Exit wound, p.7
Exit Wound, page 7
Red Ken looked over my shoulder and nodded. I turned to see Dex empty-handed.
‘For all that, I’m glad he’s here. You too, Nick. I just wish Tenny was too, you know?’
Dex bounced in and sat next to me. He studied Red Ken’s face. ‘You OK, chap? Nick here been stealing your chips?’
Red Ken wiped his eyes. ‘No, you soft twat – just the normal thing.’
‘Ah.’ Dex pointed at the carton full of juice. ‘That mine?’
He gulped it back with relish, then leant forward with that ever-bright smile. ‘Guess what? We’re being followed. The checked shirt stayed with me. So, what now?’
Red Ken took a swig of his drink. ‘Fuck ’em. We’re just shopping, aren’t we? So we carry on doing what we’re here to do – show Nick what he needs to see, and carry on as planned. We finish our drinks, get on with our job, and keep our eyes skinned.’
19
Dex had some bits of orange caught in his straw and was trying to blow them out instead of just taking the top off and drinking normally.
Red Ken thumped his watch. ‘We need to go up to the car park.’
Dex gave it some thought. ‘I’ll bring it with – and I see Checked Shirt. He’s sitting to my half-right, outside Starbucks. He’s talking with a white shirt, long-sleeved, buttoned-up, jeans. It’s a trigger.’
We got up and started walking, ignoring the two of them. We passed through the funfair, where Indian and Filipina girls stared out from behind the stalls. They looked as though they were in prison.
It’s best not to look for followers while on the move. It’s too obvious and not necessary. The best way is to check things out once you go static. Who was there the last time you stopped? Who just fucked up by jumping into a shop doorway?
We came to a massive floor-to-ceiling glass screen, the other side of which was Switzerland. Acres of blindingly white snow glittered under a brilliant blue sky. Chairlifts carried skiers over snowmen and tall fir trees. You could almost smell the glühwein. We stopped and had a quick look at all the Arab lads wrapped up in their hired cold-weather gear. As usual, the women in burqas had drawn the short straw. They couldn’t get the skiwear on over their other clobber. Their breath hung around them in clouds as they waited at the bottom of the toboggan run for their kids to appear at warp speed. They must have been freezing.
Dex took another suck from his juice container. ‘They’re still with us, chaps. They really need to sharpen their skills.’
We turned to walk away from the skiers. He was right. The two of them were directly in our eye-line, trying to look normal as they window-shopped for women’s clothes.
We took the escalator to the roof and walked out into forty degrees of overwhelming heat. Like any other mall on the planet, a queue of people with shopping bags stretched back from the taxi rank. There must have been space in the car park for at least a thousand cars, but only a third of it was occupied.
‘Recession.’ Dex shook his head as well as his drink. ‘It’s everywhere.’
The sun was low in the sky. Red Ken checked his watch. ‘Ten past six. Last light in about fifty.’
We moved into the shade of the ski slope. It ran up the side of the mall and above the car park to dominate the skyline. We admired all the massed ranks of sparkling 4x4s and Lamborghinis, and tried to look like we were waiting for someone to join us.
Neither of the shirts made an appearance. Red Ken pulled out his cigarettes and I admired the scenery. ‘They can’t be that shite. We’re up here for one of two reasons. To get a taxi, or meet someone with a vehicle. Bet they’ve gone back to the Toyota. They’ll be staking out the exit.’ I turned to the click of a disposable lighter and was met with a cloud of smoke.
‘Good. Fuck ’em. Let them wait. Dex, you keep an eye out for them. Nick, look out there.’
From our vantage-point, the area round the mall was littered with patches of barren ground and half-finished buildings draped in scaffolding. Over the constant background rumble of traffic came the rhythmic thud of pile drivers. Little ant-like bodies scurried about in yellow or blue hard hats. It must have been a fucker labouring in Gas Mark Ten.
