Scarlet Angel (23 page)

Markus shook his head and leaned against the light
pole. “You know we can’t do that.”

“
Why?”

“
Do you have any idea what would
happen to our reputations?” Markus shook his head again and stood
up straight. “We’d never have a job again. Besides, you just made
it personal.”

“
I’m telling you, walk away and
let me have Zinchenko.”

Devan screamed again. “No! Fuck this. Kill the
bitch, she ruined my hand! Slit her goddamn thro—”

Scarlett swung her weapon over and fired. A small
hole appeared at the center of Devan’s forehead. With wide eyes, he
fell face first onto the concrete sidewalk. Scarlett trained the
gun back on Markus.

“
Next?”

Markus’s arms hung limp as he stared at his
brother’s body. His shock turned into a quivering rage. He turned
to look at Scarlett. His mouth curled up in a sneer, his jaw
clenched and his eyes narrowed.

Scarlett’s finger squeezed the trigger, releasing
another shot. The bullet bounced off Markus’s chest armor. He
bolted toward her.

She fired two more shots at his chest. Scarlett
raised her weapon for a headshot when his fist slammed into her
stomach. Even through her armor, the impact lifted her from the
ground and took the air from her lungs.

Markus’s massive hand seized her face and slammed
her head into the window. Scarlett felt the glass crack against her
skull. Dazed, she swung her pistol at his face. Markus caught her
weapon with is free hand. His powerful grip crushed her fingers
against the ceramic gun. He growled and wrenched the pistol from
her. Scarlett flailed against Markus’s hand over her face. His long
arms kept his body and face out of her reach. Markus shifted his
grip to her throat and lifted her off the ground. A dark rage
filled his eyes. His chest heaved as he rammed the barrel of the
pistol he’d taken from her against her temple. “I’m gonna make you
pay, bitch.” The enraged man’s proper English accent disappeared,
replaced with a Cockney dialect. “I’m gonna fucking decorate the
front of this pretty little shop with your fuckin’ brains,
huh?”

Scarlett struggled against the man’s fist. She’d had
hands wrapped around her throat before, but none as strong as this
man’s. She squeezed her eyes shut and waited for the shot.

Over the ringing in her ears, something exploded
nearby. Her eyes opened just as bits of wooden shrapnel tumbled off
Markus’s shoulders.

He turned to look back.

The grip on her throat relaxed just enough for her
to get a trickle of air. Scarlett blinked away the dizziness.

Markus stepped aside, revealing Jules, holding what
was left of a chair from the coffee shop.

Markus looked the barista up and down and laughed.
He raised his gun to Jules’s forehead.

Jules! NO.

Scarlett grabbed at the hand around her neck. She
dug her thumb in between the bones at the top of his hand and
wrenched his grip from her neck. Markus’s arm twisted and he
screamed.

Freed, she fell to the ground. A double-fisted punch
to Markus’s groin dropped him to the ground. Scarlett climbed to
her feet and moved behind him in one swift, fluid motion. She
wrapped her arms around Markus’s head.

“
Fuck you—”

She wrenched hard to one side, breaking his neck
with a sickening crack. When she let go, he fell face first onto
the concrete, just like his brother.

Scarlett looked up. “You okay?”

Jules’s body shook. She stared down at the lifeless
hitman without blinking.

Squealing tires from Zinchenko’s car answered her.
Scarlett snatched the gun from Markus’s lifeless hand. She took a
couple steps toward the fleeing car but stopped. “Jules? You
okay?”

The barista continued to shake and stare at the dead
thug. Her head twitched up and down just enough for Scarlett to
recognize it as a nod. Scarlett took off at a dead sprint after the
black sedan. The car was leaving her behind. She tapped the skin
just below her ear. A moment later, Dax’s voice rang in her
head.

“
Scarlett, you okay?”

“
I’m fine, Dax. I need you to get
a fix on Zinchenko’s GPS for his car. I’m going to end
this.”

Chapter 36
Promises

A promise is a promise.

