The Midas Legacy (Wilde/Chase 12)

by Andy McDermott

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ said Nina, exasperated.

  ‘I’m glad you don’t run a bloody fire brigade,’ added Eddie. ‘By the time you’d held a vote on whether or not to kick open a door, everyone’d have burned to a crisp!’

  Lonmore looked offended, but before he had a chance to say more, De Klerx’s men arrived. One had a handgun in addition to his UMP; at a nod from De Klerx he gave the smaller weapon to Anastasia. She immediately pointed it at Trakas, to the Greek’s consternation. ‘The Crucible,’ the Dutchman ordered. ‘Load it on to that truck.’

  ‘No, wait, wait,’ said Lonmore, shaking his head firmly. ‘Nobody does anything until we’ve had a chance to discuss this.’

  ‘Do it,’ Anastasia snapped. The men bustled into action.

  Lonmore spluttered in disbelief. ‘Now wait! You’re not in charge here, Anastasia!’

  ‘Nor are you,’ she replied. ‘This is not a time for democracy and debate. We need action.’

  Spencer gave his father a humourless mocking grin. ‘Now you know how I felt when I lost my say in the Legacy, Dad.’

  ‘Okay, enough with the power plays,’ said Nina as one of the men started the truck and reversed it towards the radiation shield. ‘We need to get out of here before some guard decides to check on his boss.’

  Eddie indicated Trakas. ‘We should take him with us. If nothing else, it’ll stop his goons from shooting at us.’

  ‘You won’t get away,’ rumbled the Greek. ‘My men are very loyal. If you take me, they will stop at nothing to rescue me.’ He turned back to Lonmore. ‘You have always been the sensible one, Spencer – the team player, as you say in English. But now you need to be the leader! Olivia and Fenrir always do whatever they want without asking for a vote. You should do the same. Take the deal. We will both be rich – we will all be rich. What do you say?’

  Lonmore rubbed his chin, thinking. ‘I’d say it’s a good deal, yeah. What about you, Petra?’

  ‘It sounds good to me,’ said his wife, with a little uncertainty.

  The hoist whined as it moved along its overhead tracks, sliding the Crucible towards the idling truck. De Klerx’s men climbed up on to the flatbed to secure it. Anastasia watched, then rounded on the Legacy’s other members. ‘I told you there won’t be any deals. We are leaving, and taking the Crucible with us.’

  Trakas let out a growl. ‘Spencer. Tell this girl she is not in charge here – you are!’ Behind him, the Crucible touched down on the truck, the men rapidly snaking chains through its surrounding cage to hold it in place. ‘I am offering you everything you want! Take the deal, and we will all leave here rich!’ He stepped towards his friend, arms wide—

  Anastasia shot him.

  29

  The burly Greek clutched at his chest, a breathless groan escaping from his mouth, then he dropped heavily to his knees and fell face-down on the concrete floor. Petra screamed and ducked behind her husband. Lonmore himself gasped, staring at the downed man in sheer disbelief.

  Axelos was also stunned – but only for an instant, as a rage-fuelled urge for vengeance took hold. He hurled himself at Anastasia—

  De Klerx bodily intercepted him, slamming him to the ground. Both men rolled, Axelos clawing for the gun – but De Klerx pulled the trigger. The first shot hit the Greek’s hand at point-blank range and blew off two of his fingers. Before he could even cry out, the Dutchman fired twice more into his chest and throat. Axelos slumped on to his back, convulsing as blood gushed from his neck wound before falling still. The guard turned to flee, but another shot downed him.

  A brief silence, broken by Nina’s yell of ‘Jesus Christ! What the hell did you just do?’

  Anastasia’s eyes remained fixed upon Trakas for a moment before she responded, facing the redhead with an expression that betrayed little other than surprise at her own actions. ‘He . . . he was going to attack me,’ she said.

  ‘No he wasn’t!’ cried Lonmore. ‘He was making a deal – he was going to hug me!’

  ‘He was going to attack me,’ Anastasia repeated, her brief uncertainty now gone. ‘Again! I was not going to let that happen.’

  ‘You did the right thing,’ said De Klerx, standing.

  ‘No she bloody didn’t!’ Eddie yelled. ‘Now every fucking goon in the place knows we’re here – and’ll be trying to kill us!’

