Dracarys.
If Mark hadn’t been so shit-scared of dragging Harper into battle, he’d have smiled. Dracarys. The warrior cry of Daenerys Targaryen atop her dragon. A golden-haired beauty riding straight into danger to destroy her enemies, shouting “Dracarys!”
Except of course, Daenerys had her dragons and Harper only had him. He’d protect her as fiercely as he knew how, but no one knew better than he did that shit happened. No matter how well prepared a soldier is, how much he trains, how well equipped, how well planned the attack, shit happens. He’d seen it with his own eyes. Stu Carrier blown up six hours before the helicopter that would take him back into the world was supposed to lift off. Sam Lawrence, agile as a mountain goat, putting a foot wrong, a cascade of rocks giving away his position and an enemy bullet finding his head. In the field, bad weather, bad juju, bad luck happened all the time.
And this wasn’t a planned mission at all. He was operating solo, on the basis of a half-assed plan organized by a man he’d never met, and oh yeah, there was probably a mole operating in the ranks of the police.
Mark had no intel on how many terrorists were in the Gallery or posted throughout the wing. None. No one did. He was flying blind and oh shit, he was flying with Harper.
Taking her along went against every protective instinct he had. Though she was smart and agile and guaranteed to keep her cool, he didn’t want her with him, he wanted her somewhere far away, safe and sound. A place where he could go to her when it was all over.
Yeah. If he could, he’d beam her straight to the Ritz where she could stay in his suite until he killed the bad guys and saved the hostages. If he could. And if he failed, well…everyone has to die sometime.
Except Harper. This was not her time to go. God, no.
But the thing was—she wasn’t far away. She was here. And the choice was between being with him and facing danger or staying behind, but without him to protect her.
Crazy as it was, he’d rather she were by his side than alone. He’d tried to dissuade her but she felt just like he did.
He kissed her, sternly pushing away the thought that it might be the last time. No. No way. When this was over, they’d hole up in his suite, order food in, and stay in bed for three days. And he’d take care of his business, she’d do what she came to do, then they’d fly home together and they’d stay together.
They were going to have a lot of time. Forever, in fact.
But right now—showtime.
Mark reached down and slid out the slim ceramic knife from his boot seam. It wasn’t a Ka-Bar, but it was razor sharp and easy to handle.
Harper froze, having forgotten that he’d told her he had a knife in his boot. Knowing it and seeing it were two different things. Would it freak her out? She looked at him narrow-eyed and gave a thumbs-up.
Fuck yeah. He liked that she was ferocious under that cool, classy exterior. She was going to need all the courage she could find, his Khaleesi. They were going blind into danger.
“Ready?” His voice the merest breath of sound.
“Ready,” she said in a tone that couldn’t be heard a foot away.
At least part of the way they could walk between the walls, out of sight. Mark tucked her behind him and started walking north. He knew she was staying behind him because he could feel the slight tug on the back of his jacket.
They headed out, following the light of the flashlight, walking between the walls around one room, two, three.
At the fourth room, Mark halted, held up his clenched fist. Harper immediately stopped behind him. They were at the beginning of the Gallery. The drop was across the intersection and down another corridor. They’d have to leave the protection of the walls, but first he had to see what was out there.
Mark dropped to one knee, pulling out his cellphone. Harper removed his backpack and took out the drill and cable connection. He nodded and applied the head of the drill to the wall.
It did its magic, except once the drill bit broke through, it was too dark to see much. But there was an app for that, and he thanked his lucky stars he’d hired his tech genius, Ralph. He tapped an icon on the screen and the view switched to night vision, a light, watery green.
Out in the wide corridor was a faint light. The terrorists had strung a few lights like Christmas lights operated by generators along the outside wall. It looked almost festive but it was anything but. Enough faint light penetrated the side rooms and augmented by night vision, it was enough to see by.
Harper’s eyes widened and she held her thumb up again, never taking her eyes from the screen. And she was the one who saw the patrolling terrorist. She tapped the screen, and at first he couldn’t figure out what she wanted to say, but then saw the man dressed in black with an AK-47. His face was covered by a thick black beard that reached from just under his eyes to below his neck. He had small eyes and a jutting nose that had been broken at least once.
