Slowly, the tension seeped away.
The mix of concentration, aromatic smells and simple exercise worked to drain the pressure from his body. Cooking was his only release, and then only when he was home because nowhere else felt the same.
As he chopped the peppers, the knife slipped, cutting a tiny chunk of flesh from his finger. He left it nestled amidst the peppers as he swept them into the big pan and let the blood drain into the mix. Time ceased to exist. Jambalaya was his masterpiece, the pinnacle of his long-practiced culinary skills.
After a while, Cayman laid out a knife and fork on the empty table, the noise echoing around the empty apartment as if to mock him. He sat down, carefully thinking about nothing, still dressed in the standard suit and tie, and ate with robotic, measured strokes.
Hayden and Gates had escaped his trap in L.A. Where would they turn up next? Their cohorts, Ben and Karin Blake, had fled the CIA building a mere twenty minutes before Cayman’s men arrived.
He stopped eating. The anxiety made him want to fling the meal to the floor. Made him want to stab the fork through the meat of his hand and suck at the blood and the torn flesh for solace, using the hand like a grotesque dummy. He’d done it before.
But the heady aroma invaded his senses again. He returned to the meal. He finished the bowl, stood up and walked over to the window. The neighborhood outside was busy, full of parents and children hurrying about their daily routines. Cayman had chosen to live amidst a bustling civilian population, though he didn’t know why. Was it the need to feel he was a part of something? Something real, as opposed to the shadowy cutthroat world he thrived in?
He watched the young mothers, familiar figures by now. The children. He was a monster in their midst, the Halloween ghoul come to life. But the government indulged his whim and let him live amongst them.
No, not the government. The people behind the government. They didn’t have a conscience. They didn’t care where he lived, so long as they got what they wanted. The American government, the top brass, had actually balked at the idea of allowing him the use of this location. . .but they’d been overruled.
The Shadow Elite. They were the towering silhouette behind the monster. The blackness at the heart of the gloom. A body of six men, Cayman knew, who played the world’s governments like puppets. Their interest, already piqued at the discovery of the spectacular tombs and preserved bones of so many legendary gods, had skyrocketed into the stratosphere when they learned of the doomsday device. The response had been immediate. First, it must not fall into the hands of anyone else, for that person might then be able to wield some influence over them, and second, they should be the ones to control it since they always had been, and always would be, the world’s governing body. It was an irony to them, Cayman knew, that they should possess the power of old gods, since they were the new gods. And the Norseman, their leader, was an unstoppable force. On a whim, he could start a war. On the toss of a coin, he could wipe out a village—anywhere in the world. Cayman had witnessed his power first-hand. The memories still gave him night terrors.
Cayman turned back to the emptiness of his home, as his cellphone began to chirp a standard ringtone.
“Cayman here.”
“This is Mackenzie, sir. I’m in charge of coordinating all the data we collect from tombs one and two that might relate to tomb three.”
“I know exactly who you are. What do you want?”
“It’s tomb three, sir. We have a location.”
Cayman was careful not to let his excitement show. This was it! The Shadow Elite would be, literally, ecstatic.
“Gather everyone.” He spoke the words slowly and succinctly. “Send them all to the location at once. Now—where is it?”
CHAPTER TEN
Drake’s flight landed at Zurich airport a little before six a.m. Swiss time. He’d already received coordinates in-flight from Hayden so, as soon as they passed through security control without a hiccup, they found a taxi rank and gave the driver a local address. Within twenty minutes, they turned off Zurichstrasse onto Wisentalstrasse and dropped off outside a gray, nondescript building with the initials IMI painted onto a very old, very shabby sign, which hung precariously over the front door.
Drake, Alicia and Mai eyed the area suspiciously as the taxi pulled away.
“An awful lot of flat ground,” Alicia said warily. “You sure about this, Drakey?”
“I didn’t choose it,” he said testily.
