The Lawless Kind (36 page)

I was right. The single trail joined the others, following their passage through another door at the far right corner. Marshall continued to lead the way, totally at ease as I followed close by with a gun in each hand. He was taking much on faith that we were now allies, but he’d nothing to worry about. We entered an office. A large teak desk dominated the space. The Sheetrock walls were pockmarked with bullet holes. A couple of orange plastic chairs were stacked in one corner, a yellowing newspaper folded casually on the uppermost seat. A corpse lay in the other corner, in front of another open door. There was a single wound in the man’s chest, and it appeared to be from a knife as opposed to a bullet. That would explain the thud we’d heard just before the shooting stopped: a heavy blade had been driven deep into his heart and the man fell dead without a cry.

Gunfire shook the office walls. A stray round actually punched into the room, trailing a cloud of plaster dust from the wall. Instinctively we both crouched to avoid the ricochets. Marshall went forward, placing the heavy desk between him and the wall, and I took the opportunity to rush by him and approach the next door.

‘Slow down, Hunter,’ Marshall rasped.

Ignoring him, I checked outside the room. The space beyond was open plan, filled with work cubicles and old touch-button telephones. Gunfire had torn a swathe through the room. Another body lay sprawled across a cheap desk in one of the cubicles. His blood dripped freely so he couldn’t have died long ago. Although his heart had stopped pumping, his wounds were large enough to be leaking blood from his exposed innards. I was glad to see that the corpse was that of a small, dark-skinned guy and not a big Asian-American.

The gunfire had ceased in the adjacent room, but two handguns contested further on. Without waiting for Marshall, I slipped quickly through the office, swerving past cubicles. Behind me the soldier followed, and I could hear him muttering. At first I thought he was cursing my impulsive ways, but he was demanding a status report from his mercenaries. By the harsh expletive that followed, the news wasn’t good.

He caught up to me as I braced myself against the wall next to a doorframe. He leaned in close to my ear, whispering. ‘Three down. Freeman, Albertson and Garretty are all dead. Mitchell and Paulson are the only ones left. They’ve had to retreat from the fight, but are in position to offer cover if we make it outside.’

The names meant nothing to me. They should have been branded in my psyche, because all five of them had given their lives – or were about to – for me. Not that any of them knew it. As far as they were concerned they were fighting for Marshall alone, and for the money they’d earn from him.

‘Before he died, Freeman told the others to avoid firing on your pal. Seems I underestimated your mate Rink. He made it here after all.’

‘Yeah.’ That was already apparent to me.

The gunfire had stopped again. I placed a silent bet that it wasn’t Rink who’d fallen, though I couldn’t be sure how long that would last. Rink was a terrific soldier, but he was wholly outnumbered, outgunned and in unfamiliar surroundings. The odds were stacked against him surviving much longer.

‘Come on,’ I said, and went through the door.

Give Marshall his due, he didn’t question the sudden switch of command.

Chapter 45

‘You must get him out of here, Jorge. For God’s sake, he’s only a baby!’

‘You do not tell me what to do!’

Molina backhanded Kirstie across the face and knocked her to the floor. She landed heavily, unable to check her fall because her wrists were still bound behind her back. The collision with the floor made her head ring, but over the pounding in her skull she heard the terrified scream of her child as he watched her being beaten. Kirstie ignored Molina’s next threat. She blinked away tears so she could check on Benjamin. The woman who’d taken him from her when they were captured was struggling to hold on to the boy, who squirmed violently in her grasp.

Kirstie craned up to meet the volcanic gaze of her ex-husband. ‘Please, Jorge! This place is a war zone. You have to get him away from here. Please . . . if you love him . . . get him safely away.’

‘He is a
Molina
. He must learn what it means to be a
Molina
. He must be brave and fearless, or he is no good to me or to his name.’

‘He’s only a child, a baby! Please, Jorge . . .’

Molina kicked her, sending her sprawling on the ground. He scowled down at her, perhaps considering retying the gag he’d pulled off her minutes ago. But it seemed he was happier to hear her complaints, as if it gave him more power to deny her most plaintive arguments. In the next instant he lunged down and grasped her by the hair, so she had to scramble up to avoid having her scalp torn off. Molina was holding the knife he’d cut her bonds with. For a second she thought he was going to slash her throat, but he used the knife as a pointer, aiming it at Benjamin.

‘He is my son and his place is by my side,’ he said. ‘He must learn this valuable lesson. As must you.’

Benjamin squealed in response.

‘For God’s sake, you’re frightening him. Can’t you see . . . ?’

Molina forced her down, pushing the back of her head towards her knees. His next words addressed Benjamin directly. ‘Do you see, son? She is weak. You must forget her now.’

‘I want my mommy!’ Benjamin howled.

‘This . . . this
whore
is nothing to you. She is
nothing
.’ He placed the knife tip against the prominent cervical vertebrae exposed by her bent neck. ‘Forget all about her because you will never see her again. Believe me, son, you should not care.’

‘Jorge,’ Kirstie pleaded. ‘He can’t possibly understand you. Please, I don’t care what you do to me, but not in front of Benjamin. You will scar him for life.’

‘The only one scarred will be you.’

‘How can you expect your son to love you if he sees you murder his mom?’

‘It’s not his love I want,’ Molina snarled. ‘He must grow up to be a great and ruthless leader of men, the only way he will survive in this damned country. He will understand this lesson when he comes of age. He’ll know what it means to be the son of Jorge Molina, and he will act accordingly. It is the only way!’

