The Shadow Artist

by James Grayson

  As long as Lockard didn’t notice it missing, Jack now possessed a big enough surprise to take them down. So he sat, he stewed … and he bided his time.

  Lockard led Alex to the flight deck where a smooth composite dash housed 3D LCD screens, a touchpad GPS systems, and simple joysticks instead of steering yokes. It was a pilot command center far more luxurious than the Gulfstream they’d trained on in Coronado, but it was intuitive and far simpler than traditional cockpits, and only took a few moments for her to acclimate.

  Yet the joysticks were located to the sides of either seat, so it required two hands for proper navigation.

  Advantage, Winter.

  Lockard said, “Think you can handle it?”

  “This and more.” She looked at him. “With coffee.”

  “Why? Are you feeling woozy, all that blood?”

  Alex flicked switches as she said, “I have this thing where I black out if I haven’t slept in over a day.” She turned to him. “It’s been almost three.”

  “Strap in” was all he said, leaving her. Yet he returned four minutes later with a piping hot ceramic mug. Beverage holders were built into the left armrest, and Alex settled the coffee there.

  “We have any idea how long the runway is at La Gomera?” she said, prepping for take-off. “I’ve never seen that on the British Airways destination board.”

  Lockard gave her a deadpan look. “Four thousand nine hundred and twenty-one feet. This aircraft requires twenty-five hundred, if you know what the fuck you’re doing. Which you do.” Navy SEALs planned for everything.

  He rolled his chin. “Any other questions?”

  “I’m sure I’ll think of a few.”

  The plane glided as smooth as a Bentley, and Alex was able to maneuver them out of the hangar and onto the runway with minimal contact from the control tower. Of course she could have screamed Terrorists or bomb, but she was pretty sure Evan Lockard had a plan for that scenario, too. One that would start with the execution of Alex and Jack.

  An execution would be difficult to do once airborne, though, so she pushed forward.

  The wide windshield gave an open view of the second runway, the one that the ground crew—consisting of what appeared to be a teenage boy and his father—had cleared with a simple snowplow. The two of them stood off to the side and watched as the jet took off, leaning against the plow, hands in their pockets, hats pulled low.

  One minute later, they were soaring over the Irish Sea, headed south-southwest to their destination three thousand and fifty-nine kilometers away.

  The Canary Islands.

  Alex had to keep pushing thoughts of Jack from her mind. She needed to concentrate, though the Boeing’s autopilot computer kept them on target. All she had to do was occasionally check critical indicators and respond to in-flight checks, then land the plane. Apparently Lockard was going to sit in the co-pilot’s seat with his HK aimed at her ribs for the whole flight.

  Except for when he was getting her coffee. Finally, after two hours and Alex’s third cup piping mug, he decided to speak. “The motorcyclists who jumped you in Piccadilly—are you certain you killed them?”

  Eyeing him, she said, “Positive. So, who crossed who there?”

  He looked out at the pure blue ocean. “The twins made the drop and then changed their minds. They were going to take you. Ransom you to Edgar for the attaché.” He smiled. “Why else would they have missed you with all those rounds?”

  Another corner of the operation’s landscape came into view for Alex, and she nodded. “Nice team you had there. A bunch of real stand-up guys.”

  “Right? So I should thank you,” he said. “I think they would’ve succeeded if you hadn’t killed them.”

  “Anything for you, Evan.”

  He laughed. “You know, you should be blaming Moss. He’s the genesis of it all.”

  “That’s one part I don’t get. Why would Moss go along with all of this?”

  “Honey, that’s CIA 101. Everyone has a skeleton buried somewhere. And I found his.”

  “Must have been pretty damned solid, considering the money you demanded.”

  “Hey, it was no secret that we’d dumped twenty billion cash into Iraq and proceeded to lose six of it. We only aimed for one. Seemed fair, considering.”

  Just a billion dollars? Perfectly.

  “And Moss orchestrated it?”

  “More like guided. The Company had located a cache held by a small group of rebels in a palace. He pointed us in the right direction, and…under clandestine actions, we took it back.”