Beard or no beard, Mark wasn’t going to forget that face.
They both watched the terrorist walk back and forth along the intersection. Mark counted paces, trying to figure out the fucker’s guard rotation, when Harper tapped the back of his hand. She signaled moving the camera’s view lower, to cover the floor. Mark rotated the camera and saw what she’d managed to see. Two huddled bodies on the floor in that boneless sprawl of death.
Bushy Beard was walking back from his patrol and kicked one of the bodies out of his way. The body lifted then flopped over. A young boy.
Mark stilled, white noise replacing strategic planning in his head. His muscles tensed and it felt like his skin would explode—
Harper clutched his arm and shook her head. No.
No, of course not. What was he thinking? Taking revenge for a boy who was already dead was crazy. Mark wasn’t crazy.
But he looked carefully at Bushy Beard’s face in the glowing green light that made the world look like it was underwater. Because that was a dead man walking.
Bushy Beard continued walking down the corridor toward the Gallery and disappeared from view. Mark timed it. Ten minutes went by before he walked back. A ten-minute patrol. Doable.
How many other guards were posted in this wing? Most of them would be in the Mona Lisa room, with the hostages. The rest were spread out through the building as insurance against a sudden storm of French SWAT. The bulk of them would be at the entrance.
The terrorists had hostages as deterrents, not to mention some of them would have remote detonators for the explosives, too. Though he doubted detonators had been handed to everyone. You don’t give the power of massive destruction to foot soldiers. Mark had to operate on the assumption that the detonators would be held by the leader and maybe two or three others in the Mona Lisa room.
But there was no guarantee. They had to be really careful not to set off a massacre and destruction of one of humanity’s greatest treasures.
No pressure.
Bushy Beard took off for another patrol, and Mark grabbed his satphone and drill and soundlessly opened the door. They slid out and he closed the door just as quietly. Bushy Beard didn’t have night vision. They kept to the darkest shadows as they made their way down to the great intersection which was very dimly lit.
Thank God he’d asked for night-vision goggles with the other equipment. He’d be able to see better on the way back.
Mark had thought about asking for two sets of night-vision goggles, one for him and one for Harper. But what you saw in night vision was pale green and foreshortened. There was no depth perception, and it took time and training to move while wearing the goggles. He’d decided it was better for just him to have night vision and for Harper to stick close to him.
He observed the intersection for a moment, but no other patrolling terrorists came. The wing they’d invaded was a huge space and they had no reason to cover every square inch of it.
He looked back at Harper and pointed forward with his index finger. She nodded.
Good girl. Mark’s chest swelled with pride. She looked frightened but determined, a good partner in every sense. As they moved forward in the shadows, they passed a room that had a barrier across the entrance and a huge painted canvas tarp attached to the perimeter of the entrance.
Breaking through would have cost time and could have attracted attention.
Harper tapped his shoulder, cocked a thumb at the barrier. The room they were supposed to go through. Mark nodded. They would head to the drop point through another room. But thanks to Harper’s knowledge, they weren’t going to waste time.
As they rounded another corner, there was a strong whiff of ammonia. Urine. He froze, pushed Harper back.
A terrorist had just finished pissing in a corner of one of the big rooms—a corner they’d all been using, considering the strong stench of urine—and was closing his pants. He and Harper were exposed. They couldn’t get to any cover in the time it would take this guy to close his pants and look around. There was only one thing to do. The terrorist saw Mark rushing him, opened his mouth to shout, fumbling for the weapon hanging on a three-point sling around his neck.
But he didn’t stand a chance. Not a fucking chance. He could have had a freaking nuclear weapon and it wouldn’t have made any difference.
Mark closed the distance between them in less than a heartbeat, leading with the knife, punching it into the fucker’s chest with one hand while holding his mouth shut with the other. He’d have gone for the throat—one fast, deep slice of the carotid artery—but they couldn’t leave a blood trail.
Instead, he punched his knife right between the fourth and fifth rib and twisted, tearing the heart muscle. He moved his left hand to clasp the back of the terrorist’s neck and pulled him close, so close he could hear the death rattle and see the light fade from the fucker’s eyes.
