To Kill a Grey Man (6 page)

The file was opened and Keith could see Surge’s picture.
 
“Okay, this guy is a legend.
 
An unarmed combat specialist, he teaches the
top operatives, commandos,
special forces
, spooks, CIA,
MI5, you name it.
 
He was definitely not a
man to get into a fight with.”

“However, a few years ago he overstepped the mark in
Ireland and got beaten to within an inch of his life.
 
Since then he has only had one professional
job, last year helping to avenge The Assassin’s wife that also ended up with him
in hospital, so he is not what he was but still looks dangerous.”

“Each day he runs through the town where he lives and up
through this circuit,” John Sea explained, pointing at a map.
 
“Have a few armed men meet him, take him down
an alley and cut his throat.
 
Make it
looks like a mugging gone wrong if you can, I do not want any witnesses.
 
Okay?”

“Sure,” said Keith.
 
“Easy.
 
No problem.
 
I have a really good team that can handle
this, lots of experience, top pros.”

“Okay.
 
Now for Collins,
The
Assassin.
 
This
guy is really dangerous.
 
He has been killing
people for thirty plus years and is a master, possibly the best there ever was.
 
His
favourite
weapon is a pistol but apparently he is very deadly with any weapon.
 
He never misses.”

“However, he has become old and a creature of habit which
is always dangerous. He lives here,” John Sea said pointing to a picture of an old,
detached house in the south of London with a front garden surrounded by a tall
hedge and a narrow path to the front door.

“Get a team of three together, your best.
 
One in the car, one shooter, one back up.
 
Do not fuck about with this one.
 
I want heavy artillery.
 
Get him to open the door then blow him away.
 
Nothing left.”

“No problem.
 
And you
mentioned a kidnap?”

“Collins, The Assassin, has a son, Jonathan, who works in
the family shop,” said John Sea.
 
“Last
year he ran around with The Grey Man and might have some information about the
security infrastructure The Grey Man was working on.
 
I am very interested in learning more.
 
Also if anything goes wrong I want leverage.
 
I do not want those bastards hunting me
without an edge.
 
I want you personally
to take care of this.
 
Take a couple of
the boys, go to the shop and persuade this little shit to take a ride with you.
 
Bring him here for a chat.
 
Get this all in place and let me know when
you are ready to go.
 
Keep discreet eyes
on the Surgeon and The Assassin and keep all channels open.
 
Okay?”

“What about everything else that’s going on?”

“Trust me.
 
This
takes precedence over everything.
 
One
wrong move and there is nothing else.”

“Budget?”
Keith
asked.

“Unlimited.
 
Whatever it takes.”

Chapter 10

Surveillance

Keith Poole woke the next morning in his large apartment at the golf
course overlooking the eighteenth hole.
 
The room was tastefully furnished in a modern steel and glass way, with
a Scandinavian theme, minimalist, with low furniture and clean lines.
 
There was no feeling of home or warmth.
 
There were no personal effects anywhere in
the room.
 
It was smart, functional and had
the atmosphere of a hotel suite.

He worked out for an hour in his personal gym then showered, dressed
and sat at the large writing table with a big cup of coffee and thought the
problem through.
 
As an enforcer, his job
was pretty simple.
 
It was a lot of
intimidation, threats and occasional violence.
 
Mainly it was fronting John Sea’s
organisation
and that with his height, build and reputation was enough to ensure most
villains complied with whatever he wanted.
 
Only a few times in his career had he killed anyone and those he had
done with his bare hands.
 
He had done a
stint in the army so had familiarity with weapons but in the last ten years had
not had cause to carry one nor did he like them.
 
Not to mention the fact that anyone in the UK
found in possession of a firearm would face prison so it was normally not worth
the risk.

He went through his assets.
 
His
overall command was a small army of thugs and petty criminals but this job was
too
specialised
for most of them.
 
He then worked through his close team, his
day to day support, ticking them off one by one, all good guys, big and tough
and ready to do what was asked of them.

He had two guys that John Sea had recommended a few years ago that
had never let him down.
 
Ex-spooks, these
were the watchers and information gathers and were an easy slot to scope out The
Assassin and The Surgeon.

Dispensing with The Surgeon, he felt was easy.
 
An over-the-hill tough guy should not be too
hard to stop no matter what his reputation was.
 
There were two brothers, born in Russia but who spoke perfect English
and worked on this kind of thing.
 
