Blood Vengeance

CHAPTER THIRTY TWO

The Sikorsky flew unhindered through the dawn skies, carrying with it the nightmares, hopes and immediate future of the United States.

Drake watched it fly straight as they sped up Virginia Avenue. The road was like most in DC: wide and practical and straight. The way forward was perfectly clear as they passed statues and offices, heading into the university area. As far as F Street the way stood clear, but beyond that the driver was already calling for the DC cops to stop more traffic. The operation was entirely fluid; the chopper could change course at any time but, unless the VP and his advisors wanted to sacrifice President Coburn, this was as tight as it was going to get.

Alicia craned her neck. “Dammit. We’d have been better off taking the bikes.”

“Bikes already had riders,” Dahl told her. “Trained ones.”

The five-vehicle convoy shot up Virginia past Anniversary Park and the F Street turn-off without slowing down. Not surprisingly, the streets were quiet this morning. Drake stared. “Is it starting to come down?”

Instantly, every man and woman slid over to the right-side windows. The Sikorsky was losing altitude and fast. Drake watched the tracker and the blinking red dot, overlaid by a 3D map of Washington DC. The dot was descending into a wide greenish circle.

“What is that place?”

The driver clicked his fingers and threw the vehicle up New Hampshire Avenue. “That’s Washington Circle Park. Good cover. Four exits. And then a shitload of roads leading away. A ton of getaway scenarios. Can’t believe that madman’s coming down in DC.”

Dahl leaned forward. “How many roads is a shitload exactly?”

“Dunno. Eight maybe.”

“That does qualify as a shitload. Get your foot down, driver.”

Dahl sat back, stroking his chin. Drake shook his head. “From now on you should start all your sentences with ‘I’m sorry, I’m Swedish, but…’”

“Only if you start yours, ‘I’m a dumb Yorkshire knob’.”

The Sikorsky continued to descend. All eyes were fixed to the hovering chopper and its vague, indistinct payload. Team Bravo had hands on every door, weapons ready, and total focus. Their driver squealed to a stop at the top of 23rd Street outside an orange-signed Burger Tap and Shake, on the crosswalk between black iron glass-topped signal poles. The seven-story brick edifice of the George Washington University Hospital stood to their left, identified by its big black signage and fronted by holly trees and planters. The Washington Circle was empty of traffic, a surreal sight even at the quietest of times, but the park inside the sizeable roundabout was anything but.

Drake leapt out of the vehicle, chasing the first two teams who were already pounding across the road and through the nearest wide entrance. Broad grass strips and big sycamores and oaks stood all around, barren but still hampering their efforts and obstructing their vision. A four-foot-tall, chain-link fence ringed the interior of the park. Drake saw the usual water fountains, black trash cans, and black iron benches as he rushed along, all apparently designed to complement the tall broad-based street-lights that had colonized most of central DC.

Gunfire erupted ahead, bullets flying in all directions. Drake doubted it was the attacking force and flung himself behind the nearest waste basket. When he chanced a momentary glance, a scene of bizarre and deadly chaos met his eyes.

The chopper rested on its skids, its rotors spinning at full speed, the resulting wash buffeting hard at anything nearby. The horsed bronze statue of George Washington stood just behind, sword bared, the horse’s green nostrils barely out of rotor range. Six men knelt in a circle around the chopper, guns raised, firing indiscriminately. Four more men stood by the open chopper door.

Everyone wore identical black suits, gloves and balaclavas. It was impossible to tell who was who. The shooters might be prime targets, but Drake knew it would be a brave man who fired on them for fear of a luckless ricochet or even a through and through that might strike Coburn.

Before the attackers had time to settle or take stock, a shout went up from one of the men surrounding Kovalenko, maybe even the Blood King himself. Instantly, the whole contingent started to run.

“What the—” Alicia blurted.

But Drake was watching carefully. The four men nearest the chopper were joined by one shooter and broke to the south, the closest point to his position. Two other men broke to the northwest, and the remaining three to the southwest. All ran for park exits, firing hard as they went. Two unlucky soldiers took bullets, folding where they stood. In each fleeing group one man did not fire. Even now, they couldn’t tell each man apart. Would the techs at command be able to pinpoint the President’s signal?

“Hold fire!” the call screamed through the comms. “Hold yer damn fire!”

Fleet of foot, the Blood King and his men disseminated through the park. Reports came in through the comms from all surrounding areas, between the snipers and spotters on the roofs and the teams on the ground, the FBI trackers and the countless army patrols. It was more a case of too much information than too little.

Drake watched the craziness unfold, making a fast decision. “That group.” He indicated the cluster of five men, but looked to the Team Bravo leader before moving. The man nodded quickly, not consulting his comms. It was fast becoming clear that someone’s decision-making capabilities were somewhat lacking.

