Search and Destroy (31 page)

Something deep inside Andrea Chambers changed for ever at that moment. A violent creature that she’d never experienced before emerged as if from a cocoon. Fury on a primordial level ripped through her like a tsunami. The scream that sprang from her was not one of fear but of defiance. “NO! I’m going to be the one who kills
you
, you worthless piece of shit!”

Jensen Strathclyde stepped back for a second, clearly pleased at her outburst. He turned and smiled at the camera, holding the pose like a film star. “Are you getting this, brother? Oh, I wish you were here so we could share this one between us like we used to.”

Andrea followed his gaze. “Don’t tell me, your fucker of a brother is watching us. Tossing himself off, no doubt!”

“Live from our London studios,” said Jensen in a mocking American accent.

Andrea strained towards the camera, feeling the tendons in her neck standing out like ropes. “After I kill this motherfucker, I’m going to find you and kill
you
as well!”

The red light on the camera remained steady and in Andrea’s mind came to represent Stewart Strathclyde’s voyeuristic avatar. He was that red light. A scourge to women everywhere. How many lives had the two Strathclydes taken between them? How many families mourned their lost wives, sisters and daughters? Strathclyde was that light. A light that she was determined to extinguish.

Danny slipped over the fence unseen. Rain soaked his clothes in seconds, causing them to cling like a second skin. He ignored the cold, knowing it would counter the heat caused by the adrenalin surging through his body. He stayed close to the western edge of the grounds, running full tilt with his weapon held close to his body. He pushed thoughts of a sniper on the roof from his mind. There was no time for a cautious approach. The harsh reality was that if there was a sniper, he was dead anyway. His feet slipped and skidded in the wet grass but he stayed upright.

He reached the side of the red-brick mansion unhindered. As his breathing slowed he checked the magazine on Kennedy’s M4. Twenty-five of the full thirty rounds remained. He thumbed the selector switch to three-round bursts. Every shot would have to count. Eight bursts of fire, then it would be up to him to improvise. He still had five left in the Glock pistol. He would have preferred many more, but he knew that dead men tended to drop their weapons. Crouching low, he passed a window on the side of the house. Stealing a glance inside, he saw an empty room.

He pressed a hand against the window but it was fastened securely. Despite what most people believed from watching action movies, jumping through a window was not a great way of entering a hostile building. Most of the time you would just bounce off the glass and look really stupid. If you did succeed it was a quick way of severing vital body parts. Danny moved on, lowering his head in an effort to keep the rain from obscuring his vision.

He made his way to the back of the house and found a door. He tested the handle with a slow pressure and the mechanism turned slow and easy. He went through the doorway low and fast, the barrel of the stubby M4 moving in a tight arc. A voice from the past echoed in his mind: “Where the eyes look, the weapon points.”

He was in a utility room that led into a wider kitchen area. The left wall was taken up with a rusty washing machine, tumble dryer and a set of racked shelving, on which boxes of ancient detergent and household cleaning materials had been abandoned.

Danny moved into the kitchen. The sound of the rain beating against the windows was a constant annoying rattle. The room was dominated by a large utility island in the centre above which a few dusty pots and pans hung from a rectangular display rail. Danny moved around it, pausing to listen for any telltale sounds from the doorway beyond. He blanked out the timpani of the pounding rain. Nothing. He crept forward as fast as he could without making any noise, keeping his weight balanced and constant, and moved deeper into the interior of the house.

A man stepped through the doorway at the same moment and they collided in a tangle of limbs.

Danny stepped back, his head ringing from the unexpected impact and through sheer instinct fired off a tight three-round burst. The man yelled out as he took one of the rounds through the muscle of his right shoulder. He too dodged backwards, putting the doorframe between him and Danny. Seconds later a hand brandishing an angular Glock snaked around the frame and loosed off a rapid series of six shots. Sparks flew from kitchen counters and cooking pots as several of the bullets ricocheted. Danny winced as one of the bullets tore a tuft of hair from his scalp. Sighting on the hand, he squeezed the trigger on the M4. The pistol, along with an explosion of blood and fingers, was ejected high into the air.

