Assassin Read Online Free Page A

“Vicky and her father are in one of those cars. Apparently, it’s unlucky for the groom to see the bride prior to the ceremony.”
    Congreve’s eyebrows shot straight up.
    “Yes, I believe I mentioned that custom to you any number of times at the reception last evening. At any rate, we’re supposed to have a final rendezvous with the vicar in his offices prior to the ceremony. He is here, actually, I saw his bicycle propped by the vicarage doorway as we drove up.”
    “Quickly, Constable, I think I see their car.”
    Congreve breathed a brief sigh of relief that Hawke had not bolted on him, and then followed his friend through the graceful Norman arch into the cool darkness of the little church. Now the event itself was inescapably set in motion, Alex seemed to be shaking off his case of the heebie-jeebies. Here was a man who wouldn’t blink in the face of a cocked gun. Amazing what a wedding could do to a chap, Ambrose thought, glad he’d so far managed to avoid the experience.
    The church could not have looked lovelier, Ambrose observed as they approached the rear door leading to the vicar’s office. Because of the narrow leaded glass windows, candles were needed even at this time of day and the churchwarden had lit them all. Their waxy scent mixed with the lily of the valley on the altar caused a rising tide of emotions within Ambrose’s heart. Not mixed emotions exactly, but something akin.
    He adored Vicky, everyone did. She was not only a great beauty, but also a dedicated child neurologist who had recently won acclaim for her series of children’s books. Alex had met Dr. Victoria Sweet at a dinner party thrown in her honor at the American ambassador’s residence in Regent’s Park, Winfield House. Her father, the retired United States senator from Louisiana, was an old family friend of the current ambassador to the Court of St. James, Patrick Brickhouse Kelly.
    Kelly, a former U.S. Army tank commander, had come across Hawke during the first Gulf War. Hawke and “Brick,” as he called the tall, redheaded man, had remained close friends since the war. The soft-spoken American ambassador, whom Congreve now glimpsed sprinting up a side pathway to the chapel, had saved Hawke’s life in the closing days of the conflict. Now, Hawke’s chief usher was late.
    Congreve had goaded Alex into asking the beautiful American author to dance at Brick Kelly’s home in Regent’s Park that night. The two of them had been inseparable ever since that fateful first waltz. Vicky had, that very evening, effectively put an end to Alex’s legendary status as one of Britain’s most eligible bachelors. No, it was not Victoria’s future Congreve was so much concerned about, but rather the long-term prognosis of his dearest friend Alex.
    Alexander Hawke led, to put it mildly, an adventurous life.
    Having been thrice decorated for bravery flying Royal Navy Harriers over Iraq in the Gulf War, Hawke had subsequently joined the most elite of the British fighting forces, the Special Boat Squadron. There they’d taught him how to kill with his bare hands, jump out of airplanes, swim unseen for miles underwater, and blow all manner of things to kingdom come.
    Having acquired these basic skills, he’d then gone into finance in the City. His first order of business was to resurrect the somnolent giant known around the world as Hawke Industries. After his grandfather retreated from the boardroom, he reluctantly relinquished command to young Alex. Hawke had no great love of business; still, he never dared disappoint his grandfather and so, a decade later, the already substantial family interests flourished once more.
    Some called his series of brilliant but hostile takeovers around the world piratical and there was some truth to that. Alex was a direct descendant of the infamous eighteenth-century pirate, Blackhawke, and he was fond of warning friend and foe alike there was indeed a bloodthirsty hawk perched atop his family tree. With