Deep Cover (The Trigger Man Book 2), page 18
Jogging to the bus station, Pierce purchased two tickets, one for Pretoria via Johannesburg, the other for Port Elizabeth on the coast. If the police later checked, they would have two trails to follow, tying up their resources. The Joburg-Pretoria bus was the first to depart, in just under twenty minutes, so he would take that route. An overnight journey, but that suited him.
After purchasing a cap at a street stall, Pierce found a bar next to the bus station, where he ordered a beer. On the television hung above the caged street-facing window, a SABC News report from the South African Broadcasting Corporation played on today’s shooting. Nine dead, including seven officers killed during police efforts to apprehend two white men responsible for an assassination attempt at the CTICC. A fake-smiling Rupert Ponsonby flashed up on the screen with words denoting him as the victim of the failed assassination attempt. The police had killed one assassin during the ordeal. The other had escaped and was described as muscular, Caucasian, with ginger hair and a matching beard. Alex Trager. There was no mention of anyone matching Pierce’s description in the report.
Pierce felt conflicted. On the one hand, he had caused chaos for Trager’s and Walsh’s conspiracy, but his activities had led to the death of innocent people. He’d not known that Trager and Terzic were in Cape Town hunting him until he had overheard Walsh and Ponsonby’s conversation at the last possible moment to act. If he’d had time, he would have implemented a different strategy.
Pierce sipped his beer and silently honoured the dead. Then he stepped onto the bus just before it pulled out of the terminal and drove east.
He sat towards the back and pulled down his new cap.
He wondered again if his path of revenge was worth it, considering the carnage he had caused…
Pierce shook that thought from his mind. Innocents had died, but he hadn’t pulled the trigger on those deaths. That blood and the violence of their actions were on Trager’s and Terzic’s hands. Not his.
Pierce finished his beer. It was the only taste in his mouth that he savoured.
36
Western Cape, South Africa
It was four hours into his bus journey along the N1 Highway before Mark Pierce finally relaxed. If the police hadn’t stopped and searched the bus by now, they never would. Perhaps this was because the South African authorities had never pursued him, never suspecting his involvement in the killings.
He again studied the cabin of the modern coach. It featured an onboard toilet, comfortable seats and air-conditioning for the passengers who could afford this level of comfort in their travels, who were a mixture of locals and tourists of many ethnicities. The young man next to him snored lightly, his head resting on his jacket pressed up against the glass window. They hadn’t talked during the long drive to Johannesburg, which suited Pierce. Everything about this setting was perfect because Pierce didn’t stand out.
He wore his headphones so no one would talk to him, and kept his cap low, then locked his phone, leaned back in his seat and tried to sleep.
He couldn’t.
He checked his hands. They weren’t shaking now when it wouldn’t have mattered if they did. The randomness of the tremors coming and going infuriated him.
Pierce had experienced mild tremors for many years now, but after a grenade blast in Yemen during a mission behind enemy lines, his shakes had worsened. Too much alcohol and a lack of sleep aggravated his condition, so he avoided both as much as possible — no easy accomplishment in his “profession”. The only means by which he could control his tremors was by stilling his mind, through meditation and clearing his head of all thought. A technique that wasn’t always practical and didn’t always produce results, like today hanging by a rope off the edge of a skyscraper. The tremors had almost killed him in Cape Town. They might kill him in the future.
He clenched his hand into a fist and stared out the window. The landscape was rolling hills with flat scrub grass and cloudless horizons. Behind the bus, the setting sun turned the sky and landscapes into hues of reds, oranges, purples and blues.
His cell phone pinged. A conversation had recorded on Rupert Ponsonby’s phone and was ready for listening.
Pierce pressed play.
“Fucking hell! You took your time calling back!” Ponsonby yelled down the phone line. “I almost fucking died today!”
“It’s only been nine minutes since I got your message. Get a grip.”
