29

Her husband was well aware that he was behind schedule. The plan had been for Nina to draw out the meeting with the Group for as long as possible, but they both knew that sooner or later she would have to admit she had no intention of leading them to the meteorite. At that point, things would turn nasty, and he would need to be there to help her.

However, the approach had taken longer than expected, the need for stealth while dealing with the remaining guards outside the building delaying the team. But now, they were finally at the hotel itself.

There was a door to Eddie’s right, but his focus was on another entrance to the left, nearer the downhill slope. Steam swirled from extractor vents above a stairwell descending into the ground which had several large wheeled bins lined up near its top. Access to the kitchens. Even though the only guests at the hotel were the Group and their employees, the establishment was still fully staffed, ready to provide the VIPs with anything they requested. Since Eddie was determined to avoid innocent casualties, the hotel workers needed to be removed from danger.

He signalled for Glas’s men to follow as he went to the stairwell, checking nearby windows for signs of activity. All were empty. He paused by the first bin, making sure that no one was having a crafty smoke at the foot of the steps.

Nobody there. The way in was clear.

The others arrived behind him. ‘Okay,’ said Eddie, ‘remember there are civvies here. Round ’em up, then find a storeroom or something and lock ’em in until we’re done. Everyone ready?’ Nods of confirmation. ‘Right, here we go.’

He led the way down the stairwell. The door at the bottom was ajar, wisps of steaming air rising from the gap. He opened it wider. A white-tiled room came into view, twenty or so aproned staff busy preparing the resplendent evening meal for their billionaire guests.

Eddie quietly entered, gun at the ready. At first none of the kitchen staff noticed the intruders, being too involved with their work – then a woman chopping vegetables looked round at the cold draught. Her irritation instantly turned to fright.

‘If I can have your attention, please!’ said Eddie loudly to forestall her scream as the other camouflage-clad men rushed in behind him. ‘Dinner’s cancelled. Nobody’ll be hurt if you do what we say, so stop what you’re doing and keep quiet.’ A flash of movement – a waiter lunging for a telephone mounted on the wall. ‘Oi!’ he shouted as he fired, the silenced shot shattering the phone just before the waiter reached it. ‘That means you, Manuel!’ The large man froze.

Eddie quickly surveyed his surroundings. Through the circular windows in a set of swing doors he could see a lift and stairs leading upwards, presumably to the dining area, as well as a dumbwaiter near the exit, but of more immediate interest was a single door, at the kitchen’s rear, to a storage area full of catering-sized bags of dry goods. ‘Okay, everyone in there. Move!’

Glas’s men spread out to corral the staff into the storeroom, quickly searching them to confiscate phones. Eddie examined the makeshift cell’s door; it didn’t appear to be lockable. ‘Someone’ll have to keep an eye on them.’

‘I’ll do it,’ volunteered Amsel. Eddie nodded, and the German took up a position to watch both the storeroom and the main entrance. The waiter who had tried to reach the phone glowered at him through the door’s little window.

Eddie hurried for the exit, the remaining men following. He hoped the delays hadn’t made the situation worse for Nina.

Gorchakov picked up Nina’s gun. He turned it over in his hands, then glared at Stikes. ‘Why did you not search her?’ he demanded.

The Englishman was unconcerned by the anger directed at him from around the table. ‘To give her a false sense of security. I knew that if she thought she had an ace up her sleeve, she’d reveal her true intentions sooner rather than later. Don’t forget, I’ve dealt with her before. I know what kind of person she is – and she’s not the type to start blasting away at unarmed civilians. She leaves the shooting to her husband.’

Nina expected him to question her again regarding Eddie’s whereabouts, but he left the comment hanging. Instead, Warden spoke. ‘This is twice you’ve done something without telling us, Stikes – first kidnapping Chase’s father –’ he gave Larry a brief glance – ‘and now this. Don’t make us question our decision to take you on board.’

‘You took me on because you know I get results,’ Stikes replied. ‘And I have. You’ve got Dr Wilde, and you’ve got the statues. Everything you need is here.’

