Hard Knocks tcfs-3

by Zoe Sharp

  “Well, that gives you your answer about Gregor,” he said tightly. “He’s here.”

  I sat up again and shook the fragments of broken glass off my clothing. I’d picked up a couple of scratches from the splinters on the backs of my hands. Other than that I’d been lucky.

  The holes in the windscreen would have been at head height if I’d been taller. Sean’s height, for instance. I realised they’d been aiming for the driver, but they’d been thrown by the fact that – to them – he was sitting on the wrong side of the car.

  I readied the PM-98, keeping my finger outside the trigger guard for the moment. Hofmann released Ivan’s hands from the grab rail, re-cuffing them in front of him so we could get him out quickly. Gregor’s sighting of his son could be vital if we were going to avoid being shot to pieces.

  The front of the Manor forecourt was deserted, but Sean must have spotted something because he snatched the wheel over at the last moment and headed for the parking area at the rear of the house.

  Gregor Venko had parked his bullet-proof black Mercedes stretch limousine at a slant under the terrace. His men held the high ground above it. Gilby and his ragged crew had been forced into retreat as far as the rear of the car park, and were dotted among the school Audis and the wreckage. By the looks of the damage to the stonework and the cars, they’d been exchanging cordial amounts of ammunition.

  Two separate sets of guns swung in our direction as Sean made his dramatic entrance. We had a few seconds’ respite while shock kept fingers away from triggers. Gilby, of course, must have recognised his own car, but to Gregor’s troops this was an invader, to be repelled. They began to do so then, with enthusiasm.

  Sean slewed the Skyline into as sheltered a space as he could find in the split-second he had to make the decision. We ended up between the trucks, nose facing outwards, so when we flung the doors open they afforded us a little protection at least. The bullets splattered around us, zinging off metalwork like hailstones. Gilby’s men started to lay down covering fire.

  The Major had strung his people out into sniping positions along the back line of the parking area. Considering the length of time he’d had to plan his campaign, and the fact that he was severely outnumbered, he was well dug in and holding his own.

  Sean dragged Ivan out of the back of the car without regard to hurting him, yanking his head back so Gregor could get a look at his face. Hofmann and I dived behind the back end of the car with Hofmann yelling, “Hold your fire!” over and over in half a dozen different European languages.

  I glanced at Sean, standing half exposed with Ivan gripped wriggling in front of him. He refused to drop into cover with the boy and his defiant stance made me shiver. To come this far and then lose either of them to a stray bullet would be unthinkable.

  Gregor recognised his son in an instant, bellowing to his men to stop shooting. He had to give the order three times before the firing finally ceased, and the look he threw at the last man to take his finger off the trigger was pure poison.

  After the noise, the silence deafened me. The only sound that emerged over it was the quiet tickover of the Mercedes’ engine and the breathless whirr of the Nissan’s cooling fans as they battled to stop the overheated turbos from going into terminal meltdown.

  And then, into the stillness, came the click and rattle of a dozen magazines being changed and hastily rammed home, and first rounds being racked into chambers.

  Gregor Venko, no personal coward, stepped out from behind the limousine. He was wearing another beautiful long cashmere coat, this one the colour of a field of summer corn, over a double-breasted suit that was well cut enough to almost conceal his expansive gut. He advanced as far as the front wing of the Merc, then stopped and gestured impatiently to someone still behind the car.

  Sideburns, the bodyguard whose knee I’d kicked out from under him, appeared then, propelling a young girl in front. I recognised Heidi Krauss from the photographs Elsa had displayed.

  She seemed to be in a better physical condition than Ivan perhaps, but I wouldn’t like to vouch for her mental state. Her eyes showed a mind well past being terrified and into a shock so deep it was almost catatonic. She was shuffling like a convict who’s been too long in leg irons, stumbling over her own feet. If it came to making a run for it, I calculated, we were probably going to have to carry her.

  “So,” Gregor called across the distance between us. “We make the exchange without further – unpleasantness, yes?”

  “Yes,” Sean agreed. “Two men only. We meet in the middle.”

