Shadow of the Burj, Page 2

  The beard followed the long hair, and when he was clean shaven Bricko filled the sink with hot water and scrubbed every inch of exposed skin. It wasn’t as good as a shower, but nonetheless it felt good to be clean. Looking into the mirror he expected to see a different person, but he had forgotten something. The transformed biker leaned over the sink and popped out his contact lenses one at a time, and the ice blue eyes were back to their original green. Looking back at him was his own familiar 32-year-old face, where Bricko had been. Satisfied at the transformation, he smiled at his reflection and said out loud, “Welcome back, Max”.

  ***

  It took the rest of the afternoon to rid the world of Bricko. The clothes, the hair and the personal belongings of the oversized biker disappeared into the incinerator that warmed the workshop for the remainder of the day.

  The Harley was jet washed and the Warrior decals were removed from the petrol tank using solvents. After drying and polishing the impressive machine, Max carefully re-applied the standard bright red Harley Davidson logo. Then, after unscrewing the cloned number plate copied from an identical bike he had seen at a bike show in Dorset, Max replaced the original plate. Max stood back and admired his handiwork. Once the custom black painted mudguards had been replaced with the chrome originals, the bike would be unrecognisable.

  Max knew that the temporary tattoos would take a couple of weeks to fade, but he had a plan to take care of that. With his spiky short hair gelled into place, and dressed in red and black leathers, he slipped on his full face crash helmet. The journalist pushed the Harley out of the workshop, kicked it into gear and headed towards London. He had a follow up story to submit.

  ***

  After an hour of adrenaline-pumping, hard riding along the M40, Max pulled into the forecourt of the Harley Davison dealership in Colinwood on the outskirts of London. He had barely removed his helmet when the owner arrived at his side.

  “I thought you’d run off with her,” the man joked as he extended his hand. Max shook the offered hand and smiled warmly. “How was the tour of Europe?” the owner asked.

  “It was brilliant, and to be honest, Dom, I’d love to run off with her, but now I’m back I’ll be living in my London flat again, so I’d have nowhere to keep her.”

  Dom walked around the pristine machine, inspecting her as he caressed the bike’s curves.

  “Well, if you ever want to borrow her again, come and see me. At the price you paid for three months’ hire you could have put a sizable deposit down on one of your own.”

  “I’ll bear that in mind,” Max smiled as he stripped off his leathers. “You might as well take care of these, too. I won’t be needing them for a while.”

  Dom called over one of the mechanics, who wheeled the bike away for servicing. “I’ll keep the leathers in my office in case you decide to take another sabbatical.”

  ***

  By two thirty that afternoon Max was wilting; it had been a long day. His flat screen LCD TV was broadcasting Sky News, and the Warriors were the lead story on an otherwise slow news day. A well groomed woman was fronting the broadcast from the trailer park, quoting shamelessly from Max’s newspaper articles.

  Every now and then a library photo would appear on the screen with his name beneath it, and on each occasion Max would smile. The library photo was of a man Max worked with in the USA, who was around the same age but who bore no real resemblance to Max himself. Max and his editor had agreed early in his career that there was no long term future for an investigative journalist whose image was available in the press, on TV and on the internet, and so the paper had been using a proxy photo to represent Max for almost five years. Of course, if Max won another award he would either have to blow his cover and attend, or excuse himself on the grounds of an international assignment as he had done before, leaving the Editor to pick up the award whilst Max looked on anonymously from the wings.

  Max finished up his final article on the Warriors and emailed it to the paper. The final paragraph read:

  “When Bricko called me for the final time this morning, I hardly recognised him. There was a vulnerability and fragility in his voice that belied his gruff and tough exterior. I told him that he would never be safe from the Bikers he had betrayed and he just sighed; he couldn’t find the words to reply. For this reporter it was a sign of his humanity, and that of so many others whom we treat as outcasts, that he acted out of a sense of honour and decency that he believed surpassed the Bikers’ Code of Silence. Bricko will probably spend the rest of his days hiding from the authorities who want to imprison him, and the gangs who want to kill him. But I, for one, hope that Bricko remains at large. This rough and ready, bighearted man singlehandedly saved unknown numbers of teenage girls from harm, both now and in the future, and for that we all owe him a debt of gratitude.”

