Blackout - By Tom Barber Page 0,68

cocking handle and checking the mechanism inside the chamber. He had cleaned and oiled all the weapons the day before, and for street-bought guns they were in surprisingly good condition. He picked up a double-taped magazine and slapped it into the weapon, pulling back the handle and loading it, then picked up a black weapon case. Inside, there was a bazooka and a single rocket-propelled grenade that would insert inside the launcher with a click. That was it. Once that was done, it was ready to fire. Turning, he looked around, making sure everything was in order. As he did so, he caught another Breaking News report on the CNN screen.

Man killed by suspected sniper inside office in central DC, the screen said.

The big man allowed a faint smile to creep across his mouth.

Fraser was down.

Then he pulled open the door to the corridor of the empty building and walked out, closing it behind him and making his way downstairs to the car.

The building had a parking lot in the basement, protecting the men and whatever they were carrying from any prying eyes on the street, and as the lift dinged open the commander saw one of his men, Worm, sitting in the front seat of a silver Fiat, the engine running.

He moved forward and tossed the weapons on the back seat, covering them with a blanket. He slammed the door, then climbed into the front passenger seat, pulling the door shut.

'King is dead, sir,' Worm said, in Albanian. 'Shot him in the face. I made it just before the police showed up.'

'Good,' his commanding officer said, adjusting the seat in the car to accommodate his large frame. 'Let's go. We need to get to McCarthy before they do.'

Without another word, Worm nodded. He put his foot down, and the tyres squealed as the car took off towards the exit and the street outside. As they moved up the ramp and into the afternoon sunlight, the commander ticked off both Fraser and King from the checklist in his head.

Eight down.

Just three to go.

TWENTY

Unlike King, the reason that McCarthy wasn’t picking up his phone wasn't out of fear or apprehension. He simply hadn't been at home.

He'd just got back from his girlfriend’s place from across town, the time on the clock ticking to 2:30 pm. He had been asleep all morning after a heavy drinking session last night and hadn’t seen or heard anything on the news. He had a half-day today, working the afternoon shift from 3:00 'til closing, and wanted to freshen up and drink some water before he made his way over to the warehouse, his head pounding from the hangover.

Pulling the front door of the house shut behind him, he dropped his keys on a table by the door then walked upstairs, taking off his shirt as he went. Moving into the bathroom, he twisted on the tap for the shower, pulling off the rest of his clothes. He showered fast, peering out from behind the curtain to check the time on the clock across the room on the bedside dresser. It had just gone 2:10 p.m.

He didn’t mind the job at the depot. He was a manager and the pay was surprisingly good, enough to put food on the table and put his nine year old son through a local school. He had left the army in 2009 as a Sergeant, and had bagged the job at the warehouse immediately after he left. Staying in the army hadn't been an option for him. His views and the way he saw things had changed. He didn’t agree with the war in Afghanistan and he sure as hell wasn’t willing to put his life on the line for it. A lot of his friends were out there at the moment, and he knew it was likely at least some of them would never be coming back.

Turning off the water, he stepped out of the shower and dried off quickly, then brushed his teeth and towelled his hair, taking a few moments to drink as much water as he could from the tap to give his body a hand as it processed all the alcohol from the night before. Once he'd changed into his uniform, he moved downstairs, grabbing a blueberry muffin from a cupboard in his kitchen and heading to the front door. He took a coat from a hook and pulled it on, then stepped outside and locked the door behind him, taking a deep breath of