The Monarch (31 page)

 

44

Australia

4:45
A.M.
Local Time

“T
HERE IT IS,”
Lew said from the backseat of the Land Rover they had liberated from the Canton George Estate. After calling Kring and telling him they were coming, they'd locked George in his own vault. Jonathan glanced back and saw Lew's new toy in his lap: a sniper rifle from George's gun cabinet.

Jonathan, driving with Emily in the passenger seat, didn't see the car Lew said he'd stolen to get out to the reserve, but he drove up a rock outcropping on the side of the road Lew pointed at anyway. The three of them got out of the Land Rover, Lew taking the rifle, and walked through the long grass lining the dirt road. It was cool in the early morning dim, and Jonathan wished he had his own duster about then. In the distance, Jonathan could hear traffic on the main road, though it was still out of sight. Behind the rock outcropping, Jonathan saw Lew's stolen car covered in branches. Jonathan helped him clean it off.

“You walked from here?” Emily asked as she watched them work, awe in her voice.

“Jogged, actually. If they hadn't been hauling you two over their shoulders, I never would have caught up to them. Well, in time. They left a trail through the jungle like a herd of elephants running from a mouse.” Lew tossed the rifle in the back of the car. Jonathan held out his hand, but when Lew shook it he didn't let go.

“What?” Lew asked.

“Nobody dies,” Jonathan said. He wasn't just talking about them or expressing a consideration for human life. They needed the pilot and they had no idea if Kring's man had made arrangements to contact Kring en route or not.

“No worries,” Lew said with a smile. Jonathan would have felt better if Lew didn't seem like he was enjoying all of this.

Abruptly, before Lew could get in the car, Emily kissed him on the cheek. Jonathan thought Lew looked like someone had sent a jolt of electricity through him.

“For luck,” Emily said, her eyes darting to Jonathan before her cheeks flushed red and she headed back to the Land Rover.

Lew cleared his throat and seemed to avoid Jonathan's glare as he got in the car. He started the engine and rolled down the window.

“Remember, give me ten minutes,” Lew said, his arm crooked out the window. Lew was going to position himself at the airport so he could cover Jonathan and Emily when they arrived at the plane.

“What do you want, a kiss? Get the fuck out of here,” Jonathan said with a wink, slapping the roof of the car before backing away.

“Asshole,” Lew said before gunning the engine, shooting dirt up into the air and heading on down the road. He gave the horn a toot and waved his arm as he went.

Jonathan joined Emily at the Land Rover as they watched Lew's car disappear around a bend.

And then the longest ten minutes of Jonathan's life began.

“You had to do it,” Jonathan said when he thought he saw Emily retreating into herself. She looked at him and smiled sadly.

“I know,” Emily said. “I was just thinking about how I'm going to tell him that my bio and name are phony.”

“Right,” Jonathan said. It was then he realized Lew and Emily might be feeling more than the bond of two ­people in the same kind of trouble.

“I finally—­” Emily started to say before she sighed and opened the passenger door. “Never mind.” She got in and closed the door, slumping in the seat with her arms crossed.

While she sat alone in the Land Rover, Jonathan stood beside it, leaning against the hood and staring at the beauty around him as the sun started to come up. He thought about Natalie's dream about him being with a mysterious woman who saved him from dying. Just a child's wish in disguise. Or was it? Strangely enough he found himself thinking about Sophia Kring. What side would she be on when they got to the island? He thought he knew, but you could never tell. He felt a strange flutter in his chest as he thought about her, but turned his mind to other things. Checking his watch, Jonathan took one last look at the landscape and got into the Land Rover beside Emily, and started the engine.

“Here we—­”

The explosion rocked the Land Rover like it was doing the watusi. Jonathan thought they'd been double-­crossed, but aside from the rocking and an echo across the Australian morning sky that sounded like a rocket full of thunder, the event seemed to stop. He looked over at Emily, but she was looking out the window behind them.

“Oh my God,” she said. “Isn't that about where we just were?”

Jonathan spun around in his seat and then got out when he saw the cauliflower-­shaped cloud rising up into the sky. Emily was right. It was the George estate. Or what had
been
the George estate, judging from the size of the cloud.

“What could have happened?” Emily asked when Jonathan got back in the Land Rover.

Jonathan pulled off the shoulder and accelerated down the road. Every now and then his eyes would flick to the rearview mirror to look at the smoke. He had an idea of what had happened but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered except getting to that plane.

 

45

Canton George's Estate

5:15
A.M.
Local Time

C
ANTON
G
EORGE WOKE
up covered in glass and human flesh. The vault had saved his life, but he'd still felt the blast. He couldn't tell from where he was, but he was pretty sure he could guess what had happened.

