London, England – Present Day

Entering the diner, Anna nodded at the man behind the counter before sliding into the booth across from Mikolaj. "How've you been?"

"My mother put me on diet." He shrugged, "Make me miserable."

"Sounds like." Anna took a breath, "Any women in your life?"

"No. Not interested."

She raised an eyebrow, "Men?"

"Can't trust them."

"Fair." Anna sighed and then caught Mikolaj's glance out of the window. "Don't mind them. They're tailing me to get at my brother."

"Are they trouble?"

"Only for him."

"You sure they won't be for me?"

"There's a back entrance to this place. I'll give you a ten-minute head start on them if you want."

"No." Mikolaj shook his head, "You leave first. They follow you and I know I'm safe. Simple as that."

"Fair enough." Anna reached into her pocket and extracted a letter. "Here's everything I could gather on a three-year-old. It's not much but it'll tide over your boss until his grandson can attempt to form sentences."

"And this," Mikolaj handed over a key. "Unlocks safety deposit box at the bank you chose. They think you are my wife."

"I've had worse dates." Anna took the key. "How long are you in town?"

"Few days. Just until box is empty and then I go back." Mikolaj tucked the letter into the interior pocket of his overcoat. "Work there is… stable, for now."

"I've not got a job to offer if you're hunting for one."

"No." He shook his head, nodding at her. "But I wish you well."

"Same to you." Anna winked at him, sliding out of the booth. "It's not every day I get to meet with Saint Nicholas so near Christmas. And I thought I wasn't getting any presents this year."

"Be careful I not find excuse to still leave you coal." Mikolaj gave her a bit of a smile as Anna left the diner and braced herself against the cold.

She was not more than a block away when two men, both of them two-thirds the size of Mikolaj, intercepted her on the street. Anna tugged on the edges of her coat and nodded at them. "Afternoon."

"Anna Smith?" The one with gray hair spoke first, reaching into his coat to extract a badge with matching credentials. "I'm DCI Crawley."

"Pleasure to meet you." Anna turned to the other man, her hands going into her pockets. "And you? Unless you're studying how a master plies his trade and are, therefore, under a vow of silence."

"John Bates," He showed his identification. "Technically I'm still training so I should probably stay a bit quieter."

"Not a quiet one?"

He gave her a little smile, "I tend to be vocal."

"Me too." Anna gave him a conspiratorial smile. "I'm quite the screamer."

She noted the uncomfortable shift from DCI Crawley and shrugged, "But that's beside the point."

"Probably."

Anna looked Bates up and down. "You look a little more weathered than the fresh faces they've got puttering the streets in those fluorescent vests."

"Because I am."

"And now you're in training?" When Bates nodded Anna shrugged up her shoulders again, "But I guess you never can tell when the desire to serve the country'll strike you. Or at what age you'll give in to the call of duty."

"It's my second term of service."

"You were a policeman before?"

"I served SBS."

"Thank you for your service." Anna turned back to DCI Crawley, "As fun as meeting you both has been, I do have other places to be."

"Places you'll go with your Polish boyfriend?" Anna raised an eyebrow as DCI Crawley nodded toward the window where Mikolaj sat drinking from a mug almost the size of Anna's head.

"He's not my boyfriend."

"So you've got other plans with him?"

Anna narrowed her eyes to study DCI Crawley before taking a breath. "He's just an acquaintance. Happened to be in town and we stopped to chat."

"Not a long chat."

"We're not that great of friends." Anna chewed the inside of her cheeks. "But I'm curious why you're curious. Or why you even know my name."

"We found it when we tracked the license plate on your car."

Anna gave a strained smile, nodding. "You're the blokes following my brother around aren't you? I should've recognized your drab trench coats but you kept far enough back I thought maybe you weren't all that curious."

"We're very curious where he's stashed the money he stole in that heist." DCI Crawley took a step toward Anna but she held her ground. "What do you know about it?"

"Only what happened in the court case." Anna let her smile relax a little. "If you knew me from my license plate then maybe you should've checked the court records. Pretty sure they recorded it and you'd see me in the gallery every day he was at trial."

"They never called you as a witness."

"His barrister didn't think a character witness was going to help someone going up for joyriding and possession." Anna bit at the inside of her cheek. "And you never could make those larceny charges stick so I guess that's no-never-mind now, isn't it?"

DCI Crawley's face purpled. "He stole that money."

"Not that anyone could ever prove and not that it would even matter since he's already served his time." Anna shrugged yet again, this time pulled at the fabric of her coat as she did so as if to say 'sorry-not-sorry'. "Guess that's the end of it."

"It was until someone rolled on his crew last year."

"It's not exactly an industry where people believe the phrase 'honor among thieves' is it?" Anna leaned forward, "More often than not they realize they've chosen a shit profession and they're not out to get their throats cut in a cutthroat world. It'd surprise you what people'll say to save their own skin."

