The Blood King Conspiracy (Matt Drake 2) (9 page)

“Your father,” Drake said. “He was CIA wasn’t he?”

“James Jaye. J.J.,” Hayden said with pride. “If I do nothing else with my life I will honour his death.”

Ben was well and truly in second place with this one, Drake thought. How naive of him to think of them as the happy couple, living among the roses and not sensing the coming blight.

Kinimaka now hunched down beside them. “So,” he said. “What are we looking at?”

“Water, water everywhere and not a boat to sink,” Drake said before rising to his feet. Kinimaka just stared. Drake took a moment to shoot two adversaries who dared to peer around the bulkhead and then checked his weapon.

Three-quarter empty. “Where the hell are the marines?” he wondered aloud.

Then Hayden screamed, making Drake almost squeeze the trigger in alarm. A chopper had been drifting towards them, inch by inch, and now as it came within their warning range a man had leaned out and started shooting.

“Boudreau?” Drake guessed.

“The very motherfucker,” Kinimaka growled. “Fruit-bat crazy, that one. Pure fruit-bat.”

A great claxon went off, louder than the shooting and the fighting and the death-cries of wounded men. It could only mean one thing.
They had the device.
Then ropes unravelled heavily from the chopper and struck the deck like big boa-constrictors all around them. All of a sudden men were abseiling down.

Were they trying for Hayden again?

Drake fired the machine-gun one handed, scooping up a knife with the other and walking towards the landing zone. Dead adversaries plummeted to the ship’s deck, bouncing hard.  Hayden emptied her clip too quickly, panic affecting her aim. This arsehole Boudreau really had her traumatized, no doubt his intentions when he so brutally executed her men.

Kinimaka walked with them, waiting for the hand-to-hand. He didn’t have to wait long. Their enemies bounced lightly and sprang forward. Drake allowed one to land on his knife, then twisted and slashed another across the throat. He caught a blow on his chest and fired close-up, sending a man skidding back into his comrades, scattering and confusing them.

A knife flashed.

Drake let it pass through the gap between his arm and his chest without even blinking. The knife-wielder’s expression change from smug to terrified in a millisecond. It changed to agony one millisecond later.

Kinimaka was at his side, an intimidating presence if ever there was one. Boudreau was leaning out of the chopper, being held up there only by his men, spittle flying from his lips.

“Get him!” came the mad scream. “Can’t you fucksticks see him? He’s fuckin’
big enough!”

Mano?
Drake thought.
They were after Mano Kinimaka? Not Hayden?

“He’s desperate,” Kennedy’s voice came from close by. “The Blood King must have given him another chance.”

More men came at them. Drake understood better now why they weren’t shooting. They wanted the Hawaiian alive. Never mind, it would accelerate their downfall.

He front-kicked one man in the chest, heard ribs break. To his left and right, Kinimaka and Hayden used close-up fighting techniques. Boudreau’s team was good, and the melee soon turned into a stalemate, helped at Drake’s end by the limited corridor of attack his enemies were afforded by the bulkhead.

Again the claxon sounded.
“Fuck you!”
Boudreau’s voice rang out, a madman on the verge of losing his last, tentative grip on reality.
“Fucking useless meatheads!”

And he started shooting indiscriminately. Several of his men went down. Blood slathered the deck. Boudreau laughed.
“Fucking,
” he fired, killing a young mercenary with red hair.
“Useless,”
he fired again, sending another bullet into another subordinate.
“Meatheads!”
He fired twice more. Two more men collapsed, one with a hole in his head and his blood spattered across the rest of the living.

“Get back! Are you deaf as well as useless?”

The remaining men started to jog towards the port side. They must have some kind of makeshift disembarkation apparatus over there.

Which is why they were defending that area so ruthlessly against Bradey and his men.

Drake let them go. He had no interest in chasing down fleeing men. The chopper above them with its crazy occupant veered upwards and began to climb.

Hayden was staring at Kinimaka. “What gives, Mano. Why’d that monster want you?”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The stakes had risen higher than ever and still they had no idea which mastermind was orchestrating the humiliation of the United States on its own soil.

The SOG commander, Bradey, was alive and looking flabbergasted. He seemed to have lost control of his reasoning abilities. All he could say repeatedly was that
someone had declared war against the U.S. military inside its own damn country.

Who would have the resources? Drake wondered. Who would possess such audaciousness? There were people out there who could do it, and he betted that almost every one of them was currently trying to contact the CIA to assure them
it wasn’t me.

“All of DC will be involved in this now.” Hayden had said something, Drake fancied, just to shut Bradey and his rambling up. “And the device that was stolen? That's
huge.”

“I’ll say,” Ben agreed with her. “I just got off the phone with dad. He says it’s already hit Sky News. Jeremy Thompson looks gobsmacked.”

“Poor old Jeremy,” Drake said. “One thing’s for sure though, if the Blood King now has the box, then he’s not going to waste any time before chasing after the controller.”

“Everyone
will,” Kinimaka said.

Ben’s mobile sang out a Pretty Reckless song. He moved away to answer it. “Karin?”

Drake ignored Hayden’s long look and muttered something about taking a leak. Kennedy was involved with a fallen marine. The man looked so young, lying there trying to look so tough, and all the while back in Montana or Alabama, or plain old Texas, his family were unaware that their son and brother and friend was sharing his final moments with a stranger.

Drake disappeared below to check his mobile. He was right. Wells had tried him twice, Mai just the once. He hit ‘return’ and waited.

“How ya doin’ pal? I’m betting you’re near that ship, am I right? The Drakester I knew never strayed far from a battle.”

