Last Man Standing

CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE

Matt Drake emerged from the ruined hotel, staggering from side to side. The battle had not been kind to him. Ribs were bruised. Red marks covered his neck, testaments to how hard Alicia had squeezed. Dust covered his body from head to toe.

Coyote chuckled. “Now that’s what I call a final fight, Matt.”

The skies were bright, shining down on the town square. Coyote’s mercs had thinned out. Drake heard the sounds of battle in the distance. He swallowed hard, not an easy feat with a mouthful of plaster, and licked his lips.

“They’re coming for you.”

Coyote indicated her dozen suited-up captives. “Let them come.”

Drake stopped on the top step that led to the hotel doors. Billows of dust and smoke mushroomed through the shattered opening and windows at his back. He tried not to cough.

“How does it feel to be the last man standing? Your friends are dead. How does that feel, Matt? I’m sure Kovalenko — wherever he is — will be watching. Blood Vendetta fulfilled.”

“We had a deal,” Drake rasped, nodding at the captives. “Will you keep your word now, Shelly?”

The use of her name brought an open expression to her eyes. “I always do,” she said, a touch regretfully. “I always have done. That’s why we’re in this fucked-up position, you and I.”

She turned and, with a flick of her head, indicated that her lackeys should remove the nano-vests. Drake waited until they slithered to the floor.

“What now?”

“Well. You’re not actually the last man standing, are you, Drake? There’s also Beauregard.” She gave him a sly smile. “And me. That’s France versus England. An interesting matchup.”

Drake flexed his already battered muscles.

“And let’s not forget Japan,” a lilting voice spoke out.

Coyote’s eyes glimmered with confusion, her face slackening. “What? How?”

Mai Kitano emerged from the billowing dust; a white ghost.

Drake grinned. “C’mon Coyote. In what reality did you ever believe you could best me?”

Coyote shouted her fury. Her mercs raised their weapon and took aim. The townsfolk screamed and scattered or dived to the floor. Drake ran hard toward their nemesis, Mai at his back.

Coyote didn’t wait. She didn’t allow her lackeys to fire their weapons. She took off like a sprinter out of the blocks, running headlong toward Drake.

And in the middle of it all, from his position above the action on the roof of the town square, Beauregard Alain suddenly appeared, dropping down like a deadly snake.

Torsten Dahl’s half-choked, disembodied voice came out of the fog. “Don’t forget Sweden in that matchup.”

And Alicia’s too: “Is that Beauregard?”