‘How many bottles did we drink?’ asked Shepherd.

  ‘You can never have enough Cristal,’ said Meyer. ‘It was a good night.’

  ‘Yeah. I had a blast. Thanks.’

  ‘It’s good getting to know you, Jeff,’ he said. ‘We should have a chat about business opportunities sometime.’

  ‘That’d be great,’ said Shepherd. ‘I’m not getting any interest here. I was thinking of heading over to Greece, see if I can pick up some charter work there.’

  ‘Don’t do anything rash,’ said Meyer. ‘Give me a chance to put something together.’

  Lisa snored softly, then put her arm in Meyer’s lap. He laughed. ‘Bless her.’

  They dropped Shepherd at his hotel before driving over to the marina. He phoned Willoughby-Brown as soon as he got back to his room and brought him up to speed. ‘And he didn’t mention that he’d pegged you as Rich Campbell?’

  ‘Didn’t come up,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘I wonder what he’s playing at?’

  ‘Maybe he’s running more checks. How’s the Portsmouth flat?’

  ‘Still secure. And it’s not exactly difficult to break into.’

  ‘He did suggest we do business together, so he’s definitely interested,’ said Shepherd. ‘Now, here’s a question for you, Jeremy. Has Lisa ever been asked to get a bug on the boat? Get it wired for sound?’

  ‘Not that I know of, but I’m not privy to everything that NCA is doing. Why?’

  ‘It was something Docherty said. Meyer has all his meetings at sea, precisely because he can’t be overheard. That means his conversations afloat would be incriminating, for sure. It’s why he leaves Lisa ashore when he has business to discuss.’

  ‘So we get a bug on board? That makes sense.’

  ‘The question is, why hasn’t it been done already? Was she asked? If she was and she refused, I’d like to know why.’

  ‘There are valid reasons,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘If she got caught, it would be the end of her.’

  ‘Yes, but she comes and goes as she wants, and Meyer clearly trusts her. The NCA has the same sort of technical experts that Five has. I’m sure they could have come up with something that would have done the job. Or rigged her phone. Might be worth asking the question.’

  ‘Could you get a bug on board?’

  ‘That ship has probably sailed,’ said Shepherd. He chuckled. ‘That was accidental. But the issue is, I’m still the newcomer so there’s going to be an element of suspicion. Let’s see what happens next. But maybe start thinking about it. Jeeves is always on board so we wouldn’t be able to make it anything permanent. It would have to be something portable.’

  ‘I’ll put it under consideration,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘What about you wearing a wire?’

  ‘I’m loath to risk that, unless we know for sure he’s going to have an incriminating conversation,’ said Shepherd. ‘It’s bloody hot here so we don’t wear much in the way of clothing. Plus there’s the wind, so anything strapped to your body is going to show at some point.’

  ‘We’ll put our thinking caps on,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘What’s your plan now?’

  ‘There’s nothing much more I can do,’ said Shepherd. ‘The trap’s baited. It’s just a question of how tempting the bait is.’

  ‘Nice analogy,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘You be careful.’

  ‘Always,’ said Shepherd.

  Standing woke at six, spent an hour exercising in Hyde Park, showered and shaved, then had breakfast in Queensway before catching the Tube to Edgware Road. It was the same Pakistani man behind the counter in the phone shop, and the same young assistant who went out back to unlock Faisal’s phone, an iPhone 7, but the price had gone up to thirty pounds and again there was no receipt. Standing waited until he got back to his apartment before checking what was on the phone. There were pictures. A lot of pictures. With a lot of different girls. All young. In some the girls, and Faisal, were naked, or semi-naked. Standing’s stomach churned as he flicked through them, knowing what he was going to find eventually. When he saw the first naked photograph of Lexi, tears sprang to his eyes and he blinked them away. He threw the phone onto the sofa and stood up, then paced up and down taking deep breaths. After two minutes he sat down and picked up the phone again.

  In some of the photographs, Lexi was naked and smiling at the camera, clearly happy at what was going on. There were photographs of her lying on a bed, and in others she was standing next to Faisal in a bathroom. He was holding her with one hand and the camera with the other, taking the picture in a mirror. Lexi was holding him, kissing him, playing with him. In one of the pictures she was on her knees in front of him, clearly giving him oral sex. Standing’s hand was shaking and his eyes misted again. He wiped them with the back of his hand.