Hearing Idris Walsh’s voice again, his body broke out in a sweat as every muscle tensed.
He imagined pressing a pistol against Walsh’s forehead and squeezing the trigger…
He imagined Walsh begging for his life, and Pierce denying the spymaster his wish…
He imagined… much more…
Shaking his head to clear away his self-destructive thoughts, Pierce checked to ensure he’d backed up the conversation on a cloud computing account he had established earlier, which he had not done with the last conversation while distracted with the sniper rifle in his hand. With this conversation backed up, he continued listening.
“No, you get a grip! First someone tries to assassinate me! Then Angola’s Minister of Natural Resources, Odel Nunes, visits me in hospital, where he fucking threatens me if I don’t pay him his regular five-million monthly pay cheque. I tell him I will, and then he has the gall to break my fucking finger!”
Back in his days with the CIA, Pierce had studied Minister Nunes’s file, and recalled several facts on the corrupt politician. Since taking on his ministerial role three years ago, the kleptomaniac had already squandered over half a billion dollars from the Angolan Treasury and transferred the money into several private bank accounts in Europe and the Caribbean, and he had done so without the president knowing about it. Arguing with Ponsonby over a five-million-dollar payment plan seemed trivial compared to the wealth and power Nunes controlled, but that was always the way with greedy people. No amount of money was ever enough.
It was a comforting thought, however, that Pierce wasn’t the only individual currently complicating Ponsonby’s life.
He listened as Ponsonby rattled on in his high-pitched whine. “I’m supposed to be in partnership with Nunes on the diamond marine mining operation I run in his country, not cowering to him!”
Walsh sighed. “You’re hyperventilating. Calm yourself, or you’ll pass out.”
“I’m fucking calm, okay! Just fucking tell me what’s going on? And how did your foot soldiers fail to protect me? You should see my arm. The big fucking ‘problem’ almost killed me.”
“No, he didn’t.”
“Didn’t what?”
“If he wanted you dead, he wouldn’t have missed,” Walsh growled. “His ploy was to scare you.”
“Scare me? How the hell does he even know about my involvement?”
Walsh sighed. “The more pressing problem is our Aussie friends. The corporal is dead. Shot in the streets while evading Cape Town first-response officers, which means they have a body that they can identify. They’ll soon know he is a close associate of our sergeant, and with a bit of smart intelligence work, it will all link back to us.”
“Can’t you clean it up?”
“No, I fucking can’t just clean it up.”
“Fuck!”
“Yes. Fuck!” Walsh cleared his throat. “However, the sergeant escaped. But it seems our ‘problem’ cleverly framed him as your assassin, forcing him to flee South Africa and compromising our operation further.”
“Fuck, again!” Ponsonby’s breaths were fast and shallow. “But we did get the second nuclear device placed in the South African location.”
“Yes, at least we did that.”
“Good! But you need to deal with this bloody fall guy that he was supposed to be, once and for all. If he found me in Cape Town, God knows what else he knows.”
“I agree. Get yourself to Bayanga. I’ll send word to the others. This scheme of making the world believe he’s the real nuclear terrorist is at risk of falling apart. We can’t risk any further discussions that aren’t face to face, because the ‘problem’ may have tapped into us.”
“Tapped? You mean he’s spying on us?”
“It’s a possibility.” Walsh sounded as if he now ground his teeth together. “He must have outside help. I tracked him to two of his assets aiding him in Azerbaijan, who killed themselves before I got to them, but there could be others. And another thing. I saw your presentation, when it was uploaded on the diamond conference’s website.”
Ponsonby’s voice suddenly became lighter. “Oh, did you like it?”
“I don’t fucking care about it, but you spent too much time on tailings dams. I mean way too much time.”
“So what?”
“Because it’s the key to the success of our operations, that’s why. Shut the fuck up about them from now on.”
“Oh, shit!”
“What now?”
“There’s one more thing I should have mentioned…”
“What?” Annoyance grew in Walsh’s voice.