  Max knew that when the article was published it would be accompanied by a blurry picture of Bricko and the Warriors on the seafront at Brighton, a photo deliberately chosen by Max because of its lack of clarity. One day Max would tell the editor, and the world, exactly who Bricko really was, but that day was a long way into the future.

  ***

  Heathrow Airport, England: February 11th, 7am GMT

  Max was dozing in the business class lounge when he heard his flight called. He answered one last call from a TV station pleading for an interview on breakfast TV the next morning, politely refusing the invitation. Since yesterday afternoon he had avoided calls from most national dailies, radio stations and even the police. Against his better judgement he was persuaded by his editor to speak to a reporter from the BBC by telephone. The interview was broadcast live on Radio 4, with the BBC TV News carrying the interview on their evening news bulletins, accompanied by a library photo showing Max’s American friend.

  His newspaper bosses weren’t entirely happy with Max’s early departure, and were even less happy with his reluctance to specify his destination, but they had an exclusive and a story that would carry them into the weekend and which would triple the circulation of the Sunday edition, especially now the News of the World had gone.

  Less than an hour later Max reclined in his seat and drifted off to sleep immediately as the Virgin Airbus ate up the miles on its way to Dubai.

  Chapter 2

  Dubai:

  11th February; 10am, Local Time.

  Todd Michaelson knew he had a problem when he heard a car engine fall silent, and a car door click closed more quietly than was necessary on a deserted housing estate. It was something of a rarity for vehicles of any type to drive along the unfinished roads between the abandoned villas, because the dusty, unpaved roads led nowhere.

  Living as inconspicuously and anonymously as possible in one of the few completed villas on the development, Todd made his living as an ad hoc caretaker for the development, while using his six foot four muscular frame to advantage by offering door security to pubs and clubs at weekends. Straining to hear his visitor approaching, he heard stealthy footfalls outside his villa and it became clear that the problem was more serious than simple trespassing or petty theft. Todd’s villa, which was a rather grand title for what was in reality a small two bedroom townhouse, appeared deserted and uninhabited from the outside, yet someone was heading directly toward it and they were being very careful not to make a noise.

  The young Australian cracked the window blind and looked out through the dark reflective film that covered the window, to observe four men walking silently down the brick paved driveway. They were intentionally avoiding making any noise at all. The stealthy intruders were not even whispering, preferring instead to use sign language as they progressed. They were very definitely not making a friendly house call.

  On a signal from the leader of the group, the four men reached inside their windjammer jackets and pulled out their weapons. Todd saw what looked like three lightweight Sig Sauer P238 Nitrons, distinctive handguns because of their compact size and their rosewood grips, and a Steyr Machine Pistol. Todd was unar
med. As he watched covertly from the window, he saw the man holding the ugly looking 30 round machine pistol split up his team; two to the front of the villa and two to the rear.

  Todd realised that if these Westerners were real professionals he was a dead man walking. His only advantage was that they could not know with any certainty that he was in the house.

  The front door crashed open at the first kick; limited crime and harsh punishments for the most minor offences in the UAE made security locks on most buildings unnecessary. The caretaker heard two men step inside. If they both worked together, covering one another, Todd would be cut down before he was given any opportunity to do them any harm. Todd silently prayed, “Let me live through this and I’ll go back to church,” and then he remembered promising the self same thing in Iraq as a twenty one year old, nine years ago. He hadn’t been back to church since his return. By divine intervention, or sheer good luck, his prayers were on their way to being answered for a second time. In their haste to check and clear the building, the assailants were working solo. One of the two intruders who had come through the front door was creeping up the stairs; the two to the rear were still outside.