  He took deep breaths to calm himself before he checked the videos on the phone. The most recent was a group of Asian men standing around a bed. They were laughing and jeering. The camera moved through the crowd. There was a figure on the bed. White-skinned. Dark-haired. Standing wanted to look away but he couldn’t. The camera moved closer. An Asian man was lying on a girl. A white girl. She was young. Very young. He’d been holding his breath and he let it out when he saw that it wasn’t Lexi. The camera went close in on the girl’s face. There was a faraway look in her eyes as if she wasn’t aware of what was going on, and Standing figured she’d been drugged.

  The Asian climbed off the girl to cheers from the crowd. Another man, this one in his sixties, pulled down his trousers and took his place.

  Standing stopped the video. There were others, dozens, but he couldn’t bring himself to look at them.

  His phone rang and he jumped. It was the therapist’s office. ‘Mr Standing?’ said a woman’s voice. It wasn’t Dr Doyle.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘This is Dr Doyle’s office. I just wanted to check that you were going to be here at eleven.’

  Standing cursed under his breath. He’d completely forgotten that he had a therapist’s appointment. He looked at his watch. It was ten o’clock. ‘Yes, of course I’ll be there,’ he said. He ended the call, picked up Faisal’s phone again and went through the messages. Again, there were hundreds. He scrolled back to the day that Lexi had died. There were several messages to and from a man called Ali. Standing figured that might well be Ali Hussain, one of the owners of the minicab company. When he read the messages he became even more convinced. Make sure she goes. You have the heroin? Make sure she injects. Is the bitch there yet? Standing checked the calls log. There had been more than a dozen from Ali during that afternoon, and several from Faisal to Ali. Standing had a sick feeling in his stomach. The two men had clearly been planning something involving Lexi, and he had a horrible feeling that he knew what it was.

  He went back to the messages. There were plenty of texts between the two men in recent days, most of them about girls. There was a long conversation with texts back and forth about a girl called Emma. Ali was asking if she was ready and Faisal said she was hooked on heroin and would do as she was told. He had sent pictures of Emma, naked on a bed, either drunk or stoned. In some of the pictures Faisal was sitting next to the girl, pushing an empty Bacardi Breezer bottle between her legs. She looked young. Fourteen or fifteen at the most. Standing gritted his teeth, furious that the cops were allowing this to happen. Part of him wanted to give the phone to Inspector Reynolds but then he would have to explain how he’d got it and that would open up a whole can of worms. He switched it off and put it into the safe, then grabbed his jacket and headed out.

  There was a delay on the Tube – someone had thrown themselves under a train at Paddington – so Standing arrived at Dr Doyle’s office five minutes late. He apologised profusely to the receptionist, and again to the therapist, but she said, as she sat down in one of the armchairs, ‘Getting around London can be problematical at the best of times. Wait until we have another Tube strike. Then you’ll see what I mean.’

  ‘Hopefully I won’t be here for too long,’ he said. ‘I want to get back to the Regiment.’

  ‘I understand that,’ she said. ‘And obviously that’s what we’re working towards. So, how are you getting on with your anger journal?’

  ‘Yeah. Okay.’

  ‘Did you bring it with you?’

  Standing reached into his jacket pocket. He brought out a small notebook he’d bought from a Ryman’s office-supplies store in Queensway and handed it to her. He’d scribbled into it the previous evening, putting a different date at the top of each page and writing down things that he figured she would think he would find upsetting. Things like people pushing in front of him on the Tube, surly shop assistants, waitresses who got his order wrong, music being played too loudly at night when he was trying to sleep. All of it was made up: things like that generally didn’t upset him. He wrote how he had reacted to each of the fictional events, and how deep breathing and square breathing had helped him to relax. What he didn’t write was that he’d threatened to kill a shopkeeper and sent an Asian child-abuser to his death from the top of a tower block. Some examples of his anger-management issues were best kept to himself.

  She nodded as she read through what he’d written. ‘This is good, Matt,’ she said, approvingly. ‘This is very good. And how are you managing with the relaxation exercise I showed you?’

