“We can’t wait,” Molokai said in a soft growl.
“Oh my God.” Kinimaka gripped a portion of the bulkhead so tightly it buckled.
Hayden saw a passenger shot and pushed out of a window, then another shoved alive through a door. Others were being herded to the roof. This was not a hostage situation. It was a terrifying killing field.
“Dagger or not, we have to act,” she said. “Get us down there now and don’t fuck about. We need to get on that train.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
The Chain of Aphrodite was causing them trouble.
Drake spun his head as Alicia dropped face-first at his side. “You okay?”
“No, I’m fucking dead.”
“Is that all? Stop whining then, and get on with it.”
Alicia raised her head, blood smeared within the lines that crisscrossed her forehead. “What the hell happened?”
“I think we took a hit.”
“Ya do? Wow, Drakey, you got some major extra-sensory perception going on there.”
“Extra-bollocks what?”
“Lookout!”
Drake ducked as rubble exploded all around them. “Where are we?”
“Greece.”
“Funny.”
“Glyfada. It’s a beach resort.”
“Yeah, I know that, love, but where the hell are we?”
Alicia sighed. “Shit, man, I have no bloody idea.”
“Tempest hit us.”
“There was that report…”
“Yeah, yeah, Tempest are in the area, I know. But Hayden said they were training terrorists, not using mercs.”
“Maybe they’re doing both.”
“Maybe.”
At that moment Kenzie and Mai crawled up. “Street’s too narrow,” the Japanese woman said. “We can’t move without being targeted.”
“Well, if we stay right here we’re sitting ducks,” Alicia said.
“Where’s Luther?” Drake asked.
“Behind the overturned Bentley. See?”
“Oh, yeah, I see him. Is he okay?”
“I hope so,” Mai said quickly, then changed her tone. “Can’t see any blood.”
“Ooh, good save.” Kenzie laughed. “Not.”
“Where are they?” Drake asked.
“This would be easier if the comms hadn’t gotten knocked out,” Mai said. “I spotted one with a semi-auto there.” She pointed. “Third story of that building, and another with a handgun there, first floor. He’s pinning Luther down.”
“High buildings to both sides, narrow road in the middle,” Drake said. “Doesn’t bode well. Are there others?”
“Reckon so,” Alicia said. “I heard four different guns firing.”
“Me too,” Kenzie said with a nod of respect. “Good call.”
Another burst of gunfire shattered the silence that had fallen over the street, a precursor to a hail of rubble that spattered their shoulders and backs and the screams of fleeing pedestrians. Windows fractured. Car alarms started their incessant whine.
“We still have our weapons,” Mai pointed out.
“They got us pinned down pretty good,” Drake said. “Where does that bloody archaeologist live?”
“One block over,” Mai reminded him.
“Are we sure it’s him?” Kenzie asked. “I’d hate to wade through this battle and then find we got the wrong man.”
“Whitehall struggled with this one,” Drake admitted. “They couldn’t discern where the archaeologist in question made the hand-off. No money trail either. Turns out, he kept it. Right here in Greece. Adrian Doukas keeps the Chain of Aphrodite in his home.”
“Crazy, right?” Kenzie muttered.
“Takes one to know one,” Alicia said, shifting position.
“I guess all relic hunters have a little crazy in them.”
“All relic hunters?” Drake asked. “You know others?”
“I know all the best ones. It was my business.”
Bullets rattled the Bentley sheltering Luther, but the big man shifted to his right a little, now hunkering down beneath the engine block, barely moving. His eyes moved across to them.
Drake waved. “Good job with the car, mate. I’ve never seen anyone overturn a Bentley before.”
“Ideas?” The bellow scared at least one remaining civilian into fleeing their hiding place.
“Retreat,” Mai said. “We don’t have to fight every battle. That’s life. Let’s go.”
“Every second we wait, our archaeologist friend may decide it’s time to run,” Kenzie said.
“No way he knows we’re coming for him,” Drake said. “But I guess Tempest could beat us to it. Mai’s right. The job comes first. Is everybody ready?”
Whilst they complied he signaled their intentions to Luther. Alicia watched with some amusement.
“If that were me behind that car, I’d be thinking you were asking me which pizza I wanted to order.”
“Then we’re lucky it’s a real soldier,” Mai said. “He’s ready.”
“Wanna blow him a cute kiss first, Sprite?” Alicia teased.
The answer was silence.
Drake stretched the muscles that had been stuck in the same position for so long. “Okay, good to go.”
And then, actions spoke louder than words.
Drake broke cover first, firing up at the third-floor shooter. Mai rolled along the ground. Aiming her gun at the first floor, she fired to keep her gunman occupied. Kenzie sprinted back down the street, taking cover behind another vehicle. Luther dashed from behind the cover of the Bentley past them all to join her. In seconds he had another car, a small Seat Ibiza, on its side.
“He’s very quick to flip his vehicles onto their sides,” Alicia commented. “Wonder if he’s like that with his women.”
Mai rolled back into cover and Drake ducked. Together they endured another round of aggressive gunfire, reloading as they waited. One look passed between them and then Alicia rolled out, Drake rose, firing, and Mai ran to Luther. Kenzie was already sprinting away toward the next cover, a deep alcove that formed the doorway of a shop.
In the next moment, the three runners stepped out and laid down covering fire so that Drake and Alicia could join them. By now, they had pinpointed all four shooters and were peppering their hiding places with heavy fire. Kenzie left the alcove and found another vehicle, and then the end of the street, the others following her in turn. Their guns were never inactive, bullets constantly flying at their enemies.
When Kenzie reached the corner, she laid down hails of gunfire and soon they were all around it, safe for now, pocketing weapons and sprinting headlong for the next, parallel, street. The archaeologist at the very least was in danger. It took just a minute to reach his street and much less time to spot his address. Steps led up to his front door. Drake hit them at a run and kicked at the white paneling, splintering it. Luther arrived a moment later and smashed it off its hinges.
“Nice,” Drake said. “Good job I weakened it for you or you’d have taken a leg off.”
“Yeah, thanks man.”
Luther pounded on, going for the narrow staircase, heading for Doukas’ first floor flat. They knew the man lived alone. They knew he was a freelance archaeologist. They knew he was currently working part-time for a small, local museum and that he was sixty two years of age.
Less than two hours ago a local contact had seen him entering his apartment with a coffee-and-bagel breakfast take-out.
Drake reached the first-floor corridor, saw another staircase at the far end, and thought: crap, there could be two exits. No time for that now. He backed up Luther as he smashed through Doukas’ door without offering any kind of warning. The door resisted a little so the big soldier just tore it from its hinges and threw it several feet up the corridor.
“That works.” Alicia watched the door bounce gradually to a stop.