CHAPTER ELEVEN
“The group who took Dr Starling call themselves SPIDER,” Ezra began. “This stands for Special Infiltration, Deception and Emergency Retrieval.”
“Sounds like us,” Zara said.
“It sounds like you,” Ezra agreed. “And they have similar skills, but there the similarity ends. Unlike you, these men and women dedicate their lives to evil. They’re all thieves and ex-cons.”
“Not like us, then.”
“No. The Spiders were in prison for serious crimes — murder, blackmail, intimidation and violent armed robberies, not to mention art and jewel theft, kidnap and smuggling — especially drugs.”
“Who’s their leader?” Mason asked.
“In the field they’re led by a man named Linus Finn.”
“Is he the top dog?” Caleb asked.
“No. The boss was a man named Horst Vogel, but he died in mysterious circumstances on the Berlin underground. Now Finn’s controlled by a woman known as the Black Widow. We have strong suspicions she’s working for someone else. We’ve been watching bank accounts and seeing large sums of money transfer into a German business account under her control.”
“Ooh — a mystery bankroller!” Ella said. “I like it.”
“Source?” said Mason.
Ezra shook his head. “She shut the account down two weeks after we started monitoring it. I’m guessing whoever pulls her strings figured out we were poking our noses in there and shut the thing down.”
“What sort of money?” Caleb asked.
“Fifty thousand US per week, so a hundred grand in all.”
“So whoever’s turning his key has wealth,” Ella said.
Mason shifted in the comfortable leather seat and sipped some water. He’d relented and let the medic tend to his wounds, including pumping him with painkillers. “Tell me more about this Finn guy.”
“He’s a British national, and a highly intelligent former army officer who spent five years in prison for robbery and didn’t like it. After that he turned to more complex, white-collar crime and he’s wanted for a string of offenses by the British authorities. He’s the ultimate apex predator. His codename is Tarantula.”
Ezra turned in his seat and activated a small plasma screen on the aircrew cabin wall. Seconds later, several mug shots flicked on the screen.
“Woah,” Zara said. “That’s five people you don’t want to meet on a dark night.”
Ezra confirmed her observation with a shallow nod. “Finn’s latest employee is a Latvian thief named Iveta Jansons, codename Hobo after the Hobo spider. The Latvian authorities suspect her of being the genius behind dozens of high society robberies. She uses her looks to persuade men to take her to exclusive parties all over Russia and Europe and then she gets to work cleaning out the cream of the crop. She has never been caught and some say she doesn’t even exist.”
“A ghost…”
“Next up is this man — Bjorn Brick. A native of Seattle. As far as armed robbery is concerned, he wrote the book. Calls himself Huntsman.”
“Who’s that guy with the spider tattooed on his neck?” Ella said. “I don’t like that at all.”
“Kyle Cage, Codename Wolf. He’s the man who went into the university and physically snatched Dr Starling. Most members of SPIDER have the spider tattoo on their arms, but Cage opted to have his loyalty etched permanently on his neck.”
Milo raised an eyebrow. “That could be a problem with future employers. Really.”
“Thank you very much for that, Mr Risk,” Ezra said. “But five years ago, Cage was convicted of killing nineteen people over a period of ten years, so I think that ship sailed already.”
“Nasty,” Ella said.
“He was busted out of ADX Florence supermax prison in Colorado a few months ago, almost certainly by the rest of SPIDER.”
“Oh great,” Zara said. “A free-range psycho.”
“No,” Ezra said firmly. “I want you to understand that Kyle Cage is no psycho, and he’s no serial killer. The people he murdered were all hits ordered by whichever Chicago gang boss he was working for at the time. His skills were very much in demand — still are, in fact. He’s highly intelligent, and very precise in his work. But he is no free-range psycho.”
“If you say so,” Zara said, raising an eyebrow.
Ezra fixed his eyes on Zara and for a second it looked like he was about to burn two holes through her with the look in them. “I absolutely do say so, Miss Dietrich. But don’t get trapped in an elevator with him.”
“What about the other girl?” Caleb pointed to a mug shot of a woman no older than twenty-five. Short, pale skin and bright red hair.
“Molly Cruise,” Ezra said. “Another Brit, from Manchester, Codename Redback. She’s a small-time hustler with some street smarts but her real skill is behind the wheel of a car.”
“You’re kidding?” Virgil said.
“Our very own little Lightning McQueen,” Zara said seriously.
“I am not kidding. She’s pretty much the best getaway driver there is. She has abnormally fast reflexes and her reaction time is considerably quicker than most people’s. She can drive a car like you wouldn’t believe, so don’t let the pretty, young face fool you.”
“Good to know,” Caleb said.
“There’s another man who has been known to work with the Spiders. His name is Alfredo Lazaro, a Cuban hit man. He went underground some time ago after a hit in Vietnam when he killed a double agent by the name of Elizaveta Compton. No one’s seen him since then, so for now we’re not considering him part of the crew.”
“Also good to know,” Ella said. “Sounds nasty.”
“Where are the Spiders holding this Dr Starling?” Virgil asked.
“According to latest intel, they’re holding her in Frankfurt, Germany.”
Zara clapped her hands together and rubbed them. “Great. Who doesn’t like a few inches of knackwurst — Milo?”
Milo gently passed his hand over his floppy hair as if he had all the time in the world. “You know why you’re such an asshole, Zara?”
“Do tell, my eager young padawan.”
“Because fuck off, that’s why.”
Zara clasped her hands over her mouth. “Oh my goodnesses! That was so funny!”
Ezra sighed. “If you successfully extract Dr Starling from the safe house where Linus Finn and the rest of the Spider team are holding her, you will learn more about why she was taken in the debrief.”
“You mean there’s more we don’t know?” Mason said.
“A hell of a lot more, but I’m not prepared to go there until Dr Starling is safe. After that, it’s up to you if you work with me or go your own way.”
“It’s up to us what we do right now,” Mason said, looking each member of his team in the eye. “So are we doing this or not?”
The look in their eyes gave him the answer.
Katherine Addington lowered the collective on the R22 and brought the light utility chopper down on scrubland to the north of Istanbul. With the blades still whirring above her head, she leaped out of the helicopter and jogged over to a Fiat Doblo she had parked up on the side of the road earlier in the day.
She jumped in the driver’s seat and pulled Mason’s canvas bag onto her lap. She opened it, excited to see the asset with her own eyes.
No asset.
She turned her head up and looked through the windshield. Her eyes squinted with confusion and she plunged her hands back into the bag, eventually pulling it inside out in a frantic search for the steel tube. This can’t be happening, she thought, and ran back to the chopper to search the cockpit. It must have fallen out of the bag when I was flying out of the city.
No luck.
She raised her hands to her head and screamed with frustration. That no-good son of a bitch must have double-crossed her. She felt the anger rise in her heart, a wild, hot pain that felt like burning gasoline. She screamed again and stomped back over to the Doblo. Kicking the side of it hard, she dented the rear door panel and cursed. “You bastard, Jed… I’ll get that damned thing back from you and teach you about betrayal at the same time.”