 
I spy, I saw her die (Book One)

A Cyber Crime Murder Mystery Conspiracy Thriller

By

IAN C.P. IRVINE

Published by Ian C. P. Irvine on Smashwords

Copyright 2015 IAN C.P. IRVINE

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright observed above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the copyright owner.

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.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Google and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Please note: This is the first book in a two part series. The story begins with Book One, carries on seamlessly and concludes with Book Two.

This is an excellent way to introduce yourself to this new and exciting author!- If you enjoy Book One, to continue the story you may then choose to download Book Two.

Alternatively, you have the option to purchase an Omnibus version containing both Book One and Book Two, which readers are recommended to purchase.

Cover Design by Ray Luck

raymondoluck@hotmail.com

Dedicated to my wife and children.

And to my parents, and all my teachers throughout the years.

Other Books by Ian C.P. Irvine

Haunted From Within

Haunted From Without

Time Ship

The Orlando File

The Messiah Conspiracy

London 2012 What If?

The Sleeping Truth

Alexis Meets Wiziwam the Wizard

Chapter 1

London

One year from now

October 8th

12.30 p.m.

For most of us, death comes when we least expect it. For Eva Baczkowski it would be no different.

Eva liked England. The people, the weather, the jobs. And the men.

Everything about England was better than where she came from.

She would never go back to Poland. Her home was here now.

A new life, so full of hope. So full of promise.

Eva laughed aloud in the car. She hadn't been as happy as this for years.

It was only her third month in England, but just over thirty minutes ago she had been offered the job of her dreams: a saleswoman in Selfridges in the perfume department.

Every day she would be surrounded by beautiful people. Beautiful smells. And beautiful women.

Eva also liked women.

In Poland, people said she was strange. Different. Not a good Catholic.

But here in England she was free.

Free to live, love and do anything she wanted.

With whoever she wanted.

The traffic lights in front turned to red and Eva slowed down, came to a halt and began to daydream.

She would soon be able to afford a good car. Not one full of holes with a steering wheel on the wrong side.

Her small car had driven her all the way from Krakow in Poland, with all her worldly possessions stuffed tightly inside, but Eva knew it wouldn't pass an English MOT. Nor could she afford to have all the things fixed that were wrong with it.

Perhaps she would meet a rich, young, handsome man in Selfridges who would whisk her off her feet. They would get married, maybe... and then she could afford a good, English car.

Eva looked up.

An aeroplane was flying overhead. She followed it as it flew directly above her car and then disappeared across the top of the tall building on her left.

The sky was blue today. Bright blue. There were no clouds.

At first the black object that seemed to separate from the building above her had no real form. It was just black. Initially small, but quickly growing larger.

As she stared at the object, time seemed to slow down, and her mind fought rapidly to make sense of the anomaly with which it was presented.

Different shapes and comparisons swept through her head, but none of them made sense.

Until, with a shock, one memory registered in her mind, and struck a chord.

She suddenly remembered an image from a television programme she'd seen a few weeks ago, from a documentary on the BBC recounting the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York.

The image was of what the English documentary called 'the falling man'.

When she had seen it for the first time on the television it had fascinated her and now as she looked up, directly above her through the windscreen, her mind connected the two images together and told her they were similar.

In fact, they were the same.

Eva's eyes widened.

Adrenaline shot into her veins and she gripped the steering wheel in panic.

She didn't have time to scream.

The person accelerating to Earth above her, heading straight towards her, arms and legs flailing the surrounding air, hit her car at over fifty miles an hour.

A head and a torso punched through the roof and the windscreen, smashing into Eva with the force of a falling baby elephant.

The body of the falling person merged violently with Eva's, crushing her head and pulverising her rib cage and internal organs, which exploded and splattered like a squashed tomato all over the inside of the car.

The traffic light in front turned to green.

The sky was blue today. Bright blue. There were no clouds.

Outside the car, some pedestrians began to scream.
Chapter 2

London Saturday 28th

9.30 a.m.

Ten Days Earlier

Ray Luck stirred, reached out with his fingers and caressed Emma's hair.

Soft, golden, beautiful.

As was the rest of Emma.

He turned towards her, cuddled up closer and whispered in her ear.

Emma opened her eyes briefly, smiled, and then fell back into a deep sleep.

Sunlight streamed into the room, confirming the forecast from the night before: a late Indian summer was on its way. This weekend would herald the start of three well above average weeks, warm days of sunshine and balmy nights, each an average of five degrees hotter than normal for this time of year.

Global warming.

Yet another indictment of what mankind was doing to the world, but which was certain to be dismissed and diminished by everyone who thought more of the dollar than the planet.

Ray hated politics. But he loved life.

Life was great.

Especially with Emma.

Deciding to nip down to the deli to get freshly brewed coffee and some croissants for Emma, he slipped out of bed, showered quickly and let himself quietly out of his expensive two bedroom flat on the top floor of their shared building.

Walking down the road, he breathed in the fresh morning air and as he always did every single time he walked down the street, he admired the beautiful, elegant Georgian facades of the white, terraced houses in the Square in which he lived, all of which faced onto communal private gardens in its centre.

The rent in this part of South Kensington was exorbitant but the first instant Ray had seen the flat, he knew that if he was going to live in London, this had to be the place.

As a cyber consultant for one of London's top security firms, Ray could afford it. He was lucky and he knew it. People were prepared to pay highly for the skills he had to offer and Ray was happy to take their money, for as long as they were prepared to pay it.

Thanks to the growing threat that cyber crime posed to almost every business in the world, people like Ray were in short supply. Unlike his friends who had been hit hard by the recession, Ray had not been out of work for a single day since he graduated from university.

It was the law of supply and demand.

For every cyber specialist like Ray, there were at least ten jobs.

Supply was short, demand was high.

It was only a short walk to the corner deli, run by an Italian who'd moved here twenty years ago and still had his thick accent, almost singing each word as he spoke. On a Saturday morning the deli was full of the same faces out walking the dog and collecting the papers. Ray smiled and nodded at a few of those he knew, and chatted to an old lady with silver hair and the biggest diamond ring he had ever seen.

The community was one of many things that made this area special, and although probably one of the poorest people in the Square, Ray didn't feel out of place. People were friendly.

Collecting his coffees and the croissants he left the shop and stopped by the newsagent on the way back.

Scanning the headlines, he saw that the war on ISIS in Egypt had taken another turn for the worse: they had consolidated their position in Cairo, and now it looked certain that the only way to make any progress was to commit another task force on the scale of Desert Storm, when Britain and its allies had gone to war with Iraq.

Tucking a copy of the Times under his arm he started back towards his flat: he didn't want the warm croissants or coffee to go cold.

As he turned back into the Square, he thought of Emma and last night.

She had been quite cold towards him. It worried him a little.

A few weeks ago they had started going through a bad patch, but then things had improved for a while, and Ray had been looking forward to this weekend.

For lots of reasons.

Tonight was going to be a big night.

After seven years of being together, Ray was planning to pop the question.

The question.

The one that he knew he had been avoiding for a while now, and which was probably the reason behind Emma's strange comments as of late.

Ray knew that something was bothering her. After he had cooked her dinner he had tried to talk about it with her last night, but she had avoided proper conversation.

A headache, that time of the month, and a hard week at work had all been reasons for her to go to bed early without any real discussion between them.

But tonight Ray would make everything right.

It was all planned.

Tonight was going to be special.

A woman with a cat on a lead was coming towards him on the pavement. Seeing it, Ray quickly covered his mouth with his free hand and crossed the road: the last thing he needed now was to breathe in a mouthful of cat scent and for his cat allergy to flare up.

Darting between two cars - a Porsche and a Land Rover - he skipped onto the pavement and carried on up the Square on the other side of the street.

It was then that he saw the envelope lying on the ground a few feet in front of him.

A sixth sense told him to bend down and pick it up, so he did.

The envelope was sealed, and turning it over, he found no address on the front. It was quite heavy, about two centimetres thick. The envelope bent in his hand and whatever was inside felt like paper. Looking around him there was no one else who could have dropped it. Crossing the road back towards the entrance to his building, he stuffed the envelope inside the folded newspaper as he fished out his keys and opened the door to the stairwell.

Upstairs, when he let himself into his flat and walked in, Emma was sitting in his dressing gown on the sofa, eating a piece of toast.

She looked up, her expression rather serious.

"Where have you been?" she asked. "I woke up and you were gone..."

"Your favourite coffee, and some fresh croissants," Ray replied, holding them up. "I wanted to treat you."

He walked towards her, putting the coffee on a side table and bending forward to kiss her.

Her eyes searched his, and for a moment Ray thought she was going to say something, but then she closed her eyes and returned the kiss gently.

Ray hesitated, then volunteered to go and get some plates, whilst handing over the bag of croissants and the papers.

"What's this?" Emma called after him as he left the room.

"What?"

"The envelope in the papers?"

"Envelope?" Ray enquired, thinking for a second. "Oh, that. I just found it on the street outside. There's no address on it... Why don't you open it up and see what's inside?"

He returned to the room, two plates in his hands.

Emma was looking up at him, her head shaking in disbelief and a quizzical look in her eyes.

"You found this outside?" she asked, waving the contents of the envelope at him with her right hand.

It was a wad of crisp, new £50 notes.

Ray stared at the money.

"How much is there...?" he asked.

Emma shook her head again.

"I don't know... thousands... tens of thousands... There's got to be. They're all fifty pound notes... There's a fortune here!"

Ray hurried across and sat beside her, reaching out and gently taking them from her hand.

"Bloody hell..." he whistled.

"Ray... you just found these? Outside?"

"Yes. Just now. On the other side of the road, near the railings."

Ray started to count the money, putting them into piles, each containing a thousand pounds.

"Fourteen... fifteen..." he said aloud, finishing at "Twenty thousand pounds, exactly."

"Twenty thousand pounds?" Emma parroted back.

"Exactly." Ray reiterated.

"Bloody hell," she replied.

"I just said that..." he said, looking back up at her, their faces expressionless.

For a moment they stared at each other, then Emma looked back at the money, and Ray laughed. Nervously.

"So, who does it belong to?" she asked.

"I've no idea... it was just lying on the ground, in the envelope."

Ray reached across to take the envelope that Emma was still holding firmly in her left hand. She let go of it and Ray looked inside. He lifted the envelope to his nose, and sniffed it.

"Nothing. It's empty."

"So... What are you going to do with the money?" she asked, her eyes searching his questioningly.

"What do you think I should do with it?" Ray replied.

"You can't keep it. It's twenty thousand pounds. You have to hand it in."

"To whom? The police?"

"Of course... you've got to take it to the police station."

"Are you joking?" Ray asked. "You want me to take this in and just give it to the police?"

"Of course! That's the right thing to do!" Emma said, standing up.

Ray reached across the table and picked up his coffee, taking a few large sips.

"It's going cold," he said, pointing at Emma's.

"Forget the coffee, Ray. Tell me what you're going to do with the money!"

"I don't know. Keep it, I suppose."

"Brilliant. This is just typical of you. Just typical." She said, turning her back and walking towards the bedroom door, before stopping and coming back.

"What do you mean, 'typical'? " Ray asked, standing up from the sofa.

"I mean, you never do the right thing. Never. The right thing to do is to hand it over to the police, but no, oh no, Ray Luck isn't going to do that, is he?"

Ray stared at Emma, sensing from the tone of her voice and the way the conversation was so suddenly changing focus, that this was not just about the money.

"What do you mean?" Ray said, dropping the money on the sofa. "Of course I'll do the right thing. I always try to do the right thing!"

"You mean, like watching other women take their clothes off on that stupid program you use to spy on people in their own homes through their TV or computer cameras?"

"I don't do that anymore. I promised you I'd stopped that. You watched me delete the program. I erased it. You saw me write over it so that I could never use it again! Why are you bringing that up? It's got nothing to do with this!"

"But you used to watch it, didn't you? You even wrote the program so you could get your rocks off whenever I wasn't around."

"Emma, I promised you. I deleted the program. Anyway, you watch Big Brother. It's just the same. I just like to watch people living their real lives..."

"No, it's not the same, Ray, and you know it."

She stopped and took a deep breath.

"So are you going to take the money to the police or not?"

"No. Taking the money to the police is probably, actually, completely the wrong thing to do!"

"The wrong thing? How on earth can being honest, doing the right thing, suddenly be the wrong thing?" Emma asked, storming back over to the sofa and sitting down.

Ray sat down beside her, picked up her coffee and handed it to her.

She pushed his hand aside.

"I don't want the bloody coffee. I want you to tell me what the hell you mean!"

"I mean, look at it... it's twenty thousand pounds in new fifty pound notes. In a brown, unmarked envelope. No name. No identification. Nothing. If you or I had that much money and were carrying it around outside, there's no way I'd just stuff it all in an envelope, without a business card, or an address. I'd have it in a wallet, or better still, a briefcase padlocked to my wrist. The fact it's just stuffed in an envelope and sealed like that means it's got to be dodgy. It's most likely stolen, or drug money or something..."

"Stolen? Drug money? How did you work that one out? Someone could have just got the money out of a bank, or was given it as a present. Maybe for the deposit on a flat, or something?"

"Possibly. Maybe... but the more I think about it, the more it feels like it's drug money. And the last thing I'm going to do is take a pile of drug money down to the police. I'm telling you, the worst thing you can do is to get your name and address associated with anything to do with drugs. I'm not getting involved with anything like that again."

"People can't think like that... If, and it's a big 'if' Ray, a HUGE if, if this is drug money, then it's down to people like you and me to do the right thing. Handing it over to the police is the right thing to do."

"Emma, it's drug money. I promise you. I can almost taste it, and after what happened to my brother, you know I won't have anything to do with anything that has any connection to drugs. I repeat, I'm not getting involved again. And I'm not taking it to the police, and I'm not talking to anyone else about it." Ray paused, the memory of his young brother's death caused by an accidental drug overdose in the school playground choking him up. He swallowed hard. "I'll give it to charity," Ray announced, resolutely. "I'll give it all to charity. But I'm not taking it to the police."

"Take it the police first, and if no one claims it, then give it to charity..."

"Emma, if no one claims it, they'll just keep it and we'll never see it again."

"They won't, Ray. They'll hand it back..."

"You honestly think so? I love just how naive you are Emma. I love it."

"You just called me naive? I'm naive?"

Ray stared back at her. Her face was beginning to turn red.

"No..."

"Naive? I can tell you this much, Ray Luck... This might be your 'lucky' day, finding twenty thousand pounds. But you just lost me. I'm not so naive any longer to think that this relationship is going to last. We're just too different."

Tears were beginning to stream down her face.

Ray jumped up and went towards her, wanting to wrap her in his arms and pull her close.

She stepped backwards.

"We're just too different, Ray. I can see that now. In fact, I've been seeing it for quite a while."

"Please, Emma, calm down... Can we just sit down and talk about this?" he said, waving gently at the sofa.

"No, I'm sorry, Ray. It's over."

"Over? Why? I just said, I'm going to give the money to charity. All of it. I promise. Any charity you want. You wait and see, I'll do it today. This morning. I'll do the right thing, okay?"

"The right thing? It's been seven years Ray. You're selfish. You only ever think about yourself. And as for the 'right thing' to do, you wouldn't know what that was if it hit you right between the eyes!"

Five minutes later Emma was gone, pulling the front door closed behind her.

Ray stared after her, tears welling up inside.

What was that all about?

What had just happened?

Should he run after her and beg her to come back?

The woman he loved, the woman he had planned to propose to that very evening, had just walked out of the door.

What should he do now?

Her last words rang in his ears, "...and as for the right thing to do,... you wouldn't know what that was if it hit you right between the eyes!"

"Shit!" he shouted aloud.

Emma was right.

The truth was, Ray didn't know what to do next.

Chapter 3

London

September 28th

8.00 p.m.

Ray Luck was getting drunk. Slowly, but surely.

He had spent the day wandering along the banks of the Thames, sitting on different benches beside the water and staring at the river as it flowed past.

The water was calming. It helped him to concentrate. To plan. To think of what he should do next.

With each period of time spent sitting on a different bench, he was able to think back upon his relationship with Emma, figure out a reason why she must be so upset with him, and then compose a text message on his iPhone, apologising to her for whatever it was that he must have done.

By the time he had walked from Waterloo train station to Tower Bridge along the South Bank, he had sent twenty text messages, and left ten voice messages.

As he crossed over the river to the Tower of London, a single solitary beep signified the arrival of a text message.

From Emma.

"Ray, Please stop. It's over. Believe me. No matter how many times you text me, I won't change my mind. Even now, you don't know that the right thing to do is to just leave me alone! I did love you Ray. I did. But not anymore. I'm sorry. Emma."

Not having eaten all day, the first beer had an immediate effect.

By the time the second was finished, he was feeling quite tipsy.

There would have been a third too, and a fourth and a fifth, except for the fact that Ray had not brought enough money with him.

Sadly, he had left the twenty thousand pounds at home.

After Emma had gone, he had sat alone in the flat for an hour, staring at the money.

He knew that it wasn't the cause of their break-up, that the reasons were already there before he had found the envelope, but he couldn't help but wish that he had never set eyes upon it.

For a moment he had considered burning it all.

But then he remembered that he had promised... sort of... that he would give it all to charity.

Before he had left, he had hidden the money and collected the diamond ring from his hiding place underneath the loose floorboard in the bathroom.

He had stared at the ring, sitting crossed legged on the bathroom floor, imagining in his mind how it could have been... how the evening should have played out.

Ray was not a stoic, but he hardly ever cried. So when he felt the tears beginning to flow, he fought back, picking himself up, having a shower and then leaving the flat.

He didn't know where he was going. Or what he was doing.

He just knew that he had to walk. To think. To escape the confines of the house.

He had no set plan.

But just in case, he had taken the ring with him.

They had met when he was nineteen years old. In a club in Oxford.

She was a beautiful second year student at Christ Church College, reading History, and he was a fresher from Hertford studying Computer Science: tall, slim, athletic, apparently very good looking.

Within a week they were dating, and ever since they had been together.

Seven, fantastic, years.

Bloody wonderful years.

Standing in the middle of the pedestrian bridge halfway across the Thames between St Paul's Cathedral and the Tate Modern, he looked down into the river and watched it flow past underneath.

A thought crossed his mind.

Throw the diamond ring into the water.

As he pulled it out of his pocket, he looked at it, imagining once again the moment he was to have slipped it onto her finger.

The receipt in the box declared that the ring had cost him one-and-a-half thousand pounds. When he had seen it in the shop, he had instantly known that this was the ring for her. He knew she would love it. When he walked into the shop to buy it, he would have taken it, even if it had cost ten times as much.

It was beautiful: a single, one carat stone set in a platinum ring.

Preparing to toss it over the edge into the water below, he pulled his hand back, mentally primed and just about to throw it,... when he felt the phone vibrate against his leg.

A message had arrived.

\------------------

The best present any parent can give a son, is a sister.

Claire was younger than Ray, smarter and the 'best Luck' he had ever known.

"Did she say yes?" she had enquired in her text message.

She was the only person he had told about tonight, about what was meant to have happened.

Now, returning the ring into the box, and putting it back into his pocket, he called Claire and told her the painful truth.

"Are you okay? Shall I come down and see you?" Claire had asked.

"No. I'll be okay. I think I just want to be by myself."

"Don't call her again, Ray." She had warned. "I know you love her, but you have to let her come back to you. Either she will, or she won't, but if you contact her anymore, you'll just push her further away."

"You're probably right."

"I know I am. I'm a woman."

She paused.

"What are you going to do now?"

"I'm going home."

"Call me if you need to talk, okay?"

"I promise."

Thirty minutes later, Ray walked up the steps to the front of the grand building he lived in, took out his key and opened the main door.

He was so wrapped up in his own thoughts, that he didn't see the three men in black suits on the other side of the road, walking up and down the street, searching the pavement.

He also didn't notice when one of them looked across and watched him enter his building.

\------------------

The flat felt empty. As soon as he walked in the door, he could smell Emma's perfume. Hanging up his coat and taking off his shoes at the door - a habit he had learned while living in Japan with Emma one summer - he walked through to the bedroom and sat on the bed.

The bedclothes were still rumpled from the night before. Lying down, closing his eyes and sniffing the pillow, Ray tried to imagine Emma being there again.

It wasn't easy.

She had always breathed life into any room she had entered. But now she wasn't there, the effect was the same, but in reverse.

That essence of life had gone.

For the first time in years, Ray felt alone.

Taking his clothes off, he walked through to the bathroom and stepped into the shower.

Sitting on the floor, he wrapped his arms around his knees and pulled them into his chest, and let the warm water rain down upon him.

He began to cry.

The tears flowed and he sobbed heavily. Wave after wave of hurt, confusion, longing and pain boiled up from within, overflowed and were washed away. After five minutes they dried up and stopped.

He sat there for another ten minutes until the water began to run cold.

By the time he stood up, reached for the towel and started to dry himself, a calmness had descended upon him, and he was feeling slightly better.

It was then that he noticed that Emma had left quite a few of her personal possessions in the flat: perfume and toiletries in the bathroom, jewellery, a hair-dryer, clothes and shoes in their bedroom. A nice coat in the cupboard, a pile of her favourite CDs and DVDs in the lounge, and her Kindle on the bedside table.

Seeing these, Ray knew that there was a possibility of him seeing Emma again. She would have to come back to collect them... or he could take them over to her.

For a second, hope flickered, but was quickly extinguished when he realised that equally, she could come round and get everything when he was at work or out: the most likely scenario.

Ray walked to the fridge and pulled out a four-pack of cold beer.

Ray had a plan to make the pain go away.

He was going to vanish into his virtual world. Get drunk. And have some fun.

The second bedroom in his flat was the place where Ray went to disappear. During the day it doubled up as an office, from where he often worked from home and performed his duties for his company. For the past four years, he had been working as a Cyber Analyst and a Penetration tester, alternating between the two roles on a three-monthly basis. For twelve weeks he would be paid to try to find a way to hack into the computer networks of paying clients, trying to discover vulnerabilities or backdoors into their security architectures and software. When he did find them, as he always did \- it was just a matter of how quickly he could do it and how many he would find - he would explore the company's networks, see how deep he could go and investigate what damage he could potentially do. Once he had identified all the ways he could break into a network, steal corporate data, and disable their systems, he would write up a comprehensive report and then present it to the client. He always loved the look of surprise and horror on a client's face as he showed them just what he could have accomplished, had his intentions been malicious.

Sometimes he felt slightly guilty when employees within the client who were responsible for their IT security were subsequently fired. It didn't happen often, but either way, after his report was delivered, quite often his company was immediately given a contract to manage the security services on behalf of the client. He felt bad for those who had to go home and tell their wives that they no longer had a job, but in general he knew that he was performing an essential role: if he had not done his thing and broken into their network, purely with a positive intention to help, it could alternatively so easily be a Russian, Chinese or Eastern European hacker who was out to steal the company's Intellectual Property Rights, to disable their systems, or steal their money. And if that happened, the company could go broke, and end up having to get rid of many more staff. The truth was he was saving people's jobs, not threatening them.

After three months aggressively hacking into the networks of clients, he would then switch to working within the Security Operation Centre at his company, Castle Security Defence, or 'CSD' as the brand logo simplified it. Once back in the SOC, he would spend the next twelve-week shift analysing the data traffic that they monitored on the networks of companies who paid them to protect their businesses. He would look for strange events or patterns in the data that told his experienced mind that the company was being hacked, or had already been hacked. He would find out what the hackers were doing, and how they were doing it. And then he would blow the whistle, stop it all happening, make recommendations on how to prevent it in the future, and give guidance to other colleagues in CSD as to what damage had been done and how it should be fixed. Although the information they provided to their clients was often enough to help identify who the hackers were, they left the rest up to the client. Sometimes the client called in the police, and arrests were made, but often there was nothing that could be done anyway, because the hackers lived in another country or were supported and shielded by a foreign government.

Ray wasn't so interested in what happened afterwards. His interest, his fascination and his passion were in finding patterns and trails in the 'big data' every company generated these days, and discovering hidden cyber attacks that other analysts could not.

Ray was one of the best.

If he had been a criminal, he would be very rich indeed.

That was not to say that he was squeaky clean.

There had been a time, once, long ago, during which Ray Luck had learnt his trade, when he had played the game and made some money.

Not a lot.

But enough.

Before he was caught and offered a job by the company that had caught him.

CSD.

Thanks to CSD his life had diverted down a new track, back onto the straight and narrow. The best part was that he was still doing all the things he had done before, but this time getting paid for it. Legally.

Ray loved his job. He relished what he did.

When he entered his 'den', switched off the lights, and sat in his black leather swivel chair surrounded by banks of flat-screens and glowing panels, blinking lights and computer terminals, Ray was in his element.

Once inside, surrounded by the comforting hum of his servers and their cooling systems, he would forget the life he lived in the 'real' world, and become immersed in the digital underworld, the dark web, digital crime, cyber hacktivists, malware and bitcoins. In microseconds he would jump from one continent to another, from one network to the others it linked to, from a host to all the servers it connected with. He would follow packets of data as they swept through networks across the world, surfing digital waves and boring through firewalls with ease. Once he had logged on to the internet, he could be anyone he wanted, go anywhere he fancied, and do anything he wished. No one would notice him, and if they did, Ray had gone to extraordinary lengths to ensure that anyone else who had the same skills as he had, would never be able to find him.

To everyone else, Ray was invisible.

And yet, from this room, Ray could see everything that happened in the world.

Almost literally.

That was the story of Ray Luck. The professional cyber expert employed by CSD.

The story of SolarWind, the name of the alter ego Ray Luck now assumed in cyber space, was slightly different.

Ray had adopted the name, because in his mind it conjured up the feeling of an unstoppable, high energy force that could sweep across the galaxy at lightning speed. Likewise, his cyber world 'avatar' was unstoppable. No firewall, no DMZ, no defence-in-depth security strategy from any company, had ever stopped him. True, sometimes it might take him a little longer than normal to hack through the well organised security defences that some companies would put up, but in general, if SolarWind was motivated, had the time, resource and determination, he would always succeed. Seldom did he give up.

That said, the lessons Ray Luck had learned in the real world when he had been caught by CSD had taught him a lesson he had never forgotten.

Ray was always in control. As 'SolarWind' he never stole anything in the cyber world that would be considered as breaking a law. He never hacked into government or official sites, where some government agencies might take offence, particularly the NSA, FBI, CIA or any other US affiliated government bodies. He knew that if he was caught, a deportation order and a one-way flight to the US was a realistic consequence. Secondly, he was extremely cautious to ensure that if he did penetrate a business or large company that he would always leave immediately and not touch anything should he discover that the company ran industrial processes or was part of the Critical National Infrastructure. Thanks to the experiences he had learned during his paid career, he understood that a significant proportion of the infrastructure upon which most countries depended for the provision and distribution of gas, oil, water, electricity and food was built upon old networks using 'Operation Technology', which unlike modern 'IT' networks, had little or no ability to defend themselves against cyber attack. A mistake made when hacking into the network of an oil plant, or a chemical factory, could have disastrous consequences, not to mention what might happen if he accidentally shut down or opened up the wrong valve in a nuclear power plant.

SolarWind just wanted to have fun. He wanted to play in cyberspace. To explore and get kudos for doing what few others could. He certainly did not want to harm anyone, get caught, go to prison or steal anything.

It wasn't that he was a coward. He just wasn't a fool.

In the past five years, he had watched too many of his peers, cyber colleagues and even some personal cyber-world friends all go that little bit too far and get caught.

Three were in prison. One was dead - from dubious circumstances that had never been explained - and another was now working for the government.

Ray cracked open his first beer, switched the Play button on the old Denon hi-fi system that he had inherited from his dad, and settled back to the latest Coldplay album.

It would take SolarWind ten minutes to log on through the various levels of security defence he had built around his own virtual world, moving down through the multiple network security levels he had established until after having passed through two of his outer layered demilitarised zones - DMZs for short - he was authenticated by the central operating system and admitted to his own private network.

From within the cocoon of his multilayered set of DMZs, through which no other cyber entity would ever be able to pass without the data-processing power of the NSA -and even then it would take them months, if not years to break the encryption and find the right passwords - SolarWind could operate at will, virtually doing anything he wanted to.

Luckily for society, SolarWind was a good citizen, a good person, and had a conscience.

Sadly, SolarWind knew others like him who were almost as talented, some even more so, who were angry citizens, who bore grudges against the world, and revelled in their ability to wreak havoc and cause as much disruption as possible.

For the most part, SolarWind did not associate with such people as much now as he used to. From time to time, he would come across them at hacker conventions, or he would bump into them on the dark web, or on the normal internet. Occasionally he might even cross their path when playing around inside someone's network, having penetrated a company's network defences.

However, SolarWind was still, and probably would always remain, a participating member of several of the largest online hacker clubs, and although the membership came from a wide spectrum of society, they all shared a common, unwritten social code: you never ratted on a cyber-bruv, a fellow member of that club. No matter what.

As Ray Luck, the Dr Jekyll of the partnership, sometimes Ray would suspect a known cyber-bruv as being the perpetrator of an attack he might be investigating. Whenever that happened, it caused a few deep-seated personal conflicts of interest. Typically, he would end up warning the other hacker, firing a ping in their direction, and giving them a cyber heads-up that they were under surveillance and would soon be caught. So far it had always worked: the other hacker would give up, retreat, and leave Ray as the victor, without forcing him to choose between his job and dobbing in the cyber-bruv to the authorities or the company who had commissioned him to test their network defences.

So far.

Ray knew that one day his luck would run out and he would have to make a choice.

Little did he know, as he cracked open his second beer and settled down for the first fun of the evening, that such a day was going to come sooner rather than later.

\------------------

Outside on the street, the four man team of mysterious men dressed in black climbed back into their two black sedans and drove off.

They had found nothing. The twenty thousand pounds was still missing.

The good news was that someone had given them a tip off.

Someone, when asked, had actually remembered seeing a good looking, tall, athletic, young man walking down the street about the same time the money must have gone missing.

It wasn't much. But in their capable and highly experienced hands, such information was invaluable.

The man was young, white and probably a local.

He had been carrying a brown bag and a newspaper.

And a coffee.

Chapter 4

London

September 28th

10.35 p.m.

Ray Luck was no longer getting drunk. He was drunk.

Finishing the fourth can of beer he went to the kitchen and came back with a bottle of red wine: cabernet shiraz. His favourite.

After the third beer Ray had stopped trying to randomly hack into the companies he found online. His personal rule of never hack when you had drunk too much was one he never broke.

It was like driving when under the influence.

You could make mistakes. Crash and burn.

Damage something, or leave a trace as to who you were.

He wasn't scared that someone might follow his cyber tracks back to his flat...no one would ever be able to break through all his defences and identify who he was, or where he lived. At most they could perhaps guess what country he was in, but beyond that on the internet he was anonymous and untouchable.

No, what worried Ray was that as SolarWind, he had a reputation as one of the world's top hackers, and the last thing he wanted was to do something stupid, and accidently leave a glass slipper behind that someone would eventually trace to SolarWind.

Ray had spent years establishing a reputation in cyber space, and he didn't want to give any cyber-bruv a cause to doubt him, dis him or pull him down.

So, whenever it came time to stop knocking on firewall doors, Ray would stop hacking and look for other forms of entertainment.

He would log on to a hacker chat-room and, using one of many of his aliases, would swing by from one room to another, chat with peers, and find out what was happening in the dark web.

There was always something interesting to find out. Always.

Or occasionally, if he was really bored, he might switch his large computer screen to what he liked to call "Big Brother Mode", run a small computer programme he had developed to help him survey networks for CSD called '1984' and start to watch the world around him.

1984 was one of the simplest, but finest, computer programmes he had written. Four years ago, it had only taken him a few nights of coding, but it had kept him entertained and given him hours of endless fun ever since.

It was based on a similar idea to the 'Big Brother' television program but was far better: written to see what information he could gather from the cameras customers installed and ignored in their company networks, Ray had discovered that 1984 also gave him the ability to reach into homes all over the world and watch people living their normal, everyday lives.

It worked as follows.

The program scanned the web looking for cameras that were switched on and connected to the internet. Once identified, his program would identify them and categorise them as belonging to one of several main groups, classing the majority of them as either CCTV cameras, live-video feeds for television stations, security cameras, video-conferencing cameras, laptop or computer connected cameras, or cameras that were embedded in or connected to flat-screen televisions in people homes. To avoid any problems with data protection laws, and to keep 1984 on the good side of any laws governing privacy, when viewing public CCTV cameras the programme automatically stripped out the IP addresses from the information presented on screen, thus ensuring that anyone who used the program \- i.e. Ray - would never be able to identify the country or people picked up in the videos. Of course, it would be a simple matter to 'change' the program so that this information was made available, but Ray had never felt the urge or need to do so. The commercial version of the program that they used when looking at specific companies however was more targeted. You chose the IP address range you wanted that related to a specific company, and then went fishing.

When running the public, internet searching version, of all the groups that 1984 broke the video feeds down into, Ray found the last four groups the most fascinating.

When using 1984 to look at companies, he couldn't believe that businesses would buy video conferencing equipment, install it in their boardrooms where they discussed their most sensitive corporate secrets, and then forget and be totally oblivious to the fact that a video-conferencing camera and audio equipment were pointing at them and listening to every word that was being said during their highly sensitive board meetings.

The same went for home computers with cameras attached to them for Skype and messaging, and likewise for the new internet connected television screens with embedded cameras built in and permanently switched on.

His program 1984 took advantage of a simple fact that very few people seemed to have learned: when a camera was embedded in or attached to a computer which was connected to the internet, just because the owners were not using Skype, or a video-conferencing or video-messaging app to look at and see someone else, it didn't mean that someone else couldn't see them.

In fact, the opposite was mostly true - if a camera was connected to the internet, and his program could find it, 1984 would switch it on, and establish a direct video feed from the camera to the big screen in Ray's second bedroom.

1984 divided his viewing screen into rows of smaller images: Ray could choose how many rows he wanted, and how many video images he could view in each column.

Normally he would set it to watch twenty one remote cameras at a time, the images from each camera appearing in a little window in one of three rows and seven columns.

Using his mouse, Ray could pick any window he liked and it would automatically appear full screen on a second large flat screen in his room.

Ray found it fascinating.

Sometimes it made him feel what it must be like to be God, being able to see directly into people's homes, and observe them doing anything and everything you could possibly imagine.

The majority of the time he couldn't understand what people were saying because most of the images he found most interesting and drew his attention came from countries where Ray could not understand one word of the mother language.

However, Ray soon discovered that although people might wear different clothes, eat different food, and speak different languages, the things they did were mostly very similar.

They would sleep, laugh, cry, drink, eat, read, listen to music, read, work, iron, dance, argue, fight, get naked, masturbate to the pornography they were watching on their screens, or have sex.

On a scale of one to ten, watching people reading was the worst, and continually scored zero. At the other end of the scale, occasionally, he would discover a very attractive woman taking her clothes off. Sometimes, he would watch couples have sex, although it had surprised Ray when he had started watching the output from 1984 how quickly watching other people having sex became quite boring. The most interesting thing he found from 1984 was the ability to watch other people argue. He loved to observe their behaviour, to listen to the to's and fro's of the arguments. He found their confrontations fascinating.

Emma had hated 1984. When she had first discovered Ray watching it, she was shocked.

She had accused him of being a pervert. A sick voyeur.

He had promised that we wouldn't watch it anymore and had gone through the motions of deleting it. In fact, he had told her that he had deleted it. Which was a lie. But not a bad, terrible lie, because in truth, he had really cut back, and he had hardly watched it all in the last few years.

Only occasionally. When Emma wasn't around and he was lonely.

Or drunk.

The truth was that 1984 fascinated him.

It wasn't just about finding naked women and watching them, although, obviously Ray wasn't going to not watch one if he saw one... But it was much more than that.

If he had been an author, he would have been inspired by the ability to see real-life stories unfold before him so that he could then turn them into chapters of a book which would fascinate others.

One of Ray's favourite episodes from 1984 was when he watched a man in Brazil bring a woman home to his apartment, make love to her on his bed, only to hear his wife coming into the house.

He had hidden the other woman under the bed, and when his wife had come in he had feigned sleep.

His wife stripped off, climbed in beside him, and the man and wife started to make love.

After a few minutes, the woman under the bed had tried to crawl away and sneak out of the room.

From his vantage point of the camera embedded in the TV in the bedroom, Ray had watched as the wife had turned round and seen the naked mistress sneaking out.

All hell had broken loose.

But that was not the end of it.

After twenty minutes shouting at each other the wife had reached out to the mistress, who then climbed into bed between the man and the woman.

What followed next was every heterosexual man's fantasy, and Ray was no different.

It had been a one off. Ray had never seen anything quite like that again.

Thankfully, in the past few years, Ray's life had been so full of Emma that he had not felt the need to indulge so much in a life of voyeurism.

Tonight though was different.

Ray was alone. And he hated the feeling that accompanied it.

So, instead, he was determined to lose himself in the lives of others, and the rest of the bottle of wine.

In recent months 1984 had become a distant friend, but tonight they were going to be fully reacquainted. Emma was gone, and now there was no reason not to watch it.

Tonight, 1984 was the only friend he had.

Ray poured his glass, watched as the little boxes on his screen started to fill up with video streams from around the world, and began to browse the lives of others.

\------------------

It had probably been about six months since the last time Ray had run 1984. What immediately impressed Ray was that the average standard of images that he was now viewing was remarkably better than those he had seen last time he had logged on.

Although it was a surprise, Ray quickly realised why.

In the past year there had been a dramatic uptake of HD TV's, most of which now had good quality cameras embedded in them. For those that didn't, the resolution and quality of the cameras that you could now buy from any computer store to attach to your TV was much better than ever before. Cheaper, but better. The wonderful advantage of economies of scale.

The second reason was that the average speed of broadband piped directly into people's homes was much greater. Fibre optic cables were being laid everywhere, and the price of affordable bandwidth had plummeted. Nowadays, lots of people were watching TV online, catching up on programmes they had missed or watching movies in real time from subscription services.

The amount of detail that could be transported across network links had risen dramatically.

Thanks to all these advances Ray Luck was now able to watch Mrs Jones at Number 36 strip off her clothes in High Definition, while some man in Japan was getting drunk drinking Saki and dancing round his living room. A family probably in South America seemed to be playing some sort of game, and a couple speaking French were fighting, literally \- they were kick-boxing each other. About five women on different screens were all naked and lying on beds, touching themselves, which Ray quickly realised was a sign of the times and one of the latest developments in on-line porn: they were paid sex-workers providing on-line chat room services where subscribers could contact them and in response the women would do whatever they were asked to do for three minutes at a time...or something like that. Ray had never subscribed and did not know the intimate details.

In the bottom left of his screen a teenage girl was crying her eyes out. The sadness was palpable. Ray was drawn to her, and he directed his mouse towards the screen image, clicked on the picture, and watched it go full-screen on the other display.

The girl was reading a letter and sobbing her heart out.

Almost as if with a sixth sense, Ray immediately understood what was going on. The girl had just been dumped. He watched her crying and wished more than anything that he could reach out and comfort her... but he couldn't.

The sadness was infectious. After two minutes of viewing, his own sadness began to surface, and he felt a sudden pang in his chest. An emptiness. A longing. A loss.

He closed the window down and returned to viewing the main screen.

People were reading, knitting, sitting on sofas staring at the cameras, cooking, ironing. Almost every aspect of modern life was being captured for his entertainment.

Top right, a screen window that until now was showing a bedroom but no occupants suddenly became interesting.

A beautiful woman walked into the room. She came over to where the camera was and bent over towards him.

She was wearing a red, figure hugging dress. Her breasts were large and full, and a wonderful, exposed cleavage caught Ray's immediate attention. Ray clicked on the image.

The light flickered on the other display, and the image went full screen.

As she bent forward, Ray got a full view of her cleavage, and in spite of the beer and wine, he felt an immediate physical response.

The woman was gorgeous.

She was obviously fiddling with something underneath the camera, or close to it.

Suddenly it went dark.

She had switched the light off in the room.

"Shit..." Ray swore, thinking that was that, and all the fun was over before it had begun.

Luckily, a few seconds later, before Ray had managed to switch channels, the camera in the woman's room started showing an image again.

This time the room was much darker. Another light had been switched on somewhere in the background.

"Yes!" Ray said aloud, as the woman standing in front of the camera came into full view.

The woman was stripping off.

Ray watched her remove her dress, unveiling black-stocking clad thighs, and a wonderful body.

She half-turned, looking across the room and said something to someone off screen.

Ray quickly lent forward and turned the volume up, switching off the CD playing on his hi-fi.

She was speaking a language he didn't recognise. Not English, or European. If Ray were to guess, it was probably Arabic.

A man's arms encircled her body, and he watched a hand unclip her bra strap.

Her breasts fell free. Heavy and beautiful.

The man - Ray couldn't see his face - was kneeling in front of the woman, kissing her stomach. His head moved down, exploring between her legs.

The woman moaned and grasped the man's hair with both hands.

She rotated slightly away from the camera, and the man shuffled across round in front of her.

Ray could only see the back of the woman, who was leaning forward, but from the sounds he heard, he could tell that the man was kneeling up, and fondling and kissing the woman's breasts.

"Shit!"....Ray swore again, realising that he had forgotten to hit the 'record' button.

Reaching forward, he switched on the external hard drive and started to capture every second for his own personal future entertainment.

The man stood up in front of the woman, and they started to kiss.

With still no clear view of his face, the man lifted the woman up and walked backwards away from the camera carrying her in his arms. For a second or two they disappeared from view. Then the unmistakable sounds of a woman making love filled the room. The woman was moaning.

Incredibly, and at this point Ray laughed aloud and reaffirmed his love for modern technology, the camera in the TV in the distant room picked up the sound of the lovers coming from a bed, swivelled round to find them and zoomed in.

A second later the image of a woman straddling a man filled the screen.

Although there was less light further away from the camera, Ray could still easily make out that the woman was bucking back and forward on top of the man, who was lying across the bed, sideways on to Ray.

Ray took a large sip of his wine and smiled as he watched the woman's large breasts bounce up and down. They were incredible.

Much larger than Emma's.

Emma's breasts were beautiful - Ray had never really thought twice about their size - but this woman's breasts were undeniably special!

"You are one lucky bastard!" Ray chuckled, glancing at the man, whose face was still in shadow.

Just then, the phone rang.

For a second, in Ray's drunken state, he thought it was the phone on the TV, but then after a few rings, he realised that it was his own landline.

Looking back at the screen and the action that was going on, he was about to ignore the phone, when a thought occurred to him.

It might be Emma.

Turning towards the door, Ray dropped the remote control onto his chair, and stumbled out the room.

The hands-free phone had been left on the table in the kitchen. Interestingly Ray hadn't noticed that before. Had Emma called someone that morning after she had woken up?

He made it just in time.

It was his sister.

"Are you okay? I haven't heard from you again... I was just wondering if you were okay. We're just going to bed..."

"I thought you might be Emma..."

"Sorry, it's just me. How are you?"

"Drunk."

"Understandable, and not surprising. Just make sure you don't drink too much."

"Don't worry, sis. I'm a big boy now."

"I know you are... you are okay though?"

"Yes...I'm just...Listen...I'm okay...I don't feel like talking now... Can I call you tomorrow?"

"Sure. When your hangover has got better. Don't forget to turn everything off..."

"Night night, sis..."

The was a moment's pause, his sister thought about saying something else, but didn't.

"Night."

And she hung up.

The moment Ray walked back into his den and looked at the screen he could tell that something had changed.

The woman was standing in front of the camera. The man was standing near the doorway on the other side of the room, in darkness and not visible, and the woman once again close to the camera, her right side visible with a clear view of her curvaceous breasts. Her head was not in view, and standing closer to the camera she blocked Ray's view of the man's head and face.

She was shouting aggressively at the man in her native tongue and waving her arms in the air.

The man was listening to her, and shouting back at her when the woman paused to take a breath.

How the situation could have deteriorated so rapidly was incredible, but this was exactly the sort of thing which made watching 1984 so addictive.

Ray settled down in his chair again, and picked up his wine.

The man walked away from the woman, and was gone, disappearing into another room.

The woman turned around, looking at the wall where the camera was, scanning for something.

She came closer and then disappeared off camera for a few moments.

Ray could hear her doing something but could not see what it was. There was the sound of rustling.

