Drake threw a punch he knew would be deflected, struck out with a series of martial arts moves he knew would be defended. Dahl came back at him, gaining a punch to the arm and a bruise on the thigh. Drake doubled him over, but allowed him to fall back. To their right Mai and Alicia performed a similar dance, making it look good, but taking very little damage.
Within a few minutes the sugary tomes that would haunt Drake for the rest of his life drifted through the lobby.
“Stop pussyfooting around, boys and girls. This is where it gets real. I want to see some blood and guts or the next sound you hear will be Mr. John Featherstone’s scream as his body parts have a disagreement and split. You hear me?”
Drake glared around the vast lobby. “We’re out of options, folks. Her bloody computer guy has eyes and ears everywhere.” He shook his head, remembering the band attached to his wrist. “Even monitoring our heartbeats.”
“That’s right,” Coyote said just to drive her point home. “How exciting. My money’s on the big Swede.”
“I dunno.” Alicia dropped into defensive mode. “I’m still fancying Beauregard.”
Mai smirked. “The tights again?”
“It was in my face.” Alicia grinned.
Mai blitzed her, employing several blows that brought her in close, then used elbows before spinning back out again. Alicia spluttered and held a hand up to her face. “Damn, if that turns into another black eye, you’re history, Sprite.”
“More like it,” Coyote said sweetly. “And the men?”
Drake feinted and ducked, slamming a hard right into Dahl’s midriff. The Swede’s muscles were flexed, absorbing the blow. He stepped away and then came right back with a push-kick, surprising Drake and bruising ribs. The Yorkshireman threw caution to the wind, getting stuck in, and ran at his unlikely opponent, catching him around the waist in a bear hug and driving him backward.
Dahl’s clenched fists crashed down onto his exposed back with a blow that would have felled a charging raptor. Drake’s teeth clenched but he kept on pushing, the momentum driving him on, until he slammed Dahl into the wall that supported the staircase. The whole side of the structure juddered, plaster cracked, and there was the sound of splitting timbers.
Dahl grunted.
Drake stepped away, ducking as a fist whistled past his ear. Dahl somehow managed to grip one of the staircase’s spindles just above his head and used it to gain leverage, kicking out and connecting with Drake’s chest.
“Oof!”
Coyote’s clapping echoed around the lobby.
Mai drove Alicia back against the reception desk, then ducked under a flurry of blows, raised the Englishwoman up, and deposited her hard on the polished surface. Cracks raced away to all sides like a crazy spider web. Alicia swiveled and slipped off, falling to her knees and striking low. Mai found her impetus upset and stepped aside, ready to drive again. Alicia jumped back up onto the desk in order to gain the high ground then yelled in surprise as it collapsed around her.
Fractured sheets of wood fell inward. The front of the desk collapsed. Alicia disappeared amidst the destruction, leaving Mai staring in disbelief.
Drake took a step and launched a high front kick at the Swede’s chest, determined to stay on par. The blow was blocked but the force of it sent Dahl back against the staircase. This time the entire wall cracked. A hole appeared behind the Swede, revealing a dark space where the staircase’s supports lived. Without thought, Drake strove to keep the Swede on the back foot, hitting him again and again around the chest—not the face or other vital areas—and driving him even deeper into the fissure.
Off balance, Dahl pinwheeled backward, striking support after support, smashing the timbers apart. Drake heard the staircase coming down before he saw it, but by then it was too late. The structure began to tumble down around him.
“Shit!”
Drake hit the deck, covering the back of his head with his hands. He heard Dahl grunting about dumb northerners somewhere among the collapsing construction up ahead. A heavy chunk of six connected risers smashed down inches from his feet. The main staircase almost seemed to slide off its moorings, slipping out into the lobby and leaving a spindly carcass behind. In the darkness near the back wall something sparked; a circuit blowing or shorting. Tiny flames flared into life.
Drake coughed and looked up. Dahl stood before him.
“Dickhead.”
