Marked for Death

by Marked for Death (retail) (epub)

  If he was going to learn who had motivated Greville-Jones’s betrayal, he must do it now. He wanted to know the name of the man Hunter had knocked on his ass in the restroom, and he’d get the answer by similar – but more vicious – means. McTeer was dead; Greville-Jones might not be so fortunate.

  He had to consider that Greville-Jones was armed, and dangerous. He had come across as a pompous fop, but you didn’t attain the position of head of security at an exclusive six-star hotel on cultured manners alone: Rink assumed the man had been around the block a few times, and would be no walkover. But it didn’t matter. If the bastard fought back, then it would only justify being hit all the harder.

  Rink’s fists curled at his sides. He still wore his rented tuxedo, but had doffed his tie and loosened his collar. The shoulders of his jacket were sodden. He took it off and dropped the jacket among some shrubs as he approached the stairwell up to the second floor. As he ascended he undid the buttons at his shirt cuffs, and cinched his belt a couple of notches.

  The SoBe apartment was a home from home for Greville-Jones, who also owned a larger condo north of Miami. Rink had no desire to terrorise any innocent family members, but through Harvey he’d also learned that the security man was divorced and childless. He was confident that Greville-Jones had returned home alone after leaving work earlier, and his perusal of the windows gave him no reason to doubt his summation. He’d watched the man pacing to and fro, speaking animatedly into a cell phone, but his had been the only figure to cast a shadow on the windows. However, as he ascended the stairs he thought he could discern men’s voices – plural. Greville-Jones didn’t enjoy sole occupancy of the building, only the uppermost second floor, so hearing the voices of other people wasn’t too unusual, but it raised Rink’s hackles. He had to consider that there was more than one way up to Greville-Jones’s place, not only the stairwell he’d come onto.

  Expecting trouble from one party or another – and likely the police – had Greville-Jones summoned assistance of a legal team, or indeed a couple of his employees to back him up? The former would prove more troubling for Rink: he’d seen the calibre of Greville-Jones’s uniformed monkeys and they didn’t sweat him one little bit. In fact, wailing on them would help some of his pent-up rage before he set on Greville-Jones. Otherwise he might be in danger of destroying him prior to learning anything useful.

  Prepared for violence, he nevertheless didn’t allow his anger to get the best of his senses. He ascended the final few risers on cat’s feet, and approached what appeared to be a secondary exit door from the apartment. A covered balustrade allowed access along a short corridor to the other side of the building, where Rink supposed the main entrance was. The voices – excited whispers, he now realised – originated from the far side. Whoever was doing the speaking, they were being careful not to attract the attention of the other tenants of the building. Doubtful, then, that it was Greville-Jones’s legal team or in fact police officers who’d gotten there ahead of Rink.

  It felt as if his blood was running like ice melt through his veins; suddenly it almost solidified, growing colder again. Rink ignored the back door and padded along the corridor. Overhead the rain pattered on the semi-opaque ceiling, covering any faint noise he made, but not the voices. Gaining the corner, he could now see that the front of the building featured balconies adorned with hanging baskets overflowing with exotic flowering plants, and overlooked an equally twee garden. It was not a scene conducive to violence, but that was what it had become.

  Two indistinct figures hulked over a third, who had collapsed in the open doorway of the apartment. Even as the slumped man shuddered in agony, one hand pawing the air ineffectively in defence, the two over him stooped and plunged knives into him repeatedly. Greville-Jones’s blood glistened darkly on the steel blades.

  Rink had gone there to exact violence on the man, but was conversely moved by his plight. The two assassins appeared to be taking great delight in making the security man suffer before he died. They goaded each other with prods and slaps of encouragement to stab him again, which they did, slowly and surely. It occurred to Rink that perhaps Greville-Jones had not been an enthusiastic party to the attack on Hunter and the woman after all, but had been coerced or threatened, and this was his payment for involvement. Whoever was behind the hit on his friends, Rink realised, they were now cleaning shop.

  He was unarmed.

  It mattered not.

