Viper Nine Read online

  Alvarez walked across the bridge with a pair of armed officers. Montero sent a two-man delegation to meet them halfway. One Rios recognised as the cartel leader’s close confidante, Miguel Hernandez, a twig-like man in a pink shirt, his hair getting thinner by the day.

  Montero’s men held a brief conversation with Alvarez. They appeared calm, but the police chief mad as hell. He threw his arms in the direction of the convoy and jabbed a finger in the face of Hernandez.

  Montero’s number two was as cool as a frozen Margarita After a few words from Hernandez, Alvarez looked ahead towards the cartel boss.

  Montero remained unmoved, hands in pockets and trouser legs ruffling in a hill breeze. That crooked dog Alvarez shook his head, turned and signalled to his officers guarding the convoy.

  A nearby SWAT member grabbed Rios by the arms and yanked her off her ass. He nudged her in the spine with his assault rifle, over the lip of the pickup trailer. As her boots hit the ground, she fell face-first in the dirt.

  Spitting out a taste of mud, she struggled to her feet with her hands cuffed behind her back. Pope landed hard behind her, but his trunk-like legs took the impact.

  The pair of them stood shoulder to shoulder as their cuffs were removed. With her hands free, Rios found herself shoved forward away from the convoy, alongside the Australian.

  ‘Is anyone else here confused?’ Pope asked her, as they walked with rifles in their backs.

  ‘Just carry on walking,’ Rios replied as they crossed the bridge. ‘And this time definitely keep your mouth shut.’

  As Alvarez returned the other way from his meeting with Hernandez, he had the look of a man who’d won the lottery and lost the ticket.

  Behind those sunglasses, Rios knew his eyes were on fire. She offered him a smirk. ‘Watch your back, amigo,’ she said, putting two fingers to her temple and pulling the trigger.

  Alvarez passed by without comment, seething all the way to his convoy.’

  ‘What happened to keeping our mouths shut?’ Pope asked.

  Rios didn’t care to answer. Her threat was empty, but if it caused Alvarez a few sleepless nights, it was worth it.

  Feeling her heartbeat return to a steady pace, she and Pope reached the other side of the bridge, where Montero waited.

  Rios turned to see the police convoy backing up and turning around. One by one, they took off into the distance and towards the city.

  She turned to Montero. ‘Why the change of mind? It would have been easier with me out of the way.’

  The Juárez kingpin removed his sunglasses. ‘Is that what you think of me?’ He put a warm, rough hand to Rios’ cheek. She flinched at the gesture. Who was he to touch her?

  Yet Montero kept his hand where it was, and her resistance faded.

  The cartel leader looked around at the roadblock, the Range Rover and the armed men, waiting on his next command. ‘What use is all this if I can’t protect one of my own?’

  Rios didn’t know how to respond. This closeness, it was alien. She felt more comfortable at a distance. Preferably a thousand yards, behind the crosshairs of a rifle. She focused on the mission still at hand, rather than her own unease.

  ‘Seeing as you’re feeling charitable,’ Rios said. ‘We could do with a set of wheels and a jet.’

  Montero withdrew his hand and flapped his arms. ‘You don’t ask much.’

  The Latina swallowed her pride and put on her best puppy-dog eyes. She looked up at a man renowned for his vicious, ruthless regime. ‘Please, Papa,’ she asked softly.

  Montero wobbled and broke. ‘Fine,’ he snorted. ‘But after this, we’re even.’

  Rios couldn’t stop the girly smile escaping her lips.

  The cartel boss turned to one of his men. ‘Call the pilot. Take them wherever they want to go.’

  Rios lingered, an unspoken truce between she and the man she was supposed to hate.

  ‘Get out of here,’ he grunted, waving her away.

  Rios beckoned Pope on behind one of Montero’s foot soldiers, as far as the Chevy SUV.

  ‘Papa?’ Pope whispered in her ear.

  ‘Ask me another time,’ Rios replied. ‘The mission’s not over.’

  * * *

  The Gulfstream jet was ready by the time the SUV swept into the private airfield a mere three miles from Montero’s estate. His men had phoned ahead with instructions for the pilot and left Rios and Pope standing on the tarmac as they sped away to attend to other business.

