by Chris Ryan
'I need a beer,' he said, looking up towards Janey.
The clipping from the newspaper was starting to fade, but it still caught Matt's eye as he knocked the cap from the bottle: six months later it still made him smile every time he looked at it. The clipping was pinned to the cork noticeboard, along with ads for a couple of second-hand SUVs and one from a Polish girl looking for some au pair work, EUROSTAR SUFFERS TWELVE-HOUR DELAY, ran the headline in bold 48-point type.
A Eurostar was stranded ten miles outside Lille in northern France last night. A train in front was stuck on the tracks, its engine damaged, and trains were halted all day as workers struggled to clear the line. The carriages of the damaged train were empty according to the rail company. They were on a routine engineering exercise, and nobody was on board. Eurostar apologised to passengers for the severe delays that could be expected to the service for the next forty-eight hours while the tracks were checked for any faults.
Officials of the train company blamed the recent heatwave for the accident.
The wrong kind of heat, thought Matt with a grin as he took his beer towards the back of the bar.
There's only one kind of heat, and you can either take it or you can't.
A Christmas tree had gone up at the doorway, and some of the regulars had put presents around its base. A couple of rows of Christmas cards were hung up on some string behind the bar. The Last Trumpet was fully booked for Christmas lunch, and they'd already sold fifty tickets for the New Year's Eve bash. It promised to be quite a party: an Abba covers band was booked, and Janey had dreamt up a couple of new cocktails. Matt took a sip of his beer, letting the cold alcohol soothe his nerves. It was this part of the day he enjoyed the most. He could kick back, let the fresh air rush across his skin and relax, without the stresses of running the bar that filled up the day. And he had a stunning woman to share his bed at night to look forward to.
So long as I can stay awake, things aren't so bad.
A wind was blowing in from the sea, but the skies were still clear, and the sunset was streaked red and blue. A couple of tables away, Penelope and Suzie were sharing another bottle of Chilean white, and dissecting the latest disasters in their personal life. Both of them were talking at the same time, making it hard for Matt to follow what was up, but from the snippets of conversation drifting across it seemed Suzie's new boyfriend had hooked up with one of the fitness instructors at a gym in Puerto Banus, and Penelope's ex-husband had shacked up with someone else and was trying to cut the maintenance for young Liam.
Matt smiled and looked back towards the bar. Bob and Keith were looking at a two-day-old copy of the Daily Mail, competing with each other to complain the loudest about tax rises they didn't pay anyway since neither of them had been back to Britain for a couple of years. Up on the plasma-screen TV that had just been installed, Sky Sports was getting excited about the Boxing Day clash between Manchester United and Arsenal. Match of the season, Andy Gray was proclaiming, although so far as Matt recalled there seemed to be one of those every week.
At the Last Trumpet, not much ever changes.
His eyes drifted out to the horizon. The last embers of the sunlight were starting to disappear beneath the black surface of the waves. The sun never really sets, Matt reminded himself. That's just an illusion caused by the world spinning round.
On the CD, a selection of Christmas songs was already playing: 'Let it Snow', followed by 'Rocking Around the Christmas Tree', 'White Christmas' and 'The Little Drummer Boy', until you imagined that reindeer and holly were all lyricists ever wrote about. Matt had tried to take the disk off, but Janey loved Christmas and put it straight back on again. I'm old enough to stop fighting losing battles, Matt told himself. If she wants the music, she can have it.
He opened up yet another Christmas card, and smiled as he read that Eleanor had got engaged to one of the doctors at the hospital. It was good to see that things were working out for her.
'Is this seat taken?'
He looked up and smiled at Orlena, taking the cap off a fresh bottle of San Miguel. She had just returned from a day's shopping in Malaga. She was carrying a Zara, a Versace and a Chanel bag under her arm. 'How was your run?' she asked. 'Those wounds starting to heal?'
'There's still some pain in my leg and my shoulder,' said Matt. 'I'll be OK. I don't take bullets as well as you do.' That was one of the things he liked about Orlena. She was a real fighter. She understood.
Orlena laughed. The Kevlar jacket she had been wearing on the train had protected her: she had been badly bruised with a nasty swelling beneath her left breast that had taken a month to clear, but otherwise she had not been harmed. Her ability to survive a bullet had become a standing joke between them.
'That time at Petor's house back in Kiev. I would never have shot you, you know.'
Matt looked at her quizzically.
'But if you ever shoot me again,' she said with a smile, 'then I'm going to be really cross.'
'There's something I've always wanted to ask,' he said. 'Why did you shoot Petor that day in Kiev?'
'He developed the drug that damaged my brother. Not just him. Many good men died because of him, lots of families were destroyed. He deserved to die.'
Matt nodded. Right now, one explanation was as good as another. She wanted to kill Petor for the same reason he felt Lacrierre had to die. 'Have you heard from your brother recently?' asked Matt.
'Roman seems to be fine,' said Orlena. 'Did Eleanor give the antidote to the other men?'
'To all the survivors, yes,' replied Matt. 'There have been no more reports of side effects. They all seem to be doing OK.' He smiled, more to himself than to her. 'So some good came out of the whole damned job. Are you staying after Christmas?'
Orlena had arrived three months ago. Her contract at Tocah had been terminated by the new management that took over after Lacrierre's death. Shooting the chairman was not the sort of thing human-resources departments approve of, she'd noted wryly. But they had been generous with the settlement, as big companies always are when they want to cover up an embarrassing incident. At first she had just planned to stay for a few weeks, but that had turned into months.
Matt could see a look in her eyes: her eyelashes lowered, and her lips moved together seductively. 'I wanted to ask you something.'
'I'm. just sitting around listening to Christmas songs,' answered Matt.
'Back in the Ukraine. A business proposition. I thought it might interest you.'
Matt smiled and rubbed his shoulder. 'I'm trying to limit myself to one shooting a year,' he said. 'That and eating more home-delivered pizza. Those are my two New Year's resolutions.'
Orlena's hand reached out across the table. Matt could see a ring on her left hand, a sparkling creation of diamonds, emeralds, gold and platinum, all woven together into an elegant crescent design. A few thousand dollars' worth of finger candy, reflected Matt. 'It could be worth a lot of money,' she said softly. 'And we could work together again.'
Matt grinned. He wouldn't say he wasn't tempted. Life was quiet by the sea. He didn't know how things would work out with Orlena but he was happy just to wait and see. 'I just want to run a restaurant,' he answered. 'The only trouble I want to deal with is a dodgy shipment of olive oil.'
NOW AVAILABLE IN ARROW
Greed
Greed is an explosive story of what happens when terrorism, money, love and jealously combust.
Five men. One Robbery. A deadly game of greed, revenge and betrayal is about to begin.
Fresh out of the SAS, Matt Browning is down on his luck. He owes £500,000. If he doesn't get the money soon, he dies. From nowhere, he is offered a lifeline. A hit on Al-Qaeda, sanctioned and helped by MI5. Matt gathers a small team of former SAS men to steal $10 million in gold an ddiamonds from the world's most deadly terrorist organisation. MI5 will give them all the equipment and information they need. No charges will ever be pressed.
Matt thinks it's the perfect crime. Safe, quick, and patriotic.
But after the money is stolen, the killing starts.
Someone is taking down the members of the team one by one. A silent, expert assassin is stalking the team, gruesomely murdering both them and their families. And Matt knows that he's next.
'lean prose delivers all the action with the usual trenchant force . . . The plot moves like proverbial express train'
The Good Books Guide
'Hard as nails'
Mirror