Gray Redemption (Tom Gray #3)

Gray Redemption

~by~

Alan McDermott

Published by Alan McDermott at
Smashwords

Copyright 2012 Alan McDermott

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not
be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book
with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person.

Alan wrote this book in his spare time.  If you want to read more of
his work, please make sure you pay for a copy so that he can quit work and
realise
his dream of writing full time.

You may not reproduce this work, in part or in its entirety, without the
express written permission of the author.

All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to
real persons, living or
dead,
is purely coincidental.

Also by Alan McDermott:

Gray Justice (Tom Gray #1)

Gray Resurrection (Tom Gray #2)

Gray
Redemption
is the final book in the Tom Gray series and
is not meant to be read as a standalone novel.  For the ultimate reading
experience you should first read
Gray Justice
followed by
Gray
Resurrection
.  If you choose not to read the books in order, don’t say
you weren’t warned.

Prologue

 Saturday
April 21st 2012

Ben Palmer placed the
bloodied knife on the table and removed the tape covering Kan Tek Kwok’s mouth.

“I know that you’ve been
passing sensitive material to
Alphaco
,” he said, his
voice calm.  “Just tell me what you shared with them.”

It was, in fact, a lie. 
He neither knew that Kwok was selling trade secrets to his client’s rival
technology firm, nor did he care.  His remit for the current assignment
was simply to extract information, and in this particular field he had no equal.

“I swear...”

It wasn’t the answer Palmer
was looking for.  He placed the tape back over Kwok’s mouth and picked up
the knife, which he’d found in his subject’s kitchen drawer.  It was
probably fine for slicing vegetables but it had taken a lot of effort to cut through
the man’s fingers.  Still, he thought, it all added to the effect.

Palmer ran the knife down
Kwok’s bare stomach and over the two marks created by the Taser.  The file
he’d been given showed the man lived alone, and fortunately he hadn’t been
entertaining that evening.  After getting him to answer the door, Palmer
had stunned him with the electroshock device.  While he was still reeling
from the shock, Palmer had flipped him over and administered an injection
between his shoulder blades.  He had then closed the curtains while the
neuromuscular-blocking drug — derived from Curare, a relaxant which left the
recipient unable to move any of his voluntary muscles — took effect. 
Unlike other varieties — such as Suxamethonium chloride, which also affected the
involuntary muscles such as the diaphragm — this derivative allowed the patient
to breathe unaided.  The result was that Kwok was unable to put up any
resistance whatsoever, but could still feel every ounce of the pain being
inflicted.

“I can make this last all
night, Kan,” he said, moving the knife down to Kwok’s bare genitals.  “It
would be better to tell me now, while you can still father children.”

Palmer placed the blade on
the man’s penis and applied a little pressure while making a sawing motion – not
enough to break the skin, but sufficient to bring a look of horror to Kwok’s
face.

“I’ll count to five,” Palmer
said.  He got to four when his phone rang and he knew it was work-related
— less than a dozen organisations and governments had this number, and his
circle of friends could be counted on one hand.

“Think about it,” he said to
Kwok, and hit the Accept button.  “Palmer.”

*
* *

James Farrar had been through
Tom Gray’s file twice, but as he’d already suspected there were just two
associates known to be in Asia.  In order to prioritise them he had been
in touch with the Government Communications Headquarters to get a breakdown of
recent calls made to their known numbers, specifically anything from the island
of Jolo.  Within twenty minutes GCHQ had come up with the information he
wanted.

 Farrar closed down
Gray’s electronic file and opened the one for Timothy Hughes.  Once it had
passed through security protocols and loaded, he looked for the current
address.  Minimising the file, he opened another screen and searched for
resources in the area.  The results showed that the nearest was in Japan
and currently working a case, and Farrar didn’t have the authority to pull him
off it for his own needs.

What he could do, though, was
bring in some outside help.  Given the sensitivity of the mission, it
would have to be someone he could trust, and that narrowed it down to just one
man.  Despite this, he was reluctant to mention Tom Gray’s name. 
After careful consideration, he decided to limit the mission to locating and,
if possible, eliminating the quarry: Len Smart, Simon Baines and one other, as
yet unidentified.

Farrar looked up the number
in the database and dialled.

“Palmer,” he heard when the
call was connected.

“Ben,
it’s
James Farrar.  I have an urgent job for you.”

“Sorry, gonna be a bit busy
for the next few days.”

Farrar cursed silently. 
Palmer was the only man he could turn to, the only one he could trust.  He
had performed other jobs for the organisation and Farrar knew that operational
secrecy was a given.

“How much are they paying
you?” he asked the freelancer.

“Three hundred…” Palmer
replied, and Farrar knew from previous negotiations that he had to add
“thousand” to the end.  He also suspected that Palmer had doubled the fee he
was currently earning, but that wasn’t his concern.  All that mattered was
getting him on board.

“I’ll give you five hundred
if you can start now.”

The offer brought a pause in
the conversation.  “Sterling,” Palmer said eventually.

“Dollars,” Farrar insisted.

Another pause, then: “Write
this down.”  He gave Farrar an internet URL consisting of letters and
numbers, one that couldn’t be guessed or stumbled upon accidentally. 
Palmer also gave him a twelve-digit code to enter when he got to the website.

“Once you’re in, enter the
job details and hit send.  You can also upload files and images. 
Don’t worry, it’s secure.” 

“How secure?”

Palmer explained that it used
2048-bit encryption and a one-time 28-digit key, which meant even a
supercomputer
would spend a lifetime trying to unscramble
the garbled message. 

“I’ll have access to the
message in an hour.  Please make sure the money is transferred to the
usual account before then.”

