Free Hunter Killer by Chris Ryan Page A

nodded.
    ‘Heads down,’ he said. ‘We’ve got some cunt from the press sniffing around. MoD gave him access, fuck knows why . . .’
    Instantly, Danny and Spud turned their backs on the northern end of the LZ where everyone else was milling around. The soldier handed each of them a set of keys, and they climbed behind the camouflage of the Discovery’s tinted windows. Spud took the wheel, and followed the gesture of the soldier who pointed them across the LZ towards the exit, which was manned by two more soldiers. Moments later they were heading down City Road towards the river.
    Danny punched a postcode into the vehicle’s satnav that would take them to their safe house, then quickly checked through the glove box of the Discovery. Here he found the vehicle’s radio, hardwired in, and a magnetic siren that could be thrown on to the top of the vehicle if Danny and Spud needed to cut though the traffic. These were the only modifications that distinguished the vehicle from an ordinary civilian Land Rover. With those exceptions it was anonymous from the inside and out.
    At 09.55 they arrived at what was to be their digs for however long this operation lasted. The house itself was on the south side of Battersea Park, a two-storey, redbrick, Victorian end-of-terrace that to the untrained eye looked no different from any others along this street. As they stepped out of the car, however, black rucksacks slung over their shoulders, Danny immediately saw the security cameras pointing down towards the front door. He wondered who was monitoring them. Five? The Firm? GCHQ? Hereford? Could be any of them. Or all of them. He made a point of looking up into the camera and winking.
    He opened up the envelope Cartwright had given him the night before. Among the contents were two house keys – one for each of them – and a six-digit alarm code. Danny gave Spud his key and unlocked the door. A high-pitched beeping sound came from the alarm just inside. Danny punched in the code and it stopped. They quietly closed the door behind them.
    Danny and Spud checked over the flat wordlessly. Spud examined the windows on the ground floor – all locked from inside – while Danny moved through to the kitchen and checked the back door. It led out on to a decked area about six metres by five, on the far side of which was a locked gate. The kitchen itself was unmodernised, with plain white units and an old oven. There was a brew kit on the side but no milk, and the fridge wasn’t even on. Danny opened up a tall broom cupboard. Inside was a steel strongbox bolted to the floor. He fished inside the envelope for a third key, which opened up the safe. Inside, he found two Glock 9mm pistols – standard issue for the security services, even though the MoD had spent millions on the Regiment’s preferred Sig P266 in recent years. But the composite, hammerless Glock was light, easy to conceal, and reliable enough. There was a silencer for each handgun, two covert holsters and several boxes of ammunition, which he unloaded on to the kitchen table before returning to the strongbox. There was more stuff in here: two radios, which looked like chunky mobile phones, a couple of spare batteries, and a well-thumbed spiral-bound notebook containing lists of numbers, call signs, frequencies and codes. Tucked at the back was a snap gun, almost exactly the same as the one Spud had used the night before, along with a collection of bits and a small handbook of lock makes and sizes. Also, a small method-of-entry kit, comprising a two-ounce strip of military-grade explosive, about the same size as a packet of chewing gum, a two-inch-long, pencil-thin detonator, a battery pack and a roll of coated wire. A couple of vacuum-packed SOCO kits, no bigger than a paperback book. And, weirdly, some foil-wrapped ration packs, as if they were going to need those in the middle of London.
    Danny chucked all the gear back in the safe, locked it up again and returned to the kitchen