Kick A** Heroines Box Set: The UltimatumFatal AffairAfter the DarkBulletproof SEAL (The Guardian)

by Karen Robards

  “Don’t drive too fast, but we have to get through the gates as quickly as we can.”

  The stretch limo was sized to seat twenty. The interior was beige leather and carpet and still had that new-car smell. The rear windows were tinted. No one could see her in the back. Having moved into the long, rear-facing seat closest to the driver, she turned and leaned forward, one hand on the back of Doc’s seat as she spoke to him through the open partition that separated the two sections of the vehicle.

  “O-kay,” he said, putting the car in gear. His black-gloved fingers flexed as he gripped the wheel. “Drive slow but fast.”

  The limo pulled away from the steps and started around the wide circle at a stately pace. They still had to make it down the long driveway and get through the closed, guarded gates.

  Glancing back at the palace, Bianca felt her stomach twist. Its domed beauty was deceptively serene. Inside, a volcano of fury would be erupting. Looking forward again didn’t help. At the end of the palm-lined drive, the gates waited under bright white security lights. It was—Bianca glanced at her watch—one minute, fifty-three seconds after midnight. How long would it take before word to stop all exiting vehicles reached the guards at the gate?

  She couldn’t count on it being much longer.

  She wanted to scream at Doc to drive faster. She didn’t dare.

  “So what happened?” Doc asked.

  “The vault was empty.”

  “Empty?” He looked at her through the rearview mirror.

  “Empty. As in, the money was gone when I got it open.”

  “The money was gone? Gone where?”

  “No idea.”

  “We don’t have it?”

  For a smart man, Doc was being remarkably slow to catch on.

  “No, we don’t have it,” Bianca said. “That’s what I meant when I said it was gone.”

  “So who has it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You kidding me?”

  “Do I look like I’m kidding you?” Their eyes met in the rearview mirror.

  What Doc saw there must have convinced him, because he said, “No! No, no, no! I was supposed to walk away from this and never have to work again!”

  “Life’s a bitch,” Bianca said. Actually, she knew where he was coming from. She just hadn’t had time to process it yet.

  “We did all this for nothing?”

  No point in sugarcoating it. “Yes.”

  “Shit!” Doc sounded as poleaxed as she felt. “Wait. If we didn’t steal the money, why are we running away? We didn’t do anything.”

  “Because the money’s gone. It’s possible that someone else beat us to it, and we were set up to take the fall. At this point I don’t know for sure. Anything’s possible. But the prince knows our team is here, and he knows the money’s missing. He’s going to blame us. He’s going to come after us. He’s going to shut the palace down at any second, and if we’re not out of here…”

  “We’re all gonna die.” Doc’s voice was hollow. Under better conditions Bianca might have smiled, but these weren’t better conditions. She was just glad she didn’t need to spell things out. Like the rest of the team, Doc had been well briefed on possible consequences if the job should go wrong.

  “Pretty much,” she agreed.

  There was a moment of appalled silence. Then Doc said, “This totally sucks, you know what I mean?”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  They were approaching the security checkpoint, a small stone guardhouse that stood just to the left and in front of the enormous gilded gates. The guardhouse was lit from within as well as from without. Through its mullioned window, Bianca could see one of the two heavily armed sentries looking out at them. Then the sentry turned his head sharply. A second later it became clear why. He walked away from the window to pick up the phone.

  Bianca felt her insides constrict.

  “If they don’t let us through right away, tell them you have a medical emergency,” she said. Her first instinct if they weren’t allowed to leave—ram the gates—was problematic. The gates were heavy iron. The car might not make it through. There were airbags. The sentries had guns. “I’ll sell it from back here. I hope.” If she couldn’t sell it from the back seat—the ability to vomit on cue was one of the many minor talents on which she prided herself—she was going to get out and collapse, moaning, in the grass. When the sentries came over to check on her, she would take them out and open the gates. Or something. “Whatever happens, you stay in the car and be ready to take off.”