The man shouted something from the bathroom. It sounded like it was in English, but Ray could not be sure. He certainly did not understand it.

The woman shouted something back, and a moment later reappeared in front of the camera, dressed in her clothes, a long coat, and carrying a bag.

It looked like the evening's entertainment was almost over.

Ray knew this part very well...the woman was about to storm out of the house, or flat, or apartment or wherever it was.

She was standing with her back to the camera when to Ray's great surprise, she called out aloud in English, "Please, come back here!" to the man.

A second later, the man reappeared in the doorway, his face still shrouded in semi-darkness, although this time Ray could make out the silhouette of his face, head and shoulders.

"Where are you going?" Ray heard him ask. "You can't leave. Not now."

"I go!" she shouted back at him. "You bastard. I leave now."

The man was walking towards her. Ray could hear the footsteps and his voice getting louder, but his head and face were once again, frustratingly, not in view, the woman's torso again blocking his line of sight.

"Don't go. There's something else I have for you." The man said, his voice gentler.

The woman hesitated.

"Perhaps," she said. Sounding calmer. "Come here..."

The man came closer, now standing in front of the woman.

It appeared as if he slipped his hands inside her coat and around her back, knocking the bag that was hanging from the woman's right shoulder so that it seemed to slip forward towards the front of the woman.

There was the sound of kissing.

The woman moaned, seemingly getting aroused.

What happened next, happened very fast.

The woman moved back from the man, the man shouted something, the woman screamed...

There was a struggle...it only lasted a few seconds, the woman screaming again, and the man shouting once more.

Suddenly, the woman stepped back, turned towards the camera with her hands against her chest, holding something, and fell forwards towards what was presumably the TV with the camera in it. She banged heavily against the lens and the TV, the camera wobbled, and then the image went haywire for a second, different confused images flashing across the screen.

When the image settled down, the camera was looking along the floor, pointing at a strange angle towards the woman, who was also lying on the floor.

Ray stared in disbelief at what he saw.

The woman's hands had slid to the side, revealing what was unmistakably a long knife handle sticking out of her chest.

Her face was staring at the camera, her eyes wide open and unblinking.

The image on the camera began to flicker.

Sitting bolt upright Ray bent towards the screen, studying the woman's face.

A man's torso appeared, kneeling over the body, a hand reaching to her throat to feel her pulse.

The man bent down, turning his ear to the mouth of the woman, listening for a breath, his face turned away from the camera.

The image on the screen flickered again a couple of times, then disappeared.

The screen went black, and the room was silent.

Ray Luck breathed in deeply, trying to keep calm.

He couldn't believe what he'd just witnessed.

It was not an act, a film, or a play. This was not Big Brother, or any reality TV show. This was real.

He had just seen something that he would never forget for the rest of his life. In the time that he had left on this earth, he would replay the past few seconds in his mind over and over again.

Without a shadow of a doubt, Ray Luck knew he'd just watched an innocent woman being murdered.

Chapter 5

SOHO, London

September 28th

11.35 p.m.

Adam Grant sat in the chair by the window, looking out at the dark river Thames flowing a few hundred metres below his penthouse flat.

He was not a happy man.

In fact, he didn't mind admitting, "I am FUCKING pissed off!"

The man standing behind him in the dark suit, his head slightly bowed, his hands clasped in front of him, did not say anything.

Two tall, muscular men, also wearing dark black suits, stood by the man they were guarding, one beside and behind each shoulder.

Adam Grant swivelled round in his chair and looked up at the man in front of him.

The lighting in the room was subdued, allowing the London city lights to flood into the apartment and for those inside to be surrounded by the vibrancy of the city.

"Well?"Adam asked.

The man Adam was looking at said nothing. His name was Ben, and this was the part Ben hated. He knew exactly how it went. Normally he was one of the two men standing behind whoever it was that was being 'talked' to by Mr Grant.

And normally it was his job to take that man outside afterwards, anywhere, so long as it was somewhere very far from here, and then either beat the man to a pulp, cut off one of his fingers, or kill him. Which punishment was meted out always depended upon how angry Mr Grant was, or how much the person deserved to be punished.

The fact that Mr Grant was 'fucking pissed off' did not bode well for Ben.

"Well, Ben. What the fuck do you have to say, then?"

"I'm sorry, Mr Grant?"

"Is that a fucking question or a statement?"

"A statement."

"You're telling me it's a fucking statement. I'd be truly sorry if I had to tell one of these two bullies to take you outside and ...well, you know the story only too well, don't you Ben? And that's why I would be fucking sorry. You're a good man. I'd hate to lose you. How long have we been working together now?"

"Five years, Mr Grant."

"Five years? Doesn't seem so long. We must have been having fun. Time flies, as they say."

"Yes, Mr Grant."

"Except, I haven't been having any fun recently, have I Ben?"

"No, sir, Mr Grant."

Adam stood up, and walked across to Ben, standing directly in front of him and looking up into his eyes.

"What the fuck do you think you were playing at when you lost my envelope? And where the fuck is it now? Why haven't you found it yet?"

"I'm sorry, Mr Grant. I've already told you, it was an accident. I must have dropped it. I'll make up the twenty thousand. I can give it back to you tonight if you would like. I accept it was my fault."

"Twenty grand? Do you think it's the money I'm upset about? The money? Bloody hell, Ben, twenty grand is nothing to me. You know that. It ain't the money, Ben. It's the fucking envelope!"

Ben looked up, for the first time looking at Mr Grant. He didn't understand.

"The envelope...?" he began to ask.

"Yes, the bloody envelope. It's covered in my DNA. I was the one who put the money in the envelope, licked the bloody flap, and stuck it down. That's my bloody saliva. If someone fucking finds that envelope with the money in it, and hands it into the police, they'll trace the notes to the Bond Street robbery, match my DNA on the envelope and have a concrete case against me. Fuck, Ben, I might as well walk right into the police station now and dob myself in. If someone hands that money in, Ben, I'll do time."

"I'm sorry, Mr Grant..."

Mr Grant stepped a little closer, his hot, garlicky breath blowing up Ben's nostrils.

"Ben, you're a good lad. But you know the score. I've got to punish you. I really should. Except, I'm also one who respects loyalty, and good service. And I like you, Ben, you know I do, right?"

Adam paused.

"You KNOW I like you, right, Ben?"

"Yes, sir, Mr Grant. I know you like me."

"Good. That's good." He replied. "And because I like you, I'm going to give you another last chance. I'm going to give you another chance to find that fucking envelope. And I'm going to be reasonable too. I'm going to give you some more time. You've got a week. Seven days. One hundred and sixty eight fucking hours to find and bring that envelope to me." Adam Grant paused, walked away, sat down in his chair, and looked out of the window at the Thames again. "I think you know the rest,... what will happen if you don't find it? That's what's meant by the reference 'last', isn't it? As in, your last chance. Dead people don't have any more chances, do they? You'd better go now. I think you need all the time you can get. You fucked up Ben. Big time. Now you'd better unfuck it up."

\------------------

Emma lay in her bed, shaking. The tears had long since dried up. And so had the texts and phone messages from Ray.

It seemed that he had given up on her.

She felt empty. Weak.

Ray had been the love of her life.

It had been so difficult to make this decision, but she knew that it had been the right thing to do.

They had become different people.

There was a dark side to Ray that, truth be told, had attracted her to him in the early days, but which now scared her a little.

At the same time, she was attracted to his strength: his physical, muscular strength and also his character.

But he frustrated the hell out of her.

She had made it painfully obvious over a year ago, that she was ready to move on to a new stage in her life, but Ray had just not been able to see it.

Nine months ago she had been offered the dream job of her life. In Canada.

She had not even told Ray about the offer. After thinking long and hard about it for a month, she had turned the job down, hoping...hoping that Ray would grow up, become an adult...and pop the question.

She had waited. And waited. And then waited some more.

And yet, there was still no ring. No talk of living together. No real talk of a future they would share.

She had tried talking about it with him, but each time she brought it up, he seemed to change the subject.

Her best friends had told her, that if it didn't come naturally from him, she should not chase it.

The last time she had mentioned it...she had taken him to Brighton for the day. They had ambled up and down the little narrow streets full of antique jewellery shops, and Emma had stood outside, cooing and saying "wow" and "look, that one's beautiful..." while pointing at rings. Engagement rings.

Ray had been nervous.

Later that afternoon, he had made an excuse, and disappeared for thirty minutes, somewhere. Then that night, over dinner in a nice restaurant near the pier, he had given her a ring.

A 'friendship' ring.

Silver. Worth about thirty pounds.

He was beaming. So proud of himself.

She was shattered. When they got back to London that night, she developed a headache, came home to her own flat by herself, and cried.

She couldn't have made it more obvious if she had tried.

Emma had come to terms with the fact that Ray was a lost cause. Commitment was obviously not his thing. He wasn't growing up, but she was.

So last week, when the company in Canada had called her up again, saying that the person they had hired had not worked out, and would she reconsider, she told them she would.

Opportunity only knocks once.

Or so they say.

For her, against all the odds, it had knocked twice.

She would not make the same mistake twice.

Emma was heartbroken.

She loved Ray..."No, I DID love Ray", she corrected herself verbally.

But she knew now that that was not enough.

This time next month she would be in Canada.

A new job. A new country. A new life.

The future had never looked brighter.

With that thought in mind, Emma buried her face in her wet pillow and started to cry again.

\------------------

Ray Luck blinked several times and steadied his breathing.

The external hard drive?

Quickly looking at the flashing white light on the front of the box, everything seemed fine and he was reassured that he had just recorded it all.

Scanning through the little images on the other main screen, just to be sure, he checked that there was nothing more to see.

His guess was that as the woman had fallen, she had smashed against the camera which was probably embedded in a TV, or given what happened next, actually probably just attached to the TV and sitting on top of it.

The camera would have fallen, got knocked off the top of the TV... the TV probably fell over too, the power was lost, and the camera switched off.

But not before revealing the dead woman on the floor of the room with the knife sticking out of her chest.

Ray ran through the sequence of events in his mind again.

Had he made a mistake? Had it all really just happened? Maybe it was not real...was it some sort of weird reality show that he had inadvertently jumped into?

He quickly dismissed the thoughts, turned to his computer, and stopped 1984 from running.

Going to the Start panel, he found the external hard-drive, and located the file he had just recorded.

His adrenaline still pumping through his system, he got himself a hot, strong coffee from the kitchen and came back, and started to run back through the images he had captured on the big screen again.

The screen flickered, the video started and Ray relived the experience once more.

The room in the video appeared quite dark. The man was standing up in front of the woman. It was then that Ray remembered that he had initially forgotten to switch on the hard-drive and that he'd missed the opening sequence, the woman coming into the room with a red dress, the view of her breasts, her stripping, the man coming into the room, some foreplay starting.

Ray halted the video, grabbed a notebook and quickly wrote down what he could remember of the part that he had seen but not recorded. He didn't want to forget something later, especially since he was quite drunk and would find it very difficult to remember details in a few hours.

Noting items of interest and recording thoughts and observations as they occurred came naturally to Ray: it was part of the discipline of his job as a cyber analyst.

If he saw something that could be important, he noted it down. It was the little things that often came together and signified something far more important.

Starting the video again, he watched it through several times, pausing it at different points, making notes, absorbing as much of the detail as possible.

Time and time again, he studied the moment when the man murdered the woman, seeing her fall, waiting for the camera to follow her, steady its image on the floor, before capturing her blank, death stare and the knife buried deeply in her chest, seconds before the camera feed then died.

The woman was - had been - beautiful. Her body amazing. If it was not for the way it all ended, Ray would probably have got quite aroused when watching it.

On the contrary, there was nothing erotic about death.

Fetching a new cup of coffee, Ray came back to his chair, and sat and stared at the image he had frozen on the screen: the picture of the woman lying on the floor on her back, the knife handle emerging from her chest.

He drank the coffee, staring at the dead woman.

Thinking.

Going over it all in his mind.

Over and over again.

One question kept coming back to him.

What should he do now?

Call the police?

How would that conversation go...?

"Hi, This is Ray Luck here... I'm a cyber security consultant. I work for one of the largest Cyber Security companies in the world... trusted by governments and industries everywhere... In my spare time I hack into people's homes and spy on them. Totally illegal I know. Breaking the law, yes? Probably lose my job now and go to prison? Okay. No problem. By the way, I just saw someone being murdered."

It didn't sound so good, did it?

There were a few other small problems.

Ray did not know which police to call. Which country was the woman murdered in? Where was she murdered? In someone's house? A hotel room?

And who had been murdered? By whom?

Ray wound the video back to the beginning again, searching for answers to some of the questions.

The thing that was bugging him most was that nowhere did he seem to get a clear shot of the man's face. He was a mystery, an enigma.

But something else was nagging at him too...something...

When the woman had got dressed and shouted at the man in English, threatening to leave, the man had reappeared in a doorway, coming back into the room.

For a few seconds he had been facing the camera, and his body and head seemed as if they were in clear view and not obscured by the woman's body. Focussing on the few seconds of this part of the video, Ray found that although the outline of the man's body was visible, there was no obvious detail. He was too far away and where he was standing was shaded from the source of light in the room, mostly in darkness.

When he started walking towards the woman, the man had moved over slightly into the room, and the woman then came between Ray and the man. His face was totally hidden.

Watching that part over and over, Ray noted a few more points: the man seemed to have put some clothes on. Like the woman, he was not naked anymore.

Pyjamas? A dressing gown? Trousers and a shirt? Ray could not make out any details.

Moving through the rest of the video, Ray confirmed that there was not a single point when the man's face was visible. Apart from those few seconds in the door, he had magically been out of view the whole time.

"Shit!" Ray swore, speaking aloud to himself, a habit he often had when sitting for hours on end by himself, trying to hack into a network. "The man's invisible! I can't see him."

Slumping back in his chair, he glanced at the clock.

It was 3 a.m. He had lost track of time.

Sleep would be impossible now...Ray was wired.

Having watched the video a million times now, what else did he know?

Ray decided to go through the outstanding questions, one at a time.

Question One: where was it filmed - in a hotel room or a bedroom? In someone's house?

He thought he might know the answer to that one.

When the woman was stabbed, she fell forward against the camera, knocking it from whatever holder it was being held on, and causing it to fall.

In Ray's experience, most fancy TV's in hotel chains now either had a camera embedded in it, or no camera at all. It was highly unlikely that a hotel would buy cameras as extras and stick them on top of the TVs. What for? Perhaps in a business suite, but not in a hotel room. The fact that the camera was attached to the top of what was most likely a TV, meant that it was almost definitely a private bedroom in someone's house.

Also, unless it was a palatial suite, the room was too large for a hotel. It seemed to have several private rooms going straight off the main room, which were probably a bathroom and maybe a large walk-in wardrobe. Which made sense, thinking about it, because the man walked through the door, and seemed to come back dressed in something. Pyjamas perhaps?

If it was a house, it seemed to be a BIG house. The owner had to be well off. Who else could afford such a big bedroom with an en suite and other rooms coming off a bedroom?

Also, few people had large TVs in their bedrooms.

Whoever had such a large, well-equipped bedroom was most likely loaded.

But where was it? What country?

That was not so obvious.

Once again, Ray went through the whole video sequence again from the start.

This time around, he was not looking at the people, but focussing on the background. He was looking for books, newspapers, pictures on the wall...anything small, or large, that he hadn't noticed yet, but which could give a clue as to the country where the murder had taken place.

He found nothing.

What about the woman's clothing?

Was it indicative of anything?

Unfortunately, Ray was not a fashion expert. It didn't help him at all.

He thought momentarily about Emma...she might know, but as soon as he thought of her, he felt a pang in his chest, and he forced himself to refocus his mind on the video, blocking further thoughts of her.

The woman was foreign. It had sounded like some Arabic language, guttural, quite harsh and very expressive, but he wasn't sure. If he could identify the language, he might be able to locate the country.

The man seemed to be English. Or he could be American, or... actually, all Ray could really tell was that he spoke English with a good English accent. It didn't mean he was English.

On the other hand, it seemed that the woman had been intent on leaving. If she was going, the room belonged to the man. Which meant that if he could identify the accent with which he spoke, he would get a clue as to where the man's house may be...Was she a foreign woman leaving an Englishman's house? In England?

It was a long shot, he knew. But he made a note of the thought anyway.

He ran the video a few more times, but nothing new surfaced.

Ray was not making any progress. He had reached the point of diminishing returns.

The coffee was beginning to wear off. His eyes were hurting.

He yawned.

Ray looked at his watch.

The little hand was pointing to the seven, the big hand at two.

Bloody hell.

He'd been up all night.

For a moment he considered showering and making some breakfast, but it was only a passing thought.

Ten minutes later he was lying in his bed.

Asleep.

Chapter 6

St Cecelia's Square, London

Chiswick

Sunday

September 29th

08.40 a.m.

Ben stood on the corner of the beautiful St Cecelia's Square, watching the rich bastards who came out of the white Edwardian terraced buildings and either started to jog, cross the road to the private park in its centre to meet up with their personal trainers, jump into their Porsches, or amble slowly down to the corner shops and the delicatessen.

They were looking for a young white man, who might soon buy croissants and a newspaper. Just like he was reported to have done yesterday.

There was however a small problem.

They were all fucking white. Every single last bastard amongst them.

Ben was black. He wasn't a racist. Never had been. But he did recognise the class divide. In this part of town, most of the billionaires and lesser class of millionaires were all white.

Ben loved this square.

Not only because quite a few of his very rich customers were here, and he earned an awful lot of commission from them on the items he supplied to them, but because he genuinely loved the architecture and the 'ambience' the whole place oozed.

One day, when he had done enough deals, or pulled a few successful raids, this was one of the places he would like to live.

For now though, the art of continued living was something that he was more determined to focus on.

Purchasing a house in this area would be quite difficult if this time next week Ben was dead.

What made Ben slightly angry, actually very angry, was that he had himself not been the person who had lost the envelope. That honour went to one of his team, Petrov. Not the brightest of this crew. Not the bravest. But certainly the most loyal and hard working. Petrov would do anything for Ben.

Which had made it quite difficult for Ben to decide how he should be punished, for his incredible, stupid, bloody ineptitude.

How could the fool have dropped an envelope with twenty thousand pounds in it?

For now, though, punishment had been postponed.

Ben had taken the rap, a typical action which the men who worked for him respected and admired him for, and it was Ben that who would take the bullet if things did not go well in the next seven days.

On top of that, Ben needed as many eyes and ears on the streets as possible, and Petrov would work twice as hard as anybody else to recover what he had lost. Ben knew that.

This morning the plan was simple.

Watch out for any young man who went to the deli, bought croissants, a newspaper or a coffee.

If any did, someone from his team was to approach them, make some polite enquiries, point out that an envelope had been lost, and make known that there was a sizeable reward for any information that led to its safe return.

For now, no one was to apply any pressure.

There would be no violence.

Just a few polite questions, a mention of the reward, and a telephone number where they could be contacted.

Of course, if in a few days they were no further forward, violence would be the next step.

Ben was a clever man. He had survived in this game almost intact all of these years by living off his gut instinct.

So far, it had never failed him.

And right now it was telling him that this was the place. The missing money was here somewhere. In one of these houses. Being looked after by one of the bastards living in luxury while he lived in a tiny two bed in Brixton.

As far as the possibility of the envelope having been handed into the police, Ben was not so concerned.

The envelope had contained twenty thousand pounds. Good money. Money which even these people would not ignore.

Ben knew he could count on whoever had found the money to keep it. It would be a different story if it had been dropped on the pavement in a poorer area of town - it would have been handed in to the Klink within hours. Poorer people had more to gain from keeping the cash, but they also had a greater sense of what was right and wrong. Invariably, the majority of them would always do what they considered to be the right thing. They would hand it over to the police.

Here in St. Cecilia's Square the people were different. These people had all become rich by stealing from the poor people beneath them. They had been stealing for generations, and were experts at looking after themselves first, and thinking of others ...practically never.

Although it was the envelope that was the most important thing, Ben did wonder about the twenty thousand pounds.

He would not be surprised if it had already been spent. It had only been twenty-four hours, but the chances were that some rich bastard had quickly blown the money, Mr Grant's money, on cocaine and prostitutes.

Which, ironically, probably meant that it been indirectly returned to Mr Grant already.

Just then, one of his crew across the road waved and pointed to a man who had just walked past him.

A young man, tall, brown hair, and an expensive jogging suit and trainers on.

The funny thing was, in spite of the fact that he had all the gear, the man was not jogging. He was walking.

Right into the corner deli.

Ben crossed the road and followed him in.

\------------------

Ray stirred in his bed, the sunlight streaming in through the window making him wince and reach for the pillow and the duvet to cover his head.

Buried beneath the soft eiderdown, his brain was given a few seconds of respite before the memories of the day before began to hit him.

Saturday had been a day that had started with so much promise.

He had intended to end it with a proposal, a 'yes', and a bottle of champagne.

Instead he had spent it alone, with 1984, and it had ended in a hangover and a murder.

And he was the key witness. The only witness.

"Shit..." Ray muttered and buried his head deeper in the mattress.

"What am I going to do?" he asked himself.

For a second he thought about calling Emma to tell her what he had seen and ask for her advice, but as soon as he thought of her, he felt that thrusting pang in his chest again, as if someone had just stuck a blade into his heart and twisted it.

At the thought of the knife, a mental image of the dead woman lying on the floor filled his mind.

"Shit!!!" Ray swore again.

Pulling back the cover, he glanced across his bed to where Emma had been lying only just yesterday morning.

Naked. Beside him. Underneath the covers.

He reached across and pulled her pillow over and sniffed it.

He could smell her.

For a while Ray's mind filled with thoughts of Emma. Memories of places they had been together. The sensation of holding her close to him. Of making love to her. Her soft lips.

His thoughts started to go round and round in circles, trying to figure out what he had done wrong.

Had they really split up?

Would she call him again and give him a second chance?

He lay there for an hour, thinking, analysing everything.

But after an hour, nothing had changed.

He was still single. Emma had gone. And the world looked like a very dark place.

And yet, he was still alive. Unlike the woman whom he had watched being murdered.

Shit! What was he going to do about that?

He thought again about calling the police, and quickly discounted it once more.

Climbing from his bed, he wandered through to the kitchen, made a coffee and dragged himself through to his den.

A few minutes later, he had got the recorded video running and was watching the murder again, replaying it over and over.

It began to drive him mad that he couldn't see the face of the murderer.

There were those few seconds when the man was standing in the doorway, in otherwise clear view and not obscured in any way. But he was in darkness and it was impossible to make out any features.

If only there had been more light!

Ray sat there staring at the screen.

If ONLY he could see that man's face.

And then it dawned on him.

The answer to his problem.

RobinHood.

It was time to call RobinHood.

\------------------

Although most people didn't know it, Ray had a dark past.

After the death of his brother, who was killed by a drug overdose when he was barely a teenager, he had begun to rebel against authority. It had started with arguments with his dad, which he seldom won.

As he got bigger, and the arguments more heated, Ray had taken to the streets, and for a while had joined a gang and hung out with like-minded youths, all struggling to find an identity, independence...and some respect from others.

Incredibly, thanks to his high IQ and the ability to learn everything almost without trying, he had done very well at his exams and was offered places at several universities, eventually choosing Oxford.

At Oxford he had fallen in with a bunch of other students that he had met at one of the university debates. Like him, they all rebelled against authority, although this was mostly done in an intellectual way, with very little real action.

Within months, finding his studies too easy leaving too much time on his hands, Ray had sought out another, more aggressive club: The Oxford Anarchists.

The members came from all walks of life, and met every Thursday in the Trout, a popular pub on the outskirts of Oxford.

Ray had become fascinated by the rhetoric and passion expressed during their meetings, and very soon he volunteered to start joining in some of the anti-establishment demonstrations that were being planned.

During his first very heated demonstration opposite the House of Commons in London, Ray got carried away, and threw a bottle at a policeman.

He was arrested, spent a day in the cells, and was bailed out by his father.

Instead of fighting with Ray and showing anger, rather surprisingly his father had cried.

Driving Ray back up to his college in Oxford, his father hadn't said much at all, an uncomfortable silence filling the space between them.

Ray knew better than to say something before his father broke the ice, so he remained quiet during the journey.

Only when the car pulled up in front of his digs, did his father say anything.

As tears ran down his cheek, he said: "Ray, I'm not angry. I was young once too. I did my fair share of things which my dad frowned upon and which could have got me into some really serious trouble. If I hadn't ended up in the navy, and got some real discipline rammed down my throat, I can't tell you what would have happened to me. I'm not upset with you son, I'm just worried. Please think carefully about the choices you make. You're an adult now, son. If you want to carry on being an anarchist, it's your choice. But, please, think about your future. Think about the opportunity you have here at the university. Don't mess it up son. I know what it's like to get involved...if you don't break free from this group you've joined, you probably never will. Do it now, son. Break free. Find your kicks elsewhere. You've got a good future ahead of you. Don't ruin it for yourself."

His father had reached out, asking for a hug.

For the first time in years, Ray had agreed.

His father had pulled him close, held him tightly in his arms and cried.

After what seemed like ages, he had pulled back, wiped away some tears, smiled at his son, and said, "You're a good man, Ray. Your brother would be proud of you. Just like we are."

He smiled, almost managing to mask the hurt Ray saw in his eyes at the mention of his brother. "I love you, Ray. Since James died, I never told you often enough. I should have, and I'm sorry. I love you, I always have. Promise me you'll remember that, okay?"

Ray nodded. His dad was acting a little weirdly.

His dad smiled again, nodded, and then turned around and got back in his car and drove off.

Ray never saw his father again.

He died of lung cancer three weeks later.

What got Ray was that his father must have known he was dying when they last talked, but he had not said anything.

The memory he was left with, from that day till now, was of a father who truly did love him. A strong man. A man of principles. And a good father, whose last advice had changed his life.

After the funeral, Ray never went back to the Oxford Anarchists.

Instead of funnelling his latent anger at the UK government, he began to direct it increasingly online, into the developing world of cyber-space.

He was soon joining in and regularly contributing to online forums of fellow hackers, all keen to explore the art of hacking, develop their skills and boast about them to others.

Ray had become a regular and well respected member of the cyber underworld.

Here, in a world that no one could touch or see, he found the respect he had always craved.

For a number of years he had explored his wild side, developing an online personality and set of cyber skills that few could match.

Within the cyber community he had made many acquaintances and some good friends. Except for three people, he had never actually met any of the people he hung out with online in real life.

RobinHood was one of the exceptions.

After exchanging conversations in hacker chat rooms for several months, Ray had discovered that like himself, RobinHood had a shared interest in anarchy and had been a card carrying anarchist for several years - Ray realising in hindsight that the name should really have given the game away sooner.

Over the past eight years, SolarWind and RobinHood had met several times in pubs in London. They hadn't seen each other for four years now, but Ray knew he could call him if he needed help. As he did now.

Last time they had met, RobinHood worked for a well known film production company.

He was a special effects expert and using CGI could make anything appear to happen that he wanted, being paid to create his own fantasy worlds into which he could then disappear.

If anyone knew how to take the film that Ray had recorded, find the face of the man standing in the doorway, and use computer enhancement tools to play with the imagery and extract and construct the face of the murderer, RobinHood would.

Ray and RobinHood had never been to each other's houses before, but Ray knew that RobinHood used to live in London.

If he was still here, then it should be easy to track him down, and find him.

In fact, it didn't take him long at all.

He simply looked up the last email he'd got from him and replied to it.

"We need to meet up. Face to face. Need your help! Urgent."

An hour later, an email alert Ray had set on his computer pinged, and he jumped up from watching some boring Sunday morning TV, ran through and read it.

"Long time no hear, SolarWind. I'd be glad to help, cyber-bruv! I'll send you a separate email in two minutes with instructions where to meet. Tonight!"

Chapter 7

Jamboree Night Club

Limehouse

London

September 29th

9.30 p.m.

Ray didn't know RobinHood's real name and had never asked it.

Likewise RobinHood had never asked his.

As Ray paid the entrance fee to the Jamboree night club and swept aside the heavy, crimson velvet curtain that separated the real world from the inside, he smiled to himself.

The Jamboree was just typical of RobinHood. Whenever they met it was always in some bizarre location that Ray had never been to before.

This place was no different.

The bar was hidden away at the back corner of an industrial building in an area of Limehouse that Ray had never been to in his life before.

To get in, you had to ring a bell at the front of the building and tell the night guard that you were going to the bar. He then buzzed a set of heavy, iron, electronic gates that opened and let you into a large courtyard.

The only way to find the bar was to follow the music. There were no signs, no advertisements. It reminded Ray of a secret bar in Moscow that he had once visited.

A man sat at a desk, half hidden in a doorway. Ray stepped into the door, the man smiled, asked for six pounds, and Ray was in. That part was easy.

Inside the light was dim. On his left there was a drinks bar on one side of a large, square room, some stools dotted around the edges. The walls were bare concrete, with large rectangular grey ventilation ducts and thick electrical cables running along the ceiling.

Large canvases covered the walls, which on quick inspection seemed to depict people who were members of an audience dancing to music.

Turning to his right to identify the source of the music, he saw that a makeshift stage dominated the other end of the room opposite the bar.

Heavy red curtains hung from the ceiling on either side of the stage, imitating the curtains at a theatre. A piano, stage left, was being played by a man dressed in Victorian clothes and wearing make up to make him seem as if he was dead. Large black circles surrounded his eyes, and his skin was painted grey. The effect was quite spooky.

A woman in a red, French-style dress with red bows tied around two childlike pigtails was playing a violin and making strange faces at the audience.

A bald drummer, and a bass-guitarist with a bright yellow top hat and large red eye glasses, coloured shirt, strange boots and yellow trousers stood behind her, playing away.

They seemed to be playing some sort of weird, bohemian music from a French cabaret.

Some young students were dancing on the floor in front of the stage, obviously getting quite drunk, but enjoying the bizarre ambience of the place. Judging by the way one of them was swaying to the music and staring into space, alcohol was not the only drug he had taken tonight.

Apart from the lighting on the stage, the room was dark, and it took a while for Ray's eyes to adjust.

There were about twenty people in the bar already, which for a Sunday evening was quite good going, especially in a place hidden so far away. Those not dancing were clustered in little groups around tables at the edges of the room, with a few people at the end of the bar: they seemed to be watching a man in the corner, an artist, who was painting a large canvas, probably the same man who had painted all the canvases on the wall.

Turning round completely, Ray looked at the people immediately behind him, and found RobinHood.

He was sitting at a small table just behind the curtain covering the entrance, looking straight at Ray.

The table was empty and Ray took a seat beside him.

"Long time no see, SolarWind," he said, offering Ray his hand.

"Too long." Ray replied, accepting the hand and shaking it.

In the years since they had last seen each other, RobinHood had changed a lot. He'd put on a lot of weight, grown a black beard, and started to go bald. But he still had the same piercing dark eyes, which were now fixed on Ray and examining him.

"What do you think of the band?" he asked.

"Weird. The man gives me the creeps."

"Me too. But that's the idea, isn't it? You don't like the music?"

"I didn't say that," Ray said, shuffling a little closer so that they could speak without anyone hearing them shout at each other above the music. "The music's weird, but it's interesting. I quite like it."

"So do I. So what've you been up to? What do you need some help with?"

Ray looked around the room.

The table beside them on the right was empty, the heavy curtain hung down on his left, blocking the entrance to the bar.

The music from the band was loud, and Ray was assured that no one would be able to hear them. He shuffled closer with his chair towards RobinHood.

"I was surfing the cameras... you know, seeing what was happening in people's houses and hotel rooms... and I saw something." Ray started to explain.

RobinHood looked across at him, his eyebrows raised.

"Saw what?"

"Something bad..."

"Bloody hell, am I meant to bloody guess what you saw, or are you going to tell me. Spit it out, man, spit it out."

"I saw a man kill a woman."

RobinHood sat up straight, looked around quickly, and then leant forward.

"No shit!"

"I'm telling you the truth. I saw a man kill a woman. Stab her in the chest with a big knife..."

"Fuck me..."

"Actually, he'd just fucked her...Afterwards they'd had an argument. She started shouting at him. She'd got dressed, was just about to leave, and then she shouted at him again. He came across the room to her, they started to reconcile, kiss and make up, then next thing you know she was shouting at him and he was shouting back. They fought briefly, she screamed and fell to the ground. She knocked the camera off the TV as she fell and it fell to the ground beside her. The last thing I saw before the camera died and the transmission stopped was a whacking, great knife stuck right into her chest, and her eyes all glazed over. As dead as dead can be."

"Fuck me..." RobinHood said again.

"I'd rather not." Ray said, whimsically, trying to make light of it all. RobinHood didn't laugh. He was thinking.

"Any idea where it was? Any way to track down who it was?"

"I've been through it all a million times in my head and examined the footage over and over again..."

RobinHood reached across and grabbed hold of Ray's wrist tightly.

"What do you mean? Did you RECORD it?"

Ray nodded and then looked around the room again before continuing.

"Yes, I did. As if you wouldn't! The moment she got naked and started showing off her incredible breasts, I recorded the whole thing!"

"You actually recorded the man murdering her?"

"I said so, didn't I. I've got it all."

"Bloody hell..." RobinHood said, whistling aloud and settling back in his chair.

He picked up his bottle, drank the rest of it, and waved it at Ray.

"I need another drink, and a few seconds to think. You want anything?"

Ray nodded.

"A bottle of cider."

RobinHood got up, pushed the table forward as he eased himself around it, and walked across the room to the bar.

Ray looked back at the band, staring at them without really seeing. The music - weird but wonderful - washed over him. He stared at the lead singer, the sweat now running down his face and smearing the black mascara around his eyes like a crying woman.

This whole thing - the music, the bar, the conversation, meeting RobinHood again the night after Emma had left - it was all so bloody bizarre! He was just thinking about getting up and walking out, when a bottle landed on the table in front of him, and RobinHood edged back into his seat and sat down.

"So, you've got this all on film?"

"I told you. I have."

"And what do you need me for? Where do I come into this?"

"It's simple. I've got a problem and I think you're the one person I know who can help me solve it."

"Which is?"

"I can see the woman who got murdered really clearly. She's in view a lot, especially when she's lying on the floor and facing the camera. I can't forget her face. I see it all the time when I close my eyes... I can't get rid of the image of her staring straight into the camera... at me... with those dead eyes of her. If she walked into the bar right now, I'd spot her immediately. I'll never forget her face!"

"I wouldn't worry about that, mate. From what you say, the last thing she's going to do is to walk into this place. Or any place."

"Funny ha-ha. But you know what I mean. The woman's dead, I know that. But it's the man that worries me. Nowhere on the tape is the man's face easily visible. There's only one part, for a few seconds when he is standing in a doorway on the other side of the room, that the view of him is not obscured by the woman. You can make out his body - I think - but he's in shadow, and his face is so dark you can't see it properly."

"Aha... I think I get you now...," RobinHood smiled. "You want me to work my magic on the man and pull his face out of obscurity. Clean up the images and play with them until you can see what this guy looks like?"

Ray nodded.

"Actually, I don't work for the film production company anymore," RobinHood explained, "... but don't worry, I've still got everything I need."

"I want to see this bastard's face. I need to know what he looks like."

"Why? What will you do when you know? Are you going to the police?"

Ray was silent. He picked up the bottle and drank a few gulps down.

When he was finished, he wiped his mouth, and turned to RobinHood.

"I don't know. I don't know what I'm going to do. The murder could have been anywhere in the world, and I know that if I go to the police I could get arrested..."

"The right thing to do would probably be to tell someone about this..., you know..." RobinHood said.

Suddenly a voice echoed in Ray's head: Emma's voice - "... the 'right thing' to do, you wouldn't know what that was if it hit you right between the eyes!"

"...but then again." RobinHood continued. "What would be the right thing for other people to do, is not always what would be the right thing for us to do."

RobinHood stared at Ray for a moment, then slowly turned his face to the band, picked up his drink and took several long swigs from his bottle.

Ray stared at RobinHood, studying him, thinking ahead.

He'd come here tonight to meet RobinHood for one specific reason. He'd been thinking about it all day, and he knew there was no other way.

But could he trust him?

The music suddenly changed pace and the man started singing in French, some sort of strange French cabaret song. Ray could feel the hairs on the back of his neck rising. It was eerie music.

"So," Ray heard RobinHood ask, bringing his thoughts back to the here and now. RobinHood was looking directly at him. He leaned forward towards Ray.

"Have you got it? Did you bring it with you?"

Ray didn't reply. Instead, he looked about him, surveying the other people in the room.

Thankfully, nobody else in the room seemed in the slightest bit interested in them, and even if they were, it was too dark in their corner for anyone to see them properly.

Ray grabbed hold of his bottle. He downed the rest of it and stood up.

He felt a hand on his wrist.

"Did you bring it with you, SolarWind? If you want me to help, I will, but obviously, I need the video."

"You promise you won't copy it and put it on YouTube?"

RobinHood laughed.

"What? So that SolarWind, one of the most respected hackers in Europe can tell everyone else in the community what I've done, and stop anyone from ever trusting me again?"

"You promise?"

"I do, SolarWind. I do. I'm annoyed you asked. You should know you don't have to."

"In that case, I'll say goodbye." Ray replied.

For the briefest second, Ray saw some confusion in RobinHood's eyes.

Ray reached out to shake RobinHood's hand goodbye.

RobinHood grasped it, felt something hard in the palm of Ray's hand, and smiled.

"I'll get right on to it, SolarWind. I'll ping you as soon as I have anything."

"This is between you and me, you swear? Just us two!" Ray emphasised again.

RobinHood nodded, clasping his hand around the USB stick, retracting it slowly and putting it in his pocket underneath the table, out of view from anyone in the room.

Ray looked down at RobinHood. Yes, he thought, he had put on weight. A lot.

SolarWind turned, pulled back the curtain, and stepped into the empty courtyard outside.

As he walked towards the DLR to catch a train to Canary Wharf, it began to rain.

Heavily.

\------------------

10.45 p.m.

David Anderson sat in the corner of his bathroom, rocking himself back and forwards, his arms clasped around his knees.

His girlfriend, Chloe, was knocking on the door, crying and slowly becoming hysterical.

"Let me in, David. Let me in! What's the matter? You have to tell me!"

She began to knock again, this time more loudly than before.

"You've been in there all evening. If you don't come out now and tell me who did that to you, I'm going to call the police..."

David heard her speaking, but didn't move.

The trouble was, he didn't know who had done this to him.

Three men had grabbed him from behind, bundled him into the back of a van and driven off.

They had immediately put a bag over the top of his head, and two of the men had sat on him.

After ten minutes driving, the van had stopped.

The men had not removed the hood, but they sat him up, and pushed him back against the side of the van.

They then hit him once, in the solar plexus, knocking all the air out of him and forcing him to double up and fall back onto the cold floor of the van.

As he gasped for breath a man spoke.

A deep voice, a slight accent that David couldn't place.

"Where is the envelope?" the voice had asked.

At first, David didn't him hear him, his mind and focus being elsewhere: on just trying to breathe.

The man spoke again.

"This is how this works, David. Every time I ask you a question, you answer me. If you don't, we hit you again, but twice as many times as we hit you the time before. So, since you haven't answered my question yet, now we hit you twice more."

Two heavy blows rained down upon David, one to the lower back, and another in quick succession to his stomach.

David screamed aloud with the pain.

"Ready for my next question?" the man said. "...And by the way, the answer to that question is yes or no. If you don't answer... it's eight blows this time..."

"I'M READY! DON'T hit me... please..." David coughed and said as loudly as he could. "What do you want to know?"

"I want to know where the envelope is!"

"What envelope? I don't know what you are talking about..."

"We think you do, David."

"I DON'T. I don't know what you are talking about!"

"I'll repeat. We think you do. We've been making enquiries. We followed you. We know who you are and where you live. We know you went for a run yesterday morning. Bought papers, food from the corner-deli. Walked your girlfriend's dog, like you do every Saturday morning, before you go home and fuck her. What's her name? Chloe? Lovely name. Lovely girl. We took some photos of her, so we know what she looks like. You're a lucky man, David. Very lucky. So tell us what we want to know, otherwise..."

"I don't KNOW what you are talking about!" David pleaded.

At this point, although David couldn't see them, the two men who had been hitting him looked searchingly at their boss, doubt beginning to show in their eyes.

Ignoring them, Ben stepped forward, bent down and put his lips to the side of David's head.

"The thing is David, and I'm going to be very honest with you here,... I'm going to trust you, and by the way, if you break that trust, I'm going to kill you... you see, the thing is that we lost something, an envelope, on the pavement beside the park where Chloe lives. We know that you went for a walk about the same time, and that you must have passed where we dropped the envelope. We know that someone picked the envelope up. And kept it. And we think it was you."

"Why? Why do you think it was me? It could have been anyone!"

It was a good question. A question that Ben didn't have a good answer for.

So he slapped David across the side of the head as hard as he could.

"I ask the questions, you give the answers. Do you understand?"

David quickly nodded. And then quickly added a verbal 'Yes' just to be sure.

"I'm going to ask you one last time, David, and you had better tell me the truth now, because if you don't, I think we will kill you. I must admit, I haven't decided yet completely. Perhaps we will cut off your fingers first, but then we will kill you. Do you understand?"

David nodded.

"Good. So where is the envelope David?"

David had started to shake.

"I DON'T KNOW. I HONESTLY DON'T KNOW. You HAVE TO BELIEVE ME!" the man shouted back, curling into a ball on the floor and tightening, obviously expecting the blows to rain down upon him.

There was a sudden pungent smell, and one of the men quickly stepped back as David's urine began to flow across the floor of the van.

Ben swore to himself. Fuck! This was not going the way he had expected. Or hoped.

The two men in the van with him were staring at him, shaking their heads gently.

It was obvious that the man did not know the answer to the question he was being asked.

Ben looked at his Rolex and realised it was getting late. They had been parked in the mews for too long now. They could be drawing attention if anyone heard them.

Squatting beside the man on the floor, he whispered.

"Messy. Very messy, David. A bit childlike if you ask me. Are you a little boy, David? Will you go home crying to mummy? Will you tell her what happened here today? If we let you live?"

"No! I won't. I promise. I won't tell anyone. Just don't kill me! Please!"

Ben put one of his gloved hands on the man's shoulder.

"Okay, David, I've decided to let you go. I believe you when you say that you don't know where the envelope is. Which for me, quite honestly, is a bit of a problem. I was sure you were the one who had taken it. So, this is what we are going to do. I am going to release you. And you will help us find the envelope, okay?"

"Yes! If you release me, I'll help you find it. I promise! I will!"

"That's good. And I believe you will, because if you don't, I think that perhaps instead of killing you, we will probably just kill Chloe instead. Do you want that?"

"Yes.., I mean NO! I mean, Yes I want to be set free, and yes I want to help you find the envelope, but NO..."

"But no, you don't want us to kill Chloe? Is that it? You love her? You don't want her to die?"

David was starting to sob now.

"Please, just let me go. And don't hurt Chloe. I'll do anything you want. Honestly I will. Honestly..."

They had driven for another ten minutes, the van had stopped, the doors had opened, and he had been pushed out of the back door, hitting the ground hard.

David fell flat onto the road, smashing his face against the ground, and instantly tasting the blood from his burst lips.

For a few seconds he lay still, listening to the engine of the van moving away from him, stunned and aching all over.

After a few moments, there was no more sound, no kicks to his ribs, or punches to the body. He seemed to be alone. And alive.

Pushing himself up into a sitting position, he groaned in pain as he slowly reached up and pulled up the hood over his head.

It came off easily and looking around, he found himself in the middle of a quiet cobbled courtyard surrounded by industrial buildings.

It took several minutes before his head began to clear, his breathing calmed down and he was able to take in his surroundings.

Mentally he flipped into survival mode. He didn't know where he was. He was injured, shaken and bleeding.

Home. He had to get home.

Not recognising anything, he slowly got up and started walking.

As he hobbled towards the entrance of the courtyard, he heard traffic and was relieved to see a big red bus pass by in the street beyond.

It was just beginning to get dark and looking at his watch he realised that it was almost seven o'clock.

What should he do? How would he get home?

His trousers were soaked in his own pee, blood was pouring down his nose, he was covered in bruises, and he looked a complete mess.

Public transport was probably out.

Feeling into his pocket, he was relieved to find his wallet.

A taxi it was then.

