Alex King 18.The Enemy, page 1
part #18 of Alex King Series
The Enemy
A P Bateman
Copyright © 2023 by A P Bateman
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
For Clair, Summer and Lewis
Thank you for all the fun
Also by A P Bateman
The Alex King Series
The Contract Man
Lies and Retribution
Shadows of Good Friday
The Five
Reaper
Stormbound
Breakout
From the Shadows
Rogue
The Asset
Last Man Standing
Hunter Killer
The Congo Contract
Dead Man Walking
Sovereign State
Kingmaker
Untouchable
The Enemy
The Rob Stone Series
The Ares Virus
The Town
The Island
Stone Cold
DI Grant
Vice
Taken
Standalone Novel
Never Go Back
Short Stories
The Perfect Murder?
Atonement
Further details of these titles can be found at:
www.apbateman.com
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Author’s Note
Chapter One
The empty bullet casing bounced on the hard slate flooring and rolled all the way to the skirting board, where it came to rest in time with the man falling heavily to the floor. King stared at the man, lost momentarily in the sight of the third ‘eye’ that had blinked open in the centre of his forehead the moment he had pulled the trigger. Black and gaping. He could observe shards of bone and brain matter, but for a moment, he glimpsed the polished slate flooring underneath, until blood filled the void, swelled, and ebbed out from underneath the body like a flooding river breaking its banks.
King wobbled, a sudden wave of exhaustion washing over him. There was blood pooling on the floor at his feet. It was a different shade than that of the dead man’s blood in front of him. Darker, thicker. He had not registered the second gunshot, but he knew that the man’s bullet had hit his liver, and he was aware of a warm sensation running down his waist and right leg, but not enough warmth to ease the sudden chill in his bones. He glanced at the gun in his hand, a flicker of smoke wafting from the muzzle, the noise of the gunshot still filling his ears. He dropped the weapon, the instinct to fight and survive that he had experienced and honed over the years strangely absent. He couldn’t give up. Or could he? There had always been a reason to fight, to win to survive. Ego, duty, love, or revenge. He had experienced them all in their delicious, raw, ugly, and infectious entities, but as he looked over to where Caroline lay, bloody and eerily still, he could not think of a reason to go on. Windless sails flagging loose in a doldrum, no drive or momentum to move him onwards.
He tried to shift his feet, but there was a lack of connection, and his body swayed, his legs failing to catch up with the movement and he fell beside Caroline and reached for her hand. It was still warm and soft. He pulled her towards him, but there was little strength left in him and as he rolled onto his back, staring at the flickering light above him, he wondered if it had all been worth it. Not just the mission, but his entire existence. Because here, at what he realised was the end, not much of it made any sense at all.
Chapter Two
Arlington, Virginia
Two months earlier
Newman had hung back. Funerals were a family’s affair, even if many of those family members had not truly known the man they had just buried. Friends and work colleagues usually had a fairer insight. The tearful mourners mourned, colleagues paid their respects and distant family members stood awkwardly, strangely at odds in the congregation as a sense of duty had bought them here, and little more.
The air was cold. Autumn finally here, although it was called fall in these parts. Maple, sycamore, and oak leaves fell lazily to the ground on the still air, adding to the dry leaf matter that had been recently blown from the neatly mown paths. The sky was azure and clear, contrails intersecting, planes heading to all points, their passengers ignorant and oblivious of the man lying in the ground forty-thousand feet below them. Unaware how many lives his actions had saved. Newman yearned to be on one of them. Anywhere but here, anywhere but in his new deskbound role in the CIA.
Newman waited for the family to leave. There was talk of a wake back at Robert Lefkowitz’s home, but from the way it was mentioned, Newman recognised that it would be a strict family and close friend affair. Certainly, Newman had cared for his former boss, and he had been shaped into the role of protégé, with the veteran director being somewhat of a mentor, but the two men had not been friends. Newman had taken the missions that the gnarled old spy had given him to the utmost of his abilities, and he had seen the man’s deterioration over the years, the cancer finally catching up with him three weeks ago, thus officially ending Newman’s field career. That, and the half-dozen high velocity rounds from an assault rifle on his last operation in Switzerland.
He shifted his weight and was glad of the walking cane as he stepped forward and paid his own, private respect at the graveside. Yet to be filled in, ‘Old Glory’ had been folded and presented to Lefkowitz’s widow, and the dark, highly polished mahogany coffin lid looked as lustred as polished onyx in the early afternoon light. Newman bowed his head and prayed.
