“I will do it, let me kill him.”
Chapter 4
Lotfi wasn’t going to let that happen. “No, we have our tasks.”
Hubba-Hubba was still in a state of disgust. “How many?”
“For definite, two men, three boys. That’s all I’ve seen.”
Lotfi had a change of heart. “Then I will kill the other one.”
Hubba-Hubba agreed. I was starting to worry. “No, only the target. Just the target, okay, we’re just here for him. No one else, remember?” Doing things outside your limits of exploitation can lead to horrendous screw-ups elsewhere. We didn’t know the whole story, just this little bit. I felt pretty much the way he did, but…“Just the target, no one else.”
Lotfi said he would lead, as the color of my eyes and skin could still be a problem for a little while longer. I caught his shoulder. “Remember. If there’s a situation—”
He finished my sentence. “No head shots.”
I tapped my traser. We had less than six minutes.
I could hear Hubba-Hubba still murmuring quietly to himself about what Zeralda was up to as there was a burst of laughter from inside the room, and I remembered that his own sons were nearly as old as these boys.
We stopped just short of the door. I could hear a little Arabic banter, then more laughter from inside the room. Then I heard a young voice, clearly pleading: whatever was going on in there, he didn’t like it. I felt a surge of anger.
Traser told me there were four minutes left on the Parkway timer. I undid the top flap of my bergen, dug out the rubber gloves and started to put them on. Those two, and their invisible friends, had better get off their butts once we were inside: we didn’t have much time.
Hubba-Hubba picked up a wrought-iron chair and hurled it against the windows. The noise of smashing glass was followed by startled screams from inside, and then by even louder screams of aggression as he and Lotfi kicked out the remaining glass and pushed their way through. Even Pink Floyd was no match for this pair.
The next distinguishable sound I heard was begging, this time from the men. I didn’t want to know what was going on in there now, or how Lotfi and his pal were choosing to control the situation. I heard more breaking glass, the racket of furniture being pulled around.
A split second later the loud crump of the devices made me duck instinctively as what looked like sheet lightning filled the sky. There was a renewed frenzy inside; more furniture being hurled around, and the screams became wails.
All at once the boys’ cries ceased, as if a switch had been thrown.
I checked my shemag, took the bergen in my left hand and the Makharov in my right, and poked an eye around the corner to see what was happening. The room reeked of cannabis smoke. Pink Floyd was still going for it next door.
Both men were on the floor, being kicked and stamped on by Lotfi, who was alone in the room with them. Zeralda was about to collect a boot in the teeth.
“Not the face,” I yelled. “Not the face!”
Lotfi turned, his huge black eyes wide and quivering. I jumped through the French windows, my sneakers crunching on shards of broken glass. I dropped the bergen and put my gloved left hand on his shoulder, keeping a good grip on the Makharov with my right, and my thumb on the safety in case he totally lost control and I had to stop him.
I gave his shoulder a squeeze and eased him away from the whimpering and bloodstained heap on the floor. I had to speak up to be heard over the music. “Come on, mate, remember why we’re here….”
I understood what was disturbing him and liked him for it, but not so much that I’d let him jeopardize the job. He moved back against the wall as I looked down to check out Zeralda’s head. I caught the other one looking into my eyes. I guessed that he knew I wasn’t an Arab, that this wasn’t a GIA attack. Bad decision on my part, not waiting until Lotfi had finished and called me in. It was just one of those screw-ups that happen once on the ground. And a totally bad decision on his part, having ears and eyes: no matter what the reason for no one else being killed in the house, he would have to die.
He seemed in control, even if his overfed face didn’t look that good; most of the blood that should have been inside his head was now on the front of his shirt.
I kicked Zeralda over onto his back. His face wasn’t too bad. He had a few teeth missing and blood leaking out of his mouth and nose, but not much else. His eyes were closed and his body wobbled as he, I presumed, tried to explain why I should keep him alive.
I stepped back, raised the Makharov, and double-tapped him in the chest. After a couple of jerks, he wobbled no more.
Zeralda’s pal’s eyes were shaking in their sockets now, just like Lotfi’s, but there was no gasp of horror or any begging from him as the music took over again, punctuated by the distant cries of the boys from somewhere else in the house.
Hubba-Hubba came back into the room.
“Where are the boys?”
“Bathroom.” Hubba-Hubba pointed back the way he’d come.
“Get them out of here before the fuel cuts us off. Give them the car. Go, mate, just get them out of here. This fucker stays, I want him to watch.”
Lotfi had pulled the greaseball onto the bed and was yelling abuse at him. He let fly with his fist, punching him hard in the mouth for good measure.
As Greaseball tried to separate his hair from the blood on his face, I made sure he saw me take out the butcher’s knife. He began to get the message. His brown eyes bulged and shook some more.
I pulled Zeralda by the arm and rolled him back over onto his stomach, then sat astride him and grabbed a fistful of his hair in my left hand. I yanked it back and positioned the knife below his Adam’s apple.
I looked up to double-check that Greaseball was watching, and then started to cut. I had prepared myself for days by telling myself that this was going to be shocking, but this wasn’t the time to be shocked. I had a job to do.
The knife was razor sharp, and I felt little resistance once it got through the first layer of skin and I pulled back on his head to make the cutting easier. I was beginning to feel a little light-headed. Maybe it was because of the cloud of weed that still hung in the air, but I doubted it. Pink Floyd were still at full pitch, singing about the best days of our lives.
Greaseball closed his eyes but Lotfi thrust his pistol against his ear, uttering in Arabic. His eyes opened again, just in time to see blood stream from his dead friend onto the tiles, and flow between his own feet dangling from the bed. It was too much for him; he vomited onto the bedding as he tried desperately to keep his feet off the ground, as if it were on fire.
He started to babble in vomit-soaked Arabic to Lotfi, but halted abruptly as a blinding light burst through the haze of sweet-smelling smoke that still filled the air.
It came from the area around the tanks. The OBIs had done their stuff. The fuel was burning fine: I could see the leaves on the trees outside, which were higher than the perimeter wall, reflecting the bright orange flames.
I concentrated on the job at hand, working at the top of his spinal column like I was cutting a section of ox- tail.
Lotfi had gotten fed up with his supporting role and was pistol-whipping the other pedophile. If he hadn’t before, Greaseball now got the message: he was in deep shit. He started begging, his legs and red-stained soles up by his chest, his hands down between them trying to protect himself as he lay on the bed. “Please, please, I’m a friend. I’m a friend…” something like that, anyway. His English sounded pretty good; I just couldn’t hear too clearly with the music this loud.
I yelled at Lotfi: “Turn that fucking noise off, it’s doing my head in.”
