Traitors Read online

  Iqbal realised he was breathing heavily; he was a lover, not a fighter and hadn’t been involved in any fisticuffs since a schoolyard tussle when he was seven. The first drunk swayed unsteadily in front of him but didn’t speak. Iqbal was about to leave when loud voices sounded in the doorway. Three men, dressed in camouflaged fatigues and holding Kalashnikovs, entered the shop. Before Iqbal had time to understand what was happening, one of the men produced a can of Mace and sprayed him in the face while another punched him hard in the gut.

  Unable to see and barely able to breathe, Iqbal was lifted bodily out onto the street and bundled into the boot of a waiting car. Once inside, a hessian sack was placed over his head and unseen fists and feet pummelled him. Iqbal lost consciousness and when he awoke, found himself in the garage.

  *

  Iqbal opened his eyes. He heard a scraping outside, a sound he’d come to associate with one of two things – food or fists. The door opened and one of the DNR militants appeared. ‘Get up.’

  Iqbal slowly staggered to his feet.

  ‘Raduga is ready for you.’ The man jeered and despite himself Iqbal felt scared.

  Chapter 4

  DGSE Headquarters, Paris

  The door was open, so Jacob didn’t knock. Baptiste glanced up from his military-clean steel desk, registered his boss’s appearance, and his eyebrows arched. Jacob, wearing his ancient camel-coloured overcoat, stepped inside the room. He shut the door on the blue-walled corridor behind and started to speak. ‘I’m heading out to meet with the British.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘Yes.’ Jacob had made the decision that they would delay informing the British authorities of Mohammed Iqbal’s location until the DGSE mission was underway.

  ‘Do you have any updated intel on his location or condition?’

  ‘None.’

  ‘Our official belief is that Iqbal is being held at the place we pinpointed?’

  ‘It is, sir.’

  Jacob ran his tongue over his top lip. ‘Remind me of the details of Racine’s insertion?’

  ‘Are you going to share that with the British?’

  ‘Of course not. The British are our close colleagues, not our dear friends. I’ll inform them that there are assets in the region but there is no need for us to tell them about our specific involvement.’ Baptiste remained silent, but Jacob could see he was not happy. ‘Go ahead; say what it is you want to say.’

  ‘Do you not think it would be wise to say exactly what we have underway? That we have located a rogue agent.’

  ‘In order to assassinate him?’ Jacob asked.

  ‘That is not what I meant. Surely they know of Vasilev’s actions and our claim on him? Besides they will see it’s him who has been interrogating their citizen.’

  ‘Do you think the British would agree to me sending in Racine, or someone like her, if they had any say in the matter? Believe me, Baptiste, they would wave their arms around, huff and puff and demand that we make this an official joint operation.’ Jacob noticed that his hand had gone into his pocket and was clutching his hip flask. He caught Baptiste watching him and looked away. ‘Our objective is the elimination of Vasilev,’ Jacob continued. ‘Theirs would be the rescue of Iqbal. I’ll admit, begrudgingly, that they are the best in the world at hostage rescue, but how would an SAS team be able to work around our sole, surgical operative?’

  ‘The British have access to ECHELON, and that could be useful to us.’ Once classified, the ECHELON surveillance programme was operated by the US and four other English-speaking, signatory states – Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom – collectively known as ‘the five eyes’. It originally monitored the diplomatic messages of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact countries. Now it boasted intelligent keyword algorithms to monitor all private communication and was a key tool in identifying terrorists and their targets.

  ‘Baptiste, I am sure they will alert us to anything relevant, without us having to go cap in hand and ask them. And let us not forget the time factor.’

  Jacob left his junior to his paperwork and took the stairs two floors down to the side exit where his car was waiting for him. He greeted his driver, and once the security gates shut behind them, they sped through the suburbs. Although he had a liking for motor cars, Jacob wasn’t fond of driving. This in part was due to his fondness of drinking. He raised the privacy screen and pulled his faithful hip flask from his pocket, now refilled from a bottle of Courvoisier he kept locked in his desk. Jacob allowed himself a sip, as outside Paris rushed past. His driver knew where they were going and how to get there, and this afforded Jacob a few minutes for reflective thought.

