Spider''s Web

by Stephen Leather

Genres: Action & Adventure; Thrillers

Synopsis

Three all-action short stories, including two brand new Spider Shepherd adventures. The collection also includes an extract from the tenth Spider Shepherd thriller, TRUE COLOURS, out 18 July 2013. One of the new Spider Shepherd short stories, Hard Evidence : When Dan ''Spider'' Shepherd wakes up alone in a bricked basement room, chained by the wrists to a cast-iron ceiling pipe with a throbbing pain in his skull, he knows he has a big problem. He has no idea how he got there. He has no idea who put him there. He has no idea of his fate. And he has no idea how he is going to escape . . .

Release date: June 6, 2013

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Print pages: 48

Sample

Dan ‘Spider’ Shepherd had good days, and he had bad days. One of the advantages of working for MI5 was that life was never boring, but that wasn’t always necessarily a good thing and sometimes there was a price to be paid. His day had started out as a good one but all that had changed when the men in ski masks had bundled him into the back of a Transit van. Now he was hanging by his arms in a basement and it was most definitely turning out to be a bad day. One of his worst.

They hadn’t taken him without a fight, and his jaw ached where he’d been punched and something had cracked him across the back of his skull. The walls were brick and the only window was set high in the wall and composed of glass blocks that were covered in cobwebs. The floor was bare concrete, and in one corner of the room there was a small pile of what looked like rat droppings.

They had used a chain to bind his wrists together and then slung it over a metal pipe that ran across the ceiling. It was a good six inches across and made of cast iron. It was probably a waste pipe, and from time to time something gurgled inside. The pipe was strong and the brackets holding the pipe to the concrete ceiling were just as sturdy.

Shepherd’s heart was pounding as adrenalin continued to course through his system. He consciously slowed his breathing and forced himself to relax. Whatever was happening wasn’t good but at least he was still alive. He needed to think.

The chain was made up of small links, no more than half an inch long, and they had used a small brass padlock to fasten it around his wrists. His legs were free but they had yanked his arms up so high that he had to keep his legs and back straight to keep the pressure off his shoulders.

He pulled hard on the chain but the pipe was unyielding and all he did was hurt his wrists. The chain was so tight around his wrists that he was already losing the feeling in his fingers. He stared up at the ceiling, wondering whether there was anyone above him. He tried banging the chain against the pipe but it barely made any sound.

‘Hello!’ he shouted. ‘Is there anyone there?’ His voice echoed off the walls. Shepherd listened. He couldn’t hear anything outside the basement and he doubted that anyone would be able to hear him. If there had been any chance of his cries being heard they would probably have gagged him.

Shepherd had no idea who his captors were. The men that had bundled him into the van had been wearing ski masks and gloves and hadn’t said a word from start to finish. They had been professional, that much was clear. There had been an economy of movement that came with practice and familiarity.

He hadn’t seen them coming. He’d parked his BMW in the car park of a pub where he was due to meet a contact. It was just after ten at night and he’d deliberately parked in an unlit area, which is why he hadn’t seen the three men until they’d emerged from the shadows. Shepherd had managed to get a few punches in but then a fourth man had appeared from nowhere and smacked him in the face, and as Shepherd had turned he’d been hit across the back of the head. The next thing he remembered was waking up in the room, hanging from the pipe.

There were three cases that he was working on, any one of which could have blown up in his face. He was running an agent who had infiltrated a Somalian drugs gang that was helping fund Al-Shabaab terrorists back in their native Somalia. Ali Sharif, a London-born Somalian, had applied to join MI5 and had been immediately signed up and assigned to an undercover unit. Shepherd had been brought in to run him.

Shepherd had also recently reprised one of his regular legends, that of Garry Edwards, an arms dealer happy to sell weapons to anyone with money. It was a joint operation with the Metropolitan Police, set up to entrap a group of armed robbers who were planning a raid on a Hatton Garden jewellery firm.

The third case was mainly surveillance, tracking a Russian assassin who, according to a tip from the Russian intelligence agency, had flown in from New York intent on killing a Russian journalist who had made London her home. The assassin’s name was Viktor Tankov and according to the Russian intel he was a former special forces soldier who had carried out more than a dozen killings. Shepherd had been in charge of a surveillance unit that was keeping a close eye on the Russian since he had arrived in the country.

They had taken him for a reason, Shepherd was sure of that much at least. If they’d wanted him dead they could have put a bullet in his head and left him on the ground, or they could have strangled or knifed him in the van and dumped his body. The fact that he was gagged and bound meant that they needed something from him, probably information.

He concentrated on his active cases, trying to work out who had imprisoned him.

Somalian drug dealers generally didn’t bother gathering intelligence; they tended to shoot first and not worry about asking any questions. And. . .