Gone Black

by Linda Ladd

  Chapter Twelve

  Novak and the team decided to make their move on the chateau just before five o’clock in the morning. Decked out in night gear, they separated and took their places at designated intervals along the outside wall. Novak lay concealed in heavy brush, wearing black and gray camouflage, his face and hands blackened. The plan was to wait for Booker and Holliday to get inside from either side and into place before he set off the first explosives, the ones he’d set up with meticulous precision along the length of the electrified fence several hours earlier. He had set them to detonate at five-second intervals along the outer edge and bring the fence down all at once, in a domino effect meant to disorient the guards on the perimeter.

  The whole damn mission was a high-stakes gamble. He wasn’t comfortable with it, and he was pretty sure the other two men weren’t, either. They were both experienced and well-trained enough to see the flaws and worry about the short time they’d had to put together the assault, just like he was. There weren’t that many guards on the fence, either, which didn’t make sense to Novak. Soquet’s organization was purportedly a big operation, well organized with well-trained people and encompassing several continents with arms and explosive devices and assassinations and narcotic distribution, all for sale to terrorists and other radical groups as well as any criminal organization that had enough money to pay for the best. If this was where he was keeping his prized prisoners, Nick and Claire, where were all the guards? Unless the main protective detail was inside the chateau, all assigned to guard both prisoners up close and personal and with lethal intent.

  Somewhere within that massive chateau, his two friends were imprisoned. At least, Black was in there. His GPS signal flashed steadily, still on beat, glowing on Booker’s handheld monitor, nice and strong and regular. Nicholas Black was definitely inside that house all right, most likely under heavy guard. For the millionth time, Novak hoped that Claire was in there with him. Otherwise, she was most likely already buried in a shallow grave somewhere.

  Novak lifted his arm and looked at the soft glow of his wristwatch. Almost time to go. The C-4 was set to start going off in exactly two minutes. He rose onto his haunches, ready to move out, his assault rifle in his right hand, very eager now to storm the place and fight his way inside. With the SEALs, he had performed similar assault and extraction missions and mostly under the same kind of outnumbered conditions. But his orders rarely included a target who was a personal friend. A partner. Someone he cared about. And this time he cared a lot. He had only known Claire for a matter of months, but he admired her. He liked her a lot, and she didn’t deserve to die at the hands of some maniacal criminal sadist. He’d known Black a bit longer, and he was a fine man. Neither of them deserved to die.

  Even more concerning, Novak didn’t like the fact that they were operating on French soil and without official government sanction. This was Novak’s country, or at least one of them. He had a triple citizenship: France and the United States and Australia. On the other hand, the criminals inside this place needed to be blown down into hell where they belonged. And if all went according to plan, it wouldn’t be long until he could do just that.

  Staring at the second hand on his watch, he waited, five seconds, four seconds, three seconds, two seconds, and then he heard the loud explosions going off one after another, every five seconds, ripping through the fabric of the quiet night, six times, each one shaking the ground under his feet. The fence in front of him fell inward, hitting the ground and throwing a shower of sparks as the electricity flared and then died. He jumped up and ran over it in a crouch and out into the open fields in front of the dark, hulking chateau. He could hear the ocean now, the waves crashing on the shore and then ebbing away, and he could see a high mountain range rising up behind the big place, dark and massive and solid, blocking out the stars twinkling in the black sky.

  Novak headed in a low crouch for the front courtyard, his silenced weapon up and ready to fire on anybody who got in his way. He heard sporadic gunfire from the enemy, and knew that Booker and Holliday had engaged. They would take out any guard accosting them. He hadn’t seen anybody yet, which was fine by him. He ran hard for cover, hunched over, wanting to get out of the no-man’s-land, just in case Soquet had a sniper positioned on the roof. And he probably did. That’s what Novak would’ve done.

  More gunfire erupted all around, staccato bursts in the darkness, but then everything grew quiet as death again. He had expected at least a dozen men to rush out of the big garage at one side of the courtyard or spill out of the massive front entrance gate, but the house remained dark and silent. Frowning, not sure what to expect, he made it to the low interior wall, inched along behind it, protecting his back, until he reached a tall and fancy wrought-iron arched garden gate. It was closed, but there was no guard and there was no lock. Now fearing he was walking into a trap, he waited where he was for a few moments, listening for the ratcheting of weapons or the scuff of shoes on pavement. His headphone crackled inside his ear, and Booker’s voice came to him, very low, “Clear in back.”

