‘Button, yeah?’
Shepherd shook his head. ‘There’s a hotline we call that’s answered by a duty officer. We explain the problem and the duty officer takes care of it. If it’s the cops then it goes to the commissioner’s office and he sorts it out.’
‘So you could get away with murder, could you?’
‘Bloody hell, Razor, I’m not James Bond and there’s no bloody licence to kill. And it’s all hypothetical anyway. It’s not as if I go around breaking the law.’
Sharpe laughed and jerked his thumb at the boxes in the back of the Range Rover. ‘What’s that back there? Chopped liver?’
Shepherd nodded. ‘Fair point. But if we do get pulled over by the traffic cops then I assume you’ll flash them your warrant card before they start rooting around in the back.’
‘Yeah, that’s one of the benefits of being back with the Met,’ said Sharpe. ‘At least everyone knows what a warrant card is. That SOCA ID was bloody useless.’ He folded his arms. ‘So where are we doing the show?’
‘Out in the Brecon Beacons,’ said Shepherd. He tapped the TomTom unit on his dashboard. ‘Got the location programmed in already. There’s a place we can drive off the road and not be seen. The nearest house is a mile away and the SAS sometimes do live-fire exercises out there so the locals are used to gunfire.’
‘And no back-up? That’s a worry.’
‘Not a problem. We’re not carrying cash so no one’s going to get heavy for three guns and a hand grenade. Plus, you can take care of yourself, can’t you? What do they call it? The Gorbals Kiss?’
Sharpe chuckled. ‘I’d never headbutt anybody, Spider. You know that.’
‘Anyway, Kettering and Thompson didn’t look the heavy sort to me. Cerebral rather than physical. We’ll be okay.’
‘And has Hargrove said anything about when we move in?’
‘I know as much as you do,’ said Shepherd.
Sharpe slowly turned his head, a sly grin on his face. ‘Are you sure about that?’
‘What, you think I’ve got some sort of inside track?’
‘Heaven forbid,’ said Sharpe.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing’s wrong,’ Sharpe shrugged. ‘I’m just starting to feel like a third wheel on this job, that’s all. Hargrove’s gone very quiet ever since you came on board. He doesn’t seem to be talking to me as much as he used to. Not just about this operation, either.’
‘You’re paranoid,’ said Shepherd.
‘Yeah? Well, just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get me.’
‘Razor, Hargrove has been talking to me because I’ve got access to the Sass. It’s the only way we can get the weapons we need. Can you imagine the paperwork that we’d need to get assault rifles through the Met?’
‘I guess,’ said Sharpe. He looked at his watch again. ‘How long before we’re there?’
‘Two hours, maybe.’
‘I’ll catch forty winks,’ he said and settled back in his seat.
‘I’ll miss your sparkling conversation,’ said Shepherd.
Shepherd kept the Range Rover at just below the speed limit on the drive from Hereford to the Welsh border and through the national park to the town of Brecon. He stopped at a small pub on the outskirts, woke Sharpe, and drank a cup of strong coffee while Sharpe drank a pint of lager. They sat at a table close to a walk-in stone fireplace and Shepherd waited until the barmaid was out of earshot before taking out a pay-as-you-go mobile and dialling Kettering’s number. ‘We’re about half an hour away,’ said Shepherd. ‘What about you?’
‘Parked up already at the lay-by, like you said,’ said Kettering. ‘Traffic was light and we got here early. You’ve got the stuff?’
‘Of course I’ve got the stuff. I wouldn’t have driven all the way to sheep-shagging country for nothing, would I? We’ll see you there.’ He ended the call and nodded at Sharpe. ‘All good. They’re in the lay-by. We can let them wait a bit. Show them who’s boss.’
‘Did you just say sheep-shagging? Doesn’t Five have diversity-awareness courses?’
‘I’m in character,’ said Shepherd. He finished his coffee and nodded at Sharpe’s half-empty glass. ‘I’m having another coffee while you finish that.’
Shepherd went over to the bar, ordered a second cup of coffee and then carried it back to the table.
‘What do you think about Kettering and Thompson?’ Sharpe asked as Shepherd sat down.
‘In what way?’
‘They’re not Walter Mitty characters, are they? They’re not fantasists.’
‘Fantasists don’t normally buy dozens of automatic weapons,’ said Shepherd. ‘They might put photos of themselves holding replicas on Facebook but they don’t usually follow through.’
‘So what’s their game?’ asked Sharpe. ‘What do you think they’ve got planned?’
‘Who knows?’
‘All that crap about defending themselves if there’s another riot is crap. Grenades aren’t defensive, and Kalashnikovs are overkill,’ said Sharpe. He took a long pull on his pint before continuing. ‘It’s not about self-defence. They’re planning something, something that’s going to leave a lot of people dead.’
‘Maybe,’ said Shepherd. ‘But it’s not going to get to that stage. They’ll be busted long before they get a chance to use the guns.’
‘I hope so,’ said Sharpe. ‘But we could bust them today if we wanted. Conspiracy to buy automatic weapons. That’d get them ten years.’
‘Except they’re not paying us today, are they? We need them to hand over the cash. What’s bugging you? We’ve done this before. We do a show and tell, we arrange a handover and we hoover them up.’
Sharpe shrugged. ‘This one just feels different, that’s why. Kettering and Thompson aren’t regular crims. They’re not blaggers, they’re not drug dealers, but they want enough guns to supply a small army. Don’t you want to know why?’
‘Not really,’ said Shepherd. ‘In the grand scheme of things the reason doesn’t matter. They buy the guns, they go to jail and they don’t pass go or collect two hundred pounds. And we move on.’
‘Yeah, maybe I’m over-thinking it.’ Sharpe drained his glass and patted his expanding waistline. ‘Okay, once more into the valley of death.’
‘There’s confidence for you,’ said Shepherd. He stood up and Sharpe followed him out to the Range Rover.
After driving for fifteen minutes they arrived at the lay-by where Kettering had parked. There were four men sitting in Kettering’s Jaguar. Shepherd flashed his lights and slowed down as he drove by. Kettering flashed back, pulled into the road and followed them.
It took Shepherd another ten minutes to drive to the destination on the TomTom. There was a fence running to their left with a barred gate leading to a track that wound round a gently sloping hill. Sharpe got out and opened the gate, waited for Shepherd and Kettering to drive through and closed it. Ahead of them, about a hundred feet or so in the air, a hawk was flying into the wind, its wings fluttering as it held its position over the ground. As Sharpe got back into the car the hawk plummeted down, its wings tucked in close to its body, and grabbed a small rodent in its claws.
Shepherd drove around the hill. The track petered out but the four-wheel drive kept the Range Rover moving easily across the field. The Jaguar had more trouble and slowed to a crawl.
Shepherd brought the Range Rover to a stop and climbed out. Sharpe laughed when he saw how much trouble Kettering was having driving over the rough ground. ‘He’s not going to be happy about this,’ he said. ‘It’ll play havoc with his suspension.’
The Jaguar, its sides now splattered with mud, finally reached the Range Rover. It parked and four men got out. Kettering and Thompson were both wearing leather bomber jackets and jeans and had scarves round their necks. Kettering waved. ‘All good, Garry?’
‘No problems,’ said Shepherd.
Kettering nodded at the two men who had been in the back of the Jaguar. ‘Friends of ours,’ he said. ‘Roger and Sean.’ The two men shook hands with Shepherd and Sharpe. Sean was broad-shouldered, with a military haircut and a Northern Irish accent that suggested Londonderry rather than Belfast. Shepherd had seen Roger
