Torsten Dahl book 1 - Stand Your Ground Read online

  Table of Contents

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY ONE

  TWENTY TWO

  TWENTY THREE

  TWENTY FOUR

  TWENTY FIVE

  TWENTY SIX

  TWENTY SEVEN

  TWENTY EIGHT

  TWENTY NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY ONE

  THIRTY TWO

  THIRTY THREE

  THIRTY FOUR

  THIRTY FIVE

  THIRTY SIX

  THIRTY SEVEN

  THIRTY EIGHT

  THIRTY NINE

  FORTY

  FORTY ONE

  FORTY TWO

  FORTY THREE

  FORTY FOUR

  FORTY FIVE

  Other Books by David Leadbeater

  Stand Your Ground (A Torsten Dahl Thriller)

  by

  David Leadbeater

  Copyright 2016 by David Leadbeater

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher/author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  All characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  This ebook is for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this ebook with another person, please purchase any additional copy for each reader. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Crime, thriller, mystery, action, adventure, military, war, suspense, men's adventure, assassinations.

  DEDICATION

  For my wife and children,

  Erica, Keira, Megan

  ‘One day confound, the next astound.’

  CONTENTS

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY ONE

  TWENTY TWO

  TWENTY THREE

  TWENTY FOUR

  TWENTY FIVE

  TWENTY SIX

  TWENTY SEVEN

  TWENTY EIGHT

  TWENTY NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY ONE

  THIRTY TWO

  THIRTY THREE

  THIRTY FOUR

  THIRTY FIVE

  THIRTY SIX

  THIRTY SEVEN

  THIRTY EIGHT

  THIRTY NINE

  FORTY

  FORTY ONE

  FORTY TWO

  FORTY THREE

  FORTY FOUR

  FORTY FIVE

  Other Books by David Leadbeater

  ONE

  Of all the absurd ways to spot one of the world’s most dangerous men, Nick Grant never imagined it would be over the top of a fat and juicy Five Guys burger.

  Is that . . . ? Was it . . . ?

  No, it couldn’t be.

  Could it? After so many years?

  Grant hated to give up the burger, but his prey made for a far more palatable prospect.

  Dulles International in Washington, DC, hummed with humanity, its gleaming floors trodden by tens of thousands, from the world-weary to the desperately excited, its open-plan shops and restaurants gleaming from wall to wall. There were Bentleys waiting to be won, tired shop assistants helpfully pointing customers to the most expensive products, coffees and pastries and specialty chocolates being served. Announcements chimed out, one merging with the next, pointing travelers to their gates. Grant found the airport hustle comforting, anonymous, and felt a moment of happiness remembering that the number of living people who knew his face and could connect it to what he did numbered less than a dozen.

  Unfortunately, one of them had just crossed his path.

  Grant didn’t think Torsten Dahl had seen him, but he had to be sure. Dahl was an ex- Swedish Special Forces soldier – an elite warrior. To underestimate such a man would be equivalent to stabbing oneself in the back, and Grant hadn’t survived twenty years of criminal activity living in a cloud of complacency. Nor had he survived two previous run-ins with Dahl by taking the veteran lightly.

  Laying the burger on the tray, he slid off of his high stool and melted into the multitudes heading for Duty Free. His quarry was a tall man, broad and sporting a head of blond hair, making him relatively easy to keep track of. The real problem was maintaining his own anonymity. Grant didn’t know much about Dahl’s activities these days – their paths had been divided for over a decade – but he had heard that the Swede was working for the American government, part of some task force. The way the man shopped leisurely in the sundries store now, picking out tubes of toothpaste, deodorant and packets of mints, told Grant that he wasn’t exactly mid-mission. It occurred to Grant then that the Swede, isolated and relaxed, might never be more vulnerable.

  Except for the location, of course. It would be madness to move on a target inside a major, international airport.

  As Dahl paid for his items, two children ran up to him, clutching at his coat. Girls, both of them, perhaps eight or nine years old. Their excitement was infectious, Dahl bent to hug them both as a woman approached the trio, also blond.

  Grant’s suspicion was confirmed: Dahl was departing on some kind of vacation with his family.

  Moments ago, he’d postulated that the Swede might never be more vulnerable than while traveling for pleasure. But as he watched him now, as he saw the interaction between Dahl and the two kids and the woman, Grant realized he could be more vulnerable. He was more vulnerable.

  Grant followed the foursome at a distance, taking infinite care to remain unseen. The Swede might be good, but Grant was no freshman. People had been trying to kill him for years, or at least lock him up, which to Grant amounted to pretty much the same thing. He still tasted gun smoke when he thought about his long-ago encounter with Dahl . . . heard the grunts and moans of his dying men . . . and then tasted bitter, personal hate when reminded of his most recent one.

