CHAPTER SEVEN
Adam ensured that the weighty folder he carried was facing away from him so that the name of Peterson was clearly visible. He gathered his concentration and opened the door to the coffee room.
A few people nodded covertly in his direction.
“Excuse me, sir,” said Adam, measuring his tone very precisely, “could I have a word?”
Peterson turned around and immediately clocked the folder and his name. The colour told him that it was a top security folder, the toppest possible security the organisation could muster. He turned even paler than usual and seemed to shrink slightly into his own skin. Adam ensured that he did not break eye contact with the man but also maintained a non-committal, unconcerned expression.
“Yes... what is it?” asked Peterson, affecting an unconvincing air of authority over Agent 37.
“There's no urgency, sir, but if you could come to my office in, say, ten minutes?”
Peterson nodded meekly.
“Thank you, sir, in your own time.”
Adam smiled and turned slowly away, leaving Peterson silently flapping in the middle of the room like a moth under a bus. As he shut the door behind him he was already convinced that his mornings work had not been wasted but it would nevertheless be extremely interesting to hear what the old man had to say.
Back in his office, he planned his line of attack, focusing more on what he wouldn't be saying.
As Adam suspected, it took Peterson less than five minutes to knock on his door. Whether it was due to nerves or a desire to try to catch him out Adam neither knew nor cared; if it was the latter, it was a desperate and doomed strategy. On the spur of the moment he decided to get up and quietly open, then noisily close a filing cabinet drawer.
“Come in,” he said, ensuring that Peterson noticed him locking the drawer as he entered. “Good morning again, sir, please take a seat.”
The old man was trying and failing to maintain his usual icy composure and oily superiority but it was a losing battle. Surely 37 couldn't know anything?
Adam had to admit that he was enjoying this hugely and that much of his conduct had more to do with intimidating the deputy director than gaining any insight into his mental state. He randomly circled a word on the piece of paper attached to the clipboard he held, tapped his pen on the paper, ostentatiously clicked the nib back into the pen (careful, don't overdo it) then put the pen down carefully on the desk.
“As you know, sir, from time to time I am required to conduct random security checks on all staff, no matter how senior.”
The impatience was written all over Peterson's face like florescent graffiti but he maintained his silence.
“Yesterday, your name was drawn from the hat, so to speak,” Adam smiled, as if making a little joke. Peterson didn't flinch. “I'm sure it's a matter of little import but nevertheless I am duty bound to bring it to your attention.”
He picked up the pen and ran it down the list of numbers on his clipboard.
“I was browsing through the records of your wife's mobile phone.”
The deputy director could not help reacting and thus confirming the first piece of information Adam required: he knew full well which call had been spotted and exactly why he was in trouble.
“There has been a call to a number which gives us cause for concern. Tell me, sir, does your wife keep her phone with her at all times or does she sometimes lend it to a friend?”
Peterson looked confused, then hopeful, then angry with himself for looking anything at all, all within the space of two seconds.
“Well,” he spluttered, “I mean she's her own woman, I don't know what she does all day when I'm at work. She does have friends, I think. I mean there's no knowing what they get up to... I mean I don't know... she may let a friend make a call on it.”
“I see.” Adam paused just long enough to be really irritating. “Does she ever lend it to you?”
“Why... why should she, I have my own?”
“Of course, your official phone but all those calls are recorded, aren't they?”
“Yes,” he replied quietly.
“But we don't go as far as to tap the phones of agent's wives.” Adam smiled again. “Anyway, it is an undeniable fact that somebody has used your wife's phone to contact the sort of person that we really don't like our people to associate with. A criminal type. So what we have to establish now is who made this rather unwise call and for what nefarious purpose.” Shit, he was really enjoying this.
Peterson swallowed as if trying to get rid of the evidence.
“Tell me, sir, this is a rather delicate question but does your wife have any sort of drug habit?”
“How da.... no, nothing like that.”
“What about your children?”
“They're eight and eleven!”
“I'm sorry, I don't have any children myself, I've no idea how old they start these days.” Stop smiling, you're overdoing it. “Do you have any drug habits, sir?”
“No, I do not.”
“Hmm!”
Adam crossed off a few words on his sheet and stared thoughtfully into the distance for a few seconds.
“Oh dear! In some ways it would be easier if this were just a matter of a bit of a naughty drug habit, perhaps we could look the other way. If we can eliminate that possibility then I'm afraid what we're left with are a whole variety of altogether more serious options. I've been to have a little chat with the police today.”
He left the sentence hanging in the air for a few seconds. Peterson volunteered nothing so he continued.
“It seems that, as well as being a small time drug dealer, this individual with whom your wife's phone has been in contact recently is a rather larger time thug, one could even say psychopath for hire. He's conducted some very nasty business in the past, a lot of unnecessary violence against people who really don't deserve that sort of fate.”
The words were chosen at random but Peterson suddenly looked aghast, even slightly ashen-faced. Adam paused for a moment to think through the implications of this reaction. It seemed to be the word 'fate' that had hit Peterson so hard.
