The Trade (A Hans Larsson Novel Book 2) (27 page)

H
ans
and Penny spent the rest of day at the villa, soaking up the sun, barbecuing mackerel
kebabs and going over the missing pieces in the jigsaw in search of a smoking
gun. Late afternoon, Hans received a call from Innes Edridge, his handler in
Boston.

“Orion, dear boy, just to let you know the glasses you sent
for fingerprinting finally turned up and I’ve sent them to ForTech,
overnight
delivery, with an instruction we need the results Code Zero.”

Based in a state-of-the-art building in Phoenix, ForTech
was
a forensics laboratory under contract with the Arizona Department of Public
Safety. However, unbeknown to the many law enforcement divisions under the DPS’s
umbrella, the Concern owned ForTech,
and many of its staff were operatives.

“Muttley, this is great news.”

“Don’t raise your hopes, Orion. Even if they can raise a
decent print, there’s no guarantee anything comes back from AFIS.”

He referred to the Automated Fingerprint Identification
System, an electronic gateway allowing law enforcement agencies in member
countries to submit search requests to an international fingerprint database
managed by Interpol. Naturally, ForTech
had end-user access.

“Muttley,” said Hans, “following the Logan debacle, one
thing I won’t be doing is raising my hopes.”

“Good chap. I’ve also spoken with our ballistics man about
the detonator cap.”

“And?”

“Confirmed what he told us before – US military grade, but
available to commercial operations worldwide. He says the salt mines in Cape
Verde order thousands of the bloody things.”

“Gotcha.” Hans hid his disappointment. “On a positive note I
had an error in comms with Odysseus over the rental of the hire car. He’s gonna
get back to me with a fresh set of data. It’s possible another name turns up.”

“Bear in mind they could have used a fake driving license
and credit card,” his handler warned.

“I don’t think so. That would have taken time to organize,
and whoever this person was they were onto me right away.”

“I hear you.”

“Any news on Triton and Achelous?” Hans mentally crossed his
fingers.

“They should be with you in forty-eight hours. If you need someone
sooner, say the word, and I can be on the Lear tonight.”

“That’s very kind of you, sir.”

“She’s my goddaughter, Hans. Carter comes first, but family
comes a close second.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Hans ended the call.

As Hans relayed the conversation, Penny didn’t need to see
the strain on his face to know how much rested on the fingerprint results and
Jonah’s second hacking of the Hertz database. They couldn’t act until they
heard anything, so “Let’s go fishing,” she suggested.

“Er.” Hans worried there was something to do.

“Come on! Let’s chuck some beers in the boat, grab Karen’s
fishing poles and see if we can catch a monster with the leftover mackerel.”

Hans knew Penny deserved a break from the constant stress
too. “Catcher of the biggest fish gets breakfast in bed?” he suggested.

“If you don’t mind cooking.” Penny winked, running a finger
up his chest and pretend-poking him in the eye.

Hans grabbed the beers and rum and rowed out into the
channel as Penny cut the mackerel into strips.

“Here’s good,” he said, shipping the oars.

Using hefty leads and stainless-steel hooks, they set up
paternoster rigs and, making sure to keep a thumb on the spool to prevent the
line from bird’s-nesting, lowered them over the side.

“Good idea of yours, Penny.” Hans gazed at the spectacular pink
and orange sprays firing up the lilac sky.

“Yeah, we should have left a note saying ‘Gone Fishing’!”

“Up until this last eighteen months it was always the answer
to life’s problems. Chuck a line in the water, crack open a beer, and if you
caught a fish it was an additional bonus. Now . . .” Hans’ shoulders slumped.

“Honey, there’s a big difference between ‘problems’ and the
life-changing events you’ve had to go through.”

Penny hated seeing Hans beat himself up.

“Yeah, I know. When I was in the life raft with Jess . . .”
Hans stopped himself.

“It’s okay. I know what you mean.” Penny swapped hands on
the fishing pole to lean across and squeeze his arm.

