“I need Cassidy with me,” he said, and then explained his plan.
“I’ll do it,” Jemma said, nodding. “For family, right?”
For our family.
Bodie and Cassidy exited, taking a circular staircase down. The clock was ticking. Thirty seconds — that was game time, which he hoped wouldn’t be too long and too late for Yasmine and Hakim.
“A week ago, I was going to kill you.” Viktor leaned forward, leering at his captives and spitting. “Slowly. Painfully. And then grind your flesh and bones into my garden. But this…” He gestured all around. “This came up, and I thank you. I am pleased to have waited, for now… now I can kill you knowing that you led us to Atlantis.”
This time he aimed his gun, sighting down the barrel, and started to pull the trigger.
“Who?” Hakim shouted. “Please, Viktor, who betrayed us?”
Maybe he was playing for time, maybe he was just desperate, but Bodie thanked the bald man for the question. The countdown was almost up.
“Who betrayed you? Nobody here on their knees. They are all too dumb to see, and that’s why they will die here too. Who betrayed you? It was the Frenchman. Lucien, of course.”
“Our boss?” Hakim sounded incredulous. “I don’t believe you.”
Viktor shrugged. “It does not matter, but why would I lie? Lucien has been whoring in every pocket for a decade. He’s my boss, your boss, and a double agent whenever it suits. His power… his global reach, gives him immunity.”
Yasmine had stayed quiet until now. Bodie saw the pain on her face, the hurt in her eyes. “Eli!” she shouted. “Eli! I never stopped—”
Then Jemma did her job in the control room, changing what everyone thought was about to happen.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
The control room exploded. Gouts of fire surged through broken windows as glass shattered onto the deck in a lethal, glittering rain. A moment later, a hail of gunfire rang out, bullets hammering into the deck’s machinery and railings. This was followed by a second explosion on the other side of the ship, behind the control room, that again sent up an eruption of flame and smashed mechanical parts.
Bodie had hoped the new Bratva arrivals would react instinctively rather than with forethought, which is exactly what happened. Viktor spun and screamed an order. Men peeled away, heading to the sources of the fresh trouble. Bodie waited for a clear deck in front and then made his move.
He ran straight for the captives with Cassidy at his side. At first, their appearance was lost in the general upheaval. Bodie caught Heidi’s eye. The CIA agent reacted instantly, berating the guards and drawing their attention. Bodie ran into one, elbow first, sending him tumbling, and grabbed his weapon. Cassidy felled another, and then Heidi was up and grappling with a third. Bodie turned the gun on more guards and then went down to one knee as the captured Bratva fighters surged to life. Cross, he saw, had started moving toward Yasmine, probably intent on her safety over all else.
Viktor stared in pure anger, seemingly unable to believe his speech and executions had been interrupted. Bodie saw his lips move but couldn’t read the words. The half-dozen men guarding him raised their weapons as the freed Moroccans attacked.
Bodie fired, felling one of the guards. Viktor ignored it all, turning his back with disdain and concentrating once again on Yasmine. Viktor’s five remaining guards took on the Moroccans, bullets flying and then bodies crunching as the dead littered the deck.
Cassidy rolled with her opponent, smashing him on the side of the head until he went limp. She saw Cross relentlessly beat down one of Davydov’s men, then immediately look toward Yasmine.
“I won’t let you die!”
A blow landed on the older man’s right side, one he hadn’t seen coming. Cross was going to die unless he focused on things besides Yasmine. Cassidy saved him, then gave him a punch of her own.
“Get with it, granddad!”
She rose, evaluating her surroundings. She’d counted eight men rushing off to deal with the distractions Jemma had set, and figured they had maybe a minute before at least some of those would return. The surviving rebel Bratva were fighting a losing battle against Viktor’s guards, but now the ship’s crew were running to aid them.
Bodie grabbed the captain. “Arm your men.” He threw the man a weapon. “Watch our backs when the others return. We’re going after Viktor!”
The remaining crew hesitantly grabbed weapons, but the captain fought to rally them, pointing out that fighting and winning was the only way they’d ever see their families again. Some scrambled for cover. Others knelt, aimed, and waited. Bodie felt sure Jemma would be okay since they’d told her to find somewhere safe to hide.
Viktor raged at Yasmine and Hakim. His cracked, frenzied voice brought Cross’s head up quickly, snatching his attention.
“Eat my food, drink my wine, try my drugs!” The gun came up, leveled at Hakim. “This is my answer to you!”
“No!” Cross yelled, his face twisted with pain.
Viktor squeezed the trigger, and the bullet tore through Hakim’s chest. Yasmine screamed in distress. Cross, still too far away, scrambled across two dead bodies to stop what was happening. Bodie saw Hakim spinning away from Viktor, blood gushing from his wound. Viktor fired once more, the second bullet ending the bald man’s life. He raised his gun.
“And one more traitor must die.”
Too slow. They were all too slow.
Viktor realigned the pistol, leveled it at Yasmine’s throat, and pulled the trigger.
Cross threw himself at Viktor. Bodie fired but Viktor was no longer there. It took him a moment to realize that the Bratva boss had been distracted by Cross’s attack, sent staggering sideways but managing to shrug the thief away. Yasmine still lived, swinging slightly, screaming, spattered with Hakim’s blood, and losing some of her own where Viktor’s askew bullet had torn a ragged wound in her left arm.
Viktor bludgeoned Cross with the empty weapon, striking him around the temple and ear. Cross slumped and Viktor wriggled away, leaving the thief to crawl desperately after him. Viktor ran right up to Yasmine, drawing a wicked blade as he came close.
Cassidy went down to one knee, sighted Yasmine herself, and then elevated the barrel one meter higher. Two shots severed the chains and sent her figure crashing to the ground. In his haste, Viktor stumbled over her torso, sprawling headfirst.
Bodie nodded his satisfaction as he dashed in, but Viktor was faster than he could have imagined. Still holding the knife, he slashed at Yasmine’s unprotected throat.
She couldn’t move, muscles spent from hanging upright for so long. Bodie heard an outburst of gunfire behind as he moved in. The first wave of guards had returned.
It was Cross who saved Yasmine, coming just close enough to drag Viktor away by the leg and deflect the Bratva boss’s swing. Even so, the knife nicked Yasmine, causing her eyes to open wide and a burst of adrenaline to fire her veins. She folded in on herself, bleeding from two wounds. Viktor leapt in again, landing on her and furiously gripping her arms as he tried to avenge her betrayal.
In a chaotic second, he raised the knife. It flashed down at her throat, but Cross was there, intervening in the only way possible, striking Viktor from the side and grabbing the descending wrist to wrench it upward. Viktor rolled off Yasmine and pulled Cross over her, their two bodies together again at last, their eyes meeting briefly and poignantly.
Then Viktor thrust the knife back toward Yasmine, turning at the last instant and plunging the blade up to the hilt into the side of Cross’s neck.
Yasmine screamed, a torn, desperate sound that resounded through the chaos of the battle.