"But you never said anything to save your brother's skin."

"As far as I knew, he confessed and he was guilty. I did my familial duty and that was that."

"Familial duty?" Bates spoke for the first time in the back-and-forth, causing both Anna and DCI Crawley to look at him. "But he's not really your brother, is he?"

"What makes you say that?"

"He's Irish and you're…" Bates almost winced, "Well you're a Northerner."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"It means you're not really his family."

"Not by blood but he's my step-brother so I consider it close enough." Anna shifted her position to keep both DCI Crawley and Bates in her line-of-sight. "My mother remarried and Tom was the additional joy to the family."

"Not your mother's first try at marriage, was it?"

Anna stiffened, "Not sure how that's relevant."

"I'm just trying to understand a case where you're protecting a brother that's not really yours."

"It's all a matter of perception."

"Like your mother leaving two previous marriages?"

Anna bit hard into her cheek. "Not that it's any of your business, but my mother and father divorced due to infidelity on my mother's part. She remarried a rather… Let's just say the world's better off with him not in it kind of man, and when he thankfully was no longer in this world she married Tom's father and moved to Ireland with him."

"Because she couldn't remarry your biological father?"

"The state, and most of society, usually recommends against marrying the dead." Anna checked her phone. "As lovely as this has all been, chaps, I think I'm going to have to leave this conversation. I'm a busy woman."

"Not so busy that you missed picking you your brother."

Anna let out a sigh, rolling her eyes. "Look, whatever beef you've got with Tom is between you and him. I don't care about the case and I don't care whatever's got your goat about it. Far as I'm concerned that's over and done with. So if you harass me again, you'll be speaking a solicitor friend of mine. Are we clear?"

She turned on her heel to leave when Bates spoke. "As clear as the Polish police were last year about the death of Ethel Parks."

Anna swallowed hard, forcing her fists to clench in the fabric of her coat's interior pocket before relaxing enough to turn back and face them. "What about Ethel Parks?"

"You were her hired security."

"I was."

"And yet she ended up dead?"

"That's what happens when you run afoul of Karol Brzycki."

Bates took a step closer to her, putting out a hand to wave off DCI Crawley. "And then he, and his five closest associates, ended up dead within a week."

"As I said," Anna strained her smile again. "It's a cutthroat business."

"One the Polish police left alone. Gave it a wide berth to the point Interpol thought about investigating but the case was ruled as gang violence."

Anna's eyes narrowed, "Sorry, Mr. Bates, but I don't think I read your credentials closely enough when you showed me your badge."

"It's an easy mistake."

"Hence why you showed them to me after DCI Crawley did." Anna closed her eyes, letting out a breath. "Did Henry Talbot send you?"

"He's not working with Interpol any longer." Bates cringed, "The case in Poland didn't exactly put him on good footing with the administration so he went back to MI5."

"Good for him."

"Not for you."

"And why's that?"

"Because you quit after Ms. Parks' unfortunate death."

"Let me make one thing very clear to you, Mr. Bates." Anna raised a finger. "Ms. Parks' death was not unfortunate. It was tragic and should've been prevented."

"And you blame Interpol for that?"

"Don't be ridiculous. I blame myself for that. I blame the Polish police for that. And I blame Karol Brzycki for that." Anna let her body relax a little. "May he burn in Hell for what he did to that woman."

"She performed an admirable service."

"We used her, Mr. Bates, not like Brzycki did but we used her all the same and she ended up stabbed through the throat for it." Anna checked her phone again. "Now, if that's all you've got to say about Poland, I'd rather leave it there. I don't like to talking about it."

"Because you left under a cloud?"

"Because I left and she didn't." Anna turned on her heel, "If you've got any other questions about a closed case and a dead woman you can find me I'm sure."

Black Site, London (?), England (?) – Eight Years Ago

Anna blinked as the pulled the bag from over her head, shaking herself to reorient with the room. Her hands twisted in the ziptie and she breathed out as she turned her wrists. Pain nudged at her tendons and muscles as she worked one hand over the other. It took a sharp exhale for her to dislocate her thumb and slide one hand free of the ziptie to leave the other shaking it on the table.

As she popped her thumb back into place the door opened and Anna curled an ankle around her chair to stop herself jumped at the sudden noise in the room she now realized was padded. Soundproofed. A shudder barely suppressed as a woman sat down across from her with a face like thunder and a pinched expression.

"I was curious how long it'd take you."

"Wanted to see before I got myself free." Anna pointed at the room. "Nice."

"You're certainly chipper."

"I've not very little to lose at this point and seeing as I'm somewhere no one'll hear me, I'd rather not go out without my sense of humor intact."

"How lovely for you." The woman opened a file on the table as Anna reached for the ziptie, twisting it in her fingers as if manipulating a balloon animal. "But that's not why you're here."

