When Death Frees the Devil

by L. J. Hayward

  “Actually, I wasn’t part of the Cabal when the experiment was underway.”

  Prisoner secured, Jack stood and pushed Balakrishnan onto his back with his foot. “Look at you, moving up in the world. Guess you’re going to be there when the experiment ends, though.”

  Balakrishnan smiled. “I guess so.”

  That wasn’t right. The man was too smug for someone tied hand and foot while one of the world’s most successful assassins was in the house with death on his mind.

  Rattler directed towards the milling guards, Jack closed the sliding glass door on the dining room, locking it by the simple means of smashing the keypad. Several of them would have handguns but Jack doubted that when building this frivolous house, Balakrishnan had skinted on the bullet-proof glass. After kicking the dropped Rattlers into the garden and covering them in sand, he hauled Balakrishnan into the lounge room where he’d been earlier and into a chair.

  “Tell me about the Cabal,” Jack said.

  “Don’t you already know it all? With your Office of Counterterrorism and Intelligence, and the Meta-State. You got the Messiah’s data. Surely you know everything.”

  “Yeah, it was very helpful in tracking down you and the other elite members of the Cabal. Helped us narrow down the list of scumbags running the whole thing, as well. But what it didn’t tell us is why. Is it just the money?”

  Balakrishnan laughed. “Are you truly that naïve?”

  “When it comes to your level of sociopathy, yeah. Spell it out for me, Scrooge.”

  Settling back into the chair as well as he could, Balakrishnan smirked. “Tell me about your Meta-State first. Why was it formed?”

  Jack could see where this was going and he played along, hoping that the lack of noise from the second floor meant Ethan had won through whatever guards had been stationed up there.

  “To protect its signatories from internal and external terrorist threats. We’re working for the people, not using them for our own gains.”

  The smirk turned condescending. “I know that you know very well that it has been manipulated for monetary gain.”

  “If you’re talking about Glen Harraway then you’re as naïve as I am, because he was a traitor and we dealt with him. Very fucking harshly.”

  “And you’re doubly naïve if you believe he was the only one.” Balakrishnan continued over the top of anything Jack might have said. “But that is not what I’m talking about. This current trouble between our two countries—your two countries, I believe—is a perfect example. Or is that something else you need explained fully?”

  Jack moved away from Balakrishnan and towards the tree, listening for a clue as to what might be happening upstairs. He needed a moment as well. Balakrishnan probably knew exactly what he was doing bringing up that topic right now. He was on a rung just below the leaders of the Cabal. He had three of them in his house right now. There was no way he didn’t know exactly what had happened in Jharkhand all those years ago, and that Jack had been there, in the thick of it.

  He heard nothing from upstairs. No movement, no voices. Hoping it meant Ethan had finished his bloody business and would be appearing on the ground floor any second now, Jack checked on the guards—still in their see-through prison, still glaring at him—and went back to Balakrishnan.

  “I think it is something you need to hear, Jack Nishant Reardon.” His tone dropped into a conspiratorial hush. “Let me tell you exactly what your Meta-State got out of the deal.”

  A loud crash came from above. Several booming gunshots. Feet running, bodies colliding at speed, voices snarling. Jack spun on the spot, trying to track the ruckus through the wooden barrier between him and Ethan. Across the way, the guards took it as their cue to move. Bunched together, handguns up, they all fired at the wall between them and the central garden at once. The glass crazed with impacts but held—for now.

  Jack whirled and took cover behind Balakrishnan’s chair, knife back at his throat.

  “Kill me and you will never learn the truth about Jharkhand.”

  “I know the truth already.”

  “Do you?”

  Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Things were quickly going tits up and right now was when this dickhead decided to dangle that bit of bait?

  The guards ran out of bullets but the glass wall was still standing. So they started throwing furniture at it and three heavy wooden chairs from the dining suite was all it took to shatter it.

