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  Tango One

  Stephen Leather

  In different parts of London, three recruits prepare for their first day at the Metropolitan Police's training centre, but on their first day, the assistant commissioner announces that he wants them to join a team of undercover detectives. They are to become criminals, work their way up through whatever criminal organizations they can get access to, and collate evidence against the criminals they come across. Their target is one of the world's biggest drug dealers, Den Donovan, alias "Tango One." Three years later all the recruits are getting close to their target. Too close, perhaps, to remember the rules.

  Tango One

  by Stephen Leather

  Acknowledgements

  I am indebted to John C. Cummings, retired USAF Combat Controller, and James Clanton, USAF Major (Retired), for their help on aviation matters, and to Sam Jenner for the inside track on the Caribbean drugs trade.

  Denis O'Donoghue was once again invaluable when casting his professional eye over the manuscript, and I'm especially grateful to my fellow Dublin-based thriller-writer Glenn Meade for getting me through a particularly nerve-wracking case of writer's block.

  Sarah Binnersley has line-edited many of my books over the years and as always my work is the better for her keen eye for detail and her no-punches-pulled opinions. And I'm especially grateful to Carolyn Mays at Hodder & Stoughton for overseeing Tango One from beginning to end.

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  The Home Office Consolidated Circular to the Police on Crime and Kindred Matters (Home Office Circular 35/1986, Paragraph 1.92).

  a. No member of a police force, and no public informant, should counsel, incite or procure the commission of a crime.

  b. Where an informant gives the police information about the intention of others to commit a crime in which they intend that he shall play a part, his participation should be allowed to continue only where i. he does not actively engage in planning and committing the crime;

  2. he is intended to play only a minor role; and 3. his participation is essential to enable the police to frustrate the principal criminals and to arrest them (albeit for lesser of fences such as attempt or conspiracy to commit the crime, or carrying offensive weapons) before injury is done to any person or serious damage to property.

  The informant should always be instructed that he must on no account act as agent provocateur, whether by suggesting to others that they should commit of fences or encouraging them to do so.

  The man had been tied to the chair for so long that he'd lost all feeling in his hands and feet. His captors had used thick strips of insulation tape to bind him to the wooden chair and slapped another piece across his mouth, even though he was in a basement and there was no one within earshot who cared whether he lived or died.

  The three men who'd brought him to the villa hadn't said a word as they'd dragged him out of the back of the Mercedes and hustled him across the flagstones into the pink-walled villa. He'd lost a shoe somewhere and his big toe poked through a hole in his blue woollen sock.

  The tape across his mouth pulsed in and out with each ragged breath as he looked around the room where he was being kept prisoner. No windows. A single door that had been bolted when the three men left. Bare walls, stone with a thick covering of yellowing plaster. A concrete floor. A single fluorescent strip light above his head. One wall had been shelved with slabs of rough local timber and there was a scattering of tinned goods at eye level Heinz baked beans, Batchelor's peas, bottles of HP sauce and boxes of Kellogg's cornflakes and PG Tips. The cravings of an Englishman abroad.

  The man fought to steady his breathing. Panic wasn't going to get him anywhere. He had to stay calm. He had to think.

  In front of him a Sony digital video camera stood on a tripod, its single lens staring at him full on. The man stared back. He had a bad feeling about the camera. A very bad feeling.

  He strained to hear where the three men were, but no sound penetrated the depths of the basement. He hadn't heard them leave the villa or the Mercedes being driven away, but that meant nothing. The soundproofing of the basement worked both ways.

  The man tested his bonds. The tape was grey and metallic looking, the type used by plumbers, and while it was only an inch wide, it had been wound around his limbs so many times that they might as well have been made of steel. He tried to rock the chair backwards and forwards, but it was big and heavy and he could barely move it.

  He swallowed. His throat felt raw and every breath was painful, but at least the pain proved that he was alive.

  He racked his brains, trying to think where he'd gone wrong. He must have made a mistake somewhere along the line, and if he could just work out what it was, maybe he'd be able to put it right. Had someone recognised him, had he said something to give himself away, some stupid slip that he hadn't noticed but which they'd picked up on? He replayed all the recent conversations he'd had but nothing came to mind. He was too professional to make mistakes. Too careful. Too scared.

  He knew two of the men who'd brought him down to the basement. One was Scottish, the other Brazilian. He'd known them both for almost two years. He'd drunk with them, who red with them, on occasions almost felt that they were friends. However, when they'd picked him up on the pavement outside the hotel their eyes had been hard and their faces set like stone, and he'd known even before they'd grabbed him that he was in trouble.

  The third man, the one who'd driven, was a stranger. Hispanic, jet-black hair that had been swept back, and high cheekbones pockmarked with old acne scars. The driver had kept turning around and grinning at him, but like the other two hadn't said a word during the drive to the villa.

  Initially the man had tried to bluff it out, to make a joke of it, then he'd faked anger, saying that they had no right to treat him that way, then he'd threatened them. They'd said nothing. The Scotsman had jabbed the barrel of a large automatic into the man's ribs and kept his finger tight on the trigger. Eventually the man had fallen silent and just sat between his captors, his hands in his lap.

