by Mark Leggatt
Montrose stepped back and lifted his machine pistol to the sky. They’ll come in low. And firing. I need some cover.
“Connor!” Kirsty stood in the doorway as the flight attendant tried to close the door.
He turned to the pilot at the window and pointed down the runway. The engines wound up and the flight attendant shoved Kirsty inside and hauled the door shut.
The downblast of the helicopter blew Montrose to the ground as it swept over the terminal building at head height. Another followed behind and they took up position either side of the runway. The water in the dock churned and blew clouds of spray into the air.
Lockhart kept low and pulled Montrose to the side as the jet straightened up and faced the runway. “Get behind the Jag,” shouted Lockhart over the noise. “It’s armored.”
He ran with Lockhart and knelt behind the hood, then brought up the sights of the machine pistol.
“Go for the pilot,” said Lockhart.
The cargo doors on the helicopters opened on both sides and automatic rifles pointed straight at them. The Learjet squealed to a halt at the start of the runway.
He saw Kirsty at the window, frantically pushing down her palm to tell him to keep his head low. Yeah, kinda worked that out. Doesn’t matter. We’re fucked. He looked over to her again and she was pointing across the dock. He glanced over the water, to the far dock, where a group of kids in long black trench coats stood, each wearing identical Guy Fawkes masks, with flashing red lights at their feet. What the hell? He watched the red lights rise and fly straight towards the helicopter before he realized. Drones.
The first drone kept low on the water, barely skimming the surface and then rose up to the nearest helicopter. Another followed close behind, but as soon as they touched the downward blast of the rotor wash, they tumbled over sideways and crashed into the water. The kids wrestled with their remote controls, but it was useless. Two more drones took off, arcing high into the sky above the dock, edging towards the airspace over the helicopter. Holy shit, they’re going to be pulled down. The lights dropped fast as the drones were sucked into the rotor blades.
“Get down!” He grabbed Lockhart and pulled him beneath the fender of the Jag as the rotor blades shattered, sending shards of metal in all directions. He looked up as the helicopter keeled over on its side then plummeted into the dock. Water flooded in through the open cargo doors and burst up from the hot engines. It sank like a stone.
The second helicopter swung low across the runway and turned sideways, automatic fire pouring from the cargo door.
“Protect the jet!” shouted Lockhart. “I’m going to draw their fire.” He rushed out from the side of the Jag, firing his machine pistol from the hip, but was cut down in a spray of bullets.
Montrose looked up and saw Kane in the cockpit. A rake of heavy fire tore across the armored Jag. Montrose dropped to the tarmac just as more red flashing lights appeared in the sky.
The pilot saw them too and swung the helicopter towards the kids, raking the area with gunfire. The kids scattered and ducked behind the corner of a warehouse, except for one, who stood still and pushed up his mask, concentrating on the drone in the air. He dropped to his knees behind a metal bollard as bullets spattered the tarmac around him.
Kane pointed to the kid and the pilot swung the helicopter hard to the right, searching for the drone. The helicopter dipped and twisted in the air and a black-suited figure toppled from the door and bounced on the ground, then lay still. The helicopter swung away towards the kid, who looked up, his eyes fixed on a point in the air above the helicopter, then dropped the controls. The drone fell out of the sky.
One rotor blade shattered and the helicopter lurched to the side and hung in the air for a moment as the pilot wrestled with the controls; it plunged down, smashing into the edge of the dock before toppling sideways into the water, churning the surface to foam and disappearing from view.
The Learjet’s engines screamed as it shot forward down the runway. Montrose hit the tarmac as the jet wash blasted over him and looked up as the jet rose steeply into the sky. He watched it bank hard between the skyscrapers then rise up into the clouds.
He stood up, machine pistol still in his hand, then ran over to the edge of the runway and looked down into the water. He could hear screaming sirens.
Kane’s body floated to the surface, a gun still grasped in his dead hand. Montrose stared open-mouthed at the carnage around him, then heard shouts from the kids on the opposite bank. They were pointing at the water. I don’t understand.
His legs began to shake and the gun dropped from his hands. He looked behind as the sirens became louder and a police car slid to a halt outside the terminal gates. He turned back and caught the eye of the kid without the Guy Fawkes mask. Oh, yeah. I’ve got it. He took two steps back and dived into the water.
Chapter 32
He closed his eyes and let the aroma of bitter coffee and wet stone drift over him. The murky water lapped gently against the worn steps leading into the canal. In the near distance he could hear gondoliers crying out, vying for the tourist trade. Montrose looked along the water, where the buildings seemed to slump together, holding each other up against the tide and the assault of the sea. The canal was so narrow he could have jumped across it. At his feet the rising tide had edged higher, threatening to flood the tiny café terrace and the small hotel on the far side of the canal.
