Mac guffawed. Kinimaka was up against a wall. Mac charged and Hayden fired, the bullet punching into the enormous merc’s side and lodging there. To the bullet’s credit it did make Mac grimace, it made his body kink, but it didn’t slow him. He hit Kinimaka head on, foreheads colliding with a heavy crunch. The wall exploded around them, plaster and timber and a single block wall smashed to pieces. Debris rained down and cascaded away. Mac fell on top of the Hawaiian.
Kinimaka blacked out.
***
Smyth windmilled his arms as he fell, searching for any kind of purchase. The one thing that could have saved him, the ledge, slipped smoothly across his flying fingertips, offering no salvation. Almost in slow-motion, he felt his feet falling through fresh air, felt the tipping of his body as his top half started to over-balance. Sheer panic ignited every nerve ending. The sudden pounding of his heart was so loud it felt like a heavy-metal drummer had climbed inside his head.
Not the best way to die, goddamn it.
Smyth flailed again, sensing another floor flashing by and that his increasing momentum meant this was his last chance. The ledge hit his hand, his fingers closed.
And slipped off!
Smyth screamed. Adrenalin smashed through him. Somehow, he bought a second chance; his fingers again closing around the ledge. By luck and good fortune his feet caught on one of the building’s aesthetic outcroppings, a protruding figure-eight design of bespoke blocks. Even then his momentum was enough to make his feet slip and his fingers almost break.
But he held on. Panting, shaking, face pressed into the rough brick, he held on. And looked up at the window, just above the ledge. Panic wanted to take control, but Smyth wouldn’t let it. He was a soldier, trained, honed. His friends were fighting for their lives. Mai hadn’t texted him back.
With so much to live for and debts to dead friends that still remained unpaid, Smyth reached out and hauled his body up through the turbulent air. He gained the ledge, used his weapon to smash the window, and hurled himself inside.
A second was all he allowed himself. Then, body purged of excess adrenalin, he calculated his floor and ran headlong for the lifts. As a reward for his bravery the car stopped at almost every floor on its way up, but soon Smyth was inside and heading back up to the top floor; praying he wasn’t too late; resisting the urge to check his messages. When the buzzer dinged, Smyth leveled his weapon and eased out into the corridor. The door to Hayden’s room lay on the floor, the frame busted open. Bodies lay all around.
Mercs were filing toward the open door; new groups that had infiltrated the hospital using different means. At least eight . . . nine . . . ten.
Smyth didn’t stand on ceremony. Without a word, he opened fire.
***
Kinimaka was unconscious. Mac was victorious. All the meaty colossus had to do was neutralize him. Instead, the merc chose to punch the Hawaiian’s face into a pulp and it was the constant, painful blows that actually brought Mano back to consciousness.
Shit, that hurts!
Kinimaka opened his eyes. Another blow crunched into his cheekbone. Mac was above him; eyes feral, lips split and bloody, spikes of wood still sticking out of his face. The great fist he raised blocked out everything else, like a deadly, hard-hitting eclipse. When it descended at speed, Kinimaka lowered his forehead, still receiving a dose of sickening pain but also dishing out more than a satisfying measure. Mac yelped.
Gunfire sounded through the half-demolished wall that led back to Hayden’s room.
Kinimaka firmed his resolve. This piece of shit might well be of tyrannosaur proportions, but it was still a piece of shit. He blocked the next blow with upraised arms then dodged the next, rolling to the side. Though his head still spun he managed to grab one of the cracked walling blocks and swing it in Mac’s direction.
Mac’s fist smashed into the lightweight block, breaking it apart. Another yelp issued from the beast. Kinimaka threw another and another, knowing Mac was too big to evade them. Next, he hefted a broken piece of two-by-four and swung that over and over at his assailant’s head, making the man duck and cover. The wood landed time and again on exposed knuckles and wrists, flaying skin and drawing blood.
“Guess what, Mac?” an exhausted Kinimaka said. “You’re about to lose for the first and last time.”
The same thought had obviously struck Mac too. He withstood two more blows then charged forward, yelling, a lumbering titan with no concept of how to lose. Kinimaka inched to the right, rumbling loudly with effort and still thwacking his opponent.
