by Rob Jones
“Jump!” he yelled, holding onto the board as he leaped off the jetty.
They both dived into the water and swam down under the jetty seeking whatever cover they could find. Looking up to the surface Hawke saw the rider had slowed down and was now taking his dirt bike along to the end of the jetty where the Aurora was moored. He was peering down into the water and pointing the MP5 down at the waves as he went, searching for any sign of them.
Thanks to his extensive SBS training, Hawke could hold his breath for several minutes, but he knew Lexi Zhang would run out of air much faster, so he had to think fast and act even quicker. If she broke the surface to take a breath the rider would rake her full of holes in a heartbeat.
Lexi had swum over to him now but he could barely see her in the dark water. The full moon gave a low light and lit her face a ghostly silver, and her eyes were staring at him with desperation and fear.
The rider fired the MP5 and they both saw the bullets tracing through the water all around them. He had no idea where they were and Hawke knew it. He was firing blind and would soon give up.
Hawke waved at Lexi and gestured she should follow him, and then he turned and swam back along the length of the jetty toward the shore. With the plank of wood still in his hands he swam up to surface and sure enough the final rider turned and headed back to the shore.
Speeding up as he prepared to jump the dirt bike off the jetty and land it back on the sandy beach, Hawke waited until the last second and then rammed the plank up through the gap in between the jetty boards.
The dirt bike rider had no time to react. Half a second later his front tire smashed into the plank and the spinning wheel came to an instant stop, propelling the rider off the bike. He backflipped through the air and landed with a heavy crunch while his bike crashed down on its side and came to a rest at the beach end the jetty.
Hawke and Lexi clambered up out of the sea and then the Englishman made his way over to the rider. Still soaking wet, and aware of the sniper hiding up on the bluff, he acted fast. Grabbing hold of the disoriented man’s helmet he twisted it hard to the right and back again. They both heard his neck snap and then a high velocity round took the top inch off one of the jetty poles.
“Shit!”
A shower of splintered wood burst into the air between them. They looked at one another and said at the same time, “Night sights!”
Hawke cursed again and grabbed Lexi by the arm, pulling her down off the jetty and into the sand. He knew the direction of the sniper because of the way the round had struck the pole, and now they were tucked down behind the riders’s dirt bike.
“This is our only way out of here,” he said.
Lexi looked at him. “So what are you waiting for?”
He pushed the dirt bike back up onto its wheels and straddled it. Lexi jumped on behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist. “Just like that night in Hong Kong, remember?”
Yes, he remembered, but when another high velocity sniper’s round thudded into the sand a few millimeters from the front tire he was very much back in the moment. Revving the bike wildly and releasing the clutch he was soon steering the dirt bike across the dark beach and up toward the same ridge Danny Devlin had used for cover a few moments earlier.
Sniper fire was now spitting all around them as the gunman up on the bluff tracked them along the beach through his night sights. Hawke swerved the bike left and right in an attempt to make them harder to track, but then one of the rounds ripped out the rubber on the rear tire and sent the bike skidding all over the place.
Gunfire from the forest now. He saw a muzzle flash from behind the trunks of the stone pines. For a second Hawke almost turned the dirt bike west and headed away from the ridge but then he realized the shooting inside the pine forest was aimed at the sniper up on the bluff.
“Must be Danny!” he said.
“He’s redeemed himself, then,” said Lexi.
Hawke aimed the battered dirt bike for the ridge, and seeing a narrow pathway that seemed to lead off to the right, he raced up it as fast as he could with the intention of jumping the last few meters.
With Devlin’s cover fire to their left, Hawke now zoomed the bike up the incline and launched into the night air. The engine growled as they flew through the night and then crashed back down on the path leading into the small forest. Gravel chips and pine cones exploded out around them as the bike smashed down to earth.
Lexi pointed to another muzzle flash. ‘There!”
