by Cherry Adair
“Anything I can do to help?” Taylor asked, coming up beside him.
Yes, he thought. Go outside and wait for those choppers. Hunt desperately needed to touch her, to run his lips over the worry lines between her lovely eyes, to feel the beat of her heart beneath his fingers, to assure her that everything was going to turn out all right. He did none of those things.
“If I asked that you go back topside accompanied by some of my people, would you do it?”
“Yes,” she said without hesitation, her gaze steady, “I would. If you asked me to. But I’d rather stay here until you leave.”
Jesus.
It had made him nervous as hell watching her wiggling into that small hole. And he’d been frankly floored when she’d done as he’d ordered.
Taylor Kincaid was a woman who kept her promises.
He resisted touching her. “I’m not leaving until this is done.”
She gave him a small smile. “I know.”
His people were crawling all over the place, their black-clad figures melding into the darkness between the crates. High above the cement floor, Savage had taken up point. Beside her, three shadowy figures were setting up automatic weapons. Weapons that could not be used down here on the main floor because of the ammunition and chemicals contained in the crates.
When it came down to it, they would have to fight hand-to-hand. Unless Morales was even crazier than Hunt thought, and didn’t give a damn if he blew himself and his people up.
He tried again. Wanting Taylor to make the decision on her own, but acknowledging she’d worked just as hard on this as his other team members. She deserved to be in on the payoff. But, Jesus bloody Christ. He didn’t want her anywhere near Morales and his insanity.
“It’s crazy to stay down here. You know that. Morales will be here any minute. We’re counting hours, not days, for this all to turn to shit.”
“Then tell me how I can be the most useful, and go and do whatever it is you plan to do.” She reached up and pressed two fingers against his mouth. “I’m not stupid. In fact, I’m sensibly scared of this whole situation. I won’t be doing anything either foolish or heroic. I promise.”
He brushed a kiss to her fingertips, wanting to hold her in his arms and beg her to leave. “Why don’t you go over there and work with Tate. I need to look around. Something still doesn’t feel right to me.”
Taylor cocked her head. Most of her hair had come loose from the band around her ponytail and was now wild and every which way after being tugged at by the rocks as they’d come through the wall. She looked so sexy, Hunt wanted to swoop her up in his arms and— Bloody hell.
“Yeah, yeah,” she said, smiling. “You have to go to work. Go.” She waved him off with the back of her hand, but when he turned to leave, she grabbed his arm. “Hunt?” Her voice was suddenly dead serious. “Don’t do anything overly heroic yourself, okay? Promise me.”
He touched her cheek with the tips of his fingers. More would be dangerous. Everything about her begged to be touched. This was neither the time, nor the place. “Stay out of trouble,” he told her without answering. Then walked away.
“No, you big moron. You stay out of trouble!” Taylor said to his retreating back. Of course he didn’t hear her, and if he had, he was ignoring her warning.
Half an hour later Taylor was clambering up and around the crates with Tate, calling out the information stenciled on the boxes as he inputted them into his wrist PDA when Hunt called her down.
“I have something that will interest you far more. Come down and I’ll show you.”
“You okay for a bit?” Taylor asked Tate.
“Sure. Go. He’s the boss.” He laughed when she made a face and started to protest. “No, really. Go. We have enough people. We’re covered.”
Released from duty, she climbed down the mountain of wooden crates. She decided she’d rather not know the contents of some of them. There was an area that Hunt, Daklin, and Tate had decided should not be touched until another hazmat team arrived with more suits and equipment, and she was fine and dandy with that.
Hunt reached up and took her hand to help her down off the last crate.
“What do you want to show me?”
“You’ll have to wait and see.”
Curiosity sparked, Taylor followed him across the cement floor. Morales had constructed a warehouse in the middle of nowhere. No one could get in or out without those codes. It was diabolical and brilliant. But now she’d seen it, experienced it, lived it. She’d like to see sky and smell fresh air pretty soon.
“Oh. My. God!”
Hunt had pushed open a tall mahogany door, ushered her inside, and closed the door behind them. Taylor did a slow turn, trying to take everything in.
