The Crime Trade

1

‘Where’s the money?’

‘Where’s the gear?’

‘Gear?’

Stegs kept his expression neutral. ‘The dope. The drugs. The stuff we’re buying.’

The Colombian allowed himself a tiny smirk. It reminded Stegs of the expression Barry Growler, a notorious bully at his old school, used to pull before inflicting one of his famous punishments. ‘It’s close to here,’ he said.

‘So’s the money.’

‘OK. That’s good.’

‘I’m going to need to see the gear first, before I hand over any cash. I’ll have to test it, see that the quality’s right.’

‘You don’t trust me?’ asked the Colombian, his hands raised in a gesture of jovial innocence. The smirk grew wider.

Stegs didn’t like the look of it at all, but that was the thing in their game. You couldn’t trust anyone, and not only that, you could never tell how they were going to behave either. This was his first time dealing with Colombians and he couldn’t help thinking about the scene in that old Al Pacino film, Scarface, when Al and his mate, Angel, go to a Miami hotel to buy some coke from a group of Colombians, only for the sellers suddenly to pull guns on them and use a chainsaw on Angel’s head in a (surprisingly futile) bid to get Scarface to reveal the whereabouts of the money. Stegs was not enjoying this meeting one little bit.

Neither was his colleague, Paul ‘Vokes’ Vokerman. Vokes was sitting in a chair next to Stegs, across the table from the Colombian, Fellano, and he was fidgeting big-time, like he had crabs.

Fellano, on the other hand, was oozing confidence, but then he also had three bodyguards scattered about the hotel room, and Stegs would have bet a grand no problem that they were all packing firearms. Under those circumstances, he had pretty good reason to be confident.

Now it was Stegs’s turn to smile. ‘It’s not like that, Mr Fellano.’

‘Jose, please.’

‘Jose.’ Jose. Typical. It had to be fucking Jose. ‘It’s not like that, but you have to understand my position. I have to satisfy myself, and my partners, that the goods are genuine. We’ve only done business once before, on a much smaller scale, and I don’t want there to be any complications or misunderstandings this early in the relationship.’

‘Of course. You are right. We don’t want any. . misunderstandings.’

Stegs didn’t like the way Fellano emphasized the word ‘misunderstandings’. In fact there wasn’t anything he liked about him, and he knew Vokes felt the same way. Fellano was about forty-five, possibly a couple of years older, and well built with a large, square-shaped head and features that were berry dark and more South American Indian than Hispanic. He was dressed very smartly, but without ostentation, and he had an amiable air about him which Stegs had seen on serious criminals plenty of times before, and which he knew would disappear faster than a bun at a weightwatchers’ convention the moment you got on the wrong side of him. Stegs was keen for that not to happen.

He pulled a weighing machine out of the bag and put it on the desk, hoping that it would act as a hint, which it did. Fellano turned in his chair and nodded to one of the bodyguards, who was leaning against the opposite wall, next to the kingsize bed with the silk sheets. The bodyguard, also wearing dark glasses (in fact, Fellano was the only one of them who wasn’t), left his post and walked into an adjoining room, emerging a few moments later with a briefcase. He brought the briefcase over to the table and handed it to Fellano. There was a moment’s pause while Fellano fiddled with the locks, then the briefcase flicked open. He put it on the table with the open part facing Stegs. There was a single kilo bag of coke in there.

Stegs stared at Fellano. ‘Our deal was for twenty kilos, not for one. I was under the impression you were a major player.’

‘Come on, Steve, we’re wasting our time here,’ said Vokes, using the codename for Stegs he always liked to stick to.

Fellano didn’t even look at him. Instead, he addressed Stegs. ‘You talk about trust, Steve, and I understand that, but tell me this. How can I trust you? You could be anyone. You could be a police officer for all I know.’

‘I think my colleague might be right, Mr Fellano. Maybe we are wasting our time here. I thought I’d provided you with all the credentials you needed, plus twenty grand of our money for that first kilo. If you still don’t think I’m kosher after all that, then there’s nothing I can do about it.’ Stegs started to stand up. ‘Maybe you ought to look for another buyer.’

‘I have the rest of the consignment nearby, but I now wish to see the money.’

‘OK, but I want to see the rest of the gear at the same time.’

Fellano nodded. ‘Sure, I understand that.’

‘The money’s not here, but it’s also nearby. I’ll show you it, Mr Fellano, and one of your men, but I’m not going outside with all of you. It’s too risky. We’ll arouse suspicion.’

‘Then your partner will need to stay here.’

Vokes looked at Stegs, his expression one of concern. ‘I told you this was a waste of time, Steve. We don’t need to deal with people like this.’ He stepped away from the table.

