Redemption

by Will Jordan

  His sister was going to die here today, and so was he.

  Munro grinned as the hope died in Drake’s eyes, then turned his attention to Anya. She was on her knees, hands cuffed behind her back, keeping her eyes locked straight ahead. She had said and done nothing this whole time.

  ‘And look what we have here.’ He moved to stand in front of her, looking down on his former commander with absolute contempt. ‘What’s the matter, Anya? Don’t you have anything to say?’

  At last she lifted her eyes to meet his. ‘Kill me now, while you still can.’

  In response, Munro drew back his arm and struck her hard across the jaw, snapping her head around with the force of the impact.

  ‘You piece of shit!’ Drake tried in vain to rise to his feet, but a well-placed strike from a rifle butt at the base of his neck put him firmly down again, leaving stars dancing across his eyes.

  Munro nodded to the man who had struck him; the same man who had captured him outside the cave. ‘Good work, Cartwright.’

  ‘A pleasure, sir.’

  His attention returned to Anya. A trickle of blood was flowing from the corner of her mouth, and another from her cheek where the blow had grazed the skin.

  ‘Do you know how long I’ve waited to do that? How many mornings I looked in the mirror and saw this –’ he pointed to his glass eye – ‘and thought about the woman who gave it to me?’

  Her expression remained impassive when she spoke again. ‘You brought it on yourself, Dominic. You got what you deserved.’

  His face darkened in anger. It was quickly masked, but she had seen it all the same. She had provoked him.

  Saying nothing, Munro circled around behind her, taking his time, savouring the moment. His gaze rested on the blood staining her shirt, the ragged hole torn in the fabric.

  Kneeling down behind her, he closed his eyes and leaned in close, smelling the scent of her hair, her skin, as if she were a lover that he would hold in a tender embrace. He could feel the warmth of her body, could almost imagine he heard the beating of her heart.

  A beautiful woman even now.

  He had once idolised the beautiful, ruthless and enigmatic leader of his unit, entranced by her strength, captivated by her charisma, willing to follow her to any end. In time that infatuation had turned to love, but it had been a turbulent, temperamental love wracked by conflicting emotions.

  He had wanted her above all else, but knew he could never have her unless he earned her respect. Driven by his obsession, he had thrown himself into his training with a determination that none could equal. He took on the most difficult operations, the most dangerous aspect of any plan, always seeking new ways to prove himself.

  Seeing his potential, she took him under her wing and became a mentor. But as high as he climbed, always she remained beyond his reach. Even as he rose through the ranks, so she began to move away from them.

  His love and adoration gradually turned to resentment and bitterness. He began to see her actions in a new light, perceiving her not as the wise and fearless leader he’d once known, but as a strutting coward who took credit for other people’s work. His work.

  The tipping point came when Marcus Cain approached him personally and, in a secret conversation amongst the endless graves of Arlington Cemetery, warned him that his former mentor was plotting to leave the Agency and turn mercenary. Worse, she had grown jealous of Munro’s influence within the group and intended to remove him.

  It had been more than he could take. At that moment, he knew she had to be stopped before she dragged the entire unit into disaster. She would never willingly surrender control, and as long as there was breath in her lungs, she would remain a threat.

  There was only one option, as inconceivable as it might have seemed only a few short years earlier. She had to be killed.

  ‘You know something, Anya? I used to look up to you,’ he whispered softly in her ear. ‘You took me in, taught me everything I know. But there’s one lesson I learned by myself.’

  Reaching up, he gently brushed aside a long strand of blonde hair, then moved his hand down her neck, across her shoulder, tracing a lazy path down the graceful curve of her spine.

  Her face was an emotionless mask, but Drake could see the muscles in her throat tightening as his hand moved lower.

  ‘Sooner or later, we all get what we deserve.’

  With a malicious smile, he pressed his thumb into the open wound left by the piece of shrapnel, twisting and turning it without mercy. The woman’s body went rigid, muscles trembling, teeth gritted against the agony that tore through her. A low groan escaped her lips, and she squeezed her eyes shut as Munro pressed in deeper.

