Fair Game (14 page)

‘What about him?’

‘How long have you known him?’

Brett shrugged. ‘Ages.’

She reached into the pocket of her raincoat and took out a packet of cigarettes and a slim gold lighter. ‘Specifically, Nicholas. When did you first meet him?’

‘Five years ago. He was a Marine. I met him in a bar.’

She slowly lit a cigarette, then blew a tight plume of smoke up at the ceiling and watched as it dispersed. ‘And you both being from the Old Country, you fell into conversation and became best buddies?’

‘What the fuck’s going on here?’ asked Brett.

‘You introduced Tanner to people in New York, right? Fund-raisers?’

‘He wanted to know more about what was happening back in Ireland. He hated the way the Brits were behaving, and thought that the IRA had sold out.’

‘A meeting of minds,’ said the woman, her voice loaded with sarcasm.

‘Who are you?’ asked Brett.

‘I’m the woman who’s going to decide what happens to you next, Nicholas. You might say that your life is in my hands. And what you say to me over the next few minutes is pretty much going to determine what happens to you. You know that Tanner ended up in Belfast?’

‘I didn’t. Why would I? What was he doing in Belfast?’

‘Winning friends and influencing people,’ said the woman. ‘So tell me again, where did you first meet Tanner?’

‘An Irish bar in Boston.’

‘Name?’

‘Hell, I don’t know. It was five years ago.’

She took a long drag on her cigarette before speaking again. ‘You’re going to have to do a lot better than that, Nicholas. There’s a lot depending on this.’

‘What?’ said Brett. ‘What’s depending on this? I know Matt Tanner, sure, but I’ve not seen or heard from him for . . .’ He shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. ‘I don’t know. Four months. Five.’ He shook his head again. ‘I don’t know. It’s been a while. Has he done something? What’s he done?’

‘So where were you when you saw him last?’ She flicked cigarette ash on to the floor.

‘We were in a bar. In Manhattan.’

‘Name?’

‘The Shamrock.’

‘And who were you with?’

‘There was a group of us. Half a dozen.’

‘Give me some names, Nicholas.’

Brett shook his head again, trying to clear his thoughts. ‘Mark Dawson. Tommy Crofts. Reggie McIntyre.’

The woman nodded slowly. ‘Fund-raisers,’ she said.

‘Yeah, they send money back to Northern Ireland. For the Cause.’

The woman smiled without warmth. ‘That’s right. The Cause. You’re a pal of Mark’s, right?’

‘We go back a ways, yes.’

‘They’re regular drinking buddies?’

Brett nodded. ‘What’s this about?’

‘I’m the one asking the questions here, Nicholas. All you have to do is to answer them.’

‘I can answer your questions without being trussed up like a chicken.’

‘Who do you work for, Nicholas?’

‘Handguns Unlimited, in New Jersey.’

‘That’s your day job, Nicholas. Your cover. Who do really work for?’

‘I sell guns. That’s what I do. I work in a gun store.’

The woman looked over at the man sitting at the table and nodded at him. He grinned at Brett, reached inside his jacket and pulled out a semi-automatic.

‘So you won’t have any problem telling me what that is,’ she said.

The man held it up and waggled it from side to side.

‘It’s a Smith & Wesson Compact,’ said Brett.

‘Yes it is,’ said the woman. ‘So what would it sell for?’

‘New? Between seven and eight hundred dollars. It’s a nice weapon. Perfect for concealed carry.’

The woman nodded. ‘Ten out of ten,’ she said. ‘Go to the top of the class.’

The man at the table took a suppressor from his pocket and slowly screwed it into the barrel of the handgun.

‘Who are you?’ asked Brett.

The woman held up her right hand and waggled her index finger at him. She was wearing glossy black leather gloves. They were all wearing gloves, Brett realised.

‘Who told you to introduce Tanner to the guys in Manhattan?’

‘It wasn’t like that,’ said Brett. ‘I was going for a drink, Matt tagged along.’

The woman scowled, then waved at the man in overalls. He walked over and switched on the television, then used the remote to flick through to MTV. He turned the sound up, put the remote on the coffee table and then walked over to Brett and slapped him across the face, hard. Brett tasted blood as he stared at the man in horror. ‘What the fuck?’ he shouted but the man hit him again, this time a backhander that rattled his teeth.

‘Just answer the questions, Nicholas,’ said the woman. ‘You supplied guns for the guys at the Shamrock, didn’t you? Guns that were sent to Ireland.’

Brett shook his head. He cleared his throat and spat bloody phlegm on to the floor. ‘I helped them buy guns, I didn’t supply them. They were buying automatic weapons and they wanted me to check that they were fit for purpose.’