  “You mean Draganic, the twins, and yourself.”

  He nodded. “Your name came up…you know, for the snatch team. I actually considered recruiting you. You’re a Talonstriker, and I thought you had to be game for a little payback considering how the Company screwed you and your dad. I even reviewed your file.”

  “Lemme guess. I was too honest for you?”

  “Women lack killer instinct.”

  Alex decided to take that up with him later. “So instead, you suggested Moss use me as bait, knowing my father would then go after Moss.”

  “And I knew you’d end up with the attaché.”

  “And you’d have one less partner to split this with.” She motioned to the back of the plane.

  “Brilliant, right?”

  “And Draganic?”

  “He helped in the beginning, but then got greedy. He made his own bed. Right in the dirt.”

  Alex watched Lockard shake his head, and realized she was sitting next to a guy who considered life to be no more or less than a bargaining chip. He was a machine, unfeeling, unemotional, if self-motivated. Yeah, money was a good way to keep score, but this guy was all about the win and so far he’d outmaneuvered and manipulated her father and Moss and Draganic. He’d either killed or orchestrated the deaths of his teammates, and what was his reward for all of that?

  A cool billion in cash.

  This world was so fucked up.

  Alex unstrapped her seat belt.

  “Fuck you going?” Lockard said.

  “Fuck you think?” she replied. “Restroom.”

  Truth was, she wanted to check on Jack. She wanted to be sure he was okay…and she wanted to stir the water up a bit. If the two of them were going to live, Grant and Lockard would have to be incapacitated before they landed. The final descent was in ten minutes.

  Lockard finally glanced at his watch. “Make it quick.”

  She switched the captain controls over to Lockard, and eased out of the cockpit seat and out the door. Standing in the galley, Alex watched Grant and Jack as she put another pot of coffee on the burner. She stretched her neck and touched her own wound, indicating that she knew how Jack felt.

  His lip curled up and he nodded.

  Grant sat between piles of money on the long sofa, watching the large-screen television. Some British show was on, the kind that featured jokes from Churchill’s era, and when Alex emerged from the galley, he seemed annoyed that he had to train his Walther on her.

  “Favorite childhood show?”

  “Pardon?”

  “Forget it.” She continued past him and he said, “Alex. I thought you should know, I really liked your father. For the record.”

  She stopped, and turned to him. “And he thought you were a masterful leader of MI6 operations.”

  “Really?”

  Alex just stared back.

  Jack laughed.

  “You’re a bloody bitch, you know that?” Grant said, but by this time he was behind her.

  Alex stopped before Jack. “You okay?”

  He glanced at Grant, already engrossed in his show again, then tipped his head for her to lean down.

  She dropped a kiss on his forehead as he whispered, “I’ve Lockard’s blade.”

  “Keep moving,” Grant yelled. “I’m happy to shoot you, too!”

  The bathroom rivaled that of most five-star hotels, and for a moment it was all she could do not to lay down on
the limestone tiles and close her eyes. Instead, after taking as long as she dared without alarming the Dream Team, Alex exited the bathroom with a plan of attack. One that begged for proof of sanity.

  Grant barely took his eyes from his show. “Hurry it up.”

  Jack nodded once and looked away.

  Alex stumbled over a packet of cash, calling out and falling into Jack while reaching around his back. As Grant jumped up from the sofa, she sliced the tie between his wrists with the knife he’d readied.

  He had it hidden again before Grant could reach them.

  “Wait for my move,” she whispered.

  “Up!” Grant grabbed Alex’s shoulder and pulled her to her feet. He pressed the gun into her back as he pushed her down the hall toward the cockpit.

  Easy part, done.

  Jack could take Grant even with one good leg, of that she was sure. But could he do it quickly enough for them to take Lockard together? At least neither man could fire his gun at this altitude. A forty-five caliber round could blow a hole through the engine block of a Cadillac. A tear like that in the jet’s hull would be disastrous for all of them.

  Alex stopped in the galley. “I need coffee.”

