Keys to the Kingdom (8 page)

‘Thanks, but no thanks,’ Gallagher finished his beer but didn’t call for another. During a mission, he didn’t ingest any substance that might lead to under-performance. ‘My needs are very specific. I want fifty kilos of plastique, preferable Semtex.’

De Wolfe’s eyebrows shot skywards. ‘There’s a premium on Semtex since the Czechs decided they wanted to become part of NATO,’ he cut in quickly.

‘I’m talking availability, not price,’ Gallagher said. ‘I’m in the market for as much high explosive as you can lay your hands on and quickly. I need the stuff yesterday.’

De Wolfe loved a client with an urgent need. It had a very positive effect on the price. ‘Let me see. Fifty kilos of Semtex immediately. I would have to ask for one hundred thousand dollars. Cash.’

‘Agreed,’ Gallagher said without hesitation.

Shit, de Wolfe thought. I should have asked for more. ‘Delivery will be extra.’

‘I’ll arrange delivery myself,’ Gallagher said. ‘How quickly can you get the order together?’

‘Two days,’ de Wolfe cast a glance at Michel. The big man nodded.

‘Make it one and there’s a twenty thousand dollar bonus in it for you,’ Gallagher said.

Sweat started to break from de Wolfe’s hairline. He opened his mouth to speak.

‘Two days,’ Michel’s harsh voice cut across his boss. ‘You view and pay at the same time.’

Gallagher nodded. He looked at Michel’s face and wondered what the real relationship between him and De Wolfe was. One thing was for sure. It wasn’t the normal master/slave relation.

‘How can we contact you?’ Michel asked, aware of Gallagher’s stare.

‘You can’t,’ Gallagher answered. He nodded at the mobile phone sitting on the table in front of Michel. ‘It’d be a pity to have one of them things in your pocket and not use it. Isn’t technology marvellous? Give me the number and I’ll contact you the day after tomorrow.’

Michel removed a small notebook from his pocket, wrote a number on a page before handing the page to Gallagher.

‘Don’t forget,’ de Wolfe said suddenly becoming part of the action again. ‘The agreement was for cash.’

‘And cash it’ll be,’ Gallagher put the page with the number on it in his jacket pocket and stood up. ‘And just in case anybody is thinkin’ of it, don’t fuck with me. Let’s do a bit of business together and then everyone goes his or her merry way. Okay.’

‘Call the day after to-morrow,’ Michel said leaving de Wolfe with an open mouth yet again. ‘We’ll have the goods. You’d better have the money.’

Gallagher stood up and turned around. Six pairs of eyes glared at him from the two tables beside the door. The skinhead he had kicked sat in the corner furthest away from him. Gallagher assumed that de Wolfe was still the power in Het Roode Leeuw, so he moved towards the door. Two skinheads at the injured man’s table started to rise and just as quickly sat down again. Gallagher assumed that the signal had passed behind his back. He walked to the door, opened it and winked at the wounded skinhead before he disappeared into the Antwerp night.

‘I want him,’ Michel said in Flemish as the door closed behind Gallagher.

‘For the love of God let this one go,’ de Wolfe said beneath his breath. At the door the skinheads were telling each other what they would have done to Gallagher if they had been given the chance. ‘I got a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach about this one. I’m getting too damn old. In the back of my mind I know that there’s something about that one that I should remember but I’m damned if I can. Let’s get the bastard his Semtex and take his money. We’ll split the profits’. He squinted at Michel’s face. ‘How much do you make a month?’

Michel remained impassive.

‘One thousand five hundred, two thousand Euros? Don’t be an idiot. This one is too good to mess up.’

‘No,’ Michel said quietly. ‘We bring this bastard down. He’s ordered enough Semtex to start a small war. I smell a big fish.’

‘Yes and they’ll give you a big reward for reeling him in. Two thousand lousy Euros and a clap on the back. And all the time the big boys in Brussels are ripping off millions. Wise up. Let’s fleece the bastard and split the profits. I can’t remember the last time a pigeon as fat as that one walked in here.’

Michel picked up the mobile phone and left the bar. He needed to call his chief and set up the bust.

De Wolfe slumped back in his wooden chair and called the barman to bring him another genevre. He had definitely seen their new client before. But was it something to do with Ireland or was it the Arabs? It was so long ago. He took the glass from Henri’s hand and sipped the white alcohol. He was damned if he could remember. Anyway what was it to him if the Irish
rotzak
took his place in jail.

