by Andy Maslen
“You look nice,” he said.
“Thank you. I’m not just an action girl, you know.”
She touched her hair and then fiddled with a string of shell beads at her throat, and he had a sudden intuition.
“You’re not nervous, are you?”
Her eyes widened, and she touched her hair again.
“Me? Why would I be nervous?”
“About meeting Britta.”
“No! Why, should I be?”
Gabriel smiled. Stroked her left cheek.
“I just thought, with her being the ex-fiancée, you might, you know …”
Eli shook her head then leaned forwards to pour herself a glass of the burgundy. She took a gulp and replaced the glass on the table. She blew out a breath, puffing out her cheeks.
“OK, fine. Maybe I am a little nervous.”
“There’s really no need. Britta’s just—”
“I’m just what?”
Gabriel and Eli turned towards the side gate that led out onto the grassy area abutting his back garden. Britta was standing there, bottle in hand, a wide smile on her freckled face, which was even browner than Eli’s. She flipped up the latch and stepped across the threshold and back into Gabriel’s life.
He realised as he embraced her that Eli hadn’t been the only nervous one. His pulse was rapid and he became aware of the swarm of flittering butterflies in his stomach.
“Hi. You look great!”
“You don’t look so bad yourself,” she said, though he didn’t miss the way her eyes flicked down to his left hand and back.
She kissed him on both cheeks then stepped back and turned to Eli, who had risen from her chair and was waiting to greet Britta. A smile played on her lips, but Gabriel could see it was a nervous one.
“Hi, Britta, I’m Eli.”
“Hi,” Britta said with a wide smile. “So pleased to meet you.”
Gabriel noticed Eli’s right hand fluttering at her hip and felt her anxiety – Are we going to shake or kiss ?
Britta solved the problem, leaning towards Eli and kissing her on both cheeks, just as she had done with Gabriel.
“Wine?” Gabriel asked, when the two women were sitting.
“Yes, please,” Britta said. “I left my car across the road in the public car park, though. I didn’t know if you had a private space.”
“Enough for two. Give me your keys, and I’ll move it for you.”
Britta handed him a set of keys.
“It’s the red Fiat Punto in the front row. It doesn’t look much, but if you push it through the gears it’s actually quite a lot of fun.”
“OK, well I’ll see what I can manage in the fifty yards from there to here.”
Gabriel left and as he walked across the road he could hear Eli and Britta laughing and talking. And he knew everything was going to be OK between them. Between all three of them.
A Tempering
The following day, after a very late breakfast of shakshouka that Eli prepared, Britta suggested a walk out of town along the deserted stretch of beach that led due south towards a Martello tower.
Heading towards the brick-built defensive fort, Eli threaded her right arm through Gabriel’s left. She watched as Britta did the same on his other side. Then, companionably, they strolled along the beach, scrunching over a patch of tennis-ball-sized stones.
“These bloody stones are hell to walk on,” Eli said after almost rolling her newly healed ankle over. “Have you guys ever thought of having sandy beaches?”
“I’ll have you know Britain has some beautiful sandy beaches,” Gabriel replied, feigning indignation.
“Yes, that’s true,” Britta chimed in. “Just not the weather to enjoy them, hej ?”
Eli enjoyed seeing Gabriel bantering with Britta. After overcoming her initial nervousness at meeting his ex, she’d realised how much she liked her. Most of her friends in Israel had been men, and, since moving to Britain, she’d barely had time to socialise. So finding another woman who could relate to her line of work and had a great sense of humour was something she prized.
The wind was whipping spray off the tops of the waves, and the air smelled deliciously of ozone and seaweed. Eli looked out to sea. A few fast-moving white clouds were racing across the sky. Beneath them, she spotted a trio of sailing boats scudding across the water’s ruffled surface, a lone fishing boat some way behind them. On the horizon, she saw a long, white ship. Some kind of tanker , she thought. Its colour and proportions reminded her of the factory in Vareshabad. And once again, she was struck by the utter contrast between her work for The Department and the way most people spent their waking hours. She tucked a strand of hair back behind her ear, from where it immediately escaped.
“Penny for your thoughts?” Britta asked her, leaning forwards to speak across Gabriel’s chest.
She sighed.
“I don’t know. I suppose I was just thinking how, just, how normal all this is. And yet, a few days ago, we were up to our ears in an operation. Codewords, infiltration, the works.”
Britta disengaged her arm from Gabriel’s, stopping the trio, and spoke.
“I know you can’t talk about the specifics, but you know you were doing the right thing, yes?”
“Yes. Absolutely.”