  Todd flattened himself against the wall, just an inch away from where he felt sure the lounge door would slam against the wall beside him at any second. He hoped that his would-be assassin had watched too many movies, and would kick open the door and two-handedly cup the small handgun as he arced it around the room. Two hands on the gun meant no hands free to defend yourself.

  Todd might have written the script for the intruder, because the door flew open and a man stepped inside, holding his pistol in a two-handed grip with the barrel pointed midway between the floor and head height. Obviously right handed, the man turned to his right to scan the room from right to left. If he had scanned the room from left to right instead, he may have lived.

  Todd stood slightly to the left of and behind the assassin, just out of his peripheral vision. He tensed his muscles, waiting for his opportunity. As the man turned towards his left, finger on trigger, the young ex soldier threw out his right arm in an arc, the edge of his hand crashing into the assassin’s throat, crushing his windpipe. The man’s eyes bulged with panic as he tried to suck air into his lungs but couldn’t. He raised his left hand uselessly to his throat and Todd grabbed his gun hand. Without bothering to disarm his assailant, Todd forced the gun under the man’s ribs and pushed the man’s finger against the trigger. The special short 9mm round sped from the gun; further silenced by the proximity of the barrel to the skin, and at full velocity, it ploughed a path through the major organs and up into the skull. The bullet did not exit and the man was dead before his limbs responded by going limp.

  Todd lowered the body to the floor in the entrance hall to avoid making any further noise, grabbed the P238 pistol and checked the magazine; five rounds left. Behind him he heard the back door smash open. There was one internal door between him and a second assassin. The kitchen led into the combined living-dining room, as well as the hallway, so Todd had to make a snap decision as to which way to go to avoid offering an open target.

  The door handle in the hallway was being carefully depressed and so his mind was made up for him.

  The door handle was lowering quietly and the Polish assassin opened the door into the hallway stealthily, only to see his colleague lying on the floor beside an open lounge door. Keeping his gun trained on the door opening, he moved forward very slowly until he reached his fallen friend. Squatting down whilst covering the doorway, he felt for a pulse and swore when he was unable to find one. Angry, and ready to avenge his colleague, he unbent his knees and moved towards the open door. Before he made it to the doorway a shadow crossed behind him, and he knew he had made his last ever mistake.

  Todd had circumnavigated the hallway by moving quickly and silently through the lounge and dining area to manoeuvre himself into the kitchen. With his confiscated gun at the ready, he moved into the doorway with his aim directed at chest level.

  A second gunman was standing over his dead colleague with his back to Todd, looking into the empty lounge. The man obviously sensed Todd’s presence as he started to move, but it was too late. Todd squeezed off two shots to the upper torso and, as the man arched his back by way of reaction to two potentially killing shots, concerned that the man might be wearing full body Kevlar, Todd sent a third bullet into the base of his skull.

  The man fell hard and his gun skittered across the floor, away from Todd. The ex-soldier knew that he needed to retrieve the extra ammunition the gun held, but he also knew that if he did so he would become a sitting target for the man upstairs. Almost on cue the man on the first floor started down the stairs with his Steyr machine pistol firing on short burst. The noise echoed around the near empty house in a deafening roar.

  Todd ran into the dining room, closing the door behind him, and glanced quickly through the window to determine whether the fourth man was still in the garden. He was there, but would not be for much longer. The man outside had heard the shooting and was running towards the kitchen door at the side of the house. Using his only means of escape, Todd threw open the patio doors and raced across the garden in the direction of the garage. Too late the fourth assassin caught sight of him, and fired off three shots in quick succession, but all were off target and Todd flung himself through the doorway into the dark garage.