  Rink sprang on the two killers, mashing them together as he drove them off Greville-Jones’s body and onto the balcony. His fists hammered in, a blow to each of the nearest man’s kidneys, which arched him backwards in agony before he understood he’d been set upon. Rink’s left elbow pounded in, taking the man in the side of his neck and knocking him against the balcony railings. Instantly Rink pursued the second killer, slamming the toe of his leather shoe deep between the man’s legs. Because the man still had his back to him, Rink’s kick was wholly unexpected and was more effective. The knifeman dropped to his knees, moaning in anguish as his hands dropped to cup his injured groin. His bloody knife clattered on the concrete floor in the same instant that Rink’s right knee powered into the nape of his skull. The force sent him face down on the ground, and he didn’t stir afterwards.

  Rink forgot about him. Spinning, he sucked in his gut as the first knifeman slashed wildly at him. For the first time Rink got a look at either of his opponents’ faces, and it was a face he instantly fixed in his mind as one to be hated with a passion. As the man took another wild stab at him, Rink caught the extended arm on his upraised forearm, and swept it aside. The palm of his other hand drove into the knifeman’s chin, but not with stopping power. It was a move designed to keep the knifeman confused and off balance. Rink’s left hand snapped down on the knife-wielding hand, and yanked it down and across in a deep sweep between their bodies, and then the hand was somewhere overhead, the elbow flexed over Rink’s shoulder. He wrenched on the lever of the man’s arm and there was only one way the man could go unless his arm was yanked loose of its socket: up and over.

  Rink stepped back half a pace as the man disappeared over the balcony railing, and didn’t need to see him impacting the ground two floors below to know the killer had gotten his just deserts. The exotic plants below didn’t offer much resistance, and the body hit the ground with bone-smashing force.

  Rink gave the second killer a cursory glance. He hadn’t moved and wouldn’t soon. Rink was tempted to finish the job his knee had started, and a quick heel stamp would part cranium from vertebrae. But killing either man was unwise unless he wished to become the subject of a manhunt the way Hunter was.

  He went to one knee alongside Greville-Jones. The man was a mess of blood and torn clothing. But miraculously he was alive, though not for much longer. His hand that had pawed so ineffectively at the air before now reached for Rink. He grasped the front of Rink’s shirt as if it holding tightly enough would stop him slipping over the precipice.

  ‘P-please help me,’ Greville-Jones croaked. He knew he was dying, and was scared of going.

  ‘I should let you die, you son of a bitch,’ Rink growled. He wasn’t certain that the man recognised him. But apparently he knew exactly why he’d been repeatedly stabbed.

  ‘I… I was pushed… into helping them.’ Blood popped in Greville-Jones’s left nostril. ‘Cahill said…’

  ‘Who is Cahill?’

  ‘Sean Cahill. The Irish bastard…’ More blood popped, this time from his mouth. He began to drool.

  ‘He’s the one that ordered the hit on Joe Hunter?’

  The hand on Rink’s shirt flexed, then lost what strength was left to it. Greville-Jones began to slip away. Rink slapped the side of the man’s head and his eyelids fluttered. ‘Stay with me,’ Rink commanded brusquely.

  ‘H-help me… first.’

  ‘Tell me what I want and I will. Is Cahill the one responsible for murdering my friend?’

  ‘He has murdered me!’

  ‘You’re not
dead yet. Jim McTeer is. Do you remember my friend Jim? He’s the one you sent those bastards after. You helped murder him.’

  A sob broke from Greville-Jones’s lips, and more bloody saliva streamed down his chin. Rink doubted his grief was driven by guilt.

  ‘Cahill said… if I didn’t help… Vish… Viskhan would have me killed.’

  ‘Viskhan. Who is he?’

  ‘He… he is… a bad man.’

  ‘I want his full name.’

  ‘Mikhail. His first name is Mikhail. He’s… he’s…’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, a bad man. Well, buddy—’ Rink couldn’t form the dying man’s full name on his tongue ‘ —he doesn’t scare me. He made the wrong enemies when he chose to kill one of our friends. You’re dying, not much I can do about that; not sure I would help you if I could. But know this, and it might give you some peace: Cahill, Viskhan, they won’t be far behind you.’

