12

Colclough brought the car to a halt. They were in the Marais, directly across the river from the Ile Saint-Louis. Once, aristocrats and courtiers built their mansions here, to be as close as possible to the kings of France in their palace at the Louvre. They filled their homes with paintings, sculptures, and furniture of exquisite taste. They dressed in silk and lace. Yet behind the impeccable facades and courtly etiquette raged an unrelenting war for influence, wealth, and access to the throne.

When the old order vanished in the revolutionary frenzy of 1789, the Marais went with it. The area was neglected for almost two centuries, only to be revived in recent decades as a Parisian equivalent to New York’s SoHo or London’s Notting Hill. Now the rich and fashionable rubbed shoulders with the ethnic and exotic: exclusive boutiques next to Jewish delis, gay bars alongside Algerian restaurants. But many of the mansions remained, and one, at least, was still home to conspiracy and intrigue.

“It’s just there,” he said, pointing with his free right hand to a gateway about fifty meters ahead of them, on the far side of the road. Then he slumped in his seat and muttered, “I don’t know why I bothered. You’re gonna kill me anyway.”

Carver reached across, grabbed the shoulder of Colclough’s sweat-sodden shirt, and shook him. “No, I’m not. Not if you do exactly what you’re told. If we live, so do you.”

“Aren’t you scared I’ll talk?”

“Who to? I don’t see you going to the police in a hurry. If we’re alive, then Max won’t be, so you won’t be talking to him. And you’ve already told us you have no more idea who his boss is than we do. So don’t worry. I believed you when you swore you wouldn’t blab. But this little chat just wasted thirty seconds. So drive up to the gate, nice and easy. Let the guard open up. And keep your mouth shut.”

Carver pulled a third plastic cuff from his pocket as Colclough started the car again. “Last in the packet,” he said with a wry smile, handing it to Alix. “That’s for the man at the gate. I’ll tell you when.”

The car pulled up in front of the gate. Colclough flashed the headlights. The gates swung open and a man on the far side waved them through. He was holding a gun, another Uzi by the look of it, straight down by his leg, making a token attempt at keeping it out of sight of passersby.

The man stepped up to the car and motioned to Colclough to open the window. Carver was counting on him doing what all gatekeepers do—bend down and look inside the car. When he did, he’d see Carver’s gun pointing at him. Alix would then get out and cuff the guard. Simple—just so long as Colclough kept his mouth shut.

But the copper lost his nerve. As the metal gates swung shut behind the car and the man leaned down toward the open window, he shouted, “Watch out! He’s got a gun!”

The guard stepped back and tried to bring his Uzi to bear. Carver was faster. He raised his pistol and shot twice through the half-open driver’s window. He put two bullets neatly grouped in the guard’s chest, the force of them slamming him up against the brickwork at the side of the entrance arch.

“Big mistake,” Carver muttered, almost to himself.

Colclough was moaning, “Oh Jesus, I’m sorry, please don’t kill me. . . .”

Carver ignored him. He threw Alix’s gun into her hands. “Follow me!” he shouted. “Fast!”

The key principles of close-range urban combat are surprise, speed, and controlled violence. Any hope of surprise had just been shattered. That left speed and violence. Carver started running.

Across the cobblestones, the main body of the house rose in a block of gray white stone. As he reloaded his pistol, Carver glanced to the right, where the black hood of a BMW 7 Series limousine glinted in the recesses of the old coach house. Max traveled in style. If Carver got out alive, that would be his getaway vehicle. By the front door he stopped for a second and gestured to Alix to stand on the far side. He took a deep breath, steadied himself, counted to three, and kicked the door open, moving in fast, his gun held straight out in front of him. He caught a glimpse of Alix following just behind.

The hallway was floored with white marble tiles, and a massive glass lantern, lit by electric candles, hung down the center of the stairwell. The staircase curved back on itself as it rose up to the first floor. Carver heard a sudden high pitched warning shout from behind him, saw a door open to the right of the stairs and a man run out.

