“Yes, sir.”
The Blood King severed the connection. The naked prisoner trussed up at his feet stared up at him with wet, desperate eyes.
“Did you lure them with the blood trail?” the Blood King asked his men.
“Several sharks are now following us, sir.”
“Excellent.” The Blood King bent down and drew a knife across the prisoner’s wrists and thighs. He took a moment to watch the life-blood begin to pump and then kicked the trussed-up man overboard, taking care to hold the rope that attached him to the ship. “Stop the boat and inflate his life-jacket. The ocean sport is looking good today.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
It was late in the afternoon when Hayden called Drake’s mobile. The ex-soldier glanced at Kennedy before he answered.
“This must be important.”
Kennedy nodded and looked away. Truth be told, her mind was elsewhere. Her boss, Captain Lipkind, had called about thirty minutes back. The questions he asked were questions she had been avoiding for a while now.
How are you really feeling? Have the nightmares subsided? When are you coming back?
And Drake’s reply when she finally mentioned her misgivings? Then we need to get some things out in the open. There are some things you don’t know . . . that you really need to know.
What the-?
That was when Hayden called. Drake was agreeing to drop everything and head right over. Of course he was.
“Be right behind you.” She waved him on ahead, taking a moment for herself and a moment for all those who had died at the hands of Thomas Kaleb. She would never forget them. Not for one day. She still had a purpose to fulfil, somewhere.
She just didn’t know here yet.
*****
Drake didn’t want to push Kennedy too hard, so he high-tailed it over to the other hotel. The room was full, with only Kinimaka standing watch. Drake pushed to the front.
“What’s the score, guys?”
Hayden was almost grinning. “Listen.”
Hudson was leaning back and cracking his fingers one by one. “That last one was a hard bastard to crack. Feels like I took the skin off my fingers. Anyhow, in this age of digital information and electronic eavesdropping nothing is secret. Nothing. The trick is to know where to look. I started by writing a simple program that collects information. A gatherer, if you will. I sent it trickling through the-”
“Ok, dude,” Hayden rounded on him. “Just tell us what you’ve got.”
“It starts a long time ago. A figure called the Blood King first rose in Russia in the late ‘80s. There’s nothing but snippets, and most of those appear to have been erased.”
“Erased?” Hayden repeated. “How? And by whom?”
“I have no idea. But to get rid of that much information must have taken someone a very long time. Or a lot of people a long time. Or-”
“So he has a team of techs erasing his very existence,” Hayden nodded. “Makes sense.”
“But no one can erase everything. Traces will always remain. Tiny titbits will always be missed. It’s just common sense, you know?”
“I get it techno-boy. Get on with it.”
“Well, blah, blah, a figure called the Blood King definitely existed in Russia around the late 80s, early 90s. It took me eight hours to confirm just that. But when you get a starting point, that’s when you can start digging in earnest. By piecing together various obscure articles I think the man got mega-rich and decided to vanish.”
“Mega-rich?” Drake said. “Through crime?”
Hudson smiled at the computer screen and gave it a loving pat. “Ever hear of Southern Cross Vodka?”
Drake blinked and Ben said, “Well, yeah, it’s everywhere.”
“The Blood King owns Southern Cross.” Hudson looked pleased.
“So you’re saying our man’s a Russian vodka millionaire.”
“Not quite.”
Hayden almost reached for her gun. “Then what?”
“He also owns Stryanka. And Russian Best. And Vlodsko. Get the idea?”
“Explain it to me.”
“The Blood King is actually a vodka king. Officially, a man called Dmitry Kovalenko owns Southern Cross Vodka, but this man, Kovalenko, appears to be the undisputed number one on every single ownership agreement I come across.”
“So our Russian millionaire is-”
“Actually a Russian multi-billionaire. A literal king of his country. I got one passage of juicy information. Just one, mind, in two days of searching. Dmitry Kovalenko lives at sea.”
“Like-” Ben struggled to speak. “Like a pirate?”
