Matt Drake 8 - Last Man Standing (21 page)

He whirled, but Coyote was already on him, striking again and again, a pure killing machine. This time he made his punches tell
; breaking ribs, jabbing at eyes and behind the ears, but it made no difference. Coyote was above it, beyond it, transported from a singular hell into a world of sudden chance—the world where she could again be Shelly—and now back to a life of pure torment and terrible desire. Choice made, she gave it her all.

Drake wilted slowly. When Beauregard appeared behind Coyote
—a black angel of death—he knew the game was up.

Last man standing? Beauregard would win the day.

“I’m so sorry,” Coyote muttered even as she pounded at him.

Beauregard’s knife glinted with the fire of the rising sun.

The noise Drake would never have expected, the one that changed it all, was the roar of a motorbike. From the corner of his eye he saw a trial bike, ridden by Torsten Dahl,
ten feet off the ground
, soaring above them like the veritable bat out of hell. Dahl dangled from the seat and plucked the very blade from Beauregard’s hands as he started to plunge it downward, then threw it back at the Frenchman.

Beauregard fell hard, avoiding the knife but hurting himself in the process. Dahl landed and turned the bike on a penny, mud and wet grass shooting from the spinning wheel. Coyote still struck out at Drake, but her attack was distracted.

Dahl shot between the two of them, blasting both their bodies and faces with dirt and thick sludge.

They fell back, opening a gap. Drake suddenly found himself with allies at his side. Standing in a line behind him had been Mai
, Alicia and Crouch, now joined by Dahl on his bike.

Facing them were Coyote and Beauregard.

The titans of combat came together.

All hell broke loose in the town of Sunnyvale.

The SAS had slipped around the flanks of the merc army and were among them. Paid mercenaries twisted every which way, fighting hard. SO units came at them from covered positions. Men fell, twisted and bled in the dirt. A high inflatable slide exploded and rapidly deflated among them, its flapping sides knocking three men off their feet. A funhouse, built on two levels of shaking walkways, distorting mirrors, screaming sirens and irregular steps exploded as two RPGs hit it. Timber and flame fired high into the air, debris shooting out like crazy fireworks, the whole thing lit like a blazing bonfire. Whatever snipers were inside died instantly.

Drake, Mai and Alicia ran at Beauregard and Coyote. Dahl revved his bike and shot forward like a bullet.

The big wheel, poised above the funhouse and littered with burning wreckage from its arms to its gondolas, shuddered and groaned for the second time that morning. Then, in slow motion, it started to tilt, the massive structure now leaning over. For a moment, as all eyes turned upward, it halted, hesitating as if deciding whether to hang on or give up the ghost. The morning was still for one precious instant, a span of tension and fear and a little regret, and then the circular edifice collapsed.

It came down among the men, bodies darting everywhere, some waiting until the last second and
coolly stepping aside, others tying to gauge the structure’s fall and being slammed into by those in a panic. Mayhem reigned. Those that still stood in the aftermath tried to pick off their enemies, some never losing a beat. Those that were injured or crushed yelled out to their colleagues and, depending on which side they were on, received immediate help.

Drake slid into Coyote, taking her legs. Alicia feinted past Beauregard, drawing his attention.

“Get a little closer, Beau. I got a ruler in my pocket and, man, do I wanna use it.”

The Frenchman paused, as if confused. That gave Dahl all the time he needed to ram the speeding bike into his body, hurling him away from the handlebars. The Swede didn’t let up on the throttle one bit, knowing they had to take such a dangerous enemy completely out of the picture.

When Beauregard landed, Alicia jumped atop him, just to make sure.

Drake had slid past Coyote, put a palm on the ground, and used it to spin his body back
around. Now, as Coyote scrambled up, he hit her at the same time as Mai. The double-headed attack left the assassin lying on her back, winded and trying to catch her breath.

“Give it up
,” Drake said. “Tell your mercs to stand down. It’s over.”

Coyote spat at him.

“Shelly,” Drake tried. “There’s no need for any more loss of life.”

Crouch joined them. “We protect our people, Shelly. Not sacrifice them.”

Coyote snarled. “Shelly died when she was eight! When
I
made her torture her first small animal. Innocent girl, long lost. Poor girl. Poor parents. They knew when she changed. They knew when the killer took root. Only it was
me
who learned to control it. To feed it slowly and never get caught. If Shelly ever came back . . . the animal would destroy her.”

Drake stepped back as Coyote kicked out and managed to
regain her feet. Mai produced a pistol that she’d taken from a dead merc in anticipation of this moment.

“Stop
,” she said. “This is over.”

Coyote smiled. The sugar
-sweet tones slipped once more across Drake’s senses. “The nano-vests were an experiment for the Pythians,” she said. “In the event of my capture that was the last thing I was supposed to tell you. My job is over.”

