Outlaw, page 10
‘If you are here, if you are with them –’ he nodded towards Saito and Grace – ‘what does that mean? Rubicon is in ruins. The Combine gutted it.’ He shook his head and a sudden, wry bark of laughter escaped him. ‘We are what remains . . . les fantômes.’
‘There are other survivors from Rubicon’s Special Conditions Division,’ noted Saito. ‘Dane and Keyes, perhaps two or three others. Glovkonin has invested significant resources in the search for them, but to no avail. They have proven remarkably proficient at concealing themselves.’
‘We need to find them,’ said Solomon.
Delancort studied his former employer, measuring him for anything that could have been a lie or a misdirection.
‘How do you know that these two are not manipulating you?’ He gestured towards Saito and Grace. ‘These are the soldiers of our enemies. How can you ask me to trust them?’
‘Another good point,’ said Grace, with a smirk. ‘I wouldn’t trust me.’
‘I do not,’ said Solomon, and he placed a scarred hand on Delancort’s shoulder again. ‘Henri, you are the conscience that kept me in check. I have always had faith in you. I ask you now, give me a measure of that in return.’ He nodded to himself. ‘I came here to get you out of this mire, to repay you.’
‘Where can we go?’ Delancort shook his head. It was hard to push back the bleak tide that had overwhelmed him. ‘What can we do?’
‘We will do what we have always done.’ Solomon showed a smile. ‘Seek justice.’
SIX
Sochi was the last point on the map before Russia hit the water, a busy resort town on the northern shores of the Black Sea that extended up and down the coast. Encompassing hotels, cafes and bars along the warm reaches of the seafront, the town seemed slightly displaced, as if it were a decade out of sync with resorts of similar character down on the Mediterranean.
Dating back to the age of the Tsars, Sochi’s charms and temperate weather had always been a draw for those with the money to enjoy it. Post-Revolution, in the Soviet era it became the holiday home for the elite of the Communist Party, before transitioning after the 1990s into a place where the oligarchs and the people who wanted to be them came to summer. Then the 2014 Winter Olympics had opened Sochi up in new ways, and not all of them for the better. Endeavours both political and criminal flourished there, even after the athletes had gone home with their medals. The remains of the sports complex built for the games – the ice dome, the skating palace, the stadium and the rest – still stood along the line of the stony beach. They were monuments to Russian enterprise, but exactly what kind of enterprise was open to debate.
Marc glanced up at the open-roofed shape of the Fisht Olympic Stadium as he walked by, adjusting his sunglasses to hide the fact that he was checking his whereabouts for any potential tails. Seeing nothing untoward, he kept moving, idly drumming his fingers on his thigh as he walked towards the nexus of the complex.
The area was busy with people, tourists and locals rubbing shoulders with the travelling army of sports fans that had come to temporarily colonise the town for the race. Sochi was alive with activity, as the clock ticked down to the start of the latest heat in the Veloce Cup Championship, an international challenge series where high-performance single-seater powerboats raced against one another along shoreline circuits.
Out on the water, Marc could see lines of drum-shaped inflatable marker buoys and the tall flags of the starting line bobbing in the gentle swell. Overhead, a big Bo 105 helicopter in international orange made lazy sweeps back and forth, as the camera crew on board captured footage for internet live-streams and the giant repeater screens erected along the waterfront. The gathering crowds waved at the helicopter as it buzzed above them like a gigantic bee, and Marc automatically turned his head as the camera’s eye swept over him, pulling down the peak of his cap to hide his face.
A handful of the craft were already on the water, going through qualifying time trials to fix their starting positions for the race proper. Low-slung and aerodynamic in form, the racers looked more like segments of aircraft wings than boats, and they left stark white wakes behind them as they shrieked past the crowd-line. Each brightly coloured powerboat – neon green, flame red, electric blue – was adorned with a patchwork of sponsorship decals.
The crowd gasped around him and Marc saw one of the racers lift a pontoon out of the waves as it made a turn too steeply. For a second, the boat looked as if it might flip over, but then the craft’s velocity bled off and it settled again. A scattering of applause congratulated the driver on their skill, but it was half-hearted. Marc had the impression that the crowd hoped to see some fire along with the thunder.
