“Now that is simply not true,” Hawke protested. “It was ten pound notes.”
Lea rolled her eyes and shook her head in disgust.
Hawke was defiant. “It’s not true. I was joking.”
“You haven’t changed, at least,” said Scarlet.
Lea opened the file that Eden had given her back at the hotel. It was essentially the one Matheson had brought to the meeting but with several sections missing. Unlike Baumann, Vetsch was not former military, but just pure underworld scum with busts for everything from drug dealing to extortion to pimping.
How he had gotten out of prison for his last conviction was questionable, but most linked it to Zaugg’s influence, running through Baumann. As for Didier Martin, he was simple pondlife and should crack like an Easter egg with the slightest application of pressure.
Scarlet finished her macchiato and tossed the paper cup out the window into a nearby trash bin.
“Good shot,” Ryan said.
“I could hit you in the throat with a hunting rifle from half a mile away,” she said flatly. “While you were jogging. That was not a good shot.”
“Fair enough,” Ryan replied, and sank back into his scarf. “Just trying to be nice.”
“Cairo Sloane and nice?” Hawke scoffed. “Not so much.”
“That’s not what you thought back in Helmand that night.”
Lea turned in her seat. “Oh yeah?”
“Forget it.”
“I can’t believe in a car full of ex Special Forces it takes me to point out that Martin has come back — look.” Ryan pointed across the square where a man hunched into a dark raincoat was passing the marble medieval fountain. He spat into it, and looked over his shoulder before briskly jogging up the steps outside his apartment.
“Could be anyone, boy” Scarlet said dismissively.
“Hey, less of it, grandma.”
“Grandma? I’m not even thirty.”
Hawke nearly choked on a peanut. “Come off it, Cairo. Besides, he’s right — the light to his apartment has just gone on.”
“That’s as maybe,” Scarlet said, turning to Ryan and running her fingernails along his upper leg. “But you’d beg for it if you thought you had half a chance.”
For once, Ryan was totally, completely speechless.
“And who’s this, I wonder?” Hawke said.
A gold Lamborghini pulled up in the square outside Martin’s apartment. The lights closed into the hood and the engine powered down. It was like watching a lioness go to sleep. The door opened and a man in a leather jacket stepped out, warming his hands with his breath.
“Vetsch!” said Lea.
“The very same,” Hawke added, narrowing his eyes.
“You let a weasel like that chase you around New York?” Scarlet said.
“He had a team of Uzi-wielding maniacs,” Ryan said.
“Basic training,” said Scarlet. “Eden should have called me earlier.”
Vetsch walked casually up the steps and moments later the two men were standing in Martin’s apartment talking.
“Time to join the conversation,” Scarlet said in her cut-glass Oxford accent. She pulled a small device out of her bag.
“What the hell is that?” Ryan asked.
“What the hell is what?” Hawke asked without taking his eyes off the apartment.
“Looks like a light sabre,” said Ryan, clearly impressed.
Hawke heard Scarlet sigh. “It is not a light sabre, boy. It’s a very high-quality laser microphone.” She put on some headphones and opened her window, gently resting the mic on the sill to keep it steady.
Inside, Martin and Vetsch were now arguing about something.
“What are you getting, Cairo?”
“Sadly, not much — not unless you can speak whatever the hell they’re speaking.” She passed Hawke the headphones.
“It’s Schweizerdeutsch,” he said, passing the headphones back to her. “Swiss German.”
“Sounds like a cross between Dutch and Klingon to me,” Scarlet said. “I was hoping they might speak French. It’s so much more sophisticated.”
“That’s your laser microphone in the jacks then,” Lea said, smirking.
“I'm sorry?” Scarlet asked.
“Nothing.”
“That’s not really true about what happened in the sergeant’s mess, is it?” Ryan asked, his face the picture of genuine concern.
Hawke smiled. “Why do you ask?”
“I just can’t believe things get as bad as that in the army.”
“Of course not,” Hawke said reassuringly. “Things get much worse than that. And it was the marines, not the army.”
“We wouldn’t let a man like Hawke into the army,” Scarlet said.
Hawke smiled. “Yeah, yeah. Let’s not forget we’ve got a job to do.”
Lea opened her door. “So let's do it. Ryan, stay here.”
“Damn!” he said. “I was hoping to sneak into Martin’s apartment and strangle him with his braces for information.”
Lea glanced back at Ryan. “Very funny.”
“But that’s not how you get information out of a toerag like that,” said Scarlet, opening her door.
“You too, Cairo. In the car.” Hawke’s tone was firm.
“Eh? Eden put me in here to fight, not babysit Ryan — no offence.”
“None taken.”
“We need a backup unit, and you’re it. You know how these things work.”
“So put Miss Ireland in backup.”
Lea scowled.
“In the car, Cairo. I mean it. Eden put me in charge and I want Lea up front with me. We’ve fought these guys before and we both know their moves.”
Scarlet sloped back into the car, but this time in the driver’s seat, and adjusted her black roll neck in the mirror. “If you say so, darling.”
Hawke and Lea crossed the square and walked past two or three cafés and boutiques before reaching Martin’s apartment. It was two storeys above a pharmacy which was closed for the night, the green glow of its sign reflecting in the melted snow outside in the street.
“We’re opposite a police station.” Hawke gestured over his shoulder.
“Great,” Lea said. “Let’s keep this quiet or it could get really out of hand.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
Hawke looked across the square where Scarlet and Ryan were sitting in the shadows of the side street in the Lexus. A fleeting doubt crossed his mind about whether or not he could really trust Cairo Sloane, but if Eden had vouched for her then he could live with it.
“You think Ryan will be okay back there?” Lea asked.
“Sure. Her bark is worse than her bite.”
“I meant if anything kicks off with Vetsch, Joe.”
“Oh sure — that too. She can look after him. Trust me when I tell you there’s only one person in the world more ruthless than Cairo Sloane.”
“And who would that be?”
“If you’re nice to me I might tell you one day.”
“What’s his name?”
“Who said it was a man?”
They slowed up at the bottom of the apartment steps and rang the bell.
“Oui?”
“J’ai une pizza pour vous, monsieur,” Hawke said.
Lea gave him an appreciative glance. “Not bad,” she mouthed. Hawke nodded his head with exaggerated pride.
“Je n’en veux pas. Allez-vous en, maintenant.” The reply was gruff and short.
Lea winced. “I’m guessing that’s not polite.”
Hawke thought again. “D’accord, j’ai besoin de la blanche, mec.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Lea whispered.
“I think I asked him for heroin, but my accent is so bad he’ll just think I'm a foreigner.”
“Pas ici!” Then the door buzzed open.
Upstairs, it didn't take Vetsch long to recognize Hawke and Lea. He reached for his gun, but Lea had a Glock 17 in his face before he knew it.
“Forget about it, laddo, and hand the old shooting iron over before I blow your balls off.”