Tarantula (10 page)

The driver’s side door opened, and a tall, dark-skinned woman stepped outside.

Milton recognised both of them. The passenger was Yehya al Moussa. The driver was Sameera Najeeb.

He stepped out from behind the trunk and brought the HK53 to bear. He flicked the selector to automatic and fired off a volley of shots. The bullets struck Najeeb in the gut, perforating her liver and lungs. She put her hand to her breast, confusion spreading across her face, and then pivoted and fell back against the side of the car. Najeeb shrieked, moving quickly, ducking down beneath the line contour of the car. Milton took two smooth sidesteps to his right to open up the angle again and squeezed off another burst. The scientist was trying to get back into the car; the bullets tattooed his body in a line from throat to crotch.

The fusillade sounded around the trees for a moment. Frightened birds exploded into the air on wingbeats that sounded like claps. The echo of the reports died and faded away, and then, short moments after the brutal outburst of violence, all was quiet again: the wind rustled through the trees, the water chimed beneath the bridge, a nightingale called from high above.

Milton paused. There was another sound.

A second car approaching.

Hiding would have been pointless; the bloody tableau would give him away. The car emerged from the mouth of the forest. It was a Renault Mégane, painted blue with white and red chevrons screen-printed across the bonnet. The policeman in the front of the car must have seen him immediately. The Mégane came to a sudden stop fifty feet away.

Milton ejected the magazine and slapped in a replacement.

The officer opened the door and stepped out of the car, his hand on the butt of his holstered pistol. “
Arrét!
” he called out.

Milton did not pause to think. His reaction was hard-wired, a response that had been drilled into him across ten years so that now it was automatic, an expression of muscle memory without conscience, sudden and terribly deadly. He swung the rifle around and squeezed the trigger for a longer burst. The car was peppered with bullets, half a dozen slamming into the radiator and bonnet, another handful into the windscreen. The officer was struck in the face and chest, stumbling backwards and then dropping onto his back, where he lay for a moment, twitching horribly. Milton walked towards him, the gun cradled low, and put a final bullet into his head. Finally, the man lay still.

Peacefulness returned, ornamented now by the sound of the shards of glass that fell to shatter on the road from the breached windscreen.

Milton crossed the road to the Renault. He opened the boot and wrapped the rifle in its blanket, then stowed it away carefully beneath the spare wheel in the false floor. He pulled on a pair of latex gloves and collected the ejected shell casings from the rifle. There were forty of them, and they were still hot to the touch. He dropped them into a small evidence bag. He crouched by Najeeb’s body and frisked her quickly and efficiently. He found her smartphone and a USB stick and bagged them both.

He went around to the other side of the car and lowered himself to examine al Moussa. The door was open, and as he raised his gaze from the body to peer inside, he saw a small, pale face staring back out at him. Milton did not rush. There was no need. The face belonged to a young boy, perhaps five or six years old. His skin and his hair were dark, and his features recalled those of his parents. He was cowering in the footspace, a streak of blood across his forehead as if it was paint that had been thrown over him. It was not his blood: it was blowback from his father.

Milton reached for the Sig Sauer he carried in his shoulder holster, his fingers brushing against the butt. The boy held his eyes. His face was white and quivering with fright, but he did not look away. He was brave. Milton felt a swell of vomit in his throat as his memory cast him back twenty years and a thousand miles away. He remembered another young boy, a similar age, the face peaceful despite the obscenity of his death.

He lowered his hand from the Sig and stepped back. He gently pulled the man’s body onto the muddy surface of the lay-by and went back to the car.

“Stay there,” he told the boy. “Help is coming.”

He closed the door. He checked that he had removed the evidence of his presence and, satisfied, got into the Renault, put it into gear and drove away.

He turned to the north, upwards, and drove towards the lake.

Building a relationship with my readers is the very best thing about writing. I occasionally send newsletters with details on new releases, special offers and other bits of news relating to the John Milton, Beatrix Rose and Soho Noir series.

And if you sign up to the mailing list I’ll send you all this free stuff:

1. A copy of my best-seller, The Cleaner (116 five star reviews and RRP of $5.99).

2. A copy of the John Milton introductory novella, 1000 Yards.

3. A copy of the introductory Soho Noir novella, Gaslight.

4. A free copy of my best-seller, The Black Mile (averages 4.4 out of 5 stars and RRP of $ 5.99).

5. A copy of the highly classified background check on John Milton before he was admitted to Group 15. Exclusive to my mailing list — you can’t get this anywhere else.

