LITMIR.BIZ

       CHAPTER ONE

      The day that changes a life, or ends a life, rarely comes with a warning. There are no signs in the sky, no dark ravens on a post, no soundtrack in a minor key. To Felipe Tavares, security officer at the United Nations building in New York, September 23 had started as a regular Monday.

      He had come in on the Long Island Expressway on the 6.15 train, picked up a cappuccino and a muffin – a skinny blueberry one, in a concession to his wife – waved his permit at the guys on the door and headed to the basement of the United Nations building, headquarters of the institution he had served for the previous three years. There he opened up his locker, pulled out the blue uniform of an officer of the UN Security Force, complete with the Sam Browne belt and the brass badge that still triggered a charge of pride, and dressed for his shift.

      Next, he went to the armoury to pick up his weapon. He handed over his smartcard photo ID, taking in return a 9mm Glock, standard issue for most serving members of this miniature police force, charged with protecting the international territory that was the UN compound and everything within it. Felipe took the ammunition from the pouch on his belt and loaded up, carefully pointing the weapon into the loading barrel to guard against any misfires. Once his gun was holstered on his belt, alongside his truncheon, a P38 baton with handle, pepper spray and cuffs, he headed for the basement's ‘ready room’. There he would stand in his place for the line-up, where he and his fellow guards would be reviewed by an officer, checking to make sure his men and women were tidy, sober and fit for duty.

      That done, he headed back to the main entrance on First Avenue between 45th and 46th Streets to begin what he assumed would be another long day checking permits and answering tourists' questions. It was warm enough, but rain was in the air; he put on his orange-and-black waterproof cape. The work would be boring, but he did not care. Felipe Tavares had yearned to escape from the drudgery of small-town Portugal where he had been born and grown up, and where, if he had not moved fast, he would have died – and he had made it. He was in New York City and that alone was excitement enough.

      * * *

      At that same moment, across town in a Tribeca side street that was no more than an alley, Marcus Mack conducted his own morning routine. African-American and in his late twenties, wearing loose, frayed jeans, with a full head of dreadlocks and with a grungy Crumpler computer bag slung across his shoulder, he checked on his parked car. Anyone watching would have assumed he was merely proud of his souped-up, if aged, Pontiac and that when he knelt down by the driver's side rear wheel he was checking the tyre pressure. They probably wouldn't have seen him feeling in the well above the wheel and finding, stuck there with duct tape, a cellphone. He took it and walked on.

      Perhaps a minute later the phone rang, as Marcus knew it would. The voice that spoke was familiar but Marcus knew better than to say hello. It said four words – ‘Athens coffee shop, seven-thirty’ – then hung up. At the corner of the street, and without ceremony, Mack dropped the telephone into a garbage can.

      The café was full, the way his handler liked it. Marcus spotted him instantly, on a stool in the window, just another grey-suit reading his newspaper. Marcus took the seat next to him and pulled out his laptop. They made no eye contact.

      The handler's phone rang and he pretended to answer it. In fact, he was speaking to Marcus, whose eyes remained fixed on the computer screen in front of him.

      ‘We've picked up activity in Brighton Beach. The Russian.’

      He did not have to say any more. Marcus knew about the Russian, as did the other member of his unit in the NYPD Intelligence Division. The Russian was an arms supplier who had been spotted a year ago. The Division had enough to shut him down immediately but the order had come from on high: ‘Keep him in play.’ It was a familiar tactic. Leave a bad guy in business, watch who comes and goes and hope he leads you to some worse guys. Throw back the minnow, catch the shark.

      ‘Surveillance camera caught a man in black entering the Russian's place last night, leaving an hour later. Traced him to the Tudor Hotel, 42nd and Second.’

      Marcus did not react, just kept tapping away

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