She raised an eyebrow. ‘Someone with access to specialist police kit. Are you ready to point the finger at anyone?’

‘We think we may have found the shooter.’

‘Do the police know?’

‘Not yet, and we want to keep it that way for now. We don’t think he’s acting alone, so if we bring him in it’ll tip off the group who’s running him.’

‘So if it’s not resources you’re after, what is it?’

Woolf sat back, bit his bottom lip. ‘Time.’

‘It’s virtual civil war out there. And you want time?’

‘To bring in a recruit, someone credible we can put in with them. He’s got to be completely kosher, an ex-serviceman who’s been fucked over.’

‘Ask the MoD. They probably know hundreds.’

He leaned closer and knitted his fingers together. ‘We don’t want them in on this.’

She started to laugh. ‘You really are going out on a limb if you think the MoD are involved.’

He showed no sign of sharing her mirth, which alarmed her.

‘Is your DG across this?’

Once more, she imagined Mandler’s instructions to him. Here’s some rope: try not to hang us with it, there’s a good chap. She could see he was struggling to find the right words. ‘We’ve been looking for the right man.’

‘And have you found him yet?’

‘I think we have.’

Chapter 11

11

The hold of the Starlifter was almost empty, a giant aluminium airborne metal cave. Before it had finished the climb out of Afghanistan, Tom, too wired to sit or sleep, unstrapped himself and paced the length of the plane’s vast hold while the events of the last twenty-four hours replayed themselves over and over again. Oblivious of the thunder from the engines and the temperature at this altitude, he was numb.

But one thing he couldn’t shut out, couldn’t stop replaying, was Dave’s death. Wherever he looked, his face gazed back at him, the inert glassy stare in the semi-darkness where he had found him, his features frozen for ever in the moment he must have known his charmed life was about to come to an end. Had those eyes seen his assailant? The devastating slash to his throat suggested he had been killed from behind. The fact that Qazi had appeared not to be blood-spattered supported that, with just the tell-tale stain on the thigh of his fatigues where he’d wiped his bloodied hand.

So here he was on his way home. What would that mean at the other end? An inquiry, a court-martial, a quiet word? Tom realized he didn’t care. Something had snapped. The unimaginable had happened. The Army, which he had loved, which had been his second family, had turned on him.