Games Traitors Play

68

Monika had always thought she would be able to do it herself, that she owed it to her brother, but she couldn’t. She hoped he would understand. She had the money in cash, £20,000 withdrawn from an emergency AW fund in London that was meant to be used for bribing disillusioned SVR agents.

As she stood outside a snooker hall in Haringey, north London, waiting for her contact to arrive, she wondered if she had any energy left to hide her tracks, to invent a cover story for the money. To begin with, she had resigned herself to being caught. She had imagined standing over him, waiting calmly for the police to arrive, but she couldn’t do that either. Her survival instincts, honed in the field, were too strong. So she had contracted out her revenge instead.

She was spoilt for choice in London, but had settled on a Turkish gang with a proven record and an obsession with forensics. They had never been caught, and they asked for more when she told them the West End venue.

‘It’s very public.’

‘Good. I want everyone to know.’

General Borowski would certainly know, but at least this way there was a chance of protecting herself afterwards, providing the political will was there. She was in his hands now.