"I'd assume not since I don't think you're the kind for company." Anna set the reconfigured ziptie on the table, in the vague shape of a four-legged creature. "So why did you decide to kidnap me from my home?"

"Because it's the way the next phase of your application goes." The woman flipped a page before finally looking at Anna. "I'm rather impressed by your application thus far, all things considered."

"Should I bother asking which things you're considering as part of 'all' or should I just assume you're not talking about my streaming service preferences or what's on my Netflix viewing history?"

The woman did not even crack a smile. "They explained to you, Captain Smith, that there's to be no outside contact until the testing is complete, yes?"

"Yes."

"And that you've agreed to rather strenuous terms that state any attempt to contact anyone until you've been accepted or rejected into this program is strictly prohibited, yes?"

"I do remember the terms of the contract I signed."

"Then why, Captain," The woman held up a paper from the file. "Did you call this number no less than twenty times since the start of the selection process?"

Anna flicked her eyes toward the number before she shook her head. "I kept to the terms of the contract I signed."

"This number is listed to your husband."

"I know my husband's number, ma'am."

"Then why call it?"

"To hear his voice."

The woman snorted, "Then you're in flagrant violation of your contractual obligations, Captain. To speak with-"

"I said, 'to hear his voice', ma'am, not to speak to him." Anna waited until the woman's eyes narrowed. "It goes to his answering machine."

"And why would you be calling his answering machine?"

"To hear his voice, as I said." Anna sat back in the chair. "It wasn't listed in the contract that I couldn't call a number. It said I wasn't allowed to speak to anyone and I haven't."

"But your husband would know you've called his phone."

"I doubt it." Anna inspected her fingernails before returning her gave to the other woman. "Seeing as he's deceased."

The woman stopped and turned another page. Her mouth formed and 'O' but before she could speak Anna did. "I'm sure you were just getting to that page in your file but you wanted to rake me over the coals first."

"Captain-"

"This isn't my first time around this particular carousel, Dr. O'Brien."

The woman blinked, "How'd you know my name?"

"Because the contract we signed states we're not allowed to converse with any outside the program while we're under evaluation but it didn't say anything about before or afterward. So," Anna straightened in her chair. "I did what any good investigator would do and I researched. Made sure I knew the ins and outs of this before I put in my papers."

"Because you knew you'd be selected?"

"I meet all the qualifications and a friend of my recommended me, strongly, for this program." Anna took a breath, "It's not a prideful thing to say my chances were above average."

"And why did you think yourself above average?"

"I joined the Special Air Service at eighteen, with some of the highest scores they'd seen in a very long time." Anna clicked her teeth. "Not the highest but good enough to get me into Sandhurst. I excelled there and when a friend of mine contacted me about this opportunity when things… changed, in my life, I knew I was as good a fit as you'd find."

"Good for us or you?"

"Does it matter?"

"It does if you're joining this program to try and fix something that broke in you when that car accident killed three members of your family." Annas jaw tightened. "Your husband included."

"It's what I'm trained to do and I'm good at it."

"Simplest way to get over a loss is to throw yourself into work?"

"I've never had the chance to test the adage before so now seemed like a good time to do so." Anna moved her hands to her lap, catching sight of the cameras in the corner. "It'll give me something to do."

"You're joining this organization for something to do?"

"It's the only life I know."

Doctor O'Brien glanced at the folder again. "Your father, husband, and daughter die in a car accident and you refused recommended grief counseling."

"It was recommended, not ordered." Anna measured her breaths and controlled how she blinked. "Since my day-to-day was not affected they couldn't do anything but recommend it."

"That was six months ago Captain."

"We all deal with grief differently, Doctor."

Doctor O'Brien narrowed her eyes again, leaning slightly over the table. "So your father, husband, and daughter die in a tragic car accident, on their way to retrieve you from the airport, and you simply go back to work the next day?"

"I took a week, Doctor."

"But that wasn't the first time you've suffered an emotional loss, was it?" Doctor O'Brien turned another page. "You had a training injury two years after you entered the Special Air Service."

"Is there a question there?"

"Was that traumatic?"

Anna only stared at the woman. "I think dignifying that with a response is rather ridiculous. Which means you've another question you want to ask instead."

"What was the injury?"

"I took a rather hard kick to the stomach during a training exercise. Fractured a rib or two."

"And that kept you out for a week?"

"It caused other problems."

"Like what?"

"A miscarriage." Anna held Doctor O'Brien's gaze. "Which turned out to be what saved my life at the expense of my child."

"But you had another one?"

"They're not kitchenware, Doctor, you don't just replace one with another."

"And yet you had another child."

Anna took a breath, "Yes, we did."

"And now that she's gone?"

It took Anna another minute to respond. "It's a good thing I don't have anything to tie me down or keep me from fully committing to this program, isn't it?"