  ‘It’s all right,’ he said gently, enjoying every moment. ‘You can scream … if you want. Scream for me, Anya.’

  She was trembling with the effort of staying in control. Tears were in her eyes, but still she didn’t cry out. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

  When he finally withdrew, she collapsed forward in a limp pile, drawing in deep shuddering breaths as fresh blood pooled on the floor.

  Munro circled back around in front of her, a massive imposing figure. Anya was small and frail by comparison, hurt and bleeding.

  ‘Tough old bitch,’ he remarked, both irritated and impressed by her refusal to yield. His Nomex combat glove dripped with her blood. ‘Stubborn to the end. I’d expect no less.’

  She pulled herself up, flicking her head back to get a clump of tangled, bloodied hair from her eyes so she could look right at him. The sheer, absolute hatred in her eyes even made Munro pause.

  ‘You’re a piece of shit, Munro,’ Drake spat, shaking with rage at what he’d just witnessed. ‘You’re a fucking coward.’

  Munro turned to face the man. ‘I wouldn’t point fingers, Drake. You’re the one who brought her here.’

  ‘Because you demanded it.’

  At this, Munro shook his head. ‘Not me. I was just the messenger.’

  ‘What the fuck are you talking about?’

  ‘You still don’t understand, do you?’ His triumphant smile returned; an expert hunter about to spring his trap. ‘It was Cain. He was the one who made this whole thing happen.’

  Chapter 68

  ‘IT’S CONFIRMED. THEY’VE stopped at Hijazi Airbase,’ Frost reported, studying the satellite images that were downloading in real time to her laptop. ‘It’s an abandoned Iraqi Air Force facility about fifty miles south-west of Karbala.’

  The thump of the massive rotor blades overhead combined with the rush of air as their Black Hawk streaked along barely 50 feet above ground, forcing them to use the aircraft’s internal communications system. Outside, the vast yellow-brown sweep of the Iraqi desert swept past at 150 knots.

  ‘Far from prying eyes. A perfect place for an execution,’ Dietrich remarked, glancing at his meagre assault team; Frost, her shoulder still heavily strapped up beneath her body armour; Keegan, clutching the crucifix on his charm necklace as he stared out the open door; and Rahul, busy checking the feed mechanism on his MP5.

  Not much of a strike team, but there hadn’t been time to gather more operatives. In any case, this one was as unofficial as they came. The fewer people who knew about it, the better.

  He switched frequency to talk to the pilot. ‘What’s our ETA at Hijazi Airbase?’

  ‘Ten minutes.’

  ‘Punch it, will you? We need to be there now.’

  ‘Copy that.’

  As the engines roared with increased power and the desert whipped along beneath them, Dietrich closed his eyes and sent a silent prayer to whatever deities might be inclined to hear him. His plea was simple but heartfelt.

  Don’t let this be for nothing.

  In that instant, all the colour drained from Anya’s face.

  ‘No …’ she gasped.

  Cain. The one man she had always believed in. The man who had given her a chance when no one else would, who had guided and encouraged her, who had made her who she was. Th
e man she had trusted with absolute conviction …

  It was him. It was all him.

  She was distraught, devastated. Had the situation been different, she might have broken down in tears at what she had just learned.

  Munro folded his arms. ‘Our friend Cain is a rising star in the Agency. He’s going to be promoted to Deputy Director in a couple of months, but you don’t get to that kind of level without making enemies. There are plenty of guys who would like to see him take a fall, and his dirty little arms deal in Iraq would have made perfect ammunition. It was a sword hanging over his head that he had to deal with. That’s why he cooked this whole thing up.’

  Munro turned his eye on Anya again. ‘He knew you’d come close to finding out his little secret once before, and that there was a source out there who still had the evidence to bring him down. But he couldn’t find him alone. And even if he could, there was always a chance you might tell the Russians what you knew and compromise him again. So he did what he does best – he found a way to kill two birds with one stone.’

