Authors: Anne Stuart
Tags: #Assassins, #Soldiers of Fortune, #General, #Romance, #Romantic Suspense Fiction, #Suspense, #Fiction
Ice Storm (30 page)
She knew what deep cover was like, but that was nothing compared to what Killian must have lived through. Two decades of lies and betrayal, of dealing death while he was ostensibly on the side of the bad guys.
Of killing people who didn’t deserve to be killed, just to keep up his cover. Yes, she knew what that was like.
In their life there was no such thing as good guys and bad guys. He was still a monster. He was simply the same kind of monster she was.
“There was no sign of him,” Peter said from the front seat as Bastien pulled out into the rainy street. “It’s going to take him some time to get there—first he has to steal a car, then he was to figure out the roads, and there’s been some bad weather out there. Freezing fog. It’ll coat everything with ice, and he’s not likely to steal a car that can handle it.”
“Don’t underestimate him,” Bastien said. “He hasn’t stayed alive this long without paying attention to details. He’ll find an SUV, maybe with studded tires.”
“Studded tires are illegal over here,” Peter said.
“He’ll find one anyway.”
“I’m not talking to you,” Isobel told Bastien in a sharp voice.
“Don’t be petty, Killian and I had an arrangement. He was out of the picture at the time I retired.”
“And you didn’t think I needed to know a piece of information that crucial?”
Bastien shrugged. “I wasn’t particularly interested in anything the Committee needed.”
“I think Peter should drive. You’ve been driving on the wrong side of the road for the last three years.”
“Don’t worry, Isobel. I’ve lived on top of a mountain—I know how to deal with ice and snow.”
She sank back, resisting the impulse to snarl. There was no place for emotions right now, no time for anger. There was simply the job ahead of them and no room for anything else.
She glanced over at the silent
“Are those Mahmoud’s?”
He jerked his head, startled. “Yes.” he said finally. “He gave them to me. They belonged to his foster sister.”
“The one Killian shot?”
Isobel had been hoping that was a lie. “Why did he give you the beads? They were his most valued possession.”
“We exchanged gifts. He was ready to give these up, he said. Along with his oath to kill the man responsible.”
“Why did he kill her?” She ignored the men in the front seat.
“He didn’t tell you?”
“Killian told me nothing but lies.”
“Mahmoud’s foster sister was a suicide bomber. She was in the middle of a crowded marketplace, holding on to Mahmoud with one hand, the detonator with the other. Killian shot her before she could detonate it.”
Isobel closed her eyes for a moment. In the darkness no one could see her reaction. She swallowed. “He took a big chance,” she said. “The girl could have hit the button in reflex even as she died.”
“She could. Either way there would have been scores, maybe hundreds of people dead. He took Mahmoud and got out of there.”
“And the girl? She was pregnant. The baby...?”
“From what Mahmoud said it sounded as if the people in the marketplace pulled her body apart. Too many suicide bombings, too many deaths.”
There was nothing Isobel could say. At another time she’d wonder about the kind of life she lived, that someone could tell her something so horrific and she couldn’t even respond. But not now.
She concentrated on the present. “You should be in a hospital,” she said.
She didn’t bother to argue. She leaned back, trying to will her body to relax, to get ready for the upcoming battle. She could still feel Killian inside her, still feel his hands on her. Like a tape, playing over and over again in her head.
“How long will it take us to get there’?”
“We’re not even sure where we’re going,” Peter said. “The coordinates we lifted off the GPS get us within a mile or so of where we want to be, but it’s not exact.”
“So we head straight for Thomason’s country house and kill him,” Bastien suggested in the calmest of voices.
“I doubt Sir Harry is doing this on his own,” she murmured. “His skills were always organizational, not field-ready. If we kill him, we leave Mahmoud at risk.”
“I really hate you all,” she said irritably. “You know as well as I do that I draw the line a children. Sometimes innocent people have to die. Mahmoud isn’t innocent but he’s still a child, and we’re not having his death on our hands. That’s the difference between us and Thomason.”
“I know,” Peter said gently. “I just wanted to make sure you did.”
Isobel counted to ten. It was a very good thing that she was, temporarily, without a gun. “Does anyone in this goddamn car have a cigarette?”
“You gave them up.”
“I need one.” She turned to
Isobel leaned back against the seat, muttering. She could still feel the dozens of tiny cuts from the shards of glass that Killian had carefully, even lovingly picked from her skin. She hadn’t even noticed them during the endless night.
“What was that?” Peter asked.
“What was what?” she snapped.
“Did you moan?”
“Just fucking drive. And if we pass an open store we’re getting me some cigarettes.”
“Here,” Bastien said, passing a gun over the seat back. “Play with this instead.”
It was a nasty piece of weaponry, heavy, solid. It would blow a good-size hole into anyone she aimed it at. Right now she was thinking Killian would make a good target. They could explain it to their so-called allies later.
“Just keep driving,” she muttered. Stroking the gun.
Mahmoud sat cross-legged on the cot, leaning back against the rough stone walls, the violent waltz of the video game reflected in his blank eyes.
The man who’d brought him here, the one with the blond hair. Russian. Mahmoud thought. He’d seen Russians before. They drank too much, but they bled as much as any man. The one who took him, who’d ordered
He knew what they were waiting for. He was unimportant—Mahmoud had learned that long ago. They were using him to get to the man who’d killed his sister, and a month ago he would have helped them.
Not now.
Reza would have killed him, and a hundred others. He hadn’t known until the last minute, but he wouldn’t have stopped her. She had loved him, looked after him. He wouldn’t have minded dying with her—it would have all been over in a flash.