The phone went dead in
Farrar’s hand.  Now that he had secured Palmer’s services, all that
remained was to get his hands on half a million dollars.  As an idea came
to him, it brought a smile along for company.  He still had control of Tom
Gray’s Manila bank account, which had a balance a shade over the sum he needed. 
The smile grew as he considered the irony of using Gray’s money to pay the man
sent to kill him, and he thumbed through the list of contacts in his phone in
search of the account manager for the Philippine National Bank.

*
* *

Palmer put his phone away and
looked down at Kwok.  The man had tears streaming down his face and a pool
of urine had formed between his legs. 

“You got lucky,” he said,
extracting another hypodermic needle.  Kwok had overheard his
conversation, but that was the least of Palmer’s worries: he had seen his face,
and that sealed the man’s fate.  Palmer stuck the needle into his
subject’s carotid artery and delivered double the normal dose.  As he
waited for the drug to take effect, Palmer straightened his wig and considered
an explanation for his current employers.  He settled on reporting that
Kwok had been innocent and collecting the fee, which he had tripled for
Farrar’s benefit. 

  Kwok’s breathing was
becoming laboured and Palmer prepared to leave, replacing the hypodermics in
their case and stowing it in the inside pocket of his jacket.  He sat
there for another minute until Kwok took his last breath, then he left the
house, quietly closing the door behind him.  As he walked to his car he
removed the bloodied surgical gloves and screwed them into a ball before
wrapping an elastic band around it to stop them unravelling.  The ball was
discarded down a storm drain, along with the hairpiece.

He drove the car to a
secluded wooded area and removed the false licence plates which he had stuck
over the originals.  He wiped them down before digging a shallow hole in
the undergrowth and burying them.

No loose ends. 

Palmer drove back to his
rented apartment, curious to see what the urgent mission entailed.

Chapter
1

Sunday
April 22nd 2012

The radar indicated a small
vessel a mile ahead, apparently stationary in the water.  According to his
GPS it was within fifty metres of the rendezvous point and the captain made a
small course correction to intercept it. 

“Just where you said they’d be,
sir,” he said to Timmy Hughes, who had just entered the cabin.

“Anyone else
around?”
  Hughes asked. 

“Nothing
larger than a canoe for twenty miles.”

Hughes stepped onto the deck and
switched on the Carlisle & Finch searchlight, playing its beam out over the
bow of the twenty-metre yacht.  It was a couple of minutes before he
located the small craft and its four occupants.  Using hand signals he
indicated for the captain to slow their approach and a few minutes later they
pulled alongside the craft.  Hughes threw out a rope and it was caught by
one of the males, who tied it to a ring on the wall of the inflatable. 
Hughes walked the rope to the stern and tied it off, allowing his visitors the
chance to climb onto the swim-deck attached to the transom. 

First aboard was the familiar
figure of Len Smart and Hughes gave his old friend a hug.

“Good to see you, man.”

“You too,
Timmy.
  You haven’t changed a bit.”

Hughes grabbed an inch from his
own midriff. 
“Maybe a couple of pounds heavier.”

He looked over the transom at
the others.  “Who are your friends?”

Len leaned over and gave Sonny a
hand up.  “This is Simon Baines.  He joined the regiment shortly
after you left.”

The men shook hands. 

“Looks like you’re doing okay
for yourself,” Len observed.  “Nice boat.”

“Business has been great for the
last couple of years,” Hughes said.  “I struggled at first because
everyone was going to Viking Securities, but once Tom Gray sold up, the company
lost its reputation.  They raised their prices and cut the wages for the
people in the field, so a lot of the contractors came to me instead.  I
approached all of Viking’s clients and offered to do the same work for a twenty
percent discount and the rest is history.”

The final two passengers had
clambered aboard, and the male came over to shake his hand.

“Hello, Timmy.”

The voice was familiar, but not
the face.  It was a few moments before realisation hit him.

“Tom?”

“I hear you’ve been stealing my
clients,” Gray said with a grin, his amusement increased by the look on
Hughes’s face.

“But you’re dead.  It was
all over the news.”

“It’s a long story.  I’ll
tell you over some food.”

Once Hughes got over the shock
of seeing a ghost from the past, Gray introduced his female companion. 
“This is Vick.”

Hughes held out a hand while
simultaneously straightening his short-cropped brown hair.  For a man
approaching his mid-forties he still had the looks and physique the ladies
found appealing. 

“Welcome aboard,” he said in his
most charming voice.

Hughes led the party down to the
main cabin and offered them seats while he went to the galley.  He was
back moments later with a champagne bucket full of beers on ice. 

“Something for the lady?” he
asked Vick, but she was already reaching for a beer.  He disappeared again
and was back five minutes later, this time carrying a plate of bread, butter
and cold meats.

“So, tell me how you happen to
be in the middle of the Sulu Sea a day after a terrorist attack on Jolo.”

“You hear about that?” Gray
asked, making himself a sandwich. 

“It was all over the local
news.”

Gray gave him a rundown of
events over the last year, starting with his injuries in Abdul Mansour’s attack
and the government’s subsequent subterfuge in declaring him dead while
spiriting him out of the country.  He glossed over the following year and
took up the story at his kidnapping in Basilan.

Vick was nursing her third
bottle of beer and the alcohol — combined with her first full stomach in months
— was taking its toll.  Her head was on Gray’s shoulder and her eyes told
the others in the cabin that sleep wasn’t far away.

Hughes sat back in his chair and
took a swig of his beer.  “I’ve alerted Carl Levine and Jeff Campbell to
the danger and they are taking their families into hiding.  There’s
nothing to stop you calling the media in London and letting them know that
you’re still alive.” he said.