Mac ran harder.
Seeing only one chance, Kinimaka slipped to the side as Mac ran at him, then, gripping his opponents armored vest, he hurled the man even faster on his course, the power of his arms practically sending Mac airborne.
And straight into the room’s only window. Glass shattered, a thunderous fragmented explosion. Mac lurched to a stop half-inside, half-outside the window, bent at the waist. Kinimaka felt every urge to topple him over and out into the night, but couldn’t bring himself to do that. Instead, noting the sudden lack of movement and hearing the drip of blood, he left Mac alone and ran back toward Hayden’s room. Walls spun around him, his feet felt like they were inside flippers running across a pitching deck. His recently pounded face bones ached.
Ducking through the gap, he took blocks and timber with him, making the hole even larger. Back inside Hayden’s room the first thing he saw was her grateful eyes, her shaking hands lining up a Glock, and then mercenaries flying through the door to her room.
Only they weren’t running. They were stumbling, sprawling, collapsing in death spasms. Kinimaka stopped for a second, but one of the downed men began to move, prompting him to stomp over and put an end to such audacity. The Hawaiian stamped among them, dealing out punches and kicks and ensuring the wounded stayed down. At last Smyth put his head through the door, checking the scene.
Hayden breathed heavily. “Thank God. Now let’s get our asses out of here.”
But Smyth was staring over Kinimaka’s shoulder with growing horror. “What the hell is that?”
The Hawaiian whirled, already fearing the answer. Sure enough, Mac stood there, but he was a terrible, twisted version of the nightmare figure that had already beaten and bruised him. The crag-like visage was bleeding, lacerated flesh hanging loose. The jaw was broken, twisted to an uneven angle. Teeth were smashed. The three spines of wood had been driven even further into the bridge of his nose and now protruded like small, deadly horns.
“Oh shit.”
The monster charged, bellowing like resounding thunder. Death and hatred shone from those violence-crazed eyes. Smyth opened fire, pumping bullet after bullet into the oncoming mountain of flesh. Hayden fired too, emptying her Glock. At first the bullets had no effect but little by little they took their toll, slowing Mac down until he shambled to a bloody, heaving halt, right in front of Kinimaka.
The Hawaiian punched him square on the nose. Mac wavered, but he had experienced nothing yet. Kinimaka bent over as Mac fell, hefted the man’s weight over his shoulders, and then lifted his bulk into the air.
Mac bleated, never guessing such indignity existed.
Kinimaka staggered under the weight, but tensed and flexed every muscle before throwing Mac across the room. Airborne, Mac pinwheeled helplessly, arms flapping like a mad marionette’s. Gravity didn’t give him much of a flight, but when it brought him back down to earth it did so brutally. Mac thudded into the floor with a sound that made all three of them cringe. The walls shook. The room seemed to sway, but that could have been Kinimaka’s unsteadiness.
“Really?” Smyth stared around the room. “You spent all that time with that guy? What were you doing? The waltz?”
“Not now.” Kinimaka hurt in a thousand places.
“You wanna know what I’ve been through?”
“No.”
“Really? Well, I’ll tell you anyway. First, I scraped my friggin’ fingers raw on that—”
&n
bsp; Kinimaka tuned him out as he scooped Hayden up and tried to figure out which exit might be clear and what they should do next. If safe houses were no longer safe, where could they possibly go next?
Somehow, the CIA houses in DC were fully compromised. Only two places we can go, he thought. One, the White House, is closed to us. The other . . . might not be.
A call to Robert Price should do the trick.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Drake led the way back down the steep hill. With no clear way forward, the team had decided to scope out the town’s highpoints, reasoning that such intimate knowledge would come in handy later. The big church and its surrounding graveyard offered many places of concealment, but flushed out no assassins. Now, they were on their way to the train station and after that the castle. As a team, they weren’t afraid of being ambushed; they were confident in each other’s abilities to predict and react.
“Hey,” Alicia breathed down the line. “Wouldn’t it be easier to just go to the pub? You know, wait until all these assholes kill each other and then just take out the final man.”