“Then find a way to let it go. Try some of Gabriel’s meditation. Throw some stones into the sea. Get drunk!”
Eli laughed.
“That’s not a bad idea. We should celebrate!”
“Actually, it’s a very good idea. Because I …” Britta looked down for a moment, then back at Gabriel. “I have some news.”
“Go on then,” he said. “Don’t keep us in suspense. What is it? Another new job?”
Britta cleared her throat. “Well …”
Eli sensed the other woman’s embarrassment. In a flash of intuition, she knew what Britta was going to say.
You’re getting married!
“I’m, uh, I’m engaged to be married.”
Gabriel pulled his head back, his forehead rumpling.
“You’re, I mean, you said … Wait. What? I thought …”
Britta was smiling, but Eli detected the anxiety behind the expression. A tightness around those amazing blue eyes. A nervous pull on that plaited skein of copper-coloured hair. A drawing down of the eyebrows.
“I know, I know. I said before that we shouldn’t get married.” She shrugged. “But it just happened. Jarryd is a teacher. At a little rural primary school. He’s not part of our world. We met at a Midsommar party in Uppsala last year. I have a girlfriend there.”
Eli nodded, secretly delighted, but scrutinising Gabriel’s face for a reaction. Then he smiled, and she relaxed.
Thank God. For a minute I thought you still had feelings for her.
“It’s fine,” he said. “No. It’s more than fine. Listen, I’m pleased for you, OK? Really. Come here.”
Eli watched as Gabriel held his arms wide. Britta’s smile now looked like the genuine article. She stepped into his embrace, then stumbled on a loose stone and lurched forwards. Gabriel laughed and leaned back as she crashed into him.
Then the crown of Britta’s head blew apart.
Blood, brain matter and skull fragments trailing coppery-red hair flew in all directions, and her lifeless body toppled sideways.
The sound of the gunshot crashed into Eli’s awareness a split-second later.
Her heart racing, she whirled away from Gabriel, who had been shocked into rigid immobility.
Time slows down for Eli.
The stranger is standing, arms outstretched, twenty yards away. He’s tall, over six feet. Rangy. Cropped blond hair. Both his eyes are open. His lips are pursed. He stands, legs apart, one foot slightly ahead of the other. Classic shooter’s stance .
In slow motion, she sees him preparing to fire again. Gripped in both hands is a semi-automatic pistol, a fat, black suppressor screwed into its muzzle.
Eli’s brain is trying to do several things at once
.
Shout a warning. Get Gabriel out of the assassin’s line of fire. Draw her own weapon. Thanks, Boss, for telling me to wear one when I’m with him.
She tries to shout. But her lips feel glued together, as if she’s dreaming. From far away, she hears her own voice screaming a warning.
“Gabriel, get down!”
It sounds feeble. Lacking even the force to disturb a dandelion clock, let alone prevent a killing.
She frees her pistol from her shoulder bag, straightens her right arm and pulls the trigger. A ragged, bloody hole appears in the gunman’s right shoulder and a spray of red colours the air around him. He staggers back, firing his own weapon.
Eli sees the gun jerk and hears the bang. She feels a splash of something hot against her cheek.
The gunman is transferring his gun to his left hand. She fires again, hitting him in the right cheekbone and blowing half his face away. And she keeps firing until the magazine is empty.
His body falls backwards, fountaining blood over the rounded stones, adding splashes of scarlet to the pinks, golds, greys and whites. Her brain processes the movement as a stuttering series of still images, as if a movie projectionist had braked the spinning reel with his thumb.
Through the haze of sharp-smelling blue smoke, the ringing in her ears, the tang of adrenaline at the back of her mouth, she has one thought. Gabriel! She turns. He is kneeling beside Britta, stroking her face. And the woman Eli has only just met lies dead, the top of her head missing altogether, brains showing pinkly inside the cratered bone. Below her oddly unblemished forehead, her eyes are open, staring sightlessly into the blue, blue sky above the stony beach.
Time sped up.
The gunman’s second shot had clipped Gabriel in the triangle of flesh between his neck and his left shoulder. His shirt was soaked in blood, and more was flowing freely out of the wound. Eli ripped open the shredded fabric to reveal an ugly mess of torn muscle and skin. She pulled her T-shirt over her head, wadded it into a thick pad and pushed it down hard against the bullet wound. Gabriel turned to look at her. His eyes were unfocused.
“Come on Gabriel,” she said. “Come back to me.”
His face was spattered with Britta’s blood. She leaned across him and closed Britta’s eyelids.
“We have to save Britta,” he said.
“We can’t. She’s gone, darling.”
“You’re wrong. She’s just knocked out. I made this mistake once before.”