  ‘Yeah, good,’ said Standing. In fact, he hadn’t bothered even trying it. He felt there was no need. He fell asleep as quickly and as easily as he woke up. When he was tired he went to bed and slept. It was as simple as that. He put his head on the pillow, closed his eyes, and within minutes he was fast asleep. He assumed that she thought someone with anger-management issues would lie awake at night tossing and turning but he had never had any problems on that score. It was partly the nature of being in the SAS. On operations you were never sure when you’d get the chance to eat or to sleep, so you grabbed the opportunity whenever it presented itself. ‘I’m surprised at how well it worked.’ If he was going to lie to her, he might as well go the whole way.

  She nodded happily and jotted in her notepad. ‘That’s good to hear,’ she said. She finished writing, looked up, and smiled. ‘This time I thought I’d show you another exercise. This one is much shorter but it can be just as effective.’

  ‘I’m all ears,’ said Standing.

  She stood up, put her pen and notepad on her chair and motioned for him to join her. ‘So, first you stand up straight and tall. As if you were on parade. But let your arms hang naturally by your side.’

  Standing did as he was told.

  ‘Now, breathe in slowly through your nose, but as you do that I want you to tense all the muscles in your body. Every muscle. So clench your fists, pull your stomach in, clench your buttocks, hunch your shoulders and go up onto your tiptoes. Sort of make out you’re the Incredible Hulk.’

  He tried to do as she described but he felt ridiculous and started laughing.

  She laughed with him. ‘I know, I know! This is an exercise you’re going to want to do in private,’ she said. ‘But you need to tense everything and hold it for a count of five. Then breathe out and relax back into your original standing position.’ She showed him how to do it and he couldn’t help but smile.

  ‘I know how stupid it looks,’ she said. ‘But, trust me, it can help relax you in a very short space of time. Three to five repetitions should do it.’

  Shepherd’s phone rang. It was Meyer. It was early afternoon and Shepherd was in his room, watching an in-house movie and nursing a hangover.

  ‘What’s your pool like, Jeff?’ Meyer asked.

  ‘There isn’t one,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘That’s a pity, I fancy a swim. How about the sea? You up for a swim?’

  It was a strange request, so Shepherd assumed that Meyer wanted something more than a dip. ‘Yeah, sure.’

  ‘Meet you on the beach outside your hotel? Ten minutes?’

  ‘Sounds like a plan,’ said Shepherd.

  Meyer ended the call and Shepherd phoned Docherty. ‘Meyer wants to meet on the beach dressed for swimming, so I figure he wants to make sure I’m not wearing a wire, which means he wants to tell me something.’

  ‘I’ll make sure to get some pictures,’ said Docherty.

  ‘What about Jeeves and the girl?’

  ‘Jeeves is working on the boat, the girl’s sunbathing. Topless, as it happens. I’ve some very nice pictures I can show you.’

  ‘Please don’t,’ said Shepherd. He ended the call and went over to the wardrobe. He’d bought a pair of shorts and a couple of shirts soon after he’d arrived in Marbella, along with underwear and socks. One of the pairs of shorts was suitable for swimming so he slipped them on and chose a Lacoste short-sleeved shirt. The beach was right outside so he decided to go barefoot. His watch was waterproof but it was chunky and he figured it might make Meyer nervous so he put it into the safe.

  Meyer was waiting for him on the beach wearing tight red trunks that left little to the imagination. It was the first time Shepherd had seen him without a shirt and he noticed a puckered scar near to his left shoulder, like an old bullet wound. Meyer grinned when he saw Shepherd was looking at it. ‘A war wound,’ he said.

  ‘What was it, nine mil?’ asked Shepherd.

  Meyer nodded.

  ‘Nasty.’

  ‘You should see the other guy,’ said Meyer. He laughed harshly. ‘Actually, you can’t. He’s dead.’

  ‘Was it a gunfight?’

  Meyer shook his head. ‘Came out of the blue. Did a deal with a couple of scallies who came up short on the cash front. They thought it’d be cheaper to pay someone to kill me than come through with the money they owed. Big mistake.’ He gestured at the sea. ‘Come on, let’s have a swim.’