You can get the novel, the novellas and the background check,
for free
, by signing up at
http://eepurl.com/Cai5X

Mark Dawson is the author of the breakout John Milton, Beatrix Rose and Soho Noir series. He makes his online home at
www.markjdawson.com
. You can connect with Mark on Twitter at
@pbackwriter
, on Facebook at
www.facebook.com/markdawsonauthor
and you should send him an email at
[email protected]
if the mood strikes you.

When Harry and his brother Frank are blackmailed into paying off a local hood they decide to take care of the problem themselves. But when all of London’s underworld is in thrall to the man’s boss, was their plan audacious or the most foolish thing that they could possibly have done?

Free
to download:
US
UK

London, 1940: the Luftwaffe blitzes London every night for fifty-seven nights. Houses, shops and entire streets are wiped from the map. The underworld is in flux: the Italian criminals who dominated the West End have been interned and now their rivals are fighting to replace them. Meanwhile, hidden in the shadows, the Black-Out Ripper sharpens his knife and sets to his grisly work.

Buy it:
US
UK

War hero Edward Fabian finds himself drawn into a criminal family’s web of vice and soon he is an accomplice to their scheming. But he’s not the man they think he is - he’s far more dangerous than they could possibly imagine.

Buy it:
US
UK

In this dip into his case files, John Milton is sent into North Korea. With nothing but a sniper rifle, bad intentions and a very particular target, will Milton be able to take on the secret police of the most dangerous failed state on the planet?

Free
to download:
US
UK

Sharon Warriner is a single mother in the East End of London, fearful that she’s lost her young son to a life in the gangs. After John Milton saves her life, he promises to help. But the gang, and the charismatic rapper who leads it, is not about to cooperate with him.

Buy it:
US
UK

John Milton has been off the grid for six months. He surfaces in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, and immediately finds himself drawn into a vicious battle with the narco-gangs that control the borderlands.

Buy it:
US
UK

When a girl he drives to a party goes missing, John Milton is worried. Especially when two dead bodies are discovered and the police start treating him as their prime suspect.

Buy it:
US
UK

John Milton is blackmailed into finding his predecessor as Number One. But she’s a ghost, too, and just as dangerous as him. He finds himself in deep trouble, playing the Russians against the British in a desperate attempt to save the life of his oldest friend.

Buy it:
US
UK

On the run from his own demons, John Milton treks through the Michigan wilderness into the town of Truth. He’s not looking for trouble, but trouble's looking for him. He finds himself up against a small-town cop who has no idea with whom he is dealing, and no idea how dangerous he is.

Buy it:
US
UK

Beatrix Rose was the most dangerous assassin in an off-the-books government kill squad until her former boss betrayed her. A decade later, she emerges from the Hong Kong underworld with payback on her mind. They gunned down her husband and kidnapped her daughter, and now the debt needs to be repaid. It’s a blood feud she didn’t start but she is going to finish.

Buy it:
US
UK

There were six names on Beatrix’s Death List and now there are four. She’s going to account for the others, one by one, even if it kills her. She has returned from Somalia with another target in her sights. Bryan Duffy is in Iraq, surrounded by mercenaries, with no easy way to get to him and no easy way to get out. And Beatrix has other issues that need to be addressed. Will Duffy prove to be one kill too far?

Buy it:
US
UK

Beatrix Rose has worked her way through her Kill List. Four are dead, just two are left. But now her foes know she has them in her sights and the hunter has become the hunted.

Buy it:
US
UK

A story of greed, duplicity and death in the flamboyant, super-ego world of rock and roll. Dystopia have rocketed up the charts in Europe, so now it’s time to crack America. The opening concert in Las Vegas is a sell-out success, but secret envy and open animosity have begun to tear the group apart.

Buy it:
US
UK

Daniel Tate looks like he has it all. A lucrative job as a lawyer and a host of famous names who want him to work for them. But his girlfriend has deserted him for an American film star and his main client has just been implicated in a sensational murder. Can he hold it all together?

Buy it:
US
UK

The moral right of Mark Dawson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor to be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.