Retribution Book 2 - Winter Revenge: Retribution, #2

By David Harvey

Cesar Quevedo's life revolves around revenge. The Cape Town winter rains are starting when heads will be down and buried under umbrellas. That will be his time to strike.

Dimitri Alfieri also wants revenge but understands the value of waiting. In the meantime, he can't stop niggling away at the Hout Bay family, despite being warned off.

With drug money missing, two psychopathic killers with a reputation for brutality are sent from Bogota to Cape Town to find it.

Needing fresh abalone suppliers, Cesar Quevedo unleashes his peculiar brand of brutality against an abalone poacher to simply make a point and later, meets Melissa Samuels, a key player in this world and surprises himself by succumbing to her charms.

While Cesar Quevedo and Dimitri Alfieri spend their time plotting revenge, the Hout Bay family carry out a pre-emptive ambush with military precision against them.

Dimitri learns a very painful and expensive lesson that leaves him in a hospital with a huge question mark. How could anyone know where he would be at a specific time and what he had in the boot of his car?

In an elaborate but deadly game of chess, the stakes are high and the longer this game goes on, the more dangerous it becomes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dave
• Release date: Feb 14, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463339947

Book preview

Chapter 1

Ethan’s statement about the magic of Hout Bay and what they all did, taken with what Ajax had said regarding the risks Katie was taking every day and lived with, closed the conversation on the Alfieri family and Cesar Quevedo. Following a final quick swim as suggested by Ethan they powered up the SkyJax and Lovemore took them back to Hout Bay.

The beauty of having someone with the size and strength of Makulu along now became clear.  While everyone took their share, Lovemore also brought the rods, and the portable table, and while it needed two people to normally carry the cooler box packed with fish and ice, Makulu easily carried it by himself.

Lovemore organized for them to be cleaned and filleted and while they were waiting, Boykie helped Lovemore wash the rods and packed them away carefully. Lovemore would take his share of the fish, ensure the boat was cleaned and covered where necessary and disappear to find someone to barter with. Everyone else disappeared to Beach Club to braai at Ajax’s house

First stop though was Woolworths in Mainstream Shopping centre for salads and bread followed by the complications of ten people going through a quick shower routine between the two houses.

After that was a detailed walk-through of Ajax’s gymnasium and a discussion with Makulu once the men had been dismissed from the kitchen.

‘Not everyone has a home gymnasium. What’s the story?’

‘Not much to tell. Dallas, I and Tulley when she’s here, run every morning and afterwards we come back and work out. Ethan joins us most days but our focus is on Krav Maga training, while Ethan is Martial Arts and Tulley is both Krav Maga and Russian Combat Sambo, which is another form of Krav Maga.

She had some ruthless training in Israel during and after her time in the Army, so don’t pick a fight with her. She’ll gouge your eyes out while you’re thinking about your first move.’

‘I’ll bear that in mind. So what you’re saying is that if she offers you something to drink, best to say yes?’

‘Probably a good idea.’

‘By the way, we need to rotate Andrea and Susan for two weeks. Otherwise, they’ll eventually get bored staring at the same street every day. Are you okay with that?’

‘Oscar mentioned it to us and it makes sense. When did you have in mind?’ Ethan asked.

‘Could we look at Wednesday? Susan will bring them around early to introduce them to you and it will be a seamless transfer.’

‘So long as they’re good, we’re happy.’

Boykie looked at Makulu for a few seconds as though thinking something through and said. ‘What exactly does Krav Maga or Combat Sambo do?’

‘They’re both self-defence systems, but they’re damn cutthroat and ruthless. If you take a mix of karate, judo, some MMA and add Krav Maga training it is essentially the complete self-defence system. Amongst other niceties, it’s eye-gouging, fighting on the ground, choking someone, you name it.

It’s teaching you to end something before it even begins. We end every session with the heavy bag punching, speed bag, everything you saw downstairs. Why?’

‘Because we need to step up our training to something like that. We have a comprehensive training routine that everyone goes through regularly, but this takes it a whole step forward.’

‘There are places in Cape Town that offer Krav Maga,’ Ajax said.

‘Yes, I’ll take your word for that but you’ve got three different stories all happening in one place which sounds as though you’re combining them. Which means you’re taking it to a whole new level,’ Makulu said.

