Exodus Code (31 page)

‘Cash, do you read? Cash!’

Nothing. Static.

Jack tasted sage, heavy and distinct. And ginger, stronger than before. And then the voices in his head started, a serenade of low-pitched humming.

Too soon. Too soon to lose my mind, he thought. I need my notebook if this is going to work.

Jack’s stomach knotted at the state of the bus, on its roof, steam hissing from its engine, no movement from anyone inside, but he had no time to react let alone get to the wreckage to help Gwen and the
Ice Maiden
crew.

Seconds after Isela’s shot, Castenado’s men swarmed from the barracks, leaving the inside of the hacienda protected only at its distant corners.

This might be Jack’s only chance to search for his notebook. He knew that if either the CIA or Castenado’s gunmen won this fight, he’d not be free to roam the mountain and time was ticking away.

Five hours and fifty-eight minutes.

Jack darted into the canopy of the jungle shading the perimeter of the tropical gardens and the terraced courtyards. When the last of Castenado’s armed guards charged past heading out into the piazza, Jack slipped his belt from his pants and jogged in line behind the last man. When he was sure he was at the end of the line, Jack snapped his belt against the guard’s head, the buckle drawing blood. The guard whipped around. Jack smashed his fist into the guard’s throat. He crumpled. Dragging him behind a copse of bougainvil ea, in seconds Jack had stripped the guard of his automatic weapon, and the night goggles hooked to his belt.

Before abandoning the body, Jack took the guard’s shades too.

Jack silently slipped inside the main house, finding himself in a glittering foyer, its ceilings flecked with gold leaf, its wal s covered in Diego Rivera-like murals depicting scenes from the family’s dark and chequered history.

Jack figured he had about three minutes to get to Castenado himself before the piazza outside became a bloodbath. Jack wasn’t entirely sure what was going on, but a simple kidnapping had become something much more. He thought he had an idea what, but he couldn’t take the time to stop and check for sure.

A curving marble staircase dominated the foyer. Jack knew from his earlier reconnaissance that Castenado’s private offices sat at the back of the house, looking out at the peak of the mountain.

‘Hey, who the hel are you?’ A large heavily armed American stepped out on to the corridor, blocking Jack’s advance.

Jack had about ten seconds to make his decision. Footsteps pounded down the hal way behind the guard. In seconds, he’d be surrounded.

‘I need to talk to Castenado, and I need to do it now.’

Jack was surrounded.

‘No one gets past me unless I say so, and I want to know who the hel you are.’

Jack raised his hands into the air. ‘Tel your boss that I need to speak to him about Renso Castenado.’

The guard squinted at Jack. ‘Are you some kind of nutcase?’ He took two steps closer to Jack, his gun pointing at Jack’s chest.

‘No doubt about it, but you real y don’t have time to debate the point with me,’ said Jack staring down at the gun.

Without warning an explosion from outside shook the building. Jack pivoted, taking out the guard directly behind him, catching his gun in mid air, then rol ing across the floor, the second guard’s bul ets shattering a statue of Inti the Sun God displayed in an alcove.

‘Hold your fire!’ a man cal ed to the guard about to take another shot at Jack, who was scrambling back to his feet, arms raised, prepared to return fire at the two guards who remained standing.

A tal , olive-skinned man in grey trousers, a loose white tunic, carrying a black case, came out of the room at the end of the hal flanked by two guards carrying heavy black bags.

An explosion of gunfire pelted the house.

‘We’re under attack, boss,’ said a guard, another North American, sprinting in from the courtyard. ‘It’s what we thought. Antonio’s taking most of the men with him. The rest are pinned under fire in the piazza. Americans. Maybe ATF

or CIA.’ The guard took the bag from Asiro’s hand. ‘We gotta go, boss.’

Jack heard a voice answer in Spanish in his earpiece that the trucks were loaded and in back.

Asiro stepped up to Jack’s face. ‘If it is you who has interfered with my business, Señor, you should know I’m not a forgiving man. I wil return and I wil hunt you down.’

Jack let his weapon drop to his side, and stepped closer to Asiro, a sad smile on his face. ‘My God, you are your grandfather’s double.’

‘You knew my grandfather?’