  “Oh, bollocks.” Grant stood there, waving his pistol. “Make it snappy, then.”

  The metal pot was still filling with near-boiling liquid, but Alex did the mug-for-pot replacement trick, catching the stream of hot coffee as it fell from the filter. She slipped the pot back under the stream once her cup was full, and Grant holstered his pistol and turned back to his show. Alex entered the cockpit.

  Lockard knew their time was short. He was watching her with an intensity in his eyes; anticipatory, gleaming … wary. “Hurry up. You need to guide the descent.”

  Alex climbed back into her seat, placed the coffee into the holder, and touched the screens to take back control of the jet.

  “Keep it steady, and remember,”—he nodded to the back and smiled—“we’re flying with an extra twenty-three thousand pounds here.”

  “Hard to forget,” she said, easing the thrusters.

  Alex couldn’t see the Canary Islands yet, she but kept her focus straight ahead and touched the thrusters back again, watching as they dropped in altitude.

  Taking hold of the handle because the coffee was still hot, Alex turned the mug in her hand.

  The altimeter dropped from twenty-five to fifteen, then to ten thousand feet. She waited a bit more. Eight, then seven thousand feet.

  Holding her breath, Alex pulled all the way back on the thrusters, all but killing power to the engines.

  “What are you doing?” Lockard sat forward and tapped his screen. “It’s too early for that.”

  Alex threw the piping hot coffee in Lockard’s face right as he turned to glare at her, and then she shattered the cup on the side of his head.

  Thirty-Nine

  There really were moments in which time froze. Seconds in which each action unfolded in slow motion due to hyper-perception, your mind clocking at an inhuman pace.

  This wasn’t one of them.

  Though scalded and struck, instead of falling backward like a normal human, Lockard reached for his knife.

  “Shit!” he yelled, coming up empty.

  He vaulted from his seat and onto Alex, and she drove an elbow into his head while ducking her own. Still holding the cup handle, she tore the jagged porcelain across his face. It fueled him like a lanced bull. Raging, he drove his shoulder into her, taking them both to the flight-deck floor.

  Suddenly, Grant yelped from the rear of the plane. “What the devil are you—”

  Lockard, turning his weight and bending an arm under her, rolled with Alex on the floor. She clenched a fist on his bad hand and he grimaced, blood dripping from the cut on his face, but he didn’t yield. With just enough room, she reached behind him and ripped his HK from its holster.

  Lockard, with the kill-or-be-killed expression of an MMA fighter, held her arm high and drove a knee into her pubic bone.

  Jack yelled from the back, but Alex’s ears were ringing with such pain that she couldn’t make out his words.

  She slammed the butt of the gun into the back of Lockard’s head, but he kept going. She did it again, and he twisted, using his bad hand to deflect the blows before driving a fist into her bandaged shoulder. The strike to the gunshot wound blasted through her, and the gun clattered to the floor as she turned to avoid the next strike.

  Lockard pushed a forearm into her throat, grabbed the HK with his good hand, and came back with it pointed it at her head.

  Jack held the knife, drawn but ready, behind his back as Alex returned to the cockpit. He spotted Lockard half-turned in his seat, but when Alex glanced back at Grant, Jack knew it was go time.

  He pounced at the exact moment Alex threw the coffee into Lockard’s face.

  At the defense training facility in Lyon, Jack learned that an aggressor could clear twenty-one feet in one and a half seconds, a half second faster than the time it took to draw a pistol from a holster. Even though he had to hurdle bundles of cash with one good leg, he cleared half that distance in two seconds flat.

  Grant swung his pistol around at the last second, but he’d spent too many years behind the desk, far removed from his glory days in the Cold War.

  “What the devil are you—”

  One stiff-arm blow to the underside of Grant’s chin, and the old man was flat on his back.

  The gun dropped to the floor, and in a clumsy attempt to draw it back to himself, Grant kicked it forward as he fell. It spun all the way into the bathroom.

  From behind, Jack pressed the blade to Grant’s neck and shoved a knee into his lower back. Grant glanced down at Jack’s bandaged leg and moved a hand toward the wound.