Carver’s reaction was subconscious, automatic. He fired at the man and the backup who came after him. They both went down. Carver needed to get upstairs, fast. But he never turned his back on a wounded man. He strode ten paces across the marble floor and finished the job: two point-blank head shots that spattered blood, bone, and brain matter across the marble floor.

Alix whimpered in horror.

“Come on!” Carver shouted as he turned and ran towards the stairs.

Three men down so far, thought Carver, taking the steps two at a time. That left how many—another three, four maybe? He had to get to the next floor before . . .

The stair in front of him disintegrated in a clattering blast of submachinegun fire. Carver threw himself down, scrabbling for the cover of the stone balustrade that followed the sweep of the staircase as the last reverberations died away. Then, through the ringing in his ears, he heard a familiar calm, flat voice.

“That’s far enough, Carver. Get up. And drop your weapon.”

He craned his neck and gazed up at the top of the staircase. He could see three men. Two of them were big guys, powerfully built but running to fat, with necks wider than their skulls: basic joints of beef from the head down. The third man was standing between them, a tall, thin figure in charcoal gray trousers, a white shirt—sleeves rolled up his forearms—and frameless designer glasses.

He barked an order at one of the men. “McCall, bring that man here.” Then he turned to the other guy. “Harrison, cover him. If he tries anything, shoot him. Shoot McCall too, if you have to.”

The thin man looked down, regarding Carver with a disapproving eye, as if disappointed by what he saw.

“One more time, drop your weapon.”

Carver let the gun fall from his hand. It clattered against the stone step. It struck him that he was alone on the stairs. Alix had vanished. Well, he could hardly blame her for that. She was all right, that girl. He wanted her to get away. And that meant buying her time.

“You must be Max,” he said, getting to his feet.

“If you say so. And now, perhaps you’ll tell me what you’re doing here.”

McCall reached Carver, pointed his gun at him, and waved the barrel upward. “Move it,” he said.

“Jesus Christ, Max,” said Carver, moving slowly up the stairs, “is this the best you can do for staff? Let me give you some advice. If you want top-quality people, it’s best not to kill the ones who are actually any good. So tell me, what was it made you want to get rid of me? If I’m going to be executed, you might at least tell me why.”

Max regarded him with the look of contempt that those in the know reserve for the truly ignorant. He opened his mouth to speak. Then he stopped, and tilted his head slightly to one side.

“What’s that noise?”

From the yard came the sound of a man at the far limits of panic and terror, screaming in desperation. “Help me! For God’s sake, someone, please help me!”

Max frowned at Carver. They were no more than six feet apart now. “Who’s that man?” When he got no response, he turned to the man he’d called Harrison. “Go and see what that is.”

Harrison hurried down the stairs. They watched him go through the door.

Max refocused his attention on Carver. “So, you obviously got away. . . .”

The explosion ripped through the courtyard, blowing open the front doors of the building with a blast that echoed around the stone-clad stairwell.

McCall moved toward the noise, half-crouched, his gun at his shoulder ready to fire, pointing away from Carver. It gave him a fractional opening. He lunged for Max’s throat, gripping it with all his force, ignoring the fists with which Max desperately tried to pummel him and the footsteps of the man running up the stairs behind him.

The butt of the gun slammed into Carver’s kidneys, sending a shock of pain and nausea charging through his body. He let go of Max’s throat and fell retching to the floor.

“Bring him into the dining room,” said Max.

McCall lifted Carver up by the scruff of his neck, then prodded him again in the back, this time with the gun barrel. “You heard him, walk.”

He didn’t walk. He staggered into the dining room through the connecting door, bent over like a chimp. Max had been getting ready to go. There were open cases for a laptop computer, a separate high-speed modem, and a twenty-inch flat-screen strewn across the table, wires unplugged and wound up, ready to be packed away. Max’s suit jacket was draped across the back of a chair. Carver tried to ignore the agony in his back. He wanted to stand up straight, get his dignity back, and create the illusion, at least, that he and Max were talking on equal terms.

Max was not impressed. “Think of yourself as a dead man,” he said, walking around to the table and pulling wires from the back of the computer. “Do me a favor, Carver, make it easy. Answer my questions. What happened to Kursk?”

