They wheeled and circled, Raffa looking for the opening, but none came. Finally, Raffa lunged and pulled back and Winter stepped forward quickly, kicking the smaller man in the chest and knocking him onto his back. Then Winter pounced, grabbing the knife hand as he came down on the Mossad man and throwing a fast left elbow into the man’s teeth, stunning him. As Winter lined up a head-butt, the Israeli leaned away and struck at his attacker’s eyes.
Gallen struggled to keep his feet, the SIG now trained on the two men who rolled across the grass, the knife still firmly in the Israeli’s grip.
Winter emerged from the melee with a lock on Raffa’s knife wrist, which he turned into a quick inside elbow. It knocked Raffa’s chin upwards and made the Israeli drop the knife.
Training his SIG, trying to keep his eyes focused, Gallen watched as if in a dream. Grabbing the Israeli by the hair, Winter slapped his massive right paw on Raffa’s neck. A cry of anguish echoed around the farm as Winter’s grip tightened, his thumb crushing the throat.
Gallen could make out the dying plea from the Israeli as he was choked. ‘We’re professionals, please.’
Swinging Raffa’s head like he was wielding a bowling ball, Winter cracked it into the trunk of a maple tree in one sudden movement. Raffa’s body went slack and he collapsed like a sack in the grass, the broken neck finally finishing it for him.
Winter turned. ‘Sorry ‘bout that, boss,’ he said, as Tucker pulled up in the Ford. ‘Forgot myself for a minute.’
‘Don’t matter,’ said Gallen, gasping for breath to stay conscious as the pain from his shin pulsed through his body. Letting his legs give out beneath him, Gallen fell to the grass before Winter could make it to him. More than four years of special forces combat gigs, and never taken a bone shot, thought Gallen as Tucker moved towards them. And now here he was, taking lead for some oil executive.
Tucker stumbled. And then Gallen could see why: he’d been pushed. Behind him was a large man in a black field jacket, holding a submachine gun.
‘Shit,’ said Gallen, recognising the gunman from three weeks earlier, outside a meeting in Kugaaruk.
‘Well, well,’ said the thug in a strong Russian accent. ‘It’s the funny man, don’t give his name when asked.’
‘Fuck me,’ muttered Winter, his hands slowly rising.
‘Oh, you’re fucked alright,’ came an American voice.
Turning his head to his left, squinting to focus, Gallen felt the air expel from his lungs and his jaw drop. The man in front of him had his left arm in a sling and a patch over his left eye. But his dark hair was still receding and the Annapolis ring was where it always was.
‘Mulligan?’
‘The thing I love about Chase Lang?’ said the spook, pallid as the sun tried to warm up the morning. ‘His vests are genuine Kevlar.’
CHAPTER 69
The farmhouse kitchen was warm and the body left by Gallen’s shot had been dragged out, leaving a smear of blood on the timber floor. The Russian tested the coffee pot with his hand and poured. He’d duct-taped Gallen’s and Winter’s wrists to their ankles.
Wincing at his shoulder injury, Mulligan eased back in a Mennonite chair, waiting for the coffee to be placed in front of him. Through the windows Gallen saw other gunmen roving around the farmhouse.
The coffee steamed and Mulligan turned on a fake smile. ‘So, Ace — where’s Florita?’
Gallen shrugged. ‘What you want with her?’
‘Mind your business.’
‘You made it my business, Paul,’ said Gallen, his leg aching despite the painkillers. ‘Remember?’
‘I remember bringing you in to run a personal security detail for Harry Durville,’ said Mulligan, picking up the coffee. ‘Nothing in there about Florita Mendes.’
‘I got promoted,’ said Gallen.
Mulligan laughed at that. ‘Here’s my deal, boys. You return that woman to me now, this morning, and I fly away into the sunset, leaving you here with sore wrists.’
‘Or?’ said Gallen.
‘I don’t make threats,’ said Mulligan. ‘You know that.’
Gallen thought quickly, avoiding looking at Winter. They had a few seconds to get this right and no margin. No second chances if Mulligan sensed a trick.
‘She’s with my guys,’ said Gallen.
‘So tell your guys to bring her,’ said Mulligan, smiling like a lizard. ‘You’re just a soldier, Gerry. No heroes, right?’
‘Right, Paul,’ said Gallen, wanting to punch the guy. Gallen and Mulligan had once been in a pre-op briefing in the Khost region of the Ghan: Mulligan was the spook from the Pentagon, Gallen was running the men. To end the briefing, Gallen had given his customary sign-off of ‘No heroes,’ and Mulligan had laughed.
Mulligan opened his hands. ‘So get her back. Time is money, Ace.’
His mind spinning, Gallen tried to think through the fog of the Tylenol 3 tablets. The shock of the bullet wound had turned into an all-body pain.
‘Gimme a minute, okay,’ he said, his eyelids drooping. ‘Can I get a glass of water? I’m not feeling well.’
He tracked his brain backwards in time like a computer programmer looking for a piece of data while the big Russian got the okay from Mulligan. He used his old tricks of memory — tricks you used when you carried every piece of information in your head, when RV coordinates and exfil call signs had to be totally accurate, when chopper registrations mattered and secure-burst radio frequencies had to be right first time, because you only got half a second to use them and you didn’t want them flying off into space when you had tired and wounded men to lift out.
‘Okay,’ he said, after the Russian had tipped the glass of water into his mouth. ‘How do we do this?’
Mulligan nodded at the Russian. ‘Viktor has a phone. Tell him a number and then call your men back. And do it nice, Gerry, like you mean it.’
‘Call them back to be killed?’ said Gallen, shaking his head. ‘You’re confused, Paul. No man of mine ever took a bullet for me, and I’m not going out with that said about me.’
‘Make that two of us,’ said Winter.
Mulligan’s shoulders sagged and he looked out the window. ‘Does everything have to be so honourable with you people?’
‘How it works,’ said Gallen. ‘How else you gonna get men to go out there, get blown up by Towelie while people like you drink Scotch in the officers’ mess?’
Mulligan fixed him with a sarcastic look. ‘Okay, Captain. Your boys get to live. Now give Viktor the fucking number.’
Gallen watched the Russian walk towards him, cell phone in hand. His mind spun to the recesses of his memory and he was ninety per cent sure he had the number right, having only looked at it for two seconds as he’d pocketed the card.
Looking up, he started the number with 4-1-6 and rattled off the rest, trying to make it sound like a number he’d phoned many times.
Viktor kneeled beside him and put the phone against Gallen’s ear. The ring tone was agonising and cold sweat seeped out from beneath his short fringe.
The number connected: a woman called Mae, in the supermarket in Dundalk.
‘You’re all thumbs, Viktor,’ said Gallen, avoiding Winter’s eye. ‘Get it right this time.’
Viktor looked to his boss, and Mulligan nodded.
Gallen tried the same number with the last two digits swapped. His throat was sandpaper dry as he felt Mulligan’s eyes boring into him. This was it — if he couldn’t produce Florita, they’d be tortured and fed to the pigs.
The ring tone droned and after four rings it was answered. ‘Yep,’ came the man’s voice.
‘Arkie. Gallen here. You got a minute?’