Last Light (4 page)

On his left hand he wore a wedding ring. I'd never seen a picture of his wife in his office, and I didn't know if he had children. In fact, I really hoped he didn't or if he did, that they looked like their mother.

Producing his mobile, the Yes Man came off the threshold and moved to the right of the doorway as he finished dialling. He looked up and nodded hello to somebody out of my field of view, then gave a wave to them and pointed at the mobile to show his intentions.

I watched him listen to the ringing tone, keeping his back against the wall so that we could check the tie. His hair was greying, or it would have been if he'd left it alone but he'd been at the Grecian 2000, and I was catching more than a hint of copper. It complemented his complexion very well indeed. I felt myself grinning.

A young waiter came up to him with a tray of full glasses, but was waved away as he continued with his call. The Yes Man didn't drink or smoke. He was a bornagain Christian, Scientologist, something like that, or one of the happy-clappy bands. I'd never really bothered to find out, in case he tried to recruit me and I found myself saying yes. And I didn't set much store by it. If the Yes Man discovered C was a Sikh, he'd turn up at work in a turban.

His conversation over, the phone got shut down, and he walked towards the river.

As he wove and sidestepped through the crowd he bounced slightly on the balls of his feet, as if trying to give himself extra height. Watching his progress, I gently undid the tripod restraining clips so I could swivel the binos and continue to follow him if I needed to.

He passed the two PR women, who looked pretty pleased with themselves. Each had a phone and a cigarette in one hand and a glass of self-congratulatory champagne in the other. He passed the cameraman, who was now busy taking group shots with Big Ben in the background for the Latin folks back home. Little did he know that he was a couple of chimes short of a world exclusive.

The Yes Man side-stepped the photo session and continued to go left, still towards the river. He stopped eventually by a group of maybe ten men, gathered in a wide, informal circle. I could see some of their faces, but not all, as they talked, drank or waited for refills from the staff buzzing around them. Two were white-eyes, and I could see four or five Latino faces turned towards the river.

The older of the two white-eyes smiled at the Yes Man and shook his hand warmly.

He then began to introduce his new Latin friends.

This had to be it. One of these was the target. I looked at their well-fed faces as they smiled politely and shook the Yes Man's hand.

I could feel my forehead leaking sweat as I concentrated on who he was shaking hands with, knowing that I couldn't afford to miss the target ID, and at the same time not too sure if the Yes Man was up to the job.

I'd assumed they were all South Americans, but as one of their number turned I saw, in profile, that he was Chinese. He was talk-show-host neat, in his fifties, taller than the Yes Man, and with more hair. Why he was part of a South American delegation was a mystery to me, but I wasn't going to lose any sleep over it. I concentrated on how he was greeted. It was a non-event, just a normal handshake. The Chinaman, who obviously spoke English, then introduced a smaller guy to his right, who had his back to me. The Yes Man moved towards him, and then, as they shook, he placed his left hand on the small guy's shoulder.

I hated to admit it, but he was doing an excellent job. He even started to swing the target round so he faced the river, pointing out the London Eye and the bridges either side of Parliament.

The target was also part Chinese and I had to double-take because he couldn't have been more than sixteen or seventeen years old. He was wearing a smart blazer with a white shirt and blue tie, the sort of boy any parent would want their daughter to date. He looked happy, exuberant even, grinning at everyone and joining in the conversation as he turned back into the circle with the Yes Man.

I got a feeling that I was in worse trouble than I'd thought.

FOUR

I forced myself to cut away. Fuck it, I'd worry about all that on the flight to the States.

The conversation on the terrace carried on as the Yes Man said his goodbyes to the group, waved at another, and moved out of my field of view. He wouldn't be leaving yet that would be suspicious he just didn't want to be near the boy when we dropped him.

Seconds later, I had three bulbs burning below me. The snipers were waiting for those three command tones to buzz gently in their ear.

