Hannah whimpered, horrified as she realised what he meant.
He raised the gun that he held loosely in his right hand, tightening a silencer on the end of its barrel. Then he pointed it at Hannah’s mother.
‘Your husband did this to you, not me. He wouldn’t pay the ransom.’
Hannah shook her head violently, begging with her eyes, screaming out to her father as she had been doing since the horror had begun. Why hadn’t he paid them the money? Why hadn’t he saved them? Where was he?
The gunman’s eyes were so cold. ‘He had his chance,’ he said simply.
Then he pulled the trigger. He shot Jessica Shapiro twice. The shots made a sound like a nail gun.
‘Can’t say we didn’t give daddy a chance,’ said the hood.
Hannah slumped back in the chair, reeling. Her system shutting down in shock. The grip of fear holding her heart so tight that she couldn’t breathe.
The man holstered his gun and undid his trouser belt. ‘Untie the girl,’ he said.
At that moment, a lifetime too late, the door to the loft was smashed off its hinges.
As the gunman turned, a high-velocity bullet punched through his forehead, knocking him off his heels. His head exploded.
The sound of the shot still rang deafeningly in the air as his dead body slid down the wall.
The other kidnapper took a step towards his partner before three shots from the semi-automatic weapon cut him down. He crashed to his knees, tumbled sideways, dead before he hit the floor.
A fine mist of red seemed to hang in the air for a moment and then a tall man stepped through it, lowering the gun that he was holding in a two-handed grip.
He looked down at the girl with desperately sad, apologetic eyes.
‘You’re safe now, Hannah,’ said Jack Morgan.
Chapter 2
Seven years later. Somewhere over the Atlantic.
MY NAME IS Dan Carter. I run the London office of Private International.
At that moment I was sitting in first class on my way to New York to meet with my boss. I’m ex-military – ex-Royal Military Police, to be specific. Late thirties. Shade over six foot, dirty blond hair, blue eyes; 185 pounds in weight. I can run the mile in under five minutes and bench-press 240. I could build up to more but I like the way my suits fit me just fine. In my line of work it’s not all about brute strength. I don’t scare easily.
But I don’t like flying.
‘Sorry, what did you say?’
‘I said would you like another drink, sir?’ asked the air hostess. She had a smile that could have lit the pitch at Wembley Stadium but I wasn’t even registering it. Like I said, I’m not a good flyer. The man I was on my way to meet was. But then, he was an ex-military pilot. Served his time in Afghanistan. Jack Morgan who owned Private worldwide. Hell – Jack Morgan was Private!
The air hostess moved away and I took another small sip of beer. I didn’t want to overdo it. Not good form, turning up drunk for an important meeting. I didn’t know if my boss was well known for giving people a second chance – somehow I doubted it – but I didn’t plan to find out.
One of the reasons he’d hired me was because I had rescued an American soldier over in Iraq. Saved his life. I don’t talk about it, but he had known the real story behind it. Suffice to say I wasn’t following standing orders – could probably have been court-martialled and dishonourably discharged.
Might have been better that way. Eventually I was invalided out and had to ride a wheelchair for a while. Jack Morgan had checked my references pretty thoroughly. Going so far as to talk with the injured young GI I had carried through a kill zone to medical help.
The fact that I had killed two other American soldiers who had shot him and were raping a suspected bomb maker’s wife didn’t faze him. He knew why, even if the people who gave me a medal for the rescue didn’t. And I sincerely hope they never did. But Jack Morgan approved, he knew the circumstances and he wanted to have a man capable of making his own decisions heading up his London operation. Getting the job done – whatever it took – and living with the consequences.
I guess I had proved that I could do that. To him, at least.
For me, though, things are never as black and white as I would have liked. Moral certitude is something that gets blown away pretty damn quickly when you take the King’s shilling and march overseas to another man’s war.
Or fly.