“Possibly,” Dahl said with a big grin. “But where’s the fun in that?”
“My guess is, Coyote’s got something planned,” Drake said uneasily. “They’ve mined the damn town, for God’s sake. She has men guarding its outskirts. I’m betting her exit strategy will not be people-friendly.”
“We need to avoid that,” Dahl agreed.
“So we take Coyote out of the running as quickly as possible. Her plans will die with her.”
They passed the flapping huddle that constituted the town’s market. At the bottom of the street a road intersected, running both ways. The train station lay around the gently curving corner and across the road, swathed in darkness. A high dirty brick wall enclosed it, protected at its apex by barbed-wire mesh. The only way inside that Drake could see was a wrought-iron gate topped by spikes and chained with a padlock.
“Station’s closed,” he said.
Dahl waved the tracking device. “One blip has been stationed inside there for the past half hour. We don’t know if that means they’re dead, in hiding or something else.”
“What about the three blips up at the castle?” Alicia said. “Another group?”
Drake shrugged. “We’re here now. As much as I hate the idea of a tracking device that refreshes every twelve minutes, the question has to be asked—how else are we going to find them?”
The group kept to the shadows as much as they could, crossing the road and reaching the high wall that enclosed the station. Drake tested the padlock that secured the gate. “Locked,” he breathed.
Dahl pointed up. “Over we go.”
With a leg up the Swede was soon poised with his arms over the top of the wall, his eyes scanning the inside of the station. The top of the wall was just a little higher than anyone could boost him, so he had to remain still using only his arm muscles. After a few minutes he called down.
“It’s quiet. I don’t like it, but there’s some cover right inside.” He lifted himself over the wall. Drake gave Mai a leg up then waited until her arms reached back down toward him. Within seconds they’d crossed over the wall and were crouched in the shadow of a shed on the other side.
“We have to assume the assassin knows where we are,” Drake whispered. “It’s not exactly Swedish Special Forces we’re dealing with here.”
Dahl shook his head. “No. They’d have snapped your scrawny neck by now.”
“Shh,” Mai hissed. “Please. We have to take this seriously. Gozu is one of the assassins and even with Coyote and Beauregard involved I find it hard to believe there is anyone better.”
Drake nodded in silence, accepting the rebuke. Carefully, he raised his head, scanning ahead. Their shelter lay at one end of the station, the actual terminus of the track. The platform led away on both sides of the rusty tracks, sloping upward. A ticket booth and store stood to the right-hand side and a low bridge toward the end of the platform. So many dark places filled his vision that he could barely tell them apart.
Between the shed and the next place of shelter, the store, lay about twenty feet of exposed ground.
“Hope Alicia’s found a way in,” he muttered. “This way couldn’t be more dangerous.”
As if in answer, a shout rose up from the darkness. Drake saw two quick things – a shadow approach fast from the far end of the platform and then another chunk of darkness shift amidst the deep shadows that clung to the roof of the store.
Alicia had caught someone’s attention, and that person had moved, betraying themselves.
“Down!” Drake yelled, breaking cover. Instantly, the shadow above the store rolled again and a flash of light erupted. Drake dived for cover. A blast rocketed overhead.
“Was that a shotgun?” Mai gasped. She yanked on Drake’s legs, pulling him back as a second explosion occurred about the same time a rocket of flame erupted from the path where his head had been.
“Almost blew my bloody brains out!” Drake twisted back into the shelter.
Dahl chuckled. “Not even an assassin’s that good a shot.”
Mai rose and fired one of the handguns, giving the assassin reason to doubt. Sure enough, knowing they’d been spotted, Drake saw the shadow flit off the edge of the roof and land, catlike, on two feet, poised on the platform.
“Again,” he said.
Mai rose and fired. The shotgun spat flame. A throaty chuckle drifted through the air.
“It is Drake and his comrades, dah? Lucky for me. I fuck you up early and take prize.” More laughter and an increase in gunshots as the assassin closed the gap.
Drake’s mouth was a thin line. “Another fucking Russian. I’ve had my fill of fucking Russians lately.”
“Must be Gretchen,” Dahl said.
