Beirut - An Explosive Thriller (3 page)

The driver
laughed. ‘Power cut.
Khara
.’ Shit.

They were
coming into the smart Christian enclave of Ashrafieh. The shop
fronts, usually lavishly illuminated, were looming shadows. The car
ahead slowed, Lynch caught its taillights turning right.

He raised his
voice above the engine noise. ‘Right here.’

‘
Sure,
meester. No problem. Twenty dollar, I turn left, right, any
way.’

The other car
had stopped just beyond the turn. Lynch cursed quietly. ‘Carry on
past him.’

‘
As you
like.’

Lynch turned
away from the other car as they passed it. He waited a few seconds.
‘Okay, right here. Stop.
Khalas
.’ He held out a note.
‘Thanks.’

The driver
was still thanking the
effendi
as Lynch shut the door. He took a deep breath of
clean air before he padded back down the dark side street to the
corner. The
servees
he followed drove past empty. Lynch peered round the corner.
The two men were crossing the street towards him. Lynch pressed
himself back against the wall.

Forage Cap
was still angry, his voice carrying in the chill evening air. Lynch
eased away from the shadows and followed the two men at a healthy
distance, the unwieldy laptop bag on his shoulder annoying him. He
adjusted it to hang the strap across his chest, right to left so he
could still reach the P99 in its shoulder holster. He didn’t fancy
his chances against two of them without it.

They turned
left across a patch of waste ground. Lynch waited in the shadow
until they reached the other side of the open space. They rounded
the corner, lost behind an apartment block. Lynch crossed the
uneven ground, picking his way through patches of broken-up
asphalt.

The street
lights flickered back on. Lynch muttered a quiet ‘Fuck’ as he
scuttled for the safety of the periphery, feeling like an escapee
caught in floodlights. He turned the corner into the street leading
away from the open waste ground. The little blue enamel plaque
read: Rue Abdul Wahab El Inglezi. The two men mounted the steps of
a smart-looking office block on the other side of the street a
hundred metres or so ahead. Lynch paused by the corner, shadowed by
a faded shop awning.

Forage Cap
halted on the steps, touching his companion on the shoulder to stop
him. He turned and stared at Lynch. Barking a command at the other
man, he started down the steps again. Lynch turned and ran,
breaking across the open ground. He turned his ankle on a lump of
concrete. His arms flailed wildly to try to regain his balance and
maintain his forward momentum. The pain from his twisted ankle
forced him to hobble. A shout rang out behind him and Lynch glanced
back as the two men broke into the square. He reached the other
side of the open space, the laptop smacking against him.

Lynch halted,
his ankle jarring pain. He turned and crouched on his knee, drawing
the P99 in a fluid motion. The two men’s faces registered the
danger a second before Lynch’s shot placed a red rose on Forage
Cap’s upper leg and dropped him to squirm on the rough ground. The
other man scrambled to a halt, his hands held towards Lynch, palms
up.

Lynch backed
away, leaving the man to tend to Forage Cap roaring in pain. He
jogged across to Ashrafieh Street, where he flagged down a
servees
.

Early the
next morning, when Lynch returned to get the address of the
building the two men had entered, there was a large, rusty patch in
the middle of the waste ground. His original intention had been to
go into the building and discover more about it, but just in time
he noticed first one, two then more tiny CCTV cameras mounted on
top the of the buildings along the street. He told the driver to
move on.

THREE

Charles
Duggan’s shoulder ached, the bulky dressing rubbed against his
heavy leather jacket. The chill Hamburg fog deadened his steps in
the dark street as he passed a restaurant, beery smells escaping in
a gust of warm air from the doorway as a couple entered. Even
hunched against the cold, Duggan was a big man, his breaths puffing
little trails as he forged ahead.

He reached
the crossroads and was waiting for the lights when her soft call
came in German and, when he didn’t respond, in English.

‘
Would you
like some company, sir?’