Standing at the side of the main road that he had come out onto, looking for a taxi, he started to think about the last words they had said to him:

"Tell the police, tell anyone, and we will come for Chloe. She's a beautiful girl. Maybe we won't kill her. We'll just slash her face a few times, so that every time she looks into the mirror she will see what you did to her. We'll cut off a few fingers on each hand, and we'll beat the living daylights out of her. And then, just when she's started to get better and cope with her injuries, if she ever does, we'll come back and complete the job, cutting the rest of her fingers off."

They had hit him in the small of the back then, and he had almost blacked out with the pain. They'd waited for him to start moving again before continuing to map out exactly what they now expected from him.

"The thing is David," the leader had explained. "I obviously made a mistake. Got the wrong guy. But I know how you can help me fix things. You see, you can HELP me to find the man I should be looking for. While we were making our enquiries, shall we say, we were told that someone had seen a young man walking down the side of the road just about the time my envelope was lying on the pavement. I don't who it was, obviously not you, but you're going to help me find him. You're going to make enquiries for me. Find out who that young man could have been. And you're going to start making polite enquiries if anyone found the envelope you dropped. Do you understand?"

For a second David didn't realise that he was expected to answer, then panicked and rushed to shout back 'Yes' before they hit him again.

"Good," the man continued. "In fact, this will work out quite nicely. You can even go round all the houses in your street, knocking on the doors for us, until you find the right man."

"But I don't live there... I just visit Chloe..."

"Not my problem, mate. Just knock on the fucking doors, ask people. Put up a notice in the local shops. I don't fucking care HOW you do it. Just do it, okay?"

David nodded, then quickly followed with a loud 'yes' just in case they hadn't heard him.

"We'll call you. Every night. You can tell us how you are doing and if you have found it."

"But you don't know my number?" he replied, stupidly.

"Of course we will, 'cos you're going to tell us it right now. Aren't you?"

"Yes, I am." He replied quickly, complying immediately and giving them the information they needed.

"What was in the envelope?" David asked. "I'll need to know, if I'm going to tell people it was mine, and they've found it."

Ben thought about that one for a moment. It was a good point. If he himself had lost something and then located the person who had found it, the other person would surely ask him to describe the contents of the envelope before returning it to him.

"Twenty thousand pounds."

David nodded.

"What colour was the envelope and how big was it?" David asked.

"Bloody hell, you ask a lot of questions!" Ben replied, slapping the hooded man roughly over the head. "But since you ask, I'll tell you. It was brown. And I want the envelope back with the money. If I get the money back without the envelope, we'll come for Chloe. Do you understand?"

David nodded.

For a moment there had been hope. Hope that if he forked out twenty thousand pounds of his own money, that the thugs would leave him alone. David was a derivatives trader in the City, and raising the money wouldn't be difficult for him. But could he just stick it in any old brown envelope and get away with it? He knew he couldn't. There was obviously something special about the envelope.

"Is there anything written on the envelope? Anything particular that might help me identify it?"

The man slapped him again.

"You ask too many questions. I've helped you enough. Now you just go and do your bloody job. We'll call you tomorrow night. Every bloody night until Saturday. If you haven't got lucky by then, Chloe gets it. DO YOU UN-DER-STAND?"

"Yes," David had answered.

A second later, the van ground to a halt, spun round and David was thrown to the floor.

He felt two sets of powerful hands grab him by the arms and shoulders and hoist him up. The van doors opened and he felt them propel him out through the doors into the courtyard beyond.

It was twenty minutes before a taxi agreed to stop for him. Several had started to slow down, got close, and then sped off again.

The one that did finally stop demanded an extra forty pounds up front for the fare, to cover the cost of cleaning the seat afterwards.

"What happened to you mate?" the driver asked, after David stumbled inside, and slammed the door closed behind him.

David was just about to reply when he thought of Chloe.

"I fell," he replied. "Down some steps... Can you take me home now please?"

He was still shaking when he rang the doorbell to Chloe's third floor flat, crashed past her when she opened up, and barricaded himself into her toilet.

He'd been there ever since.

Chapter 8

London

Monday

September 30th

7.15 a.m.

Ray woke, stirred, and went back to sleep. There was another hour and forty-five minutes before he had to go through, log on and start his day.

He worked from home on most Mondays, trying to extend the weekend as long as he could. He found that if he knew he didn't physically have to go into work the next morning, that he could avoid the Sunday night blues, and spend every single spare second he had with Emma.

Emma.

Shit.

He hugged her pillow tighter, and sniffed it again, worried that the perfume was already beginning to wear off.

Every time he thought of her, he felt that sharp pain in his chest. He'd never experienced anything like it before. It was difficult to describe it exactly...like a feeling of dread, loss, excitement and fear all bound up together. As soon as he thought of her and felt the pain, adrenaline would pump into his body and he'd immediately start to feel sad, the reaction to her name being accompanied by a pressing feeling of loss and emptiness.

He tossed and turned in his bed, trying to fight the world around him, but it wouldn't go away.

Eventually, he reached out behind him, grabbed the corner of his own pillow and threw it against the door in frustration.

Putting her pillow back beside him on the mattress, he climbed out of bed, and went to grab a towel from the cupboard.

Just then the phone rang.

"How are you?" the soft voice of his sister asked.

"Great. Never better."

"Have you heard from her?"

"Nope."

A moment's silence.

"What are you doing today?" she asked.

"Working."

"Good. It'll take your mind off things."

"I know."

"You don't want to talk, do you?"

"Nope."

"Ray, you haven't called her again, have you? You know, I don't think that that's the best..."

"No Alice, I haven't. I'm never going to call her again. Ever. That's it. We're over. Done. Her choice. She made it abundantly fucking clear that she never wants to see me again. And you know what, I'm better off without her!"

Another silence.

Ray wasn't convincing anyone, let alone himself.

"I'll call you later, Ray...tonight, when I get back from work?"

Ray swallowed, fighting back a few tears.

"Yes," he coughed, then spoke more softly. "Please."

Fifty press-ups, a hundred squats and sit-ups later, showered, breakfasted and

dressed, Ray poured himself a fresh coffee and wandered through to his den.

Whereas one half of the large second bedroom was dominated by the world of SolarWind, the other was occupied by his home-office: two large screens, a couple of laptops, a desk-tower, two servers, firewalls, several external hard-drives, a landline, and a VoIP phone connected to one of the laptops.

Ray powered up the screens and laptops, switched on the hi-fi and took a sip of his coffee.

Although he had some of the best technology in the world at his fingertips, it never failed to amaze him that it still took an age for the computers to load everything up and be ready.

Choosing a new CD from the tower beside the hi-fi, he replaced the CD in the tray with some Kaiser Chiefs, and turned up the volume.

A few minutes later, Ray logged onto the CSD network, and when asked for his pin and SecurID token, he copied the six digits from the display on the small RSA key fob, and waited for the VPN to log him onto the corporate network.

Scanning Outlook, Ray caught up with new email since last Friday - mercifully only twenty that needed responding to - and then settled down to the job in hand: hacking into the accounts department of the new bank that they had signed up last month.

Within minutes he was lost in a different world, playing the game that he loved, and still finding it difficult to believe that he was actually being paid for doing it.

Without doubt, Ray had the best job in the world.

He loved the challenge. The detective work. The chase.

He had long since become addicted to the adrenaline that flowed through his blood as the excitement built, and Ray began to map a client's defences in his mind. Ray never rushed. He always took his time. Methodically learning as much as he could about the structure of a client's network, the defences they had in place and the systems that they used.

He took copious notes, which he would rely on later to help him build his report for the client. When he felt that he was ready to slip past a client's defences and step inside their network, he would always take a break. Go for a walk. Do some more sit-ups. And think.

Had he missed something?

Was there a better way?

Was he walking into a trap?

When it came to his job, Ray was a perfectionist.

Getting into a network was mostly quite easy. Getting in undetected - that was the trick! And it was a skill that Ray had developed and honed over the years, learning from both his failures and successes, until he had got to where he was today.

This morning, Ray was impressed. The new client was clever. Had impressive security defences, and had obviously spent a lot of money selecting and implementing the most advanced products and software.

Their systems and software were up to date, and Ray was struggling to find any vulnerabilities that he could exploit. Over the years, Ray had built up a wealth of experience along with a suite of software tools that helped him automate the basic hacking processes. Normally it would be quite easy to scan all the ports he could find in a network, identify hardware and software and establish a list of vulnerabilities in their business applications or operating systems that would allow him to manipulate their systems so that he would be given access and admin rights to a client's network.

But today it was harder than normal, and as he played, his respect for his adversary grew.

And he began to understand why they were paying Castle Security Defence so much money.

It seemed as if they had recently built a new layer of defence across their systems and were keen to test it out.

CSD had some of the best penetration testers in London, with a reputation second to none.

If their new security defences could stop the 'good guys' in CSD from getting in, then chances were, they would be highly effective in stopping the bad guys too.

If.

It was six hours before Ray discovered the answer to that question.

And in this case the 'if' did not apply. Once again, it had simply been a case of 'when'.

Ray had done it again.

Incredibly, Ray found that one of the pages on the bank's website allowed him to inject some SQL code directly into a window that then allowed him, through a series of additional steps and procedures, to get onto a web server, penetrate a firewall, elevate his admin privileges, and hop from one part of the network to another, until eventually, bingo, he was granted access to the main server from which their latest banking applications and accountancy software was run.

Job done.

Normally, when Ray had completed the job he had been asked to do, he would start to prepare his report with the evidence he had gathered, explaining the steps he had taken to penetrate the network defences, gain full access and put himself in a position where he could have committed specific additional cyber crimes - had he wanted to do so.

Having cracked the passwords, given himself the correct admin statuses and gained access to servers, business applications and any systems he was interested in, Ray had enormous power to do damage to his client's businesses.

At the touch of a button he could delete a customer database, erase essential business programs, or wipe out account information. In the case of this bank, he could easily commit financial fraud by creating a string of new fictitious accounts loaded with cash, or transferring money from one account to another.

Throughout the world, cyber crime was rocketing. Criminal hackers with the right experience and significant resources were peering together and forming organised crime syndicates that were developing ever more sophisticated attack vectors against high value financial targets.

Cyber attacks were being conceived and launched that took many months or even years before they were successful. Where targets had put in place significant cyber defences, hackers planned for the long haul, conducting organised, military style manoeuvres. Months were spent scanning networks, probing their servers, firewalls and gateways, gathering information and looking for weaknesses in their infrastructures, and vulnerabilities in the software code or operating systems which they could exploit to launch an attack against their target. Where the targets had deployed additional security measures that could only be overcome with specific knowledge, the hackers turned to social media, email phishing schemes, and old-fashioned detective work to identify key individuals in an organisation, and then obtain their passwords and details from them.

In spite of all the security precautions put in place, Ray always found it amazing how easy it was to get hold of vital passwords from so-called responsible people in key posts in target organisations.

Sometimes it was just as simple as calling a receptionist, asking for the person responsible for 'X' or 'Y', getting transferred, and then pretending to be someone from the IT department, who was trying to fix a problem or make some authorised changes to the systems. By having a little knowledge of the company - which you could easily find from websites or groups on LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter - what the company did, its structure, a few of the bosses's names - you could drop a name or a line, and get almost any information you needed. Sometimes, the best way to get a password was simply to ask for it. The practice had become so common, and so many people fell for it, that nowadays it had even got its own name - 'Social Engineering'. Another way to get important details and passwords was to send specially crafted emails direct to the employees of companies. If the first one didn't work you would send a series of emails, linked and related to each other, each one referring to senior people in an organisation, and attaching made-up emails from those individuals. The people who received the emails saw the attached fake emails from their bosses, instructing the IT department, for example, to make changes to the systems, and to get the passwords from employees directly... People reading the email chains they received were convinced by the authority and authenticity of the emails, which contained so many details about the organisation that they just had to be real. Most of them would end up clicking on included links and then supplying all the information requested by the very official looking forms on the website to which they were directed.

Of course, in reality the link took them to websites which were created by the hackers, and the details and passwords which they typed into the forms they were presented with, went straight into the hacker's database.

Over days, weeks, or months, the knowledge gained by hackers in these so called 'Advanced Persistent Threats' or 'APTs' for short, eventually gave the hackers all the information they needed to access a company's network and achieve anything they wanted to do.

Advanced - because the technologies and tools and methods being used by hackers to break into networks were more sophisticated than ever before. Cyber security companies like CSD were struggling to keep up!

Persistent - because the hackers would not give up until they got what they wanted. If the payload was worth it, hackers kept right at it until they struck gold. Sometimes they really had to work for their money, but when an attack succeeded and the walls of Jericho came tumbling down, the cyber criminals could all become multi-millionaires in minutes.

Threat - because such attacks had got everyone scared. If a business was hit by a successful APT, it could be the end of the company.

Which was why Ray and hundreds of others like him around the world were employed to try to help businesses stay one step ahead of the attackers.

To protect them.

To keep them secure.

To keep them safe.

Ray looked at his watch. Incredibly it was already almost 4.30 pm and he had forgotten to take lunch, so caught up was he in the excitement and chase of finding the chink in his client's armour that would allow him to wound them to the core.

Sitting back in his chair, he was surprised to realise that he actually felt quite sad. There was not the usual high that always accompanied his successes. Instead, now that his attention had been drawn back from his screens, he was overcome with a feeling of sadness and loss.

Emma.

Thoughts of her invaded his mind and brought him down.

Ray swore, shook his head and tried to block her out of his thoughts.

He stared at the screens, seeking escape.

Having made it all the way to the centre of the bank's financial systems, he was sitting now facing the entry screen to the bank's core financial application.

The flashing prompt on the screen challenged him to enter a password and his ID.

"Login", one of the words on the screen commanded him.

Ray smiled.

It was if he was being instructed, compelled to action by a force greater than he could resist.

Yet Ray knew that he must resist. Sitting at the entrance to the bank's crown jewels, he was Ray Luck. Not SolarWind. He was being paid as a member of CSD. Now was not the time to play around with the bank.

"Login", the screen challenged him again.

Ray didn't have a user-id or a password to login with.

So he couldn't comply.

Yet.

The truth was that he knew that if he wanted to challenge himself to do it, he could find a user-id and a password. He could, if he wanted to.

"Login!"

Ray thought about his life.

Things were not going great. Were they?

He'd behaved himself, tried his best... and look how he'd been rewarded.

Alone. Single. Without Emma...

Getting a few passwords and user ids wouldn't be difficult.

How long would it take him?

He looked at the clock on his wall. Almost fifteen minutes to five.

Could he get them by six o'clock?

Ray laughed to himself.

How about five thirty?

Moving across the room to his other desk, he picked up the phone and called the receptionist at the bank. From there he asked to be transferred from one department to another, writing down names, taking notes, copying phone numbers and extensions. A couple of times he had to hang up and call back. Once someone hung up the phone on him. But within five minutes he had the names of three people who worked in the department he needed to target, along with their email addresses, all of whom were definitely at work that afternoon. Turning to another screen, he searched LinkedIn and Facebook until he found them, made some more notes about their likes and dislikes, their hobbies, interests and some of the achievements that they had claimed to have made on LinkedIn. Hacking into the company HR server, he downloaded some org charts, found the names of the people he was now interested in, and noted down details of the people to whom they reported.

Then he prepared to send them each an email.

A typical spear-phishing email which contained an email chain. The email at the bottom of the chain was made to appear as if it came from one of the VPs of the bank, the next one from their immediate boss, and then another one from the same boss asking why they hadn't responded to the first email.

Urging them to respond. Telling them to respond.

Instructing them to fill in the survey from the IT department and make sure his team was not the one that would hold up the installation of the new SAP system.

"Make sure that you do it before you go home tonight, please," the email urged.

It was now almost twenty five minutes past.

If he caught them now, just before they went home, they'd feel under pressure, and their normal judgement might go out the window.

That was the plan.

He waited three minutes, adding a further calculated delay which would increase the time pressure, then picked up the phone, dialling the first of the names on his list.

"Hi, Bianca? It's James here, from IT. I was wondering if you got the email this afternoon?"

"James? What email?"

"You didn't get it?"

"No."

"Not another one. That's why I'm calling you... half of the people still on my list haven't responded because they didn't get it... and they didn't get it because their system is needing to be patched... which is the whole point of the email.. I'm sorry... just let me check something... I think I can go into your Inbox on Exchange and increase your limit so the email will come through... yep, I can see it now... it's not spooled to your server yet... There you go... that's fixed it, the email should pop into your Inbox any second now..."

At his end Ray hit the send button on the email, sending it from a fake account he had created on the Exchange server for their corporate Outlook.

"By the way, how's the hill walking coming along? Did you do that West Highland Way Challenge that you mentioned the last time we spoke?" Ray bluffed, reading from his notes of the achievements that Bianca had boasted about on Facebook.

There was a pause at the other end of the line as Bianca tried to figure out how Ray knew about it. She'd forgotten completely that she'd ever spoken to this guy James in IT before...

"Has it arrived yet?" James asked, distracting her thoughts.

"Yes," Bianca replied, staring at the screen. "It just did..."

She opened it up and started to scan the contents.

"Good," James replied. "Whatever you do, fill in the form before you go home, otherwise Michael will go spare. It's only you and Debbie Wales that haven't filled it in yet..." Ray said. Debbie Wales was the next person he was going to call.

"What form?"

"Scroll down in Michael's email... see that blue linked URL underneath the paragraph about the new SAP installation? Good... click on it, and just fill in the details... It'll only take a few minutes... "

"Will it take long... I have to pick up my son in thirty minutes..."

"It won't if you do it now... Anyway, I'd better go... I have to catch Debbie too, before she goes as well. Good luck with your half-marathon next week..."

Disappointingly, Debbie Wales had already gone home by the time Ray called her, but another colleague, Janice, was ever so helpful and cheerful. She was really touched that James had remembered her birthday next week, even though, for the life of her, Janice couldn't ever remember telling James about it in the canteen.

Under pressure, wanting to leave at the end of the day, and convinced by the internal knowledge that James from IT had, especially since it was being pushed on them from above by their own boss, both Janice and Bianca visited the webpage that Ray had created several months ago and had used to trick some employees from another bank during a legitimate, paid exercise. All Ray had had to do was change the name, logo, the addresses, and bingo, it was good to go.

By the time Janice and Bianca had left to go home, Ray had their email addresses, their passwords, and their SecurID PIN numbers, which he had immediately recorded in real time as they authenticated themselves to his webpage as requested, and which he then instantly reused to log on to the real application server before the token had expired.

Two out of three. Not bad.

And it was only five forty-eight.

Okay, so, he hadn't done it by five thirty, but that was an unrealistic target and Ray had known it.

The good news was that Ray was now logged onto the bank's main systems under the identities of two of the banks trusted, authorised employees. Who had both now gone home and had no inkling of what Ray was just about to do.

Chapter 9

London

September 30th

7.15 p.m.

David stared at the front door, willing himself to open it up and step outside. Chloe would be home soon and he knew he had to go before she got back. The problem was that he'd been staring at the door for the past hour, too scared to step forward, turn the handle and leave.

Scared for two reasons.

First, because he was sure they were waiting for him outside. Ready to grab him, drag him back into the van and kill him.

Secondly, because his plan to run away was not proving to be as simple as he had hoped. It turned out that he actually did love Chloe. He couldn't just leave her. If he did get away, they knew where she lived. They'd come for her. Slash her. Take her beauty away from her. Destroy her.

And David would be to blame.

In spite of himself, he couldn't let that happen to her.

It had been a long, long night, followed by an even longer day.

He'd spent the evening locked in the bathroom, refusing to come out. When Chloe had begged to be allowed in to use the toilet, he'd passed her out the bucket she often used to hand wash her clothes in.

Before he'd finally fallen asleep on the bathroom floor he'd cried and shaken with both fear and anger.

Though mostly it was fear.

They were going to kill him. He knew it.

But WHO were they?

Why had they grabbed him?

How on earth had they had mistaken him for someone else? And who on earth had they mistaken him for?

David was too young to die. He'd too much to live for.

For a start... after all the years of struggling through university and working every hour God gave him in the bank, he'd finally made it onto the derivatives desk. Last year his first bonus had been five hundred thousand pounds. FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND POUNDS!

And he was only twenty-seven.

This year he would earn more. Seven hundred and fifty thousand, maybe one million. It was a dead cert.

If only he'd be alive long enough to collect it.

Secondly, he was too good looking to die.

Perhaps it was a stupid reason for someone to be granted life whilst others may be killed, but David didn't see it that way.

He was good looking. Women loved him, and he loved women. He adored them.

Sometimes two, maybe even three at the same time.

Money, good looks, and sometimes a little of the white stuff helped, but together it was a magic combination. A brilliant combination.

A combination that so few people had. So few...

He was one of the lucky.

Until now.

He'd run through it all a million times already, trying to remember every single second, striving to make sense of it.

Who did they think he was?

When he'd woken in the morning, Chloe had gone, and his mind felt much clearer. He began to think more rationally.

What exactly did they know about him, whoever they were?

They knew his name, where Chloe lived - where CHLOE lived! - and his phone number because he had given it to them... but apart from that they really had nothing on him.

He could walk away. Go. Leave Chloe... and they would never find him.

Yes. That was the simple solution.

He could just leave and this would all be over.

The plan seemed so simple.

He'd showered, got dressed, taken some paracetamol to dull the incredible pain that wracked his body, and swigged a glass of whisky. That seemed to do the trick.

He had been about to pack his night bag and go when his phone had rung.

Terror had surfaced within him from out of nowhere, a blinding panic coursing through his veins at lightning speed.

Dropping his phone and running to the bathroom he'd bolted the door and cowered on the floor.

They said they'd call him, and now they had.

The phone stopped, rang again, and then went silent.

It was half an hour before David opened the door, crept across the carpet and picked up the phone. Checking the display, he discovered it was his office calling him, probably because he'd not turned up at the desk or called in sick. His position would be open, he'd let the team down... a black mark against his name.

Fuck!

Looking down at his trousers he realised that he'd wet himself.

Pissed his own pants again.

Twice in two days.

Popping his jeans in Chloe's washing machine, he stepped back into the shower and let the water run down over his face, calming him.

He thought about Chloe.

A vision of her beautiful smile popped into his mind. She was gorgeous.

A second later, he imagined a knife slashing her cheeks open and blood pouring out...

He hit the side of the shower with his fist, cutting the skin across his knuckles.

Fuck!

Fuck!

Shit!

David just couldn't walk out of the door and leave Chloe.

He couldn't let them do that to her.

Did that mean that he loved her?

Was David finally, actually, in love?

Shit!

He swore again.

He'd been in love before. Once. With the woman who worked in the supermarket. She was twenty eight. He'd been fifteen. She'd taught him how to kiss, how to touch her, how to make love. He'd fallen for her, slept with her, adored her, and then she'd dumped him.

"You're just a kid!" she'd said, brushing his attentions away with a red face. "Now leave me alone, or I'll tell your dad. Buzz off!"

David had been getting his revenge on women ever since, enjoying their heavenly bodies without ever getting close to them.

Until now.

Until Chloe.

So when she opened the door twenty minutes later and walked into her flat, he was waiting for her.

"We need to talk," he said.

She looked at his bruised face, screamed and started to cry.

"Come in, sit down," David continued. "... There's something I have to tell you..."

\------------------

11.00 p.m.

At 6.15 p.m. Ray had shut down his laptops, powered down his servers, and crossed to the other side of his den. Switching on and booting up the ultra-secure private network of SolarWind, Ray had become a different person.

Almost literally.

By 7 p.m. he was pacing up and down his flat, trying to make up his mind and wrestling with his conscience.

For someone with half of his skills, making a lot of money would never be hard. Legally, or illegally. Illegally was far easier, but perhaps a lot more fun.

For someone with all of his skills, making a vast amount of money, illegally, was actually not that hard at all.

The only downside was the threat of being caught.

It wouldn't be so bad if the victim of the crime was a UK or European-based bank, but nowadays, anything involving American clients would almost certainly incur the wrath of the American administration, leading to an arrest warrant and a deportation order.

The UK government just loved to comply with their Yankee cousins. There would be no fight.

Within months SolarWind would be in prison, locked up in Guantanamo Bay, or dead.

The problem for now was that the client Ray had been working on was a US based bank.

Ray had already drunk several cups of coffee, and the carpet was probably wearing out, due to the heavy pacing back and forth he had been doing in the past hour.

He knew what to do.

He knew how to do it.

In fact, he'd already done some of the preliminary work.

Also, others had done it before him... most recently a bank in the middle east had been hit for over forty-five million dollars and those responsible had almost got away with it.

SolarWind had studied their cyber crime, and was amazed how close they had come to getting away with it scot-free. But they had made a few fundamental mistakes - mistakes that SolarWind would never make - and those who had masterminded the crime had been caught. SolarWind however, would not have been caught. If he had done it. Or repeated it.

Which he now could. But only if he could make up his mind...

When the unlucky bank had been hit, the cyber criminals had hacked their way into the central computer systems of the bank - as Ray Luck had already done today with a different bank. With the usernames and passwords that they had somehow obtained - probably in a way similar to how Ray had obtained his - they had logged into several accounts and using the authority of those who employees whose identities they had assumed, they had started to create a large number of new, fictitious accounts. They had then removed the upper limit which capped the amount of money that any of these account users could normally withdraw and issued new debit cards to these account users. The new cards had been sent to a series of addresses, at which members of the cyber crime gangs were waiting. At the same time the new cards arrived, the bank automatically issued new PIN numbers for those cards, and also sent them to the same addresses. Of course, the cyber criminals were still there, waiting for the pin numbers. And once they had them, they abandoned the addresses where they had been waiting for the cards and pins, all of which had been rented under false names and paid for with stolen cards anyway, and then they had disappeared into the night.

The cards, along with the pin numbers, had then been cloned, and large numbers of the cloned cards had been sent to other members of the gang across the globe.

These team members - the money mules and cashers - had taken the cloned cards to ATMs across their countries and withdrawn huge amounts of cash.

It was a while before the bank began to suspect that something funny was going on, and by the time they did, it was too late.

The cyber gang had become very rich indeed.

Ray, aka SolarWind, knew exactly how they had done it.

He knew he could do it too.

It would take a bit of organisation, but... now, what with Emma not being around, what else should he do with his time?

Emma.

He stopped in mid-pace.

His eyes welled up. He swallowed hard, turned around, and walked back into the den.

Angry. Confused. Alone.

He had made up his mind.

He knew exactly what he was going to do next.

\------------------

11.15 p.m.

Chloe's Flat

When the phone eventually rang, David was lying in bed with Chloe, holding her tightly in his arms, her slow, deep breaths soothing him as she slept.

He had told her about the mugging, that there had been a case of mistaken identity, and that there was still some danger to him.

He had mentioned nothing about the threats to her.

Which is why, after they had made love, she had fallen asleep, his strong arms making her feel safe, loved and wanted.

David had left the phone in the dining room, and as he slipped out of bed and hurried towards it, he hoped that Chloe would not wake up.

"You took your time, David," the voice at the other end said. "I don't like to be kept waiting. From now on, you keep the phone with you at all times, do you understand?"

It was a question.

David replied as quick as he could.

"Yes!"

"Have you got it?"

David began to shake.

"No." He replied, his voice quivering with fear. "...No, I haven't."

"Do you know who has?" The man asked.

Another question.

"No."

"Then, David, I suggest you better find out soon. And just in case you need a reminder of the reason you should bother to pull your bloody finger out and do something, I recommend you go to the front door and see what just came through your lovely girlfriend's letterbox. I'll call you tomorrow. You'd better have some good news for me by then. Sleep well."

The line went dead.

David pulled the phone away from his ear, staring at it as if it was something he'd never seen before, his hand shaking, his mind numb. Then he remembered what the man had said, and letting the phone slip out of his hand and drop to the floor, he hurried to the front door of the flat.

A brown envelope lay on the carpet, just below the letterbox.

Kneeling down, he picked it up, turned it over and examined it.

There was no writing on the outside, and it was not sealed.

Gently, he slipped a finger inside and pulled up the flap.

There was a single photograph inside.

A photograph of Chloe getting into her car outside their building.

It was daylight.

David noticed that she was wearing the same dress that she had on when she'd got home from work.

Which meant they had taken the photograph that morning.

And that they were outside.

Watching him.

And waiting.

David rushed to the toilet and threw up.
Chapter 10

Castle Security Defence Headquarters

Central London

Tuesday

October 1st

9 a.m.

Ray smiled at the receptionist, swiped his card at the electronic gate, touched the screen with his thumb, and waited for the waist high glass door to swing open.

"Good morning, Ray!" the text on the LED screen on the wall in front of him announced, and the gate swung quickly open.

Ray stepped through, walked across the hall and called the elevator. When he heard the soft, gentle 'ping' and the doors finally opened, he stepped inside and rode it to the eleventh floor of the Central London offices of Castle Security Devices.

CSD operations were split between two locations, the office on the south bank of the Thames, and another office in a cheaper and more isolated business park in southwest London.

From his desk in the corner office, Ray had what he thought was one of the best views in London. From where he sat, he looked over the plaza below to the River Thames only a hundred metres away, directly opposite the Tower of London on the other side of Europe's greatest river.

The two tall towers of 'Tower Bridge' stood impressively on his right, and diagonally below him was the dome of City Hall, the futuristic offices of the Mayor of London.

Since Boris Johnson had left, and become an MP angling for control of the Conservative Party and hoping to become Prime Minister at the next election, Ray hardly ever gave the building a second glance.

He didn't like Boris, and he didn't like his successor, but at least Boris had had some charisma.

And for an anarchist to admit that, it was certainly saying something.

A woman's voice caught him by surprise as he stared at the two sides of Tower Bridge, watching them start to rise to let a three-masted tall ship pass underneath.

"So?" was all that the woman, his boss, asked. "I wasn't expecting to see you so soon. Have you cracked it already?"

Ray turned and looked straight up into her light blue eyes.

She was an attractive woman, but Ray no longer looked at her in that way. He now just saw the one thing that he really didn't like.

Authority.

She used to be one of his colleagues but when their boss left to join one of the new government agencies that had sprung up to help protect the nation from the growing cyber threat, she had been promoted, and he hadn't.

"No." Ray said simply.

"No what?" she asked. "'No' as in, 'I'm losing my touch, and I couldn't hack my way in yet?', or 'No' as in, 'I'm not going to tell you how, but I've done it again. I made those walls of Jericho fall down one more time, and 'hallelujah!' I'm in and all over them!'", she exaggerated, waving both hands in the air and looking skyward.

Ray smiled.

"Sadly," he replied, shrugging his shoulders slightly. "Sadly, it's the former. Their defences are good. I couldn't get in...At least not yet...They are good. Very good."

"So what are you doing in the office, then? Why aren't you still at home, trying to find a way in?" she asked, seeming a little annoyed.

This was a big client. Worth a lot of money to CSD.

It was a good question.

One to which Ray didn't have an answer which he could give to her yet. He hadn't been expecting to see her this morning.

"I've been trying since Friday. I worked over the weekend," he lied. "And I needed a break. A little inspiration."

"Do you want any help?" she asked, her voice a little more friendly.

"No. Not for now... I just need to think and get some fresh air."

"Fine. Okay... but how long do you think it'll take you to get in?"

Ray shrugged again.

"I don't know. Hopefully a few days. There's always a way in. Always."

She looked down at him, her lips quivering as if she was going to say something, but then thinking better of it.

"Fine... but you'll let me know as soon as you get in, right? As soon as you do?"

Ray nodded.

"As soon as I do, you'll be the first to know."

She smiled, turned, and walked away.

\------------------

11:45 a.m.

For most of the morning, Ray sat at his desk, just staring out of the window. Numb. Thinking. About Emma. About last night. About how he had possibly just made the biggest mistake of his life.

And he thought of Saturday night.

Incredibly, yesterday he had able to forget about it almost completely.

How was that possible?

On Saturday evening he had watched a woman being murdered, and he'd simply forgotten about it?

Mind you, it had been rather an eventful weekend.

On Saturday morning, he had found twenty thousand pounds.

On Saturday afternoon his girlfriend had walked out on him hours before he was going to propose to her.

In the evening he had watched a snuff movie. A real one, although perhaps not a deliberate, premeditated murder. A bloody murder, nevertheless.

Then he had met up with one of the world's most notorious hackers.

Followed by Monday where he had successfully hacked into one of the most secure banks in the world.

And then started to execute the perfect cyber crime. Although he didn't exactly need the money did he? He'd already got twenty thousand pounds.

All this, followed by lying to his boss, and threatening continued employment in the best job in the world.

In short, a few interesting things had happened.

Deciding that he needed some fresh air, he left his desk and wandered down to the plaza, ambling over to the bank of the River Thames and sitting down on the concrete wall.

In spite of it being October, the sun was shining, and it was surprisingly warm. Almost hot enough to take off his jacket and walk around in his shirt and tie, the mandated office attire: the smartest hackers in town.

He stared down into the water, his own mind a river of thoughts.

Thinking back on Saturday he felt destroyed. Disgusted. And scared.

Thinking back on yesterday, he felt elation.

Surely that was wrong.

In fact, he knew it was wrong.

It was wrong.

SolarWind had committed the cardinal sin. He'd broken the law.

It was almost with surprise that Ray finally felt his stomach rumble and realised that he was hungry.

Wandering along the side of the river, he eventually found himself in a pub, ordered some pub-grub - steak and kidney pie, chips, gravy and peas \- and found a corner where he could disappear for a while.

Just about to sit down at the table, he reached out to a paper that someone had left behind, and turned it around to look at the headlines.

Seeing the photograph on the front cover, Ray dropped his plate of food onto the floor, the plate smashing and his lunch spilling everywhere.

The world around him suddenly began to spin, and he grabbed the edge of the table to steady himself, taking deep breaths and trying to calm his nerves.

Sitting down, staring at the paper, the unmistakable eyes of the woman who was murdered on Saturday night glared straight back at him.

The title above the photograph announced quite stoically, "Israeli Model Found Murdered In North London."

As he hurried out of the pub, rushing out for fresh air and sunshine after having scanned the article, three phrases stuck in his mind, "Israeli", "mugged" and "stabbed to death."

Ray made it to the side of the Thames in time to vomit into the murky waters flowing past only feet below.

"Mugged and stabbed to death on the streets of North London?..." he muttered to himself, wiping his mouth clean. "Like hell she was!"

As he turned and hurried quickly towards London Bridge tube station, he felt that the eyes of everyone around him were following him. Staring at him. Boring into the back of his skull.

Ray knew he had to escape. He had to get home.

Quickly.

He needed to think.

\------------------

1:00 p.m.

For the second day in a row, David sat in Chloe's flat, too scared to go out of the door. But feeling a little excited.

Excited because he had made his mind up that he was not leaving, and the reason he was not leaving was because he was in love.

Being in love, actually being emotionally attached to a woman, was an experience he had not allowed himself to feel since the shop-assistant.

"Wham, bam, thank you ma'am." Had been his motto ever since he had been emotionally abused by his first love.

The incredible thing was that David did not want or choose to be in love with Chloe. He just was.

Which, in his mind, meant that it had to be the real deal.

The icing on the cake, of course, was that Chloe genuinely seemed to love him back.

Last night he had held her close in his arms as he told her how he had been mugged.

He had told her everything except about the danger to her.

Chloe had wanted to take the day off work and stay with David to help him plan how they would go about finding the twenty thousand pounds and the envelope, but David had finally persuaded her to leave him alone.

He was always able to think better by himself.

The other reason he didn't want Chloe to stick around too long was because although he had managed to pretend that he was not as scared as he truly was, he knew he couldn't keep it up too long.

His own personal nervous breakdown was just around the corner, and it was best if Chloe wasn't around to witness it when it happened.

Not now that she was so special to him.

So, when she left, David sat on the sofa, cried twice, thought of Chloe, stared at her photograph, and did precious little else.

A few times he got up, walked to the window, pulled back the curtains and stared out at the street to see if he could see anything. Or anybody.

The third time he did it, his phone rang.

"David," a voice said. "You can't see us, but we can see you. Don't worry. We're here. Waiting. Outside. To protect you."

"Protect me from what?"

"From anybody who tries to mug you when you find that £20k, and the envelope. You are trying aren't you? You are sitting inside your flat, making a plan for how you're going to recover my money, aren't you? AREN'T YOU?"

A question.

"Yes. I am. I am. Honestly."

"Good, because from out here, it looks very much to me as if you are just shitting your pants and are too scared to come outside... Oh, listen... what was that?"

There was a loud bang on the door. And then another.

"Two knocks, David? Can't be opportunity, can it, because we all know opportunity only knocks once. No. It's someone else. In fact, I can tell you who it is. Do you want to know?"

Question.

"Yes, I do."

"Well, it just so happens I was going to tell you anyway. It's my friend Petrov. He's a good lad. You might remember him? He was the one that broke your nose. Or at least tried to. Of course, if it isn't broken, he could try again. Would you like that?"

"No. No. Please don't."

"Then get your bloody ass out of that fucking flat and find my money. If you haven't done something about it by tomorrow, I think me and that lovely lady of yours are going to get nicely acquainted. Do you understand?"

Question.

"Yes. Yes, I do."

An interesting thing happened after the call.

David started shaking.

Not from fear.

But from anger. The call had been strangely positive, galvanising him into action.

Now that he realised that he loved Chloe, things had changed. For the first time in his life, he had something serious that he could lose.

He looked at the photograph again.

The thought of someone harming her made him angry.

An inner voice spoke to him, urging him to channel the anger and use it, shape it, turn it into something positive.

David knew that time was running out.

If he didn't do something soon, Chloe was going to get hurt, and it would be his fault.

Standing up, he walked through to Chloe's office, turned on her printer and her computer and started typing.

An hour later he left the flat.

He had a plan.

\------------------

2.30 p.m.

From outside in the black-windowed car, Ben watched as David slipped out of the front door, and started going from door to door on the street. He watched him stick several pieces of paper to the lamp posts along the road and disappear around the corner.

Nodding to Petrov and his boys, they all jumped out onto the street, and Petrov followed after David.

Ben walked up to the lamp post, looked at the A4 piece of paper that David had stuck on, and smiled.

"At last, some bloody progress!" Ben muttered to himself, then turned back to the car, got in and drove off.

It was time to start making a Plan B. All the other routes Ben had been down had turned up a big fat zero.

It seemed now that David was his last hope, and if at the end of the week he'd come up with nothing, it was looking more and more likely that Ben would not see the start of the next.

With Petrov following David, and the others still searching all the other streets and parks nearby, Ben was finally able to slip away and start to make a few arrangements of his own.

He needed a new passport, and he needed it fast, and he knew just the woman who could get it for him.

\------------------

2.40 p.m.

Ray finally made it back to his flat just before 3 p.m. He hurried up the stairs, opened the door and hurried inside, stepping over the post and papers on the floor behind the letterbox.

Ten minutes later SolarWind's network was powered up, he'd gone through the three layers of authentication and authorisation, and he had logged onto his secure email, which thanks to the TOR Project allowed him to send emails securely to other hackers in the dark web with no risk of his location or identity ever being discovered.

His email to RobinHood was short but sweet.

"We need to meet. Tonight! SolarWind."

Of course, there was no guarantee that RobinHood would notice his email until later that day. Ray was just banking on the fact that like other hackers, they checked their TOR email religiously: read, reply, delete.

At three thirty, Ray sent another email. This one slightly more urgent.

"Have you seen our friend? Urgent I know what he looks like. SolarWind."

There was no reply.

An hour later, still no reply.

While he waited, Ray watched the video. Over and over again. Almost obsessively. Who was the murderer?

On the way home he'd bought all the newspapers, and from each he had ripped the photographs that went with the various articles about the dead woman who had been murdered in North London by a drug addict who was later found dead in an alley-way with her handbag, mobile phone and wallet, having overdosed on heroin.

As he waited for RobinHood to respond, Ray compared all the photographs with the woman in the video, her face so clear and visible in the final scene, frozen in the act of death, her eyes looking out at him from the screen and staring straight through him into eternity.

There was no doubt.

It was her.

Chapter 11

London

October 1st

5.55 p.m.

Ray lay back on his sofa, staring at the ceiling in his lounge.

Occasionally his thoughts drifted back to Emma, but each time it did, he felt that pang of pain in his chest that he had begun to loathe and hate, and he instantly changed his thoughts to something else.

To the video.

And to the newspaper articles.

Ray was worried.

Instinctively he knew that there was something going on here that was far more sinister that it seemed.

This was no ordinary death. No ordinary murder.

As soon as he read that the woman had been mugged and stabbed to death in North London by a desperate drug addict whose body was later found with conclusive evidence linking him to her death, Ray knew that he had stumbled upon something far more concerning than he could have imagined when he had first watched the murder happen.

This was the stuff that conspiracy fanatics would thrive upon.

Fact One: According to the newspaper articles, the coroner's report cited a time of death of around 7 p.m. on the Sunday evening. Ray knew that the woman had been murdered on the Saturday evening, not the Sunday. Any impartial coroner would be able to spot the difference between death occurring on Saturday night or Sunday night.

Fact Two: The dead drug addict had been found with evidence which linked him to the mugging and murder of the woman, including DNA underneath his fingernails which belonged to the murdered woman. DNA and some dried blood from her body were also found on his clothing.

Question One: Where had the body of the drug addict come from? Had he been conveniently murdered to help create a concrete cover up story for her death?

Question Two: The inquest had already been held, late on the Monday afternoon, with judgement passed on her death. All the details of the murder by the drug addict were reported at the inquest and made available to the press who quickly printed them. Had that not all happened far faster than it normally would? A lot of information had been made public and printed. Was that normal? Or was someone working hard to divert public attention away from the truth? The answer to that question was obvious!

Question Three: Were the police part of the cover up? Or had somebody arranged it all to make it look like as it was reported? But how could they do that without the coroner lying? And the police were not fools... any experienced police officer could tell the difference between a body one day old or two days old.

That was three questions so far. Big questions. Ray knew there would be more. Unfortunately, so far there were no answers.

For the briefest moment, Ray wondered if there could be any way that someone would ever manage to detect that he had seen the murder take place. Obviously whoever found the body, or committed the murder, had serious connections. The sort of connections that could have the resources to...

"Shit!" Ray swore to himself. He was losing the plot. Ray KNEW that there was no way that they would ever know he had hacked into the camera, and that even if they did discover that someone had, they would never, ever, be able to trace it back to him.

SolarWind operated behind three ultra secure layered network perimeters, each with the best security in the world. All data packets leaving his network were further anonymised by a chain of servers around the globe, making it impossible to track down where the packets came from: a similar principle used by those who established the TOR project, but now enacted in a solution that was far, far better, and had been improved by the top cyber minds in the world who worked outside of military and government clutches...

When SolarWind communicated with others from his secure, core network, all traffic leaving and entering his network went through hundreds of proxy agents located randomly all over the globe. Someone might possibly be able to read an email he sent, but could never track down the location it was sent from, so long as he always sent his email through the system he and his peer hackers had nicknamed "Ghost". For obvious reasons.

Shaking his head, to clear his brain, and suppressing another random thought about Emma, he got up from the sofa and walked through to his den.

It was time to check if RobinHood had got his message.

He had.

His reply was short but sweet.

"Meet at the same place as before, outside, at 7.30 p.m."

Ray looked at his watch. He had one hour.

He showered quickly, dressed and hurried to grab his jacket, a black hat to help cover his face - just in case - and his wallet.

Almost without thinking, he bent down and grabbed the mail from the floor beside the door on the way out.

Scanning through the envelopes quickly he found nothing of interest or importance.

The last thing he looked at was an A4 piece of paper, folded in half.

He opened it up.

In big black letters, it read:

"Have you found £20,000 in a brown envelope? If you have, please call me. This was my savings to pay my way through university. Lost on Saturday morning, I will pay a £500 reward if you please give it back to me. My future depends on this money. If you have any information that can help me get it back, please help!"

There was a telephone number and an address. It was another flat in his street.

Ray shook his head in disbelief.

A momentary image of his dead brother's face appeared before his eyes, and a spark of anger flared within him.

Long ago he had realised that the only way to deal with the drugs aspect of his brother's death was to shut any and all reactions and feelings to drugs out of his mind. If he didn't, his anger and stress levels went through the roof.

For his own sanity and health, he had trained himself not to get involved in the debate. To stay well clear.

And this letter?

His immediate gut reaction was that it was a ruse. A lie.