‘If Dr Wilde cooperates.’

‘Oh, she will.’ Stikes gave her a lupine smile. ‘One way or another.’

‘Don’t bet on it,’ said Nina.

He sighed. ‘Are we really going to go through this routine again? I make a demand, you refuse, I put a gun to someone you care about, you cave in.’ He slid the case across the table to Nina. ‘So why not just save everybody’s time and put the statues together?’

‘Nina, I don’t know what the hell’s going on here,’ said Larry with nervous bravado, ‘but, er, much as I’d like you to do what he says so we can all go home, I’m getting the distinct feeling it’s not a good idea. So don’t give this bastard what he wants, not on my account.’

Stikes regarded him with an odd sense of approval. ‘I didn’t think you had that much backbone, Larry. Maybe you and your son have more in common than either of you would like to admit. Oh, and Gerard,’ he added to the man holding Larry, ‘shoot him in the knee.’

‘No!’ Nina screamed as Gerard unhesitatingly pointed the gun at Larry’s leg. Stikes snapped up a hand, and the big mercenary stopped, his finger tight on the trigger.

‘I told you,’ Stikes said to her. He gestured at the case. ‘Now. The statues.’

Nina and Larry exchanged helpless looks. The gun was still fixed on his knee; at point-blank range the bullet would shatter the bones, almost certainly crippling him for life – if he survived the blood loss from the wound. Larry’s face was ashen with fear, but he still summoned up some reserve of defiance. ‘Nina, you shouldn’t . . .’

‘It’s your choice, Nina,’ said Stikes. ‘Don’t keep everyone waiting.’

‘You son of a bitch,’ she hissed. Until Eddie arrived, she had no choice but to obey. Slowly, her disgust and reluctance almost tangible, she opened the case and took out the first statue.

The effect of her touch upon the stone figurine was immediate, the strange glow bright even beneath the glaring spotlights on the roof beams. ‘And the others,’ prompted Warden, fascinated by the display. ‘Put them together.’

Nina linked the second figure with the first. The glow intensified. Supporting the paired statues in one hand, she picked up the last member of the triptych, the bifurcated figurine now held crudely together with adhesive tape. It made no difference to the effect, the purple stone coming alive with the shimmering blue glow. Just as in Japan, she felt a weird electrical tingling through her hands.

Everyone watching held their breath, even Larry and his captor. The statues shone, the tingle intensifying as she brought the figures closer together. There was another feeling, too – as much as she wanted to prevent the Group from finding the meteorite, her innate curiosity was becoming ravenous, urging her to take the next step and discover the secret of the stone to sate it. She had felt the effect before, in Tokyo; there, she had been caught unawares and snapped back to reality by shock. But now she knew what to expect. She could recreate the experience, and this time be in control . . .

‘Put them together!’ Warden ordered – but before he could finish speaking she had already done so.

Even prepared for what would happen, Nina was almost overcome by the rush of sensation. Again, there was the feeling of acquiring a new sense that extended far beyond the limits of her body, inescapably linking her to life in all its myriad forms. If what Glas had said was true and all living things on earth originated from one single source, the sky stone, then she was now following the common thread joining them together through billions of years.

And she felt the stone itself.

A sixth – or seventh? – sense, a homing instinct; however she could think to describe it, all she knew was that the thread led her directly to it. There was no life around it now, but there had been, once. She had impressions of heat, light where there should have been darkness, being beneath the ground yet not buried. The feeling was so intense that she could almost see it, a visual echo from the people who had been there long ago.

It was far away, she could tell, but closer than it had been when she was in Takashi’s skyscraper. She knew in what direction—

That thought made her open her eyes. She knew, but now so too did the Group. The joined statues floated just above her cradling palms, shining brightly. Some of the Group were looking at the wall towards which the light was strongest, as if hoping to see through it all the way to the meteorite’s hiding place.

