The Persona Protocol - By Andy McDermott Page 0,165

me up at the usual time tomorrow morning.’

‘Yes, sir. I’ll see you at six.’ The driver waited until Harper had opened the front door of the house, then climbed back into the Cadillac and drove away.

Harper entered the hall, going to the alarm panel and checking that everything was as it should be. The Director of National Intelligence was not granted round-the-clock protection by the Secret Service, but he still required a high degree of security. The fact that he had once summoned Adam Gray to his home – meaning that Gray surely now remembered where he lived – had been weighing on his mind, but requesting a bodyguard would have raised questions about his past connections to the rogue agent.

However, the display told him that the house remained secure. Satisfied, he entered a disarm code. The system chirped in confirmation. He headed down the hall, going into the kitchen—

A savage kick slammed into his stomach, knocking him breathless to the floor.

Despite her loathing of Harper, Bianca couldn’t help but wince at the violence of Adam’s ambush. ‘Don’t move,’ the agent ordered, drawing a gun – the DNI’s own, taken from a cabinet in his study.

Harper clutched at his midsection. ‘How – how did you get in here without tripping the alarms?’ he rasped, struggling to draw breath.

‘It turns out I was trained by the best,’ Adam replied. ‘Now, I want answers.’

‘Go fuck yourself, Gray,’ came the snarled reply. ‘I’m not going to tell you anything.’

‘I don’t need you to.’ Adam glanced across the kitchen to Bianca, who was setting up the PERSONA on the oak dining table.

Harper saw what she was doing. His eyes widened in alarm, and he tried to get up – only to have Adam’s heel crunch down hard on his sternum, forcing him back to the floor. Even through the pain, however, the older man was still defiant. ‘You just earned yourself a lifetime ticket to Gitmo,’ he gasped. ‘That’s if you’re not executed for treason!’

‘Shut up,’ Adam snapped. ‘I’m going to find out the truth about what happened in Pakistan. That’s what you’re afraid of, isn’t it? That’s why you pressured me into joining the Persona Project – so I couldn’t tell anyone what I knew.’

‘You didn’t know shit, Gray,’ Harper replied. ‘You didn’t then, and you still don’t. You’ve got your memory back, sure – but what does it tell you? Only that you fucked up, and got the Secretary killed – and your own brother!’

Adam stared at him for a moment – then bent down and delivered a fierce blow to his forehead with the butt of the gun, drawing blood. Harper let out an agonised cry.

‘Jesus!’ Bianca shrieked. ‘Adam, what are you doing? You’ll kill him!’

‘If I wanted to kill him, he’d be dead,’ he replied coldly. ‘Wire us up.’

She took out the skullcaps – then hesitated. ‘Adam, are you sure you want to do this? It’ll wipe your own memories.’

‘I don’t want to, but I need to. It’s the only way to find out what really happened. And we’ve still got the disk – you can re-imprint them.’

‘In theory,’ she reminded him.

Harper fought back through the pain, squinting up at his captor as Bianca placed the skullcap on Adam’s head. ‘You do this, and it’s all over for you,’ he said. ‘The US government will never allow someone to run around with all the DNI’s secrets in their head. They’ll take you out – both of you.’

‘Seems like that’s what you were trying to do anyway,’ Adam countered. ‘Baxter wasn’t shooting at my tyres. Did you order him to kill us?’

Harper ignored the question. ‘You should think about what you’re doing, Dr Childs,’ he said instead. ‘If you back out now, I’m prepared to be lenient.’

‘I suppose you’ll just drop the whole matter and I can go home, right?’ she said sarcastically.

‘Not exactly. But there’ll still be a possibility of your seeing merry old England again before you die of old age in a federal prison. You get one chance. I’d recommend that you take it.’

‘And I’d recommend that you take your offer and shove it up your arse,’ Bianca replied, drawing a quick smile from Adam – and a glare of furious outrage from Harper. ‘You’ve done nothing but bully and intimidate me ever since I arrived in the States. Well, not this time.’

‘It’s easy to act tough when your boyfriend’s pointing a gun at someone, huh? You think you’re Bonnie and Clyde? Well, remember how it ended for