The drug gang clearly just wanted their money back.

Hurrying out the flat, he screwed the paper up into a ball and stuffed it into his pocket, taking the stairs two at a time.

A minute later he was running down the street.

The man in the car saw someone run past, but because of the black hat, didn't get a look at his face. By the time he turned around to take a photograph, the runner was gone.

\------------------

7.40 p.m.

When Ray finally made it to Limehouse, the gate to the courtyard where the Jamboree pub was hidden was still locked up.

Searching for the night-watchman who manned the cubicle in the nearby building, Ray eventually conceded that it looked like there was no one on duty.

Scanning the announcements board in the far corner, he discovered the reason: the Jamboree was closed tonight.

Blast!

Ray looked around him at the street.

It was an old cobbled street. Down one side ran several large, old, industrial warehouses. On the other side was a long series of arches, the arches now all filled in and turned into storage. A long time ago, a railway probably ran along the top of the arches.

A few cars were parked up and down the road.

The rest was empty, the street dimly lit, and reminding him of a scene from the 1920s, before the world went crazy.

Scanning up and down the road, there was no one to be seen.

He checked his watch.

It was now 7.45 p.m.

Had RobinHood come and gone? Had he missed him?

Across the other side of the street, something moved in one of the dark shadows underneath an archway.

Almost out of nowhere, a figure emerged and started towards Ray.

For a fleeting second Ray felt a tremor of fear... what if it was not RobinHood? Had someone been following him?

Without thinking about it, he reached up and pulled down his hat across his face, stepping back towards the gate.

The figure came closer.

"You're late!" the man said. "Follow me!"

Ray hesitated.

The figure turned.

"SolarWind, are you coming or what?"

Ray felt a surge of relief, and he swore at himself underneath his breath for being so stupid and edgy.

"RobinHood?"

"Who else were you expecting? The bloody police? The Sheriff of Nottingham, perhaps?"

"Sorry...," Ray replied, stepping up closer to RobinHood. "But after what's happened, I've just got a little jumpy, that's all."

RobinHood turned, "What's happened?"

Ray looked at him, "Did you not see the newspapers this morning?"

"No, should I have?"

Ray glanced up and down the street. They were still alone.

"Where are we going?" he asked RobinHood.

"That depends...," RobinHood, "On what you next tell me. What happened this morning, and why are you so jumpy?"

"I'll tell you, but walk with me as I do. Where do you want to go?"

"Like I said, it depends on what you tell me!... How about the DLR station?"

Ray nodded.

"Take a look at this," Ray said, handing over a copy of the Metro newspaper he'd picked up on the tube. "On the second page."

RobinHood opened up the paper, stopping and staring at the photograph under a street light. He scanned the article.

"It's her." Ray steady, looking over his shoulder. "It's the woman from the video."

RobinHood opened up his mouth to say something, but thought better of it.

"Exactly." Ray replied.

"Brilliant. This is all we need."

"So, have you managed..."

"... to clear up the video and see who the man is that murdered her?" RobinHood finished his sentence.

The two men were now standing facing each other under the lamp, alone in the street.

Just then a car swept around the corner and rattled past on the cobblestones, the sound echoing off the warehouse walls against the old railway arches.

"Not yet." RobinHood replied. "I'm running a programme that automatically refines any grainy images on videos and enhances and extracts them from their surroundings. It's similar to the ones the police and MI5 use. It's slow...it takes ages to run, going through billions of mathematical computations, but slowly, very, bloody slowly, it can find and clean up any image you need, almost regardless of the background it's in. It's amazing. Incredible. But very, very slow. I got straight down to it the moment I got home the other night, and its due to finish..." RobinHood looked at his watch, "in about an hour."

Ray lifted his eyebrows, questioning RobinHood.

"Where? Is it on your laptop? Have you got it here?"

RobinHood laughed.

"Here? On a laptop? You're joking, right? This programme sucks up power. I've had to build a parallel array of about eight servers at home, just to get this thing to work."

"At home?"

"Yes. Let's go there. Given that we know that someone is covering this up, I think the sooner we find out who's behind it all, the better. And besides, it's probably best if we don't hang out in public together, especially if Mossad is following you!"

Ray stared at RobinHood, his jaw hanging open.

RobinHood laughed.

"I'm joking!" he said, and punched Ray on the arm.

But there was something in the way that he said it that gave away the fact that far from joking, RobinHood was being totally serious.

"Stay here for a moment, SolarWind." RobinHood said, lowering his voice. "Let me walk ahead a hundred metres, before you start following me. But don't lose sight of me."

Twenty minutes later, having stalked RobinHood all the way from Limehouse to Stratford, Ray followed RobinHood down a series of dark roads, across a large park, and then into a cul-de-sac about a mile away from the 2012 Olympic Park.

As he followed him, Ray noticed that RobinHood was walking a little strangely, almost as if he was in some sort of pain. Or perhaps it was just the way he walked? After all, Ray didn't really know him all that well.

RobinHood was about thirty metres in front, standing outside the door to a small, old church. As Ray came close to catching up with him, RobinHood opened up the gate beside the road, walked up the path, put a key in the main church door, opened it up and stepped inside.

Stopping at the bottom of the path, for the hundredth time that night Ray looked around him to make sure that he was not being followed, and then followed RobinHood into the church yard.

Nervously.

The last time Ray had been inside a church was at his best friend's funeral: dead at the age of twenty five, killed by a drunken idiot in a pub fight.

The heavy wooden door at the front of the old Victorian church was ajar. Ray pushed the door open.

Immediately inside there was another door, also open. Ray walked through, and couldn't help gasping with surprise.

On the outside, the building looked old, and run down. A Victorian church that looked like it hadn't seen much love for years.

On the inside it was a completely different story.

He was standing inside a modern, luxurious house, the interior of the church having been transformed into an amazing, spacious living space.

RobinHood appeared on his right, as if out of nowhere...

"Coat?" he asked, quickly closing and locking the doors behind Ray.

Ray looked at him, not understanding.

"Do you want to give me your coat?"

"Yes, yes...sorry..." he replied. "Do you live here?"

"Absolutely."

"But it's a church. I thought you were an atheist?"

"I am. And this isn't a church. It's a house. My house. Obviously, the God business hasn't been doing so well recently. People prefer to watch TV than pray for their souls."

"Did you do all this? It's amazing."

"I'll take that as a compliment. I did most of it. When I bought it, it was a wreck. The roof had fallen in. The locals wanted to knock it down, but it's a listed building. I got it in an auction and then got funding from the EU to do it up. They practically paid me to do it. Personally, I think it's crazy, but that's the government for you, isn't it? A bunch of idiots who don't know what they're doing. I saw it as my moral duty to take as much money from them as possible. I still do. Anyway, I know we both think the same on that one!"

"It's great. You've done a fantastic job!"

"I know. But as they say, you ain't seen nothing yet. Follow me."

They walked down a corridor that was probably once the aisle. When they got to the back of the church, on the left of where the altar probably used to be, but which was now a sumptuous living room with the most incredible stained glass windows, RobinHood opened a secret door which was cleverly embedded into a book case, and stepped down a spiral staircase into the vaults. Going through another few doors, they found themselves in the bowels of the building.

They came to another door. Locked, with a digital keypad on the wall on the right. RobinHood produced a key, turned it in the lock and returned it to his pocket.

He then turned to Ray and looked him in the eyes.

"The Inner Sanctum. I'll take you inside, so long as you make me one solemn promise."

"Which is?"

"Anything you see in here, you never repeat to anyone else, do you understand?"

Ray understood exactly what he meant. In fact, he couldn't believe that RobinHood was offering to take him inside to his den, but he recognised it for exactly what it was: a mark of respect from RobinHood to SolarWind.

"I promise. And I'm honoured."

"Don't be. Just don't bloody tell anyone about this."

For a second there was an embarrassed silence, then Ray apologised and looked away, allowing RobinHood to place a finger on the digital scanner and then tap his pincode onto the digital wall panel.

There was a small electronic buzz, and RobinHood pushed on the door.

"Come, take a seat." RobinHood said, inviting him in.

Ray stepped into the room beyond.

As soon as he was inside, RobinHood pushed the door closed behind him.

It closed tightly shut, with a loud, electronic beep. Locking them both in. Whether Ray liked it or not.

As they stepped through the doors, movement sensors detected them and automatically illuminated the room.

The space inside was large. With no natural light, and no way for anyone outside to see what took place within.

Three desks were arranged around the room, each covered with laptops, and multiple flat screens. There was the familiar constant hum of the servers which were arranged in several towers, as well as a few being placed underneath the desks. Cabling, neatly arranged and tagged, ran around the edges of the floor. Several speakers were attached to the walls, and Ray guessed that they were connected to the flashy sound system that sat on a small table between two of the desks.

Several large maps of the City of London and the River Thames dominated one wall, a large white board covered another, and a cork board hung from the third, onto which RobinHood had hung hundreds of newspaper and magazine clippings.

Knowing it would be rude to pay them too much attention, Ray scanned them quickly with his eyes, taking a mental note that most of them seemed to have a common theme: the banking system and public anger over the bankers' large bonuses

RobinHood pointed to one of the two black swivel chairs in the room.

"Take a seat."

Ray sat down.

"Beer?" RobinHood asked, sitting down and rolling his chair towards a small, glass-doored, well stacked fridge that was just behind the entrance they had come in through.

Ray nodded and smiled.

"Nice touch!" he laughed, noting that this was one improvement that he could make to his own den, which was otherwise quite similar.

RobinHood took two beers from the fridge, prised the lids off with a bottle opener that hung from a string attached to the door handle, and handed one over to Ray.

"Cheers. Now let's see what we've got here then, shall we?"

RobinHood pushed his chair across the floor to the desk against the middle of the far wall, pushed the buttons on the side of two screens and after looking over at Ray, who then politely looked away so that he could not see, typed in several passwords onto the keyboard on the desk.

The two screens jumped into life.

Whatever the programme was that RobinHood was running, the job it was doing was obviously not yet complete. A dashboard filled the screen, full of numbers and figures, most of which Ray did not understand, except for one part: a box with a red surround contained a clock, counting down till completion - '98% complete. Minutes left: 3.'

RobinHood smiled.

"We're in luck. Good timing!"

He swivelled round and leant back in his chair, his eyes coming to rest on Ray.

"I can't believe you're here... in my lair. You're the first cyber-bruv to see this."

"I'm honoured. And I have to say, it's really cool. And probably the last location in the world you'd expect to find a place like this!"

"Exactly. Anyway, we never really got a chance to speak the other day. So how's things nowadays? Still working at CSD?"

"Yep. Pays the wages, and keeps me on my toes."

"Still being a good boy, then?"

Ray thought briefly back to last night and then lied.

"Yep."

"Incredible... If I had your talents, SolarWind, I'd be the richest person on the planet."

Ray swallowed hard.

"Flattery will get you everywhere, but you've always been just as good as me. How come you're not rich then?"

RobinHood laughed.

"Who says I'm not? Or perhaps I was, or will be again? You know the rule, if you've got it, don't flaunt it, right? Don't draw attention to your real self. Ever."

Ray nodded.

He understood exactly.

The lessons learned by their flash cyber-bruvs who had paid the price for boasting of their successes were lessons well learned by the others who were still free, and apparently poor.

A screen behind RobinHood began to flash.

"Here we go..." he said, spinning round in his chair, and pulling himself closer to the desk.

Ray pushed himself across the floor to join him.

The dashboard had been replaced with a box with a red triangle in it.

"Are you ready for this?"

Ray nodded.

"I want to see the face of the bastard who murdered that woman. If we can identify him, then maybe we can..."

"We can what?" RobinHood hastily interrupted. "Tell the police? Help the authorities? Are you joking? You know I'd never do anything like that! I hate the bloody authorities..."

"I'm not saying I will... but..."

"But what?"

"Come on, a woman's been murdered. And someone's covering it up. We need to know what's going on!"

"Why?"

"Because..."

"WHY?"

"Because, I'm the only person who knows what really happened, and..."

A look of concern crossed RobinHood's brow.

"You've changed SolarWind. You're different. I can't believe you're saying these things. It's that good woman of yours that's done this to you, isn't it?" RobinHood said, then laughed.

Ray felt that pang of pain in his chest, and a wave of sadness crossed his heart, followed by an incredible feeling of loss.

"Just play the thing. We can argue about this later." Ray said firmly, redirecting his thoughts swiftly away from Emma. "If you don't want to watch it, then leave the room, or just give me the flash stick and I'll leave. Otherwise just hit play. I want to see this bastard's face now."

RobinHood said nothing, just looking at Ray and appraising him.

For a moment or two, Ray wondered what RobinHood would do next, but then he eventually spoke.

"Sure thing. I was just playing with you. Let's watch this," and with that he spun around again to the screen and clicked the 'Play' symbol with his mouse.

Coloured video immediately filled the screen. It was the opening sequence of the video. It looked just the same, nothing different from what Ray had seen before.

"It hasn't worked...this is just the same..." he started to say.

"Patience..." RobinHood cautioned. "You'll see in a second...we'll fast forward to the bit you want in the doorway where the man was standing..."

RobinHood looked down at some notes he had scribbled on a notepad on this desk, then moved the mouse along the play bar that appeared below the bottom of the video. A little window appeared at the bottom of the video and inside it they could see the scene that would play if they released the mouse at that step of the video.

RobinHood dragged the pointer along until the moment the video showed the man just about to appear in the doorway, and he then released the pointer with his mouse.

The image on the full screen changed, and they were at the point where they could see the dark contour of the man's body in the far doorway of the room.

"Ready? Watch this..." RobinHood said.

Pressing one of the Function buttons on the keyboard, the dashboard they'd seen previously reappeared to the left of the video on the screen, and RobinHood moved the mouse and adjusted some of the parameters within the dashboard, moving a red sliding bar in one of the graphics slowly up from zero towards the maximum of ten.

The images in the video immediately improved.

Almost incredibly a clear image started to appear in the doorway, and as the slide-bar advanced towards the ten, the image of the man became more and more defined.

At 'five' out of 'ten', RobinHood moved the mouse over the image of the man, clicked a few more buttons on the keyboard, and a dotted box appeared above the image. RobinHood grabbed hold of the edge of the box and dragged it around over the head and shoulders of the man. Rotating the wheel on the mouse, the man's head and shoulder grew bigger, the program zooming into that part of the image.

Advancing the slide-bar up again, the face of the man began to emerge clearly from the darkness.

As the slide-bar came to 'ten' out of 'ten', RobinHood played with the wireframe around his head once more, zoomed into the image again, and suddenly the face of the man, now clearly visible, filled the screen.

As with one voice, both RobinHood and Ray stared at the image before them, and then uttered the same, two words.

"Oh shit..."

Ray and RobinHood had both instantly recognised the man.

It was the face of Randolph Best, the Foreign Minister of Great Britain, one of the most famous and powerful men in Europe.

Chapter 12

London

October 1st

10.15 p.m.

When the phone rang, David picked it up immediately.

He'd been waiting for it to ring for the past hour.

Earlier on, when he had been out and about, knocking on people's doors, he'd left the mobile at home.

Stupidly, he'd forgotten to take it with him.

When he'd got home, he found that he already had one missed call.

There was no number associated with it.

But he knew who it had been from.

Today David wasn't scared.

He was angry.

Angry that whoever it was that was doing this, was playing him. Manipulating him. Toying with him.

He knew he should be scared, but for some reason today he wasn't.

His face and body ached, and the bruises were so bad that as people walked past him in the street outside, they stopped and stared at him. He could see people visibly recoil when he approached them.

David was also angry with himself. Why was he doing nothing about this? Why was he just complying and not fighting back?

He knew the answer to that question though. It was simple.

Chloe.

David was worried about Chloe.

"Hello?"

"David. Is your girlfriend with you? We know she's in the flat with you...we watched her go in. But is she with you now?"

"No. She's asleep..."

"Good. Open the front door."

"Downstairs?"

"No. The door to your flat."

"Why?"

"Open the bloody door. Now!"

David stared at the front door.

"Now!" the voice shouted one more time.

The bravery that David had felt earlier was rapidly disappearing.

Gingerly, he edged towards the door, keeping the phone pressed to his ear.

He flipped the chain off, slid the bolt and opened the door with his left hand.

There was no one there.

He looked down.

There was a black canvas bag on the floor.

"Put the bag over your head."

A tingle of fear pulsed through David's body.

"Why?"

"PUT the bag OVER your HEAD!" the voice said again, calmly. This time more quietly than before, the effect being to make David focus on his words and comply with them as directed.

"Turn around and face the door. Close the door behind you. And wait..."

"What for?"

"Do NOT speak again. Remain quiet. Just tell me when your door is closed."

Slowly David bent down and picked up the bag.

Every ounce of his being was telling him not to do this. Was this really happening? It was like some nightmarish scene from a horror film, and he was just going along with it.

The calm and bravado that he had felt before was gone now. In its place was a mounting terror that threatened to engulf him and drive him over the edge of reason.

He wanted to scream, to cry, to run... far, far, away... but he knew he couldn't. They would find him, catch him, kill him. He knew they would.

With trembling hands, he lifted the black bag up and pulled it over his head.

"Pull the cord tight..." the phone urged him, "... and tell me when the door is closed."

David stepped outside of the door and turned around.

"This is madness..." he said to himself in his head, too scared to say it aloud. "Madness..."

Reaching out with his hand, he found the edge of the door and pulled it towards himself.

It was pitch black inside the bag, his hot breath quickly heating the inside up. For a second, David wondered if he would be able to breathe, but then he realised the bag was porous and made out of cotton.

Breathing would not be a problem.

Slipping his fingers inside the edge of the letter box, he closed the door tightly, listening with dread as he heard the lock click home.

"The door is closed. What now?" he said to the voice on the phone.

"Now you wait. And I am going to come back upstairs to your flat and punish you. I need to hit you several times, hard, because you did not answer my questions fast enough. And I also have to cut off one of your fingers, so that in future you will try harder to find my money."

"My finger..?" David almost screamed aloud, reaching for the door, and giving it a push... but it was locked tightly shut.

"Shit..." he heard himself say loudly, his rapid pulse pounding in his ears and his body beginning to sweat. Down below, he could hear the heavy sound of footsteps rising up the stairwell as whoever the footsteps belonged to, came up the stairs two at a time.

"Fuck..." David said loudly.

"Don't go anywhere, David. Stay where you are. If you go inside the flat, we'll come inside and punish Chloe too. Do you understand? Wait where you are. Take your punishment like a man!"

On the edge of tears, David finally lost control of himself and for the third time in a week, he wet himself.

He felt the growing damp patch on his legs and smelt the urine, and for a few moments - all it took for one of the thugs to make it back up the stairs - he was distracted.

He felt a rough hand suddenly grab him from behind and propel him sideways against the wall so hard the air was forcibly expelled from his chest.

Two hands on his shoulders were pushing him down to a kneeling position on the floor.

"Put out your hand!" the voice commanded.

David's hands tightened into two firm balls.

"Question. Did you hear me?"

"Yes!" he shouted back quickly, and then slowly extended his left hand.

He felt someone grasp his fingers and screamed out of shock.

"NO!" he screamed. "Please... don't do it! I promise you, I'll find it tomorrow. Honestly, I will!"

"It's too late for that, David. I'm very disappointed with you. You've been very lazy. And I'm running out of time."

David felt the man tugging on his clenched first, forcibly trying to extract the fingers.

"I'll give another twenty thousand pounds back... with the original twenty thousand. I'll give you twice as much... just please leave me alone. Don't kill me!" he pleaded.

"But we're not going to kill you David. We already told you that. We're just wanting a finger as a mark of good faith from you. Is that alright?"

Question.

"No... NO!... Please..."

"Can I have the finger?"

"NO..."

"This is the last time I'm going to ask nicely, David. Extend your fingers and let me take a finger. No... actually, you must now ASK me to take a finger. Or I'll force you to ask me and I will then cut off two! Do you hear me?"

Question.

"Yes... I hear you... but please, NOT two fingers... One... just take one."

"Like I said, say 'please'?"

David hesitated, considering for a few fleeting seconds that he should stand up and simply jump over the banister onto the cold concrete below. It would be almost certain death. Instantaneous.

A word began to formulate itself at the back of David's throat. It tried to come out by itself several times, but David ended up choking and coughing.

"What was that? What did you say?" the voice asked.

"Please... Please FUCKING please... I said, please take my finger!"

"Thank you David. I thought you would never ask. It's certainly very nice of you to offer... and I think it would be simply rude to turn you down... so..."

David had never ever felt pain like it before. It started with a rough, pushing sensation on his left pinkie, a building up of pressure that lasted what could only have been a second.

Then there was the sound of a metallic click, accompanied seconds later by a stab of pain that went straight through him, on and on...

He screamed, felt himself falling, and felt a dull thud against his forehead as his head collided with the concrete floor.

After that the world went silent.

\------------------

10.30 p.m.

Several doors away, just a bit up the street, Emma bundled the last of her stuff into her car, stepped inside and closed the door behind her.

Tears were running down her face, and she felt empty.

She had been dreading coming over to collect the rest of her belongings.

Part of her had been scared of seeing Ray again. She didn't know how she would react when she saw him. She missed him. More than she had expected to. There were questions in her mind that needed answers, and she had hoped that maybe, when she saw Ray, he would have helped her to find some of those answers.

She had deliberately left it until the evening to come over, hoping that Ray would be there. All day long she had been arguing with herself that the easiest thing to do would be to wait until he was definitely out and at work, and let herself into the flat then: no Ray, no confrontation, no conflicting emotions.

Absolutely no chance of him smiling at her, and her falling into his arms.

No possibility of a hug, a kiss, and all her resolve being swept away. But she had lost the argument.

The other part of her was much stronger.

Canada was beckoning. She had spent most of the day at the Passport Office getting a new passport, then sorting out some paperwork at the Canadian Embassy.

Everything was falling neatly into place.

Yesterday she had spoken with her new employer on the phone. They had called her. They wanted her.

In Canada, she had a bright future.

Yet, in London, she had Ray. Or used to.

He had stopped texting. He wasn't home. She hadn't heard a word from him in days.

Had he moved on?

She had begun to replay the last few months over and over again in her mind. Of course, she knew she was still right to have ended the relationship with him.

It was, at the time, the right thing to do.

But was it right now?

Words had been said. Actions had been taken. New emotions and realisations and thoughts and feelings had all surfaced since Saturday afternoon.

A year of feelings concentrated down into a few days.

There was so much that she could talk to Ray about...except she couldn't, could she?

The truth was, she missed him. It felt like her right arm had been cut off. Part of her was missing.

Of course, she knew she would grow used to being without him again. She had existed fine without him before, and she would exist just fine without him in the future.

Canada would take all thoughts of him away.

The finality of it all, however, was beginning to scare her.

Splitting up, moving to Canada... there would never be any chance for reconciliation.

On top of that, she felt guilty. Ray knew nothing about her plans.

If he still had any feelings for her, he would be devastated when he found out what she was about to do.

When she had arrived at the flat at 7 p.m., that part of her which she had allowed to confuse her into coming here tonight was actually excited. Excited about seeing Ray again.

Discovering that he was not there had been an incredible anti-climax.

After gathering her things together, she had tried to find reasons why she should hang around, waiting for him.

She had made coffee. Read a magazine. Tidied the kitchen. Watched some television.

The longer she waited, the more nervous she got.

Where was he?

At 10.24 p.m. she began to get scared that he would walk through the door with another woman on his arm. Laughing. Happy.

She imagined the shock on his face...the disappointment as he saw her.

That had been too much.

Wiping the tears from her eyes, she had looked around the flat one more time, switched off the lights, and closed the door.

Slowly she had walked down the stairs.

As she walked across to her car from the steps to the grand frontage of their - Ray's - building, a tall man in black clothing had rushed past her, not seeing her and banging into her.

For a second their eyes had met, and she had felt a tingle travel down her spine.

It had been a little weird.

The man never apologised, but hurried past her, jumping into a white van further down the road and speeding off.

For those brief few seconds her thoughts had been distracted.

She looked at her watch.

10.30 p.m. and still no sign of Ray.

Climbing into the car, she wound the window down and looked back up at the third floor of the building.

Once, she had thought, Ray's flat could have become her home.

Things could have been so different.

The problem was, Ray had never asked her. Obviously she and he had always had different plans.

And where was he now?

Out drinking? Celebrating? Forgetting her already?

Emma turned the key in the ignition, signalled, looked over her shoulder and drove off.

In just over a week, she would be on the other side of the world.

Leading a new life.

The future was so bright she would have to buy a pair of sunglasses.

In spite of that, just as her car turned the corner out of the road, she couldn't help but look back down the street - hoping - checking, that Ray hadn't just come home and it was not too late to see him...

Chapter 13

London

October 1st

10.45 p.m.

Ray paid the taxi driver, climbed out of the cab, and hurried up the steps, unlocking the door to the communal stairwell, and hurrying inside.

He rushed up the stairs, wanting to get into his flat and lock the door safely behind him as soon as possible.

His mind was awash with thoughts and emotions.

Today had started off weird and got progressively worse.

Within the space of twenty-four hours he had found himself the key witness in a murder that had such profound implications it scared him just to think about it.

But think about it he must, and would.

In fact, practically nothing could stop him from doing so.

The events of the evening at RobinHood's were like a piece of film that went round and round in his head.

After they had seen the image materialise on the computer, as the programme had finished cleaning and rebuilding all the pixels, it had rendered an almost crystal clear photograph of one of the most famous and powerful men in the world.

Randolph Best, the Foreign Minister of Great Britain, was unlike most other politicians. He commanded respect from all quarters, and all parties. Even anarchists like Ray had been forced to offer the man respect. He was the public face of his party and was an internationally respected politician and statesman, who travelled the world fighting for 'good and justice and defending the British way of life,' as he was famously known for saying.

He was no coward.

As a young man it was reported that he had been a commander in the British SAS, and had won several citations for bravery for actions taken in Afghanistan.

There was no doubt that he stood up for his principles and fought hard for what he believed.

It was Randolph Best who had persuaded the British people to send troops to start defending the Egyptians from the onslaught of ISIS troops, after they had taken over most of Iraq and Syria and destabilised the Middle East.

The British - all cultures, religions, and walks of life - loved Randolph Best.

In recent months he had become increasingly involved in trying to find a way to bring peace to the Middle East and was personally championing several peace plans.

He was a good man.

Or so the rest of the public had reason to believe until tonight.

Over the past few years, Ray had become less and less of an anarchist, and more and more of a normal working man, thanks in part to the example that dear old Randolph Best had portrayed.

Not all politicians were bad.

And justice in Britain, so it seemed, had once again begun to return. On the streets of the UK, there had been fewer anti-police riots. The corruption that had seen the last government swept out of power had been dealt with, and Randolph was seemingly the herald of a new brand of statesman.

A statesman that even anarchists could trust.

"SHIT!" Ray had shouted aloud, a few moments after the shock had begun to wear off.

For a few minutes both Ray and RobinHood had simply sat in silence, staring at the screen in disbelief.

Both knew the implications of what they had seen.

"That bastard is just the same as all the rest. He's a liar, just like the others!"

RobinHood stood up and started to pace the room.

"I never liked the man. Never trusted him. Never did. They're all the same. All politicians are the same. They're all criminals. Every last man... and woman of them!"

"Shit!" Ray shouted again. "No wonder there's been a cover up. No fucking wonder!"

"Well, what do you expect?" RobinHood said loudly, standing behind his chair and facing Ray, gesticulating wildly into the air. "He's just another bloody Oxford boy, one of the fucking elite few that has always had everything handed to them on a silver platter, and who now spends every day screwing the great British public as if it's his God given right!"

"You know what happened, don't you?" Ray said, pointing at the face of Randolph Best on the screen. "He murdered that woman, called his Security Service in and they arranged the whole thing. They covered it all up. Made it look like a street murder by a druggie, fixed the coroner's report, and no doubt made sure that Mr Fucking Best has an alibi on the other side of the world somewhere."

"I hate the bastards. It's one law for them, and another law for the rest of us." RobinHood declared. "Always has been, and always will be. Unless we do something about it. Which we are going to... soon... and then we'll start to get our own back. You know, it's not too late, SolarWind. You should take this as a warning, a reality check, and come back and get active with us again. Once an anarchist, always an anarchist. We need you SolarWind. And we could do with your help pretty soon... We've got big plans!"

Ray looked at RobinHood. What was he talking about? What was he planning?

"SHIT!" RobinHood suddenly said, "If the spooks who work for the government have covered up the murder of the woman, then that means that Randolph has the backing of the Security Service or some other government agency..."

"Obviously... it's what you would expect... I just said that. He's the bloody Foreign Minister. Of course, he's going to have the MI5 and MI6 behind him. Protecting him."

"So how sure are you that no one knows that you were watching him? When the clean-up team walk into the room to recover the body, they'll see the TV and the camera lying on the floor, and given all this shit recently in the press about Russian hackers taking over our CCTV cameras, they'll be checking to see if anyone had hacked..."

"Calm down...think rationally. All the sessions on the servers would have been cleared long before anyone would have looked at any network connections, and I was surfing using the Ghost browser. It's secure...even if they could find any servers that might still have had records of any packets going back and forward from my broadband modem, Ghost would prevent them from ever discovering that I was at the other end of any of the sessions. And even if they did, they would never be able to get through my layered defences and find out it was me. There's no way. And you know that. So stop worrying!"

RobinHood nodded.

"And you definitely used Ghost, right? You weren't drunk and forgot to use the Ghost browser?"

Ray laughed.

"I NEVER do that. Don't be stupid. It's my 'First Protocol': don't drink and hack! Do you think I want to get arrested and deported?"

"Fine. Because we're both in this now..."

"No we're not. I'm in it, whatever this is... but you're not. It's only me. You're in the clear. This..." Ray said, waving his hand around the room, and at RobinHood, "never happened. You've got nothing to do with me."

RobinHood looked at Ray, not saying anything for a moment. Ray knew that he was thinking. Finally, he nodded.

"Okay. Good. If that's what you want, that's fine. You're on your own. Thanks."

Ray nodded and sat down again.

"Have you got another drink? Something harder?"

RobinHood nodded. "Whisky? I know I could do with one."

"Make it a double..."

"Come with me then... we'll go upstairs."

They left the room, and after RobinHood locked the door and the electronic lock audibly reset, Ray followed him upstairs.

They ended up in a large room lined with bookcases filled with thousands of books, reclining on two large leather sofas.

RobinHood picked up a remote, pressed a few buttons, and a gas fire embedded in one of the walls roared into life.

"Ice?" RobinHood asked, before nipping out of the room for a few moments and returning with two glasses of whisky.

"It's thirty-seven year old Glen Doig. You'd better love it." he said, handing a whisky tumbler to Ray. "It's probably the best whisky you'll ever drink... and also the most expensive."

Ray stared at the glass and the amber liquid within, not really paying attention to RobinHood's words.

"What do I do?" he asked, quietly.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, what the fuck do I do now?"

"What do you want to do?" RobinHood asked.

"I don't know. Not yet. But I know I can't just let the bastard get away with it. Just because he's a politician... NO, I mean, BECAUSE he's a politician, he has to be held accountable. The government and everyone who's covered this up have to be held accountable. This is a cover up on a massive scale. It could bring the government down. No, actually, it should bring the government down. And since only I know the truth, I've got to do something."

RobinHood settled back on the sofa and laughed gently.

"That's more like it. But what are your going to do?"

"I don't know. What can I do?"

RobinHood laughed louder.

"You're SolarWind." he replied. "You can do anything!"

\------------------

At the top of the stairs, Ray fumbled with his key, still nervous and thinking about the conspiracy he had uncovered.

Turning the key in the lock and opening the door to his flat, the smell of Emma's perfume wafted out of the hall and hit him immediately.

Randolph Best was quickly forgotten and adrenaline surged into Ray's veins.

"Emma?" Ray shouted, stepping through the doorway and hastily closing it behind him. "Are you here?"

Silence.

Kicking off his shoes, he hurried into the lounge, hoping to see her curled up on the sofa. Had she come back to him? Were things going to be okay after all?

For the past few days Ray had consciously tried to bury each and every thought that he'd had of her. To think of her was to hurt, to feel an emptiness and pain the like of which he had never felt before and which he couldn't endure. Perhaps now he wouldn't have to endure it anymore.

If she had come back to him, he would never do anything stupid again... From now on, he would be a changed man! The perfect man! He would tell her how much he loved her, how he couldn't live without her, how the past few days had been like hell...

The sofa was empty.

Her perfume was even stronger now though. She must still be here.

Hurrying through to the bedroom, he found it empty. As was the kitchen, the bathroom, and his den.

She was gone.

She had been here though, definitely. But she was not there now.

Collapsing on the sofa, Ray noticed the note on the coffee table: a sticky from his telephone pad. Reaching across and picking it up, his heart sunk.

"Ray, I came to pick up my things. I've left my key in the kitchen drawer. I'm sorry for everything. Emma."

Ray swallowed hard, his heart pounding in his chest, a feeling of despair engulfing him and threatening to suffocate him.

At first the tears came one at a time, but quite quickly they became a torrent that flowed and flowed.

Ray never tried to stop them.

He knew now that Emma wasn't coming home.

It was really over.
Chapter 14

London

October 1st

10.46 p.m.

David started to scream, even before he opened his eyes. The pain was like nothing that he had ever experienced before, a degree of pain that he could not have imagined was possible, even in his wildest and darkest imaginings.

Sitting up and fumbling with his right hand, he pulled violently at the hood that covered his head.

Still screaming, the pain more than he could bear, he began to panic. The hood was not coming free, the cord pulled tightly around his throat and was not loosing itself as he tugged at the bag.

Suddenly he felt two hands upon him again, and instantly he tensed. The man had come back for more of his fingers.

"No, NO!" he shouted loudly. "Leave me alone... Please!"

"David," Chloe's voice answered..."It's me..." and almost simultaneously he felt her fingers loosen the cord around his neck and the bag was pulled off.

The moment he emerged from the blackness, he started to gasp for breath and blink in the brightness of the stair lights. As he gulped the cool air in the stairwell, his senses came alive again, and another wave of pain washed over him.

"Help me!" David screamed, "Quick... get a bandage, or something..." he shouted, lifting his hand up in front of his face and seeing for the first time the space where his little finger used to be.

Simultaneously Chloe saw it for the first time and screamed aloud too, drawing in a sharp intake of breath and raising both her hands to cover her mouth.

"What... What HAPPENED?" she asked in disbelief. "Where's your finger? Who did this to you?"

David tried to stand up but slipped on the pool of blood on the concrete step and fell forward, stumbling against the wall. Slipping back down the wall to the floor, he tried to catch some breath. To calm down. He was feeling light headed.

Chloe was crying now, standing in the doorway and staring at his hand. As he looked up at her, he saw the fear in her eyes.

David breathed in deeply and forcibly tried to get a grip of himself.

Turning his attention back to his hand, he saw more objectively this time that his finger had been sliced off just above the knuckle. The blood was congealing now, and a plug was forming around the wound.

For a moment he stared at it, trying to control his thoughts and his breathing.

He felt Chloe's hot breath on the side of his cheeks. She was kneeling down beside him.

"Who did this to you David? Who?" she asked gently, between her tears. "The same people that beat you up?"

David took another deep breath. He had to get a grip.

"Chloe... please, do as I say... get a tea towel and some ice or frozen peas. Please..."

Chloe nodded, resting her hand gently on his shoulder. Sobbing, she stood up and took a step backwards towards her open door.

"... and your car keys! Don't forget your car keys!" he shouted after her as she backed through the door to their flat. "And put some clothes on... I need you to take me to hospital."

In spite of the pain, slowly David found himself beginning to think. Pulling his eyes away from his wounded hand, he started to scan the floor around him.

"My finger..." he said aloud to himself. "Where is my finger?"

It was nowhere to be seen.

Holding his elbow with his right arm and supporting his arm, keeping it high in the air with his hand pointing upwards, David stepped gingerly down the top flight of stairs scanning the steps below for his finger.

Nothing.

Peering over the banister down the stairwell, he looked to see if it had fallen down to the ground floor, but he couldn't see anything down there apart from the dark tiled flooring.

Turning around he stepped gingerly back up to his flat.

The blood had spilled down the steps, forming dark red pools which were slowly drying up and forming sticky, solid masses.

The blood on the floor outside his door was now almost all congealed, and the soles of his feet were sticky with his own blood.

Each time he took a small step upwards, he could feel it sticking him down, sucking gently at his feet, and making a squelching sound as he moved.

Glancing around him at the blood covering the ground, he felt suddenly weak and nauseous.

Stepping quickly to the banister, he vomited noisily down into the void of the stairwell.

\------------------

Chloe sat beside David in the ambulance, holding his arm and resting her head against his shoulder.

She had run into their apartment, grabbed some peas and ice and then taken them back to David, wrapping them in a thin tea-towel and surrounding his hand with it.

Then she had hurried back inside, called an ambulance and got dressed.

She was in no fit state to drive, and she was worried about how much blood David had already lost.

"What the hell is going on?" she had screamed aloud in the lounge, away from David. Taking some deep breaths, she had grabbed some spare clothes for David and his pyjamas, and then hurried back to be with her man.

The ambulance had arrived a few minutes later. She buzzed them in and the paramedics rushed up the stairs, taking over and asserting order where there had been none.

They had immediately hooked David up to a saline drip, done some checks and given him an injection, and then rushed them both downstairs.

With the siren blaring and the lights flashing, they had hurried through the streets of London.

"What happened? Who did this?" Chloe asked one more time, softly, gently.

David did not reply.

\------------------

11.00 p.m.

Ray picked up the bottle of whisky and examined the golden liquid at the bottom. He had drunk almost a quarter of a bottle. Not enough to make him drunk but certainly enough to make him feel a little better.

Emma was gone. Gone. Gone. Bloody GONE!

She wasn't coming back, and he certainly was not going to call her again.

What sort of coward was she that she had to sneak round when he was out, to collect the rest of her stuff? Could she not face him?

Why not?

It dawned on him then. Something new that until that point he had not considered.

She was seeing someone new.

She'd met someone else.

The reason Emma had split up with him, after all this time, was because she was fucking someone else.

It hurt like hell to think those thoughts, but deep down, it all made sense.

Ray was an idiot.

All that time he had been planning to spend the rest of his life with her, she had been planning to spend it with another man!

There were a few more beers in the fridge that Ray had brought home with him. Time to fetch one.

Or two.

There was nothing on the television tonight, at least nothing new that he hadn't seen before. He thought briefly about playing a game on his Xbox, then decided not to.

He was too angry to concentrate.

Fuck.

He thought of Emma again and how she had made a fool of him, and his temper flared.

He cursed himself.

He'd become weak. Fallen in love. Let someone else take over his mind and control his thoughts.

Ray hated giving up control. He hated being weak. He loathed anyone having authority over him.

Bastards.

If it wasn't women... it was the fucking government.

Telling people what to do... making laws... forcing people to do things they didn't want to.

Controlling them.

Herding them like cattle.

Taking away their rights.

Bastards.

Fucking, fucking bastards.

His mind turned towards Randolph Best. Another bastard in whom he'd begun to put his trust. In whom LOTS of people had put their trust.

A man who had spat in the face of the great British public... those who had supported him and believed in him.

RobinHood was right.

It was time to bring the fuckers down.

To show those bastards that they couldn't screw people over whenever they wanted to.

Ray stood up, reaching momentarily for support from the side of the sofa, but after steadying himself, moving slowly but surely through to his den, carrying another two beers and his almost empty bottle.

Like some people who can actually drive better after a few beers, Ray could surf the net and hack faster when he was drunk, than when he was sober.

If he wanted to.

If he chose to break the cardinal rule.

"Don't drink and hack!"

But as he sat down at his terminal, switched everything on and logged on to his secure networks, he thought once more about the beautiful woman that Randolph Fucking Best had murdered in cold blood and he knew exactly what he was going to do.

He'd got a plan.

And it was cool, because he wasn't going to hack.

He wasn't going to break the cardinal rule.

He was just going to have a little fun.

First things first though.

He needed an email address.

He needed the personal email address of Randolph F. Best.

Actually, for someone like Ray, finding something like that wasn't particularly hard.

Several years ago Ray has scripted a few lines of code that searched the net and found any records of a name associated with an email address. At the time he'd written it, he'd just wanted to track down an old school friend to get back in touch, but since then it had proved immensely useful.

He'd actually thought about selling it and letting the rest of the world use it, but then he'd realised that it was one of several tools which he had that made him stand out from others, cyber tools which made other hackers look up to him, and wonder what special weapons he had in his cyber kit bag: 'How the hell did he do that?'

The script dug deep into the public records, social media, and media files that anyone could find out there in the web, if you cared to look and had the inkling to do so. Most people couldn't write code like he could, though, so it would take them ages, but his program - Hound \- would run in the background while he did something else, automatically searching the web and sniffing for what it could find.

The great thing was that Hound always found something.

And bloody quickly too.

With GHOST and Hound running together, Ray typed in the name of Randolph Best, pressed RETURN and then opened a new beer.

While he waited for a little picture of a dog to appear on his screen and start to wag and then point his tail - one of the worst animations he'd ever done - he sat back and watched the video of the murder on the other screen for the millionth time.

His anger flared again.

BASTARD.

Feeling a wave of alcohol hit his head, he blinked several times, and scrunched up his eyes to clear his vision.

Ray laughed.

"Shit... I'm getting drunk!" he said aloud.

Just then a hound appeared on his other screen and began to bark.

Ray turned away from the murder video and clicked on the hound's head.

Another screen appeared, and a list of emails, telephone numbers, addresses and contact details began to populate the screen, along with snippets of text which provided the context of where they had been found.

Ray started to scan them.

One by one.

The twenty-third entry on the list jumped right out at him.

It was a record from the Junior Common Room at Hertford College at Oxford. It had something to do with a 'Gaudy' that Randolph Best had attended... going back to his old college for a free meal and to give a speech and encourage other students on the path to greatness...

Something for the wealthy. A way of bonding and teaching other people in the rich and privileged club the secrets of how to keep the poor down and under the foot.

Bastards.

According to the snippet which had been recorded and then digitised later and stored in the college records, Randolph Best had invited the other students to email him with any questions or thoughts.

To all intents and purposes it looked like a personal email address, given out about two years before he'd got his first senior Cabinet position.

Bingo.

It was exactly what Ray had been looking for.

Ray knew that the chances were that the email address was still valid. Still real. Still an email address that Randolph F. Best would use to communicate with his inner sanctum: his friends, relatives and close colleagues.

Downing the rest of the beer, the adrenaline pumping through his veins, Ray blinked a few more times to clear the alcohol from his now fuzzy brain.

Smiling to himself, Ray used GHOST to open up a new fictitious Brazilian Outlook account. It took a few minutes to get it up and running, but once he had done it, he sat back and thought very briefly about what he was going to do.

Ray smiled.

After typing in the email address of Randolph F. Best, he focussed on the message he was going to send to the bastard.

Blinking, then taking another swig of his beer, he focussed his eyes on the screen.

The words were blurring a little, but his anger wasn't.

"Fucker. Bastard... MURDERER!" Ray swore aloud, putting the bottle of beer back onto the table too forcibly and watching as it bounced, fell over and then rolled off the table onto the carpet.

"Fuck..." Ray swore again. "I'm fucking drunk..."

The cursor on the screen blinked at him. Beckoning at him.

Egging him on.

Ray's fingers crawled along the keyboard, typing in a message into the field where you put the title of the email.

He wrote two words:

"I spy..."

And then in the space where the message body went, he wrote.

"... I SAW her cry."

Ray smiled to himself. It was a simple message, but one that would get the point across.

"I spy, I SAW her cry."

He laughed, hit SEND, and then immediately began to feel a lot better.

He was going to show that fucker you couldn't play with people like him.

Ray had a plan.

He was going to make Randolph F. Best pay for what he'd done. But first he was going to play with him. He was going to make him sweat...
Chapter 15

London

October 1st

11.38 p.m.

RobinHood stood in front of the mirror and surveyed the pathetic individual that he had become.

Slowly, as each day passed, and as the grams turned to kilograms and the fat continued to accumulate on top of his 'one-pack', RobinHood loathed himself more and more.

He detested the way he looked.

He had never been a handsome man, and now things were just going from bad to worse.

As a child he had looked a little odd. Not terrible, but enough for the other kids to bully him for several years. Until one day he'd had enough and discovered that he could hit the other kids harder than they could hit him.

