He gave Atkinson a long, uncomfortable stare, but didn’t say anything.

‘He threatened to kill my family,’ she whispered.

A pause.

‘Abu Ra’id?’

Atkinson shook her head. ‘Of course not,’ she breathed. She buried her head in her hands for a moment. When she looked up again, her face was tear-strewn. Mascara was smeared round her eyes. Danny almost felt sorry for her.

Almost.

‘Gengerov?’ he asked quietly.

The name seemed to go through Victoria like an electric shock.

‘You know?’ she whispered.

Danny kept a blank face. He couldn’t let her see how little he actually
did
know.

‘Abu Ra’id told you?’

No response.

‘I was young,’ Atkinson breathed. ‘I didn’t understand. Pyotr Gengerov helped me with my Russian so that I could get my Moscow posting.’

She closed her eyes again. ‘We fell in love,’ she said. ‘At least, I fell in love. That’s all. I didn’t
think
I was being indiscreet.’

‘What did you tell him?’

‘Nothing,’ Atkinson said. ‘Really, nothing. Nothing important. But it was enough. Enough for him to . . .’ She buried her head in her hands again.

‘To blackmail you?’ Danny said.

She nodded.

‘How long have you been feeding him information?’

A pause.

‘Twenty years,’ she said. ‘He said he would reveal everything if I didn’t keep the intelligence coming. I’d have gone to prison for the rest of my life. And I had . . . I had
children
by then . . .’

She dissolved into helpless tears. Danny paced round her. He knew there was more to come.

‘I thought I was getting away with it,’ she said once her crying had subsided a little. ‘But then . . . Syria happened. Relations between us and the Russians hit rock bottom. And he wanted . . .’ She tried to steady herself with a deep breath. ‘They wanted names. The names of all British personnel operating undercover in the Middle East and Africa.’

Danny felt himself frowning. He wondered how many of his mates’ names would be on a list like that.

‘And?’ he asked, his voice dangerously quiet.

She shook her head. ‘I couldn’t do it,’ she whispered. ‘I swear, I just couldn’t do it. But he insisted. He’d always kept my identity secret from Moscow, but now he said if I didn’t give him a list of names, he’d reveal my name to Moscow
and
London. And he threatened to harm my family. I believed him. You don’t know what he’s like. I
truly
believed him.’

Another pause.

‘So you decided to kill him,’ Danny said.

Bloodshot eyes looked back at him. ‘It was for my children.’ Her voice cracked as she spoke.

‘And Abu Ra’id?’ Danny said.

She bowed her head again. ‘He was my best weapon,’ she said.

‘What do you mean?’

A flash of irritation crossed her face. ‘Why do you think nobody could ever deport him? He was working for
us
! Our highest-ranking double agent.’

Danny blinked heavily. ‘
What?
’

‘Only a handful of us knew about it. Me, the head of MI6. Four or five others in the security services. The PM, of course. Abu Ra’id was going to deliver the whole network. Or so we thought. He was permitted to orchestrate minor acts of terrorism to keep his cover, but nothing like Paddington or the Trocadero.
Nothing
like that.’