He threaded through the attendees towards the race village. It was a sprawling campus of temporary pergolas, pop-up buildings and maintenance tents erected in a cluster around the dockside and the wedding-cake form of the modernist Hotel Marine Luxe. The new hotel faced directly on to the water on a plaque of reclaimed land, built in the brief post-Olympic boom. Its contemporary, curved lines enclosed hundreds of high-end suites, a casino and a conference centre, the latter of which had been temporarily taken over by the race event. The Marine Luxe was an obvious attempt to outdo the Zhemchuzhina, Sochi’s famous Soviet-style landmark hotel, and from what Marc had learned, much of the cash to make that happen had come from sources close to Giovanni Da Silvio. Small wonder, then, that the Italian had made the Marine Luxe the hub for this heat of the race he sponsored.
Marc approached a gateway that divided the public spaces from the race operations area, and pulled a slim plastic pass from inside his shirt, letting it dangle freely on the end of a lanyard. The pass identified him as a member of the press and it granted limited access beyond the first layer of security. A bored-looking young woman in a deliberately revealing dress waved him through with a fake smile, and he made his way past temporary boathouses set up along the line of the docks.
‘Through the first gate, no problems,’ he said quietly, almost swallowing the words.
A wireless radio bead in his ear picked up the comment through bone induction and a moment later Kara’s voice buzzed back at him.
‘Understood, Active. Overwatch, do you have eyes yet?’
Lucy responded immediately, and Marc resisted the urge to look up.
‘Negative, no angle on Active at this time.’
The smell of engines lingered in the air. Marc glanced into the team enclosures as he passed them. Most were empty, with their craft already out on the waves for the qualifying runs, but a few of the dart-shaped racers were up on supports, their technical crews busy making last-minute adjustments before they hit the water. He watched a swarm of mechanics fitting hatches back to a boat painted with the stars and stripes of the American flag, getting it ready to go. They showed the same kind of controlled chaotic energy as the pit crews of a Formula 1 Grand Prix, except that instead of changing tyres, these people were fitting custom propellers to massive outboard motors.
Banners crackled in the stiff breeze off the sea, the lines of the pennants stretching for the length of the docks. Marc noticed the colours of sponsors from all over the globe, from European concerns like Koastwell GmbH and Hawkeshead, to Riverine Tech from the USA and Australia’s Horizon Integral.
Zack Ridgeway – the garrulous motorsport journalist whose stolen pass now dangled around Marc’s neck – had been more than happy to talk at length about the behind-the-scenes happenings at the Veloce Cup. The night before in a seafront bar, oiled by plentiful vodka and Marc’s winning smile, Ridgeway’s explanations provided a more detailed briefing than Marc could have hoped to get from hours of remote study.
According to the journalist, Da Silvio’s event drew strong interest from the offshore racing community, but the Veloce Cup had to work hard to compete with rival championships based in China and Abu Dhabi. There was talk of corruption, of course. In an arena of professional sport worth millions of dollars, it came as no surprise that there were accusations of dirty tricks and actual inter-team sabotage at previous Veloce meets. In addition, safety did not appear to be a primary concern for the race management, despite their insistence to the contrary. The year before, two drivers had been killed in a collision that still had not been adequately investigated.
‘They like the prospect of some bumps and shunts, a bit of smoke on the water,’ Ridgeway had noted, somewhere around his eighth or ninth shot. ‘The organisers think it makes them look edgy and cool.’
Marc imagined the journalist still sleeping off the alcohol in his hotel room, unaware that his affable drinking companion, who had been so generous with his expense account, had lifted his press pass as they shook hands and went their separate ways. Marc peered at the careworn Cabot dive watch on his wrist. It wouldn’t do to outstay his welcome here. The purpose of this little sortie was to scout the location and confirm what security precautions were in place throughout the Marine Luxe, where Da Silvio currently occupied the Presidential Suite.
