Wilderness of Mirrors (32 page)

She kept you very close; didn’t she, Turner?

Demidov tensed. “Kirstin was fond of that saying.”

It was enough. One swipe of his finger, a circle in the air, and Nigel sent them away. Three points. Brad went for the far side, up the long column’s toe holds. Nigel took Boots’s end. Vasily went for the middle.

Bait.

Like father like daughter. Bloody brave people.

When Nigel’s feet were on the stairs, silent, silent as fastness can be, he heard Boots say, “What is that?”

The moon chose that moment to pop from her captivity, and Nigel saw the outline of Demidov’s silvered hair. It would be a scare looking down at that face.

Up, up he went, not waiting for Sam and Boots’s reactions.

On the fifteenth step, the staccato popping of a silencer came.

It scalped his heart.

She fell back, loose hair cascading softly between the mesh walkway’s gaps. The platform shouldered her collapse, no vibration to be felt. Only the hollow echo of her head bouncing off the frozen surface and the wailing lament of banged iron and his tearing soul.

A
lways, Boots found pleasure in her forced movements, secretly delighting as he dropped barriers in her mouse-maze, driving her onward in whatever direction he so chose.

Tonight was to be that rarest of specialties.

He had come as a spectator, come to watch first-hand, for the first time, as his latest directive knocked her back teeth out.

Only the bitch had set a trap for him, sweet and sticky as her cunt.

His ear turned toward the crisp snick of a twig crushed beneath a pivoting shoe. There were three of them. Boots let his eyes rest once more on the disturbing creature below.

“You’re going to pay dearly for that, Botenke.” The deep edge of the Russian-speaking voice came from the other side of the veil and Boots suddenly regretted underestimating Samantha.

“You’re supposed to be dead.” It was a stupid, obvious thing to say. Still, it came through his lips beside a few too many Yorkshire vowels.
Pull yourself together, fool. You’re armed and Ivan’s not far.

“We all disappoint.” Vasily had the eyes of a barn owl, neither blinking nor particularly bright. The accident had hopefully left the bugger brain damaged. It had certainly fucked with his face.

“Speak English, Demidov. Your whore said you could. Passable, though a gutter version.”

Vasily smiled. Gruesome and odd considering his daughter lay dead above him. “That was something Kirstin enjoyed.”

“Your peasant charm? Hardly.” Boots remembered all too well Kirstin’s love of couture clothing and ridiculously priced restaurants. It had been quite easy to lure her away from patriotic duty. She’d have done anything for a packet.

But Samantha’s confident suppositions mocked him.
She kept you very close; didn’t she, Boots?

“No, not that,” Vasily said softly. “Although she was favorable toward the calluses on my hands.” Which were clasped behind his back. “No, she enjoyed making fun of my accent,” he tilted his head and the eyes weren’t so dull anymore, “and yours, because she was so linguistically gifted herself.” Not so dull at all, those eyes. “The difference is that Kirstin knew English was my second tongue.”

Boots went hot with indignity and rage. “I should have killed you myself.”

“Yes. Bombs and car crashes are tricky things for an amateur. It’s much easier and more enjoyable to simply slit a man’s throat.” The eyes glittered with tears and vengeance. “Which I’m going to do to you tonight.”

Boots’s fear quelled as he watched Ivan come up behind Vasily.
I will win in spite of these odds. Ivan will take care of Demidov, leaving me free to shoot left and right.
Boots glanced once at Samantha.
What did you look for in men? Money? A pretty face? Muscle that metastasized to the brain?

Ivan’s shot hit Vasily, and the Russian crashed to his knees like an oak felled beneath chestnuts.

Boots would go for the dark one first. The actuary would be slower. He’d get him next. And be more deliberate about it because the bastard had fucked the bitch.

Boots followed the Glock’s muzzle around, finger ready on the trigger.

Only the goddamn
cumpa
had fucking disappeared.

Nigel watched as Brad swung over the side into the cover of an overhanging tree, leaving him time to cover the distance between himself and Boots.

Ivan was down there somewhere, scrabbling like a hunted squirrel, but Brad and Sergei would be closing in fast.