“I found the lights and fired up the music. Wanted you to get the full effect.”
Taylor turned around slowly. “The effect is pretty freaking incredible.”
The room was large, beautifully lit, and filled with paintings hanging against a backdrop of rich, red, African Padauk, a rare wood. One of the homes she’d robbed had reported to their insurance company, and hence the newspaper reports that the thief had destroyed the walls of their study, paneled in this rare and expensive wood. Not true. And bad press.
“This is hideous enough to be a Picasso.” Taylor approached the butt-ugly painting.
“Stolen from the McGills the day after they brought it home from Sotheby’s in ’89. Valued at forty-three million.”
She whistled as she moved down to the next painting bathed by special lighting. “Van Gogh’s Irises. Forty-nine million. That Renoir over there? Seventy-eight.”
There were sculptures from sculptors she’d never heard of. Hunt was familiar with many of them. Once she heard the names, Taylor could fill in the blanks. Many of the pieces in Morales’s fantastic collection were on Consolidated Underwriters’ lists of retrievable objects.
A Serra worth five million. A Bonheur worth eight. There were two of Emperor Qin Shihuang’s life-size terra-cotta soldiers, and a small bust of a sweet-faced young girl. There was a full-size bronze horse, and a collection of Fabergé eggs, millions of dollars worth, scattered on a velvet cloth on a side table.
“No wonder he went to such lengths to keep people out,” Taylor whispered in awe as she walked around the room. There must be well over a billion dollars worth of stolen artwork and precious jewels here.
And her fingers itched to touch it all. “I can’t believe anyone would go to such elaborate lengths to accumulate all this . . . magnificence, only to turn around and blow it all to hell and go, Oh! Oh! Oh!” she whispered, sinking to the floor in a boneless puddle beside a beautiful little glass-fronted display case.
She spread her hand on the glass like a pink starfish against the black velvet-lined shelves inside. Shelves filled with bling. Shiny, brilliant, priceless, perfect diamonds in every shape and color. Set in gold. In platinum. In silver. Artistically sprinkled like stars around and between the jewelry were hundreds of loose stones, tossed like glitter against the midnight dark velvet.
Taylor thought she’d have a heart attack right then and there.
All those lovely diamonds blurred into one as her eyes feasted on the set right in front, dead center. The earrings. The bracelet. The—oh, Lord—the necklace.
The czar’s Blue Star diamonds.
Her Blue Star diamonds.
“Come to mama.”
She tugged at the fist-sized, flame-red silk tassel attached to the intricate inlaid gold and ivory door handle. The door swung open on well-oiled hinges.
Reaching in, she reverently slipped her very dirty fingers around the necklace and took it out of the cabinet without taking a breath. She draped the ornate platinum setting across her palm so she could admire the necklace close up.
“My God,” she whispered. “Even though I’ve followed her all over the world, I was never really sure she was real. Her existence reached mystical proportions over the years.”
“Her?”
“Yes. Her.” Taylor ran a finger gently over the face of the center stone. Lord. “Beautiful. Filled with fire. Strong. Beyond price. Have you ever seen anything this exquisite in your life?”
“Yes.” Hunt’s voice was husky. She thought she felt the brush of his hand, moving lightly over her hair. “As a matter of fact, I have.”
She moved her wrist so the light could play across the surface of the necklace. She didn’t need her loupe. The center stone was a 51.84 carat Fancy Deep Blue round brilliant. Another sixty carats of smaller but equally exquisite blue diamonds ran up each side, all surrounded by ninety carats of F’s. Pure, white, absolutely flawless, colorless stones.
The diamonds contained fire like Taylor had never seen before. Not only were the stones huge and flawless, they represented the finest Antwerp cuts in the history of gems. Exactly and lovingly chiseled so that hundreds of tiny prisms refracted light in a way that nearly made the stones seem to radiate all on their own.
The stones were cool to the touch, yet the luminosity of each perfect stone shone like distant stars against her filthy palm.
