She eyed Drake and Dahl. “You know it was the right thing to do. Could have ended this shit right there.”
Drake glanced over at the weeping huddle of a man. “I guess he got lucky you went soft on him.”
“Never gonna happen, Drakey. Not whilst there’s filth and cowards out on our streets, hurting civilians because they think they have some kind of right to.”
“You and me both,” Dahl agreed, his recent vacation highlights no doubt surfacing.
Hayden rounded them all up. “Another sighting, now along the Champs,” she said. “This one accompanied by gunfire.”
“Sounds more credible,” Mai said. “And we really need to leave this place behind. Fast.”
Drake saw the recovering figure waving to the assembled authorities.
“How far is the Champs?”
“A fast run,” Beau said. “I know this place. Just follow.”
“Gladly.” Kenzie fixed her gaze on the seat of his tight-fitting trousers and jogged into line. Drake settled alongside Smyth, noting that the soldier seemed even more irritable than normal these days.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “We’ll get him this time. No more Pythians. No more stalking.”
Smyth’s return was revealing, at first incomprehension and then a blank nod. “Sure, man. Sure.”
Beau led them directly to the famous street and its brightly lit byways. As if in greeting, gunshots rang out ahead and the entire force burst in that direction, flowing along the road beside crawling cars, dodging excited tourists and mingling locals, using benches and verges, car roofs and the sides of statues, anything to thread through the throng and get ahead. A motorcyclist veered and then stalled in front of Alicia and Mai, but the pair picked him up by the front and back wheels and tossed him aside. Another insistent weaver found his bicycle lifted and deposited in a nearby tree by a growling Torsten Dahl and decided to remain there for a while, amidst the branches.
More shots ahead, and the force poured the speed on to the very limit. Mai inched ahead, surprisingly followed by Kenzie and then the Swede. Drake slipped back, panting slightly.
“Quit with the bacon sandwiches,” Dahl exhaled at him out of the corner of his mouth.
“Meatballs and muesli,” Drake wheezed back. “Is that what you think I need?”
“Anything would help.”
“Maybe… maybe I’ll try a holiday. Oh no, wait…”
Dahl ignored the jibe as Beau slid past them all, giving the impression he was bouncing from place to place, the soles of his feet barely touching earth, the panther-like gait eating up the distance.
“A bloody real-life Tigger,” Drake moaned, not for the first time wondering where the Frenchman found so much speed, poise and energy.
“And a Yorkshire Winnie the Pooh,” Dahl chuckled back at him.
“Fuck off, Dopey.”
They saw the running figure ahead at the same time.
“Bloody hell!” Drake shouted. “He’s right there.”
Beau was already arrowing in on Webb, determined to close the man down. From a side street came a flood of men, clad in black and making a very poor attempt at concealing nasty looking weapons.
The French police went ballistic, screaming at the new arrivals to desist or die. Interpol agents swerved to and fro, caught in two minds, but seemingly unworried about the threat to themselves. Drake and the SPEAR team had only their major goal in mind.
Hayden leapt over a fallen civilian, whilst Kinimaka bent down to help the man up. Mai matched Beau for speed. Alicia’s lips were in constant motion, but Drake couldn’t hear the words. Probably for the best. Smyth ran beside Lauren and Yorgi, though Drake could tell he was holding back. Nobody looked comfortable. Kenzie fairly galloped along ahead of Dahl, grinning wildly as if this place, on this night, was exactly where she wanted to be.
A car zoomed ahead of Beau, cutting him off. Tyler Webb ran on, limping, a wild look back confirming his identity. Drake closed the gap. They were almost abreast of the chasing mercs, and had to decide how to handle them. Hayden was expected to shout out the orders and didn’t disappoint.
“Drake, Dahl, Alicia, Smyth — take ’em out. The rest on Webb!”
Drake immediately pivoted, aimed and sighted a handgun. Mercs scattered, seeing the attention switch. One remained standing, tracking Webb. Smyth fired first, spinning the man around with two bursts and spraying the nearby trees red. Drake rolled past a slow-moving car, its wheels crunching a few meters from his head. Then quickly up, two-short bursts, and another move. Mercs dived for better cover.
“Who the hell are we fighting?” Dahl asked.
“Not a friggin’ clue, mate.”
Hayden lowered her head and increased her speed, pushing harder than she’d known she could. More than anyone in the team, she had reason to take Webb down. She had reason to take him down as hard as she possibly could.
Good job Kinimaka isn’t around.
Knowing the big Hawaiian was back helping the civilian when the man who’d sneaked around, filmed and tried to terrorize them in their own homes was a hundred meters away, took a storm-cloud to Hayden’s already thundery outlook and made a volatile tempest out of it. She was close to becoming her own woman again: solitary, self-contained, intense. Already, she’d tried that new mantle on in her head and liked how it felt. The writing, as they said, was well and truly on the wall.
Webb scuttled gamely up ahead, listing from side to side and clearly drawing each consecutive breath as a scream through tortured lungs. The man was unfit, but he wasn’t giving up. Hayden saw Beau lock on to a running merc like a heat-seeking missile and veer away to head him off.
That left just her and Mai at the front of the remaining pack, with Kenzie gesturing in confusion.
“Are we taking this man down? Or not?”
Hayden surged ahead.
“For good.”
CHAPTER TEN
Ever since the stalking began, Hayden had known she would come face to face and on equal terms with her shadow. Seeing him now, exhausted, panting and bloody, his face slack, made her wonder how on earth he’d ever gotten so far under her skin. But that didn’t matter now.
What mattered was what happened next.
Webb stared, a mini-shockwave trembling though his features. “Hayden Jaye.”
“You have two choices. Come with me now or go straight to Hell.” She shrugged, holding her weapon angled at his feet. “Either way, I’m good with it.”
“I’m unarmed,” he said. “And I must say… it’s good to see you again.”
“Straight down then.”
She lined his skull up between her sights.
Kinimaka let out a yell from behind, far away. His words didn’t matter. Webb looked aghast, an expression that warmed her heart. Even Kenzie gaped though, and that single expression was what gave Hayden cause to hold back.
“Witnesses,” the Israeli was saying. “What are you thinking?”
I don’t care, was on Hayden’s lips. Her hand trembled, her finger quivering. One shot, one blast and it would all be over. No more chances for this destroyer of lives, no long reprieve. Just freedom, for everyone he had ever touched.
Webb flinched as her finger spasmed. The bullet flashed past his skull amidst a terrible, impenetrable silence.
“Well look at that,” he quaked. “I dodged it.”
Hayden jumped in, but a heavy hand on her shoulder jerked her backwards. She knew that hand, and then the voice that accompanied it: