Read Online The Pure by Jake Wallis Simons - Free Book Online Page A

we get back into our routine?’ he mumbled. ‘You were supposed to only come out at night.’
    ‘I am the Kol. I can come out whenever I please.’
    ‘You’re a heartless bitch, you know that?’ said Uzi.
    The Kol fell silent. Uzi squinted at the screen through the fragrant smoke. The heat of the day was beginning to fall into his apartment; he opened the window and sat down. Slowly but surely, his eyelids became leaden and his mind gently wandered. The picture of Ram Shalev – the one which had been on the front page of all the newspapers after he was killed by Operation Cinnamon – appeared his mind. Smiling in his garden with his two children, his wife. The trees behind, the vivid blue sky, the button-down shirt. Uzi tried not to hold on to the image. He knew it would only make things worse. Eventually it passed, and for a while images of the ambulance appeared, pleasant images, as if it had been a comfortable place to be. As if it were a womb.
    Then, memories of a kill sprang up, his second kill for the Office. Beirut, 2007. Lebanon was being rebuilt in the aftermath of the Israeli bombardment. A network of new roads and bridges was being constructed throughout the capital; Adam was posing as a building contractor, bribing local construction workers to build plastic cases into the infrastructure as they worked. Airtight plastic cases containing little Israeli-made bombs that could remain in a serviceable state for years, even decades, buried in bridges and motorways, to be detonated remotely at the push of a button. They would give Israel a great advantage if there was another war. But it was dangerous work. Not only was there a good chance that one of the construction workers would be caught in the act, but it was difficult to trust them. They were being paid handsomely, of course, but the operation had been put together in haste, and Adam hadn’t had time to build up a solid connection with these men; as a result their relationship was always poisoned by suspicion.
    One in particular – Walid Khaled, a wiry old labourer with the eyes of a beaten dog – had been spotted one night photographing the bridge with his mobile phone. No chances could be taken. A kill request was sent to Israel and the prime minister approved it within hours; an emergency closed-doors court case had ruled that the action was unavoidable. The only snag was that all the Kidonim – assassination units – were tied up elsewhere in the world. Adam would have to carry it out himself, despite his lack of expertise. The danger was too great; if Khaled reported him to the authorities, or, if he was clever enough, sold the information, the Office’s mission would be compromised and Adam would almost certainly be dead. There was a chance that Khaled was innocent, of course. But Adam had no choice.
    This was no time for a signature hit. The Office’s usual brand of audacious, broad daylight attack – a devastating volley of dum-dum bullets in a public place, followed by a single shot to the temple – was out of the question. The operation was in a delicate enough state as it was. So Adam armed himself with a newspaper and a bottle of vodka, and arranged a meeting with Khaled.
    He wasted no time. As soon as the labourer drove up in his dust-covered jalopy, Adam slid into the car and forced a Desflurane ether mask over the man’s face. Khaled struggled, but had been taken by surprise. His fingernails scratched Adam’s cheek; that was all. Adam drove north along the coast, with Khaled slumped in the back, until he found a stretch of secluded cliffs overlooking the Mediterranean. He hauled the unconscious labourer into the driver’s seat, rolled the newspaper into a funnel – it was the Lebanese Daily Star , the ink rubbed off on his fingers, for some reason he remembered that – and poured half a bottle of vodka through the funnel and down the man’s throat. Vodka, which he knew Khaled drank in secret. Vodka, which burns easily. He poured