“Trust the goddamn suits,” he muttered as he pushed past Drake. The team crossed a paved area and ran onto a concreted exit path. Bullets slammed into a man’s vest, sending him to his knees with a grunt. Drake understood it was an unusual situation. No one could fire on Kovalenko’s men, but at the same time Kovalenko couldn’t directly threaten the President. What the hell else did the man have up his sleeve?

Choppers thundered overhead. Army vehicles screeched to a halt at hastily erected police barriers all around the Circle. Like gasoline on fire, this was a situation fast raging out of control. Drake pursued the fleeing group, Dahl and Alicia at his side. When he turned to them he noticed, for the first time since she’d returned, the fresh scars on Alicia’s face.

“Looks like you put up a major battle.”

Alicia’s eyes were windows looking onto a black death. “These,” she said, rubbing a hand across her cheeks. “I’m proud of.”

Drake jumped off a curb, now crossing the road. The fires of dread burned bright in his heart. They couldn’t care for all of their people right now. He couldn’t care for them. Not even Mai. Sometimes silence was seen as inaction, but today it was an imperative.

The five-man terrorist group ran carefully but quickly alongside buildings. If the President was one of them, then he was under a constant threat of some kind. Drake rounded a corner, ducking back as gray stone exploded where bullets struck. Another team member went down, wounded.

“Orders?” the team leader repeated into his comms. “What are my orders?”

Kovalenko’s men slowed alongside the big hospital building and threw a grenade at a shop front, blowing out the doors and proving they had more than just guns in their arsenal. The team charged inside. Drake pulled up close by, noticing the green Starbucks sign.

“This part of their plan?”

“Good friggin’ idea,” Alicia said. “An extra-hot latte might just save my bollocks from freezing off out here.”

One of the other team members studied her strangely, as if wondering whether to call her on that one. Wisely, he held his peace and looked away. Drake listened as the team leader consulted a digital blueprint on his handheld scanner.

“Shop exits onto a parallel street,” he said. “Yeah, they planned this one.”

The soldiers dashed inside, knocking over chairs and metal tables. Almost without thought, Dahl grabbed a handful of caramel waffles as he passed a big brown wicker basket, throwing one each to his colleagues. The mirror-clean pastry case was empty. Once through the café they exited onto a narrow street just in time to see Kovalenko’s men blowing their way into another shop.

“We have them,” the team leader reported. “They’re not exactly trying to hide their movements.”

Drake glanced at Dahl. This wasn’t right. Kovalenko’s men couldn’t do this all day. It felt more as if they were waiting for something to happen.

Something big.

Drake entered the next shop on the escapees’ boot-heels, surprised to find it was a large bookstore. They quickly crossed the open-plan area where big publishers paid small fortunes for their books to be stacked on tables designed to attract the eye and the wallet of incoming, unwitting consumers — the nearer the door the more expensive the table — and started to thread through the high stacked shelves beyond. With a high-pitched whistle, bullets began to thud and fly into the bookshelves, shredding wooden surrounds and paper pages alike. Drake hit the deck as books fell and spun all around him. One of the larger cases, shredded, collapsed into a tumbling pile, shedding heaps of mashed up books like trickling sand. The team leader muttered into his headset.

“Keep ‘em in sight,” came through the comms system.

“Taking heavy fire!”

“All these freakin’ books,” Alicia put in. “Don’t they sell Kindles in Washington?”

“Apparently,” Dahl said, inching forward on his elbows. “Some people still prefer paper.”

“Dinosaurs in a digital age,” Alicia said.

Dahl laughed. Drake peered around the edge of a sturdy looking bookcase. Paper still fluttered all around, fighting clouds of dust for airspace. The rear of the store was empty.

“Go.”

Running again, Team Bravo was now down to a total of five. None of the men they had left behind were seriously injured, but all had sustained some kind of wound. The damaged bookshop exited through a constricted back door which led to an alleyway, still within the shadow of the George Washington University Hospital building. The Blood King’s men were already racing along the alley’s length, heading for the sliver of daylight that beckoned from its far end like the exit of a tunnel. Drake could see men running parallel along the rooftops above, tracking the runaways.

The team took off in pursuit, using dirty doorways and grimy dumpsters to duck behind when they came under fire. Bullets clanged and fizzed from every surface. At one point they were forced to take cover behind a big Dodge truck. Drake shook his head sadly as gunfire riddled its front end.

Alicia noticed the gesture. “For fucksake, Drake. Don’t worry. It’s not one of those Cobra things.”

“You mean an AC Cobra.” Drake glared. “Like the one you shot up in Hawaii.”

“Whatever.”

The alley gave onto another wide thoroughfare. By the time Team Bravo reached daylight, Kovalenko’s men were over a hundred yards ahead, but it was immediately apparent where they were heading.

“Metro,” someone said. “Shit.”

“Metro’s closed,” the team leader said. “Don’t worry.”

Drake raced on. Something was coming and rushing headlong toward them at a terrible pace, but what?