He acted fast, before doubt could creep in.
He snatched up a piece of metal that was still hot from where it had torn free of the wreckage. It would be no defense against a semi-automatic.
He hugged close to the wall, brushing against the concrete blocks until he was close enough to reach out and touch the door. Another shot. He couldn’t tell if it came from the tower or from the building.
He was banking on Leopov reading his mind. She fired a single shot into the open doorway.
Maddock seized the chance. He hit the door hard, and slammed it into place, trying to force the sliver of metal underneath the frame to wedge it closed.
A staccato burst of gunfire erupted from inside and tore through the door, showering him with splinters of wood.
He pulled back against the wall, grateful for the thickness of concrete between him and the Russian bullets. The door was shredded. If he’d been behind it he would have been cut in half. He needed to get Leopov out of the tower. His pistol was one thing, but the gun she’d taken from the dead sentry was another altogether. They needed to match the Russians shell for shell.
Bones had read his thoughts.
The Cherokee reacted to Maddock’s move, charging toward the sentry tower. He could see Leopov making her way down the ladder, exposed.
“Wanna start a fire then, boss?” Willis said, appearing at the other side of the fence again.
“Let’s light this place up like the Bicentennial,” Maddock said.
Willis chuckled. “You’re a man out of time; that’s so Seventies. You couldn’t just go with the Fourth of July?”
Maddock rolled his eyes.
The overwhelming smell of gasoline filled the air. Willis carried a box stuffed with a dozen or so glass bottles, all of various shapes and sizes, each with a rag wedged into its neck.
“That’s me,” Maddock said, distracted by the sight of Bones and Leopov racing back across the killing ground toward them. “Time for the fireworks.”
“What’s the plan?” Willis asked.
“We take out the bad guys, get the egg back, save the girl and get the hell out of Dodge. You know, that kind of thing. Nothing to it.”
“Not that this girl looks like she needs saving.”
“No. But maybe I was calling you the girl?” Maddock grinned.
“Funny.”
“I like to think so.”
Bones reached the wall. “Ready to smoke those bad boys out?”
“I think we give them a couple of minutes then we open the door,” Maddock said.
A look passed between the four of them. Bones broke the strained silence. “Either I’m missing the joke or you’ve lost your mind.” He had a tight hold on the gun. Leopov had a huge smile on her face. Maddock almost told her she’d done a good job, but if she wanted to be treated like one of them she was going to have to get used to being taken for granted.
“I’m not sure we’ve got much of a choice. We can’t rain down holy hell on them. We need to get in after them, or smoke them out, if we’re going to complete the mission. Remember we’re here to get the egg. Simple as that. They have it. They’re in there. We want it. We need to go in and get it or bring them out and take it off them.”
“You make it sound simple,” Leopov said.
“Logistically it is.”
“What about secondary objectives?” she asked. “If the egg is some sort of assassination tool, how about we rig the place to blow — we wouldn’t get the egg back, but the Russians wouldn’t have it either.”
“We’d still have to go in to make sure it had been destroyed. We couldn’t risk someone finding it in the rubble, especially as we don’t have any idea of what’s inside or or how well its contents are protected,” Maddock said.
“He’s got a point,” Bones said. “So we go in after it.”
A single semi-automatic, four handguns and a box of Molotov cocktails didn’t seem like much to go up against a crack team of Russian Spetsnaz who were armed to the teeth. The odds were stacked in the Russians’ favor. Maddock had never been on to worry about odds when he had a job to do. Maddock was working on the theory that the enemy wouldn’t be eager to die; self-preservation should take precedence. The problem was some things were worth dying for. What if the Russians saw this as one of them?
“We could try negotiating with them,” Leopov suggested.
“You think they’ll just hand it over if we ask nicely?” Maddock asked. “They’ve got us out gunned, we’re on their soil risking a major international incident. And let’s be honest, for all we know they could be radioing for reinforcements right now.”
“You make a compelling case,” she agreed. “Let’s go in through the front door then.”
TWENTY SEVEN
Willis held one of the bottles at the ready.
He’d found a length of wood and used the still-burning wreckage of the helicopter to turn it into a blazing torch. Admittedly, the conflagration was overkill, but it worked. They made their way back to the doors on the other side of the building where Professor was keeping an eye on the skidoos. He welcomed the thought of the Russkies charging out. He was ready to do some serious damage to East-West relations.
Maddock kept the others back as he moved past the skidoos.
Bones had handed over the heavy artillery. Even so he’d be at Maddock’s side, ready to take down all comers.
Willis hefted the burning cocktail, ready to hurl it through the doorway.
Leopov’s idea of trying to talk their way out of this without bloodshed appealed, but why on earth would a bunch of fanatics seemingly involved in a plot to assassinate their own president simply hand over Pandora’s Egg? It was naïve in the extreme.
Maddock eased the door open.
No gunshots greeted the slow groan. He waited, holding the team back.
Nothing.
The Russians waited somewhere in the near darkness within. Ready.
Maddock gestured for the team to move in. They took a couple of steps over the threshold and waited for the volley of gunfire. Nothing.
No. Not nothing.
In the silence Maddock heard a dry click and knew they were screwed. The point man had tripped some kind of trap.
“Get out!” he yelled, snatching hold of Leopov’s arm and pushing her back toward the open door. She stumbled as the first bullet dug into the concrete where her head had been a heartbeat before. They bundled back through the still open doorway out into the open air. Bones was on point. He had no idea if the man had been cut down until he saw him stumble out of the door behind them a few seconds later, bleeding. He’d taken a hit up in the soft flesh of his left bicep. His Arctic jacket was stained with blood. The big man didn’t so much as wince as he came out of there.
Maddock dragged Leopov to one side as a hail of bullets filled the air with deafening noise. It was pointless firing back into the darkness.
Willis didn’t hesitate. He flung the first of his blazing bombs inside.
The glass bottle hit the concrete floor and exploded with a gout of flame which seemed to suck in the air from outside to swell its angry fire before it died back. Amongst the roar of the flames Maddock heard a scream. At least one of the Russians was hurt. Willis launched a second bottle. The burning rag blazed a trail through the air as it turned end over end before spinning away into the line of flames beyond the threshold.
The scream was louder this time. A direct hit. A burning man staggered out through the doorway, dropping to his knees as the fire tore up his body, fusing cloth and flesh into one blackened, charred, mess of sores. The flames licked at his face. He brought his Kalashnikov up, spewing bullets until the trigger dry-clicked on the empty cartridge. The burning man didn’t release his grip. He couldn’t. It wasn’t a good way to die. He fell forward, dead, still burning, the cocktail soaking into his skin. The air reeked with the stench of charred meat.