The Bombmaker (33 page)

Payne nodded thoughtfully. 'So the bomb is already in the City? It's not in some sort of vehicle?'

'We don't know,' said Patsy. 'They've been using a van, but we think they've been using it to transport equipment. If I were to make a guess, I'd say they were assembling it in a building. But we're not in the guessing business. We're not ruling anything out at this stage.'

'Okay. So basically we'll have to play it by ear? No rehearsals?'

'I'm afraid not,' said Patsy.

Payne smiled broadly and winked. 'That's what we do best,'

he said.

McCracken and Quinn picked up Egan at a service station on the Mi outside Luton. He climbed into the back of the Volvo.

'Everything okay?' he asked.

McCracken nodded. 'We're on schedule,' she said. 'Tomorrow afternoon.'

'Excellent,' said Egan. He settled back in the seat as Quinn drove back on to the motorway and accelerated towards Milton Keynes.

On Egan's instructions, they kept to just below seventy miles an hour, but it still took them less than half an hour to drive to the industrial estate. Egan got out and unlocked the main door,

and Quinn drove the Volvo into the factory and parked next to the Transit van. McCracken climbed out while Quinn pulled the lever to unlock the boot.

After he'd closed the metal door, Egan opened the boot and looked down at the suitcase. It always amazed him how something so innocuous could do so much damage. Five cubic feet of chemicals at most, a few pence worth of electrical components,

and yet it had the capacity to completely destroy the building they were in. Bigger bombs didn't look any more threatening.

The bomb that destroyed the Federal Building in Oklahoma,

killing hundreds of US government officials, would have fitted comfortably into the back of the Transit. The one that had devastated the centre of Nairobi wasn't much bigger. Egan put on a pair of medical gloves.

McCracken opened the back of the Transit while Egan carefully lifted the suitcase out of the boot. He carried it over to the van and slid it along the metal floor. Quinn came up behind him. 'Shall I put the Volvo outside?' he asked.

Egan shook his head. 'Get the petrol and douse the offices,

yeah?'

Quinn went over to a stack of red petrol cans and picked up two of them. McCracken watched as Egan opened the suitcase. He eased aside the plastic bags to expose the digital clock. 'Why the gloves?' she asked. 'It's all going to go up in flames anyway.'

Egan looked over his shoulder. 'They can get partial prints off anything these days, Lydia.'

'Even after an explosion?'

'Sure. Off the smallest fragment. DNA, too. A few skin cells or a piece of hair. That's why the authorities spend such a long time collecting all the residue after an explosion. They'll be all over the place once it goes off. The only prints I want them to find are the woman's.' He checked his Rolex and compared it to the digital read-out on the bomb's timer. Exact to the second.

'Right, show me what to do,' he said.

McCracken talked him through the setting of the alarm,

then he pressed the button to activate it.

'Okay,' he said. 'Five minutes.' He could feel his heart pounding and he smiled to himself. Nothing had changed,

not really. The bomb was the same as when he had lifted it out of the boot of the Volvo. Individually, the components were exactly as they had been all day. But his body recognised what his mind was trying to ignore. By pressing the alarm button he'd irrevocably changed the nature of the beast. Now it was live.

Now it had the power of life and death. He shut the suitcase lid and closed the rear door of the van.

'Better get the Volvo out before the fumes get any worse,' he said. He pulled the chain to open the door for her. McCracken got into the car and reversed it out through the doorway.

Over by the offices, Quinn threw down the two petrol cans and went over to the stack for two more. The smell of petrol wafted over from the offices. 'All of it, Mark!' Egan called. 'We want the whole place to go up.'

He went over to help Quinn, and together they doused the offices with petrol, then McCracken poured more of the fuel along the sides of the factory. Egan looked at his watch again. A little over four minutes. Plenty of time, though he could feel the adrenaline pumping through his system. The fright, fight and flight response. But Egan was well used to suppressing his body's automatic reactions, and he calmly closed the rear doors of the Transit.