  Jack threw the chair with Balakrishnan over sideways and crouched behind it, opening up with the Rattler. Men dived for cover but two of them fell to bullets before they could. Taking the rifle off automatic, Jack kept the rest of them pinned with strategic shots, but his ammunition wasn’t going to last forever. He just had to hope—

  A body clad in the same armour as the guards—as Jack and Ethan had stolen—sailed through the air from the second storey, arms flailing, and landed in the pool, water splashing up a great fountain.

  Ethan?

  One of the guards took advantage of his momentary distraction and dived from the dining room and into the sunken garden. Jack fired and grazed him, getting a cry of pain, but the man got one of the buried rifles and aimed it at Jack.

  Ducking back behind Balakrishnan, Jack had the joy of hearing the industrialist scream “Don’t shoot” just as the guard opened fire.

  A spray of bullets arced over the chair, uselessly high but keeping Jack pinned. Then the Rattler jammed thanks to the sand in its mechanisms. While the man scrambled for another weapon, Jack leaped up, aimed, and put a bullet through his head.

  Three down. The rest of them remained obediently behind the dining table they’d overturned.

  Flicking a glance to the side, Jack saw no movement in the pool, but the blue water lapping gently at the edge was now stained pink.

  Had it been Ethan?

  “Bait.”

  Jack refused to look at Balakrishnan. “What?”

  “You were bait. That’s the truth of your deployment to Jharkhand. The Indian government needed something to draw the Maoist terrorists out of hiding without committing their own troops to a no-win situation. Foreign soldiers in a place they really shouldn’t be was the perfect lure.”

  “Shut up.” Jack really didn’t want to hear this. He’d finally found something meaningful enough to drag him back here. Made enough peace with what happened back then to return now. God, he wanted to know, but finally learning exactly why he’d almost died, why he’d had to watch half his squad be picked off one by one by the enemy might just send him over the edge once and for all.

  “Of course, your precious, altruistic Meta-State got paid for it. Preferential trade and economic resource agreements. Does that make the blood you and your men spilled there easier to accept, Mr. Reardon?”

  The moment Balakrishnan had brought up this line of discussion, Jack had wondered if this was where it would end. Speculation never equalled certainty, however, and Jack was convinced the man was being honest. Lies could be disproven and never cut as deep as the truth.

  He shoved it in a drawer in the filing cabinet in the back of his head. He would deal with it when he and Ethan were home and safe, not while he had at least three enemies and a prisoner, and he wasn’t sure of Ethan’s exact whereabouts or welfare.

  Jack was turning when a gunshot rang out. The glass of the internal wall spider-webbed at the exact height of Jack’s head. Instinct sent him to the floor, rolling behind the nearest couch for cover. Coming up to his knees, he aimed the Rattler at the new threat.

  He stood at the back of the house, as if he’d just come down the stairs. Middle Eastern, scar across his forehead, sunglasses, a massive S&W 500 pointed at Jack.

  Ten.

  Calmly, the assassin walked towards him, his aim never wavering.

  “I succeeded this time,” Ten said and Jack realised just how bad his imitation had been. There had been too much life in the droning tone he’d used. Too much warmth. Too much soul.

  Jack suppressed
a shiver. Christ. Ethan had never made him feel this unquestionable wrongness. Neither had Two, for all his creepiness and homicidal hobbies. This was more than a psychopathy. It was an absence of something Jack couldn’t define right then, but he suddenly empathised more with Ethan’s need to punish the Cabal. They had not only created this man, but then unleashed him on the world.

  Behind Jack, Balakrishnan started to chuckle.

  Fighting the urge to shoot the industrialist, Jack said, “Succeeded at what?” He really didn’t want to fucking engage with Ten but he needed time to find a way out of this mess.

  “In getting my brother over a balcony.”

  Heart skipping beats, Jack’s finger tightened on the trigger. Shooting now would do him no good. He didn’t have enough ammo left to shatter the wall and Ten had too many options to take cover.

  “Was he dead? ’Cause that’s the only way I can see you actually managing it.”

  Ten’s expression didn’t change. “He wasn’t dead, but he probably wished to be.” When he reached the shattered wall, Ten backed into the dining room, never taking his site off Jack.

