Private India: (Private 8) Read online

  “You don’t have to do this,” she said in a parched voice.

  “I do,” he said dreamily. “I have to, or I shall never have peace.”

  “You’ll never have peace, Aakash. You’re a troubled soul.” She looked at him with beseeching eyes. “You can’t soothe your soul with yet more pain.”

  His lips twitched slightly. “Well, Nisha, we shall see, shan’t we?”

  He began to tighten the garrote.

  Chapter 105

  DRAWING HIS COLT, Jack tiptoed up the stairs with Hari close behind him. As they approached the loft they heard two voices, one of them belonging to Nisha. At the top was a door inset with a dirty window. Raising himself up slightly he was able to peer through the dust and grime on the glass.

  He saw a large warehouse space. A bed in its center. The whole scene like a film set, except there were no cameras, no guys in baseball caps hanging around, just Aakash leaning over the bed. And Nisha. Or what he could see of her at least.

  And then Jack saw a flash of yellow in Aakash’s hands. He saw Nisha’s legs tauten at her bonds. The garroting had begun.

  On the bed, Nisha felt the material tighten around her neck. She felt dizzy as her oxygen supply began to diminish. She was blacking out.

  Jack tore open the door and took aim with the Colt. At the bed, Aakash turned just as Santosh barreled from the door behind Jack and knocked his gun arm. “No, Jack! We need him alive.”

  Jack cursed and threw himself forward, covering the yards to the bed as Aakash returned to his work, straining with the effort of tightening the garrote, no longer savoring the kill but wanting to finish it fast. Jack saw Nisha’s hands and feet straining at her binding. He saw her eyes that seemed to be popping out of their sockets. In the final moment, Aakash swung with his fist but Jack caught him around the waist, using his forward impetus to take Aakash off balance. The two of them crashed to the boards of the warehouse floor.

  The fight was over in a matter of seconds, Jack easily overpowering Aakash, grateful to hear Nisha cough and splutter—hurt but alive—as he planted a knee into Aakash’s back, dragged his arms behind him, and secured his wrists with a plasticuff. As he picked up Aakash to drag him away from the bed, Aakash looked up at Nisha, still coughing and spluttering, with a grin.

  “You were right,” he said, “I never will find peace.”

  She turned her head away, and when Santosh sliced the first of her hands free with his sword, she covered her eyes and began to cry.

  Jack glanced over. “Get him out of my sight,” he told Hari. As Hari dragged Aakash away, Jack went to the bed, fishing his hip flask from his jacket pocket. He offered it to Nisha’s parched lips—maybe not the best remedy for her thirst, but a remedy all the same.

  What happened next, nobody was sure. Did Aakash goad Hari? Had Hari planned it all along? The first Santosh saw of it was when he glanced toward where Hari stood with his gun trained on Aakash, and realized that Hari wasn’t simply holding Aakash captive—he was about to execute him.

  Aakash knew it too. Kneeling on the ground with his hands cuffed behind his back, he looked up at Hari and he smiled, and it was as though the two men knew and shared each other’s madness.

  “No!” shouted Santosh. Mubeeen and Jack, both tending to Nisha, swung around. “No, Hari, no!”

  But he was too late, and the sound of the bullet reverberated high up in the rafters of the old warehouse, scaring birds that were nesting up there. Aakash’s body pitched sideways, half his skull torn away.

  A moment later, another shot rang out as Hari put the gun into his own mouth and delivered himself from his suffering.

  Chapter 106

  SANTOSH AND MUBEEN sat in the Private India conference room. There was nothing to say. Shock, grief, and guilt hung over them.

  Nisha was in hospital, sedated for shock. Alive, at least: the case hadn’t been a complete disaster. No, wait—yes, it had. Santosh stared at memos on his desk, hardly seeing them: Bhosale, the driver of the vanity van, was to bring a wrongful confinement suit against the state; the government was asking the Attorney General to step down over allegations of mismanagement of the Sir Jimmy Mehta Trust.