He sipped his coffee and watched two tourists drag their luggage towards the hotel. They checked the map in their hands and he could hear their relief that they had found the address. Montrose grinned. Being hard to find was a good thing. Pilgrim had given him the address of a safe house which had turned out to be a two room attic at the top of a six-hundred-year-old building that had sunk ten feet into the Venetian lagoon since it was built.
He stretched his legs out below the table, listening to the incessant dialogue between the Italian mamma behind the zinc counter and the waiters scurrying around with orders. For the first time, he began to relax. He had spent his first day working out escape routes over the maze of roofs, discovering hidden attics through unlocked skylights and nearly killing himself on moss-covered slates. The next few days had been spent navigating the blind alleys and hidden courtyards that laced the buildings, threading out to every corner of Venice. And then he did it all again: in the dark, under flickering lights, memorizing the doors, the graffiti, the nameplates and windows, the smell of restaurants and dinner cooking in the apartments, until he was sure he could do it blindfolded.
He sat up and leaned forward in his chair, but there was no-one watching, no new faces on the corner. The canal was too narrow for anything other than a gondola and he had photographed every boat that had come down, checked their numbers and logged them in his notebook. The sour scent of the sea caught in the back of his throat. The only escape from it was deep between the buildings, down alleys so cramped his shoulders brushed the sides. He closed his eyes again and mentally retraced a route he had taken the night before, the sights and smells ingrained in his memory. Yeah, I could do that with my eyes shut. He remembered the hidden entrance to a courtyard, just behind a perfumers, where they had sold the same brand of perfume since the Middle Ages. A right turn, through another courtyard and there was the low exit towards a vaulted, crumbling archway, leading to the tannery with its tang of ammonia, past a cheap restaurant redolent with the lingering aroma of rosemary, fried tomatoes and garlic, then sideways along an unlit alley, reeking of piss, garbage pails and yesterday’s fish, before emerging into a wide palazzo.
A waiter stood at his shoulder and held out a newspaper. “Signor?”
I wrote the damn news, I don’t need that crap. He shook his head.
“No, Signor, it is for you.” He placed the newspaper on the table.
Montrose looked down at the headline of The Herald & Tribune. Hell, this I’ve got to see. The front page was emb
lazoned with the story of an old Soviet satellite exploding in space and taking out several other military satellites before it burned up in the atmosphere. Conspiracy theorists were having a field day, but by the end of the week it was old news and prime-time TV had moved on from how some decrepit space junk had nearly brought the Middle East to war. The born-again environmentalists in the White House were having the most fun, having a go at the Chinese and Russians. Like they give a shit. He pushed the newspaper aside. She is safe.
His phone buzzed and he pulled it from his pocket. The text message showed a list of double digits, in groups of five. He sat up in the chair. If Pilgrim thinks this is funny... He glanced around, but no one looked his way. He slowly reached for the newspaper and opened it at the crossword. It had already been completed. What the hell? Pilgrim could just phone me. Unless my phone is compromised. He flicked his eyes left and right, then hunched over the table and began to decode the first numbers, using the newspaper as his notepad.
I have become a butterfly.
He stared at the message. Kirsty?
A light breeze ruffled the pages of the newspaper. He looked up, but there was no one around. The tourists had gone. He spotted a curtain move, high up in the hotel across the canal. A figure stood at a long window, behind lace curtains, her back to the canal. A flash of short, red hair and a towel slipping down to the waist to reveal pale, almost faultless skin on her arms and back. No, it’s not her. You’re crazy. She’ll be long gone.
He turned back to the crossword, trying not to look up at the window.
Tomorrow I fly away forever. What you saw before? Lipstick, powder and paint.
He lifted his head.
The towel dropped from her waist to her feet, to reveal a bright red tattoo. She pulled aside the curtain and pressed her ass to the window.
A snort of laughter escaped as he scribbled the final words.
Except for one. Now, come up and kiss the dragon.
Connor Montrose is running for his life. All that he held dear has been ripped away. Every Western intelligence agency and all the police forces of Europe are looking for him, with orders to shoot on sight.
The only man who can prove his innocence, is the man that most wants him dead. Only one woman, a Mossad sleeper in Paris, will stand by his side.With her help, he must now turn and fight.
Read the brilliant debut from Mark Leggatt, introducing the first action packed thriller with Connor Montrose.
The London Cage
Mark Leggatt
© Mark Leggatt 2016
The author asserts the moral right to be identified
as the author of the work in accordance with the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious.
Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead,
is purely coincidental.
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EH15 2QE
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Print ISBN 9781905916122
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