‘And Tanner knew that?’

‘Yes. I don’t know. Maybe.’

The man raised his hand. ‘Make up your mind, Nicholas,’ said the woman.

Brett nodded slowly. ‘Yes.’

‘And Tanner knew who he was meeting, didn’t he? That’s why you took him to the bar. He wanted to be introduced.’

Brett shook his head and then flinched in anticipation of another blow.

‘There’s no point in lying, Nicholas. There’s absolutely nothing you can say that’s going to convince me that you didn’t know who Matt Tanner was or why he wanted to get close to the guys at the Shamrock.’

Brett said nothing as he stared at the floor.

‘The thing is, Nicholas, Matt Tanner killed two of our people in Ireland. He shot them in cold blood and then fled. So we know that he’s bad. And you’re the one who introduced him to our people. You took him into the Shamrock and then Dawson took him to Belfast. So we know you’re bad, too. You’re the cause of all this. You initiated it. It’s your fault.’

‘He just wanted a drink and I was meeting them in the Shamrock. He tagged along. I thought he was kosher.’

‘Kosher? You thought he was kosher, did you?’ She chuckled softly. ‘You’re not stupid, are you, Nicholas? You wouldn’t have introduced someone to Dawson and the guys unless you trusted them. Is that what you expect me to believe? That Tanner fooled you, too?’

Brett nodded quickly. ‘That’s it,’ he said. ‘He told me he was a former Marine and that he wanted to go back to his roots, to Ireland. Said that his parents had been forced out during the Troubles and he wanted to help teach the British a lesson.’

The woman smiled at the man in the overalls and pointed at Brett’s feet. The man knelt down and began removing Brett’s left shoe.

‘What are you doing?’ asked Brett.

The woman ignored him. She stood up and walked into the kitchen and returned a few seconds later with a large carving knife which she handed to the man in the overalls.

‘I’m telling you the truth,’ said Brett, his voice trembling.

‘No you’re not, Nicholas,’ said the woman as she sat back on the sofa. ‘You’re clinging to the hope that you’re going to be able to lie your way out of this situation, but that’s not going to happen. As soon as you accept that, the easier it’ll be for all of us.’

The man in overalls roughly grabbed Brett’s ankle and held the blade of the knife against the little toe. ‘Remind me again which is the little piggy that went to market?’ he said to the woman. He also had an Irish accent, Brett realised.

The woman tossed her hair and laughed. ‘Was that the big one, Nicholas, or the little one? Do you remember?’

Brett struggled but there was nothing he could do. ‘You don’t have to do this, I’ll talk,’ he whimpered.

‘I know that,’ said the woman. ‘The only question is how many toes you lose before you do.’

‘OK, OK, look, I was doing my job, all right. It was nothing personal. I’m just one of the Indians and I do what the chiefs tell me.’ The words came out so quickly that they were tumbling into each other.

The man with the knife sat back on his heels and looked at the woman. She waved a languid hand. ‘So what are you, Nicholas? Just some rat-fink out to make a few bucks by grassing up whoever he can? Or are you a bigger rat with a salary and a pension?’

Brett took a deep breath, trying to steady himself.

‘Come on, Nicholas, cat got your tongue? What are you? MI5? MI6? CIA? FBI? DEA? Which three-letter group pays your wages?’

Brett swallowed. ‘ATF,’ he said.

The woman nodded and took another long drag on her cigarette. ‘That sounds about right,’ she said. ‘But I guess you weren’t too concerned about the alcohol or tobacco side, were you?’

She reached into her raincoat and took out a small Ziploc bag. She extinguished what was left of her cigarette on the sole of her shoe and put the butt into the bag.

‘So what were you doing, undercover?’ she said, putting the Ziploc bag into her raincoat pocket. ‘Tracking guns being shipped to Ireland?’

‘Not just Ireland,’ said Brett. ‘I was watching a bunch of arms dealers in New York. One was a Russian, another was a Serb.’

‘So the Irish connection was just one of several investigations?’

Brett nodded.

‘And Matt Tanner. Who was he with?’

‘They didn’t say.’

‘They being?’

‘My bosses. They said I was to introduce him and that he’d do the rest. It was a rush job, I didn’t have much time with him, just enough to work out how we were going to play it.’ He looked at the man with the knife and back to the woman. ‘I wasn’t happy about it, mine was a long-term penetration operation and I didn’t want to blow it by putting someone I didn’t know into the mix.’

‘How very unfortunate for you.’

