It sounded empty.
Impossible as it seemed, she wasn’t inside.
Surveying the garbage, he bent down and picked up an empty glass soda bottle and tossed it through the gap, and then rolled into the doorway as it crashed against the floor, splintering in an explosion of shards.
There was no movement, no shooting.
He stood and saw the collapsed floor at the far end of the room, and realized that the woman must have dropped down to the ground floor while he had been tending to his partner. That meant that she could be anywhere now. Sixty seconds was a lifetime in a trained operative’s hands.
He was edging towards the gap in the floor when he heard the smallest of scrapes from behind him. Without thinking he whirled and fired, registering too late that it was his wounded partner who had somehow rallied enough strength to drag himself to imagined safety. Two slugs shredded his head and chest, and a look of resigned surprise froze on his face as he rolled onto his back, sightless eyes staring into space.
How had this turned so upside down so quickly? A routine hit, for which six men was complete overkill, had transformed in seconds to a bloodbath where a team of elite commandos had been slaughtered like lambs. It was impossible; and yet here he was, in a dark room, a dead man at his feet, bodies strewn through the hall, and no sign of the target.
He faced a difficult choice: drop down through the opening to the floor below, following her, or descend the stairs and try to pick up her scent. He debated, then went for the stairs.
As he crept towards the stairwell, the disturbing sensation that they had gone from the hunters to the prey took hold, and he had to remind himself that there was one man in the other building, which still made it two against one – under normal circumstances, a guaranteed kill. He tapped his ear bud, violating the order to maintain radio silence, and listened for a response from the other gunman.
The tiny device crackled, and then he heard a whisper. “What’s going on? Where are you?” a voice asked.
He paused a few feet from the stairwell. “We were hit. Everyone’s dead except me.”
“Dead? Everyone? Shit…”
“Yeah. Shit is right.”
“How?”
The one word trembled in the silence. How indeed.
“She got behind us. Somehow got one of the guns. It all happened so fast…”
“Where are you?”
“Second floor of the building we went into. She’s on the ground floor now.”
“That...that means she could be near me.”
“Affirmative. Keep your eyes open.”
“I’ll do that. You coming down?”
“Yes. I’ll be by this building’s main entrance within twenty seconds.”
“All right. I’ll make my way over.”
There wasn’t much more to say. The stairwell was almost completely dark, the lights burned out or broken, the building electricity shut off. He peered up at the third-floor landing and then stepped down the first few stairs, moving as quietly as possible.
A shadow dropped from the rail above, and he whipped around, but not fast enough. The razor-sharp blade of the butterfly knife sliced into his abdomen, the point jutting up, through his stomach wall into his heart, driven with startling power by a hand with an iron grip. He dropped his gun and stared at the apparition before him in shock – it was the woman, a look of complete calm on her face, hardly winded by the impossible leap from the third floor.
Consciousness quickly faded and he collapsed, tumbling backwards down the stairs, his last image that of Jet, standing on the steps, her hand clutching a blood-smeared knife as she watched him fall into nothingness.
Jet moved down the stairs to the dead man and wiped the blade off on his jacket before flipping it closed and sliding it into the back pocket of her jeans. She unzipped her purse, pulled the silenced gun free, and cocked her head, wary of any further danger. By her count there was still one man left.
On the ground floor. Somewhere close.
She heard something from the first building, like something falling or being dropped, and thanked providence that these men had been so over-confident, which had translated into carelessness. And now the remaining gunman was blundering around, making her job easier.
She ejected the magazine and counted the remaining bullets, then slid it back with a soft click.
Four more rounds. Which would likely be three more than she would need.
Chapter 6
A terrified scream echoed off the building walls, freezing Jet in her tracks, the shrill reverberation like nails on a blackboard.
She would know that sound anywhere.
Hannah.
Her operational instincts battled her maternal ones, and in a blink, maternal won. She took the stairs three at a time and was on the ground floor within seconds, ready to hurl herself into the breach and do whatever it took to save her daughter. Then self-preservation slammed her with the force of a wrecking ball, and she slowed.
She wouldn’t be of much help to Hannah dead.
With a measured determination, she stopped herself from bolting recklessly into an unknown situation – probably an ambush.
But Hannah was in danger.
As was she. And the only one that could save them both was Jet. Not a terrified woman who acted without thinking and blundered into a trap.
Regaining control, the icy calm that characterized her operational persona returned as she calculated the best approach. Hannah was one building over from the main one through which they’d entered, on the second floor. Rushing headlong to her aid was precisely what the remaining gunman was hoping for – that was the whole point, of course; to destabilize her and get her making emotional decisions rather than logical ones.
But they had Hannah.
Who needed her to be calm and effective more than at any point in her life. Everything Jet cared about hung in the balance. She couldn’t afford the luxury of making a misstep.
~ ~ ~
The second floor offices of the building where she’d left Hannah were still, no further screams disrupting the quiet.
