‘Good girl,’ Lars said.
Keeping her pistol trained on King, she tossed the M4 carbine across the tarmac. Lars caught it and slipped a finger into the trigger guard. Kitchener turned and yanked Kate out of the Hawkei. She fell to the tarmac beside King, staring in disbelief at the police officer. Kitchener wiped her brow and readjusted her grip on the pistol.
‘Bet you didn’t see that one coming,’ Lars said, striding forward in nonchalant fashion.
‘Can’t say I did,’ King said.
‘I’m sorry, King,’ Kitchener said.
‘Sorry?’ Lars said, and let out another harsh cackle. ‘If you were sorry you wouldn’t have shot him. If you were sorry you wouldn’t have taken my offer all those weeks ago.’
‘Offer?’ King said.
‘What did you expect?’ Lars said, pointing at Kitchener. ‘You think a broke small-town cop living from paycheque to paycheque would say no to seven figures? Do you really believe it’s that hard to get people to work for you? Jason, Jason, Jason. You act like everyone who gets swayed by money is a monster. It’s called being human.’
‘That true?’ King said, looking up at Kitchener.
She shrugged. ‘Somewhat.’
‘When did he contact you?’
‘As soon as he landed in the country, last month. I’ve been trapped in this town my whole life. Don’t have the funds to move. Now I’m free.’
‘What about all the people that are going to die?’
‘No-one will know I was involved.’
‘You’re pathetic.’
Her grip on the pistol hardened, and her tone darkened. ‘Am I? Who’s around to say so? Just you and your girlfriend? You won’t be much longer.’
King turned to look at Lars. ‘So she’s been with you this entire time?’
He nodded.
‘Then you’ve been letting me live.’
He nodded again. Another wry, disgusting smile spread across his lips. ‘You’re catching on.’
‘She saved us at the concrete plant.’
‘I had a change of heart at the top of the road. Sent her down to help you. I wanted you to tag along for a little longer. Wanted you to actually see me leave with the spores.’
‘You killed your own men?’
He laughed. ‘Jason, I handled you for ten years. I know exactly what you’re capable of. You think I sent all my men to kill you at the dropzone with any intention that they would return?’
‘I don’t follow.’
‘I needed to dispose of them anyway. Turns out I had a one-man killing machine conveniently running around behind me. I just fed them to you.’
King saw the plan. ‘No witnesses.’
‘Exactly.’
With that, Lars turned and swung the barrel of the M4 so that it pointed directly between the eyes of the last remaining mercenary. He was a black man, short and stocky, with wide eyes and a quivering mouth, both recent developments after listening to Lars reveal his true intentions.
‘You can’t be fucking serious,’ he said.
‘Sorry, champ.’
Kate let out a cry and averted her eyes from the killing. It only took a cluster of bullets to the temple for the man to tumble back against the side of the monoplane, smacking into its chassis with a dull thud and slumping to the ground a moment later.
Lars turned back to King. ‘Where were we?’
‘You were explaining your entire plan to me instead of putting a bullet in my head.’
‘Ah, so I was. It’s hard to resist, you know. The movies make it seem like a ridiculous concept. Why aren’t I killing you? The truth is, this is the most enjoyment I’ve felt in… years. Look at your face!’
‘Did you kill Brandt?’ King said to Kitchener. ‘You killed your co-workers?’
‘No,’ Kitchener said quietly.
‘That was me, I’ll admit,’ Lars said, raising a hand in jest as if he were a kid in a classroom. ‘Officer William Brandt — nice enough fellow — happened to see us carting the spores around the construction site. Kitchener here didn’t have the stomach to kill, at least back then. She kindly informed me of his place of residence and I got the job done.’
‘Hence the imposter at the police station,’ King said. ‘You let him in?’
Kitchener said, ‘He was one of the mercenaries. I gave him Brandt’s uniform when we heard you were in the area. Before we came to arrest you. I didn’t want to kill you myself.’
‘Oh, so you’re a coward as well as a bitch.’
She stepped a little closer to him, barrel locked on target. ‘Want to see how I’ve changed?’
‘I saw first-hand at the warehouse. That was a quick turnaround.’
‘Money does that.’
King didn’t respond. He looked past her, to the tree line on the other side of the runway. The pine branches stirred softly in the breeze. In amongst the darkness of the forest, he thought he saw a slight glint. Like the sun reflecting off metal.
He turned to Lars. ‘Want to know the problem with using local help?’
‘What’s that?’
‘They’re complete amateurs.’
‘Excuse me?’ Kitchener said, rattling the pistol in his face.
‘You heard me,’ he said. ‘You see, all this juicy gossip would have been big news if I didn’t realise you were working for Lars yesterday.’
‘What?’
‘Remember when you and Dawes arrested us at the construction office?’ King said. ‘You took us back to the station and decided to tell me that you’d had a look into my file. You noted that I used to work for Black Force.’
‘Yeah…’
‘Well, the only way you could have known that was if someone close to me told you. Such as Lars. There are roughly five people on the planet who know what I used to do. And you are definitely not one of them. That division of the U.S. Government doesn’t exist. It’s a little hard to read a file on it when every single aspect of the program was deliberately kept off the books.’
‘You played along, though?’ Kitchener said. Now the doubt had begun to creep into her tone.
‘I wasn’t sure exactly what was going on. It took me by surprise. So I just watched you very closely. And waited.’
‘Well it seems you waited a tad too long.’
‘Quite the contrary. I made my move last night.’
She paused. ‘When you left the factory?’
‘I never scouted the town last night. What good would that have done? It’s Jameson. Completely useless to wandering the empty streets.’
Silence.
‘In fact,’ he said, ‘I made a few calls. To a few old friends. Turns out one of them was in the country. He had to drive all night to make it here.’
She shot a glance in either direction, keeping her gun trained on him. ‘I don’t see anyone.’
‘That’s the point.’
The runway seemed to freeze for a single moment in time. Lars had watched the conversation unfold with growing restlessness, eyes darting left and right, searching for invisible threats. King knew he had unnerved them. Kitchener remained unsure of herself, awkwardly shifting her weight from foot to foot. The type of action that came from sudden discomfort and unease. She’d felt so in control, and now it had all been torn away. Did King really have backup? Was he lying?
The answer came a second later.
CHAPTER 41
A .338 Lapau Magnum bullet sliced through the top of her head, creating a deluge of blood and brain matter. King knew the exact make of the bullet because he knew the round came from a Barrett MRAD sniper rifle, which was the only weapon of choice of the man behind the scope. When the man had one in his hands against a stationary target, missing was something of an anomaly.
The sound of the discharge rang out across the runway shortly after, at the same time that Kitchener’s corpse smacked against the tarmac. It caused Lars to flinch involuntarily. He raised his M4 and scanned the tree line, desperately searching for a target. Anything that could possibly resemble an enemy. He found nothing. Just as King knew he would.