The whole city was criss-crossed with highways that looked like giant concrete flumes. A monorail was also under construction. We had seen the elevated strip of concrete heading towards the city centre from the airport. The partly built stations looked like golden cocoons wrapped around the track. Red Ken, of course, thought they were shite. I quite liked them.
We could see all the way to the sea. The Burj Al-Arab hotel looked like a giant sail a couple of K away on the coast. The needle-like Burj Dubai was well on its way to being the world’s tallest building. In all directions, the rows of dominoes gleamed in the sun. But we weren’t there for the view.
He leant against one of the concrete supports for the ski slope and sucked hard on his B&H. ‘Dunes. You got it?’
The hotel, like a black glass pyramid, would have looked at home in Las Vegas.
‘Got that.’
‘OK, that’s your axis. Go half right. Five hundred.’ He was using a fire-control order format to get me onto the target. I looked half right, scanning the five-hundred area.
‘You’ve got a ten-storey building with an all-black ground floor. Seen?’
‘Seen.’ The boring ten-storey cube’s shop fronts were all black marble.
‘OK, go left of the building, into the wasteground, at about a K. You’ve got a one-storey flat-concrete-roofed building – rectangular, with a wall surrounding it. Seen?’
‘Seen.’
‘That’s the target. The surrounding wall is five metres away from the building. The wall is three metres high and the wall gate and building shutters are facing us. All the damage we do must be within the wall, inside the compound. That way it’ll be months, maybe years, before anyone gets to see our handiwork. And when they do, they won’t even know what was in the building. The outside wall will not be touched.’
I couldn’t see much detail from this distance but I had a visual on what Red Ken and Dex had described to me. We couldn’t do a walk-past to soak up more detail. No one walked in this city.
20
The perimeter gate, the only way in and out of the compound, directly faced a doorway set into rolled-steel shutters wide enough to admit a vehicle into the building. Either side of the shutters was a window, the one on the right larger than the one on the left. I couldn’t see from this distance, but Red Ken said they were iron-barred. He and Dex had been on-target during their last recce. There were no other entrances or exits.
There was no electricity or water running into the building. It had been left to decay for the past nine years, waiting for Saddam to defeat the Americans and then get down to a bit of DIY on his palace.
‘Nick, make a note of the main drag between us and the target. That’s our route out. Going left, as we look at it now, it takes us south-west out of the city, following the coast towards Abu Dhabi and the RV. Going right, we take the tunnel under the Creek into the old quarter, the gold souk and markets. You got it?’
‘Yep.’
The job was kicking off at last light tomorrow. For Red Ken and me, it would start in a block of public toilets in the old quarter. Dex was going to go local and steal a Tata truck in the same area they’d pinged with a crane attached, much like the ones Jewson’s used to deliver bricks and stuff in the UK.
Red Ken and I would keep out of sight as we moved to the target. We’d lift the crates, load them onto the truck, then take a swift detour to Dex’s GMC Suburban, parked about six K west of the target. After transferring our little insurance policy, we’d take the Tata and the Suburban back to the airport before catching up with Spag at the strip.
Bingo.
It was perfectly simple. Too fucking simple by half.
I reckoned it was time for one or two awkward questions. ‘So, these Gucci gold doors have just been sitting there since the second Gulf War – and nobody knows?’
‘They will when the developers move in. Five years ago this was the Empty Quarter. Now look at it.’
A flood of tourists spilt out of the mall, designer bags bulging with stuff they could have bought back home, and probably for less.
‘Spag said he found out about the doors just after the war.’
‘Yeah, he told me.’
‘Did he also tell you he found the lads who made them?’
‘No, he fucked me off on questions. Told me to ask you.’
Red Ken nearly choked on his next mouthful of nicotine. ‘The guy in charge locked the crates in that building for Saddam to collect as soon as he’d sorted out the Americans.’
‘And the others?’
‘Two of them, apparently. Spag reckons he binned them – permanently – in case they confused the gold with their pension scheme.’
‘Then Spag binned him, and it’s been sitting there ever since?’
Red Ken nodded. ‘Just waiting for the right time.’