The terrorist collapsed, held up only by Mark’s hand around the back of his neck and his hold on the knife’s haft. Mark pulled the knife out and eased the dead man down. He couldn’t see blood against the dark clothes but he could smell it.
“Pull my lock pick set out of my backpack,” he said to Harper, and a second later it was in his hand. “Watch my back.”
She turned and kept watch, head slowly swiveling back and forth. Mark opened the door into the wall, lifting the dead terrorist inside. He took a radio receiver from the terrorist’s pants pockets and hefted the AK-47, stripping four magazines from waist pouches.
Man, it felt good to have firepower again.
He stepped out from the space between the walls and touched Harper’s back. I’m here. She nodded without turning around. “No one has come by,” she said, her voice so low it was almost soundless.
Good. Mark directed her to the entrance of the great room. They flattened their backs against the inside wall. Mark peeked around it into the corridor, not breathing, listening carefully.
All clear. They headed out carefully. His boots were designed specifically with soles that gripped but made no noise. Her shoes, too, were noiseless. She kept pace with him perfectly, step by step. Good girl, he thought again, wanting to kiss her.
No. Fuck no.
Very dangerous and very stupid to think of kissing a woman on a mission. Should never happen. But he’d never been emotionally involved on a mission before. Rightly so, because it was the pits.
It sucked. Rocks.
Half of him was terrified that something would happen to Harper. The other half was coolly determined to keep her safe. But the half that was terrified was dangerous. Not being sharp was the best way to get her hurt.
Never again. Never, ever again. If they got out of this alive, they’d go on vacation to Disneyworld and small, safe towns and never go anywhere dangerous. Though in this world, that was hard.
The big corridor was very dark, not having been strung with the Christmas lights of the Gallery. It was past midnight and through the big windows he could see the internal courtyard and the black hole where the Pyramid had once stood. Shards of glass gleamed in the moonlight, something of great beauty reduced to ruins.
Behind the black hole where the Pyramid had been was a seething mass of black bodies, police officers waiting for orders. In the distance, Mark could clearly see the light sources of cellphone screens, far away from the jamming device.
They were massing, awaiting instructions. Knowing that a hostage situation could potentially last days.
And in their midst were traitors. A mole or moles ready to pass on information about countermeasures, maybe planning to get the terrorists away, certainly willing to kill the hostages and blow up the Louvre.
While the police were out there, awaiting orders, Robert’s Special Forces men were climbing the steep rooftop to drop supplies. They would enter through a remote part of the museum and muster out of sight with suppressed weapons, waiting for the signal from Mark that the hostages and terrorists were unconscious.
Then they could quietly eliminate the patrolling guards and make it to the hostages in the Mona Lisa room. Mark knew that though they’d have a lot of firepower and explosives, they would work hard to avoid damage to the Louvre and its works of art. They were French and the Louvre was sacred.
The mop-up of the patrol guards would have to be done quietly, one by one. No one knew who had the detonators, though Mark was certain that only the leader and two or three others had one.
That wasn’t Mark’s problem and it wasn’t his mission. His mission was to put down the terrorists and hostages in the Mona Lisa room and to keep Harper safe.
They were at another intersection—a huge open space with no cover at all if a patrol came by. They’d be gunned down.
He lingered at the corner, indecisive. If it were just him, he’d make it across just as fast as he could and if he were discovered, he was now armed and he’d go down hard.
But he had Harper with him, who wasn’t armed in any way and who would be caught in the crossfire. He looked as carefully as he could in each direction, knowing full well that the longer he waited, the greater the chance that a terrorist guard would come by on his rounds.
Goddamn. An image of a broken and bleeding Harper was keeping him frozen.
Shit!
He felt an urgent tap on his shoulder and turned half around to see an exasperated face and Harper rolling her index finger forward. That wasn’t in the military manual of combat gestures but it was very clear.
Get going!
Stay with me, he mouthed and she nodded. One last long look in every direction and he took off. Harper followed right in his footsteps, completely silently, and they reached the other side of the intersection just as the sound of two pairs of boots came from the west corridor.