For the rest of his school days, he'd been one of the popular boys. Extremely clever, the teachers had been frustrated that he was wasting his talents and had tried to rein him in. They had encouraged him as best they could to make the best of himself and not to hang around with the other losers in the school. Their attention had two effects: first, he had rebelled and started to develop a hatred of others trying to impose authority on top of him. What right did they have to tell him what to do? Secondly, he had become angry.

Subconsciously though, he must have heard their voices and understood what they had tried to say to him, because in the last few years of school his anger had taken the form of deliberately trying to frustrate them even further by ignoring their teaching in school, but learning everything he could at home, studying hard and passing every exam with straight 'A's: "See what I can do? By myself! I don't need you telling me what to do!"

His favourite subjects were Maths, Physics and IT. IT especially.

One day he realised that he knew more than his teachers did about computers, and the feeling that he was better and cleverer than the authorities above him spurred him on to even greater heights.

About that time he also realised that computers were beginning to take over the world. They were everywhere you looked. Doing everything. Ruling everything.

For once the underdog had an opportunity to be free!

He had begun to really enjoy playing with them, writing code, developing his own software programs and exploring the power which mastery of IT and understanding computer networks could give him.

But being able to surf the web, explore virtual worlds and have fun was slowly being destroyed by the cancer of 'passwords' and 'logons' which attempted to limit you and prevent you from going places you wanted to.

RobinHood reacted by going all out to stay one step ahead of anyone who would attempt to try to throw up barriers and fences and hem him in.

Absorbing any book or magazine he could get his hands on and joining one computer club after another, RobinHood quickly learned everything there was to learn about computing, networking and IT security. And how to get around it.

He wasn't the best hacker in the world, but it wasn't until his second year at university studying computer science that he started to meet others who were better than him.

The internet gave him access not only to an vast number of networks to hack into and play with, but also to an incredible community of fellow hackers who also loved to break into networks, do a little damage just to show that they had been there, and then leave without getting caught.

The world of hacking expanded his horizons not just virtually, but also in real life: he began to travel the world, attending 'Black Hat' and cyber hacking conferences and meeting other like minded people who like him, could think of no other better way of sticking a finger up at authority than by hacking into their network and screwing it up.

RobinHood became a respected member of the hacking community, and he loved the way others looked up to him and held him in such high regard. It became a vicious circle to which he became addicted.

Being good at hacking made himself feel good and earned him respect, so he studied harder at it, got better, got more respect and enjoyed it even more. So he studied it harder...and got better...

It was at university that he had met SolarWind, one of the best hackers in the world. Soon they became friends, or at least RobinHood hoped that's what they were. They didn't see much of each other, but RobinHood had taken it as a good sign when it was him that SolarWind had turned to in his time of need.

In his third year at university, RobinHood had joined the 'Three-Ists Club', whose members all shared three main beliefs: they were all atheists, anarchists and hedonists. For years RobinHood had lived by the mantra:

'Live for today, don't worry about tomorrow, and don't think that there is any reason for your existence apart from one: to have as much fun as possible!'

Sadly, for RobinHood that mantra had now become slightly ironic, or perhaps even more meaningful, and the word 'tomorrow' was becoming more dubious and poignant as every day slipped by.

Hacking and anarchy had become a way of life for RobinHood. Thanks to his blatant disregard for all forms of authority, he felt no concerns whatsoever about hacking into networks and seeing what damage he could do. As far as he was concerned, all networks were fair game. If the IT managers were stupid enough not to have decent security in place, then it was his moral duty to teach them a lesson they would not forget.

It was also during his third year at university that he had earned the nickname RobinHood. It happened just after he had learned one of his greatest lessons in life.

Hacking wasn't just fun, it could be extremely lucrative.

RobinHood had just spent the previous summer working in a bank, trying to earn some extra cash to help put him through the next year.

He'd learned how to create accounts, transfer money, withdraw money...all the basic stuff that normal bank tellers would do.

Whilst there he had taken a particular interest in the systems and applications that the bank used in its everyday operations.

He had made notes.

Studied how everything worked. Learned the processes and workflows.

A few months later, several months into the academic year, and money running out fast, RobinHood had decided that things had to change.

He couldn't stand being poor any longer.

He couldn't stand sharing a flat with other poor people - his friends and fellow members of the Three-Ists club.

RobinHood also felt anger that the banks had so much money, and was enraged when he learned how much money they were paying their top employees in terms of bonuses.

Bastards!

The banks were part of the system, part of everything that was wrong about society. It was his moral duty to do something about it.

So, one Monday morning, about the time that banking activity would be at its peak for the day, RobinHood hacked into the headquarters of the bank he had been working in the year before, created a few new fictitious accounts for himself and all his friends and flatmates, and filled them up with money. He knew exactly what to do, and he did it.

He also knew that the risk of him being caught was minimal. Using his expert knowledge, he'd done everything according to the book. Committed the perfect cyber crime.

A few days later bank cards and pin numbers arrived at his friends' houses, and following strict instructions they had gone out and withdrawn all the money from friendly ATMs. The next day RobinHood filled their accounts up again, and later that day they had emptied their accounts again.

They'd done the same thing every day for a week.

At the end of that time, RobinHood had hacked back into the bank and deleted all records of the accounts.

Along with any records that the accounts had existed in the first place.

And any audit trail that could possibly exist.

In a single week RobinHood had stolen over £15,000 from the rich bank and redistributed it to the poor and very needy.

Hence his nickname which had been so aptly given and so well deserved.

Of course, RobinHood was no fool. Cyber enabled bank robbery was not something that could or should be repeated too often, lest it be accidentally detected. So, being smart, he restricted and controlled his crimes, only taking what he and his friends needed, and when they needed it, which roughly equated to the beginning of each university term. Careful only to transfer small amounts in and out of their accounts at any one time, and never anything over £2,500, by the time university was finished, their bank loans had been paid off - with the bank's own money - and they could each afford to take a long, well earned gap year off.

All financed and paid for by RobinHood.

Of course, being out of the country for a year had probably been a prudent thing to do, but when he came back nothing had changed, and there were no police waiting to arrest him.

So ever since, RobinHood had continued with his altruistic views, creating wealth and redistributing it to himself and his friends as needed.

For a while he had been a very popular man indeed.

Eventually though, as network security became tighter, hacking had become tougher and the risk of getting caught greater.

So RobinHood had stopped supplying his friends with cash on demand.

That wasn't to say that he had stopped lining his own bank accounts though.

On the contrary, like any drug, he was addicted to the adrenaline and buzz of getting away with it, and for many years the amount of money he had stolen had increased from month to month.

The more he had got away with it, the more he had taken.

It was incredible.

No one seemed capable of spotting what he was doing.

The bank was like his very own private bank account, a bottomless pit of money that was at his own personal disposal whenever he wanted it.

So RobinHood took more and more.

And more.

And then some more too.

Eventually he had so much that it had begun to lose its meaning, and the buzz had gone away.

So he stopped.

Curiously, the fact that he had actually got away with it made him even more angry at the banks than he was before.

Now he positively hated them.

How could they be so careless with other people's money?

Anger management had never been something that RobinHood had been particularly good at.

The only way that he managed to calm down was by cycling. Getting out on his bike and cycling for hours on end. Ever since he was sixteen he'd been crazy about cycling. He'd loved it.

It kept him fit, helped compensate for the hours he spent on his computer, and regularly got him out of the house.

Thanks to his cycling he could eat and drink whatever he wanted and he never really put on weight.

Two years ago, though, his world had changed, for the first time.

On a wet, rainy day, he had taken a corner too fast and his bicycle had lost traction on some wet leaves...

After coming off his bike at speed, sliding across the road, and banging into the wall against his back, he'd spent a week in hospital, only managing to leave with two walking sticks to support him.

It was weeks before he could walk properly again. But he got better one step at a time. Literally.

For months his back would go into spasm, almost at will. Wave after wave of the most intense pain would wash over him, pain the like of which you could never imagine and which RobinHood would not even wish upon his worst enemy, authorities or even bankers.

At night time he would wake up, desperate to go to the toilet, but knowing that as soon as he tried to move, as soon as he tried to rise from the bed, his back would go into one spasm after another.

And the pain...

The worst thing of all was that the doctors could do nothing for him. Nothing.

"There's nothing we can do for you!" they parroted. One after another.

"Just take painkillers, and hopefully it will go away."

Luckily it did.

For weeks though the only comfort he got was from sitting at his computer filling up newly created bank accounts, an old habit which had resurfaced.

For every muscle spasm, he rewarded himself with £1,000.

By the time the spasms had finally subsided he had another £75,000 in various accounts, just waiting for him to go out and empty them.

His life during that time was full of anger, an anger that got worse day by day.

Why had this happened to him?

Anger at the doctors for not being able to help him get better.

Fury at the government who had taken funding away from the NHS.

Rage at the bankers. For no apparent new reason, but because with so much anger, he had to be angry at someone.

For months his house had become his only world, his office and his computers where he spent most hours of his day: it took him so long to hobble down the steps to get to his den in the basement that once there he didn't leave unless he had to.

The floors of the church slowly became littered with debris: pieces of rubbish, scraps of food, letters, papers... and anything else that fell on the floor and which he could no longer bend down to pick up; the floor and anything beneath his waist had become another world. If something went there, he couldn't go after it. For months he had lived surrounded by the off spill from his life. It sickened him. Quite literally.

The other main comfort he enjoyed was food.

Lots of it.

For months on end he couldn't cook because the pots and pans were too heavy to carry or lift up, so instead he ordered food in. Junk food. Every day. Masses of it. Tons of it.

Food which quickly began to accumulate on his stomach. Growing. Expanding. Burying his waist and the remnants of any youthful figure that he had managed to keep.

With no exercise, the weight piled on.

RobinHood got angrier.

And angrier.

Someone had to pay.

Someone would pay.

But who?

The answer wasn't long in coming.

Two words.

The bankers.

And then, just when his back was returning to normal, and when he started to make plans to improve his life, a regular check-up with the doctor one Tuesday afternoon turned his life upside down. Forever.

How could this be?

Why him?

Surely the doctor was wrong!

But the doctor wasn't wrong, and RobinHood knew it.

The word cancer swum around and around in his brain, and RobinHood began to drown in fear, and anger.

Life didn't seem fair.

And it wasn't.

Life had never been fair to RobinHood.

Never.

Now living in a world of his own, RobinHood's anger at life morphed to fury, and then to incandescent rage. It boiled away within him, growing, expanding, getting ready to erupt. Then one day RobinHood woke up and decided that enough was enough. If he wasn't going to be allowed to live, then why should anyone else?

His plans changed. Now it wasn't just the bankers who were going to suffer, it was going to be everyone else in London too!
Chapter 16

London

Wednesday

October 2nd

06.10 a.m.

Chloe's head was buried underneath her pillow, trying to quieten her sobs so as not to wake David up.

They hadn't got back from the hospital until five a.m.

The whole time she had not been able get a word out of him.

The doctors had treated his hand, stitching it up and giving him several more injections before sending him home.

Perhaps if he had managed to find and bring the other part of his finger with him they could have sewn it back on.

David knew that the doctors didn't believe his excuse that he had cut his finger off accidentally with a knife in his garage.

If he had, where was the finger?

They had wanted to call the police, suspecting there was something more to it, but David had sworn there was not, eventually managing to talk them out of it.

"Go home and rest," the doctor had finally agreed, "... and take the full course of these antibiotics."

Chloe was no fool. There was something deeply wrong. Something terribly wrong. Yet, she knew there was no point in pushing him if he didn't want to speak. Instead, she hugged him, kissed him, cuddled him. Held his hand. Helped him get home.

Got him into bed and cuddled into him until he had fallen asleep.

Then she had turned over and started to cry.

Chloe had never been more scared in all her life.

When the alarm clock went off at 6.55 a.m. she stopped crying. She dried her tears on the edge of her pillow and was just about to sneak out of the bed when David spoke.

"Pack a bag. A small one, just a few clothes... and a different coat. Enough to change into when you get to work. And take one of your party wigs. The one with the long black extensions."

"Why?" Chloe asked, turning around and looking deep into his eyes.

"I want you to go to work as normal," he started, his voice monotone and matter of fact."Take the bag with you... hide it under your coat... and then at about eleven o'clock slip into the bathroom, change and then leave the building. Just walk out of the front door."

"Why?" she asked again, softly.

"Walk to the tube station, get on a tube, change at the next station and then go to Paddington. Catch a train to Bristol and go stay with your cousin for a few days. At the end of the week go up to Edinburgh and stay with Cathy until I tell you to come home."

"Leave? Just like that? Why, David, why?"

"Please, Chloe. Just do it. For me. Please?"

For a few minutes Chloe stared into David's soul, searching for an answer. She saw none, finding only pain and hurt. And fear.

She inched forwards, folding herself into his chest and hugging him tight.

Thirty minutes later she left the flat. Her flat. Carrying a small bag of clothes under her coat.

\------------------

9.05 a.m.

David had a plan.

An enforced plan.

One he knew he had to fulfil, or face the possibility that next time around they might cut off his hand, kill him or go after Chloe.

Over the past twenty-four hours he had been round the street sticking up posters asking people if they had found the twenty thousand pounds: he'd knocked on some doors - although only a few - and had pushed some flyers through half the doors in the street.

Today he was going to take it to the next level.

By the end of the day he was personally going to knock on the door of every flat or house in the Square, starting with all the houses in his street. If no one answered he would leave the flyer. And he was going to double the reward.

Before he did anything though, he would make sure the bastards who took his finger knew what he was going to do.

He dialled the number he had been given.

The phone rang, but there was no reply.

He dialled it again.

The phone rang, but no one picked up.

"Shit!" David swore.

How could he contact them if they wouldn't answer the bloody phone?

Just then, the phone in his hand rang, startling the hell out of him.

"Hello?"

"David, hi. Have you got the money?"

"I just tried calling you..."

"I was busy. How's your finger? Do you miss it?"

There was a silence. A rush of fear and anger coursed through him at the same time.

"That was a question..."

David responded immediately.

"Yes. Yes, I miss it!"

"Do you want it back?"

"What... what do you mean?"

"I mean, just as a little reminder... if you want, we could put it in the post and send it back to you. If you want?"

"You've got my finger?"

"Yes. I thought it might make a good souvenir... but to be quite honest, it's beginning to smell a little... and every time I look at it, it points at me. It keeps reminding me that if you don't get me the money back by tomorrow, then I will come back and get another finger. From your right hand this time. Now, answer the question... shall I send it back?"

A wave of nausea and fear washed over him, and David retched onto the floor.

"I heard that, David. I'll take that as a 'no' then."

There was a pause, and David wiped his mouth and steadied himself against the bookcase in his lounge.

"Fine. No problem. I'll put it back in my fridge again then. Until later maybe. Perhaps we can send it to Chloe's mother in Oxford as a present."

"Her mum? How do you know she lives there...?" David replied, shaking. He couldn't believe what he was hearing.

"I've made it my business to learn everything about you and Chloe, David. Everything."

"Why... Why are you doing this to me?" David asked, his voice shaking. "Why don't you come and find the bloody money yourself?"

There was a moment's silence, then the man's voice which came back was quieter, deeper and slightly more menacing than before.

"I ask the questions not you. Don't ever question me again, do you understand me David?"

"Yes."

"Good. But for your information, I'll tell you that we are looking David. We are. But I think you realise that if we go round your rich neighbours, asking, pushing for information, it might look a tad suspicious? You're ideal! You live there. You're one of them. They know you. They'll listen to you... let you into their houses even. You're our mole, David. Our undercover spy. And if you can't find out what happened to my money, no one will."

Another pause.

"David, tomorrow night. By tomorrow night, you will get me my money back. With the envelope. Tomorrow night, or I'll come and take both your hands. Then Chloe's eyes."

David's knees gave way underneath him, and he collapsed to the floor. His left hand was throbbing, and he felt dizzy and weak.

"Why me?" he began to cry.

"Wrong place, wrong time, my friend. I guess it was just bad luck."

David closed his eyes and swallowed, breathing deeply and bringing his emotions and his fear under his control.

"Listen, please... whoever you are. I called you to tell you just what I am going to do today to get your money back. I promise you, I will spend every moment I have trying to find your money. I'll do everything I can. I won't stop trying... But if I can't find it, it won't be my fault... you have to understand that!"

David waited for a reply, holding his breath, hoping, praying that the man at the other end would understand.

"We're watching you David. You have until tomorrow night. After that you won't need your skiing gloves anymore."

The phone went dead.

\------------------

11.05 a.m.

The doorbell woke Ray up, its persistent, shrill, ringing drilling into his skull and boring into his fucked up brain.

"What?" he shouted hoarsely, pulling the covers back and holding his head with his hand, one eye opening slightly.

The doorbell rang again.

Ray coughed and cleared his throat.

"Wait... wait, I'm coming," he said, opening both eyes and rolling out of the bed.

He was still dressed from the night before.

Stumbling towards the front door out of his bedroom, he quickly tried to adjust his clothes and smoothed down his hair, but then gave up.

At the doorway, he peeked through the security hole to see who was there.

A young man he didn't recognise.

The doorbell rang again.

"Bloody hell! I'm coming!" he shouted back, this time managing some volume.

Flipping off the catch, he turned the handle and opened the door.

"What? What do you want so badly that you have to ring my bell a million times? And who are you anyway? How did you get through the front door and up the stairs?"

"I'm David. I'm a neighbour. I live at No. 33. Flat 4. With my girlfriend Chloe. I followed one of the other residents in."

"Great security. What time's it mate? And what do you want?" Ray asked, coughing, and blinking, then deciding it was better if he screwed his eyes up half closed. The light was very bright.

David turned his left hand to look at his watch. His arm was in the sling given to him by the hospital, his hand bandaged all over to stop the air getting to his wound, and protect it from further injury and the stitches being pulled on.

"It's just gone eleven."

"Wow. What happened there, mate?" Ray asked, noticing the bandages. "Lost a finger or two?"

The man nodded.

Ray opened his eyes and looked the man over. His face was bruised and haggard. He looked like he'd recently received a big kicking.

"What happened to you? Car accident?"

The man nodded again.

"Did you get my note?"

"What note?" Ray asked, suddenly feeling very rough. His head was throbbing.

"The one I left yesterday about my money? I lost £20,000. All my grant money."

"Ahhh..." Ray replied, the light beginning to dawn. He looked the man up and down again. "Bit old for a student aren't you?"

The man hesitated.

"I'm a mature student. Didn't get in at first. Had to retake some exams. Took a while to get a place."

"What are you studying...?"

"... Economics..." David replied after another slight hesitation.

"Where?"

"King's College?"

"Are you asking me or telling me?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, it sounded like you didn't know at first. As if you were making it up?"

David took a step backwards, his face flushing red.

"What do you mean, making it up? I lost all my money, and I'm desperate to get it back. There's a reward. £1,000 if you find it and give it back to me."

"I thought it was £500?"

"It was... I doubled it."

Ray was starting to get angry. The man was obviously somehow in trouble with a drug gang. What the problem was Ray didn't know, and didn't care. He had sworn to himself that he would not get involved with anything, ANYTHING, to do with drugs and that was never going to change. Ever.

Plus his head was throbbing. He was beginning to realise just how rough he was actually feeling.

He hadn't had a hangover like this for years.

Since before he had met Emma.

At the thought of Emma, a wave of anger engulfed Ray.

"Listen mate, I don't have your money. But I do feel like shit... and I need to get some strong black coffee before my head explodes. So, if you don't mind..." Ray said, motioning with his eyes that he was going to shut the door.

"Please..." the man before him said, an audible edge of desperation in his voice, "If you hear anything, or meet a neighbour who has found my money, please, call me on this number?"

Ray was just about to close the door when something in him made him pause. All of a sudden he could hear Emma's voice uttering the words 'do the right thing' in his mind.

Ray paused.

He looked at him, staring straight into his eyes.

One desperate man looking into the eyes of another.

For a second there was a slight connection, a moment of mutual recognition.

"Is everything,..." Ray stuttered."Is everything... okay, mate?"

David looked back at Ray, the connection lasting a few palpable seconds longer.

Then David looked away, towards the front of the building.

"Yes...," he replied, stepping away, edging towards the stairs. "Yes, everything's fine. I just need the money back. And soon. If... if you hear anything, please... call me?"

Then he turned and started walking down the stairs, his right arm cradling his left in the sling as he went.

"Do the right thing..." he heard Emma's voice prompt him again, followed by a vision of his dead brother's face.

"But what was the right thing?" Ray asked himself, watching the man go.

For a second he looked after him, wondering, then he stepped back inside and closed the door.

Ray wasn't stupid. The story about the money was made up. All of it. There was no way that the guy had lost the money. He was so obviously lying about the whole thing, Ray would have to be an idiot to fall for it.

What was more obvious was that someone had just kicked the shit out of him, and probably broken his fingers or broken his hand.

Someone was putting pressure on that man to find the money.

Why? Ray didn't know.

But right now that was someone else's problem.

Ray's gut reaction was, and always had been, that the money was drug money. And the last thing Ray wanted to do just now was to get involved in a drug war.

"Do the right thing!" he heard Emma's voice say again.

"Shit!" Ray swore aloud. Another wave of anger rolled over Ray, and he was suddenly furious that even now she was gone, she was still telling him what to do.

"Leave me alone!" he said, shaking his head to clear all thoughts of her from it. And succeeding.

Thoughts of Emma were immediately replaced with pain from the worsening headache and a string of memories from the night before as he suddenly remembered what had happened: coming home to discover the note, the whisky, and beer, and wine, sitting at his desk, watching the murder video, and...

"OH SHIT!" he shouted aloud, suddenly remembering the email he'd sent.

In a flash it all came back to him in blinding clarity.

"SHIT!" he swore again loudly. "What the fuck have I done?"

\------------------

11.15 a.m.

David stood outside in the street, looking back up at the front window of the last flat he had visited. He had knocked on the doors of everyone on the stair and spoken to the residents in all but one. The last one was the man with the hangover who had stunk to high heaven of alcohol when he had opened the door.

David was excited. A siren was blaring at the back of his mind, a deep seated instinct telling him that the man - David didn't know his name yet \- knew something.

For the few seconds that their eyes had met there had been a strange, weird connection. It had been quite uncomfortable, and so intense that David had been forced to look away.

The man in the flat had seen straight through his story and knew that David had been lying, that he had made up the whole story about the grant money. It was almost as if the man had taken a particular interest in what David had been saying and was probing him for the truth.

But why?

Why did it matter to the man what David was saying... and whether or not the details were true?

Why did he take the time to question him?

In total, David had now spoken to the owners of about twenty different flats, and whereas some had expressed concern and shown kindness, and promised to let him know the moment they heard anything, the man with the hangover was the only one to really probe and show an interest in the story behind the story.

To David, the reason why was obvious: the man with the hangover knew where the money was!

\------------------

11.25 a.m.

Sipping a strong black coffee, Ray sat at his desk in his den and navigated his way impatiently through the different layers of his security.

Eventually he succeeded in using Ghost to log on to the fictitious Outlook account he had used to send the email the night before: an email account pretending to be based somewhere in Brazil.

"Never drink and hack!" he chanted to himself over and over again as he waited to see if anyone had responded to the email he had sent last night. "What the hell was I playing at?" he chided himself.

The Outlook screen opened up, and as it did so, Ray dreaded what he would find.

He had just sent an email to one of the most powerful people in the world, mocking him for murdering someone. Thankfully he had not gone as far as admitting that he had seen the woman actually being murdered, but given that the man had just murdered someone, if he saw and read the email, he might think it pretty strange and guess what David had been alluding to.

Would Randolph Best have seen the email?

Would he have read it?

How would he respond to it?

As the Outlook screen appeared Ray immediately saw that whereas yesterday he had no emails in his Inbox, now he had two.

Ray's heart leapt a beat.

He quickly scanned the titles.

One was from Outlook: an email welcoming him to the account and giving him Outlook blurb.

The other was from a name he did not recognise with a title that said, in bold, "READ THIS!"

Shit!

Ray clicked on the email and opened it up.

A wave of relief swept over him as he read the contents. It was an email from a man in Africa who had six million pounds to share with any idiot who fell for the phishing scam and would agree to help transfer it out of Nigeria.

Ray sat back in the chair and breathed in deeply.

Glancing quickly at the junk folder he confirmed that there were no other emails.

Except for one in his SENT file.

Ray clicked on it.

"I spy, I SAW her cry."

"Fuck! Shit!" he shouted, punching the desk with his fist.

"What the fucking hell was I thinking?"

Ray stared at the email.

How could he have been such an incredible idiot?

Did he have a death wish?

"Yeah, right, just email one of the most powerful people in the world and tell them you think you know they killed someone!" he shouted at himself.

Ray read and re-read the email about twenty times.

Each time he read it, he got more scared.

Questions began to flow through his mind.

Doubts.

Fears.

Had Randolph Best read it?

If not, why not?

Was the email account still active?

How often did Randolph check that account and read his emails?

Had Ray's email gone through to the junk box?

Did Randolph scan it and then decide that it was rubbish sent by a mad man, and then just delete it? - Or was that being too hopeful?

If he had read it, would he understand what Ray was referring to?

Ray studied his email again...

He tried to imagine what someone else might think when they got the email and read it. How would the words be understood?

"You saw her cry? Who? Who was crying? What the hell are you talking about?"

Maybe Randolph would read it, think it was a phishing mail or some sort of scam and then delete it.

Perhaps, which was also possible, he got so many emails that he didn't read them all. And he never would.

Was Ray worrying about nothing?

Ray began to relax.

It could be that he had got away with it.

"Yeah, come on, I'm just being bloody paranoid!" he promised himself.

"It's not like I said that I saw him actually killing her, did I!"
Chapter 17

London

October 2nd

1.30 p.m.

RobinHood checked his email for the tenth time that day. He hadn't heard a word from SolarWind in the past twenty-four hours and was really curious to know what was happening.

About an hour ago he had pinged him another email, but there was no reply.

He considered calling him but decided against it. Establishing a phone record that connected them both together was not something that seemed like a good idea.

Instead, he sat in his underground den and went through his plans for the millionth time.

He wanted to make sure that there was no room for a mistake; no way that once the cyber attack was launched that they would ever be able to trace it back to him.

He'd been planning this for almost a year now and was confident that it would work.

However, RobinHood knew that confidence bred complacency and complacency bred mistakes.

When SolarWind had been round the other day, RobinHood had come very, very close to telling him all about the project.

In the old days, he would have understood. Might even have wanted to come on board and be a part of it.

Truth be told, RobinHood would prefer it if someone of SolarWind's calibre was working with him on this: not only could the impact be much greater, but with each of them auditing the other's work, the chances of them making a mistake would be significantly reduced.

The problem was that SolarWind was no longer the passionate anarchist that he used to be. Gone were the days when they had sat together and planned the overthrow of the whole system.

Instead, SolarWind had got a beautiful girlfriend, and he...RobinHood... had got fat and got cancer.

It was a shame SolarWind wasn't on board, but there was a plus side.

Being forced to go it alone meant that only one person would claim the glory.

This cyber attack would leave the others trailing in the dust behind him.

By launching one of the most devastating cyber attacks of all time, RobinHood's name would become famous the world over, and in the eyes of all his cyber-bruvs and fellow anarchists he would be a hero. Forever.

In a few short days time, RobinHood was going to establish cyber history.

Time was short.

There was so much still to check.

And only a few days to go.

\------------------

11.25 a.m.

Emma was almost packed.

Her two suitcases were full of the clothes and belongings that she had decided to take with her to Canada.

Her passport and visa were all in order, and the plane tickets were booked.

In a few days time she would be leaving for a new life.

The 'New World'.

And she would be closing a door behind her in a way that increasingly she had begun to worry about. Had she done the wrong thing...?

In fact, was she just about to do an even worse 'wrong thing'?

She missed Ray.

It was as if her right arm had been cut off.

She felt incomplete without him. She was missing something that at first she couldn't pinpoint, but over the past twenty-four hours she had realised exactly what it was.

What she missed was a tall, stupid, ignorant, lovable, funny, clever and obstinate, independent fool called Ray.

Why hadn't he contacted her?

Why hadn't he come chasing after her, demanding that she get back together with him?

Where was he the other night?

When he got home... assuming that he had gone home that night... maybe he had moved in already with some other woman... or gone on holiday... no, assuming that he had gone home that night, why hadn't he got angry with her or upset or heartbroken and sent her a text message.

Why hadn't he got angry with her?

Another thought hit her, one which really worried her. She remembered seeing the dirty dishes and the empty beer bottles in his flat. Obviously he had been drinking quite a lot in the past few days.

Had he got drunk, gone out driving and had an accident?

Should she call the hospitals? To check?

Should she call him?

The rational side of her knew that she was panicking. Being unrealistic. The truth was obviously that there was nothing wrong with Ray.

She had broken up with him.

He'd accepted it.

Then he'd moved on.

They were over.

Finished.

Canada was calling and going there would be the best thing she would ever do.

\------------------

2.00 p.m.

David had continued on his way round the Square, knocking on doors, talking to residents, passing out flyers, begging for information on the missing £20,000.

About half an hour ago, he'd even decided to increase the reward to £2,000.

He was getting desperate.

Yet, with every door that he knocked on he became more and more certain that he'd already found the person who knew where his money was.

His gut instinct was screaming at him.

In fact, it was screaming so loud that after he'd returned to Chloe's flat and grabbed something to eat, he decided that he would go back and knock on the man's door again.

Try again.

Push a bit harder.

He was even considering telling him the truth. Explaining exactly what had happened to him and praying that the man would take pity on him and just hand the cash back.

With any luck the nightmare could be over within a few hours.

Just then his phone began to ring...

David stared at the number trying to figure out if he knew it or not.

Was it them again? On yet another different SIM card with a new number?

The phone stopped ringing. David breathed a sigh of relief, but a few minutes later it started ringing again.

If he didn't answer it, he knew he'd worry who it was.

If it was them, maybe he should tell them about his gut instinct and the man in the top floor flat at number 23?

He picked up the phone and pressed the answer button.

"Hi..."

"David," Chloe's voice immediately shouted back. "Are you okay? I was so worried about you!"

Chloe.

Shit, he'd forgotten all about her! He was meant to call her!

"Hi! It's me... I'm fine... are you okay? Don't tell me where you are... just if you are okay!"

"I'm fine. Everything is okay."

"You remembered what I said?"

"Yes. I'm there. Now. Everything is fine. Don't worry about me."

A wave of relief swept over David.

"Fantastic! That's the best news I've heard in months."

Chloe laughed gently at the other end of the phone. David's heart went out to her, and in that moment he realised again how much he loved her.

"Chloe," he started, about to tell her. Then he remembered the latest threat to them both, and a vision of her with no eyes popped into his mind.

A combination of revulsion, fear and anger passed through him.

"Yes...?" Chloe answered.

"I just wanted to say I love you. That's all. You have to look after yourself for me, you know that, don't you?"

"I promise. But David, please, please look after yourself too. And call me as soon as this is all over! Promise?"

David hesitated, about to say one thing more, but thought better of it.

"We'll speak tomorrow. Don't worry. This will all be over soon."

They hung up.

At the other end of the phone connection, Chloe began to cry.

"What?" she said aloud to herself, now safe in her sister's spare bedroom. "What will be over? I don't understand what's going on!"

Although she was now safe, Chloe was more petrified than before.

All the way on the train from London, a single thought had been going round and round in her head.

"Would she ever see David alive again?"

\------------------

3.00 p.m.

Ben was concerned.

He'd enjoyed working for Mr Grant.

They respected each other.

He understood why, if he didn't come up with the goods in the next few days, Mr Grant would have to punish him severely.

Possibly kill him.

If he was Mr Grant he would do the same thing.

But Ben wasn't stupid. If circumstances hadn't dramatically improved within the next three days, Ben was leaving the country.

His plans were already made.

A new - false - passport was already tucked away in a freshly packed suitcase, which was locked up in a storage facility in Wandsworth.

He knew that Mr Grant wanted to see him on Saturday night. The appointment had already been arranged, and he'd promised to attend.

The thing was though... Ben had already decided that if he didn't have the money, he would pick up his suitcase on Friday night, and be out of the country by Saturday.

If he went to the meeting on Saturday, the chances were that Mr Grant would have him killed. He knew that Mr Grant thought he would probably think that Mr Grant would let him off, on account of the fact that they went back a long way, and that Mr Grant really liked Ben.

However, the way Ben saw it was that Mr Grant had problems at home: the Russians and the Libyans were pushing into his turf, and the boys were already questioning if Mr Grant had the bottle to face up to them or not.

A couple of the boys were thinking of jumping ship.

If Mr Grant went slack on Ben, the boys would see it as weakness and that would be that. They'd lose respect for him, and in this game, respect was everything.

So Mr Grant would have no choice but to kill him. To set an example.

Which left Ben with no choice but to kill Mr Grant.

First. Before Mr Grant would kill him.

It would all get horribly messy.

Ben didn't like mess.

He didn't mind violence. A little torture. Killing people.

That was all fine.

The problem was that he genuinely liked Mr Grant, even looked up to him as a father figure of sorts.

The last thing Ben wanted to do was to be forced to kill him.

All of this made Ben quite angry.

Thanks to that fuckwit David who hadn't done his job properly, they were no further forward in finding the money and the envelope.

True, it wasn't his fault that they'd lost it, but Ben had made it very clear that it WAS his responsibility to find it.

Ben's team, Petrov especially, had searched high and low for it everywhere: underneath the cars, in the bushes, down the drains... in buckets, bins, dustbins... They had stopped and asked residents on the street, casually asked questions in the local shops.

Nothing.

Ben's instinct told him that the money had been lost in the square. At one point it had been there.

He still also believed that the money had probably been spent by now, but the money wasn't the important thing here. It was the envelope.

With any luck, though, Ben could still turn this situation around. Since taking David's finger as a souvenir - Ben's tenth finger this year which meant he was heading towards breaking his personal record for fingers-per-year - David had been working twice as hard.

The kick up the backside had worked.

David was trying really hard now, and if he found the envelope Mr Grant, instead of being angry and forced to kill Ben, would be pleased and grateful - and relieved not to have to lose a good man. Everyone knew that when Mr Grant was grateful, he was generous. Very generous.

So, fingers crossed - he could borrow one of David's for that part - by Sunday, he'd be a few grand richer, back in the good books, and sitting in front of his own TV watching Sunday football.

The alternative was not something he wanted to think about too much just yet.

Except for one thing.

If Ben was forced to leave the country because David hadn't performed, the last thing he would do before he left the square would be to kill the lazy bastard.

He'd make sure of that.

\------------------

5.15 p.m.

Ray had not been out of the flat all day.

His hangover, instead of getting better, had just got worse.

He felt terrible.

So much so, that come 3 p.m. the choice was simple.

Either a few paracetamols, or the hair of the dog.

When Ray opted for the first, he was disappointed to find that the box in the cupboard in the bathroom was empty.

Emma had obviously had the last one and not got a new box...

Emma...

Ray went for the drink.

A cold can of beer from the fridge. His last one.

Dressed casually in his running trousers and a rugby top, he took the beer through with him to his den where he refreshed the Outlook link for the 100th time that day.

No other emails had arrived.

Ray had been thinking about it.

Rationally.

Perhaps optimistically.

It was beginning to look like he had got away with it.

Or was he just being stupid, assuming that others would check their emails as much as he did.

Randolph F. Best was a busy man. He might not get round to checking his emails for days, even weeks.

On the other hand, if that happened, Ray's email would be buried in spam and other emails by that time, and Randolph would never ever read it.

There was definitely 'scope for hope'!

The other reason Ray kept on using to justify his belief that he might have got away it was quite simply this: Ray had used Ghost to create an account and log onto a Brazilian version of Outlook. When R. F. B got the email, if he got it, to all intents and purposes it would have come from someone in Brazil.

There was no way that R. F. B. could track it to Ray in London.

The only danger was that R. F. B. read the email, passed it onto his security team, and asked them to track down the idiot who had sent it.

However, even if R. F. B. did that, Ray argued to himself, even the best people in MI5 would never be able to track Ray down from that account. Ghost virtualised and randomised every data packet so that to anyone who might be interested in Ray, he would be just a... ghost. Hence the name. No one would ever be able find him down and touch him.

Ray being Ray, though, he was constantly double-checking everything he did, and all his assumptions. Deep down Ray knew he was safe, but his being safe and him feeling safe were two different things.

Which is why, as an ultimate precaution, Ray had built his 'onion' alarm system.

Essentially, Ray's core network was protected by two outer networks. Each of these was effectively a DMZ, a demilitarised zone, with one of these DMZs acting as an outer DMZ to the other... a double DMZ.

At the ingress and egress to each of the DMZs Ray had put firewalls, NAT devices, Intrusion Detection systems, Intrusion Prevention Systems, you name it, he had it.

These DMZs sheltered and hid Ray from the outside world and made it impossible for other hackers to ever see his network, let alone hack into it, which would also be impossible.

However, being Ray, and being cautious, Ray did not want to leave anything to chance. So, within each DMZ and within his core network he had placed a network probe, a device that examined all the network traffic that passed through it and generated instant alerts if any 'strange' traffic was observed. These probes were linked to two flashing lights that were screwed into the wall above the network servers.

One was green. One was red.

The way the onion alarm worked - another one of Ray's inventions of which he was very proud - was the following: if the network probe in the inner DMZ detected that some rogue, unexplained traffic had successfully entered his network - most likely indicating that he was being probed or attacked by someone from outside who had already got through the outer DMZ and was now inside the inner DMZ \- the green light on the wall would start to flash, and an SMS would be sent to his mobile.

This was the Den's equivalent of DefCon 2.

If the red light started to flash, this meant that someone had hacked their way through the inner DMZ and got all the way into the core network.

This was DefCon 1.

As well as an SMS to his mobile, his phone would start to ring and an audible alarm would go off in his bedroom.

Ray knew that if anyone ever, ever managed to hack into the second - inner - DMZ \- which was impossible to do - that whoever succeeded in doing so, would also have the power to hack into the core network and get access to his crown jewels, his servers and databases.

Two things would happen if the red light ever started to flash.

Firstly, Ray would grab his hard drives and disconnect them from the core network, possibly removing them and hiding them underneath his floor boards.

Secondly, he would then run a special program he'd written called "Scorched Earth" which would automatically delete and overwrite all the data on any of his servers, laptops or network devices.

On no account would he ever, ever let another hacker get into his network and get access to his data.

Never.

Ever.

Would.

That.

Happen.

Chapter 18

London

October 2nd

10.00 p.m.

The tissue box was empty. The glass of wine needed refilling. Her life was a mess.

"My life is a mess!" she repeated to herself. A little drunk.

She was packed. Ready to go. Ready to run away.

Yet, instead of being blissfully happy with a new life stretching out in front of her, as the day had grown older, she'd become sadder, and sadder.

Her best friend had just left and her flatmate was out, and now she was left alone to face herself, something that she had been trying to avoid all day.

Emma was petrified.

Not of going to Canada, but of leaving London behind.

Actually, if she was brutally honest, that wasn't the truth.

The reality was that she was petrified of leaving Ray behind.

"Why hasn't he called me?" she sobbed to herself. "He hasn't even tried to contact me!"

She'd been over it a thousand times in her mind. She knew she was doing the right thing. She definitely was.

But what if she wasn't?

Ray had given them no chance to discuss it, to argue about it. He hadn't tried to 'woo' her back.

Not one single flower.

Which proved absolutely beyond a shadow of a doubt that the reason she'd split up with him was one thousand percent the right reason.

So why did it hurt so much?

Every time she looked at her suitcases she thought about Ray.

He didn't even know she was going.

She hadn't told him.

Maybe, just maybe he was planning to leave it a week before he would come charging round the corner on the back of a big white horse, all dressed in shining armour, and he would hoist her up onto his saddle and carry her off into the sunset.

And they would live happily ever after.

Except, obviously, there was one slight flaw with that whole fantasy.

Horses couldn't fly all the way to Canada, and that's where she would be by Saturday evening.

If that's what Ray's plan was, he would miss her. She would be gone.

"But will he miss me? Does he miss me?" she mumbled to herself as she dragged herself off the sofa to the fridge to get another bottle of chilled white wine.

Returning to the lounge, she curled her feet back up on the sofa and pulled her favourite cushion onto her lap.

The light on the phone was flashing. She hadn't noticed it before...Maybe it was Ray!

It was Paula, her friend, saying that she had got home safely and was looking forward to meeting her the next day for coffee as planned.

Putting the phone down, she stared at it. Telling herself it was not a good idea.

No good could come from it.

"But I have to tell him!" she protested. "Otherwise..."

She picked the phone back up and hit the little button with Ray's name on it and settled back into her sofa.

At the other end of the line, Ray's mobile phone began to ring.

There was no answer. Ray was not picking up.

Nervously, she sat up and dialled the number again.

Once again, it rang, but there was still no answer.

"Why is he not answering?" Emma asked herself, sitting up straight and impatiently dialling Ray's landline.

Once again the phone rang, but eventually went to voicemail.

Emma hung up, stood up from her sofa and started pacing around her lounge.

"Where are you Ray? Why are you not answering? Are you avoiding me?" she said loudly.

She stood for a second by the window looking out onto the street below, cradling her phone against her chest.

Her throat was tight, and she fought back the tears of frustration that were gathering in her eyes.

Suddenly her emotion changed, from sadness to anger.

With renewed emotion she dialled his number again and waited for the phone answering service.

"Hi, this is Ray. Please leave a message."

She swallowed hard.

"Ray, hi, it's Emma. I just wanted to tell you something...important...but you're not there. I'm leaving the country on Saturday. Going to live in Canada. I've got a job. They wanted me very badly so I'm going..."

She had intended just to leave a short message, but already she was starting to stretch it out, to talk too much... not wanting to hang up... She closed her eyes, took a deep breath and continued.

"... that's it. Have a nice life, Ray." She hesitated, feeling the temptation to say something more but thought better of it. "Bye..."

And then she hung up.

\------------------

10:11 p.m.

Ray walked into his flat, closed the door and went straight to the fridge to put the cold beers in before they warmed up any more.

Two six packs, and a new bottle of whisky.

Enough to see him through the next few days.

As he took off his jacket and dumped it on one of the chairs, he thought again about his encounter with the man with the broken hand who had knocked on his door late that afternoon.

The man - what was his name? David? - knew that Ray knew something. In the same way that Ray knew that he was not telling the truth.

It was funny, Ray could almost sense that David wanted to tell him something more, but was hesitating to do so. At the same time, Ray had no intention of pushing him to tell him more: Ray hated drugs, they destroyed lives, and those who dealt with them were a force not to be reckoned with, but to be avoided at all costs. Ray was not going to get tangled up in the whole situation, and that was that. He wanted - and would have - nothing to do with it.

He would rather burn the twenty grand than give it back to a drug gang, and so long as he didn't say or admit anything, he would be safe.

Yet, there was something about the guy - he seemed a little desperate, that made Ray feel guilty.

"... not doing the right thing..."

The phrase from Emma jumped into his mind and started nagging him again.

Ray knew though that he was doing the right thing.

His every instinct told him to stay well clear, and that was what he intended to do. He had no idea what trouble the guy with the broken hand had got himself into, but it was his trouble, not Ray's.

Luckily he wouldn't have to go to work for the next few days. After lunch he'd had a brief email exchange with his boss. He'd told her that he would be working at home for the next few days, trying to crack the defences of the bank. He was close...Just needed a little more time. She seemed pleased.

"Little do they know..." he laughed to himself as he cracked open the first beer.

Checking his mobile phone on the kitchen table, he saw that it wasn't fully charged yet, so left it without picking it up.

As he walked towards the den to check the alarm lights on the wall and then to refresh the link on Outlook, he noticed the light blinking on his landline phone on the table in the hall.

Poking his head into the den, neither of the lights on the wall were flashing. He stepped into his den and quickly logged off and closed down all the servers. He was going to relax this evening, drink a few beers and clear his mind.

Stepping back into the hall, he sat down on the floor beside the table and picked up the phone. It was probably his sister who had left a message. He hadn't spoken to her in a while.

He pressed 1571 and listened to the voice message.

"Ray, hi, it's Emma..."

His heart skipped a beat, and he listened to what she had to say in disbelief.

"What?" he shouted aloud.

He hit '1' and listened to it again.

