Andy McNab - Dark winter

'Everything else will stay here,' I pointed over at the clothes, 'including the cells. If the Yes Man sees them moving without knowing we have them, he'll take action, thinking we've fucked up. Besides, he'll already have every number these phones have called. We're just here for DW.'

Suzy frowned. 'Including King's Lynn, we've got four down, four sets of kit, but only three bags?'

'We'll have a quick look after packing. I want to get out ASAP and get this shit handed over.'

Three bottles later, Suzy took the roll from me and placed it in the first sports bag. It wasn't long before the two others were full. We couldn't find a fourth bag, so headed downstairs. The wind and rain were still going for it, big-time. I could see the Metropolitan Police sign lit up outside the station, through the window on the landing. 'That's all we need.'

We moved swiftly across and started down the stairs. Suzy was still on a high. 'Fuck 'em, we'll just box around it back to the car.'

We slipped back into the kebab shop, ripped off the NBC kit, rolled it up and threw it into the ready bags. The sweat had cooled on the back of my neck by the time I pulled out the jams in 297. We didn't bother unloading the weapons. I could hear Suzy breathing rapidly through her nose, trying to calm herself.

With all the kit stowed and the Browning back in my sweat-soaked jeans, I shouldered my ready bag, and one of the bags of DW, and carried another in my hand.

Suzy still had her rubber gloves on and was using her fleece to wipe the prints off the lock and key. I wasn't going to rush her. Finally she stood up and smiled. 'What's keeping you? Let's go.' The padlock and key went into her fleece pocket, then she pulled her cuffs over the rubber gloves to disguise them. 'I don't know about you,' she said, 'but I've got an urgent appointment with Mr Nicorette.'

I used the Maglite to locate the steel fixings wedged in the door, pulled them out and threw them into the bag. Then all torchlight was extinguished, ready to exit.

Suzy was behind me with her two bags. While I listened, she leant forward, ready to pull the door back. There was nothing out there but the wind and the rain. I nodded and she opened up. Light poured into the hallway and the first thing I heard was rain bouncing off the pavement.

I waited as the wind attacked my sweat: there was no rush. We wanted to get out quickly, but also do it correctly. I listened for footsteps, heard nothing. I looked out. Two people were hunched under a collapsing umbrella, walking away from us, no one else in sight. That was it, time to go. I stepped out into the rain with two bags over my shoulder, the other in my hand, my eyes fixed on the police station. The wind was cold as it attacked my wet clothes, which were getting even wetter.

I heard the door close behind me and the shaft click back into the hasp. 'All done.' We turned left, away from the station towards King's Cross Bridge and the stern of the ship. Suzy put the key away in her fleece just as sirens started in the distance and two police officers, a man and a woman in bright yellow fluorescent jackets, appeared from round the bend of Gray's Inn Road. Luck was with us: they were on the other side of the road and bent over, protecting themselves from the driving rain. They weren't bothered at the sight of us and our bags, or even Suzy dumping the key down a drain. There were plenty of people like that around here, normally trying to find a doorway to sleep in.

We slid the three sports bags carefully into the rear footwells of the Mondeo, then slung our ready bags into the boot.

Even though she was soaked to the skin, her hair plastered against her head, Suzy was still on a high. 'Did you see all that writing and the handprints?'

I nodded. 'Yeah, same as the nine/eleven crew, I reckon – these fuckers wanted the world to know who they are and why they did it.'

Suzy got the key into the ignition. 'It can't have been DW in those spray cans. The girl must have gone back to spray the place up.'

I reached under my seat and retrieved the moan-phone. Suzy's priority was her gum: she got chewing as soon as she'd pulled away from the kerb. Her jaws and the wipers were working overtime.

Rainwater dripped from my hair and nose on to the phone keys as I tapped in the Yes Man's number.

'Yes?'

I wondered if he'd ever thought of putting himself through charm school. 'It's done, we're mobile. Three dead-'

'You have Dark Winter?'

'Yeah, twelve bottles. Three vaporizing kits still in the building, but four sets of tube tickets, and maps targeting mainline stations. It's the tube, it was going to happen tomorrow for sure.'

'Any of the bottles open?'

'No, all still sealed. They've sprayed the place and ID'd themselves with handprints. Same cans as we found in King's Lynn. What about the fourth bag? You reckon we should lift the source? Find out what he knows? There's something wrong there.'

There was a pause. 'There's always something wrong with those people. We have control of Dark Winter – that is all that matters for now. Wait out.' His voice went muffled; he must have put a finger over the mike, but I still heard him. 'We have possible Underground systems, get a message out.' He came back to me loud and clear. 'How far are you from Pimlico?'

We were passing Madame Tussaud's, heading west, the wipers still in a frenzy. 'Maybe fifteen minutes, twenty at the most.'

'Yvette is on her way. I want you to leave everything in the car and give her the keys. You're now weapons free – understand?'

'Yep.'

'Wait out at the flat. I'll be there later.' There was a pause. 'Excellent work, both of you.' The phone went dead before I realized he was talking to me.

Suzy powered down her window and turned up the heater, then wiped condensation off the windscreen as rain hit the side of her face. 'What now?'

'We're weapons free. The Golf Club's taking the car, and we have to wait out at the flat. He'll be arriving later to hand out tea and medals.'

She smiled ruefully. 'We did well, Norfolk boy – we really did.'

I opened the glove compartment and took out a blister pack of antibiotics as her window went back up. 'Here's a thing,' I said. 'He finished off by saying we'd done an excellent job. Either he's had a personality transplant, or he had an audience.'

'He's hardly going to be sitting there on his own.'

'That's not what I'm getting at. There were American and German voices in the background earlier today, and when I told him about the tube maps, he called out to someone close by that it was the Underground systems. Systems, plural. We've only got one here…'

She thought for a while, rolling the gum between her front teeth with her tongue. 'I reckon if there are other targets we deserve extra medals and even more tea.'

'You'll definitely be getting permanent cadre now, won't you?'

She didn't reply. With that grin on her face, she didn't need to.

I popped four capsules from the blister pack and passed two across to her. 'Listen, thanks for helping me out back there. I couldn't see a fucking thing.'

'You looked a bag of shit.' She gave me an extra big smile before concentrating once more on the road. 'But don't worry, I won't tell anybody.'

She was silent for a moment. 'I suppose you'll be back to the States soon, seeing Kelly, sorting out stuff?'

'Yeah, and you'll be watering your hanging plants and all that shit in your conservatory and poncing around in your Blue Lagoon, or whatever it's called.'

This time she gave me the sort of expression mothers in supermarkets normally saved for their small children. 'The conservatory's only half built, and it's Blue water, dickhead, the shopping centre. If it was the Blue Lagoon, I wouldn't worry about seeing it from the kitchen window.'