<p><b>''Masterful . . . superior entertainment that makes most other novels of suspense appear dull and slow-witted by comparison'' <i>Publishers Weekly</i></b><br><b><br>What should have been a simple pick-up turns into a day-long nightmare for Bad Sam Chapman.</b><br><br>When an operational catastrophe puts a gun in the hands of a young man, who then breaks into South Oxford Nursery School and takes a group of hostages, teacher Louise Kennedy fears the worst. But Jaime Segura isn''t there on a homicidal mission, and he''s just as scared as those whose lives he holds as collateral. <br><br>As an armed police presence builds outside the school''s gates, Bad Sam Chapman - head of the intelligence service''s internal security force, the Dogs - battles the clock to find out what Jaime is after. But the only person Jaime will talk to is Ben Whistler, an MI6 accountant who worked with Jaime''s lover, Miro. <br><br>Miro''s gone missing, along with a quarter of a billion pounds allotted for r