  The cameraman finally overcame his paralysis, dropping to his knees and gabbling in clear fear for his life. De Klerx turned towards him, but before he could do anything threatening, Nina hurriedly interposed herself. ‘Don’t! This has already gone way past far enough. We’ve got to get out of here.’

  ‘Where’s this boat?’ Eddie demanded.

  Nina pointed. ‘The docks are that way.’

  He signalled for the Lonmores and Anastasia to follow him. ‘Okay, come on. You an’ all,’ he added to Spencer.

  The young man was ashen, unable to take his wide eyes off the dead men. ‘I . . . I should stay here, explain what happened . . .’ he stammered.

  ‘All they’ll care about is that someone killed their boss,’ Nina warned, ‘and you’re a someone! They’ll shoot you just as quickly as the rest of us.’

  ‘She’s right,’ said Lonmore. ‘Spencer, we’ve got to get somewhere safe. Come with me. Please!’ He was almost pleading. Spencer looked up at his father in surprise before frantically nodding.

  ‘I’m staying with Rutger,’ Anastasia announced. She followed the Dutchman as he joined his men at the truck.

  ‘Take the Crucible to the boat,’ he ordered. ‘Get there quickly!’ He opened the cab door for her, then followed as one of his team raised the large roller door. The truck started towards it, the men on the flatbed hunching down around the Crucible with their weapons at the ready.

  ‘Why do I get the feeling we just became decoys?’ said Nina.

  ‘Better get to this bloody boat before they do,’ Eddie growled. ‘Come on!’ He took the lead as the group headed across the factory floor towards an exit, Spencer following at his father’s urging. ‘How many guards did you see on the way in?’

  ‘At least eight,’ Nina told him. ‘And they were all armed.’

  ‘Well obviously— Shit, down!’ One of said guards burst through the exit ahead of them, spotting the approaching fugitives. He fired at them – only to fly backwards with a pained scream as he was hit in the shoulder by a round from Eddie’s weapon. ‘Fuck’s sake!’ growled the Yorkshireman. ‘I was really hoping I wouldn’t have to shoot anyone else. It’s a bad example for Macy.’

  ‘Yeah, let’s not tell her about all this,’ said Nina.

  They reached the door. Eddie swept out with his gun raised. There was nobody in immediate sight, though he was certain that situation would not last long. ‘Okay, where are we going?’

  They had emerged from the factory some way along from where Nina and De Klerx had arrived. The crane gave her a landmark. ‘Over there,’ she said, gesturing.

  Eddie turned to the Lonmores, who were still in shock. ‘Okay, we’re gonna get you out of here. Just stay with us and keep your heads down.’ Lonmore and Petra nodded, wide-eyed. Spencer looked to be eyeing alternative escape routes for himself, so the Englishman grabbed him by the arm. ‘You, stick with me.’ The order was half advice, half warning.

  Nina went first, the other married couple close behind as they headed for a low brick building. Eddie pushed Spencer ahead of him, gun at the ready. Still no guards. Nina and the Lonmores reached the hut—

  Two guards raced around the far end of the factory, one shouting into a radio. ‘Get into cover!’ the Yorkshireman yelled as he shoved Spencer onwards. A moment later, gunfire cut through the night air. A round smacked into the brickwork just behind Eddie as he reached the hut.

  Petra squealed. ‘They’re shooting at us. They’re really shooting at
us!’

  ‘What did you expect, that they were going to politely but firmly escort us off the premises?’ Nina said scathingly. Across a rutted pathway beyond the hut was a half-built section of hull. She waved the Lonmores past her. ‘Get behind that!’

  They ran into the shelter of the skeletal ship. Nina followed. Crackles of gunfire echoed through the boatyard. De Klerx and the others in the truck were encountering resistance.

  She reached the hull, pausing in its shadow to let her husband catch up. Lonmore and Petra continued past another ship under construction and one of the racks of gas cylinders—

  More shouts – from ahead.

  ‘Look out!’ Nina cried. The Lonmores darted behind an upturned superstructure as the guards opened fire with their Spectres set on full auto.

  Bullets clanged against the rack, the wire mesh gates doing nothing to shield its contents from the gunfire—

  A spear of bright flame erupted from a maroon gas cylinder. Nina immediately realised the danger and dived backwards – as the acetylene tank exploded.

