Ordinary Thunderstorms

10

EVEN THOUGH HE DROVE a taxi, a black London cab, his motor vehicle of choice — ubiquitous, unremarkable and there was no law against it — Jonjo liked to steer clear of other black-cab taxi-drivers, particularly when they were present in significant numbers. He wanted no impromptu solidarity, no leading questions. So he parked up some distance from City Airport and its long line of taxis waiting for their clients and walked a good half-mile to the neat little terminal building.

Inside, he took a tour around, checking the available exits. He was an hour early for his meeting — he was always an hour early, just in case, you never knew — and he rode up the escalator to the first floor and selected a seat in the corner of the cafeteria with a view of the escalator and the small concourse and settled down with his coffee and croissant and his newspaper and contentedly did the puzzle for half an hour before deciding that the time was right for some more vigilance.

Fifteen minutes before the appointed time for the rendezvous—10.00 a.m. — he saw his contact come in. He could spot them a mile off, other soldiers. He could go into a crowded pub and in three seconds could have picked out the men who were Tags or Blades, Crap Hats, Toms, Jocks, Squaddies, whatever they called themselves or each other. Funny that, he thought: like an instinct, like we give off a spoor, a smell. We’re like Jews and Scotchmen, Roman Catholics and Freemasons, ex-cons and gays. They spot each other, they know in seconds, split seconds.

Funny that — as if we’ve got some sign on us only visible to our kind.

He watched this young guy — thirty-something, short cropped fair hair, burly — come in and check the terminal as he had and then come up the escalator to the cafeteria. He stepped in and on his first sweep of the tables Jonjo knew he’d clocked him. He stayed bent over his puzzle: how many four-letter words could you make from the letters LFERTA? Tear, fart, leaf—

“Excuse me. Are you Bernard Montgomery?”

Jonjo looked up. “No.”

“Apologies.”

“I’m often mistaken for him.”

The young guy sat down.

“We got news,” he said.

“From our friends in the Met?”

“Yeah.”

“About bloody time.”

The young guy seemed edgy, on the tense side.

“Kindred’s phone has been used,” he said. “Few seconds.”

“Not by Kindred, obviously,”Jonjo said. “He’s not that daft.” He leant back, putting down his pen as the word ‘FERAL’ came into his head. Must remember that.

“No…It was used only once, in Rotherhithe — someone on an estate: the Shaftesbury Estate. Then they must’ve changed the sim-card.”

“Someone stupid, then.” Jonjo thought for a second. “So, his phone was stolen or he sold it. I suppose we don’t know who made the call.”

“No.”

“Lovely-jubbley. I’ll check it out.”Jonjo smiled. “I’ll need paying by the way. For the last job.”

The young guy pushed a thick envelope across the table. Jonjo scooped it up and stuffed it in the inside pocket of his leather jacket. The young guy was staring at him intently.

“You’re Jonjo Case, ain’t you?”

Jonjo sighed. “You’re breaking all the rules, mate.”

“I knew it was you,” the young guy persisted. “You were a friend of Terry Eltherington.”

“Terrible Tel,” Jonjo reflected, bitterly. “Great shame. Fucking shame…”

“Yeah…My brother-in-law. I saw you in his photos.”

“Those cunting LEDs. How’s Jenny coping?”

“She killed herself. Couldn’t face it. Three days after the funeral.”

Jonjo took this news in, sadly, sagaciously: he remembered Jenny Eltherington — blonde, big, jolly girl. He nodded to himself: soldier’s wife — worst fate on earth.

“You must be Darren, then,” Jonjo said, stretching his hand across the table. “Blues and Royals.”

“That’s me.” They shook hands.

“Tel and I were in the Regiment, went through Hereford together. Fucking nutter, Tel.”

“I know. Yeah, he used to talk about you a lot: Jonjo this, Jonjo that…”

They were both quiet for a few seconds thinking about Terry Eltherington and his sudden violent death in Iraq, victim of an unusually powerful roadside bomb. Jonjo felt his neck stiffening and eased it side to side.

“What happened to you?” Darren said, indicating the now star-shaped but still livid scab on Jonjo’s forehead.

“You should see the other guy,”Jonjo chuckled, then said, “Anything you want to tell me, Darren? On the Q-T? Off the record?”

Darren looked grim for a moment. “This is as hot as I’ve ever seen it, Jonjo, believe me. Blazing hot. No idea why, but they’re going train-wreck.”

“No pressure, then?”

“Find Kindred, priority ‘A’. Call in any time — you can have every resource: Metropolitan Police database, back-up, tools, intel, Centurion tank. Anything you need.”

“Good to know,” Jonjo said, feeling his guts squirm, and becoming slightly worried, all of a sudden — not like him at all.

“What happens when I find Kindred?”

