Chris Ryan - Who Dares Wins

There were unanswered questions, too. Things that just didn’t stack up. As he drove home, he kept reliving those moments in the woods outside the training camp: Craven catching one; the silent corpse of the Spetsnaz soldier. Were they Spetsnaz? Whoever they were, it seemed to Sam that they had been expecting the Regiment. Waiting for them. But how was that possible? The operation was top secret, a quick in-and-out job. The only way anyone would have known about the unit’s arrival was if they had been told. And if they had been told, that could mean only one thing. A leak. A mole.

What if I were to tell you, Sam, that the red-light runners were being trained not by MI5, but by a foreign intelligence agency? Bland’s words popped into Sam’s head. If Spetsnaz were being tipped off, everything pointed to the Russians, but that made no difference to Sam. He was being played by the Firm either way. He remembered Porteus, handcuffed and humiliated. He was being punished for tipping Sam off, that much was clear. But why then had Bland let Sam himself go so easily? He was up to something. Manoeuvring. He didn’t trust Sam any more than Sam trusted him.

He parked outside the flat. It always felt weird, coming home after an op. Like he was coming back from the office. Today it felt weirder than most other times. He took his rucksack from the back seat. It wasn’t regulation to take his gear home with him, but he didn’t care. It wasn’t like he was going to leave the contents of his bag at RAF Credenhill.

Sam locked himself into the flat and closed the curtains of the front room. Only then did he pull out the laptop computer.

He hadn’t had a chance to examine it, so he did so now. It was unremarkable. A little too unremarkable, perhaps: it bore no logo, no brand name. Its metal casing was scuffed and worn: the machine looked like it had received some pretty heavy use. Sam opened it up. Nothing unusual, just a bit of Kazakhstani grit that tumbled from the hinge and fell on to Sam’s lap. Some of the keys were worn away so that you could no longer see which letter they displayed; the delete key had come away completely, displaying its plastic skeleton underneath.

Sam found himself breathing heavily. He knew he should switch it on, but for some reason he felt reluctant. Perhaps, he told himself, he didn’t want to find out what this machine contained.

He scowled and pressed the power button.

For a second there was nothing. Then a whirr, and an electronic chord pinged around the room. The screen flickered and lit up. It was blue. A blank box in the middle, with a flickering cursor. Next to it: PASSWORD.

Sam blinked. He had no idea what to type. He should have expected this, but he hadn’t. Cursing under his breath, he closed the machine down. How was he going to break into it? How the hell was he going to break into it? Take it to a shop? No. He couldn’t just walk in somewhere and demand that someone he didn’t know hack into a computer; especially when he didn’t know what the computer contained. And when he went through his list of friends and acquaintances, people who might know someone who knew someone – well, they were all Regiment. Hereford was a closed shop. Word got around. No doubt tongues would already be wagging about his interview without coffee with the Firm in the Kremlin meeting room. He didn’t want to add fuel to the fire.

He sat in silence. Jesus, he stank worse than a hooker on the blob. He needed to shower. Picking up the laptop, he walked into the bedroom to strip. When he went into the bathroom, he carried the computer with him too. He wasn’t going to let it out of his sight. No way.

Half an hour later he was clean and freshly clothed: jeans, a hooded top and his trademark leather jacket replacing the stinking camouflage gear that sat in a heap on the floor. With the laptop under his arm, he left the flat. He realised as he walked outside that he was on tenterhooks, his eyes darting around for anything unexpected. But there was nothing. Sam climbed into his car, put the laptop on the passenger seat and drove off. He didn’t know when he had made the decision. He didn’t even know for sure that he had made it until he hit the motorway heading towards London. His eyes were fixed in the rear-view mirror as much as they were on the road ahead. Sam almost expected to be followed; the fact that he couldn’t pick up any trails did nothing to quell his paranoia.

By the time he was approaching Addington Gardens in Acton, evening was beginning to close in. It was with a sense of déjà vu that he parked up in the same road parallel to Clare Corbett’s street. Hiding the laptop under his jacket, he sauntered to the corner of the road. Sam didn’t feel inclined simply to walk up and knock on the door – that would be making life too easy for anyone performing surveillance on the flat, if indeed that was what they were doing. Instead he loitered on the corner. Clare couldn’t stay at home forever. All he had to do was wait.

He glanced at his watch. 18.00 hrs. Darkness fell. 19.00 hrs. Inhabitants of the street left and returned to their homes. Sam couldn’t see anyone in the road who looked as if they were keeping watch over Clare’s place, but he knew that didn’t mean anything. He knew that if he were snooping, he would probably take up position in an upstairs room of one of the houses opposite.

It was just gone seven-thirty when Clare’s door opened and she stepped outside. She walked briskly, her head down and her arms, clad in a heavy brown coat, wrapped around her body. She looked small. Sam pulled his hood up and started following from a distance. He only increased his pace once they had both turned on to the main road. Clare didn’t dawdle. She wove in and out of the other pedestrians in the half light; Sam had to concentrate so as not to lose her. She came to a halt at a bus stop where a small crowd had congregated. Sam loitered for a few metres behind, keeping well out of sight.

The bus arrived, a long one with a flexible midriff. It was almost full and the windows were steamed up. Sam joined the queue, a couple of places behind Clare; when the moment came to pay his fare he had to scrabble around in his pocket to find change for the impatient driver. By the time he had paid, Clare had taken a seat towards the back. There was a spare place next to it. He put his head down again and approached her.

She was lost in thought, her pale eyes staring through the window, the condensation on which she had wiped away with one hand. She clearly hadn’t noticed Sam; he waited for the doors to close and the bus to move off before speaking.

‘Clare,’ he said softly. ‘It’s me.’

He felt her body jump and put a reassuring hand on her arm. Never had he seen such alarm in someone’s face. Her skin, already limpid, went white; her eyes bulged.

‘ Sam! ’

She looked around, as though expecting to see someone else there, but then dragged her attention back to him. She looked frightened now. ‘I had to tell them,’ she whispered. ‘I’m sorry. They threatened me…’

In front of them a drunk started to sing. Most of the other passengers looked at their boots.

‘Forget about it,’ Sam muttered. ‘Look, I need your help.’ He frowned. ‘I didn’t know where else to go.’

She shook her head nervously. ‘I can’t, Sam. I can’t have anything more to do with this.’

One of the passengers in front – an old woman with a hard, nosy face – glanced round at them. Clare bowed her head again. ‘I just can’t,’ she repeated.

The bus came to a halt; a few passengers left, others embarked. A harassed woman with two kids jostled towards Sam, staring at him in a way that suggested he give up his seat. He didn’t. They sat in silence.