He scribbled his signature on the bottom of a stack of papers and handed them to his pinch-faced secretary, who nodded respectfully and left the room.
The colonel removed his reading glasses and tossed them on a new stack of papers. “I’m afraid things are getting worse out there.”
“I noticed.”
“No matter how hard we try, how hard we push, we can’t seem to get a handle on the population. They lost faith in government and by extension, the military, a long time ago. Problematic in the past, a bloody catastrophe now. People should have faith in their leaders to do the right thing. At some point, we lost that.”
He sighed, shook his head, and slipped his glasses back on. He read a report. “So, you found and annihilated the terrorists, I hear.”
“That’s right, sir.”
“They all perished during your second interaction?”
“That’s correct, sir. Except the leader. He managed to survive long enough for us to interrogate him.”
“That’s a shame. It would have been useful for us to interrogate them ourselves, see if we couldn’t loosen a little more information from their lips.”
“I believe their leader told us almost everything he knew about their activities, sir.”
The colonel peered over his glasses. “Yes. Almost. Tell me, did I ever tell you how I began my career in the military?”
“No, sir.”
“It was in intelligence gathering. I’ve always been an ambitious man and wanted to get to the top as fast as I could. So, I did what all ambitious men did – what no one else would. I did the dirty work. I discovered something very interesting when I met the prisoners. I learned how to get at a man’s innermost secrets. The truth is, he wants to tell you. He’s dying to tell you. There’s no need to resort to medieval practises. Just by talking and becoming friends, you discover everything you would want to know from him. People are far more open with you when they think you’re their friend.”
He put down the report in the out tray along with a stack of others.
“Thankfully, we have other sources, and together with what you found, we were able to locate every cell in the country.”
Laurie blinked at that. “You did? How, sir?”
“I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to discuss that with you. In any case, I can see I sent the right man for the mission.”
He stood up and approached Laurie, who hastily joined him. They shook hands. The colonel barely even touched him before he released it.
“Your honour and loyalty to the country is a beacon to us all.” Fitz flashed his teeth in what was meant to be a smile.
“What will my next mission be, sir?”
“Oh. Nothing quite as exciting as hunting down terrorists, I’m afraid. We’ll be in touch in due course.”
He turned toward the window.
Laurie stopped at the door and looked back at the colonel. He peered into the distance, into the future, perhaps, at the world he had to control somehow from this small office.
He exited and shut the door behind him.
“You may go in now,” the secretary said to the next appointment.
A figure stood up and straightened his tie.
Laurie was in his own world when he squeezed past the man. “Excuse me.”
“It’s no problem,” the man said.
Laurie recognized the voice right away. It was Finnegan. He wore a greasy smile that matched his shiny hair cropped tight to the top of his head.
“Finnegan?” Laurie said. “What are you doing here?”
“Here to see the old man. Word is, he wants to promote me.”
“Well, that’s… that’s great news.” Why was Finnegan getting the acknowledgement he was owed? Laurie shrugged the ugly monster of jealousy off. “Congratulations.”
Finnegan placed a hand on his shoulder and gave him a broad grin. It wasn’t warm. “I owe it all to you.”
“You did good work. You deserve it.”
“I didn’t say I didn’t deserve it. I’m saying it’s thanks to you I got this promotion and you got… politely passed over.” His whole demeanour changed. The friendly face and beaming smile were gone, replaced with the sharp grinning teeth of a shark. He leaned in close. “Those terrorists sang like canaries when we got down to business.”
Laurie’s stomach fell to the floor. His mouth barely moved. “What?”
“You don’t think I was going to let them slip through my fingers the way you did, do you?” Finnegan tutted. “It turns out one of the terrorists was Owain’s assistant, tasked with keeping him fuelled with tea, coffee, and cream cakes. He overheard a great deal of the details of the other terrorist cells, and we’ll be dealing with them in due course. It’s a brave new world out there, Laurie. You have to get with the program. It’s dog eat dog, and you just got bit.”
He turned his back on him. “No hard feelings, old boy. You know how it is. Better luck next time.”
Finnegan pushed the door open. His face melted into the shadows as he shut it behind him.
The door shut on Laurie’s career, on his future, on his honour.
Had Captain Burgess known the innocents they hunted were not the terrorists all along? In protecting the lives of the innocent, Laurie had condemned hundreds, maybe even thousands, to death.
Someone was attempting a coup. And it was happening right behind that door.
But it was going to have to be someone else’s responsibility. Laurie had done his part and his soul was much too heavy.
He walked through the busy scurrying office, no one even noticing he was there.
Chaos. Pure chaos.
In the next book in the series, Katie is hard at work building a commune when she's tasked with corralling escaped convicts, but when someone steals the town's food supply, she finds herself pitted against a far more dangerous enemy. CUT LOOSE is available now on pre-order.
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CUT THROAT
Book Two in the Cut Off EMP Post Apocalypse series
by Charlie Dalton
Copyright © 2020 Charlie Dalton
Published by Urgency
All Rights Reserved
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express
written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Cut Off (Book 2): Cut Throat Page 24
