The Murder Exchange (47 page)

He kept pacing, telling himself that it was he who was
getting too paranoid. What possible reason was there to suspect
the two of them? As always, they'd played everything
just right, their stories standing up even to the closest
scrutiny, their demeanour that of men not to be trifled with.
And with back-up just round the corner, ready to move in if
anything looked like it was going to go wrong. But even
bearing all this in mind, Vokes didn't like the fact that he was
split up from his partner and stuck in a hotel room with two
armed men who insisted on wearing sunglasses on a wet
English afternoon.

The phone on the bedside table rang, shattering the heavy
silence.

Yokes stopped. Dead.

Slowly, he turned and stared at it. So did the two
Colombians. It rang again, a long, shrill tone that seemed far
too loud for the room. Who the hell was this meant to be?

An urgent message in his head said: Run! Get out of there!
In fact, it didn't just say it, it screamed it. RUN! GRAB
THE DOOR HANDLE, TURN IT, AND GET YOUR
ARSE OUT OF THERE!

He glanced at the two Colombians, who were looking at
each other, their expressions puzzled. The phone rang a third
time.

One of them strode over and picked up the receiver. At
the same time, the second Colombian, perhaps reading their
hostage's thoughts, produced a silver Walther PPK from
inside his suit. He pointed it at Yokes and motioned him to
get on the bed. 'Now, now,' he demanded impatiently.

Yokes looked over at the other Colombian, the one on the
phone. He hadn't said anything since he'd picked it up but
was listening to someone on the other end, at the same time
staring hard at Yokes. He too removed a gun from his pocket
- a Glock, Yokes reckoned. It didn't seem like he was pleased
by whatever it was he was hearing.

Yokes thought of his two young children and realized then
that he was too old for this game; that this was the last time
he'd ever go undercover; that no more would he attend clandestine
meetings in bleak hotel rooms with men who'd kill
him without a second's thought because that was what life
was worth where they came from - nothing. He realized too
that he was beginning to panic for the first time ever on an
op, an unfamiliar feeling of dread spreading through him like
a poison, and that was another reason why Stegs should have
been up here in this room instead of him, because he was
always able to handle the pressure.

'Get on the bed, now.'

The words came from the one holding the phone, except

now he wasn't holding it, he'd replaced it in its cradle, and
his expression behind the glasses was angry. He walked over,
gun waving, and grabbed Yokes by the arm, pushing him
towards the bed. Yokes tried to sit on it, but was roughly
pushed face down. He could feel the barrel of the Glock
against the back of his head.

'Stay there, do not move,' said the gunman, before adding
something to his colleague in Spanish.

Yokes was shaking, shaking with absolute fear, and he
could feel the sweat from his forehead sliding onto the sheets.
He offered a silent prayer to the Lord, but it didn't make him
feel any better. He had never been so scared in his life
because he knew that this was the closest he had ever been
to death. And all the time he was wondering who the hell
had made that phone call, what they'd said and, most
importantly of all, when the cavalry were going to show
themselves.

The boot opened to reveal a leather briefcase similar to the

one Fellano had shown them upstairs. He and Stegs leant in,

trying to look as inconspicuous as possible, while Moustache

stood back. Fellano undipped the locks and opened the case.

A quick count revealed nineteen kilo bags of white powder

inside.

'Are you satisfied, my friend?' the Colombian asked with

a smile.

Till need to test it, a sample from each bag.'

'Of course, we will do that back in the room.'

Stegs nodded, standing back up as he shut the briefcase

and closed the boot. Till go and get the money and catch you

up,' he said. 'My car's just over there.'

Fellano raised an eyebrow to indicate that he wasn't sure

about this change of plan.

'We'll look too conspicuous going over and staring in the

boot of my car as well,' Stegs told him, 'and now I know

you've got the stuff, plus my colleague, I've got no incentive

not to bring it up to the room.'

Fellano still didn't appear convinced and gave him a hard
stare in an attempt to prise out any lies from behind his eyes,
but Stegs kept his business expression firmly on his face, and
eventually the Colombian relented. 'All right, but I want to
get this deal sorted out right now, so hurry up. I have a plane
to catch.'