The Swede reached down with huge arms. Drake knew exactly what was coming but couldn’t react in time. A second later he felt himself pulled up and lifted into the air; then he was in mid-flight, enjoying the air-time but not looking forward to the landing. He smashed down amidst a great splintering, remembering that there’d been a low wooden table where he now lay.
Shit, they were wrecking the place. Demolishing it.
Alicia rose from the wrecked desk. “A phoenix from the ashes,” she said as she tried to maintain her dignity.
Mai eyed the vast desk she’d destroyed. “A dumb blonde from Essex,” she returned.
Alicia held out a hand. “Just . . . wait. Wait until I get myself untangled from this shit.” She picked her way carefully out of the mass of splintered and cracked wood, avoiding sharp edges, then gave an imperious flick of her hair.
“Okay. I’m ready.”
Mai didn’t waste time, painfully aware of Coyote’s eyes and SaBo’s careful monitoring system. She propelled Alicia into the warren of Egyptian artefacts, not only keeping up the onslaught but purposely giving the other woman more obstructions than she could handle. Sphinxes tumbled and crashed to the floor, their heads rolling across the Turkish rug. Alicia threw a display but Mai ducked under it. A short row of pillars, topped by objects, fell in unison like a tumbling row of dominos. Alicia caught Mai’s lashing foot and twisted, making the other woman perform a three-hundred-and-sixty degree spin just to keep her attack at the correct pace. Mai executed the spin and came back around for good measure, slapping Alicia across the face with the sole of her other foot in mid-flight.
Alicia dropped the foot, shocked. “Shit. You’re a goddamn Power Ranger. That’s what you are.”
Dust and falling shavings and other particles swirled all around them. Drake rose and staggered out of the remains of the table, almost falling, but used Alicia’s back as a leaning post. As he eyed Dahl he saw the electrical fire that had started under the stairs.
“Ah, guys. That can’t be good.”
Flickering flames ran along wires and into circuit boards, spreading fast. Dahl ran at Drake, but the Yorkshireman slipped under his grasp, loping out of reach. To his left Mai, close enough to touch, grabbed Alicia and spun her around, then kicked her away.
Dahl delivered a weighty blow to Drake’s ribs that left him gasping, stunned.
Mai sent the Swede a hard look, then jumped at him, instinct urging her to protect Drake. Her thighs grasped the Swede around the head, her arms balanced on the floor by his feet, and then she yanked him over. The Swede gave a yell of surprise and fell hard.
Alicia, losing her opponent, came at Drake, feinting before slipping around his body and grabbing his throat in a choke hold. Drake felt no slack in the powerful grip, corroborated by the fact that his face started to turn red.
He couldn’t breathe.
Mai landed hard on Dahl’s chest, driving her knees in. Her next strike landed on his right ear, rocking his senses. Her next was to his nose, making him see black spots. The final blow would come from stiffened fingers to the larynx; a strike that would hit like a knife.
Drake fell to his knees, almost blacking out.
The dust hung heavy in the lobby. Smoke from the fire began to billow. An explosion boomed out from below, the blast taking part of the floor with it. Still more wreckage plumed into the lobby, now licked with flames. Part of an upper floor collapsed, showering the lobby with debris, dust and bits of carpet; even bedside cabinets, a small TV, and a chair came crashing down.
Amidst the chaos the four fought. Drake reco
vered quickly, in time to reverse head-butt Alicia, breaking the choke hold, then used what little strength he had left to send a powerful punch at her cheekbone. The Englishwoman cried out. Drake fell back as she threw herself at him and caught her by her own throat just as she regained her hold on his own.
Eye-to-eye, they fought to survive. To be the last man standing.
Mai sent her throat jab but Dahl diverted it at the last second. His large hand struck her temple. Mai wavered. The Swede bucked, trying to throw her off, but the Japanese woman jabbed at his nervous system, making him fold with agony.
The fires burned all around them. The hotel’s innards collapsed. In the intensity and the terrible heart-wrenching destiny and the heat of the moment, the final blows were struck.
***
SaBo couldn’t believe his eyes. He stared at his computer screen, checking three times before he dared relate his finding to Coyote.