  Holliday came on, “Clear at garage.”

  Novak said, “Clear in front, but I don’t like this. This is way too easy.”

  “Roger that,” said Booker. “Could be a trap. Go in as planned. Be expecting fire.”

  Novak knew all that without being told. He took one deep breath and then barreled through the iron gate, low and fast, the old hinges squealing shrilly in the stillness. Then he ran across the courtyard and through the glare of a spotlight affixed high on the side of the house. That’s when he heard a sharp ring and the ricochet of a bullet hitting the pavement behind him followed by the loud crack of a sniper rifle. The sound rolled like thunder through the night and echoed back into the woods. He hit the dirt on his belly, combat crawled across to the wall of the house, and took a knee under a bank of windows. He stopped there and waited.

  “Sniper on roof, front right,” he breathed into the headset. Then he lifted his gun and scanned the part of the roof where he figured the shot had come from. His high-power nightscope was top-of-the-line, and he patiently scanned back and forth until he finally saw the sniper when he raised his head just enough to peer down into the courtyard. The sniper was positioned against one of the huge gray stone chimneys at the far end of the house. Novak ducked down and got into position to fire and then steadied the gun sight on the spot where he’d seen the sniper. He looked around for the enemy on the ground but saw no one. No shots now. All was quiet.

  Then another shot rang out from the same area on the roof, probably the sniper firing at Booker or Holliday. He moved, crawling inside a thick stand of lilac bushes hugging the interior wall, and then he turned and rested the rifle barrel on the top of the wall and put his right eye back to the scope. He waited for the man to appear again and could hear the others in his team shooting back at the sniper’s position from their cover. When the sniper’s head came up again to scan the courtyard below, Novak pulled the trigger, nice and slow and easy. He saw the top of the shooter’s head disintegrate and fly back into the darkness, and Novak got back down fast, flat on his stomach. Listening for return fire. For another sniper. Nothing.

  After a few minutes, he rose up into a crouch and then ran the rest of the way across the courtyard to the front door, staying low and in the shadows. He was met in the threshold by two of Soquet’s men rushing out at him, both dressed in black and armed with automatic rifles. He shot one twice in the chest and then ducked behind the wall as the other riddled it with a barrage of bullets. He scrambled along behind it, with gunfire erupting all over the estate now, and ran headlong into another bad guy coming around the far end. Novak shot him midchest, twice again, and then rose and fired at the man pursuing him. The man was knocked backward by the force of the slug and landed on his back, writhing and groaning. Novak shot him again, made the door, and edged inside, weapon ready.

  John Booker was already inside some kind of big hall and running lightly up some wid
e steps leading to the second floor, his assault rifle up and out in front. Holliday inched in from the back of the hall, and the two of them walked backward up either side of the massive staircase, covering Booker’s back. The place was dark, only a few sconces lit along the walls, but there was no opposition or gunmen on the stairs or upstairs hall. Booker was already halfway up a smaller staircase rising to a third floor.

  Following the light they’d seen remain on all night long, they had already ascertained that Black was in some kind of tower room, most likely guarded by a tight cadre of Soquet’s most elite guards. The three of them edged down the wide stone corridor in staggered positions toward Black’s prison, and Novak could hear music now, playing very loud. What was that? It sounded like wedding music. He kept thinking that this wasn’t right, nothing about it was, that everything seemed all wrong. Way too easy. Everything in him knew it, and he was suddenly afraid that they were heading into a death trap.

  Holliday must have shared his view, because he muttered softly aside to Novak, “This is messed up. Where are the guards up here?”

  “Right,” said Novak. “Be ready.”

  When they gained the far hallway, the one where they thought Black was most likely being held, they tried doors and cleared empty, dilapidated rooms with peeling paint and fallen plaster ceilings and carved marble fireplaces, until they found one near the end of the corridor that was locked. Inside, the music blared on, so loud that it echoed down the hallway. Booker gave them a hand signal, and then they went in quick and hard. Booker kicked the door open and led, then Holliday, with Novak last.