  Gregor nodded slowly, but was unwilling to surrender complete control by accepting the suggestion without his own stipulations.

  As Hofmann went to walk out with Sean, Gregor stopped them. “Wait!” He pointed at Sean, eyes narrowed. “I don’t know you. I don’t trust you,” he said. He waved in my direction, the light flashing from the diamonds on the Rolex at his wrist. “Miss Fox can bring Ivan. Just her and the German. She gave me her word.”

  I cursed under my breath and edged out from behind the car. Aware of the eyes watching me, I took over Sean’s grip on Ivan’s collar. The boy curled his lip at me. I smiled sweetly back at him and jammed the Lucznik into his ribs.

  “You don’t have to do this, Charlie,” Sean muttered in my ear, scowling. “There’s no way he’ll refuse to make the swap because of it.”

  “No, I’ll do it,” I said, sounding more confident than I felt. “And he’s right. I did give him my word.”

  With Hofmann alongside me, we moved forwards. Every step seemed to make us more exposed, more vulnerable. The parking area had grown in size until it was a very long way to the middle. Opposite us, Sideburns and the other bodyguard I remembered from Gilby’s study shifted carefully to meet us, shoving Heidi before them.

  I was watching Sideburns’s face carefully. The look on it was sly and I knew he was itching for a chance of revenge for the humiliation he’d suffered at my hands. I kept my eyes locked on his, waiting for the first indication that he was planning to double-cross us, despite his boss’s wishes.

  It just so happened, therefore, that I was watching at the precise moment that the right-hand side of his face exploded in a welter of bone shards and brain, and the high-pressure spray of viscous, scarlet blood.

  Twenty-eight

  I didn’t know who’d fired the shot that killed Sideburns, but I didn’t really need to. It was enough to know that somebody was shooting at us.

  I grabbed the back of Ivan’s neck, ramming my fingers and thumb into the sensitive points there to force his head down. I was already twisting him back towards the cover of the Skyline before Sideburns’s body had completed its final dive.

  Heidi had been so close to Gregor’s bodyguard when he died that she was immediately splattered. The noise was like she’d been hit with a wet tea towel. A great swathe of gore was flung across her face and upper body. The pig’s blood scene from Carrie was just a pale rehearsal for this.

  The horror of what the girl had just witnessed jerked her mind out of its zombie-like state and sent her reeling into the far reaches of hysteria. She darted away from the other bodyguard’s clutches, screaming fit to strip her vocal cords raw. Her popping eyes were fixed on the blood on her hands in front of her, her fingers stiffly outspread.

  Hofmann took two calm strides forward and snatched her off her feet as though she weighed nothing. The relentless chatter of automatic weapons’ fire battered our senses from all sides. My bearings were shot. Then I saw Declan beckoning frantically from behind the wreckage of the Audis and Blakemore’s FireBlade off to my right. I ran hell for leather in that direction, dragging Ivan along with me.

  Sean had tried to come out to us as soon as the shooting started, but was forced back almost instantly. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the dirt at his feet puff up from the hits. He fired a short burst from his PM-98 in the direction of the house, then threw himself back behind the Nissan and wisely stayed down.

  Whoever had j
oined the fight had done so with a complement of full clips and the will to spend them. For almost a minute hundreds of rounds came down like hard rain into the parking area. I crouched behind the Audi, instinctively keeping Ivan down, while Hofmann wrapped himself round Heidi’s still-shrieking figure and held on tight. Ivan, for once, didn’t try and get away from me. I guess he was just waiting to see if I was going to get myself conveniently killed, then he could shrug me aside.

  Then, as suddenly as it had all started, it stopped. I lifted my head cautiously and risked a peep round the bottom corner of the crumpled FireBlade. Sideburns’s body lay where it had fallen in the middle of the open ground. One leg was still twitching.

  Gregor’s men were laying low and the man himself was crouching behind his bullet-proof car with two of his largest bodyguards sticking to his back. So who the hell was attacking us?

  And then, high up on the roof of the Manor, I saw movement. Black-garbed figures, armed to their cammed-up teeth. Professionals.