Ponsonby mumbled, “I…”
“What are you not telling me?”
“It’s probably nothing, but I misplaced my cell phone at the diamond conference for perhaps ten minutes.”
“WHAT?”
“Don’t worry, I got it back.”
“Don’t you ever fucking listen to me about safe operating protocols? Get rid of it, now!”
“But it’s a Galaxy Note10. Platinum plated—”
“I don’t fucking care. It’s compromised. Everything you’ve just said to me, someone’s just heard it. That someone was probably the man who took a shot at you earlier today. Don’t contact me again until you are in the CAR.”
The line went dead.
Pierce checked his app. The signal on Ponsonby’s phone was no longer active. Pierce would receive no further intelligence from this source, but he had everything he needed now. The conversation had provided Pierce with a telling piece of intelligence that Ponsonby and Walsh weren’t as cashed up as Pierce had first suspected. Financial woes must strain their relationship, and the three and a half million Pierce had taken from them would fuel that tension further.
He also had a rough timetable for when all the players who had wronged him would converge in the same location.
But Walsh would also guess that Pierce would come for him there and lay a trap.
That wouldn’t stop Pierce though, just make him more careful.
He felt sad to hear the news that Valeriya and Yebin were dead, they were good people, but they had, like Pierce, chosen to play in this dangerous world of global espionage, so they knew the risks like Pierce did. He would drink a toast to them when this was all over and honour their memories.
It seemed fitting now that he should release the intel package Valeriya and Yebin had prepared for him in Baku. With a few quick commands, he sent the data pack to thirty reputable news organisations across the globe, via an anonymous email account that, if scrutinised, would lead back to the US Department of Justice.
It was time for his own brand of covert reckoning.
He closed his eyes and finally slept, allowing his subconscious dreaming-self to plan out his next moves and ask himself how Rachel Zang factored into this conspiracy.
He hoped in a good way.
37
London, United Kingdom
Idris Walsh nursed his lemonade in the tiny booth towards the back of the busy pub. The décor was modern but tired, and the patrons were a mixture of twenty-something professionals out after work with colleagues, or retirees out for a cheap meal and a glass of house wine.
A muscular but weathered man approached, carrying two pints of lager. He sat diagonally to Walsh so he too could watch the patrons, pushed one pint over to Walsh and raised the other in a toast. “Cheers, my friend.”
Walsh looked the man up and down. His thick South African accent was noticeable even with only a few words spoken.
When Walsh didn’t drink, the man consumed a mouthful of his amber liquid, then licked his lips. “Ah, been a while since I’ve enjoyed a good old-fashioned English beer with a friend from the old days.”
Walsh raised his glass and clinked the South African’s drink, then put his glass down again. “Cheers.”
“You’re not drinking?”
“No. Bullet wound, which ended with a liver transplant. Can’t ever fucking drink again.” Walsh was not a man prone to letting his emotions control him, but with Mark Pierce, he could no longer hold the rage in check that ate at him constantly. He imagined throttling the Trigger Man’s throat until oxygen starvation killed him.
“Well, in that case…” The South African reached over, took Walsh’s glass and drank from it. “I won’t let this one go to waste.”
“Thanks for coming, Kurt.”
The fifty-something soldier Walsh had called to this impromptu meeting went by the name Kurt Krige. He sported a close-cropped beard, while the sandy hair he’d grown out was thinning, a sight Walsh had never expected to see. A former Recces special forces soldier, Krige had turned private contractor many decades ago, and the hard life he had led showed in the creases and leathery texture of his skin. Walsh and Krige had a history that went back to those distant contracting days. They had killed men together, operated for weeks as a team behind enemy lines, and saved each other’s lives more often than either had bothered to count. Nobody knew Walsh better than Krige did, but the reverse was also true. Walsh trusted no one in the world, but if forced to choose a single individual to trust, it would be Kurt Krige.