  ‘Not bad,’ Pope said, drinking in the view of the idling jet, at least twice the size of the UN-owned Lear they’d flown in on.

  ‘Come on,’ Rios said, leading the way across the tarmac.

  ‘Not that I see why we need another plane,’ Pope continued, climbing the stairs behind her. ‘What was wrong with the one we’ve got?’

  Rios led the Australian into the cabin. It was another world. Fully loaded with a cinema screen, luxury white leather seats, polished oak furnishings and gold trimmings. Not to mention a deep-pile cream carpet underfoot.

  ‘This is why,’ Rios said, motioning to a fully-stocked bar, black-tiled bathroom with walk-in shower and a private room with a king size bed.

  If Pope’s jaw had dropped any lower, it would have been through the fuselage. ‘You little ripper.’

  Rios had no idea what he meant, but it seemed positive.

  As the plane climbed skyward, the Australian cracked the tops of a pair of chilled beers with his teeth.

  He handed one to Rios and flopped into the chair facing her, swinging left to right. Taking a large swig of beer, she closed her eyes and let go of all the shit from their holiday from hell in Juárez.

  Pope let out a small burp. ‘So you gonna tell me about Daddy Warbucks or not?’

  Rios groaned at the prospect of answering the question. Not while she was drinking her beer.

  ‘He’s your old man, right?’ Pope continued.

  ‘Only biologically,’ Rios replied. ‘It’s not like he raised me.’

  ‘Then who did?’ Pope asked.

  ‘Nuns, mostly.’

  ‘Your mum wasn’t around, then?’

  ‘My mum was one of his mistresses,’ Rios said. ‘She was also hooked on powder.’

  For once, Pope stayed quiet and let her talk. Maybe he’s wasn’t as much of an asshole as she thought. Or maybe it was because he had a beer in his hand, like a baby with a dummy.

  Either way, Rios found herself giving away more than she wanted to, telling him how Montero’s wife found out about the presence of an illegitimate child. How her mother overdosed on coke after her father ended their relationship. And the subsequent dumping of said illegitimate child on the doorstep of the Santo Niño orphanage.

  ‘The military raised me after that,’ Rios explained.

  ‘Families, eh?’ Pope said. ‘I only joined the army ’cause my old man was on the grog. Used to beat the shit out of me. And all because Mum ran off with a koala farmer.’

  Rios cracked into fits of uncontrolled laughter.

  ‘Bloke only had one arm,’ the Australian said over a slug of his bottle.

  The Mexican doubled over anew in a giggling ball.

  ‘Aw yeah, what a lark,’ Pope said, ‘It’s funny is it?’

  ‘Fucking tragic,’ Rios laughed, eyes streaming. She wiped away a tear, sighed and stared at Pope as she swigged more of her beer.

  ‘What are you gawping at?’ he asked.

  Rios felt a sudden surge of excitement downstairs. A tingling between the thighs. A restlessness that wouldn’t leave her alone.

  It had been a long time. There was time to kill on the flight, and here the two of them were.

  Besides, near-death experiences had an effect on a girl.

  Rios slammed down the beer on a side table and jumped to her feet. She snatched Pope’s bottle off him, much to his dismay, and set it down next to hers.

  Taking him by the hand, she pulled him out of his seat, along the aisle to the back of the plane.

&
nbsp; ‘What’s this about?’ Pope asked, threatening to ruin the moment.

  Rios didn’t say a word as she led him into the private bedroom and kicked the door shut behind them.

  ‘You gonna tell me what’s going on?’ Pope asked again with a dumb look on his face.

  ‘I’ve got needs,’ Rios explained. ‘And you’ve got equipment.’

  The Latina pushed him hard in the chest. He hit the bed on his back as she pulled her SWAT-issue vest off over her head. Her boots came off next, followed by her combat-style trousers.

  Finally, Pope got the drift. He wrestled frantically out of his uniform, tossing his clothes and kicking off his boots.

  The Australian lay on the bed in close-fitting white trunks.

