40
Station fourteen of the natural gas pipeline that ran
along the Pacific coast towards Lima squatted behind a high
chain-link fence, a cluster of dull grey metal tanks and rumbling
pumps. It was a lonely outpost, a few kilometres beyond San Bartolo
in the crumpled foothills of the Andes, and the sense of isolation
was increased by its being completely automated. The status of the
pumps was monitored from Lima, only closed-circuit television
cameras watching over the remote compound.
The cameras were just
one of Kit’s concerns as he turned off the Panamerica Highway and
drove his car, a loaner provided by Interpol, down the access road.
If he were caught on video, it might raise questions he would
rather not answer. But then he noticed that the chain securing the
gate had been cut – and that the gate was in plain view of a
camera. Presumably Stikes had sabotaged or hacked the CCTV in some
way.
All the same, he kept
his head down to conceal his face as he left the car. This close,
he could hear not only the thrum of machinery, but a continual low
rushing sound – the noise of hundreds of cubic metres of gas
flowing through the great stainless steel pipeline every second. He
looked through the chain-link for any sign of Stikes. The tallest
tanks were at the northern end, a catwalk running round them above
numerous pipes and valves. The walkway continued above the main
pipeline to what he guessed was a control station. The whole
facility was bordered to its east by a low escarpment, and a flight
of metal steps led up it from the controls. He now realised why
Stikes had chosen this particular place to meet: the plateau served
as a helicopter landing pad.
The empty pad wasn’t
for the mercenary’s Hind, though. It was for the person the
Interpol officer would soon be summoning . . . if Stikes lived up
to his end of the deal.
Where was he? Kit
surveyed the pumping station. Since it was automated, there were
only a few lights, and they were more for the benefit of the
surveillance cameras than visitors. Reflections glinted off pipes,
picking out a steel maze amongst the shadows . . .
Stikes came into
view, climbing a ladder up to the central catwalk. He gestured
impatiently for Kit to approach. With a wary glance at the nearest
camera, Kit opened the gate and crossed the dusty ground to the
machinery. He ascended a ladder, feeling the pulse of the pumps
through the metal.
Stikes waited for
him, dressed in dark military fatigues, beret on his head. The
Jericho gleamed in its holster. At his feet was the case he had
taken from El Dorado. ‘You’re late,’ he said.
‘I had to organise a
car,’ Kit explained.
Stikes regarded the
Indian’s vehicle. ‘Did you come alone?’
‘Yes, of course. Are
you alone?’
‘Of course not.’ The
Englishman smiled coldly. ‘Two of my men are covering you with
rifles. See if you can spot them.’
Kit turned nervously,
eyes darting across the pipework. So many hiding places . . . but a
sniper would need to be in an elevated position to avoid having his
aim blocked by the steelwork. He raised his gaze, finally seeing
one of the men: a ladder led up one of the smaller gas tanks to a
narrow platform on top of it. A dark shape was barely visible
against the clear night sky, the station’s lights reflecting
faintly off a rifle barrel.
‘One on the tank,’ he
said, continuing his search, ‘and . . . ’ He was forced to admit
defeat. ‘I can’t see the other.’
‘You wouldn’t,’ said
Stikes. ‘Gurov’s outside the fence.’ His gaze briefly flicked
towards the escarpment.
‘So are they going to
shoot me?’
‘Only if you don’t
give me what I want. So.’ Stikes straightened, putting his hands on
his hips. ‘Am I going to be introduced to the Group?’
‘Have you brought the
statues?’
Stikes nudged the box
forward. Kit crouched and opened it. The three statues were inside;
two intact, one split in half, but both the pieces present. He
picked one up, feeling the weight of the stone, the texture of the
ancient carving. They were genuine.
Finally
reunited.
‘Well?’ Stikes
demanded. ‘Satisfied?’
‘Yes,’ said Kit,
standing.
‘Good.’ He produced a
satellite phone. ‘Make the call. I’m sure you remember the
number.’
The meeting with the
president of Peru had been relatively brief and, to Nina’s mind,
entirely unnecessary, accomplishing nothing that couldn’t have
waited until the following day. Though ostensibly to congratulate
her on discovering El Dorado, it was actually a far more political
affair, the country’s leader firmly planting the flag of Peru on
the lost city and the incredible wealth it contained, while
simultaneously making it clear that the IHA’s role would be
downplayed as much as he could get away with. Zender and the
Peruvian archaeologists had already been elevated to the status of
national heroes, brave explorers who had sacrificed their lives to
bring the incredible find to the world.
Nina was too tired to
raise more than a token objection, but in truth was neither
surprised nor particularly bothered by the land-grab. She had
experienced similar attempts by governments to claim credit for her
discoveries – the Algerians for the Tomb of Hercules, the Egyptians
for the Pyramid of Osiris – but so long as she could put her own
account out via the UN, the countries involved could spin events
however they liked. Ultimately, what mattered was not who had found
a treasure thought lost to time, but that it had been found at
all.
