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  Exactly as she is.

  I closed my eyes and tried so hard to see her looking at me and smiling, but the only image that came to me was of her on that chair, her head strangely tilted, and sitting so still it was as if she'd stopped breathing, or had been frozen to death in an invisible blizzard.

  I had hours to kill before seeing Lynn and so I ended up walking all the way to Vauxhall Cross. As I walked, I thought about the two other phone calls I might have to make very soon. One was to her grandparents, to break the news that they might have to sell their house as well, though there was more chance of being struck by lightning. They'd nodded and agreed so far that Chelsea was the best place for Kelly, but I bet they'd suddenly discover how wonderful the public hospital was when I told them they'd have to start shouldering some of the cost.

  The other would be to the friend who'd put me onto the freelance job against Val. I'd ask him if he had more work going, and this time somewhere warm, like the Bahamas.

  The same Asian guy ushered me into Lynn's office. Nothing had changed apart from the fact that Lynn had a different shirt on and wasn't writing this time. I stood in front of his desk. Once again, there was no coffee on offer, so I knew I was in for another short meeting.

  "It's my last few weeks in post, and quite frankly the last person I wanted to see was you." He sat and stared at me, with an expression that said I was 100 percent responsible for his early retirement. I felt sorry for the mushrooms.

  I knew to just keep my mouth shut and listen.

  "Moonlight Maze," he said. "Do you know anything about it?"

  "No." I felt the sharp pain in my chest once again. He knew what I had been doing. He knew and was letting me drop myself in the shit. I had to play along. "Well, not really. Only what I read in the papers a couple of weeks ago."

  "That's about to change. Your job is to assist an NSA officer and his team while in the U.K. They will be here for about a month, trying to stop this darned ROC infiltration into Menwith."

  I nodded, as if I assumed it would be a boring BGcumescortcumtour-guide job, which these things normally are. But I still had the feeling he was playing games with me. "Why me, Mr. Lynn? You said before Christmas that-"

  "It has been deemed that the cost of your training and retainer is not being effectively utilized. Now get out."

  I didn't know how he did it, but the door behind me was opened by the Asian guy right on cue. "Please, sir, follow me."

  I did and we went up two flights in the elevator to the briefing area and into a sparsely furnished, unoccupied office. There were no windows and all I could hear was the noise of the forced air ducts.

  "If you wait here, sir, the officer will be with you shortly."

  The door was closed behind me. I sat against the desk and stressed. I was being set up.

  As it opened again, I stood up and turned to face the person walking in. My chest pain returned with a vengeance. I had fucked up big time.

  "Nick Stone, right?"

  The Wasp was smiling at me as he held out his hand. His face looked like I'd gone at him with a pastry cutter. The bright-red, scabby scars around his face were held together with black sutures, along with patches of his scalp, where his hair had been shaved before the wounds were treated. His hands were in shit state, too, but they were all healing nicely.

  "There isn't much time, Nick. Me and the team are going to need a lot of help here." He saw me looking at his scars and dropped the smile.

  "Hey, I know. Not good. If I ever find the sonofabitch that did this, I'm gonna be pulling the ring back on one big can of kick ass... "

  FB2 document info

  Document ID: c5d0ef09-6e39-4e34-89cf-81b539e42c57

  Document version: 1

  Document creation date: 26.5.2012

  Created using: calibre 0.8.53, FictionBook Editor Release 2.6.6 software

  Document authors :

  Andy Mcnab

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