Chapters (124)
- Cover
- About the Author
- Acclaim for Frank Gardner’s Luke Carlton thrillers
- Also by Frank Gardner
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
- 21
- 22
- 23
- 24
- 25
- 26
- 27
- 28
- 29
- 30
- 31
- 32
- 33
- 34
- 35
- 36
- 37
- 38
- 39
- 40
- 41
- 42
- 43
- 44
- 45
- 46
- 47
- 48
- 49
- 50
- 51
- 52
- 53
- 54
- 55
- 56
- 57
- 58
- 59
- 60
- 61
- 62
- 63
- 64
- 65
- 66
- 67
- 68
- 69
- 70
- 71
- 72
- 73
- 74
- 75
- 76
- 77
- 78
- 79
- 80
- 81
- 82
- 83
- 84
- 85
- 86
- 87
- 88
- 89
- 90
- 91
- 92
- 93
- 94
- 95
- 96
- 97
- 98
- 99
- 100
- 101
- 102
- 103
- 104
- 105
- 106
- 107
- 108
- 109
- 110
- 111
- 112
- 113
- 114
- 115
- Epilogue
- Acknowledgements
- THIS IS JUST THE BEGINNING
Luke had reached the conclusion some time ago that Janulis must know that he, Luke, represented something rather more than the OPCW in The Hague. Otherwise he wouldn’t be telling him all this.
‘All right, Janulis, let’s talk money.’ Luke leaned forward and clasped his hands together. ‘What information can you actually give me and how much do you want for it?’
Janulis took a final drag of his cigarette and stubbed it out on the side of the packet. He waved away the smoke, and looked around the room. He spoke in barely more than a whisper. For the first time Luke could see the fear in his eyes.
‘I will tell you this. WaffenKrieg90 are planning something very big,’ he said, ‘and they have help … They have someone on the inside. Someone inside the system – in your country. Someone who works for your intelligence people.’
52
Surrey, England
Saturday, 12 March, 0903hrs GMT
IT WAS A boy who noticed it. First weekend out after his birthday and he could hardly wait to sail his new radio-controlled toy yacht across the lake. And it was everything he had hoped for. Shane Collins was only in year six at school, but when it came to gadgets he left his parents behind. Deftly, he manoeuvred the miniature yacht, Endeavour, so it tacked neatly across the surface of the lake, while his father looked on admiringly. But five minutes in, something caught his attention.
‘Dad?’
‘Yes?’
‘Look over there. What’s that?’ He pointed. His father could see nothing. ‘There!’ He pointed again. ‘It looks like someone’s driven a car into the lake!’
‘Don’t be silly, son. Nobody would do that.’
‘They have! Look! It’s underwater. It’s got its boot sticking up.’
And for a moment his father could see it too. A car, submerged, but only just. Then the wind picked up, ruffling the surface of the lake.
‘D’you think there’s anyone in it?’ asked the boy, excitedly.
‘Now you’re just being daft, Shane. Of course there won’t be anyone in it. They’d have drowned, wouldn’t they? No, it’ll just be someone who wanted to dump their old banger and they must have rolled it down the hill. Honestly, some people. I’ll phone the council on Monday and let them know. Now, come on, show me what you can do with that yacht.’
And for the next thirty minutes Shane Collins raced his toy yacht to and fro across the water, just above the slowly decomposing body of a man riddled with one of the most lethal pathogens ever to threaten the human race.