  As the family walked ahead of him, Grant took a quick glance at his own boarding pass, seeing that his gate also lay ahead. Wouldn’t that be interesting . . . ? He entertained a vision of unknowingly sharing the same flight with Dahl, seats apart, and never, ever knowing. How many times had that happened to people? Ex-lovers? Even estranged sons and fathers. The people who sat around you on a plane always had full lives of their own, but imagine if you’d actually known them, or shared an anonymous smile across the aisle. It might stay in your memory forever.

  Grant’s eyebrows rose as Dahl steered his family into a gate area marked for Barbados. He didn’t ha
ve to double-check his boarding pass to know they had booked the same flight.

  As Grant walked past the gate area, averting his face, his mind turned to how he might profit from the situation. Profit always came before revenge, though on occasion the two could make powerful bedfellows.

  Possibilities pummeled his brain like prize-fighters, each vying for his attention. In the end, only one could win, and it tied in perfectly with his current undertaking. To do it, he needed to make a call and change flights. Grant stopped at a sparsely populated gate and stood before an empty row of leather seats overlooking a stretch of asphalt and two lonesome-looking planes. He entered a speed-dial number in his phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Give the phone to him.”

  “Who is this?”

  One of Vega’s men, trying to be funny. “Give him the phone, or I will facilitate the removal of your funny bone and see how long you laugh.”

  A pause and muffled speech.

  “This is Gabrio.”

  Gabrio Vega was the head of one of the world’s largest and most violent drug cartels. Not a normal criminal – or human being – by any stretch of the imagination, Vega treated his men like family, conducted the majority of his business dealings through the Web, and employed an online security and search presence the FBI would have been proud of.

  Hence Grant’s open sanction to contact the man directly.

  “I’m at Dulles right now and have come across something that may be of interest to both of us.”

  Vega took a moment to absorb that. “Does it have any bearing on our Barbados operation?”

  “No, sir, I don’t think it does.”

  “Then leave it alone. Barbados is shaky right now, and we have too much invested in there to let it all go sideways.”

  Grant made a quick mental calculation, then decided to press the issue. “If you’ll give me one minute to explain, I think you might . . . enjoy this.”

  Another silence. “Enjoy?”

  Grant imagined him sat behind a big Lenovo, fingers flying, the drug lord planting his specific poisons all around the Internet.

  Before Grant could respond, Vega said, “You got forty seconds. And only because it’s you. Go.”

  “Do you remember a man named Torsten Dahl?”

  The words had the required effect.

  “Dime.” Tell me in Spanish.

  Grant had expected the change in Vega’s tone. The man’s last encounter with Torsten Dahl had left his brother dead and his Amazon operation in tatters. Millions, perhaps hundreds of millions, lost. Though it had been a decade ago, it no doubt felt like yesterday to the cartel chief.

  “I’m looking at him right now. He’s sitting with everything he holds dear in this world and about to board a plane to Barbados.”

  Another drawn-out silence.

  “I thought you said it didn’t involve our operation.” Vega said quickly.

  “I don’t believe it does. The man’s embarking on what looks to be a family vacation.”

  “So you what? Followed him?”

  “Only inside the airport. I had no idea he was here. Pure chance we ended up on the same flight.”

  “Don’t get on it. Follow on the next flight. My men will pick him up on arrival. I’ll see you soon.”

  Grant couldn’t help but wince. “Please make sure they’re your very best. Dahl will spot an obvious tail, even on vacation, and we can’t alert him to any of this.”

  Vega was known, somewhat affectionately by some, to hire any man willing to join his extended family, which included the unsavory and the not-so-bright. The main criterion was that they would wear a suit.

  But Vega was already gone.

  Grant stared hard at his phone and then out the window. What did he mean? I will see you soon. No way was the world’s most wanted drug lord heading from Mexico to Barbados. They hadn’t discussed that. Grant had never met the man in person, and quite frankly never wanted to.

  He sighed. Vega had old scores to settle, exactly as he did.

  This thing with Dahl suddenly began to look as if it might get very messy.

  Loud.

  Two outcomes Grant could little afford. He turned and began to search for an available desk agent who could book him onto a later flight. He also began to mentally amend everything he’d imagined might work to trap Dahl. The cartel would do their own thing, regardless.

  Funny thing. Here he was, not even booked on the next flight yet, but already dreaming up a plan to escape Barbados the earliest chance he got. And, in truth, already regretting his call to Vega.

  *

  Torsten Dahl found it hard to shrug off the shroud of worry that had fallen across his broad shoulders less than a half hour ago. Airports were hubs of unending motion, one face popping up in a crowd could meld with another and another, and then disappear before a man even remembered why it had suddenly, inexplicably felt important. Dahl trawled his memory, sifting through the years, through incidents that he would never speak of with his family, until a match popped up like a painted, Halloween ghoul.