  “What the fuck does that mean?”

  Balakrishnan laughed harder.

  “Shut the goddamn fuck up,” Jack snapped at him, then at Ten, “Tell me what you mean.”

  Unslinging a backpack, Ten dropped it behind the table. “I mean, my brother was always too caring. Too . . . soft. He learned to kill as well as any of us, but it cost him dearly. We always knew he would want that price back. It is a pity he will never get it now.”

  Oh fuck. Oh God. What the hell had happened upstairs? Jack’s stomach tightened so hard he nearly doubled over. He had to get to the pool, find Ethan. Get them both the fuck out of there.

  It was Jharkhand all over again.

  The three remaining guards stood up, now sporting new weapons provided by Ten. They advanced in two waves of two, covering him and each other. Jack was trapped, even though he could bloody well see freedom through the goddamned walls of this stupid fucking house. He could lose himself in the trees, like he had all those years ago, running with Nigel and dragging Lionel, desperately trying to evade and escape the insurgents who’d killed their mates. He’d all but carried Lionel out of the hot zone, he would do the same for Ethan.

  Except that he couldn’t. The enemy, once again, knew so much more than he did, understood the terrain better.

  Jack dropped the Rattler over the front of the couch and stood, hands on his head. Two of the guards moved in rapidly and searched him for the rest of his weapons. As they were divesting him of his knives, the third man cut Balakrishnan free and helped him to his feet.

  Mouth open to undoubtedly say something ultra smug, Balakrishnan was drowned out by a roaring engine. Everyone turned in time to see the orange Lamborghini race by the side of the house and down the steep driveway so fast sparks flew as the undercarriage scrapped over the sharp angle in the road. It curved around the pool, fleeing like all of hell’s devils were on its tail.

  “It appears he did not drown after all,” Ten said as the red taillights grew further and further away.

  “At least he’s getting away.” Jack’s gratitude was real. Even if Ten put one of those absurdly large bullets through his head right then, it would be worth it because Ethan was free.

  “Perhaps One-three wasn’t a total loss after . . .” Balakrishnan trailed off, frown creasing his brow. “What is he doing?”

  In the distance, the Lambo’s brake lights flared brighter in the pre-dawn darkness as Ethan hit the brakes so hard the car slewed across the driveway. Then, before anyone could venture a guess, the white reverse lights came on and even in the house, the sudden burst of power from the engine was clearly heard.

  As if released from a cannon, the supercar shot backwards up the driveway, moving faster and faster while everyone watched in surprise and confusion.

  Jack and Ten worked it out before the others did.

  “Holy fuck!” Jack broke out of the abruptly slack hold of his captors and dived to the right.

  Ten went left, dragging Balakrishnan with him.

  The Lambo hit the top of the incline, wheels turning at the last second so that when it launched off the improvised ramp, its rear end was pointed directly at the front wall of the house.

  Marine dropped through the hole to the first floor, leaving just Glock on her feet. Scar was crumpled against the brick wall, his own weapon rammed forcefully through his chest. The other knife was in Ethan’s hand and he tossed it at the woman as she raised her gun again. She dodged the flying weapon, dropping and rolling behind the tree.

  Not bothering to run around the gaping hole in the floor, Ethan threw himself across the gap, caught a branch and swung over to the other side. He landed in a slide, boot colliding solidly with his final opponent’s chest as she tried to rise out of her roll. She flailed backwards, gun flying from her hand. Ethan kicked up, catching her chin, and with a snap, her neck broke.

  He lay for a moment, breathing hard. Three very skilled opponents in tight quarters had been a challenge, especially considering the gaping hole in the floor right in the middle of the combat zone. Ethan rolled over and peered through the hole, finding Marine lying in the sand, blood soaked into the yellow granules around his head. Someone—Jack most likely—had finished him off very quickly, judging by the lack of disturbance to the sand. Which meant Jack was most likely still active.

