If it were any other prisoner . . . any other situation . . . they might have ignored the laughter. Put it down to the raving of an incompetent madman. But this was the Blood King and they knew better.
“Watch our backs,” Hayden told Dahl and Luther.
Drake threatened to bury his fist in Kovalenko’s stomach. “What’s the fucking joke?”
“You are.” Kovalenko laughed. “You really are. You think that’s the real nuke? It’s not the real nuke.”
Drake felt his stomach sink through the floor. “What the hell are you up to now?”
“Check and see.” Kovalenko shrugged.
Cautiously, Molokai placed the heavy silver container on the concrete floor of the arena’s hallway. Drake felt safe, leaving the task to the robed man, recalling he’d been a bomb tech in many foreign wars. Molokai unscrewed the canister’s top and slowly lifted it out of the way.
Inside, sat a large, gray rock.
“I doubt that’s a nuke,” he said.
Kovalenko’s laughter raised a notch. “You should see your faces.”
Drake pulled the man away from the wall and started ripping off the duct tape that held the dead man’s trigger together.
“A toy,” Kovalenko said. “I bought it at Macy’s. I think it controls plastic cars.” More laughter.
“You sacrificed dozens of men with this stunt,” Hayden said. “And got yourself captured.”
Kovalenko gave her a knowing look and Drake thought: He’s right where he wants to be. This isn’t us capturing him, it’s something else entirely . . .
“Is there really a fourth nuke in New York?” Hayden asked the overbearing question.
The Blood King nodded. “Of course there is.”
Drake gut-punched him. “Where?”
“You’ll pay for that. You really will pay.” Kovalenko spluttered as he fought to remain standing. “I can’t wait to see you burn.”
“Shut it, knobhead.” Alicia looked like she was holding her breath. “You want to tell us where that nuke really is, don’t you? I’m betting there’s a good reason.”
Kovalenko’s mouth widened into another infuriating smile. “It’s set to explode in three hours. And it’s twenty blocks north of here.”
Drake set a timer. “And only you have the combination?”
“That’s right. You have three hours to get me twenty blocks. Alive.”
Dahl looked back over his shoulder from his position guarding the hallway. “Not a problem,” he said. “We could get him 200 blocks away in three hours.”
Drake saw a potential issue. “His men will be out there,” he said. “Trying to rescue him.”
Kovalenko winked.
This time, Alicia sent a punch into his gut. “Wink at me again and I’ll drag you the whole twenty blocks on your damn face.”
“Only I can stop the detonation,” Kovalenko gasped. “You need me.”
Hayden held up a hand. “Wait, we have the weight of the entire police force behind us,” she said. “They can give us a police escort.”
“Yeah, no need to walk,” Kinimaka said. “Get them down here.”
Hayden nodded and checked her cellphone, then pulled out a list of local contact names. “We need a coordinator. A head honcho. Maybe this guy.” She jabbed at the piece of paper. Drake saw the title: Special Operations Commander.
“Would he have control over the force?”
Hayden nodded. “Everything we need.” She made the call and put it on speakerphone.
“This is Harry Hodge,” a voice said.
Kovalenko hadn’t moved at all. Drake watched him as the seconds ticked away.
Hayden laid out the situation to Hodge. He responded with a quick question: “You have Luka Kovalenko with you?”
“That’s what I said. In custody.”
“Where are you?”
Hayden told him, stating that she could already hear sirens approaching the arena.
“Don’t worry. I’ll hold them back. I’m sending my men. Officers I trust. Men I came through the force with. If you have Kovalenko, and only he can disarm that nuke, you need reliable people to get you through that twenty blocks.”
“A police escort will do just fine.”
“Where’s the bomb?” Hodge asked.
Hayden eyed Kovalenko. The Blood King just grinned.
“We’ve not being supplied with that info.”
“Have you asked him . . . properly?”
“This is the Blood King we’re dealing with,” Drake hissed into the phone. “He’s not gonna just roll over like his men. The priority here is to make New York safe. Now, send us those bloody men.”