  “Medical emergency,” Doc repeated. His shoulders were tense. He looked doubtfully at her through the rearview mirror. Of course, having never seen her in action, he had no way of knowing what she could do. He gave a curt nod of agreement as the limo reached the guardhouse and braked to a stop. The guard who wasn’t on the phone came to the open window and looked out at them.

  Doc smiled and waved.

  No problems here.

  Bianca watched the other guard’s face turn toward them. He was still on the phone. She held her breath—

  The gates started to open. Slowly. So, so slowly…

  Her stomach felt tight as a clenched fist.

  “Get out of here,” Bianca breathed. The limo inched forward in the wake of the parting gates.

  “Trying,” Doc replied through the wide smile still stretching his face.

  The limo was through.

  A moment later they were making a sharp turn onto Bani Otbah Avenue.

  “Good job,” Bianca said.

  “I almost crapped my pants.”

  The limo changed lanes as Doc did his best to get themselves lost among the motley collection of vehicles traveling along the six-lane boulevard that ran through the mixed-up jumble of garishly lit modern skyscrapers and centuries-old buildings and mosques that made up the downtown. Bahrain was one of the few gulf countries that didn’t have much in the way of oil. Given that lack, they’d been forced to build their economy on something else, and that something was banking. Manama was a banking and financial hub for the region, and on this main thoroughfare there were banks on just about every corner. Banks complete with ATMs, which came with security cameras. She had mapped the route they would take to the dock with those cameras in mind.

  “Don’t look back here.” She was in the process of stripping off her dress and shoes, replacing them with jeans and sneakers and a black hoodie from the duffel: the world’s universal uniform. The gloves, jewels and garter belt stayed on. The gloves to prevent fingerprints, the jewels because if she found herself in a tight spot they could be sold for cash or used for bribes and the garter belt because, well, you never knew.

  “You know we got kind of a time crunch going here.” Doc’s voice was hushed, as though he feared being overheard.

  “I know.” They actually had five minutes, eleven seconds to make it to the boat. Bianca could feel the tension in her neck and shoulders as she tossed her purse in the duffel on top of her discarded clothes. They were moving with the flow of traffic, but still, to her, the limo felt as conspicuous as a party bus with strobe lights firing. A glance back at the palace made her feel slightly better. The gates were closed and the guard hadn’t run out into the middle of the street to brandish his rifle threateningly or fire after them, which she took as a good sign.

  The fastest thing to do would be to take the limo directly to the dock. It would also be the stupidest.

  “Hang a left at the alley before the next light,” she said.

  She’d deliberately selected a limo that lacked a GPS, because if the shit hit the fan and they had to make a run for it, a GPS made tracking the vehicle too ridiculously easy. She didn’t need a GPS to know where she was going, anyway. As part of her prep for tonight’s job, she had memorized a map of the city and
had walked the streets until she knew the parts of Manama that mattered like the back of her hand.

  Doc turned where she’d told him.

  The alley, an ancient one that was now primarily used for deliveries and trash pickup, had existed since long before cars were invented. Its single lane was stomach-churningly narrow. Bumping over the cobblestones, the limo barely avoided scraping the earth-toned, stucco-and-stone back walls of the small shops on either side. At this hour, fortunately, they were the only vehicle on the street.

  “Turn in here,” she said.

  CHAPTER 8

  “Here” was a ramp that led down to the underground parking garage beneath the Gulf Hotel. The security gate opened automatically to let them through. The limo, one of a fleet that primarily serviced the city’s big hotels, had a bar-coded sticker on its windshield that allowed access.

  Leaving the limo at the dock would be like leaving a flaming sign announcing where they’d gone, in Bianca’s estimation, so she’d arranged alternate transportation to the boat and this was where the vehicle exchange happened. They were in the lowest level of the garage, the one employees used. At this hour it was only partially full. The one security camera had most unfortunately broken earlier in the day.

