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anything?
    It was only six months since I’d first held Anna in my arms. Even then I’d had the feeling I’d known her all my life. We were standing among the wreckage of an aircraft full of dead men and drug dollars I’d shot down in Russia. We’d met at an arms fair press conference in Tehran two weeks earlier. I was working undercover for Julian; she was investigating a corrupt Russian’s links with Ahmadinejad and the Iranian ayatollahs.
    She said she wouldn’t have touched me with a ten-foot pole if she could have sorted it on her own. Then she gave me the kind of smile that makes your knees go funny. I’d first set eyes on her when she was giving the Russian a hard time in front of the world’s press. She was a dead ringer for the girl from Abba with blonde hair and high cheekbones. I’d fancied her big-time. I used to sit in the NAAFI as a sixteen-year-old boy soldier with my pint of Vimto and a steak and kidney pie, waiting for Top of the Pops to hit the screen. ‘Dancing Queen’ had already been number one for about five years, and I took my seat in front of the TV every week hoping her reign would be extended.
    This amazing woman had helped me choose furniture for the flat, and in between writing investigative pieces and flying around saving the world she’d come and stay. Only a few days at a time, mind, but for me that was almost long-term. The only thing we’d fallen out over was her smoking. She wasn’t about to be sent onto the balcony to do it.
    I headed for the kitchen sink, swallowed a couple of Kleinmann’s Smarties and stuck my mouth under the designer tap. I clicked the kettle on and told myself I had to bite the bullet.
    Did I really want to do this? Did I really need to do this?
    I had to. I didn’t want her standing in the wreckage with me again. She deserved so much better.
    I twisted and turned the mobile in my hand. Why drag her down with me?
    My arse rested against the stainless-steel cooker. It would always be this shiny. I had all the toys now, but I was never going to turn into Jamie Oliver.
    Finally, I stabbed a finger at the keypad and dialled.
    ‘Jules, mate? Count me in for Saturday.’

4
    Saturday, 13 March
14.00 hrs
    Chelsea were at home to West Ham. Kick-off wasn’t for another hour, but I still had to park so far from the ground I might as well have walked all the way from Docklands. I still preferred it to taking the tube, especially the way I was feeling.
    I passed the Vietnamese restaurant on the corner by Fulham Broadway where Jules came to be deprived of wheat and dairy practically every night. Fuck that. I went into the station and came out again with two big frothy coffees.
    I walked the last couple of hundred metres up the Fulham Road and flashed Julian’s spare season ticket at the turnstiles. The concourse was buzzing with blue-shirted fans clutching plastic pint glasses of lager, and overseas visitors taking pictures of each other eating expensive hot-dog baguettes. I made my way through them to the Block A steps. The stadium gradually came into view as I climbed. It was huge and, apart from a few bored-looking stewards in fluorescent orange jackets, virtually empty.
    Julian was in his usual seat in row twelve, studying the programme with the kind of concentration he’d normally save for a PhD thesis.
    ‘Oi, mate …’
    He turned round, all smiles. I made my way along the row and handed him his coffee.
    ‘Nightmare parking, as usual. If you were a true friend you’d support a team closer to my home.’
    ‘I don’t know why you don’t use the tube.’
    ‘No way, mate. After a lifetime of being poor, it’s the 911 everywhere for me, including the corner shop. You posh lads think it’s good to cycle and take public transport, and I’m glad. There aren’t enough spaces as it is.’
    Jules shook his head and smiled. It was the same banter every time, but he didn’t care. On the phone, he sounded like he’d shared a school desk with David Cameron.