  And these were good things. Tiny glimmers of light in the dark. Staring off into space, Santosh wondered if he was in shock. Dimly he heard the call of a drink, and knew he would answer it, and the drinker’s voice inside told him that the case going wrong had an upside, and the upside was that it gave him an excuse to drink.

  He should have seen it. He should have known. Hari should never have been with them. Rest was what he had needed. Probably a shrink. And because Santosh had failed to see that, Hari was dead and Aakash, their last chance of reaching Munna and Nimboo Baba, was dead too.

  “There’s one last option open to us,” Jack had said, taking off, and Santosh had thought he knew where Jack was going—to reach Munna before the news of Aakash’s death. To play their last remaining card as though it were an ace when in fact it was a two.

  Santosh wondered if, after his ordeal, Hari had been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, and whether Santosh himself was, too. He thought these things with a sense of detachment, totting up the trauma of the past forty-eight hours and wondering if a human being could possibly cope with it all.

  Little knowing there was more to come.

  Chapter 107

  “HELLO, MUNNA.”

  Jack Morgan had been shown to Munna’s usual booth at the Emerald dance bar, wondering why Munna’s goons hadn’t bothered to search him but grateful all the same. He’d have felt naked without his gun.

  And in front of him sat Munna, Jabba-like, his shirt open to display the gold ropes at his sweat-glistening chest, shining with grease beneath the lights. In his lap was a very young and very strung-out girl wearing next to nothing. Lank, greasy hair, a vacant expression. She should have been at home counting teddy bears and staring longingly at posters of Bollywood pin-ups on her wall, not here.

  Munna had been stroking pudgy fingers through her hair, but now he clicked his fingers. The bodyguard to his left used a remote control and the music in the booth dimmed, the bassy thump-thump coming through the walls.

  “The famous Jack Morgan. Didn’t I see you on the arm of Lara Omprakash the other day?”

  He gestured at a television mounted in a high corner of the booth.

  Jack nodded carefully, face blank, his heart hardening.

  “A beautiful girl,” added Munna slyly. “A shame what happened to her.”

  Jack thrust his hands into his pockets. “You’ll be pleased to hear her killer’s now in custody.”

  Munna looked at him sharply. “Is that so?”

  “Sure,” said Jack. “Aakash, formerly known as Aditi Chopra. An old friend of yours, I believe?”

  Munna pursed his lips. “No friend of mine.”

  “No, that’s right, a friend of Nimboo Baba’s. Well, at least Aakash is singing. He’s with the cops right now, telling them everything he knows about you and Nimboo Baba. And given that he’s Nimboo Baba’s lover, I’m guessing he has a lot of dirt. Enough to put you both back inside.”

  “Is that so?” said Munna. “And I suppose you’re here to tell me this because of your great regard for me? You just want the best for me, is that right, Jack?”

  Jack glanced from one expressionless bodyguard to the other, and then back at Munna. This was why they hadn’t searched him. He was outnumbered, outgunned.

  “No,” said Jack, shaking his head, “quite the opposite, but what I want more than your downfall is to know the whereabouts of the bomb.”

  “Bomb?”

  “Come on, Munna. The bomb planted by the Indian Mujahideen, aimed at an international target in Mumbai. You know where it is. I bet you could even abort it if you needed to.”

  “You credit me with far too much influence.”

  “Do I? Look, Munna. Let’s get down to business. Let’s you and me do a deal. You give up the bomb and I lose Aakash. I make h
im disappear. You let that bomb go off and I’ll nail you. I’ll nail you for everything, I’ll place you with the bomb, and the whole fucking world will want to see you hang. Give up the bomb, Munna, it’s a no-brainer.”

  Munna sighed. “Jack Morgan, Jack Morgan, you have such a reputation. I expected something more from you, something more sophisticated.”

  Jack felt his heart sink. That had been his last gambit. But he flashed Munna a smile, a Jack Morgan smile that said what he was really thinking, which was, Fuck. “I’m sorry to disappoint,” he said.

  “Life is full of disappointments,” said Munna, as if saying “c’est la vie.” “Because this—this is your great bluff? Fuck you, Morgan, I have more contacts at the Mumbai police than you give me credit for. Your boy Hari flipped out and put a bullet in Aakash. My troubles ended there. And as for your bomb? Fuck you, I’m admitting nothing. Now get out.” A nod to his left, and the music was turned back up.