A hand clutched at the window sill, and then the ugly blunt cylindrical shape of a silencer slid into view, followed by Jet’s face, then her body. She had scaled the exterior wall, approaching from the least-expected direction, hopefully flanking whoever was lying in wait.
Every nerve in her body twitched as she crouched by the window, waiting for something – anything – to give the gunman away.
She waited a minute, then another. Nothing. The breeze from the window tickled the back of her neck, and in spite of the cool temperature, a bead of sweat worked its way from her hairline to her taut jaw. She wiped it away with the back of her hand, eyes never leaving the far doorway.
Still nothing.
Patience waged war with the need to do something, and eventually, action won out.
She padded to the office door and stood just outside, trying to pick up any trace of whoever was waiting to kill her.
Odd. She didn’t detect anyone.
She knelt and reached into her purse, then felt around with and extracted her makeup compact. Flipping it open with one hand as she clutched the pistol with the other, she used the tiny mirror to take in the room, angling it slowly to ensure she was seeing everything. Satisfied, she snapped it shut and slid it into her pocket.
She rose and turned the corner, entering the room, weapon leading more out of habit than necessity, and moved to the recess where Hannah had been hiding.
Empty.
Jet fought down a surge of panic and mentally ran through her options. They had her; or Hannah had run away, her toddler’s nerves finally overruling her promise to stay put.
Neither situation was good – the latter only slightly more promising.
She retraced her steps and then moved to the stairwell, hesitating before she descended, listening.
In the long ground floor hall, she spotted a body at the far end, near the exit leading
to the buildings she’d just come from. When she reached it she saw the sixth gunman, a single bullet hole in the back of his neck, execution-style.
Jet did a mental count. All six were dead. Unless she’d missed a seventh who had joined them after they’d crossed the street, all were accounted for.
Which didn’t solve the mystery of where her daughter was; or for that matter, who had shot the final gunman – and why.
She toed his weapon away from where it lay by his outstretched arm and picked it up – a Heckler & Koch USP, also 9mm, with a more compact silencer. She popped the magazine out. Full. Fifteen more rounds at her disposal.
Chambering a round, she slid the Beretta back into her purse, switching to the USP, and edged away from the corpse. The building sounded empty. That left four more to search, assuming that Hannah was still in the complex.
Edging forward on catlike feet, she moved to the exit doorway, peering out before stepping into the sunshine and trotting to the building on the left, opting to try the areas she hadn’t been in yet rather than returning to where she knew five men lay dead.
As she searched room-to-room, her thoughts whirled with the ramifications of the shooters having come after her in Uruguay, battling for prominence in her mind with the hysterical fear for Hannah’s safety. The only positive, if there was one, was that they were after her, not her child, except as a tool to get to her. That meant that the likelihood that they had killed Hannah was extremely low. She served no purpose dead.
The thought brought slim consolation.
She was halfway through the top floor of the third building when she heard a scrape from outside, in the courtyard. Almost imperceptible, but there.
She whirled and inched to the nearest window, then dropped to one knee and looked over. There. At the fourth building. A glimpse of a man’s back clad in a dark blue overcoat, carrying a bundle. A bundle with a small pink arm dangling from it.
Hannah.
And then he was gone.
Jet calculated the drop and the rate at which she could descend, but dismissed climbing down the wall – she’d be exposed the entire time, and there was no guarantee she would find good holds. She debated jumping, but she knew that there was no way to do a dead fall from the third story. A two-story jump with sidelong momentum she could just pull off, but not three from a stop. That was a guarantee of disaster.
She made for the stairs and was on the ground floor within ten seconds, now unconcerned about the sound of her shoes slamming against the bare concrete in the confined space. At the base she sprinted at full speed across the cavernous open room and then slowed when she reached one of the exit doors.
Holding the pistol with both hands, she looked over at the building into which the man had disappeared, and seeing nothing, ran to it, pressing herself against the concrete wall by the entrance, wary of any motion inside.
She waited a few beats, then peered in.
The building was entirely gutted, only a few structural support columns holding up the ceiling. Black oily water pooled on the floor near pipes sticking up from the slab, and Jet saw that she was alone.
Instinct told her to move, to run, to get to the far side, to where the man with Hannah must have gone. But caution told her to check the second story, to be methodical, to not take any chances – a bullet to the brain being her reward if she made a rash call.
She inched to the stairwell and then froze as a man’s voice called out to her.
“Jet. Stop where you are and put down the gun.”
She blinked. She knew that voice. It had been years, but she knew it.
What the hell was going on?
“Jet. Now. We don’t have much time.”
Chapter 7
“I’m going to kneel down and place the gun on the ground. Nothing tricky,” she said, then did so. “There. I’m unarmed.”
“The purse too.”
Damn. She had hoped he wouldn’t think of that.
“All right.”
She lifted the strap over her head, then placed it next to the gun.
“Now what?” she asked, squinting at the darkness.