‘Yes. He saved my life a long time ago. And that’s why I’m not going to stop you, but your grandfather kept something of mine that I need. I don’t care what’s going on out in that courtyard. I don’t care about your kidnapping scheme, but I need my notebook.’

Asiro nodded to his guards, who dropped their guns, and began carrying luggage and supplies out through the rear of the house.

‘Who are you?’

‘I’m the man who fel from the sky.’

Asiro’s eyes widened. He stared into Jack’s face. ‘It can’t be you… You’d be at least as old as my grandfather.’

‘Let’s just say,’ said Jack, ‘I’ve aged better than he did. But if you want more details, I’d suggest you pul back your men from the piazza and cut your losses with the Brazilian. You’re a marked man, Asiro, and I’d like to see you live to be an old one.’

A wounded guard, obviously one of Asiro’s commanders, burst through the front doors of the ranch. ‘Boss, I don’t know what the hel ’s going on out there, but we’re taking fire from al sides out in the piazza.’

Asiro’s eyes dril ed into Jack’s. Jack held his stare, noting Asiro’s tense but cut jaw, a look of such concentration in his face that for a beat Jack could see only Renso in his grandson’s stare.

‘What do you want from my family?’

‘I need to find a smal leather notebook, one your grandfather probably kept safe, in a place where he kept his secrets.’

The gunfire in the piazza was getting louder and closer.

‘Asiro, you’re running out of time. Take your wife and your daughter and go.’

‘My daughter, Isela, has the diary,’ said Asiro, jogging down the stairs to the foyer with Jack fol owing. He paused as a guard handed him a bul et-proof vest. He pul ed it on and then turned to leave.

‘You may need this sooner than I wil ,’ said Asiro, handing his assault rifle to Jack.

‘What about your wife and daughter? You’re leaving them here?’

Asiro waved his guards on and stepped over to Jack. ‘If you knew my grandfather as wel as you say you did, then you know that he married the mountain and neither my daughter nor my mother can leave.’

SHOULDERING ASIRO’S ASSAULT rifle and harnessing his Webley, Jack sprinted from the ranch towards the hotel’s gates. From his earpiece, he heard Asiro order his only guard left inside the compound to open the gate and let Jack leave.

Jack sprinted quickly to the overturned minibus, sliding to safety behind it as a vol ey of fire rained after him.

‘Is everyone OK?’ asked Jack, crouching beside Gwen.

‘Minor injuries, thank God,’ said Cash. ‘Sam got it worst. A concussion, I’m sure.’

Hol is slapped Sam upside the head. ‘That’s what he gets for missing our flight and then almost missing the bus.’

‘The fleet was in town,’ said Sam, stretched out against an overhang of rock that the rear of the bus had lodged under when it flipped, an icepack on his head.

‘It’s Miami,’ said Eva. ‘Pretty sure there’s always a fleet in town.’

‘And you didn’t even eat Hol is’s sandwiches,’ said Sam. Hol is slapped him again. ‘Ow! I’m in serious pain here.’

‘And it could get worse,’ said Hol is.

‘How are you doing?’ Jack asked Gwen.

‘I’m OK. I probably shouldn’t operate any industrial machinery or drive a tractor, but I’m sure I’l cope.’

‘What’s going on out there?’ asked Vlad, making sure his laptop was functional. ‘I thought the hardest part was going to be getting you up the mountain.’

‘It stil may be,’ said Jack. ‘The noises in my head are stronger, I’m seeing ribbons of colours in my peripheral vision and I’ve got a rock in my gut.’

‘Wheeee!’ giggled Gwen, squeezing Jack’s arm.

‘I think I know what’s going on,’ said Cash, tapping his earpiece. ‘The soldiers who were undercover are a joint task force of CIA and ATF. The other fighters are split between guards loyal to Asiro and those who’ve switched al egiances to his stepson, Antonio, who, by the way, was sleeping with Donoso, the mark. After we crashed, Antonio shot Donoso’s long-suffering wife, who, you may be interested to know, was the one trying to have her husband kidnapped in the first place, and, who, I may add, was also sleeping with Antonio.’

‘Doof, doof, doof, doof, doof, doof, doof-doof-doof!’ Gwen sang the theme from
EastEnders
before col apsing in giggles.