“Just like a pirate. Like Blackbeard, I suppose. His ship is his castle and yet there is no record of it ever being built. He owns and runs a huge empire from his ship, a floating office and home, always moving.”
Drake whistled. “And puts figureheads in place to run his companies which he controls like puppets.”
“Did you get anything else?” Hayden asked. “Not complaining, but-”
“Just a crumb. The word Stormbringer. More recent, a few years ago actually. It came up through an American back-channel, was even reported to the CIA, but nothing ever came of it.”
“So why is it even linked to Kovalenko?”
“His Southern Cross vodka company copyrighted it as the title of their signature bottle. And I mean signature. It sold for 1.4 million per bottle.”
There was a dumbstruck silence. Drake contemplated the arrogance and ignorance of the people out there willing to pay such a sum for a bottle of vodka. “Interesting, if appalling, fact,” he said. “But so what?”
“In the blurb they wrote that the owner of their company held the name ‘dear to his heart’. That phrase, coming from Russians, well maybe it’s nothing. Just thought you should know.”
“Couldn’t that be the name of the artefact?” Ben said. “A very similar name was mentioned by Calico Jack’s scribe.”
“This is real news,” Hayden looked like she wanted to lean in and kiss Hudson. Alicia quickly perched herself on his knee. In another few seconds she had already started to wriggle suggestively.
Outside the windows, darkness was starting to fall.
Hayden hadn’t looked happier since Drake last saw her on a night out in York shooting chocolate vodkas in the Slug.
“Let’s leave the lovebirds alone,” the CIA agent said. “And go make some calls.”
CHAPTER TWNETY-NINE
Alicia Myles squirmed a little more before turning around to face Hudson. “Damn, Huddo, you’re good.”
With a practised movement she manoeuvred both legs so that she straddled him and began to grind her bottom into his crotch.
“I know that. Is there something else you want?”
“I don’t ask, Hudson. You should know that by now.”
Alicia nodded towards the bed. Hudson grabbed her by the waist and carried her over before falling unceremoniously among the covers, tangling them in a heap. Alicia laughed and fought her way on top.
“You did a good job today, lover.”
“It’s why you keep me around.”
“Well . . . you have other uses too.” Alicia pulled her tight T-shirt off over her head and flung it into the air. Hudson’s eyes glazed a little as she reached beneath herself and started to unbuckle his trousers. Within minutes they were both naked, sweat slicking their bodies. Alicia rode him wildly, letting the moment take her away.
It was in these moments that she felt free. Only in these moments.
When Hudson started to strain too much or got a bit too carried away she plucked another short hair from his beard to keep him in the game. Useful things - beards.
The nightmares she lived with, day to day, began to fade as the pleasure took hold. The release she craved from the things she’d done grew a little less important. With Hudson, maybe she had found someone with which to make a fresh start. Maybe.
With a fluid movement she flipped herself over and scra
mbled onto all fours. Hudson took up position behind her, his eyes ablaze with lust as they ran over her naked, waiting body.
“Get stuck in, Huddo,” she breathed. “Stop tossing it off.”
He thrust forward, making her gasp. She threw her head back, hair whipping her own spine. The feeling of pleasure and lust inside began to mount. There was the urge, the overwhelming feeling, the bliss and nothing else. At last.
Freedom.
The noise of the hotel-room door being barged in cut right through her cravings. It was harsh, sudden, shocking.
Then, as she twisted her body around, Hudson’s head exploded above her, showering her and the bed and the windows with blood and other matter. Her lover’s headless body slumped beside her before the sound of the gunshot entirely died away.
With his heat still inside her.
Alicia leapt off the bed to face her attackers. Three men stood there, guns in hand, pausing to stop and smirk now as they saw the fully naked woman defenceless before them.
“Look all you want,” Alicia Myles hissed. “It’s the last eyeful any of you will ever get.”
