Blackout - By Tom Barber Page 0,62

and get McCarthy. Bring them in,’ Cobb ordered. He turned to Nikki.

'Keep trying both men,’ he said. ‘Don't stop until you get an answer.'

'Yes, sir,' she said, following First Team, who were already moving to the door.

After they left, Cobb turned to Jackson again, the two men now alone in the room.

'If anyone else dies, it's on you. Know that.'

'Spare me,' Jackson said. 'I don't remember pulling a trigger.'

'You knew what they'd done. You should have told me.'

'Look man, let me ask you something,' Jackson replied. 'If I had told you what these men did, would you still have been as determined to get them out?'

Cobb suddenly paused. Silence filled the room.

'That's what I thought,' Jackson said. 'We'd have been in this shit regardless of you knowing every detail. So don't try and pin any of this on me. They came after me today too, you know. It’s not just you.'

Cobb shook his head angrily. 'Say what you want, Jackson. Whatever will help you sleep at night. But you know as well as I do that a lot of innocent people died today, joining everyone who was murdered in the town that night. If you'd warned me, we probably could have saved most of our guys, or at least given them a fighting chance. If we survive this, I hope you can live with that.'

Jackson turned before he said something he'd regret, and walked to the window, taking a deep breath and watching the four armed officers leave in one of the new black Fords.

I hope you can live with that, Cobb had said.

You don't know the half of it, Jackson thought.

As the four officers of First Team headed out quickly, they passed Deakins on the stairs who was leading an attractive woman in her thirties and two young boys up to the second floor. When they arrived, they moved down the corridor and Cobb saw them coming as he walked out of the briefing room.

He turned and moving forward, kissed his wife, his two sons staring at the damaged glass of their father's office.

Behind him, Jackson walked out of the room and saw the family.

'I'll check on Fraser's situation,' Jackson said to no-one in particular, excusing himself and nodding to Cobb’s wife. He pulled his mobile phone from his pocket and walked down the corridor, disappearing out of sight.

Standing beside the doorway to the briefing room, the tech team working away in the ops room beside them, Cobb's wife turned to her husband.

'Are you OK? We saw what happened on the news.'

'I'm fine,' he said.

His two boys were looking up at him and he hugged them both quickly, one by one.

'Guys, I want you to go and sit in my office for the time being, OK? I need to talk to your mother,' he said. The two boys nodded and shuffled round the corner, stopping to look at the damaged glass up close.

Alone, his wife lowered her voice, allowing the concern on her face and in her voice to show.

'Jesus, Tim. Who did this?'

'Come with me,' he said, motioning to the briefing room.

She followed and he led her towards the notice-board.

It took him ten minutes or so to explain what had happened. He ran through everything, from Adams’ suicide to the anthrax hoax at the Embassy and the unexpected attack on the station. He told her about Blackout and Fletcher’s revelations about what he, Carver and Floyd did in that village. And finally, he told her about the men involved in that operation all being killed systematically, picked off one by one, and how the teenage thief trying to steal his car had saved his, Jackson’s and four of his men’s lives. His wife listened closely to the whole explanation, then shook her head in disbelief once he finished.

'So they know you're still here? That's so dangerous, sweetheart. They could be back at any minute.'

'I have men guarding downstairs, both entrances. No one gets in without ID.'

'But these are Special Forces soldiers, Tim, not street-thugs. You need to get out of here. They'll come back for you and try again and again until they succeed.'

'I can't leave. This is our base. Everything we need is here. And besides, what would I tell my men? That I'm going to leave them to fend for themselves?'

'But they aren't trying to kill your men, Tim,’ she said slowly. ‘They want to kill you.'

There was a pause.

Cobb shook his head, taking a breath and pacing the room. He didn't like his options.

'Your men