Kreshnik approached a valve on the pipe. Warner’s voice rang out.
“Freeze! Hands out from your body, now!” Warner fast-walked toward him, gun pointed at his chest.
Kreshnik’s right hand went up. The left stayed out of sight.
“Both hands, now!
Kreshnik abruptly ducked, and his left hand flicked into view. Warner fired his pistol twice as he flattened himself against the wall, dodging two heavy resin spikes. The shots exploded like a howitzer battery in the tight confines of the cement-lined tunnel, the sound wave enough to knock a man flat. Kreshnik spun, arms flailing as a bullet slapped the meat and bone of his shoulder.
Leka charged from behind, knife in hand. His ears ringing wildly, Warner barely heard the thump of boots on floor. He attemptied to roll away from Leka's powerful hammer hands a moment too late. Warner's arm flew up to deflect the knife thrust. The blade came fast, slicing muscle and sinew between the radius and ulna. Warner let out a bellowing roar and jammed the butt of his pistol into the muscular Kosovar's skull. Leka roared back and hammered his fist into Warner's forehead, smacking the agent into the wall and jarring his pistol loose. It spun across the floor with a clatter.
Leka jabbed a fist toward Warner's gut, and the agent raised his leg to deflect the blow. Leka’s knuckles cracked against Warner's knee. Both men shouted in pain-filled fury. Grunting back the agony in his arm, the knife had wedged solidly between the bones of his forearm, Warner grabbed Leka's shirt and used the man's own body weight to leverage him across and away. Leka countered by grabbing Warner's clothes. The two men toppled to the ground in a seething mass of grappling and growling like a cage-fight death match. Their faces pressed against each other, grinding jawbones into each other like weapons, using every part of their anatomy as a tool of inflicting pain. Fingernails gouged into skin. Knees pressed to thigh muscles and groin. Elbows dug into ribs. Warner bit Leka's ear, drawing blood and eliciting a howl. Leka grabbed the knife handle protruding from the other's arm. Warner let out a scream and drove a thumb into Leka's eye, then repeatedly jammed a knee into his groin. Leka reacted to the testicle blow, loosening his grip enough for Warner to roll into the upper position and drive an elbow into Leka's solar plexus.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the wounded Kreshnik rise to his knees, grab the gun that had flown from Warner’s hand, pick it up, and point it at him. Warner quickly fell back onto his side, allowing Leka to raise on top of him. He took the bait. Kreshnik's shot exploded as Leka rose above Warner. A look of triumph lit Leka's eyes in the brief second before the bullet slammed the side of his head, face bursting like a ruptured melon. Leka snapped to one side, flying off the Secret Service agent as if yanked by an unseen string.
“No!” Kreshnik shouted.
Warner, now without a shield, scrambled to his feet. Another shot rang out. Warner instinctively stiffened, waiting for the bullet to slam into his body. Instead, he saw Kreshnik stumble back, a look of shock on his face. Warner turned to see where the shot had come from.
Tomer moved forward from the darkness behind them, gun raised with both hands.
“You all right, Robo-Cop?”
“Yeah, thanks.”
“No problem, but you owe me one.”
A steady stream of blood ran from the knife wound in Warner's arm, dripping from his fingertips. He checked Leka's body. He was very dead, one eye staring wildly into space, the other sitting round and bright white against the mash of bloody pudding that had been the right side of his face. The pair of agents moved toward Kreshnik, Tomer’s pistol up and ready. Warner’s weapon was several yards on the other side of the man. The Kosovar was still alive, moaning, shaking, blood bubbling from his mouth. Tomer shook his head at the sight, his turned a pale green. Warner could see by the look in his eyes, he’d never shot a man before.
Kreshnik's trembling hands moved to his chest, clutching at the wound. He said something neither man understood, then convulsed, his arms twitching, one grasping the fabric of his coveralls near the pocket. He squeezed something, as if he were feeling for an object inside, searching with the tips of his fingers. A key fob slid out of his pocket onto the floor. He grabbed it and fumbled over the buttons.
“Shoot him!” Warner cried out.
Tomer raised his pistol and fired three rapid shots, twice in the chest and once in the head. The top of Kreshnik’s skull burst, his dying hand contracting on the key fob. A loud pop sounded far down the tunnel, followed immediately by a sharp crack. A moment later, the air shook with a roar that erupted into a deafening explosion, snapping the atmosphere into chunks too jagged to breathe. The distant darkness suddenly blazed with the light of a fire fed by high-pressure jet fuel, its brightness blossoming like a solar flare reaching through the tunnel to grab them.
“Run!” Warner shouted.
He grabbed Tomer by the arm and they sprinted for the exit, a fireball expanding behind them. As they reached the stairs, smoke started rising from their jackets. The sharp odor of their burning hair prompted them to take three stairs at a time, Tomer's fear outweighing his bulk. The fire sucked the air from around them. With a burst of primal energy, Warner slammed the door open just as the blaze of jet fuel filled the space around them. The pent-up pressure threw them bodily into the air, a bright orange tongue of flame chasing them as their bodies slammed onto the pavement twenty yards away.
In the center of the park strip, a pillar of flame fifty feet high shrank back into the gaping hole from which it had erupted as the pressure released via the open door. Warner’s shocked system realized with a sudden new panic that he was on fire. He joined Tomer already rolling on the ground to put out his own flames. Screaming people fled in every direction. In the distance, a very loud “boom-pfff” thumped the air, Warner had heard the sound before, in Afghanistan — malfunctioning mortar shells bursting in their tubes.
Chapter 30
Muffled pops sounded far in the rear of the park crowd, followed by a loud crack and a rumble beneath the grassy field. The fat family jerked toward the commotion as fast as their bulk would let them, their corpulent necks undulating with the movement. Suki clutched Jim's arm, stiff with shock. They turned to see people running. Jim's eyes snapped over to Farrah. The man stared straight ahead, locking his eyes on the president, whose view of the distant chaos was unhindered. Farrah's mouth twitched with a psychotic smile. The Nordic-looking couple both let out a yelp, terror registering on their faces. Jim followed their gaze and saw a pillar of fire reaching skyward, screams echoing through the crowd. Panic swelled, starting at the back of the crowd, then moving closer live the wave of a tsunami, driving unavoidable horror nearer and nearer, allowing no place to run.
Secret Service and the foreign bodyguards rushed to protect their charges, forming a wall of armed flesh, guns drawn, waiting for a target to materialize. They organized into an impassable cordon around the stage, shoulder to shoulder. Their faces were hard like flint, no fear, ready to absorb whatever danger might be coming. The dignitaries instantly vanished behind their bodyguards. Vehicles revved and the powerful men on the stage were whisked to safety behind bullet proof glass and armored plates.
Far in the distance, several blocks away, came two loud explosions carried on the air with another sound that made Jim think of metal being ripped. He looked back at Farrah, now certain he was part of what was happening. Instead of being frightened like everyone else, the man looked furious, his plans apparently gone wrong. He turned back toward the stage, his body tense, about to bolt. Jim reached out and grabbed him by the shoulder of his jacket, yanking hard.