Private Royals

Chapter 14

With the security-cleared Major Cook acting as his chaperone, Morgan decided it was time to take a look at where the kidnapper had threatened to play his endgame.

‘Security’s impressive,’ he assessed as they cleared their second checkpoint, this one taking them from Birdcage Walk to Horse Guards Road and along the eastern edge of St James’s Park, now cloaked in darkness.

‘They’ll start ramping it up in the morning,’ Cook assured him. ‘By the time the crowds begin to turn up, there’ll be police and military all over the streets.’

‘And in the buildings,’ Morgan was certain. ‘There’ll be a few bored snipers eyeballing us right now.’

The pair walked on in silence, both searching for vulnerable points around the parade ground.

There were many.

‘What’s to stop someone coming in from the War Rooms on the southern side?’ Morgan asked. ‘The public have access to that. Could someone hide out in there?’

‘It’s closed the day of the Trooping,’ Cook explained, ‘and it was searched with dogs last night. The same will happen again this morning.’

‘What about this park? That’s a long border to cover.’

‘Foot patrols, static guards, CCTV and drones.’

‘That should do it.’

‘It should,’ Cook agreed.

The pair came to the parade ground itself. Tiers of seating and bleachers were arranged for the spectators that would flank the royal dais. On the gravel stood the small markers that signified the placement of each of the parading company’s troops.

Morgan turned to Cook, planning to ask her about the bleachers, but he held his tongue. Her eyes were on a memorial across the road that was bathed in light, the stone column lined with the figures of pensive soldiers in the uniform of the trenches.

‘The Guards Division Memorial,’ she told him, sombre.

‘Someone you knew?’ Morgan guessed.

‘John. A good friend of mine. He was killed in Babaji, Afghanistan.’

‘I’m sorry,’ he offered.

‘I know you are.’ She smiled weakly. ‘Your background is no secret, Jack. I know you get it.’

There was no reply Morgan could give. Like all veterans of combat, he did get it. ‘It’ was an unspoken shared experience, good and bad.

‘I have a question,’ she said suddenly.

Morgan wondered whether it would be one about the past or the present. He prayed it would be the latter.

‘Why are we here, Jack?’ she asked with genuine confusion.

Morgan could see there was more, and a look let her know that it was OK to say it.

‘Our job is to save Abbie, yes? If the kidnapper comes as far as the parade, then Abbie’s head’s already in a bag.’

‘Agreed,’ Morgan said simply.

‘Then why are we here?’

‘Because we’re working backward. They can’t kill her here, that’s obvious, so they have to do it somewhere else. Clearing security takes time. We’ve been held up twice for fifteen minutes, and that’s with no line and no crowds.’

‘I see where you’re going.’ Cook nodded her head.

‘Then run with it,’ Morgan challenged softly.

‘Everything about the parade’s timing is precise, and made public. Our kidnapper wanted the head rolling in front of the cameras, and there’s only one point in the parade where they can guarantee that — the march past the Queen.’

‘Right,’ he said, ‘and they’re going to need to be in position far ahead of time so that they don’t draw attention. When you have a parade full of soldiers standing frozen, any movement catches your eye. If they have the background we think they do, they’ll know that, and so they’ll be in position far enough ahead of time to avoid drawing attention. They’re going to need an escape route too. A way they can get out when everyone’s eyes are the other way.’

‘The march past is at noon,’ Cook told him from memory.

‘And the deadline for the ransom is at eleven. We figure out how long it will take to kill her and get in position here, then we have a radius for how close they must be.’

‘Makes sense.’

‘Sometimes you have to work these things from the tail end,’ said Morgan.

Cook smiled. ‘Sure.’

‘What?’

‘You know that even a small radius in central London is going to include literally thousands of properties, vehicles and boats, let alone people, don’t you?’

This time it was Morgan’s turn to grin. ‘You didn’t want to work for me because you thought it would be easy, did you?’