It didn't feel right but reflexes took over. I flicked the shaving cream top from the box and positioned my thumbs over the two press els

I was about to press when all three lights went out within a split second of each other.

I got back on to the binos, just with my right eye, thumbs ready over the press els The group was moving en masse from left to right. I should have been concentrating on the bulbs but I wanted to see. The Chinaman's arm was around the boy's shoulders it must have been his son as they approached a smaller group of Latinos who were attacking a table laden with food.

A bulb lit up: Sniper Three was confident of taking the shot,

aiming slightly ahead of his point of aim so that when he fired the boy would walk into the path of the round.

The bulb stayed lit as they stopped at the table with the other group of Latinos, getting stuck into the vol-au-vents. The boy was at the rear of the group and I could just ping glimpses of his navy blazer through the crowd.

Bulb three died.

I was having doubts, I didn't know why, and tried to get a grip. What did I care? If it was a straight choice between his life and mine there'd be no question. What was happening in my head was totally unprofessional, and totally ridiculous.

I gave myself a good mental slapping. Any more of this shit and I'd end up hugging trees and doing voluntary work for Oxfam.

The only thing I should be doing was focusing on the box. What was happening on the terrace shouldn't matter to me any more but I couldn't seem to stop myself looking at the boy through the binos.

Number Two's bulb came up. She must have found his earlobe to aim at.

Then the boy moved towards the table, breaking through the crowd. He started to help himself to some food, looking back at his dad to check if he wanted anything.

All three lights now burned. How could they not?

I watched him pick at the stuff on the silver trays, sniffing one canape and deciding to give it a miss. I studied his shiny young face as he wondered what would best complement his half-drunk glass of Coke.

All bulbs were still lit as I looked through the binos. He was exposed, bunging peanuts down his neck.

Come on! Get on with the fucking thing!

I couldn't believe it. My thumbs just wouldn't move.

In that instant, my plan switched to screwing up the shoot and finding something to blame it on. I couldn't stop myself.

The snipers wouldn't know who else had a sight picture, and it wasn't as if we were all going to get together and have a debrief over coffee the next morning.

I'd take my chances with the Yes Man.

The boy moved back into the crowd, towards his dad. I could just about make out his shoulder through the crowd.

The three lights went out simultaneously. Then Two's came back on. This woman wasn't giving up on her target. I guessed she wasn't a mother after all.

Three seconds later it went out. Wrong or right, now was my time to act.

I pushed the send press el once with my thumb, keeping my eyes glued on the boy.

Then I pressed it again, and at the same time hit the detonation button. The third time, I pushed just on the send press el

The explosion the other side of the Thames was like a massive, prolonged clap of thunder. I watched the boy and everyone around him react to the detonation instead of doing what I'd planned for him.

The shock-wave crossed the river and rattled my window. As I listened to its last rumblings reverberate around the streets of Whitehall, the screams of the tourists below me took over. I concentrated on the boy as his father bustled him towards the door.

As panic broke out on the terrace, the photographer was in a frenzy to get the shots that would pay off his mortgage. Then the Yes Man came into view and stood beside the PR women, who were helping people back inside. He had a concerned look on his face, which had nothing to do with the explosion and everything to do with seeing the target alive and being dragged to safety. The boy disappeared though the door and others followed, but the Yes Man still didn't help. Instead he looked up and across the river at me. It was weird. He didn't know exactly where I was in the building, but I felt as if he was looking straight into my eyes.

I was going to be in a world of shit about this, and knew I had to have a really good story for him. But not today: it was time to head for Waterloo. My Eurostar left in an hour and five. The snipers would now be standing at their crossover point their exit door from a contaminated area to a decontaminated area peeling off their outer layers of clothing, throwing them into their sports bags, but leaving their gloves on until totally clear of the Portakabin. The weapons, binos and lunch-boxes remained in place, as did the hide.

With speed but not haste, I leant over to the window and opened it a fraction to retrieve the antennas. The clamour from people outside was now much louder than the explosion had been. There were shouts of fear and confusion from men, women and children at embankment level. Vehicles on the bridge had braked to a halt and pedestrians were rooted to the spot as the cloud of black smoke billowed over the rooftop of the MoD building.