But the man had stopped her. Killed her. Saved him. And in the end, maybe it was all even.
They would come for him. He had fought in the wars long enough—he knew how these things worked. They would promise the man that they would let Mahmoud go, and the man would come, because he hated what he had done. Weakness, Mahmoud thought. Killian had had no choice but to kill Reza. It was a waste of time to feel guilt.
But the man would come, and they would kill Mahmoud, anyway. Unless he did something to stop them.
Right now he wasn’t sure what that was. Mahmoud didn’t care whether he died or not—the way he saw it, death was an old friend, one who took everyone he cared about, from Reza, the sister he’d known for years, to Reno, the brother he’d known for a day. It could take him as well.
But it would take the Russians, too. In the meantime he stared at the video screen, the only light in the dark, cold room, and set the blood-splatter level on high in the game he was playing.
And he killed.
Killian knew they would be waiting for him. For the last ten miles the road had been a skating rink. As the sun began to rise the freezing fog had coated everything, and the first glints of sun sent prisms of color through the heavy mist. They’d routed him along back roads, and there’d been no other traffic out in such dismal weather. He nearly missed the turn to Wilders—one touch of the brakes and he went skidding past it, Cursing, he let the car drift to a stop, put it in Reverse and carefully backed up, taking the right-hand turn toward Harry Thomason’s estate.
Not that he was supposed to know that. He’d had just enough time to pick up a few things, including some basic Intel. There were a few deserted cottages on the far end of the estate, scheduled to be torn down and turned into high-priced country housing. And there was an old bunker that had been used during World War II for some sort of covert activity. He was guessing that was where he was heading.
He had little doubt Isobel would be close behind him, but with only the coordinates, she wouldn’t be able to pin down his location exactly. Chances were they’d head for the main house first, giving him even more time to put his hasty plan into action.
Killian pulled the stolen car up in front of one of the old cottages. The roof had caved in long ago, and birds flew up into the dawn-lit air when he slammed the door of the vehicle. The ground was slick and icy underfoot. It would be damn funny if he were to fall and— He knew where they were moments before they appeared out of the mist, reaching for him. He already had one of Isobel’s small guns in his hand, and he shot the thug on the right, sweeping his long leg so that his companion fell on the ice. The man rolled as he slid, coming up on his knees with a gun pointed straight at Killian, but he just had time to pull the trigger before Killian finished him.
The bullet hit Killian, knocking him back against the stolen car, and after a breathless moment he laughed. It had hit the fleshy part of his shoulder, in almost the exact same spot Mary Isobel had shot him eighteen years ago. That hadn’t killed him; this wouldn’t, either. He needed to stop the bleeding, and then find Mahmoud before they sent reinforcements.
He could see a heavy door in the side of a hillock. So it was going to be the bunkers. Even better. An enclosed area had a great deal to recommend it.
He was freezing cold, the icy mist clinging to his body, and blood was oozing from his shoulder at an enthusiastic rate. He’d learned to deal with pain a long time ago, and he knew just how long he could go without getting a wound treated. The cold would slow down the bleeding. All he needed to do was pack it with something for the time being.
It was a good thing the dead man’s aim hadn’t been a little lower, or everyone in the surrounding area would be very unhappy, he thought as he stripped the leather jacket and T-shirt off the first man he’d killed, leaving him lying on the frozen mud. The T-shirt was bloody already, but he pressed it against his wound, beneath his own shirt, then pulled the jacket around him. It was big enough—the man had been a little shorter than he was, but burly—and it still held the dead man’s warmth.
Killian started for the hunker as the morning mist began to rise the birds began to sing and the smell of death filled the air.
23
H airy Thomason pulled out his father’s gold pocket watch for the hundredth time and wound it very carefully. It was half past five in the morning. You had to have a delicate touch with fine clockwork—too rough a turn and it broke, too light and the watch stopped prematurely. His father had worn it every day of his life since the day Winston Churchill had presented it to him, and Harry had hidden it when his father died and his older brother inherited everything. Maurice was long dead by now, childless, thank heavens, and Harry had stepped up to the task at hand.
He wouldn’t have children, either, unless he adopted someone. Perhaps a pretty young boy, innocent enough to be molded. It would be a shame not to leave all this to someone, and life did get lonely.
He snapped the watch shut. Stolya should have called him by now. The sun had risen on an ice-coated world—maybe the roads had slowed his quarry down. Stolya was supposed to notify him when it was done, and Harry had been patient for three years, ever since that bitch had taken his job and his power. He could be patient a few more minutes.
The day staff would be coming in soon. He had a housekeeper and an executive assistant, but both of them knew to keep their distance unless their presence was specifically requested.
There was just so long a man could sit and stare at the frozen landscape. He was truly going to enjoy setting that charge once Stolya called him. If there was one thing Harry couldn’t abide, it was incompetence in underlings.
The mobile phone made a quiet little chirping sound. He hated the things, but it was the only way to ensure absolute privacy, and he punched the button, growling into the receiver.
“There’s been a hitch.” Stolya’s thickly accented voice came over the line. “Your presence is requested.”
“Out of the question. You know your job. Do it!”
“Not possible. Not this moment. Your presence—” The voice ended abruptly, and a new one came on the line. An American voice, drawling, annoying.
“This is Killian, Sir Harry. If you want any chance to get to Isobel Lambert, then I suggest you come down here. Immediately, or I’ll kill the three men who are still alive, take Mahmoud and leave you holding the bag.”