The Ottoman Conspiracy, page 26
part #3 of Jeff Bradley Series
“They know we’re on to them,” Reason yelled. “They’ve increased speed.”
Reason sped up, and Jeff was having difficulty aiming his weapon. He tightened his grip and pushed the top half of his body through the window. Hands grabbed at his shirt. Barry held him.
Reason veered to the left. Jeff pushed the safety down to the middle position. He needed the rifle on automatic; he didn’t need to aim, just spray the wheels. He dipped the barrel. As Reason closed on the rear wheel, he squeezed the trigger. The weapon bucked in his hand, but he had anticipated that and had aimed low. He held his finger on the trigger and swung the barrel back and forth until the magazine emptied.
The tyre exploded. Shredded rubber ground into the surface of the road as the truck dipped on to the wheel rim. Sparks spat into the air. The out-of-control truck slid sideways and, unable to stop, disappeared over the bank.
Reason slammed her foot on the brake and the Mercedes’s anti-lock-braking sensors worked to maximum capacity, bringing the car to a gentle stop.
Jeff scrambled back inside the car.
“Magazine, Barry.”
A hand appeared holding the metal ammunition container. Jeff changed magazines.
“You lot stay here,” he ordered – not to anyone in particular, but he had meant everyone.
He flung the door open and leaped out in one movement. He cocked the Kalashnikov as he ran. The truck had crashed cab first on to the surface below, and then rolled on to its side. Two men holding weapons stood beside the vehicle. Dazed, but when they heard an avalanche of small stones as Jeff slid down the embankment they reacted instinctively, bringing their weapons to a firing position. Jeff let off two bursts. Their chests exploded and they fell to the ground. The driver climbed out through the window, holding his arms out in front of him in a gesture of surrender. Jeff waved for him to move clear of the vehicle. When he was clear, Jeff gestured for him to lie on the ground. He fell face first and did not look up.
Jeff half turned at the sound of footsteps. Reason stood beside him, her Glock in her hand.
“The Sheriff is in the cab,” Jeff said.
The cab roof hid him from sight. They could not see inside from their position. “I don’t know if he’s conscious or not.”
She touched him on the arm. A gentle squeeze. “Thank you, Jeff. The Sheriff is my business now.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
The truck lay on its side, the passenger door buried in the dirt. Reason inched along until she reached the cab. She leaned forward, far enough to allow her to see in the reflection of the cracked wing mirror that The Sheriff was slumped against the passenger door. Unmoving. She stepped into the open, aimed at the driver’s end of the windscreen and fired off two shots. The screen shattered. She reached round and pushed the Glock between her back and belt. Hands free, she stepped forward, grabbed two fistfuls of the front of The Sheriff’s jacket and dragged him through the shattered windscreen frame and on to the dirt.
She patted him down and, satisfied he had no hidden weapons, stood and looked down on him. With the toe of her boot she pushed against his ribs. The Sheriff stirred. He groaned and rolled on to his back. Eyelids flickered and slowly opened. Confusion transformed into alarm as he saw the sky, then Reason. He scrambled into a sitting position. Reason did not budge.
“You are very persistent. You and your man have rescued your friends. Why are you not driving them to safety? You must know that sooner or later my soldiers will find me?”
Reason bent over. “Still very cocky, aren’t you? Well, okay, I can put up with that at the moment. As long as you answer my questions. I’m looking for two men. Sudanese. Yusef Ahmed and Mohamed Jawari.”
“And I should know these men, how?”
“You have been recruiting soldiers for ISIS and whatever other shit organisations you can make money from, but you personally recruited these two men. I want to know where they are.”
The Sheriff shrugged. “Many have been through my hands. I never know their names or where they come from. No one cares. How would I remember two individuals among so many? It is nonsensical that you think I would.”
“These two men were African. Black Africans. How many Black Africans have you come across? I’m sure their skin colour alone would make them stand out.”
“No. I cannot help you.”
The Sheriff’s eyes flicked to the right and Reason caught it. He was lying.
She straightened.
