Andy McNab - Exit wound

I followed and jabbed my Timberland against a running leg. The body crashed to the floor. There was a moan, and hands started to flail. I pinned an arm to the ground with one foot then kicked hard with the other, two, three times into the centre mass, then reached down and found the back of a neck. I jammed my hand around a throat, squeezing the windpipe, and rammed the head against the concrete blocks. Fingers scrabbled their way upwards and gripped my wrist. I heard lungs fighting for air. I ran my free hand down the body for a weapon and brushed against a woman’s breast.

Keeping a firm grip on the girl’s throat, I shifted my free hand to the base of her skull, raised both my arms and started to lift her back across the chamber. She was level with me, but facing away. All she could do was stumble backwards, trying to keep up with me, trying to keep on tiptoe to minimize the pressure on her throat.

I reached my porthole and jammed her face against the wall to its right. I still had a job to do. I still had to keep trigger on the target.

Nothing was happening. Light but no movement.

I scanned down, trying to see into the kitchen. Again, nothing.

Then I turned my attention back to the girl. ‘What the fuck are you doing here?’

Her blonde hair hung limply over her face as she begged for oxygen. She didn’t look too much like Agnetha from Abba right now.

The call to prayer kicked off big-time in the mega-mosque over the way. I checked the drivers, hoping that Ronaldo and his mates would have covered any noise that might have worked its way down there. But they were otherwise engaged. The TV had been turned off and they were shifting their blankets to face east.

I kept my hand tight around her windpipe.

I couldn’t see her face clearly in the gloom but I knew it would be bright red by now. She’d be dizzy soon from lack of oxygen and that was good. It would control her.

I looked back towards the target. A man had begun to pray below the fan. He was on his knees, pointing in the same direction as the truckers. His forehead was pressed against the floor.

Agnetha’s hands worked their way up to my wrist again, but she didn’t struggle. She couldn’t: she was starting to die.

I let go of her throat, pushed her to the floor and kicked her up against the wall. She gave a gut-wrenching gasp. ‘Get your face down! Face down!’ I stuck my boot on the back of her neck. She could breathe, but she wasn’t going anywhere fast. I picked up the camera and fired it up, checked the flash wasn’t on, pointed and shot. I clicked the shutter three times in quick succession and checked the screen. All I’d got was a burst of light from the window that turned everything around it dark.

There was a choke and a mumble from under my boot. ‘There’s not enough light… I’ve already tried…’

I rotated the ball of my foot, like I was stubbing out a cigarette. ‘Shut it!’

A sermon of some kind was being banged out over the speakers at the top of the uni mosque. Using my camera zoom, I watched the body beneath the fan continue to pray. He was in his early thirties with neatly cut, side-parted hair and a well-trimmed beard, and dressed in a plain dark suit, white buttoned-up shirt, no collar. He looked like he’d just stepped out of a Bollywood movie poster.

I put the camera down on my day-sack and grabbed a serious handful of hair. ‘Get up! Up!’ I needed her to know who was in control here. That way she had no choice, no power, no voice. I slid her up the wall, my knee pressed between her shoulder-blades, until her face was level with the bit of window she’d cleaned. I rammed her face against the glass. ‘Can you see him? Who is he?’

‘Taliban,’ she rasped.

‘He got a name?’

‘I don’t know it.’ There was no fear in her voice. She was angry, a bit like she’d sounded at the press conference. ‘Please let go. I’m not going to run. I’m not going to shout. I’m not going to do anything. I’ll do what you say.’

‘Why is he here?’ I shoved her face back against the glass.

‘To buy ground-to-air missiles. SA-16s.’

‘Who from?’ I wanted to know everything she knew.

‘M3C, of course. That’s why he’s in the Neptun building. Look, I can help you. Tell me what you want to know. Just fucking let me go.’

‘What’s Neptun?’ I stood directly behind her, forcing her back against the wall. I twisted my hand further into her hair. Her skin tightened like a bad facelift. ‘What’s Neptun?’

‘The building – the office. The company’s called Neptun. It’s one of the companies M3C absorbed when it went multinational. It produces handheld surface-to-air missiles. That’s what you’re here for, isn’t it? That’s what we’re both here for.’

‘The Taliban buying 16s?’

‘Well, you’re British, aren’t you? You’re here about the missiles, trying to stop them getting into Taliban hands, yes? Look, I can help you. Just let me go. I’m not going to do anything. We’re both here for the same reasons, for God’s sake. What do you think I’m going to do?’

‘Spark up like yesterday. How are they being paid for? Is there a middleman? They dealing direct?’

‘Heroin cash – and direct, of course. Why would he be at Neptun if not? Either drugs direct or cash from the sales – I don’t know exactly which and I don’t really care. All I want to do is expose the deal – maybe even stop it in its tracks. Why don’t you let me help you? We want the same things, don’t we?’

The Taliban had stopped praying and was back on his feet. He started rolling up his mat, then stopped and dug a cell phone out of his jacket. Headlights rolled into the square and the Neptun gates swung open. The Taliban put the phone to his ear as the Merc pulled in.

I let go of her hair. ‘Pick up the binos. Tell me who you recognize.’

She nodded and did as she was told. The reception lights were now on. I zoomed the Nikon in on the white-marble-floored hallway. A large French-style three-seater settee with mahogany arms stood on the right-hand side of the foyer, opposite an ornate desk complete with repro Bakelite telephone and a couple of high-backed chairs. Tattoo and the Taliban waited just inside the glass entrance.

‘You know the guy with the Taliban?’

She took a couple of seconds to check him out. ‘No.’

The Merc swept round the forecourt. The rear door opened before it had come to a standstill. Out jumped Altun, arms at full stretch. He and the Taliban embraced and lavished multiple kisses on each other’s cheeks. Tattoo skirted round them and kept eyes on the square.

‘Do you know him? You know the lad who’s just got out?’

She scoped him for another few seconds and shook her head. I could feel her disappointment. ‘He was at the press conference, but I don’t know him, no. Who is he?’

‘That’s one of the things I aim to find out. Who were you expecting?’

‘Brin.’

The name didn’t register with me.

‘He owns M3C. That’s why I’m here. If I can prove the deal is going ahead, I can shine a light on some high-level corruption. I may also help prevent your planes and helicopters, and America’s and Pakistan’s, getting blown out of the sky by my country’s missiles…’ She took a deep breath. ‘I keep telling you, I can help you. Isn’t it about time you started to believe me?’

The three of them piled into the Merc and they drove back out of the gate.

Agnetha rested her head against the window, her eyes closed as the headlights disappeared towards the main. Either she didn’t know as much about what was happening as she’d claimed or she was bullshitting. It didn’t really matter which. We probably did want some of the same things, but I doubted she had the solutions in mind that I did.