‘The right time for Spag, or for some other fucker?’
‘Who knows?’ He checked his watch again. ‘You OK, Nick? Seen enough?’
‘Yeah.’
‘We’ll follow the route backwards to the gold market. See where the weapons are and where Dex will lift the truck.’
We wandered over to the cab rank. Dex jumped into the front of the first available and greeted the driver like an old cricketing companion. We headed down the ramp to meet the white Toyota, three up.
21
We drove towards the Creek about four or five K away. The main drag really was main. Four lanes in both directions cut through the city. It was pointless checking if the Toyota was still behind us. We’d wait until we stopped, just as we did on foot. These guys weren’t complete amateurs. They must have had some training or they’d have stayed with us on the mall roof. But if they were internal security, police, whoever, why tag us? Was it because we’d been with Spag this morning? Maybe they’d been following him, seen us meet and decided to find out who we were and what we were doing.
Whatever, I didn’t like it. The job felt compromised before we’d even begun. A big part of me wanted to get these lads to call the whole thing off, but I knew that wasn’t going to happen.
We fell silent as we thought about the job and the Toyota. Well, maybe just Red Ken and I did. I had no idea what was going on in Dex’s head. But then neither did he.
We drove through the tunnel and followed the Creek towards the sea. Knackered old dhows were parked five and six deep all along the harbour front while their crews unloaded fridges and all sorts straight onto the pavement.
Dex gave the driver a tap on the shoulder. ‘We’ll stop here, chappie. Thank you very much.’
Red Ken and I got out and left Dex to pay. The Toyota passed us and disappeared down a side turning. The lads would be jumping out any minute to keep with us. We both checked to see if any other cars were doing the same. Maybe they had a team with us, or maybe they’d split when we were all pinged together at the golf course this morning. We did the tourist bit, watching the locals work their arses off unloading and then dicing with death as they barrowed everything, including the kitchen sink, to the shops on the other side of the road.
The sun cast long shadows as it began to bin it for the day. Lights were already on in the shops. Street signs flickered into life, and I started to feel the energy of the place. Night-time was when Dubai began to hop. Who but dickhead tourists wanted to wander around in the sun?
Red Ken tapped my shoulder. ‘There’s the subway. Get into the toilet block and do your stuff. We’ll wait here, see if the team have pinged us yet.’
I wandered under the road. As I emerged the other side, I passed an enclosed steel-and-glass bus shelter with an air-conditioning unit on the roof. It must have been nice and cool for all the people who never used it because they all went by car. It was almost space age compared with the place I was going.
I could smell the flat-roofed cube from several metres away. The cars around it looked as though they’d been abandoned rather than parked. The local dudes leant against the wall and smoked.
I went inside.
The place was boiling hot and stank exactly like a shit-hole full of tobacco smoke should. The two sinks were cracked. The taps were broken. There were four cubicles, and only one was being used. I always thought the hole in the ground with a hosepipe to sluice your arse was a better system than ours, apart from the squatting bit. There’s quite an art in keeping your jeans and slack belt out of the firing line.
Above my head, to the right of the entrance, was a ledge on which sat an ancient air-conditioning system, a plastic box caked in grime that probably hadn’t sparked up since this place was declared open – about twenty years ago, the same time it had last been cleaned.
I watched the shadow under the occupied cubicle door. The bloke was still squatting. I eased myself up against the wall. If anybody came in, I’d stop what I was doing and leg it.
I stood on the tips of my toes, and stretched up my hand as Red Ken had instructed. The ledge was shaped like a tray for the air-con unit. My fingertips brushed the taped-up plastic bag and the hard steel it contained. Red Ken’s three pistols were still where they should be. Now I knew precisely where they were we could head towards the old gold market and the wagon Dex would lift tomorrow night.
22
A mountain of sacks, crates and plastic-wrapped white goods covered every square metre of pavement. Indian lads loaded up with cargo ran up and down the line of dhows like they were stepping-stones. As we headed deeper into the old part of town we mostly had to stick to the road.