“He liked you…”
Newman opened his eyes and faced the source of the voice. She was in her thirties, wore dark Ray-Ban sunglasses with tortoise shell frames, and a cream headscarf hid all but glimpses of her dark brown hair. Newman could tell that she was attractive, despite the merest of her features being visible. “I’m sorry, are you a member of the family?”
She shook her head. In her hand was a single red rose, and she dropped it onto the coffin lid and stared into the grave for a few seconds before facing Newman. “No. I’m just like you. One of his closest field agents.” She paused. “The kind that the senate and the select committees will never know about.”
Newman bristled slightly. He thought he had the old man’s ear. Thought he was his go-to guy. But of course, the man would have more like Newman, it only made sense. He cursed his own arrogance and stupidity. “He’ll be missed,” Newman mused.
“By some,” she replied. “I’m Georgia Scott. No need to introduce yourself, I know who you are. I know quite a bit about you, actually.”
“You have me at a loss…”
She shrugged. “Did Lefkowitz ever mention Iron Fist to you?”
“No,” Newman replied, but even if the man had, he would not have told her. He wasn’t ready to trust her yet.
She nodded sagely. “I get it,” she replied. “I wouldn’t have expected you to divulge anything.” She slipped her hand inside her coat, noticed that Newman’s own right hand was inside his jacket pocket, and the pocket had lifted slightly and in her direction. “You don’t want to do that,” she said quietly.
“No?”
“No.” She paused, easing her hand back out and bringing a manilla envelope with it. “Your tailor may well be able to stitch the bullet hole, but the scorch marks will undoubtedly ruin the fabric…” She passed the envelope to him and said, “Read it at home. Do not tell anyone about this encounter and memorise the report before destroying it.”
“What the hell is the Iron Fist, anyway?” Newman asked somewhat dubiously.
“Robert wanted you in on this.”
Robert. Newman had never been on first name terms with the man. “He did?”
Georgia Scott nodded. “It’s all in there,” she replied. “As are my contact details. Once again, read and destroy.”
She turned and walked away before Newman could protest or question her further. He watched her walk, her figure cutting a fine shape even in such a thick winter coat. A black Lincoln SUV timed it perfectly, slowing to a split second stop on the access road usually reserved for hearses and funeral processions, in which time she slid into the front seat and was whisked away, the windows heavily tinted and hiding both her and the driver from view.
Newman opened the envelope and glanced inside.
Clearance A1(Yankee White)
Content Report: The Iron Fist
Threat Level: RED 1
He slipped the contact sheet back inside and tucked the envelope inside his jacket. “Goodbye, Sir,” he said quietly. “And God speed.” And, as he walked across the grass steadying himself with his walking cane, he reflected on the life of the man who had steered the CIA for so long, and the fact that as a man so close to the end, he had wanted Newman for at least one more assignment.
Chapter Three
Istanbul
Death stayed with you. A constant and unwanted companion, always ready to remind you of its cold inevitability. But more than that, it leeched into your soul. The more you wanted to forget, the more it wove its way into every fibre of your being. Or at least, that was what Ahmadi had come to think. And for the past three months, he had spent much time thinking about it. Closing his eyes only brought their images closer and clearer to him, and he found himself always searching for a distraction to quell the pain. His faith would not allow him drink, and he envied those who could lose themselves, if only fleetingly, in a bottle. It must have been like an anaesthetic, a sleeping drug and a temporary eraser combined – a welcome antidote to the crushing aura of grief – but one he knew that would only perpetuate the purgatory that the death of a loved one sentenced you to.
Ahmadi rolled onto his side; sleep having evaded him for yet another tiresome night. He had pictured their bodies throughout the early hours. Bloody, brutally disfigured with dry, staring eyes remaining open as life had left their bodies. He closed his eyes tightly, willing the images to leave him be. And here they were, as regular as clockwork, tormenting him again. Night upon sleepless night. Ahmadi got out of bed and picked up his cigarettes and lighter as he padded across the room and stared naked out of the window onto the street below. Lighting a cigarette and tossing the packet and the lighter onto the coffee table, he appreciated the calm it gave him, and reasoned that he would soon have his vengeance. He may never get to look into the eyes of his tormentor, but he would strike a million-fold on the establishment who sentenced them to death, merely by association.