Two men, striding together in unison. Trained and alert. They marched as if on parade grounds. New recruits, true believers. Mark pulled Harper deeper into the shadows, retreating to the back of the nearest big room.
Mark hated doing it but he rushed them to the corner, where they stood with their backs against the wall. It was the darkest place in the dark room. Being backed into a corner was not good, physically or metaphorically, but there was no choice.
He could faintly discern the two terrorists standing at the opening ten feet apart, backs to the room, as still as statues.
God. Were their orders to stay there for the rest of the night? If that were so, Mark would have no choice but to rush them. He could take them down, no question, but he didn’t know if he could do it completely silently. If they’d stuck together, he could have. But if they were going to stay apart, he was in trouble.
He could mow them down, but that would attract all the guards in the galleries and would be heard in the Mona Lisa room. The terrorists would start shooting and maybe press the detonator.
It was possible that they’d rigged the explosives in sections, able to blow up one part, leaving the room with the hostages intact, only even more difficult to reach.
Anything was possible.
Mark and Harper stood, breathing shallowly, backs against the wall, and waited. Mark glanced at his watch with the non-reflective surface once. He wouldn’t do it again. Ten past midnight. He set off the stopwatch in his head and waited ten minutes, twenty.
The drop was going to be made at 1 a.m. He could even be late to it, but they’d expect some kind of signal that he’d picked up the load. Right now, he couldn’t signal anyone or anything. If the two guards decided to spend the night there, they were fucked.
With the first morning light, he and Harper would be visible. Before that happened, he’d simply have to attack and kill them both, even if it brought the other guards running.
It would likely trigger a massacre of some of the hostages, lead the terrorists to blow up at least part of the Louvre.
This room had no internal walls, either. No hiding behind walls. No doors, nothing. Just a big empty space full of priceless paintings, with them in it.
Harper was completely still, her hand clenched on his left forearm. There was a loud squelch from a radio. She didn’t jump but her hand tightened on his arm.
There was no reason for the terrorists to be quiet. The one on the right lifted his arm, presumably to press the ‘talk’ button on his chest rig.
“Ma alkhata?” he said, in Arabic. What is it?
This wasn’t an encrypted comms set; the radio transmitted in the clear. “Any news? Anything out of the ordinary?”
“No. All clear.”
Look behind you, buddy, Mark thought. Not so clear after all.
But neither of the men looked around.
Mark memorized the words, the intonation of the guard, certain that he could replicate it if he had to. He was a good mimic.
Harper’s grip on his arm loosened.
So. Twenty minutes had gone by, meaning check-in by the terrorists patrolling the empty Louvre was not less than every twenty minutes. More likely, every half hour.
Mark stood absolutely still, but drops of sweat formed along his hairline, a drop trickling down his spine. He’d been a sniper and knew how to wait, but waiting here with Harper, knowing that if the guards turned around they couldn’t outrun bullets, was the worst wait of his life. He could only imagine what she was going through, though she was utterly still by his side and didn’t make a sound.
It felt like hours were going by.
Get out, he mentally commanded the guards. Go patrol somewhere else.
As if they’d heard him, they set off to the right.
He and Harper waited until the sounds of the guards’ boots faded, and then quickly and quietly made their way to the entrance of the big room.
Though she made no sound, Mark felt Harper stiffen beside him. Her cheeks gleamed silver. Tears.
There were ten dead bodies in the corridor, each surrounded by a green lake of blood in his night vision. He’d seen them rushing in but she probably hadn’t in the darkness. Three bodies were together, holding each other, a man, a woman and a child. And a man sprawled on top of a woman, trying to protect her even in his last moment of life. The rest had died alone, people who’d only wanted to see beautiful works of art, at the wrong time in the wrong place.
Mark had seen a lot of dead bodies in his life, and many civilian casualties, though there was something particularly affecting in these people, dead in a place that celebrated the best humanity had to offer, victims of the worst humanity had to offer.
The sight was probably devastating to Harper, so he was prepared to give her a second or two. But she surprised him by keeping pace without faltering once, though tears poured down her face.