“You leave me no choice. If you cannot help me, I will hand you over to the authorities.”
Again The Sheriff shrugged. His nonchalance irked Reason.
“What will the Americans do?” he asked. “Put me in jail? I don’t think so. I am not wanted in Iraq. My men are fighting against ISIS. I have American funding. They are my friends. That is why I have kept the hostages alive and my men have been protecting them until it was safe to hand them over to the authorities. I had no control over the kidnapping. This was not me; this was the man you have had contact with, Osman Gashi. It was he who put the hostages in jeopardy. Not me.”
Reason smirked.
“You misunderstand me, Sheriff. I would not take you to the Americans. I’m going to hand you back to the Turkish police. You know them, don’t you? You killed some of their men a short time ago,” Reason said.
The Sheriff’s eyes narrowed. He wiped spittle from the side of his mouth. Reason smiled as his eyes flicked about like those of a wild animal caught in a trap seeking an escape. Right now, his demeanour had switched to dangerous. She pulled her pistol from behind her back and held it by her side ready to swing it on the target if needed. If The Sheriff so much as twitched, she would empty her magazine into him. Then his shoulders sagged. Defeated. Reason had won the first round.
“I’ll ask you again. Do you know where the two men I’m looking for are?”
“Their exact location, no.”
Reason lifted her gun. The Sheriff raised a hand.
“Look, I have no desire to die, so I am not going to lie to you. I have no allegiance to any of these people, and I am not going to get myself killed for them. My men, they are usually shooting at these groups. I got paid for delivering, and that was it. I smuggled them across the border into Syria, and after that they were out of my hands. They could be anywhere now, but they are not here, in Iraq.”
Jeff moved up to stand beside Reason.
“What do you think, Jeff?”
“I’m sorry, Reason, but I think he is telling you the truth. He has no conscience or loyalty to anyone other than himself. He would not risk being killed to save another, especially anyone signing up to join ISIS. They truly are natural enemies.”
He placed a hand on her shoulder. She did not remove it; instead, she placed her free hand on it.
“This is the end of the line, Reason,” Jeff said. “You can’t track them now. It might be they have been killed, or they might be with another ISIS unit somewhere else in Africa or even Asia. Who the hell knows where you might find them?”
Reason looked off into the distance. Her eyes welled. Jeff put his arm around her and she fell into him. She had carried a burden for so long. Vengeance had been her driving force and had kept her family alive in spirit. Now that journey had ended and her vengeance needed to be buried as she had buried her family. She needed to grieve. Jeff knew of the mix of emotions tormenting her; he carried his own ghosts. Faces inside his head he could never erase.
“Time to go home, Reason,” Jeff said. “To the States, and rebuild your life.”
She nodded.
Barry and Bethany had made their way down the bank to join them.
Jeff picked up a Kalashnikov rifle dropped by one of The Sheriff’s men. He removed the magazine and checked it contained bullets. He cocked the rifle. No round flew out. Empty. The magazine reloaded, he cocked the weapon again. Satisfied a round had slid into the chamber, he thrust the Kalashnikov into Barry’s hand. “Keep this trained on The Sheriff. The safety is off and it is set on semi-automatic. You only have to pull the trigger to fire a bullet. Just keep pulling the trigger if you want to fire more rounds. Do you think you can do that if he moves?”
Barry, a hardness in his eyes, said, “I’ve seen him murder innocent people in cold blood. I won’t give it a second thought.”
Jeff patted his shoulder. “Good man.”
The Sheriff nervously licked his lips as Barry set his eyes on him.
Jeff walked to the rear of the upturned truck and unloosed the elastic cord securing the canvas hood. There were a dozen suitcases. He pulled one out. He lay it on the ground and flipped the lock. The lid opened.
Dumbfounded, Jeff stared at the contents.
“Holy crap.”
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
What is it, Jeff? What’s in the suitcase?” Reason asked, as she walked across to join him.
Jeff said, “Take a look. Money. US dollars. The case is full of them.” He reached into the truck, pulled out another case and flicked the lid. “More money. Bundles of one-hundred-dollar notes.”