She bounded at the nearest, springing like a cat, and slamming her hard body into his chest. The man staggered back into the wall but kept hold of his weapon. Alicia was on her knees. Within seconds her stiffened palm slammed into his testicles, crushing them, making him double over and making him scream. Alicia spun across the floor, using her bare knees to pivot and gain speed, and crashed into the legs of the second man just as he fired his semi-automatic. Bullets stitched across the hotel-room’s ceiling, digging gouges out of the plaster and spraying dust everywhere.
Alicia wrenched the gun from his hand.
“Stare at this shitsack!” Spinning the weapon she fired before her adversary could even gasp. He shot backwards, dead already. From her kneeling position Alicia sent quick eyes at the third man. He was focused on her, gun raised, squeezing the trigger, a hair’s-breadth from firing . . . her shot destroyed his knees a millisecond before he fired. The man slammed to the floor in a bloody tangle, his bullet zinging harmlessly into the carpet.
Alicia turned, glimpsing the man she had de-balled desperately trying to bring his weapon around.
Sensing victory she stood up, unashamed. With a slow, deadly deliberation she glided to his side and twisted his wrist so that his own gun barrel stared him in the eyes.
“Eyes that have seen too much,” she whispered. “Need putting out.”
She squeezed the trigger and turned away. That left one man, the one with the mangled knees. “Who sent you?” she tried. “Was it the Blood King? Did he find us?” She squatted beside him. “Tell me, arsehole. Or I’ll start with your bollocks, and work my way up. You know I can do it.”
He knew alright. His eyes showed that he was aware of her reputation. And yet still all three of them had hesitated when they saw her naked. Behold the simplicity of men.
She dared not glance at the bed. Dared not think about her lover. The harsh reality might tear her to pieces.
“Boudreau. It was Boudreau. He sent us.”
“For me?” Alicia pressed.
“For all of you.”
The words sent a black wave crashing through her. For all of you. She smashed the man’s face until it bled. “How many? How many has that maniac sent?”
“So many . . . so many . . .” the words were punctuated with agonised gasps. “I couldn’t count.”
CHAPTER THIRTY
Without looking back, Alicia Myles flung on trousers and a T-shirt and sprinted away from the only man she had ever contemplated a future with. The mellowness that had started to eat away at her bitter edges, the laughter that had started to soothe her soul, disintegrated like so much confetti in the rain, leaving nothing but the razor-edge mind of a stone-cold killer.
Mobile crammed against her forehead she ran like a maniac, gun waving, still coated in blood, and all who saw her shied away and started reaching for cell-phones of their own.
“Drake? Pineapple! We’re done. Hudson’s . . . dead,” the words tangled in her throat. “There’s a bloody army on its way. You hear me, fuckhead?”
*****
Drake heard a hundred emotions in Alicia’s frantic tones. Chief among them was distress. And it was over the death of Tim Hudson. He felt a moment’s sorrow before the code-word pineapple! really struck home.
“Cover the lobby. We’ll be there in three minutes.”
Hayden was already frowning at him. The others were engaged in conversation.
“We’re compromised. The Blood King has found us.”
His words struck the room dead. “Don’t worry,” he spoke to them all. “We’ll get through this.”
“Leave it all!” Hayden shouted, already on the move. “We only need the controller.”
Kinimaka was at her side. Drake motioned Ben and Kennedy to follow and brought up the rear with Wells and Mai. As a group, they flew out of the room and down the corridor towards the stairs. The good thing was he heard no sound of fire coming from below. Perhaps the main force hadn’t arrived yet.
Which would allow them to fade away, slip down a few back alleys, steal a mini-van maybe, head for Fort Lauderdale.
They pounded down the stairs. Hayden banged through the door that led to the lobby and swung her CIA issue into a two-handed pose as she moved forward. Kinimaka fanned out to her right, brushing by the enormous fish tank. Drake pushed past Ben and Kennedy, eyes sweeping the three front entrances and trying to penetrate the darkened grounds outside.