He passed another security checkpoint entering the hotel’s conference complex, near the open expanse of an exclusive swimming pool. Marc counted two guards, both craggy-faced no-nonsense types wearing Bluetooth earpieces and wide-cut sports jackets capable of concealing firearms. After signing in under Ridgeway’s name, he pocketed his sunglasses, took a drink from one of the servers orbiting the entrance atrium and pretended to look at his smartphone. In reality, he used the device to pinpoint the locations of the discreet security cameras mounted in the chandeliers and ceiling corners. He logged the data and transmitted it to Kara before moving on.
The conference centre was broken into two sections, half of it given over to administration and race operations, the other a wide, airy lounge that looked towards Sochi proper and up the coastline through floor-to-ceiling windows. Screens showed the feed from cameras on the shore, from drones and the helicopter, but most of the people in the lounge weren’t watching.
The owners and their entourages hung out here, where they could mingle, neck flutes of Cristal and graze off an expensive buffet. The people in the lounge were here to be seen, which made Marc’s job a lot easier. He walked the room, mentally dividing it into sections for each group or clique.
He spotted a cluster of quiet, sullen men with Bratva tattoos visible at the collars of their tailored shirts. Directly opposite them, and as far away as they could be and still be in the same room, he noted the presence of a group of Sicilians in dark Armani suits of similar cut, who were carelessly loud and expressive, as if daring someone to take issue with their boisterous behaviour. The Bratva men stared daggers across the room at them, but the other group pretended not to notice.
Marc walked up to the windows, and looked out over the marina.
‘Smile,’ said Lucy’s voice. ‘This is Overwatch, I have eyes on Active.’
Marc scanned the horizon, looking towards Sochi’s taller buildings framed by the white-capped mountains beyond them, and found the tower block Lucy was using as her perch, about half a kilometre distant. Marc reached up and tapped the peak of his cap in salute. Somewhere up there, the sniper peered back at him through the scope of a high-powered rifle.
‘Safety on, if you don’t mind,’ he muttered.
‘Not my first rodeo, slick,’ she retorted.
Marc nodded to himself. If circumstances evolved to the point where Lucy actually had to pull a trigger, they were beyond any hope of recovery.
‘I have the data packet,’ said Kara. ‘Good take, more please.’
‘Active is moving.’
Marc finished his drink and wandered back towards the restrooms, slowing his pace as he passed near the doors leading into the main operations centre. The nearest security guard had his attention on one of the screens, and the moment Marc knew he was not being observed, he extended his path to the doors and carried on through.
Inside, the ops centre was busy with race technicians and staff talking into headsets, monitoring the second-by-second progression of the powerboats around the track markers. Everyone’s attention was on the front runner, the Koastwell boat with its lightning-flash paint scheme carving sharp turns around the markers.
Marc stood near an idle computer monitor and pretended to watch. Out of sight, he held his smartphone close to the machine’s tower and tapped a tab on the device’s screen. A rectangle of black glass and anodised metal, the phone could have been this year’s latest model, but it was a custom piece of tech carried only by the former members of Rubicon’s Special Conditions Division. The ‘spyPhone’, as Kara had once christened it, was loaded with state-of-the-art intrusion software and near-field systems that could wirelessly interface with most modern computer hardware. Controlled remotely by the hacker, it gave her access to the race control network, injecting a Trojan Horse subroutine into the computers that would let her set a back door for any digital infiltration.
‘Okay, we own it,’ said Kara, after a moment. ‘Active is clear to move on.’
‘Copy.’
Marc noted that some of the technicians had become aware of him, so he exited the ops centre before anyone decided to challenge his presence. Outside, the guard was still engrossed in the qualifying runs, so Marc gave him a wide berth. He found his way into the conference centre’s administration area, which operated with a skeleton staff. Finding another unoccupied workstation, he repeated his trick with the phone.
The second time, Kara’s Trojan program entered the network belonging to the hotel itself, snaking its way into the operating system. In a few hours, the hacker would be able to map the entirety of the Marine Luxe’s digital infrastructure, and with luck, find what the Rubicon team were looking for.