‘That we are,’ Ethan nodded, ‘but I’m not sure where you’re going with this?’

‘I’m not sure either yet. But Boykie’s got something brewing in his head, I recognize the glint in his eye.’

‘I want to mull my thoughts around a little,’ Boykie replied. Then looking through the doorway from the patio into the kitchen, he glanced at Ajax and said. ‘Given we’re the guests here, shouldn’t you be getting our hard caught fish on the grill? We’re about to get into some kind of trouble, I guarantee it.’

He nodded towards a tall shape as Alison materialised against the doorway, looked at each of them in turn and shook her head. ‘First, you forgot about drinks for us and second, we’ll be ready in ten minutes and...’ she looked around the patio ‘... and third, I’m not seeing anything that even vaguely resembles food preparation out here.’

Makulu leaned back, put his long legs on the railing, clasped his hands behind his head and laughed. ‘Oops, boss, between you and Ethan, this is not good.’

Ajax looked at Ethan sheepishly, grinned and leapt out of his chair. ‘C’mon Ethan, You get the drinks and I’ll get the braai going.’ He was about to ask Alison about drinks but as he looked at the doorway, she’d already left to go back inside.

He looked at Makulu. ‘How dangerous will it be for Ethan to go inside and ask who’s drinking what?’

‘Mmm, on a scale of one to ten, about an eleven I reckon.’

‘Good luck Ethan,’ Ajax laughed. ‘At least I’m safe out here.’

Long seconds passed after Ethan went inside before he emerged shaking his head. ‘Jeez, it was just drinks. You’d think we’d left them abandoned on the side of the highway in the middle of a storm.’

‘Did you get pounded?’ Boykie asked.

‘Let’s say it was experientially instructive.’

Ajax laughed as he fiddled with the braai, turned on the gas and fired it up. Then he stood back and said. ‘Oh crap, the fillets are in the fridge in the kitchen. Won’t you bring them back with you Ethan?’

‘Not a chance in hell, brother. You laughed when you thought you were safe, but now it’s your turn to experience the walk of shame.’

Boykie stood up and walked across to Ethan. ‘Let me help you with the drinks, but I’m not taking them inside. That’s your role here and I’m the guest so I’ll stick to the limit of the patio doorway.’

‘I’ll have a beer, to begin with, thank you,’ Makulu called, not moving from his position by the railing, watching with a big smile. ‘I’ve been there before. Now I’m just going to be one of the neglected guests.’

Ethan sucked it up, took an assortment of wine bottles from the fridge which he put on a tray and he and Boykie carefully placed several types of glasses on a second tray.

‘Can you carry one of these in?’ Ethan asked.

Boykie looked at him, went to the fridge, fetched a beer for Makulu and a bottle of red wine for himself with a glass, gave the beer to Makulu and sat back down, shaking his head. ‘Get Ajax to help – he’s already entering the dragon’s den to fetch the fish. I’m watching from a distance.’

‘Jeez,’ Ethan looked at Ajax and laughed. ‘And we’re putting our lives in their hands?’

‘We have your backs guys,’ Makulu said. ‘Just not during your current period of neglect. You need to learn to pick your battles more carefully I would say.’ He held up the bottle into the last glow of the sun as it fell behind the Sentinel Mountain range. ‘Nice beer by the way.’

‘Come on Ajax, let’s get this done.’

After emerging with the fish and some snack starters, Ajax tested the braai, carefully basted each fillet with his special home-made mix of olive oil and sauce and got them on. Ten people were eating, although if you added Makulu, that took it up to about fourteen.

Watching the rest of the food being laid out, he timed his preparations carefully, and as the last dish came out and Ethan and Boykie refreshed everyone’s drinks, he turned the grill off, loaded the fillets onto warming trays and brought them through.

‘Go mad.’

By nine o’clock, they’d finished, washed up, loaded the dishwasher and were heading out their separate ways. Boykie hadn’t expanded on his previous thoughts and his only parting comment after lavishing praise on the day was that Susan would bring the next security team around on Wednesday morning, but she and Andrea would be in place, as usual, the next day.

They started Monday with one goal which was to get the Apache done, and out of there. It was almost finished but needed final tweaking on the wiring before going across to the Fitment Center over the road. After that, they would road test it and if that went well, they’d give it a final polish and vacuum and arrange for its collection.