“Not by choice, Wellsy old chap,” Drake laid on the jabber. “What do you have for me?”

“Ed Boudreau is a mercenary, plain and simple. The gentleman has all the usual accolades. Even more so now, since he just rammed it up the Yanks’ arses. I have a full dossier on the man, but squat-a-doodle-do on the person he works for.”

“Nothing?”
Drake could hardly believe it. “MI5. SAS. Her Majesty’s Secret Service. A dozen secret agencies and you have zilch?”

By now the cold dread Drake had been experiencing, an emotion quite alien to him, was turning into something icier. “Who in God’s name is this Blood King?”

“It’s an ongoing op, old pal.” Wells had waved the question and its sentiment away, clearly either not understanding or not wanting to hear the undertone in it. “Now look, . . . me and my Mai time refuse to be kept waiting much longer. How’d you like some company?”

“You?” Drake coughed. “Why?”

“Umm, expertise. Moral support. General fatherly brilliance. You know.”

Drake was going to offer the standard Brit reply
up yours
, but their situation and what he already knew about the two devices gave him pause. “Do it,” he said after a moment. “Contact me when you get to Miami. I’ll let you know where we are.”

“Excellent.” The connection went dead.

Drake stared hard at the mobile, throat suddenly dry. He scrolled down and again clicked ‘return’.

“I take it you are alive then, soldier boy.” The voice was like a feather’s touch on soft skin.

“It’ll take much more than a rag-tag army to kill me.”

“Your . . . friends?”

He knew she meant well, but also knew the focus of her question revolved around Kennedy. “All good,” he said. “Any news?”

“The Bermuda Triangle op . . . ” she launched straight into her spiel, “. . . was carried out by the CIA after an unidentified box was uplifted from the ocean depths. You know all the pirate details, I am sure. This op was sanctioned by the Director and classed as a Special Operation. Six of their best agents were teamed together.”

She didn’t have to say
four of whom are now dead.

“The box was examined and classified as a ‘time displacement device’. Origin unknown. It was thought it could cause critical anomalies at random intervals, most likely when triggered by a chain of events.”

“I know all this, Mai-“ Drake said gently.

“The
second
device,” Mai went on, “and don’t interrupt me, Matt. Only the rude and the ignorant and the uneducated interrupt. The second device is a controller. It is believed it could actually dictate a
time
when the box could be turned
on.
The second device looks like a clock. An ornate clock.”

Now Drake took notice. “An expensive-looking clock? It makes sense. Blackbeard might have traded it for a fortune, intending to reacquire it later. Thank you, Mai. Anything else?”

“Nothing that is clear, Drake. I am currently inside the States myself. I will still be able to use my contacts though.”

“One other thing,” Drake said. “One of the surviving agents is a man by the name of Mano Kinimaka. Maybe you could help us understand why the Blood King wants him captured alive.”

“Ah, the Blood King,” Mai breathed as if savouring the name and the myth. “He is next on my list. I will let you know the results of my search, my friend.”

“Ok,” he hesitated. “Mai? I know I don’t need to tell you this, I really do. But, please be careful. The Blood King seems to have more resources than God. Don’t put yourself in harm’s way again. For me.”

“Again?” Mai laughed, the sound high and sweet.

“Again. Never again.” Drake broke the connection and placed his head against the cold metal wall. Times were hard enough without resurrecting what had gone before with Mai.

Things that should never be spoken about again.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

After the metaphoric dust had settled, Drake and his friends sought out Justin Harrison and told him what they were planning.

“We’re going down to Miami,” Drake said. “This whole thing’s Caribbean-related. We can work from there and see where the research takes us.”

Harrison looked preoccupied. “Yes, yes. Do whatever you must. Just, please-” he met Drake’s eyes. “Do it fast.”

Dry land beckoned and forty minutes later they were ensconced in a big station-wagon courtesy of the U.S. government, taking a last look through darkened windows at the U.S.S. Port Royal and its shattered hull. The authorities still didn’t know how Boudreau and his army had pulled it off, but meticulous planning, advance knowledge, and major inside help were being blamed.

“Jesus,” Hayden said as she ended yet another call. “It wouldn’t surprise me if there were public executions when this thing comes out!”

“We all love a conspiracy,” Kennedy said. The New Yorker was sitting beside Drake in the front, squirming around as she tried to tug the waist of her jeans a bit higher.

“They ain’t gonna fall off,” Drake frowned at her. “At least, not until we find a hotel.”

“Damn things are cut so low I keep showing my damn ass off.”

“Well, if we find ourselves chasing the enemy on bicycles your ass crack will make a nice bike park, love.”

Kennedy swatted him and finally managed to tug the material where she wanted it.

“Now that’s done,” Drake sniffed, “maybe we can get back to that what we do best, eh?”

“Saving the world?” Ben read his mind.

“You got it.”

The station-wagon cut through the encroaching night with Drake following the SatNav directions to Wilmington International airport. The early November cold snap, so apparent back in the U.K., hadn’t made it to this part of the States yet - if it ever did - so Drake drove with the Air Con cranked high. They made one stop to load up on service-station food, Mountain Dew and hot coffee before hitting the road in earnest.

“So,” Drake said after a while, “Mano. What did Boudreau want with you, my friend?”

Kinimaka shifted uncomfortably and Drake actually had to make a correction to the car’s course. “Beats me,” he rumbled. “Far as I know I’m a pretty normal guy.”

Hayden had squashed herself in beside him, with Ben to her right. “Trusting, supportive, effective. Is that normal for a guy, Kennedy?”