  Jack swallowed, desperately trying to think.

  An idea nagged at him. He let it nag, the beginnings of a dread realization beginning to form.

  The gun at his hip. He felt it there.

  You’re just going to let me leave, with me knowing you’re behind a bomb about to explode in Mumbai?

  On Munna’s face was an odd, uneasy expression. He reached for the drink in front of him and brought it to his lips, and Jack saw the gesture for what it was: an attempt to hide duplicity. He knew that in an ocean of wrongness there was something extra wrong here …

  Jack felt himself go cold, and all of a sudden he knew—he knew exactly why Munna wanted him to leave, and time slowed down. Music pounded, but for Jack it faded into the background. He was watching. His face stayed the same, but he was watching: he saw sweat glistening on Munna’s forehead, Munna’s chubby fingers stroking the hair of the girl at his side, the young strung-out girl. He saw the bodyguards, the telltale bulges in their tailored jackets, their watchful eyes, their itchy fingers.

  Okay. The bodyguard who stood to the right of Munna was left-handed. He was wearing a gun beneath his right armpit, but he’d need to take a step away from Munna and the girl in order to draw and fire.

  In a firefight, he would draw second. Mentally, Jack designated him Costello.

  The music throbbed.

  From the way he was sniffing, the guy standing to the left of Munna had recently snorted cocaine. Even so, he was right-handed. He could draw and fire across Munna and the girl with ease.

  In a firefight he would draw first. Jack designated him Abbott.

  And Munna? Well, Munna was sitting, so his draw would be impeded. What’s more, Jack knew that Munna’s sidearm was a gold-plated Desert Eagle, and gold-plated Desert Eagles were notoriously heavy and inaccurate. He’d have been better off carrying a wok.

  In a firefight, Munna would draw a dismal third.

  He had men stationed in the adjacent booths, through which you had to pass if you wanted to get in or out. No doubt the music was also loud in those booths, but they’d hear the shots and come running. Four more men, two on either side. He’d seen drinks, lots of drinks, and if one of the close protection was doing bumps it was safe to say those guys were coked up to the gunnels too.

  So—seven altogether. Not great odds. But Jack had faced worse.

  Actually, no. Maybe he hadn’t faced worse.

  “So what are you waiting for, the great Jack Morgan?” jeered Munna, inviting him to the door of the booth with a ring-adorned hand. “Get out of here. Go find your so-called bomb.”

  And you’re trying to piss me off now, aren’t you?

  “I know where the bomb is,” said Jack.

  Munna raised his eyebrows, as though amused by a flight of fancy. “Oh? Do tell.”

  Chapter 108

  THE BOY HAD run away when a mob attacked his family during the riots of 1992. Upon returning some hours later, he had found the charred remains of his father, mother, and two sisters.

  A day later, members of an Islamic charity had found him lying alongside his family’s remains. He had passed out from shock, hunger, and dehydration.

  The head of the charity had been the principal of an Islamic seminary, and the boy had been placed in it along with countless other orphans. He had learned all aspects of the faith, as well as English, science, and mathematics. The result was that he could eventually gain admission to a medical college in Saharanpur. Saharanpur was also home to Darul Uloom Deoband, India’s biggest and most influential center of Islamic learning.

  During his second year of medical college, the boy had begun to pray five times each day at the mosque. One of the people he had prayed with had carried out some surveillance work for Pakistan’s ISI in India. The man would later become head of the Indian Mujahideen.

  The boy had gradually shunned his friends at college and had begun to spend most of his time lecturing on the perceived wrongs inflicted upon the Muslim community in places such as Afghanistan, Chechnya, and Kashmir.

  The process of radicalization had begun.

  His name was Abdul Zafar.

  Chapter 109

  “HEY,” SAID MUBEEN at the door. “What are you doing?”

  Dr. Zafar had been kneeling by a gurney in the storage room and, startled, he swung around. As he did so, Mubeen saw some kind of attachment to the gurneys. Wires. A stopwatch device.