  Inside, they found a huge bedroom. There was a white canopy bed sitting on the far side. It looked like somebody was lying under the blankets. There was a TV monitor on the ceiling and a red settee at the end of the bed. Booker started moving cautiously away from the door, and then Novak saw the bomb sitting on the floor beside the bed. He yelled a warning and they all tried to seek cover, as the entire room exploded in their faces. Red and orange and yellow flames and black smoke and a blast of heat hit them, the explosion violent enough to blow them completely off their feet and into the air. Acrid smoke and soot and devouring flames licked across the bed and up the walls, and plaster rained down on their sprawling bodies. Nobody moved for the first few seconds, and nothing could be heard except the crackle and pop of flames as the fire caught and raged up the walls and across the floor, inching toward the three injured men.

  Killing Black

  Exhausted, and still pretty much out of it, Black opened his eyes and realized that he was lying on his back on the floor and staring up into Jaxy’s angry face. At least he thought it was her. He wasn’t sure about anything anymore. It seemed as if it were her face, but it was just slowly sliding off, just melting down to liquid skin and bone and pink tissue, and oozing down her neck and into the neck of her shirt. Fascinated, he reached out to touch it.

  “That’s it. Good boy. Wake up, come on now,” the young woman was saying, and then she jerked up his head and forced his face around to look at the television set. “You want to see your almost bride die, don’t you? See all the tiny little pieces of her body that are going to be sticking all over the walls and ceiling. Well, look right over there. See her? That’s her lying on that bed, all curled up under the blankets, warm and comfy, just waiting for us to let her come see you. Did you know she was here? Came right here to us, just because she loves you so much. But that was really pretty stupid of her. We wanted her here, though, so you could see her die. So you could see this little show that we’re putting on. One designed just for you and you alone.”

  At Claire’s name, Black renewed his attempts to focus his thoughts, to clear his drug-addled consciousness. He squinted at the television screen and vaguely saw the figure on the bed. Was that really Claire? Was she here? Or was it another trick? Oh, God, why had she come here? Why hadn’t Booker stopped her? Booker had promised Black, he’d sworn to keep Claire out of it.

  “Don’t hurt her,” he groaned out somehow. “Don’t do it.”

  He could barely understand Jaxy now, because her lips were so swollen and split that her voice sounded odd and thick. “Oh, aren’t you the sweetest little thing who ever lived. Now look at her lying there, just waiting to see you. She’s okay. No need to worry about her so much.”

  Black stared at the figure on the bed, if it was Claire, and he wasn’t sure it was her. She seemed to be asleep, under some blankets, or maybe she was tied up there, unable to move. But he couldn’t see her face, couldn’t be sure it was her. Then in the next instant, the entire bed, the entire room, all of it, went up in a red whoosh of fire and debris and the camera went black from the devastation of the blast. Black cried out in horror, couldn’t help it, and then he fought to free himself but he had little strength left and Jaxy was holding him down.

  “Oh, shoot, can’t see her after all, ’cause she just blew up. All blood and gore and flesh and brains all over the place. Too bad, honey. But now you know. Now you know how I felt when I was a little kid and my mother got blown to bits in front of my eyes. Now you know how Daddy and Max and I felt. Now you will understand why you have to suffer so much. But you don’t have to worry about your bride anymore, because you don’t have a bride anymore. That was it for her. The grand finale. Claire Morgan is dead and splattered all over the walls of that room. Or maybe she isn’t? Maybe that’s just the magic of digital enhancement. Or maybe that was somebody else on that bed? Another room? Maybe you’ll get to see her die over and over again, and never know if it’s real or not… .”

  Enraged with horror and grief, Black doubled his fist and hit Jaxy again so hard in the face that he heard her nose crunch. Blood spurted out and poured down onto his chest as she went over backward and rolled around in agony, groaning and moaning and crying and holding her face. He pushed himself up to a sitting position, ready to jump to his feet, but two guards were on him before he could, forcing him down again and holding him while she struggled back up on her knees, blood running out and drenching the front of her clean shirt and pants, her teeth red with it, her eyes already swelling, nearly choking on her blood. Hanging her head so the blood wouldn’t drain down her throat, she ground out her hatred through bloody lips.

