Stephen Leather - Cold Kill

The Saudi wailed and rolled off the chair on to the floor. Broken Nose and Scarred Lip moved to pick him up but Button waved them away. ‘Leave him alone!’ she shouted. She pointed at the door. ‘Get out – get out now! Both of you!’

The two men stopped dead and stood, watching her. Then Scarred Lip put his fingertips to his earpiece, frowned, and nodded at Broken Nose. The two men left the room, faces impassive.

The Saudi scuttled backwards across the floor, like a frightened crab, and sat with his back to the wall, his knees under his chin. His body was racked with spasms and he stared at the screens.

Button walked over to him slowly and knelt by his side. She touched his arm, but he flinched as if he’d been stung. ‘Abdal-Jabbaar, please. You can stop this now,’ she whispered.

His trembling intensified and his eyes flicked from screen to screen.

‘Whatever you are, whatever you believe in, it can’t be worth this,’ said Button. Tears filled her eyes. ‘They’re going to keep on until they kill everyone you’ve ever cared for. They’re relentless, these people. Relentless and uncaring.’

The Saudi began to sob and tears ran down his cheeks. Button realised she was crying, too. She sat down next to the Saudi and pulled her legs up against her chest, instinctively adopting the same posture. They were both hugging their knees, tears streaming down their faces.

The Saudi’s brother was babbling now, Arab phrases mixed with English, a stream of words that made little sense. He was close to passing out.

The man in the ski mask threw more petrol on to him – some went up his nose, making him cough and choke.

A second masked man stepped forward with a bronzed Zippo lighter. He held up the lighter to the camera and flicked back the lid with his gloved thumb.

The Saudi started to mutter an Arabic prayer, his lips barely moving.

‘Please, don’t let them do this,’ whispered Button. Her mouth was completely dry and the strength had faded from her limbs. ‘Just tell them what they want to know and it’ll be over. There are others who can take over from you – you know that. You’re a soldier in a huge army – no one will blame you if you talk now. You’ve given enough. You’ve done enough. No one will blame you, Abdal-Jabbaar. Please. Min fadlik.’

The Saudi’s breath was coming in short, sharp gasps and he was staring at his brother. ‘A’tinii waqtan lit-tafkiir bidhaalik,’ he whispered.

‘We don’t have time,’ said Button. ‘If you don’t talk now, you know what they’ll do.’

On the other screen, the Saudi’s sister was glaring defiantly at the camera, a gun pressed to her temple. She steadfastly ignored it. She was brave, thought Button, but the men hadn’t started to work on her yet. Once they did, they’d see just how brave she was.

The man with the Zippo flicked the small wheel at the top of the lighter. It sparked but did not light.

The Saudi screamed in terror.

Button could barely breathe. She couldn’t believe that the men in ski masks would set the man alight. It was inhuman. Worse than inhuman. But Yokely’s words echoed in her head: ‘The thing about threats is that they have to be carried out.’ And so far he’d carried out every threat he’d made.

She turned to the Saudi. ‘Abdal-Jabbaar, listen to me,’ she said. ‘Don’t let your brother die. If he dies they’ll start on your sister. And once they’ve killed her they’ll find someone else. End it now. Please. End it now.’

The Saudi didn’t appear to hear her. He continued to stare at his brother and mutter under his breath.

‘You can end it. Just tell me you’ll co-operate.’ She leaned closer to him so that her mouth was close to his ear, but she kept her eyes on the screen. The masked man flicked the Zippo’s wheel again. Sparks, but no flame. ‘Just tell them, even if you don’t mean it,’ she whispered. ‘They’ll stop. Tell them anything. For God’s sake, man, lie. Tell them anything.’

The Saudi ignored her.

Button grunted in frustration. She sat back and rested her head against the wall, then banged it twice, hard. She gritted her teeth and relished the pain. She banged her head again, harder this time. This wasn’t why she’d joined MI5. She’d joined because she’d wanted to do a job that meant something, a job that made a difference. After she’d graduated with her double first, all sorts of doors had been open to her. Stockbroking, banking – any firm in the City would have hired her. But she’d applied to join the Foreign Office, envisaging a career in embassies around the world, and had been soaring through the interviews when she was asked if she’d consider something more challenging, with the country’s intelligence service. She’d accepted, and until today she had never regretted her decision. But nobody had said she’d be involved in torture and murder. And if they had, she would have turned them down flat. What was happening went against everything she believed in. It made them no better than the enemy. No better than al-Qaeda. No better than any terrorist or serial killer. And they had forced her to be part of it. She banged her head again.

On the screen, the man in the ski mask flicked the Zippo again. It burst into life and the man waved the inch-long flame at the camera.

Button stopped banging her head. ‘Tell them,’ she whispered. ‘Please, tell them.’

The Saudi continued to mutter, eyes fixed on the screen. He was talking in Arabic but so fast she couldn’t follow what he was saying. She heard ‘Allah’ and ‘Abdal-Rahmaan’ but the rest was incomprehensible. The Saudi’s eyes were blank and he’d stopped crying.

‘Please,’ Button implored him. ‘Whatever your beliefs, it can’t be worth this. It can’t be worth the deaths of your brother and sister. You know that blood means more than anything. More than friends, more than country, more than politics. You know they will do it. You know they will kill and keep killing. And they will keep torturing you until you talk. So stop it now. Tell them why you’re in London. Tell them what you’re planning to do.’

The Saudi’s mutterings intensified. His hands were clenched into tight fists, knuckles white.

‘It’s your brother, God damn you,’ said Button. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. ‘Just tell them.’

On the screen the man in the ski mask turned away from the camera and walked over to the bound Arab, who had closed his eyes and, like the Saudi, was muttering a prayer.

The man with the ski mask put his left hand up to his ear and Button realised he was wearing an earpiece. Yokely was in contact with them, wherever they were. The man nodded, then went back to the camera. ‘Last chance,’ said the man. A Mid-west American accent. He waved the Zippo in front of the camera and the flame smoked. Even beneath the ski mask, Button could see that he was grinning. Her stomach churned: he was enjoying it.

‘Abdal-Jabbaar, please…’ she begged.

She slumped back against the wall and put her hands over her face, fingers splayed, as she had when she’d watched horror movies with her brothers when she was a child. One had died of leukaemia when he was eleven and she was nine: she’d never forgotten the pain, and life had never been the same. Ricky’s death had been unavoidable, a case of nature going wrong, but the loss to Button had been almost unbearable. What the Saudi was going through now was infinitely worse, though. Abdal-Rahmaan’s death would be horrific and the Saudi knew that it was within his power to stop it. Button remembered that, as a child, she had knelt at the foot of her bed and prayed to God, promising anything if he’d let Ricky get better. But Ricky had died and Button had stopped believing in God. She wondered how strong the Saudi’s faith was. Was he prepared to let his brother die an agonizing death for no other reason than that he wanted others to die? All that the Saudi stood to gain was another terrorist atrocity. But he faced losing his entire family and eventually his own life. It made no sense to Button. If her family was about to be slain, Button had no doubt that she would say whatever it took to save them.