“When I was in the life raft
thinking
I was with
Jessie, I promised myself if we ever got rescued I would give everything up –
the house, the business, the Concern – and buy an RV and travel the country.
You know, seeing the sights, sleeping under the stars, grilling the fish we
caught on an open fire.”

Hans reached for the beers and handed one to Penny.

“No, I’ll stick with the Sprite.”

“Oh, okay. You haven’t had a beer all day?”

“Good to have a break every now and then.”

“Yeah, it is – what was I saying? Oh yeah, it seems ironic
that we
were
rescued, and yet the nightmare’s even worse now.”

“Worse, but you will find her. I know you will.”

“Thanks, Penny.” Hans forced a smile, then unscrewed the rum
and gulped from the bottle.

“Do you ever think you could give it up – the Concern, I
mean?”

“Ha, it’s funny. We used to have the exact same discussion
in the military. Like, how can you
leave
, man? There’s
no
jobs
out there, you gotta
great
career, and all this kinda stuff. In the
Concern it’s known as Buying the Chains.”

“Explain.” Penny sipped her Sprite.

“You know, like when the slaves on the plantations gave up
the fight, stopped trying to escape and going against their masters’ wishes,
because buying into their own oppression actually became an easier option.”

“If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em, you mean?”

“Exactly. The difference being, in the military you’re
wearing the chains. You’re owned by Uncle Sam and used and abused for the Illuminati’s
sick agenda. Getting out ain’t a bad option.” Hans pretended to spit into the
water.

“And working for the Concern is the other way around?”

“In the Concern you feel like you’re doing something
worthwhile, like you’re working for the benefit of mankind. No one’s trying to
make off you. You’re not sitting in a crummy office typing irrelevant bullshit
into a computer all day long to make some creep rich, while he gives you two
weeks a year to spend with your family and a crummy watch at the end of
forty-five years.”

“I guess I’ve been lucky.” Penny smiled, thinking of a life
spent on the ocean.

“Damn right you have! Sailing this beautiful planet, meeting
folks from all cultures, and the only damage you’re doing is leaving a few
bubbles in your wake.”

“Have you always thought like this?” Penny’s curiosity
kicked in.

“Hell no! Remember I told you after I left the SEALs
everything went downhill – started drinking, fighting, getting sacked from god-awful
jobs by jumped-up managers, wondering what the hell this life was all about?”

“Uh-huh – before you met Kerry.”

“I hit rock bottom. When there’s no more way down, you
either stay there and die or you learn your way back up. All that stuff they
indoctrinated you with at school, like it’s good to be a doctor or a lawyer or
a goddamn whatever, and all that stuff your parents tried to instill in you –
respect authority, play by the rules, mow the lawn on Sunday, go to a bullshit
church and vote in some phony-baloney political system – you gotta
un
learn
that stuff. You gotta do in your heart what you know is right, follow your own
path, realize it’s all a big game put in place by a twisted ruling elite that
only cares about money and power, who’ve been playing it since the time of the
pyramids and know just how to sucker you in.”

“The Coca-Cola dream,” Penny chuckled.

“Ha! Do you know the average American thinks drinking that
stuff is actually good for them?”

“And did Kerry feel strongly about this stuff too?”

“Acht . . . I loved Kerry. She came along in my life when I
had nothing else, and I wouldn’t be here today if she hadn’t. I never tried to
change her. But she thought by putting a link on Facebook she could help
achieve world peace.”

“Tphuh!”
Penny choked on her Sprite. “So, I’m
guessing life in a sleepy suburb is not for you, Mr. Larsson.”

“Penny, I’m trying to say that
yes
, maybe one day I’d
be happy to give up the Concern, accept a life of obscurity and hightail it
around the good ol’ US of A in a camper with my daughter—”

“Er-hum!”

“Sorry, with the lovely
Penny
and my daughter, but .
. .” Hans fell silent, the thought of Jessica spawning a pang of anxiety bringing
him abruptly back to reality.