  ‘He knew you were being held in Khatyrgan Prison, but he needed justification to break you out. A disgraced former operative holding the Agency to ransom was just perfect, so he arranged for me to be transferred to another prison, and he made sure the guys driving the truck were all on the Agency payroll. As soon as I was free, he brought me in and explained what he needed, said he’d wipe the slate clean if I could deliver for him. He even offered me money, but you know something? When I found out I’d get my hands on you, I said I’d do it for nothing.’

  He gestured to the computer equipment on the far side of the room. The laptop in the centre of it all was displaying an overhead image of the abandoned airfield. Drake recognised the rows of ruined aircraft and the bombed-out runways. It was a feed from a Predator drone.

  ‘Another little gift,’ he explained. ‘An encryption unit taken from the Agency’s own inventory. With it, we can hack any Predator drone we want. We used it to destroy your car earlier, and launch a strike in Mosul a week ago. That was enough to convince the Agency that the threat was real, so they green-lighted an operation to bring you home.’

  He glanced at Drake. ‘Cain asked your buddy Franklin to recommend someone for the prison break. He chose you, and Cain knew he would – an old friend, a troubled man desperate to clear his name. You were perfect.’ He smiled in amusement. ‘Cain made sure you had everything you needed to evade the search operation. He hampered the Shepherd team trying to track you down, he made sure you got through Customs with that stolen passport of yours, and he even warned me when they were closing in on you at that house last night.’

  ‘But why go to all this trouble for me?’ Drake demanded. ‘Why not use one of your own men?’

  ‘Still don’t see it, do you?’ Munro gestured to Anya. ‘This little firecracker can see through a lie like we see through windows. Putting one of our agents in with her would have been a waste of time. She had to believe the threat was real if she was going to lead us to Zebari. More important, she had to believe there might be a way back into the Agency at the end of it.’

  His remaining eye glimmered with malice as he watched Anya’s reaction. ‘Even then, after everything, after all those years of compromises and betrayals, you were still loyal to Cain. You actually thought this was your ticket back. If you could deliver evidence of Iraqi weapons programmes, you thought it would redeem you, that he’d welcome you back with open arms and everything would be like it was twenty years ago. Jesus, were you really that naive?’ He leaned in close. ‘Those days are over. You’re old, Anya. You’re old and broken and obsolete. You should be put down like a fucking animal.’

  Drake stared at the woman. The look of utter desolation in her eyes was heartbreaking.

  ‘Speaking of putting people down …’

  Walking over to Zebari, Munro halted in front of the Iraqi man, drew a Smith & Wesson automatic from the holster on his right thigh and levelled it at his head. Unable to rise on his crippled leg, and with his hands cuffed behind his back, he could do nothing but sit there trembling as Munro flicked the safety catch off.

  ‘No!’ Anya cried.

  The crack of the gunshot echoed around the small concrete room like thunder, reverberating back and forth for a second or two before dying away.

  Zebari slumped back and collapsed, a limp pile of meat and bones now divorced from life. Blood and brain tissue coated the floor in a sticky red carpet around the shattered remains of his skull.

  Devastated, Anya sat staring at the dead man. He had been her hope, her lifeline, first her bargaining chip and then her instrument of retribution. Now he was nothing – just another dead body in a country littered with them.

  All her hopes of bringing Cain’s wrongdoing to light had died with him.

  Holstering the weapon, Munro looked at Anya again. ‘What was it you used to say to me? “I will show no mercy. I will never surrender,” he repeated, his tone mocking and derisive. ‘What do you have to say now?’

  She remained silent.

  Balling up his fist again, he drew his arm back and struck her with a right hook, sending her sprawling on the ground in a daze.

  Anya’s head was whirling as she lay there, blood flowing from the corner of her mouth and nose. His last blow had been delivered with such savage strength that even she was stunned by it, her vision dim as her consciousness wavered. Desperately she fought at the gathering darkness, clawing her mind back from the brink.