  He heard footsteps on the stone steps that led down to the basement and he tensed. The door opened. He recognised the man who stood in the doorway. He was a shade over six feet tall with chestnut-brown hair that was unfashionably long, pale green eyes and a sprinkling of freckles over a nose that had been broken at least twice. Dennis Donovan.

  "Don't get up, Andy," said Donovan, and laughed harshly.

  The Brazilian appeared at Donovan's shoulder and grinned, showing yellowish, smoker's teeth.

  Donovan and the Brazilian walked into the basement and closed the door. Donovan was wearing a red short-sleeved polo shirt and khaki chinos, a Rolex submariner on his left wrist. In his hand was a long kitchen knife. The Brazilian was holding a large plastic bag.

  The man said nothing. There was nothing he could say. Donovan had used his real name, which meant that Donovan knew everything.

  "You've been a naughty boy, Andy," said Donovan, stretching out the man's name as if relishing the sound of it.

  "A very naughty boy." From the back pocket of his chinos he took a black ski mask and slipped it on his head. He walked past the man, so close that he could smell Donovan's aftershave, and bent over the video camera. He pressed a button and then cursed.

  "Fucking new technology," he said.

  "Ever tried programming a video recorder, Andy? Bloody nightmare. You need a PhD in astrophysics just to set the timer. Ah, there we go."

  Donovan straightened up. A small red light glowed at the top of the video recorder as the glass lens glared balefully at the man in the chair.

  Donovan nodded at the Brazilian, who had also put on a black ski mask. Donovan tossed the knife to him in a gentle arc and the Brazilian caught it deftl
y with his free hand.

  The Brazilian advanced towards the man in the chair, flicking the knife from side to side, humming quietly. The man struggled, even though he knew there was no point in struggling. His conscious brain knew that his life was forfeit, but his animal instincts refused to accept the inevitable and he strained against his bonds and tried to scream through the tape gag as the Brazilian went to work with the knife.

  Peter Latham stabbed at the lift button and glared at the floor indicator as if he could speed up its progress by sheer willpower. He shrugged his shoulders inside his grey suit jacket and adjusted his blue and yellow striped tie. It had been a long time since Latham had worn plainclothes during the day and he was surprised at how much he missed his uniform.

  The briefcase he carried was the same one he carried into work every day at New Scotland Yard, a present from his wife of going on twenty-five years. Black leather, scuffed at the edges, the gilt weathered on the two combination locks, the handle virtually moulded to the shape of his hand, it was something of a lucky talisman and he planned to keep it until the day he retired.

  The lift doors opened and Latham stepped inside. He pressed the button for the fifth floor but the doors remained resolutely open. The hotel was advertised as four-star, but the carpets were stained and threadbare and there was a tired look to the place, like a faded actress who'd long given up on her agent ringing with an offer of work. It was in an area that Latham rarely frequented, just east of the City, London's sprawling financial district, and he'd travelled by black cab instead of using his regular driver. Strictly speaking, as an Assistant Commissioner with the Metropolitan Police, Latham was higher in rank than the man he was coming to see, but the man was an old friend and the manner and urgency of the request for the meeting was such that Latham was prepared to put rank aside.

  The doors closed and there was a sharp jolt as the lift started its upward journey. Latham could hear gears grinding somewhere above his head and he resolved to take the stairs on the way down.

  The room was at the end of a long corridor punctuated with cheap watercolours of seascapes in fake antique frames. Latham knocked and the door was opened by a man in his early fifties, a few inches shorter than Latham's six feet and several stone heavier.

  "Peter, thanks for coming," said the man, offering his hand.

  They shook. Both men had strong, firm grips. A handshake between equals.

  "We're getting a bit old for cloak and dagger, aren't we, Ray?" said Latham. Raymond Mackie pulled an apologetic face and stepped aside to allow Latham into the room. Two single beds, a pine-laminated dressing table and wardrobe, and a small circular table with two grey armchairs. There was a bottle of Johnnie Walker Black Label, two glasses and an ice bucket on the table. Mackie waddled over to it, poured two large measures and handed one to Latham. They clinked glasses and drank. Mackie's official title was Head of Drugs Operations, HODO, generally referred to as Ho Dough, although because of Mackie's expansive waistline, this was frequently corrupted behind his back to the Doughboy.

  A combined television and video recorder stood on the dressing table. Mackie saw Latham looking at the television and he picked up a video cassette.

  "This arrived at Custom House yesterday," he said.

  "I hope you haven't brought me all this way to watch a blue movie," said Latham. He dropped down into one of the armchairs and put his briefcase on the floor.

  "I warn you, it's not pretty," said Mackie, slotting the cassette into the recorder and pressing the 'play' button. He shuffled over to a sofa and eased himself down on to it as if he feared it might break, then took a long slug of his whisky as the screen flickered into life.

  Latham steepled his fingers under his chin. It took several seconds before he realised that what he was seeing wasn't a movie, but the brutal torture of a fellow human being.

  "Sweet Jesus," he whispered.

  "Andy Middleton," said Mackie.

  "One of our best undercover agents."

  On the screen, the man in the ski mask was slicing deep cuts across the chest of the bound man, who was rocking back and forth in agony.