On Wednesday they arrived slightly earlier than usual to meet with Susan and the two new BM Total Security team. She was already in the office talking to Carol-Anne when they arrived and she introduced Dallas, Ethan, and Ajax to Belinda Houston and Violet Mashike.

Belinda, a coloured lady was short and although she looked plump at a first glance, when she shook hands with them it was a different impression.

Close up she was hard muscle and a handshake like a vice. She was plain-looking and the opposite of Violet who was tall and thin with very black skin and fine delicate features, but with a similar firm hard handshake. They were both dressed in old jeans and coats and if the idea was to make them remarkable in not standing out in a crowd, they’d achieved it.

‘I’ll spend the morning with them,’ Susan said, ‘and introduce them to Jean and Tulley and we’ll walk around the streets and get to know Hout Bay.’

‘The same applies as we did with you, Susan,’ Dallas said. ‘When you’re off duty for your shift, feel free to come here and wash up or have coffee.’

‘A note of caution though,’ Susan said. ‘Don’t come up here every time or you’ll set a pattern. The person we caught who was watching the office previously is probably still in a lot of pain. Chances are he’s done a lot of wondering about what happened and how. But at some point, he will be back and he will be unhappy.’

Chapter 2

And unhappy best described Cesar Quevedo at this point. He’d had to learn the hard way that the previously simple things in life you took for granted and instinctively used your dominant hand for, were made infinitely more difficult when you had limited use of that hand.

The Doctors he’d seen were not entirely sure he would gain full use of both fingers once the cast was removed. If that was the case, he knew it would impact his ability to shoot properly as the index finger, his trigger finger, had been severely damaged.

Because he would need to meet with Benito Alfieri shortly for a status update on the next abalone shipment, he’d had to ask Dimitri, well, beg Dimitri really, to stay with the lie he would have to tell; which was that he’d been checking up on the abalone story in Hangberg and he’d slipped on wet rocks.

That he’d ended up nearly grovelling to Dimitri to support him in the lie, added to his increasing hatred of the two men in Hout Bay. But it was either a lie or Alfieri would take him swimming given he’d told Quevedo to leave the Hout Bay people to Oscar.

And to make things worse, although he hadn’t seen him since the last abalone meeting, he’d heard from Dimitri that something was making his Uncle unhappy.

Quevedo couldn’t do a lot of things properly at the moment, given his hand injury, but he could drive, and he spent time in Paarden Eiland with Donegan looking at how best to accommodate an increased quantity of abalone. It was all about the timing and the accurate estimation of the number of cases that needed to be half-filled with hake.

When the cases needed to be ready for loading onto the next ship, the night shift had to know what was happening and Marvin September, the night shift manager, brought up to speed. The next ship was due to dock in ten days and Quevedo was expecting a reply from the Chinese at any point on increased volumes. But he needed time for the suppliers to plan for any increased quantity.

A lot depended on Hondeklip and whether they’d taken his warning seriously. It wasn’t going to be easy to find a new supplier if they just told him now to fuck off, one week before the product needed to start arriving.

As he was driving back to Camps Bay from Paarden Eiland his phone rang. ‘Dimitri?’ He answered.

‘Benito needs to see you. He needs an update for the Chinese. Where are you?’

‘Just left Paarden Eiland. I’ll be there in thirty minutes give or take.’

‘Okay.’ Dimitri rang off.

When he arrived at the office, he walked up to Alfieri’s office. Jasmine looked at him, shook her head and told him to go through. As he walked into Alfieri’s office, she got up and closed the interleading door, expecting an explosion.

Alfieri looked up as Quevedo walked in, then sat back and watched as he sat down, favouring his damaged hand. ‘What the fuck did you do this time?’

‘I was looking at the abalone story in Hout Bay and we had to go over the mountain. It was wet, and I slipped and jammed my hand between some rocks.’

‘If you lie to me, you’re dead, you do know that?’ He was staring at Quevedo, looking for any signs of uncertainty, but Quevedo showed nothing. He’d also lost all sense of emotion about two minutes after birth and his eyes could go just as cold and merciless as Alfieri’s so the staring contest produced nothing.

‘When’s the next ship arriving?’