Stegs felt like telling him that if he hadn't messed them
around so much earlier he'd have had a lot more time, but
instead he turned and walked away in the direction of the
parked Merc fifty yards further along the row of cars. When
he'd gone about twenty yards, he turned and saw Fellano
and Moustache walking back to the hotel, Fellano's ample
wedge of black hair flying comically about in the high wind.
He was talking on a mobile, and Stegs wondered who it was
he was speaking to, and what exactly he was saying.

He reached the Merc, flicked up the boot and removed the
holdall, putting it over one shoulder. Fellano and Moustache
had slowed nght up in the middle of the car park, waiting
for him. Reluctantly, he started after them, wondering just
how conspicuous they wanted to be, and why they didn't
want to wait five minutes in the warmth of the hotel room
for him to arrive, rather than hanging about in the rain.

When he was within about twenty yards of them, something
caught his eye. Three smartly dressed men - two black, one
white - in raincoats and flat caps were getting out of a car a
few yards behind the Colombians and to their right, and one
of them was watching them intently from behind a pair of
glasses that looked brand new and didn't seem to fit his face.

The man didn't look right, not at all. Neither did the other
two. They might have been dressed smartly but they weren't
like any normal businessmen Stegs had ever met. Who on
earth wears a baseball cap with a suit? Maybe the odd
fashion casualty, not three together. There was something
else too. They were hard bastards, you could see it immediately;
it's not a look a man can hide very easily. He also
noticed that the one with the glasses was holding something
under his coat.

Straight away he knew it was a gun, most likely a shotgun,
and straight away he knew that it was there to be
pointed at Fellano. Instinctively, he slowed down. At the
same time, Fellano turned in Stegs's direction, tapping his
watch in a gesture of impatience, and then suddenly a look
of shock crossed his face.

Stegs froze as he heard the sound of rapid footsteps
behind him, and the next second something hard and metallic
was being pressed into his back. 'Don't fucking move,'
hissed his assailant, ripping the holdall from his shoulders,
'or you're dead. I'll blow your fucking spine out. Got that?'

'It's all yours,' said Stegs calmly, making no move to
resist, too busy looking straight ahead of him at the scene
unravelling in what felt a lot like slow motion. Moustache
was reaching into his pocket for a gun while Fellano himself
simply stood there, mouth open, watching Stegs, still completely
unaware that the three men were making straight for
him and the briefcase, weapons now appearing from under
their coats. Stegs was right about the shotgun; it was a nastylooking
sawn-off pump-action, and it was pointing straight
at Fellano's back.

At that moment, Fellano must have heard them, or seen
something out of the corner of his eye, because he swung
round in their direction. Moustache turned as well, an Uzi
coming out from his jacket, and Stegs, still standing there as
his assailant secured the holdall, knew then that this was
going to get very very messy.

'Give us the fucking case!' screamed the man with the
shotgun, now only five yards from Fellano.

At the same time, Moustache aimed the Uzi at the three
robbers, pushing his boss out of the way and going for the
safety at the same time. Beyond the group, Stegs could see
those people in earshot turning round to see what on earth
was going on, utterly transfixed by the shock of the surreal
scene being played out in front of them. It was a first for
Stegs as well, and difficult for him to get his head round,
because even in his sort of game you didn't expect everyone

I

suddenly to go for the guns and start shooting. That sort of
thing belonged firmly in Hollywood films.

'Drop the fucking gun!' yelled the pistol-wielding white
robber as he caught sight of the Uzi for the first time, but it
was already too late.

Shotgun screwed his face into a snarl and, still coming at
his target, pulled the trigger.

And that was when all hell broke loose. Moustache flew
backwards, the force of the blast lifting him off his feet, while
his Uzi suddenly kicked into life, its thirty-two rounds discharging
at the sky in a shrill clatter as his grip on the handle
loosened. He hit the ground hard and the shotgun roared
again, the noise making Stegs's ears ring. This time, though,
it missed its target and blew a gaping hole in the tyre of a
people carrier opposite, immediately setting off the alarm.

Someone somewhere let out a scream. Someone somewhere
else shouted: 'Armed police, drop your weapons!'