“My God, you will not believe this.”
“Tell me.” Sugary and confident.
SaBo checked again, trying to evaluate every circuit, keep that bitch Karin at bay, and assess his findings. The screens didn’t lie.
“The damn place is a mess, but you can obviously see that. The monitors that show their life signs, the ones we clipped to them. Well, they’ve actually changed. Not as though they’ve been removed, which I installed a trip alert for, but genuinely. Authentically. Shit, I just didn’t think they’d go that far.”
SaBo watched in dumb amazement as, one by one, the red pulsing life signs that indicated the SPEAR team slowly winked out.
Until only one remained.
“They’re dead,” he said. “Monitors prove it. Life signs have flatlined.”
Coyote sounded angry. “All of them?”
“No. No. There’s one left. Only one left alive.”
“Tell me.” The anticipation was sickly.
“Drake,” SaBo said. “Matt Drake.”
CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR
Michael Crouch was having his best workout of the last ten years. Once, he’d been above the best—at first the young rookie trying to fit in and impress his peers, moving on to acceptance and respect. In the Army, the man that carried his load and looked out for his men was a man to admire, and Crouch had those qualities in abundance. Leadership values elevated him to the top, yes, but he knew the support of his team, his men, was the real backbone that kept him strong.
Now, having being chained to an office for more years than he could count, having allowed himself to lose that knife edge, he found himself back in the field. Trying to avoid young and seasoned mercs. Trying to save a small town and a great many civilians from those forms of terror the British intelligence and military services saved them from every day.
And now they were at the crux of it all. He wondered if Drake had found Shelly yet. Coyote! He berated himself. Stop thinking of her as . . . something personal.
Dark fields spread out to left and right. Crouch tried to retrace the route he’d used previously and soon found himself near the outskirts of town. There was no mistaking the British presence. Great floodlights revealed their HQ, unlit now, and choppers hovered nearby. Crouch hoped he wouldn’t come up against some upstart of a sentry that might find it amusing to throw him into some makeshift prison. But he wasn’t too worried. He possessed enough high-level, code-red passwords to wake the entire war cabinet.
The carnival lay ahead, with its big circus tent at the far end. Crouch decided to cut through, thus saving himself precious minutes. He doubted that many workers remained after last night, but imagined more than a few would have slept through the ruckus. As he moved, he kept an eye on the British contingent. The more he saw, the odder it seemed.
Helicopters whirring at speed. But no men, save for the odd figure standing around. Obviously he couldn’t see through hastily erected tents, but . . .
It hit him.
The assault had begun. The British were on their way. Damn, he was only ten minutes away. If Karin hadn’t taken SaBo’s surveillance grid down, half these men were going to die for nothing. Crouch doubled his speed, feeling the burn in his lungs, the strain in places he’d never felt it before. As he moved he began to see shadows ahead; tall, thin shadows that existed in places they shouldn’t be.
Coyote’s mercs. Lying in wait inside and around the edges of the carnival. Lying in wait for the approaching liberators.
Crouch thought it through quickly; his sharp, strategic mind snapping it all together. Most likely the SAS would lead, negating the advantage the mercs currently possessed since it was clear the British Special Forces would sniff them out before a shot was fired. The only advantages for Coyote were SaBo’s surveillance system, a defensive position, and foresight that this might happen, and . . .
. . . and the civilians.
Coyote was sacrificing these mercs and no mistake. No way would she want to be captured. Crouch knelt in the cold earth, the soft mound giving way like castles in the sand. In his left hand was a gun filled with a dozen bullets. The mercs weren’t expecting an attack from the direction of the town.
Time to use it and hope to God the SAS didn’t kill him. Wouldn’t that be ironic?
Crouch stood. Instantly, the color of flames washed across his face as a nearby electrical point blew up. The SAS had already prepped the place. Mercs opened fire, seeing shadows. Crouch fired twice, dropping the easily identifiable mercs in their Kevlar and face masks. Once out of the shadow of rides, slides and sideshows, the random stands and mini-arcades, the generators and food stalls; the army of mercs shocked Crouch. There were more than he’d thought.
