Private Princess

Chapter 100

The first location sent to Morgan was a waypoint. Morgan expected that Flex would hold the final destination until the last moment, but the muscle-bound murderer needn’t have worried — Morgan had no intention of alerting anyone who could stand between himself and Flex. His mind was as set as a Marine charging an enemy machine-gun nest, focused on nothing but the result of his actions — his own safety an afterthought unworthy of consideration.

Flex’s first direction sent Morgan to Brixton. The second, to Waterloo. Morgan was then instructed to proceed to Lewisham, until Flex called back with the location of the true meeting place: London Bridge.

At first the site of the meeting point surprised Morgan. It was public. It had limited access. Perhaps Flex really did intend to honor the swap? Or perhaps, like Morgan, he was ready to die to get what he wanted, and the bridge was the best bottleneck to make sure that happened.

“We’re going to go in on foot,” Morgan told Herbert, remembering the barriers that had been put in place to stop terrorists from driving vehicles into pedestrians, and knowing that any stopped car on the structure would draw instant scrutiny from the security services.

“You realize your best chance to live is by doing what I say?” he asked the man again.

Herbert nodded, and Morgan ripped away the tape that had covered the man’s lips. Herbert grimaced as pieces of skin tore away with it. The tape on the man’s hands would stay, covered by a coat, the hood pulled up over the man’s head and zipped in place to act as an impromptu straightjacket.

“I’ve counted my rounds. You mess this up, I’m holding one back for you.”

“I won’t,” Herbert promised. “All that crap that mental bastard told me about unit loyalty and honor, and then he goes and tells you to stick a bullet in me? Give me a gun and I’ll shoot him myself.”

Morgan smiled at the idea. “Out the car.”

They left the Focus in a disabled parking bay next to London Bridge station. Morgan had no intention of coming back to it, and had pushed the revolver into the front of his trousers, the semi-auto in the back. Herbert had said that Flex expected Morgan was behind the Knightsbridge shooting, and so it was safe to assume he knew Morgan would be packing heat as a result. What Morgan couldn’t guess was whether or not Flex would ask him to expose those firearms on the bridge, and to draw the inevitable attention that would bring.

“He won’t give you your mate.” Herbert shook his head. “He’s a nutter, and all he’s talked about for months is killing you.”

Morgan ignored him, instead taking in his environment. The area was quiet, but slowly breathing its way to life — early birds in suits made their way toward the station. A street sweeper cleared plastic glasses and cigarette ends from outside a pub. Looming above all this was a thousand-foot-high sentinel, the Shard, looking like it had been plucked straight from one of Tolkien’s fantasy worlds then clad in glass.

Morgan looked at his watch — 5:28. They would hit the bridge’s center at exactly the time of Flex’s request. The bridge itself was a flat expanse, the pedestrian pavement on each side as wide as its two traffic lanes. Across it came a dribble of cars and lonely pedestrians, people ensconced in their own worlds, with no idea that life and death was about to pass them by within meters.

“Keep on my left side,” Morgan told Herbert, wanting to keep the firing line of his right hand free. “You see any of Flex’s people?”

“It will only be Rider with him. It was only me and him that Flex brought in.”

Morgan kept looking over the people ahead of him nonetheless. He wasn’t about to make assumptions based on the word of a man who had tried to kill him.

“Where the hell is he?” Morgan growled as they reached the center of the bridge’s long span.

There were no stopped vehicles. No sign of Flex’s bulky form, or Rider’s rangy figure.

“Where the hell are they?”

“Traffic?” Herbert suggested.

Morgan shook his head. At this time of the day the roads were almost bare.

Too late, he saw the trap that had been set.

“Shit!” hissed Herbert as he saw the same. “We’ve got to run!”

But Morgan did nothing.

He simply watched as the police car came slowly across the bridge, and indicated that it was about to pull up alongside them.

Morgan had been set up.