by Rob Sinclair
‘Come on. We’ll watch from a safe distance.’
‘This is close enough,’ Cox said.
One or two heads turned in their direction, but quickly looked away again. Further in the distance, by the large wrought iron gates to the cemetery, the officers on horseback came into view, guarded either side by a parade of police officers stretching past where the eye could see. Behind the horses trailed the long line of black hearses.
Cox felt her legs go weak.
‘I need to go,’ she said.
Cox turned and traipsed across the wet ground, towards the exit, not once looking back.
EIGHTY
Birmingham, England
Aydin was sitting on a bench in Canon Hill Park, not far from the centre of England’s second biggest city. With a steadily thickening beard and cap on his head, no one recognised him from the grainy photos in the newspapers.
In front of him families pedalled oversized plastic swans on the small boating lake. Kids whizzed around the play area beyond. People on bikes glided by, joggers huffed and puffed. So many people out and about just getting on with their lives, even though it was just days since the attacks that nearly crippled their society. Their resilience wasn’t just heads-in-the-sand, though. The attacks had brought communities together.
She approached slowly from the opposite side of the park dressed casually in jeans and trainers, a woollen jumper and a baseball cap that did the trick of covering much of her face. But Aydin knew it was her.
She sat down without saying a word.
‘Why you haven’t turned me in?’ he asked, trying his best not to cough, knowing that it would send a wave of stabbing pain right through him.
‘Because you did the right thing,’ Cox said, though she didn’t sound too convinced by that. They both knew he could have done more, that he could have acted sooner. ‘It’s not your fault, what they made you into. You’re fighting it. That’s what counts.’
Cox looked away. Aydin knew she’d crossed the line more than once to help him. She was probably the only person in the world who didn’t now want him dead. What was Cox to him? He didn’t know how to explain what their relationship was.
‘We got most of your brothers,’ she said, ‘but the Teacher and the others at the Farm are still out there. They’ll come for you.’
‘I hope they do.’
They both fell silent for a moment.
‘Is there any news?’ he asked.
Now that the attacks were over, now that his original purpose had expired, he felt alienated and lost. He had no idea what came next for him, for his brothers in custody, or what was happening at the Farm. But Cox and MI6 surely had a plan. They’d always have their tentacles reaching out across the globe, looking for something, anything, to get stuck into. Aydin would leave this place today, and he was sure he’d be on their hit list too, regardless of the good Cox may or may not have seen in him.
‘Wahid and the others aren’t talking,’ she said. ‘But we’ll keep on trying.’
Aydin ground his teeth. He was still angry that she hadn’t let him kill Wahid. That she shot Aydin instead, in the back. Once the bullet hit, he was out of it. He couldn’t remember what came next. All he knew was that when Cox came over to check him, Wahid managed to fight back. She was busy apprehending him as Aydin stumbled away and disappeared into the cloud of dust. Cox insisted she only intended to wound him. Perhaps that was the truth. After all, she was talking to him now.
‘You should have let me kill him,’ Aydin said.
‘I couldn’t.’
‘You let him off.’
‘I tried to do the right thing. Maybe I could have done more. We both could have.’
Aydin looked at her and saw the hurt in her eyes. She was feeling just as bruised about what happened as he was.
‘And what about my father?’
‘There’s no clear evidence that he’s still alive.’
‘That’s a strange way of putting it,’ he said. ‘You could have said all the evidence we’ve seen suggests he’s dead. Instead you turned it round. Essentially it means the same thing, but really it’s quite the opposite.’
‘You think he’s still alive?’
Aydin didn’t answer the question, didn’t even know if he wanted it to be true.
‘It’s possible Nilay thought the same thing,’ Cox said. ‘She was searching for what happened to both you and him.’
‘And that’s what got her killed.’
A longer, more awkward silence followed, and Aydin felt he was done. He really didn’t know what else could be said. But Cox wasn’t quite finished.
‘What are you going to do?’ she asked.
He considered the question for some time, his mind going back to his teachings at the Farm.
‘There’s a well-known fable about an archer and an eagle. Have you heard it?’ he asked.
