Saving Tara Goodwin (Mystery Book 1)

Saving Tara Goodwin

By

Richard Harrington

Saving Tara Goodwin  © Richard Harrington 2015

Kindle Edition

An earlier version of this book was published in 2013, entitled
Area 57.

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any form of storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the author.

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All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

For my family and very dear friends.

Saving Tara Goodwin

Sir Freddie Bromsgrove had watched the amazing broadcast for hours, the terrible events mesmerising him, and even now he found it incredible that they had flown aircraft into the twin towers, but through his staring disbelief, he became aware of his housekeeper, nudging him.

‘Sir, there’s an urgent call for you.’

Jolting round, he looked up wide-eyed and snatched the phone, ‘Hello.’

‘Freddie, it’s Marcus, have you seen the news?’

‘Yes, it’s incredible, but why did they want Phase 1 now, why now for god’s sake?’

‘Oh, c’mon, it’s their sense of humour, 911 is America’s national emergency number, so that’s what they gave them, a national emergency on 911.’

‘Yes, I see, but hasn’t that made things rather difficult for us?’

‘Well of course, the intelligence agencies are going crazy all over the world, and I’ve heard we’re going to have a security shake-up like you wouldn’t believe, it’s going to be a top to bottom re-evaluation and will include all the agencies and every secret installation without exception.’

Sir Freddie swallowed hard, ‘But surely you don’t mean Thornley Manor as well?’

‘You’re damned right I do, and it’s going to be a full audit, the works, everything.’

‘But they’ll discover Phase 2.’

‘Well of course they will, why the hell do you think I’m calling, and from now on it’ll be just about impossible to protect the project, or even ourselves if it comes to that.’

Sir Freddie began to tremble, ‘They’ll send the dogs for us, won’t they, it’s all over.’

‘Not quite, keep your nerve, our man on the inside will try some damage limitation.’

‘But Marcus, we agreed. Oh my god, please, no more killing.’

‘Shut up, Freddie. In case you’ve conveniently forgotten, you supplied the girl, and you took the blood money, so now you can sweat it out like the rest of us.’

Later in his study, Sir Freddie Bromsgrove took his service revolver from the desk, and placing the muzzle to his right temple, pulled the trigger and blew his brains out.

1

The official Jaguar was sitting impassively in the early morning fog that hung like a shroud over the vast and silent airfield.

Andrew Christian yawned and rubbed his eyes, and checking his watch, sighed with relief when he saw the time had at last drifted round to 4.30. Climbing out of the car, he closed the door and stretched his arms to ease the cramp.

He felt not a breath of wind, only the heavy silence as the dead hours came around him, and as the cool air cleared his mind, the unanswered questions came creeping back to bother him all over again.

Leaning against the car he lit a cigarette and looked around, but there was little to see through the gloom, just the ghostly figures of ground crew
and the runway lights fading away into a heavy curtain of murky grey mist.

Suddenly, Stella came into his mind and although it hardly seemed possible now, barely six hours ago he’d been lying exhausted and panting between her soft silky thighs while she murmured contentedly beneath him.

Christian pushed the thoughts away, because he wouldn’t be doing that again for a while, then in the distance he heard the familiar heavy drone of the aircraft as it came to him in mournful waves
of
sound, wafting eerily
across the rolling Wiltshire countryside.

Letting the cigarette fall to the ground he crushed it out under the heel of his boot, the mournful heavy drone now becoming a thundering roar as he wrenched the door open and dragged out the heavy Bergen, the driver coming awake and staggering out of the car.

‘Sorry sir, I fell asleep.’

He was blond, late twenties, muscular, well-groomed and had a public school accent, and it was some kind of a joke for him to stand there and pretend to be a driver, but his cold blue eyes soon came into sharp focus, ‘So can I help with your pack, sir.’

Christian stared him in the eye. ‘No.’

As the blond stared back, out of the gloom came the immense bulk of the Hercules, its powerful lights blazing through the mist as the massive propellers churned the fog into
whirlpools of grey light, and with tyres squealing briefly on the tarmac, the aircraft was down and hurtling along the runway.

The blond’s body language became tense as the gaze from his cold blue eyes flicked between Christian and the arrivals building.

‘I’d be happy to help with your kit, sir.’

Andrew Christian shook his head as he hoisted the heavy Bergen up over his shoulder.

‘You have your orders, so wait here for your passenger and take him to GCHQ.’

The blond’s face showed anger, and then a caustic edge of sarcasm came to his voice.