That sealed the deal as far as Adam was concerned.
“Would you just excuse me one second, sir?”
Before Peterson could react, Adam had strode quickly out of the room, shutting the door behind him. He nodded to Agent 71, a man in his early 20s whose eyes lit up at the prospect of having some real work to do for once. As Adam left the outer room the man took out a small handgun and fixed his eyes conscientiously on the door behind which Peterson was slowly resigning himself to whatever fate now awaited him.
He drew no moral conclusions from his situation, just sighed at the hole he'd managed to dig for himself. Well, if the worst came to the worst, at least he wouldn't have to see his family anymore. His lips managed to form a very thin smile.
Adam shifted impatiently in his seat and glanced at his watch. He was anxious to get back to his flat and work out what he and Jennifer were going to do next.
The head of T14, known by the codename A1, sat at his desk making notes and pondering over what he had just been told. He was a lean five feet ten and had an impressively thick head of grey hair for a man of fifty seven. He'd been the director of T14 ever since it's inception ten years ago. He was a thoughtful man with a sharp mind who kept himself in shape so that he could join in the dirty work if required.
“Okay,” said Bill White, “you go back to your flat and proceed with Agent 45 to safe house Omega. You remember...”
“Yes,” snapped Adam, standing up and making for the door.
“Hang on, sit down. We have something far more important to deal with. It's actually rather convenient that she's suddenly become available.”
Adam sat down, undecided as to whether he was more puzzled or impatient.
“I have to get back...” he began.
“I'm sure she'll be fine for a few minutes. Agent 4 has gone AWOL.”
Adam stared at his superior.
/> “But he can't. We always know where he is, unless he...”
“Exactly,” said White gravely, “His back up drives haven't been active for almost four days and now we're getting no signal from his sticks. We can't trace him at all. The last signal we got was twenty four hours ago - it indicated that his stick had been removed. Nothing since.”
“Then he may be helpless. He's never been without a stick except under supervision.”
“We know that he used his passport to travel to America thirty six hours ago, an unscheduled and mysterious trip. I don't need to tell you how serious..."
“You want 45 and I to go to the States,” Adam interrupted.
“Yes. Proceed to the safe house and you'll be picked up there as soon as we've organised a flight. I'll deal with our local gang somehow, when I've finished with Peterson.”
Adam had totally forgotten about the old man.
“Right. Well, I'd better get going.”
He made for the door once again.
“And good work, you acted correctly. The problem with the gang is trivial compared with potentially losing Agents 4 or 45.”
"Yes," mumbled Adam.
“Finding Agent 4, alive or dead, is our top priority now. No expense spared, no red tape, I'm sure we understand each other, Adam."
Shit, it must be serious if he's using my first name.
"Thank you, sir,” called Adam over his shoulder as he shut the door and ran to the lift.
White sighed. His deputy could be a real pain at times but now he'd fucked up their biggest operation and endangered a top operative, never mind what it was he'd actually been doing. There was a definite smile on his face as he stood up and contemplated the conversation he was about to have with Peterson. It was a pity he had to deal with those pesky terrorists first.
Jennifer was all too aware that she was being followed at a distance, just as she was aware that somebody had been rather clumsily taking photos of her. That was fine and to be expected. The boys were just doing their job and checking her out. She'd be doing exactly the same, only doing it properly, in their position. Her job was to convince them that she hadn't noticed their cack-handed surveillance.
It was only a couple of months since the operation had begun and she'd been engaged in the business of getting into character and living a mostly normal life. Her character was a disgruntled industrial chemist who had been made redundant for political reasons and decided to get her own back by procuring and selling explosives to terrorists. So she spent her days being a normal unemployed person; going for long walks, to the library, cycling.
Her small house had been chosen because it was at the end of a culdesac, detached, and both adjacent houses were currently unoccupied (and would be for the duration of the operation because T14 had bought them as well). This allowed her to convincingly portray the bitter loner with few friends that was necessary for this operation. It was a pain to have one's entire social life limited to controlled meetings but she was being well paid and doing important work. In any case, Jennifer was rather enjoying not having to go to the office or deal with any paperwork. At this stage of the operation she could largely relax and do as she pleased. She made the most of being able to read and go for walks in the countryside whenever she felt like. It was good in her line of work to keep in peak fitness, but there would soon be far more restrictions on her movements so she enjoyed the freedom while it was there.
After only twenty minutes this time they gave up. She briefly wondered which of the boys it was but didn't really care. She would have cared a great deal had she been able to take a proper look at the man following her, and see that it was in fact Peterson.
The gang of baby-faced terrorists had actually stopped following her a few weeks ago, having already satisfied their all too amateur curiosity. It would have creeped her out in the extreme to view the collection of photos that Peterson had built up over the last few weeks, some of them taken with a long lens through her kitchen window. His attentions, however, would soon shift away from Jennifer for an entirely unexpected reason.