Alicia gasped, still unable to breathe and pushing at Russo with weak arms. The soldier’s face was an inch from her own, creased with surprise that he’d actually managed to land inside.
“Cool,” he muttered.
Alicia flapped at him.
“What the hell’s wrong, Myles? Are you trying to fly?”
With a deep, shuddering breath Alicia finally managed to get some air inside her body. Out of her peripheral vision she could see Crouch searching for a way forward and finding nothing. Very soon their pursuers would figure out where they had gone.
Russo knelt over her. Alicia gathered her strength and struck both hands against this chest.
“Move, ya fuckin’ bouncing bomb!” Alicia had heard the word “fuck” was the most useful and often used word in the military vocabulary and always played her part in maintaining an average.
Russo rolled away, still struggling a little. Alicia tried to sit up, saw stars and lay back down. Crouch abruptly collapsed into the bottom of the craft.
“They’re here,” he murmured. “Hide.”
Russo collapsed again without ceremony. Alicia groaned. “Bastard.”
A moment passed, a few more seconds. The gondolier was still shouting from the water, attracting attention. Alicia knew that before long even the dumbest mercenary would shoot at the drifting wooden gondola.
“Grab your gun,” she told Russo. “And be ready.”
“Wait—” Caitlyn began.
“That’d be suicide.” Alicia and Russo rose as one, instantly locking gazes with half-a-dozen mercenaries who stood at the tunnel’s exit, scanning the canal. Before their enemies could open fire, Alicia and Russo sprayed them with bullets. Two fell into the water, two more collapsed back with wounds. Everyone began to yell.
“Gotta get away from here,” Alicia said.
Crouch again scanned the area. “Don’t they have speedboats? I was hoping for a speedboat.”
“Banned them a few years ago,” Caitlyn told him. “If you’d asked before you jumped…”
“I’ll try to remember next time I’m in mid-flight. How’s the ammo?” he called.
Alicia threw her gun at the water. “Out.”
Russo waited and then fired a final burst. “Me too.”
Crouch eyed the canal. “Hope there’s a way out up ahead,” he said and then leapt into the water. Taking his lead, Caitlyn slipped over the side just as Healey splashed beside her. Alicia stared at Russo.
“After you, Robster. The last time I went swimming the whole ocean exploded.”
“Why am I not surprised?”
Russo launched himself over the side, creating a splash like a whale coming down. Alicia appraised their enemies’ positioning before following suit. The female merc was leaning over as if she wanted to dive in and give chase, but someone was holding her back. Alicia knew that Crouch’s reasoning had been sound — if the mercs dived in after them they would be vulnerable when the Gold Team climbed out. Their only advantage was to beat Crouch to the exit point.
Alicia hit the canal, trying not to swallow its dirty water and arrowing down like a fish, then jack-knifing forward. Soon, she was in front of Russo and then catching up to Crouch. “You know where you’re going?”
Crouch flashed a grim smile. “Haven’t the slightest clue.”
“Fantastic.” Alicia studied the way ahead. Sheer brick and stone walls reared to either side, festooned with green fungus just above the water line. Another bridge spanned the canal but there was no access to street level. Sirens sounded in the distance.
“Maybe that’ll shake them off,” Alicia said.
Crouch looked unconvinced. “I’m sure this is Riley’s doing and believe me, nothing will ever shake him off.”
Alicia curbed a sudden outburst, wondering why the hell Crouch had suddenly turned into the world’s worst pessimist. Truth was, she didn’t know how many complex, random lines their boss was trying to thread together. Or why. Instead, she concentrated on swimming, the cold water beginning to bite at her senses. To her left both Healey and Caitlyn shot by, reminding Alicia of Flipper. Before she could say anything a gout of canal water entered her mouth, making her cough and splutter. Then, as she broke the surface again, trying not to imagine the germs she’d just ingested, she caught sight of what the two Flippers were aiming toward.
A wooden jetty dead ahead.
In fact a series of wooden jetties on both sides of the watery passage, where gondolas could dock to take on passengers. Alicia looked back, gauging their distance from the mercs. It would be close but they should have enough time to climb up and disappear. Did Riley know where they were headed next? She tried to remember the figures around them back at the café. Had anyone been listening?
Soldiers were good at spotting surveillance. But in a place like that one tourist just looked the same as another, innocent or not. And Caitlyn’s revelation about Napoleon hadn’t exactly been on the down-low…
Alicia watched as Healey reached the jetty first and began to climb the low wooden structure. The moment he reached the top he spun and held a hand out toward Caitlyn.
Alicia saw the merc appear out of the archway behind him, saw the gleeful smirk, the utter menace and opened her mouth to shout a warning. As she did so the merc threw a grenade in Healey’s direction. The sound of its first bounce seized the soldier’s attention.
“No!” Crouch cried out.
Healey’s first instinct was to let go of Caitlyn, allowing her to fall back beneath the water. His second was to face the bouncing bomb alone, trying to gauge its terminus. Alicia could only watch, heart pounding, wondering why the hell he hadn’t just jumped—
Healey leaped for the canal.
No time!
The grenade exploded in mid-air, fragments flying, its blast reaching Healey’s airborne body, flinging it like a rag doll. The jetty itself shattered, timbers and spars bursting in all directions. Alicia dipped under the water for a moment, cursing herself for not having imagined that Riley would have the cunning to cover all exits. When timbers started landing on top of the water she waited a few seconds and then broke the surface again. Ahead, the jetty was collapsing, groaning to a watery extinction.
Healey!
She spotted the unmoving body a moment before it started to sink. With a kick and a sharp dive she shot down and forward, speeding toward Healey. Caitlyn, she could see, was already underneath the young soldier, trying to support his dead weight. From out of nowhere came another explosion, but this one deep, sonorous. The mercs were flinging grenades into the water. Alicia reached Healey, took hold of his jacket and hauled him above the surface.
Caitlyn grabbed his other side, her face a mask of anguish.
Crouch swam up. “Behind you!”
Alicia wasted no time trying to determine Healey’s condition. Crouch pointed to a jetty on the opposite side of the canal. “If we’re quick.”
It was vulnerable, but their only means of getting Healey out of there quickly. Alicia immediately had an idea, handed Healey off to Crouch and grabbed hold of one of the jetty’s timbers. Climbing fast, she glanced over to the ruined jetty.
Shit.
A merc was watching her, grenade in hand.
Crouch bobbed in the water below. “What the hell?”
“Climb!” Alicia shouted. “Just climb!”