  Nick Grant. An English-born, well-educated man known in criminal circles as ‘the Facilitator’ for services rendered to an exclusive set of bad actors. Grant’s title bridged a wide and pitiless gap, for he had been suspected of conspiring to commit more crimes than any book of law contained – from leaning on lawyers in pivotal trials to engineering bloody wars in the Middle East.

  Dahl maneuvered around shelves and display cases as he shopped for sundries, using reflective surfaces as a backwards-facing mirror. Lightning-fast, he skimmed every face, every figure and frame. Men, women and children bobbed by, their features sparking no recognition.

  Was he seeing ghosts? Had the job eclipsed all to the point where he saw enemies lurking at every corner? Dahl had been on the job for two years straight, no breaks except for a week’s leave here and there. He recalled something that had been said to him a dozen times in the last few weeks alone:

  Take a break. You need it.

  He’d helped avert Armageddon at least twice, not that anyone below a certain level of government would ever know, and who was really keeping count?

  Continuing to shop, Dahl chose a handful of items to keep up the charade. He moved to the register, chiding himself for wasting any time that he could be spending with the three people who meant the most to him. Truth be told, it had been a long time since they’d all been together like this, and Dahl was feeling a little out of his element.

  Isabella and Julia raced into the store and ran up to him with freshly washed hands, sparkling eyes and exuberant smiles. He was reminded again why he did what he did. Because every man and woman wanted just one thing out of life – to keep their family safe. But most weren’t equipped with the mind-set or capabilities required to go to war and earn that safety. So Dahl did it for them. Without question. Without regret. And with no expectation of reward.

  “We found a chocolate shop,” eight-year-old Isabella said.

  “Is it calorie-free chocolate?” Dahl asked.

  Isabella turned her nose up. “What’s a calorie?” She wrapped her tongue around the word with ease, another reminder of how much Dahl had missed his girls’ daily development during the last few years.

  “A calorie is a food unit,” nine-year-old Julia explained, “that grown-ups care about a lot. Mom always says she counts hers.”

  Isabella laughed. “That’s silly.”

  Dahl thought so too but kept his peace. He still couldn’t shake the feeling of unease that had taken root in him. A quick, surreptitious glance in a nearby sunglasses-rack raised no flags.

  Of course, he thought. Because there’s nothing to see . . . There’s always an easier, more straightforward way to find out if you’re being tracked aboard a plane.

  The nagging, persistent thoughts revolved around Dahl. As a career soldier, he trusted his instincts. Every single insightful, informative and often insensitive one of them.

  His wife Johanna fol
lowed the girls into the shop, looking happy and smiley, but Dahl knew the façade was for the benefit of the children. Their long marriage was at its rockiest point ever right now . . . something Johanna and he hoped a vacation would cure. But no matter their marital woes, there was no way either daughter should be privy to it. Not at this point.

  “Shall we wait at the gate?” asked Johanna.

  Dahl nodded and led the way, his mind momentarily free from Nick Grant and focused on the greater task at hand: saving his marriage.

  TWO

  Dahl saw beauty everywhere. The bluest skies and highest palms were the softest of treats to the eye; the intermittent views of a Caribbean sea and sandy beaches were nectar, the laid-back attitude of the Bajan locals a soothing balm. Time moved differently here. Dahl could see it already. The shades of blue were deeper, richer, the yellows more golden and laced with promise. Even the music was a vibrant mix of high spirits and laughter. Isabella and Julia soon warmed to it, and seeing them happy and carefree brought Dahl a profound sense of relief.

  This was already better than their flight experience in every way. He’d found himself hefting hand luggage down and smiling at the girls, reassuring them that they’d be out of the small cramped space with its below-par food and unsmiling stewardesses momentarily. Bodies had pushed against him from behind as others joined the fray. The flight attendants had finally started to smile as they saw an end to their working day.

  The taxi slowed as its driver followed a wide, sweeping bend up a driveway bordered by palm trees and a high, orange-pink wall. At the very top it widened out even more as the hotel’s entrance appeared – a colorfully-clad gateway to paradise. Porters hovered outside, leaning on trolleys and tourists milled all around, getting in the way. Eyes drifted over the new arrivals, but none appeared suspicious, even the ones that lingered overlong on Johanna’s blonde hair. Dahl handed over a wodge of local currency to the taxi driver and then followed a porter into the high-ceilinged lobby, spotting the reception, check-out and concierge desks immediately. Isabella and Julia pointed out the way to the restaurants and shops and then they were treading between red ropes, in line to check in.