Rosconway
Carver, Tyrrell and Schultz arrived at the refinery a few minutes after the helicopters had left Northolt. Along the way Carver had learned a bit more about Major Rod Tyrrell, to give him his full rank and name, or ‘Rodders’, as he was known to his men. He and Schultz had served together in Iraq, Afghanistan and a smattering of other trouble spots. They were two tough, experienced fighting men and they talked to one another with an ease that downplayed, but never entirely ignored, the difference in their ranks. It was obvious to Carver that Tyrrell had earned Schultz’s complete respect. The battle-hardened sergeant major was well over six feet tall, with biceps like boiled hams and the gnarled, bulldog features of a rugby front-row forward. He had precisely zero patience for weakness, incompetence or bullshit of any kind. So if he was impressed by a la-di-da ‘Rupert’ — as the men referred to their officers — that was all Carver needed to know.
‘What a shambles,’ Schultz said disgustedly, as they drove past a minimal, painfully inadequate security check into a car park filled with randomly placed vehicles. People were milling around in various stages of aimlessness, confusion and phone-clutching panic, while security men wearing high-visibility yellow tabards over their black uniform jackets tried desperately to impose some kind of order.
‘An absolute clusterfuck,’ Tyrrell agreed. ‘But look on the bright side. If the good guys haven’t had enough time to get organized, then neither have the bad guys.’
Schultz laughed. ‘You always were a logical bastard, boss.’
‘Hmm,’ Tyrrell murmured, casting a sharp, narrow-eyed look at the pandemonium. ‘Let’s just hope that I’m also right.’