False Friends (5 page)

‘Have you any idea of the danger we’re in? What if anyone finds out it was us?’

‘How would they find out? On TV the Yanks are claiming the credit for the whole thing.’

‘Then let’s leave it that way. No more cracks about heroes, okay? If anyone asks then it’s Americans murdering Muslims and we need to stand up to them blah blah blah. You got that?’

Malik nodded. ‘I hear you, brother.’

‘Where’s the remote? I want to check the other channels. Let’s see what the BBC are saying.’

Malik groped under a cushion, pul ed out the remote and tossed it to Chaudhry. ‘You think we should cal John?’

‘Let’s wait until he gets in touch with us,’ said Chaudhry, flicking through the channels.

Shepherd’s BlackBerry rang when he was in a black cab a mile from his rented flat in Hampstead. It was Charlotte Button. He took the cal .

‘You’re back, then?’ she said.

‘Almost home,’ he said. ‘I’m in a cab.’

‘We need to talk, obviously.’

‘Yeah. Obviously.’

‘Do you want to do it tonight? I can swing by your place.’

‘It’s a mess,’ said Shepherd. ‘But yes, we need to discuss a few things and the sooner the better.’

‘I didn’t know what was going to happen,’ said Button. ‘You know that if I had known I’d have told you.’

‘Yeah, I’m not sure that the fact they kept you in the dark inspires me with confidence,’ said Shepherd, as the taxi pul ed up at a red light.

‘Be with you as soon as I can,’ said Button, ending the cal .

Shepherd’s flat had been supplied by MI5 as part of his cover. He was a freelance journalist and the flat was in keeping with a journalist’s lifestyle: a cramped one-bedroom flat in a side road off Hampstead High Street. The taxi dropped him outside and Shepherd paid the driver. The taxi drove off just as Shepherd realised that he hadn’t asked for a receipt and he cursed under his breath.

The flat was in a block built during the sixties to fil the gap left when two mews houses were demolished by a stray German bomb during the Second World War. Shepherd’s flat was on the second floor with a smal sitting room overlooking the street, a bedroom at the back, a smal shower room and a kitchen that wasn’t much bigger than the shower room.

He let himself in, tapped in the burglar alarm code and then dropped his kitbag behind the sofa before taking a quick shower.

He was combing his stil -damp hair when the intercom rang and he buzzed Button in. He had the door open for her when she came up the stairs, and as always there was the briefest hesitation when it came to greeting her. A handshake always seemed too formal but she was his boss and a kiss on the cheek always seemed somehow wrong. She made the decision for him, putting her right hand on his arm and pecking him just once on the cheek.

‘Good to see you back in one piece, Spider,’ she said, moving past him into the hal way. She was wearing a black suit and black heels and her chestnut hair was loose, cut short so that it barely touched her shoulders.

‘I’ve got wine,’ said Shepherd, closing the door. ‘Or are you driving?’

‘I’m being driven,’ said Button. ‘One of the perks. So anything white would be good, preferably without bubbles.’

Shepherd went into the kitchen and opened the fridge. ‘I’ve got Frascati.’

‘No Pinot Grigio?’ asked Button.

‘Sadly, no. I’m a freelance journo, remember?’

‘Then Frascati it is.’

‘Screw top, I’m afraid.’

Button laughed. ‘Corks are overrated.’ She took off her jacket and sat down in an armchair. It and the two-seater sofa were the only places to sit and there was no dining table. ‘Cosy, isn’t it?’ she said as he walked in from the cubbyhole of a kitchen.

‘It’s close to the Heath so I get to run whenever I want to. And it’s close enough to Stoke Newington so that I can be over there in a hurry if necessary.’

‘Have you fixed up a meet with them?’

‘I wil do,’ said Shepherd, sitting down on the sofa with the bottle of wine and two glasses. ‘So, you had no idea that they were going to kil him?’

asked Shepherd. ‘No hint? No clue?’

‘How can you even ask that?’ said Button. ‘I was as much in the dark as you were. Al I was told was that we could have one operative on the team. My understanding was that providing Bin Laden wasn’t armed he was to be held for interrogation and eventual trial.’

‘He was unarmed,’ said Shepherd. ‘They al were.’

‘There was no firefight? The Americans are saying they came under fire.’

‘The only shots fired were fired by the Yanks,’ said Shepherd as he poured wine into the two glasses. ‘They shot one of his wives and then they shot him. A double tap to make sure. Then they al cheered and did that stupid whooping thing. They shot an unarmed man and then act like they’re bloody heroes. Twats.’