‘But of course, sir, except you haven’t told me his name.’

‘Don’t worry about it, he’ll know you.’

Christian felt uneasy as he walked away to Arrivals, because this was supposed to be a Section affair, that’s why a military flight was being used so as not to attract attention, but with the unexpected involvement of this blond creep, he was beginning to wonder if something had gone wrong with Tonabie’s plans, not that it would surprise him.

Making his way through to reception, he dropped the Bergen at his feet, and leaning against a pillar, watched the airport staff swing into action as a line of Special Forces filed in from the Hercules, and as they dumped their kit, each face told the same story, because Afghanistan wouldn’t be on anyone’s holiday list.

Just as he was beginning to wonder if Frank had managed to get on the flight, he saw a bulky figure being escorted through the mass of men and down a half lit corridor to disappear into a side room while an RAF policeman took up station at the door.

With a sigh he shouldered the Bergen, because although it was a relief Frank was back, he knew it was only the beginning for both of them.

Christian made his way through and walked down the dimly lit corridor, and showing his ID to the policeman, stepped inside and saw Frank standing alone at a far window.

‘Hi Frank, you’re back in one piece then.’

Frank Lewis came out of his thoughts, and swinging round, gave a surprised smile.

‘Andy, what are you doing here, so are you the welcome committee?’

Christian grinned, ‘That’s right, all one of me, we’re a bit short staffed at the moment.’

Frank thoughtfully lit a cigarette, ‘So what’s all this cloak and dagger stuff with the military flight, I could have been back in half the time on a regular airline.’

‘It’s the way they wanted it, everything’s gone security crazy since Nine Eleven.’

‘Yeah, right, well that business in the States certainly had the wow factor.’

‘It sure did, and now our people are jumping around like fleas on a scabby dog.’

Frank looked him in the eye, ‘So is that why they’ve brought me back, short of staff?’

Christian dropped the Bergen into a leather armchair and rubbed his jaw.

‘Well I’m not sure if it’s that easy. You see, there seems to be one hell of a fire burning under our masters, and judging by the general fallout, the flames must be licking right up to the little fannies on top of the political heap.’

‘Really? And what makes you think that?’

‘Well something big is going down for sure, but I’m not convinced it’s to do with 9/11, or at least, not directly, there’s far too many oddball things going on.’

‘Like what?’

‘Well take Tonabie for example, he arrived at GCHQ right out of the blue, and for the past few days he’s practically lived there.’

Frank slipped into thought.
Tonabie was the worst Director of Operations the Section had known, and everyone knew he was only interested in his damned career. So what the hell could have happened to keep him away from the corridors of power for all that time?

Christian lit a cigarette as he began to wander pensively around the room.

‘And there’s something else. I’ve heard from a good source that the final solution have been brought back from Ireland on the hurry up.’

Frank sat down.
The final solution was the government’s best kept secret, Daniels and Coogan, and where they went, official death usually followed.

Christian abruptly turned away and walked over to stare out through the dark window.

‘And you won’t like this one little bit, because they’ve brought Monty out of retirement.’

Frank looked up sharply, ‘Ah, fuck off, you’re having a laugh.’

‘No, I wish I was, it’s official now. Well, unofficially.’

‘But that’s madness; he’s only just had major heart surgery.’

Christian nodded, but was frowning as he tried to unravel the questions and answers.

‘I know, but if you stop to think about it, it does fit in with bringing you back.’

Frank sagged back in the chair, ‘Great, so how do you figure that out?’

‘Well I’ve been giving this a lot of thought over the past few days, all the guys have, and every time this question crops up, there’s only one answer that makes any sense.’

‘And what’s that?’

‘Well it’s obvious, you and Monty; the dynamic duo and all that crap.’

Frank stared up to the ceiling, ‘Well if that’s your answer, it’s a load of old bollocks, because poor old Monty needs an aqualung just to go for a pee, and I’m more fed up than the last Dodo.’

Christian half smiled, ‘Yeah, well I guess that’s true, but it doesn’t really matter when you stop to consider the overall scenario.’

‘And what’s that supposed to be?’

‘Well it seems to stack up like this. It’s obvious that there must be a serious amount of political diarrhoea attached to all this because the hierarchy came straight to the Section to sort out their problem, and they didn’t just pass over MI5 and 6 but they excommunicated them from all levels of the operation as well. So ask yourself, why would the Chiefs of Staff do something radical like that?’

‘It sure beats me, but it’s a bloody good way of starting a war between the departments.’