“Take a couple of deep breaths,” Hunt said dryly as he stood over her. “Want to put it on?”
“Oh yeah,” she murmured reverently.
“Those stones are the exact color of your eyes. Only your eyes are brighter and much prettier.” He reached for the necklace, and Taylor’s fingers automatically closed over it. “You’re going to have to let go if you want to wear it, darling.”
For the first time, Taylor was more interested in the anticipation of his touch than the feel of the gems in her hand. She opened her fist, and he plucked the priceless work of art out of her hand.
How had this happened? When had his touch—even the promise of it—become paramount to her year’s long search for this necklace?
Warm fingers brushed aside her hair, then she felt the heat of his mouth against her nape. Taylor closed her eyes, dizzy with sensation. Senses overloaded by it all. The place. The gems. Hunt.
She sucked in a breath.
Most of all—Hunt.
She loved him.
Simple.
Pure.
He fastened the ornate clasp, then lifted her to her feet, turning her in his arms as he did so. The necklace was heavy against her pounding heart as Hunt cupped her face between his palms. His gaze searched her face, then he pressed his mouth to hers in a gentle kiss. Taylor wrapped her arms about his neck as his tongue sought hers.
Lord, yes.
What could be more perfect—
Something crashed loudly beyond the door.
They broke apart.
By the sound of it, all hell was breaking loose outside.
Men shouted.
Shots sounded.
Hunt moved in a flash of sleek, black-covered muscles, weapon in hand even before he straightened. He removed the gun the shaggy guy had given him and handed it to her. “Stay in here. Lock the door if you can. And please. Stay here.” There was a brief flash of—something in his eyes. “I’ll be back for you.”
“Yeah. Sure,” Taylor said to empty air as the door slammed behind him, leaving her with a big black gun in one hand, and a $75 million necklace in the other.
Forty-nine
Hunt slammed the door behind him, sizing up the chaos before he stepped into the melee.
Morales’s people had arrived in full force. There was no sign of the man himself—yet—but Hunt recognized several others, including that malevolent Greek, Andreas Constantine, currently trying to fend off Bishop.
With a feral smile, he stuck the H&K back into the holster strapped to his thigh. Any fool who used their weapon in here would pay dearly. T-FLAC agents got that—Morales’s men did not. A couple of Morales’s imbeciles got off a few shots. His own people had their weapons safetied for the duration.
Should a bullet strike any one of the thousands of stacked crates, they’d all go up in a blaze of glory. Well ahead of Morales’s scheduled launch. A few stray rounds pinged into the walls, sending large chunks of rock into the fray. But the weapons fire soon stopped as word was quickly passed and reality took precedence over the firepower.
Now, the fight was quieter, but just as deadly. Bone hitting bone. The thump and thud and scrape of bodies tumbling on the cement as the men moved in for violent hand-to-hand combat.
“Incoming!” one of Viljoen’s men shouted, lunging as a Mano guy raised a small launcher to his shoulder. The terrorist got off a shot seconds before the T-FLAC agent tackled him to the floor in a flurry of arms and legs.
Jesus bloody Christ. They were six thousand feet underground, and Morales’s people had brought in rocket launchers?
Insane! But of course they didn’t care. They were so dedicated to their cause they were prepared to die down here.
It would be bad enough if a stray bullet hit the crated ammunition. But thousands of those crates also contained biochemicals. And if that wasn’t bad enough, in the middle of it all, the missile.
Two thousand feet away, the small rocket slammed into a neat stack of crates containing ammo. The resulting explosion was deafening and instantaneous; the detonation punched Hunt’s eardrums. The contents and the heavy wooden containers exploded, debris shooting high into the air. Chunks of metal and wood rained fire on the combatants below.
For several minutes pandemonium ensued as men ran for their lives, pelted from above with flaming projectiles and jagged shrapnel. Acrid smoke filled the air, and the floor became littered with huge chunks of burning debris.
But no sooner had the wreckage landed than the men were back beating the shit out of one another. Hunt let them have at it.
