The Execution. Hugo Wilcken

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COPYRIGHT

      Fourth Estate

      An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

      1 London Bridge Street

      London SE1 9GF

       www.harpercollins.co.uk

      First published in Great Britain by Flamingo 2001

      Flamingo is a registered trade mark of HarperCollinsPublishers Limited

      Copyright © Hugo Wilcken 2001

      Hugo Wilcken asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

      This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

      All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

      HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication

      Source ISBN: 9780007106479

      Ebook Edition © FEBRUARY 2016 ISBN: 9780007396917

      Version: 2016-02-15

DEDICATION

      For my parents

      CONTENTS

       Cover

       Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

       Chapter V

       Chapter VI

       Chapter VII

       Chapter VIII

       Chapter IX

       Chapter X

       Chapter XI

       Chapter XII

       Chapter XIII

       Chapter XIV

       Chapter XV

       Keep Reading

       Acknowledgements

       Praise

       About the Author

       About the Publisher

I

      Christian’s wife was killed in a car crash yesterday. Apparently her brakes failed and the car careered into a shop front. The shop was open at the time but there were no other victims, just her. She died from asphyxiation, the seat belt crushed her windpipe. If she hadn’t been wearing her seat belt, she might have survived.

      I wouldn’t say I knew her. I’d met her twice, maybe three times, when she’d come into the office looking for Christian. We’d probably said no more than ‘hello’ to each other. She was around thirty-five I’d say and quite good-looking – I wondered how she’d ended up with someone like Christian. Once, about a year ago, Christian asked me whether I wanted to go for a drink with him and his wife, but I had something else on so I turned him down. The invitation surprised me, because although we’ve worked in the same office for the past eighteen months, I have no particular rapport with Christian and I’ve never socialised with him. I was with him yesterday though, when they called about his wife.

      There’d been a department meeting in the morning. The news had just come in about Jarawa’s sentence and we’re launching a major campaign for him. Jamie’s appointed me team leader with Christian and Joanne working under me. It’s my first big campaign so it’s important to me. After the meeting I got cuttings and print-outs from the library and looked over them until lunchtime, making notes and thinking. Then I went with Christian to the Italian sandwich bar on the corner. It’s the first time I’ve had lunch with him alone. I’ve never directly worked with him either, until now. Straightaway he told me that he was pissed off I was leading the campaign and not him. I could understand his disappointment: he’s about forty and I’m only twenty-nine. Besides, West Africa is ‘his’ area. Anyway I didn’t want any trouble so I said I hoped we could work as equals on this СКАЧАТЬ