Letting the phone slide out of his hand, and fall into his lap, he stared into space.

"Going to Canada? On Saturday? SHIT!!!!!"

His mind was awash with emotion, and he struggled to make sense of what he had just heard.

He listened to the message again, focussing on Emma's voice as she said the words.

Her voice sounded strange. A little tense.

She sounded as if she was hating having to speak to him. To tell him the truth.

"So, that's what this is all about. The whole time I was planning to marry you, you were planning a different life abroad!!!"

Ray stood up and stomped around his flat.

Swearing. Shouting.

Not able to decide how to react.

Should he call her back?

Tell her not to go to Canada?

Tell her he loved her?

Then reality hit him.

Why bother?

What would he gain by telling her? Just more humiliation.

She had obviously been planning this for months. Maybe longer.

Behind his back, without ever discussing it.

At first the initial impact on Ray was great sadness, which slowly morphed to confusion, and lastly to anger.

A great deal of anger.

He thought of the ring he had planned to give her, the wedding he had planned... he remembered looking at possible places to go on honeymoon with her.

What a bloody idiot he had been!

Then another thought hit him.

Was she going alone?

Or was she going to live in Canada with someone else?

Balling up his fist he smashed it hard into the wall.

"FUCK!" he shouted aloud from frustration and pain, then examined the resulting cut across his bruised knuckles.

Walking through to the bathroom, he washed his hand in the cold water, and then rested his hands on the edges of the sink and took several deep breaths. For a few moments he thought of looking at himself in the mirror, but he couldn't do it. He couldn't face himself.

"Never... NEVER again!" he shouted.

In that moment Ray vowed he would never fall in love again.

Emma had been the one for him. At least he had thought so. He'd been a fool. And he would never go through it again.

Never. Ever.

Walking through to the kitchen he grabbed the bottle of whisky from the table and cracked it open.

Grabbing the same glass he had used the night before from the side of the sink, he poured half a glass and knocked it back fast.

"Shit!" he shouted again.

Carrying the rest of the first six pack through to the den, he settled into his seat and finished the rest of his beer as he powered up his laptop and servers and prepared to disappear into the world of cyber.

Taking rather longer than normal to type in the correct PIN responses from his SecurID tokens and log on - because he was already tipsy - by the time he managed to access Ghost and get back into his Outlook account in Brazil the alcohol was pumping through his veins and he was fuming.

Refusing to think of Emma, he was consciously looking for another route to vent his anger.

Finding his email inbox in his Brazilian account still empty, his anger rose another notch.

"Bastard! The bastard thinks he's got away with it!" Ray announced to the rest of the computers in the room, before cracking open another beer and drinking half of it down in several large gulps.

"Idiot. You bloody idiot. Just because you're 'famous' and rich and powerful you think you can get away with killing people! Well I have got news for you, Mr R. Fucking Best!"

Almost blind with anger, Ray opened up the email he had sent before, copied the email address using Control C, opened up a new email and hit Control V.

Bingo! The personal email address of R. F. Best appeared in the "To" area.

Ray stood up, stared at the screen and then walked through to the kitchen, swiftly returning with the bottle of whisky and his glass, and poured himself another half glass.

All the time composing the new email in his mind, thinking of how to make R. F. Best pay.

"Aha...!" he chuckled to himself, as the answer dawned on him. "I'm a poet, and I don't know it..." He laughed. "Let the bloody games begin!"

Swigging another mouthful of whisky, he sat down in front of the keyboard, centred himself in his chair and started to type.

"I spy, I SAW her cry..." he wrote in the title section of the email, before moving down to the main body, "... And I know why!"

Ray sat back in his chair, surveying his handiwork.

He read the email twice.

"Short but sweet, Mr Fucking Best!" Ray approved his work.

Smiling, he leant forward and moved the mouse up to the left of the screen onto the toolbar and hit SEND.

Chapter 19

London

October 2nd

11.02 p.m.

Ferris saw the email come in, logged it and started to work on it immediately.

Anything that had to do with their contact was to be given top priority.

They had been monitoring Randolph Best for over a year now, nearly two.

Although Ferris hadn't been briefed on the original reasons for establishing the surveillance, last weekend he had been pulled into the office by his sector commander and told that the surveillance had to be increased.

He was one of only three who had been told the new reason for this: Randolph Best had killed someone: a beautiful Israeli model.

The death had been taken care of by a MOP, their nickname for the 'clean-up' teams that went in and 'sorted' difficult situations, normally arising from an accident, an assassination, or terrorist attack.

Only a few people knew that there had been a connection between Randolph Best and the deceased - officially now the victim of a fatal mugging, and on no account was it to be repeated or shared with anyone else in the agency.

Secrets within secrets.

However, Ferris was one of a few to have been told. First, because he needed to monitor any new communications to, from or between anyone connected with Randolph Best or the deceased model, to see if a link could be established. Second, they needed to ensure the safety of Randolph Best. When someone of his importance became involved in an incident, it was the job of Ferris's team to make sure they were aware of any HUMINT or Open-source intelligence that could provide any valuable information on the client or anything pertaining to him.

If anything happened in cyber space that could indicate a threat to Randolph Best, it was his job to spot it and report it.

In addition, the model who had been killed was Israeli. That made things more complicated.

She had served in the Israeli army and had a record.

She was already on their files.

Lastly, his sector commander was one of only two people that knew Randolph Best was already under surveillance. Ferris was the other.

"What you've been doing up till now is nothing to do with this, and will not be connected. Do you understand? From now, keep Project RH1 ticking along in parallel, but focus on Project Best Protect. As far as everyone else is concerned that's your main mission now. Only you and I know about RH1, understood?"

It was all a bit cryptic, but in his world, that was par for the course.

Ferris didn't give it a second thought.

More secrets within secrets.

The day before, he'd seen the first email come into R. Best's inbox. Randolph Best had opened and read the email several hours after receiving it.

As far as Ferris could tell, he'd subsequently taken no action as a result of it.

No phone calls and no replies to the email.

Admittedly it was a little confusing: "I spy, I saw her cry..."

There was no definite connection between the email and the murder.

Perhaps Best had read the email and also thought nothing of it. A random meaningless email that ended up in his inbox, but was probably a spam mail.

However, whereas Best would not have known it, there was an important piece of meta-data associated with the email that immediately drew Ferris's attention, and caused him to look at it in more detail: it had been sent and delivered from an anonymising program. Not TOR, something else. Something more complicated, something very clever, powerful and home-grown.

Which meant that whoever had sent the first email was clever, informed and deliberately trying to hide their identity.

The second email was more significant.

It was important for several reasons.

First, because there was obviously a connection to the previous email. It was the sequel to the prior one and provided more detail and clues as to the purpose of them both.

"I spy, I saw her cry, and I know why!"

The person who had sent it seemed to be indicating that they had seen a woman being distressed and knew the reason for it.

Ordinarily, the message would not get much attention, but given that there had been a death in such circumstances, it appeared to be hinting to some knowledge of an event that was possibly connected with the woman who had been killed, and was in some way being linked directly to the client.

Had the author of the email seen the client talking with the deceased model, possibly during a time when the model had been upset?

Was it in public?

Were there other witnesses?

As far as Ferris had been briefed, the death had occurred in private. They had not been outside in public together that night.

Was the client telling the truth?

Did the email allude to some information about the event that the agency did not yet know about?

Another reason that the email was significant was because it was the second email, possibly from the same author, which was also sent from an email account that had been managed using an anonymised browser.

Initial attempts to find out where the email had come from and the identity and location of the author had failed.

The popular conception of programs like TOR - the original and most common anonymising program - was that they were an effective way for users to defend themselves against network surveillance and traffic analysis. They believed that it gave users anonymity when online, that if you browsed and communicated when using TOR based programmes that it prevented others from learning someone's location and browsing habits.

Everyone who went to the TOR website could immediately learn that the onion routing project was a baby of research conducted and run by the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory. It was originally developed with the U.S. Navy in mind to develop a way of protecting government communications between government employees all over the world.

A future version of software that came from the project was released to the public, and soon people the world over were using it to secure their own personal identities and communications.

The belief - as promoted by the authorities - was that if it was good enough for government spies and employees to secure their communications and identities from surveillance, it was good enough for the thousands of people who also had something to hide and wanted to remain anonymous and protected from prying eyes.

Soon, clever forward thinking individuals outside of government circles were all using TOR browsers and software to surf the net and send emails to each other, secure in the knowledge that no one would ever know who they were, where they were, or what they were doing.

TOR made them invisible to the authorities.

Which is why, outside of the government, one of the biggest community of users to adopt TOR had been the criminal element. Terrorist and crime groups quickly became the main group to use it to communicate with each other, and to sell and buy goods -primarily drugs and arms.

What amazed Ferris was that even though most people knew that the TOR project was started and perpetuated for many years by scientists working for the US Navy, it didn't occur to them that perhaps it was not safe to use.

That maybe, although it stopped most people from seeing what you were doing, it didn't stop those who created the software in the first place from seeing everything you did.

Actually, it was a brilliant idea: create a program - create the myth that it made communications anonymous, and indirectly encourage everyone to use it. Soon those who had most to lose and most to hide would start using it, and the authorities had a clear view of everything they were doing.

It was their system. Bad guys used it. Bad guys were playing right into the hands of the good guys.

It reminded Ferris of the Enigma encryption system that the Germans had developed.

The British spies at Bletchley Park broke the German codes there and from 1941 onwards were routinely deciphering secret German communications. They kept secret the fact that they had cracked the codes for almost thirty years, during which time the Enigma system was effectively adopted and for many years used by numerous governments throughout the world in the belief that it was still uncrackable.

By not telling anyone they could read the codes, the British were able to read the secrets of other nations for many years. Even the secrets of their allies.

The truth about TOR, Ferris knew, was that like Enigma, the 'secure' communications were not totally secure. For those with the power and the capability and the trusted insight, anonymised communications were not so anonymous after all.

And the locations of those who used TOR were not as hard to trace as almost everyone believed.

For those who did not work for the people who had developed TOR, it was admittedly harder to do. However, it was not impossible.

All you needed was massive computing power, a few geniuses like those who had worked in Bletchley Park, and a lot of funding.

With those in place, the rumours were that it had only taken British agencies seventeen months to crack TOR, and put in place methodologies which allowed people like Ferris to uncloak those who had sought the invisibility TOR had promised to offer.

All it took was to have a minimum of three emails in a sequence for the UK intelligence agencies to be able to determine the location and identity of those who were using such anonymisation engines.

Using massive arrays of parallel computers the intelligence agencies would be able to capture and dissect vast amounts of metadata from the internet, and through using very powerful analytics algorithms, they would be able to trace and effectively triangulate the source of a communication by sewing together all the possible hops in a routed communication.

The process was helped by deploying 'Gretel', a programme that had been developed and inspired by the fairy tale story of Hansel & Gretel: as Hansel and Gretel had made their way deeper into the forest they had dropped a trail of bread crumbs along the way. The plan was that by following the path of these crumbs they would have been able to find their way out of the forest.

What Gretel did was the cyber equivalent of that.

Effectively, when a communication using anonymisation technologies was sent between 'A' and 'B', a small piece of 'malware' had been created which would append itself to such communications, and then periodically drop 'cyber crumbs' as it passed through the network attached to a communication. The 'crumbs' would then beacon out to its command and control centre, effectively shouting 'I'm here! I'm here'. The Gretel management program would then detect, locate and build a path from one crumb to another, which would then enable operatives like Ferris to track down where an email started or finished.

The person who had just emailed Randolph Best was not using the TOR program, but that did not matter. Admittedly, the system he or she had used was more complicated, and actually better, but their counter system should still be powerful enough and clever enough to overcome it.

Ferris knew that the way he described their solution to himself was not technically accurate. It wasn't that simple: his understanding of it was a gross oversimplification of how it worked, but for him it was the simplest way to describe and understand it. Purists would argue that Gretel did not work like that, but Ferris didn't really care.

All he cared about was that it worked, that he needed three emails in a sequence, and that in the case he was currently working on, he already had two. He had already engaged the power of Gretel to work on his behalf, its powerful processing capabilities crunching the numbers and running the analytics in the background for him even as he thought about it.

All he needed was one more email.

If whoever was taunting Randolph Best sent just one more email, they would have him.

In Ferris's experience, from now on, it would just be a matter of time.

Chapter 20

London

Thursday

October 3rd

10.05 a.m.

An alarm was going off in Ray's flat. A high-pitched, frequent 'Beep' bored its way deep into Ray's unconscious brain and prodded and pushed and shouted at him to wake up.

It screamed at him.

It took a long time to register, but when it did, Ray's eyes sprung wide open, and with a start he heard the beep again.

"Shit!" he tried to shout aloud and jump up and out of his bed but rolled sideways and fell onto the floor instead.

Gathering his thoughts, he pushed himself up from the ground and for a second forgot what he was doing and why he was suddenly awake, but then another 'Beep' sounded loud and clear and Ray was once again semi-alert.

Staggering towards the den, his heart pounding, he clumsily barged through the doorway and into the room, fully expecting to see either the red or green light flashing on the wall.

To his great surprise they were both inactive.

Nothing was wrong.

"Beep!"

It came from behind him. Confused, he turned, banged against the doorframe as he stumbled back out through the door and bruised his shoulder, stumbling and falling over.

Rubbing it vigorously with his left hand he squinted and looked around him.

What was going on?

"Beep!"

Looking up and following the source of the sound, Ray quickly found the culprit.

His fire-alarm.

The battery was running low again.

Ray swore aloud, laughed, and breathed a sigh of relief.

Then reaching for support to the table in the hallway he manoeuvred himself into a sitting position on the floor and took a few moments to recover from such a rude awakening.

"What time is it?" he eventually asked himself.

The clock on the wall told him all he needed to know.

The pain inside his head and his dry tongue and parched throat told him the rest.

A sudden memory of Emma's phone message, the emotional pain, the anger, the alcohol, sitting in the den, and then the email - which he had actually written and stupidly sent - all passed through his battered brain in quick succession.

"Fuck..."

Gathering himself and mustering more strength and determination to survive and cope with today's hangover, he eventually managed enough courage and willpower to push himself up off the floor.

The world began to spin a little.

He had got up too fast.

As everything slowly settled down and started to take on its normal, steady, position, Ray noticed the envelope on the floor below the letter box.

Bending down, picking it up and ripping it open, without really applying any thought to who it was from or what it may contain, he pulled out a single piece of handwritten paper from inside.

"Dear Resident of Flat 6,

I am sorry I disturbed you again yesterday, enquiring for a second time if you knew anything about my missing £20k.

Unfortunately, however, my gut instinct tells me that you do actually know something about it. Perhaps you even found it?

I may be wrong, but as a trader in the City who lives off his wits, my gut reaction is normally correct.

The truth is, I am in a very difficult situation. I cannot explain why, but I MUST find this money.

If you know where it is, I would ask you very humbly, that if you could help me get it back, that you would.

Quite literally, it would change my life.

Very possibly, it may save it.

David Anderson."

His mobile number and landline were both included at the bottom of the page.

As he read the words, Emma's voice echoed in his mind again. The same words.

Nagging him to do the right thing.

Ray dropped the paper onto the floor and stumbled through to the bathroom.

He needed a long, cold shower.

\------------------

12.30 p.m.

Ray had checked his Outlook account a dozen times since the morning and there had been no new emails.

Perhaps all this stress was for nothing. Maybe the account was not active, or Randolph Best never actually looked at it.

Maybe Ray could send an email a day for the rest of the year and he would still get no response.

On the other hand, there was the very real possibility that Randolph Best had received his emails, had read them, and was already taking action to find out who the hell was taunting him.

Ray was under no illusions: a man of his calibre and importance would be able to call on the assistance of any number of Government agencies to help track Ray down.

Since he had already had the murder of the woman in his house 'cleaned up' by the authorities, Ray knew that getting someone to track him down would be all part of the same day's work for whatever agency Randolph Best had working for him.

Yet, when all was said and done, Ray was 99% confident that even if some spook agency did start looking for whoever had sent the emails, no one would be able to track him down, get through his network defences and then identify who he was.

99% sure.

1% unsure.

It was that last 1% that terrified him.

Come lunchtime Ray had become sick and tired of his grotty little flat.

What's more, he had run out of decent food and needed some lunch.

He was also contemplating logging onto his work and sending some emails, and just in case his boss decided to do a video conference with him, he thought he should probably go and by a new bag of shavers: he'd run out and his stubble was no longer of the 'designer' kind.

The nearest decent sized supermarket was about ten minutes walk away. Normally he would drive there, but at the moment he would definitely still be over the limit, so that option was out.

He'd have to go by foot.

As soon as he stepped out of the front door and the fresh air hit him, he realised that he was still a little drunk.

As he got older it seemed that the time it took to get over a hangover got longer and longer. It was not a good sign.

Alcohol-wise, Ray had probably never before drunk so much over a number of consecutive days, even compared to when he was in his last year at university and they had celebrated sitting the last exam.

It did not feel good.

He felt slightly unsteady and a little shaky as he manoeuvred the streets and tried to avoid the other pedestrians who streamed past him.

As he passed a local pub that was just opening, he contemplated nipping inside for another hair-of-the-dog, a quick wee 'dram', but decided against it.

Instead of making him feel better, there was the very real possibility that it could make him sick.

The supermarket eventually arrived at the soles of his unsteady feet, and incredibly he managed to round up a basket of fresh milk, bread, and several microwave dinners.

He was on the way to the desk to pay when he passed the newspaper stand.

Stopping in his tracks he stared at the front pages of the newspapers.

On almost every front page of all the newspapers, one photograph dominated.

It was a photograph of Randolph Best.

As he read the titles above and below the photographs, Ray's blood began to boil.

Pulling four different papers from the stand, he quickly paid for his groceries and left the shop as fast as possible.

Ray hurried home and got to the entrance to his street before his anger and impatience got the better of him and he couldn't wait any longer.

Parking himself on a public bench on the opposite side of the street from his house, with his back to the railings surrounding the exclusive, communal garden reserved only for the residents of the Square, Ray pulled out the papers and began to digest the front covers of them all.

'Randolph Best Receives Knighthood From The Queen.'

'Years of public service finally repaid by Queen.'

'Most eligible bachelor in the United Kingdom is made a Knight in Shining Armour."

Followed by a headline from the Sun.

'Britain's Women Only Want the Best!', which claimed that Randolph Best had come top of a women's survey as the most wanted man in Britain.

On the second page of the Times, it went on to explain that following his knighthood, he had been invited to the Vatican to meet the Pope. Rumour had it that he may even be a hot runner for the next Nobel peace prize, for all the work he was doing to try to mediate between the warring parties in the Middle East and find a peace solution that they would all sign up to.

Ray read the newspapers in disbelief.

The man was a bloody saint!

Everyone in the world looked up to him, even the Pope!

Was Ray the only person in the world to know the truth?

No - he was not! RobinHood knew too.

And, of course, there were the British authorities who helped Best get rid of the body.

They knew too.

Although they were never going to tell the truth, were they?

An anger began to boil up within Ray.

The bastard could not be allowed to get away with this.

Someone had to do something. Someone had to reveal the truth and expose him for the murderer that he truly was.

It was time to stand up and be counted.

To do the right thing.

Ray got up from his seat, gathered his bags and crossed the street.

Ray had a plan.

He would release the video that he had taken to the world.

But before he did that, he was going to have a little more fun.

\------------------

1.15 p.m.

As Ray put the key in the main door to the communal stairway and stooped down to pick up his bags of groceries, out of the corner of his eye, he saw David - the man who was chasing him for the twenty thousand pounds \- turn the corner at the end of the street and start walking down the road towards him.

As he passed a white van parked near the entrance to the road, the two doors at the front of the van burst open and two large men jumped out. As soon as he saw them, David stopped in his tracks and froze.

The tallest, a big, burly black man in a smart blue suit, stepped in front of David, and gently but firmly grabbed him by the arm and escorted him to the back of the van which was facing toward Ray.

The other man stepped to the back, opened the rear doors, and stepped aside as the tall black man firmly but surely pushed David into the back of the van and climbed in after him.

As soon as he was inside the van, the man left on the street closed the van door behind him and then ambled to the side of the road, looking up and down the road, acting as if he was a look out.

The man glanced down the street in his direction, and Ray ducked sideways through his doorway and closed it behind him.

Hurrying up the stairs to his flat, he let himself in quickly and rushed to the window in his lounge which overlooked the square below, and from where he could see the top of the white van below.

The back doors of the van opened, and while Ray watched he saw David forcibly ejected out on to the street. He stumbled from the van, fell forwards but quickly recovered himself. He looked a little dishevelled and slightly shocked.

Brushing himself down while standing in the street, David turned and watched the white van drive off.

For a few seconds he stood there staring after the van, but then, to Ray's great shock, David lifted his head and stared directly up at Ray's apartment.

Just in time, Ray pulled back, stumbling back into his room, not a second too soon.

Sitting down in one of the chair's in his lounge, Ray thought about what he had just seen.

Either David had just done a drug deal with some rather shady looking characters, or he had been on the wrong end of some rough treatment.

For a second, just a second, Ray thought about the note that David had dropped through his letter box, begging for Ray's help.

Then the next second, Emma's voice was there again, telling him to do the 'right thing.'

"Bloody hell, woman! Leave me alone! Leave me in peace!" he shouted at his own conscience.

"You want me to do the right thing? Okay, I bloody will!" and Ray hurried through to his den, all thoughts of David now expunged from his mind and a fresh memory of Randolph Best filling it.

"You might have fooled the Pope, Mr Best, but you haven't fooled me!"

Ray sat down at his desk, logged on through his network defences, and started to plan exactly what he was going to do next.

\------------------

1.25 p.m.

David closed the door to Chloe's flat, rushed to the toilet and threw up.

He paused for a while, hovering over the toilet bowl, wondering if he should just stick his head down the toilet and flush it until he drowned.

He couldn't go on like this.

David knew that he was almost at breaking point.

From out of nowhere they had pounced on him and forced him into the van.

"Where is Chloe?" the big black man had asked.

Ray had stared at him, speechless, panicking. What should he say?

"That was a bloody question, David. A question."

The black man hit him hard in the solar plexus.

David doubled over and gasped for breath.

"I'll ask again, politely. Where is your girlfriend? We know she didn't come home last night. And this morning she is not at work. Where is she?"

David coughed, clearing his throat and holding up his hand, signifying that the gang leader should wait... give him a chance to speak.

"I don't know," he lied. "I told her to leave work and not come home. Not to go back to work until I had found the money."

"And the envelope. AND the envelope David!"

"Yes, the envelope!" David nodded vigorously.

"So you thought you'd save her, huh?"

"Yes."

"Fine. Then we'll go and speak with your mother next. In Sheffield. No problem at all."

"Sheffield? How... how did you know?"

"You don't need to worry about that, David. Not now. All you need to know is that we have friends, colleagues, who run Sheffield. And it will only take a single phone call for them to visit Sally..."

"SALLY? HOW DO YOU KNOW HER NAME?"

The tall black man in front of him moved closer, his face only inches away from David's.

"This is your last warning, David. Tomorrow night, if you don't have the money, I will come for you. Personally. And if you run away, I will personally drive up to Sheffield and kill your mother."

"Tomorrow?" David's voice was shaking. "... And what will you do to me?"

The man laughed.

"Don't worry about that. If I were you I would worry what we won't do to you. For example, how many toes and fingers do you have left? How would you like to lose them one at a time? Slowly?"

David looked down at his bandaged hand.

"Why are you doing this to me?"

"Don't let's go through this again, David. You know why. Just get the money and the envelope and all this stops. Do you understand?"

Should he call his mother and tell her to leave Sheffield? Tell her to go on holiday?

What if he did? Would they kill his sister? His nephew?

Where would all this stop?

He sat on the bathroom floor thinking about his next move.

In reality, there was precious little more that he could probably do. He'd been to all the houses and flats in the Square. He'd posted hundreds of flyers, and stuck posters everywhere.

If someone in the Square had found the money, surely they would contact him.

Although, David already knew who had the money.

The more desperate he got, the more he tried to think of where else the money could be, the more his gut instinct told him that the man at No. 23 had it!

In spite of practically begging him to help - in fact, he had begged! - the man had still not said anything.

Had he spent the money?

Should David go and see him again and tell him it was actually not the money that was seemingly important: it was the envelope? "Just give me the envelope! Keep the bloody money!"

Or should David wait until the man left his flat and then break the door down and find and steal the money back himself?

Try as he might, David could see only one way out of the hole he was in.

He had to force the man with the money to give him it back.

But how?

The one thing that David knew that he could not do was to run away.

If he did, the people that were going to kill him, would kill those he loved instead.

In that moment, David knew one thing.

He was no longer a coward.

If the worst came to the worst, he would stay and face them.

He would not run.

Chapter 21

London

Thursday

October 3rd

3 p.m.

The glass of whisky stood on his desk, as yet untouched.

Ray had poured it out of habit as he had come through to the den, but realised now that he did not need it. Or want it.

After showering and shaving he had briefly logged onto work and was relieved to find that his boss was out of town. There was no need to fake it in a video call with her. He didn't have to pretend to be working or sober.

Instead he could relish his hangover in peace and carry on doing 'nothing' at CSD's expense.

Except this wasn't nothing, was it?

He was just about to bring one of the world's most powerful people to justice.

The only question was, how?

Emma's voice rang in his head: "Do the right thing!"

This time he didn't ignore it. He was going to do the right thing.

Ray was still furious. The anger pulsed in his veins. Deep down, somewhere in his fuddled brain, some part of him recognised the fact that the fury he felt towards Randolph Best was slightly overdone: Best had become a scapegoat for his anger and frustration with Emma.

The logic was simple.

Emma had destroyed Ray's life, and now he was going to destroy Randolph Best's life. Which made sense, because Randolph Best has destroyed his own girlfriend's life!

?

Or perhaps it didn't make sense, but actually, Ray did not care.

Randolph was still going to pay.

Unlike the past two days, Ray was determined to do this sober. This would be a premeditated strike for justice.

It reminded him of his days as an anarchist.

With what he knew, he was going to launch a massive strike against the ruling authorities.

Perhaps, if he handled this well and planned it properly, Ray could kill two birds with one stone. He could wound and expose Randolph Best in such a way that the knock-on effect would topple the government!

Ray had been sitting at his keyboard for the past thirty minutes.

Thinking.

He was already logged onto his Brazilian Outlook account.

There were no new emails.

No replies from Mr Best.

And no flashing lights on the wall.

Everyone was good.

Twice Ray had started to write a long email, describing to R. F. Best exactly what he knew and making it very clear that he was going to post the video of the murder he'd committed on YouTube and spam the world so that everyone knew that it was there.

Randolph F. Best was the bloody Anti-Christ, and Ray was going to show and let the world know just why!

Each time though Ray had deleted the email after he had written it.

No. Just telling him what he knew would be too simple.

Ray had to play with him. Continue to tease him. Make him sweat.

Although it was clear that carrying on the way he had been going was not having any effect.

He had to rack it up a notch.

It should be subtle, but direct and to the point.

He thought about the thriller books that he had read, remembering the ones that were most scary.

It wasn't the number of words that you used, it was how you said it that drove the most chilling messages home.

Not quantity, but quality.

Short but sweet.

Deadly sweet.

A smile began to appear on Ray's lips and his fingers began to type.

The message was perfect.

After he had written it he stood up, went to the bathroom, made a fresh cup of coffee and then came back.

Staring at the words, he imagined how Randolph F. Best would react when he read the message.

It would make him sweat.

Perfect!

Ray lifted his right hand, extended his forefinger above the keyboard,... and hit send.

As the email winged its way around the world from the Outlook account in Brazil to Randolph's account in England, Ray repeated the email's contents to himself with a sense of pride.

His email was a classic.

Very simply the title of the email now read:

"I spy..."

Then, in the main body of the email he had delivered the payload.

"...I saw her DIE!

R.I.P. Bayla Adelstein 1991-2015"

With the last line, Ray removed all doubt as to the power with which he now threatened Randolph F. Best.

Ray stood up, stretched and clapped his hands.

He felt good.

This is how a hunter must feel as he was tracking his prey.

The best part of it was that as far as Randolph Best was concerned, Ray was invisible.

In the cyber world which Ray ruled, Ray was a ghost.

\------------------

3.05 p.m.

RobinHood's last doubt had evaporated with the latest round of public praise for Randolph Best.

At the best of times RobinHood's anger just boiled beneath the surface of his personality.

He'd never been able to hold down a job for long, had never had very many close friends, and nowadays, the only girlfriends he had came in magazines, or lived in very friendly houses in Germany which he would visit several times a year.

Called brothels.

His dissatisfaction with life fuelled his hatred of authority; quite consciously he blamed the authorities for almost everything that was wrong with his existence.

Now fat, overweight, frequently in excruciating pain, dying,... and spending most of his time in his own personal church, he had nothing to do but plan his part in the overthrow of the UK's government, the annihilation of as many of his fellow Londoners as possible, and how to hit the biggest bastards of all - the Bankers - a deadly blow from which the City of London would take months to recover, if ever.

He had been planning the cyber attack for months and the time for launching the attack was coming closer by the day.

If everything went well, he would launch the attack in less than two weeks. Perhaps sooner.

Today however, his anger directed away from the Bankers to 'Randolph the Wanker'.

As he read his profile in 'Who's Who?' he laughed quietly to himself when he saw that for a few years before entering politics, Randolph had been a Corporate Banker. A partner in one of London's top banks.

It helped firm his resolve.

Swivelling in his chair, he pushed himself across to another monitor and searched for the video file that he had copied from SolarWind.

Yes, true, SolarWind had asked him not to keep a copy, and yes, true, RobinHood had promised not to, but, hey... RobinHood was just being prudent.

He had kept a copy, just in case he might need it... In case a special occasion arose, like the one that had presented itself today.

Randolph Best had become the darling of the Western World.

But he and SolarWind knew the truth.

Sitting back in his chair, and watching the video, RobinHood's mind was thinking, calculating, planning.

Actually, it could all work out quite well.

First, RobinHood would hack into several TV stations - he'd done it before, no problem - and prepare to release the video of the murder so that it would play on TV stations across the world simultaneously at a time of his later choosing. He would build a small software program that would also simultaneously release the video to the media, including YouTube and Facebook, and all the major tabloids.

RobinHood would claim responsibility for it all.

The public would at first be shocked, but as the truth came out and millions of people across the globe watched the video and discovered the truth, they would respect RobinHood for what he had done.

He would issue a statement.

People would love him!

A week later he would launch the cyber attack which would knock out the City of London.

So many people already hate the bankers, that when they discovered that he also claimed responsibility for the attack, claiming revenge on behalf of the working man who had suffered through the recession while the bankers had become wealthier and wealthier, RobinHood would become a national hero! He was sure of it.

RobinHood was excited.

For the first time in years, he had a plan.

A plan which would make him happier, respected, loved and admired.

The last real hero that the British public had was Winston Churchill.

If everything went smoothly over the next few weeks, RobinHood would be the next.

\------------------

3.10 p.m.

Ferris sipped his coffee and watched the computer screen in front of him. Through his dashboard he could monitor everything he needed to know about the three main cases he had been assigned.

Randolph Best was his top priority, which is why half of the dashboard covered activity that related to him.

Suddenly, one of the boxes on the top left of the screen started to flash. Putting his coffee down, he leant forward and touched the flashing box with his finger.

The box expanded and instantly took over the whole screen.

It was Randolph Best's personal email account.

Another email had arrived.

This in itself was not of great significance: he got about two emails every hour.

But when Ferris read the title of the email, he sat up straight, clicked on the email and opened it up: an action that thanks to their systems, they were able to perform without the real account holder being aware that their emails were being read.

"Bingo!" Ferris said aloud, reading the content of the email.

This was exactly what he had been waiting for.

The third email in the series!

The email was significant for another reason as well.

It was no longer ambiguous.

The person who had sent this email - his account name was just a number of no importance - had directly related his observations to the death of the Israeli model and connected her death to Randolph Best. He had not blamed Best for her death, but the insinuation was very strong.

In response to the receipt of the email, Ferris did two things.

Firstly, he picked up the phone and dialled through to his superior, informing him of the latest event.

Secondly, he toggled from the email account across to another dashboard that presented all the cyber toolsets at their disposal, and opened up Gretel.

He copied across the necessary parameters from the latest email, hit return and launched the tracker program.

Agent Ferris had already tried to run the program the day before, but after eighteen hours of crunching terabytes of data, if not more, it had drawn a blank.

They needed that third email to complete the 'triangulation'.

Now they had it.

Ferris opened up the Incident Management system, created a new ticket to describe what had just happened, and entered all the necessary details.

He looked at his watch.

Perfect. If all went well, Gretel should finish its run just after he got to work in the morning to start his shift.

With any luck, by lunch time tomorrow morning, the person who was behind this attack on Randolph Best would either be in a police cell somewhere in the world, or most probably dead.

Ferris tended to veer towards the 'dead' prognosis.

If the person had, as they claimed, seen Randolph Best killing the Israeli model, he or she would not be allowed to live.

There was too much at stake and the risk of the person taking their knowledge public was too great.

A thought occurred to Ferris, rapidly followed by a twinge of anticipation and excitement.

If the person who wrote the email lived in the UK, would Ferris be the person deployed and instructed to silence him/her?

He hoped so.

Chapter 22

London

Thursday

October 3rd

5 p.m.

Ray had not touched a drop of alcohol all day.

It felt strangely empowering. Not that he was an alcoholic... it had only been in the past week that he had really ever drunk so much.

It was just that his life was falling apart... had fallen apart... and today he was facing it all square on. Sober. In spite of all the things that had happened to him.

He had lost his one true love. Simultaneously he now also found himself at the centre of a conspiracy and scandal that could rock the Western world and bring down the British Government. He was also the only person who knew where the missing twenty thousand was,... and, oh shit!... he had committed one of the UK's worst ever cyber crimes!

In all the excitement and heartbreak of the past few days, he'd completely forgotten about that one.

Standing up from his sofa and walking to the window, looking down into the beautiful private gardens in the centre of the Square, he thought about that last, minor thought: the bit about committing one of the worst cyber enabled crimes in UK history...

Was he a criminal?

Would he got to prison?

Thinking back on it now, he realised that he probably could.

For a very long time.

Shit!

Given everything else that was going on, this was probably something he didn't actually need on his plate to worry about just now.

How much had he stolen from the bank?

He tried to remember...You'd think he would remember something like that, wouldn't you?

Was it £500,000 or was it £5,000,000?

£5,000,000?

Bloody hell, it was just a matter of where to put the comma, but he couldn't remember exactly where he had put it.

At the time, he hadn't taken it that seriously.

Should he hack back into the bank and put it all back?

Tell them it was joke?

Then it dawned on him.

He hadn't actually accessed a single penny of the money - mainly because he had forgotten about it until now... ('How could I forget I'd stolen £5,000,000?')... and he'd practically not left the flat or had time to go and pick up the bank cards which gave him access to the accounts he'd put the money in.

Surely there was an argument that since he hadn't spent a penny of their money that he hadn't actually stolen anything?

Yet the thought that came to him next was even simpler.

The bank had been paying him to hack into the account.

All he'd done was demonstrate - admittedly on an unparalleled scale never before witnessed in the history of professional penetration testing - that anyone could hack into their bank and help themselves to their money... just as he had done.

All he had to do was go and collect all the bank cards, take them into the bank when he gave them his report and give them back.

He began to imagine his presentation to their Board of Directors: "Hi, My name is Ray Luck... blah, blah, blah... And now, before I continue and show you the results of my testing to see if your bank is secure or not, may I first ask you all... Has anyone here noticed that you may have lost... say... a small figure, like... five MILLION pounds?"

He'd wait for a pause... and then he would drop all thirty bank cards onto the table, invite each board member to take a few, and explain that each account contained between £16,700 or £167,000, depending upon how much money he had actually stolen..."Incidentally, I can't exactly remember how much I did take, but it was a lot of money and a lot of fun...!" Laugh, laugh.

The looks on their faces would be priceless.

Priceless.

Or at least £500,000 worth.

Below him, he watched as a very attractive young woman entered the park from the other side of the Square and started to walk her dog.

She reminded him of Emma, interrupting his though processes and forcing his busy mind to move on to another topic.

Emma.

Should he call her?

Go round to see her?

Try to stop her going to Canada?

Heading back into his den he picked up his mobile from his desk, - quickly checking his Outlook account to see if Mr R. F. Best had replied yet - he hadn't - and then went back into the lounge and took up his position at the window again.

The woman was now standing on the grass near his side of the Square.

She had thrown a ball and the dog was chasing it.

Ray dialled her number without even looking at the keypad.

It rang five times and then she answered.

"Hi," Ray said, quietly.

"Hi," she replied. "I was wondering when you would call? Did you not get my message?"

"Yes, thanks, I did. But I wasn't in the right mood to call you back. Emma..." he paused, swallowing and trying to fight back the wave of emotion that seemed to come up from nowhere and threaten to engulf him, "... Emma came round and picked up her stuff."

"Were you there?"

"No, Sis, I wasn't here. The cow came round when she knew I would be out. Sneaked in behind my back... grabbed her stuff and left!"

"Cow? Do you really think she's a cow, Ray? I don't think you really mean that, do you?"

Ray choked. His sister was right. She was always bloody right. That's why he loved her so much.

"No," he replied quietly. "I don't."

There was a pause.

His sister said nothing, waiting for him to talk. She knew he wanted to talk. That's why he had called her.

"She's going to live in Canada. Permanently."

"What?" his sister replied, her voice raised. "When?"

"On Saturday."

"How do you know?"

"She left me a voice message. A simple few sentences... nothing fancy. Just a quick 'Hi, Ray, I'm going to live in Canada. Have a nice life!' "

"Was that what she said? Her actual words?"

"No... not exactly. But it was something like that."

"How long had she been planning this for? Did you know anything about it?"

"No."

There was a silence at the other end, before his sister came up with her summation, built and informed by years of wisdom and several very bad relationships.

"What a cow!" she exclaimed. Which gave Ray the answer to the question he had not even bothered to ask her: 'Should I call her? Beg for forgiveness? For mercy? Another chance?'

"Ray, perhaps you're better off without her. Move on. Find someone else."

Ray nodded without uttering any words.

His sister was right. He knew she was.

Ray only had one question left to ask.

"Why does it hurt so much, Claire? Why?"

\------------------

9.10 p.m.

Having managed to remain sober for the entire day, Ray had decided that it would be a good idea to go to the gym for a detox. He'd had a swim, sat in the sauna, gone in the cold water plunge pool, and spent ten minutes in the steam room.

He'd come out a new man.

Fresh.

Invigorated.

Even clean shaven.

He felt great.

Until he got back to his street and found David standing at the bottom of the steps outside his building.

For a second he thought about turning around and going somewhere else to avoid him, but then David saw him and called after him.

Ray sighed.

"Blast!"

"Hi!" David said, almost apologetically as Ray approached him.

"Let me guess..." Ray replied. "You found the money?"

David shook his head.

"You know I didn't. Can we talk?"

Ray looked at him.

A twinge of guilt hit him. He didn't know why. This guy was involved in something that would just be bad news for Ray and Ray had sworn, SWORN, NEVER to get involved with anything to do with drugs again. ANYTHING! Yet, Ray DID have his money...

"Five minutes. I'll give you five minutes."

"Where?"

Ray looked around him.

"Over there. In the park," he said, nodding towards the other side of the road.

They crossed the street, Ray walking first.

When they got to the entrance to the park, Ray typed in the code to the electronic keypad on the gate, and then pushed it open and walked in.

David followed Ray into the centre of the park, where Ray dropped his stuff and sat down on the grass.

"Five minutes."

David stood still, nervously looking around the park.

"Worried that your friends from the white van might see you?"

David gawped at Ray.

"I saw you this morning. Sit down."

David joined Ray on the grass in the dark.

"Shoot. The clock is ticking..." Ray instructed.

David took a deep breath, obviously gathering his thoughts for a moment.

"I'm going to level with you. Tell you the truth. I haven't got any more time to mess around. If I don't get the money back by tomorrow the men in the van will probably kill me. Or at least, they'll cut off the rest of my fingers."

Ray looked at his hand.

"They did that?"

"Yes."

David hesitated.

"The money isn't mine. It belongs to someone who wants it back very badly. I've offered to pay the money to whoever lost it with my own money, but they want THAT money back. I guess it's stolen money. Maybe they're scared of the serial numbers on the notes being discovered if someone spends them. I don't know. Anyway, they want it back, badly. They're forcing me to help them find it..."

"How did you get involved in this mess, if what you say is true, and it's not your money?"

"They thought I was you."

Ray choked.

"What?" he spluttered. "Me?"

"Yes. On Monday they kidnapped me off the street, they bundled me into the back of a van...took me somewhere quiet and then beat the crap out of me. They thought I had the money..."

"Why?"

"Someone told the men in the van they had seen a young man walking down the street about the same time the money went missing. He'd been carrying a brown bag and a newspaper, and a coffee. The men in the van hung out in the square looking for a young man who might fit the picture... they saw me... I fitted the bill...Bloody hell, I don't know why they thought it was me...but the thing is, they did. And then, when they'd beaten me up and it was obvious I didn't know what the hell they were talking about, they decided to use me to find it. I'm their eyes and ears in the Square. Obviously it's easier for me to make enquiries, than a bunch of heavies in suits. People know me, or at least they recognise me."

"So why don't you go to the police?" Ray asked, being drawn into the problem even further.

"Because I can't. If I do, they will slash my girlfriend's face with a razor, disfigure her,...then probably kill her. I got my girlfriend out of here...she's gone...but the gang tracked down my family and are now threatening to kill my mum. And me. I've got until tomorrow night..."

Ray was silent.

He sat thinking for a few moments.

There was something about the way David spoke...maybe it was his body language, or the tone of his voice, ...or just the calm way he seemed to state the facts as if he had almost resigned himself to the inevitability of what was going to happen... whatever it was, Ray couldn't help but believe that he was telling the truth.

Which made everything a lot more complicated.

"Time's up." Ray said, starting to stand up.

David reached out to grab him, but as he looked up at Ray, his mouth forming some words to speak, he hesitated, closed his lips and withdrew his hand without touching him.

For a second their eyes met again, and in that moment Ray could feel the man's pain.

"This is all a bit heavy, ...David. Really heavy. I need time to think."

"What's there to think about? Either you know where the money is or you don't."

"Like I said, David, I need time to think."

"Fine. Take all the time you need. But don't leave it too long. This time tomorrow, I'll probably be dead. And if I am, it'll be your fault."

Ray looked at the man, nodded in acknowledgment and then turned his back and walked away.

Inside, he'd already made up his mind. He knew he was going to do the right thing.

The question was...how to do it?

Chapter 23

London

Friday

October 4th

6.55 a.m.

Ferris had come in an hour early. Ferris loved his work. He found it mentally stimulating, constantly challenging and extremely rewarding.

He was helping to defend his country, his loved ones and his way of life.

A new generation of spy, the cyber spy was probably more important, more efficient and effective than any 007 had ever been.

Ferris was one of the crème-de-la-crème. When the agency had first employed him he was already one of the best, but now, after years of further training and investment from the government, what Ferris didn't know about cyber warfare, you could probably write on the back of a postage stamp.

All last night he had been thinking about the Randolph Best case.

Would he catch his man - or woman? What would the program find for him over night?

Would it pinpoint the person behind the emails?

As well as wondering if he could be able to complete his mission and track this person down, Ferris had also started to wonder about the person's motivation.

Why were they doing this?

What did they hope to gain?

Was the intention to ultimately blackmail Randolph Best?

Would that be the next email to arrive: 'Unless you deposit £1million pounds in a bank of my choosing, I'll tell the world?"

Highly likely.

Although, at this stage, Ferris couldn't tell.

Given Randolph Best's esteemed position in society, blackmail could probably well be the ultimate goal of this activity, but for now it was not possible to tell. It could go one of many ways...if Ferris didn't catch him soon.

Which he would.

Ferris had decided that finding the person behind this threat would be his number one personal priority.

Disappointingly, when Ferris arrived at work the Gretel program was still chugging away, having not yet come to any successful resolution. The timer showed that it still had another hour to go, at least.

That had been ninety minutes ago.

The result was due any moment now.

Expectantly, Ferris watched the dashboard, willing the program to stop, and for the answer he needed to pop up on the screen.