Jack glanced at her in concern. ‘How do you know al of that?’ he asked Cash.

Nodding towards the chapel, Cash tapped his earpiece. ‘A lovely young woman told me so.’

Peering round the bus, Jack confirmed what he already knew: Dana had used her powers of persuasion and her covert connections to infiltrate the CIA’s unit, and she was one of the women he’d spotted undercover on the chapel steps.

Across the courtyard a handful of Asiro’s soldiers had taken cover behind overturned food carts. Jack caught a glimpse of Isela peering over the top of the belfry wal .

Beneath the tower, the peasant women had stripped off their colourful rags to expose their black unmarked tactical uniforms. Jack watched as one of the soldiers was setting up to climb the tower.

‘Shit,’ said Jack. ‘Cash and Hol is, cover me. Eva, Vlad and Gwen get Sam into the house in the compound and wait for me there.’

‘Where are you going?’ asked Vlad, already helping Sam to his feet.

‘I’m going to rescue a princess from her tower.’

*

Jack dodged bul ets across the piazza, diving behind an upturned table outside the café, whose doors were wide open and its windows blown out. Taking fire from Antonio’s men, Jack darted to the cover of one of the arches.

On the other side of the courtyard, four CIA ‘vendors’ had tipped over their souvenir and trinket carts and were using them as barricades. These soldiers were shooting at Jack along with the other guards from the hacienda.

It’s the red T-shirt, thought Jack.

Throwing himself to the ground, Jack rol ed behind an upturned food cart, its vendor crouched behind the steaming metal bucket.

‘Who the hel are you?’ the guard snarled, raising his gun at Jack, who whacked him with a steaming container of pinto beans. The man screamed, dropped his weapon, and swiped wildly at his face trying to stop the red-hot beans sticking to his skin.

‘None of your business,’ said Jack, grabbing his gun.

Flipping its handle, Jack struck the vendor’s forehead, knocking him unconscious. Crouching low as he ran towards the tower, Jack pul ed on a black Che T-shirt from another cart. A bit tight, but it would do. He yanked two grenades from an injured soldier’s belt as he sprinted to the edge of the arched veranda.

Dropping low, Jack ran to the last archway before the tower. The rapid gunfire flying across the courtyard was not abating. Staring out at the piazza, Jack knew the shooting wasn’t going to stop until there was no one left standing. But Jack didn’t have that kind of time. He could already feel his mind slipping, his concentration fragmenting, his stomach doing double flips.

Glancing at the tower, he could see the soldier beginning to climb up the wal to reach the girl.

Five hours exactly before al seven chimneys were sealed.

Jack needed to stop this gunfight at the Inca corral. So he pul ed the pins on the grenades. Keeping his fingers on the triggers, he raised his hands in the air and walked out into the middle of the courtyard. With shots chipping at his feet, Jack tossed the grenades up into the air above his head.

AS THE GUNFIRE worsened beneath Isela, the clanging amplified in her head. She was comfortable with her heightened perceptions so she thought nothing of their intensity.

She couldn’t believe her eyes when the
cóndor
leapt from behind the cover of the arched veranda and tossed two grenades high above his head, scuttling Antonio’s guards who were nearest to him. The American soldiers threw themselves to the ground behind their barricades. The explosion kicked up a thick cloud of smoke and dust, the
cóndor
’s body col apsing in the middle of it.

‘Holy shit!’ said Isela, her rifle clattering to the stone as the man, the
cóndor
, jolted upright and gasped for breath. A little unsteadily, he stood up, brushed off his trousers, rol ed and stretched his neck muscles, then picked up his rifle and walked out of the swirls of dust.

Instantly, the shooting stopped. Her father’s guards dropped their weapons and ran towards the airstrip. Antonio’s men fol owed them, firing wildly.

The
cóndor
stopped for a minute under the heavy canopy of the huarango tree, its wide trunk ful of divots from centuries worth of armed attacks even before today’s stand-off.

When she could stand the noises in her head again after the explosion, Isela lifted her binoculars and stared out at the airstrip. Four heavily armed men were escorting Antonio to a black Hummer. Isela recognised their insignia as that of Donoso’s private army.