  *

  After taking a circuitous route, to avoid the worst of the lunchtime traffic and to check for any tails, Jacob stepped out of the cavernous Citroën saloon a block away from the bistro. He immediately walked to the railings that overlooked the dark river, rushing below. There was a slight chill in the air but his coat remained unbuttoned, making it all the easier to draw his personal sidearm if it was required. In all his years of service it had been required just twice: once to fend off overexuberant looters during a riot and the second time to stop a suspected Libyan operative from using his own 9mm on him. Jacob did not think of himself as a man of action, and never had, but now as he pushed pensionable age he knew that his physical powers were draining away. He took a nip from his flask, just to ward off the cold, and casually turned around.

  The immediate area was not busy but there were a few people taking the air or posing for photographs. A couple stood with their backs to the river, the woman holding aloft a camera phone affixed to a metal pole. Jacob watched them and wondered where they were from. They could be Japanese, and some of the many tourists who for years had flocked to Paris like excited birds and chattered around its landmarks. And now they even tweeted too! He smirked at his own play on words. But became serious when they neared, phone still swinging on the pole.

  He hated phones with cameras, the ability to send a high-quality digital photograph across the world in seconds was as problematic to the intelligence community as it was helpful. They stopped a few paces from him, so enamoured it seemed of each other and their surroundings that he had been rendered invisible. He hoped they would remain happy as they continued to explore France’s capital city and not succumb to Paris syndrome. He’d scoffed at the idea but apparently Pari shōkōgun, as it was known in Japanese, was a real thing. It was a severe form of culture shock or a transient mental disorder, depending who you believed, which affected a percentage of Japanese tourists who arrived in Paris and discovered that Paris was not what they had expected it to be.

  He wondered if he’d go mad if he ever visited Tokyo? He walked away and then noticed a tall man standing looking in a shop window, his back turned towards him. It looked like an everyday scene except Jacob knew for a fact that the shop was a ballet boutique and boasted some of the best tutus in Paris. Men of course entered such establishments, but it was an unusual occurrence. He noted that the man’s long, dark coat was also undone, and his hands were out of his pockets. Jacob had already started to walk towards him and would be visible as an approaching apparition reflected in the window glass, so he carried on his course towards him. The man turned to look back and for a moment made eye contact with Jacob. Jacob felt a simultaneous chill in his spine and a pulsating heat in his chest. He instinctively flexed his hands.

  There was a sudden squeal of tyres and Jacob involuntarily flinched, then taking a sidestep faced the noise. It was a large, low-slung, BMW 7 series. The back door opened, Jacob’s right hand started to move towards the pancake holster under his left arm … An even taller man in a suit stepped out … Jacob’s hand continued to move … There was a flash of movement … Jacob’s hand started to pull the pistol … and then a blonde-haired woman sprang out. The man at the ballet shop window loped towards her, his arms outstretched. Jacob took a deep breath and felt himself deflate.

  He leant agains
t the wall and noticed his hand was shaking. Calming his breathing, he took another sip from his hip flask and continued to walk, berating himself for getting worked up about nothing. He passed the happy duo several strides later. He continued to carry out his counter-surveillance measures by walking a meandering route before some twenty minutes later arriving at the meeting place. Hip flask empty, he was chilled and ready for a drink.

  The bistro looked unremarkable from the outside, which was why the wrong sort of people paid it no attention. Perched on a steep slope and sandwiched between two similar, minimal establishments – one selling shoes and the other hats – it had an unrestricted view of the Seine. Inside the bistro seemed not to have been redecorated since the war. It was a welcoming cave of dark woods and burgundy upholstery. Jacob peered through the window. His guest was early and had taken a table at the back. Both a plate of cheese and a select bottle of red from the extensive wine list sat breathing. The man stifled a yawn as he checked his iPhone. The bistro owner was behind the bar polishing glasses, which seemed to Jacob like a never-ending task – almost like intelligence gathering.