‘Please.’ Kirstie now addressed the shrew-faced woman who held her child. ‘Take him away. If you’ve pity in your heart, take Benjamin out of here.’

‘Do that,’ Molina snapped at the woman, ‘and yours will be the next head I cut off.’

Kirstie could see nothing of the woman but her shoes, and they barely scuffled in place. Kirstie understood how terrified the woman was of Jorge’s threat, but she hoped that her instincts to nurture and protect a child might outweigh the fear. ‘Please take him away,’ she cried.

The woman didn’t move. Benjamin must have been struggling because Kirstie heard a harsh command spoken in Spanish.

‘Benjamin.’ Kirstie tried to offer a soothing tone, but her voice cracked on the final syllable. ‘Close your eyes, baby. Don’t watch. Turn your head away and close your eyes.’

‘No, Benny! You will watch.’ To the woman, Molina said in Spanish, ‘Bring him to me. Now. I will not tell you again.’

Kirstie struggled against the inevitable, but there was nothing she could do. Molina commanded the woman to hold her and she felt hands pressing down on her skull. She could feel the trembling in the woman’s fingers against her scalp. She thought that she might be able to pull loose of her handler, but Molina stood over her, using his knees to hold her in position. He had taken Benjamin into his arms so the boy had no option but bear witness. But there was worse to come, and Molina’s words brought back the terrifying conclusion of the nightmarish dream she’d suffered two nights ago.

‘Here, boy, take hold of the knife. You can help me.’

Chapter 46

Harvey was sitting in the back corner of the room in which he’d been beaten. His hands and ankles were bound. Blood glistened on his chin from where he’d taken a blow to the mouth. Vivid welts decorated his chest, shoulders and thighs, purple against his dark skin. His silk designer shorts now looked like rags, stained and rumpled by his ordeal. Thankfully he was still alive, and appeared to be the least injured of my friends. McTeer was in the opposite corner, his face so bruised he was barely recognisable, nose crushed, eyelids swollen to the size of baseballs. Velasquez lay on the floor between the two, and he was unconscious, breathing raggedly through split lips. Bound as he was at wrists and ankles, he was collapsed in a tortuous position that didn’t help his ability to breathe: if he wasn’t moved soon, he could expire through lack of oxygen. Harvey and McTeer would have gone to his assistance if they could, but a trio of thugs with rifles threatened them. One of Molina’s men also carried a stave, and its width corresponded to some of the wounds on my friends’ naked bodies. The stave was dark with blood. I’d no regret whatsoever about killing that piece of shit, only that his death came too quick.

I stepped up behind him, placed the muzzle of my SIG to the nape of his neck and blasted a hole in his spinal column.

As the first dropped to the floor, I shot one of the rifle-wielders in the face and turned for number three. Marshall beat me to the punch and placed a round through the man’s heart before his mouth could fully form an elongated look of shock as his allies fell. I was so enraged at the state of my friends, I put another round in his head as he went down: waste of a bullet, but it brought me some satisfaction.

‘Thank the Lord,’ Harvey said weakly as I bolted for Velasquez. Harvey tried to straighten, a show of strength that simply wasn’t there. He sank down once more, even as Marshall brought out his dagger and approached him.

I pulled Velasquez round so he was in a more comfortable pose, and watched as his mouth opened and blood-thick saliva pooled on the floor. He gasped a couple of times, spat weakly, and his breathing grew less ragged. He didn’t wake up, but his eyelids fluttered like beetles’ wings. By then, Marshall was done cutting Harvey free and moved to assist McTeer. I touched Velasquez on the forehead; my fingertips found it cold and clammy with sweat. He was in a bad way.

Harvey clawed his way up, palms flat against the corner angle of the walls, barely capable of standing. His thigh muscles cramped visibly, jumping and bunching painfully. Yet he persevered and staggered towards me. I stood to meet him and supported him against me.

‘Molina took Kirstie . . .’ His voice was thick with shame, as if it was his personal failure that had put Kirstie into Molina’s hands.

‘Don’t worry about that for now. We have to get you guys out of here first. If Val doesn’t get help, he’s going to die.’

‘I can get the others out,’ Harvey said, and he placed his cupped palms over his face. I thought that he was weeping, but didn’t comment. In situations of stress, particularly during torture, even the toughest of people can’t hold back the emotions. Soldiers who’d face an army single-handed were prone to weeping, and it was no less a measure of the man, or maybe it only made them more admirable.

‘You’re in no state to help yourself, Harve. Marshall?’

Marshall was helping McTeer to his feet, the older man having similar problems to mine when the circulation returned to my extremities. The notion that Marshall had once been our enemy was lost on him, as it was to the others, and it showed in the way he thanked Marshall profusely. Marshall glanced my way.

‘That vehicle back in the warehouse: it’s yours, right?’

He slapped a pocket on his jacket. ‘Got the keys right here.’

‘I’m going to need you to get the guys to it, they can’t make it on their own.’

‘Hold on, who died and made you the fucking boss?’

‘Don’t start with the bullshit. This is what you came to help me do, get the guys out safely. But Molina has taken Kirstie and her boy. I’m not leaving without them.’

Marshall shrugged. ‘Your choice, your funeral. Go for it, Hunter.’

‘You said you had two men left alive. That still the case?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Get them to go round the back and cover you as you leave. I’m assuming that more of Molina’s men will be out there. Velasquez needs medical attention, and you can’t afford to be penned inside.’

‘How are you planning on getting out?’

‘Don’t know. But it won’t be without Kirstie and Benjamin. Plus, Rink’s still in here someplace and I’m not leaving him behind either.’