The Old Enemy by Henry Porter (read with me .TXT) 📕

When she appeared in his ward, shoulder bandaged and arm in a sling but managing to hold two cups of coffee from the franchise café in the hospital foyer, he smiled and without the slightest note of recrimination told her, ‘I know what you were doing in the flat.’

‘How’s the leg?’ she said, awkwardly handing him a cup. She sat down beside him. ‘A millimetre or two to the left and they say you might have bled out.’

‘Fine,’ he said, though it ached like hell. ‘Jo, I know!’

‘That’s your trouble, Samson. You’re far too smart for your own good.’

‘For yours,’ he said, and grinned again. ‘Just tell me why?’

‘Drink your coffee,’ she said, unabashed.

‘You said you hadn’t identified me to your colleagues from that piece of film in the street, but of course you had and they told you to watch me. That’s why you were at the flat last night. Jo, you never stay two nights in a row.’ He was still smiling but also watching intently for her reaction.

‘Fuck it – yes.’

‘Well, they damn nearly got you killed, didn’t they? I hope you tell them that.’

‘I have.’ She smiled. ‘Thanks for being such a grown-up, Samson.’

‘What’s a little surveillance between friends?’

‘I told you more than I told them.’

‘I know you did. Of course, they don’t give a damn about my safety, or yours for that matter. If they were worried about me, as they said, they’d have had me covered when they followed me to Putney Bridge. Whoever’s after me was tracking my phone, which is why I had to turn it off and swap phones. Hence you couldn’t call me.’

She pouted then sipped her coffee.

‘So, what do they want?’

She moved closer so she was just a few inches from his face. Their eyes danced with routine intimacy, which made her smile briefly. ‘They want to know why you were outside that building.’

‘The Edgar? Why?’

‘There was something going on there. They raided it and picked up an individual they were looking for, but they didn’t find what they wanted. It’s all a bit vague, but they want to know what the fuck you were doing there.’

He put the coffee cup down and reached for her hand. ‘You can tell them I have absolutely no interest in the building, or whatever goes on there. Will you do that for me? It was coincidence that my work took me there. Nothing more.’

She nodded and withdrew her hand.

‘Do they have an ID for the man who tried to kill us?’

‘You know he died?’

‘I assumed that was the case, yes.’

‘His name was Pim Visser. Dutch citizen. Born in Rotterdam thirty-six years ago. Served four years for smuggling ecstasy. Dutch police say he had good connections in the criminal underground in Rotterdam – the penose – and may have been an ad hoc contract killer. He was nicknamed Rossi after the Italian motorcycle champion because he used high speed bikes to deliver drugs to the club scene all over Europe. An addict with a reputation for extreme violence, he was a suspect in the murder of a prostitute in Rotterdam and had two convictions for sexual assault.’

‘So was Rossi the driver for Miroslav Rajavic – the Matador?’

‘That’s assumed to be the case.’

‘I don’t understand how my neighbour heard Serbian in the flat when this man was Dutch.’

‘Visser had a Yugoslav mother. He speaks fluent Serbian. He was the link between the penose and the Balkan crime scene, mostly concerning the MDA market, it is believed. He was part of the delivery chain that fed ecstasy into Slovenia, Croatia and Serbia.’

‘So he was talking to the Matador on the phone.’

‘Yeah, it seemed that he was summoning help from his partner. Maybe he wasn’t sure of himself or was insisting that the other man – your Matador – carried out the contract, as it was his contract. I don’t know. But there was some kind of dispute and that was why he was shouting.’

The pattern was now established beyond doubt. Four men had been hired from the criminal underworld in Europe to do contract killings which would require a far higher degree of professionalism than any of them was capable of. Two were dead, one was in custody and the fourth had gone missing. He reminded himself to call Vuk Divjak in Serbia later.

‘Thanks for all that,’ he said. ‘So, you were going to tell me about the tulip guy – the man in the village you’re seeing.’

‘He’s a dear, I like him a lot. I would have spoken about this sooner but, well, you’re incredibly sweet, too, Samson. And we do have our good times, don’t we?’

‘We certainly do.’

She brushed the back of his hand with her fingernails. ‘Our time together is, like, halfway to love for me. Do you understand? It’s so good in bed that I kind of wonder why the hell we aren’t in love, just like anyone else would be. But you aren’t available and that has come to really matter to me, despite, or because of our extraordinary sex life.’

‘Despite, or because of,’ he echoed rather hopelessly. ‘So, you are planning to set up with the tulip guy?’

‘His name is Leo.’

‘I prefer Tulip Guy.’

‘We’ll see how things go. He’s helped me with a problem and I’m grateful to him.’

‘What was that?’

She didn’t reply and drew back a little. ‘I was worried they might give you a hard time about killing that man.’

‘Why. It was quite straightforward. They interviewed me last night. They wanted to know how many times I hit him. It was twice – once on the head and maybe a glancing blow which ended up on his head. They said they would wait for the autopsy.’

She looked concerned. ‘They could make life difficult for you over the next few weeks. They might cause trouble at the inquest. Not all my colleagues are good people. And there is’ – she lowered her voice – ‘a real sense that you pose some kind of threat.’

‘Have you made a statement?’

‘Yes, while you were being stitched up.’

‘An