The Ben Hope Collection: 6 BOOK SET

by Mariani, Scott

  Ben could see where he was heading. These were no ordinary rapids. The underground river was surging into a giant whirlpool, twenty-feet across-a vertical drop funnelling millions of tons of water crashing through its swirling vortex and straight downwards into the earth.

  As he watched, Kamal hit the outer current of the vortex, a tiny bobbing figure against the dark water. Foam boiled around the rocks. Where the river had been rushing past them for eons, they were smooth and rounded. But the bits of rock that jutted above the waterline were jagged and sharp, like flint. Kamal’s body was slammed into one of them by the furious current. His mouth opened in a scream that was drowned out by the roar of the water. He floated past it. Crashed into another one, and now there was blood on his face and his bared teeth were red. The current carried him on, around and around, faster and faster. Another rock sliced him, then another, and now Kamal wasn’t screaming any more. His arms hung limp as the water tossed him and spun him and dashed him off another sharp rock. The foam boiled pink around him.

  The terrorist’s broken body hit the vortex. Ben caught a last glimpse of his face as the swirling water carried him down the sink-hole. Then he was gone.

  It was a long, long time later when Ben finally staggered up the last few yards towards the mouth of the cave. Framed in its jagged arch were the moon and stars that he’d seriously never thought he was ever going to see again.

  Exhausted, he collapsed on his hands and knees, leaving bloody prints on the rock from the hundred lacerations that criss-crossed his palms after the endless journey back along the river tunnel. He’d lost count of the number of times the surging current had almost pulled him back in. After that had been the crippling, killing climb back up the wall of the chamber of Sobek. Every muscle in his body screamed out for rest, but he had to keep going.

  He struggled to his feet and hobbled out into the night. He let his gaze linger for a moment on Lawrence Kirby’s body, then walked on. At the entrance to the cave, hidden in the shadows, he found his phone and pistol still lying where he’d laid them down earlier. He stuck the gun back in his waistband and pocketed the phone, thinking about the precious evidence stored inside it. He glanced down in the moonlight to the glinting statuette that was thrust diagonally in his belt. Ran his fingers along the smooth gold.

  Now all he had to do was get out of this desert and back across the Egyptian border alive, then get to a place where he could phone Harry Paxton. He had two days to do it.

  He made his weary way down the slope from the cave and walked up the moonlit canyon. He passed the dark shapes of the dead motorcyclists, and the smouldering hulk of the destroyed tank. With every step, he was flinching at the thought that there could be more unexploded mines buried just beneath the sand, waiting for him to tread on them.

  A few metres further up the canyon, he paused to gaze regretfully at the flattened remains of the Toyota.

  But just around the bend, he came across what he’d been hoping to find. Kamal’s black Nissan Patrol glimmered dully under the stars. Ben trotted up to it, wrenched open the driver’s door and almost laughed when he saw the key in the ignition. In the back of the vehicle were canteens of water, stores of provisions, tools and spare wheels. The steel jerrycans sloshed when he shook them. He reckoned there was just about enough fuel to get him where he needed to go.

  He hauled himself up behind the wheel and drank thirstily from one of the canteens. Leaned back in the seat for a moment, shutting his eyes and letting his relief wash over him. Then he slowly turned and saw what was resting in the passenger footwell.

  ‘My old bag,’ he said aloud.

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  Ben carved his way north through the night like a man possessed, stopping only to snatch a couple of hours’ sleep when he could barely keep his eyes open any longer. The sun burned down viciously all of the next day as he crossed the Sudanese desert plains, and it was night again by the time he finally crossed over the Egyptian border. For a few tense hours he ducked and dodged the path of army border patrols. But even Special Forces would have been hard pressed to notice as he slipped by.

  By next morning, the Nissan was overheating and running low on fuel-but it had done its job. He thrashed it mercilessly along proper metalled roads for as many miles as he could eke out of it. As the first signs of greenery in the distance signalled his approach to the Nile valley, the vehicle finally gave out. He abandoned it and started walking.

  None of the lorry drivers or livestock transporters who blasted past on the highway would ever have guessed that the lone, dusty wanderer on the verge carried in his battered army haversack more gold than they would ever see in their lives, and the key to a billion-dollar treasure.