She felt an instinctive urge to follow the path back to its origin—

The statues suddenly moved, gliding silently away from her across the table. She was so startled that she didn’t think to try to grab them until they were out of reach. Meerkrieger jerked aside as the linked figures spun past him.

The glow began to fade . . . and the statues arced towards the polished wooden floor. ‘Catch them, catch them!’ Warden cried.

Stikes was already running round the table. He dived headlong, landing hard and skidding along the floorboards just in time for the figurines to drop into his hands. He breathed out heavily in relief. ‘Haven’t made a catch like that since I played cricket for Eton.’

Warden rounded on Nina. ‘What happened? How did you do that?’

‘I don’t know,’ she replied, truthfully. The statues had responded to her impulsive thought, as if she had been able to channel and direct the earth energy flowing through them by the power of her will alone. But even in her confusion, she still had enough forethought to keep this to herself. ‘It just sort of – happened. Like they were drawn toward something.’

‘The sky stone,’ said Warden. ‘They were being drawn to the meteorite.’

‘We can triangulate,’ said Frederick Bull excitedly. ‘We know the bearing from Tokyo, and now we know the bearing from here too!’

His brother was already tapping away on his smartphone. ‘The bearing from here was a hundred and forty degrees east, more or less,’ he said, bringing up a map app. ‘It was two hundred and sixty degrees west from Tokyo, so . . .’ He swiped his fingers across the screen to find where the two lines intersected. ‘Africa! Somewhere in Ethiopia, by the look of it.’

‘How could it end up so far from Atlantis?’ asked al-Faisal doubtfully.

‘I don’t think we’ve even started to comprehend the full power of earth energy,’ said Warden. ‘But now that Dr Wilde is helping us, even if,’ he smiled smugly at Nina, ‘less than willingly, we can explore its possibilities.’

‘Our first priority is finding the meteorite, though,’ said Brannigan firmly. ‘We’ve got to get the progenitor DNA.’

‘And we shall,’ Warden replied. ‘But first—’

Two doors on opposite sides of the room opened simultaneously, cylindrical metal objects flying through them to bounce noisily off the floor and skitter towards the table. Everyone looked round at the unexpected interruption.

Nina recognised the items. Stun grenades! The instructions Eddie had given her earlier sprang back into her mind, and she closed her eyes and clapped her hands to her ears.

Stikes also instantly knew what they were. He dropped, releasing the statues safely on to the floor before he too protected his senses—

Both grenades detonated, their flashes blinding anyone looking at them and the twin piercing bangs so powerful in the enclosed space that they had the same effect on the unprepared as a blow from a baseball bat. The assembled billionaires screamed, reeling in their seats as their senses were temporarily obliterated.

With one exception. Gorchakov had realised the danger just in time to raise an arm in front of his eyes. Even deafened and dizzied, he tried to stand, clutching the Glock and pointing it at one of the doors as men in white rushed into the room—

A burst of silenced bullets hit him in the back as more attackers crashed through the other door. Blood sprayed over the table as Gorchakov toppled to the floor, dead. The Glock clattered down beside him.

Eddie, leading the first team, had already spotted another threat – one of Stikes’s mercenaries holding his father at gunpoint. Both men were stunned, but even blinded all the guard had to do was pull the trigger to hit Larry in the back.

He didn’t get the chance. Two shots from the MP7, and the merc spun away with blood gouting from a pair of holes over his heart.

Across the room, Stikes had recovered from the initial shock and sprung back to his feet – only to find the other intruders’ guns pointing at him. He looked round as if contemplating a flying leap through the window, but then slowly raised his hands. ‘I was wondering when you were going to show up, Chase.’

Eddie pulled off his balaclava and strode across the room to him. He regarded his former senior officer silently for a moment – then punched him hard in the face. Stikes fell, holding a hand to his bloodied mouth. ‘Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you right now, you piece of shit,’ Eddie growled, his MP7 fixed on the other Englishman.

Stikes somehow managed a pained smile. ‘Because you went to a lot of effort to prove you’re not a cold-blooded murderer, and it would be a shame to waste it?’