Dahl and Luther were firing infrequently in the doorway as Kovalenko’s men attempted rescues. Kenzie was keeping an eye on the hallways. Hayden gripped the phone harder, still addressing Hodge.
“We’re working blind here. We don’t know how many men he has. Where they’re positioned outside. We don’t know where the nuke is and now we have . . . two hours fifty minutes to find it. So listen up. We’re a Strike Force team working under orders from the President and the President alone. Send whoever the hell you like, but send them now.”
Hayden ended the call. Drake checked his watch. They would have to wait here for at least another ten minutes. He turned to Kovalenko as the man spoke.
“I heard Team SPEAR had adapted,” he said. “You’re Strike Force now, is that right? And it’s true that you answer only to the President. How interesting.”
Drake had the impression that cogs were grinding inside the Blood King’s head. The bastard was definitely mulling something over.
“I’m sure you already knew that.”
“My contact network is far-reaching.”
“That’s not an answer. Where’ve you been skulking the last few months anyway?”
“You mean after Devil’s Island?”
“No, I mean after your Christmas bash, dickhead.”
The Blood King glowered. “You shouldn’t insult me. The time is coming when you will beg for my forgiveness.”
Drake shook his head in exasperation. “Just forget it.”
“To answer your question, I laid low and fine-tuned my plan. This plan. The Devil was looking for me and he’s a worthy opponent.”
“Does thinking about him make your pencil dick shrink?” Alicia asked with interest.
Kovalenko’s face didn’t alter. “You seek to insult and humiliate me. I see that and even understand it. But you people, and Coburn, killed my father. I will have my vengeance on every last one of you.”
“Don’t forget,” Drake said. “Both him, and you, spilled first blood. We just ended it.” He couldn’t listen to his crap anymore. He walked away and checked his watch. Five minutes had passed since Hayden spoke to Harry Hodge. He glanced up when Hayden’s phone rang.
“Hodge here,” a voice said. “There are twelve men on their way with instructions to take you twenty blocks using all means necessary. They are at your disposal and can employ any measure from changing traffic lights, to setting up blockades to . . .” Hodge sighed “. . . sanctioning murder, if it comes to that. You say the Blood King has an army that’s trying to rescue him?”
“It looks that way, sir,” Hayden said.
“So why not keep him right there at the Garden? I can’t believe that madman wants to kill himself in a nuclear blast. Sweat him out. He’ll give you the location and the disarm code eventually.”
Drake understood the reasoning. It was, in fact, sound. The Yorkshireman’s head told him that Kovalenko was bluffing. The trouble was . . . New York City housed a population of almost nine million souls.
How could you weigh that chance? How could you accept even a 1 percent possibility of risk when faced with those kinds of figures?
Hayden pinched her nose, also seeing the dilemma. “Do you really want to take that risk, sir? I know I don’t, and I doubt the President would either.”
Hodge didn’t answer her directly. “All right. Well, th
e twelve-strong honor guard should be with you in less than five minutes. They have a password—Knicks. You know, the basketball team?”
“I’m aware of them, sir, and thanks for your help.”
Hayden signed off and looked around. Drake followed her gaze. Dahl and Luther were braced against concrete pillars, looking bored. No doubt because nobody had attacked them in at least four minutes. Kenzie remained alert, covering the hallway where it curved away to the left, making sure nobody approached without being seen. Kinimaka, Mai and Molokai were standing close to the Blood King as if trying to implant every curve of his face in their memories. Alicia and Cam were loading their weapons, the latter watching the former’s every action and then copying. He was a quick study.
Kovalenko watched them all, eyes flicking between the entire Strike Force team. As Drake watched, the Blood King licked his lips.
The bastard is really enjoying himself.
But not for long. Twenty blocks for their team with all the resources of a twelve-strong police guard bestowed with extensive powers to clear the way was hardly a difficult task. Without the guard, it would have been far trickier.
