Gray Vengeance (30 page)

Chapter 40

21 December 2014

Gray knocked on the door and walked in, just as Andrew
Harvey
emerged from the en-suite bathroom. Farsi turned from his
computer
to look at them both with a broad smile on h
is face.

‘Did you just get laid while I was in having a shower?’

‘I wish,’ Farsi said. ‘No, I did some more digging on the
Cayman
Islands holding company that owns Sarah’s house. She told you she was renting it from a relative, right?’

Harvey nodded.

‘I think I know who.’ Farsi turned the laptop screen towards Harvey, who saw a familiar picture.

‘Juliet Harper?’

‘She’s Thompson’s great-aunt. Harper’s the youngest of five daughters, and one of her sisters is Thompson’s grandmother.’

‘It would explain why Harper put her in charge of the search,’ Gray said.

Harvey stroked his chin. ‘Yeah, and why she’d trust Harper, even if she was being fed a line of crap.’

‘Also,’ Farsi said, ‘I’ve been checking Thompson’s phone for new traffic, but she hasn’t used it since last night. I think she may know it’s being tapped.’

‘That was to be expected. Once Mackenzie got free, it was only a matter of time before she figured it out. What about Harper’s phone?’

Gerald Small had finally managed to get limited access to the home secretary’s handset. He could intercept her newly written messages but was still working on getting into the text library, which Harvey would need as evidence.

‘Tried that, but there are no incoming messages relating
to Farrar.’

Harvey knew that when things went quiet, it was seldom a good sign.

‘Hang on,’ Farsi said, tapping away at the keyboard. ‘Looks like we have another phone that’s had Harper’s number typed i
nto it.’

‘There’ll be a lot of those, I imagine.’

‘I know, but this one is eight clicks from us, and closing fast.’

Harvey was immediately alert, bending closer to watch the dot’s progress on the screen. ‘Download everything you can from that phone. Tom, let the others know to expect company.’

Gray dialled Smart’s room on the hotel phone and asked him to come up as soon as he could. By the time he returned to the laptop, Farsi had the new phone’s contents on the screen.

‘Bring up that one,’ Harvey said. Farsi double-clicked the file and a text message appeared on the screen.

Harvey located Farrar at 4 Avenida de La Mar, Havana, Cuba. He’s planning an assault on the house.

Smart knocked on the door and walked in, closely followed
by Sonny.

‘What’s the emergency?’

‘Someone’s tracking us,’ Gray said, pointing to the laptop.

‘Who?’

‘We’ve no idea, but they appear to be heading this way,’ Farsi said. He switched the screens to show the pulsing red dot, now only two kilometres away from their hotel.

‘Let’s get out of here,’ Gray said. ‘Grab your stuff and be in reception in one minute.’

He disappeared along with Sonny and Smart, leaving Harvey to throw some clothes on and grab his jacket. Farsi pocketed his wallet and passport, then closed down the laptop and joined him at the door.

Gray was already waiting in the reception area by the time they made it downstairs, and Smart and Sonny were only a few seconds behind them.

‘What’s the plan?’ Harvey asked.

‘I want eyes-on,’ Gray said. ‘We need to know who we’re dealing with. Hamad, let’s get you set up in the restaurant so we know when they reach the hotel.’

They found an empty table in the restaurant and Farsi opened the laptop. The red dot on the screen had moved closer, but was now stationary.

‘Could be stopped, or just stuck in traffic,’ Smart said.

‘Sonny, come with me. We’ll hide up near the entrance.’

Gray handed out the comm units and they did a quick check to make sure they were all working.

‘If that dot starts moving again, let me know,’ Gray said.

He led Sonny to the gift shop where they both bought baseball caps and sunglasses, then they walked out of the front door and through the large arch into the sunshine. Palm trees lining t
he a
pproach road swayed gently, waving a welcome to a family of new arrivals that pulled up outside the building in an ancient cab.

‘Over here,’ Gray said, leading Sonny to the left, where a row of tables sat under a portico. Gray took a seat facing the hotel entrance while Sonny sat opposite him, and Gray used their comms to ask Farsi for an update.

‘
They’re about twelve hundred yards out
.’

‘Roger that.’

A waiter appeared and asked for their order, and Gray requested two coffees, more to keep up the pretence than anything.

‘Can you also bring me a newspaper?’

The waiter nodded and disappeared, returning two minutes later with a tray. He placed the drinks in front of them and offered Gray a selection of American broadsheets. Gray took the
New York Times
and paid the bill, adding a generous tip.

‘
Now within five hundred yards
.’

Gray donned his sunglasses and held up the newspaper, peering over the top of it. He could just make out the entrance to the hotel grounds, and he saw a taxi turn onto the approach road, ferrying more guests to the hotel.

The countdown continued, until Farsi reported the target vehicle a hundred yards out.

‘
Fifty . . . twenty . . . turning in now
.’

‘Shit,’ Gray murmured. ‘There are two cars. Which one is it?’

‘
I can’t tell
.’

Gray watched both vehicles approach the front of the hotel.

‘We’ll have to wait until they get out and pick the most likely.’

Both cars came to a stop outside the main entrance, and the valet opened the door to what looked like a middle-aged hippy. He climbed in and drove the vehicle away as the woman made her way into the hotel.