The man’s mouth was wide open in a silent scream when Danny stepped through the doorway. He gagged as the barrel of the M4 was inserted deep into his open mouth, the flesh of his tongue and throat sizzling from the heat of the weapon.

“Where’s the girl?” Danny’s voice was like a blade on a whetstone. The man tried to speak but the bullet that tore the back of his head free from the rest of his body ended that intent in a fraction of a second. “Don’t bother, I’ll find her myself.”

Scowling, Danny moved on. So much for the element of surprise. He had no way of knowing how many enemies were in the house. In way of testimony three more faces appeared at the far end of the entrance hall that was divided by a large central staircase. Each man held a Glock pistol and all three commenced firing at the same time.

Danny scooted sideways using the base of the stairs as cover. The men spread out in a loose curving line, moving forward constantly. Two of the men kept on firing as the third reloaded his pistol.

Danny knew they would be on him in moments. With a defiant roar he returned fire with the M4. The three men dived for cover of their own as the fearsome carbine spat death in their direction.

Danny risked a glance upwards and saw that the stairs led up to a long landing with a balustrade running its length. Shit, if any shooters were up there then he was a dead man. The landing gave an ideal vantage point. He needed to move. But the three men were disciplined and were keeping him pinned down by their constant rate of fire. The only option he had was to backpedal into the kitchen.

The harsh stutter of the M4 was drowned out by an explosion of wood, masonry and glass as the front of the house seemed to disintegrate.

The three men tumbled away from the carnage, their faces masks of surprise. The scoop bucket of a JCB rose to its full height then smashed down again, obliterating the wall to the left of the front door. Through the dirt-covered window of the mechanical beast, Clay’s face was an angry white smear.

The closest of the men raised his pistol, targeting Clay. His shot went high into the doorway as Danny emerged from his cover and sent another volley at the trio. The JCB powered through the rubble, its heavy caterpillar tracks crushing the bricks and mortar easily. Then the cab of the machine was inside the house. Its hydraulic arm rose high, sending out another shower of debris, then again crashed down into the midst of the three men. All three scattered in different directions. The teeth of the scoop shattered the ornately tiled floor.

* * *

Inside the cab of the JCB, Clay growled and muttered curses as the three little bastards dodged and sent a hail of bullets into the machine’s windshield. The toughened glass held for the first half-dozen shots then hot lead began to get through. A ricochet cut a long furrow down his chest before drilling into the thick muscle of Clay’s thigh.

Two of the men were now to his left and were reloading their weapons while the third had scrabbled backwards away from the machine. Clay steered the metal behemoth in the direction of the two to his left. Both men continued their assault, sending shot after shot into the cab. He saw the third shooter send a wild shot in Danny’s direction then jump onto an ornate armoire and using this as a platform, vault high onto the side of the staircase, taking the upper ground above Danny. Both men fired simultaneously, and Clay saw Danny stumble as a bullet bit through the flesh of his right hip. His opponent crumpled back onto the stairs gasping for breath. His pistol dropped from his hand and clattered down several steps. He was doing a fair impression of a crab on its back, arms and legs waving in the air. Danny squeezed the trigger of his own weapon but it didn’t fire. Empty!

The man on the stairs grinned and ripped a combat knife from the sheath at his waist, launching himself bodily down the stairs before Danny could reload the carbine. Clay gasped, but his attention was then firmly drawn back to the two other men, who had reloaded and resumed their assault on the JCB. He tried to crush the little fuckers with the bucket of the earthmover but they managed to evade the saurian jaws by continuously dodging back and forth while keeping up a constant rate of fire with their pistols. Then both clambered onto the body of the JCB. Clay managed to dislodge one man at the front of the cab with a desperate jerk of the steering wheel. The machine lurched forward and the man tumbled from view. The second man swung the cab door open, clearly hoping for a clean shot to end the fight. As the JCB pitched to the right he struggled to maintain his balance and clung to the door handle for support.

Clay launched himself out of the cab at the gunman, sweeping the man’s Glock up and away with the edge of his hand. Both men bumped painfully over the heavy segmented tracks and landed in a heap amidst the rubble. Clay secured a hold on his opponent’s throat and began to squeeze. A noise from behind made him turn his head. The second man had rounded the cab and was rushing at him, a knife held high.