CHAPTER 11

Boston

The two men sitting in the suite on the tenth floor of the Marriot Hotel in Copley Square made an incongruous couple. Frank Terman had reverted to his usual flower shirt to cover his substantial stomach although he had eschewed his habitual shorts for a pair of Chinos. He completed his outfit with a pair of tan Timberland shoes. The man sitting across from him was thin and his handsome face was the light brown colour of someone who spent his weekends on the Cape. His head was set off with perfectly coiffed steel grey hair. George Dichof was dressed in his lawyer’s uniform of a Hugo Boss pinstripe suit, white Egyptian cotton shirt set off by a power red Paul Smith tie. His Church shoes were shined to a brilliant black and the whole outfit oozed professionalism.  He looked every inch a senior partner in the firm of O’Brien, Reilly and Dichof.

Terman lounged in one of the leather chairs sucking on a whiskey and soda and watched Dichof leaf through the Boston Globe while taking sips from his glass of  Perrier water. Terman tried to take in the fact that he was paying a thousand dollars an hour to watch Dichof read a newspaper. There was no justice in the world.

Dichof stopped reading to glance at the Patek Philippe watch strapped to his left wrist. The doorbell sounded and both men looked at the door of the suite. Terman rose slowly and opened the door.

‘Mr Terman?’ the man at the door asked. 

Terman looked at the new arrival. He was small and overweight. Although the day was not overly hot there was a sheen of sweat on his ruddy face. ‘Mr Timms,’ Terman extended his hand. ‘Pleased to meet you.’

‘Sorry I’m late,’ the man said taking Terman’s hand. ‘Luke Timms, pleased to meet you.’

‘This is George Dichof of O’Brien, Reilly and Dichof,’ Terman said and the lawyer rose and nodded.

‘Can I get you something from the bar?’ Terman asked ushering Timms into the room.

‘It’s a bit early for me,’ Timms said sitting in one of the room’s easy chairs. He had no idea who either Terman or Dichof were but looking around the room it was evident that there was money somewhere. ‘Your message was a little obtuse, Mr Terman. It reminded me of those TV shows where someone learns something to his advantage like he’s been left a million dollars or something.’ Timms looked apprehensively at the two men.

‘I’m sorry I couldn’t go into details on the phone,’ Terman said. ‘I hope that we might be able to do some business that will benefit us both. I’ve been led to believe that you’re having some problems in Saudi Arabia.’

Dichof had put the newspaper into his briefcase and removed a yellow legal pad. He focussed his attention on the other two men.

‘That’s about the strength of it,’ Timms was wondering what the hell was going on. The big guy in the flower shirt and his high-priced lawyer wanted something from him but he was damned if he knew what it was. ‘I’m flat broke. Otherwise I’d go after the bastards.’ He slid his tongue across his thick lips and looked at the two strangers. This was bizarre but lots of bizarre things had happened to Timms during a lifetime in business. He turned towards the lawyer. ‘Two years ago I owned a company called International Traders Corporation. For ten years I did business all over the Middle East but especially in Saudi Arabia. As the years went by the deals got bigger and bigger until I was clearing maybe 2 million bucks a deal. I was living pretty well but I had to use the proceeds of one deal to finance the next. I was dealing with some very well connected guys in Saudi. Like I mean really well connected, right to the top. The last deal was the biggest. It always was.’ Timms looked at Terman. ‘Can I change my mind about that drink?’

Terman rose reluctantly from his chair and went to the mini-bar. Dichof stopped writing on his yellow legal pad.

‘Scotch and soda,’ Timms said timidly. ‘Anyway when it came time to collect on the last deal my Saudi partners didn’t come through. They gypped me. I’d gone into hock to finance the deal so when the payment didn’t come through, International Traders Corporation went belly up. I lost my home and everything in it. I decide to go to Saudi to claim the money these guys owed me. Boy did I call a wrong number. As soon as I put my hand out for the money, my passport was confiscated and the bastards held me captive in Jeddah for more than three months. They wouldn’t let me go until I signed a document dropping all claims against them for a one-off payment of half a million bucks.’ Timms watched Terman pour his drink. ‘They knew that the half million would be just enough to keep me out of jail but that I wouldn’t have a dime left.’

‘Did the authorities know that you’d been incarcerated?’ Dichof asked.

Terman handed Timms the scotch and soda.

‘Thanks,’ Timms sucked hungrily on the edge of the glass then sighed as the booze travelled down his throat. ‘Did they hell,’ Timms turned towards Dichof. ‘Right up to the top man himself. The King was getting his rake off on the deal so he was right in the middle of it. Those bastards hung me out to dry and there was nothing I could do about it. I complained to the State Department as soon as I got back but they behaved like the three monkeys. Nobody wanted anything to do with either my problem or me. I made a big mistake dealing with the Royal Family and I was going to have to pay for it.’