‘Not her,’ Gray said, focusing on the other vehicle. The passengers were already decamping, and the three men looked more promising. He gave quick descriptions to the team, and once the trio had disappeared inside, he got up to follow them.

‘Regret leaving the weapons in the woods?’ Sonny asked.

‘They’re not going to pull guns in such a public place. Not with so much CCTV, and certainly not in Cuba,’ Gray said. ‘Let’s try to find out which room they take and plan a little visit.’

As they entered the lobby, they saw the three men standing at the reception desk. Gray told Sonny to wait by the door and walked over to stand a few feet away from them, pretending to be engrossed in the selection of tourist leaflets. He chose one and scanned through it, all the while listening to the conversation between the trio and the receptionist.

The men seemed keen to book a scuba diving excursion, and spent five minutes arranging one affiliated to the hotel, then enquired about the local nightlife.

One of the men turned and caught Gray’s eye, but there was no sign of recognition, and he began to doubt that these people were here for anything other than a few days of sun and fun. He went to join Harvey, who waited in the restaurant with Farsi and Smart.

‘These aren’t our people,’ Gray said.

‘You sure?’

‘Positive. I eyeballed one of them and he didn’t blink. Did you see the woman who came in before them?’ he asked Smart.

‘The frumpy-looking one? Yeah, she stopped at the desk for a moment, then went upstairs.’

‘Then we wait for her to come down.’

After getting Harvey’s room number from the receptionist, Sarah Thompson took the stairs to the third floor and knocked on his
door. Wh
en she got no reply, she tried again, placing her ear to t
he door.

Harvey obviously wasn’t in, which meant they probably hadn’t returned to the hotel yet. Realising her best bet was to take a seat in the lobby and wait for them to return, she decided to descend the stairs and grab a sandwich for the stakeout.

On the ground floor, she headed to the restaurant, but before she got inside a man appeared at her side.

‘Looking for someone?’

Thompson turned and found herself staring into Tom
Gray’s eyes.

‘I see you recognise me,’ Gray said.

Thompson cursed herself for being caught by surprise, but she quickly regained her composure. ‘I’m looking for Andrew Harvey. I know he’s with you.’

‘And who might you be?’

‘Sarah Thompson. We worked together.’

Gray gripped her elbow and escorted her into the restaurant to the table the team were occupying.

Harvey looked up, his face a mask of confusion.

‘Hello, Andrew.’

It took a moment for Harvey to put a face to the voice.

‘Sarah?’

Thompson offered a weak smile. ‘I think we should take this somewhere private.’

James Farrar closed his eyes and reached down to run his fingers through Joel Haskins’ hair. It had been almost a year since he’d seen his lover, and they’d been making up for it over the last
forty-ei
ght hours.

‘You know, I think I prefer you as Efram. Why don’t you dye your hair?’

Joel’s head continued to bob up and down, but he found time to pinch Farrar’s inner thigh. ‘I hate it when you call me that,’ he said.

‘Don’t you know it’s rude to talk with your mouth full?’

Their bout of pleasure was interrupted by the telephone. It was the handset set up for the relay service in Manila, which forwarded his calls but looked for all intents and purposes to be the end point. Knowing that only one person had the relay’s number, he pushed his boyfriend’s head away from his crotch and snatched up the mobile.

‘Your timing’s impeccable,’ he said.

‘I see you’re in Cuba,’ Harper replied, ignoring his insolence.

‘What the . . . ? I warned you what would happen if you tried to find me.’

‘I wasn’t looking for you, James. Every time someone enters any of my details into a device, the contents are downloaded and I receive a warning. Two hours ago, someone prepared a text
message
saying that Andrew Harvey has your address and is
planning
an assault. If you live on Avenida de La Mar, then this threat
is real.’

Farrar sat bolt upright. ‘That’s impossible. I covered my tracks when I left Africa. It must be someone at your end.’

‘Preposterous! I’ve had a tight rein on things from the very start. For the first six months I had MI5 searching for you on the quiet, with no external agencies involved. You, more than anyone, should appreciate how hopeless that made their task.’

‘Well, they seem to be back up to speed now, don’t they?’

‘I put my own great-niece, Sarah Thompson, in charge of the operation and she kept me updated every day. Whenever they got close to you in Africa, I blocked their efforts. I fail to see what else I could have done. Needless to say, we probably wouldn’t be having this conversation if you hadn’t taken things too far.’

Farrar ignored the jibe. ‘You should have taken Harvey off the case once the bombings started.’

‘I did, James. I warned Ellis to drop the case, and when she didn’t, I had her removed. I thought that would be the end of it, but Harvey appears more tenacious than I anticipated.’

Farrar cursed and reached for a glass of water. ‘Who sent you the message?’

‘I haven’t got proof, but Sarah isn’t answering her phone and hasn’t been seen for two days. I think she may have tailed
Harvey
to Cuba. That message was typed into a phone but was never sent, which means she could have been trying to warn me but was
interrupted
.’

‘Does she know your part in this?’

‘Of course not.’

‘You do understand what you’re saying, don’t you? If she knows my address, she’ll want to bring me in. That would be disastrous for both of us.’

He waited while the home secretary mulled over the options, though he knew there was only one. He would have to move to a new country—that was certain. It also meant anyone on his tail would have to be eliminated, including Thompson. Would Harper condone terminating her own blood, no matter how distant the relationship?