  Following Bianca’s directions, Doc drove to the rear of the parking garage and stopped.

  Jumping out, Bianca glanced around: poured concrete walls, round support columns, dim lighting and the faint smell of gasoline. Security camera gone dark and hanging from the ceiling by its wires. Parked vehicles. Not a soul in sight.

  “Come on.” Jerking her head to indicate the direction she meant, she slogged toward a spot two vehicles over. She opened the duffel bag and swung it in Doc’s direction as he trotted behind her. “Drop your hat and tie in here.”

  Doc did. Bianca zipped the bag up. As she reached the Kawasaki 250 motorcycle that she’d parked in the garage shortly after she’d taken out the camera, she threw the bag on the back. The plan had been for her to arrive in this garage in the limo with Doc. They would then part, making their way separately to the boat, because if/when the hunt for them heated up, the searchers would be trolling surveillance video and questioning witnesses looking for a couple. Separating was intended to confound the search, or at least slow it down. She’d planned to get to the boat via motorcycle, while Doc caught a cab at the hotel entrance. That plan was now out the window. Doc was going to have to stay with her. They were almost out of time.

  “Here.” Having secured the bag with a bungee cord and freed the two helmets fastened to the bike, Bianca held a helmet out to Doc even as she pulled the other one on. No more worries about cameras. The helmets were full face. Wearing them provided total anonymity.

  “Me?” Doc looked at the helmet like she was offering him a spitting cobra. Holding both hands up in rejection, he shook his head. “I don’t ride motorcycles.”

  “Take it.” She smacked the helmet into his chest. He took it, holding it like it was a live grenade. “All you have to do is sit down and hold on.” Securing the helmet strap beneath her chin, Bianca swung a leg over the seat. Starting the engine, she looked at Doc, who was frowning down at his helmet in mistrust, and yelled over the sudden noise, “Get on. Do you want to miss the boat?”

  “Oh, jeez.” Cramming the helmet on his head, Doc hitched himself on and wrapped his arms around her waist. It was kind of like being caught in the death grip of a giant, sweaty teddy bear. As he plopped down and the back of the bike sank under his weight, Bianca had an instant, hideous vision of the two of them popping a never-ending wheelie through the streets of Manama.

  Inconspicuous wasn’t the first word that came to mind.

  Sometimes you just had to work with what you were given.

  Yelling, “Scoot up,” she revved the gas and took off.

  He scooted, and the balance improved. Slightly. Sitting practically on top of the gas tank in an effort to keep the front tire on the ground, Bianca gunned it out of there.

  The roar of the 250’s engine echoed off the walls. The headlight slashed through the darkness like Tinker Bell on steroids.

  It wasn’t far to the dock. Zipping through a maze of alleys, she felt exhilaration at their escape edging out the fear that had been gnawing at her ever since she’d discovered the empty vault. The cold hard knot of failure in her stomach she refused to acknowledge: something to face later. As they neared the gulf, she caught glimpses of its shimmering black waters through the gaps in adjacent walls. Almost all the old buildings they passed had been built with the tall, square, open-faced turrets known as wind towers protruding from the roofs to catch the sea breezes. The buildings themselves blocked any hope of those breezes reaching street level. That, combined with the day’s accumulated heat rising up from the ground and the fact that her head was shrouded in a helmet, made it stiflingly hot. Like most of the small island nation, the city was flat, which was a saving grace as she cranked the speed until the bike was skittering like a wild animal over the cobblestones and vibrating so hard that her hands and thighs were going numb from hanging on. Careening around corners and opening up the throttle on the straightaways, she drove so fast that the collection of little shops and restaurants and offices that blocked them in on both sides became a blur.

  “Will they really leave without us?” Doc’s higher-pitched-than-usual voice reached her via the intercom built into the helmets. Pressed up against her like a gorilla-size backpack, his arms clamped around her waist, his body curved around hers, he was hanging on for dear life. Having never worked with them before this disaster, he didn’t know that the Ten Commandments were more flexible than that particular one of Richard St. Ives’s rules.

