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It was his first decent car, and he was proud of it, had paid for it himself, well was paying for it, gradually. They’d started out early, and they’d had lots of time in hand.

Perhaps it was her maturity, she never giggled or sulked; or maybe it was her looks, her make-up was always perfect and her figure impressive. That day she’d been wearing a T-shirt and tight jeans. His eyes had kept straying to the front of her jutting top.

‘You like my new shirt?’ she’d asked.

He’d plunged, and known he’d blush as he did. ‘I like what’s in it.’

Christ, in the long twenty seconds after that he’d gone through agonies while she’d fixed him with a look he couldn’t comprehend. The breath she’d taken had only made his eyes stray more.

‘Pull over here.’ Her voice had sounded different, huskier. There had been no need to park right in among the trees, but he had. If she was going to make a scene he didn’t want anyone seeing, not until he’d had a chance to say sorry, cool her down.

‘That was naughty of you. Don’t you think I should punish you, or do you think you should punish me, for not being angry?’

Her hand was in his lap, kneading his erection. Shit, at that moment he’d have swapped the flashy red coupe for any clunker that had a bench front seat.

The way they clambered into the back, the clumsy tangling of arms and legs, were all a merciful blur. The next clear image was the soft white breast being crushed into his face, a hard pink nipple pressing against his lips until it gained entry, when he had to gasp for breath. And all the time she’d whispered, ‘You can hurt me, you can hurt me.’ Then the frantic contortions to reach buttons and fasteners, and she’d come before he was ready, clutching painfully hard at his body. Nails had raked his back and thighs. He’d slipped out, been unable to re-enter, and had finished on her smooth warm belly, ignoring the biting soreness as he rubbed against her body hair.

He’d broken up with Karen soon afterwards, and they’d moved that summer. The bruises had faded, but the deep scratches took longer to heal and he’d often examined them in the mirror. There had not been a second time, though he’d tried to make opportunities, driven past often enough…

The T84 driving cautiously into view looked squat, ugly and powerful. A second followed several lengths behind, and then a third. Revell lifted his respirator from where it hung about his neck, and used its built-in short-range radio.

‘OK everyone, take it easy. This is just the advance guard, we’re waiting for the main body.’ He saw the lead tank stop a good way short of the last lot of mines they had scattered. ‘Meanwhile, let’s see how they deal with that little problem.’

‘Same way as the others.’ Dooley’s voice was easily recognisable on the radio. ‘Too fucking fast for comfort.’

‘Shut the yakking, just listen.’

Hyde had been quick off the mark, getting in before Revell. That was why the major wanted him in the outfit. The hideously disfigured British NCO might resent having been drafted into the American squad, but he never let that interfere with his combat efficiency. When it came to tank busting, he was one of the best.

His record said nineteen Soviet tanks destroyed. It was possible that unconfirmed kills doubled that, and when an estimated number of APCs, armoured cars and ammunition trucks was added on, it made for one hell of an impressive total. Men like that were more precious than gold to their commanders, and no CO in his right mind was ever going to let one go. Well he’d got Hyde for a one-off special mission, and he was going to hang on to him, whether the sergeant liked it or not.

‘Now what the hell is that?’ Cohen parted the nettles for a clearer view of the strange vehicle motoring past the tanks. It halted a hundred yards from the highly visible mines.

‘I think it’s the reason for Dooley’s discomfort.’ For a moment the radio-man’s question had echoed one in Revell’s mind, then he examined the newcomer through his binoculars. It looked for all the world like an armoured fueller on tracks. A suspicion began to form.

Thick white vapour was hosed at tremendous pressure from a small remote controlled turret, set above the heavily protected cab. The artificial cloud swept forward over the mines, feathering in the light wind. There was a distant ‘crack’, as a flare bobbed from a discharger set into the turret front beside the stubby tube of the projector, and the dense floating mist became a roaring wall of yellow flame.

Instantly, there was a swift succession of explosions as every mine was triggered by the massive over-pressure. A puking wave of compressed and super-heated air raced outwards, setting the meadow into wave-like motion.

It gave the major no satisfaction to have his guess confirmed. The clearance technique was a refinement of the aerosol bomb, an American invented fuel/air munition that was seeing wider and wider application, as commanders grew to fully appreciate its value as an area weapon, rather than just as a sledgehammer way of clearing mines and booby traps.

Before the mass of debris raised by the blast had settled, the tanks were moving again. It was self-preservation as much as discipline that prompted the crews to maintain a safe distance between each other. The mine clearer began to follow, as the first vehicle of the column’s main body came into sight.

‘They’re not bunching. They’re going to motor straight through.’ Hyde’s fingers hovered over the miniature keyboard. What was that bugger waiting for? If Revell didn’t give the order soon, at the rate the Ruskies were motoring they’d all be clear in another couple of minutes.

The slight cratering caused by the multiple detonations didn’t even slow the T84s. They took it at speed, their suspensions soaking up the bumps and passing little of the jarring of the corrugations to their hulk.

‘Make a hole in the road. Take out that fourth vehicle.’ An anti-tank missile had jumped from the grass and was jetting towards its target even as Revell’s order came through. Hyde only had to keep the sight aligned on the target, as the flame-tailed projectile skimmed the tops of the grass, receiving its commands from the control box via the twin wires unreeling behind it.

Struck as it traversed the broken section, the round’s powerful warhead punching effortlessly through the side armour and into the pressurised fuel compartment, the Soviet mine clearer turned into a tracked bomb.

Ten times greater than its predecessor, the explosion sent flame, chunks of road and anonymous pieces of armour plate high into the air. A four-barrelled Shilka anti-aircraft tank, following fifty yards behind, was pushed off the road by the blast, and shed a track.

‘OK, fire as targets present.’ They’d have to be quick now, hit and run. That second blast had flattened much of the meadow, making them conspicuous. Revell watched the crew of the flak-tank as they baled out. The last man from the big radar-topped turret threw up his arms and tumbled over the side, as a third burst from Kurt found him.

Now the fields on either side of the road swarmed with targets, as the Russian column split up and drove around the obstructing crater. Hyde wasn’t confused by the choice of victims. Playing the control panel like a concert pianist, he sent missile after missile towards the racing Soviet armour. His second round was also a hit, square on the skirt armour of a T84, but it kept going. There was no mistake with the third, it struck an exhaust-spewing T84, setting off its ammunition and sending its turret soaring into the air, accompanied by the flaming bodies of its crew.