Bwana, half falling back, losing his balance, deflected the strike with his right hand and, with his left hand, bunched Cruz’s shirt, put a knee to his middle and heaved him over his head, and threw him behind.
He rolled immediately, getting to his feet and turning around, and Cruz was up, attacking, not giving him time. He had run almost half a mile, but he was breathing normally, the knife weaving in his hand, catching the sunlight in tiny streaks.
He feinted, withdrew, feinted and attacked, a quick in an out at Bwana’s stomach, and Bwana stepped back. He darted forward again, and this time the blade went horizontal and upward, a smooth controlled flow, and Bwana swayed out of reach again.
Bwana reached down for his knife, but stopped when Cruz feinted again, a long sweep of his arm, Bwana following it with his eyes, and the arm swerved suddenly up, Bwana moving just his upper body and his head, the sharp edge catching the tip of his ear.
Cruz bared his teeth in a feral grin, attacked rapidly, thrusting in short fluid motions, and as his right arm was cutting the air, the left hand, which was stretched for balance, cocked and swung at Bwana… who was ready for it, sailed under it, and the knife came back, lightning fast, parting the air, aiming for his throat.
Bwana bent back, making room and then following the blade, grasped Cruz’s wrist in a lock that had crushed bricks, pulled Cruz forward, kicking him in the groin, his leg curling up in the same motion to knee him in the face, swayed to the side, still holding his wrist, twisted and dislocated his shoulder.
He threw Cruz to the ground and grasped his hair to pull his head back and break his neck.
‘No,’ Broker said quietly.
Bwana paused, looked silently at him, Cruz’s harsh breathing punctuating the seconds, and slowly released his head, and finally cuffed and gagged him.
He stood up, breathed deeply once, twice, then thrice, to rid his head of the adrenaline and combat instinct, and caught Broker’s smile.
‘You could’ve shot him and saved me the trouble.’ He grinned.
‘I thought it was high time you took a shower, and this now gives you the reason,’ Broker bantered back. He’d guessed, correctly, that the two swipes were more blood than cuts, and would heal in no time.
‘Were you slow, or…?’ Broker asked.
‘Nope. I wanted him to draw blood, make him confident. Overconfident.’
He walked over to Diego, crouched down, and looked in the hate-filled eyes. The feared enforcer stared back and spat at Bwana, who ducked and smiled at Broker.
‘Feisty fella, ain’t he? Let’s see just how long he lasts.’ He pressed down on the wound in Diego’s thigh.
Diego cracked ten minutes later and told them what they wanted to know.
They looked up as steps came their way — Roger and Bear, who had finished searching the bodies and stacked them together.
‘What?’ Bwana demanded, seeing something in their eyes.
‘Chloe, she’s not answering. Tony too. Eric doesn’t know where they are. He thought they would be here by now.’
Chapter 37
The Watcher had been following Tony at a sedate pace, knowing Tony would eventually take him to where the rest of them were going. He knew they were planning to take out Cruz and Diego; the where was unclear to him.
As they headed out of the city, he figured it would be somewhere on the highway, and once they were on the US 130, he knew.
He held back, shielded from Tony’s mirrors by the dark around him, his headlights doused, and was enjoying the feel of air and speed when he saw Tony’s brake lights come on, slow down, then pick up speed. He drifted to have a clearer view of the highway ahead and didn’t see anything.
That was his first inkling of trouble.
When Tony veered off the highway, the Watcher idled to a stop, dug out his night vision and scanned. He saw Tony step down from his vehicle and approach Chloe. When they bent over her bike, four figures sprang from behind the undergrowth and surrounded the two.
They were bundled in the Patriot. He followed them.
He shook his head at the hitters’ stupidity. They should’ve shot the two, but then the end result would have been the same.
Traffic was increasing now; on this highway, a couple of cars half an hour apart was the definition of heavy traffic.
Onward they went, down US 130, the SUV maintaining a steady pace, down an exit, then another, more tarmac and miles, and they entered Gloucester City shrouded in predawn mist, its red traffic lights blinking at emptiness.
Klemm Avenue and Market Street fell behind, and Southport loomed, power pylons and cranes reaching up in the sky like Godzillas.
The Watcher, holding way back now, blending his ride with dark surroundings wherever he could, followed them down to the port on potholed tracks that had forgotten what tarmac was, and saw them turn into a factory site.
He turned off his bike, and in the distance he could hear iron grating rolling, the entrance to the site being shut.
He gave them another fifteen minutes as he pushed his bike closer to the site and laid it on its side in the cover of stunted undergrowth. Stripping off his leathers, he donned a lightweight backpack that he tightly secured, and resumed the chase on foot.
Hunt, he corrected himself. It was no longer a chase.
The rolling gate across the site was ten feet tall, rusted, and went from left to right where it got padlocked to securing clasps. There was no padlock on the gate, but one glance at the condition of the gate and the Watcher ruled out rolling it a foot back to slip in.
He approached the left pillar, took a running jump, levering himself off it, over the gate and inside.
Inside was a flat expanse of tarmac littered with broken crates, old containers in a corner, run-down trucks, forklifts… what one would expect to see in a factory site, except they were all still and old.
The structure in front of him was huge, as large as an aircraft hangar, with a gaping entrance large enough for a midsized plane to wheel in and out of, and through the dim light inside he could see gantry cranes and machines.
The structure didn’t have windows, but had skylights, and the only way inside was through that enormous maw. Ruling it out, he ran along the side of the structure, left of the entrance, to the far end, peering cautiously around the corner and saw another large entrance in that side, two hundred yards down. The rear probably had another such exit.
He pulled a black ski mask over his head, donned dark shades and thin feel-through gloves, and paused when he heard the noise.
A woman’s voice cut off abruptly by a sharp sound, a slap, and then another man’s voice that, too, got cut off. The other voices started shouting again, talking over one another, their individual voices echoing in the cavernous interior.
He made out that they were at the side entrance and, if they were smart, would be in the deep interior where the light didn’t reach. He couldn’t risk putting any eyes inside, not even a fiber camera, without knowing how alert they were and which way they were facing.
Their shouting was a good sign, though. They don’t know where Cruz and Diego are, haven’t been able to make contact, don’t know if their bosses are dead or alive. He heard further shouting, slapping sounds, and what sounded like a groan. Shouting also meant they were thinking less.
He looked round and saw a couple of barrels in a far corner of the site. He ran toward them, saw they were empty, and lifting one easily, brought it back to the corner of the building. Placing it on its rounded side, the flat top parallel to the side of the structure, he assessed the lengths of the sides of the building.