"What an interesting prospective." Doctor O'Brien turned another page in the file. "But the lorry driver, the one who hit your family's car, was later found dead."

"Was he?" Anna made a face. "What a horrible coincidence."

"He was shot. Long-range with a very particular caliber of bullet."

Anna waited but when Doctor O'Brien said nothing more she smiled, giving a little laugh. "And you're afraid I shot the poor man who hydroplaned his lorry on a rainy evening?"

"I didn't say anything."

"My file's told you that I'm a sniper by training. My grief would lead you to believe that I might kill someone to assuage that grief. But the truth is, accidents happen. The tragedy is that there was no sense to the deaths."

"But the reports, filed two months later, ruled that the lorry driver was killed because of his relation to a group you helped to ruin." Doctor O'Brien shrugged. "Findings like that might tempt someone to seek justice."

"We all have relations we've rather not admit to having." Anna gave a little shake of her head. "I won't begrudge a poor man having connections to a jihadist group that I helped end because I put a bullet through the eyes of their leader."

"And if that group decided to take revenge by hitting the car of your relatives as they came to pick you up from that mission."

"There's no proof of that."

"And no proof of any of the possible local-bred terrorists either." Doctor O'Brien tapped her pen against the folder. "They never found any of them afterward. The police went to raid their cell and no one was left. No trace of them."

"Ghosts then."

"People've wondered if, perhaps, they were ended like the lorry driver. If he was the warning and they didn't see it coming."

"Wouldn't that be a shame." Anna kept her face bare.

"You don't sound too bothered."

"I'm not." Anna gave a tight smile. "I'm just wondering what I'm still doing in this room, having a conversation about dead people."

"It's what you do."

"What I did, if I get into this program."

"And you can put your past behind you that easily?"

Anna did not back down from the woman's stare. "Already have."

Four Months Previously

Anna folded the stock, moving to her knees to dissemble the gun before tucking it back into the case. She slid back on the rooftop until she was out of view before standing and walking to the lanky man who waited by the door that allowed roof access. "I never did thank you. For giving me this information."

"Don't say it too loudly or the neighbors'll hear." He opened the door for her, taking the case before leading her down two flights and through another door. "And we wouldn't need anyone asking what you're doing here."

"Or you." Anna removed her gloves, tucking them into the bag the man offered. "Given this is your career on the line."

"Not entirely." He shrugged, "Just because I can't bring them to justice with the evidence I have doesn't mean someone else can't benefit."

"Then I'm your blunt instrument?" Anna snorted, getting out of the jumpsuit and tucking it into the bag as well. "If you wanted to take me to dinner, Mr. Talbot, I don't think you helped your chances at sex with that comment."

"I wouldn't dare anything of the kind." Talbot tied the bag shut once everything was inside and tucked it and the case with the gun inside a trunk. "This is a professional arrangement, Captain, and one I hoped we could continue."

"As lovely as you were in Kabul, Mr. Talbot, I'd rather we keep the past in the past with this." Anna changed out of her other clothes into the business suit hanging from one of the doorways as Talbot kept his focus on scrubbing down surfaces. "It's better we never speak again."

"Or that we keep ourselves within easy reach." Talbot paused, the rubber gloves on his arms hold tightly to a spray bottle and a rag. "If you're in the mood for a career change-"

"I didn't realize MI5 was in the market for a wet work specialisty."

"If the Special Air Service is then we certainly are." He set the cleaning implements down and held up his hands, as if to stop her moving. "You could apply to the program."

"I rather like my job."

"But it won't fulfill you the same way." Talbot pointed through the window at the building where noise from police sirens already reached them from the street. "Not after you've crossed someone off for personal reasons."

"You think I couldn't just turn it off?"

"I don't think you want to." Talbot stripped the gloves from his hands, his voice lowering. "I think you want to point your rage in a direction and use it effectively. I think you're furious at the world and torn apart with nowhere to rebuild yourself."

"And you want me to be your little rage jack-in-the-box? A weapon to point wherever you need it?"

"I think I can give you something with purpose."

"I doubt it."

"I don't." Talbot put the gloves back on. "Think on it. They'll recruit you."

"Because I'm broken?"

"Because you're exactly what they'd want." Talbot shrugged, going back to wiping down as Anna collected her things as if she were simply off to work. "And it'd give you a place you can use your anger effectively."

Anna took a deep breath and nodded. "Get me recruited."

Talbot grinned, "I already put your name forward."

"You're a dick."

"Yes and I'm very good at it." Talbot leaned over the table, scrubbing furiously a moment before stopping. "But if you were serious about the sex thing then I could swing dinner."

"Goodbye Mr. Talbot."

London, England – Present Day

Anna smiled at the woman behind the counter, "I'm here to see my safety deposit box please. As quickly as possible."