by Matt Rogers
But King knew the consequences.
That was the worst part.
If he killed anyone during this rescue — especially an elite U.S. soldier — the search for him would amplify tenfold. He wanted to prove that he wasn’t a monster.
That would start today.
The man across from him didn’t deserve to die.
King slapped the gun away with a well-timed swipe, sending it into the corner of the room. He made it to his feet before the SEAL did, a slight difference that would prove all the advantage in the world.
By the time the man had scrambled to his feet, King had sent a front push-kick scything through the air between them.
In Muay Thai, it was known as a “teep.” If he got the placement right, it would drive all the wind out of his adversary and render the man useless.
The placement couldn’t have been more accurate.
He felt himself flowing through the motions, launching offence with breathtaking precision. The push-kick crunched against the man’s chest hard enough to wind him and send him toppling backwards — taken off his feet once again.
Before he hit the ground, King sprung forward. He utilised all of his reach, throwing a pinpoint-accurate jab with his uninjured right hand. He felt knuckles sink into the side of the guy’s head, just above the ear.
A vulnerable place to be hit.
The jab shut the lights out.
The guy hit the ground brutally, unconscious before he landed. King dashed forward and caught his head before it ricocheted off the hard floor. He would take any chance to minimise brain damage. The guy had been trying to kill King, but he was just following orders.
His intentions were misplaced.
‘In here!’ King yelled.
Klara came hurtling through the open doorway a second later. She took in the sight of the unconscious SEAL and ran straight past the man, throwing herself into King’s arms.
He held her tight, breathing in her scent, thankful that they were both alive. They embraced for less than a second before parting, both still firing on all cylinders.
‘You okay?’ he said.
She nodded. ‘They came in through the balcony. I wasn’t expecting it. Scared the shit out of me.’
‘There’s more coming,’ he said.
He noticed movement in his peripheral vision — from the far corner of the large open room. He turned to see an elderly couple cowering on a modular couch.
The owners of the apartment.
‘Sorry,’ he muttered, unable to find the words capable of explaining what was going on.
He heard rapid footsteps in the corridor outside, closing in on the apartment. King snatched up the Beretta M9 pistol and ushered Klara into the corner. He pressed himself against the doorway and levelled the pistol at the heads of the elderly couple.
‘Scream as loud as you can,’ he mouthed.
They complied. The old woman let out a piercing shriek that rang through the doorway, resonating through the corridor.
The man approaching took the bait.
He would have heard the commotion from all the way across the room and reasoned that the drama was unfolding there. King sensed him come to a stop just outside the doorway. The guy’s training kicked in and he froze in his tracks, likely aiming a weapon into the room instead of charging straight in.
It didn’t matter.
He was close enough.
King swung around the doorway and smashed a fist across the man’s chin. The guy’s legs wobbled, clearly stunned by the force behind the blow. King used the hesitation to wrap a hand around his throat and wrench him inside the apartment.
As the guy sprawled to the floor inside, King recognised his features. He reached down, ripped the man’s sidearm out of his weak grip and hurled it away.
‘Ramsay,’ he hissed.
The blotching and welts around the man’s neck had intensified in colour, his entire throat now a deep shade of purple. King had enough experience in combat situations to understand the pain that the bruising must have caused.
That knowledge brought with it a slight sense of satisfaction.
‘You personally came?’ King said.
‘This is my responsibility,’ Ramsay choked, disarmed and vulnerable. ‘It’s my job to get you back.’
‘How’s that working out for you?’
Ramsay paused, struggling for breath after being manhandled so effortlessly. ‘Could be better.’
Commotion sounded in the hallway outside. Bodies scrambling. Soldiers regrouping.
For the first time, King had a chance to take in his surroundings. The apartment was similar to Klara’s — high-ceilinged, with a single enormous open room. It was furnished with luxurious high-end gear, including a kitchen with a polished marble countertop. Floor-to-ceiling windows took up most of the far wall.
The clear afternoon light flooded in, exposing everything in stark detail.
A small door between the enormous windows led out onto a sweeping balcony that overlooked the street, five stories below. It was too far to even consider surviving a fall. Across the street, the neighbouring apartment complex rested in equally stunning fashion, complete with the similar art nouveau style.
‘How are you planning on getting out of this?’ Ramsay said, echoing King’s thoughts. ‘You’re trapped in here.’
‘We’ll see.’
‘False bravado,’ Ramsay noted. ‘Doesn’t convince me for a second.’
‘I don’t need to convince you of anything.’
King wrenched Ramsay to his feet by the scruff of his neck as the footfalls outside reached a crescendo. He pressed the Beretta’s barrel firmly against the side of the man’s temple. Ramsay squirmed, but knew better than to make any sudden movements. He marbleised before King’s eyes.
The three SEALs from the stairwell flooded into view, taking up measured positions in the carpeted hallway beyond. Each man wielded a jet-black M4A1 carbine assault rifle — the same weapon King had used in the Russian Far East.