‘Second payload delivered,’ whispered Marc. ‘I’ll do one more sweep and then extract. Mobile, you copy?’
‘Understood.’ Malte spoke up for the first time.
The Finn waited a block away behind the wheel of a blocky UAZ Hunter 4 × 4, ready to pick him up outside the hotel.
Marc made his way back into the conference centre, but two steps into the room he felt a heavy hand on his shoulder.
‘Sir,’ said a thick-accented voice.
Marc turned to find the guard he had previously avoided now towering over him. The man was as broad as he was tall, and radiated a hard, canine energy, his eyes narrow and flinty.
‘You are not allowed in there,’ said the guard. ‘You explain why.’
‘Sorry, chap.’ Marc mimicked Ridgeway’s posh accent and gave a weak smile. ‘Looking for the pisser, you know?’
He could tell immediately that the guard wasn’t buying it. Undercover ops had never really been Marc’s strong suit, and it took all he had not to look nervous. Behind the big man, across the atrium the other members of the security team were reacting to the arrival of a VIP, as a figure in a striking suit came striding into the room.
‘I will need to check pass,’ said the guard, and he lifted his arm to speak into a microphone at his cuff.
The man in the suit swept past, in mid-conversation with a severe-looking Germanic woman holding a bulky digital tablet, and Marc was momentarily startled to make eye contact with none other than Giovanni Da Silvio himself. The Italian barely registered him, but Marc saw an opportunity and he went for it.
‘Signor Da Silvio!’ He called out the Italian’s name and gave him a jaunty wave. The big guard, momentarily wrong-footed by Marc’s action, didn’t stop him as he stepped around and offered his hand. ‘Hello! Zack Ridgeway, from Power Sports Online.’
The Italian automatically accepted the handshake, and that was enough of a signifier to make the guard back off.
‘Indeed. Have we met?’
Marc saw no glint of recognition in Da Silvio’s eyes, and inwardly breathed a sigh of relief.
‘Active, what are you doing in there?’
Kara’s voice crackled in his ear, but Marc ignored it and feigned a smile, putting more distance between himself and the guard.
‘No, no. I believe my editor contacted you about scheduling an interview?’
Marc had no idea if the real Ridgeway’s editor had done anything of the sort, but he had to extract himself from the guard’s attentions and this was the most expedient way to do it. But he had traded one risk for another.
Da Silvio was still walking, and Marc fell in step with him – or at least, he tried to. The Italian’s severe-looking assistant moved to put herself between the two of them the moment the perfunctory handshake finished.
‘Willa?’
The Italian gave the woman a questioning look and Marc saw her fingers dance over the tablet’s touch-sensitive screen.
She pulled up Da Silvio’s itinerary, and he glimpsed flashes of other data panels on the device. Marc recognised the tech – an encrypted digital ‘book’ used by the billionaire’s aide-de-camp to manage his affairs.
Willa looked at Marc and gave a curt shake of the head.
‘We have nothing on our calendar.’
‘Oh.’ Marc looked disappointed. ‘That’s a pity. Perhaps we could find a moment? My readers would be fascinated to hear from the man who has put so much into the Veloce Cup . . .’ He opted for flattery, gambling on Da Silvio’s vanity to keep him from becoming suspicious. ‘We’d love to do a feature on you.’
‘Active, you need to disengage. If he makes you, we’re blown.’ Lucy’s tone was even, but he could tell she was annoyed with him. ‘Back off.’
They were at the red velvet rope of the lounge’s private section now, and Marc had little option but to follow them inside and continue to spin out the lie, or risk discovery. If he didn’t follow through, it would raise suspicion. Da Silvio didn’t seem to notice, however, and the guards let Marc pass. He’d been right to assume that moving in the Italian’s orbit was as good as an access-all-areas badge.
‘That sounds delightful,’ Da Silvio replied, ‘but I’m afraid I can’t speak with you right now, Mr Ridgeway.’ The Italian gave him an indulgent nod and a practised smile. ‘I have an important lunch meeting with one of my colleagues. My assistant will take your details and we’ll see if we can arrange something. Ciao!’
