Luc: A Spy Thriller (20 page)

And then his phone had rung. And as I walked away in the late evening gloom, I too felt a little cloudy. Because the ringtone on his mobile phone was a Rolling Stones tune. And that was twice I’d heard a Stones tune for a ringtone in only a few days.

The other time was in Ray Mortlake’s office.

CHAPTER FORTY

The large moon sent wide strips of bright light into the safe house’s kitchen. I opened the fridge door and crouched down to get a proper look at its contents.

I made up a cold turkey and pickle sandwich and sat at the kitchen table with the sandwich and a cup of tea.

I realised I was probably being daft. Rolling Stones ringtones are probably quite common. It wasn’t even the same song.

I finished the sandwich and took a swig of the hot tea.

There was the sound of movement in the hall and then Lucia came padding into the kitchen in her bare feet. She was wearing a long grey T-shirt that came down to her thighs. Her hair was a bit fluffy. She’d obviously just got up.

‘Lucia. How are you?’

Lucia put an arm on my shoulder and then took the seat at the table next to mine.

She nodded, but didn’t say anything.

The moonlight shone on her beautiful face. I don’t know if it was the moonlight itself, but she looked a little washed out.

‘Have you been able to get much sleep?’ I asked her.

‘I’ve tried. What have you been doing?’

‘I had a meeting with your Minister for National Security. Julio Falcao.’

‘Right.’ She nodded.

‘He’s arranged for me to meet one of their terrorism experts.’

The PPS had rung me about an hour ago. He said Dr Almeira would see me at his offices for half an hour before he started his work. I was to be there at eight thirty tomorrow morning.

‘How have you been, Lucia?’ I asked again.

‘Bearing up. I miss Granddad, obviously.’

Her dark soulful eyes looked strained.

She pulled her knees up to her chest, her bare heels resting on the cushion of the seat, and wrapped her arms around her shins. She dropped her chin.

‘He’d be proud of you,’ I said. ‘The way you’ve handled yourself.’

She shook her head. ‘He shouldn’t have to be. He should be here.’ She gently bit into her right knee. ‘He should be here.’

I nodded. I didn’t say anything.

‘Hold me,’ she said, still gazing down.

I stood and hugged her to me and she held me tightly and buried her cheek softly into my stomach.

‘Would you like me to go with you to meet the expert tomorrow?’ she asked sleepily.

‘No,’ I said. ‘I’ll be fine.’

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

The scientist was based in an office suite in the western district of Belize City. I drove through the early morning rush hour traffic and occasionally took sips from the carton of lime juice I’d bought from one of the stalls. I didn’t want to be late for this meeting. Unfortunately, the traffic at this hour was quite heavy and rambunctious and the street signs were a little on the
subtle
side, making progress towards where I wanted to go a bit of a hit and miss affair.

The airwaves that morning were dominated by a breaking news story. The Prime Minister, Neville Dutton, had called a leadership election. He said there had been no alternative. It was a Back Me or Sack Me move. The initial snap polls, however, didn’t look good for him.

I turned the corner into Dell Road and eventually found the office. A white painted, three-storey building with ornate wrought iron balconies. I parked the Toyota a street away. When I walked inside it was about eight twenty-five.

I strolled up to a reception desk. It had a framed photograph of Belize’s famous underwater Blue Hole on the wall behind. I asked to speak to Dr Almeira and a woman of about fifty, in thick black-framed spectacles, showed me to a nearby office and told me that Dr Almeira wouldn’t keep me long.

‘He’s a busy man, but he does like an audience to speak to about his subject,’ she confided to me with a smile.

It was a non-descript office. A desk, two filing cabinets, a print of the Los Angeles skyline at night on the wall. I noticed there were two shelves lined with binders of the security and intelligence publication
Janes
.

About two minutes later the door opened and in walked a young, athletic looking man with piercing grey eyes. It wasn’t really what I expected Dr Almeira to look like. He stepped to one side and stood to the right of the door. Another athletic young man followed him in, and he stood to the left of the door. There was a momentary pause and then a large round man strolled in. He was wearing a navy blue blazer and cream coloured trousers. He had a bland expression on his face and it didn’t change when he saw me.

It was Ernesto Giuttieri.

And I was a dead man.

***

‘Sit down,’ Giuttieri said to me. He had a quiet voice, with a faint trace of a lisp.

Through the frosted glass I could see that two more of his men stood outside. Then the blinds were closed and the door was locked.

It would be a waste of time and energy to resist on the small points. I sat down on the chair in front of the desk.

Falcao…

So the Rolling Stones ringtone
had
been a sign. I almost felt sick.

‘Where’s Dr Almeira?’ I asked.

‘I’m not aware of anybody who even cares,’ Giuttieri said lazily.

‘Does he exist?’

‘Not quite sure of the purpose of the question.’

I nodded. ‘I’ll flesh it out a bit. Is Dr Almeira a real person - .’

‘Stop speaking,’ Giuttieri said in a conversational tone.

‘Or is he just a fabrication of you and Falcao’s imagination?’

Giuttieri casually glanced at the second of his thugs. The thug strode rapidly towards me and drove his fist into the side of my face. Everything went white and then black and I collapsed onto the carpet. My collar was grabbed and I was dragged upwards and I was thrown back onto the chair, my head swimming, the pain almost touchable.

‘Do as I say.’ Giuttieri. Conversational.