  There was scant life left in him, but Greville-Jones nodded as if in gratitude. Rink snorted; he hadn’t made the promise of vengeance on his behalf. He glanced at the open doorway. The cell phone Greville-Jones had been using minutes earlier lay on the floor, dropped when he was ambushed at the door. Rink snatched it up.

  He hit 911.

  When the operator picked up he said, ‘Help… I’ve been stabbed… two men with knives are forcing their way into my apartment…’ He dropped the cell phone and allowed it to clatter along the floor, cancelling the call. Then he picked it up and wiped his fingerprints clean with his shirttail. He lay the phone down beside Greville-Jones. ‘I didn’t do that for you, buddy,’ he said.

  The cops would trace the call back to Greville-Jones’s address, but Rink would be long gone before they arrived. Let them assume that the two injured killers had fought a tougher victim than they’d expected. The unconscious man had no way of identifying Rink and the one lying broken downstairs – well, what could he tell the police? If Greville-Jones did miraculously survive, then he might finally admit to Rink being there, but by then Rink would be involved in a whole other mess anyway. He didn’t think Greville-Jones would survive. He’d been stabbed upward of a dozen times and at least two of the wounds were fatal… he’d bleed out long before the emergency services arrived.

  Rink retraced his steps, found his tuxedo jacket where he’d left it in the bushes, and shook off most of the rain. He pulled into it to conceal Greville-Jones’s bloody handprint on his shirt and walked away, while taking out his own cell phone and calling Harvey Lucas.

  ‘I’ve got some names for you to check out, Harve,’ he said.

  16

  I was hoping that the parking garage would be utilised overnight by local residents, and therefore contain plenty of vehicles to choose between. It turned out that it was a private enterprise, where cars could be parked by the hour, and had closed before midnight. Our choices were few, and of the sporadic vehicles we came across most were too modern to steal without a lot of time and effort. We’d almost given up hope of finding something I could hot-wire before Cahill’s team began a systematic sweep of the split-level garage. But I spotted an old panel van. It was parked in a recess adjacent to an access stairwell. Plastic cones, and a trestle used by a painting crew who had been freshening the directional signage on the low ceiling, surrounded the van. The crew must have clocked off work the previous Friday evening, but left their van and gear in situ for their return to work on Monday morning. The van was sufficiently aged that I didn’t expect to have to thwart a computer to get it going.

  Trey didn’t look impressed by our getaway vehicle, but followed me to it anyway. She went round to the passenger side to try the door. It was locked. It mattered not. I smashed the driver’s window with a rap of the Glock’s barrel and soon had both doors unlocked. I warned Trey not to get in, but keep watch. I’d rather she was able to run if our hunters discovered us before I got us moving, than get penned inside an immobile van. She hopped from foot to foot, scanning the length and breadth of the parking floor for sign of movement. Nobody had made it up to the third floor yet, but we could hear them below us. Cahill’s people risked being cornered by the police responding to the break-in at the art supplies store, but weren’t ready for quitting the chase. I’d probably incensed them by killing three of their number, so could understand their determination. I was as equally pissed about McTeer’s death that I wasn’t for quitting the fight either. In their story, they undoubtedly believed themselves the protagonists.

  I had to wrench at the steering wheel to disengage the lock, then arch backwards under the steering column to get at the electronics, and felt vulnerable with my legs and abdomen exposed to attack. Trey did a good job of standing guard, though, so I thought I’d be able to bring my guns to bear before anyone got close enough to shoot my balls off. It’d been some years since I’d had reason to hot-wire a vehicle, but old habits die hard. The engine roared to life, and I urged Trey to get in quick. As soon as she was on board I reversed the van over the cones, flattening them under the tyres. The sound of the engine would bring Cahill’s men running. Not Cahill, though. He’d shown caution before: I took it he’d returned to his vehicle to cut off our escape route after sending his expendable men after us into the parking garage. He could already be in place to block any escape from the building.