Duggan
glanced at the young woman stepping from the shadows. Pretty,
wearing a white leather jacket, red and white cropped tights and
carrying a patent leather handbag. Snub nose, small breasts,
shapely legs. Her hair, bleached white, was cut short and layered.
She smiled uncertainly, her red lipstick striking against her pale
skin. The lights changed and he crossed. Her high heels clattered
as she kept up with his long stride.

‘
Perhaps to
be warm in the arms of a woman? This is not such a bad thing to
want.’

Duggan’s jaw
tightened. He replied in German. ‘No. Leave me alone.’

She stopped
and he walked on.

‘
Please?’

The
desperation in her voice made Duggan turn to face her. The crossing
lights behind her changed. The car speeding towards them had its
headlights off. Duggan lurched forwards as she span to face the
danger reflected in his eyes. The car mounted the pavement,
chrome-work flashing in the streetlight. He shouted at her to move
but she was frozen and Duggan hit her hard like a rugby player,
spinning her away from the car, the wing mirror catching his thigh
an excruciating blow.

They slammed
against the wall as the car crabbed to a halt. Duggan’s wounded
shoulder pulsed pain. A dark figure unfolded itself from the car,
raising its arms, its hands clenched together. Duggan waited a
split second, imagined the tightening knuckle. He pulled the girl
with him to the ground. They rolled on the wet flagstones to the
spit of a silenced gun and a stinging hail of stone chips. Held
together by Duggan’s strong arms, they slumped off the pavement
onto tarmac. A truck’s horn sounded. The massive wheels on the wet
road spattered dirty gutter-water into their faces. The heavy
vehicle jack-knifed to a halt, its big engine pulsing. The
airbrakes released with a whistle and hiss. Duggan raised his head
gingerly, but car and gunman had gone.

The truck
driver barked at them. ‘You two are okay?’

Duggan
slurred his voice, replying in German, a thick Bavarian accent.
‘Never better, my friend. Never better.’

‘
Well, get
out of the fucking road, then.’

Duggan beamed
stupidly up at the truck driver’s pale face, hamming up the drunken
reveller act. ‘Thanks. For the advice. And for stopping. It was
good of you.’

The trucker
tutted and slammed the lorry back in gear. ‘Jesus. Hamburg. Fucking
drunks.’

Duggan held
the girl up, weaving and waving at the departing truck. Dirt
streaked her leather jacket. A small cut on her right temple fed a
tendril of blood down into her dark eyebrow. She leaned against
him, breathing in small gulps, her scared eyes searching his
face.

He helped her
away from the road and she slumped against the wall. He ran his
fingers along the two pale bullet marks in the stone.

She smiled
shakily. ‘Thank you. That was good of you. But they will come
again.’

‘
They?’

‘
Those
men.’

Duggan
brushed the gritty dirt from his jacket sleeve, the movement
triggering a dart of pain from his shoulder. ‘I only saw one. How
do you know they’ll come back?’

She fought
for control. ‘They are working for my father. He is trying to
finish me.’

‘
To kill
you?’

She searched
his face, wringing her hands. She dropped her gaze.
‘Yes.’

A customs
officer by trade, Duggan had seen desperate people before. Trained
in reading the tiny signals of body language, he had spent years
scrutinising nervous travellers in airports as they walked through
the customs channels. He had waited by lorry drivers as his
officers had pulled little plastic bags of white powder from the
prised-open boxes and had felt the heat they radiated as they tried
to look calm. He was a specialist in fear, he reflected. Just the
ticket for this girl, a man who understood frightened people. He
weighed her up, took her unresisting arm.

‘
Come on. I
think I had better buy you a drink.’

Duggan guided
her back towards the crossroads and into the warm fug of the bar
before the traffic lights. He led her to the toilets at the back.
‘Here. You can freshen up. I’ll have a wash myself and meet you at
the bar.’