“
Kring, jou bliksem!
” he said, calling Kring a bastard. They'd left the metal case of euros up in his office. If they had just been thieves and not after the brain, they would have taken that damn thing with them. As it was, he had no doubt there wasn't much of his house left up there.

It was all gone. Every last human treasure lay scattered on the vault floor, exposed to the air, with glass and debris slicing into everything. At the time of the explosion, George had been partially inside one of the vents, attempting to crawl through. He'd been slapped around inside the vent before falling back into the vault, his torso and face laced with broken glass and stinging from the preservation chemicals.

He couldn't really feel the pain. Not with so much rage boiling up inside him. Rage for both Kring and that oafish half of The Monarch who had destroyed his collection so long ago. What had they called him?

“Lew,” George said like he'd tasted something bad. Suddenly, he knew what he was going to do. It would be expensive, in both dollars and favors, but he was so angry he couldn't focus.

George pulled himself up and limped to a panel in the middle of the vault that thankfully had been mostly spared from the blast. After the loss of his last collection—­and his hand—­he'd taken precautions. Like having the vault supplied with an air circulation system, and an emergency communication line that ran underground all the way to the forest in the back compound where an antenna was secreted atop one of the trees. Those close to him had thought he was being paranoid. If nothing else, this would shut them up.

But he wasn't calling for help. Not yet, anyway.

“A Reaper? Have you lost your mind, George?” the voice on the phone said. His name was Colonel Rudyard Maitland—­pedophile, murderer, and base commander of Diego Garcia, the U.S. Navy's base a thousand miles south of India. “I can't launch a military drone on a civilian target, for Christ's sake!”

“You can if you want your secrets kept, Maitland,” George said. Even as he uttered the threat, he continued to scan his mind for other ways to entice him and any other impediments. Money wasn't the problem. A fully loaded MQ–9 Reaper drone—­or UAV, as the military called them—­cost the military about twenty-­nine million dollars, though Maitland undoubtedly knew George would pay considerably more.

“I . . . I can't. There's no way to protect myself. My career would be over, at the least!”

“Your career
is
over as of today no matter what you do, Maitland. But it's up to you whether you'll have enough money for retirement in paradise under a new name, or if you'll spend the rest of your life in a cell.”

“Oh Jesus,” Maitland muttered.

I'm losing him.

And then thinking back to his childhood in the Capetown slums, he realized he could offer something else. Something uniquely tailored for a man such as this.

“How about some playthings too, Maitland. All yours, to do with as you please. No questions asked.”

The silence on the line was deafening. If he didn't go for it, George knew he'd—­

“How many,” Maitland said, breathing as if he'd just run a marathon.

Canton George smiled.

 

46

Tartaruga Island

10:30
P.M.
Local Time

T
HE CHAIR'S WHEELS
crunched and popped as they rolled over the broken glass on the lab floor. The mélange of chemicals mixed with fire retardant foam and stuck to the wheels' rubber, riding up the arc, and making them look like whitewalls. The alarm and the sprinklers had shut off before the door had finally released its lock, not that it made any difference. The damage was done. Nothing of any use remained.

Movement caught Nathan's eye, a twitching mouse sitting on a lab bench across the room. A healthier mouse ran around and around, pausing now and then to stop and sniff the invalid before returning to the important work of showing off. Fury blurred Nathan's vision and he looked away, blinking his eyes clear.

Normally resilient to a fault, Nathan in better days would have already been planning his recovery from such a tragedy. It was how he'd lived his entire life. There was always an alternative, a route back to the top. Always, except now. The absent serums and the blinking computer screens shouting “ERROR ERROR ERROR” all around the lab told him Sophia had taken the research too. Even if they found her, someone who would do this to her own lab would never cooperate again. Without that, he'd have to start all over. But Nathan knew he didn't have time. Even if he could find the money to hire a new staff and restock a new lab, he wouldn't live long enough to see the first trials happen. Without the serum, he'd be dead in a few months,
if
he lasted that long. She'd killed him as surely as if she'd plunged a knife into his heart.

“My God,” Lara said from behind him, seeing the destruction for the first time.

“What is it?” Nathan said. He just wanted to be alone, bathe in his despair and depression. Decide on the best way to kill himself.

“She took the girl too,” Lara said. “We'll find her.”

“Don't bother,” he said. Sophia wasn't the one responsible for this. It was Hall. Nathan's plan had backfired; Hall had planted something in Sophia's brain during those few minutes they'd spent together. Lara walked up behind him and put her hands on his shoulders. It was the first time she'd touched him in over a year.