  Rios, stripped down to a black bra and knickers, leapt on top of him. She straddled his large frame and placed her hands on his hairy, muscular pecs.

  Her vagina pulsed as it rubbed up against his hardening dick.

  Pope propped himself up on his elbows. ‘You sure you wanna—’

  ‘Pope?’ Rios said, shoving him hard and flat to the bed. ‘Shut up.’

  Chapter 42

  Saudi Arabia

  Standing in his Saudi cell, Kovac watched on as years of high-risk work and exhaustive planning crumbled to dust.

  He couldn’t understand it. He’d recruited the world’s finest hackers – those not serving prison sentences or working as state-employed White Hats. Kovac had also assembled the best private army money could buy. From true believers, to seasoned cons and experienced mercenaries, he’d blended them into an elite-level unit.

  The patience he’d shown. The sacrifices he’d made. And to have it all go up in flames? He was so close to executing his plan, he could taste it.

  Yet the taste was a bitter one. A kick in the balls coupled with the panic of further failures twisting deep in his abdomen.

  Jana confirmed the worst from a nearby workstation. ‘They’re taking over. We’ve lost control.’

  ‘Then fight back!’

  ‘We are,’ Jana said, ‘but—’

  ‘You said we were secure,’ Kovac roared, scaring the other hackers in the room. ‘You said we couldn’t be hacked.’

  ‘We can’t,’ Jana replied. ‘Even with the other cells down… Unless—’

  ‘Unless what?’ Kovac yelled, squeezing a hand into a lock-tight fist.

  ‘Unless Attack Dog has turned. It would have to be from Hong Kong. But even then, he’d have to have help, and from someone with serious skill.’

  ‘So we’re sitting ducks,’ Kovac replied, watching a live broadcast on CNN.

  There were breaking rumours of militaries and intelligence agencies free to move and communicate.

  They were more than rumours. Jana had already informed him of the fall of the Mexico cell. And now he’d been betrayed by Hong Kong.

  He should have known he couldn’t trust them. You could only trust your own. Yet what choice had the Serb had but to deal with the triads? They had the only man capable of disabling the likes of the CIA and other major players in global intelligence and defence.

  Jana ran a hand over her face, a sheen of sweat on the temple and her face flush with angst. ‘It’s too late,’ she said, accepting defeat far too easily. ‘We need to burn everything. Clear out while we still can.’

  ‘No one’s burning anything,’ Kovac snapped. ‘And we’re not going anywhere.’

  ‘But it’s a losing game,’ Jana insisted, rising from her chair. ‘They’re in our systems. There’s nothing we can do.’

  ‘Nothing?’ Kovac said, drawing his sidearm from his holster. He put it to her forehead for everyone to see.

  His young assistant was quick to backtrack. ‘Maybe we can figure something out.’

  The woman eased back into her chair and returned to her laptop.

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ Kovac said, as a quiet focus restored itself to the room.

  Kovac stepped away from the work floor and paced around the back of the room, rediscovering his inner-steel.

  So the ruling elite thought they were back in control? Kovac was far from done, and they had no idea what was to come.

  Okay, so the ransom payment hadn’t come through. He no longer had a firm grip on the lion’s tail. But the lion would still be slain. And sooner than his enemies thought.

  Chapter 43

  Ardennes, Belgium

  And then there was light. An overhead light and a white ceiling with a small, square ventilation grill. The last thing Baptiste remembered was the steering wheel of the SUV spinning out of his grip as he sped across the suspension bridge.

  Now he lay in a hospital bed, tucked rigid under a sheet and pale-blue blanket. The Russian scanned the room, left to right. Pastel-pink walls. An empty chair with a discarded newspaper left on the seat, the headlines in French.

  The room was private with a closed door and a nurse passing by on the other side of a window covered with an open Venetian blind.

  On the other side of the glass, Baptiste noticed the head and shoulders of a police officer. He sat guard with his back to the room in the hospital corridor, and could only be there for him.

  The uniform belonged to the Belgian Gendarmerie. He also became aware of the steady bleep of a heart monitor attached to an index finger.