He turned to The Sheriff.
“What did you do, Sheriff, rob a bank?”
The Sheriff sat stony-faced.
“I wonder how much there is,” Jeff said.
Barry butted in. “A shitload mate. If you count all the cases. One, two, maybe three million dollars. There’s enough here to fund a small army, or buy a bloody beautiful home on the Sydney waterfront.”
“And you say there were more cases in other trucks?”
Barry nodded.
Jeff scratched his chin. He walked across to The Sheriff and looked at him. “Why have you got so much money?”
The Sheriff licked his lips.
Jeff shook his head. “You don’t have a lot of options. Tell me what I want to know, and you can walk.” Jeff gestured with his thumb towards the suitcases. “Not with the money – I’m taking that – but with your life. You can start again, but I think the deal is fair.”
“How do I know I can trust you?”
“You don’t, but I am a man of my word.”
Reason, Barry and Bethany gawked at Jeff. Disbelieving.
“He wanted to kill us, Jeff,” Barry said. “Kill everyone else, and who knows how many he has killed over the years? The guy is a mass murderer. Should he be allowed to walk away? He murdered Mildred and Reg.”
“I have to agree with Barry, Jeff,” Reason concurred.
Jeff stayed focussed on The Sheriff as he spoke to the others. “This man has a short life expectancy. Sooner or later, he will get a bullet between the eyes. But not today. I need to know what’s going on here. That’s more important.” Jeff stepped a pace closer. “Are you going to tell me what I need to know? Information for your life?”
The Sheriff shrugged. “Okay, I will tell you. What does it matter? I have more money, and can get more when I need.”
Jeff waited. The Sheriff swallowed.
“Substituting the bus with the hostages was a ruse, as you already know, to get me across the border and out of Turkey. But what you do not know is that smuggling the money was the main purpose. As your friend said, there are many cases. Added together, twenty million US dollars to be exact.”
“Holy shit,” Barry said.
“The money was given to me by Osman Gashi. One of his men came to the jail and made a deal. They would break me out of jail and get me safely across the border into Northern Iraq, and once there I had two jobs. The first job was to build a fortress in the mountains and raise a small army to defend it. Osman said that one day his boss might need a secure refuge. It was a priority.”
Jeff stood. “Avni Leka. This is all about bloody Leka and him building a hideout.” He looked at The Sheriff. “Could this be done?”
“Of course. In Qandil mountains he would never be found.”
Jeff nodded. “And the second job?”
“At the same time I am building the fortress I was to open a gateway through to Asia. Make deals with the tribal leaders in Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan.”
“To smuggle arms and people?”
“Yes, and whatever else might make money.”
“The people on the bus you blew up? Who were they?”
The Sheriff smiled. “In this case, do not worry yourself – they were ISIS recruits. It was easy to get them to play act. For them, they were helping the cause.”
“Except they didn’t know they were to be blown up at the end of it.”
“No, they didn’t know that and, as I said, that wasn’t the plan. But when you join such an organisation, it is accepted life will be short. For them, it was very short.”
“And one last question: why did you decide to kill the hostages?”
“This was easy, really. I did not blow up the bus. I do not know who did. My best guess is it was the Turks; they had the most to lose if I crossed the border. But really it could have been any number of groups. Maybe someone wanted to take over my smuggling business. Who knows? But once in the eyes of the world I was dead, then Osman Gashi thought it best I stay dead. If the hostages were found, the authorities would know I had not been killed. They might come looking for me and find his boss and the fortress.”
Jeff shook his head.
“In the end,” The Sheriff went on, “I thought it was not such a bad decision. It is not easy to sleep at night when men with guns are hunting after you. No one is going to look for a dead man.”
Reason touched Jeff on the arm, then led him away until they were out of earshot. “What are we going to do with him?” she whispered.
“What can I do? I gave my word.”
Reason glared.
“I gave my word, Reason,” Jeff said again. “I was not speaking on your behalf. If you want to put a bullet in the prick’s head, do it. I won’t stop you.”
