'In the eyes of society, anyway. But society has been known to make the odd mistake here and there. And E-Branch… well, we're sometimes called in to clean up the mess; though as often as not we just jump in feet first regardless. Very well, now we can get away from your story for a minute or so…' And after a brief pause fie went on:
'For the last fifteen to twenty years — or even longer than that, indeed ever since the fall of Communism — Europe has been in one hell of a mess. Recessions, revolutions, coups one after the other; nuclear black spots where Russian power-stations and weapons dumps are left rotting down to so much atomic rubble; little wars, and not so little wars left, right, and centre as nations take their revenge, engage in racial vendettas that should have been settled, probably would have been settled, a hundred years ago if Soviet expansionism and Communism hadn't called a temporary halt to them. Power struggles in political systems that are still sorting themselves out, in Rome and Moscow and elsewhere; ethnic cleansing in and around the Slavic and Baltic countries, and regular revolutions in Turkey, Bulgaria, and Romania. Italian, French, and German governments coming and going as regular as the ticking of a clock, and lasting about the same length of time, never long enough to do anyone any good. And as for the Near and Middle East, Africa, the Orient.. Trask sighed and shook his head. 'Have I painted a sufficiently gloomy picture?' And without waiting for an answer: p>
'Well, thank God we're an island — England, I mean — and also that we've maintained and strengthened our ties with America and Australia. Because the rest of the world seems like no-man's-land. In a word, it's chaos.
'It seems an ideal scenario for the end of life as we know it, right? Even as I speak the depletion of the ozone layer continues, we're into yet another El Nifio — the fourth in fifteen years — and there's a rip-roaring plague spreading west out of an ideologically and financially exhausted China. But there are worse plagues than a new strain of the bubonic variety, believe me…'
Again a brief pause, unticlass="underline" 'And so back to you,' Trask continued, staring at Jake.
'Your mother died of an overdose, left you some money—'
'The money was about the only decent thing she ever did for me,' Jake nodded, his husky tone betraying his true emotions.
'—But you and money together spelled more trouble.' Trask chose to ignore the interruption. 'So maybe you didn't have too much going for you, you and your Ma — still her death affected you badly. You went on a long drinking spree in all the Mediterranean resorts from Genoa to Marseille, wrecked your car on the Italian Riviera; the paparazzi took your photograph during several fist-fights in Cannes. Also it's not at all unlikely that you returned to your drug-taking habits.'
'I never had much of a habit,' Jake told him. 'Oh, I tried just about every brand, that's true, but they only made me ill. Those "funny" cigarettes were about as bad as it ever got, and where I've spent the last three months even they were far too expensive. I'm used to my asshole the shape and size I've always known it!' He looked at Liz and said, 'Sorry, but if you insist on being here…'
She shook her head, answered, 'I'm not a child, Jake. After tonight I thought you'd know that much, at least.'
And Trask went on just as if no one else had spoken: 'Then you met a girl. There'd been women in your life — quite a few — but this one was something else. She was special.'
'This is the bit you can skip,' Jake told him gruffly. But:
'Unfortunately not,' Trask answered. 'If Liz is to be your partner, and the rest of E-Branch is to work with you, they'll need to know that you aren't quite the savage that the world — and probably you, too, Jake — thinks you are. They'll need to know you had your reasons.'
And Jake sat silently now, his head lowered…
CHAPTER FIVE Jake's Story
'Her name was Natasha,' Trask went on. 'And she was working for the Moscow Mafia. She was a courier for the Mob in the guise of a fashions artist, but in fact the only designs that interested her were the designer micro-drugs in her sports car's roll-bars. Natasha was also the Mob's collection agent and ferried lots of high-denomination francs and lire back to a vastly depleted Russian economy… or rather, to the thugs who were in large part responsible for that depletion.'
Trask shook his head in disgust. 'God.' Hoods of the world, unite.' We thought it was over and done with when the Mafia took a couple of bad falls back in 1984 to '87. In America, the families really suffered. When Gotti went down everyone thought it was the end of that kind of corruption, at least in the USA. In Sicily, '87, nearly four hundred of these lizards were convicted of murder, extortion, graft, racketeering, prostitution, you name it. Surely that was the end of it? Oh, really?
'But the Russian Mafia were just starting out, and with the collapse of the European immigration laws ten years ago and the removal of border controls on the continent… well, as I said, thank the Lord that the UK's an island. We kept our border controls, our immigration laws, and for once we got it dead right. Even so, the illicit drugs trade is hard to beat and we're suffering our fair share, though not nearly as badly as the rest of the world.
And, of course, hard-core survivors of police activity and "old" Mafia-style gang wars in Italy, Sicily and the States have formed liaisons with the ever more powerful Russian gangs, which means that, in common with the world's terrorist organizations, they're now pretty much integrated.
'Marseille has always had a big drug problem. The Riviera, with its jet-setters and high-roller socialites, has been drug-dealer heaven for a long, long time. Natasha Slepak's mobility — the routes she used — were several, but mainly she would fly from Moscow to Budapest and then drive down into Italy or over into France. Or she might use another route into France, driving into Genoa, then taking a yacht to the French Riviera. The Mob have contacts, keep boats, in most Italian sea ports.
'Jake met Natasha in Marseille. According to a statement he made later — much later — to the Italian police, she wanted out of the drugs business. She was being pestered for sex by one of the Italian Mob's top men, one Luigi Castellano, a young Sicilian who ran the French side of the action from a sprawling villa on the outskirts of Marseille. Castellano was Natasha's top contact in France, and he was also the man she most feared and hated…'
As Trask paused, Jake — who had been looking more and more agitated — burst out, 'If it has to be told, let me do the telling from here on in.' Trask pursed his lips, then nodded.
'We met in a bar,' Jake began. 'What you've just heard is true: Natasha wanted out. But there was nowhere she could run, not on the Continent, anyway. No border controls; the Mob would find her wherever she went. Maybe that's why she went for me — because I had British nationality — but that's only a maybe. I prefer to think… well, otherwise. Anyway, we got on famously. For a couple of days I wined and dined her; she was a very good reason for staying sober, staying clean. We roomed at different hotels… so I thought. But in fact she was staying at Castellano's villa, and all the time fending the bastard off! And she wouldn't come anywhere near my place. In short, she wasn't any kind of pushover. And I knew she was worried about something.
'Eventually she told me just about everything. And all the time — all through our "romance," if you want to call it that — I was aware that she was being watched; even when I'd first met her, this tall guy had been watching from the shadows. I didn't tell her about it, but I knew I wasn't mistaken. Finally she told me why we couldn't be together. It was for my sake: she didn't want me to get into trouble.