The man's reaction was immediate. Even as he stumbled backward and into the railing, he chopped down with his free elbow. It ended in a deep thud against Sean's shoulder blade. Even with the sharp pain suddenly searing through his back, Sean kept pumping his legs, driving the man backward on one foot. The hit man realized what was happening and let go of Sean's wrist in a panicked attempt to brace himself against the railing.
His hand touched the white metal tubing, but the palm slipped over it as Sean pushed the guy back and forklifted him up. There was a brief yelp as the man's big body toppled over the edge and down the narrow shaft between the stairs. He fell headfirst to the hard concrete below, the short fall ending in a sickening smack.
Sean gasped for a second, each breath sending new pain through his back and stomach. He twisted his jaw for a moment, trying to loosen the muscles that had been struck so hard. He leaned on the rail and stared down at the body lying below, the neck twisted at a grotesque angle.
Sean composed himself and took off down the stairs, bounding over them three at a time, nearly twisting his ankle on one as he clipped an edge upon reaching the second floor landing.
He pushed on and jumped the last four steps to the bottom floor, almost falling to the concrete with his hurried landing. He corrected his balance and darted past the body, reaching the door to the back of the hotel wing. As he sprinted through the back parking lot along the rear wall, he was careful to keep his weapon hidden from public view. The last thing he needed was a bunch of screaming tourists panicking and running for cover.
A woman in a white dress exited her BMW 5 Series, holding an expensive-looking handbag. She saw Sean jogging by but paid him little mind. When he rounded the corner, he sped up again for a few seconds before having to slow down once more due to a cluster of pedestrians strolling leisurely down the strip.
He pressed the gun close to his body, tucking it under his shirt as he walked as fast as he could toward the hotel's other wing. If Dufort were going to try to get away, he would have to use this road. Odds are he would go north.
If Sean could get to the other hotel entrance in time, he could cut Dufort off at the resort’s only entrance/exit.
It was a good plan. And it probably would have worked had the dead guy in the stairwell not slowed him down. Unfortunately, he was too late. He watched as a black Mercedes sedan whipped out of the garage’s other entrance and onto the road. The windows were tinted, but he knew from the way the car was speeding off who was inside.
Sean had purposely left his car close to the road in case he might need to get away. Now, his foresight paid off. He turned around, dashed back toward the rear of the hotel's north wing, and rounded the corner. He reached into his pocket, thankful he'd not set his keys on the desk in the hotel room when he returned earlier.
Thirty feet from the white Jaguar F-Type, he tapped the unlock button on the keyless entry. The car exploded in a ball of searing orange flame and black smoke. The concussion knocked Sean off his feet and sent him plowing into the asphalt, shoulder first.
He winced at the pain pulsing from his shoulder. It mingled with the ache from the injuries he'd incurred during the fight. The heat from the burning wreckage melted over his skin, making the heat of the late spring sun seem like a cool autumn day.
Sean pushed himself up from the ground and dusted off some dirt and debris from his shirt and pants. His messy blond hair had a few pieces of broken glass in it, and he had to run his fingers over his scalp a few times to get them all to shake free. A siren blared in the distance, signaling that someone had just alerted the authorities to the parking lot blaze.
The last thing he needed was to get nabbed in Morocco. While he was technically doing something for Axis, it wasn't exactly on the books. Getting him out might present a certain level of difficulty, even for Emily.
He remembered his weapons and the dead bodies on the third floor. Someone must have seen the carnage by now. He checked his watch. It was only 2:00 local time, one of those periods in a day when very few people check in or out of a hotel. If a staff member hadn't seen the bodies yet, there was still the possibility that he could get out.
Sean raced back into the building through the rear entrance. He grabbed the body at the base of the stairs and dragged the man over to a dark corner underneath the lowest staircase. Several empty boxes were stacked against the wall beside a Coke machine and he quickly grabbed them and piled them around the dead man, effectively hiding him from a casual observer. Someone would find him eventually, but that wasn't Sean's problem. The present was what he worried about.
There was still some blood on the concrete, which he covered by disassembling one of the boxes and flattening it over the mess.
He ran up the steps, pushing himself to ignore the pulses of pain coming from his shoulder, abs, and back. When he reached the third floor, he warily pushed open the door and peered through the slit. The coast was clear, at least for the moment. The body still lay in the hallway against the wall near his room.
Sean eased the door open a little more, making sure no one was hiding in the opposing corners, then he made a break for it. He ran fast down the corridor, reaching his doorway in a matter of seconds. He hurried around the foot of the bed, picked up the rifle, and dropped it on the mattress. A tan canvas rucksack sat next to the two cases, and he bent down and picked it up as well then set it next to the big gun.
His hands worked like a blur, dismantling the weapon into several pieces before stowing them all in the rucksack, along with his handgun.
The sirens drew ever closer. From the sound of it, they were probably less than a half mile away.
Sean rushed back into the hallway, gripped the body by the ankles, and dragged him into the room, laying the arms over the top of the man's partner. He slung the rucksack over one shoulder and his backpack over both, then reached into his pocket for a lighter he kept handy for just such occasions. He hopped back onto the bed and ignited the lighter, holding it close to the sensor on the sprinkler system unit overhead.
Almost instantly, water spewed from the little round piece in an umbrella shape, and new alarms started bleating in the hallway. Sean jumped down from the bed and peeked into the hallway. The sprinkler system on the entire floor had activated, soaking everything. The bloodstains on the wall across from Sean's door began to run, a convenient byproduct of his ploy to get out unnoticed.
Hotel patrons started appearing in the corridor, wondering what was going on. Some appeared to be getting ready for the beach; others looked as if they'd just been asleep. In total, there were only nine other people on the floor at the moment. Not exactly a ton of cover for Sean's escape, but it would do.
He carried his sunglasses in his hand, not wanting to draw more attention to himself by being the guy who wears sunglasses indoors. He took the stairwell, following the other visitors down the same stairs he'd just been on twice before. In the stairwell, people from the floors above and below mixed on the concrete steps. They made an orderly, if not confused, procession downwards. Most of the patrons probably thought it was a drill, though they would have to have been nearly dead not to have noticed the explosion in the parking lot that surely rocked the building. Once they reached the bottom, Sean waited to see if anyone would notice the cardboard on the floor or the boxes stacked under the stairs. Sean was concerned someone might inadvertently kick the flattened cardboard, thus revealing the bloodstain underneath, but it never happened. No one seemed to pay any attention to it. They were too intent on obeying the rules and evacuating the building. Some hurried more than others on the off chance it wasn’t just a drill.