A government car
brought her back to the villa, where she met Osterhagen as he
descended the stairs. The German looked utterly exhausted,
apparently having slept from the moment he was shown to his room.
He was still in the same crumpled, torn clothes, too weary even to
undress before collapsing on the bed. ‘Nina,’ he yawned. ‘Where
have you been?’
She gave him a precis
of the meeting. ‘Ah, yes,’ he said with faint amusement, ‘I have
experienced the same thing. An occupational hazard.’
‘Ain’t it just.’ Macy
hurried into the lobby, looking anxious. ‘Hey, Macy. What’s
up?’
‘It’s about Eddie.’
With an apologetic smile to Osterhagen, Macy hastily guided her
away from the German archaeologist, who shrugged and went in search
of the kitchen. ‘I’m worried about him.’
‘Me too. I think
it’ll take a while before he can deal with everything that’s
happened today.’
‘No, no, that’s the
thing – the day’s not over. He’s gone!’
‘What? Gone
where?’
‘Some place called
San Bartolo. We were talking, and he suddenly went all weird, and
started asking one of the staff how to get there.’
‘Weird
how?’
‘I mean, he was
pissed. But scary-pissed. Like he was
so angry that it wasn’t showing on the outside, you
know?’
Nina did know; she
had seen that kind of cold fury before, not least earlier that day,
and it never boded well. ‘Why was he angry? What were you talking
about?’
‘About what happened
at El Dorado – something to do with Kit. I told him what I was
doing just before Mr McCrimmon got shot, and he got mad and kept
saying I was remembering it wrong. Then he went quiet, like he was
working something out, and then he found the maid and wanted to
know how to get to San Bartolo.’ She thought for a moment. ‘No, not
San Bartolo; somewhere near it, a pumping station on some gas
pipeline. Station fourteen.’
‘What’s it got to do
with Kit?’
‘I don’t know. But it
seemed like he was comparing what I told him with what Kit told
him, and then he said something about the statues – and that’s when
he got angry. He took a cab.’
The statues. Nina made the connection. ‘Oh
God.’
Eddie had somehow
realised what Kit had been trying to keep from him: that Interpol
was making a deal with Stikes to recover the statues. But Eddie
would only be interested in revenge – for her torture, for Mac’s
death. And he would be going after Stikes.
And if his anger was
because he believed Kit had betrayed him by dealing with the
mercenary – or worse, that he was somehow in league with him . .
.
‘When did he leave?’
she asked Macy urgently.
‘I don’t know – a
half-hour ago? What is it?’
‘I think Eddie’s
about to do something he’ll regret. How do we get to this pumping
station?’
‘That is it,’ said
the taxi driver, pointing.
Eddie saw a handful
of lights in the darkness off the Panamerica Highway. Gas tanks and
pipes behind a fence, a small cliff beyond the facility. A car was
parked outside the gate.
Except for the
burning coal of his fury, his mind was completely analytical,
assessing the scene from a tactical perspective. The car had to be
Kit’s, and if he was there, Stikes would be too. But it was
unlikely he would have come alone. So where would the other
mercenaries be?
Elevated positions,
where they could both cover their boss and watch the road. On top
of the tanks, on the cliff. No way to know how many – but Stikes’s
forces had been winnowed down at El Dorado, and it was unlikely he
would have been able to drum up more at such short notice. He had
left the cavern with only the Hind’s pilot and one other man . .
.
The driver started to
slow for the turning on to the dirt road. ‘No, keep going,’ Eddie
told him. He looked down the highway, seeing taillights disappear
round a curve in the distance. ‘Stop once we get round the next
corner.’
He turned his
attention to the rugged landscape. Scrubby bushes, small trees.
Adequate cover. It would take him ten to fifteen minutes to make a
stealthy crossing.
The taxi passed the
pumping station. Eddie looked back, seeing movement. Two figures on
an elevated walkway. Even at this distance, he recognised them
both.
Stikes. And
Kit.
His fears had been
confirmed. They were working
together.
The coal inside him
burned hotter.
Stikes’s satellite
phone warbled. The mercenary answered it, then gave Kit a crooked
smile. ‘It’s for you.’
Kit took the phone,
listened to the brief message, then disconnected. ‘The helicopter
is on its way,’ he reported. ‘It should be here in about twenty
minutes.’
Stikes checked his
watch, then nodded. He noticed Kit looking towards the gate.
‘Something wrong?’
‘The security
cameras. It could be hard for me to explain to Interpol what was
going on if this is recorded – and the Group’s representative
certainly won’t want to be seen.’