Once past the main offloading point, we could see the lights of Ye Olde Dubai across the Creek. Swarms of water-taxis waited to ply you over to the purpose-built tourist trap sited right opposite the real deal.
The two shirts were behind us, on the town side of the road.
Red Ken was deep in thought. He fished out his cigarettes and Dex and I took a couple of brisk paces to get ahead of his smoke cloud. ‘What are we going to do with them?’
I shrugged. There wasn’t much we should do right now. ‘They know where we’re staying. If they lose us they’ll go and wait for us there. We might as well keep playing tourist until tomorrow night. Then we ditch them and get on with the job.’
Dex nodded. ‘And then, Red, I think we should consider missing out on the Friday-morning golf. We should get an earlier flight.’
Red Ken took a big drag and, a moment or two later, smoke seemed to curl out of every hole in his head. ‘Agreed.’
‘I’m going to keep saying it, lads. You sure you still want to go on? We’ve just picked up another problem, something else we have no control of, and—’
‘Save your breath, son.’ Red Ken moved forward a little and slapped Dex between the shoulder-blades. ‘Right, boy? Still got your eye on that castle?’
Dex turned and grasped his hand. ‘Definitely.’
There was a lot going on there that obviously went beyond words. I felt a little jealous, and pissed off with myself at the same time. These two and Tenny had made the effort to stay tight all these years. ‘What’s all this Monarch of the Glen shit?’
Dex gave a smile that seemed more wistful than his normal don’t-give-a-fuck version. ‘It’s not shit, Nick. I’ve been thinking a lot about my father lately. The night before I went to Eton, he sat me down and gave me just one piece of advice. It’s something I’ve never forgotten.’ The smile faded. He was lost in another world. His voice deepened. ‘“Son, the only way for people like us to succeed in this country is by keeping our heads below the parapet. Laugh, be the happy chappie. Don’t let anyone see you’re cleverer than they are. If you do, you’ll become a threat.”’
We walked some more. ‘And you know what, chaps? He was right. I was the class clown all through school. They called me the Wacky Paki and I crept in under the wire and was top of the class before they knew it.’
We stopped and looked across the hundred metres of Creek. The lights of Ye Olde Dubai danced on the water.
‘And then I joined the RAF, just like my dad. He flew Hurricanes, as you know. They called him Curry-in-a-Hurry. He was brilliant at putting on the smiley face, but in his head he was giving everybody the finger. I’ve done the same, but I’m fed up with smiling now. I’ve made up my mind. I’m going to become a Scottish laird. I’m going to buy the title. I’ve got a castle in mind.’ He looked at Red Ken. ‘Five acres when the tide’s out . . .’
He came in on cue: ‘. . . three when it’s in!’
They laughed.
‘I’m going to invent a McWacky-Paki tartan and join Gleneagles and the Royal and Ancient. Two fingers up to the lot of them. One for me, one for my father. He’d be proud of what I’m doing here. I’m going to have the last laugh, something he never had the good fortune to have.’ Dex put a hand on my shoulder. ‘And you, Nick? There has to be something more than just cash.’
‘There is – I told you. I’m here to cover your arses.’
Red Ken flicked his butt into the Creek. ‘Nearly there. You see the compound?’
Seventy or eighty metres ahead of us stood a construction site that took up the entire centre of the road. Diversions and temporary traffic-lights funnelled the traffic into one lane.
I was the only one who looked. Too many eyes on one point at the same time would prompt the boys behind us to ask, ‘What the fuck are they all looking at, and why?’
Red Ken stopped and made a meal of firing up his latest B&H. ‘This whole area is being regenerated. They’re going to tart up the promenade road like the Corniche the other side, make it all Gucci. And that’s where Dex lifts our wagon.’
Above the blue-painted wooden perimeter walls, I could see Portakabins stacked four or five high, linked by wooden staircases. Cranes reached up into the sky. Arrows and strips of yellow-and-white plastic tape guided us away from the Creek and around the construction site.