  Declan had crabbed himself round into a position where he could look over my shoulder.

  “It’s the feckin’ Germans,” he said. He glanced back at Hofmann. “No offence, but it looks like your mates have arrived.”

  Hofmann nodded, not looking too surprised about this turn of events. He met my eyes. “Major König,” he said.

  If it was indeed the German security services, they’d picked the best spot for an ambush. The flat roof of the Manor offered a superb vantage point over the whole of the rear of the house. We must have all been laid out below them like a map.

  I wondered why Gregor hadn’t planted a couple of his own men up there just to hold the ground. Then my eye found Sideburns’s corpse again and realised that probably he had.

  From down here I could see along the edge of the parking area. Thinly stretched out to my right were Figgis, Gilby and Todd. They were in good defensive positions, tucked in behind the cars. Providing Jan didn’t have anything larger than the submachine guns they’d used so far, they were safe.

  But pinned down.

  For Gilby to get either over to Gregor, or to fall back to the woods in the opposite direction involved crossing open ground that was just crying out for the work of a decent sniper. I’d be willing to bet Jan had brought a couple of those with her. There was just too large a gap between the last parked Audi and our position for Gilby to reach us, either.

  As for Sean, he wasn’t going anywhere. Hard up against the back end of the Skyline, he had minimal cover, but he was completely stuck or he’d make an easy target.

  “Major Gilby!” Jan’s voice rang out above us, strangely unfamiliar and harsh with command now. “We want Ivan Venko. Bring him out and save yourself a lot of trouble. Otherwise, my men will open fire.”

  That got Gregor’s attention. He twisted round to stare across at our position. “I want my son!” he roared. “Miss Fox, you gave me your word!”

  “Yeah, and I want a brand new FireBlade,” I threw back at Gregor, reckless, flippant. “We can’t always have what we want.”

  Ivan tried to wriggle free at his father’s voice. I cursed under my breath and dug my fingers in harder.

  Sean twisted round, careful not to expose himself to the snipers. “Charlie,” he called across, “for God’s sake let the Germans have him. You try anything else and they’ll cut you to pieces.”

  “I made a promise, Sean,” I said and looked away so I wouldn’t see the pain in his face.

  I shuffled backwards, hauling Ivan with me. Ronnie, Craddock and Romundstad were sheltered by the remaining school truck. They managed to duck across to join me behind the wreckage of the Audis and the bike. “Well, Charlie, it looks like you’re the boss,” Craddock said. “What’s the plan?”

  I took a deep breath. “We’re going to have to walk Ivan over there,” I said.

  “Oh you have to be feckin’ kidding me,” Declan muttered.

  “Why not?” Romundstad said, more robust. “This is what we have been training for, is it not?”

  Ronnie didn’t answer that one. I couldn’t see this kind of thing being on the syllabus at catering college, but to his credit he didn’t raise an objection.

  I glanced at Craddock. After a moment’s hesitation, he nodded. “OK,” he said, “let’s do it. Why not?”

  “Michael,” I said. “How many of the men Jan’s got with her will speak English?”

  He shrugged. He was still holding onto Heidi, hands automatically smoothing her matted hair. “Most will probably understand a little,” he said, frowning. “Why?”

  “In that case, you’re going to have to tell them in German,” I said. “Tell them we’re civilians, we’re unarmed, we’re just pupils here. And keep telling them.”

  He nodded, not liking it, but not about to talk me out of it, either. “You do realise,” he said slowly, “that I could just take charge of the boy and save you from making this decision.”

  Declan brought his gun up and grinned. “You could try, me old lad,” he said. “In fact, we’ll be sure to tell your boss up there that you did.”

  “I should be with you,” he said, but I shook my head.

  “You’ve already taken enough risks and I think, once Jan sees whose side you’re on, that might only encourage her to aim for you, don’t you think? Besides, Heidi needs you.” He couldn’t refute that. Indeed, the girl looked permanently attached to the big German. Disengaging her was going to take some time and probably a strong solvent.

  We crowded round Ivan.