“Experiment?” Drake repeated. “What kind of experiment?”

“I don’t know. When Kovalenko failed them in DC—he was supposed to put one on the President you know—it fell to me as the next person in line to try them out. My guess? It’s nothing fun.”

Drake felt his heart plummet like a falling star. “Kov
alenko was working for someone? No way.”

“The Pythians helped bankroll him when he couldn’t get access to his money in prison. You think he did that? No way. They fine-tuned the op in DC. They gave him the drone that was used, the nano-vests.”

“Before today I never even heard of the goddamn Pythians.”

“You will
,” Coyote said. “Very soon. Their agenda is global and lengthy.”

Mai waved her pistol. “Are you giving up?”

Coyote smiled a little wistfully. “Shelly will never let you take me alive.”

Drake looked around
: At the battle behind them that still raged; SAS troops darting in and out of enemy positions; police officers crouched behind the dead, using their bodies as shields as they picked off more of their opponents. A central stall caught fire as he watched, hanging prizes melting and popping. A food stand fell over, crushing an unlucky merc. Mud glistened across the entire scene. Beyond where the big wheel had stood was a rollercoaster and now, spectacularly, its central supports buckled, making the entire metal track warp.

The mercs had seen that they were losing, dying. Death didn’t offer a pay
packet, nor a second chance or day release. Not like the British penal system. Some of them were already surrendering.

“I don’t see a way out for you, Shelly.”

“Coyote,” the woman growled. “Call me Coyote.”

And she stepped back, pulling her jacket wide open, to reveal the nano-vest buckled to her chest. The
light in her eyes was crazed but the look on her face was almost blissful.

“
I’m so glad my torture is at an end,” she said and detonated.

Drake flew backwards, slammed off his feet by the blast. Blood and other things struck his body and face as he went airborne. Coyote’s lone hand slapped his cheek, thwarting him for the last time. Even as he bounced to the ground he knew that, in her final moments, Shelly Cohen had returned and made Coyote take that all important step back.

Any closer, and they would all have been dead.

His first job was to check on his teammates
—all of whom were stunned and blooded but in good shape—and then turn to check on Alicia. The sight of her straddling Beauregard didn’t really surprise him. He did a double-take when she threw a punch at the injured man though.

“You still softening him up?”

“Quite the opposite,” Alicia said. “I think he likes it.”

Mai groaned.

Alicia climbed off the prone Frenchman. “You gotta see this thing, Mai. The tights really don’t do it justice. It’s huuuu—”

Three soldiers mercifully approached them
just then, shutting Alicia up as they waved their guns. Crouch raised his hands and diverted them, no doubt establishing protocols.

Dahl surveyed their surroundings. “Well, we lost Coyote and captured Beauregard. The Frenchman is a link to the Pythians. Could be worse.
I wonder what happened to the hacker.”

Drake
clicked his tongue. “We learned only what they wanted us to learn,” he said. “It’s how and when we find out why that worries me.”

Crouch turned to them. “We all have a rather large amount of explaining to do, but we’re good here. Carry on.”

Drake motioned for a phone. “We’ll call Karin and Komodo and catch up with the guys in DC.” He turned to Mai. “Surprised you haven’t heard from Smyth.”

“Phone
’s on silent,” she said, fishing it out and then making a face. “Oh hell. Looks like he’s filled it up.”

“Damn. Well, we’d better call them first.”

Drake made the call. As he did so he turned full circle and surveyed the fiery skies and the scorched earth; the place where his long-held nemesis, Coyote, had died; the bruised and bloody SPEAR team and Mai Kitano—his old past and future.

Full circle indeed.

A short while later, Matt Drake found himself seated in the quiet corner of a large,
old-fashioned pub in the center of York.

The place held memories for him. Nostalgia seeped through the walls. He had taken Alyson here. Even met Ben Blake here. Pain
, sorrow and the memory of old mistakes hung like the shadows of ancient ghosts inside, but there was a certain happiness too. The pub held infinitely more good memories than bad.

On this day he sat with more friend
s. Mai, Alicia and Dahl. Michael Crouch. Karin and Komodo. Mai was upbeat but still reserved, the shadow that had followed her back from Tokyo well and truly returned. Alicia currently existed in a state of extremes—one moment buoyed by excitement and cracking one-liners and looking dangerous, the next hanging her head glumly as she thought no doubt of Lomas and the bikers, and where the path to her home might now lie.

Crouch imparted more news than he was probably allowed to. Karin and Komodo reported all they knew and told them of SaBo’s fate. The hacker had fled at the first sign of trouble and hadn
’t resurfaced. Drake didn’t worry. In this game they came across the same people again and again, and when they next met SaBo—they owed him a little personal hacking time of his own.