Terman looked across at Dichof and the lawyer nodded in return.

‘We’ve got a proposition for you,’ Terman said sliding back into his chair. ‘We’d like to help you in your quest for justice’ He looked at Dichof.

‘Mr Terman has agreed to fund your case,’ Dichof said. ‘We allege conspiracy, slander, libel and invasion of privacy. We can lodge papers with the District Court of Massachusetts in two days if you engage me as your attorney. We’ll claim one hundred million dollars in damages.’

‘And you’ll pay for all this?’ Timms asked Terman.

‘You lose, we pay. You win, you pay O’Brien, Reilly and Dichof fifty percent of whatever you get.’

‘I’ll take it,’ Timms smiled broadly. A hundred million dollars was maybe out of the question but the Saudis would certainly settle for several million. Either which way he was going to be better off than he was at that minute.

‘There’s only one condition,’ Dichof interjected quickly.

Timms’ smile faded.

‘You’ll have to play the media star for a few weeks,’ Dichof continued. ‘We can try this case in court or we can try it in the media. We want to try it in the media first. After I file the papers we’ll arrange interviews with the Washington Post and Star, the Boston Globe, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the New York Times and any mass circulation journal that’ll talk to us. You’re going to be photographed with congressmen and senators who are sympathetic to your plight. Television companies are going to cover every aspect of this trial. So you better be on the side of the angels, Mr Timms. We’re going to paint the Al Sauds as the epitome of Satan and his disciples.’

‘I like it,’ Timms glowed. ‘Let’s stuff it to the bastards.’

‘You may not like it after we get going,’ Dichof said closing the legal pad. ‘These people and their friends in Washington are not going to roll over. You’re going to feel a lot of heat from the people that you are trying to stuff it to as you put it.’

‘No sweat,’ Timms said. ‘Everything I said is true and documented. Play it anyway you want. Shout it from the rooftops. I don’t give a damn. Those people screwed me. Now its my turn to screw back.’

‘Thank you, Mr Timms,’ Terman rose from his chair. ‘The great American public need to know that honest Americans are being cheated by the Al Sauds.’

Dichof put his legal pad away and removed a business card from a gold card holder. He handed the card to Timms. ‘Be at my office at 9 o’clock tomorrow morning and bring every piece of paper relating to your business in Saudi. We have a lot of work to do.’

Timms finished his drink and rose. He looked into Terman’s eyes ‘Do you mind if I ask you why you’re doing this?’

‘Does it matter,’ Terman said.

‘Not really,’ Timms said. He shook hands with both men. ‘I’m looking forward to taking those bastards on.’

After the two men left, Terman lay back in an easy chair in the suite and dialled up room service for a steak and fries and a cool bottle of Pretty Things Jack D'Or. His flight for Miami didn’t leave for four hours so he had two hours to kill before he had to head for Logan. He was almost finished his part in the plan. It was up to Bradley, Dichof and Gallagher. He was more than a bit pissed that Gallagher hadn’t taken him on for the heavy phase of the plan. They had been friends ever since Afghanistan and Terman felt that he had one more operation in him. Hell, he was five years younger than Gallagher but maybe weighed one hundred pounds more. He switched on the TV and flipped to the sports channel.

Two hours before his flight was due, he rang reception and ordered a cab to the airport and asked for his bill to be ready. He descended to the lobby and made his way to the Reception desk to settle his bill. As he walked, he scanned the open area. A man reading a newspaper at the corner of the lobby caught his eye. Terman wanted to stop and take a longer look but his training took over and he kept his gait steady as he approached the Desk. Something wasn’t kosher. Frank Terman had many skills and among them was the ability to replay an entire scene in his mind as though he was watching a film. He’d seen that guy in the corner of the lobby before. He threw his credit card to the Cashier while he shuffled the faces he’d seen in the past week through his mind. Then he smiled. He could see it as clear as day. The guy in the corner was the same guy who had been sitting with the dorky woman in the St. Regis in Houston. They were two tables away and both had oriented their chairs in his and the Congressman’s direction. It was the same man and Frank Terman was too old to believe in coincidences. That meant he was being watched. And the watchers were connected to the Government. Patrick would need to be informed. Terman decided that as soon as he passed the message to Gallagher he would go dark. His survival would probably depend on it.