‘I’m sorry it worked out that way, Spider.’

‘You know, it seems to me that we would have been better off sending in the SAS. I said at the time it was a mistake trusting it to the Seals. They like to go in with guns blazing, kil everyone and let God sort them out.’ He shook his head and sneered in disgust.

‘At least you’re back in one piece.’

‘Yeah, wel , no thanks to the Yanks. You heard about the helicopter they crashed, right?’

Button nodded.

Shepherd tapped his chest. ‘Wel , I nearly bought it when it came close to crashing into the chopper I was in. Missed us by feet. I tel you, if it had hit us it would have been thank you and good night.’

‘What happened?’ She picked up her glass, sniffed the wine, then sipped it.

‘The pilot got too close to the compound wal and the rotor blast got deflected back. Instant loss of lift and down they went. Lucky no one was hurt.

I tel you, Charlie, from start to finish it was a disaster. The plan was to lower us by rope inside the compound. The chopper crashes so we’re on the wrong side of the wal . They tried to break down the gate and when that didn’t work they had to use C4 to blow it. By the time we got into the compound every man and his dog for miles must have heard us.’ He shrugged. ‘Sorry. It just pisses me off how badly organised they are. And after al that they stil start shooting unarmed men and women. They kil ed Bin Laden’s son and he didn’t even have a gun. For al I know he could have been surrendering. It was an assassination, nothing less.’

‘There are those that might say it’s better they didn’t take him alive. Can you imagine what al-Qaeda might have done to try to force the Americans to give him back? At least this way that’s not an option.’

‘Yeah? You think there won’t be repercussions? Because I’l take any bet you want to place. If Bin Laden had come out firing an AK-47 there might have been an argument for shooting him, but he was unarmed and they put a bul et in his chest and one in his head.’ He forced a smile. ‘At least they didn’t shoot me. I guess I should be thankful for smal mercies.’ He toyed with his wine glass. ‘So what now?’

‘Business as usual,’ said Button. ‘I need you to hand-hold Chaudhry and Malik. Especial y after what’s happened.’

‘I’l check in by phone tonight and arrange a meeting.’

‘How do you think they’l react?’

Shepherd grimaced. ‘They’l be pleased he’s dead; they both hated him for what he’d done. But they’l wonder why I didn’t give them a heads-up about what was going to happen.’

‘Smooth their feathers,’ she said. ‘Say whatever’s necessary to keep them on track.’

‘I’m not going to lie to them, Charlie.’

She swirled her wine around the glass. ‘No one’s asking you to lie, or even bend the truth. But they’re amateurs doing a very dangerous job and they need the kid-gloves treatment. For instance, probably best not to tel them you were in Pakistan.’

‘I wasn’t planning to,’ said Shepherd. ‘They don’t know about my SAS background.’

‘That’s the way to play it,’ she said. ‘You’re a regular MI5 intel igence officer with undercover experience pretending to be a freelance journalist,’

she said. ‘Anything else wil just overcomplicate it.’

‘Let me ask you something,’ said Shepherd. ‘Do you think kil ing Bin Laden makes it more likely now that Raj and Harvey are going to be put into play?’

‘They were already in play. They’ve been trained in Pakistan; they met with Bin Laden; they’ve been groomed to commit a major terrorist atrocity.

It has always been a matter of when and not if. I’m surprised it’s taken as long as it has.’

Shepherd sipped the last of his wine and then refil ed their glasses. ‘I just can’t help thinking that kil ing Bin Laden is like a red rag to a bul .

Especial y the way they did it. Shooting him in cold blood and dumping his body at sea. If I was a radical Muslim I’d be getting ready to make my point.’

‘But as the Americans are taking the credit, they’l be the ones suffering the consequences,’ said Button. ‘No one knows of our involvement and the Americans certainly won’t be publicising that you were with the Seal team.’

‘But if al-Qaeda does lash out at the UK, Raj and Harvey could be at the forefront.’

‘We’l be listening for chatter and the Border Agency is on alert,’ said Button. ‘I think if anything it’l subdue al-Qaeda for a while. They’l retrench and regroup.’

‘Would you like a bet on that?’

‘I never gamble, Spider. You know that.’ She raised her glass to him. ‘And seriously, I’m glad you’re okay. I was never convinced that sending you to Pakistan was a good idea but my bosses wanted one of ours on the team. Word had come down from Number Ten.’