Hawke revved the bike and turned the handlebars to the left. Navigating the narrow path for a few seconds they were soon beside Danny Devlin. He was crouching behind one of the pine trunks with a good view of the sniper. A few meters behind him was the other rider – dead in the undergrowth, and his bike was propped up against another trunk.
“Glad you could make it,” Devlin said.
Hawke opened his mouth to tell the Irishman his fortune but Lexi grabbed his arm.
“Not the time, Joe.”
She was right, but he couldn’t help it. “You could have killed all of us, Danny!”
He smiled and winked. “Not my fault if you’re slow off the mark, Josiah.”
Hawke’s response was silenced by Devlin turning and firing the stolen rider’s weapon at the sniper.
“Now,” Devlin said coolly. “I wonder if that third round made the mark?”
They looked over the top of the dark beach at the bluff and then they saw the sniper roll gently away from his position and let go of the rifle. It tumbled off the edge of the bluff and hit the sandy beach below it with a soft thud.
Devlin gave them another of his famous winks. “I thank you...”
“Good shot!” Lexi said.
“Thanks,” said Devlin. “I don’t think that naughty little monkey’s ever going to reload again.”
She turned to Hawke. “Wasn’t it, Joe?”
“What?”
“A good shot!”
Hawke paused for a second. “Let’s get on with it, yeah? We can congratulate ourselves when Lea’s safe.”
“We’ll get her back safe, all right,” Devlin said with confidence.
“Maybe,” Hawke said flatly. “But thanks to you, the whole world and his wife knows we’re here.”
The former SBS man pushed past Devlin and padded through the undergrowth toward the treeline closest to the villa. With the two dirt bike riders and the sniper taken out, it was pretty obvious Giancarlo Zito was not going to be in a very good mood when they finally caught up with him.
Worse, thanks to Devlin’s crazy call to make a break for it back on the beach, the Italian mobster would be totally prepared for any assault and maybe even making plans to leave the island with Lea and the manuscript before they could reach the villa. He knew Lea spoke very highly of ‘the Commandant’ but he was starting to ask questions about her judgement of the man.
As they trudged through the forest toward the southern part of the villa compound Hawke turned to Devlin. “This time, you do as I say, when I say it, right?”
Devlin raised his palms in a truce gesture and gently bowed his head. “You’re the boss, Joe, you’re the boss.”
Hawke locked eyes on him and sighed. “On an ECHO operation, in the field, then yes, I am, Danny. If you can’t handle it then you can’t roll with us, all right?”
Devlin was silent for a few tense seconds, and then smiled and said, “I already told you – you’re the boss.”
“Joe – leave it, we have to think of Lea,” Lexi said.
“I am thinking of Lea,” Hawke said defiantly. “When we get inside Zito’s villa we can’t afford another fuckfest like we just had back on the beach, and that happened because the chain of command broke down. Are we all clear?”
Devlin and Lexi nodded. Everyone knew the reprimand had been aimed at the Irishman, but no one mentioned it again as they trudged through the final part of the forest, broke the tree line and finally emerged face to face with Zito’s private villa.
Crouching in the shade of the perimeter wall, Hawke pushed the magazine release button on his Glock and pulled the slide back. The empty mag dropped to the ground and he quickly smacked the spare into the grip. Wasting an entire mag trying to save Devlin’s life on the beach had got his blood up, but now wasn’t the time for debates.
The peace didn’t last long, and now Zito’s men activated a series of security lights around the property. The bright lights lit the perimeter up almost as bright as day, and then the shooting started. The first to open fire was a man on the roof with what sounded like a compact machine pistol.
“Aim’s well off,” Devlin said.
“He doesn’t know where we are,” Hawke said. “He’s just making a statement.”
“I’ll give him a statement,” Lexi said, and raised her gun into the aim.
“You’ll never hit him as long as he’s behind these damned lights,” Devlin said.