The door opened and Torsten Dahl stood there. The big Swede had a lopsided grin on his face.
“Aye up, it’s the mad Swede,” Drake said with warmth in his voice. “I remember that same stupid grin being on yer face when you stood on the edge of Odin’s tomb, staring down at his bones.”
“As did you, my friend.” Dahl came forward. “When I finally let you have a look.”
The pair shook hands. “The bloody A-team,” Dahl said. “Back together.”
“Well, by all accounts,” Drake said seriously, “we’re gonna be needed.”
“Jesus!” Alicia said, brushing them aside. “Make sure his thong doesn’t cut your lip, Drake, when you pull it down with your teeth.”
Drake stared after her. “Bitch always had a way with words.”
Mai followed Alicia. “Let’s see who else came to the party, shall we?”
Drake let Dahl get his back and followed Mai through the ramshackle door. Once inside, the building abruptly changed, everything looking more modernized. A fortified, brick-lined passageway led to another door—this one a big, riveted hard steel affair—with a nearby keypad. Hayden was waiting for them, and after giving them all a brief, tense greeting, she entered a sixteen-digit pin to unlock the door.
She ushered them through. Drake tried to shake off his ideas and plans for the forthcoming trip to the SAS facility in Luxembourg and concentrate on the job at hand. Wells’s material might hold the key to Alyson’s killer, but it might also blow the lid off the Shadow Elite—an organization even now immorally involved in trying to acquire the doomsday weapon that might exist inside the third and final tomb of the gods.
He saw Ben immediately. The young man stood uncomfortably in one corner of the big room, next to his sister, a pint of coke in hand and looking like the geek hanging out at the school disco. The bar behind him glistened with liter bottles full of the sweet nectar of forgetfulness. Drake’s eyes lingered a moment too long.
Dahl clapped him on the back. Hard. “Check that out, mate.”
Alicia had sashayed into the middle of the room, like a capable and confident model surveying an invited audience that, for some reason, never understood it was really the prey, until she came face to face with Daniel Belmonte, the British master thief, her ex-lover.
Drake could hear them speaking. Belmonte, to his credit, had recovered quickest. “Always good to. . .bump into you, Myles.”
Drake saw Hayden watching them too. And Ben watching Hayden. Such an odd rectangle of ex and current lovers.
Alicia didn’t miss a beat though. “The only thing you’ll be stealing tonight, Belmonte, is glances.” And she walked right by him, continuing toward the bar without looking back.
Mai had watched the exchange too. “She’s good. Though I’d never tell her.”
“Your secret is safe with me, Miss Kitano,” Dahl told her, a big smile lighting his face.
Drake took a moment to study the room. Clearly, this was some kind of local police safe house. Someone, Gates or Hayden or even Dahl, had probably called in a favor, an occurrence that would probably be happening a lot during the next few days. As he thought about it, Drake decided it had been Dahl. The Swede was the least likely of them all to pop up on an enemy’s radar and no doubt had a vast amount of friends and colleagues in mainland Europe. The room was furnished with a couple of big sofas, a solid oak table long enough to seat a horde of Vikings, and at least three makeshift beds in the corners. The bar, of course, was the main feature, especially for those having to deal with
a terrible new knowledge.
Dahl took out his wallet and took a moment to study a picture of his two sons and his wife. Still holding it, he turned to Drake. “This is why we fight,” he said. “This is why we try to make things better. So our children can grow up in a safer world.”
Drake opened his mouth to reply. A sudden, unexpected lump of emotion lodged at the back of his throat. Dahl stared at him. The Swede didn’t know Alyson had been pregnant. Even now, Drake was still dealing with the fact that he would never have children, and that the child he had made had been so viciously torn from him.
“I will kill them all,” he whispered. “No one will get away with what they did.”
Dahl looked momentarily confused, then returned the picture to his wallet. Maybe he thought that Drake, in his way, was just agreeing with him. “I have a man on the inside,” he said with a grin. “In Iceland. He’s translating the ancient language as we speak. I should be hearing from him any time.”