Hayden tapped his shoulder. “Our honor guard is here.”
Drake looked up. Kenzie was tracking twelve figures dressed in cop’s uniforms with flak jackets strapped over their chests. One held up a hand and stopped.
“Knicks,” he said.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Drake watched as the leader of the twelve-strong honor guard approached. He was a tall man with a gaunt face and long fingers. He wore a police cap and carried at least one gun, holstered at his hip. All of the newcomers were armed.
“I’m Bellamy,” he said. “We’re your facilitators up top. Just get underway and tell us what you need. We’ll make it happen.”
Hayden indicated Kovalenko. “This is our prisoner. We need to get him twenty blocks in less than three hours. He will have men out there trying to rescue him.”
“Understood. Are you ready to move?”
Drake liked the man’s direct, proactive approach. Hayden nodded. The team raised their weapons. Kinimaka and Molokai grabbed the Blood King, still cuffed, planting him firmly between them.
Hayden gave the order to move out.
Bellamy’s men split up, some in front and some behind the main team. They were at ground level, and followed a long, curving hallway toward the Garden’s rear exit. Food and beverage shops lined the right-hand wall, their shutters down. Concession, clothing and program stands stood to the left, all empty. Their boots rang hollowly in the high, wide concrete space that was normally crowded with fans of all kinds, but today was eerily silent.
A door stood ajar to the left. Drake saw that it led to an underground level where machinery was kept—air conditioning, heating and other services—and eyed the opening as they hurried by. Nobody poked their head out. Most likely, it had been checked earlier by the Blood King’s men and left that way. They ran past, watching for trouble but keeping up the pace.
As he ran, he contemplated Hayden’s idea to call in the cops for help. Essentially, it was sound thinking. It safeguarded the public as well as giving the Strike Force team a blank slate from which to work. They had been given the power to make their own rules out in New York today. The downside was that the success of Hayden’s idea lay with the competency of the cops. He cast an eye over them now, watching them run, how they held their weapons, how they scanned the area for predators.
“Looks like Hodge sent good men,” he whispered across the comms.
Hayden answered. “Not so sure. The guys in front seem more interested in me and Mano than anyone trying to protect Kovalenko.”
Drake raised his head. Bellamy led the way, at the tip of a wedge formation. They were approaching a curve in the long corridor. Drake guessed they were just a few minutes from the exit.
Kovalenko ran between Kinimaka and Molokai, with Hayden a step behind.
Drake doubted his own eyes then as Bellamy stopped and raised his gun, aiming the barrel at Molokai. Acting instantly, relying on years of experience, Drake pulled his own gun up and fired one shot.
Bellamy dropped dead in the corridor.
The cops slowed. There was a moment of terrible confusion, of speculation, and then the cops turned on the soldiers.
Kinimaka and Molokai dived headlong, taking Kovalenko with them. Hayden fell to her knees, sliding and swiveling using her own momentum, firing to the right. Cops darted into cover on all sides. Alicia, ahead of everyone now, killed another cop up front, opening a way forward.
“This way!”
“Stop, stop,” a cop shouted over the gunfire. “Just give him up. Give Kovalenko up and we’ll let you live.”
Alicia whirled, aiming at the metal stand behind which he sheltered. “You’ll let us live?” she echoed. “Don’t you know who we are?”
It was a flippant comment but, Drake thought, it carried some merit. Maybe not to the cops here, but to the countless bad guys they’d taken out in the past. He kept running, spraying bullets at the cops to keep them at bay.
Then Alicia pulled up. “Shit.”
“What?” Hayden cried, approaching fast.
Through the comms, Alicia explained. “More cops at the front door. Armed and aiming their shooters at us. Do we trust them?”
“You mean did Hodge send them too? I don’t know.”
Drake skidded to a stop. At the back of the group, Kenzie, Cam and Mai were exchanging fire with the ten remaining cops that Hodge had definitely sent. Their barricades were being shredded, their hiding places exposed. The trio had gotten the cops pretty much pinned down.