* * *

The black car disappeared around the corner.
Scarlett dashed down the next alley in hot pursuit.

“
You’re going to what?” Dax’s
voice echoed in her head through her comm implant.

“
I’m going to kill him, right
now.”

“
What? Now?”

Scarlett focused on her breathing. “The son of a
bitch just killed Janson, right? Not really looking to talk about
it. Just keep me up on where he’s going.”

“
Uh, okay, one second.” Dax’s
fingers tapped. “He’s heading down Forty-Second.”

Ahead, a garbage truck blocked the alley. “Yes, I
know that.”

“
No, wait. He’s heading North on
Adams.”

“
Into the warehouse district?”
Scarlett squeezed between a cement wall and the side of the
truck.

“
Yeah. That’s where his office is.
I’ll ping the address to your commpad.”

“
Don’t bother; I don’t have it
right now. You’re going to talk me through where he’s
going.”

* * *

She stood next to a three-story warehouse with grimy
windows wrapping around the building just below the roof. Graffiti
covered the surrounding structures except for the one she was about
to enter, Zinchenko’s headquarters.

A twinge of trepidation crept into the back of her
mind. She knew killing Zinchenko in cold blood was technically
murder. If the authorities caught her, she could spend life in
prison.

It didn’t matter, though. She knew criminals like
Zinchenko often had cops on their payrolls and lawyers to keep them
out of hot water.
Thugs like him always get away. But not
today.

She inched along the edge of the building until she
came to a short set of stairs with a recessed door at the top.
Metal handrails flanked each side of the green-painted steps. She
looked around to make sure the coast was clear and climbed to the
entryway.

Scarlett pulled on the handle but it refused to
budge. “Shit.” She turned around to find another entrance when a
pair of voices stopped her in her tracks. Two men approached from
around the corner of the building. She ducked back into the doorway
before they could see her.

“
Shit. Shit.” Scarlett pulled her
pistol from its holster.
So much for the element of
surprise.

She pulled her gun and checked the chamber for a
live round. Something clicked behind her. Her eyes widened in
terror.

“
You could say thank you.” Dax’s
voice rang in her head.

She spun around and pulled on the handle. The door
opened. Scarlett slipped inside and closed the door. The air was
musty and stale. She tapped her ear and whispered. “I forgot you
were still on the line. That was you?”

“
Gee, thanks. And, no, the door
opened by itself. Of course it was me.”

Scarlett smiled. “Dax, I might just have to kiss
you.”

“
Really?”

“
No.” She turned around to see a
dark hallway stretching out a couple dozen feet before her. The
hallway ended with a door on the left wall and a bend to the right.
She heard three voices talking in the distance; the loudest of them
belonged to Zinchenko.

She tried to listen but could not understand what
they were saying. “Dammit, they’re talking in Russian.”

“
Get a little closer. I’ll boost
the audio and translate for you.”

She heard Dax’s fingers tapping the desk where his
virtual keys were. “I... I can’t.”

The typing stopped. “Are you busted? I’ll call in
the cops.”

“
No!” Her response came out
harsher than she wanted. “I mean, no, I’m not caught. I just, I
can’t.”

She took a few steps further down the dark corridor.
Her eyes darted back and forth between the floor and the door to
her left.

“
Is your leg broken?” Dax’s voice
nearly broke her concentration.

“
No.”

“
Are you tied up?”

“
No.” Scarlett smirked.

“
Are you somehow otherwise
disabled?”

“
What? No.” She came to the corner
stopped, her eyes still glancing back and forth. “Would you let it
go?”

Dax sighed. “No. would you just put your ear up to
the door?”

“
Why?”

He gave another exasperated sigh. “Scarlett... I’m
pretty smart, so hiding shit from me doesn’t really work so well. I
pinged your commpad’s GPS, it’s still back in the coffee shop. That
means you either have a second one or something else.”

Scarlett shook her head then caught herself and
stopped. “Dax, I don’t have time for this.”

“
Fine, you’ve got an implant.
Direct bone-conduction audio with a receiver just below the skin.
I’m assuming your left ear?”

