Free Blood Moon Rising (A Beatrix Rose Thriller Book 2) by Mark Dawson Page A

concern.
    “I know what I’m doing,” he said, a little indignantly.
    “I’m sure you do,” she said, although she knew from experience that a career in Special Forces and a career in Group Fifteen were very different things. The former did not adequately prepare for the latter. It provided minimum baselines for physical and tactical capabilities , but active service in the Group required a certain mental state, an ethical flexibility, that came only with experience. It was something that was absorbed, the way that radiation seeped into the bones, slowly mutating the cells until the agent became something else entirely. It was a contamination. Faulkner, young and used only to stark blacks and whites, would not yet have been exposed to enough of it. She would have to remember that.
    He was looking at her curiously. “What happened in Russia?”
    “How much do you know?”
    “I know half the Group were killed.”
    She nodded.
    “And that you were involved.”
    She looked at him, as he was looking at her, and she nodded again. “Group Fifteen had a serious problem with vermin. An infestation . The man who was Control before Pope was the worst of all. He tried to kill me. He killed my husband and kidnapped my child. He tried to kill the agent who was Number One after me, too.”
    “John Milton?”
    “That’s right. You’ve heard of him?”
    He gaped. “Of course I have. He’s a legend.”
    Beatrix smiled. Green and starry-eyed.
    “How many did he send?”
    “He sent six to take us out. We sent six back in body bags. I expect Pope is working hard to replace them.”
    “He didn’t say very much. I knew something had happened, but it’s not like what I’m used to. There’s no banter. I haven’t even met any of the other agents.”
    “And you won’t, or at least not very often. You work alone most of the time.”
    The waiter appeared with their menus. There was an ex-pat in the kitchen, but he was hamstrung by the selection of ingredients that were available to him. They ordered steak and chips, and when the food came, Beatrix found she was very hungry.
    She set about her steak. “I need equipment,” she said between mouthfuls.
    “The Group has a quartermaster operating out of Basra. He’ll get you whatever you need. We’ll go first thing tomorrow.”
    “And then?”
    “I thought we could take a drive out to Rumaila. Take a look around.”
    They ate in silence for a moment.
    “Do you want to tell me what your plan is?” he asked her.
    “What do you want to know?”
    “I don’t even know exactly what you’re here to do.”
    “Two things.”
    “I know what I’m here to do: get Mackenzie West out of Iraq.”
    “That’s the first thing. What do you know?”
    “Just what Pope told me: that he wants to go public about the way Manage Risk are behaving with the locals. And that we want him to do that so he can cause them a headache.”
    “That’s right.”
    “But that’s Pope’s agenda, isn’t it? The government’s? What are you here for? The second thing?”
    “The vermin problem.”
    “There’s a rat here?”
    She nodded. “A particularly nasty one. A man who works for Manage Risk. Bryan Duffy. He and I have unfinished business. I need to be alone with him for five minutes.”
    “The kind of meeting where two people go in and one person comes out?”
    “You’ve got the idea.”
    “Alright, then. That’s all I need to know.”
    “You’ve got no problem with that?”
    “I wouldn’t be in the Group if I did, would I?”
    “No,” Beatrix said. “You wouldn’t.”
    Let’s see , she thought. Let’s see if you still feel that way when it’ s time.
    “Which order do you want to go after them?”
    “I don’t think it makes much difference. Duffy knows I’m co ming.”
    “So what’s first?”
    “Let’s have a look around tomorrow. I might get an idea.”

    They had a drink after their meal, and then Beatrix excused herself and said that she needed to rest. Faulkner