Good girl, he thought for the millionth time. She was tougher than she looked.
They quietly made their way toward their goal. Robert’s team would be making the drop and would have started staging for a counterattack, awaiting Mark’s signal.
Finally, they made it to the huge room in the Richelieu Wing. On the west wall was an ornate fireplace with enormous wrought iron andirons. The room was a sort of a diorama of a 15th-century bedroom, with a surprisingly small canopied bed, a chest at the foot of the bed, and two tiny embroidered armchairs.
Mark went immediately to the empty fireplace. Robert’s men knew the exact depth of the flue from the chimney pot and the length of rope was calibrated to stop right above the hearth. Nothing showed. No one would suspect that there was something there.
Moving fast, Mark pulled out his knife, reached up into the chimney and felt the big package. He yanked the rope and the package dropped a foot, allowing him to easily cut the rope. He caught the package and pulled it out. It smelled of rubber and soot.
There was no time to carefully unwrap. He slashed the dirty canvas packaging and pulled out the items they’d need, Harper by his side. He handed things to her, which she placed on the floor. First, two canisters that he handled very carefully. She picked up on what they were and handled them just as carefully as she placed them on the floor.
Their eyes met, hers full of determination. A close dose of what was in that canister would be instantly lethal, and she knew that, but she looked unafraid.
Jesus, what a woman. This was as far from her world as it was possible to get but she was proving to be as brave and resourceful as any of his teammates back in the day.
The pump that would soundlessly propel the knockout gas into the room. Weapon—ah. He slung the terrorist’s AK-47 to his back and lovingly held the MP5 in his hands. Six magazines in the holders of a combat vest that would go over body armor. Plus, the Glock 19 with four magazines and a thigh holster. Both had fitted suppressors.
Two sets of gloves, just as he’d asked. One a pair of shooting gloves, and a pair of latex gloves for Harper.
Four flashbangs. They emitted overwhelming noise and light but did not explode. If this had been anywhere else, a couple of grenades would have been included. Robert hadn’t even mentioned grenades.
Two gas masks. Mark checked them over very carefully. Any hole, even a pinprick, could prove fatal. But they looked brand new. He brought them both to his nose and they smelled new. If there was anything wrong with them and they died, Mark would come back to haunt Robert. Make his life miserable to the end of his days.
Body armor for Harper. That went on her immediately.
“Arms up,” he whispered and her arms went up. He slid the two plates connected by shoulder straps over her head, then carefully tied the Velcro straps at the sides, making sure it covered her entire torso. It was big, so it did. It covered her from shoulders to below the pelvic area. She was protected from major injury.
Unless, of course, a shot caught her carotid or femoral arteries. Or both.
Or her head.
Fuck.
Mark bent and held her tightly, the body armor like a carapace around her heart. He was glad it was there but he couldn’t feel her. Her warmth, her heartbeat. His head dropped to her shoulder.
She patted him on the back, as if to reassure him, calm him down.
Harper turned her head until her lips were right against his ear. “I’ll be okay.”
He nodded, hoping that was true.
“You’ll make sure of it.”
He nodded again, knowing that was true. By God, he’d do his best to keep her safe.
The satphone buzzed silently. He’d blacked out the screen. Robert, checking on him to see if he’d received the drop.
He had to let go of Harper, see to the next part of the mission.
His arms wouldn’t obey him, he couldn’t seem to let her go. Finally, it was Harper who stepped back. “Answer that,” she whispered in his ear.
Yes. Mark wiped sweat from his brow and tapped the earbud.
“Did you receive the package?” Robert asked. Mark tapped his earbud twice.
“We’re still staging, but we’ll be ready by 3 a.m. Okay?”
He tapped twice.
“Good. Bonne chance, mon ami.”
Mark turned to find, to his surprise, Harper had picked up the rest of the equipment, wrapping it in the tarp he’d sliced open, carrying that over her shoulder.
He tried to take it from her but she shook her head and stepped back. “You have to keep your hands free,” she whispered.
Mark’s heart gave a sudden extra beat. He nodded and twirled his index finger.
Heading out.