She leaned back and rested her head against the
wall. A smile spread across her face, despite her dangerous
situation. “Congratulations. Now can we get back to dealing with
Zinchenko?”

“
Oh, yeah. Um...” More tapping.
“Satellite data says there are five heat signatures in the room.
Two by the door and three in the middle.”

“
Satelli....” Scarlett’s eyes
widened. “Eh, nevermind. Good, thanks.”

“
You’re welcome. Was actually
pretty lucky that there was already one trained on the
area.”

She knew it wasn’t luck. “I’ll call back when I’m
done.”

“
Hey wait!”

She tapped the skin behind her ear and his voice was
gone.

Scarlett leaned against the wall next on the far
side of the door. She breathed in deep and knocked.

The voices silenced. Zinchenko whispered a few words
in Russian. The handle jiggled then started to turn. The door
cracked. A gun appeared through the crack, followed by a man’s
head.

Hidden behind the door, Scarlett leveled her own
weapon at the man’s face. He turned to see her barrel and froze.
His weapon went slack in his hand and hung by his trigger
finger.

Scarlett took the man’s weapon. She waved her gun
and the thug stepped the rest of the way into the hall. She turned
him around and stepped up behind him. With one gun at her
prisoner’s head and the other at his back, they moved through the
doorway.

Zinchenko stood in the middle of the room behind a
small couch. Three other men were spread out around the space.
Everyone but Zinchenko had guns aimed at Scarlett and her prisoner.
Two of the men,
probably just mid-level lieutenants,
stood
to each side of the boss. The third man was just to Scarlett’s left
near the door.

Zinchenko spoke first. “You are formidable. What
makes you think I worry about his life?”

Scarlett turned the gun onto Zinchenko. “I didn’t
say you were.”

“
You are outnumbered. You will not
walk out of here.” A smile spread across the mob boss’s face. His
eyes darted to the side and he nodded.

Scarlet’s gun arm rose in time with Zinchenko’s
enforcers’. She squeezed off a round and dropped one of the thugs
before he had a chance to fire. The two other men fired, their
bullets shoving Scarlett’s prisoner back into her. Her prisoner
collapsed to the ground in a lifeless heap as she stepped back
through the doorway and to the side. Shots continued splintering
the door and the surrounding cement wall. Scarlett pressed herself
against the wall next to the doorway. The smell of gunpowder and
concrete dust burned her nose. When the gunfire faded, she swung
around and fired.

Scarlett targeted where she remembered Zinchenko to
be, but her bullets found only empty air. At the far end, a door
with a frosted window clicked shut.

She bolted to the other end of the room and skidded
to a stop just before the windowed door. Scarlett twisted to the
side as a hail of bullets exploded through the glass.

Crouched down, she shot four times through the lower
half of the door. A moment later, she heard the thump of a body
hitting the floor.

Scarlett glanced through the shattered window. With
the exception of the dead mobster, the coast was clear.

She sprinted down the new hallway until she came to
the warehouse floor. The expansive space was empty, making every
bit of debris or dirt she stepped on echo. To her left and right
sat doors leading outside.

A single gunshot from her left rang out. Scarlett
ran to the door and yanked on the handle. A freight truck blocked
her view of most of the street.

Checking each direction, she ran out into the
sunlight. Just past the edge of the truck, she stopped. Before her,
Zinchenko stood in the middle of the street with his hands raised
over his head. The other mobster lay bleeding at his feet.

Scarlett followed Zinchenko’s gaze to two FBI agents
yelling with their weapons raised. The two black-suited agents
hadn’t seen Scarlett yet. One of them waved his gun, indicating for
Zinchenko to turn around. As the mobster turned, his gaze locked
onto Scarlett’s. He smiled.

Her mind flashed back to the army of law enforcement
and lawyers under his thumb. She stepped back behind the truck and
watched as Zinchenko mumbled something to the agent. A second
later, they dressed him in a bulletproof vest.

He kept his eyes locked on her. If possible, she
thought his smile was even more smug than before.