  By the time Ben saw the first small town in the distance, he’d already got a signal on his phone and was calling Paxton’s number.

  It was the start of the seventh day.

  Things happened quickly after that. Ben bought a cotton shirt and fresh jeans from a clothes stall, found a small hotel and checked into a room. He spent a long time under a cool shower, washing away the sand and sweat and blood. He changed and rested awhile, then wandered back outside with his bag on his shoulder, refreshed and hardly feeling the sun’s heat any more. In the winding streets he discovered a little tobacconist and a grocer’s stall selling fresh food out of palm-leaf baskets. He settled on a shady wall under a palm tree on the edge of town, and munched on aish bread filled with hummus and smoked a couple of the cigarettes he’d bought.

  Not long afterwards, the black Lexus came for him. He offered up his Jericho to the two taciturn men in suits, and they ushered him into the back. After days of harsh desert driving, the smooth, air-conditioned Lexus felt like something out of a different world. Ben rested against the cool leather as the car whisked him the eighty miles north to the nearest airfield.

  From there, a light Cessna Mustang jet flew him up the Nile, over Cairo and northwest towards the Mediterranean coast and the port city of Alexandria.

  Ben had to admire Paxton’s organisation. He’d barely stepped off the plane when another car sped him away across the city. They passed the new Bibliotheca Alexandria, rebuilt two thousand years after the greatest library of the ancient world had been burnt to the ground, and then followed the road up the long jetty of the Eastern Harbour. The car dropped Ben off, and he sat and watched the hundreds of boats passing by across the blue water.

  Then, cutting through the busy port traffic, a white motor launch burbled to the pier and its pilot stepped out. He spotted Ben standing on the dock, spoke briefly on a phone, then started walking over.

  It was Berg.

  Ben’s hands were shaking as he walked to meet him.

  ‘Mr Paxton is anxious to meet you again,’ Berg grinned.

  Ben wanted to rip the look off the man’s face. Instead he calmly walked past him up the jetty and stepped down into the launch. He sat in silence as Berg fired up the outboards and piloted the launch skilfully between the fishing boats and out of the harbour. The sea was flat and vivid blue, and the sky was cloudless.

  After twenty minutes, a white dot appeared on the horizon and grew steadily larger. The twin-masted cruising yacht was resting serenely at anchor, her graceful ninety-foot hull swaying gently on the rise and fall of the sea. As they came nearer, Ben could make out the name Eclipse on the yacht’s stern. The vessel was tiny compared to the Scimitar, and he couldn’t see any crew on her deck as the launch drew up alongside. It looked as though it was just going to be him, Paxton and Berg, all alone.

  He waited until the launch was a foot from the yacht’s side, grabbed a rail and hauled himself on board. Berg tethered up the launch and followed him on deck, eyeing him coldly.

  ‘So where is he?’ Ben asked. ‘Let’s get this done.’

  ‘Here I am, Benedict,’ said a familiar voice, and Ben turned to see Paxton sauntering casually up the companionway from below, a long drink in his hand. He looked cool and relaxed. ‘You look as though you
’ve been in the wars.’

  ‘I’m not here for conversation.’ Ben reached into his bag, took out the wrapped statuette and tossed it down on the deck with a heavy thud.

  Paxton stepped over to pick it up, and smiled when he felt the weight of it in his hand. He started unravelling the dirty cloth.

  ‘It’s not lead,’ Ben said.

  ‘I’m sure it isn’t,’ Paxton replied as he yanked away the cloth and the gold caught the sun. He looked up at Ben. ‘Magnificent. So it was all true.’

  ‘Yes, Harry, it was all true.’

  ‘Then, for once in his miserable life, Helen’s bastard son did something right. And what about the rest?’

  ‘I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.’ Ben took out the phone and tossed it to him. ‘I took pictures.’

  Paxton quickly found the photos and the video clip, and spent a few moments studying them keenly. Ben could see the same look in his eyes that he’d seen in Kirby’s when the gold fever had taken hold of his mind.

  Silence across the deck, just the whisper of the sea. Berg walked around Ben and stood at Paxton’s side, gazing impassively at him. Ben ignored him.

  Paxton scrolled through the last of the pictures. ‘What’s this?’

