The Last Bazaar

CHAPTER FORTY

They reacted instantly and as one. Even under fire, guiding the boat and picking off the enemy the team were fully aware of their surroundings. Drake had already spied a third racing speedboat and knew it approached them from the right-hand side. Without a second’s hesitation he threw himself off their boat and into the other, holding his breath as he fell through thin air and hoped he’d gauged the distance correctly.

The team came down hard, smashing the new speedboat momentarily beneath the waters and making it spin around. At that moment their old speedboat erupted, destroyed timbers arcing all around. One of the men who’d occupied the new boat fell out; the other faced the Mad Swede.

“Jump,” Dahl growled. “Or die.”

The man chose the former, and maybe the latter too depending on his luck. Dahl jumped on the throttle and increased the engine’s revs at the same time as assessing the state of his teammates.

“We all okay?”

Drake rubbed bruises and Alicia flicked away blood. Mai traced the new scar mostly healed on her face, a new chapter to her story, and one she hadn’t yet told Drake. The speedboats again closed together as Ramses’ pilot hit even worse traffic.

“See that?” Drake pointed out the jam ahead. “Like York at bloody rush hour. Nothing’s going nowhere.”

Alicia raised her own gun. “And for once — that’s our gain.”

Akatash was trying to load another rocket, but then came under increased fire. Seeing the crush of vessels ahead, Ramses yelled into a handheld radio.

Almost immediately the hovering chopper banked and zoomed overhead, settling above Ramses’ position. Two rappel lines flickered down, harnesses strapped to ends that brushed the deck.

Dahl glared at Drake and Alicia. “What are you waiting for? Shoot!”

The Yorkshireman fired, but then Akatash ordered his own men to lay down some cover. Bullets impacted dangerously close and Dahl spun the wheel in an evasive maneuver. Then, both Ramses and Akatash secured the harnesses around them and began to be hauled up toward the chopper. The bird itself rose fast as they came up, escaping the river and any danger.

Drake stayed low. “There,” he said. “Go there.”

Dahl wrenched the wheel in the direction of Beauregard and the chopper that had put down earlier. “Your boyfriend,” he said to Alicia, “must work on some kind of telepathic link. Either that or he’s an android, programmed to think laterally.”

“He’s not my boyf—” Alicia began.

Drake interrupted. “You really think he anticipated this?” He gazed up at the escaping Ramses as they approached the muddy bank.

Dahl shrugged. “Doesn’t matter now, because one thing’s for sure — that Prince of Terror is about to meet his match.”

Drake paused as their radio crackled to life. “You all okay?”

Hayden shouted down the line. “We have Price. Do you have Ramses and Webb?”

“Not really, no.”

“Not really? What the hell does that mean?”

“It means it’s a work in progress.” Drake flashed on the fact that when he’d seen Beauregard running along the riverbank the man had most definitely been alone. Maybe he’s stashed Webb in a tree or something? A baboon’s den, hopefully.

“Drake,” Hayden asked. “Where do we stand?”

He explained quickly as they approached the waiting chopper. Dahl, Mai and Alicia ran ahead to help Beauregard mop up the remaining terrorists. “We’re about to set off in pursuit,” he said. “Can you grab some transport?”

Back along the docks, he remembered, two separate choppers out of many remained untouched, as their owners fought and died alongside them or became caught up in the conflagration, searching for another way out.

“Damn right we can,” Hayden snarled. “Get that bird up in the air now, Drake, and chase Ramses down. If he escapes the world will pay. Once we’re airborne I’m going to have to speak to the President.”

Drake clambered aboard the commandeered helicopter. “We’re on our way.”