T-FLAC’s job was to find the bad guys, break their toys, and kill them, not necessarily in that order. His people would deal with the former. He kept his eye searching for the prize. The person he wanted was Morales.
T-FLAC intel indicated that Morales would want to be close to the action. Not close enough to die for his cause, but close enough to observe the minutiae of the culmination of his lifelong dream. Morales had planned this for years. Hunt knew he wouldn’t be satisfied sitting safely in San Cristóbal awaiting news. He’d be right here in the thick of things.
He’d want to do the countdown personally. And press the launch button himself. Which is why Hunt had dispatched a group to find and bring Morales to him. Here. If the head of Mano del Dios wanted to witness his creation, then he could bloody well do it up close and personal with everyone else.
There were more bad guys than T-FLAC operatives. Just the way they liked it. Hunt ran like hell, zigging and zagging across the warehouse. Just because guns were verboten didn’t mean knives were too. Ka-bar in hand, he kept his eye out for his prey as he moved through the flaming bonfires and bodies. Both dead and alive.
His headset clicked. “St. John.” It was one of Viljoen’s men who’d been sent to search for Morales. “Find him?”
“Yeah, he has a house on the other side of Blikiesfontein. He was all spiffed up and ready to detonate. Oh, yeah, and by the way? The sick fuck killed his wife.”
“He killed his wife?” Hunt repeated, startled.
“I shit you not. Strangled her. We found her in the chapel behind the house.”
“Grab a chopper and bring him to the circus,” Hunt told him. “I’d hate him to miss the show.”
Fifty
Lisa Maki had been instructed by the Black Rose herself to hold her people back, and to wait in Blikiesfontein for her signal. Although it made sense for T-FLAC to do Black Rose’s grunt work for them, she hadn’t enjoyed the wait. They’d observed the vehicles and choppers converging on the African village a few miles away, and her heart had pounded with anticipation.
She and her group were eager to go in, kick some butt, and stake Black Rose’s claim to the power and glory of Mano del Dios.
Finally it was time.
By the time Lisa and her group arrived down on the lower level of the mine,
it was almost impossible to see anything. The cavern was filled with choking smoke. Small fires burned, then jumped and spread among the wooden crates, and men lay dead or dying across the floor. Through the veils of thick, gray smoke, the sight of the missile—enormous and eerily white—made Lisa’s breath catch.
No guns, the Black Rose had warned. Made sense with the missile, the Black Rose’s ultimate prize, projecting through the floor like a giant white penis. Besides, Lisa much preferred hand-to-hand with her Nepalese-commando, Khukri, crescent-shaped combat knife. She preferred the intimacy of knife fighting. It was fast, fluid, and lethal.
The curved amari hilt fit comfortably in her hand as she fondled it, looking into the mass of humanity before her. The gleaming, well-honed, nine-and-a-half-inch steel blade was like an old friend. They’d done some fine work together. Lisa smiled. Slashing and stabbing were made simple with a good knife, but the Khukri also did a fine job of decapitation.
T-FLAC or the Mano. Both enemies would feel the slice of her blade. She couldn’t wait.
She motioned her people into place. The men and woman she’d been given awaited her signal. Lisa felt a surge of power so profound it was almost sexual. She smiled. “Let’s show Mano del Dios and T-FLAC who just joined the party.”
Fifty-one
“St. John?” One of Daklin’s men, Hunt thought, as the kid came running full-tilt toward him.
Hunt swiped a hand across his smoke-streaked face as he pulled the guy aside behind the temporary shelter of a crate of
AK-47s. “Talk.” Jesus, they were hiring them young. The operative, redheaded and freckle-faced, looked about twelve. A scared twelve at that. He was probably twenty, Hunt thought, and an MIT protégé.
“We went down the assembly launch tower. The warhead weighs in excess of twenty-three percent of the missile’s weight . . .”
As he listened, Hunt scanned the scene before him. Fires had sprung up everywhere. His people were attempting to put them out as fast as possible using the fire hoses they’d found somewhere. Putting out fires and fighting off Mano del Dios. Both formidable tasks.