A blur of motion ran at her. Pink-clad motion on small, unsteady legs.
“Mama, Mama…”
She knelt and gathered Hannah in her arms, hugging her tight, eyes welling with tears of relief as she held her.
“Are you all right, sweetheart? Are you hurt?”
Hannah shook her head.
“But scared, huh?”
She nodded, crying. “Wait...long time.”
Jet hugged her more. “I know. You were good. You were more than good. The best.”
The man stepped from the shadows and took several steps towards her, his gun by his side, pointing at the floor.
“The gunman in the other building…” Jet started.
He nodded. “That was me.”
“What are you doing here? How did you find me?”
“I’ll explain everything, but right now we have to get going. The backup team will be here when those guys miss their radio check.”
“Backup team,” she repeated.
“Three more men. They aren’t screwing around.”
“You’re here to help? Why? Who are they?” she demanded.
“Jet. There’s no time. Promise not to shoot me now. You understand I could have killed you ten times over in the last few seconds. Pick up your things, and let’s get out of here. I’m serious. We’re on borrowed time.”
She did as instructed. “Where to?”
“Follow me. Out this way.”
They ran to the exit on the far end of the room, and he held up a hand, pausing as he looked outside.
“They’ll be looking for a woman with a child. Let me take Hannah. That’s the best cover you can hope for. And they probably have a description, so take off your jacket and tie it around your waist,” he instructed.
Jet kneeled down and fixed Hannah with a calm, serious gaze. “Sweetie, you need to hold the man’s hand while we leave here, okay? Can you do that for me?”
“He…He scary.”
Jet nodded. “I think we’re all a little scared right now. But he’s a friend. Please do as I ask, Hannah.”
She considered the request, then agreed. “Okay.”
Hannah wobbled over and took the man’s hand.
“Last time I saw you, the front of your apartment was blowing all over the sidewalk in Yemen,” Jet said. “You’re supposed to be dead.”
He looked back at her. “There’s a lot of that going around, I guess. Reports of my demise were somewhat exaggerated.”
“How did you find me?”
“Later. Now come on. Follow maybe twenty yards behind me until we get to my car,” he said, and then strode through the door, Hannah holding his hand, as though nothing was amiss.
They skirted the outer perimeter of the construction and then followed the large boulevard one block before making a right onto a smaller street. He approached a Peugeot sedan and hit the keyless remote, and the lights blinked once. Surveying the area as he turned, he opened the back door and motioned to Hannah to get in. She hesitated.
“No. Need Mama.”
Hannah had been cautioned to never get into a strange car without her mother.
The man rolled his eyes, and with a final glance up both directions of the street, he signaled to Jet, who made her way at a moderate pace before sliding into the back with Hannah, pulling the door shut after her.
He started the engine, and then with a glance at his side mirror, revved the motor and slammed the transmission into gear.
“Buckle up and hang on to her. We’ve got company,” he warned, and then stomped on the gas, cutting off a truck as he swung into traffic and roared towards the nearest intersection.
“How could they find us?” Jet asked, gripping the seat back and holding Hannah to her with her free arm.
“We took too long. They must have had watchers around the site. One of the hit team probably calle
d them and reported their position. These guys are pro.”
“Not that pro. I left five of them back there.”
“Six of them. Not to be technical.”
“The sixth was yours, so I’m not counting him.”
He twisted the wheel and they careened onto a larger street, three lanes of traffic in each direction. “Hang on.” Horns blared as he cut in and out of the already fast-moving stream of cars, occasionally cutting into oncoming traffic to get by slower vehicles.
“I see you’ve gotten the hang of the local driving customs. How long have you been in town?” Jet asked.
He peered at her in the rearview mirror, a look of studied concentration on his face. “Not very long. Three days.”
She looked back and saw a black BMW sedan mirroring their moves, carrying three men, including the driver. “They’re gaining,” she said.
“It ain’t over till it’s over.”
He wrenched the little car hard left, tires screeching in protest, and veered crazily down a narrow alley, knocking garbage cans skyward as he regained control and floored it. She watched as the BMW appeared at the alley mouth and roared towards them, the Peugeot’s four-cylinder engine no match for the Bavarian brawn of the German sedan.
“Honey, hold on to the seat back and close your eyes, okay?”
Hannah looked up at her and nodded, and then threw her arms around the passenger seat, eyelids clamped tightly shut.
Jet reached into her purse and extracted the H&K, then rolled her window down.
“Hold this thing steady for a few seconds, will you?” she shouted, the engine and wind noise deafening in the small cab.
“You got it. Make them count.”
She leaned out the window with the pistol and squeezed off five shots. Two missed, but one punched a small hole in the windshield directly in front of the driver’s head; she saw a splash of red spackle the windows, then the car slammed into a building on the right side of the alley, leaving a trail of sparks as it scraped along before flipping over, end to end, and sliding to a stop upside down, wheels spinning in the air.
Jet 03: Vengeance Page 5