“It’s been a while, Idris. Surprised me when you called wanting a hit taken out on two beautiful women.”
“Your man failed.”
“And drowned in the Thames for his troubles. I told you I couldn’t organise a quality kill in that short a time.”
Walsh nodded and stared into his lemonade. “It sent a message.”
“So even after that botched operation, you still wanted to meet?” When Walsh didn’t answer, Krige said, “You still with the CIA?”
Walsh watched the crowds to see if anyone showed any interest in their conversation. Nobody did. “Not for much longer.”
Krige chuckled. “I can’t believe you actually scored a high-ranking position with them after all those fucked-up years together killing rebels in the Congo jungles as mercenaries.”
Walsh shrugged and said nothing.
“Finally saved up enough money to properly support your sister. How’s she doing, by the way?”
Walsh cringed as images of a staircase came to mind. “Nothing changes there, Kurt.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.” Krige drank more beer while he rubbed an itch at the back of his neck. “So, you can’t drink to drown your sorrows. Idris, you are one unlucky bastard.”
The crease-lines around Walsh’s eyes grew darker as he squinted. “Actually, Kurt, I’m on the verge of securing the mother lode of fucking money.”
Krige sat straighter. His eyes stopped watching the crowds and focused only on Walsh. “Why are you telling me this? You’re not one prone to sharing! And truth be told, neither am I.” Then realisation spread across his face. “But you’ll only secure this mother lode of money through my help?”
Walsh resisted the urge to nod, for Krige had guessed correctly. “The people I’m working with, they’re about to fuck up my scheme spectacularly. I need your help with a few jobs to get that scheme, and my people, back on track.”
“I’m listening.”
“Enjoying life in rainy, miserable England?”
Krige shrugged. “Not much to do here for a man with my skills. Africa, the Middle East and Central America is where I operate best. But until the money runs out, England suits me fine for a vacation. I gamble and enjoy whores to pass the time. The whores I know in Soho, in particular, keep me content.”
“How about returning to Africa?”
Krige shrugged. “Depends on the scenario and the pay cheque.”
Walsh grinned. “I’m talking protection duty.”
“Protection duty? That doesn’t sound like you.”
“It’s what I’m offering.”
“You going to elaborate?”
“Let’s say it involves a diamond mining ship.”
His face flushed, Krige took a long sip of his beer and didn’t stop until he finished the first glass.
“It will be like the old days, Kurt. If my scheme goes south, I need an exit plan. That exit plan involves you, me, and the old team being on that ship. But don’t worry, if the scheme fails, I have a contingency in place to ensure you and I get rich, at least.”
“And if your scheme doesn’t go south?”
Walsh drank from his, until now, untouched glass of lemonade, and decided it wasn’t too bad a substitute for a proper drink. “I’ll make you an investor in my original scheme. We’ll make so much money, the exit plan payout will look like small change.”
Krige leaned back and rested his arm on the chair next to his. “Sounds too good to be true. What is it you’re not telling me?”
“Lots. Actually. But nothing changes there. Are you in or not?”
38
After a night of frantic activity, Zang returned to Jaya’s home just before dawn, exhausted and buzzed on too much coffee. She couldn’t rest yet. There was still much to do. Before she stepped inside, however, she made a quick call on the burner phone she had secured earlier, reported in, then erased the call.
Yesterday’s battle had been to save Mackenzie Summerfield’s life. The bullet had nicked a major artery in the former analyst’s arm, which had caused her to lose a lot of blood. Being a universal donor, Zang had transfused a significant quantity of her own blood into Summerfield’s veins, saving her life.
Many hours later, when Summerfield had been stabilised and Zang could give no more blood, she disappeared, saying she needed to clean up a few loose ends, and would return within twenty-four hours. Jaya had looked less than impressed, knowing that she might soon have a dead body on her hands and no means to dispose of it if Zang didn’t return. But Zang had returned, and Mackenzie Summerfield had survived.