Lexi threw him a look. “Thanks for that, bái chī.” She shook her head and then lined up the first light with the front sight post of her weapon. She pulled the trigger and the light exploded in a shower of sparks. “One down, four to go.”
Before the Irishman replied, Lexi Zhang astonished him by blasting the four remaining security lights to shattered glass in as many seconds. Then she lifted her weapon and fired on the shooter on the roof. He tried to take cover behind a chimney stack but she was too fast for him. She ploughed the first round into his left shoulder as he dived for the cover and turned him around like a spinning top. Firing a second time she hit his throat and he crumpled down like an empty suit.
She raised her smoking muzzle to her lips and blew the smoke into Devlin’s amazed face. “How was that?”
Devlin laughed. “Pretty damned good, as a matter of fact – but tell me, what does bái chī mean?”
“It means you’re very rugged.”
“Does it now?” he beamed.
“Yes,” Hawke said with a withering glance. “Does it now?”
Turning her back on Devlin, Lexi winked at Hawke and they turned to face the villa again. With the grounds plunged into darkness, they noticed a flashing light in one of the upstairs windows. “Check it out,” he said.
Lexi squinted up at the light. “What is it?”
“Morse code – SOS.”
“Lea!” Devlin said.
“Maybe,” Hawke muttered. “Or maybe a trap.”
“We have to check it out,” said Lexi.
Hawke nodded, and the team cut across the blackened lawn until they reached a broad patio and a set of French doors. Trying the doors and finding them locked, Hawke fired at them with his Glock and fractured the safety glass into a thousand pieces. He picked up a heavy bronze patio chair and hurled it at the window. It smashed through the pane and skidded to a halt in a sea of glass splinters all over the floor inside.
“Come on,” he said. “We haven’t got much time until...”
The lights went out.
“Damn it!” Lexi said. “Now they have the advantage.”
“They always had the advantage,” Devlin said.
“Not while I’m around,” said Hawke.
Lexi looked at him in the darkness. “If there’s one thing that always amazes me it’s the size of your cock-”
Her words were cut short by the sound of the enemy firing on them. Judging by what the rounds were hitting, Hawke figured they didn’t have night vision, but he dived on the floor just as fast. Seconds later Lexi and Devlin were beside him, taking shelter from the gunfire behind a large, antique sofa.
“It’s just two guys, I think,” Devlin said. “On the landing of the stairs there.”
With her eyes now accustomed to the darkness, Lexi peered around the sofa and confirmed what Devlin had said.
“There’s another staircase over there in the kitchen,” Hawke said quietly. “You keep these clowns company,” he said. “I’m going upstairs to get Lea.”
With Lexi and Devlin giving him cover fire, he crouch-walked across the sunken living room and hit the stairs. Seconds later he was sprinting down a long central corridor until he found a door which he thought was in approximately the right place. Opening it, he found an empty bathroom with moonlight glinting on the polished silver taps of the bath, so he moved on down the corridor. Lea was up here somewhere and it was up to him to rescue her.
With the sound of gunfire and yelling below him, Hawke sprinted to the next room along the corridor and booted the door open to find Lea Donovan standing in the moonlight beside another man. With his back to the window he was little more than a silhouette to Hawke, but the Englishman could see clearly enough that he was holding a gun to her throat.
“Joe!” Lea cried out. “Behind you!”
Hawke spun around to see another man stepping out from behind the door. With the moonlight shining directly in his face he was able to recognize him at once as one of the men he had fought back in Boston.
“Drop the weapon,” Moonlight Man said, calmly lifting a pistol into view. The silvery light shone dully on the weapon’s muzzle as he grinned at Hawke. “I’ll ask you only one more time, and then I’ll...”
Hawke fired his gun at the man before he’d finished the sentence. The round tore through the man’s eye and sprayed a misty cloud of blood and brain matter on the wall behind him.