Mai peered out at a low angle. “Wait. Just wait,” she said. “You know my thoughts on Russian-made items. Well, that’s a Russian Saiga boomstick if I’m not mistaken.” She held up five fingers and then counted down.
“Four . . . fi—”
There came the unmistakable sound of a gun jamming. Mai rolled instantly, firing hard. Drake and Dahl both broke cover, running up the side of the platform. As they sighted the Russian they noted Alicia advancing from behind.
Gretchen dropped the shotgun and whipped out a compact Uzi. Drake had expected all kinds of weapons present tonight—assassins knew how to smuggle their weapon of choice into any country—and so far he was not disappointed. Gretchen herself was on the large side, a slab of pure nondescript muscle from the Soviet era that could have belonged to either gender. No expression crossed her bland features. Her arms and legs were trunks of pure muscle.
When Alicia hit her from behind, the Englishwoman appeared to bounce off, her face twisted into an almost comical expression of shock. Gretchen merely blinked and brought the Uzi to bear, but then hesitated, as if unsure which direction to attend to first.
Alicia shook her head and rose. Drake and Dahl closed the gap rapidly. Mai’s rolling gunshots passed close to the Russian but were too random to be accurate, especially as Mai had the added problem of also avoiding Alicia. But by now most of the team were converging on the Russian and the time for gunplay was over.
Gretchen saw it, drawing a wicked blade over twelve inches long. It was the first time any emotion touched her eyes—wicked and excited expectation. A pale tongue flicked across her lips.
“I gut swine like you for my breakfast.”
Drake didn’t doubt it. He paced warily outside the woman’s swing. She may be big, muscle-bound and clumsy looking, but she certainly wasn’t slow, this Russian travesty of times past. He studied as she adjusted to Dahl’s movements and his own, and then to Alicia’s padding up behind.
The problem wasn’t taking her down. It was taking her down and remaining fully intact. The night was yet young and full of terrors. Even the slightest mistake could cost them the tournament and their lives.
With every sense and nerve on edge
, Drake feinted. Gretchen ignored him, sensing it was a ruse. Instead she turned to Dahl.
“You are fine Englishman, dah? Big. Solid. We could make strong Russian babies, you and I.”
Dahl didn’t answer, but the expression in his eyes showed he knew he would take a few hits for that comment later. Drake feinted again, and again Gretchen didn’t respond. Instead she whirled her deadly blade in an arc, almost catching Alicia as she moved in.
“Back off, little ferret.”
Alicia held up both hands. “Already there.”
Drake heard Mai moving behind him. Judging by the swiftness of her footfalls and the sharp flicker of Gretchen’s gaze, the Japanese woman was moving fast. This was it, then. Mai had called the play. Gretchen couldn’t help but track Mai, the approaching whirlwind. Drake and Dahl moved in. The Russian did the only thing she could; tried to break for it in Alicia’s direction.
But as she moved, as she geared up that locomotive of a body, something fell onto her from the darkness that filled the train station’s arched roof. It was a heavy shadow, a cloaked arcane thing. The first indication Drake had that it was human was when Gretchen’s face opened up from hairline to chin, blood pouring out. The expression of shock in her eyes continued, the flicker and dart of surprise, even as she collapsed. She was still breathing when her head hit the floor, alive because her body hadn’t yet realized she was dead.
Mai gasped into the silence, “Gozu!”
All hell broke loose. The Tsugarai’s new master assassin moved like a dervish, flicking a shuriken in Alicia’s direction, a small blade toward Dahl, and slicing the wicked sword he’d bloodied on Gretchen at Drake.
The Yorkshireman backpedalled, not expecting such a sudden onslaught. Within seconds the manner of the fight had changed. Gozu was like a spinning devil, the opposite of Gretchen, and the shock of his silent arrival had stunned them all.
Gozu leapt through the gap between Drake and Dahl, bursting toward Mai.
“Dishonorable bitch!” He spat. “You kill your master! Enslave your clan! You will pay in eternity for all that.”
The Matt Drake Series Books: 7-9 (The Matt Drake Series Boxset 2) Page 30
