Giles Frederickson had a raging headache and a desperate thirst.
He’d been far closer to the detonation than Grace McColl, still remembered the tremendous compression through his chest as it buffeted his internal organs and sent him diving.
He’d got away with a bump on the head, possibly a wrenched knee from landing awkwardly. All in all, nothing much. A few seconds earlier, he realised grimly, and it would have been another story.
Like it was for those two poor devils.
The medics argued he should go to hospital, of course, but Frederickson had survived enough skirmishes to know when injuries were serious. On a battlefield triage scale, he didn’t even count as walking wounded. Nothing that couldn’t be cured by a stiff brandy and a soak in the bath. He intended to indulge in both as soon as he got home.
Leaving the scene, he drove the Defender north through the pretty market town of Kirkby Stephen, accelerated out past the cemetery and turned off towards Warcop village.
The road was tight and twisty, but the most direct route. A convenient shortcut that avoided the regular traffic jams of the main A66. Frederickson drove automatically, his thoughts churning.
The bomb disposal chaps told him little, of course, but he knew by their questions what they were thinking. Those oil drums must have been packed with shrapnel as well as explosive.
He’d seen such damage often enough in Iraq. And on home soil, come to that—two nail-bombs in London parks in the early ’eighties.
But this was more than simple mindless carnage. As soon as Mercer mentioned the name Patrick Bardwell, all Frederickson’s very well-developed survival instincts warned him to get out fast.
The Bardwell he’d known had died in Afghanistan, his entire squad killed when the vehicle they were travelling in had come under sniper attack. Those mountain roads were narrow and treacherous, and no-one ever knew if the driver had jerked disastrously as the anti-matériel round hit, or if the steering gear itself was shot away. Either way, the result was the same. A long deadly plunge and yet more body bags loaded into the belly of a Hercules.
They should never have been there, he thought fiercely. I followed my orders, saw that Tawney followed his…
But Frederickson remembered Mercer’s certainty that he was the target. If the sniper in the trees above the barn wasn’t Pete Tawney, then perhaps he had been waiting for Frederickson and the woman to clear the scene. But if he was minimising civilian casualties, why take out the CSI chap, Sibson as well? And it didn’t explain using the name Patrick Bardwell.
No coincidence, Frederickson was sure of that.
He massaged his grazed temple under the band of his beret, hoped the painkillers the medics had given him would kick in soon.
In his breast pocket, the major’s iPhone began to buzz. He slipped the Bluetooth earpiece in place.
“Frederickson.”
“You were lucky today, major.” A man’s voice, quiet, not gloating.
It took a startled moment before Frederickson’s brain put it together and he was suddenly glad the Defender’s steering was forgiving enough to absorb his reflexive twitch.
He ducked, scanning the rapidly passing terrain. Trees, low fields, a couple of barn conversions. Unfavourable territory for a sniper. Too enclosed and twisting, without enough commanding high ground. Nevertheless, his right foot lifted momentarily.
“Mr Bardwell, I presume,” he said, recovering. “Sounding very much alive for a dead man.”
“Wondered if you’d remember.”
Do I stop or go on? Frederickson had walked away from one ambush by the skin of his teeth. Was he being herded towards another, or just being taunted?
He pressed his foot down again, hard. The Defender lurched forwards and picked up speed, diffs whining.
“I know you, don’t I?” Frederickson strove for casual. Not Pete Tawney, but that voice…
“To the likes of you, I’m just another piece of equipment. Long as it functions, you look after it. Soon as it doesn’t, it’s on the scrapheap, regardless. Plenty out there just like me.”
Frederickson heard the bitterness behind the even words. He pushed the Defender through another bend, cutting it fine, the protruding hedgerow thrashing against the bodywork. Unsettle him. Distract him.
“So, you were decommissioned,” he said, drawling slightly. “Is that what this is all about?”
Bardwell grunted. “Ironic, isn’t it, major? You reckon a man’s mentally unfit to fight, but you of all people know we can’t do what we’re trained for, tour after tour, and stay entirely sane.”
“When history looks at what you’ve done here, everything you were before won’t matter,” Frederickson crossed a humpback bridge over the Eden, fast enough for the suspension to unweight at the crown. “You’ll be immortalised as a monster.”
“Who’s to blame for that? You train us to forget we’re human, then condemn us when we do. And when you decide we’re done, you expect us to turn back into civvies again overnight. Flick of a switch. Can’t be done.”
Don’t I know it. “If you’re hoping to punish the army for their indifference, they won’t even notice.”
“Somebody like me, loose on home ground with a weapon like this?” Bardwell jeered. “Trust me, they’ve already noticed.”
A reference to the team of ex-SAS mercenaries Weston mentioned? The turnoff for Musgrave village appeared ahead and Frederickson hesitated. Should he take it—deviate from any expected route? Surely Bardwell, whoever he was, hadn’t had time to set up another hide. That voice was tantalisingly familiar.
“So you’re out to prove a point?” he said. “Using civilians—non-combatants?”
“They were connected, one way or another,” Bardwell said, and Frederickson clamped his jaw, reminded himself that this man had murdered Angela in cold blood for the actions of her brother. “The army gave me the only family I’ve ever known, then tried to take it away again. Combat forges bonds that can’t be broken. Stronger than blood.”
“You talk like I’ve never been there,” Frederickson snapped, finally goaded into temper. And his brain finally flashed him an image of his office wall, of the line of photographs, and of one in particular, taken in the mountains. Of a big guy, standing at the major’s shoulder amid the rocks, cradling his beloved Barrett, surrounded by his grinning fellows. Gotcha!
Distracted, Frederickson braked late for a ninety-degree blind corner onto the bridge over the dismantled railway line, almost locking a wheel. “What the devil did you think you signed up for, man?” he demanded. “A chestful of medals and glory?”
Another grunt. “We all of us, at one time or another, fall some way short of glory, major. You should know that.”
And the line clicked off, abrupt.
As Frederickson turned onto the bridge, the soldier in him realised his mistake. The bridge was narrow, straight, about thirty metres long. Dead ahead, the land rose maybe fifteen metres up towards the tree line at the top of the hill. Perfect uninterrupted visibility into a controlled and measured kill zone.
He stamped on the throttle, but he’d misjudged the gears. From a near standing start, the Defender’s non-turbo diesel responded with utter lethargy. Frederickson’s gaze skimmed across the top of the field, just catching a glimpse of chimney pots through the trees. He almost gasped his relief.
Madness to risk a shot so close to habitation…
The .50 calibre round punched through the radiator grille like it was paper, ripping straight into the cast iron engine block. The motor seized instantly, with an explosive detonation.
Power gone, the Defender coasted gently towards the exit of the bridge, scuffing against the stonework.
Out! Get out!
Frederickson just had time to reach for the door.