The clock said he only had a few more minutes to go...the programme was coming to an end. It would be soon. Very soon indeed.

\------------------

7.30 a.m.

Ray stirred, opened his eyes and was instantly wide awake.

He had had a terrible night.

An evening of fitful sleep, dreams and feeling terrible.

Mainly from guilt.

After speaking with David the night before, he knew he had no choice but to hand the money over.

Ray believed what the man had said. David was in big trouble. Serious trouble.

Ray had no doubt that the men looking for the money would probably kill David if he didn't produce the goods. Goods which Ray had hidden in his flat.

Which would make Ray responsible for David's death, if it happened.

Which it wouldn't, because Ray knew that he would have to give the money back today.

Being sober had its downside...such as realising that in spite of not wanting to get involved or have anything to do with any drug gang, he already was.

Ironically, although Emma would never find out, it had turned out that Ray was right all along.

The money was drug money, and the danger had been real.

Was still real.

The question was, how could Ray give the money back without getting dragged into the whole sordid mess and ending up dead in an alley somewhere?

It didn't seem to Ray that he could hand the money over to David and that would be the end of it...could it be that simple?

On the other hand, it could be that simple. If David didn't know who they were, once they had the cash, they could simply disappear and David or the police would never be able to track them down. So perhaps, they would just leave it at that.

After all, if they already had the money, and they then killed someone, that would just make things far worse for them... the police would definitely get involved...and they'd surely find a fingerprint somewhere...?

Ray could find arguments that went both ways.

One stream of thought ended up with both Ray and David dead as dodos. The other had them both having a relaxing beer on Saturday night, both looking back together on a week from hell that had been bad at the time, but which had passed.

Albeit with David having half a finger less.

After checking his Outlook account - which had no new emails - going for a quick jog, showering, and then making some scrambled eggs and bacon for breakfast, Ray decided that he would think about it some more.

He had David's phone number and address.

Was there a way that Ray could be more clever about this?

Could he come up with a plan that guaranteed both David's and his own safety?

Surely, there must be some way!

However, having spent the evening before thinking about it and going over it repeatedly in his mind, he still hadn't found an answer.

He would give himself until lunch time -12 noon - to think of something.

After that, if he hadn't thought of anything, he would just hand over the cash and keep every finger crossed.

Which would be one more than David had.

Ouch!

Knowing that he couldn't continue to do nothing for work, but not yet ready to face up to going into the office again, he called in sick.

"A virus...apparently. The doctor says there's a lot of it going round. I just have to wait for it to wash itself out of my system." He explained to his boss when he called the office. "But I stopped throwing up early this morning. I feel much better now. I could come into the office if you want me to. I've got so much to do..."

Surprisingly, his boss had insisted that he didn't.

"Stay at home and rest. Take the day off. I think you've overworked yourself on trying to crack your way into the bank. I know how much you hate to fail, Ray, but maybe it's not a bad thing that we can't get in to their systems. For once we've found someone who took all our advice two years ago after our last security assessment and who is now pretty secure!"

"I'd like to agree with you," Ray replied. "But I can't. I cracked it! Yesterday afternoon. I got in after all."

"Honestly?" his boss beamed.

"Would I lie to you?" Ray replied. "I'll start writing it all up on Monday. We can go see them next Friday and give our report to their management team then, if you want to."

As the conversation drew to a close, Ray knew that if they did go to see the bank next week, pretty soon he would have to make up his mind about the money he had stolen from them.

Would he tell them?

Or would he keep the five million pounds for himself?

He knew what Emma would say.

"Do the right thing!"

The thing was, Emma was gone.

She'd left him, and she'd done the wrong thing.

Ray was upset and still angry, and he knew it would just get worse, not better, as he thought more and more about her over the coming weeks.

Which is why, Ray knew, the only way to survive was not to think of her.

To forget her.

And move on.

There was one problem.

He had loved Emma. A lot.

And, try as he had over the past few days to block her out of his mind, whenever a sober thought of her passed through his brain, he felt an accompanying wave of pain and sadness.

The reason why, Ray knew only too well.

Ray was still in love her.

Always had been, and always would be.

Even if she was in Canada and he never saw her again.

She had been the one.

\------------------

8.25 a.m.

Ferris was beginning to get impatient. Every time the timer on the program showed that it only had a minute left to go, it would recalibrate itself and suddenly announce that it still had another ten minutes of processing to do.

It had done that several times, and now as the clock counted down from sixty seconds, the final minute, Ferris held his breath.

Was this it?

Was the program finally going to complete?

Would he know in just a matter of seconds who the email had come from and what their location was?

Ferris watched the last few digits on the digital clock begin to count down: ten, nine, eight...

Quite literally, he held his breath.

Five, four...

Three.

Two.

One.

The screen went blank, turned white, and then the final dashboard appeared with the summary of its run.

"Target undetermined. Location unknown. Insufficient data."

Ferris's heart sank.

"What?" he said aloud, "...but we had three distinct emails! This has never happened before."

For a few moments he sat there in silence, the significance of the message sinking in.

The strength of the anonymising program that the target was running was much greater than he had at first believed. As far as Ferris knew, this was the first time that Gretel had not managed to follow the breadcrumbs through the forest back to the origin.

For now, they were as lost as ever.

"Blast!" he said, thumping the table in front of him so hard that Agent Rees took off his headphones and turned around in the cubicle beside him.

"What's up?" he asked.

Ferris ignored him, picked up the phone and pressed three digits.

He was immediately routed through to his boss, now somewhere in the Middle East at the Peace Summit, where he was accompanying Randolph Best as part of his security contingent.

"Speak," his boss said.

"Sir, the program completed. The target is still yet unknown."

"What? I thought you said we had three emails?"

"We do. It's not enough. We need more."

"So what do you advise?"

"We need another email...," Ferris hesitated, reconsidering what he was just about to suggest, but then realising it was probably the best option. "Have you advised Unicorn already? Is he aware of the emails?" Ferris knew not to mention Best by name across an international connection, even though it was an encrypted and secure link. No one really knew how powerful the American surveillance systems were. Unicorn was Randolph Best's code name.

"Yes. I have. And he's read them. I cautioned him not to respond. That we were working on it."

"Sir, would it be possible to discuss it with him again this morning? I have a suggestion that would really help. If you could request Unicorn to respond to the latest email directly, we might be able to flush out a response. Perhaps prompt the target to send a fourth, possibly a fifth email?"

"I'm due to escort him to lunch. I can get his attention and speak to him then. Do you have any suggestions what he should say?"

"Yes. Tell him to reply and say that he doesn't believe whoever sent the emails. Suggest that he asks the author of the emails to prove his claim about what he saw. Something short but sweet, and slightly arrogant. Make the target angry. We need to force them to react spontaneously so that they make a mistake and we can flush them out."

"Agreed. But Unicorn is busy. Why don't you do it on his behalf?"

"Sir?"

"Just do it, okay? We need to catch this person soon. Do you understand?"

"Certainly." Ferris hesitated. "Sir?"

"Yes?"

"I have a request if I may?"

"The answer is yes."

Ferris frowned, surprised by the response.

"But I haven't asked the question yet, sir."

"I'm short of time. You want to ask me if you can take care of business once we know who we are dealing with, correct?"

"Correct, but how....?"

"As I said, so long as he/she is on UK territory, you are authorised to lead the sweeping party. I've already sent you the permission through the normal channels. Is that all?"

Ferris was almost speechless. His boss continued to amaze him.

Which is one of the reasons he had requested the transfer to this team originally.

When Ferris checked his emails a few minutes later, he saw that his boss had indeed already sent Form Z9 through, in anticipation of the previous run of Gretel being more successful than it had been.

Form Z9 however, did specify one condition.

Ferris was to try and bring the target in alive. Not dead.

Whoever it was that was sending these emails to Unicorn was very clever. Very clever indeed.

Rather than immediately dispose of him, the agency needed the target to tell them as much as possible about the details of the cyber or terrorist group to which they belonged, as well as information about the anonymising program they were using.

Whatever it was, it was very powerful.

The agency needed to understand what it was, how it worked, and if they could get a copy for themselves.

Ferris agreed.

Thankfully, after they had what they needed to know, Form Z9 also gave full permission for the target to be liquidated.

Ferris smiled.

Perhaps all was not yet lost.
Chapter 24

London

Friday

October 4th

10.45 a.m.

David sat in his bedroom looking through the photographs of the last time he and Chloe had been together on holiday.

He had just spent the past hour talking to her on the phone.

She was fine. Worried about David. Terrified that something bad might happen to him.

But she was safe.

His mother was also safe.

Or safer.

He had booked a nice weekend away for her, and a taxi had picked her and her best friend up an hour ago and both of them were now on a train heading towards Scarborough.

They would stay there for the weekend, and come home on Tuesday.

David knew he didn't have to worry about Chloe or his mum.

All he had to worry about was himself.

For a while he had considered fighting back when they came to get him.

Perhaps he could kill them before they killed him?

Unfortunately, David had never killed anything in his life before, and he didn't imagine he could start now.

How do you kill someone?

What do you do?

He didn't have a gun. Should he stab them with a kitchen knife?

He shuddered at the thought.

Should he call the police?

Perhaps.

Maybe he would.

The thought scared him.

What would happen if the police did arrest the gang, but they were then released?

Even if they did get sent to prison for a few years, nowadays people only ever served half of their sentence.

They would be out in a few years, if not months, and then they would be even angrier than they were now.

David knew that there probably was a solution. An answer. Somewhere.

But he was so scared, and mentally so terribly, terribly tired that he struggled to think. Everything was so confusing. Everything was taking on dark, sinister overtones.

He had tried so hard to convince the man who he still believed had the money, but in spite of his pleading, he had not budged or admitted to it at all.

Perhaps his instinct had been wrong after all.

Surely, surely, if he had been right, the man would have returned the money by now? What sort of person would keep it and watch as another man had his fingers hacked off and was possibly murdered?

No, David must have been wrong.

He looked at his watch.

Time was passing so quickly.

Soon it would be the evening.

They would come for him.

He would die.

He felt resigned to it now.

\------------------

11.25 a.m.

Time was ticking by.

Ray paced his flat back and forward.

Thinking.

Pondering.

Practically praying...there had to be a way he could help David without endangering his own life, and also helping David to protect his own.

Yet, every scenario he could think off ended up, almost invariably, in the demise of any possible witnesses.

Ray knew these guys. They were ruthless.

Pushing thoughts about David to the back of his mind, he looked at his watch and realised it was time to check on his emails again.

Walking back through to his den, he sat down at his desk and refreshed the Brazilian Outlook account.

Nothing.

No response.

Since yesterday Ray had started to come to terms with the Randolph F. Best affair.

He was still as angry about it as before, but what could he do about it?

In spite of everything it was beginning to look like there was no one reading the email account he was sending his emails to.

The last email had sparked no reaction whatsoever.

If Randolph Best had read the email Ray was sure that he would have responded in some way.

But there was nothing.

He began to feel like an idiot.

He was getting incredibly stressed and excited about sending his cleverly worded threats to one of the most powerful people in the world, but it seemed he was just wasting his time.

What other options did he have?

To send the video to the press?

Hand it into the police?

Publish it online?

Publish it online!

Wow...why hadn't he thought of that before?

Surely that was his next, best option.

Actually maybe it was the only safe option he had.

Suddenly the screen in front of him moved, and Ray's heart jumped.

An email had just popped into his inbox.

Ray read who the email was from in almost pure disbelief. The name in the left hand column that identified the sender said, quite simply.

"Randolph Best."

And the title of the email was:

'Re: I spy."

Randolph Best had replied to his email!

Ray's heart started to thump hard against his chest, the adrenaline shooting into his arteries and instantly kicking in the primordial 'Fight or Flight' response.

Breathing deeply and with a shaking hand, Ray moved the mouse onto the email, pausing for a second before he finally decided to click it open.

The content of the reply to his message 'I spy, I saw her die!' was three words.

"Prove it, asshole!"

\------------------

12.35 a.m.

Emma stood above the River Thames, looking down at the cold, dark water flowing so quickly out to the sea.

She was standing on the Millennium Footbridge linking St Paul's Cathedral and the Tate Modern. She and Ray had walked over this bridge many times together.

When they had started dating, it was one of the first places that they had kissed.

She knew that Ray probably never thought about things like she did... he wasn't as romantic as her... but every time she saw a picture of the bridge she thought of that first kiss, and it gave her goosebumps.

Even now. Even today when she was leaving the country tomorrow.

She had come to London this morning to walk and think and to say goodbye.

She hadn't planned to come to this spot, but now she was here, she wasn't surprised.

It was a good place to be to think of Ray.

She missed him.

She loved him.

Still.

And yet, deep down, she knew there was no hope now.

She'd been dreading telling Ray that she was moving to Canada, because she was worried about his reaction.

On the one hand she was worried that he would come chasing after her, begging her to think twice, to take him back, pleading his love for her. And even more than that, she was worried that she might agree.

Her plans would be ruined, and she wouldn't move on with her life and experience any new adventures. Ray would win. She would lose. Or would she? Perhaps she would win everything she had ever wanted: Ray!

On the other hand, she was also scared that he would hate her. He would call her, swear at her down the phone, they'd have an argument and they would never talk to each other again. But she would go to Canada, and soon she would be happy?

The one thing she hadn't thought would happen when she finally plucked up the courage to tell Ray was ....'nothing'!

In all of her imaginings, Ray had reacted strongly. Either positively or negatively.

But at least he had done something.

And what had happened in real life? What had he done?

NOTHING!

She had got no reaction from him at all.

For a while her mind had gone into overtime, worrying about him.

Was he okay? Had he got her message? Or was he in hospital somewhere...?

She had a million different thoughts... She'd even almost got in a taxi and gone over to his house last night in the middle of the night.

In the end, her best friend had listened to her crying on the other end of the phone at 3.30 a.m. in the morning and persuaded her not to do anything.

It was quite obvious that Ray had moved on.

"Men," she had said. "They're all the bloody same. Honestly Emma, from what you've told me, you're better off without him!"

Perhaps she was right.

First thing tomorrow morning she would get on that plane, leave this country for good, and start a new life.

A life without Ray.

A new life. A better life.

Wiping away her tears, she looked up at the sun and closed her eyes.

She could feel the warmth upon her face and the sunshine dancing on her eyelids.

Smiling inwardly she repeated the little mantra to herself that she had been chanting all morning.

"A new life.

A better life."

If only she believed herself.

\------------------

1.00 p.m.

In a matter of just a few short seconds, from opening the email response from Randolph Best to reading it and digesting its meaning, Ray went from being calm to incensed with rage.

He'd been looking for a response from R. F. Best, not knowing fully how he would respond, but seeing the words 'Prove it, asshole!' was something he had never expected.

Asshole?

"Bastard!" Ray had shouted upon reading it.

"Bastard! Bastard! Bastard!!!!!"

Who the hell did Randolph FUCKING Best think he was?

Obviously Ray's email had not moved him at all! Instead of being cautious, wary, or even a little scared that someone out there knew his big secret, the bastard had actually doubted him and called him an asshole!

Ray jumped up from his desk and stormed about his flat, punching the wall several times, and repeatedly coming back into his den and reading the email over and over again.

He couldn't quite believe what he was reading!

"Prove it?" Ray shouted. "Don't you fucking worry mate, I will prove it. Beyond any bloody shadow of a doubt, mate, I'll prove it to the whole bloody world!"

His hands and fingers were shaking as he sat down at the keyboard and began to type a reply.

"FUCK YOU, ASSHOLE! WATCH YOUTUBE IN TEN MINUTES!"

He was just about to press return, and send the email when he caught himself.

He was breathing hard, and practically hyperventilating.

He read the email again, hesitating.

Inhaling slowly, he fought to control his breathing.

In....out...Innnnnn...ouuuuttttttt.....deep breath in....and now...a deeeeeepppp breath out.

Pressing Control A and 'Delete' he erased his message.

Standing up slowly, he returned to his kitchen and popped on the kettle.

He needed a coffee. A chance to step away and think rationally.

Why had Randolph Best replied like that?

Returning to the den, he checked the source email address just to make sure it did originate from the same place he had sent his email to.

The addresses corresponded.

He returned to the kitchen, switched the kettle off and made himself a strong, very black coffee.

"Shit!" Ray swore to himself.

He knew he needed to calm down. To think rationally. To plan what his response would be.

The last thing that Ray or SolarWind should ever do would be to shoot from the hip, and make a gut reaction response.

Ray took the coffee, marched through to the bathroom, stripped off and stepped into the shower, turning the temperature to cold.

As the water cascaded over his body, he focussed his mind and closed his eyes.

Think, Ray, think.

Plan. Think. Don't just react.

What would the best response be?

Why had Randolph challenged him like that?

Towelling himself down he walked through to the lounge, wrapping the towel around his waist. Resting one hand against the window, he looked out onto the park below.

Incredibly, as he gazed downward, out of the corner of his eye he saw David, standing at the side of the road, staring up at him.

For a second their gazes locked in on each other.

"Fuck off! Leave me alone, man, leave me alone!" Ray shouted loudly, thumping the wall beside the window frame.

Pulling back, he stepped backwards into his room and landed himself on the sofa.

He'd had enough of David.

Ray had given himself a couple of hours to try and think of a good solution to the bloody mess but didn't come up with anything. Dealing with David was the last thing he needed to have to deal with everything else that was going on.

He also felt very guilty. Ray knew that the right thing to do was to help the guy get out of the situation he was in.

Knowing what he did now, if he didn't help him, he'd be just as bad as the bloody drug bastards who were threatening to kill David in the first place.

Ray needed a clear mind, and couldn't afford to be distracted any longer.

Walking through to the hallway he picked up the paper from the table with David's phone number on it, and fished his mobile phone out of his trousers on the chair in the bathroom.

Typing in the number he sent a quick text to David.

"I think I might know who has the money. Got a bigger problem just now, but will call you in a few hours when I'm done. Don't worry. I think we can sort this!"

The moment he pressed 'Send' Ray felt a tiny wave of relief spread through him, and for a brief second he thought of Emma.

He squashed the thought immediately.

Tossing the mobile phone onto the table, he walked slowly back into the den.

A thought had just occurred to him.

Perhaps Best was actually scared? Perhaps he was just trying to take some control back from a situation which had the potential to turn into a nightmare for the world's most eligible bachelor?

And if Randolph was scared, perhaps he was just fishing to try and find out exactly what Ray knew?

After all, how was he to know that Ray wasn't bluffing?

The phone in his hall beeped. Ray ignored it. It was obviously a message back from David.

He could wait.

Right now he had bigger fish to fry.

The thing was, Ray had to take back control and remain in control. He had to be the one playing with Randolph, and not allow Randolph to play with his head.

Ray was the one in the driver's seat, not the other way round.

Ray was the Hunter. Best was the Hunted!

He tapped a message on the keyboard: "I spy," - the title header.

He began to play with the main message in his mind.

And then he had it.

He knew what he was going to do, and what he was going to write.
Chapter 25

London

Friday

October 4th

1.45 p.m.

David stood outside on the street, wondering whether in spite of everything, he should maybe try talking to the man in the flat one more time - he still didn't know his name.

He was looking up at the window, thinking about it when suddenly the man appeared, looked out across the park, and then downwards, directly into David's eyes.

The man looked angry. Very angry.

For a few fleeting seconds the man stared down at him, then moved back from the window and disappeared from view.

He was gone.

The man had seen him. He knew David was out there. And his sixth sense told David that the man did actually now believe his story.

So why was he not going to give him the money?

A thought occurred to David that he hadn't had before.

What if the man did once have it, but not now?

Perhaps he'd gambled it all away?

Given it away?

Feeling suddenly very lonely, and once again scared - the fear seemed to come and go in waves-, he decided that he needed to speak to Chloe.

Pulling out his iPhone from his pocket, he was just about to call her, when the phone vibrated slightly in his hand and a text arrived.

It was from an unknown number.

But when David read the message his heart soared, and he punched the air with joy!

"Yeeessssss!"

The message read:

"I think I might know who has the money. Got a bigger problem just now, but will call you in a few hours when I'm done. Don't worry. I think we can sort this!"

David looked up at the window, expecting to see the man standing looking down at him again.

No one was there.

David waited for another ten minutes then decided to go home and wait for the phone call that could save his life.

\------------------

2.00 p.m.

"I spy" Ray had already written into the title of the email, which he followed by typing in slowly, "...As YOU killed her, I watched her die."

He thought about it for a few minutes longer, then hit 'Send'.

That was only the first part of his plan.

Next, he opened up his favourite movie making package - and imported the video of Best killing the Israeli model.

He selected a few of the best bits, cut them out, and inserted them into a short video clip, which he then interspersed with some text titles.

At the beginning of the thirty second teaser he created, he wrote "I SPY..." with text that reminded him of the beginning of a cinema blockbuster movie. The next few seconds were of the woman stripping, some passionate kissing between them, a short clip of him standing in the doorway with his face now clearly visible, followed by a few seconds of the fight scene and then her falling to the floor with the knife embedded deeply into her chest.

The last image on the screen was of her eyes staring blankly at the camera, hauntingly...before the credits rolled up:

"British Government Members of Parliament Productions

Proudly Presents

'Death by Stabbing'

Starring

Bayla Adelstein as the Murder Victim

&

Randolph Best as The Murderer."

When Ray played the video back, and then added a small sound track, he couldn't help but admitting to himself that it looked quite professional. It was short, but to the point, and he was sure that Randolph Best would absolutely love it.

He loaded it in an email, relieved that the final file compressed size was not too large for Outlook, and closed his eyes to think of a suitable message to go with it.

Actually, it didn't take long. A few seconds later the email was primed and ready to go.

It read:

"I spy..." in the header, followed by,

"Oh look, I watched the whole thing and recorded it...I wonder, who would like to watch this little movie first? The Pope, the Queen, or the great British Public? Perhaps I'll just send it to them all, courtesy of YouTube. Say goodbye to your career and 'Hello' to prison! Who, Mr Best, is the ASSHOLE now? ...You murdering bastard!"

Ray sat back, read the email several times, and thought it was pretty, bloody perfect. It certainly got the point across quite nicely.

He hit 'Send'.

\------------------

3.00 p.m.

Ferris had just returned from a late lunch when the first email arrived.

He read it and almost screamed aloud with pleasure.

"Brilliant!"

The idiot had taken the bait and fallen right into their trap.

"I spy... As YOU killed her, I watched her die."

Ferris sent a quick message to his boss.

"Email worked. Now have 4th email in reply. Will immediately initiate new run of Gretel with the new data."

After sending the message Ferris immediately got to work. He initiated Gretel, input all the parameters from the new email, and started the run.

Surely, this time it would succeed.

Noting the time, he filled out a ticket in the incident management system so that if he was not on duty when the run finished, the next agent would know to call him immediately. Only Ferris was now permitted to read the results that came from Gretel. It was strictly on a need-to-know basis, and nobody else apart from him needed to know.

Having completed the ticket, Ferris stood up from his desk, hit Control-Alt-Del to lock his screen, and then went to get a fresh coffee from the canteen.

\------------------

3.30 p.m.

When he returned fifteen minutes later, logged back on to the console and went to take another sip from his coffee, he almost dropped the coffee carton onto his lap when he saw that another email had arrived.

He opened it up and read the message inside.

Ferris frowned.

Picking up the polarised blackout screen from beside his computer he placed it across his screen so that no one else apart from him - sitting directly in front of the screen- would be able to see any images on it.

Taking a deep breath, he clicked on the video file that was attached to the email.

"Oh....shit...." Ferris said aloud, as he watched the video play.

Without wasting another second, Ferris picked up the phone and connected with his boss.

"Sir, It's Ferris here. I just got another email. A fifth. There's a video attached to it. I've just watched it..."

"And?" His boss enquired.

"We have a problem. A big problem...I think you need to get to a secure terminal as fast as possible. You need to see this..."

"I'm just about to enter the Embassy with Unicorn..., this is not a good time."

"Sir, I must insist. You need to get to a secure terminal NOW! And make sure you take Unicorn with you. He'll want to see the video too."

"Why?"

"Because he's in it, Sir."

\------------------

3.45 p.m.

Ferris was waiting for his boss to call him back.

In the meantime he had a difficult decision to make.

He was watching the Dashboard for Gretel and trying to decide whether to halt the program now, or let it run to completion.

Time was of the essence.

The author of the video was threatening to release it on YouTube.

The moment he did, chaos would ensue.

Right now, it was his job to stop that happening.

He had two choices: he could let Gretel run and hope that the fourth email was enough to help pinpoint the originator of the email. At best, the program would take several hours to complete. However, there was a possibility, Ferris conceded to himself, that even with four emails to work from, there might not be enough data.

But with five? Surely five would make the result a foregone conclusion!

It was almost definite that with so many discrete data points and all the information that could be distilled from the sea of metadata created by the five emails in combination with the magic that Gretel weaved, that they would be able to pinpoint exactly where the connections to the server were, from which the emails were originating.

So, should Ferris stop Gretel, add the information from the fifth email, and start it all over again?

The problem was, it might not be necessary, in which case he would lose the past forty minutes of run time that Gretel had already spent working on the problem.

On the other hand, he could pre-empt failure and promote certain success by starting it all over again from scratch...

The trade off was almost sixty minutes, and right now, Ferris knew that almost every second would count.

Deciding that 'Certainty' was better than 'Possibility', Ferris took a deep breath, hesitated for one second, then hit "Stop" on Gretel's dashboard.

A box and some annoying text appeared on the screen.

"Are you sure you want to abort this sequence?" the program asked him.

"Yes!" Ferris almost shouted as he clicked "Confirm".

It took another five minutes before Ferris had loaded up all the new data, primed the program and got it ready to track down the author to the emails.

He had just hit "Start" when the phone rang.

It was his boss.

As he picked the phone up, a new thought entered Ferris's brain.

"What happened if there wasn't just one person who was behind this? Maybe there was a group of people? In different locations?"

"So," the voice at the other end of the phone said. "I couldn't get Unicorn. He's still with the President of Egypt. But I'm logged onto the Secure Teamshare. Show me what you've got..."

"Certainly sir, but I think you'd better warn Unicorn afterwards...He's not going to like this, sir. Not one little bit...!"

Chapter 26

London

Friday

October 4th

4.45 p.m.

Ray felt good. Nervous. But good.

He was back in control. Only an idiot would not be scared once he opened up the video file and played it. By now Randolph Best would be shaking in his boots.

If he was at all human.

Which was part of the problem: whoever can kill in cold blood like that had to be insane, and an insane person didn't behave like normal people, did they?

\------------------

Ray felt nervous...more nervous than before, because he knew that now he was in direct contact with R. F. Best that as soon as the video was viewed, it was highly likely that he would hand the file over to whichever government agency was protecting him, and that they would then start to try and find Ray.

Thanks to Ghost, they would not be able to do that.

Although he was still very confident they couldn't, it was that little nagging 1% uncertainty that still got to him.

Now that he'd sent that video, that 1% seemed to be much more significant than before.

He walked back into the den from the kitchen and checked the flashing lights on the wall.

They were dark.

"I need a break!" he said to himself, and then remembered what he had promised David.

"Shit...!" he swore aloud. "I forgot all about him."

Ray glanced quickly at his wrist.

It was late.

Would he be too late? Would David still be alive, or would they have come for him already?

Hurriedly Ray went through to the toilet, forced off the side panel that encased the left hand of the pedestal underneath the wash hand basin, and reached inside.

Pulling out a thick plastic bag sealed tightly with duct tape, he hurried through to the lounge and ripped the bag open.

Inside there was the brown envelope he had found last Saturday, a time that now seemed to belong to a different life long, long ago.

Taking the money out and dropping the envelope on the floor, he quickly thumbed through the money, counting it again to make sure it was all there.

It took him a couple of minutes to check it all, but he was relieved to find that he still had the full twenty thousand and the mice hadn't eaten any.

Grabbing his keys and mobile from the table in the hall, and starting out the door, he remembered that he'd heard a message coming in earlier.

Wondering if it was David chasing him for the money, he flicked to his messages and stared in disbelief when the saw that it was a message from Emma.

Stopping still in the stairwell, he opened it up.

"I'm leaving tomorrow. Good bye, Ray."

For a second he stared at the message in disbelief.

His hands were shaking, his mind a sudden mass of confusion.

Why had she texted him the obvious? She'd already made it abundantly clear she was going to Canada already - 'Have a nice life!' It was not the sort of thing he was likely to forget, was it? Was she just rubbing it in now? Or did it mean something else? Was there some sort of cryptic meaning behind her telling him again?

He was still trying to think what her message could mean and why she had sent him the message now, of all times, when the phone started to ring in his hands.

He hit answer and put it quickly to his ear.

"Emma? Are you okay? Why are you ..."

"It's David. Not Emma. Ray, that's your name, right? It was on your text message? Ray, it's late. You said you had the money. They'll be here soon...And if you don't give it to me quickly, it'll be too late! I'll be dead..."

"David..." Ray replied, trying to interrupt him, and immediately switching thought processes once again. "I'm on my way. I'm coming down the stairs. I'll be there in a moment."

"Where, Ray, where will you be?"

It was a good question. It would not be a good idea to hurry over to David's flat if the heavy mob were just about to turn up.

"Starbucks...the one opposite the tube station. In four minutes. Okay?"

When he got to the coffee shop there was a queue outside the entrance. Deciding not to join it, Ray stood to the side, and waited for David to arrive.

It was only a few seconds before he saw the man running round the corner at full pelt.

Ray stepped out, grabbed his arm and ushered him into the doorway of the next shop, now closed.

"Here." Ray said, thrusting the plastic bag at him. "It's all there. Count it if you want."

David grabbed it off him, the relief on his face almost changing his appearance completely. He even managed a smile.

Weighing it in his hands, David laughed for a second, and then looked Ray straight in the face.

"Where was it? Who had it?"

Ray felt himself turning a little red.

"It's not important now, you've got the money. Take it. Give it back to them, or do whatever else you want to do with it...I don't care. But with the greatest respect in the world, I never want to hear from you again. Or see you. Do you understand?"

David looked down at the bag, and then up at Ray.

He started to open the bag, but Ray grabbed his arm.

"Are you crazy? Not here...It's all there, I promise you."

"But..."

"When you get home, not now!" Ray reached out and touched David on the shoulder, lowering his voice and speaking to him calmly.

"It's going to be okay now David, honestly, it is. Just a few more hours, - hand that back, in public preferably - and you'll be fine." Ray smiled.

David nodded.

"I hope you're right."

"I am. I promise you."

Before David could react any more, Ray turned and jogged along the road, around the corner and back into the Square and up to his flat.

\------------------

5.15 p.m.

Having just checked his emails for the third time since he got home five minutes ago, Ray was about to start cooking something to eat when his phone rang.

He ignored it.

Ray just wanted some peace and quiet.

He wanted time to think about what his next step would be with Randolph Best. Was he really going to post the video on YouTube?

Did he really want to go through with it?

For the past few days Ray had been in a rage. He'd also been drunk for most of the time.

Now that he was sober...some of the alcohol fuelled anger had left his system, and he was a little calmer.

Not a lot.

But a little.

It was a good time to take stock of the situation.

Threatening Randolph Best was one thing...it probably did no harm as long as he was anonymous with no way of being discovered... but if he posted the video, he would bring the wrath of hell down upon himself, and the British Government would never give up until they tracked him down...

What they would do with him when they found him, probably didn't leave much to the imagination.

If they had already covered up the killing of the Israeli model, an ugly bastard like himself would not even make them pause for thought.

Ray would be dead.

If they caught him.

The answer was therefore, quite simple.

Don't get caught!

As he stirred some pasta and then added some sauce from a jar, he realised however, that it was already too late to go back.

Now the threat had been issued, and the gauntlet had been thrown down, the agencies working for Best would actually have no choice but to pursue him until they found him. If they could find him.

The thing was, they would never know if he would or would not carry out his threat, and the risk to them was too great.

They had to find him now. At all costs they had to prevent any possibility of Ray releasing the video.

In other words, like it or not, Ray was committed.

From now on he would never be able to live completely in peace.

For the first time since the whole affair had started, Ray felt a real twinge of fear.

He stopped stirring the pasta for a moment, and looked out of the window of the kitchen towards the setting sun. It was going down now. It would soon be dark.

Then Ray thought about the woman in the video. Her life-less eyes...and the lies the establishment had told about her death.

He thought of the 'hero' that Randolph Best had become.

He thought of Emma, and the life he had planned, but which now would never be.

He swallowed hard.

Then he thought of Randolph Best again.

And once again, his bile began to rise and the anger overtook him.

Ray knew he had it in his power to make Randolph pay, - to make the government pay.

Now he realised that he was committed, he knew that there could only be one victor, and Ray knew who that would be.

His name was Ray Luck.

Just then the phone rang again.

Unfortunately, Ray never heard it, a boiling kettle and some loud music on the radio drowning it out.

Ray served up his pasta.

He was starving.

Chapter 27

London

Friday

October 4th

6.30 p.m.

Ray had eaten his meal, chilled out and listened to some music,

When he switched on the television, the news was just finishing, and he caught the tail-end of the weather forecast.

The woman giving the weather tonight was very attractive.

Ray watched her, ignoring what she was saying and paying more attention to her dress, her eyes, her good figure, and the way she smiled at the camera and waved her arms almost sexily at the weather chart.

He had never seen her before. He probably never would again.

Ray had always wondered where the 'weather people' came from. It seemed to Ray that there were millions of them - every night you switch on the TV and the weather person had changed. Where had the last one gone? Where had the new one come from?

Why were there so many different people?

What happened to all the people who had had their moment of fame and been on national TV and given a weather forecast?

Was that it? Was their career over?

Only the sexy ones survived...the ones who fascinated men like Ray who watched them and not the weather.

Actually, perhaps that was the plan.

If you watched the weather-forecaster and not the weather, perhaps you would not notice how often they got the weather forecast wrong!

Ray's mobile started to ring again.

Sighing, he switched off the TV and walked through to the hall.

Picking up his iPhone he was surprised to see that he had five missed calls.

Two from David.

Three from Emma.

There were four voice messages.

Ray dialled in to pick them up. The first was from David.

"Ray, hi it's me, David. Where is the envelope? The money's all there but I need the envelope the money came in! Did I not tell you that the envelope is just as important, if not more important than the money? They'll kill me without the envelope! Have you still got it? Call me, back, urgently." There was a slight pause, and then, "...Please."

Ray listened to the message and glanced at the floor through the doorway into the lounge where the envelope still lay on the floor in full view.

Shoot...he'd better take it to him right away... meet him back at the Starbuck's and hand it over.

The next message was from Emma.

"Hi Ray, it's me, Emma. I'm going tomorrow,...to Canada... I... I just...Perhaps, maybe... I thought that...," there was a long pause. "I'm sorry, perhaps I shouldn't have called. Take care, Ray."

Ray's heart skipped a few beats. He pressed a few digits on the phone and replayed the message again. And then again.

Bloody hell. What was going on?

Quick. He had to call her back... he would, in a second...

But first he'd listen to the other messages just in case there was another one from her.

The next one was from David.

"Hi, Ray, Please, please, call me back. I'm scared. They'll be coming over soon. One of the them just called me, asked me if I had the package. I said yes. They're coming over...they'll be here soon...Please, help me. Call me? I need the envelope!"

Ray listened to when the message was left, and looked at his watch.

Ten minutes ago.

Shit, he hadn't heard the phone ringing with the music on.

One more message to go. He typed in another number and let it play.

"Ray, it's Emma. I ...I can't go without seeing you again. I'm worried about you. Why haven't you returned any of my messages? Are you alright? I don't want it to end like this." Another pause, during which Ray's pulse soared to well over a hundred and twenty beats a minute. "Ray, I'm coming over. I'm near my tube station and I'm just about to go down and get on a train. I'll be there soon. Please be there..."

Ray's heart almost stopped beating.

The time at the end of the call was nine minutes ago.

She'd be there any moment.

\------------------

6.31 p.m.

Ferris stared intently at the bright red digits on his screen as they slowly counted down from five minutes to zero.

The program had been coming to a resolution far faster than he'd expected - it had been the right thing to do to halt the previous run and start it again with the data from the fifth email added it. The extra metadata had given Gretel the oomph it needed to thread all the clues together and pin-point the location of where the data trail was starting.

According to the dashboard, there were only two minutes more to go.

Ferris stood up from his desk and paced his little cubicle, not for one moment taking his eyes off the screen.

The anticipation was almost killing him.

One minute to go.

"Yes," Ferris muttered underneath his breath. If the program had got this far at this point, it was highly unlikely to recalibrate the anticipated time to resolution.

This was going to be it!

Twenty, nineteen, eighteen...

Ferris took a seat in front of his screen again, and took a deep breath in.

Five, four, three, two, one.

The screen went dark for a few seconds, and then another dashboard appeared, complete with the crest of his agency and a picture of the Portcullis and the Royal Coat of Arms.

"Target data identified. Please input your credentials to view report."

Ferris pulled out the key fob from his pocket and in response to the various challenges on the screen, typed in his ID number, his PIN, and the number that was currently showing on his RSA token.

"Welcome back Agent Ferris." The screen announced.

"Do you wish to view the report on screen or download and save to PDF for printing?"

Ferris took the first option. He couldn't wait to print it off.

The screen flickered for a second, and then the report was there.

Ferris stared at the screen, and almost jumped for joy when he read the report.

It gave them everything he needed to know.

In fact, much more than he could ever have hoped for.

Ferris reached for the phone, punching in a few numbers and tapping the table with his fingers impatiently as he waited for the person at the other end to pick up.

"Simons here..."

"Simons, it's Ferris. The data just came in. I need you to drop everything and chase this down immediately. I'm forwarding you the data now. It's Code Red. Find me the address of where this bastard lives. As soon as you can. Remember, every second counts. Got it?"

\------------------

6.44 p.m.

Ray was standing by the window staring down at the street below, in the direction of the tube station Emma would come from.

If she hadn't changed her mind, she'd be there any moment.

Would she really come?

Why was she coming?

Did this mean she might have changed her mind?

Was she coming back to him?

Or had she just forgotten something in the apartment that she was coming round to pick up?

What should Ray do?

Tell her the truth...that he still loved her? Beg her not to go?

Then a thought jumped into his mind that both scared and excited him at the same time: 'As soon as she comes through the door, get down on one knee, and give her the engagement ring!'

Ray smiled, his heart beating fast with excitement and nervousness.

Maybe things were going to be alright after all!

Just then an alarm began to ring.

At first - just for a moment - Ray wondered what it was. Was it the doorbell? A fire-alarm?

Then with a jolt and a surge of panic, Ray recognised it.

The last time he had heard it was months ago when he had last tested it.

The alarm was coming from his den.

Abandoning his stance by the window and rushing through from the front room, he pushed hard against the closed door to his den and barged inside.

His attention was immediately drawn to the flashing green light on the wall, and for a few moments he stood staring at it in disbelief.

The sound of the alarm pulsed every sixth time the light flashed, its din loud and grating, forcing Ray to quickly bring up the control dashboard on his laptop and then toggle the virtual switch for the audible alarm to the off position.

Slumping in the chair, Ray stared again at the flashing light, his brain struggling to understand exactly what it meant.

Clearly it signified that someone had managed to hack through the first two outer layers of his defences, passed through the outer DMZ, and his probe and Intrusion Detection System had now picked up anomalous network activity within the inner DMZ.

But how could they have done that?

Ray knew it was virtually impossible to do. It would take vast amounts of processing power to force their way through his defences, and to provide the right responses to the challenge questions they would be given. Ray had heard tell that the NSA and GCHG might have the power to do something like that, or alternatively there was a rumour that the security company that provided the tokens would automatically provide the security agencies with the capability to know the correct responses to any of the challenges that the authentication solution would demand a response to.

Ray had always been deeply suspicious that the rumours were true, but now, looking directly at the green flashing light on his wall, he knew they were right.

"I spy... As YOU killed her, I watched her die"

The words of his arrogant email flashed through his mind. He'd been an idiot.

How could he have been so stupid!

Ray had challenged a member of the British government, someone with full access to all the resources of GCHG, and now they had tracked him down!

As he watched the flashing light, the true severity of the situation began to dawn on Ray, and he felt the first edges of real fear.

He started to breathe deeply, panic now only moments away.

Ray gripped hold of the side of the table with both hands, knelt forward and began to breathe deeply, consciously trying to take control of the 'fight or flight' emotions that were pumping adrenaline into his veins and demanding a response.

In his nightmares he had practised for this moment, and planned what he would do if the day ever arrived when the lights began to flash and the sirens began to sound. But now it was actually happening, he was finding it difficult to remember exactly what it was he knew he was meant to do.

He took several long, slow deep breaths and then held it. Ray knew that his life was potentially in danger now and that he had to get a grip or in the very near future, that future may come to an abrupt and very unexpected end.

In, out, relax...

Innnn..., ouuttttt..., relax...

Slowly his mind began to clear.

He began to think rationally again.

Now that whoever it was that was pursuing him had managed to break through the outer defence perimeters and was marching around inside the inner DMZ looking for a way in past the next set of firewalls, Ray knew that it would probably only be a matter of time before they succeeded.

Having cracked the outer defences, with the vast processing power that they must have at their disposal to penetrate the outer firewalls, they would surely also be able to break through the walls of the inner perimeter. Ray didn't know how long it had taken them to track him down and then discover the correct passwords and pins to get this far, but whether it was only days, hours or minutes, at most it would only be the same amount of time again before they got through the last of his defences.

It could be tomorrow, tonight, in a few hours, or any minute now.

His gut instinct told him that it would probably be soon.

And once they did that, it would only be seconds before they would be able to identify his true location and his name...in fact everything about him: his age, mobile phone numbers, credit cards,...everything that identified a person in today's digital world.

Ray stood up from his desk, calm, and once again in control. "It's time to go," he said to himself aloud.

He looked at his watch.

6.55 p.m.

It was time to abandon ship.

Fast.

Ray knew his boat was sinking quickly and worst case, he had only minutes to escape.

From now on, every second would count.

He had to act fast, move quickly, and get out of the flat as soon as he could.

In real life he had only rehearsed it once, eight months ago, but he now he was calm again, he knew exactly what he had to do.

Hurrying to his bedroom, he grabbed a sports bags from under his bed, one which already contained a long length of rope and a torch, and a number of other things he had preselected and always kept in there, ...just in case. Rummaging through his cupboard and chest of drawers, he quickly selected a range of clothes and underwear, his sunglasses and a hat, and then grabbed his passport, birth-certificate, some utility bills as a proof of address, and a few other documents from his hiding place underneath the sink in the bathroom.

Returning to his den, he unplugged his three external hard-drives, on which all his activity, personal documents, photos and computer programmes were kept and recorded, and grabbed the folder from his desk drawer that contained all the DVDs and CDs he used and had recorded, including the video of the murder. He dumped these in the sports bag. Next he gathered up all the USB drives he had, and anything else that might contain any information that he didn't want anyone else to see, and dropped them into the bag too.

Switching the shredder on, he quickly destroyed a handful of papers and computer print-outs he had on his desk, and then stepped back and made sure he hadn't left anything else that he shouldn't.

There was only one more thing to do...one more final, but drastic step, and he didn't want to do that until the absolute last moment... and only if the other light started to flash and the next alarm went off signifying that they'd penetrated his final defence barrier.

When that happened, within minutes a swat team from the police or some government agency would be streaming up his staircase and breaking down his door...

Ray looked again at the other light on the wall.

It wasn't flashing...yet.

Bending over his keyboard he brought up the interface to the program that he had written several years ago..., but never really thinking that he would have to use it in real life. He'd nicknamed it SCORCHED EARTH, and that explained almost exactly what it did.

In the eventuality that someone penetrated his defences, tracked SolarWind down and found out who he was and where he lived, forcing him to abandon his den and potentially run for his life, he would initiate SCORCHED EARTH: the programme would run through every IP device on his network and erase all memories and data and then write over them with random data.

Anything that wasn't in his sports bag or which he took with him would be lost.

Deleted. Erased. Burned.

He'd lose it all.

On the other hand, no one else would ever find it either.

The green "Start" button flashed on his screen, and Ray's finger hovered over the keyboard, hesitating.

He looked up at the other light on the wall. It was still dormant.

His finger trembled. Twitching.

Pressing the button, initiating the program...it was so final...

What if he was overreacting?

What if his second layer of cyber defences held out and were strong enough?

