Endgame (Agent 21) (7 page)

Zak Darke looked terrible. His hair was scruffy. There were black rings under his eyes. Ricky wasn’t sure, but he thought he could see tear tracks down the dirty skin of his face. He was very sure that Zak was as tense as a tightly coiled spring. He was ready to defend himself if Ricky went for him – which, for a brief, irrational moment, he felt like doing.

– If he’d wanted to hurt you, he’d have done it when your back was turned.

‘What do you want?’ Ricky said. Zak didn’t answer. ‘Look, mate, I’ve had a pretty trying morning.’

‘You know what?’ Zak said. His voice was hoarse. ‘So have I.’

‘What was all that business with the phone call?’ Ricky asked warily.

Zak nodded at the window. ‘Check out our friend reading
The Times
on the other side of the plaza.’ Ricky hesitated, and Zak said, with a grim kind of smile: ‘Don’t tell me you didn’t see him.’

Ricky edged over towards the window. He looked out over the plaza. His sharp eyes picked out the guy on the bench. He had folded up his newspaper and was now standing, holding his phone to his ear. Ten seconds later, he turned and hurried out of sight.

Zak joined him at the window. ‘He’s just received a call telling him to get to the corner of Regent Street and Oxford Street. And right now I reckon there’s an armed response unit on its way. Maybe two.’

Ricky blinked at him. ‘What for? Why are they sending an armed response unit to apprehend me, when they know I’m in my flat?’ Then he silently cursed his own stupidity. ‘It’s not me they’re after, is it? It’s you.’

Zak nodded. ‘They’re monitoring your phone,’ he said. ‘They figured I might make contact and I needed a way to throw them off the scent. It was a decoy, not a message. Which reminds me . . .’ Zak took his phone from his pocket, opened up the back and removed the battery. Ricky understood why – without the battery, the phone couldn’t be tracked.

‘Is this something to do with Felix? He called this morning, before it got light. Said he was going off the grid for a while . . .’ Ricky’s voice petered out. He didn’t like the way Zak was looking at him. He had the stony expression of someone about to deliver bad news. ‘What is it?’ Ricky demanded. ‘What’s happened?’

‘There’s no good way to say this,’ Zak replied. ‘Felix is dead. He was shot this morning. I was there. I saw it happen. It was very quick. I doubt he even knew about it.’

His words were like hammer blows. A cold wave of numbness crept over Ricky’s body. He stared uncomprehendingly at Zak, then suddenly staggered to his bathroom. Once inside, he stared in the mirror. He was shocked to see that his own face had taken on the same, haunted expression that Zak’s had displayed. He closed his eyes. Felix?
Dead?
It didn’t make sense. He had only spoken to him a few hours ago . . .

He felt tears coming. He wiped them away just as there was a knocking on the door. Zak’s voice: ‘We don’t have much time.’

Ricky took a deep breath and suppressed a surge of anger. How could this guy be so calm, when such terrible things had happened? He spun on his heel and marched back out of the door, his chin jutting out, ready for an argument.

Back in the main room, Zak had one hand up, palm outwards. A mollifying gesture. He seemed to be expecting Ricky’s anger. ‘I know how you feel,’ he said. ‘Whoever shot Felix shot my handler, Michael, at the same time.’

Ricky felt as though the wind had been taken out of his sails. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘You need to listen carefully. Things are moving fast, and we have to move faster. They’ll soon realize I’ve sent them on a wild-goose chase, and when they do, they’ll be straight back here.’

‘Who’s “they”?’ Ricky whispered.

‘The Agency,’ Zak said. ‘The people we work for. I had a two a.m. RV with a guy called Calaca. He was once the henchman of someone called Cruz Martinez, a young Mexican drug lord who likes to think of himself as my enemy. Calaca is in prison – at least he was, until I turned up. He escaped when I was there. At the same time, my Guardian Angels, Raf and Gabs, were abducted from the place where we live. The Agency thinks I helped Calaca escape, and that I was involved in the disappearance of Raf and Gabs. They think I’ve gone bad. They probably even think I’m in league with Cruz. And I don’t want to sound cocky or anything, but if they think
that
, they’ll take the whole world apart trying to find me. I guess they’d do the same to you, if
you
went missing – don’t worry, I’m not asking you to do that. But Felix was about to help me go off the grid until Michael got it sorted out.’ A frown creased his forehead. He looked like he was remembering something terrible. ‘They didn’t get a chance,’ he said.