Eddie was forced to admit that he had a point. ‘No, I’m not a murderer,’ he said, lowering the gun. Stikes’s unpleasant smirk widened at the minor moral victory – then the Yorkshireman booted him in the head. ‘Doesn’t mean I’m not a complete bastard, though.’

‘You’re neither of those things,’ said Nina, crossing the room to him. En route, she noticed that the Glock had ended up almost within Warden’s reach, and kicked it away. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Yeah. Sorry we were a bit late.’

‘Better than never.’ She kissed him. Stikes made a disgusted sound.

Eddie returned the kiss, then regarded the Group, recovering from the effects of the stun grenade. ‘So these are the rulers of the world? A bunch of old farts in suits? Pretty disappointing – I was hoping for at least one supervillain in a cape.’ He turned to Larry, who was also emerging from his befuddlement. ‘Dad? Dad! You all right?’

His father squinted at him in confusion. ‘Edward? What . . . what happened?’ He took in the two dead men. ‘Jesus Christ!’

‘It’s okay,’ Nina assured him. ‘We’re getting out of here. You’re safe.’

‘What about this lot?’ Eddie asked of the Group. ‘We’ve just pissed off the world’s most powerful people. That might cause one or two problems down the line.’

‘We’ll have to worry about that later. The main thing is that we’ve got Larry, and the statues.’

He gave the three figurines on the floor nearby a disapproving look. ‘In that case, we should smash the fucking things to bits right now.’ He raised his gun to shoot them – only to halt as one of the commandos took out a cell phone. ‘Hey! Who are you calling?’

‘Mr Glas,’ came the reply, as if it were self-evident. ‘Sir? Yes, it’s Vinther. We are successful. We have the statues, and we have the Group.’ He listened to the response. ‘Yes, sir. The hotel will be secured for your arrival.’ He disconnected.

‘What?’ Eddie demanded, the statues forgotten as he went to face Vinther. ‘Glas is here in Switzerland?’

‘Yes, he entered the country in secret. He is about to come up in the cable car.’

‘And why the fuck wasn’t I told about this?’

‘Mr Glas decided that you didn’t need to know.’

‘Oh, he did?’ said Eddie, bristling, but Vinther was already issuing instructions to the other men. Several left the room, spreading out into the hotel to mop up any of Stikes’s remaining mercenaries. ‘Well, that’s fucking nice.’

Nina joined him. ‘Look, I know it’s kind of an asshole move on Glas’s part, but it doesn’t matter. We did what we came here to do.’

‘I suppose,’ he rumbled, before jerking a dismissive thumb at Stikes. ‘Keep an eye on that twat,’ he told one of the remaining commandos.

Stikes stared at the couple, behind the blood his expression angry . . . but also coldly calculating.

In the kitchen, Amsel snapped up his MP7 as the main doors opened, but relaxed when he saw it was one of his comrades entering. ‘What’s the situation?’ he asked.

‘Everything’s under control,’ his companion reported. ‘We’ve captured the Group, and the others are making sure there are no more guards in the hotel. Mr Glas is on his way up.’ He glanced at the storeroom door, through which the waiter was still glaring. ‘Any trouble from them?’

Amsel shook his head. ‘How long before Mr Glas gets here?’

‘A few minutes.’

‘Good. Don’t leave me behind when you go, okay?’

The other man grinned. ‘We’ll come and get you. See you soon.’ He turned and exited.

Amsel looked back at the storeroom. The waiter’s fixed look of stony anger was becoming unsettling, but as looks couldn’t kill he ignored it, turning away to maintain his watch on the kitchen’s other entrances.

Inside the cramped room, the waiter slowly brought one muscular arm round behind his back, raising the tails of his jacket to find something the commandos’ cursory search had missed, pushed into his waistband.

A gun.

His hand closed on the grip, but he didn’t draw it. Instead he stood statue-still amidst the frightened hotel staff, waiting for the right moment . . .