Strike Back (18 page)

‘I have many faults, but I’m not vain,’ said Porter. ‘What’s the deal?’

Layla paused. The BMW had passed through Hammersmith now, and was roaring along the fast lane of the M4 towards the airport. ‘She’s not really a nurse at all, although she knows how to give someone an injection, and stick a plaster on them if they’re cut. She does the honey traps for us. She beds men, usually middle-aged men, and then we threaten to tell their wives unless they do something we want them to do. It’s the oldest trick in the book, of course, but a damned good one all the same, and still works a treat.’

‘So why me?’

‘One of the psychologists we got to watch a video of you talking suggested it,’ said Layla. ‘He said he reckoned your self-esteem was low.’

‘Well, you just spoilt it by telling me.’

Layla shrugged. ‘You’d already guessed.’

Porter laughed, ‘Well, if by some bloody miracle I get back from this hellhole you’re sending me to, tell them I’m still feeling a bit down,’ he said. ‘I might need a repeat prescription.’

‘I’ll try …’

‘And ask her to bring her sister as well.’

The BMW had already pulled up in the short-stay car park at Heathrow. Porter followed Layla towards Terminal 4. They still had an hour and a half to go before the flight, but the check-in rules meant they had to be there in plenty of time. Porter was carrying a single leather holdall the Firm had brought for him, with a spare pair of jeans, a couple of shirts, some shaving kit, and a paperback to read on the plane. He slung it over his back, and walked alongside her in the direction of the check-in. His eye caught a newspaper display. All of them were leading on the Katie Dartmouth story: the
Guardian
had a poll showing support for the government slumping as the crisis worsened, predicting a wipeout in the by-election; the
Mail
had signed up Katie’s mum to write a kidnap diary; the
Sun
was carrying a Katie countdown measure – ‘D-DAY MINUS 3’ screamed its headline.

They whizzed through the VIP lounge, then went on to passport control. Porter naturally hadn’t had a passport: it wasn’t the kind of thing you needed when you slept rough. The Firm had rustled one up overnight. Amazing what you could do when the fate of the government was on the line, he reflected. Even the picture doesn’t look too bad, he decided, as he took the passport back from the immigration officer and tucked it into his jeans. Maybe they didn’t have to pay that Danni girl too much for the shag: at the rate my life is improving, he thought with a wry smile to himself, the next one might even be free.

‘We’ll be staying away from the duty-free, I think,’ said
Layla sharply, steering him towards the coffee bar in the departures lounge. ‘You’ve got quite enough in your system, without stocking up on the vodka.’

‘Maybe I should bring my old mate Hassad a gift from Blighty,’ said Porter with a grin. ‘A T-shirt with Big Ben on it. Or some nice biscuits from Harrods.’

Layla had already ordered a couple of large lattes and croissants: Porter had grabbed some cereal and toast in his bedroom, but his hunger was still far from satiated, and he wolfed down the croissant in a couple of bites. ‘I somehow imagine the Society of Muslim Brothers doesn’t break out the Johnnie Walker when they get together for a meeting,’ said Layla.

‘I could grab a bottle just in case,’ said Porter.

‘Don’t even think about it.’

‘Maybe get them all pissed, then sneak out with the girl while they’re sleeping it off.’

Layla just rolled her eyes.

‘You eating that?’ said Porter, pointing towards her croissant.

‘There’ll be food on the plane, I suppose,’ she replied with a shake of her head.

He grabbed the croissant, and ate that in two bites as well. Looking around, Porter couldn’t tell where the rest of the flunkies the Firm had ordered to accompany them on the flight might be, but he felt certain they wouldn’t be far away. They were flying on an A320, which in economy class had six seats in each row, three on either side of the aisle, making sixteen additional officers once you took out the two seats occupied by Porter and Layla. Quite a party, he thought to himself. They would all be in plain clothes. They would slip quietly into the background. The Firm was good at that: it could tap an endless supply of grey men who shuffled unobtrusively into the shadows, only to appear as if from nowhere when they were needed.

‘I need the loo,’ said Porter, standing up.

Layla looked at him sharply.

‘Don’t worry,’ growled Porter. ‘I’m not doing a runner. I might need my head examining, but I actually
want
to get out there.’