The white robber had reached Fellano now and was
trying to wrestle the briefcase out of his hand, with the help
of one of his colleagues. Meanwhile Shotgun was waving his
weapon in the direction of the dozen or so men in casual
clothes - all wearing black caps - who were now appearing
from among the cars, guns drawn, closing in on the scene.

'Armed police! Drop your weapons!'

But you could see straight away that Shotgun was not
going to go quietly. This was a man who had never gone
quietly anywhere in his life. His face screaming defiance, he
pointed the weapon at a youngish guy in jeans and a leather
jacket who was just coming round the back of the people
carrier, an MP5 outstretched in both hands.

The cop made the decision no-one with a conscience ever
likes to make, and he made it quicker than his target. Two
bullets cracked out of the MP5, hitting Shotgun in the upper
body. Another cop also fired from behind a Nissan, the same
two-shot double tap, this time the rounds striking their
target in the face.

Shotgun whirled round, still holding the weapon, still

trying to fire, and then a third two-shot volley struck him in
the side of the head, the final bloody coup de grace. He died
immediately, staring in Stegs's direction, the shotgun slipping
out of his hands and discharging for a third time as it hit the
ground in a final gesture of defiant rage, the blast setting off
another car alarm.

No-one else decided to go out the hard way. Fellano's
hands shot skywards, and the other two robbers made the
same gesture, although far more slowly, the shock of their
predicament taking a little longer to register. At the same
time, two cops in caps came round from behind Stegs, and
he was pushed roughly to the ground. He just managed to
get a glance at the man who'd relieved him of his holdall getting
the same treatment five yards away before his face was
pushed into a puddle and the cuffs were unceremoniously
forced on his wrists.

The hotel room was on the fifth floor and the same side as
the car park, so even with the soundproofing the shots
and the general cacophony of the confrontation were clearly
audible.

Vokes heard his two guards talking rapidly to each other
in Spanish, and his fear grew even more intense. He was
shaking violently, the dread at what might happen to him
becoming almost unbearable. If I get out of this, then that's
it, he told himself. I'm retired. Not just undercover, but the
whole thing. They had a codeword if things went wrong but
he didn't want to draw attention to himself by using it, and
anyway, help should have been here by now. They were only
in the next room. What was keeping them? Hurry up! he
silently cursed. Get your arses moving! Let me get back to
my family. Please, Father. Please, Lord. Not for me, but for
them.

One of the Colombians had stopped at the end of the bed.
Vokes could sense it. Then he heard the door opening, the
sound of movement and shouting in the corridor outside, and
he was already thanking the good Lord for listening to his

prayers when the silencer spat and the bullet ripped through
the back of his head and into his brain.

Paul Vokennan's executioner was twenty-eightyear-old
Manuel Lopez, known as Manolo to his friends, a long-term
junior member of the Cali cartel and an ex-soldier in the
Colombian army, now resident in London. He was a killer
by trade and, as Yokes had suspected, thought no more
about ending a life than he did about taking a leak. It was,
after all, just business.

Manolo fired a second round into the back of Vokes's
head, just to make sure, then turned towards the open door
where his colleague, twenty-six-year-old Pedro Daroda, was
standing. He could hear the noise of footsteps coming from
outside, then the staccato bark of orders, and he realized
they'd been betrayed. Pedro stepped out into the hallway,
raised his gun, and then fell backwards as shots rang out.
Manolo ran over to the side of the bed furthest from the
door, then crouched down, gun pointed out into the hallway,
thinking that he was at least going to make it difficult for
them.

A black-clad figure half appeared round the door, gun
outstretched, and Manolo fired twice, both rounds hitting the
burgundy-coloured wall in the hallway as the cop stepped
back. A second later, a second cop appeared round the other
side of the door, and started firing. Manolo let off a shot but
was forced to turn away as the bullets passed over his head,
the noise of them bursting in his ears. Suddenly there was a
much louder bang somewhere near the foot of the bed, and
he became disorientated and unable to see properly. It was
as if somebody had force-fed him a bottle of whisky and
dropped him on his head from the fifth-floor window, and he
knew they'd used a stun grenade. But, even dazed, he still
held the gun as the black-clad police in breathing apparatus
came into view and, with a gesture of defiance that perfectly
mirrored the expression of the man with the shotgun in the
car park below, raised it in front of him, aiming at the first
officer's crotch.