Big
and powerful, individually they were highly dangerous, together they were
unbeatable.
 
They normally worked with a
little Scottish guy who was great with a knife.
 
As a team they were very reliable.

“These three for one middle-aged has-been was more than enough,”
thought Keith.

For The Assassin it was a little more complex.
 
He was undoubtedly armed and it could get
very dangerous.
 
Keith knew a couple of
guys who freelanced, ex- terrorists who liked money more than the cause.
 
He would put feelers out tomorrow.
 
They lived in Marseille, France.
 
They could fly in, do the job and disappear.

The biggest worry was The Grey Man.
 
Storming a house with all guns blazing was a difficult thing, even
though it looked easy in the movies.
 
The
chances of shooting and killing each other were high.
 
It had to be mercenaries and they were not
easy to find, especially ones willing to work in the UK, also time was not on
his side.

He first called on the ex-spooks, both men in their early thirties
who had worked for MI6, both were too young to have worked with Surge and
neither had met Collins.
 
They were small,
quiet men and went by the names of Ian and Damien.
 
Ian was fit, five foot seven inches tall,
dressed in jeans, sweatshirt and trainers with blonde hair in a modern haircut
which was short and flicked up.
 
Damien
was overweight, five foot five inches, balding, dressed in a shiny grey suit
with an open collar on what looked to be a slightly dirty white shirt.

Keith gave them the brief.
 
“Look,”
he said.
 
“I do not want a full twenty
four hour surveillance.
 
What I need is
times in the day when we know where these guys will be so we can take them out.
 
I suggest you take a target each and then
swap.
 
These are highly experienced
marks, if you stay around too long they will spot you, so after a few hours in,
change place.
 
Okay?”

“No problem,” said Ian and Damien almost in sync.

“The boy was no problem,” Keith thought.
 
He worked in the shop all day.
 
No need for surveillance.
 
Keith would turn up with another big man and
together they would walk him to the car.
 
Easy.

Chapter 11

Eyes on

Surge was pulling pints in his pub which is what he did most nights.
 
The regular customers had got used to him,
probably the least talkative landlord in England, but he smiled and nodded and
served a good pint and there was something strong and dependable about him that
people liked.

For his part, the pub was always busy as was he, so he did not have
to make the small talk that he hated, but he was always listening in and
enjoyed the stories that he overheard about the village and the people all living
such nice, safe, ordinary decent lives.

This particular night, Mel the busman sat at the bar.
 
A big, round, friendly man in his late
forties who always held court and had a big circle of friends.
 
Everyone knew Mel and he knew everyone, a
nice ordinary guy.
 
He often stopped in
town between bus stops on his route to pick up the old village residents who
struggled to make it to the regular bus stops, even though it was totally
against the health and safety rules and everyone knew their kids were safe if
he was on the late run from the city as he took no nonsense from intoxicated
youngsters.

He ordered a large whisky which was rare as Mel was a beer man.
 
Surge could see that Mel was very upset, his
eyes were red and a wave of sadness hung over him.
 
He was joined by his best friend Mickey, a
scaffolder
, who could see Mel was not his usual self.

“What’s wrong?” Mickey asked.

“I have just had a run in with those three big bastards who are selling
drugs.
 
They got on the bus without
paying and when I went to have a word, two of them grabbed me and the other
knocked me about,” said Mel.

“Oh no.
 
You have got to go to the police.
 
They can’t do that.”

“I would,” said Mel.
 
“But
that big bastard knows where I live.
 
He
threatened to come round and rape Kathy and slit my little girls’ throats and
they are high enough on drugs to do that so I am going to have to suck it up
and do nothing.”

He turned to Surge who had overheard everything.

“More whisky, please,” he said, setting his glass down on the
counter.
 
“And make them large ones.”

In the corner, Ian sat reading his paper.
 
He had been in the pub for a couple of hours
after sitting in a cafe earlier where he had seen Surge go for his early
morning run.
 
He was careful not to study
Surge too closely using peripheral vision as much as possible.
 
These kind of operations were dangerous, normally
in surveillance you would have a team of ten to fifteen operatives all
constantly ringing the changes, clothes, hair, glasses, shoes, etc so Ian felt
quite exposed, but this so called ‘Surgeon’ looked easy to him, just an average
height average looking, fit middle-aged barman.
 