He walked over to where Quinn was slopping petrol around the corridor between the plasterboard offices. 'Nearly done,' said Quinn. Egan took his automatic out of his jacket pocket and slammed the butt against the back of Quinn's head. The man fell without a sound, and Egan deftly caught the petrol can before it hit the ground. He hefted the unconscious man over his shoulder and carried him and the half-empty can of petrol over to the Transit. He put Quinn in the driver's seat, then poured the rest of the petrol over him before looking at his Rolex again.

Two minutes. Time to go.

He walked quickly across the factory area, pulled the chain down to close the metal shutter, then left by the pedestrian doorway, closing the door behind him.

McCracken was gunning the engine of the Volvo. 'You're cutting it close,' she said.

'Ninety seconds,' he said, pulling open the passenger door and climbing in. 'Anyway, we want to see if it goes up.'

She looked at him expectantly. 'Where's Mark?'

'Mark's not coming with us,' said Egan, taking off his gloves.

'What?'

Egan pointed ahead. 'Lydia, I think if we're going to discuss this, we should be doing it while we're on the move. Don't you?'

McCracken looked back at the factory unit as if reluctant to leave.

'Eighty seconds,' said Egan.

McCracken put the Volvo in gear and drove off. Egan looked around casually, checking to see if they were being observed, but the industrial estate's pavements were deserted. It wasn't a place where people walked around. Almost all the men and women who worked on the estate drove in. McCracken drove quickly out of the estate and on to the main road to Milton Keynes. The road curved back along the estate, giving them a clear view of the factory units.

'What happened back there?' said McCracken, her eyes flicking between the traffic and the industrial estate on her right.

'You said it yourself, Lydia. He was unreliable. It's almost over -- we don't need to be carrying a liability. For the next stage we need Andrea's total concentration. What we don't need is her looking over her shoulder at Quinn every other minute.' He looked at his watch. 'Ten seconds. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six.'

There was a flash of light from the skylights at the top of the factory unit, followed almost immediately by a shower of debris erupting from the roof and the metal shutter being blown out of the side of the building. A second later there was a dull crump that they felt as much as heard.

Egan looked at his watch and frowned. 'Five seconds early.'

He looked across at the burning building. It was already well ablaze and little remained of the roof.

The traffic was slowing around them as drivers craned their necks to get a better look at the inferno. People were pouring out of adjacent factory units and running away from the blaze.

Thick plumes of black smoke were spiralling upwards. By the time the emergency services arrived, there'd be nothing left.

'And that was just fifty pounds?' asked McCracken, slowing to avoid a coach ahead of them that was barely travelling at walking pace. All the passengers had moved over to the right hand side of the vehicle and were peering through the windows.

'Pretty impressive, huh? Andrea knows her stuff.' Egan looked across at her and smiled thinly. 'You're thinking of the damage that a four-thousand-pound bomb will do, aren't you?'

McCracken shrugged. She accelerated past the coach and switched over to the left-hand lane, where the traffic was moving faster.

'It's gonna be awesome, Lydia. Absolutely awesome.'

Martin reached out for the black phone, but pulled his hand back when Fanning gave a small shake of his head. 'I keep wanting to check that they're working,' said Martin.

'They're fine.' Fanning ran a hand through his thick blond hair. He tapped the digital tape recorder. 'This monitors the signal constantly. Any problems with the line and it'd show a red light. Relax.'

'Relax?' Martin stood up and paced around the office. Carter and Denham watched him from the sofa. 'What if she doesn't call? What if they don't let her use the phone?'

'There are other lines of enquiry, Martin,' said Carter.

'We're doing everything we can.'

Martin continued pacing. 'What if it's not enough? What if they kill her? What if we never find Katie?' He stopped and glared at the telephones as if he could force them to ring by effort of will.

Carter pushed herself up out of the sofa and went over to Martin. She was a couple of inches shorter than he was and had to tilt her chin up to maintain eye contact. 'Martin, you have to take it easy. Worrying isn't going to solve anything. When she calls, the kidnappers are going to be listening in. If they suspect you're with someone, they'll cut the connection immediately.

You have to stay calm.'

The door opened and they all turned to look at Patsy Ellis.

'There's been an explosion,' she said.

'Is Andy all right?' asked Martin. He took a couple of steps towards Patsy. 'Is she? Is she okay?'

'We're not exactly sure what happened, Martin,' said Patsy.