Crack! Crack! Crack!
The air behind Jeff and Reason exploded with gunfire. They flung themselves sideways. As they fell to the ground, they grabbed their pistols and searched for a target. Jeff relaxed first. He dropped his gun and leaned on his elbow.
Barry stood over The Sheriff’s body, the Kalashnikov still aimed. Jeff picked himself off the ground. He slowly walked across to his friend. Bethany clung to Barry’s arm. She turned at Jeff’s approach. Barry stood still.
Between clenched teeth he said, “He murdered Reg and Mildred, Jeff. I couldn’t just let him walk away.”
Jeff looked down at the lifeless body of The Sheriff. Blood oozed from the holes in his chest. Jeff placed a hand on Barry’s shoulder.
“Come on, Barry. Let’s get the hell out of here.” Barry loosened his grip on the rifle and let it fall on to The Sheriff’s legs. Jeff gave Bethany a nod, and she led Barry back towards the road.
Jeff watched them walk away, then turned to Reason.
“Contact Luka. Tell her we have a gift.”
Reason gave Jeff a quizzical look.
“Many of the women in her troop lost their families and their homes,” Jeff said. “Maybe Leka’s money will help them build new lives. Life as a rebel can’t last forever.”
Reason nodded an agreement.
“And tell her we need an escort to Erbil.”
The phoney cop watched from a safe distance. When The Sheriff had escaped, and after the American woman and the New Zealander, Bradley, had taken the two hostages, he ran out through the back door. He had been to the house a number of times. He knew a car was parked outside. One of The Sheriff’s getaway vehicles. It had weapons on the back seat, a full tank of petrol and a mobile phone on the front seat. If nothing else, The Sheriff was always prepared. The phoney cop knew where Bradley had parked their car. He waited until they drove away, then followed.
He phoned Osman Gashi.
Gashi ordered him to follow but keep his distance. If The Sheriff did not escape Bradley, then he was to kill the PKK rebel leader. And, if The Sheriff did escape, he was to lead Bradley to him and make sure Bradley saw The Sheriff killed. Whatever happened, Gashi wanted The Sheriff dead, and he wanted Bradley to bear witness. It had surprised the phoney cop that Osman Gashi wanted Bradley left alive, but he was not about to argue with the boss. When Gashi gave an order, Gashi expected it to be obeyed. He said killing Bradley was not as important as having him confirm The Sheriff had been killed. With the hostages rescued, the Turks and other security forces would set about hunting The Sheriff. The pursuit would be relentless. And that would make it difficult to re-establish the business. The Sheriff needed to be dead. They would have someone else take his place and carry on with the project. With this in mind, Gashi ordered him to stay on, make contact with the rest of The Sheriff’s men, and secure the money in the suitcases.
To his relief, The Sheriff had not escaped. One of the hostages had saved him the task of killing the PKK soldier. He could report the good news to Gashi.
The phoney cop climbed into his vehicle and drove back to Dornaq. He had much work to do.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
The media converged on the town of Lecce, in the Apulian region of Italy. The occasion had a voyeuristic aspect that had the news producers salivating. They had already screened titbits from YouTube videos uploaded by the locals. One amateur cameraman was lucky enough to be in the right place and caught the mafia chieftain Pietro Gallo climbing out of a car. Excitement was building. The gathering of Gallo and his family at his granddaughter’s wedding in the Basilica di Santa Croce was becoming big news. The Basilica had begun construction in 1549 and was completed in 1606. It seemed fitting that such an historic building should now be the focal point of the coming together of members of one of the world’s oldest known criminal organisations. Real live gangsters on television.
Hundreds of the most influential members of the Gallo family had packed into the church. A hush descended over the congregation as the priest brought the bride and groom together to exchange vows. Gallo, leaning against the rail of the pew, looked on with a mixture of pride and boredom. He’d been to too many weddings in his lifetime. When he was younger, at the later festivities he would screw a bridesmaid; nowadays, when the sun went down, all he wanted to do was go to bed.
