turned and walked slowly back across the bridge. If this was what the intelligence community had become, there was no place in it for him. He glimpsed an oystercatcher in the mud down on the Thames. At least he would have more time for birdwatching. He wasn’t interested in going back into the City, or working in oil, despite various approaches that had already been made. The money was eye-watering, but he had never wanted for much. And he hadn’t talked Gaddafi out of his nuclear ambitions in order to feather his own nest.
He would call up old friends he hadn’t seen for years, cook them pomegranate chicken with fattoush salad, baba ganoush and sesame couscous cakes. There would be time to spoil his godchildren with trips to Russian circuses. Improve his flute-playing. And travel. Ever since reading From the Holy Mountain he had longed to journey through the lands of the ancient Byzantine Empire, visiting monasteries, churches and Stylite hermitages.
There might even be time for love. He knew what the office gossip was: the Vicar was gay – either that, or celibate. It wasn’t surprising. He had made a conscious, cold-hearted decision to put that side of life on hold when he joined the Service fifteen years earlier. There had been a woman in his life once, when he was working in emerging Middle Eastern markets before he had joined the Service. Later, during his initial vetting process, questions were asked about her. Kadia’s parents were Libyan, and she and her family had spent a life in exile, mostly in London. Despite her opposition to Gaddafi, Mossad had passed a file to MI6 suggesting she had links with Palestinian terrorists. It turned out to be untrue, but he had learnt his lesson. Love had nearly ruined his career before it had started.
As he was nearing Dolphin Square, a 4x4 Subaru with blackened windows slowed down beside him. Fielding tensed, suddenly regretting his decision to go out without protection.
‘Get in,’ the voice said. It was Turner Munroe, the US Ambassador to London.
26
The platoon of sixteen men from Seal Team 5 sped across Portsmouth harbour in two Zodiac Combat Rubber Raiding Craft, leaving HMS Victory and HMS Warrior to port. The inflatable rubber was bulletproof, but no one was anticipating incoming fire, not until they reached the shore in front of Fort Monckton.
Despite their professionalism, there was unease in the team. Forty-eight hours earlier they had been simulating a terrorist asymmetric swarm attack with the Royal Navy in the Irish Sea. Afterwards, they had spent a drunken evening in the bars of Portsmouth with their colleagues from the SBS. Now they were being told to lift a member of MI6 – allies in the war on terror, last time they checked – from a British military training base, and to expect resistance on the ground. The head of the platoon had queried the order with the captain of USS Bulkeley, who shared his discomfort. But the mission had been confirmed by the head of US Special Operations Command.
The two Zodiacs skidded up the sandy beach at the same time. Seven Seals, armed with M4 carbines, jumped out of each one and ran up either side of the accommodation block, leaving two men to keep guard on the beach. They didn’t know which room Marchant was staying in, so they started from the outermost rooms on the ground and first floors and worked inwards, kicking open the doors and clearing each one.
Lakshmi heard them coming, but she wasn’t frightened. She felt safe in her bed, protected from the outside world by the blankets and the diamorphine hydrochloride that was coursing through her veins. It had already reached her brain, transforming into morphine and triggering her opiate receptors. In turn they had released a sweet surge of dopamine that was orgasmic in its intensity. She knew it all, had studied the medical effects at Georgetown until the words had blurred on the page.
Despite her overwhelming sense of contentment, she still had the presence of mind to hide the syringe in the bedside table moments before the Seals burst in through her door.
‘Hands where we can see them!’ one of them shouted while another made for the bathroom.
‘It’s OK, everything’s OK,’ she said. ‘I’m CIA. Lakshmi Meena. ID’s over there.’ She nodded at the bedside table.
‘Where is he? Daniel Marchant? The Brit,’ a more senior Seal asked, coming into the room behind the others.
‘Dan?’ She paused, smiling wanly.
‘Don’t fuck us about, lady. Where is he?’
‘He’s gone home.’
27
There were no lights on in the house as Marchant crept up the driveway, keeping off the gravel and in the shadows. It was strange to be back. He had spent some time here after his father’s funeral, but it had been a harsh February, and the place had never really warmed up, despite the roaring fires he had made in the sitting room. It had been his intention to visit at weekends, but he had never made the journey, and the longer he stayed away, the harder it was to return.
He wished he had come before. The sight of the house at dawn triggered happy memories, stronger and more lasting, it seemed, than those of the funeral, when the place had been full of dark suits and white lilies and forced conversation. An air of guilt had hung over proceedings that day. Friends and colleagues knew they could have done more to stop the CIA from driving his father out of office and into an early grave.
But those dark memories were fleeting. It was here in the orchard, on the other side of the drive, that Marchant had spent some of his most blissful days with Sebbie, his twin brother. For a few years they had come here every summer, escaping the heat of Delhi to play in the shade of the Cotswolds, climbing trees, throwing water balloons, chasing the cat. He had returned in the aftermath of Sebbie’s death too, hoping the wounds would heal.
Now, in the family home, he was about to meet another brother. He knew he didn’t have long. He might even be too late. Despite the heavy encryption, the call would already have been traced. It felt as if he was here to say goodbye. Dhar would be dead within hours; there was no escape from here.
He walked around to the back of the house, where a rusting greenhouse leant against the rear wall. His father used to call it the conservatory. A door to the kitchen was inside. Marchant was about to slide the greenhouse open when he saw that the window in the kitchen door had been smashed. Dhar must have come in this way. There used to be a complex alarm system installed in the house, including floodlights, but it kept going off for no reason. Marchant had deactivated it after the funeral.
Moving quietly, he stepped into the greenhouse, lifting the glass panel as he slid it to avoid noise, and then stopped. He could hear a muffled sound inside, and what he thought was a chair being scraped across the tiled kitchen floor. He walked up to the kitchen door and looked in through the broken glass. A man in a flying suit was sitting on a stool, arms and legs tied and mouth taped. He was trying to shuffle his way across the room. When he saw Marchant, his eyes widened with fear or relief, it was hard to tell which.
Marchant put a finger to his lips and opened the door. The man must have been from the Search and Rescue helicopter that picked Dhar up.
‘Where is he?’ Marchant asked. The man nodded at his bound feet in desperation. He was clearly expecting to be released, but Marchant wasn’t going to be rushed. First, he needed to find Dhar.
28
‘I’m not happy with where things are going,’ Turner Munroe said. He was in the back of his official car, with Fielding beside him. Oleg