Jensen Strathclyde was considering his options. He was sure that the contents of the flash drive had not been posted online. He’d searched the web relentlessly as soon as he’d received the call from Stewart. And even if it made it to YouTube or CNN, it would likely be dismissed as a fake. On the off chance questions were asked, other versions with obvious CGI manipulation would be posted online, discrediting the original. It had worked many times before and was standard practice. And everyone knew that snuff films were an urban legend.

So it came down to business as usual. He had carried out many interrogations on behalf of TSI, some of which had ended in termination, but this time it was different. This time he was going off script; he would have some fun. Stewart had always run the show during their joint exploits, taking the dominant role and only letting Jensen participate after most of the real fun had been had. Jensen had operated the camera on six of their kills but had only taken the lead once. This was his time to shine. Stewart was on the other side of the Atlantic, reduced to the role of voyeur via video-streaming. Sure, he would get to see all the action but this time he would not get to dictate it. And he could see what his brother had learned…

Jensen looked over Andrea’s exposed torso. He leaned in close and slowly inhaled. A faint perfume and a slightly acrid aroma combined. It was often said that animals could smell fear. Jensen felt sure he shared that ability. The bitch in front of him reeked of it. He tapped the cold blade of the scalpel against her nipples in an alternating rhythm. He inspected the trails of blood that still trickled from Andrea’s brow and chest.

“You ever play ‘eeny meeny’ as a child?”

“Fuck you.”

“Eeny, meeny, miny moe, catch a bitch-whore by the toe.”

“You fucking insect. What’s wrong? Your mother never loved you? Your father abused you?”

Jensen smiled. “If you think I’m going to lose it and kill you quickly you’d better think again. And forget being rescued. Those two cowboys are already dead.”

From below came the unmistakable sound of gunfire. Jensen turned, the blade in his hand momentarily forgotten. Then a deafening crash shook the floor beneath his feet. Jesus, had a bomb gone off?

The woman’s lip curled back in a snarl. “Dead already, eh?”

Jensen raced to the bedroom door, the flaps of his executioner’s cap bouncing as he ran. He crossed the short landing and peered over the balustrade at the carnage below. A mixture of fear and fury swept through him. The front of the house was in ruins. This was not how it was supposed to be! He turned and stalked back to the woman. It just wasn’t fair. This was supposed to be his day, his time to step out from Stewart’s shadow.

* * *

Andrea’s heart beat hard against her ribcage. Dare she hope she might survive after all? She felt a mixture of relief and vindication; Clay and Danny were not only still alive but fighting to rescue her. Strathclyde burst back into the room, swearing. “You’re fucking dead, bitch.”

Andrea closed her eyes involuntarily as he raised the gleaming blade as if to slash her throat open. But no lethal blow came. She released her breath. The executioner’s cap swivelled from side to side in indecision.

“You’re my insurance if those fuckers manage to make it past my men.” He wrapped his hand through Andrea’s hair, wrenching it as he pressed the scalpel against her neck. “You as much as twitch and I’ll gut you from arsehole to breakfast time!”

He sliced through the bonds that held her limbs, then used her hair and the blade at her throat to steer her out of the door and onto the landing. Andrea wrapped her now free hands over her exposed breasts as he tightened his grip on her hair. Her hand came away crimson. She tried to turn and drive her knee into his groin but the scalpel at her throat sliced into the underside of her chin as Jensen hissed a warning. Her legs felt like they were being controlled by some external force as she was guided puppet-like to the balustrade that overlooked the entrance hall. Her hands and feet tingled painfully as circulation resumed.

“Want to see your friends die?” Jensen wrenched her hair to emphasise his question. He forced her forward, pressing his groin tight into her backside and pinning her legs against the railing.

The sight that greeted her was unbelievable. A huge bulldozer had crashed through the front of the house. Bricks, mortar, splintered wood and glass lay everywhere, and a cloud of grey dust hung in the air. Bullets cut the air and sparks flew from repeated shots aimed at the cab of the bulldozer.