“Can’t risk going forward,” Hayden said. “Turn around.”
“Back?” Alicia echoed. “Back where?”
Drake knew. “Follow me,” he said. “We’re going down.”
Forming up, they grabbed Kovalenko and sprinted back the way they’d come. The cops weren’t ready for them but started shooting anyway. Drake ran the gauntlet first, firing right; Dahl was a step behind, firing left. They had the advantage of superior firepower. The cops ducked for cover.
Two more died, their shelters not standing up to the Strike Force team’s attack. Drake headed back toward the arena floor, checking doors along the way.
“There it is.”
He’d remembered the open door that led down to the service level, a basement of sorts. He approached and then slowed, checking inside and behind the door. He went right; Dahl split left. They found themselves in a wide, low-ceilinged room, dry and warm; a place that hummed with the sound of machinery. Pipes made a latticework of the ceiling. Both square and rectangular metal cabinets stood everywhere.
Drake ventured further into the warm room. The team followed. Kovalenko stayed quiet, no doubt sensing that Hodge’s cops presented some new threat, a different enemy determined to wipe him out. Drake signaled Dahl to take the lead, dropped back and ran alongside the Blood King, grabbing him by the shoulder.
“Is this you? These killer cops?”
“No. I don’t own the New York cops. I tried, but it would have taken too long.”
“It’d be a damn sight easier if you told us the location of that bomb. If you switched it off.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Bollocks. We all know you’re never gonna trigger it. You’re too bloody hellbent on vengeance.”
“Oh, I have faith in my men.”
Drake paused to pick that comment apart in his head. “I see. So you’re letting the nuke’s timer tick down, confident that your men will rescue and whisk you away before it detonates? That’s some faith there, pal.”
“I do enjoy the brinkmanship of it all.”
“Then you’re crazier than an Asian dock rat.”
By now, they were leaving the first machine room and approaching a second. This one was vast, high-ceilinged and noisy, the clunk and whine of machinery far louder than the first. Drake saw tall air conditioning units and industrial d
ryers among the equipment, most of which he couldn’t name.
“Get among it all,” Mai said. “We have company.”
The cops were following. Drake could hear their approach. It hadn’t escaped his attention that nobody outside the arena knew what was going on inside.
“It’s about time we sent out for reinforcements,” he said.
Hayden answered as she threaded her way between eighteen-foot-tall units. “We’re on our own for now. We have no idea who we can trust.”
“We can surely trust the Strike Force HQ,” Mai said.
“Can we? I thought we could trust one of New York’s head cops. And this is the Blood King right here. How do we trust anyone except the ten of us?”
Drake saw the veracity of her words. Maybe she was taking it too far, but she was correct. For years, they’d relied on each other to get them out of everything from pitched battles to backyard scrapes. In adversity, there was only one recourse.
Trust those that bled alongside you every day.
You trusted family.
Drake nodded at Hayden. Family was everything right now. They pushed further into the basement level. Kenzie fired a few well-placed shots at the following cops, making them leap for cover.
Kinimaka dragged the Blood King along, keeping him close. Drake saw a swift exchange between them. He checked his watch. Two hours and thirty eight minutes to go. Three hours had seemed plenty of time earlier. Now . . . not so much.
The vast room gave way to a far smaller space. Drake saw an area full of banks of monitors with two leather chairs. It was unmanned and it had only one entrance and exit. They hurried past.
Kenzie and Mai stayed at a corner, keeping the cops at bay.
Drake pulled up, swearing. There was a high wall ahead, the farthest point of the basement, and no doors. It looked like they’d been chased into a dead end.
Hayden whirled. “We’re gonna have to fight.”
“No,” Kinimaka said, still holding on to Kovalenko. “Look to the far right.”
Drake focused on a rectangular shape set in the wall. It looked like a vertical trapdoor. Dahl was already breaking off what appeared to be a rudimentary lock, smashing it to bits.
The Blood King Takedown Page 7