– How do we know he’s telling the truth? How do we know he
hasn’t
gone bad?

Zak smiled. Something in Ricky’s expression had obviously told him what he was thinking. ‘If I was going to hurt you, Ricky, you’d already be hurt,’ he said quietly.

There was a silence.

‘Why don’t you just let the Agency capture you, and explain to them what you just explained to me?’

Zak shook his head. ‘If Michael thought this was serious enough to take both me and Felix out of action, the Agency must be very certain that I’m working for the other side. My guess is they’re not in the mood to be persuaded otherwise.’ He looked down. ‘It probably didn’t help that some passers-by saw me rummaging through our handlers’ clothes.’ He looked slightly apologetic. ‘I needed to find Felix’s phone to get in touch with you.’

Another silence.

‘So who
did
kill Felix and Michael?’ Ricky asked finally. ‘If it was this Cruz guy, why didn’t he kill you too?’

‘I’m not sure,’ said Zak. ‘I guess that’s one of the things we need to find out. Cruz is . . .
crazy
. He’s also rich. And he really,
really
hates me.’ He sighed. ‘Well, he hates someone he knows as Harry Gold.’

‘Why?’

‘Long story.’ Zak glanced nervously towards the window, then towards the front door. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘it won’t be long before the Agency distributes my picture to law enforcement, and as soon as that happens, every policeman in London will be looking for my face.’

‘So you thought you’d come and hang out at my place? Thanks a million.’

Zak gave him a serious look. ‘If I hadn’t come, you’d never have known what happened to Felix.’

Ricky stared at him for a moment. ‘What about your Guardian Angels? Do you think they’re still alive?’

‘I don’t know,’ Zak said, and for the first time his voice sounded slightly weak.

Ricky nodded. ‘How can I help?’ he asked.

‘Thank you,’ Zak said quietly. He put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a small USB data stick. ‘I think there might be some answers on here. Calaca put it in my hand when he escaped. I need to use your computer. Then I’m out of your life.’

‘In the bedroom.’

‘Show me.’

Ricky was still numb as he led Zak to his laptop. In the absence of his own parents, Felix had been like a father to him. A strict, sarcastic, demanding father, but a father nonetheless. If what Zak had just told him was true, there was suddenly a massive hole in Ricky’s strange life.

The laptop was set up at a table in the bedroom. Zak sat in front of it, but didn’t yet plug in the USB stick. Instead, he disconnected the laptop from the wireless network.

‘What are you doing?’ Ricky asked.

‘If the Agency’s watching you, they’ll be monitoring your internet traffic,’ Zak said. He pulled another mobile phone from his pocket and tethered it wirelessly to the laptop.

‘How do you know they’re not monitoring your mobiles?’ Ricky asked.

‘They’re not mine,’ Zak said. ‘I stole them from some passers-by.’ He gave Ricky a sidelong glance. ‘You’re not the only one who can pick pockets, you know.’

Once the new internet connection was up and running, Zak plugged in the USB stick. Watching the screen, Ricky saw that it contained a single document. Zak opened it up. They were presented with a web link. Zak clicked it.

A web page came onto the screen. At its centre was a Quicktime window.

Zak clicked ‘play’.

At first there was nothing. Just a black screen. Zak felt sick to the pit of his stomach. He’d been relying on this data stick. Calaca had surely pressed it into his hand for a reason. But as the seconds passed, and nothing appeared on the screen, he felt his hope draining away.

Suddenly, however, there was a flicker. A face appeared. Zak’s sickness turned into something else – halfway between fear and anger. It was Cruz Martinez.

Cruz had changed since their last meeting. His face was leaner and his hair longer – almost shoulder length. His eyes were cold and hard.

‘Who’s that?’ Ricky breathed.

‘Cruz,’ Zak said quietly. ‘Shhh . . .’

‘
If you’re watching this, Harry Gold, and everything has gone according to plan, you will have suffered this morning.
’

‘Who’s Harry Gold?’ Ricky asked.

‘Me,’ Zak told him. ‘It’s one of my cover names.’

‘
If everything has happened the way I hope, my most loyal employee is on his way back to me, your handler is dead and your friends Raphael and Gabriella will be under my control.
’ Cruz smiled. ‘
I’d like to say that they are being well looked after, but we both know it would be a lie and I won’t insult your intelligence. By now, I kind of imagine they’re wishing they’d never been born.
’

‘He’s a real charmer, isn’t he?’ Ricky said.

