Page 32 of Stripped

"No, not legally. I have no papers. I don't exist here, but Angus called me his malen 'kaya zhena. His little wife."

"And this is where you live?" she asked.

"Yes. I would go to the house once a week, as long as you weren't there, and he would sometimes visit me here. I grew to love him. I do love him." She began to cry. "I'm not sure what I'm going to do without him."

"I'm sorry. I can't—" Pim stopped and reached in her purse, pulling out a credit card. "Here." She handed it to Natasha. "Pay your rent. Get what you need. There's a ten-thousand-pound limit on it. I-I need time to think." She left, shutting the door behind herself. She wanted to scream, to cry, to hit something, but she couldn't, not now, not at this moment. She hurried down the stairs to the sidewalk outside and ordered an Uber.

A man approached, his eyes darting back and forth nervously. He scratched at his arms and chest as he asked her for money. Heroin addict. She shook her head. "Bitch," he said, walking off. This place was a slum. All his money, and he kept her in a fucking slum. Her ride pulled up and she got in, heading home. Bloody fucking hell.

* * *

Wraith watched as Pim got in the Uber, hoping she was headed home. He needed information. Besides, he had a bone to pick with the one person who could help him. The fog from the morning had cleared but the day was still driech. Dark clouds sat heavy in the sky, matching the city's dismal feeling of despair. He parked the car and walked the few blocks down the gray asphalt to the old tenement housing. Evidence of the area's rampant drug problem could be seen everywhere. Opening the main door, he walked into the dank hallway. Small wonders, the lift had been fixed since the last time he was here, but he decided to take the stairs to the ninth floor, feeling it the safer option. He knocked on the door, his leg and lungs burning as he waited for the telltale shuffle. Thump. Scrape. Thump. Scrape.

"Who's there?" a voice asked. He knew the bastard was watching him through the peephole.

"Open the fucking door, you bawbag." He listened as several locks were turned and the door swung open.

"Well, if it isn't the prodigal son, resurrected from the dead," the inhabitant declared.

Wraith didn't wait for an invitation but stepped into the tiny, one room flat, pushing past Dougal Murray.

"Well, by all means, come in." He shut the door. "At least I don't have to call you fucking captain anymore."

"Aye, there's that." Wraith looked around. Things hadn't changed since the last time he was here. Take-out cartons littered the kitchen counter, along with empty whiskey bottles and ashtrays full of cigarette butts. The curtains were drawn tightly shut, adding to the gloom. Dougal made his way across the stained and grimy carpet. The thump of his walker was followed by the scrape of his one remaining leg, limp and barely usable. His other leg was no longer there, a casualty from the same IED blast that had ruined Wraith's chest. He plunked down in a worn leather chair before a desk full of expensive computers and state of the art monitors, his only connection to the outside world.

"Have you come to thank me?" He motioned for Wraith to have a seat.

Wraith brushed old, discarded ashes off the chair before sitting down. "Thank you?" he asked sarcastically. "What, for ruining my life?"

"Aye. Ruining your life." The bitterness in the young man's voice couldn't be masked and caused Wraith to give pause for a moment. Dougal had been a lieutenant in his SBS unit of the Royal Navy, a handsome lad with a promising future. That was before the ambush in Afghanistan, before Wraith made the decision to get his men out of an irrigation ditch they were trapped in, before Dougal lost his leg and most of his face. "I didn't ruin your fucking life. I think I saved it," Dougie said.

The irony was not lost on Wraith. If anything, it was offensive in its cruelty. Two lives ruined. Two lives barely saved. It was Dougal who gave him the card with The Watch's number on it, to be used if he found himself in a situation he couldn't get out of alive. He sat back in the chair. "I should have died."

"Aye, one day, you'll realize I did you a favor. One day, you'll thank me." Dougal found a bottle of whiskey on the desk, holding it up.

"I wouldn't go so far as to say that," Wraith said, going to the kitchen. He found two tea mugs. Washing out their previous contents, he brought them back over.

Dougal poured them each a generous dram. "The Watch saved my life. The colonel saved my life," Dougal said, taking a sip of the amber elixir. "I owe him everything."

"And he knows about all this." Wraith motioned with his hand to the track marks lining Dougal's arms.

"That I'm a junkie?" He laughed. "You fucking honorable, righteous, prick. I see those qualities didn't fucking die with Captain Robert McFadden. Of course, he knows. He's the one who saved me from the gutter."

Wraith flinched at the sound of his former name. "Why do you live here then? Why not at The Tower?"

"Look at me. I'm not exactly the good-looking agent the colonel normally chooses. I'm a fucking monster." He drained his cup, setting it down. "This works for me. The colonel checks in on me once a month, makes sure I'm okay, keeps me supplied with the finest whiskey and turns a blind eye to everything else. And I, in return, give him full access into the dark web."

"The colonel normally chooses?" Wraith's eyes narrowed. "He didn't choose me. I called him."

"He was looking for a new agent, so I told him about you. I knew you were in over your head with Al-Saad. It was just a matter of time. How do you think those agents were able to scoop you up so quickly after you called the number?" He poured himself another drink. "What do you want, Wraith? I doubt you came here to pick a fight. Your principles wouldn't allow that."

"You don't know anything about my new principles."

"What do you want?"

"I need information on a girl."

"Natasha? I already sent Gabriel everything I could find."

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