‘In nine days.’

‘Are we ready?’

‘We will be. I’ve spent most of the last two weeks since the accident,’ he held up his hand, ‘at Paarden Eiland. Do we know yet if the Chinese will take more?’

‘That’s why we’re having this talk. Yes, they will. How much more can we supply?’

‘I don’t know for sure yet as I need to speak to the people up the coast. They’re waiting for me to tell them before they can get out into the water because it has to be caught, shucked and frozen immediately.’

‘I don’t want fishing lessons. That’s your problem. But the Chinese will take whatever we can supply them.’

‘Did they pay?’

‘In full. Is there anything else?’

‘No.’

‘Leave the door open on your way out.’

As Quevedo opened the door and stepped into Jasmine’s office, Alfieri called him back. ‘Just step carefully with the Chinese. And in Hout Bay. Understand?’

Hearing the double entendre for what it was, he replied. ‘I will.’

Quevedo walked back down to his office. He needed to get the abalone people moving, as their deliveries had to start in the next few days so he hit the phone, starting with Hondeklip again, curious to see what would happen.

His call was answered so rapidly, it was as though they had been waiting. ‘Yes, sir?’ Which surprised him. Maybe they’d stopped being funny after all.

‘Can you supply next week?’

‘How much?’

‘Can you do seven hundred?’

‘Seven hundred fish or seven hundred kilos?’

‘Kilos. But we’re talking shucked, no shells.’

‘Ja boss, probably. When?’

‘Next Wednesday night in Paarden Eiland. At nine o'clock. I will send you the coordinates.’

‘Okay. And payment?’

‘As soon as they’re offloaded and weighed.’

‘Okay.’

‘You know the nuclear power station by the main road?’

‘Yes.’

‘Tell your driver to phone me when he gets to it so I can make sure everything is ready.’

‘We will.’

Cesar killed the call. Obviously, they’d gotten the message. This time there was no funny stuff, no joking, just yes sir, no sir. He loved it.

His second call to Papendorp produced more good news. They could probably do another five hundred kilograms on top of what they had delivered the previous month and by the time he put the phone down on his third call, Saldanha Bay, he was smiling. The pressure from the police and National Parks had eased, and they were good to go. Full payment on delivery with no messing around had to be playing a big part, he thought.

His final call was to his man in Hangberg. Cesar had no wish to go out there just yet in case temptation overcame him and he did something stupid.

He wasn’t ready for the next step just yet, but he also knew he wouldn’t take the Hummer when he went Hout Bay hunting as he was convinced now they’d seen it somehow and not him necessarily.

He would hire a car for a week or so because the rains were coming and once they did, he would be ready.

He made one further call when he’d finished getting the product sorted for delivery from Hangberg and that was to Marvin September to get his team set for the following week. The first delivery would come through on Tuesday night and he needed to get the packers ready and in place.

They’d meet at the warehouse at five o’clock next Tuesday afternoon just after the day shift left and then get the night shift going in preparation. They had to unload the half-filled boxes of hake from the freezer, pack the abalone in, fill each box to the top with a layer of hake, seal them and get them back into the freezer.

On Tuesday as scheduled, Quevedo met Marvin at the warehouse. Donegan was waiting for them and showed them the boxes they’d left half-filled in the freezer. He also showed Marvin where they needed to be re-stacked once filled and sealed.

About thirty minutes after he left, the first mini-bus of night shift workers arrived, came in, changed into their safety wear and unloaded the freezer. The second mini-bus with the rest of the team arrived a few minutes later and within ten minutes the warehouse was in full un-pack production mode, while Cesar sat upstairs and plotted his Hout Bay strategy.

When the call arrived at eight-thirty from the Hondeklip driver that he’d just left the Power Station in his rear-view mirror, Cesar called Marvin into his office.

‘They’ll be here in about fifty minutes. But, I want you guys to be careful. I had problems with them up in Hondeklip so I gave them a lesson in not being stupid in the future. I’m not sure they’ve fully bought into it yet, so when the truck reverses in, let the driver open the doors, but stand to one side, away from the truck if you can.’

Marvin looked at him puzzled and then his face cleared. ‘You think they may try something?’

‘Don’t know, but let’s not under-think what could happen. There might be some anger issues still.’

‘What did you do to them?’