Penny understood. Constantly being in limbo was hard for
both of them, but for Hans it didn’t end there. Circumventing the system by
conducting his own investigation, he’d taken sole responsibility for Jessica’s
safe return.

They fell silent awhile, sipping beer, jigging the lines up
and down and watching the city’s lights come on as the sky turned to graphite.

“It’s just . . . look at us here now, Penny. If it weren’t
for the circumstances, would you wanna be anywhere else? A beer, a hook in the
water, fresh air, the rise and fall of the sea and an incredible view. To think
most kids today will never get to experience being in a boat, let alone casting
a line or gutting a fish, but it’s perfectly fine to spend all day with your
nose stuck to a smartphone or an iPad making synthetic friendships and clicking
buttons for corporations who tell you how to think, feel and do. You know I ended
up buying Jessie a cell phone, a tablet
and
a PC. Not because I believe
a seven-year-old needs to be text-messaging her friends when she’s bored or surfing
the net, but because I don’t want her getting left behind in the technology
stakes.”

“You talk about being controlled by a sicko elite – don’t
you think technology and social media help bring people together, like it’s
easier to spread the word on, you know, chemicals in our food, illegal wars and
stuff?”

“I think it’s the opposite, Penny. Disinformation is just
information being used against you.”

“In what way?”

“Take three weeks ago, an Ausair jumbo jet on route from Sydney
to Rome shot down over Jakarta. The media went crazy, right?”

“Uh-huh. At first they thought it was Muslim separatists
using rockets supplied by al-Qaeda. Then the blame shifted to the Indonesian government
for creating a false-flag operation.”

“Exactly. Bringing the plane down so they had a legitimate
excuse to go after the extremists, all of which set off a thousand and one
theories on TV, radio and social media. But do you really wanna know who killed
those innocent passengers?”

“Go on.”

“MIT – Turkey’s intelligence agency.”

“MIT? But Turkey has nothing to gain by stirring up trouble
in that part of the world.”

“What if I were to tell you that the day the plane went down,
the Turkish Army waged an all-out offensive on several Kurdish villages under
the pretext of destroying PKK rocket-building factories? That four hundred
innocent Kurds were killed, many of them children.”

“I saw something about that, but—”

“You were caught up in the hullabaloo created by the plane
being shot out of the sky.”

“Oh, Hans, I thought I kept abreast of the madness, but the
more you learn about the world, the sicker it gets.”

“Can you understand now why I’m not ready to buy the chains?”

“I don’t think you’ll ever be ready – oh-oh-oh!” Penny’s
fishing pole bowed.

“Hell, does this mean I’m cooking breakfast?” Hans joked.

“Whatever it is, I don’t think it will take much cooking.”
Penny grinned, playing the fish as it jittered about trying to shake the hook.

“I’m thinking great white shark.” Hans downed his beer and
stretched a hand toward the line, ready to help.

“No,
bigger
than that!” Penny laughed.

“Do we need a gaff, or shall we let it tow us into shore?”

“I’m thinking we should cut the line to save us being
chomped!”

“Well, it better be worth us sacrificing our breakfast
mackerel!” said Hans, the thought of the jazzy fish’s oily flesh perking his
appetite.

“It’s . . . it’s . . . it’s . . .”

The fish’s white underbelly began flashing below the
surface.

“It’s . . .” Penny lifted the rod to bring the catch on
board. “A mackerel.”

“Ahhh-hah-ha-hah! It’s not just a mackerel, Captain Penny.
It’s a smaller mackerel than the one we had!”

“It’s a start!” She poked her tongue out.

They fished on awhile, Penny pleased her monster catch had lightened
the mood on an otherwise miserable day, particularly as Hans’ clenched jaw told
her that today was especially difficult for him.

“It’s her birthday tomorrow, Penny.” Hans stared at his line
disappearing into the shimmering black brine.