Gray Salvation Read Free

data that had been downloaded by Brigandicuum and the subsequent action taken.
    ‘It says the police found nothing on his computer. Are they sure they got the right one?’
    ‘They double-checked that,’ Harvey said. ‘Brigandicuum had downloaded the network card’s global unique identifier, and the police’s technical forensics team confirmed that they had the right machine. They just couldn’t find the data that was supposed to have been on it.’
    ‘A new hard drive?’ Farsi suggested.
    ‘It could be,’ Harvey admitted, ‘or perhaps he used a program to destroy any incriminating data before his computer was seized. I ran it past Gerald and he said both were possible explanations.’
    When it came to anything electronic, there wasn’t much that MI5’s resident technician Gerald Small didn’t know.
    ‘What did a background check reveal? Anything to suggest a motive?’
    ‘Nothing,’ Harvey said. ‘Notley looks to be squeaky clean, but we can’t take any chances given the supposed threat.’
    ‘So what was your next step going to be?’ Farsi asked.
    ‘We’ve got taps on his phone and all data streamed through his Internet service provider is being channelled to us. So far there’s been nothing unusual. All we can do now is assign a resource to him and see where he goes.’
    ‘I’ll get on it,’ Farsi promised.
    Harvey returned to his desk and found an internal message from Ellis. It contained a link to the file Willard had been working on, and he opened it to see the now familiar face of Nikolai Sereyev.
    Harvey raised his arms and stretched, then leaned over his keyboard.
    ‘Let’s see what you’ve been up to.’

Chapter 2
    18 January 2016
    Harvey was adding to his growing list of notes when his mobile phone tore him away from Nikolai Sereyev’s file. He checked the caller ID and smiled as he answered.
    ‘Hi, honey. How did it go?’
    ‘Looks like I’ll be moving office,’ Sarah said.
    ‘Excellent! Do you know when?’
    ‘I haven’t got a clear date. Martin wants me to hand over all of my assignments first, so it won’t be before the end of February. He isn’t happy about it, though.’
    ‘His loss is my gain.’ Harvey leaned back in his chair. ‘Thankfully he saw sense.’
    ‘Only after I threatened to resign if he blocked the move,’ she said.
    An email from the Russia desk interrupted him. ‘You’ll have to tell me about it when I get back to the flat,’ he said. ‘I’ve got to pop down and see someone about a new case I’ve been assigned to. If you can throw something together, I’ll get a bottle of wine on the way home.’
    The evening’s plans made, he said his goodbyes and walked downstairs to see Gayle Cooper, head of the Russia section.
    ‘I’m so sorry to hear about Jason,’ Harvey said as he walked into Cooper’s office. He could tell she’d been crying, and she suddenly looked a lot older than her forty years.
    ‘It’s knocked us for six,’ Cooper admitted. ‘Veronica says you’re going to be leading this up, so I wanted to give you everything we have on Bessonov.’
    Cooper had a laptop mirrored on a wall-mounted TV, where the Russian mobster’s face already filled the screen. She clearly wasn’t in the mood for conversation, so Harvey let her launch into the presentation.
    ‘Alexi Bessonov, born in Moscow on 30 May 1962. His mother was a seamstress, his father a machine operator in a munitions factory. He became delinquent at thirteen and was arrested four times before dropping out of school at fifteen. He took up with a local black marketeer, where he earned a reputation as an enforcer. Bessonov reportedly killed his first man at age sixteen, and a dozen other deaths in Russia have been attributed to him.
    ‘At twenty he was sent to London to help out in a power struggle between two Russian gangs. Thirteen people died in less than a week, including the head of the rival mob, and Bessonov became one of the personal bodyguards of the victor,