The group noted their commander held at gunpoint, using their training to establish a measured response to the live hostage situation. King saw the three rifles pointed in his direction and grimaced at the sensitivity of the stand-off.
He dug the barrel a little firmer into Ramsay’s skin.
The man winced.
‘Looks like we have a bit of a predicament here,’ King said.
None of the three responded. Their faces were set into stone, focused hard on the sight before them. They would not move from that position until they had their leader back.
King had been trained similarly.
Be patient for an opening, and then utilise it for maximum effectiveness.
He had to find an opening before they did.
With the hand that wasn’t controlling the Beretta — the hand that sported a recently-broken wrist — he reached down tentatively and slipped a pair of fingers into his left pocket, shielding the move from view with Ramsay’s body. They touched the BMW’s remote, still in his pocket due to the car’s electronic start function.
King found the button he was looking for and pressed a finger to it, praying that the remote would connect to the wreck resting in the lobby below. They were right next to the apartment’s balcony, and there couldn’t have been more than seventy feet of space between him and the ground floor.
Possible, he thought, repeatedly depressing the narrow button.
On the sixth try, it worked.
With a horrendous, ear-piercing screech, the BMW’s alarm echoed up through the complex, its sound pouring out of the open stairwell in the hallway.
It jarred the three SEALs just enough to cause them to hesitate. In such heightened mental states, one reacted to almost anything that disrupted their concentration. King saw their minds whirring, trying to ascertain if the alarm was a cause for concern. Neurons firing, they realised that it was coming from somewhere below and re-calibrated their senses to focus on the hostage situation.
> That was all the time King needed.
With the same hand, he shoved Ramsay forward a step, so that the man stumbled towards the doorway. When there was a foot of space between them, King thundered a boot into the small of the man’s back, hard enough to throw him forward uncontrollably. Ramsay’s legs were weak from the fear that came from having a live gun pressed to the side of one’s head.
He crashed into the trio of soldiers and they paused for a second to keep him on his feet.
King darted across the six feet of no-man’s-land and threw the door closed.
It slammed on its hinges — a flimsy barrier between the two parties.
His work wasn’t over.
King sidestepped to the right, over to the towering bookshelf positioned a foot from the door. The entire thing was made of marble — King guessed it would have almost six figures. He also guessed that it weighed close to eight hundred pounds.
It would have taken a small army to cart it up to the apartment.
He moved to one side of the massive bookshelf and planted his shoulder against the smooth marble. He planted his feet and — with the kind of primal, unbridled strength that could only come from a life-or-death situation — heaved until the veins in his forehead were set to burst.
It took far too long.
As the bookshelf began to topple, groaning like a falling building, the door burst open — kicked in by one of the SEALs who came charging into the room.
27
The blood drained from King’s face and his stomach twisted into a painful knot as he imagined the ramifications of the marble slab crushing the man to death.
An unforgivable act, and a fate that the guy didn’t deserve.
Even though they were trying to kill him, saner heads prevailed.
But it was too late. The slab was uncontrollable, already toppling towards the wooden floor.
Thankfully, the SEAL saw the enormous bookshelf coming. He sprung backwards, impressively agile.
The left-hand side of the marble bookshelf met the door swinging in the opposite direction, just as the SEAL dove back out of harm’s way. It crashed against the flimsy wood, almost tearing it in half, and sent the door rocketing back in the other direction.
The door slammed shut, and the marble slab hit the floor behind it hard enough to feel like a sizeable earthquake underneath King’s feet. For a moment he feared that the bookshelf would continue straight through the floor and they would drop into the apartment below as the ground caved in.
But it lay still — accompanied by a thunderous boom. The barricade sealed off three-quarters of the door from the outside corridor.
If they were determined enough to break in, they would shoot the top quarter of the door to shreds and climb over the bookshelf.
King guessed he had bought himself a minute.
He spun and saw Klara staring wide-eyed at the scene before her. She ducked instinctively as a gunshot tore through the wood at the top of the door. It came nowhere near them, angled toward the ceiling to prevent civilian casualties. They were on the top floor of the complex, after all.
King sprinted across the room and picked up the TAIL grappling hook he’d dropped moments previously. He stared down at the bulky system, breaking out in a cold sweat.
Then he turned to Klara.
‘I have a really bad idea,’ he said.
She looked down at the grappling hook. ‘Surely not…’
‘I can’t see any other way out of this.’
‘Jason, no…’
He took her by the forearm and hustled her towards the balcony, ignoring the whimpering of the elderly couple on the couch. They would be terrified, but they’d survive unscathed — save for a slightly-damaged bookshelf and the need for a new front door.
King pushed open the balcony door and helped Klara through into the cool afternoon air. As he did so, a volley of desperate rounds passed through the upper half of the door. He turned to see the wood splintering, shredding into pieces as it cascaded over the top of the marble bookshelf.
There was almost enough of a gap to squeeze a rifle through.