  Shepherd took off his shirt and Meyer’s eyes widened when he saw the scar under Shepherd’s right shoulder. ‘Fuck me, that’s a bullet wound, all right. That’s huge.’

  ‘Yeah. Tell me about it.’

  ‘Who shot you?’

  ‘Taliban,’ said Shepherd, dropping his shirt onto the sand.

  ‘In Iraq?’

  ‘Afghanistan.’

  ‘What sort of gun was it?’

  Shepherd shrugged. ‘Who the fuck knows?’ Actually he knew all too well what had done the damage. He still had the round in a drawer somewhere in his house in Hereford. It was a 5.45mm round from a Kalashnikov AK-74. The AK-74 was a small-calibre version of the AK-47, initially developed for parachute troops but had eventually become the standard Russian infantry rifle.

  Meyer frowned. ‘There’s no exit wound,’ he said.

  ‘The doc took it out from the front,’ said Shepherd. ‘It hit the bone and went downwards. I was lucky – it could have severed an artery and I wouldn’t have been here today.’

  ‘If you’d been really lucky, the shot would have missed,’ said Meyer. ‘So how does a sailor end up in Afghanistan being shot at by the Taliban?’

  ‘It’s a long story.’

  ‘You didn’t mention it.’

  ‘It was another life, Marcus.’

  ‘Did you get a medal for it?’

  Shepherd laughed. ‘No, I didn’t.’

  Meyer slapped him on the back.’ Come on, let’s see how far out we can go.’

  ‘I’m not the world’s best swimmer,’ said Shepherd.

  He followed Meyer into the water. As soon as it reached their waists, Meyer drove forward and began to swim in an energetic crawl. Shepherd went after him, but using a brisk breaststroke. He wasn’t a fan of swimming, as exercise or recreation. He enjoyed running, and ran for fun as much as for fitness, but it always seemed to him that swimming was something you did when you fell off a boat. Meyer was pulling away from him so Shepherd switched to a crawl. Meyer was swimming directly away from the beach and didn’t seem to be slowing. Shepherd breathed evenly, putting his face into the water every second stroke, and concentrated on maintaining a steady pace. He had no idea how long he could swim because it wasn’t something he did regularly. He knew exactly how long he could run, and at what speed, and in his SAS days he’d known how long he could march, depending on the speed of the march and the weight on his back. But swimming was alien to him and his arms were already tiring.

  Meyer continued at his pace, cutting cleanly through the water, still heading away from the beach. Shepherd switched to breaststroke. His legs were stronger and more efficient than his arms so it made sense to let them do most of the work.

  When they were well out to sea, Meyer trod water and waited for Shepherd to catch up with him. ‘You okay, Jeff?’ he asked.

  ‘All good,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Tired?’

  ‘Getting there. I guess you’re not worried about sharks.’

  ‘Sharks? There’s no sharks here.’

  ‘There are almost fifty species of shark in the Mediterranean,’ said Shepherd. ‘Including the Great White.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Sure I’m sure.’ He grinned. ‘But they don’t usually attack. We’ll be fine.’

  Meyer began swimming again, this time parallel to the shore, away from the marina. He was still doing the crawl, but slower than before, and Shepherd’s breaststroke was enough to keep up with him. Off to their left a speedboat roared by. Shepherd hadn’t been joking about sharks, but attacks in the Mediterranean were rare. There was much more chance of being mown down by a fast-moving boat.

  Meyer was slowing, and Shepherd got the impression he’d been showing off before. They were still half a mile from the shore. If Meyer didn’t turn back soon he might run into problems. ‘Marcus, I’m fucking knackered!’ shouted Shepherd. ‘Can we head back?’

  Meyer trod water. ‘You wimp!’ he yelled.

  ‘Yeah, I know,’ said Shepherd. ‘What can you do?’

  Meyer laughed and swam back towards the beach. Shepherd followed. His breaststroke was still relaxed and methodical, and he reckoned he could maintain the pace for at least another hour. But Meyer’s crawl had become scrappy and undisciplined, and Shepherd could hear his laboured breathing. He kept back. This was about face. Meyer was the alpha male in the relationship and he wouldn’t be happy if Shepherd had to rescue him.

 

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