with the estate's guards while Sergeant Fernandez and I and a couple of others hop the fence and head for the house. We set off some flash-bangs and some puke lights and take out any guards there, go in and round up everybody, haul the ones we want out, and hightail it for the border. Ruzhyo, Peel, and Bascomb-Coombs will do, and we can feed any incriminating information about Goswell back to our hosts later and let them deal with him if he's involved. With any luck, by the time the locals figure it out, we're on our plane and halfway across the ocean.'
'One small addition,' Michaels said. 'I'll be going in with you. And yes, I know, it isn't the wisest course of action, but we've had this discussion before, and since I get the heat, I get to make that choice.' He glanced at Toni, about to say that she'd be staying at the command center.
The look in Toni's eyes was reptilian. She knew what he was going to say. And he suddenly knew if he said it, whatever chance he might have of patching things up between them was going to die right here and now. So instead, he said, 'And Toni will be going in, too.'
She gave him a short nod. 'Thank you.' Her words were cool and crisp — you could use them to frost beer steins — but at least she was still talking to him. Better than nothing.
When they got to the fire station, near a little town called Cuckfield, the Net Force Strike Team was already there. But when Toni stepped out into the rainy evening, there was a surprise waiting under the overhang of a carport next to the main building: Angela Cooper was there, too. She wore combat camo, pants, shirt, and boots.
'Oh, shit,' Fernandez said quietly. 'Looks like the game is about to be canceled.'
They moved to the carport, out of the weather. Alex stepped forward, but before he could speak, Cooper raised one hand to his objections. 'If I wanted to stop you, Alex, I wouldn't be here alone.'
'What
'Officially, His Majesty's government cannot condone any action against Lord Goswell without much more evidence than we currently have. However, the DG and our MP know what we've found out and, unofficially, they believe what we all do — that Bascomb-Coombs is very likely responsible for the computer terrorism, and that Major Peel and Goswell are privy and part of it as well.'
'So you've decided to look the other way?' Alex said.
'Yes. Provided we have an unofficial observer to make certain our unofficial position is kept, well, unofficial.'
Toni said, 'So we get to do the dirty work, take care of your problem, and if it all blows up in our faces, you get to keep your hands clean.'
'Can't put anything past you, can we, Ms. Fiorella? Well, that's probably not strictly true, is it, Alex?'
Years of martial arts practice gave you a certain amount of physical self-control. If you knew you could seriously injure or kill somebody with your hands, elbows, knees, or feet, it tended to make you think before you made any sudden moves. You had to be able to move almost reflexively fast once the action started, but you also had to know when it was appropriate. Once, in college, a dorm mate had sneaked up behind Toni and grabbed her in the hallway, intending to tickle her. His practical joke had cost him a visit to the campus clinic and a concussion. It had taken her a few more years to get past the reactive stage, so she could usually assess the situation before decking somebody who didn't really mean her any harm.
That hard-won self-control was all that kept Toni from stepping forward and destroying Angela Cooper. She really wanted to do it, bad. Instead, she managed a smile. She said, 'Oh, I'm a bit slow sometimes, but I eventually catch on.'
'All right,' Alex said. 'Colonel Howard will run it down again. We've got a couple of hours until we go.' He looked at Toni, shook his head a little, then gave her an open-handed 'Sorry' shrug. He looked pale, almost gray, and she hoped he felt bad. He should.
Ruzhyo leaned against the stone wall of the big house under the substantial roof overhang. The wind had died pretty much as the rain began, and the gutters piped the water away to drain chains at the house's corners, so he was dry enough even in the damp evening. And he had his umbrella, of course, and a feeling he would be needing its hidden functions before the night was over. Intelligence services of every country he knew of took a dim view of anybody who killed any of their operatives. It was bad for business.
Kill one of ours, and we destroy a village of yours. It made even zealots think.
The British were more polite and less savage, but they would by now assume their men were dead, and they would know who was responsible. At least they would know of Peel, and if they knew enough to find and follow him, they doubtless knew for whom he worked and where his employer lived. Peel would realize this, and he would have a plan in place by now, a way to escape being captured.
Huard, dressed in rain gear, walked a circuit around the back of the house, looking at Ruzhyo but not speaking as he moved from sight. Huard didn't like him, but Huard was a child.
So, in Peel's shoes, what would he do? Flight was the only real option; even Goswell could not protect him if he stayed here. And timing was critical. Peel would have to disappear before things grew too warm. Were he Peel, he would already be gone. Certainly before morning light offered his pursuers too much help in spotting him. And he would wish to depart without any telltales left behind. Peel had sent his men to the property's borders, leaving only Huard and Ruzhyo here. They, along with everybody inside the house, were expendable. That's how Ruzhyo would see it in Peel's place.
So, sometime during the night, Peel would call him inside. Or perhaps use the com to tell Huard to do it, to kill him? No. He wouldn't trust Huard. And if the boy failed, his master would know that Ruzhyo would have to come for him.
Ruzhyo could simply disappear into the rainy darkness in a few more minutes. None of Peel's men would find him or stop him if they did find him. He could trek away, catch a ride, steal a car, and be in France tomorrow. This game was nearly over, and what was the point in waiting around for the expected end?
He mentally shrugged. No point at all, actually. And perhaps that was the reason. There was nowhere he had to be. One place was as good as another. Did it matter where the sands of one's hourglass ran out? In the end, did anything matter at all?
Next to the parked lorry, Howard slipped his helmet on, and checked the LOSIR com. 'Perimeter team, sound off, by the numbers.'
The Strike Team obediently replied. All ahead functions there.
'Entry team, sound off.'
'This is E1, Cooper.'
'E2, Michaels.
'E3, Fiorella.'
'E4, Fernandez.'
And he was E5. Five of them should be enough, if everybody did what they were supposed to do. He and Fernandez would work the heavy shots, and while Michaels and Fiorella weren't trained assault troopers, he'd seen them in action enough to know they had balls. The only unknown was Cooper, and if she was a field agent for MI-6, she ought to have at least some basic moves. It was hurried, it was slapdash, it was hung together with string and bubble gum, but it was what he had to work with, and it was about to be a go. They all wore the light SIPEsuit configuration, mostly just armor, corns, and the tactical comp to run the helmet. They all carried the simple but reliable H&K 9mm subguns and tactical pistols, save for Howard and his.357 revolver. And as soon as he'd brought that out, Julio had howled.
'Why, Katie Mae, I must be going blind,' he'd said. 'My tired old eyes completely shot. What is that ugly lump on top of the colonel's antique good luck charm? Is that a dot scope? It can't be!'
'Julio…
'No, I must be on drugs, or maybe just out of my mind. The Colonel John Howard I know would never in a million years upgrade to hardware just because it was state-of-the-art and