Briefly, he glimpsed the cold steel of an M4A1 barrel. He blanched and hurried Klara to the edge of the balcony.
As he suspected, it was too far of a fall to have any hope of surviving. Five storeys added up to over a seventy-foot drop, especially because of the enormous apartments and high ceilings within the complex.
They were dizzyingly high.
King looked over the edge of the white plaster railing and saw a cluster of police milling around the lobby far below, many of them clearly panicked. He imagined this was more action than they had seen in their careers.
Sweden had notoriously low crime rates.
Then King’s gaze wandered to the apartment complex across the narrow street.
They weren’t far from it. It was exactly the same height as the one they stood in, with the same decor and architecture. It meant that the windows were similarly enormous, taking up most of the visible exterior of the building.
King counted five floors in total.
‘We can do this,’ he muttered, more to reassure himself than Klara.
Forcing down the reminder that he would only get one shot, he tucked the Beretta M9 into his waistband, freeing up both hands. He levelled the TAIL system and rested the butt on his shoulder to stabilise his aim.
‘You’re kidding,’ Klara said.
He fired.
The recoil almost threw him off his feet, but the launch itself was impossibly silent. King remembered that the grappling hook had been designed specifically for the Navy with rescue operations in mind, which meant it catered to sensitive circumstances. The heavy titanium hook barely made a whisper as it tore out of the barrel, dragging a hundred feet of Kevlar line behind it.
It speared across the open space and thudded into the thick concrete running the length of the neighbouring complex’s roof.
The line went taut.
King wrenched the end of the thick Kevlar line out of the barrel and discarded the empty TAIL system on the balcony floor. Another barrage of gunfire sounded behind him.
There was no time to think.
Ramsay and his men would have a lock on them in seconds.
Moving at breakneck speed, he calculated the trajectory to the best of his ability, moving his grip on the line almost a dozen feet closer to the grappling hook. He hoped like all hell that the hook across the street was firmly embedded in the concrete.
If it loosened and fell, the pair of them would splatter across the pavement below.
He spent one last second focusing hard on the path they would take, checking that the length of cable between the hook and the balcony matched up with the distance between the fifth floor and the second floor.
He thought it did.
That would have to be enough.
He heard wood splintering in the room behind them.
Ramsay’s men were forcing their way in.
King looped a powerful arm around Klara’s waist and pressed her to his side, tightening his grip hard enough to cause her pain. He knew what he would have to live with if his hold on her slipped. Temporary discomfort would have to suffice if it meant extra caution.
‘King…’ she yelled, paralysed by fear.
‘Hold on,’ he muttered.
He wrapped the Kevlar line once around his forearm, so that the pressure wouldn’t damage his swollen left wrist even more. The sharp cable bit into his skin, drawing blood. He ignored it.
Then — as the SEALs forced their way into the apartment, scrambling over the bookshelf, he held Klara tight and dove over the balcony railing into empty space.
28
Sensory overload took hold, and time seemed to slow to a crawl.
He felt the wind assaulting his face and he squinted against the barrage, trying to focus on the path ahead. It was like the terror of a BASE jump magnified tenfold. Klara locked her arms around him and held on for dear life.
For a second they fell straight down, carried by their bodyweight and the assistance of gravity. The line trailing behind the grappling hook locked tight all at once, biting into his forearm hard enough to cause a world of pain.
It didn’t matter, because it saved their lives.
They swung across the short gap between the two buildings, probably appearing as a sweeping blur to the police below. King realised he had no time to react to anything. Correcting course was impossible — he simply had to hold his breath and hope for the best.
One of the vast second storey windows rushed at them at indescribable speed.
They weren’t going to hit the brick.
King recognised that, and pushed the thought of instant death to the back of his mind. Instead, he focused on dealing with the pain that was about to come.
He let go of the line at the last second, so the lower half of his arm wasn’t severed by the coming impact. The momentum built up from the swing carried them the last few feet. King turned away from the thin sheet of glass and wrapped his burly arms around Klara as they crashed through the window.
Sheer destruction.
The breath smashed from his lungs as he slammed back-first into the glass. He continued straight through, hitting the wood-panelled floor hard enough to whiplash the back of his skull against it. Shards of glass from the shattered window sliced his upper back in over a dozen places, sending a wave of intense, nauseating pain through his insides.
He kept Klara pinned to his chest, shielding her fall with his own body. They skidded uncontrollably across the room — almost as wide and spacious as the previous apartment — and came to rest by slamming into an antique coffee table against the far wall.
Just as quickly as it began, it ended.
King froze in his tracks as he ground to a halt, struggling to process what had just unfolded. He hurt in too many places to comprehend. Nerve endings fired across his back, his arm, his head, his neck. The apartment was a mess, littered with fragments of glass that had come from the now-gaping hole where a floor-to-ceiling window had once stood.
Slowly, he rolled Klara off him and she got tentatively to her feet.