‘Just don’t be long.’

Porter walked in the direction of the toilets. He glanced towards the duty-free, and couldn’t help but notice the vast display of whiskies, vodka and gin stacked high in the shop window. Bloody cheap, he reflected bitterly to himself. Johnnie Walker at twelve quid a bottle. They are practically giving the stuff away. No, he told himself, as he carried on walking. Nothing to drink. Not yet anyway.

The Firm had given him a hundred quid along with his luggage: to head up to Heathrow without any money in your pocket was just one more thing that would make him appear suspicious. He had another five hundred in Lebanese pounds, and Ben Stanton would have plenty more if he needed it. Just beyond the duty-free shop, there was a row of gift and clothes stores. Porter slipped inside one, and told the girl at the desk to give him a pair of jeans, a white shirt, some socks, pants and a pair of trainers, size nine. When she asked what label, he told her he didn’t care. And no, he didn’t mind what colour the jeans were, whether they were straight or boot cut, nor did he want to try them on. Within a couple of minutes, she had returned with a bulging bag. Porter counted out the money, thanked her and left.

Swiftly, he walked the last few yards to the Gents, then, locking himself into one of the cubicles, Porter quickly undressed. It was a cramped space, but he was soon naked. He ran his hands across his body, making absolutely certain there wasn’t any kind of tracking device planted anywhere on him. When he was sure, he took the new clothes from the bag, dressed himself, washed his face, and walked quickly back towards the coffee bar where Layla was waiting
for him. Glancing up at the departures board, he could see there were still forty minutes until their flight, but passengers were already being asked to make their way to Gate 26.

‘What the hell have you done?’ said Layla, looking up at him.

‘Changed,’ said Porter gruffly.

Layla shook her head, the expression on her face that of a nursery-school teacher faced with a particularly unruly pupil. ‘You didn’t like the clothes we bought you?’ she said. ‘Christ, we’re taking you to Beirut. We’re not going to Milan for a bloody fashion shoot.’

Porter leant over the table. She’d ordered herself as chocolate muffin while he was gone, and he grabbed a piece, putting it in his mouth. ‘Like I said in the car, I may have had a bit too much to drink over the past few years, but my brain’s not completely gone. Not yet anyway. I have to be absolutely certain you lot haven’t planted any tracking devices on me. Because if you’ve put a tracker on me, then sure as hell Hassad is going to find it. You can slip one into my clothes easily enough, even into the heel of a shoe, or just the button of a shirt. The only way I can be certain I’m clean is to be wearing clothes I just bought in the shop right here. Because if Hassad does find anything, he’s going to kill me on the spot. And frankly I wouldn’t blame the bastard.’

‘Christ, John, don’t you trust us?’

Porter shook his head firmly from side to side. ‘I trust only myself.’

The flight was only about half full, and that was including the seats the Firm had booked. Not many people flying to Beirut, thought Porter as he walked along the aisles to the toilets at the back of the plane. And who the hell can blame them. No business to be done, half the hotels are shut, and unless you’re dressed in a burka or a headscarf, the chances are some nutter will kidnap you and phone home asking for
a million quid or he’ll chop your head off.

The A320 had been in the air for three hours now, and so far the flight had been pretty smooth. It was the first time Porter had been on a plane in nearly fifteen years, and they’d come on a bit since the charter flight to Spain he had taken with Diana and a three-year-old Sandy on the last family holiday they’d gone on before his drinking meant they no longer had any money for luxuries like that. The wings didn’t scream with pain every time the pilot changed direction. The seats were comfier. You could plug forty or more channels of music into your ear. And there was a neat little screen hanging on the ceiling that tracked the progress of the plane over Europe and told you how far you were from your destination. They were just passing over Sicily, Porter noted, and heading out into the Mediterranean. The pilot was banking left to steer them away from Egypt and towards Israel and the Lebanon. Not long now before they started their descent into Beirut.