  One stress eased, Ethan flipped to his feet, picked up Glock’s gun and his abandoned Rattler and went to the door where Marine had been standing guard. After a few deep breaths, he punched in Jack’s code and the lock opened.

  The room was large and dark, shrouded by heavy velvet curtains in forest green. It was also suspiciously quiet. No one could have slept through the noise of the fight, or the one that appeared to be starting up below. All the gunfire was a good sign. If the enemy were shooting at something, then Jack was up to his usual tricks and making people very upset with him.

  That didn’t explain why the only reaction to the sudden ruckus below from the person in the bed was a faint mumble and twitch of a hand.

  Cautiously, Ethan scouted the room, keeping one eye on the bed. As with the first floor, furniture was scarce and what there was, was made of the same wood as the house frame. Bed, bedside tables, dresser, two chairs and a low coffee table between them. A bathroom took up one corner, frosted glass walls around a free-standing shower, vanity, and toilet. The amenities were incredibly basic, but then this didn’t seem to be a place one lived, but rather a showpiece for Balakrishnan’s wealth.

  A soft moan drew him to the bed, borrowed Glock in hand. The woman was perhaps in her sixties, a bob of artificially auburn hair messed up on the white pillow, wide, worried eyes looking up at Ethan as he came to stand over her.

  Karyna Seaver. Scion of the New York Seavers, CEO of the multinational conglomerate holding company Seaver-Randal Inc and one of the richest women in the world. Ethan had worked for her, indirectly, several times over the years. He had suspected she was very close to the Cabal leadership, if not actually one of them, but had not been able to prove it.

  Seaver’s throat worked but no sound emerged apart from a few quiet gasps. The one hand resting on top of the covers twitched towards him, fingers stretching uselessly. Something had been done to her. A strong sedative perhaps. Or poison.

  “What did they give you?” Ethan asked.

  Mouth opening and closing in silent desperation, Seaver’s eyes grew even wider and panicked.

  “One blink for yes, two for no.”

  She blinked once.

  “Do you know who I am?”

  A slight tremble overtook her, whether from the paralytic agent running through her body or fear of him, Ethan didn’t know. Didn’t care. She blinked once, slowly, almost reluctantly.

  “So you know what I do for the Cabal?”

  A fast blink. She strained with her hand again, pleading. Ethan ignored it.

  �
��Are you one of the five leaders?”

  Two blinks.

  Ethan pressed the barrel of the Glock to her forehead, right between her eyes so she could see it. “Are you one of the five leaders?”

  The trembling grew and her eyelids fluttered, but made a single, jerking blink. Something like “please” stuttered out of her mouth.

  “Then you know exactly why I am here.”

  Though pulling the trigger felt more like a mercy than a punishment as the tremble turned into convulsions and her struggle for air became a losing battle.

  Ethan had rarely felt anything more than a passing bother for any death he caused. There had been worry when he hadn’t been certain of a target’s guilt, or relief when an enemy was no longer a threat, or sorrowful determination when he was killing his brothers. But those instances were few and easily lost amongst the vastness of nothing.

  He had wanted to feel something now, though. Satisfaction? Release? Happiness? Something to mark this as the moment he felt free.

  There was nothing.

  The poison had robbed him of any agency in her punishment. The poisoner had stolen his freedom from him.

  In the next bedroom, Osamu Sakamoto was already dead, sheets torn and rucked up thanks to the convulsions that had marked his final moments. Not even imaging the agony or fear that must have overtaken Sakamoto in those last minutes was a balm.

  Yanis Mylonas was on the floor, one arm outstretched towards the door, as if he’d been trying to alert his guard. His body was still warm. He’d probably died during Ethan’s fight with his bodyguard.

  So close, but still nothing.

  The chasm that had opened up in his chest when he’d walked away from Jack, that had only just started closing since reuniting with him, pulled wider again. He felt cold and empty. This was where he’d wanted to be, where he’d worked so hard, sacrificed so much, to get to, and now . . . it had all been for nothing. There was no fulfilment here. Just hollowness.

  He’d risked Jack’s life—their life together—for nothing.