‘I shot one of them the last time I was up there.’

‘Shot him how bad?’

‘As in dead.’

‘That would piss them off. How where they when you contacted them last week.’

‘That’s what worried me. Too eager to please. Who answers the phone yes sir?’

‘Where will you be?’

‘Close enough to respond if they try to play games. But if they do, get yourself and your team out the way. They’re my problem, not yours.’

‘You got it.’

Cesar’s phone rang again about thirty minutes later. ‘We’re outside. Can you tell your security to let us in?’

‘Give me a minute.’

Going downstairs, Cesar called Marvin. ‘Open up, they’re at security.’

Marvin rolled up the big warehouse door and walked to security, indicating for them to open the gate.

As the truck drove in, Marvin walked up to the driver’s door and showed where to turn so he could reverse into the warehouse. Then he walked next to the driver, showing him exactly what position they needed and when to stop and moved out the way as the driver got out, followed by a second person who’d been in the passenger seat.

Marvin met them at the back and then as the driver opened the truck doors, he moved away and pretended to crouch down and tie his shoelace up. When he’d done that and nothing had changed, he moved around the back and saw nothing but containers stacked on wooden pallets.

‘You have people to unpack?’ The driver asked.

‘Yes – they’re here.’ He turned and called, ‘Jerome, let’s get this story going.’

Jerome and three women arrived and started unpacking as the driver said. ‘Where’s Mr Quevedo? I need to get paid.’

‘He’s here, let me call him.’

As he moved away, Cesar emerged from one of the ground floor offices holding a heavy bag in his left hand.

‘Let’s do this upstairs,’ he pointed up to the first floor. Then he turned and led the way to the office he used when he was here. Standing aside, he waited until the driver was inside the office, then came in and laid the bag on the desk, opened it and showed the driver the cash.

‘What’s the total weight?’

The driver pulled out a notebook from his pocket and opened it.  ‘Should be seven hundred and twenty-seven kilograms. A big haul.’

Cesar pulled out his phone and did his calculations. Then he turned his phone around so the driver could see the figure. His eyes showed surprise. ‘That’s more than was agreed?’

‘Because this time you guys didn’t fuck me around. It was done properly, so that’s what happens when you don’t play games. It’s in here,’ he pointed at the bag, ‘but let’s get back downstairs and wait until it’s all off-loaded and double-checked.’

Leaving the bag there, Cesar walked behind the driver as they left, he closed the office door and together they went down to where the truck was now almost empty. Marvin was standing next to an electronic scale, recording the weight of the shucked abalone as it came off the pallet and placed on the scale.

He knew the exact weight of the container, so each time the weight recorded was less the weight of the container until finally, he showed the electronic figure to Cesar and the driver.

‘Seven hundred and twenty-nine kilograms,’ Marvin read.

‘Okay,’ Cesar said. ‘Let’s go back upstairs and get it done.’

Retracing his steps the two of them walked back to the office where Cesar opened the bag, pulled out piles of carefully packed two hundred rand notes, each in a bag and with a total written on a sticker.

Each stack was worth twenty thousand rands, so he counted out twelve of the bundles and then the balance from another stack of notes and finally the last bits and pieces that made up the total.

When he’d pulled out what was going to the driver, he took out the rest of the cash and his backup gun and placed them on the other side of the table. The empty bag, he handed across. ‘You’ll need this,’ he said.

When the driver finished counting, he packed the money away and looked at Quevedo. ‘And next month?’

‘I only want freshly shucked abalone. Not something three days old and left in the sun.’

‘We only do fresh, you saw that. We dive two days before and then we shuck them and freeze them. We can’t leave it later than that. Seven hundred kilograms is a lot of diving and a lot of perlies.’

‘What’s the highest you can get?’

‘Maybe eight hundred kilograms. That’s the maximum. More than that is too risky for everyone.’

‘Eight hundred will be good. If you can do that every month you’ll make a lot of money.’

‘So will you.’

‘Just remember who my customers are. If we make them unhappy, they won’t come out here and just shoot one person. They’ll shoot your whole team and bring their own in. That’s who we’re dealing with. That’s why you got more money tonight. We keep them happy, we keep everyone happy.’