  The blast ripped through its neighbours in a fiery chain reaction, some of the oxygen and acetylene cylinders blowing apart while others rocketed out of the inferno on trails of high-pressure flame, spiralling hundreds of feet into the air or pounding the grounded ships like cannonballs.

  Eddie saw Nina throw herself down just in time to follow his wife’s lead, hauling Spencer with him. ‘What the fuck was that?’ the Englishman yelled as another errant cylinder went up like a bomb.

  Nina hurriedly scrambled further behind the unfinished ship as burning chunks of metal smacked down around the crater where the rack had once stood. ‘That’s why our apartment’s all-electric!’

  Spencer stared at the inferno in horror. ‘Dad! Dad! Are you okay?’

  No reply for a few seconds . . . then Lonmore’s voice reached them. ‘Spencer!’ The older man sounded dazed. ‘We’re okay! Are you all right?’

  ‘Yeah, yeah!’

  Eddie stood and quickly reached Nina. ‘You’re not too crispy?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ she replied. ‘Don’t think we’ll be going that way, though.’ A ragged wall of flame stretched across their path, cutting them off from Lonmore and Petra – while leaving the guards’ line of fire all too clear. ‘Spencer, Petra! Keep going – head for the crane and you’ll see the dock! Stay in cover!’

  ‘So how do we get there?’ asked Eddie.

  Nina gestured to their left. ‘There’s a line of boats. They go most of the way, and they should give us protection.’

  He nodded, then gestured to the young man behind him. ‘Come on.’

  They picked their way through the dockyard until they reached the muddy roadway running along the row of standing boats. Eddie peered out from behind a dumpster of rusty scrap, spotting the crane beyond the beached vessels. ‘Get across, I’ll cover you. Spencer, you too.’

  Nina started over the road towards the boats, Spencer behind her. Eddie briefly held back to cover them, then followed—

  An engine roared – and a pickup truck skidded around the end of the road to his left, racing towards them.

  Spencer froze. But Nina had already seen a man in the rear bed standing up. She shoved the young man forward as the guard fired at them, flames sputtering from his Spectre’s muzzle. ‘Move!’

  They ducked between two of the boats. Bullet impacts kicked up mud and gravel, then splinters flew as the gunman tracked them behind the hull. Spencer shrieked. ‘Keep going!’ Nina yelled.

  Eddie jumped out from cover and fired at the bounding pickup. The man in the rear unleashed another burst, but the vehicle’s wild ride over the uneven ground made accurate aiming all but impossible. The Yorkshireman was stable – and more skilled. He let off three rounds, the first striking the truck’s radiator grille. He instantly refined his aim. The second bullet shattered the windscreen – and the third hit the driver squarely in the head.

  The pickup veered sharply as the dead man slumped over the wheel, flinging the gunman from the rear bed to hit a boat’s mast and fold around it with a horrific crunch of bone. Out of control, the truck skidded on before hitting a bump and being thrown into the air . . .

  It smashed into the line of boats, ripping one in half before burying itself nose-first in a second. The force of the impact collapsed the stands supporting the hull. It toppled over – hitting the boat beside it.

  Which hit the next in line.

  One by one, the grounded ships fell like dominoes, masts snapping and lines flailing. The line of destruction marched towards Nina and Spencer. ‘Shit!’ Eddie cried. ‘Get out of there, run!’

  Spencer hurried for the boats’ sterns, but stumbled over debris hidden in the darkness. Nina ran into him from behind. They both fell. The ship to their left lurched as another vessel collided with it, then toppled sideways.

  Even in the shadows, there was still enough spill from the boatyard’s lights for Nina to see the ship’s bronze propeller slicing towards her—

  It jolted to a stop barely a foot above her as the rolling boat smashed against its neighbour. ‘Go, go!’ she shrieked, scrambling forward. Spencer gasped in fear and followed, both flinging themselves clear as the other ship rolled from its stand to continue the chain reaction. The first boat’s abbreviated fall concluded, the propeller’s edge burying itself a foot deep in the wet ground where they had been lying.