Alicia hovered near the big desk. A different pretty girl stood behind it now, her face betraying how concerned she was about Alicia’s appearance.
Drake moved towards the girl. “Leave,” he nodded towards the back. “Please. Now.”
He’d seen the furtive movement outside. But his warning came too late for them all. The hotel’s front windows shattered as multiple weapons opened fire. Tons of shards and sheets of glass came crashing down in a deadly avalanche. Everyone dived for cover as bullets pinged and whizzed around the lobby, thudding into plaster walls and concrete beams and earthenware pots.
Drake dived on top of Ben and immediately began to shuffle them both across the plush carpet towards the hotel’s check-in desk, using sheer brute force.
“If only my mum could see me now,” Ben grunted, but at least he was keeping his chin up.
Drake grabbed him in a bear hug and double-rolled them behind the heavy desk. A few feet in front of him the desk clerk was on her knees, screaming. Blood soaked a patch on her shoulder.
Drake scooted across. “Listen to me,” he shouted. “Listen! Doing nothing will get you killed. Now, go.”
He manhandled her towards the door that led to the back office. Not safe by any means, but safer than where she had been. A figure came around the corner of the desk, Kennedy, which made Drake exhale a gulp of relief. One of these damn days he was going to have to start carrying a gun.
But then, it was so much cheaper prying them from the hands of his dead enemies.
The sound of running boots galvanised Drake further. These bastards were taking no prisoners, attacking with devastating force and only one goal in mind. The ex-soldier popped up his head quickly to take in the scene.
Ruined front windows. His heart skipped several beats to see a group of tourists huddled over by the potted plants in the corner. They weren’t taking cover, just sitting there in shock, and the Blood King’s men were taking a bead on them.
“No!”
It did no good except to draw unwanted attention. Madness prevailed, as it had through every step of this Caribbean nightmare, as the innocents were shot dead. Now Drake could hear a voice screaming above all the noise, a voice that could only belong to Ed Boudreau.
From somewhere, Hayden and Kinimaka were firing back. The first wave of killers were quickly decimated as they ran into the hotel and collapsed, blocking the path of those running behind them.
Drake used the disruption
to vault the check-in desk. He landed and rolled to the left, scooping up a weapon as he went. In another moment he was smack-bang in the middle of a melee. The enemy came at him from all sides, too close to use weapons effectively, but striking with arms and heads and knees. Drake blocked and ducked and side-stepped, but still he would have faltered if it wasn’t for Hayden and Kinimaka clinically taking out every man around him. Then, as if Christmas had come early, Mai had waded in to his right and Alicia was to his left. Killing machines both, they cut a swath of destruction through the bad guys. Mai ended a life with every strike of her limbs. Alicia hurt or maimed a man with every punch. Drake used the gun.
For a moment the enemy onslaught faltered.
Then Drake saw the second wave coming, armed to the teeth, and he knew this night was far from over.
“Cover!” he cried. “Regroup to cover. Now!”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Using the carnage as cover, Drake and his comrades made for the back stairs. Drake remembered to drag the terrified clerk with them, putting Ben in charge of her.
“Babysitting duty,” he muttered. “Bit of a U-turn for ya.”
Their rooms had been prepped. The bad guys couldn’t know where the controller was being kept so would have to exercise some caution, at least. They left Kinimaka watching the stairs. When they dog-legged past the corridor that led to the small bank of lifts Wells stopped them by saying: “Any way we can dismantle those?”
Hayden floundered. Mai took immediate control of the suggestion. “You go on. I can take a look.”
“I’ll back you up.” Wells patted his pocket. Drake hoped to God there was a gun in there. He motioned that Alicia take position behind Mai and Wells just in case they needed back-up.
Hayden reached their rooms. It took a moment to make a call. “Alert’s out. Cops are already on their way. Army soon after.”
“Army?” Drake frowned.
“Figure of speech. SWAT. Marines. Delta, whatever. They’re sending whoever’s nearest.”
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