“And why are there five?” the Swede asked.
“Us, plus bodyguards. Protection is… must.”
Drake caught the man’s attention. “Did you have… shall we say an inventory? Or an index of items.” He searched for an easier description. “A wish list.”
“No. Ramses’ reputation is enough for me.”
“What were you hoping to buy?” Hayden asked suddenly, changing the flow of questioning.
The Albanian’s eyes fell. “I not know. Browse, you say? Yes… browse.”
Drake gulped down a rush of bile born of pure hatred for such creatures as this who murdered and destroyed lives because they thought they had a right to. He signaled and Dahl went off quickly to tell Alicia to shut the boat down. They didn’t want to be drifting too close to the bazaar just yet.
“So that’s it?” he said. “The bazaar is a basic market place with stalls and entertainment. Ramses is in it to make a few quick bucks and seal a few deals. Will it really be so easy to get in?”
The Albanian understood the last sentence. “All hard work done,” he said. “To get passes. They know you don’t keep… people waiting.”
Drake met Hayden’s eyes. “Five passes,” he speculated. “I wonder…”
With shocking swiftness the Albanian’s wife struck out, battering Hayden’s already bruised face with a mug and then kicking her in the chest. Hayden tripped over the coffee table and went sprawling. Drake ignored the shock and leapt at her. The Albanian man struck too. Drake reached the wife first, but she danced away, kicks and blows well aimed enough to make him slow down. The Albanian hit him from behind, the bottle coming down against his neck, but over the thick jacket he wore so the pain was dulled. Drake flicked his shoulders, throwing the man off. The wife came in again. Drake batted her foot away, grabbed her ankle and pulled, overbalancing her so that she smashed through the table. Hayden rose once more, face now bruised in two places, and shouted a warning.
“Quit!” she cried. “As of now, you guys live. Any more of this shit and I’ll personally gut the both of you!”
Drake spun to face the Albanian, hands ready, but the man backed off, holding his arms high but still clinging to the heavy bottle.
“Had to try,” he said, fingers grasping around the neck.
The wife picked herself up off the floor, brushing glass from her clothes and wincing from the dozen or so cuts she’d received. Drake noted that she still did not stop even as the blood flowed and caught Hayden’s attention.
“I think the two Albanian Kruegers really need to be restrained and guarded. No slacking. These two are bloody dangerous.”
“I agree.”
There was the clatter of footsteps and then the rest of the team joined them. Drake regarded Alicia.
“How close are we?”
“No sign of the bazaar’s guards. We’re okay for now.”
“Good. Because we have decisions to make before we go in.”
“I’m all ears.”
“Five passes,” he said. “Eight of us. Who stays?”
“Soldiers should go,” Yorgi said immediately. “More training if something go wrong. If I am needed I can help better alone.”
“Then that rules me out,” Lauren said. “But I agree. I’d be no good in there.”
Smyth watched her. “I’ll stay with them,” he muttered. “That makes it easy and they’re gonna need a guard.”
Drake agreed with him. His eyes took in Alicia and Dahl, Hayden and Kinimaka. “Then it’s all up to us. Are you ready to crash the last bazaar?”
“Are you kidding?” Alicia grinned. “Crashing parties is my thing.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Drake said automatically, then added, “In fact, I remember it.”
Dahl stayed serious. “We should conduct a little extra interrogation first. Get them to tell us about what we’re allowed to take in — weapons and the like.”
Kinimaka couldn’t take his eyes away from Hayden’s bruised face. “Shit.”
Hayden ignored him. “All right, let’s do this. And in there we’re in hell. Murder central. Surrounded by the worst of the worst. This is gonna be like nothing we’ve experienced before, boys, so be careful. Danger, literally, will be all around.”
“Better than that other fucker that they reckon is all around,” Alicia murmured. “Love.”
Dahl rubbed his hands together a little too gleefully for Drake’s liking. “So come on,” he said. “What are we waiting for? Ramses’ bazaar isn’t going to obliterate itself.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Tyler Webb rather enjoyed wandering anonymously from tent to tent, pavilion to pavilion by way of several cut-back jungle trails. Yes, the persistent showers were annoying and, in truth, they were a little more than that but Webb began to welcome the heavy downpours because they actually brought a little relief from the incessant heat. Of course, their aftermath brought even more humidity as the jungle dried out, but most of these tents were air-conditioned anyway. How else could you attract so many wealthy people to Purgatory?
Webb sensed Beauregard at his side the entire time, except for twice when the lithe Frenchman was forced into action. The conflict didn’t last long, though the one time Webb noticed his adversary was a woman several words were passed along with wry smiles. As darkness fell on that first day, Webb found himself enjoying the diversities. Wealthy, privileged men like himself craved uniqueness and Ramses’ bazaar was as unusual as it got.
Guards moved aside, their weapons pointed upward, as Webb ambled by. This pavilion extended up to a point, white fabric stretched and adorned with lights, bathing the key area in a golden glow. Webb’s interest centered on a long, low sturdy table where sat three familiar items.
Julian Marsh’s plan of using a so-called suitcase nuke to force the US to capitulate to the Pythians’ demands — as China previously had over the Z-Boxes — had forced both Webb and Marsh to become doyens of what was once simply Cold War tech. The only nations with enough expertise and money to successfully develop a tactical nuclear weapon small enough to fit into a backpack or large suitcase were the US, the Russians, and the Israelis. None of these three had acknowledged the existence of a weapon compact enough to be able to fit into a small suitcase, but the original technology was now at least thirty years old. It was also claimed — but never proven — that a dummy suitcase nuke was regularly carried on internal airline flights in the 1980s. For training purposes naturally. Webb allowed a little smile of disdain to creep across his features. How many times per day did a government lie to its people? And how many of those lies were for the people’s own good, rather than the politicians’?
He moved closer to the table in question, studying the item it held. The backpack was large and shapely enough so that it would stand out in a crowd, even scream for a closer inspection. The coloring was distinctly military, the strapping old and worn. It actually looked to Webb like half an oil drum wrapped in canvas.
The surprise must have registered on his face, for a man stepped forward out of a discreet shadow. “Is this not to your liking, sir?”
Webb scowled. “When I heard the term ‘suitcase nuke’ I imagined something smaller.”
“These three items are overlarge for your purposes?”
“They were overlarge for Hussein. How the hell am I supposed to utilize them?”
“Might I point you this way then, sir?”
The salesman, a young African who sported a name badge with the code word: Clay, which Webb really didn’t understand, waved him toward a set of curtains on the far side of the tent. Though the screen was merely fabric, the way it was hung and with two more beyond, it formed the perfect barrier. Webb passed through all three to find himself in a much smaller area bordered by two exterior sides of the tent. Clay left him and Beauregard to face a man whose face and demeanor was much more in keeping with the nature of the bazaar.