***

Back in the hotel room, Pete set up the equipment one more time to ensure it worked properly before they returned it. He set up the two tripods, one at the front and one behind, and then clamped the 1600mm lens on to them both, securing them with tension screws. He removed the lens cap and moved to the back of the lens. Instead of a lens mount, which would normally attach the lens to a camera, there were a series of computer ports. He slipped a blue data cable into the lens network port and connected the other end to the laptop.

Because the 1600mm lens was so difficult to manoeuvre, he sighted his target with the handheld spotting scope and used the readings to set the trajectory of the main lens. He then sat down at the computer and operated the cross hair focussing automatically from the trackball in the middle of the keyboard.

Once it was fully focussed, he fired off half a dozen shots. If she had ever seen them, the buxom blonde bar tender in the atrium bar would wonder how anyone had managed to get so close to her with a camera yet remain unseen. So close, in fact, that they could see down her cleavage to her lacy blue wonder bra.

Pete was still cropping the risqué image when Dee slapped him playfully on the back of the head.

“Put that away, you pervert. We have a meeting to go to.”

Chapter 5 5

Courtyard Marriott Hotel, Lynchburg, Virginia,

Monday 24 ^th January, 7pm.

Steve Post drove into the car park of the Courtyard Marriott at precisely seven in the evening. The drive through the Virginia countryside had been comfortable and traffic free. He swept his new Chevrolet Equinox into one of the marked parking spaces. Inevitably black, the vehicle had evidently caught the eye of the admiring parking attendant. The sleek crossover, something between a saloon and an SUV, was still a rare sight in Virginia, and its flowing lines suggested a European design influence.

The air was damp and cold, his breath visible in a cloud of vapour, and he was not wrapped up well. He scurried across to the lobby, where he encountered Pete chatting to the concierge.

Pete acknowledged him with a brief nod, and pointed into the bar as he continued his intense conversation with the concierge. Steve saw Dee sitting in a booth at a table by the window and joined her. Sliding along the bench opposite her, this was the first time they had been alone together on this trip, the first time since that fateful night in Quantico.

“You look contented,” he said. Dee was puzzled by the comment, especially as he was aware of the problems she had encountered that day.

“You always looked tense before, even when you were relaxing. Josh must be good for you.”

She didn’t believe her contentment was visible, but she had to accept that married life was far more comfortable than she had imagined it would be.

They talked quietly about their respective spouses; the conversation was easy and relaxed. It seemed that they had both found their soul mates. The conversation turned to the case at hand, and Pete returned to the table brandishing several sheets of printing.

Dee ordered drinks. She had a house white wine, Pete had a Bud and Steve took a diet coke.

As they sipped their drinks they passed the papers around. Each one had a picture of a pretty young woman with short fair hair placed squarely in the middle. The clarity and resolution of the pictures, taken from around half a mile away, was superb.

“That’s some great optics you have at your disposal, Steve,” Dee said, envy in her voice, knowing that Vastrick were unlikely to spring for the ten thousand pounds it would cost to obtain such equipment, given that it would be used only occasionally.

“Obviously you are sure this is our girl?” Steve asked, knowing the answer. He too had seen pictures of Gillian Davis, longer hair, same features, collecting some kind of award in the UK. Dee and Pete nodded.

“These photos were emailed to Scotland Yard, to DCI Coombes and his Sergeant. They are keen to interview her, and not just because it means a taxpayer funded trip to the USA.” Dee lifted the mood of both of her male companions with her smile.

“One thing is for sure. They can’t expect the US to extradite her, not at present and not with her newly found contacts,” Steve confirmed.

“Do we all think that she is exploiting her old man?” Pete theorised. “I mean, she could have sought him out before now. I was wondering whether she had always planned this trip, you know, as a contingency if the whole UK thing unravelled.”

“I’m not so sure,” Dee mused. “That would be pretty cold. And whilst I accept that you have to be cold to be a paid assassin, it has to be different in your personal life. You would go mad otherwise.”

“Pete has a point, Dee. But it gives us a problem. You recall the training at Quantico, with Professor Norton? She might fit his definition of a sociopath. If she is a sociopath she will be able to manipulate those around her and convince everyone that she is just a simple girl who the government trained to kill people.”

“Or that could be the truth; she could be a normal person whose training makes her act intuitively, particularly in terms of self preservation. It’s scary that the UK and the US might have trained hundreds of people who will eventually return home with alleged sociopathic tendencies from Iraq and Afghanistan.” Dee shuddered involuntarily.

They sat for a while, contemplating her words. Silence fell over the table like a heavy blanket.

“I’ll take these pictures and put them with the Scotland Yard request for an interview, to the Special Agent in Charge, the SAIC. We will try to facilitate a formal interview, but even with our ‘special relationship’ it will be down to Gillian Davis and her advisers as to whether she agrees to be interviewed by Scotland Yard. We may have to ask the questions ourselves, based on a crib list from DCI Coombes.”

Steve paused before continuing in a more cautionary tone. “The two of you have done some remarkable work. You have tracked down a murder suspect after she has successfully evaded the authorities, but we still face a great many hurdles.”

Steve counted out the issues on the fingers of his left hand. “One, Gillian Davis was a covert operative for MI5. She worked on secondment to the CIA, the FBI and to other agencies. She is owed a lot of favours and has a lot of embarrassing stories she could tell in a court room.

Two, she is essentially one of us; that is, she is a product of the war against terror and a successful product who could argue that she has probably saved countless lives. There is likely to be considerable sympathy for her in the secret services on both sides of the pond.

Three, even when operating with her colleague as the Chameleon, they continued terminating bad guys under contract. Until they took out the Israeli Minister, they had an unblemished record, and in all honesty he had been a terrorist himself in his younger days. Mossad were understandably angry but our diplomatic section say that the Israeli population, now largely émigrés, hated the sight of the man and were glad to see him gone. In our own Delta Force there is admiration for the work the Chameleon did in taking out that Somali pirate leader. The Chameleon was right under their noses and they didn’t see him until he wanted to be seen. The man is a legend.

Four, this lady has skills that the FBI, CIA, ATF and numerous other US agencies would kill for. She is one of the world’s best snipers, yet she looks like a kindergarten teacher. She speaks with a clipped English accent that could place her in situations we could never get an American into, and she is unknown in the international arena. We could send her anywhere and she wouldn’t attract any attention at all.