Stikes tutted. ‘Do
you think I’m an amateur? The camera at the gate is sending a
looped recording – and as long as we stay away from the pumps,’ he
gestured at the machinery behind Kit, ‘none of the others can see
us. I don’t particularly want to appear on Candid Camera either.’
‘I suppose not.’ He
turned his gaze back to the gate and the road beyond, seeing a lone
car pass out of sight round a bend.
‘You want me to
wait?’ asked the taxi driver.
‘No, that’s fine,’
said Eddie, paying him and providing a generous tip before getting
out. The driver shrugged, then drove away.
Eddie started uphill
through the undergrowth towards the escarpment.
With no time to go
through the rigmarole of obtaining a car through government or
United Nations channels, Nina and Macy had followed Eddie’s example
and got the maid to summon a taxi. It was now heading through
Lima’s southern outskirts for the Panamerica Highway. ‘How long
before we get to this station?’ Nina asked.
Macy put the question
to the driver in Spanish. ‘About twenty-five minutes,’ she said
after getting an answer. ‘And yes, I already told him that we’re in
a rush.’
Nina tapped her foot
in impatience – and worry. Would they get there in time to stop
Eddie making a mistake?
Kit broke off from
pacing the catwalk to check his watch. Over twenty minutes had
passed since the phone call, and there was still no sign of a
helicopter. The Group’s representative might simply be being
cautious . . . but might also have decided that the risk was too
great and abandoned the meeting.
And their operative.
The thought twisted his stomach into a knot. He glanced at the gas
tank. Stikes’s sniper was still lying on the platform. The Interpol
officer had no doubts whatsoever that Stikes would kill him the
moment he felt things had gone wrong . . .
A new sound over the
unceasing rumble of the gas pumps. Rotor blades. The
helicopter.
Unable to conceal a
sigh of relief, he looked for the noise’s source, seeing strobe
lights in the sky to the west.
Eddie also heard the
incoming chopper, and froze behind one of the tanks. Stikes and Kit
showed no signs of surprise or alarm, so they were expecting it.
Who was aboard?
For now, that was
irrelevant. What mattered was that it gave him a deadline: it was
no more than two minutes away from touching down. He had to be
finished before it arrived.
He set off again,
moving through the pumping station’s shadows until he reached the
ladder up one of the tanks. From here, the sound of the pumps was a
steady, churning rumble, backed by the low-frequency hiss of gas
rushing through the main pipeline. It would mask the sound of his
climb – and better yet, he realised as he took hold of the ladder,
there was a vibration running through the framework that would
camouflage his steps.
He began to climb.
The tank was about thirty feet high. As he approached its top he
slowed, cautiously peering on to the platform.
A man dressed in
black lay upon it, back to him.
One of Stikes’s men,
armed with a SCAR rifle with a telescopic sight. He wasn’t looking
through the scope, though; he was watching the approaching
helicopter.
Eddie waited, poised
at the top of the ladder. If he climbed any higher, the man might
catch him in his peripheral vision and raise the alarm. The chopper
was now only a minute out. Look away,
dammit!
After another
agonising few seconds, the man finally moved his eye back to the
sight. Eddie carefully climbed the last few rungs to crouch on the
platform just behind the sniper . . .
Then he lunged,
grabbing the mercenary’s head and yanking it back as hard as he
could, wrapping an arm tightly round his throat.
The sniper made a
choked gurgling sound, dropping the SCAR and trying to claw at his
attacker’s face. Eddie squeezed harder, twisting sharply – and a
crunch of crushed cartilage came from the sniper’s neck, followed
by the muffled snap of bone. The man went limp.
Eddie dropped him and
caught the SCAR by its strap just before it tipped over the
platform’s edge. He lay beside the dead man, recognising him as
Voeker, and quickly and expertly checked the gun. A full load of
thirty 5.56mm rounds, and the scope was a high-quality night vision
unit, a sharp red chevron superimposed over the centre of the
shimmering green image.
He lined up the
chevron’s point on Stikes’s head. The mercenary leader was
completely unaware of him, a sitting duck. All he had to do was
pull the trigger . . .
It wasn’t mercy that
stopped his finger from tightening – he had already decided that
Stikes was going to die. Instead, it was the urge to find out what
was going on, to catch everybody involved. The helicopter swung
overhead, kicking up dust as it settled on the pad. Stikes picked
up the case, and the two men on the catwalk headed for the metal
stairs.
Eddie moved the sight
to the helicopter. A young, beefy blond man in a dark suit climbed
out. Was this the contact? No - he hurried round to the aircraft’s
far side to open the door for another passenger.
At first, all he
could see beneath the fuselage was a pair of black stiletto-heeled
boots. Then the new arrival strode into view.
He was so shocked
that he almost dropped the rifle.
The person meeting
Stikes was someone he knew. Someone he thought was
dead.
His ex-wife.
Sophia.