The former commando turned and fired at the man holding Lea before the first man hit the floor. The back of the second man’s neck blasted away into pieces and he slumped to the floorboards with a look of terrified realization etched on his now-dead face.
Lea screamed. The sheer speed with which Hawke had despatched the two men holding her at gunpoint had shocked even her. She had expected a wisecrack, an insult and then for her lover to throw down his gun. Instead she got a bloodbath, dealt out in less than two seconds. With the gun still smoking, Hawke crossed the room and held her by her shoulders.
“Are you all right?” he said. He noticed the shooting downstairs had stopped.
“Sure... I...” she glanced down at the dead man at her feet. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“Where’s Zito?” Hawke asked, straight to business.
“I’m not sure. He was in here but when you attacked the villa he ran out and started barking orders at his men.”
Lexi and Devlin ran into the room. The Irishman approached Lea and smiled warmly. “Are ya alright, girl?”
“I’m fine, Danny. Joe... handled it.”
Devlin looked down at the two dead men, and sniffed. “So I can see.”
Hawke kissed Lea but then locked his eyes on her. “What about the manuscript and idol?”
“The idol’s already gone,” she said. “Some guys turned up a few hours ago and took it. Zito told me that finding it on me was an unexpected pleasure. All he was hired to find was the manuscript.”
“But the men that took the idol,” Lexi said. “They didn’t take the manuscript?”
Lea shook her head. “Nope. Zito said that’s being delivered to someone else.”
“So where’s Zito got the manuscript?” Hawke asked.
“How should I know?” Lea said, hands on hips. “He didn’t invite me here for a tour of the place, you know!”
“Fantastic,” Hawke said. “You’re on the island for bugger knows how many hours and you haven’t found out where Zito’s safe is.”
“Give her a break,” Devlin said.
Hawke and Lea turned to Devlin and spoke at the same time: “Keep out of it!”
“I was just...”
“I’d keep out of it if I were you,” Lexi said.
“So now we’ve got to track the safe down,” Hawke said.
“It’s not in the damned safe,” Lea said, squeezing her eyes shut as she struggled to remember something. “Wait a minute – he mentioned something about reading it in his observatory. It means nothing to him, anyway – he was hired to take it by someone else, like I said.”
“Who b
y?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “He wouldn’t let that particular cat out of the bag. He said I’d find out tomorrow.”
“Too bad neither you nor the manuscript are going to be in his possession tomorrow then, isn’t it?” Hawke said. “We need to get out of here and in a hurry, but we need the manuscript first. Danny – can you arrange some transport while we go to the observatory?”
Devlin chuckled. “Leave it to me, Joe.”
They watched Devlin vanish into the darkness of the corridor and then Hawke turned to Lea. “So, which way to this observatory?”
“I think it’s at the far end of the corridor outside this room,” Lea said.
They checked the corridor was clear and then made their way hurriedly toward the observatory.
“It’s definitely down here, right?” Lexi said.
“I already said that I think so,” Lea said, “but only from overhearing snatches of their conversation.”
They made their way down the final stretch of the corridor and turned a corner to find themselves faced with large double doors. Osservatorio was written on one of them in polished gold letters.
“Bingo!” Lexi said.
They entered and found a large, low-lit room with the largest telescope any of them had ever seen in the center of it. It was mounted on a turntable and pointing toward a retracting roof.
“So this is what old Zito spends his time on when he’s not giving people the cement shoes?” Lexi said, mesmerised by the enormous telescope.
“There!” Lea shouted. “That’s it – on the chair next to the telescope.”
Hawke jogged over to the chair and snatched up the manuscript. “All right – we’re set. Let’s just hope we can get out of here as easily as we got in.”
“So what’s the plan, Joe Hawke?” Lea asked.
Hawke stuffed the manuscript into his shirt and winked at her. “Just like usual – we wing it.”
They left the room and jogged down the stairs toward the lower part of the villa. “So this winging it...” Lexi said. “Is that an SBS thing?”