“We need the girl,” Lara said. “If you want to lure him in, you need her as bait.”

Lure him in. Yes, lure Hall in and use him and his daughter as leverage to force Sophia to cooperate. He'd kill Hall in front of her, just like he'd killed that Bobby at her university. Then he'd hold a gun to the girl's head and Sophia would do whatever he asked. And once she'd done it, then he'd kill the girl. And he'd kill Sophia too. Slowly.

Nathan felt the despair fade and mutate, become something white-­hot burning the depression away. The girl was the key.

“Find her,” Nathan said. Lara took her hands off his shoulders and headed out, stopping by the wall.

“I think I know where to look,” she said. Nathan spun his chair around and saw Lara standing by the bent maintenance tunnel access panel.

“Nothing fancy,” Nathan said, rolling out of the room. “They'll be here in a few hours. And Lara . . .”

“Yes, Father?”

“I want them both alive,” Nathan said.

“Yes, Father,” Lara said, her voice strained.

 

47

Australia

5:30
A.M.
Local Time

“O
N YOUR KNEES!”
the large Australian shouted.

Jonathan and Emily knelt beside each other with their hands behind their heads for the second time in the past few hours.

“Just take it easy,” Jonathan said.

“Shut up,” the man said. Jonathan could see into the plane from his position. It looked like there was only one other person in there, a man sitting in the pilot seat busy at the console in front of him. “Where is it?”

Jonathan turned to Emily and whispered, “Stay where you are. Don't give him any reason to do anything.”

Jonathan rose to his feet.

“What are you doing? Get down—­” Jonathan waved his hand and two chunks of asphalt exploded in front of the Australian's feet.

“The next shot goes through your heart,” Jonathan said. “Put your gun on the ground and kick it over here. And tell your pilot to get out here.”

This was always a tense moment for Jonathan. The subject would either comply or open fire. But the fact was the pilot was the only one they needed. If push came to shove, this guy was expendable—­but that didn't mean he couldn't get a few shots off before Lew took him down from his sniper position.

“Drop it!” Jonathan shouted. He felt ridiculous ordering an armed man to drop his gun when the only thing he was holding was air.

The man scoured the hills around the airstrip, clearly trying to find the source of the shots. Jonathan hoped he could do the math. The hills were several hundred yards away and he was holding an automatic handgun. Even if he spotted a muzzle flash, his situation was untenable.

Elongated seconds stretched out; the man massaged his weapon as he tried to decide what to do. Finally, he gave up on the hills and stared at Jonathan and Emily.

“Dieter! Get out here!” The man put his gun down on the tarmac with a flourish so whoever had him in their sights could tell what he was doing, then kicked the gun over to Jonathan. He picked it up and held it on the Australian and the pilot, who had joined his comrade, as they waited for Lew.

He came out of the forest on the hills, his rifle slung over his shoulder. When he arrived, they tied and gagged the pair and put them in the cargo hold. The pilot went willingly, but the big Australian was obstinate to the end, dragging his feet and continually hooking his legs around the plane's seats as Lew walked him toward the back of the plane. When he'd apparently had enough, Lew grabbed him and slammed him hard against the bulkhead.

“Look, dickwad, don't give me a fucking reason,” Lew snapped into the man's ear. “We need your buddy, but you're just dead weight.” The man grudgingly nodded and allowed himself to be put in the hold beside the pilot.

“Sorry about that,” Lew said to Emily.

Their captives secured, everyone sat around a table to make their plans. Jonathan could feel the time slipping away, tick by tick.

“Okay,” Jonathan said, drawing on a piece of paper to help him think. “I never saw the outside of the place, but I got a good tour of the inside.”

“Tour?” Lew said.

“Don't ask,” Jonathan said. “Kring said there's a runway on the north side of the island. We land there and head down a road to the main compound. There's a courtyard outside the main building. Place looks like an old control tower. That's where the exchange will take place.”

“You can't give it to him!” Emily said. “It's practically a national treasure.”

“Pretty gross treasure,” Lew said.

“I don't care what it is,” Jonathan said. “If it gets Natalie back, he can have it. And I'm not going to risk trying to con him. This is a guy who has figured out all the angles. If either one of you have a problem with that, you better speak up now.”

No one said anything.

“All right, then.”

“Shouldn't we contact the authorities? There are only three of us,” Emily said.

“Which authorities?” Lew said. “We don't have any idea who has jurisdiction over Kring's island. Hell, it might be a damn nation on paper.”