A lot more.
And they carried missile launchers. Grenades. They moved in formation. Before him, a mass of men capable of holding off the British forces moved out.
Crouch saw the British coming in the distance. He didn’t see the SAS, but hoped they were reporting back. More incendiary devices went off. Bullets flew. The bigger rides started to shudder and shake as lead smacked into them.
Crouch realized he was superfluous. This battle was going down hard, right now. The British came from all angles except the town, firing at targets. Crouch, from his low vantage point, saw choppers rising over the heads of the running men.
C’mon Karin. C’mon Drake, he thought. One single needless loss of British life was one too many. Give us an edge.
CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE
Matt Drake emerged from the ruined hotel, staggering from side to side. The battle had not been kind to him. Ribs were bruised. Red marks covered his neck, testaments to how hard Alicia had squeezed. Dust covered his body from head to toe.
Coyote chuckled. “Now that’s what I call a final fight, Matt.”
The skies were bright, shining down on the town square. Coyote’s mercs had thinned out. Drake heard the sounds of battle in the distance. He swallowed hard, not an easy feat with a mouthful of plaster, and licked his lips.
“They’re coming for you.”
Coyote indicated her dozen suited-up captives. “Let them come.”
Drake stopped on the top step that led to the hotel doors. Billows of dust and smoke mushroomed through the shattered opening and windows at his back. He tried not to cough.
“How does it feel to be the last man standing? Your friends are dead. How does that feel, Matt? I’m sure Kovalenko—wherever he is—will be watching. Blood Vendetta fulfilled.”
“We had a deal,” Drake rasped, nodding at the captives. “Will you keep your word now, Shelly?”
The use of her name brought an open expression to her eyes. “I always do,” she said, a touch regretfully. “I always have done. That’s why we’re in this fucked-up position, you and I.”
She turned and, with a flick of her head, indicated that her lackeys should remove the nano-vests. Drake waited until they slithered to the floor.
“What now?”
“Well. You’re not actually the last man standing, are you, Drake? There’s also Beauregard.” She gave
him a sly smile. “And me. That’s France versus England. An interesting matchup.”
Drake flexed his already battered muscles.
“And let’s not forget Japan,” a lilting voice spoke out.
Coyote’s eyes glimmered with confusion, her face slackening. “What? How?”
Mai Kitano emerged from the billowing dust; a white ghost.
Drake grinned. “C’mon Coyote. In what reality did you ever believe you could best me?”
Coyote shouted her fury. Her mercs raised their weapon and took aim. The townsfolk screamed and scattered or dived to the floor. Drake ran hard toward their nemesis, Mai at his back.
Coyote didn’t wait. She didn’t allow her lackeys to fire their weapons. She took off like a sprinter out of the blocks, running headlong toward Drake.
And in the middle of it all, from his position above the action on the roof of the town square, Beauregard Alain suddenly appeared, dropping down like a deadly snake.
Torsten Dahl’s half-choked, disembodied voice came out of the fog. “Don’t forget Sweden in that matchup.”
And Alicia’s too: “Is that Beauregard?”
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
Drake met Coyote in battle, sending his first strikes against her vital areas. Unlike the previous struggle there would be no holding back in this one. They had all known the score from the moment they stepped into the hotel. Dahl had bruised a rib when he might have splintered it. Alicia had marked his neck when she could have broken it. Now, Drake had the chance to make Coyote pay for her mistake.
Drake ducked as Coyote came back at him; the two foes face to face. Shelly Cohen’s face was unrecognizable, transformed into the wild animal she truly was at her core. The killer shone through for all to see, and Drake was still disturbed by it.
Coyote kneed him, pushed him away. A little distance opened up. Beyond her frame, her mercs fell to Beauregard, the French assassin a living scythe in their midst. The hotel continue to billow out smoke and emit sounds of destruction. Chopper blades whirred and clattered through the air. Explosions and gunfire made powerful rents in the dawn chorus.
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