  ‘The map,’ Ben replied quietly. ‘Drawn thousands of years ago by the High Priest who hid the treasure. You don’t want to know the details.’

  Paxton frowned. ‘This is gibberish. It’s all hieroglyphics.’

  ‘Don’t get yourself all worked up, Harry.’ Ben dipped into his pocket and took out the folded note that he’d written on the plane. Across the top of the headed paper was printed the banner ‘Paxton Enterprises’. Underneath, in neat capitals, was Ben’s translation of the clues. He handed it to Paxton. ‘Now you have everything,’ he said.

  Paxton’s frown melted away as he scanned the note, then folded it. Lying on one of the deck seats nearby was a little leather pouch. He picked it up, slipped the paper into it together with the phone, and closed the zipper. ‘Thank you, Benedict. And well done. I knew you wouldn’t let me down. I certainly chose the right man for the job.’

  ‘Great. Now where is she?’

  ‘You mean my wife?’ Paxton replied with mock innocence.

  ‘We had a deal,’ Ben said. ‘Remember?’

  ‘I remember,’ Paxton said. ‘But there’s no deal, Benedict.’

  Ben shook his head. ‘That’s not how it works.’

  ‘It works any way I say it does,’ Paxton said. ‘I’m in control here, not you.’

  ‘Where is she?’ Ben said again.

  ‘Somewhere you won’t find her,’ Paxton said.

  Berg grinned.

  Ben tried not to look at him. His fists balled at his sides. ‘You really are a piece of shit, aren’t you, Harry?’

  ‘I told you what I do to people who are disloyal to me,’ Paxton said. ‘I meant what I said.’

  Berg grinned more broadly.

  Ben’s stomach churned. For a terrible moment the image of the three severed heads danced up in his mind’s eye. Then the picture of the mutilated body of Linda Downey. Except he was seeing Zara’s face on it. The glassy blue eyes, lifeless and unblinking. Blonde hair matted with dried blood. He tried to shake the image out of his mind, but it stayed there right in the foreground.

  He suddenly wanted to vomit. They’d killed her. They’d kept her alive long enough to give proof of life, and then slaughtered her.

  He closed his eyes and felt himself rocking on his feet. Reached out a hand to steady himself with the rail at his side.

  When he opened his eyes, he found himself staring down the muzzles of two pistols. In his right hand Paxton was holding the same 9mm SIG Pro that he’d pointed at Ben in Paris, the leather pouch in his left. Berg was holding a massive Desert Eagle semi-auto with a barrel diameter half an inch across.

  ‘We’re going to shoot you,’ Paxton said. ‘Then we’re going to feed your body to the sharks. But, before you die, Berg is going to tell you exactly what he did to my dear wife. In detail.’

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  That was it, then. Paxton had beaten him. He should have known. Should never have gone looking for the damned treasure.

  ‘Just shoot me,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to hear.’

  ‘Of course you don’t,’ Paxton replied with a smile. ‘But you’re going to nonetheless.’ He turned to Berg. ‘Come on. Tell our friend what you told me.’

  Berg’s eyes glittered. He opened his mouth to speak.

  Then he stopped. His mouth opened wider, and he drew in a sharp breath. A tremor seemed to run through his body, making him sway on his feet. His eyeballs turned inwards as he tried to focus on the strange object that had suddenly appeared low down in the middle of his forehead.

  It was the three-bladed steel triangular point of a hunting arrow, protruding four inches from his skull.

  Berg dropped like a tree and landed with a crunch on his face. The Desert Eagle slid across the deck. The slim arrow shaft embedded in the back of his head was still quivering from the impact of the shot.

  But Ben wasn’t watching Berg any more. He was staring as Zara emerged from the companionway hatch behind where the man had been standing. In a summery white cotton dress that emphasised her tan, her hair catching the sunlight, she looked even more beautiful than before. In her hand was the bow she’d been shooting the first time he’d ever seen her, and a quiver full of arrows hung at her side. Her eyes caught Ben’s.

  Ben couldn’t speak, couldn’t tear his gaze off her. His heart was thudding wildly in his throat. Zara was alive. Paxton had been enjoying a sick joke at his expense. He hadn’t just wanted Ben to die-he’d wanted him to die in despair.

  Paxton twisted around to stare at her, then gaped down at Berg’s corpse, incredulous. ‘You killed him,’ he stammered.