Which sounded good but was pretty much bullshit, Cesar thought. If the Chinese ran out of patience, they’d be seriously pissed, but would just go somewhere else. That would mean Alfieri wouldn’t need Cesar, so he’d probably just take him swimming. But the people who brought the abalone up from the bottom of the ocean didn’t need to know any of that.

The same pattern repeated itself the next night when the second delivery took place, at a slightly lower price though. Cesar felt that unless there were exceptional circumstances like Hondeklip coming to the party, at last, it was best to keep the extra profits for times like the previous night.

Saldanha came through on Thursday night with their agreed delivery and that just left Hangberg. When they off-loaded their agreed amount on the fourth night, the warehouse had close to three thousand kilograms of abalone mixed in with the hake which would net them close to seventeen million rands this time.

Do that every month Cesar thought, and they’d be the serious players. Besides, he knew it was a product with a limited timeline. They were being poached faster than they could ever be replaced and in ten years they’d be gone. But in ten years they’d make a ton of money.

Chapter 3

Back in Hout Bay, Ajax and Ethan reunited the Chevrolet Apache with its owner on Monday afternoon, but with a strong warning like a terms and conditions label.

When Joe De Vos, the owner, arrived to collect it, the first thing Ajax told him was. ‘Joe, understand how powerful this thing is now. I promise you, don’t put your foot flat at a robot because you’ll end up in a tree. I don’t know if you ever drove it before you loaded it on the flat-bed to bring here but now you’ve got a monster.’

‘Beauty inside the beast,’ Ethan chipped in.

‘Meaning?’

‘Let’s be honest Joe – this thing is ugly. It may look beautiful now, but it was ugly in 1958 and it’s still ugly now. But crap – even I have to say it’s got the engine from hell and it can move. Unless you’re thinking about what you’re doing, when you drive up the road, pretend petrol is costing you a hundred rands a litre.’

Joe looked at them to see if they were joking, taking a few seconds to realize that was not the case. ‘I hear you,’ he said eventually. ‘Let me get used to it before I put it through the paces is what you’re telling me?’

‘Exactly,’ Ajax said. ‘This is absolutely a walk before you run story.’

With the Chevrolet Apache out the way, they could afford to take a small break before Carol-Anne announced the next car was arriving. 'An ex-rally driver, a Bernard Du Plessis owns the car. It’s a Jaguar. But he told me to tell you he needs to talk about the engine when he gets here. It has some special needs he wants to talk about.’

‘Okay,’ Ajax said. ‘When is he coming in?’

‘On Wednesday. I pushed him out a day as you asked, so you can take a break tomorrow, and sweep out the workshop or something?’

‘You’re a funny lady Carol-Anne. Assuming we will not be sweeping out the workshop, do we need to be paying attention to anything else that’s been one of those things we should’ve got to but didn’t?’

‘I would’ve hounded you if there was. Why don’t you two visit your friends from Camps Bay or something?’

‘Is it just the Jaguar coming in?’

‘Yes – according to the owner, Mr Du Plessis, he says the engine has a lot of special requirements that need to happen to it. That’s why he wants to talk to you, so I pushed everyone else out.’

‘Did he say what kind of engine it was?’

Carol-Anne looked at her monitor. ‘Yes, it has a V12 engine. It’s supposed to be a six litre, V12 engine if that means something to you?’

‘You hear that Ethan? Our first V12 engine. Do you know how big that thing is?’

‘Not really no. But going by how excited you look, it sounds kind of big?’

‘A V12 is enormous. You have no idea. We studied them at College because they were such a rarity in a streetcar.’

Just then the office door opened and Belinda Houston walked in. As the door closed behind her, she stopped and said. ‘I’m sorry, am I interrupting anything?’

‘Not at all,’ Ethan said.  ‘We’ve just gotten rid of that monstrosity of a truck we had in the workshop so we’re sitting here bored and being entertained by Carol-Anne. She’s on a roll today.’

‘May I make some coffee?’

‘Of course; but if you’re offering, I’ll have some,’ Ajax said. ‘Myself too,’ Ethan added. ‘And me,’ called out Dallas from her office. Belinda looked at Carol-Anne. ‘Can I also make some for you?’

‘I’d love some too, thank you. And you thought you’d just sneak in and grab a quick cup? Now you’re making for everyone.’

‘That’s fine.’