“About what?”
“About everything. Bloody hell, why are Yorkshire men so dumb? The whole story is there, mate. About why the gods lay down to die. About the time-travel devices you found near the Bermuda Triangle and in Hawaii. About the doomsday machine. About how they created fate. They hopped through time, Matt, literally hopped, like we would visit different stores in a mall. Do you remember that poem, the one related to Odin?”
Drake collected himself. “Vaguely.”
“The ending went ‘Forever shall thou fear this, hear me sons of men, for to defile the Tomb of Gods is to start the Day of Reckoning.’”
“Yes?”
“We believe that it has begun. The day of reckoning is fast approaching.”
“The Day of Reckoning? Something to do with Armageddon. Or the Viking’s Ragnarok?”
“Exactly. Ragnarok. Either heroes will rise to save the day or villains will end it.”
Drake stared at his Swedish friend. That sentence struck a chord in him. Either heroes will rise to save the day or villains will end it. “So we’ll stay strong until the end,” he said. “And we’ll win the day. For our children, and our friends.”
“No matter what.” Dahl gripped his hand and the two men shared a moment that would lock them together for the rest of their lives.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Drake watched Hayden walk through the crowd as Alicia had done. But this time the crowd parted with respect and expectation.
He saw her command attention with a look, a sigh. He saw Ben staring at her and suddenly felt a wave of sadness for his young friend. There was no future there. Ben, though exceptional in his own right, was not the man for Hayden Jaye. And widening his field of vision, he noticed Komodo—the Delta team leader who had helped him win the day against the Blood King in Hawaii. Drake made a point of catching the man’s eye and nodding in respect, though Komodo seemed more intent on chatting with Karin than noticing Drake.
There were men scattered around who Drake didn’t know. Probably colleagues of Mai and loyal soldiers attached to Jonathan Gates, a US Secretary of Defense who could realistically trust no one except the few people in this very room.
“We’re in desperate times,” Hayden said. “You all know that the third tomb of the gods houses the nastiest of their kind. So we have no idea what to expect. And even worse—it may also contain some kind of doomsday device. We don’t know with any certainty, so we can’t rule anything out. What we do know is that Russell Cayman—under the command of some all-powerful group—will stop at nothing to reach the tomb. The race to reach it first has already begun. If you’re willing to risk your life to become a hero, then stay in this room. Otherwise—just walk away.”
Not a man or woman listening moved a muscle.
Hayden smiled. Everyone was scared, but they stayed anyway. She nodded toward her boss. “The US Secretary of Defense would like to say something.”
Jonathan Gates didn’t move, but his voice carried around the room. “I can only reinforce what Agent Jaye has already told you. The tomb is vital. The remaining eight Pieces of Odin, now in Stuttgart, are vital. Russell Cayman is vital, and if at all possible needs to be captured alive. We don’t know”—he paused—“if the eyes of authority consider us the bad guys here. But we’re monitoring the news services and nothing has come up so maybe someone, somewhere, has our backs. There’s a group—calls itself the Shadow Elite—who think they own the world. Let’s shake it up and show ’em who it really belongs to. The people.”
A cheer went up. Drake could hardly imagine the variety of characters a man like Gates could enlist to find the Shadow Elite. Something would shake loose soon. When Gates stopped speaking and the room started to mobilize for their short journey to the tomb, Drake drifted over to Ben and Karin.
“You two nailed down the tomb’s location, I hear. Not bad for a head banger and a dropout.”
Ben’s face fell. “Don’t remind me, mate. Just don’t remind me.” He sounded suicidal.
Drake blinked rapidly at Karin. “His nappy rash flared up again?”
Karin smirked. “Worse than ever. But on top of that, he’s just heard that, in his absence, the band released their CD when they came out of police protection and have been invited to guest at a festival near Leeds.”
“Isn’t that good news, mate?”