Stegs put his hand up. ‘Hold on, Paulie. Wait a minute.’

‘What’s the point? We’re just getting taken round the houses here.’

‘Because I didn’t drive all the way over here for nothing, that’s why.’ He turned to the Colombian. ‘All right, Mr Fellano, here’s what I suggest. My man stays here with two of yours, then you, me and your other guy take a walk down to wherever you’ve got the stuff. You show it to me, and after that, if you want, I’ll take you to the money. Then we return here and make the transaction. How does that sound?’

Vokes wanted to say something, but Stegs gave him a look that said ‘Come on, don’t blow this,’ and Vokes appeared to relent, although he didn’t look too happy about it. But that was the thing about the drugs business, particularly the high end. The complete lack of trust meant that even a routine retail transaction required a half-hour debate and more than a couple of heart-stopping risks.

Fellano thought about it for a moment. ‘OK,’ he said, nodding slowly. ‘That sounds fair.’

Stegs turned to his mate, who’d now sat down again. ‘Are you all right with staying here for a few moments, Paulie?’

‘No, not really. Maybe you should stay here.’

‘We’ve decided,’ said Fellano with some finality. ‘You stay here.’

Stegs patted Vokes on the shoulder. ‘I’ll only be gone a few moments and I don’t think Mr Fellano here is reckless enough to cause any problems in a hotel room with thin walls in the middle of Heathrow. Am I right, Mr Fellano?’

‘I want this deal done as much as you do, Steve, even if your friend is not so keen.’

‘He’s just cautious, that’s all.’

‘A man can get over-cautious.’

‘Not in this game,’ said Stegs, with a cold smile. ‘So whereabouts nearby is the other nineteen kilos you promised?’

‘In the trunk of a hire car in the parking lot.’

Stegs nodded. It wasn’t an ideal location, but it was wet and windy outside, so they probably weren’t going to get too much attention. ‘Shall we go, then?’

‘Are you sure about this, Steve?’ asked Vokes.

‘I’ll be ten minutes. No more. Then we do the deal and we walk.’

Fellano stood up and motioned for one of the bodyguards — a wiry little guy with a droopy moustache and seventies hair — to come with him. He then said something in Spanish to the other two. Vokes looked nervous, and Stegs felt a pang of guilt, having given him the worst job. The job of hostage. But he couldn’t see any other way.

‘Let’s go,’ said the Colombian, and he and Moustache walked to the door.

‘Tell him to get those fucking shades off,’ Stegs said to Fellano. ‘He’ll stick out a mile in them on a wet March day at Heathrow airport.’

Fellano gabbled something else in Spanish, and Moustache took them off, giving Stegs a dirty look as he did so. Stegs ignored him. ‘I’ll be back in a mo, Paulie, all right? Just stay here and keep these two company.’

Vokes looked at the two silent Colombians watching him from the far wall, then back at his partner. ‘Don’t be long,’ he said.

‘Ten minutes,’ Stegs answered. ‘Ten minutes max.’

No-one spoke in the lift down to the ground floor, and when the doors opened, Stegs hung back while the two Colombians walked through the busy reception area and out of the rear doors that led directly into the hotel’s car park. After spending a few seconds perusing a selection of the day’s newspapers and magazines that were laid out on a low mahogany table, he walked casually in the direction they’d taken.

It was raining steadily outside and the cloud cover was so grey and thick that the day was almost dark. Only a handful of people were scattered about, and they were mainly businessmen, hurrying along under umbrellas, so immersed in their working lives that not one of them even glanced up as he passed.

He walked between the rows of parked cars and made his way towards the back of the car park, keeping ten or twelve yards behind the Colombians, watching for anyone who looked out of place. A middle-aged man in jeans and a Barbour jacket getting out of his car caught his eye, but the man looked away without interest, and the moment passed.

When the two Colombians got to the last row of cars, parked against a high brick wall that marked the car park’s boundary some fifty yards from the hotel, Fellano looked left and right as nonchalantly as possible, then back at Stegs. Stegs smiled like he knew them both, then quickened his pace and caught up, walking between the two of them without speaking as they approached a new metallic-blue BMW 7 Series. A typical high-end dealer’s car. It made Stegs wonder whether BMW approved of the fact that so many of its customers were involved in the illicit drugs trade. Perhaps one day they’d end up sponsoring crack dens.

Fellano stopped three feet from the back of the car and deactivated the alarm.