In fact he did not look like a player.
 
Not once during his morning run was he looking round or doubling back to
see if he was being followed and definitely he had no interest in anyone coming
into the pub. When Ian had bought his drink, he hardly looked at him or said a
word. Legends are built on reputations which are built on stories.
 
Ian bet all this guy’s stories
were behind him.
 
Thirty more minutes then he would swap with
Damien.

At 7.00 pm Surge went upstairs into his study and picked up the
phone The Grey Man had given him on their last mission.
 
Whilst it looked ordinary, it was secure and
untraceable and represented the latest in high tech equipment for special
services operatives.
 
He pushed the speed
dial to get Collins.

“Hi,” said his friend.
 
“I was
just about to call you.”

“How many have you got?” Surge asked, as usual not bothering with the
pleasantries.
 

“Two little ones,” said Collins.
 
“Fatty and Skinny.”

“I have the same two,” said Surge.
 
“One who is quite good and one a joke, who
will not look at me no matter how much I get in his face.”

 
“Amateurs?” said
Collins.

“No.
 
I don’t think,”
so replied Surge.
 
“They have definitely
had some training.
 
I would think ex-operatives
or new boys, but they both should go on a refresher course.
 
Any ideas why we are being
watched?”

“No,” said Collins.
 
“Unless we are part of a training exercise but if so I think we would
have been advised.
 
Let me talk to The
Grey Man and see if he can dig up the Who and the Why.”

“Okay,” said Surge.
 
“I have CCTV behind the bar which is a little more high tech than the
norm.
 
It can take HD stills.
 
I will email you their photographs.
 
If you send them on, The Grey Man might be
able to get a match.”

Collins waited for the photos to come through and then
called The Grey Man.
 
It took a few
seconds longer as The Grey Man liked to have anyone contacting him bounced from
server to server to ensure no one could trace where he was.

“Hello,” said The Grey Man.
 
“Unusual for you to call me!”

“Hi,” said Collins.
 
“Look I am sorry to bother you but is anyone trying to trail you?”

“No,” replied The Grey Man confidently.
 
“If there was, I would know about it.
 
Why do you ask?”

“Surge and I have two watchers.
 
I am emailing you their photographs.”

“Okay.
 
“Give me 30
minutes and I will call you back.”

As soon as he put down the phone The Grey Man ran through a
security protocol.
 
All sensors, CCTV and
microphones were checked.
 
He also ran
diagnostics on the sniffers placed on his computer.
 
They can check anyone trying to find him
electronically.
 
Lastly he sent a message
to The Firm to have a team come in within twenty four hours to sweep within
three miles of his base for any new or strange goings on.

He fed the photographs into his system and then linked with
GCHQ, Interpol and a dozen other police and security databases.
 
Almost immediately, Ian Colley and Damien
Carr popped up.
 
Both had done small
stints at MI6, both had been washed out.
 
In the real world they had set themselves up as private detectives
taking on work which mainly involved divorces and bad bill payers.
 
No prison records but both were under
suspicion for dodgy work.
 
Most
interestingly they both now worked part time for John Sea.
 
He ran a search on John Sea and then called
Collins back.

“We may have a problem.”

“Oh, why?
said
Collins.

“Your watchers work for John Sea.”

 
“What have Surge and
I done to upset him?”

“Nothing as far as I am can see,” said The Grey Man.
 
“And why would he go after you when he knows
I would rip him apart if you were attacked.”

“Very strange.”

“Well, here are some more bits of information to worry over,”
said The Grey Man.
 
“John Sea had a
meeting with Sir Thomas Robertson ten days ago in London that C did not declare
officially which is highly irregular and Sir Thomas gave John Sea a brief
case.
 
No one knows what it contained.”

“How do you know that?” Collins asked.

“Sir Thomas has been watched by me ever since he came onto
my radar.
 
A very dangerous man and here
is another thing.
 
One of John Sea’s men,
the one they call The Enforcer, is trying to hire mercenaries.”

“
Merc’s
to take Surge and me out would
be ridiculous.
 
A simple hit squad would
be much easier and Sir Thomas has more than enough clout to get that done
internally.”

“The two things may have nothing to do with you being
watched but it all looks very odd.
 
Be
very careful,” said The Grey Man.
 
“Put
Surge on alert and I will keep digging.”

“Okay, see you soon,” said Collins and rang off.