“Not when I’m here,” Ben whined, “saving the world.”
“Worse thing is—” Karin couldn’t contain herself any longer. “The festival’s being headlined by Ben’s two favorite groups. Pretty Reckless and Evanescence.”
Drake whistled. “Bummer. Don’t worry. Maybe the world will have ended by then.”
Ben glared at him. “I thought you, at least, would understand.”
“Life’s tough, Ben.” Drake cast a sideways glance at Hayden. “And if you don’t realize that pretty soon, you’re gonna find out in a way that’ll cut you off at the knees.” Drake turned away, an old memory of Kennedy playing through his head. “Stick to working the internet, Blakey.”
Karin put a hand on his shoulder as he made to walk away. “There’s something else bothering him too. Well, both of us. This Shadow Elite—we found literally bugger all about them on the net. Not a trace nor a trail. Not even a sniff of digital footprints.”
Drake nodded. “I understand.” Ben and Karin working together could crack into the NSA without breaking a sweat. He walked them over to where Hayden, Mai and Alicia were talking. “Now, if you’re up for it, there’s the last tomb of the gods to raid.”
Hayden heard his last comment as they approached. She looked up, eyes hard. “You’d better be up for it. You think you’ve gone through hell so far? You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”
PART 2
The tomb, the thief and the train.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The industrial city of Singen in Southern Germany had no idea of the storm that was set to strike. Sitting pretty and picturesque under a clear, blue sky, surrounded by forests, lakes and mountains, and overlooked by the landmark it was made famous for—the volcanic stub on which was built a fortress, now ruined—it basked in dangerous ignorance.
Some of the world’s most ruthless men and women approached. Some were already there.
They made the trip in less than an hour. During that time Drake, Alicia, Mai and Dahl swapped stories and jokes to help alleviate the tension. Drake kept half an ear on the conversation, but concentrated mainly on checking the gear he’d been issued back at the safe house. Of course, as always, Dahl had chosen that particular place for a major reason. Not only was it an SSG facility, it was also a military bunker and stored enough weaponry to outfit a small army. SIG and Glock pistols, American M16’s, and M4 Carbines. Pump-action shotguns, rocket launchers, grenades and flares.
Alicia and even Mai had approached the stash eagerly, like kids at Christmas, but Drake had grabbed the bare minimum, while making sure both Ben and Karin were outfitted with easy-to-use “point and click” handguns. At first, he had tried persuadi
ng them to stay behind, or at least stay hidden.
Ben had shaken his head immediately. Karin, in the way of a close sister, had put his thoughts into words. “We’ve come this far. We might be scared, but we’re doing it anyway.”
Drake looked at them, looked at them all. “That’s what makes a hero.”
“My life,” Karin said, “hadn’t been worth living, until I chased a madman down a black hole in a tropical paradise. Until then. . .I purposely destroyed my life.”
“Why would you do that?” Drake had asked.
Karin had shaken her head. “I lost my faith in people. Even now, I can’t find it. I just...can’t.”
“We’ll try to help.” Drake said to her, painfully aware that two months ago his words would have been trust me. I’ll save you. But not now. Not ever again.
“Like I said, we’re coming with you.”
Now Drake began to prepare himself mentally for what was to come. Their toughest battle yet. The streets of Singen streamed past, the stump of Hohentwiel now commanding the horizon. Lush fields, stands of green trees and a few houses encircled the volcanic stub and its old castle and, as they drew closer, something else.
Something completely out of place.
The chatter began to fire up the airwaves almost immediately. “I see three choppers, sir. All military.” A voice from the lead car.
Dahl’s voice. “Markings?”
“Sir, I think you should know this first. They’re just landing. Men are e-vaccing as I speak. I think we should consider an immediate strike.”
A stunned silence followed. Drake’s adrenalin spiked and he caught a look that flashed between Alicia and Mai. They were up for it too. They all nodded at Dahl.
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