  She rolled onto her back, and felt a renewed surge of pain as the piece of shrapnel embedded in her flesh was pushed in further. Munro’s little torture session must have dislodged it.

  He was going to kill her. She knew that with absolute certainty. He had killed Zebari without hesitation, and he would kill her too, though she doubted her death would come quick or easy.

  With her hands cuffed behind her back, she could do nothing to defend herself, much less attack Munro and his cohorts.

  She had to get the cuffs off. She had been well trained at escape and evasion over the years, and the locks on most handcuffs were simple to pick. All she needed was a piece of metal.

  A piece of metal.

  Her eyes lit up as she pictured the shrapnel still lodged in her back.

  It might work. It might not. She could only try.

  Closing her eyes for a moment and preparing herself for the pain that was about to come, she gently probed around the edge of the wound with her fingers. She could feel something hard beneath the skin, and a tentative movement of it prompted a sudden burst of pain. That had to be it.

  Don’t think about it. Just get it done.

  Gritting her teeth, she pushed two fingertips into the wound, ignoring the burning pain and every instinct in her body which told her to withdraw them. She pushed deeper, felt something sharp and hard, and grasped one edge of it, gripping it tight. The last thing she wanted was to lose her grip at the crucial moment.

  ‘I did everything you asked of me,’ Munro said.

  There was no anger in his voice. It had drained out of him as he watched the formidable and intimidating woman he’d known lying on the floor with blood pooling around her.

  ‘I risked my life for you again and again, and it meant nothing. You were happy to stay in Washington and take all the credit for our work. We meant nothing to you.’

  Do it now. Now!

  With a sharp, strangled gasp, she yanked the metal sliver free from her body. Her vision swam for a moment and she felt warm blood coating her hands, but she held her prize in a tight grip. A slender piece of car chassis, perhaps an inch long and tapered to a narrow point at one end. It was far from a perfect tool for her needs, but it was all she had.

  ‘You’re … wrong,’ she gasped, adjusting her grip on the metal fragment before going to work on the cuffs. They were secured by a simple lever lock mechanism. Normally it would present no challenge, but having to work while lying on her back in a pool of her own blood without tipping
off Munro was rather more difficult. ‘I was weak, Dominic. I was weak with you.’

  He hesitated. Her words had struck a chord.

  Just keep him talking. Keep him occupied.

  ‘You still don’t understand, do you? I trusted you. I trusted you to lead the unit without me, because I couldn’t be there for you any more. I had to go back to Washington.’ She could feel the first lever with the tip of the metal shard, and pressed it down as she moved on to the next one. ‘They wanted me to replace Cain as division leader. Men from the board of directors approached me, told me their plan to remove him. That was why I left you. I wasn’t trying to destroy him; I was trying to help him.’

  For all her field experience and prowess in combat, Anya had virtually no knowledge or understanding of the politics within the higher echelons of the Agency. Almost without realising it, she had found herself thrust into a new world; a frightening and difficult world of clandestine meetings, planning sessions and power plays.

  She was neither a desk jockey nor a politician, yet some within the Agency had begun to encourage her down that path, telling her she was too valuable to waste on the front line, encouraging her to take her rightful place as Cain’s successor.

  Even then, after years of mistrust and growing rifts between them, she had baulked at the notion of destroying Cain’s career and ousting him from power. Whatever his flaws, he had remained a brilliant intellect, a force to be reckoned with. There were no limits to what they could achieve together.

  But it couldn’t be the same as before, with him dictating policy and her acting as the unquestioning instrument of his will. They had both changed too much for that, and on some level she had sensed the passage of time more than before. Deep down, she knew she was getting older.

  Time was running out. If she wanted to make a meaningful contribution to the world when her fighting days were over, it would have to be from within the corridors of Langley. If she was to survive, she had to adapt.

  But she couldn’t do it alone. She had desired instead a partnership with Cain, fair and equal, where each could harness their strengths and experience to their greatest effect. That had been her final vision for her life. It would allow her to finally make real the vague, childish fantasy she’d harboured since that night in the infirmary.