  “Yes.”

  “What about that thing about never leaving a man behind?”

  Bianca snorted. “You’ve got us confused with the US Marines.”

  “Oh, man.”

  A glance at her watch told her how much time they had before the boat left without them: one minute, sixteen seconds. It would be tight, but, she calculated, they were going to get it done. They were only about a block away from where the alley opened out into the road that ran along the plaza fronting the harbor. The garbage scow would be docked about three blocks to the left, at Pier 16. It was situated so they could drive right up and—

  The quick flash of multiple headlights in the spaces between the buildings to her right caught her eye. What she was seeing was traffic on the next street over, she realized—and all of a sudden there seemed to be a lot of it.

  “We got a plan B in case we miss the boat?” Doc’s uneasy voice crackled in her ear.

  “We’re going to make it.”

  “Really? Boo-ya! I knew you could do it!”

  It was touching, the amount of faith Doc seemed to have in her, Bianca reflected absently as she did her best to make sense of the sudden flood of vehicles that seemed to be racing down the main drag parallel to them. Almost from the beginning, when her father had recruited him right out of his two-year stay in a minimum security prison for hacking a defense department server with a job offer that, if successful (which obviously this fiasco hadn’t been, but who could have foreseen that?), would have paid enough to make his felony conviction no longer a concern, Doc had latched onto her as the least likely one of the group to screw him over or murder him in his sleep.

  Good call, because she was.

  The last of the headlights that marked what seemed to be a speeding motorcade running parallel to them flashed past.

  Bianca frowned. They were almost at the plaza—

  Directly ahead, she watched a large truck zoom past the end of the alley, crossing the space where the alley emptied out into the road that ran along the plaza that fronted the dock. The road that the garbage truck would have taken, the road that the bike would be turning down in the next few seconds—

&n
bsp; Bianca braked sharply as more vehicles rattled past the mouth of the alley. The bike’s rear wheel skidded sideways before they shuddered to a halt mere yards short of the road. Putting her foot down automatically—Doc did the same thing, or the bike might have toppled over—Bianca stared. Her throat closed up as she realized that what she was looking at was a military convoy. Jeeps and covered personnel carriers and boxy trucks bristling with soldiers and fitted with big guns, all racing in the same direction she and Doc were heading. The same direction that her father and his crew had taken not so long before.

  Coincidence? Oh, God, she hoped so.

  “What’s happening?” Doc was hopping a little as he fought to maintain his balance. He was in the awkward position of having one leg flung over the bike and one leg planted on the ground, which made it hard to stand still. Bianca’s grip tightened on the handlebars as she struggled to keep the bike upright.

  “Get off,” she instructed, her eyes locked on the string of vehicles still speeding past the end of the alley. As Doc obediently hopped off, she pushed up the visor on her helmet to get a better look.

  Her heart began to slam in her chest.

  “You think they’re after us?” Doc had clearly recognized the military nature of the convoy, too. He stood in the alley beside her with his helmet in his hands, his gaze glued to the clattering trucks.

  “Not us. They haven’t seen us.”

  “Whoa.” The appalled way Doc drew out the syllable told Bianca that he’d reached the same conclusion that she had: the convoy’s target was in all likelihood the garbage truck, or the boat. Or both.

  “Yeah.”

  Doc said, “How about we just tell them we don’t have their money?”

  “They won’t believe it. And even if they did, they’d kill us for knowing about it.” She did a quick reconnoiter. The yellowish glow from the streetlights that illuminated the plaza and road in front of them didn’t penetrate this far in. She and Doc were sheltered inside the alley, deep in the shadows cast by the buildings rising on either side of them, protected by darkness. A few dusty windows overlooked their position. None had lights on inside. Except for the bike’s headlight—she instantly killed it—and the roar of the engine, there was no reason for anyone to so much as glance their way.