Ahmadi dressed quickly and picked up a handful of items from the coffee table in the middle of the room. Mobile phone – switched off and without one of the five SIM cards he used in it – as well as his gold Dunhill lighter, cigarettes, wallet, and the tiny derringer pistol he was accustomed to carrying. The stainless steel glinted in the light, the mother of pearl grips lustred a hundred shades of white and grey. He opened the action, tilted the over and under double barrels upwards and inserted two .38 rounds. Hollow points and soft lead for maximum damage. The weapon was quite useless at ranges of over thirty feet, but he only ever intended to use it when he could see the flicker of uncertainty in his victim’s eyes and hear them take their final breath.
Downstairs, the hotel breakfast buffet yielded pastries, breads and fruit with yogurt and honey. He ignored the offering and settled on a triple espresso. He sipped the coffee and picked up a newspaper from the pile at reception and took a window seat overlooking the Bosporus. The water was black and choppy. It reminded him of the Caspian Sea where he had taken his summers as a child. A stagnated land-locked sea with constant shipping which was somehow home to the very best sturgeon and the world’s finest caviar to the north. He reflected how he had played in the gentle waves on the shore, the sand strangely sticking to the skin and difficult to brush off at the end of the day. He had taken his wife and son there to show them where he had spent his summers, neither impressed having been used to the glorious Mediterranean and Red Sea resorts. The memory stung, as did any negative experience that the dark recesses of his mind would conjure, but that was also the effect of grief. It was unrealistic that only golden memories should remain, but to recount the negative seemed a slur on their memory.
Newspaper headlines scanned, coffee ingested, and Ahmadi stepped outside and hailed a taxi. He made the driver take a devious route, then when he was dropped off, he paid and walked several hundred metres before hailing another taxi. He repeated another three times, ever mindful that he should have a tail and that the murdering bastards from British intelligence should have him in their sights now that they had taken everything from him. His final taxi dropped him at the train station where he bought a ticket in cash for the district of Icmeler but crossed the platform and stepped off and got into the rear of a beaten-up Citroën. The driver said nothing as he whisked him away, crossed the freight tracks and took a route through the backstreets and under a series of bridges and flyovers. As they reached the halfway point in a short tunnel, the Citroën stopped beside a stationary black Mercedes facing the other way and Ahmadi stepped out and got into the back, the Citroën continuing northwards, the Mercedes now heading south.
“We are quite safe,” the man beside him said. He was a large, unconditioned man of fifty and what little hair remained had been styled in a comical combover and greased in place for good measure. “Even if you were followed by a drone, that switch was as smooth as my mistress’ unmentionable…”
And yet, you mentioned it… thought Ahmadi. He had no time for crudeness, and nor for adultery. For him, a man and a woman’s relationship were sacrosanct, and anyone bragging about the sexual aspect usually fell short in that department. How he wished he could hold his beloved Alya, yearned to feel her breath on him, hear her laugh, hear her pleasurable moans as they made love. He thought of the man beside him bragging about his mistress, casually devaluing his marriage to a virtual stranger, and he wanted to smash the man’s head against the glass beside him.
“She has a friend…” the man said casually. “I could give you her number, as you are all alone in the city…” He paused. “A very accommodating young woman with a voracious sexual appetite, or so I am told…”
“How far to the complex?” Ahmadi asked, ignoring the man’s vulgarity, and leaving him in no doubt that the topic was no longer up for discussion.
“Ten minutes, give or take,” the man replied dejectedly.
“Good,” replied Ahmadi.
“I am Karim…” the man offered.
“I already know this.”
“I am to aid you while you are in Turkey.”
Ahmadi shrugged like it meant nothing to him. “I know all about you, and I know all about your lifestyle,” he said curtly. “And, if I may, I will give you some advice…”
“Please, go ahead,” Karim replied, for there was nothing else he could do. Ahmadi’s reputation was legendary, and he was at the man’s beck and call.
“I was not asking for your permission,” Ahmadi told him tersely. “The General expects discipline and a certain decorum from his soldiers. Your army days may be over, and the battlefield has undoubtedly changed, but while you serve him, you are still considered to be one of his soldiers. I will not report your lifestyle, but you will sever your ties with your whore immediately, and you will put the effort you waste on this Jezebel into your marriage. Pillow talk is dangerous. No mistress ever sleeps with just one master. Your lifestyle jeopardises our entire operation. If you do not end this affair, then I will find her and I will kill her… do you understand?”