  And in an instant Mubeen knew where the Indian Mujahideen had planted their bomb. It was there in front of him, in the science lab of Private India.

  Chapter 110

  “AM I RIGHT?” asked Jack. “Is it at Private?”

  “I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Munna. As though bored.

  “Sure I’m right. That’s why you were so keen for me to leave. An ‘international target in Mumbai’? It’s Private, isn’t it?”

  Munna looked at him, apparently deciding that he might as well reveal all. “It’s really rather clever,” he said. “Your man Mubeen has helped set up the bomb himself. Tell me—after the various autopsies he’s been performing, are there now a number of gurneys in his lab?”

  Jack had no idea. Munna looked delighted. “No, of course not. I don’t suppose the great Jack Morgan concerns himself with what goes on in the lab. Oh, by the way, you have until nine and it’s currently three minutes to nine. I think you’d better make a call, don’t you?”

  “Sure,” said Jack, reaching for his phone. “Good idea.” With one hand he threw his cell phone at Costello, with the other he drew his gun on Abbott.

  Abbott hadn’t cleared leather when Jack’s first bullet took out his eye, spraying lumpy brain matter on the red flock wallpaper behind. Dropping to one knee, Jack whipped around, felt the air above his head shudder as Costello loosed off a wild shot, and with a two-handed grip made his reply. Costello dropped, hands at his throat, blood spurting through his fingers.

  Munna lurched forward in his seat and reached behind for the waistband of his trousers, but Jack sidestepped, leaned, and kicked him once in the jaw, then planted the same foot on his chest, temporarily stopping him from moving.

  The doors. They swung open at the same time, front and back. Jack put a bullet through one, swiveled at the waist, took aim and fired at the second, where a goon had just arrived and died, a look of surprise on his face and a flower of blood at his chest. Dazed, Munna was struggling beneath Jack’s foot, so Jack kicked him again. His Colt fired again, and another guard died.

  Two guards left, but the booth was clear and they were staying out of sight for the time being, which gave Jack a second to regroup. He pulled Abbott’s unfired Glock from his lifeless fingers, pumped a couple of bullets at the wood surround of the door, and was rewarded with a shriek of pain from the other side.

  Then came a shot and he felt the searing pain almost as soon as he heard it—a pain in his thigh, and he dropped to his knee, yelling in agony.

  Chapter 111

  EVERYTHING FELL INTO place for Mubeen. He remembered the night when he had
picked up the first two bodies from Cooper Hospital. He’d wondered then why he was retrieving them from there instead of JJ Hospital. Zafar must have ensured that Private India–related autopsies were assigned to him alone.

  He’d insisted on being present during the autopsies.

  The examination of Priyanka Talati. “Do you mind if I leave the gurney here and have it picked up later?” he had asked.

  He’d been building up a store of gurneys in the lab.

  And those gurneys would be packed with explosive.

  Mubeen saw a digital readout that began counting down. With a shout, Dr. Abdul Zafar launched himself at Mubeen, a knife in his hand. Mubeen felt his shirt sliced open and warm blood course down his front. He grabbed at the knife hand and tried to wrench the weapon away from Zafar, but Zafar had the strength of a zealot and twisted until he was over Mubeen and pressing down with the knife, his lips pulled back over his teeth and beads of sweat popping on his forehead.

  Chapter 112

  MUNNA, WITH BLOOD pouring from his nose, still dazed, grinned. But Munna hadn’t fired the shot.

  It was the girl. Somehow she’d grabbed Munna’s Desert Eagle from the waistband of his pants and used it to shoot Jack.

  Jack kneeled with arms like a signpost, the Glock trained on the girl, the Colt on Munna, and his eyes going from one to the other, skittishly returning to the door of the booth. He had just seconds before the last gunman got his act together.

  “Drop the gun,” he told her in a faltering voice. The bullet had gone through, thank Christ for that. He’d be losing blood. It gushed down his leg, filling his shoe. He could actually feel it pouring out of him, and that wasn’t a good sign.