  The van was designed for lugging around scaffolding and paint pots, not for speed or manoeuvrability, but what it lacked in finesse it made up for in brute force. Its tyres squealed in protest as I took the sharp turn onto the first down ramp, and the van rocked wildly, throwing over some equipment in the back. Trey clung to a handle above the door, but I told her to get down as close to the floor as possible. Presented against the window she’d offer too irresistible a target. She squeezed down on a rubber foot mat dotted with speckles of dried paint, her backside and lower torso beneath the dash, arms bent on the seat, and head tucked into them. The doors wouldn’t stop a bullet, but at least hidden our pursuers wouldn’t know if she was in the front or in the cargo area behind. Driving, I was the obvious shot to go for. The first one wasn’t long in coming.

  There was no direct route down between the levels, and I was forced to take the van in a wide semicircle between thick concrete stanchions to attain each ramp down. As I sped for number two, a gunman tracked our progress, shooting with calm surety. The first bullet shattered Trey’s window and sprayed her with glass. She yelped, even as I gritted my teeth and squinted my eyes: all I needed was flying slivers to blind me. The second bullet drilled the body of the van and ricocheted around the cargo area before its force was spent. The next bullet hit the back doors, which meant I’d powered the van past the shooter, but he’d get another chance as I swung towards the next down ramp.

  Bullets caromed off the hood this time, one of them nicking the windshield. The van’s tyres shrieked in torment as I torqued the van for the ramp. It went down at speed and the front fender clattered off the concrete floor before I could right the van. I yanked the steering to the left, glancing in my mirrors at the last second and seeing a stocky figure rush onto the ramp behind us. Another volley of bullets riddled the van before we were out of his firing line. I checked on Trey. Her impulse was to blink up at me, her mouth held in a taut grimace. ‘Stay down,’ I grunted brusquely.

  ‘You’re bleeding.’

  ‘It’s nothing. A bit of flying glass.’ I could feel the sting in my right cheek where my dermis had been sliced open. Warm blood trickled down the side of my neck. I tested the integrity of my inner cheek with my tongue. The glass hadn’t made it all the way through.

  I ignored the minor injury, concentrated on racing the van through the next half circle. A crazy guy – the same skeletal figure who’d tried to shoot me earlier – lurched out from between two stanchions and set himself directly in our way. His gun flashed repeatedly, the strobe effect of his gunshots lighting up the parking garage, mimicking the lightning flashes outside. The windshield was holed twice in quick succession. The spent bullets didn’t strike me, o
r Trey, but I dread to think how close they came. I stamped the gas and sent the van ploughing towards the shooter and he dove for cover at the last second. A bump told me he wasn’t fast enough to avoid all injury; I think at best I clipped his heels, but he wouldn’t be as spry after that. He didn’t get off another shot as I swung hard towards the exit ramp.

  A security barrier controlled access from the parking garage. It was no serious obstruction to the van. It was smashed loose, although not before the van’s hood crumpled at the impact, and the windshield imploded. Parts of the shattered barrier clattered over the roof and rattled to the floor behind us. A few splinters found their way inside, but they were lost among the glittering nuggets of glass that landed heavily in my lap and over Trey’s shoulders and hair. Trey shouted wordlessly – I think I might have too. There was a short incline up to street level. Thankfully the road was deserted of traffic as the van rocketed up and performed a graceless bound off the uppermost end of the slope. It bounced and jostled as I fought with the steering wheel, throwing most of the heaped glass off my thighs onto the floor, then the back end swung out and slammed a signpost on the far kerb. We were on 16th Street by my best guess, facing back towards Collins. I didn’t want to go that way, because if Cahill had returned to his vehicle he’d be coming in from that direction. I tore the van around in a tight arc, and was again facing the exit ramp.

  The thicker-set guy with wavy black hair was lumbering up the ramp. In his dark features his eyes practically seethed with determination. He came to a halt, taking a shooter’s stance, and aimed directly at my exposed face. I leaned down hard on the wheel, stamped the throttle, felt his bullet whizz by the back of my skull before it buried itself in the padded upholstery of the passenger seat. By the time he got off a second bullet, the van was hurtling away in the direction of Washington Avenue, trailing its rear bumper along the asphalt.