'It wasn't here. It was in Milton Keynes.'

Martin bent over as if he'd been punched in the stomach. He struggled to speak but couldn't find any words. Milton Keynes?

What the hell did that have to do with Andy?

'Sit down, Martin,' said Patsy. Carter took his arm and eased him down on to a chair.

'Are we talking about an own goal here?' asked Denham.

'We've no idea what happened,' said Patsy. 'Other than that there was an explosion on an industrial estate just outside Milton Keynes. It was a device of some sort. SOCO are there now,

along with explosive officers from the anti-terrorist branch.

Early reports are that there was a vehicle inside a factory unit and that it exploded. There was at least one person killed.'

Martin put his head in his hands and moaned. Carter patted the back of his neck and looked across at Patsy. Patsy shrugged,

not sure what to say. She fingered the crucifix around her neck.

'Just one?' asked Denham.

'That's the information we have.'

Denham went over to Martin and sat down at the table next to him. 'That's good news, Martin. She wouldn't be on her own, not with the bomb.'

Martin lifted his head. Denham could see the hope in his eyes. 'Do you think?'

'I'm sure. If it was an accident, there would have been more killed.' He scratched the birthmark on his neck. 'And there's no reason for her to be in Milton Keynes. It's a wasteland. No terrorist is going to waste a bomb on Milton Keynes.'

Martin took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Denham looked over at Patsy and grimaced. He hoped he wasn't being too optimistic.

Andy took the Tupperware container out of the tumble-drier and placed it on the floor. She put in a new container, set the timer, then stood up and stretched. The Wrestler was mixing a fresh batch, measuring out the aluminium powder with a plastic cup. They'd done almost a quarter of the mixing, and had a line of black garbage bags, each containing about thirty pounds of explosive. The neck of each bag was tied with a metal fastener.

Andy went over to him. 'I'm going to take a break,' she said,

her voice muffled by the respirator. 'I need something to drink.'

The Wrestler nodded. 'Bring me back a Coke, yeah?'

Andy went along to the office where Green-eyes had stockpiled the food and drink. She took a chicken salad roll out of the Marks and Spencer carrier bag and opened a bottle of iced tea. She listened at the door before easing it open, then padded across the corridor and into the office opposite. The briefcase was where she'd left it. Andy picked it up and carried it back into the meeting room. She put it on the table and started flicking through the combinations. She'd reached the high seven hundreds.

O'Keefe jumped as he felt a hand on his shoulder. He whirled around, his right hand reaching for his holstered gun, but instantly relaxed when he saw it was McCracken. She'd put her ski mask on, but he could still see that she was grinning at his reaction. He pulled his respirator down. 'Didn't hear you,' he said, pointing at his ear. 'The tumble-driers.'

'That's okay,' said McCracken. 'Where's Andrea?'

O'Keefe gestured with his thumb at the private offices.

'Getting a drink.' He looked over McCracken's shoulder.

'Where's Quinn?'

'Quinn's not with us any more.'

'What? He's buggered off?'

'Not exactly.' She frowned at the line of black bags. 'Is that all?'

'Come on, it's hard bloody work, this. There's only the two driers. I'm doing as much as I can by hand, but it's taking for ever.' He grinned. 'The IRA used to use cement mixers for this bit, you know? We should have tried to bring a cement mixer in, huh?'

'Yeah, sure. We've got to get this done by tomorrow or Egan's going to be on the warpath.'

'It'll be done. We could do with Quinn, though.'

'Quinn's dead.'

O'Keefe's jaw dropped. 'Dead? What the hell happened?'

'He went up with the van.'

O'Keefe put down his wooden spatula. 'McCracken, what the fuck happened?'

McCracken explained what Egan had done. And why.

O'Keefe listened in silence, then rubbed his throat. 'He's a hard bastard, is Egan. You trust him?'

'He's come through with everything he promised. A third of our money in advance, this place, the Semtex.'

'Yeah, but he didn't say anything about blowing Quinn away, did he? What if he decides to get rid of the two of us the same way?'

'Quinn was a mistake.'

'Aye. But he was Egan's mistake. Remember that. Egan hired us all.'