‘Yeah, well you’re dead right about that, because Spook 5 are obviously not amused and they’ve got their foot soldiers sniffing around as if this game is the last fix in town. So again, why didn’t the Chiefs of Staff use Spook 5?’

‘Well maybe they’re being careful, and don’t forget, they’ve got their fair share of low life, and some of those slime balls will do anything for money and attention.’

‘That’s true, but we think they might have another reason.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like they might need untraceable muscle.’

‘Okay, fair enough, but if that’s all they wanted, they could still use Spook 5 and contract out the hard stuff as usual.’

Christian turned away, ‘Quite right, except of course, in the worst case scenario.’

As Frank stared at him, all the alarm bells began to jangle, ‘Oh shit.’

Christian grimaced, ‘Exactly, and if this game turns out to be a 10 on the Richter scale, it just might go all the way to the big C.’

Frank stared across the room, ‘Yeah, and then Cardinal will want secondments, and as we all know, Cardinal only makes secondments from the Section.’

‘Right, and if you accept that as a likely scenario, then everything else fits in around it, because whatever we might think of Tonabie, he’s still one of the world’s best survivors, which brings us to you and Monty, and if Tonabie was asked for recommendations, what would he do? Well it’s obvious, he’s just a paper soldier, so all he could do, would be to check out the CVs and choose, and guess what he would see, Lewis and Montague, the best double act on the books.’

Frank sighed, ‘Well some might agree, but that was a lifetime ago.’

‘Maybe, but Tonabie can still cover his back by saying his recommendations were based on a proven track record, and as Monty’s brain is still as sharp as a razor, if things did go pear shaped, you can guess what he’d say.’

Frank nodded, ‘Yeah. Lewis and Montague must have fucked up.’

‘Exactly.’

As the two men sat quietly in thought, a tin voice suddenly bounced off the walls as it announced the next flight departure, and looking over, Christian wearily stood up.

‘Oh well, I guess it’s time to go.’

Frank glanced across to his Bergen, ‘So where are you going?’

Christian shrugged, ‘Same place you’ve just come back from.’

‘Affy?’

‘Yeah, Operation Veritas is moving and they want Bin Laden, but it won’t be easy.’

Frank nodded, ‘Well there’s plenty of places to hide in that country, and some of the war lords aren’t exactly friendly.’

‘So I’ve heard, the briefing made that clear.’

Standing up, Frank unbuckled his body belt.

‘Here’s some stuff I’ve collected, some useful contacts and some to watch out for.’

Christian took his time fitting the belt, his expression becoming serious.

‘Frank, now don’t go ape shit, and I know I should have told you this before, but without the background I didn’t think you’d take me seriously, and it’s important.’

‘Okay, go for it.’

‘Well just before I left GCHQ, a Star Code came in from the Chiefs of Staff to Tonabie.’

Frank turned away and stared out through the misty grey of the dismal windows.

‘They’ve confirmed authorisation for three unconditional secondments to Cardinal, two will be allocated from the Section, but the third was unspecified. Sorry mate.’

Frank felt his anger rising.

An unconditional secondment meant just that, no guarantees, not that he minded for himself, it was what he’d signed up for, but an official, unconditional secondment to Cardinal was a totally different ball game, it was the end of the line and as bad as it gets, and they had no right to involve Monty.

A knock came on the door and a Military Policeman looked in.

‘Excuse me, sir, but they’re calling you to the gate.’

Christian nodded, and waving him away, turned back to Lewis.

‘Look, I know I’ve made a complete mess of this, but I had to put you in the picture before you met Tonabie. You know what he’s like, he would have taken his fun stringing you along and laughed in your face when he dropped the bombshell.’

‘Oh, don’t apologise, you’re a good mate, you always were, you lousy bastard.’

Christian grinned, ‘I’m forgiven then?’

‘Yeah, I reckon so, but it’ll cost you a Guinness later.’

‘Okay, then let’s make it two, because I’ve left a letter in the office for Stella. If ….’

Frank always felt awkward at this point, with him not having any family of his own.

‘No problem, but you’ll be just fine, what with your thick head and steel balls, what the hell could happen to you.’

Christian smiled, but it faded away as he turned to leave, ‘Watch your back, Frank.’

‘No sweat, and when this is all over we’ll get totally rat-arsed in the Irish bar. Okay?’

‘You’re on.’

He walked away, but stopped, ‘One more thing. The driver of your government Jag, is a young, blond, smart-arsed creep, he’s not one of the regular guys and says he was brought in to help out, but something stinks.’