  "He went missing on Anguilla two weeks ago. This came via Miami."

  Latham tried not to look at the man being tortured and instead forced himself to look for details that might help identify the assailant or the location. The torturer had no watch or jewellery, and was wearing surgical gloves. There was no way of knowing if he was black or white, or even if he was male or female, though Latham doubted that a woman would be capable of such savagery. The walls were bare except for a few shelves to the left. A fluorescent light fitting. Concrete floor. It could have been anywhere.

  "Middleton was trying to get close to Dennis Donovan," said Mackie.

  "Donovan's been active in the Caribbean for the past six months, meeting with Colombians and a Dutch shipper by the name of Akveld. Middleton's in was through one of Akveld's associates. He's gone missing, too."

  A second masked figure stepped into the frame holding a plastic bag. He stood for a second or two looking directly at the camera.

  "We think this is Donovan," said Mackie.

  "Same build. There's no way of knowing for sure, though."

  The man walked behind Middleton and pulled the plastic bag down over his head, twisting it around his neck. The undercover Customs agent shuddered in the chair, his eyes wide and staring. It was more than a minute before his head slumped down against his chest, but the man behind him kept the bag tight around his neck for a further minute to make sure that he was dead.

  The recording ended and Mackie switched off the television.

  "Middleton is the third agent we've lost in the Caribbean. Like Middleton, the bodies of the first two haven't been found. They were hoping to bring Donovan down as part of Operation Liberator, but it didn't work out that way."

  Latham nodded. Operation Liberator had been trumpeted as a major victory in the war against drugs almost three thousand drugs traffickers arrested, twenty tons of cocaine and almost thirty tons of marijuana seized along with thirty million dollars of assets confiscated as part of a massive operation conducted by the United States Drug Enforcement Administration and British Customs. Latham knew that most of the arrests were low-level dealers and traffickers, however, men and women who would have been replaced before they'd even been strip-searched. And thirty million dollars was a drop in the ocean of a business estimated to be worth more than five hundred billion dollars a year.

  "Were they killed on tape?" asked Latham.

  Mackie shook his head.

  "So why this time? What was special about Middleton?"

  "It's a warning," said Mackie, sitting down in the armchair opposite Latham and refilling their glasses.

  "He's telling us what he'll do to anyone we send against him."

  Latham sipped his whisky.

  "It's unusual, isn't it, killing a Customs officer?"

  "Not in the league Donovan's in. If it was just a case of a couple of kilos, maybe, but the last consignment of Donovan's that went belly up had a street value of thirty million dollars. If the DEA catch him with the goods, he'll go down for life without parole."

  "Even so, he could just give them a kicking and send them packing, couldn't he?"

  "I guess we've become a thorn in his side and this is his way of saying enough is enough."

  "And is it? From your perspective?"

  Mackie looked at the Assistant Commissioner with unblinking grey eyes.

  "I knew all three of them, Peter. I worked with Andy way back when. Checking cars at Dover, believe it or not. I'm not going to send any more men into the lion's den."

  "So he's won?"

  "Not exactly." Mackie fell silent and stared at a painting of a vase of flowers above one of the beds.

  "Spit it out, Ray," said Latham eventually.

  "We've had an idea," said Mackie, still studying the painting.

  "Well, I guessed that much."

  "The problem is,
no matter how good our agents are, and Andy Middleton was one of the best, an operator like Donovan can still spot them. They don't have his background, his instincts. No matter how good they are, they're still playing a role. One slip, one wrong move, and their cover's blown."

  Latham nodded but didn't say anything.

  Mackie put his glass on the table and stood up, his knees cracking like snapping twigs. He walked around the room, his left shoe squeaking each time it touched the floor.

  "We put our guys through the most intense training imaginable, same as you do with your SO10 people. We teach them about surveillance and counter-surveillance, we teach them how to act, how to think like a criminal. And up against low-level operators they pass muster. You see, if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, then the bad guys assume that it's probably a duck. But probably isn't good enough for a man like Donovan. First, he only does business with people he's known personally for a long time. He treats all strangers with suspicion. And he has an instinct for undercover agents. It's as if he can smell them. Apart from the three who've died, I've had half a dozen bail out of their own accord, convinced that Donovan was on to them."

  "I get the picture, Ray. I even get the duck analogy. But what do you want from me? From the Met?"

  Mackie took a deep breath and turned to look at the Assistant Commissioner.

  "Virgins," he said, quietly.

  "We need virgins."

  Jamie Fullerton gritted his teeth as he pounded along the pavement on the last leg of his two-mile run. He was barely sweating and knew that he had the stamina to run for at least another hour, but he had nothing to prove. If it had been the weekend he might have pushed himself harder, but it was Monday, the start of a new week. The start of a new life. He looked left and right and dashed across the King's Road, heading for his basement flat in Oakley Street. London wasn't the most convenient place in the world for an early-morning run, but Fullerton couldn't abide the clinical efficiency and mechanical contraptions of a health club. Fitness was a way of life to him; it had nothing to do with spending an hour on an exercise bike reading the FT and listening to the latest Simply Red CD.