I closed the window and left them to it, taking down the tripod for the binos and packing away all my gear as quickly as I could. I needed to get that train.

Once all the kit was back in the bag, including the shaving-foam cap, I put the dirty coffee mug, Wayne's World coaster and telephone back exactly where they'd been before I'd cleared the desktop to make room for the binos and lunch-box, using the Polaroid I'd taken as a reference. I checked the general area pictures I'd taken as soon as I broke in. Maybe the net curtain wasn't exactly as it should have been, or a chair had been moved a foot or so to the right. It wasn't superstition. Details like that are important. I'd known something as simple as a mouse mat out of place leading to an operator being compromised.

My brain started to bang against my skull. There was something strange about what I had seen outside. I hadn't been clever enough to notice, but my unconscious had. I had learnt the hard way that these feelings should never be ignored.

I looked back out of the window and it hit me in an instant. Instead of looking at the column of smoke to my right, the crowd's attention was on the hospital to my left. They were looking towards the sniper positions, listening to the dull thud of six or seven short, sharp, single shots ... There were more screams below the window, mixed with the wail of fast approaching police sirens.

I opened my window as far as it would go and pushed the net curtain aside, sticking out my head and looking left, towards the hospital. A fleet of police cars and vans with flashing lights had been abandoned along the embankment, just short of the sniper positions, their doors left open. At the same time I saw uniforms hastily organizing a cordon.

This was wrong. This was very, very wrong. The event I was witnessing had been planned and prepared for. The frenzy of police activity down there was far too organized to be a spur-of-the-moment reaction to an explosion a few minutes earlier.

We had been stitched up.

Three more shots were fired, followed by a short pause, then another two. Then, from further along the riverbank, I heard the heavy thuds of a flash bang going off inside a building. They were hitting Number Three's position.

Adrenaline jolted through my body. It'd be my turn soon.

I slammed the window down. My mind raced. Apart from me, the only person who knew the exact sniper positions was the Yes Man, because he needed to position the target well enough for it to be identified. But he didn't know precisely where I was going to be, because I hadn't known myself. Technically, I didn't even have to have eyes on target, I just needed to have com ms with the snipers.

But he knew enough. Messing up the shoot was the least of my worries now.

FIVE

Helicopters were now rattling overhead and police sirens were going ape shit in the street as I closed the door gently behind me and moved out into the wide, brightly lit corridor.

My Timberlands squeaked on the highly polished stone floor as I headed towards the fire-exit door at the far end, maybe sixty metres away, forcing myself not to quicken my pace. I had to stay in control. I couldn't afford to make any more mistakes. There might be a time to run, but it wasn't yet.

There was a turning to the right about twenty metres further down, which led to the stairwell that would take me to the ground floor. I reached it, turned and froze. Between me and the stairwell was a wall of two-metre-high black ballistic shields. Behind them were maybe a dozen police in full black assault gear, weapon barrels pointing out at me through the gaps in the shields, blue assault helmets and visors glinting in the strip-lighting.

"STAND STILL! STAND STILL!"

It was time to run like the wind. I squeaked on my heels and lunged the couple of paces back into the main corridor, heading for the fire exit, just willing myself to hit that crossbar to freedom.

As I zeroed in on the exit door, the corridor ahead filled with more black shields and the noise of boots on stone. They held the line like Roman centurions. The last couple emerged from the offices on either side, their weapons pointing at me at far too close a range for my liking.

"STAND STILL! STAND STILL NOW!"

Coming to a halt, I dropped the bag to the floor and put my hands in the air.

"Not armed!" I yelled. 'I'm weapons free! Weapons free!"

There are times when it's an advantage just to admit to yourself that you're in the shit, and this was one of them. I just hoped these were real police. If I wasn't a threat, then in theory they shouldn't drop me.