Tested by Fire Read online

  Tested by Fire

  By

  David Costa

  ‘Monsters are real, and ghosts are real too.

  They live inside us, and sometimes, they win.’

  ~ Stephen King

  I dedicate this book to my wife Helena and my granddaughter Erin who, through their love and encouragement, helped me to finish this story.

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-one

  Chapter Forty-two

  Chapter Forty-three

  Chapter Forty-four

  Chapter Forty-five

  Chapter Forty-six

  Chapter Forty-seven

  Chapter Forty-eight

  Chapter Forty-nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-one

  Chapter Fifty-two

  Chapter Fifty-three

  Chapter Fifty-four

  Chapter Fifty-five

  Chapter Fifty-six

  Chapter Fifty-seven

  Chapter Fifty-eight

  Chapter Fifty-nine

  Chapter Sixty

  Chapter Sixty-one

  Chapter Sixty-two

  Chapter Sixty-three

  Chapter Sixty-four

  Chapter Sixty-five

  Chapter Sixty-six

  Hurghada, Egypt: Two Weeks Later

  Malta: One Month Later

  About the Author

  A Note from the Author

  Chapter One

  You never hear the shot that kills you.

  Costello lay flat in the back of the white Transit van, the tripod holding the Barrett Browning .50 calibre rifle steady. He held the stock against his right cheek and shoulder, the barrel pointing between the slightly open rear doors. As he looked through the scope, the outline of the figure standing beside a car half a mile away crystallised into clarity in the crosshairs. Costello began to take the pressure on the trigger, his aim square on the chest of his target.

  Private Stephen Channing 1st Battalion Royal Welsh Fusiliers had been working at the Vehicle Check Point (VCP) since 0800hrs that morning and his four-hour stint was almost up. The VCP was part of a ring of manned check points that encircled the small village of Bessbrook in South Armagh. The job of the patrol was to check the vehicles entering the village which was home to the Bessbrook Mill Army Base, and one of the busiest landing pads in the world with hundreds of military helicopter landings and take-offs carrying troops, police, supplies, and equipment around the outlying bases of South Armagh. The danger of land-mine attacks in the infamous Bandit Country of the South Armagh Provisional IRA had made it almost impossible to travel by vehicle transport. The check points around the village provided a protective shield, preventing vehicles potentially carrying explosives getting close enough to hit the base.

  Stephen Channing was happy, the day was bright, and his thoughts were on relaxing in the sun on the grass near the landing pads after lunch.

  Costello took the full pressure of the trigger, squeezing through. He felt the cushioned kick in his shoulder as the figure in his sights stood up straight to inspect the licence he’d been handed by the driver of the red car beside him.

  The soldier felt as if someone had hit him square in the chest with a sledgehammer, throwing him backwards and knocking him completely off his feet. The pain reverberated through his entire body as the bullet punched through his flak jacket and exited out of his back after destroying most of his internal organs. He blacked out before the real pain registered; he was dead when his body hit the ground. What remained of the bullet exploded against a wall behind him, sending shards of masonry in all directions.

  The van moved off in the opposite direction, leaving another dead British soldier lying on the ground.

  The driver of the red car could only tell the police that the soldier was already flying backwards when he heard the loud bang of the shot. Maybe it was true. You never hear the sound of the shot that kills you.

  MONDAY, 23 SEPTEMBER 2019

  Chapter Two

  She checked if she was being watched. Before she became one of their agents, years of being on the run from the British Security Services had left their scars. His voice kept coming back to her. Trust no one; always expect danger and you’ll be all right.

  The man she knew as Joseph had been her RUC Special Branch handler. She’d been his agent inside the top echelons of the Provisional IRA in Northern Ireland. The war was supposed to be over yet now she felt the danger and again, she was turning to the one man she trusted.

  She remembered all he’d taught her on the streets of Belfast – London was no different to any big city – she could hear his voice clearly in her head.

  Use the shop windows, use the reflection in the glass to see who’s behind you. Memorise the clothes people are wearing. If you’re in a building, use the lift, professionals won’t follow you in because it’s hard to avoid eye contact inside. Drop your keys or tie your laces, take a chance to look around you.

  She used his teachings as she walked through Victoria close to the main national bus station. Opposite the main entrance to the station was the Red Lion Pub She entered knowing it would be busy and loud, many accents lost in the crowd. She’d been here many years ago with Joseph and he’d shown her how she could walk in the front door on one street and leave by the back door on another, allowing her to confuse anyone who might be following her.

  Its main attraction today, however, was the public phone at the back of the bar.

  She knew the Belfast number by heart and when the voice answered, she spoke clearly, ‘This is Mike, BC15, I need to speak with Joseph at the set location in London. Tell him, Democracy. I’ll be at the meeting place at 1 p.m. each day for the next three days.’

