E.V. Seymour - The Mephisto Threat

Also available by E.V. Seymour

THE LAST EXILE

by

www.mirabooks.co.uk

For Bex, Milly, Katy, Olly and Tim

My Famous Five

I couldn’t have written this book without the generous help of others. It’s been a long time since I last visited Turkey so I’d like to thank Brian and Margaret Fox for bringing me up to date and for giving me such a personal insight into a country they clearly love. Special thanks also to Keeley Gartland, Media and Communications West Midlands Police, and to Detective Sergeant Maria Cook who shared her knowledge of the workings of the Organised Crime Division. It must be stated that the opinions and attitudes expressed in the story are my take and not a reflection of the views expressed by the officers with whom I spoke.

Selwyn Raab’s excellent book, Five Families , provided the starting point for the novel. For inside knowledge of gangs and organised crime, I highly recommend all books written by Tony Thompson on the subject. Likewise, Peter Jenkins’s book on Advanced Surveillance helped to give Tallis the edge in a number of tricky situations.

I’m not sure I’d have been able to write about Billy’s injuries had it not been for my visits to the Acquired Brain Injury Education Service, Evesham College. The staff and clients there are truly inspiring, and big thanks to all for making me feel so welcome.

Lastly and by no means least, thanks to my agent, Broo Doherty, and to Catherine Burke and the team at MIRA. I couldn’t have done this without you.

HEAT was killing him. Blades of light skewered his skin. Without air, the soaring temperature suffocated, halting time and muffling his senses so that he couldn’t focus on the narrow streets, sprawling stalls and brightly coloured bougainvillaea, couldn’t smell the spice and fenugreek, honey and dried beef, couldn’t taste his apple tea or hear the blare of car horns signalling another mad couple’s leap into matrimony. In all of his thirty-three years Tallis had never known weather like it, not even when he’d fought in the first Gulf War. It was as if the whole of Istanbul was being microwaved.

He changed position, slowly, lethargically. He would have preferred a café nearer to the university. Students were always attracted to the best hangouts, but Garry had insisted they meet close to the Spice Bazaar, or Misir Carsisi, to give it its Turkish name, a cavernous, L-shaped market within sight of the New Mosque. He didn’t know the reason for Garry’s choice of venue, or whether it held significance.

Tallis reran the conversation he’d had with Morello at the airport. They’d literally bumped into each other, a surprise for both of them.

‘Fuck me, Paul, what are you doing here?’

‘Could ask you the same question.’

Garry tapped the side of his nose. ‘Work.’

Tallis copied his friend, taking the piss. ‘Holiday.’

‘Lucky sod.’ Oh, if only you knew, Tallis thought. ‘How long for?’

‘Three weeks, maybe more.’

‘Good. I’ll be back from the UK by then. Actually,’ Garry said, ‘there’s something I’d like to bounce off you, something I’m following up.’

‘I’m a bit out of the game, man.’

‘Once a cop always a cop.’ Tallis flashed a smile. Garry had no idea that, since he’d left West Midlands police, he’d become involved in working for the Security Services. Oblivious, Garry returned the smile then his look turned shifty. ‘I’ll explain more next time we meet. Give me your number and I’ll give you a call soon as I’m back in Istanbul.’

Tallis had hesitated, felt tempted to give him the brushoff. He was working undercover and off the books for MI5. Asim, his contact, had been privy to a limited amount of chatter, which he wanted Tallis to verify. There was no huge expectation because the word on the ground was embryonic, no specific threats, no timing, no hard targets, but there remained a major fear that terrorist organisations were dreaming up a new kind of campaign, involving different methods of destruction, different tiers of people, hinting at an involvement with British organised crime. In among the white noise, the city of Birmingham was hinted at. A meeting with Garry could horribly complicate things but, apart from the insistence in Garry’s manner, he owed the man.

As a freelance crime correspondent, Morello had covered the botched firearms incident in Birmingham for which Tallis, then a member of an elite, undercover firearms team, felt responsibility, even though he had officially been cleared. Unlike many, Morello wrote a balanced account, sympathetic almost, along the lines of a firearms officer’s job was not a happy one. Tallis had phoned him afterwards to thank him and they’d hit it off. He’d stayed in touch ever since, even having several dinners with him and Morello’s wife, Gayle, at their home in Notting Hill. When Garry was in Birmingham, he made a point of calling Tallis so they could hook up. Friends like that were hard to come by so, in spite of the risk, Tallis had given Garry his new mobile number with a smile. And Garry had got in touch.

Tallis adjusted his sunglasses. He was looking and listening, his senses attuned for anything out of kilter. He’d already closely considered his surroundings: five tables arranged outside on what passed for a pavement, all of them occupied, one by a group of middle-aged Turks smoking and playing backgammon, another by a young British couple. Some dodgy-looking Russians were eating mezes to his left. The furthest table away was taken by a single male, early thirties, nationality unidentifiable. For some time he’d been mucking about with a mobile phone. As Tallis glanced at him the man smiled with hooded eyes, black, same colour as prunes, then put away the phone and turned to his Newsweek .

Tallis continued to sip his tea, a beverage more suited to regulating body temperature than beer. Not that he was drinking alcohol—unprofessional to consume booze on the job.

He looked out onto a street crackling with latent heat, sky a screaming shade of blue. There was a small commotion as a street trader ambling past, his cart filled with plump bulbs of garlic, narrowly missed a taxi, the moustachioed cab driver displaying his displeasure by placing his hand flat on the horn and gesticulating wildly. Tallis smiled. When it came to driving in Turkey, you took your life in your own hands, the high road accident rate evidence that it was never wise to assume right of way. Just one of those many little things he’d discovered in the short time spent travelling in this strange, beguiling nation, a magical blend of ancient and modern, fast-paced and fast-changing and full of contradictions.

Take its government, Tallis thought. It desperately wanted to be accepted into the European Union but did the very things that made it unacceptable; it was an open secret that Turkey’s human rights record continued to raise concern. By the same token, its people were friendly, generous and full of good humour. Especially the blokes. When a Turk declared himself your friend, an arkadas , he genuinely meant it, and it amused Tallis that while every Turk honoured the female of the species, every Turk also reckoned himself irresistible to women. While fathers could allow their daughters to enjoy certain freedoms, many saw no contradiction in offering them for sale, particularly to well-heeled Englishmen.

But this was all extraneous stuff, Tallis reminded himself. His brief concerned the criminal and political. Turkey might be a secular society, but there was enough pull from a variety of religious quarters to make it extremely vulnerable to conflict—that and its geographical position. Lying midway between Europe, Asia and the Middle East, the country was a gateway, a melting pot for culture and ideas on the one hand, terrorists and organised crime on the other. No accident that many unsuspecting girls were trafficked through its borders. More worrying still the significant trend for criminal organisations specialising in arms smuggling and extortion, with all their consequent violent sidelines, to get themselves involved in religious fundamentalism. An explosive mix.