For himself, Nigel couldn’t think past the bulk of Boots Turner. Didn’t want his eyes to peel across the metal slats to the snowy veneer dotting jeans and Tamar-licked boots. He had to quiet the giant, clamoring, howling thing inside him.

There were two of them. Only two.
I won’t underestimate him. He’s as good as I think. No one lies this long and this well without being an automaton. They have wires though, these automatons. Bits of hidden coils. Batteries lodged in titanium casings. And I’ll dismantle him. Step by step.

The gun will be first.

Nigel knew Boots led too fast with his hands. He was a machine whose peripheral acuity and visual field were diminished.

I won’t have to worry about that happening to me; I won’t live long enough.

The Glock arced round. Nigel caught Boots’s wrist on the outer edge of the swing, used his thumb to turn the bastard’s hand inward at the palm’s hinge. The muscle there was strong. It would be. It took Nigel’s right hand to yank the gun free.

Now away with it. Somewhere far, to be retrieved later, when it was all over.

Boots grunted. Or maybe they both did. In any case, his knee came up and caught Nigel’s bad leg. A great rip of god-awful pain shouted along his nerve lines. Nigel lost his grip and Wellington’s gun-hand came away.

Cover your ribs; he’ll go there next
.

Just in time. Nigel felt the blow of Turner’s chop on the outside of his right forearm.
Quick now
. He caught and twisted, wrenched Wellington’s wrist until there was a gratifying crack.

One wire loose, several to go.

And then something else. An unexpected boon.

Phlegm flew alongside Wellington’s mouthful of curses and badly timed kick.

You’re not used to pain, are you? Never suffered through it quietly. Let it become ambient noise to your planning. Good.

Nigel bent at the hips, dodged Boots’s swinging foot and came back at his opponent with a knee to the groin. But Boots managed to catch the inside of Nigel’s knee and the pair collapsed in a seething, sprawling mess.

Nigel spun to his stomach and hammered the toe of his boot into what he figured to be soft flesh. Maybe the neck or belly. Hard to tell. Wellington’s uninjured fingers were now gloveless, and they grated the skin on Nigel’s left shin.

Staying on the ground gets you killed. Get up. Knees first. And turn, you idiot, your back is to him.

So it
had
been the neck. Boots was gagging, his good hand out, bad hand twisted and massaging out a hoarse, “…gonna fuckin’ kill you! No number-crunching pillock fights like that. You’re a bloody spook, ain’t you?”

Talking gets you killed quicker than a knife or bullet.

Wire number two
.

Nigel felt for his belt buckle, acutely aware of an inability to breath. Had Boots got him in the ribs? Punctured a lung?

Been done to you before, mate. Stop thinking so much. Finish him
.

He got a hand on the leather, unsnapped the clasp and pulled cleanly until the metal-tipped end whipped across Boots’s eyes.

The ensuing scream meant little. People yelled all the time. But it got Forsythe to his feet where he had time to lay a substantial, full-footed blow north to south along Wellington’s chest.

Knees still planted, Boots swung backward, folding in a curved pile of clothing-covered bones.

Nigel staggered into the white-eyed pool of Boots’s vision.
Can’t suck a breath in that position, can you?
His own chest could commiserate.
You can hear me though
. “Sam was never yours. Not for the important things.” He didn’t let himself look at her. “Now you know what I am, what Brad is.” The dilated pupils were round with incredulity. “Didn’t tell you, did she?” He paused, feeling the raw edge of reason slip almost away. “And she guessed. Bloody good at reading people, my Sam. And she read you, Turner, like a fucking First Year primer.”

Brad’s voice came up from between bloody, slushy mesh. “All right there?”

“Yeah. Ivan?”

“
Friends
have him.”

“I thought I saw Fredricks.”
Anything so I don’t have to see your face, Sam.

“Donovan is here too,” Brad called. “He’s rounded up your pal Jaak.”

I don’t trust Donovan. Must talk to C about it one of these days.
“Vasily?”

“Yes?” The deep voice wasn’t a pitch off.

“This piece of shit is all yours.” Nigel’s kick knocked Wellington’s subconscious into orbit. Then he staggered over him toward Sam.

She was still there. Just a few feet from them. Not so far.

Maybe four minutes had passed. She would be warm. And if he didn’t pay attention to the blood, perhaps he could hold her and imagine all was well.