She looked quite a lot like Carol-Anne, Ajax thought and it had nothing to do with them both being coloured, as he watched her get the coffee machine going. Carol-Anne without the muscles. If you put the age difference aside, they could’ve been sisters.

‘Is anything happening out there?’ Ajax asked.

‘Nothing at all that we’ve seen. If anyone walks up Victoria or down it, we’ve got eyes on them and they either turn left onto Princess and carry on or right towards the harbour. But neither of us have seen someone doing both up and down within about ten minutes of each trip. Because I’m a coloured woman, nobody looks at me. There’s too many of us walking up or down and people just assume I’m coming from Hangberg or going back there, like everyone else.’

‘Where’s Violet?’

‘Enjoying breakfast at Dario’s. And she blends in, being black and fluent in about five languages. She’s getting to know all the waiters – which works well because she can tell them she keeps coming back to chat them up.’

While they were talking, Ajax took a call from Boykie. ‘How busy are you guys right now?’

‘We’re sitting having coffee with Belinda and the team, bored out of our skulls, why?’

‘Can Makulu and I come round for coffee as well?’

‘Sure, how long will you be?’

‘About forty minutes.’

‘Okay, just when Belinda thought she was done making coffee for the day. I’ll get her to fire up another two just now.’

Belinda looked up enquiringly. ‘Makulu and Boykie are coming round,’ he answered. ‘Any reason you know of that they would want to pop around?’

‘Nothing I can think of. I’ll wait until I hear them park and then get fresh pods going for them.’

‘Impress the hell out of them,’ Ethan grinned. Then he looked at Ajax. ‘Boykie gave you no indication at all?’

‘Nothing – unless they’re also just bored.’

Thirty-five minutes later the answer arrived with a car turning off Victoria and onto their gravelled parking. ‘That’s probably them,’ Belinda said. ‘Let me impress the hell out of them and get their coffee going.’

‘Um Belinda, you would also impress the hell out of me if you could extend that to a top-up for me as well?’ Ajax lifted his mug. ‘Ditto,’ Ethan said.

They stood up when Makulu and Boykie came in, shook hands warmly and then they greeted Belinda and everyone else and sat down. Boykie produced his tablet and opened it but left it on the table and sat back waiting for his coffee.

‘How’s our friend with the ponytail?’ Ajax asked.

‘He’s been a busy boy between Camps Bay and Paarden Eiland,’ Boykie said. ‘He’s been there several times during the day and then last week he was there in the evenings as well.’

‘So long as he stays that side of the Mountain, we’re happy,’ Ethan said. ‘Do you think this has anything to do with the abalone story Oscar was telling us about?’

‘Probably, but as you said, that’s not our concern. Only when he comes this way again.’

Belinda had finished all the coffee orders, and as she was getting her refill, she looked at Makulu and asked. ‘Is this private or can I sit in during my break?’

‘Sit,’ Makulu answered. ‘It affects you as much as anyone in the organization. Just so you know, this goes back to that last fish braai we had at your place. Boykie’s finally got his head around what he was thinking so, Boykie – go for it.’

‘I was extremely interested that evening in that Combat Sambo and Krav Maga story, as you were aware,’ Boykie started. ‘That’s something we could use a lot of. We get reasonably intense hand to hand and combat training, but I don’t believe it is anywhere near as intense as what you guys are doing or what Tulley used to do.

The reason for coming out here now is to find out how busy Tulley is during the week? I mean if we provided the venue and the staff, could she train them in a unique blend of the two?’

Ajax looked at Boykie in surprise. ‘To be honest, I don’t have a clue. But if she had free time – and I stress if – where’s the venue you’re talking about? I’m not sure going through to Cape Town two or three days or evenings a week would work for her.’

‘She could walk there,’ Makulu smiled. ‘That’s the beauty. We’ve been doing some investigations in Hout Bay. The house at the end of Royal Avenue, which is the road parallel to Victoria, have been looking for an owner or long-term tenant for a long time, but their problem is that the house looks as though someone designed it as an Art Studio or Gallery. I don’t see it as a live-in family home. Also, I imagine that when the wind blows, the house gets some sand.’

‘And how do Tulley and this house connect?’ Ethan asked.

‘If it became a work-out house, then sand isn’t a problem