  She didn’t reply. Instead she drew another arrow out of the quiver and fitted it expertly to the bow.

  Ben saw the intent flicker through Paxton’s face and the twitch in his muscles before the man even had time to swing his SIG around to aim at her. He dived for Berg’s fallen pistol. Saw a clear line of fire and pulled the trigger. The Desert Eagle recoiled harshly. Paxton cried out as the large-calibre slug slammed into the side of his pistol and sent it spinning out of his grip. The leather pouch dropped to the deck as he staggered, clutching his injured hand. Fear in his eyes as Ben aimed the pistol steady at his head. The colonel suddenly looked much older, frail almost.

  ‘Kick the pouch over,’ Ben commanded him.

  Paxton obeyed. Ben picked it up and stuffed it in his jeans pocket. ‘You’re done, Harry. Interpol can have you now. I’m taking you ashore.’

  Zara took a step closer, still holding the bow. She shook her head. ‘No, Ben.’

  He looked at her.

  ‘You’re not taking him anywhere,’ she said.

  Before Ben could react, she swung her bow towards Paxton, drew and shot him at point-blank range.

  The arrow whipped across the short distance and caught Paxton in the right shoulder. He screamed in shock and agony. His left hand flew up, grasped the arrow shaft. Tried to pull it out, but the muscles around the wound had clamped it tight. Blood spilled down his silk shirt. He dropped to his knees. ‘What are you doing?’ he bellowed at her.

  ‘Something I’ve been waiting to do a long, long time,’ Zara replied softly. There was a cold look on her face that Ben had never seen before. Her hand moved quickly, expertly down to the quiver on her belt and she fitted another arrow to the bow. Drew and fired again.

  The arrow stabbed into Paxton’s left shoulder. Its bloody tip protruded five inches from his shoulder blade.

  Ben suddenly understood. She wasn’t hitting at random. As a champion archer engaging a large target at extreme close range, she could have hit any spot she wanted. She was deliberately drawing this out, by pure cruelty.

  Paxton screamed again and fell back on the deck, writhing in blood, smearing it across the polished
wood.

  ‘Zara!’ Ben yelled. ‘Are you crazy?’

  But she wasn’t listening. She walked coolly around Paxton as he gaped up at her. The same swift, mechanical movement of hand to quiver to string. She fired again. The arrow lanced through Paxton’s thigh and pinned him to the boards. Blood spurted in a fountain from a severed artery. Paxton was past screaming now. His mouth was opening and closing as he went into terminal shock.

  ‘Stop!’ Ben pointed the Desert Eagle at her, because he didn’t know what else to do. ‘That’s enough!’

  There was already a fresh arrow on Zara’s bow. She turned nonchalantly to Ben. ‘OK. You’re right.’

  And then she fired one last shot. The arrow took Paxton in the nostril and drove his head back and thunked into the wood. Paxton twitched as blood spewed from his nose and mouth. His muscles went limp, and he sank down against the deck and died.

  The pistol in Ben’s hand was shaking as he lowered it. ‘What the fuck did you do that for?’ he asked breathlessly.

  Zara took a step towards him, and he realised there was another arrow fitted to her bow. The quiver was empty now. It was her last shot. And it was for him.

  ‘The pouch,’ she said. ‘Hand it over.’

  Ben was speechless for a moment. Nothing made sense to him any more.

  And yet, in a horrible way it did. What kind of hostage was free to walk about with a lethal weapon?

  ‘You and he were in it together,’ he whispered. ‘The whole time.’

  Zara sighed. ‘It’s true, Ben. I’m sorry.’

  Thoughts were flooding through his mind so fast that it was making him dizzy. ‘But Valentine—’

  ‘Harry knew she was after him,’ Zara said. ‘We came up with the plan. Or maybe I should say, I came up with it. To let them see us fighting in public. Harry slapping my face in the restaurant, me throwing my drink over him and walking out. All staged, to give the impression we were having problems. But they fell for it.’ She smiled, shrugged. ‘Soon afterwards, Valentine approached me and gave me the whole bit about her girlfriend, Downey, and the poor little Africans that Harry’s guns were killing. The whole spiel. A real tear-jerker. So I played along, pretending to be all shocked and horrified.’