‘My God!’ They were much higher now. A virtually sheer face dropping away until it met the scree slope a long, long way below. Holm closed his eyes as vertigo snatched the last of his courage from him. He imagined dropping from the cliff and falling until he was pulverised on the boulders littering the bottom of the ravine. He clutched at the rock in front of him. Wondered, perversely, how Huxtable would spin the news coverage of his death.
Stephen Holm was on extended leave and taking a walking holiday in Tunisia… he was a valued member of JTAC but hadn’t been working in the field for several years… he will be missed greatly by his family and his many friends and colleagues…
‘Boss!’ Javed snapped him back into the present. ‘We can make it. Look up!’
Holm opened his eyes and craned his neck, expecting to see nothing but a sheer wall of unclimbable rock. Instead he saw a sloping boulder dappled with sun and shade. Above the boulder hung the branches of an olive tree. He thought of olives now. Olives and a crisp white wine. Perhaps, after this was all over, he’d return to Italy and rent a villa on the Amalfi Coast. Sit and watch the sea.
‘Right,’ he said, reaching for the next handhold and pulling himself up. In another couple of moves, his head crested the clifftop and he wriggled over and lay in the shade of the tree. ‘Thank God.’
Javed scrambled up and lay alongside him. For a moment they stayed still. Holm turned towards the farm. The little olive grove comprised half a dozen ancient trees. Each tree sat in a small depression and a black hose snaked between them. Water trickled from a hose end within arm’s reach. Holm crawled over and put the hose to his mouth and took a drink. Then he splashed water on his face before handing the hose to Javed.
As Javed drank, Holm turned to the farm again. A low wall separated the olive grove from the farm. Beyond, several buildings surrounded a yard. The farmhouse stood to one side and there was a veranda at the rear. He eased himself up. The yellow SUV was parked next to a pick-up truck and on the back of the pick-up was the crate they’d seen loaded into the white van.
‘The weapons,’ Javed said. ‘We need to call Palmer.’
‘Yes, but I want to see what’s going on in the farm first.’ Holm swung his gaze to the main building. ‘And find out what the hell Karen Hope is doing in there.’
Taher stood at the farmhouse window. On the far side of the room the future president of the United States of America sat at a small table eating breakfast.
‘We’re done,’ Karen Hope said. ‘You fulfilled your side of the deal and you’ve got the missiles and the money. Now we go our separate ways.’
‘You think you can just walk away from this?’ Taher turned from the window. Despite the large deposit sitting in his bank account, despite the missiles hiding in the loft space of his lock-up garage and the ones outside on the truck, he felt as if Hope had got the better of him. ‘Your hands are stained with blood too.’
‘It goes with the territory.’
‘Perhaps, but there’s always a price to pay, and I’m wondering, given the nature of the prize, if I wasn’t short-changed.’
‘Tough. You set the terms and I delivered.’ Hope reached for a glass of orange juice and took a sip. ‘My brother made a huge error of judgement and almost jeopardised my chance of becoming president. I don’t intend to let anything else get in my way.’ She slammed the glass down on the table and looked across at him. ‘Including you.’
‘Yes, but…’ From the corner of his eye Taher spotted something through the window. Someone.
He held a hand up to Hope, edged up to the opening and peered down. Two men lay prone by the wall in the olive grove. One was brown-skinned, with short black hair, not much more than a boy. The other was older and white, a few strands of grey hair on his head, flabby features. Taher had seen the man before in a dossier given to him by his contact in London.
‘MI5,’ he whispered to himself.
Hope pushed her chair back and stood. ‘Visitors?’
‘Yes.’ Taher moved back from the window and grabbed his AK-47 from where he’d propped it against the wall. He checked his Glock was secure in his shoulder holster and went to the door. ‘I’ll deal with them.’
Downstairs, he crept along the corridor which led to the veranda. A slit of light came through a narrow window. He peered out. The men were still there, hunched behind the stone wall. Neither looked armed.
Taher continued along the corridor. He stopped and listened before he stepped onto the veranda. Anybody approaching along the track would have triggered the PIR alarm, but the alarm was silent and apart from the wind there wasn’t a sound. By the state of these two they must have climbed up from the ravine. This was amateur hour.
Taher slipped out onto the veranda and across to the steps that led down to the olive grove. He moved silently until he was within a few feet of the men and then cleared his throat.
‘You’ve been after me, old man.’ Taher raised his gun as the two men scrabbled upright. ‘For a long time.’
‘Taher.’ The older man pushed himself up from the ground and beckoned his colleague to do the same. He didn’t appear to be surprised.
‘And now you’ve found me. Job done.’
‘I’m not finished yet,’ the man said. ‘Not until you’re behind bars.’
‘You’re out of touch. There are no bars these days. Missiles from the sky, helicopters bringing special forces – so much easier than all the legal problems imprisonment brings.’ Taher gestured towards the steps with the barrel of his gun. ‘And I’d welcome that. I wouldn’t