“They need to know what he knows — first. Then they’ll tell you what to do with him.”

“Cool.”

“I’d better get going.” Darren made as if to get up but Jonjo gestured him back into his seat.

“Nice meeting you, Darren. Do me a favour, will you?”

“Of course.”

“Keep me in the loop. Just you and me…” He paused to let Darren understand the full implications of what he was asking. “Sorry to hear about Jenny — my condolences.”

Darren nodded.

“I better give you my number. Like they said — anything you need. Call me, twenty-four-seven.”

“Write it on the newspaper. I don’t think I’ll need you. Only last resort, yeah?”

“Anything.” Darren wrote down the number.

“You’ve obviously got mine. Call me if you need me. Terry Eltherington, one in a million — if his sixteenth cousin called me, I’d be there. If his stepsister’s adopted son’s mate’s mate called me. Know what I mean?”

Darren nodded, visibly moved. Good to know someone in the chain of command, Jonjo thought, might give him a bit of time if it was needed. Darren wouldn’t know any more about this Wang-Kindred thing than he did, but an ally was an ally, every little helped.

Jonjo stood. “I’ll leave first,” Jonjo said. “You wait here for ten minutes.” He picked up the newspaper. “It was a pleasure, Darren.”

“Copy that.”

♦

Jonjo walked back to his taxi-cab, his mind busy. These freelance jobs were usually so straightforward: you were told to slot someone, you did it and you were paid. You didn’t know anything more. He took the envelope from his jacket pocket and briefly contemplated the packed, mint wad of 200 £50 notes. Ten grand on completion. At least they weren’t punishing him for the fuck-up, though by rights he should have had a further 10K advance on the new Kindred job. Still, the full twenty grand would be all the sweeter once that was done and dusted. Wang was dead, he’d been paid his money, now on to the next one. Busy, profitable month.

He continued on his way, heading for his taxi, thinking about Wang for a moment, the last man he’d killed. Strange, that, he thought: he had no idea exactly how many people he’d killed in his life — thirty-five to forty, perhaps? It all started in 1982 with the Falklands War when he knocked out that bunker at Mount Longdon. He had been an eighteen-year-old paratrooper firing a Milan wire-guided missile, steering it right into the sandbagged sangar on the hillside. When he went to look after the battle all the dead were laid out in a row, like on parade — he looked for all the burnt and mashed-up ones and counted five.

Then he’d killed a Provo in a car on the outskirts of Deny but three other Paras had opened fire that night so they had to share the kill. It wasn’t until he joined the SAS and went through Hereford that the tally began to climb. Gulf War I, after the Victor Two fire-fight when the prisoners ran off — he slotted three. Then in Afghanistan, in 2001—his last operation — at the fort, Qala-I-Jangi. He lost count at Qala, all those rioting Taliban prisoners down below and our guys up on the battlements. Terry Eltherington had been there also. Shooting fish in a barrel, Terry had said. Jonjo could see his big, stupid, smiling face, chucking him ammo. Prisoners running around in the big overgrown courtyard, all the guys up on the battlements blasting away — SAS, SBS, the Yanks, the Afghans. Incredible. They just laced the whole courtyard, hosed it. He must have got a dozen or so, just picking them off as they ran around.

He opened the cab door and sat down behind the wheel, still computing. Christ — then there were all the jobs when he left the forces and joined the Risk Averse Group, one of the biggest private security companies. God knows how many Jacky-bandits he’d slotted on the Jordan — Baghdad run when he was a PSC — six? Ten? Then the five freelance jobs — he’d started counting again, properly — and there was always the money in the bank to confirm the number. He had no idea who’d found him, who called him up, sent him the details, no idea who paid him, no idea who the victims were and no idea why they were victims. Solid, professional, efficient, discreet — he was damn fucking good. Wang was number six and it would have been perfect if bastard Kindred hadn’t blundered in with his briefcase…His hand went reflexively to his new star-scab. Got rid of ‘L-for-Loser’—got pissed, sloshed a bit of vodka on the wound and the tip of a hot knife had done the rest. Kindred had made a neat job messy — so now he would find Kindred, hand him over for interrogation, and then make sure that his last moments on planet Earth were very memorable.

His mobile rang.

“Hello?”

“Jonjo, it’s Candy.”

Candy was the woman who lived next door. Divorcee, big woman, managed one of those flat-pack stores in Newham. Nice enough, friendly, looked after The Dog when he was busy.

“Yeah, Candy, what is it? I’m working, darling.”

“I don’t think The Dog’s very well. He’s been sick all over your carpet.”

Jonjo felt his chest fill with air.

“I think we need to take him to the vet…Jonjo? Hello?”

“I’ll be there in twenty minutes,” Jonjo said, his mouth dry. He started the engine.