  Jacob entered and the bell above the door jingled. He made a beeline for his guest. ‘My dear old friend. How nice to see you here, in Paris.’

  ‘It’s nice to be here, Maurice.’ The man’s French was good, but his accent was unmistakable.

  Jacob shook hands with the senior SIS (MI6) officer. He marvelled at how the man, who was now in his mid-fifties, hadn’t seemed to age. He subconsciously smoothed down his own coarse, grey locks, removed his coat and took a seat.

  Before either man could say another word, the elderly bistro owner had appeared at the table to pour their wine. ‘How are you today, Maurice?’

  Jacob smiled the same as he always did. ‘I am comfortable, Francois.’

  Francois nodded at the Englishman. ‘I told him he still looks like a young Robert Redford.’

  ‘And I asked him what he was after,’ the Englishman replied, with good humour.

  Francois retreated, but ignored Jacob’s coat, which lay on the empty chair to his left.

  ‘Jack, you needn’t have come all this way to see me.’

  ‘I came for the cheese and wine; seeing you was an added extra,’ Patchem said.

  ‘To your good health!’ Jacob raised his glass. The wine was exquisite, as it always was at the bistro. He never quite knew if it was because as a customer he chose well or because Francois only stocked the finest. He relaxed a fraction. He really was happy to see Jack Patchem, head of what the Secret Intelligence Service still referred to as ‘The Russian Desk’ and felt a pang of guilt at the words he had used in front of Baptiste.

  ‘So why are we here?’ Patchem asked, as he took a piece of brie.

  ‘We have received intel that a British citizen is being held prisoner in Eastern Ukraine by the Russian-backed militia.’

  ‘Do you have a name?’

  ‘Mohammed Iqbal.’

  Patchem seemed to be racking his brain. ‘Doesn’t ring a bell.’

  Jacob ran his tongue along his top lip before he replied. ‘He’s just a student who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.’

  ‘What type of intel?’

  Jacob explained and then retrieved a folded A4 envelope from his coat. ‘And as soon as we realised he was a British citizen, I contacted you.’

  ‘Thank you, Maurice.’ Patchem removed the papers from the envelope and glanced at them briefly before he slipped them into his briefcase.

  ‘I of course will tell Baptiste to immediately send your people all this in an electronic format. I imagine you will want to reach out to the relevant authorities to ensure his swift release?’

  ‘As far as I am aware the OSCE has a mandate to facilitate prisoner swaps between all sides of the Minsk II agreement.’

  ‘Ah, well that is the official line.’ Jacob emptied his glass. ‘Will you send in a team, perhaps “The Increment”?’

  He saw Patchem feign surprise. ‘The Increment’ was a classified cell of the United Kingdom’s Special Forces troops selected to carry out operations for the Secret Intelligence Service. For the past few years, however, it had been known as ‘E Squadron’. Jacob knew this but wanted to play dumb.

  ‘I see you have your sources.’

  ‘I do,’ Jacob replied.

  ‘Given the tricky, diplomatic situation – an undeclared war in Ukraine – I will have to decide on the best course of action.’ Patchem finished his own glass. ‘And I have a man for such action.’

  ‘You do?’ Jacob was surprised.

  ‘I do.’ Patchem filled both glasses. ‘He’s somewhat of an expert on Ukraine.’

