The room went silent. All eyes were on Miles.
‘Brooks, obviously, found that rather suspicious. Worrying. When he raised it with me, so did I. I don’t believe in coincidences.’
‘But surely Kammler wouldn’t be that stupid,’ Jaeger objected. ‘Grey Wolf is known. It’s blown. So why use it again?’
‘But he would be that arrogant,’ Narov interjected. ‘It is deeply symbolic. He will never drop it, bearing in mind who the original Grey Wolf was.’
‘You think he believes he’s Hitler?’ Jaeger queried.
‘Hitler’s modern incarnation, at the very least.’
Raff nodded. ‘Ego. The big killer and the big banana skin.’
‘Kammler does see himself as the Hitler of today,’ Miles confirmed. ‘Plus he feels protected. Shielded. Invulnerable. Assuming the DNA sample that proved he was dead was doctored, then Kammler has friends in high places.’
‘Okay, so let’s presume Grey Wolf is Kammler,’ Jaeger mused. ‘What else do we know about this Moldovan deal?’
‘Dates, plus destination the goods are being shipped to. All the Moldovan mafia is waiting on is the final payment. And believe me, this stuff is obscenely expensive. Once they get their money, they’re flying it out to a particularly nasty narco gang based in Colombia.’
‘Kammler mentioned Moldova, in the Dubai meeting,’ Narov interjected. ‘It’s on the tapes. Something about the Columbians being on standby to take delivery.’
‘Did he?’ Miles gave an appreciative nod at Narov. ‘Good work. That pretty much confirms everything we’ve been hearing.’
‘You’re saying Kammler’s in bed with Colombian drug traffickers?’ Jaeger ventured. ‘How does that work?’
‘Arms dealers, drugs runners and terrorists – the nexus of evil draws ever closer,’ Miles explained. ‘You couple that with a hatred of the West – of America in particular – and the Moldovan mafia, Colombian narcos and Kammler can make common cause. Plus, a remote, lawless jungle base: in a sense, it offers the perfect place for a man like Kammler to hide.’
‘Then there’s Kammler’s former role at the CIA,’ Narov volunteered. ‘He was big into developing narcotics as tools of espionage and warfare. LSD. Heroin. And worse. You name it, he dabbled in it. He has to have contacts in that world. Maybe he called in some favours.’
‘Then why not roll it up?’ Raff queried. ‘Now. Kill the network before the shit has a chance to hit the fan.’
‘Because if it is Kammler, this is the means to track him,’ Miles answered. ‘We trace the cargo, we trace Kammler.’
‘Do we know the exact location the uranium’s being routed to?’ Jaeger asked.
‘We do,’ Miles confirmed. ‘Dirt airstrip hacked out of the Colombian jungle. One of the narco trafficker’s drugs-smuggling hubs, for onward shipment to the US.’
Jaeger eyed Miles. ‘Okay, so the contention is that Kammler’s set up some kind of IND lab alongside the drugs-processing facilities? Am I right?’
Miles nodded. ‘That’s what we’re thinking.’
‘Right, let’s do a pre-emptive strike. Before the flight leaves Moldova and has a chance to jet in, we hit Kammler’s jungle base and blow his labs to shreds, then get in there and kill or capture the man himself – that’s if he’s there.’
Miles smiled. ‘My thoughts exactly.’
Jaeger got to his feet. ‘Then what’re we waiting for?’
23
‘This time, just who is the “we”?’ Raff queried. ‘Who exactly is going to be backing us? Where’s our top cover?’
‘Myself. Daniel Brooks,’ Miles confirmed. ‘Plus a few other highly placed and trusted individuals. The usual suspects.’
Over the decades, the Secret Hunters had cultivated a network of powerful backers, encompassing the elite military and intelligence agencies of the major Allied governments.
‘But I’ll level with you,’ Miles continued. ‘Brooks is worried. If Kammler’s DNA sample was doctored, then he’s got problems in his own agency. Until he proves Kammler’s back in business, he can’t do much about it. Hence his need to keep this low-profile.’ He ran his gaze around the room. ‘Hence the desire to use you.’
‘I am curious about one thing,’ Narov volunteered. ‘How much is the final payment the Moldovans are waiting for? To green-light the shipment?’
‘Tens of millions of dollars.’
‘The kind of money Kammler’s trying to grab via Hitler’s literary estate.’
‘Indeed. Using the revenues from Mein Kampf to wreak some kind of nuclear carnage in memory of the Reich. Well, it would appeal to Kammler’s ego, not to mention his sense of the dramatic. But we won’t know for sure until—’
‘He is smarter than that,’ Narov cut in. ‘If he aims to spread terror, it won’t be only revenge he is after. He will do so to light a fire, one that will scorch the world, from the ashes of which he will build anew. Bringing back the Reich, that was always his aim. A Fourth Reich. With him as Führer. I don’t believe it will have changed.’
‘Quite,’ Miles agreed. ‘But as I was saying, we won’t know for sure until we get eyes on, and that’s down to you guys.’
Jaeger, Raff and Narov glanced at each other. Either they agreed to Miles’s proposition, or potentially they’d have the blood of millions on their hands. But beyond that, this was deeply personal.
Narov had her own reasons to hate Kammler, reasons rooted deep in her family’s dark past. As for Raff, he’d seen good friends die horribly at Kammler’s hands. And for Jaeger, this was the man who’d murdered his best friend, and very nearly succeeded in doing the same to his wife and child.
They broke for a brew. Jaeger found a quiet place where he could make a private call via his computer. He needed to let Ruth know that he wasn’t about to make it home any time soon. He steeled himself for what was coming: he didn’t figure this was going to be easy.
Predictably, her mobile went to voicemail. He decided to call home. Maybe she was there. A woman’s voice answered. For the briefest of moments he was hopeful, but it wasn’t her.
‘Who’s this?’ he demanded. What was a stranger doing answering the home phone?
‘It’s Jennie, Will.’
Jaeger felt a sinking feeling. Jennie was Raff’s long-term partner, and one of Ruth’s closest friends. She’d proved a constant support. But why was she there now, at their home?
‘Is everything okay? Where’s Ruth?’
‘No easy way to say this, Wilclass="underline" she’s disappeared from the clinic. I’ve been trying to call you for hours. It kept going to voicemail.’
No surprise she couldn’t reach him: the Falkenhagen Bunker had zero mobile coverage. Jaeger’s mind started to race. Ruth had been acting increasingly erratically. But pulling a disappearing act? What on earth was going on?
‘Will? Are you there?’
Jennie’s voice dragged Jaeger’s mind back to the present. He forced himself to speak. ‘I am. Tell me – how long has she been gone?’
‘It happened yesterday. The clinic people tried calling. They couldn’t raise you, so they got hold of me. I’ve been trying to reach you ever since.’ A pause. ‘Plus there’s this. They say she left in the company of a suspicious- looking individual.’
‘Suspicious like how?’ Jaeger queried. ‘Any description?’
‘Not much. Big shaven-headed guy. Man of few words. “Scary looking” was how they described him. But the clinic’s not a prison, so they couldn’t exactly stop her.’
Jaeger felt punch-drunk. What the hell was going on? There was more than a hint of Steve Jones in the description of the individual who had taken Ruth away. Maybe she’d been kidnapped by Kammler’s people. But Jones couldn’t be in two places at once – the tunnels under St Georgen and the London clinic.