I sat up in my seat, arched my back. I took a deep breath.

‘This is an office building,’ I said. ‘I could make a lot of noise.’

‘Like a little girl?’ He nodded. ‘Go ahead. Scream the place down. If you think it would take long for my men to silence you.’

‘What do you want?’ I said.

‘Good. I want to know what you know.’

‘About what?’

‘But not here.’

I didn’t even see a glance, but before I knew it the first thug was sticking a needle into my neck.

I tried to hit him, swipe his hands away, but I couldn’t move. And then the floor swung up to meet me and everything dissolved into a black nothing.

***

A blinding light. I tried to shield my eyes but I couldn’t move my arms. Or my head. I shut my eyes tight, but that did little to block out the penetrating ray.

I was lying on my back and I could now feel the straps on my legs and arms and across my forehead. I could see nothing else but the white light.

Nobody spoke. Was I alone?

So it was Falcao. I imagine that was how he was able to stop the riots so professionally. He or Mortlake had paid the ringleaders. And when on their orders the ringleaders disappeared, most of the rest followed. It would probably be easy to mop up the remnants.

I tensed. I thought I heard somebody breathing.

Behind and to the right of me.

‘Anybody there?’ I asked.

Nothing. Silence.

So, Falcao and Giuttieri.

They had said on the radio that Julio Falcao was the front runner to win this leadership election. If Falcao was in the pay of Giuttieri that meant that if Falcao
was
to win, Giuttieri would have the Prime Minister of the country in his pocket.

He could do virtually anything he wanted.

Breathing. I definitely heard breathing.

Someone else was in here with me. Watching me.

‘Are you going to say anything?’ I asked loudly.

No response.

My heart was racing and I realised I was tensing my left buttock and thigh.

The fear of the unknown. Where was I? Who was that? What was he going to
do
?

I tried to relax. Control my breathing. I thought back to Falcao. I didn’t know the ins and outs of Belize politics. But my guess would be that if it was discovered that Falcao, their great warrior for justice, had been on the take all along, it would, on top of everything else that had happened, be fairly shattering for the public.

Who could they turn to? Who could they trust?

There was definitely breathing. And it definitely seemed louder. Or were my ears more attuned to the sound now? Either way, I could distinctly hear it. Low breathing, like a man’s. Behind me, over there on the right.

It was a muffled sort of breathing. Almost as if the person…as if they were wearing some sort of mask.

Why did he need a mask?

So I didn’t see his face? Or was it to protect his face?

From what?

I suddenly had visions of a butcher wearing a face mask, hacking away at flesh. Blood splattering the room.

My blood.

God, this is what he wants. This is the reason for the silence. So that my mind can imagine the worst.

Well it was doing that all right. Difficult bloody not - .

‘My name is Arkan Szolche.’

It was a deep, quiet, slow, muffled voice. He was definitely wearing a mask. ‘My role is to obtain information that Senor Giuttieri requires. I will do it precisely and scientifically. There will be pain. There will be a great deal of pain. Eventually you will accede.’

He let the words sink in. Allowed me time to conjure up the worst possibilities.

Why did he tell me his name? Because he could? Because he knew he was safe to do so? Because the surest thing in the whole world was that I wasn’t going to get out of this to be able tell anyone?

It was coming, he was telling me. The pain was on its way. And there was no way out once it arrived.

Oh god…let me be - .

Darkness.

The bright light had been extinguished and I was left with bright spots in front of my eyes.

We were alone in the dark, Szolche and I.

He didn’t say anything. For the hundredth time.

Amid the blanket blackness his soft, masked breathing returned.

Szolche was playing with my nerves, stretching them out. He wanted them to snap.

Clang
. Sounded like something metal clanging in a metal bowl.

Then a loud crunching, grating noise, as if something was moving above me.

I realised that this must be the same man who had worked on Wilson.

Giuttieri’s go-to man for torture.

I lightly gasped because a droplet of something, felt like water, had fallen on my face.

The bright light snapped back on and I suddenly found I was staring at a man’s head, hanging about two feet above my face. There was no body attached to it. He had been a man of about sixty, wispy white hair around the sides of his bald head. The brown skin now a pallid brownish grey.

I clamped my eyes and mouth shut as blood dripped from the severed neck onto my face and throat.

‘Forgive me,’ Szolche said slowly. ‘I heard you wished to speak to Dr Almeira. No? Never mind.’

The light disappeared again and darkness returned, along with the swimming white spots.

Then the clanking, grating noise above me crunched into life again. The splattering of the blood stopped.

Silence.

I gritted my teeth. I couldn’t allow myself to react to Almeira’s fate. That could come later.

The silence was the worst thing though. It allowed me time to think. I didn’t want to think. My mind was - .

The metal clanking in the bowl.

Then the grating, clanking movement above.

Then the light snapped on again.

I gasped loudly, almost yelled.

I was staring at the severed head of a woman.

‘You can always book another appointment,’ Szolche said in a slow, bored drawl.

I recognised her immediately. I’d only seen her about half an hour earlier. It was the middle aged woman with the thick black spectacles who had shown me into Dr Almeira’s room. Gruesomely, she still had the spectacles on, as if nothing was wrong. Behind her, on the ceiling, I could now faintly see some sort of metal track.

A watery feeling in my stomach. Rising up my throat. I wanted to vomit. I could see and feel her blood dripping onto me.