  ‘Holy crap!’ Nina gasped, pulling herself clear as smashed wood rained around her. She checked the almost hyperventilating Spencer. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘Yeah, I – I think so.’ He tried to stand, but his shaking legs gave way. ‘Oh my God!’

  She heard her husband shout her name. ‘Eddie, we’re here!’ she answered.

  ‘Thank fuck!’ Eddie said, staring at the wreckage. There was no longer any space between the overturned boats, and he didn’t fancy climbing over them either. Snapped spars jutted from the crushed hulls like the teeth of a Venus flytrap, lines from fallen masts entangling everything in a crazed spiderweb.

  He looked to the right, seeing the nautical cascade finally end as the last boat in the line smashed against the ground at the edge of the nearest dry dock. ‘I can’t get to you! Head for the dock, I’ll catch up with you there.’ He waited for an acknowledgement, then ran along the roadway.

  Nina stood. She and Spencer had emerged by one of the workshops at the top of the slipway, the dark shapes of boats lurking inside the open-sided shelters. Beyond them she saw the dry docks – and approaching the further of the two, the vessel on which she and De Klerx’s team had arrived.

  Bursts of gunfire sounded from elsewhere in the boatyard as the truck made its way to the waterfront. ‘We’ve got to get to the ship,’ she said, pulling Spencer to his feet. ‘I don’t trust Anastasia not to leave without us as soon as she’s got the Crucible aboard.’

  ‘I never trusted her anyway,’ he replied. ‘She always was a sanctimonious bitch, doing whatever Daddy Dearest told her to do.’

  ‘Unlike you, blowing the family fortune.’

  ‘Hey, at least I wasn’t a hypocrite about it. But Jesus Christ, she killed Augustine!’ he went on, before she could ask him what he meant. ‘Right in front of everyone! It must run in the family; I knew Fenrir was stone cold, but fuck me!’

  ‘No thanks.’ She set off again. ‘Right now, though, we’re relying on her and her boyfriend to get out us of here.’

  Spencer quickly caught up. ‘Rutger?’ he snorted. ‘Now he’s a cold-blooded asshole.’

  ‘No arguments here.’ They reached the first dry dock. ‘Shit,’ Nina muttered. There was no easy way to get around it to reach De Klerx’s ship in the second; the wreckage of the last grounded boat, its hull crushed like a dropped eggshell, had fallen right at its edge, the mast and superstructure jutting out over the concr
ete basin and blocking their way.

  ‘We could climb over it,’ suggested Spencer.

  ‘Only if you want to get shot.’ She hurriedly crouched behind some barrels, pulling him with her. A man with a rifle was climbing the ladder to the crane’s control cabin.

  She looked towards the sea. The lock gates of the nearest dock were both closed, keeping out the water. There were no railings along their tops, but they still looked wide enough to traverse. ‘Across there.’

  Spencer grimaced. ‘Are you crazy? We’ll either fall in the sea or thirty feet on to concrete – and we might still get shot!’

  ‘We can make it. And I don’t think the guy in the crane’ll be looking in our direction.’ A furious exchange of gunfire came from somewhere across the boatyard. Had the guards managed to regroup and intercept the truck?

  A glance back at the crane. The man had reached its cabin. ‘Quick, before he gets his gun ready,’ she said, scurrying towards the lock. Spencer gave the guard a nervous look, then hurried after her.

  The roadway turned sharply away from the waterfront. Eddie kept going in a straight line, picking his way between a clutch of containers and stacks of metal plates. He had also heard the barrage of gunfire, coming to a similar conclusion as Nina: Trakas’s men had probably set up a roadblock.

  He reached the side of the first dry dock, pausing in the shelter of the containers. A ship was in the drained tank, the rear half of its superstructure suspended overhead from the crane. Where was De Klerx’s boat?

  There – creeping into the second dock. It was running dark, a ghostly shape fading into view as it entered the wash of the boatyard’s floodlights. To reach it, he would have to either skirt around the inshore end of the dry dock past the crane, or cut across the gangways leading to the disassembled boat; the smashed remains of a yacht blocked the way to the lock gates bridging the seaward end.

  The first route, he decided. It was longer, but seemed safer. The dry-docked craft was missing large sections of its deck, shadows making it hard to tell what was merely darkness and what was an open hole. He broke cover and ran—