  Baptiste found a saline drip plugged into the back of his right hand. The left hand and wrist lay by his side, handcuffed to the bed rail.

  As he regained his full senses, he ran some basic exercises in his head, testing his mental faculties, including his short and long-term memory.

  All was functioning well. But what about his body? Baptiste flexed his hands and moved his arms, pulling against the bed rail with the cuff. Levering himself off the pillow with his free hand, his head felt like a lead weight with a dull, heavy pain in the crown of his skull.

  The Russian’s body was a lump, with everything on fire. A lightning strike of pain surged up his right side as he forced himself upright, eschewing the assistance of the bed remote.

  Why did they have to tuck it in so tight? Baptiste struggled to loosen the sheet. After persisting a moment, he tugged it free and threw the blanket aside.

  The Russian lifted the sheet and saw a catheter bag between his legs. He could feel the tube inserted up his urethra. That was a good sign. And an even better sign, his legs moved. First, the right, then the left. He bent both at the knee under the bed sheets and wiggled all ten of his toes.

  Baptiste turned his neck left and right, rolled out his shoulders and flexed his jaw. He whispered his own name and felt his trunk. All the organs present and correct, with no signs of surgical intervention other than a bandage on his ribs under his hospital gown.

  Movement outside the window caught his attention, his instincts still sharp. Baptiste flattened his legs, tucked the sheet back in, threw the blanket back over and slid down in bed. He made a last few adjustments to the bed spread, and as the nurse opened the door, he closed his eyes and lay still.

  Hearing the ECG machine blip, he realised it was pacing too fast. Baptiste employed a slow breathing technique he learned while training at The Institute, his old spy school in Moscow. It made for a colder, calculating agent, whether under stress or during the crucial moments of an assassination.

  He heard the beep from the ECG slow down and the nurse shuffle around the room. She seemed to be engaging him in a one-way conversation, telling Baptiste all about the latest on the cyberattacks. Many of them had been undone by government cybersecurity teams, according to the reports. Baptiste doubted it. And took it as another good sign, that Wildcard remained operational.

  ‘At least that’s some good news, no?’ the nurse asked in a sweet French accent.

  Oh, how Baptiste missed Paris – the music of the language, the smell of the cigarettes, the taste of a good wine and the superior table manners.

  At least Belgium was close, he thought, opening an eye a slit as the nurse’s footsteps moved away from him towards the
window.

  He sized her up as she turned her back, noticing details big and small. She was of average appearance in a blue trouser uniform, with sandy hair fixed to her head with more pins than it needed.

  ‘How about we let some fresh air in?’ the nurse continued, as if expecting a response.

  Levering open the window a few inches, she turned and crossed the floor. Baptiste closed his eye and tuned into his other senses of hearing, smell and energetic feel.

  The nurse tutted. ‘Whoever worked the last shift didn’t doesn’t know how to make a bed.’

  Baptiste felt the sheet pinned tighter over him. He cracked his right eye open and saw the nurse bending over the bed, tucking the sheet under the edge of the mattress. In a heartbeat, he snatched a pin from the woman’s hair.

  Baptiste returned his hand flat to the bed, the pin concealed under his palm. The nurse put a hand to her hair in confusion, as if she’d felt something.

  As she turned to look at the Russian, he closed his right eye. But he sensed her attention on him.

  ‘No, it’s impossible,’ the nurse whispered to herself. ‘I’m imagining things.’

  After she finished arranging the bed, the nurse bid Baptiste goodbye and told him she’d be back to check on him later.

  ‘Don’t you get up to any mischief,’ she chirped, closing the door on her way out.

  Certain the nurse was gone, he opened his eyes and then his right hand, taking hold of the hairpin.

  The Russian straightened it with fingers and teeth and inserted one end into the lock on the set of cuffs.

  As cuff fell open, he pulled his left hand free from the bed, keeping a close watch on the guard through the window.

  Baptiste lifted the sheets and ruined all the good work of the nurse.

  With the male police officer nodding off, he removed the drip from the plastic clamp inserted into the back of his hand. But he kept the ECG clamp attached to his finger.