‘What, to demonstrate that the special relationship is stil there?’

‘Who knows how our masters think?’ said Button. ‘It was probably just to get one over on the French.’ She sipped her wine again. ‘While we’re waiting for Chaudhry and Malik to be put into play there’s another job coming up, if you’re interested.’

‘I get a choice?’ said Shepherd. ‘That’s a change.’

‘It means a secondment to the Met.’

Shepherd’s eyes narrowed. ‘I’m not investigating cops again,’ he said. ‘I told you after the last time, that’s not what I’m about.’

‘Heard and understood,’ said Button. ‘No, it’s run-of-the-mil bad guys being targeted. And it’l mean you meeting up with someone from your past. Sam Hargrove.’

It was the last name that Shepherd had expected to hear and he raised his eyebrows.

‘Sam’s found a home in the Met’s Covert Operations Group and needs a hand on an undercover job,’ continued Button. ‘He’s a DCS now. He was stil a superintendent when you were with his unit, right?’

‘Yeah,’ said Shepherd. ‘Good to see him doing so wel . Did he ask for me specifical y?’

Button shook her head. ‘The Met is stretched, SOCA’s in disarray and the head of Covert Policing Command knows my boss at Five so I think it got discussed over lunch at the Garrick and I was asked to put someone forward. With your police background you were the obvious choice.’

‘Okay,’ said Shepherd hesitantly.

‘Problem?’

‘No, it’s not that. It’s just, you know, the past is a different country. You can’t go back, can you? I left the Met to join SOCA and left SOCA to go to Five. It’s going to feel strange going back to where I started.’

‘It wasn’t that long ago. But if you’ve any reservations, any reservations at al , let me know.’

‘No, it’s al good.’ He nodded. ‘Real y. It’l be interesting to see how the Met’s been getting on without me.’ Shepherd smiled. He wasn’t worried about working with Sam Hargrove again. In fact he was looking forward to it. He’d enjoyed working for Hargrove in the Met’s undercover unit in the days before it had been taken over by SOCA, and there had several times over the past few years when he’d considered giving his former boss a cal .

‘Why don’t you sleep on it and if you’re not keen you can let me know tomorrow?’

‘I don’t need to,’ said Shepherd. ‘It’l be fine. It’s not as if I’m rushed off my feet, is it?’

‘There’s a lot of waiting, that’s true,’ said Button. ‘But I’ve made it clear to Sam that if you are co-opted your Five work takes absolute precedence. If Chaudhry or Malik need you, you drop everything.’

Shepherd nodded and sipped his wine, watching her over the top of his glass. She almost always referred to the men by their family names, almost never as Raj and Harvey. He wondered if it was deliberate and that she was distancing herself from them. And that made him wonder how she referred to him when he wasn’t around. Was he Dan? Or Spider? Or Shepherd?

‘What?’ she said, and he realised that he must have been staring.

He grinned. ‘Nothing, I was just wondering if Jimmy Sharpe would be involved. I haven’t seen him for months but the last I heard was that he was doing some undercover work with the Met.’

‘Wel , if he is, give him my best.’ She looked at her watch. ‘I’d better be going, I’ve a stack of emails that need answering and I’ve a conference cal with Langley in a couple of hours.’

Shepherd slapped his forehead. ‘Damn, I knew I’d forgotten something. I was supposed to Skype Liam.’ He groaned. ‘They’re not al owed to use their laptops after eight. I’l have to cal him tomorrow.’

‘How’s he getting on at boarding school?’

‘Loves it,’ said Shepherd. ‘His grades are improving and he’s real y into al the sports. He’s started rock climbing, and that’s something I used to do as a kid so hopeful y we’l get in a few climbs together at some point.’

‘It’s funny how quickly they adapt,’ said Button. ‘My daughter always wanted to go to boarding school. There were a few tears the first week she was away, but these days she can’t wait to get back. It’s a teenage thing, I guess; they’d rather be with their friends.’

‘It works out real y wel for me,’ said Shepherd. ‘I can take him out any weekend if I want and they’re very relaxed about midweek visits. I try to Skype him every evening but this whole Pakistan thing has meant that I haven’t spoken to him for a week.’

‘What did you tel him?’

‘I spoke to him just before I went away, but obviously I didn’t say where I was going, just that I was working and that I probably wouldn’t be able to use my phone or computer. The Yanks were so paranoid they took everything off me as soon as I got to their airbase. They didn’t give me my phone back until I was boarding my plane this morning and by then the battery was dead.’