  “Just remember,” I told the boy in a savage whisper. “You try and run for it and there’s a dozen men up there who’ll win a prize for being the first one to shoot you. We’re your only chance, OK?”

  “OK,” he said, the single word torn out of him. He would almost rather get himself shot than submit to this indignity, I realised. I tightened my grip and nodded to Hofmann.

  He started shouting up to Jan, his voice loud enough to carry to all the men up along the roof line. He told them we were coming out, and who we were, and that she would be murdering unarmed civilians if she ordered her men to open fire.

  I looked across to where Major Gilby had crawled to the edge of the last Audi. He met my eyes but didn’t speak. Maybe he just couldn’t bring himself to plead with me. He knew, as well as I did, what had been threatened if we didn’t match Gregor’s half of the bargain. We were risking our lives by this, yes, but even more so if we backed out now.

  “Charlie,” Sean said urgently, “for God’s sake don’t do this.”

  I swallowed, ignoring him, bearing down on the fear that was threatening to overwhelm me. We dumped our guns and positioned ourselves around Ivan, with Craddock and Romundstad in the front, Ronnie to his left, me to his right, and Declan bringing up the rear. We were so tight in that we could hardly move without standing on each other’s feet.

  Then, before any of us could have second thoughts, we stepped out into the open ground.

  Above us, Jan was going practically apoplectic, screaming at her men to shoot us, not to let Ivan reach the safety of his father’s limousine. But Hofmann’s words were hitting home. They hesitated.

  Jan drew her own gun and started firing down at us, but there’s a limit to what you can hit with a handgun at that sort of distance. Besides, we were keeping too tucked around Ivan for her to have a clear shot at the boy.

  Still, it was only a matter of time.

  And then Ronnie gave a shrill cry, spun away to the side and dropped. He’d taken a round through his left thigh, just above the knee, but that wasn’t the real problem. The blood was pumping out between his clamped fingers, a thin jet of it, pulsing to the beat of his heart.

  Artery.

  Ronnie sat up and almost tried to hutch away from the sight of his own blood, as though it was a separate entity that was attacking him and he could somehow escape it.

  He was screaming now, in terror as much as pain. He knew as well as the rest of us how little time he’d got. You can�
�t work with big sharp chef’s knives for a living and not have it hammered into you about the dangers of accidentally slicing your femoral artery. Untreated, he had minutes.

  We faltered, our advance stumbling to a halt.

  “Close up, for God’s sake,” I hissed.

  Declan stared at me with eyes that were wide with shock. “For feck’s sake we can’t just leave him!”

  “We don’t have a choice,” I snapped back. I grabbed his arm and yanked him back close round Ivan. “We stop now and they kill the boy and all this is a total waste of time. You wanted to be a bodyguard, Declan, well this is what it’s all about, not those Hollywood babes you’re so keen on. Now live with it and let’s move!”

  Just for a second he looked at me as though his dearest wish was that I was the one writhing on the ground in a growing pool of my own blood. Then he nodded darkly and we moved forwards again. The whole thing had taken only a moment, hardly a break in stride, but it felt like hours.

  We were almost in the lee of the terrace now, and close enough to Gregor’s Merc to make a dash for it.

  Gregor grabbed hold of his son in a quick fierce bear hug, then his bodyguards were bundling the boy into the limo. Gregor climbed in behind him, but just before he slammed the door he looked directly into my eyes, his own bright and hard like pebbles.

  “I will not forget this,” he said, his voice a deep bitter rumble. “And I will not forget you.”

  It was hard to tell if it was said as a threat, or a promise.

  Then the heavy door slammed and we had to jump back as the Merc was gunned forwards, fishtailing wildly as it swerved out of the parking area. What was left of Gregor’s invasion force retreated behind him, covering his escape with well-drilled precision.

  If Jan had had the time to assemble a larger force, they might have stood a chance of preventing Gregor’s escape, but as it was they were woefully outnumbered. Their elevated position had only given them the advantage while we were all pinned down in one place. As soon as the Merc left the parking area, that superiority was lost. I heard her barking commands into a radio, but by the growing ire in her voice, she knew she was beaten.