‘I don’t think so,’ Cox said. He saw the look of both confusion and intrigue in her eyes.
‘The story goes that there’s a predatory eagle, swooping over fields of barley. This eagle is the king of its domain. It spies a beast bounding through the field below. A rabbit. This vicious eagle, belly grumbling in anticipation, swoops down. Now, this eagle never misses, and whatever the rabbit can offer isn’t enough. The eagle crashes down on top and digs its talons into the little critter’s neck. The eagle is just about to fly away with its catch when there’s a whoosh, and an arrow comes flying out of nowhere, and plunges into the eagle’s chest . . .’
‘Kills it?’
‘It’s a bad wound. The eagle falls to the ground. Its talons are still wedged firmly in the rabbit, who’s writhing and crying. The eagle struggles to keep hold of its prey. Even though it’s dying, its instinct is that it can’t let this kill get away. It can’t fail this time. It never fails. But the rabbit somehow pulls itself free, and darts away into the barley. The eagle turns its head and looks at the arrow. And what does it see?’
Cox pursed her lips and shook her head.
‘It sees that the quills of the arrow are made from its own feathers. And the eagle says, “I should have felt bad indeed, to think any other eagle had a hand in this.” By the time the archer comes along, the eagle is dead.’
‘So, what are you saying?’ Cox asked. ‘You’re the eagle? The hunter is me shooting you in the back?’
Aydin laughed. It made his head pound and chest ache. ‘Actually, that almost fits, doesn’t it? But no, that’s not it at all, because there’s no moral there.’
‘Then what’s the moral? That we are the cause of our own doom?’
‘Closer. You asked me what I’m going to do next. Well, I’m the arrow. I am a product of them. The Teacher and the others at the Farm made me what I am. They’re the predator, like the eagle. They’ve tried to kill the innocent. They failed. And now this arrow will come back to destroy them all.’
Cox just stared at him and he’d loved to have known what she was thinking in that moment.
‘Then perhaps I should be the hunter,’ Cox said eventually. ‘Arrows are deadly, but they’re not much use on their own. They need direction, and power behind them.’
Aydin smiled. He got to his feet.
‘It was good to see you under more casual circumstances,’ he said.
‘And I’m sure we’ll see each other again,’ Cox said.
Aydin turned and walked away.
Acknowledgements
A special thanks goes to Ben Willis at Orion Publishing, without whom this book wouldn’t have happened. Thanks also to my agent, Camilla, and the rest of the publishing team behind the scenes who have helped make Sleeper 13 what it is. I’ve enjoyed writing every one of my books in different ways, and for different reasons, but Sleeper 13 feels particularly special to me. I’m massively grateful to all those readers, reviewers and bloggers who have been with me since I first self-published my work back in 2014, and to the many who have joined me along the way. Sleeper 13 may well be the first of my books you’v
e read, and if it is I hope you’ve enjoyed it, and that I’ve earned your loyalty now too.
About the Author
Rob Sinclair specialised in forensic fraud investigations at a global accounting firm for thirteen years. He began writing in 2009 following a promise to his wife, an avid reader, that he could pen an ‘unputdownable’ thriller. Since then, Rob has sold over half a million copies of his critically acclaimed thrillers in both the Enemy and James Ryker series. His work has received widespread critical acclaim, with many reviewers and readers likening his work to authors at the very top of the genre, including Lee Child and Vince Flynn.
Originally from the North East of England, Rob has lived and worked in a number of fast-paced cities, including New York, and is now settled in the West Midlands with his wife and young sons.
Also by Rob Sinclair
THE ENEMY SERIES
Dance with the Enemy
Rise of the Enemy
Hunt for the Enemy
THE JAMES RYKER SERIES
The Red Cobra
The Black Hornet
The Silver Wolf
OTHER BOOKS
Dark Fragments
Copyright
AN ORION EBOOK
First published in Great Britain in 2018 by Orion Books
Ebook first published in 2018 by Orion Books
Copyright © Rob Sinclair 2018
The right of Rob Sinclair to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor to be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978 1 4091 7594 0
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