  Roissy-Charles de Gaulle International Airport, Paris, France

  The flight time from Paris to Vienna, the first leg of Racine’s journey, took only two hours. For this reason and the fact she was playing the role of a single, Swiss tourist, she flew economy class, wore nondescript clothes and carried just hand luggage. She had the window seat and the two seats next to her were empty. The three across the aisle were occupied by a French family. The father – thin and angular – had the window seat; the mother – a large woman – was squashed in the middle; whilst her pre-teen daughter, who looked to have inherited her mother’s girth, sat nearest the aisle. As the plane taxied towards the runway, the mother produced a packet of boiled sweets from the pocket of her cardigan and handed one to the little girl. She popped it into her mouth obediently. The plane accelerated and they lost contact with the ground.

  Racine took innumerable flights each year and understood the mechanics of flying, yet it still never ceased to amaze her – the moment of weightlessness in her stomach followed by the G-force pressing her back into her seat. Over the whine of the jet engines she heard the girl give a squeal of delight. Racine turned her head and saw a wide smile filling a chubby face. Then there was a crunch as the girl chewed on her boiled sweet. Her mother tutted and, unbid, popped a new one into her mouth.

  Racine turned her head away and closed her eyes. She’d try to sleep for most of the flight as she didn’t know when it would be safe enough to do so again. Another crunch and another tut reached Racine’s ears as she drifted off.

  Chapter 5

  Fifteen Years Ago

  Nice, France

  The puddles formed by the overnight rain had not yet dried out and her feet had seemingly landed in every one of them as she ran. But her discomfort was cast aside as she focused on moving, hitting the pavement with one stride after another. Her daily run took her from their house on the hill down through the old town and along the promenade before turning and heading back, a circular route and quite pointless unless one counted exercise as the point. It was a little over two kilometres in length. ‘A short, easy length’ – said her father who ran with her when work allowed him to – yet it had taken her the best part of a month before she had managed to run it without stopping or feeling sick. The uphill part was the hardest, but she relished the extra challenge, the heightened effort to maintain her progress on the ever-increasing slope.

  Her mother of course had been worried about her daughter being out on the streets alone before seven a.m. Sophie promised not to get into any strange men’s cars, especially if they had a box of puppies with them. Her father had laughed at this but her mother had not understood the sarcasm and explained that ‘one did not transport puppies in a cardboard box’ and did she really believe that any man would entice a young lady with puppies?

  Sophie’s mother had become increasingly difficult over the past year, and the rows between her parents had become more frequent. What Sophie, as a kid, had put down to her mother and father just getting on each other’s nerves, she realised now as a young woman was due rather to a fundamental incompatibility. Her mother and father were too much alike in their impenetrable belief that their view on raising their daughter was correct. Neither would bend nor compromise. Her mother had given up her career as a pastry chef to become a housewife and her
father was a former Legionnaire turned defence lawyer. In short Madame Racine loved to cook, whilst Monsieur Racine lived to exercise. It should have worked. It didn’t.

  As her feet continued to splash along the wet cobbles Sophie concluded that it probably hadn’t mattered before she’d been born. She’d seen photos of her mother and she’d never been model slim – her father had obviously enjoyed her curves. And then she’d been born and come between her parents. Her mother had passed on her eating habits to her daughter who had become fat. This had eaten away at her father especially when the puppy fat had still not shifted when she’d entered her mid-teens. So he had taken action. She’d overheard them arguing about her weight. Her mother said she was developing ‘a natural womanly figure’ but her father said she was starting to resemble a hippo. Sophie had cried herself to sleep that night.

  The next morning Sophie took a good look at herself as she dressed in front of her mirror and then decided to side with her father. She wanted to change. She’d become the fat kid, and that had to stop. And so she ran. It made her father proud, but it worried her mother. She’d heard them argue again, but this time she was not upset by it at all.

  Sophie’s legs had started to feel tired as she hit the uphill part of her run. At this time of day, the narrow, cobbled streets of the old town were empty. The restaurants were closed, and the cafés had yet to open up for their breakfast customers. She turned a corner, took an alleyway between two old stone buildings and came to a halt. A boy was standing in her way, his arms folded and a sneer spread across his face.