  She then hung up and walked out of the pub’s back door.

  Chapter Three

  HQ SG9 London City Airport

  The brass plaque on the door said ‘Business Sales International’. The three-storey flat-roofed building located inside the perimeter fencing of London City Airport was, in fact, the secret headquarters of Secret Intelligence Group Nine. SG9, a section of SIS, the British Secret Intelligence Service, and known as ‘the Department.’

  The Department had been created not long after the worst terrorist atrocity in the modern world, the 9/11 attacks on the Twin Towers in New York. And when London suffered its own attacks on 7 July 2005, where fifty-two people were killed by four so-called home-grown suicide bombers who exploded their backpacks on the London public transport system during the morni
ng rush hour, since then there had been more attacks in Manchester and London.

  The British Prime Minister, in agreement with his Cobra Committee, decided that Britain needed a secret organisation working outside the restrictive parameters of the existing intelligence agencies. Democratic governments around the globe were finding their hands tied by the need for transparency in their methods and the rise in media coverage meant they were scrutinised beyond anything they’d known before.

  Prime Minister Peter Brookfield put the unit into the hands of the head of MI6, Sir Ian Fraser – known to many only as C. He was given the power to recruit the team as he saw fit with the order to report back to the PM only when needed.

  The fact that MI5 and MI6, along with other elite intelligence organisations throughout the world, had failed to identify the 9/11 attack meant that western intelligence agencies had to adapt to a new type of war; not only how to gather intelligence, but how to thwart the attacks and, in the case of SG9, retaliate. The CIA and the FBI were to be criticised after 9/11 for the way they kept secrets which, if they had been shared, would have shown an attack was being planned and maybe stopped. The US Government then formed Homeland Security to oversee all the American Intelligence Agencies, filter the information, and ensure those people at the top couldn’t work to protect their own little kingdoms in the future. The something else that was needed had been agreed between the Western powers: to share intelligence where they could, identify clear targets, and strike back.

  The Department was set up in the two years after the July seventh bombings under the utmost secrecy and on a strictly need-to-know basis.

  Back then, Sir Ian and his deputy for Subversive Activity, Jim Broad, personally scoured the files of relevant British covert agencies selecting the operators who would become the core of the Department.

  The vetting had been carried out by Broad, a career spy who had gone straight to MI6 from Oxford University where he’d originally met Sir Ian. Fraser had taken a different direction and had worked his way up the army becoming a trusted friend of the PM and eventually heading up MI6 after a service record that saw him as General Officer Commanding British Military Intelligence.

  Broad studied the Personal Record File of one of his SG9 operatives. The file was written in a crisp civil service format, telling him a lot but, in the end, very little.

  Name, date of birth, and where he’d been born, Belfast. The file described retired Detective Inspector David Reece and his time covering the intelligence training and operational background. RUC Special Branch twenty-three years during the Troubles but what, realistically, was an all-out terrorist war. He’d served through the ceasefires, the peace talks, and the Northern Ireland Peace Agreement gathering – analysing all aspects of intelligence and, when necessary, handling the enemies of peace, even if that resulted in death.

  He’d been a successful recruiter of agents and through the agents he had under his control had saved many lives and, on many occasions, prevented terrorists succeeding in their terror campaign. His skills were second to none: specialist firearms, bomb making and disposal, recruitment and training of new agents, surveillance, counter-terrorism techniques, interviewing…Reece was considered one of the best due to his ability to adapt and learn on the spot.

  The file also showed that the impact of the dangers he’d come to face daily had taken their toll. Two failed marriages, two estranged sons from the first. Diagnosed with severe stress during a period of heavy drinking, resulting in a period of enforced leave, but somehow, with counselling and follow-up treatment, he’d come through it a changed man, the file said he was hardened to life around him, a loner who kept himself to himself.

  The police service had changed since he’d joined and after taking early retirement in 2015, he’d stumbled from one type of personal security job to another, from bodyguard to the rich, to private investigations. This was when in 2017 the file of David Reece, retired Detective Inspector Special Branch RUC George Cross and Police Service of Northern Ireland PSNI had landed on the desk of Jim Broad and after some detailed enquiries, he’d brought the file to the attention of Sir Ian Fraser. Sir Ian respected the skill of his second in command and trusted his judgement, so when he’d read the file, he agreed that Reece should become an agent in the Department.

  Now Broad was about to call him in for the most important mission of his career.

  Chapter Four

  ‘The ravens are in danger,’ Broad said to Fraser before hanging up the secure line between their offices. The code for extreme danger to the British State, borne from the legend that if the ravens that nested in the Tower of London were to disappear, it would be the end of Britain, was not one to be taken lightly, so Sir Ian had immediately left his office overlooking the Thames and was now sitting in Jim Broad’s office.