Hayden, Kinimaka and Smyth had reported in.
The Pentagon appeared to be their new home. Drake rolled his eyes. Could they be under closer scrutiny? Especially now that Kinimaka and Lauren Fox were in the early phases of launching an entirely new operation against General Stone.

He had a feeling they were standing at a crossroads. The way back was littered with mixed memories and defining moments. The roads either side led to nowhere
; a stagnant invariable path to dissolution. It was the way ahead that offered a vista of possibility. Only in moving forward and facing new challenges could Matt Drake hope to survive.

And on the road ahead something big was looming. Something immeasurable, on the grandest scale yet.

He wanted to be there for that party.

“Not thinking of retiring now are you?” Crouch asked, noticing the depth of his concentration.

“Furthest thing from my mind,” Drake said. “Coyote is dead. That lifts a weight from my shoulders, yes, but I actually pitied her at the end. I wanted Shelly back. If anything, I miss that girl.”

Crouch smiled pensively. “Me too.”

“Other things are coming,” Drake said. “It will never end.” Mai had spoken a similar sentence to him a long time ago, back when Kennedy was still alive.

“I know. That’s one of the things I wanted to talk about.”

Drake sensed something coming. “Of course, Michael.”

“The Ninth Division is no more. Defunct. Of course, a new department will stand in but I have no interest in that. All my life I
’ve wanted to pursue a dream, an ambition. It appears that now I’m in a position to do exactly that.”

Drake smiled. “Sounds good. What kind of dream?”

Now Crouch looked slightly embarrassed, the first time that Drake had ever seen him so. “It’s okay,” the Yorkshireman said quickly. “You don’t have to—”

“No, no
,” Crouch said quickly. “I want to. I have to, actually. You see all my life I’ve had this, largely secret, love for archaeological mysteries and ancient unsolved riddles. I guess you could call them cold cases, but ice-cold really. Frozen over. I’m not talking about old gods or Alexander the Great or the plagues of Egypt. I’m talking Aztecs, Incas, Mayans—the civilizations that came and went and left a million stories behind. Even the pirates, the stories they traded and told were pure gold dust.” Crouch was speaking faster and faster, warming to his subject. “Real, living treasures that you can touch and discover. I want to form a team dedicated to searching for these treasures . . . and I have a backer.”

“You do? That’s fantastic.”

“He provides the money. We get paid a wage. A good one. I have so many government contacts both here and around the world I need a book the size of the Bible just to keep track of them. Wheels can be greased, favors met.”

Drake grimaced a little.

“It’s what makes the world go around, Matt. Politics. Business. Commerce. Banking. The favors, the special invites, the small concessions. Negotiation is as much a currency as banknotes. In any case, I can get us access to a country and its more interesting parts through my contacts. Our benefactor has the money. Now all I need is a team.”

Drake blinked rapidly. “Oh. Are you trying to ask
me?
” he blurted. “Sorry, I didn’t realize. Us Yorkshire folk need it laid out in plain English. We’re not that good on the uptake.”

“Actually no
.” Crouch grinned. “I was asking
her.”

He turned toward Alicia, who
’d been listening in on their conversation. An expression of surprise was soon covered by a victorious leer.

“In yer face, Drakey!”

Crouch winced a little. “Her qualities are unmistakable.”

Drake nodded seriously. “Alicia is the best teammate and companion anyone could ever hope for.”

Crouch nodded. “That’s what I thought.”

Alicia stared down at the table. Her lips moved but nothing came out, as if the emotion had choked her words. Seconds passed. When finally she met Drake’s gaze the slight sheen in her eyes spoke for her.

Crouch leaned forward. “Will you join me, Alicia?”

“I will
,” the Englishwoman said. “I will. But not indefinitely. My options are always open, Michael, so that if the something I’ve been looking for presents itself then I’m free to take it. I’ll also have to talk to the bikers. And SPEAR.”

Drake
recognized the craving in those words, the desire that Alicia never let go. A free spirit, she would always follow the road, searching, seeking for that one thing she might never find.

A family.

“And of course you can call on her. And us. Anytime,” Crouch told Drake, and now the rest of the table who had all tuned in.

Alicia said, “You guys have been awesome. The best soldiers, the best friends. The best of everything. Even you, Mai
,” she added with a laugh. “But I have to keep searching. Once a rebel always a rebel. Away with the clouds. Riding into the sunset. That’s me. Look for me at the break of dawn, the dying of the day. That will be me—saluting you.”

And she stood up, trying to hide
the emotion she felt, no doubt trying to find that one last memorable quip.

“I’ll say
my proper goodbyes to SPEAR. Oh, and if I could maybe interrogate Beauregard? Three or four minutes of hard work and I should get what I need.”