“Who the hell is Kursk?”

“The Russian.”

“He’s dead.”

“And his partner, the woman?”

“What do you reckon? I’m here. She isn’t. Dead.”

“How?”

“I flushed them down the sewers. Like shit. I think you know that.”

Max said nothing for a moment as he slipped the computer into its case, then asked, “Colclough saw two people return to the apartment. Who were they?”

“I’ve no idea. I don’t know anyone called Colclough. And I’m not going to answer any more of your questions until you answer mine. Why do you want me dead?”

Max sighed as he zipped up the case. “Please, don’t treat me like an idiot. You went back to the apartment. But why? You had no reason to do that. Not unless you wanted me to think that the woman was dead. And the only reason to go to such trouble would be if—”

“I was alive?”

Alix was standing in another doorway at the far side of the room, holding her Uzi, moving it from side to side, trying to cover Max and McCall at the same time. She was carrying the gun properly, high on the shoulder, sighting along the barrel. The gun trembled slightly in her grip, betraying her tension. She looked like a little girl playing with her big brother’s toys.

For half a second they all just stood there. Any longer and it would have been too late. If McCall had done nothing, forced Alix to take the initiative, dared her to shoot in cold blood, she might have lost her nerve. But he got cocky, staking his life on her inability to turn the threat of her gun into action. He grabbed Carver with his left hand and threw him to one side, clearing the space to bring up his own weapon. But Alix fired first.

She did it properly, just like a training exercise. She didn’t spray bullets all over the place. She fired a three-shot burst into McCall. There was nothing girlish about her now, just a fierce, almost manic concentration in her eyes as she turned toward Max, who was desperately backing against the wall. Another burst hit his chest, shoulder, and neck—the hits rising as the force of the shots lifted the barrel in Alix’s hand. He spun around, blood from a ripped artery spraying in a scarlet arc across the wall. Then he fell to the floor, dead.

Carver got to his feet, wincing, and made his way across the room. The air reeked of cordite and blood. Alix was standing stock still, her eyes wide open. Then suddenly she turned away from Carver, bent over, and started shaking. She was dry retching, streaming tears and snot. Carver stood next to her, rested a hand on her shoulder, and offered her a handkerchief.

“First time?”

Alix nodded.

“You did well,” Carver said. “You saved my life. Thank you.”

He was seized by a deep, familiar emotion, the comradeship that exists between those who have experienced combat together and survived. Carver had experienced feelings like this in the Falklands, Iraq, and the bandit country of South Armagh. He’d known what it was to have that bond between fighting men. But a blond Russian woman in a short silk dress, well, that might take a bit of getting used to.

Gradually, her body stilled, her breathing steadied. Alix stood up, wiping her face. She looked at the two bodies for a second or two. Then she looked at Carver as if seeing her reflection in his eyes. “Oh my God,” she said. “I must look terrible.”

Carver gave a clipped, dry laugh. “Not half as bad as they do. Listen, you’ll be fine. But we’ve got to get out of here. Wipe your prints off the gun. Stick it in Max’s hands—the guy with the gray hair. Make it look like they shot each other.”

It would take at least a day for the police forensic lab to work out that all the bullets had come from the same gun. By then, he planned to be long gone.

He turned his attention to the computer in its case on the table. Somewhere inside it was everything he needed to know about the people who’d hired him and everything anyone else would need to know about him. For both reasons, it was coming with him.

So was Max’s gray jacket. Carver needed to get out of the clothes he’d been wearing all night, to do something to change his appearance. He looked at the dead men on the floor. Even their trousers were spattered with blood.

Then he struck lucky. Beside the table there was a soft brown leather overnight bag. Max must have had it beside him, ready to leave. Inside there was a fresh white shirt, still in its laundry wrapper. He put it on, then slipped the jacket over the top.

Carver picked up the back nylon computer case. “Time to go,” he said. But as he walked from the room, he was thinking: If Alix Petrova had never fired a gun in anger before, what the hell had she been doing on this mission?