  Broad had told Sir Ian to read David Reece’s file on his way over so when he’d arrived, he wasn’t surprised to see Assistant Chief Constable Tom Wilson PSNI, a six-foot Ulsterman, fit for his sixty years and with a head of silver hair, was already there. He acknowledged Fraser’s arrival with a welcoming smile. Wilson headed up what used to be the Royal Ulster Constabulary Special Branch, now called the Crime Special Department of the PSNI.

  They knew each other well, having worked together in Northern Ireland when Fraser was a Five Operator targeting the same terrorists as Wilson, and both men had a deep respect for the other.

  ‘Well, Tom, I know from our history such a request for an urgent meeting can only be for one of two reasons: something is going to blow up in my face, or the person involved needs my help.’

  Fraser sat back in the chair at the top of the conference table and took a long sip of the whisky Broad had handed around.

  Broad looked at Wilson. ‘When you phoned this morning, you said it involved David Reece, so we pulled his file. What’s it all about?’

  Chapter Five

  Liverpool John Lennon Airport

  Every journey begins with a single step, and this journey started in the departure lounge of Liverpool’s John Lennon Airport. As usual, the Belfast bound flight was delayed, so he had time to carry out his favourite pastime – people watching. Since 9/11, terrorism was a worldwide sport, and he’d found his talents sought after.

  Every nationality seemed to be milling about the departure area. Some he watched for a while, others he would pass over quickly as he worked out in his mind where they’d come from or where they were going. Most of the young people were booking on to flights to hotter climates; their clothes light and cool reflecting that their destination point wasn’t within the United Kingdom. Unfortunately, he wasn’t bound for a warmer climate.

  While watching he began to feel he was also being watched. Every human has this hidden sense from the time we were running with the dinosaurs as a defence mechanism in times of danger. After years of specialist training and living with danger, this gift had been honed to perfection. In the modern world of mobile phones, too many people were losing this special skill. Instead engrossed in the small screens they missed so much in front of them, and unfortunately sometimes because of this the very killers in their midst.

  Slowly, he looked around. As he did so, his mind began to break down each section of the room into individual sequences. Within a few seconds he could see the security CCTV camera that typically panned the concourse had stopped and was focussing in his direction. He was sure he was the target of its interest. As he had nothing on him of a sensitive or incriminating nature, he stared back, daring the people observing to show their hand, to show why they were interested. It didn’t take long. Two men in suits, both about thirty, walked towards him. Within seconds they were standing each side of him, the one to his right spoke.

  ‘Mr Reece, sorry to bother you. There’s an urgent telephone call for you in our office, if you would like to follow us?’

  No identification had been offered; he didn’t need to see any, recognising the methods they were using from his own training, don’t bri
ng attention to yourself unless you need to. His trained eyes landed on the slight filling out of their suits at waistband level; they were armed, so likely Special Branch officers.

  The office they took him to was small but big enough for its needs. One of the men handed him the phone and when he said hello, he immediately recognised the voice on the other end.

  ‘Hello, David, I’m glad I caught you. I need you to get down to London asap.’ Hearing the voice of Jim Broad made him wary. He reminded Reece of Captain Mainwaring from the TV sitcom Dad’s Army; part bank manager, part soldier, looking after his kingdom and the people who worked for him. He demanded and received respect. Anyone who had taken the time to research Broad’s background would know he’d been there and got the T-shirt.

  ‘What’s the matter with my mobile phone?’

  ‘Security, dear boy.’

  ‘I’m on my way. I’ll have to get across to Manchester Airport as there’ll be a better chance of getting a flight there.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that, there’s a Puma helicopter on its way to you, should be there in fifteen minutes. It will bring you to the office at London City Airport and I’ll meet you here. See you in a couple of hours.’

  With that, the line went dead, and he stared at the noiseless handset.

  What the hell is going on? he thought.

  As he settled into a seat behind the pilot and they headed over the English countryside following the contours of the M6 motorway hundreds of feet below, the memory of the last time he’d been in a Puma came flooding back.

  He’d been travelling with an army search team over the snow-covered hills of South Armagh in the middle of the night five years before. Although he wore the uniform of a Sergeant in the Royal Ulster Constabulary, he usually worked in civilian clothes as an undercover officer. Later, when walking through the streets of Crossmaglen – a Provisional IRA stronghold – the uniform would give him the anonymity he needed to do his job. As they flew over Camlough Mountain, it seemed like they were flying upside down as the white, snow-covered land below looked like clouds in the moonlight except for the odd golden light flowing from the windows of the farmhouses dotting the landscape.