Duggan wasn’t
long in the gents. He went back into the bar, pulled up two stools
and called for two double brandies. He wondered if the girl would
slip through the back door. Looking back, he saw her coming back
into the bar and relaxed. Duggan watched her scan the room and
strike out towards him through the throng, her face pale and
serious. She reached the bar and drained her glass in a gulp. Her
nose was slightly off-centre, the imperfection lending her a quirky
prettiness. The cut above her eye no longer wept blood now she had
cleaned it up, but the nasty graze on her cheek burned
crimson.

It seemed as
if they were the only people in the bar not chattering to each
other. The long room resounded with constant outbursts of bright
laughter, the bitter reek of beer mixed with rich food
smells.

‘
So. We have
not yet been introduced,’ he said in German, smiling. ‘I’m
Charles.’

‘
Elli. Elli
Hoffmann.’ Her eyes were on her hands cupping the small brandy
balloon.

‘
You
certainly know how to make a first impression, Elli.’

She grimaced.
‘My jacket is ruined.’

He
acknowledged this with a wry dip of his glass at her. ‘You could
have lost more than your jacket out there.’

She glared up
at him. ‘It would perhaps have been better.’

‘
Oh come, on.
You’re being melodramatic,’ Duggan said, signalling the barman for
more drinks. ‘You could have died back there. A jacket’s a small
price most people would be glad to pay.’

‘
Maybe I am
not most people.’ She ran her hand through her short hair. ‘So,
thank you for trying to help me. This was very nice of you. But now
I think I would be better to leave.’

He signalled
to the two glasses on the bar. ‘I bought you another drink. You’re
still very shaken.’

She paused
for a second, resettling herself on the stool. ‘And then I
leave.’

‘
As you
like,’ he said. ‘It is after all a free world.’

He felt her
eyes on him. ‘You know, you’re not a very good
prostitute.’

Her laughter
softened her fierce glare. ‘Is this a compliment, I
wonder?’

‘
Why do you
do it?’

‘
This is my
business, Charles with no family name who speaks German like a
Bavarian but who is not, I think, German.’

Duggan
inclined his head, accepting the compliment. She talked to the
glass again. ‘I am, as you say, not very experienced as a
prostitute. You would have been my second customer. I washed myself
so hard after the first one that I have been not able to work for
the past week.’ Her small smile was a private mourning. She was
fierce again. ‘I hurt myself.’ Tears brimmed in her eyes. ‘Thank
you. You looked kind. You are kind.’

Duggan hadn’t
expected her to be so vulnerable. Her eyes were dark under the
makeup. He shook his head. ‘There are other ways to make
money.’

‘
Really? This
was the only one that came to mind,’ she snapped. She raised her
eyes to the roof, took a breath and held her palms up at him.
‘Sorry. Sorry, Charles with no name. I shall call you Charles
English, I think. You are English, aren’t you? You speak very good
German.’

‘
British. And
my family name is Duggan.’

‘
So, Charles
Duggan. I am running away from my home because it is dangerous for
me. I cannot do any decent job because this requires identity and I
cannot afford to have this identity because they will find me. And
now I have no money, I must eat while I try to survive from these
murderers.’

‘
Your
father?’

‘
You say I am
melodramatic, so you will not believe me, but yes, my
father.’

‘
Why would
your father want to kill you, Elli?’

‘
He is
breaking the law for money. I know what he is doing. The bitch’s
brother helps him.’

‘
The
bitch?’

‘
His wife.
Not my mother. His second wife. His business is doing badly and the
bitch is bleeding him dry with her dresses and handbags, her
surgeries and diamonds. They are selling bombs to the
Arabs.’

Duggan kept
his face neutral but his body tautened and his movements slowed.
‘Does he often do that?’

‘
Sell to
Arabs? Yes, but usually he sells them boats. Not bombs. This is the
first time. It will make him a lot of money. They’re not his. He
found them.’ Elli glanced up at him. ‘I am telling the truth,
Charles.’