They hadn’t let him hold Irina. Just carted her away and left her for the rats and winter.

But you can’t look at her face and avoid the damage.

He didn’t try.

And he noticed four things.

Snow stuck to her hair like so many diamonds, unmelted and exultant.

He’d left a love-bite on her neck, just below the hairline behind her left ear.

Her shirt was torn in a handful of round shredded places.

And there was no blood.

He was yelling then, stirring a beehive of action, on his knees with his arms wrapped around her goose-fleshed skin wondering, wondering in near hysteria how he had ever missed it.

“T
here is, of course, some trauma. Nothing, not even – ” The Firm’s doctor held up the custom bustier. “Kevlar with plate, um – ” He touched the dented curves along which Nigel had run his thumbs.

Nigel, at this moment under the cool reason of LED hospital lighting, could hardly believe they were having this conversation.

“Boning.” It came from her. He looked down, surprised all over again she was with him.

“Ah. Like in hoop skirts.” The doctor smiled.
Sucker
.

“Or bras,” she whispered, bold even now.

“Shut up, Sam.” Nigel ran the back of his knuckles against her neck. She’d warmed up. Made him quite happy, that. “You sound awful.”

She coughed or laughed. Either way, the crash of it made him sweat fear. “What trauma?”

“We’re going over the x-rays. But a preliminary examination shows internal bruising, slight concussion and a few cracked ribs. Altogether not so bad.”

It was all bad.

“She needs rest.” The doctor eyed him. “The same as
your
records indicate.”

C, quiet until now, grunted.

It said volumes.

“Go.” Her exhausted eyes were smiling. “See to Tam.”

He nodded. “He’s been moved to the training kennels. He’s going to be just fine.”

She nodded again, lashes closing over the deep brown of her irises. He leaned in and brushed his mouth across her forehead. “I’ll be back in a little while. Go to sleep, Sam.” He watched her a moment longer, filled himself up with her.

When the door closed behind them at last, C said, “Follow me.”

They walked the long corridor in silence. After a few turns and a stop at the coffee station, they entered a small and utilitarian conference room. A few x-rays hung forlornly against a backlit surface.

Someone’s tumor, black and terrifying underneath the cage of his cheekbones, glared at them.

C gave it a moment’s attention before sitting down, his back to it. “Shouldn’t think they’d leave something like that hanging about.”

Nigel took a seat. He didn’t care what was on the walls. Sam lived. Tam too. If Will were to walk through the door, the hat trick would be enough to make him believe in the power of wishes. The power of Batushka Yuri’s God.

“Are we waiting for anyone particular?”

C sipped at the scalding blackness. “Christ, I hate coffee.” He gave up the Colombian assault and said, “I remember telling you to stay away from her.”

“Then you’ll be reassured Alzheimer’s hasn’t set in.”

Nigel’s own coffee reintroduced him to the sensation of being warm. He was tired. Cold too. But the sharp clawing pain in his throat had been reduced to a dull throb. With any luck, the antibiotics he’d been given would wash away whatever it was before morning, because his mouth needed Sam’s.

Then there were voices in the hall. The door opened and Demidov loomed. He hadn’t bothered with the requisite hospital gown. His pant-leg had been cut and refitted over the plasters. Only a cane, industrial and couture as orthopedic shoes, marred the man’s indomitable presence. “I thought it might be the morgue.” His escort, unseen but for a wrist and long fingers, closed them in.

Nigel stood, very glad Vasily had not been killed. “Can I get you a coffee?”
Can I have your daughter? Take her from you when you’ve only just found out she lives.

The offer was waved away. “I make it a point not to pollute myself with anything under 80 proof. In any case, spasibo. Sit, please.”

Nigel did so, aware C had yet to speak a word.

There were six-foot drifts of cemented tension locking up the room’s little space. If the Cold War started up again, Nigel knew where the first ice cube had been dropped.

So he said, “Demidov, this is C. My boss at SIS.”

Two big hands rested, overlapping one another, on the cane’s head. “An introduction that could be made more perfect only if I knew the x-ray over there belonged to him.”

It was enough to bring the faintest of twitches to C’s upper lip. “Would you join us?”