Crossfire by Andy McNab Read Free Book Online

. . .' His eyes
narrowed. 'You got family, Nick?'
    'I did have, once.' I got a sudden rush of pins
and needles in my legs, a sensation I hadn't
experienced for a long, long time. 'A little girl
who was a lot like your Ruby, as a matter of fact.
Her parents were killed, I was her guardian.' I was
vaguely aware that sweat was now leaking more
heavily down my face and tried to wipe it away. 'I
never really got the birthday thing right . . . In the
end I had to ask someone more reliable to take
over.'
    My memory stick was set to locked, and that
was the way I liked it. Somebody once told me I
lived life with the lid on, and I guessed they were
right. It was the way it had to be. How
was I supposed to function if I spent all my time
clicking thumbnails of a teenager dead on a
King's Cross bed? The image I tried to cling to
was of her bright and sparkly at the one birthday
I did manage to get right, at the replica of the
Golden Hind on the Thames.
    I was spared having to go there, and poor Pete
was spared having to listen. One of the rifle-company
lads appeared and stood next to me,
but it was Pete he was after. He had a blue Helly
Hansen T-shirt on under his armour, and a
brand-new tattoo of barbed wire curling round
his right arm. Here and there a few scabs still
clung to the ink – but not as many as there were
on the zits he'd popped on his face.
    Pete looked up at him with a big smile. 'Hello,
mate. What can I do you for?'
    The young lad smiled back. 'I heard you was a
tankie. My dad was, too – Jim Duggan, you know
him?'
    Pete moved his head from side to side in
thought mode. 'No, mate, sorry, don't ring any
bells. He still in?'
    The lad was Welsh, and flushed with pride for
his dad. 'No, he's here, in Iraq, working for one
of the security companies.'
    Duggan . . . The name suddenly rang a bell
with me. He was the boy who needed bigging
up. I held out a hand. 'I'm Nick, that's Pete. You
number one on the door tonight?'
    He got even prouder. 'Terry. Yeah, first time.
The platoon swaps round the entry teams.'
    'Good luck, mate. You know, until about four
years ago only special forces would be doing that
shit.'
    His eyes widened and he kept shaking my
hand, and Pete just kept looking at him, deep in
thought.
    'Yeah?'
    'That's right, mate. Big day. Good luck.'
    One of the RMP girls walked past and Terry's
eyes swivelled. Pete laid down his iBook, stood
up and wrapped a fatherly arm round him. 'You
do good tonight, my son, and she'll be all over
you like a rash.'
    Terry might have been about to get the party
gear on and make entry into a house packed with
guys wanting to kill him, but he was maybe nineteen
at a push. The RMP would have had him
soft-boiled for breakfast.
    Pete gestured at the iBook. 'If that old man of
yours is on email, you want to drop him a line?
Tell him you're OK?'
    Pete and I exchanged a glance. He knew as
well as I did that if tonight went to rat shit this
might be the last time he ever made contact.
    Terry was even more made up as he sat and
started tapping away.
    Pete stepped over to me, looking pleased with
himself. 'You know what? There would be stuff
I'd miss. Mostly the camaraderie. The brotherhood.
It's a bit like being a squaddy, what we do.
Even when you're up to your neck in shit, you're
surrounded by mates.' He smiled. 'We were in
Kabul when Ruby's mum fucked off to Spain
with the bloke who built our extension. It was
Dom and all the other guys who kept me afloat.'
    He slapped my arm. 'Sorry, mate, too much
information. If you do ever get there, though, the
Gandamack Lodge is the place to drown your
sorrows. Great bar. The city's not exactly awash
with them. All the news crews stay there, and it's
the circuit's watering-hole. Plenty of company.'
    The shout went up that the attack was over,
but we stayed where we were. The area still had
to be cleared before anyone could move.
    'Talking of keeping afloat . . .' he hit my arm
again . . . 'when Tel's finished, why don't you go
online to Sad Fucks