Private Princess

Chapter 77

Peter Knight slotted his ID card into the garage’s door, and followed it with the biometric data of his thumb print and retinal scan. Only on the authentication of all three did the heavy deadbolts click open, Knight raising his hand to the cameras that monitored his every move. The security of his headquarters was more than a match for any building in the UK.

It was with a clouded mind and heavy feet that he walked Private’s hallways. He had known Jack Morgan for years, and he had never seen the American act this way. Morgan had always been a focused, driven individual, headstrong, even — how else could he have built the world’s biggest private investigation firm? — but his single-minded desire for revenge was worrying Knight. Knight knew that he and Hooligan had saved Morgan’s life by pulling him back into the car and keeping him from rushing after Flex and into an inevitable trap. Now Morgan was out again, who knew where, and without anyone to stop him from making any rash moves. Flex was ex-SAS and highly trained in tactical warfare. In order to beat him and achieve the justice Morgan so desperately wanted, they needed to be as cold and calculated as he was.

Justice, he thought. What did that mean to him? Peter Knight had worked for a long time as part of the British criminal justice system. He had seen innocent people go to prison, and evil ones go free. The system was flawed, he knew, but overall he believed in it. What kind of society would it be where people felt the need, and the right, to dispense their own justice? Knight had studied cases from Indonesia to Venezuela. He knew what happened when law broke down and vigilantism took over. Inevitably, those vigilante groups descended into becoming gangs and cartels and murderous groups just like the ones they had at first stood up to, and Knight had no wish to see that on London’s streets.

And yet.

And yet, he had done nothing to stop Jack Morgan taking the car and leaving on what could only be the pursuit of Flex Gibbon. A pursuit that, deep down, Knight knew would not end with Flex being handcuffed and put into the back of a police car. It would end with a casket, and spadefuls of dirt.

Knight strode toward the tech lab. “We need to track, Jack,” he told Hooligan.

“Already on it,” Hooligan replied intently.

“He didn’t disable the tracker?” Knight asked, frowning. As head of Private, Morgan was aware of all standard operating procedures. One of the most basic of which was to tag and track all of the Private fleet.

Hooligan shook his head. “He didn’t, surprisingly.”

Knight was confused — why would Morgan go it alone, unwilling to disclose his intent, but leave the electronic signature of his whereabouts?

“Where is he now?”

“Well, that’s odd.” Hooligan frowned, looking again at his screen, and then to Knight. “He’s at Horse Guards.”