Court slammed into the cold tile floor, slid forward, and lifted the third gunman’s pistol. The man with the knife in his eye was on his knees now, dying but not yet dead, screaming bloody murder. Gentry rolled onto his back next to him and turned to fire back at the last enemy still in the fight. This man had a half chance to shoot but hesitated; Court was alongside his partner.
The Gray Man, however, did not hesitate. From his prone position he poured round after round between his splayed legs into the armed man and watched him spin and die.
When Court was certain the only man alive was the hit man next to him with the knife in his eye, he placed the barrel of the gun to the wounded man’s temple and pulled the trigger without hesitation.
The American stood over the bodies of three men sprawled in the bright, white corridor. Blood splatters stained the wall, and pools grew from the corpses at his feet. His ears rang, and his thigh wound stung and throbbed.
They had compromised themselves back at the coffee shop. He’d pegged them as operators in just over one second as they came through the door and he noticed the unmistakable flicker of recognition in the first man’s face as he met Gentry’s glance.
After identifying the threat these three men posed, Court had watched them in the reflection of the handbill of the poetry reading, in the reflection of the café’s windows, out on the street in the windshields of the few passing vehicles. In the stairway down to the metro, he sensed them closing. They closed further in the tunnel, and by the last turn before the trains, he knew the time had come to act.
Court had been faster, better-trained, colder-hearted, but as he stood over the three bodies, he knew good and goddamn well there was only one reason they were now slaughtered meat and his racing pulse continued to pump blood through him.
Dumb fucking luck.
These assassins just decided to stop in for coffee before taking position outside of his hotel, and Court just happened to be at the café when they got there.
Everything else just fell into place after that.
Court was lucky.
He knew it was good to be lucky. But he also knew his luck could turn in an instant. Luck was fleeting, arbitrary, fickle.
Court scavenged the bodies quickly and without a shred of remorse. He knew the morning’s first commuters would be rounding the corner either towards or away from the trains in moments. Less than thirty seconds after the last gunshot, the Gray Man had collected a Czech-made CZ pistol and a small wad of euros and crowns.
One minute after that, he was back at street level and wearing a canvas jacket taken from one of the men. The blood on his dark brown pants was concealed by the morning’s shower. Through the mist he walked, purposefully but without haste, towards a bus stop near the Charles Bridge. A slight limp in his gait, but nothing else differentiated him from the ever-increasing throngs of people on the street, each beginning their workday commute.
Fitzroy had been offered a small room with a cot to rest, but he refused on principle. Instead, he dozed fitfully in the conference room in a high-backed executive chair. Around his slumped form, the Tech moved from terminal to terminal, and Lloyd made call after call on his mobile. The security men stood both inside and outside the door throughout the night.
Sir Donald awoke at six thirty and was just sipping black coffee when the Tech called across the room to Lloyd. “Sir. The Albanians are not checking in.”
Lloyd had been sitting in a chair across from Fitzroy, drinking coffee and staring at a map of Prague. He looked up at his man, shrugged his shoulders, and pursed his lips. “Hard to do when you’re dead.”
The Tech remained hopeful. “We have no way of knowing—”
Lloyd wasn’t listening. He spoke mostly to himself. “One down. Eleven to go. That didn’t take long.”
Fitzroy smiled behind his coffee cup, and Lloyd noticed this. He rose to his feet, circled the mahogany table, and kneeled in front of Sir Donald. In a soft voice he said, “You and I may seem like adversaries, but we have the same goal here. If you are secretly celebrating the Gray Man’s victory, remember that as he gets closer to his target, the stakes will rise. The quicker he is put in the dirt, the better it is for you, your son, your daughter-in-law, and your precious little granddaughters.”
Sir Donald’s smile faded.
Over an hour later, Fitzroy’s satellite phone chirped. Lloyd and his men immediately went into silent mode. Sir Donald pushed the speakerphone button just after the third ring.
“Court? I have been trying to reach you. How are you?”
“What the hell is going on?”
“What do you mean?”
“Another kill squad just tried to zap me.”
“You’re joking.”
“Do I joke?”
“Admittedly not. Who were they?”
“I’m pretty fucking sure they were not Nigerians. Three white dudes. Looked Central European. Didn’t have time to pull IDs. If they were any good, they wouldn’t have been carrying them, anyway.”
“Abubaker must still be using hired hands. No surprise, considering his deep pockets. Are you injured in any way?”
“Yeah, I am, but not by these clowns. I took a bullet to my thigh in the plane yesterday morning.”
“You’ve been shot?”
“No big deal.”
Lloyd reached quickly for a notepad and jotted this information down.
“Son, there has been a complication.”
“Complication? I’ve had to take down eight guys in the last twenty-eight hours because of some breach in your Network. You’re damn right there’s been a complication!”
“The Nigerians know I am your handler.”
The satellite connection went quiet for a moment. Finally Gentry said, “Shit, Don. How did that happen?”
“Like I said… a complication.”
“Then you are in just as much danger as me. It’s just a matter of time before they come for you, too.” There was concern in the younger man’s voice.
“They already have.”
A pause. “What’s happened?”
“They have my family. My son and my daughter-in-law, my two grandchildren.”
“The twins,” Court said softly.
“Yes. They are holding them in France, telling me I must give you up, or they will kill them. Thirty minutes ago they gave me forty-eight hours to produce you, dead or alive. They have teams hunting for you, but they want me to give them intel on your whereabouts.”
“Which you already have, apparently.”
“No, son. I haven’t said a word. You were compromised in Iraq somehow, yes, but a Nigerian agent saw you board the plane in Tbilisi. I’ve told them nothing, and I don’t intend to.”
“But your son’s family.”
“I don’t turn on my men. You are family, too.”
Fitzroy’s face was twisted into a pained expression of disgust at his words, but Lloyd’s eyes widened appreciatively at the elder Englishman’s two-faced ability to simultaneously cajole and betray his top killer. Fitzroy was playing whatever remaining heartstrings his assassin possessed like a virtuoso.
Lloyd knew Gentry’s file like the back of his hand. He knew what would come next.
“Where are they holding them?”
“A château in Normandy, France, north of the town of Bayeux.”
“Forty-eight hours?”
“Minus thirty minutes. Eight a.m. on Sunday morning is the deadline. They say they have assets in the French National Police; any hint of an operation against their location will result in a massacre.”
“Yeah. The cops will be useless. I’ve got a better chance going solo.”
“Court, I don’t know what you are thinking, but it is too dangerous for you to try any sort of—”
“Don, I need you to trust me. Best thing I can do is get there and clean this shit up myself. I need you to get me all the intel you can about their force structure, don’t give up any info on me, and I will get your family back.”