  “Do that…” Jack pressed the blade harder to the man’s throat. “And it’d be the last thing you do.”

  “Drop it!”

  It was Jack’s voice, coming from the back.

  “Calm now. Calm!” Grant shouted.

  Alex didn’t dare move. Lockard had his gun tight to Alex’s head, and as she stared up at him she could see the calculation moving across his pupils. If he shot her, Jack would have all the incentive he needed to cut Grant’s throat and take his pistol. Then Lockard would be in a gunfight with someone with nothing to lose. Causing a plane crash would not factor into Jack’s actions.

  So Lockard cracked the butt of the gun against Alex’s head and stood.

  Blinking, Alex turned to see doubles and then triples of Jack. Grant was on his knees before him, the knife to his throat.

  “Drop the gun!” Jack yelled again.

  Lockard pointed the gun at Jack and Grant, then at Alex again. Then at Jack.

  Grant yelled, “Shoot this man, Evan! Do it!”

  “Brilliant,” Jack said. “Then we’ll all die.”

  Lockard swung the gun from Jack to Alex, back to Jack, then Alex. Back to Jack. Stalemate.

  Almost.

  “Fools,” he said. He began walking to the back of the plane, gun trained on Jack.

  Lockard had found a way to win this, Alex realized. He could take Jack on without care of Grant, or Grant’s gun, kicked out of Jack’s reach. After all, you don’t bring a knife to a gunfight, right? Even if you are a few thousand feet in the air.

  “Jack, think about it.” Lockard took another step.

  Alex was struggling to right herself, still seeing multiples of each of them. Looking up at the screens, she saw they were at four thousand feet and dropping faster than normal with the lower thrust.

  “Stop right where you are,” Jack said, but he couldn’t hide the doubt in his voice. Lockard had bested them all. In about a minute, he would be the last one standing. Just him and a great big pile of money.

  “A billion dollars.” Lockard stepped forward. “Drop the knife and we could share it. You and me, we’d make a great team.”

  “What are you saying, Evan?” Grant demanded. “For God’s sake, get your wits a
bout you!”

  “Do shut up.” Jack pressed the blade to Grant’s throat so hard it cut his flesh this time, a string of red from the man’s neck dribbling into his shirt.

  Three thousand feet.

  Grant began to shake. “Shoot this bloody bastard, Evan!”

  Lockard ignored him, smiling at Jack. “Go ahead, Jack. Kill him. It means more money for us. You and me.”

  Grant said, “Evan, son. Stop this nonsense!”

  “I told you not to call me that,” Lockard said. He took another step forward.

  The jet whined as the computerized flaps moved, dipping the jet into descent. Alex crawled backward, but stopped when Lockard turned to her.

  “Stay right there, Winter. Loverboy’s life here depends on it.”

  Two thousand.

  Grant said, “Evan, you need me. You need me to pass Customs in the Canarys!”

  Alex pulled herself closer to the controls, an arm’s length away.

  Lockard shook his head. “No, I don’t.” He raised the HK. “I just need to land the plane.”

  Alex hauled herself onto the seat, hit the screen with one hand and flipped off the autopilot with the other. She jerked the joystick left. Everyone stumbled.

  “Winter!” Lockard spun and aimed at her.

  Alex rolled the plane again, harder this time, and Lockard took a shot, hitting the seat as she ducked. The bullet ripped straight through the seat back and buried itself in the flat-screen control on her side of the plane. Sparks jumped from the smoking hole, but the computers remained on.

  The bastard had lost his mind.

  Alex kept her head below the seat back and her hand on the joystick.

  Lockard spun and shot again, the echo of the pop dampened by the hoards of cash on the floor and seats. But Grant’s scream rang loud and clear.

  “You shot me! You son of a bitch, you—”

  Knowing the move had exposed Jack, Alex jerked the joystick again, causing the plane to roll the other way. All three of them tumbled.

  Grant crumpled and stayed down as Jack crawled behind a row of seats.