  ***

  Todd had always suspected that this time would come. He had long feared that a hit man would be sent to look for him, but he hadn’t expected it to be this soon and he certainly hadn’t been expecting a small army. The local authorities had refused him permission to arm himself, but they had given him a high-tech personal alarm which he wore around his neck at all times and which, once activated, would bring the Dubai police rushing to the GPS coordinates being broadcast by the alarm. Todd reckoned it was already too late for the panic button. He guessed that, even if they hurried, his lifeless body would be stiffening by the time they arrived.

  The garage was windowless and dark inside. Within its walls were building materials destined for use in completing the abandoned development. Anticipating some form of attack, Todd had built a defensive position, a nest of sorts, behind a stack of cement and plaster bags, but now, in these circumstances, facing two armed attackers, it seemed woefully inadequate. Nonetheless, the nest offered some degree of protection, and so he settled in behind it, visually confirming that the magazine in the gun held only two more rounds, a fact that was probably well known to his assailants.

  Todd was watching the doorway through a small opening he had left between bags when he noticed the opening darken as two bodies blocked the light. Taking no chances, these two were covering each other, and so raising his head over the cement bag parapet to shoot at them would mean almost certain death.

  Todd had the slight advantage that his blue eyes had already adjusted from the cruel blinding desert sunlight to the cavelike darkness of the garage. As he watched through the small opening he had prepared, he saw one of the men step forward and go down on one knee with his gun at the ready. Todd did not have a kill shot, but he took a chance anyway. Todd fired a single shot at the man who was down on his haunches, and his carefully aimed shot shattered the man’s bended knee as it passed through, removing the patella and the cruciate ligaments whilst displacing the tibia and fibula. The wreckage caused by that single shot was dramatic, and the man screamed before collapsing forward. Todd’s shot was answered by a barrage of automatic fire directed into the cement bags, but he held his position, and in another second the kneeless man’s head fell forward into view, his face a mask of pain and torment. Todd stopped his screaming with a bullet through his ear.

  The odds were suddenly one against one, but the Australian had no ammunition and his opponent had plenty. Todd had to think fast.

  ***

  The leader of the assassins was a Latvian called Laslo. He had worked with the other three Eastern Europeans as mercenaries around the globe
since they had been forced to flee from their own countries. Luckily for Todd, they were ex-soldiers, not assassins, and their inexperience in ‘wet work’ had shone through today. Laslo was now alone.

  He dragged his last colleague from the garage whilst loosing off a hail of bullets from the Steyr Machine Pistol, mainly to retrieve his man’s handgun. Now he had a new 30 round magazine in the Steyr and he had Androv’s handgun with three rounds left. Laslo was fairly sure that the target had no ammunition left, and that he was nested behind the cement bags, and so he devised a plan that would blow the man away before he could do any more damage. It was going to be difficult to explain how, as leader, he was returning to base with three dead colleagues when all that his employer had asked them to do was kill a single unarmed caretaker. Hopefully, the caretaker’s bloodied corpse would offer his employer some consolation.

  Laslo switched the Steyr to fifteen-shot burst firing, and held it in his less favoured left hand. He held the Sig P38 in his right hand. After three deep breaths he launched himself into the garage, at the same time yelling and depressing the Steyr’s trigger, firing a hail of covering fire over the cement bag nest. The first burst of cover fire would keep the target pinned down. He then fired a second burst into the bags themselves, hoping that a shot or two might penetrate and wound or kill the target. Then, following his desperate plan to the letter, Laslo came around the side of the bags, and as soon as he could see into the nest, he dropped the now empty Steyr and unloaded his P238 magazine into the confined space.

  ***

  As soon as Todd heard his would-be assassin dragging his friend out of the garage, he made his move. He knew that he could not defend his nest without ammunition; his only weapon now was surprise. Todd moved quietly across the garage to the opposite wall and pressed himself flat against it, hiding in the darkness behind a few scaffolding poles which were leaning at an angle against the wall. No sooner had he got into position than a hail of bullets thudded into the far wall, with a second burst ripping into the cement bags, sending an impenetrable cloud of dust across the little nest. Through the fog of cement dust came the last assassin, blazing away with his Steyr.