‘Look, what I’m saying is that it wasn’t my fault. It was nothing to do with me. My bosses told me I had to introduce the guy and that there’d be no comeback.’

‘Well, they were definitely wrong on that score, weren’t they?’

‘If he did something bad to your people, that’s down to him.’

She nodded. ‘Believe me, Nicholas, I’d much rather have Matt Tanner tied to that chair than you. But one step at a time, you know?’

‘I don’t know where he is,’ said Brett. ‘I swear on the lives of my kids.’

‘You’ve got kids, have you, Nicholas?’

Brett nodded frantically. ‘A boy and a girl.’

‘So what’s a good father like you doing working undercover? Why aren’t you at home tucked up with Mrs Brett?’

‘She walked out on me two years ago,’ said Brett. ‘Took the kids with her. That’s one of the reasons I took this assignment, to take my mind off it.’

The woman nodded thoughtfully. ‘So Tanner, you made the introduction?’

‘Yeah. I took him to the pub, we had a few drinks, he got on with them like a house on fire. I left early, he stayed with them, that was the last time I saw him.’

‘That was what your bosses wanted? You introduced Tanner and then walked away?’

The man sitting at the table finished his beer. He stood up and walked slowly into the kitchen. ‘Look, I was only doing my job,’ said Brett. ‘I didn’t know what he was going to do. They didn’t tell me.’

The woman nodded. ‘I understand,’ she said. ‘Do you think Tanner was his real name?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Do you know who he worked for?’

Brett shook his head. ‘I asked but he didn’t say.’

‘And he didn’t tell you why he wanted to get close to them?’

‘He wouldn’t say word one about what he was doing, or who he was. I spent a morning with him in a motel room in New Jersey, going over our background, how we met, who he was, anecdotes, bullshit, all that stuff. He was good, I can tell you that. He’d obviously worked undercover before.’

‘And he was American? Irish American?’

‘Born in Belfast, he said. But moved to the States when he was a kid. Served in the military.’

‘Family?’

‘He said he wasn’t married. No kids. We talked about my situation and he said he was glad that he’d never married.’

‘And you think that was true, or just his legend?’

‘I don’t know. I couldn’t tell. Like I said, he was good. If he was lying I’d never have known.’

Brett heard the man in the kitchen washing the bottle in the sink. There was only one reason for him to do that, Brett knew. To remove any DNA.

‘I’m a Federal agent,’ said Brett, his voice trembling again.

‘Yes,’ said the woman. ‘Yes you are.’

‘If you do anything to me, you’ll be taking on the Federal Government.’

‘I suppose that’s true,’ said the woman.

Brett could feel his legs start to shake and he was finding it hard to breathe.

‘If you go, if you just walk away, I won’t say anything,’ he said, hating himself for sounding so weak.

‘Now you know that’s not going to happen, don’t you?’ she said. ‘Just be quiet now. It’ll soon be over.’ She nodded at the man in the overalls and he came up behind Brett. Brett heard a tearing sound and then a strip of duct tape was wound around his mouth. He struggled but in seconds he was gagged and then the hood was pulled back over his head.

He tried to scream but the duct tape muffled it to a grunt and tears pricked his eyes. He wanted to plead and beg for his life, to offer them everything he had if they’d just not kill him, but even if he wasn’t gagged he knew that there was nothing he could say. He jerked forwards and backwards and the chair shifted on the floor but his bonds held firm.

He heard footsteps. The man walking from the kitchen. Walking over to the dining table where the gun was. Tears streamed down his face and his breath was coming in short gasps. It wasn’t fair, he’d only been doing his job and no job was worth dying for. He felt his bowels loosen and a warmth spread around his groin and he realised that he’d wet himself. He moaned like an animal in pain as he rocked back and forth, and part of him wanted to say a prayer and another part of him wanted his ATF colleagues to come charging in to rescue him even though he knew that only happened in the movies and this wasn’t a movie. This was real life and he was helpless and there was nothing he could do to stop what was happening.

He heard footsteps in front of him and a metallic click and he began to moan again.

The plane banked to the right and through the window Crazy Boy saw the airfield for the first time. It had been built by the Russians in the years when Somalia had few friends among the international community. There was a single paved runway, three metal hangars and a brick barracks that had once housed Russian troops tasked with guarding the airfield. Behind the buildings was a line of concrete huts with corrugated-iron roofs. Eventually the Russians had moved out, and when the Americans had moved in they had erected a mesh fence topped with razor wire and two watchtowers. It was from one of the watchtowers that the bullets had come last time Crazy Boy had landed, a single spray of ten rounds of which two had clipped the tail.