“Lew's right,” Jonathan said. “Besides, there isn't time. Kring knows we're coming and how long it takes to get there. I'm not giving him any reason to pull a fast one.”

A banging noise reverberated from the cargo hold, along with muffled shouting.

“Shut up back there!” Lew said. The banging stopped.

“We need to hurry,” Jonathan said.

“Okay, so where am I in all this?” Lew asked.

“I figure no matter how aboveboard we play it, he's going to try and get the upper hand. I don't know how many guards he's got working for him, but I saw at least three different ones. You got to figure there are shifts and some I didn't see. We're probably looking at ten.”

“At least,” Lew said.

“Why don't we ask
them
?” Emily said, looking at the door to the cargo hold.

“That would be nice, but anything they say would be suspect. Bad intel is worse than no intel,” Jonathan said.

“If that's the case, how can we be sure they'll even take us to the island at all?” she countered. Jonathan liked the way her mind worked.

“I'll ride up in the cockpit and watch the compass. It's the best we can do. Besides, Nathan wants our care package pretty bad,” he said, and then looked at Lew. “As for you, I figure we play it the same way we did here. Give you a head start so you can get into position. Hopefully we'll get a look at the place on a flyover before we land.”

“Works for me,” Lew said.

They talked about a few more details and worked out the kinks in the plan. Jonathan offered Emily a gun, but she declined.

“Okay, let's get this show on the road,” Jonathan said. “I'll see if there's any grub in the galley. I don't know about you but I'm starving.”

Lew headed back to get the pilot. The plan was to just leave the big guy back there where he couldn't do any harm.

Jonathan found some sandwiches and bottled water and was loading up a tray when he heard Emily scream. He came running, gun out.

Emily was sitting in the cabin, looking whiter than she had when she'd shot that guy back at the estate. Jonathan made a motion with his hands, asking what was wrong, then followed her eyes. She was looking through the restroom door out into the cargo hold.

“You better get in here, Jonny,” Lew called. Jonathan entered the cargo hold and saw what had made Emily scream.

His hands still tied, the Australian had worked his gag off. Blood covered his face. And it wasn't his blood. The pilot's corpse lay bleeding out on the floor.

“Jesus.”

“Do you need me now, mate?” the Australian said, spitting out blood. He'd leaned over and bitten through the pilot's neck. Jonathan realized that's what the banging had been.

“You piece of shit,” Lew said. “I ought to—­”

“Easy, mate. Touch me and you're not going anywhere.”

“We'll just get another pilot. The delay will be worth it if it means I get to kill you,” Lew said, grabbing him by the lapel and cocking his fist back.

“Go ahead. But good luck finding a pilot. There are maybe fifty pilots in the world that can fly this baby. Well, forty-­nine,” he said with a smile, his teeth still covered in blood.

“And you're one of them?” Jonathan asked.

“That I am.”

“I still say we—­”

“Lew!” Jonathan commanded more than shouted. Lew looked at him and hesitated, but eventually let go. He vented his frustration by pounding the bulkhead a few times.

“Fine. But if you so much as turn on a fucking light without checking with us first . . .” Lew said, pressing his gun to the Australian's forehead.

“I get it,” he said.

“So you'll fly us to Kring's island?” Jonathan said.

“On one condition.”

“Condition? Are you fucking—­”

“Lew, go see if Emily's all right,” Jonathan said.

“This is a mistake,” Lew said to Jonathan before he left, casting a final glare at the Australian.

“Boy's got a temper,” the Australian said.

“He's cheerful compared to what I'll be if you fuck this up for me,” Jonathan said. “What's the condition?”

“I want the girl. Lara, Kring's daughter. I don't know what you lot are planning once we get there, but I'm thinking there aren't going to be any survivors.”

“That's it?” Jonathan asked, finding it hard to believe anyone would want that sneering Hitler in a dress. Sophia, he could understand, but Lara?

“And a ride out of there.”

“Done,” Jonathan said, and knelt down to untie his hands.

“But take my advice, mate. Whatever you plan, make sure killing Kring is part of it. If he's even got one breath left in him, you, your family, and everyone you've ever known are dead.”

“Right,” Jonathan said sarcastically.

“Don't dismiss me. You see that explosion after you left Canton George's place?”

Jonathan nodded, getting a bad feeling.

“George wasn't useful to Kring anymore. That metal case of money was lined with C–4. There's nothing left back there but a deep hole. And the same thing will happen to you once you're no longer useful to him.”

Jonathan wanted to ignore it as an empty threat, something just to throw him off, but he couldn't. The Australian's voice was edged with pure fear as he talked about Kring. He wasn't scared for Jonathan.

He was scared for himself.