Eli tried again, though she was close to tears.
“No, Gabriel. Oh, God, I’m so sorry. Can’t you see? She’s dead.”
Gabriel looked at Eli. He was frowning. Then he smiled.
“It’s OK. We just need to get her patched up by the MO.”
Then he turned away and went back to stroking Britta’s cheek.
Pressing the pad down with her left hand, Eli pulled her phone out with her right and called 999. A woman answered.
“This is the operator. Which service do you require, ambulance, fire, police or coastguard?”
“Police and ambulance.”
“Hold on, please.”
A man came on the line.
“Suffolk emergency services. What’s your location?”
“I’m on the beach, about two hundred and fifty metres south of the Brudenell Hotel in Aldeburgh. I have a man with a gunshot wound. He’s in shock. And two people dead, also from gunshots. I’m applying emergency first aid to the injured man. My name is Eli Schochat.” Then she used the code issued to all Department personnel for emergencies on the British mainland. “This is a seven-oh-seven call.”
“Please repeat that number?”
“Seven-oh-seven.”
The man’s tone sharpened instantly.
“OK, Eli. Listen. I’ll get an air ambulance scrambled from Norwich. I can see there’s one on the ground. They’ll be with you inside twenty minutes. Can you hold on till then?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“Good. You know what to do. Keep the pressure on the wound. They’re on their way. I’ll get a police unit out to you ASAP.”
Eli sat beside Gabriel, holding the improvised field dressing down against his wound. He hadn’t moved since she ended the call. A siren broke into her thoughts. She looked up to see a uniformed police officer racing across the beach towards them. A second was ushering the approaching onlookers back towards the hotel.
From the north, she heard the sound of an approaching chopper.
THE END
Copyright
© 2018 Sunfish Ltd
Published by Tyton Press, an imprint of Sunfish Ltd, PO Box 2107, Salisbury SP2 2BW T: 0844 502 2061
The right of Andy Maslen to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. Requests for permission should be addressed to the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Cover illustration copyright © Stuart Bache
Cover design by Books Covered
Author photograph for the print edition © Kin Ho
Edited by Michelle Lowery
Acknowledgments
Every time I finish a book, I marvel at the skill, diplomacy and patience of the group of people who help me iron out the glitches and make these stories as good as they can be.
This time around I want to thank the following awesome members of “Team Gabriel”:
Jo Maslen and Sandy Wallace, for reading the first draft and helping me knock it into shape.
My editor, Michelle Lowery. Sorry I couldn’t help with that one personal request, Michelle!
My proofreader, John Lowery, whose eagle eye keeps me out of trouble with the pedantry.
Simon Alphonso, OJ “Yard Boy” Audet, Ann Finn, Yvonne Henderson, Vanessa Knowles, Nina Rip and Bill Wilson: my “sniper spotters”.
My advanced readers for picking up any last-minute typos.
And, as always, my family, whose love means everything.
I must also thank the serving and former soldiers, friends all, whose advice helps me to keep the military details accurate: Giles Bassett, Mark Budden, Mike Dempsey and Dickie Gittins. Any and all mistakes in this area are mine alone.
Andy Maslen
Salisbury, 2018
Also by Andy Maslen
The Gabriel Wolfe series
Trigger Point
Reversal of Fortune (short story)
Blind Impact
Condor
First Casualty
Fury
Rattlesnake
Minefield (novella)
The DI Stella Cole series
Hit and Run
Hit Back Harder
Hit and Done
Let the Bones be Charred (coming soon)
Other fiction
Blood Loss - a Vampire Story
Non-fiction
Write to Sell
100 Great Copywriting Ideas
The Copywriting Sourcebook
Write Copy, Make Money
Persuasive Copywriting
About the Author
Andy Maslen was born in Nottingham, in the UK, home of legendary bowman Robin Hood. Andy once won a medal for archery, although he has never been locked up by the sheriff.
He has worked in a record shop, as a barman, as a door-to-door DIY products salesman and a cook in an Italian restaurant.
As well as the Stella Cole and Gabriel Wolfe thrillers, Andy has published five works of non-fiction, on copywriting and freelancing, with Mars
hall Cavendish and Kogan Page. They are all available online and in bookshops.
He lives in Wiltshire with his wife, two sons and a whippet named Merlin.
Afterword
To get a free copy of Andy’s first novel, Trigger Point , and exclusive news and offers, join his Readers’ Group at www.andymaslen.com .
Email Andy at [email protected] .
Follow and tweet him at @Andy_Maslen.
Join Andy’s Facebook group, The Wolfe Pack .