He looked towards the drinks trolley. The stewardess – a pert little blonde who introduced herself as Chloë while serving Porter his microwaved breakfast – had already been through the cabin offering people a drink but it was still only mid-morning and there weren’t many takers. Layla had told her sharply that they didn’t need anything, and Porter had had to settle for finishing her breakfast instead. There was a row of tiny, airline bottles: whisky, vodka, gin, rum, several different types of beer, quarter-bottles of red and white wine. Porter could hardly remember the last time he’d seen so much booze in one place. And all of it free as well. He grabbed two vodkas, one gin, and a double-sized serving of Johnnie Walker, and slipped them inside his jacket.

There’s only one place they manufacture the kind of courage a man needs to face what I am about to put myself through, he told himself.

A brewery.

He grabbed another vodka bottle, and twisted its cap. It came loose in his hand, and he put it to his lips. He could feel the warm glass against his skin, and then the steady, strong liquid started to trickle down into his throat. Porter had never found a drink he didn’t like the taste of. He’d drink paint-stripper if that was all he could find. But vodka was his favourite. A real drinker’s drink: maybe that was why the Russians loved it so much. Vodka didn’t mess around with flavours or aromas. There was no nonsense about grains or vintages. It was the closest you could get to pure alcohol without visiting a hospital. And it got you fired up with the minimum fuss and the maximum efficiency.

‘What the hell are you doing?’ snapped Layla.

Porter spun round. She was standing right next to him, her dark eyes alive with anger. Already her right hand had grabbed for the vodka bottle. She was trying to take it from him but had only succeeded in spilling half its contents down his shirt.

‘What the fuck do you think I’m doing?’ growled Porter. ‘Admiring the pretty cloud formations out of the window? I’m having a bloody drink.’

‘Put it down,’ said Layla, her tone rising sharply.

Porter held on to the bottle. There were only a few drops left in it, but he wasn’t about to let them go.

‘Put it down,’ said Layla again, even more loudly this time.

Porter could hear the roaring of the plane’s engines in his ears. It had just hit a patch of turbulence, and the A320 bounced sharply, then plunged downwards. Porter steadied himself against the plane wall with his left hand. Ahead of him he could see that the pilot had switched on the seat-belts sign.

‘I know you’re practically an alcoholic,’ said Layla, trying to keep her grip as the plane rolled and swerved through the sky, ‘but you’ve had a couple of days without a drink, and you’re starting to clean up.’

‘I needed a drink,’ snapped Porter.

‘What the hell for?’ shouted Layla. ‘We’re pinning everything on you. We’re paying you two hundred and fifty grand. The last thing we need is a fucking wino crawling off the plane too drunk to even remember his own name.’

‘One drink, that’s all I bloody needed.’

‘It’s always one drink, then one more,’ said Layla. ‘You were a sodding tramp. We’ve taken you in, given you a chance, but we damn well expect to be repaid. That means you deliver what we expect. That’s the deal, and if you break it, we’ll fucking break you. You hear me, John Porter. We’ll break you like a fucking matchstick.’

Porter paused for a moment. He could already feel the vodka he had drunk a few moments ago hitting his bloodstream. The plane was starting to balance out again, but the weather was still rough, and the undercarriage was thumping against pockets of air. The alcohol was already working its lethal magic, calming his nerves and soothing his anxieties. People said the juice stopped you from thinking straight, but they were wrong. He could always see things much more clearly when he had some alcohol inside him, and right now he could see there was some truth to what she was saying. He’d had nothing, not any kind of life to speak of, but now he had a daughter again, and he’d had done something for her, and that was something he could take to his grave and feel proud of. He had the Firm to thank for that. It didn’t mean he couldn’t handle a drink, though. She was wrong about that.

‘What the hell do you know about soldiering?’ he said, levelling a stare right into her eyes. ‘There are only two rations every commander in history has made sure his men have plenty of before they go into battle. Booze and smokes. In the trenches of the Somme, that was all the blokes lived on. Rum and tobacco. And you know why? Because it is fucking frightening. Most blokes wouldn’t be able to fight
unless they were too drunk to know any better.’ He paused again, waiting for the plane to pass through another patch of rough weather. ‘Well, this is a battle, and I reckon it’s going to be a bloody nasty one,’ he continued, his voice dropping down to no more than a whisper. ‘And I’m going to need all the courage I can get. Some men get it from a church, and some from their country. I get mine from a bottle, and that’s all there is to it.’