Perhaps he would wait a little longer...perhaps...

A loud banging noise on his front door startled him and made him jump. At exactly the same moment his phone started to ring.

Shaken and scared, Ray pulled out the iPhone and walked slowly towards the front door.

The name on the display said "David."

Shit...he'd completely forgotten about him.

Sneaking up to the front door as quietly as he could, he peeked through the peep-hole to see who was on the other side, holding his breath, half-expecting to see the police or...or...

Could it be EMMA?

It was David.

He grabbed the door handle and pulled it open, ushering David quickly inside...

"Why didn't you call me? I need the envelope...and I need it now!" David started demanding immediately, obviously very flustered and sweating profusely. Ray noticed that his hands were trembling. "They just called me...asked me if I had the money! I said yes, and they said they're coming straight over. When they find out I haven't got the envelope they'll kill me."

David's eyes saw the bag he had dumped in the middle of the hallway, now full.

"Are you going somewhere?" he asked, worriedly.

"What?" Ray asked, confused for a second. He followed David's eyes to the bag.

"Oh..., yes..." Ray replied. "I've got to get out of town. Believe it or not, I've got bigger problems than you. Way bigger..."

"Bigger than mine? They're going to fucking kill me! How can your problems be bigger than mine?" David demanded, reaching out and grabbing hold of Ray's arm. "Give me the envelope! Now!"

Ray shrugged his arm off.

"Listen, mate...I'm sorry..."

Ray started to apologise and was about to say he would get the envelope for him when there was another knock on the door. It was still ajar, and as both David and Ray turned around, Emma stepped into the hallway.

Ray stopped in mid-sentence, staring at her.

She looked gorgeous.

More beautiful than he had ever seen her...although as she opened her mouth to speak, he noticed that she was really nervous and her face was very white.

"Ray...," she whispered, then coughed to clear her throat. "Hi..."

She took another step into the hallway and then saw the bag on the floor.

She looked up at him, her eyes searching his for a thousand answers to questions that she wanted to ask.

"Emma..." Ray said quietly, stepping past David towards her and reaching out his open arms towards her.

At that exact moment an alarm started to blare loudly from his den, and a light started to flash behind him so brightly that they all turned to see what it was.

"Fuck!" Ray shouted aloud, spinning around on the spot and hurrying into his den, Emma and David following quickly behind him.

Ray stood just inside the doorway, staring wide-eyed at the red flashing light on the wall, the alarm so loud that they all lifted their hands to their heads and covered their ears.

"What's happening?" Emma asked, shouting to be heard above the noise. "What's going on? That's never happened before?"

Ray turned to her, and then looked across at David.

"Can you switch it off?" Emma asked. "It's deafening me!"

Ray glanced back at his desk. On one of the screens he saw the big green 'Start' button flashing that now implored him to initiate the Scorched Earth program.

On the other screen a big white number displayed on a black background was incrementing every second. In smaller letters above it a display read, "Time since network breach: 0.10," the number ten dominating half of the screen. "0.11, 0.12, 0.13..."

"Shit..." Ray said again, playing with the mouse and calling up a dashboard from which he could switch the audible alarm off.

With the room now suddenly quiet and everyone deafened by the silence, Ray turned to them both.

"You have to go. Both of you. Now!"

Emma's face dropped.

"Ray, Go? Why? You're scaring me. What's happening?"

Ray reached out and put one arm around David and the other around Emma.

"Go. Now! You have to go... Both of you! And NOW!"

Stunned and confused, David and Emma allowed themselves to be turned around and guided in the direction of the front door.

"Ray...? I need to talk to you! I..."

"Emma, go! I mean it...you have to leave! Now!"

They were at the front door.

Suddenly David dug his heels in and tried to spin around.

"I'm not leaving until I get the envelope!"

"You bloody are, " Ray shouted at him, letting go of Emma, grabbing hold of David and physically ejecting him through the doorway.

David was caught off-guard by the sudden show of force and stumbled forward through the door and just caught hold of the banister with his good hand before he almost fell down the flight of stairs.

"GO!"Ray shouted.

The door on the other side of the landing outside the flat began to open and old Mrs Simons, his octogenarian neighbour, started to come outside to see what the alarm was all about.

Ray hurried across the landing, smiled at her, and said, "It's okay Mrs Simons, everything's okay. But go inside now please, and don't come out whatever more noise you hear, do you understand? DON'T come outside!"

David was standing three steps down the stairs, his eyes begging Ray for help.

As Ray hurried back across the landing to his flat, he caught David's gaze and a thought suddenly occurred to him.

"David, you said they're coming over now? To get the envelope?"

"Yes..."

"Good. Tell them all about me. Tell them I've got it. I've given you all the money back, every penny, but when you get home, take some of the money out and hide it and then tell them that I've kept some of the money along with the envelope that they so desperately want, and that I'm not going to give it to back to them, ...and tell them that if they want it they have to come and get it from me. They'll have to break the bloody door down though and search the flat from top to bottom because there is no fucking way I'm just handing it back to them!"

David's face went white.

"Why?" he asked. "I don't understand...they'll kill you!"

"Maybe. Maybe not. But whatever you do, David, don't come back with them. Find an excuse, anything...but don't come back up these stairs or it might be the last thing you ever do. Now go...leave! NOW!"

Without glancing back at him, Ray stepped back into his flat, pushing Emma back inside in front of him.

Placing both his hands on her shoulders he leant forward and kissed her gently on the lips.

"Emma, you have to go. Now. Honestly. Please...I'm sorry...I haven't got the time to explain just now... honestly I can't..."

Emma tried to speak, but Ray silenced her with a finger on her lips.

"Listen to me. LISTEN!" he commanded. "I don't know why you came over tonight, and I don't know what you want from me, if anything... but before I push you out that door in two seconds and close it firmly behind you, I need to tell you something. I fucked up. I know I did. You were the best thing that ever happened to me, and I lost you. But I love you. I always have and I always will."

Tears had started to roll down Emma's face. Ray was just about to say something else when a thought occurred to him. Momentarily he turned around and ducked down to retrieve something from the bag on the floor. Standing back up he turned to Emma and unrolled her clenched fist, forcing a small square box into it.

"Take this...don't open it yet, but if you haven't heard from me by the time you get on your aeroplane, take a look inside when you get to Canada. Not before! It's self explanatory. Okay?" he looked at her, and half-smiled, nodding to get her agreement.

She nodded.

"Good, now you have to go. You have to hurry. Some very bad people are coming and you have to be long gone before they arrive. If you stay here you could be in danger. If you pass anyone, don't stop and talk to them. As soon as you get home, grab your bags and leave the house. Don't go back. Go and stay with Paula for the evening. If I can, I'll come find you there. If I don't, you get on the plane tomorrow to Canada and never come back to England. Do you understand?"

Emma looked petrified. Her mascara was running and she was shaking from head to toe.

"DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME? PROMISE ME YOU'LL GO TO PAULA'S!"

She nodded...

"I promise..."

Ray kissed her gently on the lips. He felt Emma push forward, increasing the pressure, but before she could, Ray pushed her back, looked at her for one more second, and then spun her around, opened up the door and pushed her out.

He closed the door behind her.

"GO!" he shouted one more time, allowing himself a second more to look through the peephole to see that she was obeying him.

Outside, Emma stood staring at the door, squeezing the box in her hand tightly.

Then she turned, grabbed hold of the banister, and started to hurry down the stairs.

Ray's heart almost ripped apart as he watched her go.
Chapter 28

London

Friday

October 4th

7.03 p.m.

Ray knew that he had already taken too much time.

They would be here any moment.

Either the drug gangsters, the police or the Security Service.

Which would get there first, Ray didn't know, but either way it was likely that if they caught him, he wouldn't live very much longer.

He probably only had seconds to leave.

Grabbing a ski pole from the cupboard in his bedroom, and the folding metal ladder from the cupboard in the hallway, he unfolded the ladder and placed it beneath the trapdoor to the attic in the middle of the hallway.

Then hurrying back into the lounge he picked up the brown envelope from where it still lay on the floor, and then dropped it into the bag in the hallway.

Next, he climbed the ladder and pulled the trapdoor down.

Grabbing the bag from the floor he climbed up into the attic and dropped the ski- pole inside. He was almost up inside and about to close the attic hatch, when he remembered something important that he had forgotten.

Scorched Earth.

Swearing under his breath, he quickly let himself down again, hurried into his den, and without any further thought, clicked the mouse over the big, green 'Start' button.

Hesitating for a second to check that the program was running and to ensure that Scorched Earth had started to delete everything on his servers and any IP device on his network, he then switched off the monitors so that no one would see what was going on.

With the red light still flashing brightly he rushed back to the ladder, pulled himself up into the attic space and switched the light on.

Just then someone rang the buzzer on the steps outside the entrance to No.23, trying to get his attention.

The buzzer rang again and again, repeatedly, then suddenly stopped.

Ray swore again, cursing himself for not having practised the next step of his escape more than once or twice.

Grabbing the ski pole from beside himself, he reached down into the hallway below, holding onto the entrance of the attic as hard as he could with his other free hand.

He would only have one shot at this.

He took a deep breath.

Slowly, he leaned further down and extended the ski pole out in front of him. Pushing the top of the ski pole in between the flat bit at the top of the ladder and the first step down, he pushed the ladder slightly backwards then pressed down on one end of the pole and forced the other end of the pole up, locking the pole between the first step and the flat top of the ladder. The ladder was aluminium and very light. Slowly, very slowly, Ray started to lift the ladder up into the air, holding his breath all the time.

If the ladder fell, the game would be up.

He had to get this bit right.

Footsteps...he could hear the sound of heavy footsteps starting to come up the stairs in the stairwell, the heavy footfalls echoing up towards him.

Keeping his calm, he kneeled up slightly, freeing up his other hand. Carefully, he swapped the pole from one hand to the other, moving the ladder backwards beneath him, maintaining the pressure all the time.

As soon as it was beneath the opening to the attic, he started to lift it up towards himself.

When he'd practised it before, this was the most difficult part.

Slowly, very slowly, he edged away from the hole, guiding the top of the little ladder up into the attic space.

As soon as it appeared, Ray pushed the ski pole forward, jamming the ladder against the other side of the trapdoor.

Quickly, Ray knelt forward and grabbed it, pulling the ladder upwards and inside.

Even before he had breathed out, he grabbed the trapdoor and lowered it gently down, closing it and sliding home the bolt that he had added a few months ago to the inside of the lid.

Ray was now locked inside the attic.

Directly beneath him he could hear someone pounding on his door.

\------------------

7.04 p.m.

Ben took the brown envelope out of David's hand and pulled out the thick wad of fifty pound notes. He flicked through the notes, not counting them, but using his experience of handling large amounts of money to guesstimate the amount. He estimated eighteen to twenty-two thousand pounds. It was about right.

Ben looked at the envelope. He turned it over in his hand and looked at the other side.

It was brown.

True.

But there was no blue tick on the back of the envelope. Where he had ticked every envelope to signify that he had counted the money inside and checked it.

David shifted nervously in his seat in the back of the car.

Ben turned round and looked at him.

"It's not the right fucking envelope, is it?" he said loudly, raising his voice. "You thought you could bloody trick us, didn't you?"

Before David could move out the way, Ben turned in his seat and threw a punch at David, hitting him on the side of his face and splitting his cheek.

David was pushed into the back of the seat, the minders on either side of him holding him tightly by his biceps and forcing him quickly to sit back up and in range of Ben's fist again.

"What the fuck are you playing at, David? Where's the bloody envelope?"

"He's got it." David shouted back. "The bastard in Flat 6 at Number 23 has got it!"

"What do you mean?"

"He gave me most of the money back, but not all of it. He told me to tell you that he'd kept some of it along with the envelope and that you could fuck off, and that he wasn't going to give you the other money or the envelope back. He said to say that if you wanted it back you had to go get it yourself. It's in his flat, but he isn't going to give it to you. He hates drug gangs...! And he swore that if I ever went near him again or he ever saw my face again that he'd call the police and tell them what was happening and give the money and the envelope to them."

In the back seat, one of the minders stifled a laugh, and the other smirked. No one ever told Ben or Mr Grant to 'fuck off', but now they had they knew it was going to get interesting.

Until now Adam Grant had sat quietly in the front of the car in the passenger seat.

He heard the men reacting and knew they were laughing.

Whether they were laughing at him, or Ben, he didn't know, but he knew he couldn't let such a remark pass without punishment.

Whoever was challenging his authority had to be punished, and it wasn't a job that he could let Ben take care of for him.

At times like this it was he who had to reaffirm his authority. He would make an example of whoever had the envelope and his money and who had disrespected him, and he would do it personally and in front of the gang.

Adjusting his gloves, and checking the gun and the knife in his pocket, Mr Grant opened the door and stepped out onto the pavement.

Bending down again into the car, he issued some instructions to the three men in the back of the car guarding David, telling them to follow him.

"...and Ben, you stay here. It's time I took over and finished this off personally. Keep an eye on our guest for me."

"...but I gave you the money back...and I've told you where the envelope is? You promised to let me go...."David shouted.

Ben hit him again.

"Shut up! Mr Grant is speaking!"

"No, Ben, that's fine. It's understandable. Our guest is a little concerned. Slightly worried, I imagine. But there's no need to be." Mr Grant replied in a quiet voice. "I'm just going to pop up and visit our friend in Flat 6 and if everything goes well, we'll be back down in a moment, with the envelope. And we'll let you go, as promised." He paused. "On the other hand,...if we don't get the envelope back...then I'll ask Ben to drive you somewhere quiet and kill you. Does that sound fair?"

At the entrance to No. 23 Mr Grant adjusted his tie then stood patiently with his hands crossed over in front of his stomach while one of his men used his tools to open the lock on the front door. Meanwhile, the other two men flanked him, keeping an eye out on the street, and making sure that Mr Grant was shielded at all times.

"Okay, we're in," the man with the lock-picking kit announced.

"You took your time, Harry." Mr Grant said, stepping past his henchman and into the building.

They hurried up the stairs, one of the men rushing up in front checking the door numbers. When they got to the top, it was the first one on the left.

Mr Grant leant forward and knocked on the door several times rather heavily.

He smiled at the three men beside him.

"Don't forget men, we're here because we were invited. I want you on your best behaviour please."

The men looked at each other, confused.

"Joking, obviously." Mr Grant laughed. "But no one touches the bastard who has my envelope until I've finished with him. Do you understand? This one's mine. No one disrespects my organisation and lives to tell the tale. Just make sure that he doesn't slip past me, okay?"

The men nodded. Smiling.

Mr Grant seldom got this involved anymore, personally, but when he did, it was always a lesson in sadism that few ever forgot.

They wouldn't miss it for the world.

\------------------

7.10 p.m.

In the attic Ray knew that he had to act fast.

Opening up his bag he took out the torch, switched off the attic light and gingerly walked across the floor away from the entrance hall below to where the sloping glass window was at the rear of the building.

He opened the window up and after pushing the sports bag through and letting it drop onto the section of flat roof outside, he reached up, took the strain on his arms and hauled himself up and through the window.

Loud voices suddenly became audible beneath him.

He listened for a second. Someone was issuing instructions, and he could hear people moving quickly into and around his flat.

A wave of fear washed through Ray.

With shaking hands he pulled the window closed behind him, and pressed down on the bottom edge until he heard the catch click home behind him.

Gently he lowered himself down the outside slope of the roof until his feet touched the flat roof.

It was already dark outside, so Ray shone the torch down, picked up his bag and started to tip-toe across the roof in the direction of where Mrs Simons lived.

It was only a few metres, but for Ray, scared that someone underneath him in his den might hear his footsteps on the roof above, it was the longest walk of his life.

Not to mention the fact that only one metre to his left there was a fifty metre fall straight down.

\------------------

7.11 p.m.

Downstairs, one of Adam Grant's henchmen finally managed to pick the lock to Ray's front door. With their guns drawn, they opened the door and searching and sweeping the space in front of them with their guns held up high in front of their chests, the four men stepped cautiously forward and into the flat.

Closing the door behind him, Mr Grant adjusted his gloves, mentally checking that all his men were wearing theirs too, and then pointed at his men in turn signalling for them to move forwards into the lounge, kitchen and the bedroom.

Adam chose the room with the flashing light for himself. He was hoping that he would walk in and catch someone by surprise, probably doing some sort of weird meditation or listening to music, but as he opened the door and stepped inside, he realised just how annoying the flashing light was: no one would chose to remain in that room for long, let alone find the experience at all relaxing.

The team moved from room to room, each person finding no one there.

A minute later they all met again in the hallway.

"Where is the bastard?" Adam Grant spoke loudly, his anger and frustration beginning to show.

"Petrov, what do you make of that?" Adam asked, pointing the den. Petrov stepped inside and came back out a few moments later.

"An office. Looks like we set an alarm off when we came through the door."

"I doubt it," Adam said, drawing on his quite extensive experience with burglar alarms from his earlier career as a thief. "It's something different. An alarm of some sort, but I don't know what for. Besides, if it was a burglar alarm, it would be outside the flat, not inside."

"What do we do now, boss?" Petrov asked, reassured that Mr Grant didn't seem to be at all concerned.

"We turn this place upside down until we find the envelope. Without touching anything and leaving any prints behind, mind. And whoever finds it gets a five thousand bonus. Seem fair?"

The boys smiled.

"But keep an eye out in case the bastard comes home. If he does, make sure he doesn't leave. I want to leave my initials on his forehead...for starters..."

Adam waved his hand briefly in the air and the team went to work. Adam stepped back into the den, and started going through the desk, the buckets, and cupboards. He picked up any books, opening them up and shaking them by the spines to see what fell out, and then dropped them on the floor.

In the other rooms cupboards were being emptied, buckets were turned upside down, and sideboards examined. In the bedroom, the pillows were turned inside out, the bed lifted up... his men knew exactly the sort of places people would hide things, both out in the open in full public view and in secret.

Methodically they started to go through the flat from one end to the other, turning a once habitable dwelling into what soon resembled a warzone.

\------------------

7.16 p.m.

At the end of the road at the entrance to the Square, four black vans stopped and blocked the street off. Simultaneously another four vans entered the square at the other side and parked, blocking the entrance from that side too.

No cars could now come or go.

Almost immediately the backs of six vans popped open and six men jumped down from each. The men who exited the first four vans were all fully armed, and kitted out in black uniforms, helmets, and Kevlar bullet proof vests. Each man carried an assortment of weapons and a supply of ammunition large enough to fight a small war, including MP5 sub-machine guns, Glock 17 9mm sidearms, NICO stun-grenades, and knives. Six men took up positions at the end of each street, blocking the entrance to any further pedestrian foot traffic, and locking down all movement into and out of the square.

The rest of the men immediately started fanning out across the square to take up pre-agreed positions in the park, the street, and from within other buildings in the square.

The men who jumped out of the last two vans wore an assortment of different civilian clothes.

One was dressed as a police man, another in the uniform of an electricity company, and a third as a pizza delivery man.

The rest were dressed normally.

They did however, all have one thing in common: they were each bristling with weapons and grenades hidden from view beneath their clothing.

While the others hung back at the end of the road, the pizza man walked down the street carrying a large pizza box, inside of which was hidden his MP5.

Turning at the entrance to No. 23 he hurried up the stairs and after checking that no one was watching or following him, he quickly started to pick the lock on the main door.

It only took him twenty five seconds, but by the time he was finished, the electricity man had come up the steps and joined him.

Pushing the door open, the electricity man disappeared into the building and using his torchlight, made his way quickly to the electricity junction box in the small cupboard that the plans of the building showed was located just underneath the stairs in the stairwell ahead.

Whilst he opened the junction box and found the fuse boxes for the flats at the top of the stairs, and the lights in the stairwell, the pizza man continued to hold the front door open as ten other members of the SWAT team made their way quickly down the street and rushed up the stairs into the building.

Within seconds, there were eleven men kneeling on the floor or flattened against the walls at the top of the stairwell outside of Flat 6, the home of Ray Luck, a professional cyber expert and ex-card-carrying member of the British Anarchist League and the Oxford 'Three-Ists Club'.

Ferris was in his element. This was his first live op in over six months, and as the excitement flooded through his veins, he realised again just how much he missed the thrill of real live combat.

Hopefully, after he had successfully led and completed this operation, he'd be trusted to lead other such operations in future.

First though, he had to catch Ray Luck.

At the top of the stairs the lead man put a listening device against the door and took a few seconds to determine what movement and activity he could hear from within the flat.

He could hear nothing. It all seemed quiet.

He signalled Ferris, and Ferris gave the command to place a small charge on the door and get ready to blow the lock.

As soon as it was in place, Ferris signalled to the men to put on their enhanced night vision goggles and spoke into the microphone on his sleeve, giving the order for the man below to cut off the electricity.

From this point on, everything would take place automatically.

Once the charge blew, the men would be on autopilot.

Suddenly everything went dark.

Simultaneously Ferris gave the signal to detonate the small charge and the men pushed back against the walls.

Ferris smiled.

"Sorry 'Ray', it looks like your 'luck' has just run out!"

\------------------

7.20 p.m.

Inside the flat Mr Grant pulled out his phone and listened to the warning that Ben gave him.

It looked like a SWAT team of some sort had arrived in the square, had entered the building they were in, and were heading up his way.

Without any time to think, he signalled for everyone to stop everything and take up defensive positions.

Raising his finger to his mouth, he commanded them all to be quiet.

For a few seconds no one moved.

Guns drawn, primed and ready, they all held their breath.

\------------------

7.21 p.m.

Up above, Ray had managed to make his way across the flat roof to the far end of the building, a journey that took him over the roofs of about twelve houses. Looking over the edge of the building he could see the top of the fire-escape that went from the ground to the top floor window of the flats at this end of building. Presumably, once upon a time, each of the different sections of the building had had their own fire-escapes, but for whatever reason now only this one still existed.

To get down to the fire-escape below him he would need to drop down about two metres, which ordinarily wouldn't be so far, and grab hold of the edge of the ladder pinned to the wall.

But at the back of the building, in the dark, with absolutely no margin for error, Ray was understandably a little scared.

Cursing his shaking fingers, Ray bent down and took out the length of rope from his bag.

Climbing back onto the main roof, and carefully and very gently shimming up the tiles, he reached a chimney stack and fed the rope around its base before tying it into a tight triple knot. Pulling on the rope and testing it, he manoeuvred back down onto the flat roof and stood up, pulling hard on the rope to make sure that it and the chimney stack would take his weight.

It was firm.

Next, he tied the other end around the handles of his bag and leaning cautiously over the edge he lowered his bag so that it dangled close to the edge of the ladder.

The bag disappeared below him, the rope stretching about half way down the building.

Taking several deep breaths, he lay down on his stomach and edged backwards towards the side of the building, gripping the rope tightly in his hands.

He was just about to commit himself to go over the side of the roof when he heard the first gunshots.

\------------------

7.21 p.m.

As soon as the lights went out in the stairwell and the flats, the explosive charge went off, and the lead man pushed forward and kicked the door open.

From either side of Ferris his men streamed past him and into the flat, weapons drawn and sweeping in front of them.

Each of them carried Heckler and Koch sound-suppressed MP5SD automatic weapons, fully loaded and capable of devastating rapid fire in bursts of three rounds at a time.

Trained to seek out targets and threats and neutralise them, the SWAT team reacted automatically to the sight of the men immediately inside the flat who had their guns drawn and pointing straight at them, but who were now in pitch blackness, their eyes blinking and trying to acclimatize to the dark.

The first man in opened fire immediately, letting off a three-round burst of subsonic 9mm automatic fire that blew away the nearest man and pushed him back into the room behind him, into which most of his body exploded in a bloody mixture of flying flesh and shattered bones.

Almost simultaneously two of the men waiting for them and facing them inside the flat began to return fire blindly with their hand guns, the bullets hitting the first of the advancing SWAT team in the chest, and pushing him backwards into the men behind him.

But not before the second man entering the flat had himself depressed the trigger on his weapon and let off three trails of subsonic bullets that swept across the hallway, raked up the wall and cut one of the targets in half.

As the other men poured into the flat behind the first men who had entered, they immediately fanned out on either side of the door, simultaneously finding targets opposite them and firing at almost point blank range.

Unprotected, outgunned, untrained and not used to battle combat and unable to see in the dark, Adam Grant and his men were no match for those who had come in after them.

Both he and his last surviving henchman were forcibly smashed against the walls behind them with the momentum of the bullets fired only a metre away from them, large chunks of their bodies being ripped open and torn off by the force of the bullets entering their flesh.

Within seconds of the flat being penetrated, all four of them were dead.

\------------------

7.23 p.m.

Up on the roof Ray tried to control his breathing. He had never felt his heart pounding in his chest so hard before.

He had heard four loud bangs come from his flat, and when they had started he had immediately looked along the edge of the building towards his rear window. For a couple of seconds a series of bright flashes had come out of the window from his bedroom. The bangs and the flashes had not been coordinated, and Ray didn't understand what was happening.

Whatever it was, it certainly was not good news.

All he knew was that people were in his flat firing guns.

Who were they shooting at?

The moment he asked himself that question he knew the answer: his plan had worked!

He thought momentarily of David and wished him well, hoping that he had taken his advice and not returned to the flat with the drug gang.

With any luck, David would be able to walk away from all of this and carry on his life as before.

Unlike Ray whose life may now never be the same again.

"Ray Luck: Enemy of the State."

Ray fought to focus on the here and now.

At any moment they may guess where he was and come after him. He had to make good his escape while he still could.

Now. Before it was too late.

Wrapping the rope around his back, like he had once done when learning how to abseil on a school trip to the Lake District, Ray gripped the rope tighter and swallowed hard.

Slithering backwards on his stomach to the side of the building, Ray's legs passed over the edge.

He kept going.

One moment he was on firm ground, the next he was dangling in the pitch-dark fifty metres above the ground.

\------------------

7.29 p.m.

A few moments before, Ben had wound the window down and was cautiously looking at the reflection in the side view mirror to see what was going on in the street behind them.

The limousine was parked two thirds along the street, facing the other entrance of the square, which like the entrance behind them that was closest to the entrance to No. 23, was now also blocked off by a small army of police or soldiers. Whoever they were Ben could not tell. All he knew was that all hell seemed to have broken loose.

He had seen quite a number of bright flashes and heard several loud gunshots coming from the windows of the top flat at No. 23.

So far, no one had come out of the building.

Ben was scared.

He turned furiously to confront David.

"You bastard, you fucking set us up!" he started to say, but didn't make it very far.

While Ben was looking out of the window, David had reached into his trouser pocket and taken out a can of the pepper spray that Chloe sometimes carried in her hand-bag when she went out with her girlfriends in London.

As Ben turned towards him, raising his gun and obviously going to point it straight at him, David had lifted the can and depressed the nozzle on the top, launching a jet of the spray straight into his captor's eyes.

The man immediately started to shout, automatically raising his hands to his face and pushing back from David against the dashboard on the passenger seat where he was now sitting.

As soon as he went backwards, David leant forwards and pressed the button on the dashboard that released the lock on the rear door.

Immediately, he dived for the door and pushed it open, stumbling forward and falling across the pavement against the iron railing opposite.

Pulling himself up with the help of the metal posts, he raised himself up first on to one knee and then up onto both his feet, heading towards the entrance to his stairs at No. 45.

Just as he passed the front door of the car, Ben threw it opened and stumbled out after him. With one hand wiping the tears from his eyes, Ben raised the other hand and took aim with his gun at David who was now only two metres away.

From this range Ben couldn't miss.

Two single bullets flew through the air, both hitting their target.

One passed through the top right shoulder, forcing the target to spin around and start to fall.

The second bullet passed through the left side of the skull, blowing the top of the head off and splattering a horrific mixture of blood, brains and bone all over the white plastered walls of No. 43.
Chapter 29

London

Friday

October 4th

7.30 p.m.

"Clear!" a voice called from the front room.

"Clear!" another announced from the toilet.

"Clear!" several others announced serially as one by one the rooms of Ray's flat were entered and searched for other targets.

Each room had been taken by a three man team, one standing to one side and pushing the door open, another standing directly in front of the door, primed to move in immediately the NICO 9 Burst 'flash and noise' stun grenade went off and started to bounce around the room, and another who stood behind him. The latter was responsible for taking the stun-grenade from its place on the back of the jacket of the man in front, holding it out briefly over the shoulder of the man in front and showing it clearly to him so that the man in front would know he was just about to throw it, counting down, and then tossing it in through the door.

As the grenade entered the room and went off, the men followed in after it.

Whereas those inside the rooms would be passively waiting or hiding and would be hopefully temporarily disabled by the bright explosions and concussive blasts, the SWAT Team would be moving quickly and aggressively, their action nullifying the effect of the grenades on them and allowing them to quickly overpower any resistance that they may otherwise encounter in the room.

Thankfully, there was no further resistance.

Within moments the flat was secure.

There were four dead.

Two of the bodies were no longer recognisable, their facial features either missing or so badly distorted that no visual identification would be possible.

A quick body search revealed something rather surprising.

One was carrying a very large amount of money in £50 bills. The other men were carrying guns, several knives and dark sun-glasses.

Before they had been messed up, they had all been dressed rather smartly, in expensive clothes, shoes, and designer watches, particularly the one who had been carrying the money and who no longer had a face.

Ferris had not expected this.

It appeared as if he had stumbled into the headquarters of a rather classy drug gang.

Unfortunately, Ray Luck, the man to whom the flat was officially rented, was nowhere to be seen.

Before calling in the rest of the team, Ferris had taken a moment to examine the flat himself.

Particularly the room at the back of the building that was filled with computers, servers, flat-screens and was currently illuminated by an annoying, flashing red light.

This was the room that most interested him.

It was obviously the centre of operations for whoever it was that had masterminded the attack on Unicorn - aka Randolph Best. There were several large servers, several flat screens to view data and images on, printers. Everything you would expect to see.

Except external hard drives or any laptops or tablets.

That worried Ferris.

It could be that Luck had backed everything up on the servers, hence why there were several of them - to provide redundancy. Or it could be that he had audaciously backed everything up in the cloud!

Ideally Ferris would have immediately liked to have started to ferret around on the systems to see what he could find.

Unfortunately, the large body count in the hallway precluded him simply sitting down and seeing what he could find. Any moment now the police would arrive and he would be consumed with bureaucracy and bullshit.

The main problem, however, was that the stun grenade that had been tossed into the room ahead of its penetration had destroyed the large flat screens: both had absorbed the compressive blasts, their screens smashed and splintered, and had then been pushed off the table onto the floor where they had received further damage upon impact.

The servers had also not come off well, but Ferris knew that so long as the hard-drives were not totally destroyed, they would still be able to recover all the files from them.

Ferris stared at the flashing light on the wall.

Almost miraculously it had survived the stun grenades and continued to broadcast a warning: although what that warning was about, Ferris was not sure.

While Ferris had just started to think about where Ray Luck could or might be, and what the relationship between him and the dead men in the hallway was, his mobile went off.

Ferris looked at the display to see who was calling him on his secure line, and immediately answered: it was his boss, Jacobson.

This was a call he had take.

What he had to report was not good.

Ray Luck was still at large, and until they recovered the hard drives from the servers and examined the data they contained, they would not know if they had the video file of Unicorn murdering the woman.

Until they had both of them in safe custody, Ray Luck would remain one of the top threats to the survival of the British Government.

As of this moment, Ray Luck had just become the most wanted man in the United Kingdom.

\------------------

7.33 p.m.

Trying to make as little noise as possible so as not to draw any attention to himself from anyone looking out of his flat's windows or to alarm any of the residents of No. 47, who in a worst case scenario might call the police to report a burglar, Ray had finally managed to make it safely down to the bottom of the fire escape.

Climbing down two metres to reach the metal ladder on the end of a dangling rope in pitch blackness above a fifty metre drop, had been the most scary thing he had ever done in his life - far worse than the experience minutes before of walking across the section of flat roof.

However, possibly not as scary as the next few hours may prove to be.

After having managed to find the top of the metal ladder and lower himself slowly down onto it until he could grasp it firmly with both hands and find solid footholds, he had then taken a few minutes to try and bring his breathing under control.

Going down the ladder he couldn't afford to put one foot out of place. He needed to be fully in control.

Still shaking like a leaf, he had then managed to slowly descend the ladder, one rung to another, eventually coming level with the bag, untying it and swinging it carefully across one shoulder, before continuing on down.

Now unbalanced, it was even more difficult than before, and he found that he could no longer look down, forcing him to 'sense' the position of the next rungs as he lowered himself from one rung to another rather than actually see them.

In total, it took him about five minutes to descend the fifty metres, and as soon as his feet touched terra firma, he looked up towards his bedroom at the end of the building, praying that no one had seen him.

Luckily, it seemed that no one had.

Getting this far, however, was not the end of it.

Now he was on the ground, he was in the communal garden that ran the length of about seven of the buildings.

To make his way to safety he had to cross the garden to the other side, climb up on top of a shed, ascend the high stone wall, and then drop down into the garden behind. Once there, he would be able to cross that garden, and then find himself facing the wall that separated that garden from a small mews behind it. If he could climb that wall, and get down safely into the small street behind, the only entrance to the street was from the main road which was on the other side of the buildings on the other side of the rectangular gardens that all the buildings around it shared.

By walking along the mews, he would come out onto the main road that ran parallel with the street where the entry to his building was, and from there he could catch a bus in any direction to get as far away from there as possible.

But right now, getting as far away as possible, in once piece, and still breathing, was Ray's main priority.

What happened afterwards would be something that Ray would figure out later, if he was still free and alive.

\------------------

St. Cecilia's Square

7.36 p.m.

Within seconds of the shot being fired, both the bodies on the ground were surrounded by four members of the SWAT team that materialised almost mysteriously out of the bushes in the park and from behind parked cars in the streets.

The SWAT team split into pairs, each checking one of the bodies.

While one of the tall men in black kept his MP-5 cocked and pointed directly at the first of the bodies on the ground, the other approached it cautiously, and checked it for signs of life.

There were none.

The second bullet the body had received entered at an angle into the neck and had removed most of the flesh on the right of his spine, taking with it all the blood vessels including a piece of the jugular, ripping it out as the impact of the bullet had been absorbed by the body.

The bullet had done its job. The 9mm rounds the SWAT team carried were designed to bring any target down, the bullet spreading on impact and imparting its full momentum to the target, and ensuring that it did not pass through the body.

Their purpose was very different from soldier's bullets which were designed to pass through a target and carry on beyond it - hopefully then hitting a second or maybe even a third target in quick succession as it continued on in its trajectory.

A second SWAT team member probed the other body, this time quickly determining that he was alive and unharmed.

"Put your hands behind your back!" the SWAT team member ordered, quickly placing a plastic loop around the man's wrists and pulling it tight, locking his two hands painfully together.

"Roll over," the man ordered, the SWAT team stepping back, just in case the man had booby-trapped his body.

"Stand up and turn towards me!" the SWAT team member ordered.

The man who had been lying face down on the ground complied.

When he turned around towards the SWAT team, the three men raised their weapons high, the first man once again shouting.

This time it was a question.

"Why are you smiling?"

The man's smile made the SWAT team nervous. What did he know that they did not?

"I'm still alive and you just saved my life!" the man answered.

"What is your name?" the SWAT team leader quickly demanded.

"David," he replied. "My name is David."

\------------------

7.48 p.m.

Ferris's job was done.

Before the IT Forensics team had arrived, and he had granted them access to the room with all the computers in, he had searched everywhere of relevance and removed a few objects for himself.

He felt uneasy about all of this.

There was something going on here that he didn't understand.

One of the men in his team had scanned the two faces of the bodies in the hallway, and uploaded the images to headquarters. Almost instantaneously it was confirmed that neither of them was Ray Luck. There was a possibility that either of the other two men with no recognisable facial features remaining could be Luck, but Ferris doubted it.

Their online database immediately announced that the two men were known criminals. Heavy duty members of one of the most dangerous and wanted crime gangs in England.

What were they doing in Luck's flat?

Did Luck work for them?

Was Luck a cover, a made up name?

Were the crime gang the ones behind it all, who, if they had not been killed, were intending to blackmail Unicorn?

"Ferris?" one of his colleagues asked, knocking on the door and requesting entry.

"Come. What's up?"

"I think you need to hear this," Agent White said. "This is David Anderson. He's a neighbour of the man who owns this flat. We just arrested him outside in the street. Mr Anderson has intel about Ray Luck and who these dead men are..."

It took twenty-five minutes for David Anderson to tell his story, and by the time he was finished, Ferris knew several things.

Firstly, Ray Luck had clearly invited the criminal drug gang and its leaders to his flat in the specific hope that they would get trapped by his men and either arrested or killed. It was evidently his way of helping David Anderson out of a situation that had got out of control and for which Ray Luck was partially responsible.

Secondly, it meant that Ray Luck had anticipated that they were coming for him.

He knew he had been rumbled.

Ferris turned to look at the flashing light on the wall.

In an instant, it all made sense: the flashing light, the lack of a laptop, external hard-drives, the freshly shredded paper that Ferris had found in the shredder. Ferris had known they were coming...he had planned his escape and got out of there before anyone else had arrived.

As he was thinking, Ferris's eyes were scanning the contents of the computer room, his eyes noticing for the first time the blinking green light on the back of one of the monitors. It signified that the monitor was connected to the network...and although the screen was dark and broken, there was still some active communication that was going on...

With further recognition dawning on Ferris, he dived forward, pulling out all the plugs from the walls, switching off all the IP devices and servers still in the room.

He looked quickly at his watch, estimating the time it had taken for them to get here, and how much time had elapsed since they had broken through the second firewall and discovered who Ray Luck was and where he was operating from: it had been all of about fifty minutes.

"Blast!" Ferris shouted aloud, staring at the servers, cursing himself.

He wouldn't be able to have it confirmed until a few hours later, but already Ferris knew what the IT Forensics guys would tell him: the servers had been wiped clean. Overwritten with dummy data.

Luck had started a data-washing programme before he left, and all the time he had been standing in the flat, Ferris had been an idiot and let the program continue to run in the background.

His only hope was that he'd still managed to pull the power in time, and that somehow there might be some data left on a device somewhere which could still help them find Luck.

The third piece of intel that Ferris now knew was this: Ray Luck had got clean away.

He had known they were coming - demonstrated by the flashing red light - and had somehow managed to sneak past them all.

With the nearest tube station only five minutes away, he'd be well gone now, and there was no point in immediately pursuing him.

Ray Luck was obviously a very clever man.

It made Ferris more angry, and in some strange way, more excited to think that the chase was not yet over - and that in fact it had just begun.

Ray Luck was out there, and Ferris was going to find him.

Ferris knew that his escaping was only a hiccup in the process: ultimately, they would catch him, and probably very soon.

He was one man.

They had all the resources of MI5.

It would only be a matter of hours before Ray Luck would be caught.

Ferris smiled.

This hiccup would make the final victory that much sweeter, as well as giving him the perfect excuse to inflict a little more pain than necessary during the interrogation which he couldn't wait to enjoy.

"So, Ray Luck, your luck may not have run out yet, but it will. Very soon!" Ferris muttered under his breath. "That much I promise..."

\------------------

7.55 p.m.

Ray dropped his bag onto the seat beside him at the back of the bus, keeping his head down and staring out of the window.

Before leaving the shelter of the cobbled mews and joining the hustle and bustle of busy London life on the main road beyond, he'd taken a woman's long black burqa body coat out of his bag and put it on, his body and face now completely covered, thus ensuring that his identity would be concealed from the CCTV cameras in the street and on the buses and public transport.

Ray knew that his life had now changed.

For how long, he didn't know.

He didn't have a plan.

Yet.

For now he knew that he had to live in the shadows and escape and evade capture at all times.

He was under no illusion as to the seriousness of the situation he was in.

He knew it was wrong, but he couldn't resist catching a bus that took him past the entrance to the square he lived in. As the bus had sat in the queue waiting for the lights to change outside the tube station at South Kensington, he had been able to see right into his Square from the top deck of the bus.

What he saw confirmed everything he had feared: the square was blocked off with quite a number of vans and unmarked cars, and the street outside his house was swarming with fully armed SWAT teams.

They'd come for him just as he knew they would.

"They."

Who 'they' were he did not know.

There were no police cars. No regular signs of authority.

Whoever it was, it was not the regular police.

As the first bus he had boarded pulled off and drove on, Ray knew that he would never be able to go back to the square.

At least, not for a very long time.

The people who would now be taking his flat apart, bit by bit, looking for the video he had taken of Randolph Best murdering an innocent woman, knew what Ray Luck looked like.

What's more, they knew everything about him.

They would have copies of his birth certificate, his credit cards, his medical records, his school and university records, his phone records, and his last browsing habits on Google and Firefox before he had started to use Ghost.

Soon they would know details of all his friends, their friends...their medical records, their telephone numbers...

In this digital world, the government forces that were now looking for Ray would soon quickly discover every single aspect and detail about his life that there was to know.

In short, they would now know more about Ray than he did himself.

Ray knew that very soon photographs of him from his teenage years until today would be flying across the internet, any and all recognisable images of him being shared with every other government agency or police department in the world that might help track him down.

Computerised CCTV camera systems across the country would soon be programmed to pick up images from passers-by in the street and compare them with the photographs that they now had of Ray.

As soon as one camera - it could be a traffic camera, a camera in a shop, a CCTV camera in the street, anywhere - caught a view of his face in sufficient detail that it registered as a match to one of the known photographs they would now have of him, then he would only have minutes before he would be arrested.

Right now, Ray's appearance and identity were his biggest weaknesses and posed the greatest threat to him being caught.

Before the evening was over, Ray would have to vanish from the face of the planet: as the Phoenix rose from the fire, another person would have to rise from the embers of Ray.

Who? Ray did not yet have a clue.

Where would he take refuge? Likewise, another detail that he had not yet figured out.

For now, Ray knew that he had two goals.

Firstly, to get to Paula's and to see Emma before she left for Canada. With any luck - not his luck...luck that hopefully she would get from elsewhere - she would be able to catch her flight early tomorrow morning as normal. She had to get out of the country fast, before her name made it onto a watch list and she was picked up as she tried to board a plane.

Canada would be the best place for her.

Secondly, Ray had to stay free, and alive.

He didn't have a plan. Yet. But so long as he was free, he would have time to think of one.

In the next thirty minutes, Ray changed buses three times, zigzagging his way across the city towards Paula's house.

As he got closer and closer to his goal, his thoughts slowly began to crystallise.

Ray Luck, once the hunter who had taunted Randolph Best, teased and threatened him, had now become the hunted.

So long as he was free, the only power that he could barter with would be his ability to release the video of Randolph Best to an unsuspecting world and potentially topple the UK Government through the ensuing scandal.

Ray knew that it was a chess piece that if played correctly, would save his life.

It was also the only chess piece he had.

END OF BOOK ONE

To continue reading 'I spy, I Saw Her Die: Book Two' and to discover the answers to the questions below and much more, please purchase Book Two.

In Book Two discover the answers to the following questions:

1: Who killed Bayla Adelstein?

2: Will Ray Luck be caught and killed by Ferris?

3: What is the terrorist plot that threatens London?

4: Who was the 'falling man' that squashed Eva Baczkowski in the opening scene of the book?

5: What is the secret conspiracy that threatens world peace and how can Ray Luck stop it?

6: Will Emma be killed, and by whom?

7: RobinHood: friend or foe?

8: Will Ray Luck's luck finally run out?

9: What is the surprising ending that will keep you on the edge of your seat till the very last word of the book?

IF BOOK TWO IS NOT YET AVAILABLE ON THE SITE YOU PURCHASED 'BOOK ONE' FROM, SIMPLY TYPE

"I spy, I saw her die (Book Two) "

INTO YOUR INTERNET BROWSER TO FIND AN EBOOK VENDOR THAT SELLS IT.

PLEASE PURCHASE IT FROM THERE.

Please look out for others books by IAN C.P.IRVINE :

Haunted From Within

Haunted From Without

Time Ship

The Orlando File

The Messiah Conspiracy

London 2012 What If?

The Sleeping Truth

Alexis Meets Wiziwam the Wizard

If you have any comments, please contact the author at :- iancpirvine@hotmail.co.uk

To connect with Ian C.P.Irvine on Twitter, connect with Ian at @IancpIrvine

To keep up to date with other news, events and ebook releases, please visit the website at: www.iancpirvine.com or http://www.free-ebook.co.uk/

Dec 2015