Zak stared hard at the screen. Awful images of what Raf and Gabs were undergoing spun through his mind.

‘
I imagine your employers think you were involved in the jail break. So, you will be watching this by yourself. Be assured that as soon as you have finished watching this video, the link will no longer work. There will be no benefit in delivering it to your employers to prove your innocence.
’

Another smile. Cruz seemed very pleased with himself.

‘
I thought we might play a little game, Harry.
’

‘Why do I get the feeling,’ Ricky cut in, ‘that he isn’t thinking Buckaroo?’

‘
I’m taking your friends to a secret location. If you fail to locate them by midnight on
el Día de Reyes,
I’ll kill them, just like that witch Gabriella killed my father.
’ His eyes narrowed unpleasantly. ‘
The feast for the King of Kings. A day to bring me a special gift –
yourself.
If you do find them, but it appears that you have had – how can I put this – adult supervision, I’ll also kill them. But if you turn up alone, I’ll spare their lives.
’ Cruz leaned further in towards the camera. ‘
I’m not making any promises about
your
life, though, Harry.
’ He leaned back again. ‘
I am taking them to a place between yesterday and tomorrow. From time to time I might upload some footage of your friends, just to keep you focused.
’ A third unpleasant smile. ‘
I hope you’ve got a strong stomach. My next message might be a bit of a video nasty.
’

Cruz lowered his head, and the video ended.

Zak’s mouth was dry, his skin tingling with hate and panic. He tried to play the video again. But when he clicked, it didn’t work.

‘
El Día de Reyes?
The king of kings?’ he said, puzzled.

‘Epiphany,’ said Ricky. ‘Sixth of January.’ He bit his lip. ‘Foster parents, once,’ he added. ‘Knew all that kind of stuff, crammed it into me and I guess some of it stuck.’

Zak looked at his watch and made a quick calculation. It was 8:45 a.m. That gave him just shy of eighty-seven hours to find his Guardian Angels. And they could be anywhere in the world.

Silence in the room. He could feel Ricky looking at him, sense the waves of sympathy coming from him. For some reason that made him even angrier. He didn’t want sympathy.

He wanted to get his Guardian Angels back.

‘I don’t understand what he was on about,’ Ricky said. ‘How can a place be between yesterday and tomorrow? It doesn’t make sense.’

‘It’ll make sense,’ Zak said grimly. ‘We just haven’t worked it out yet.’ He looked around the flat. ‘I shouldn’t have come here,’ he said. ‘I’ve put you in danger. I’ll go now. I know what I have to do.’ He removed the USB stick and stood up.

‘Where do you think you’re going?’ Ricky said.

‘To find Raf and Gabs.’

‘Not on your own.’

Zak narrowed his eyes. ‘It’s a trap, Ricky. Can’t you see that? Cruz thinks I’ll do anything to save them, and he’s right. He’s forcing me to go to him so that he can kill me. And if you’re by my side, he’ll kill you too.’

Ricky shook his head. ‘I don’t think so. From what you’ve said, he’s had two opportunities to kill you this morning. Why didn’t he?’

Zak didn’t have an answer for that. But his mind was made up. He was doing this alone. ‘I’m sorry, Ricky. I know this has been as bad a morning for you as it has for me. But this is my mission, not yours.’

Ricky’s eyes flashed. ‘He killed Felix. That makes me involved. End of.’

‘Forget it,’ Zak said bluntly. ‘I’m leaving. Alone.’ He stood up and headed to the exit. But when he was three metres from the door, he stopped.

He’d heard something. A scratching noise on the other side of the door. Instinct took over. He strode towards it and peered through the spy hole. His pulse rose at what he saw: four men in full combat gear – helmets, flak jackets and assault rifles. They were clearly preparing to enter.

Zak turned sharply to Ricky, who was just behind him. ‘Hold them as long as you can,’ he mouthed. ‘And remember, you never saw me . . .’ He pushed quickly past his fellow agent and back into the main room of the flat. His eyes picked out the line of baseball caps on the wall. He grabbed a lime-green one and ran to the open window. He could already hear shouts coming from behind the door as he looked out.

His stomach turned.

The window-cleaning cradle that he had used to scale the building was still empty, but now it was moving downwards. Vertical distance between Zak and it: fifteen metres. And the distance was increasing with every second. It was blowing and rattling precariously in the wind . . .