Upstairs in the hotel room, Vokes Vokerman paced nervously, trying to ignore the two other men in the room as they watched him boredly, one by the door, the other against the opposite wall. Vokes had expected there to be the usual to-ing and fro-ing, as there always was on a big deal like this one, but he hadn’t wanted to be the one left up here with the Colombians while Stegs went walkabout. It had happened before of course, them being split up on an op. More than once, since nobody ever took you at your word in the drugs game; except this time, it shouldn’t have happened. They’d been told by the handlers to bring the money into the room with them, but instead had opted to keep it back, thinking it would show they were serious buyers (i.e. distrustful) if they turned up without it. Which was now looking more and more like a mistake. This meeting had been in the making for weeks, months even. The Colombians had their credentials, knew their backgrounds — their pedigree in the importation game — and there’d already been a test purchase of a kilo, for which they’d handed over twenty grand. And still they didn’t seem satisfied.

Since he and Stegs had arrived more than an hour ago, they’d been thoroughly searched, before undergoing a long and repetitive sequence of questions from Fellano about deals they’d done, people they were meant to know, etc. The Colombian had been trying to read them, to probe for weakness, not so much in their accounts of themselves, but in their characters, and Vokes was beginning to convince himself that the reason for this was that he was on to them. Knew who they were and was working out what to do about it. Fellano was a ruthless man. He had a reasonably good reputation in the marketplace (as much as anyone who sells hard drugs has a reasonably good reputation), but cross him — give him any reason to doubt you — and you could expect no mercy. Vokes had heard a rumour once that Fellano had personally cut the tongue out of a police informant’s mouth back in Cali, and had replaced it with the man’s penis. It wasn’t a thought he wanted to dwell on.

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.

Vokes 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 Vokes and motioned him to get on the bed. ‘Now, now,’ he demanded impatiently.

Vokes 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 Vokes. He too removed a gun from his pocket — a Glock, Vokes reckoned. It didn’t seem like he was pleased by whatever it was he was hearing.

Vokes 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 Vokes by the arm, pushing him towards the bed. Vokes 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.

Vokes 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 unclipped 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.

‘I’ll 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. ‘I’ll 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 right 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 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 black guy 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 nasty-looking 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 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 to 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 Vokerman’s executioner was twenty-eight-year-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 Vokes 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 moment 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 a 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.

Sergeant Phil Winter of Scotland Yard’s elite firearms squad SO19 didn’t hestitate. He’d already seen the body of DC Paul Vokerman face-down on the bed, a growing bloodstain soaking the sheets around his head; now one of the suspects, hunched down in the corner of the room beside the bed, was lifting his gun. Two shots, then a step, two shots, then another step, then another two shots, every one of them finding their target. Beside him Constable Sammy Jecks opened up with his MP5, and the body of Manuel Lopez did a strange dance as the bullets ripped into his head and body and charged about his insides, ripping them and him apart.

Minimum force. The training always says only the minimum amount of force possible must be used to incapacitate a subject. Shoot him too many times, particularly when it’s clear he’s no longer a threat, and a police officer leaves him or herself open to charges of manslaughter, or even, in extreme cases, murder. But Winter couldn’t resist pumping another two into the Colombian’s guts as he continued towards him, knowing that statistically he probably wasn’t going to get another opportunity to pop a bad guy. Lopez’s head slumped, the Glock with silencer fell from his dead hand, and Winter stopped in front of him, before kicking him hard in the face.

Jecks rushed up to Vokerman and tried to find a pulse, but Winter could tell from the expression on his colleague’s face that it was a lost cause. He turned to the door as the senior officers involved in what was supposed to have been a highly successful sting operation entered the room along with the remainder of the SO19 team. They didn’t look too happy.

And that, unfortunately, is where I, DI John Gallan, join the tale, being one of those senior officers involved. The thing is, I was only meant to be there as an observer, as was my colleague, WDS Tina Boyd, but I don’t think that fact made either of us feel any better. It had been our informant who had provided the details and false character references that had set up ‘Stegs’ Jenner and Paul ‘Vokes’ Vokerman, both members of Scotland Yard’s specialist undercover unit, SO10, with a group of high-level Colombian drugs traffickers, so as Tina and I followed DCS Noel Flanagan and DI Asif Malik of Scotland Yard’s organized crime unit, SO7, into the hotel room, I was experiencing a feeling in my insides that was a nasty combination of fear, shame and nausea. As I saw the ruined bodies of Manolo Lopez and Vokes Vokerman, one of whom I’d got to know quite well over the past few weeks, watched the frantic efforts of the medical team as they worked their futile magic, and heard DI Malik curse loudly under his breath, the question I remember I kept asking myself was a very simple one.

What the hell had gone wrong?