  “You bastard, I’m gonna kill you, I’m gonna kill you.”

  “No, you are not, Jaxy. You’re gonna give him a bigger hit of acid so he’ll be docile. Like you should have done in the first place. You never learn, do you?”

  Jaxy jerked around and faced the man who spoke. “No, damn it, I’m gonna kill him now. Look what he did to me. Look at my face, look, I’m bleeding, damn you, damn you. Let me kill him. He’s gonna die anyway. Let me do it now! It hurts! It hurts!”

  “Father wants him to stay alive, and he wants him doped up and out of his head. So shut up and do what I say. Don’t make me hurt you.”

  Black hadn’t seen the man come into the room before, but he knew who he was. He watched Max Soquet walk across the floor and push Jaxy aside. He bent down and took out her pouch of drugs. As two men held Black down, Max took out four more pink sugar cubes and forced Black’s mouth open and stuffed all of it inside and then he held Black’s mouth shut. Black knew it was more LSD, and too big of a hit and too soon, much more than he could probably tolerate. But all he could think about was that Claire was most likely dead. They had killed her. She was gone from him. Forever. He lay back on the floor and stared up at the white ceiling. He hoped they just killed him, too. He didn’t care anymore.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Claire lay on her back on the bed for a long time, very still, waiting for the camera to click off. Rico was no longer in the vent. She had recently whispered to him and he hadn’t answered. Now she was scared that he was gone and wouldn’t come back. He should’ve stayed put. Claire hoped to heaven that Jaxy didn’t catch him while he was sneaking around. Where had he gone? And why? But at least, he was not in that bitch’s grasp. He must have lived in constant fear inside this plac
e, wherever the hell it was. Although he was not much more than a baby, Rico had shown a lot of guts against the Soquets’s well-practiced cruelty.

  God help her, Claire loathed Jaxy, that despicable, evil, devil of a woman. She was so cruel, got off so much on hurting other people. Especially innocent and defenseless people. Claire only hoped she would come and pick on her instead of tormenting Black or that poor little boy. She would love more than anything in the world to give that red-haired freak the beating she deserved. To stick the shard of mirror so deep inside her gut that she would never get it out.

  Turning on her side, she watched the ornate brass grate for a while, hoping to see Rico’s little face peeking out in the pale wash of moonlight. It had been a long time now that he had been gone. Claire was really worried. About him, about Black, about how she was going to get out of that room. Jaxy and her men would kill Rico without blinking an eye. She had no doubt about it. All of them would probably enjoy murdering him. And if Jaxy had gotten him back in their clutches, there wasn’t a damn thing that Claire could do about it. But who was she kidding? They were going to kill them all, anyway. It just depended when Daddy Soquet got tired of his nefarious games and gave the signal to butcher them to death.

  So she lay there, as the dawn gradually lightened the sky outside, thinking hard, wracking her brain for a good way to come out of this alive, some kind of trick that she could perpetrate that would give her a fighting chance. But she was coming up blank this time. This was a predicament that had no easy solutions. No good solutions, at all. All she had was knowledge. Black’s dossiers had told her how to act with each of them, and more important, what not to do. She had to use their weaknesses against them. That’s what she had to do. She sure as hell was glad she knew them better than they knew her.

  Thoughts of Black’s ordeal inside that white room, the bruises on his face, the drugs, and Jaxy kissing him made her sick and so angry that she could barely contain it anymore. They’d already abused him so much. What in God’s name loomed in the future? Her heartbeat started thumping hard and fast, just thinking of his suffering. Her mind was filled with the worst kind of dread, because they were probably hurting him right now. Beating him or drugging him while she lay in that bed, helpless to do a thing to help him. All that was left to her was to wait and worry that Booker and the guys would not be in time. That Black would be dead when they finally found him. She couldn’t bear thinking about it much longer. She had to get out. But how? She didn’t know what to do next. She had relied on her plan to entice Jaxy to meet her alone, up close and personal.